Morning poked its head around the mountains and wondered what I was doing up. I was wondering too. The others began to stir as well, once the light hit the tree hollow. I also may have, out of boredom, rolled Pride onto the edge of the hollow. He rolled and fell off the edge but his wings instinctively caught him. It was less funny when he woke up and began screaming. I thought it was because he didn’t know where he was. Instead he was screaming at the pile of animal corpses in the tree line. Looks like I didn’t need to see them for my eyes to have effect. They just had to see me. That woke up everyone else. They were mostly like insects but kinda furry like rats. There was also a vine-like worm with far too many teeth for me to be comfortable. It was like an alley filled with knives. It had more blades than a thief's armory. It was sad to think that they were probably just attracted to the fire’s light.

Wrath began feeding parts to the slightly furrier Lizeer. I tried dislodging some teeth from the worm. I got three of the biggest ones into my hands. They were jagged on the back. I looked at the worm's weird leaf-like appendages then knocked Pride to the floor as one worm dropped down to where his head would have been. The trees were filled with the guillotine-like worms as they dropped to try and decapitate the rest. Wrath saw one go after her pets and raged, smashing its head. She then proceeded to shake the tree nearest to her to have three or four fall and writhe on the ground. The rest of us ended up right next to the giant tree. What kind of purpose would those worms serve? Why would the sorcerers create those? I didn’t want to know anymore. Once Wrath finished murdering the guillotine worms, we reconvened. For Mme personally, I was all for burning down the whole forest and going back to the long road around. I was told that it was irresponsible and a “huge signal to any one saying 'hey we are here.'” Pride seemed quite flustered. He wasn’t at my level of being attacked randomly. Envy laid out the plan.

“Alright, no more going into the forest. We climb this valley wall and follow it to the village. It should be only a couple more hours. Pride stay here with us, Death will carry you.”

I was going to protest but realized I wasn’t going to get a choice anyways. So we scaled the valley's side, finding a trail that was hopefully made by goats and not something with teeth. I was quite done with the forest of nightmares. At least I got to check out the remains of the creatures. The guillotine worms had those barbs on the back of their teeth to help keep prey in their mouths. The appendages were to help conceal its shape, I’d guess. How it was made I did not know. Maybe they were like us, monsters of man. We had progressed a long way when we all heard the noise. A child's cry was coming from a cave in the wall. Nope. Nope. Not happening. That is a creature or a trap or something. Pride was about to say something from his perch but I shushed him with a hand. Never going to happen. So we kept on walking. Stupid forest. We then found out where the smoke Pride had seen was from. The village was gone. Smoking remains was all that lasted. The charred corpse of a villager lay on its face on the trail. The village’s walls were blasted away leaving a great hole. I went first through into the village. The place where the wall had been blown open appeared to be the remains of a hovel. Through that was the town square with five or six buildings in various states of ruin. Corpses were abundant and partially eaten. Arrows sprouted like weeds from the corpse near the gate. A watchtower lay toppled into the square. Whatever life once persisted in the village was gone. Envy stopped at the small skull of a corpse. It may have been a child at one point. Sadness seemed to fill his movements. Then suddenly, he began barking orders.

“Let's search for supplies and get the hell out of here. There is a good chance there are creatures from the forest here to eat the corpses.”

My bruises from previous days suddenly decided to protest any movement. I felt older than I was, in the view of so much death. We split up and searched the more intact buildings. Envy followed me into the largest of the buildings. Pride flew into a hay filled wreckage across the square. Envy began muttering to himself.

“I doubt there is anything of value in the other houses, but the town hall might have some gold that the soldiers missed. Why would the mayor take sides so fast?”

I must have appeared to be confused because he elaborated.

“The only reason we escaped is because the prince’s faction in the holdfast attacked the king's faction. There is a civil war going on right now. This town must have declared allegiance too early to one side or the other and you saw what happened. There probably isn’t anything left to even scavenge.”

I definitely felt frustrated. No one left alive seems kinda precise for a rampaging army. If they were trying to get to the holdfast or trying to kill the opposition they wouldn’t have had enough time to kill all the villagers. They would have seen the army coming from the watchtower and fled into the forest or the caves. Envy seemed to read my thoughts.

“They didn’t kill all of them. The building we are going to is the town hall. They would have hidden therehere. The soldiers doomed them another way. Once a hole was blown in the wall the creatures from the forest could get in.”

I began to see what he meant as we got closer, the corpses started to be more pieces. It got steadily worse and the smell became less charred meat and more like rotten sausage. The mangled remains of a hand didn’t help that image. The entrance of the town hall was filled with meat. To call them cadavers now was a stretch. We followed the carnage downstairs while I prayed that Luck wouldn’t, couldn’t leave a monster down there. I felt Luck smirk as it got darker and the stairs were slick with, hopefully, blood. The stairs led to a basement where the torches still burned on some of the metal holders. The smell was unbearable to the point of tears forming in my eyes. A pile of supplies and foodstuffs wereas overturned and tossed around all around the room. A copious amount of hair and blood coated the walls with a sick painting of death. The corpse of a large hairy teeth thing. Fortunately, it was not breathing. I thanked Luck for that mercy and began to try and find things that were more or less bloodless. Envy was gasping from the smell. I found some apples that were red and some coins from a pair of pants that was semi attached to a leg. A halberd was under the staircase, its tip wet with blood. I grabbed a few boxes and waved to Envy to help carry it instead of dry heaving next to the wall. I then proceeded to bolt up the stairs with the halberd. I hear Teacher’s voice echo through my head. “Never run with the spear point forwards.” A quick adjustment meant that the halberd was positioned over my shoulder. I finally breathed through my nose. Rancid air still filled my nostrils. Envy staggered out behind me breathing heavily. I left the building with my prize and Envy trailing behind.

I could spot the others in the town square. I tried not to look at them but rather, at their feet. It was an awkward shuffle. Envy jogged a bit to help lead me there. Since my death eyes now appeared to have no limit on range besides line of sight I was going to have to be more careful about not killing my companions. Following Envy’s feet I arrived at the towering chest of an angry Wrath. In the arms of said behemoth were the two lizeer that seemed furrier than before. They were also larger and snappier. I tried to avert my eyes and not attract their attention. So many things to not kill. I turned towards Pride who was babbling at Envy. His feathers had a large amount of red spattered over it. It was eerily pretty in the way that the breeze under the gallows was peaceful. It was mesmerizing. A quick examination revealed I also looked like I had died. Blood coated my overshirt and shield. A wash would be beneficial.

Envy reached over and slapped my head. “Pay attention and help me calm him down.”

“There were things in the corpses in the buildings burrowing into their bodies. It was horrible. They almost got me …”

Pride was shuddering when Lust wrapped him in a hug. He was covered in blood as well. Envy processed this information with alarming slowness. He was usually much quicker with an answer. I decided to help a little.

“We probably can’t get to the next town today, so we’ll need to find somewhere to stay as well as some new clothes, or water at least.”

Envy nodded and pointed towards a building that seemed fairly intact.

“That’st is the inn, so there should be less corpses there. It should also have a bath fed by the mountain spring.”

Turns out he was partially right. The innkeep was half eaten by the doorway. I went first into the top floor. It was deserted. The rooms all had hay beds with a legendary feature. That was a glorious pillow which had goose down. I stole as many as I could from the rooms and piled them up on a bed that I claimed. Envy came up as a scrawny child.

“I checked the kitchen for food and got these.”

I didn’t know what they were but they smelled delicious. Some kind of pastry with apple and crusts. I was pleased that other food existed besides eggs and pieces of boar. We set out by preparing things for night. Wrath took one of my pillows for her lizeer. I hadn’t noticed before, but they were scaly and starting to walk already. Their fur was coming in as well. Fascinating if they weren’t such bastards. One bit me when I tried to pet it. Next, I went down with Envy to get rope. They had some in the stable. No horses, though. Luck wouldn’t let me get too far ahead. I brought the rope to the staircase while Envy got more food from the kitchen. I proceeded to start the plan. Wrath was waiting at the top of the stairs. I wish I was not the one to start this. I flicked Wrath in the back of the head. She grew in size rapidly. Hopefully it didn’t go too far. She considered smashing me into smithereens but instead slammed her fists into the top stair crushing all of them in a pleasant crashing noise. What remained was the shattered frame of the staircase and planks. Much more defensible and had an extra benefit of getting to build a barricade with the planks. It would have been nice to have nails, or glue, or tools. When I had finally gotten a nice solid pile that would surely keep out the enemy, Envy showed up with a pile of apples and a bottle of something. My glorious fortress was destroyed as I hauled up Envy and the rope. She at least was still the little girl and not the hulking muscle man. She was heavy enough to make me regret that Wrath calmed down so quickly. It actually seemed like Lust had fixed something inside of Wrath. She was calming down way faster than usual and with way less dead things in between. Envy scrambled up to the landing and offered me an apple.

“We’ll need to set guard rotations for the staircase. I think you and I should probably be the ones to do it. I don’t think Pride is feeling great right now considering what he saw and neither Wrath or Lust are really suited to guard duty.”

Looks like I wasn't going to be allowed to enjoy my pilfered pillows. I soon was glad for that because, as it turns out, Envy thought it would be safer if we all slept in the same room. I didn't have any experience with baby animals but I could already tell that they would wake everyone up every couple of hours. I could hear their hooves clicking on the ground. I could also hear their teeth snapping together. I groaned with the agony of those who were denied baths. I decided then to take my first watch. I waited at the top with the axe and my kite shield. I quickly found that hallways share some characteristics with cells. Mostly I found that they had nigh same levels of boredom. I began piling the wood back into a form of barrier. That took a good hour. It was very efficient if an army of toddlers attacked. The inn at least had several shuttered windows that faced the town square. I looked out there for a bit. I could see shapes by the moonlight. I don’t think any graves would need to be dug. Nature performs its own cleanups. Around midnight a few creatures had tracked our smell to the inn. Aggressive buggers. One took a peek and met my gaze at the usual price. The rest didn’t wait. They rushed at me and died in a pile right where the staircase used to be. No cause for alarm. I am unbeatable with a wall at my back. Envy walked out of the room, not that she had been sleeping. She had the bottle in her hand. She was looking a bit strange though. She was a half middle aged man based on the belly, with the little girl on top. She staggered over.

“You should have called me. I’m useful in a fight. I can help with those guys.”

I wasn’t quite sure how to respond. I’m fairly certain she was wasted and quite unable to guard anything. She had probably never drunk that much before. She started crying all of a sudden. I had to restrain myself from looking to see if she was okay. Instead, I reached back and grabbed her arm gently, extracting the bottle and pulling her to lie down.

“I’m sorry. I wanted to help… I want to help people. I want to live the way others do. I want ….”

She didn’t get through the thought without slumping over asleep midway. At least she didn’t throw up. I watched as she finished shapeshifting as the middle aged man took over the upper half as well. I'm going solo I guess. I seem to be guessing at a lot of things these last few days. Like what I was going to do. Hours passed without being able to answer the question. With every passing moment, my eyelids drooped at an alarming speed. I took my knife and poked myself every time they closed more than half way. That led to the bandages on my wrist being even looser than before. I took a look which probably was a mistake. It appeared I was producing pus like never before. Either that, or it was custard.