Chapter 100: Funny Bones
Roscoe stood with his army outside the walls of Greg. The people here had been more resistant than he could have ever expected. His first assault had been rebuffed. Of course, he could have taken the town through sheer persistence eventually, but he didn't want to lose too many of his elite troops. So instead of storming the town, he sent out groups to the surrounding areas to recruit. The source of this content nov(el)bi((n))
So far, things were progressing, although slowly. More and more troops trickled in, and they were almost ready to commence another assault. Not every troop he sent out had come back, but so far, all the elites made it back. That was what mattered. Each time a group went out, he impressed upon it to leave the castle alone. It wasn't just to prevent spoiling the seat of his god, though that was a consideration. No, he just didn't believe that anything would be able to take on such a mighty being. They would just be destroyed in the attempt.
He wasn't sure how well the command would hold with the newly created. However, he just didn't have much choice but to trust that it would work out. Now the tens of thousands of zombies, skeletons, ghouls, and other undead surrounding the city were numerous enough to attack.
With a command, the formerly still fodder troops surged forward in a wave. They were all very low-level and wouldn't accomplish much. Still, they would act as a ramp for the others to scale the wall. Many would be destroyed, but many would recover, and the new comrades from the city would fill their ranks again.
A cry rose from the city, and bells started ringing. A sparse volley of arrows sailed over the walls, only to land ineffectually among the uncaring dead flesh of the approaching masses. As the bells continued to ring, more and more arrows joined each volley. Soon enough, balls of fire arced over as well. Defenders on the wall threw rocks. A few even dumped boiling oil, which didn't do much besides make its target slightly more slippery. Useless. Footing wouldn't become a concern on the ramp of bodies without many orders of magnitude more oil.
The zombies hit the wall before the defenders had even begun to make a dent in their numbers. The first ones at the walls were promptly trampled, and the next wave became that much closer to the wall's top. If the defenders had only to defend one part of the wall, they would have repelled the attack, just as they had the first night Roscoe had tried this. Even a dozen different points of attack would have been possible to overcome.
However, this attack was bigger. The entire wall was being scaled at once. By the ninth wave, the undead could reach their fingers over the walls. They were mostly beaten back, and the ones that pulled themselves up were quickly thrown back down to the pile.
The next rank didn't have to reach for the wall, though, and the one after that simply stepped over the ledge. All the further ones practically climbed over their predecessors only to fall upon the defenders. The twelfth rank caused a mass of undead to fall off on the inside of the wall, their momentum simply clearing the wall of defenders. The arrows coming over the wall never stopped.
Roscoe had to admire their determination, but they couldn't stand before the might of the Void. The world would be cleansed.
He didn't have to, but he sent his elite troops in. They might as well get some experience as well. Fifteen minutes later, he was walking through the gates, and the ghastly undead ramp was sorting themselves back into ranks.
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Tony and Bee spent some time trying to figure out if Void had laughed or not. They weren't able to come to a conclusion, and Void had stopped responding to them at all. So eventually, they gave up and continued on. Before leaving the now-abandoned farm, though, they made sure to destroy the skeleton acting as a scarecrow. Void did them a favor and absorbed its powdered remains.
I decided to circle back to this after some time. Circle back? Like when something required a second sweep of cleaning? I was pretty sure there was something there. I just couldn't quite put my bristle on it. Oh well.
We had turned up the road and walked a bit before exploring down the next side path several hours later. When we were about halfway down the path, Tony and Beatrice realized an issue. The day was starting to get late, and with the tall trees, the setting sun was rapidly being covered. They began to trip on roots constantly for several minutes. Maybe this was funny. Watching Tony brush the dirt off his knees certainly was fascinating.
Yet still, it didn't quite make me want to laugh. It wasn't quite the right kind of... I really wasn't sure how to describe it. Humor was hard.
Bee laid out their bedrolls while Tony got a fire set up in a small clearing off the side of the path. I was worried about them sleeping directly on the dirt, even if the bedrolls helped a little. The camp was fairly basic, and they didn't bother to use the fire to cook. Instead, they just ate some of the dried provisions that they had packed for the trip.
They did, however, like staring at the flames. "Have you ever seen flames flicker like that?"
"It's like watching a clock tick. The interval between flare-ups is exactly the same as far as I can tell."
"The height of the flame is exactly 3 times taller when it flares."
"Huh, I would say the interval is about 3 seconds too...."
"And it looks like along the edges of each flame, there are smaller copies of the whole flame pattern..."
"You are right! I think I read something about that a little while ago. I think it was called a fractal. Supposedly some people can describe them with just numbers. I didn't really get it. Advanced mathematics is so much more boring than magic."
"How do you not find magic boring? How is it any different than math? I don't really understand either."
"Well, with math, everything is connected and makes sense. You know, one plus one is always two. It makes sense and can be seen everywhere. By definition, it's common. Magic, though, is different. Sure, it has rules, but the products just don't make sense. Why is it that if I replace gray squirrel fur with red squirrel fur, the speed potion changes to slightly bad-tasting coffee? Or why does the phase of the moon matter when collecting alligator tears? There is no connection, as far as I can see. If you looked at those tears every way you can, there'd be no way to tell when it was collected."
Tony snorted. "That sounds like a whole mess...."
I listened to them talk for a while, still focusing my own processors on the nature of humor. Eventually, they made their way to sleep and left me to watch and meditate.