Balance

Bruno and Alm ran for their lives in a clumsy and noisy escape, being pursued by the army of skeletons commanded by the necromancer. They skillfully dodged the rusted blades and kicked some dry bones that tried to grab their legs.

'You suck at controlling this body! Why the hell are you so slow?' Alm complained mentally as he made an evasive maneuver to avoid a skeleton trying to grab him.

'Do you have anything better to do than complain? I'm as new to this as you are! Besides, you are just as slow as me!' Bruno snapped in response, aiming for an opening in the chase and increasing their speed.

They looked like a drunk monkey, making movements that one would consider ridiculous. It reached the point of being comical. Yet, there was no one there to laugh.

Still, the advantage of being two separate souls was becoming evident. Bruno had complete control of the body and was pushing it to its limits to run, while Alm focused his awareness on the attacks around them, skillfully dodging strikes.

'What kind of crappy system is this? We're just a simple skeleton, only slightly stronger than an average human,' Alm continued complaining as he took control of one of the arms and threw a rusty dagger, hitting a skeleton's skull and knocking it down.

[Main Mission Initiated]

[Restore the natural balance between Life and Death]

[Main Reward: Qi Gathering Realm Cultivation Liberated]

[Extra Reward 01: 40 upgrade points]

[Extra Reward 02: Bonus chest of a level equal to performance.]

'Fuck this shit!' Alm was lived. 'This shit suddenly put us in the middle of nowhere, no warning, no explanation, NOTHING! Now we are fucking running for our lives. Then, out of the blue, it starts the fucking mission and gives a pretty vague explanation. Does the Heaven's Will truly want to help kill that bitch or not?!'

'Life and death. It seems like this army was about to attack the living. If we want to complete this, perhaps we'll have to defeat that necromancer,' Bruno commented while he kept calm and running.

'Yea? And how are we supposed to do this in this weak state? The shit system couldn't even give us an incentive and explain the reward correctly,' Alm cursed.

High in the skies, the necromancer watched in astonishment as the skeletons entered a dense forest. He had a lot of experience summoning undead, but it had been centuries since he failed in mentally controlling these creatures. The skeletons didn't retain memories of their past lives and lacked souls. While they retained certain habits, behaviors, and characteristics from their past lives, their intelligence was rudimentary.

Normally, without control, they would attack any living creature they saw due to the dark energies animating them. But this skeleton seemed different, as if it still had some consciousness amid its skeletal condition.

'Don't be so dramatic, Alm. The real issue is the necromancer. He's still assessing the unexpected situation, but he'll come at full force after surveying the surroundings and finding nothing that could have interfered with his technique. We need to think fast!' Bruno urged urgently.

'How ridiculous, being cornered by a mere conjurer who can only summon low-level skeletons. The true death magic we possessed could create an army with bodies more powerful than when they were alive. He shouldn't even be able to...' Alm abruptly interrupted his thoughts as he realized something.

His skeletal left fist clenched fiercely, emitting a faint, pale black energy. 'Yes, this skeleton was reanimated with Death Yin Qi. Even though it's weak, we're still experts in this!' Bruno mentally exclaimed.

Suddenly, the necromancer narrowed his eyes. He had summoned the skeleton and had a slight connection to it thanks to using his Qi to control it. This connection would allow him to supply his Qi to heal them and perform other techniques through it. However, at this moment, the channel of this tenuous connection seemed to expand like a vein suddenly swelling.

The necromancer was astounded as the desperately fleeing skeleton halted its steps and jumped onto a tall tree. All the pursuing skeletons clustered, trying to clumsily climb up, which would take them a few seconds to reach. From the top of the tree, the Bruno/Alm skeleton emerged and looked in the direction of the necromancer.

It was then that the necromancer stared into those empty sockets, and his body trembled as he had a foreboding feeling. He couldn't be more right. All the black energy in his body was stirred in his meridians, and he spat out a mouthful of blood, feeling the channel with that skeleton multiply hundreds of times. The Qi from his meridians seemed to be ruthlessly drained.

In the midst of despair and pain, he forced the channel to disconnect, falling from the skies at that very instant.

Simultaneously, the skeleton, cloaked like a black streak in the darkness, shot toward the horizon, quickly disappearing from everyone's sight. So what if Bruno and Alm did that to the necromancer? Without ascertaining the situation, they had no intention of staying there. First, they needed information.

***

It's the middle of the night, and after covering a good distance, the skeleton shrouded in a black aura stopped at the top of a hill. Now, he was in a mountainous area, far from the dark interference, with a clear view of the activity below.

'That bastard! We managed to suck out almost half of his Qi, but it's still too weak,' Alm commented.

'He was only in the second or third stage of the Core Formation Realm; most of the Qi was concentrated on controlling the skeletons, that's why we only managed to take close to half of it. Well, weak as it is, we know thousands of techniques to use this Yin Qi,' Bruno replied.

Observing from above, they saw a source of light in the distance, in the opposite direction of the dark mist. 'There must be the army of some race, ready to fight the necromancer. He won't attack today, though. We still have a few hours until sunrise. We need more information about the situation,' Bruno concluded.

They then moved stealthily in the darkness, blending in with the night as they infiltrated the camp. Slowly, they made their way to some tents in the rear where the infantry was housed. In the end, they decided to check the army that was supposed to fight the necromancer first.

As they advanced through the trees, they immediately noticed that there weren't humans in the camp. It was a race that shared a striking physical resemblance to humans, except for the vibrant and varied color of their hair. However, there was something distinctly different in their aura and blood pressure.

Upon sensing the Qi emanating from these beings, a dense sensation of purity ran through their bones, making them tremble. It was a race they had never encountered in their original universe.

Bruno and Alm continued to move cautiously toward the back of the camp. This race had realized that the enemy was no longer moving, so they were only partially alert.

As they slowly approached the tents where a group was resting, their steps, however, were clumsy and produced sounds of creaking bones, which greatly annoyed Alm since he needed to use his stolen Qi to cancel out that bothersome noise.

Alm immediately wanted to use a mind control technique to scan the individual's memories, but Bruno refused, explaining that it would likely kill him unnecessarily. 

'As naive as ever...' Alm commented through their soul connection.

'Put yourself in their shoes. Would you like to have your soul searched at the risk of dying?' Bruno asked back.

'It's because I'm not them that I don't give a damn, idiot!' Alm obviously couldn't care less.

Bruno still refused. 'Hmph! Whatever reason you give me, I won't allow you to do that. Instead of wasting time here, let's continue our research. Also, we have limited Qi resources to use, so just pretend we are doing some savings.'

With that said, they checked if the individual was asleep and applied a simple technique to deepen his slumber. Then, carefully, they took a crystal the individual was guarding, made from an unknown mineral but suspected to be similar to a spatial ring.

Searching through the individual's belongings, they found some rudimentary weapons made of mystical wood, underwear, and strange objects. However, the most intriguing item was a leather scroll that appeared to be a hand-drawn map.

Bruno then looked at the socks they had found and had a strange idea. He turned to Alm enthusiastically. 'Keep a look out.'

Alm responded skeptically. 'What are you planning?'

Bruno then took the socks and an overcoat and began dressing with a determined look. Alm became even more irritated with the situation, though.

'What is it? Do you intend to turn us into some kind of fashionable skeleton?' 

However, Bruno smiled and continued dressing strangely as he said, 'Fashionable, uh? Does that mean we are considered beautiful skeletons?' 

Alm felt like crying but had no tears... literally!

As soon as they finished getting dressed, they resumed moving in search of other tents. Alm grumbled as he walked clumsily with the socks, but to his surprise, the noise they made while walking decreased considerably.