Dead Man Walking: Living By Day, Dead By Night

Nearly half a year had passed since Zane and Tabitha shared a meal over the fire together, where in a bizarre moment they briefly became intimate, before some sense was slapped into the overly possessive horde king. And in doing so, compelling her to act with some semblance of sanity once more.

At first, Zane was someone she clung to because she was inwardly scared that she would go insane once he was gone and tear apart the earth looking for him. But even so, she thought that the man was nothing short of a burden.

His weakness was a problem for her. Especially since he proclaimed himself to be the one true son of Death. How could their mother's son and heir be so weak? He had crossed the boundaries of a Tier I Horde King and had for a while been a measly Tier II.

But as Tabitha watched as Zane slowly but surely became more ruthless, slaughtering everything he came across with his newfound power on his journey to the west. She became convinced he was a man truly worthy of the title he had thrust upon herself, at least from her perspective.

The son of death, the Prince to rule them all. There was no doubt about it. And as Zane continued to progress, he had now reached the end of what one might consider a Tier II Horde King. Yet the power he wielded was so much more.

From the size, scale, and equipment of his Horde all of which were at the pinnacle. To the Death Knights he raised as the officers of his army. Even the Horde Kings who found themselves stripped of sovereignty and bent to the man's will to act as his commanders.

They all had been outfitted and equipped with the best gear Zane could provide them. While he stood at the helm of his army, a specter of death in the flesh. One on one, Tabitha doubted there was a Tier III Horde King who could be Zane's rival.

And yet she could tell instinctively he had yet to break through the threshold necessary to become one. In fact, he had reached a bottleneck in his progression. One that he appeared incapable of overcoming without a certain enhancement.

It was not like Tabitha was not already aware of what the boy needed. In fact, while in her sane state she had been quietly pondering whether to tell him where to find it. Especially as death's aura began to vastly shift the world.

There was no doubt in Tabitha's mind that the world beneath the surface was beginning to forge a new life, and that this life was something which even she would come to dread should Zane find himself travelling beneath the surface of the Earth.

While the life of the old world that remained was corrupted and twisted. First into fantasy like creatures which warred with the living and the dead alike. But with such a poisonous miasma silently permeating the earth's surface even they began to decay and corrupt into shambled horrors of their former selves.

More bone than flesh, the monsters of that had first evolved from living animals became entities of death equally as uncontrollable as they were in life, but far more fearsome now that they were a member of the dead.

Life began to fade rapidly across the Earth, with each passing day the dead claimed more living souls to join its ranks. While the dead themselves waged as a much war against each other as they did the living.

The living were no doubt bolstered in strength, no longer held back by things like morals, or the weak among their herds. Gravestone had become a bastion of light in the darkness that now encompassed the world.

Even the sunlight itself began to fade more and more with each passing month. The hours of the day became shorter and shorter, while the night became longer and longer. Some believed that the sun itself had become infected and was slowly dying.

But this did not bother Zane in the slightest as he could see equally well in the night as he could the day. A silent assassin reaping the souls of everything he came across and forcefully converting them to his control.

As the Darkness surrounded them, and the winter quickly approached in the middle of what was once called September, Tabitha could not help but comment on Zane's brutality as he ruthlessly gutted the survivors of the found in the nation they had found themselves in.

A nation whose name most people of the old world would have never even known, or at least most Americans who were woefully uneducated on the subject of geography. Interestingly enough, the banners of the group he had slain resembled that of a group who once ruled these lands.

The banners burned in the darkness and were the only source of illumination that lit up the vast plains now filled with nothing but death.

Whether it was Zane's owned horde which was quickly approaching a million men and women, or the dead of those who lay before him. Their undead figures fought against one another as Tabitha watched Zane wage war against the local Horde King whose puppet kingdom Zane had just burned to the ground.

The Horde King in question was a Tier III Horde King, who had once ruled the lands which in the old world had been known as Kazakhstan. But like in the past, a ravenous horde came from the east, and supplanted his rule practically overnight. Slaying the people beneath his command and replacing them with their own.

Like the Golden Horde which once seized these lands by the sword, so too had Zane done so now. What remained of his enemy's army was rapidly being encircled and slain by the forces bound to Zane's will.

An army of vampires, ghouls, and specters armed to the teeth, and defended by a second skin made of steel was clashing against the more cost effective units which your garden variety Horde King raised as his own minions.

Sure, quantity versus quality was a debate to be had on the battlefield. But it was a simple matter of math to determine whether a victory could be gained from such a tactic. If you outnumbered your enemy 10:1, and their KDR were 9:1 then sooner or later you would win. But what happened when the enemy killed 11 of your men for 1 they lost?

Then it was a game over… And thus was the nature of Zane's command. No matter how many men the enemy threw at him, his troops would cut them down like wheat to the scythe before slaying the next line in front of him.

Meanwhile, he had a number of Tier III Horde Kings acting as his personal bodyguard unit. Combine these with his own personal dueling prowess, which was at the maximum of Tier III capabilities, despite being Tier II, and one could easily tell how this battle would end.

The only reason the Horde King had agreed to this fight was because Tabitha stated she was merely an observer. And would not get personally involved. Not that she actually needed to. Only a Tier IV Horde King posed a risk to Zane.

And the man they were fighting against wasn't one of them. As was evidence when Zane returned to her from the depths of the darkness with his victim's head clutched within his hands, and the man's blood tainting his flesh and body. Continue your adventure at empire

Nevertheless, Tabitha could not help but feel pride as she approached Zane, and hugged him tightly, kissing him on the forehead as she whispered praises in his ears. With a tone that hinted her two personalities had long since begun to merge into one.

"Welcome back, little brother…"