<Alex, Real - All Dead? Is It Permanent?, 4th Floor of a Burnt Out Art Gallery>

The fourth floor was nothing if not frustrating.

There were two of the undead hammer-crests mixed among another large dose of ravagers and finally, two flesh golems.

Yay… It was a test of their coordination and teamwork, but it wasn't actually that difficult, all things considered.

They'd managed to get one hammer-crest to drop his hammer—two well aimed and timed shots from John having blown off most of its fingers—and they'd even stripped enough flesh from the 'normal' flesh golems that they looked like plague victims.

Alex had tried to learn more about 'Resistance to Magic' from them as well, but it hadn't worked. Around that fool's errand, he had fought on the ragged edge to hack away sections of flesh and ash what he'd cut free. On either side of him, Grant and Natasha worked up a sweat and began sucking wind as they held off every other threat to allow Alex to get the golems to that point.

Unfortunately, that's when a new creature made itself known.

A woman with alabaster white skin came in low, scampering on all fours—the limbs twisted in a way to allow her to move like a four-legged spider—hissing and trying to bite Grant's ankle with horribly sharpened fangs

Natasha noticed in time and thrust her spear out to intercept and hopefully block the attack. They were all trying to force the habit of using Analyze on Alex whenever they could, so it was no wonder that Natasha had it in mind for use on the new threat. "Initiate! Turned."

Alex grimaced even as he ashed another bit of flesh. "Taco Tuesday. Burst!"

Then, as Grant and Natasha took a guarded step back, Alex jumped forward and up before triggering his Force Burst, throwing their enemies back.

He had no idea why the Initiates seemed to be odd variants when turned, but he didn't much care at the moment.

Spider-lady was skittering forward, her nude-yet-doll-like state, too white skin, fangs, and solidly putrid green eyes made him want to gag, even after days of dealing with the dead and undead alike.

The skin gleamed like metal, if not quite as glossy, and she took the new opening around him as an opportunity to lunge in, somehow pushing off the floor and going straight for his throat.

Alex used Multi-Strike with a slash of his dadao and a palm strike. The blade glanced off her shoulder, leaving a crack from the weight of the strike but nothing more. Still, Alex blessed his choice of such a heavy blade as a lighter sword likely wouldn't have even done that much.

He landed his palm against the thing's forehead, sending a pulse of health into it, trying to unturn it in the hopes of a quick resolution.

It hissed and slashed at him with wicked looking claws before pulling back, some emotion akin to hatred in its eyes as it slipped back out among the other undead.

Those others were closing in again, the exchange having taken only a quick second.

Her slash had only caught the bottom of his greatcoat as Alex had shifted his stance to avoid it, but it had still cut a quartet of lines across the fabric.

As he saw that, a plume of rage roared up within him.

He liked this coat, and now it was damaged. Given that the coat was tough as anything it also showed just how sharp those claws were.

Grant and Natasha flowed back in, not having been fast enough to engage the harrying spider-lady, but they did blunt the renewed engagement of the lesser undead.

Alex slashed, punched, kicked, and rued that he couldn't use Force Burst in a more controlled manner.

He ashed any that died near enough to reach, and slowly they worked their way through this group.

They were all harried by the spider-lady, but with their eyes now watching for her—and her violently white body being rather hard to miss—they were able to keep her back to a reasonable degree, though she did spoil their fighting enough to get both Natasha and Grant hurt.

"Scratch!" Natasha called out as John put a normal shot into the spider-lady. It ricochetted off, eliciting an injunction about the thing's hairy toenails.

Alex touched Natasha's reaching, off-hand, sending a burst of HP through her.

An instant later, her relieved voice snapped out again. "Clear!"

A moment later, Grant screamed. He'd twisted away from spider-lady—somehow already on the other side of their group—and right into a lunging ravager. It had clamped down on the muscle of his thigh, sinking its teeth deep.

Technically, Grant should have called out 'Bite!', but Alex wasn't going to stand on protocol, disengaging to lunge for Grant.

They didn't need any more turned Initiates, and he had no idea how quickly this variant's bite would turn people.

John seamlessly took up the slack, firing a truly impressive number of rounds into the group that had been alternatingly holding back and whittling down.

Grant punched the ravager's head three times, his points in strength leading to the first cracking the skull, the second caving it in, and the third throwing the beast away, likely near re-death.

Alex slapped a hand on John's shoulder and sent a wave of health through him both to heal the bite and banish the turning plague.

He then stepped to the side, kicking the ravager where it lay on the ground and pulsing it with health to ash it.

Grant shook himself, then called, "Clear!"

That allowed Alex to move back into position, John turning with a high-pitched squeal as he put an explosive shot into spider-lady's forehead as she tried to lunge at him from above… coming down through the drop ceiling.

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That's terrifying.

The shot threw her to the back of the large entry space they were fighting in, allowing her to get lost among the now much reduced throng.

John coughed in the momentary respite as they fought only the more standard undead. "Sorry… I hate spiders."

Grant and Natasha each had small smiles, but those faded as they went back to work.

Alex snorted, even as he kicked away the nearest, staggering flesh golem.

Thankfully, these variants of flesh golems seemed to not like the undead flesh of those around them. Unfortunately, any that died were absorbed if Alex wasn't fast enough to ash them.

Alex had thought of the flesh golems as mostly mindless creatures, but the one that he'd just kicked, seemed to gain a frustrated look to it as it stumbled against the surrounding undead.

It then roared—a somewhat pathetic sound given its current stature—before turning and ripping the head from one of the nearest undead in clear frustration. As soon as that undead died, the formerly undead was absorbed with the flesh golem filling out and becoming obviously stronger.

Alex's eyes widened, as did those of the other flesh golem. He suddenly knew that he had moments before that second one did the same—killing undead to absorb them—thus becoming a greater threat once more.

Natasha's voice was heard despite the continued fighting. "Wasted potatoes."

Grant grimaced even as he crushed the head of a ravager variant, pushing it Alex's way.

John's voice followed another pair of shots. "Muddy rounds. We can not let them recover."

So, it was to be a race between them and the flesh golems: Who could get to and kill the remaining lesser undead first.

Alex and his companions were further opposed by an undead hammer-crest—the disarmed one already long-destroyed—and spider-lady, who'd seemingly vanished back into the drop-ceiling once more.

Despite the direness of their situation, Alex couldn't help but hear a small, accented voice within his mind. 'It's a race! …I hope I win.'

The first flesh golem roared once more, and this time, it sounded far, far more threatening.

"Natasha! Golem on the left. Grant, hammer-crest. John, cover us."

There were grunts of acknowledgement, but Alex was already moving, lunging toward the golem on the right, the one that hadn't yet added to its emaciated mass.

It was three quick strides for Alex. The first was a powerful leap forward, his footing aided by his traveler's shoes.

The second was actually more of a powerful kick through a ravager that dove for his legs. It might have spoiled his charge if not for his Advanced Kinesthetics, paired with his Danger Sense's forewarning, helping him turn what would have been a dangerous attack into a chance to drive back another potentially deadly opponent.

Third, even as the ravager stumbled to the side—one of John's shots blowing through its head now that it was out of line with Alex—Alex planted his foot firmly, using the stability there, to add force to his Multi-Strike multiplied dadao slash.

The two hits took the head, then the right arm, and as he was about to move on to the next, he felt something.

He didn't have any time or attention to spar, but he felt like he almost could have spent more stamina to hit again.

But the feeling passed when Alex spun, ducking under the flesh golem's flailing left arm.

Hah, it's the arm that's left. Alex would have to get back to the skill later.

As he spun, he slapped out his hand, sending a pulse of Life into the creature—paying the extra mana to overcome its Magical Fortitude—commanding it to learn how to resist Magic.

Come on, come on!

The neck and shoulder sealed over, even as the arm flopped to the floor and the head continued to snap all-too-human teeth at him as it rolled about.

Thankfully, these were not flesh-golems of the Plague Guard, so their magical resistance was entirely due to their nature, rather than due to magics added onto their bones.

That meant that as soon as the head and arm were separated from the main body, their magical resistance was reduced significantly, allowing Alex to ash them.

Behind him, he heard Grant give an excited exclamation, just before John's guns began to bark once more.

Alex was sure that the other flesh golem was going to be a bigger problem for his delay, but he would not allow this one to grow as well.

He swept around the blindly flailing, one-armed golem, ashing the lesser undead that John had downed, as well as killing and dusting those that would have come within reach of the fleshy thing.

As he did so, he was able to see that Grant had gotten the hammer from the hammer-crest, allowing John to kill it with a simple shot to the head, its wooden hammer already withering away.

Unfortunately, Grant had taken a hit to his left shoulder, and that arm hung limp. Even so, he was moving toward Natasha to help her.

That, of course, was when spider-lady returned, dropping out of the ceiling to land on Grant's back, her mouth moving toward his neck with blinding speed.

John cursed, putting three shots against her side… and one skimming across Grant's back as she lunged away, hissing and spitting at the loss of a meal.

Grant yelled in pain, spinning and lashing out with his warhammer, one handed.

He missed spider-lady, who was lost among the legs of the lesser undead, but he did manage to brain one of the ravagers, dropping it with that single hit.

But that was all Alex caught as he cut and ducked and ashed in an odd sort of dance with his own flesh golem.

He found it was actually harder to predict and evade the headless creature, because he wasn't able to use its gaze as an indicator of what it was focusing on.

It seemed to be using some sort of life-sense, or flesh sense, to allow it to orient on and come after him as well as the undead that drew near around.

He had a niggling feeling building, and he just knew what it meant.

As such, he cut his attempt short, slapping his hand against the animate flesh once more, drawing his own Life back before ashing the creature, spending far too much mana to do so.

He was down to a quarter with just under five hundred in his mana pool. He spent an additional ten to Force Burst, clearing the undead that had begun to press all too close.

He got a notification when he drew in the Life, and another as the flesh golem ashed, but he ignored both as he spun, listening to the keening wail of his Danger Sense.

As such, he brought his blade around and down just as spider-lady flashed out from between the staggering, surrounding undead.

She'd shrugged off nearly every hit they'd delivered, so he put as much power and leverage into the hit as possible, needing to slow her down so they could mop up this situation.

His heavy blade chopped deeply into her shoulder—by luck, striking the chip he'd already made in her exoskeleton—driving her downward and into the floor with a satisfying thwack and pained hiss from the thing.

He'd had a lot of momentum, and he put even more strength behind the strike. With her unable to be flung away, the full force of the hit came to bare, the sharp edge leading the way for the heavy blade.

He split her shoulder to groin.

His eyes widened as white skin was coated with almost black, gel-like blood.

Her voice took up a whimpering simper that was somewhere between the sound of a hurt puppy and that of nails on a chalkboard.

Alex was practically frozen in place for a moment, eyes wide, before gunshots resounding and a ravager—one of the few left—slamming into him jarred him back to the present moment.

As he was taken to the ground by the bulky thing's tackle, he only had one thought.

Solomon's baby, I hope that wasn't fatal.

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