Holy Emperor's Grandson Is A Necromancer

This couldn"t be something simple at all.

In one single night, the village was decimated, leaving behind 100 or so survivors.

They all crowded into the narrow and dilapidated monastery. Kids, old folks, housewives and the likes were busy offering desperate prayers inside the building. Meanwhile, men were helping me to carry the dead to the cemetery.

Once things had calmed down sufficiently enough, the village chief came up to me to speak. "Thank you for aiding us, your highness."

I was fl.u.s.tered. The village was decimated even before the holy water could be distributed? Now I had a mountain of things to do thanks to this development.

"Wasn"t there a Paladin stationed in the village?" Said I, remembering that there was a Paladin residing in the biggest village here, tasked with monitoring me.

"After the incident broke, we sought him out, but his current whereabouts are a mystery," said the village chief

"Did you try to send the word out to the Theocratic Empire?"

I might have been exiled here, sure, but still, I was the Imperial Prince. Paladins showed up promptly just because the owner of this body rampaged around a bit, so there was no way the higher-ups would ignore the advent of a zombie wave when I was staying here.

At the bare minimum, they should be dispatching a knight"s order or something.

"T-that is…. we tried to send a messenger, but…"

"But?"

"He must"ve been killed by the zombies during his journey."

"……….."

"Zombies are hiding among all of the roads leading to Ronia. Even the contact with the nearest sentry post has been cut off, too…."

The zombies of this world were nothing to scoff about, in other words.

The Paladin in the village monitoring me was missing. Zombies seized this opening and attacked, and they even managed to cut off the exit. Did that mean they could use their heads?

If true, these b*stards were just as scary as those ones from the movies capable of running around like marathon runners.

Also, if there was a separate ent.i.ty that had intelligence and controlled all the others, then finding the origin of this plague would be next to impossible.

"How many zombies are there?"

"It, it was about 30 of them. That"s how many we saw when we were running away."

The village of the monastery actually consisted of four separate satellite villages. I went to an already-decimated village yesterday, so in just one night, the remaining three had basically been wiped off the map.

If there were 30, did that mean there were around ten in each village? Or, maybe they worked together to attack the villages, instead. This was no dang den of zombies or something. There was nothing to fear when they didn"t even know how to run and simply flailed about. It wasn"t as if you"d turn into an undead just because you got bitten once, too.

"Okay, so what now?"

"W-we"d like you to contact the Imperial Palace, your highness."

"But, didn"t you say that all roads have been blocked?"

"Wouldn"t you offering a prayer be sufficient? Like, with some sort of magic…..?"

How unfortunate, but I didn"t know any convenient skills like that one.

The villagers were looking at me with hopeful eyes, but it was my job to break the bad news for them. "Obviously, such a thing is impossible. You said that a wave of zombies showed up, right? In that case, we don"t have a choice but to hold up until Paladins come to rescue us. If not, we"ll all become zombie fodder."

I didn"t want to get their hopes up, so I honestly told them our options. And thanks to that, they all fell into panic. Some became really pale, while some wailed uncontrollably. h.e.l.l, some even began screaming, too.

The villagers were in despair.

But, that was obvious. They were about to die from the plague, or become the next meal for the zombies.

Even if I enjoyed similar ‘attributes" with them, the continuous appearance of zombies would become dangerous for me in the long run. If I managed to survive alone when everyone else had perished, now that would look rather peculiar to other people, wouldn"t it?

Meaning, the current situation remained unfavourable whether it was the villagers or myself.

"Please, help us!! Your highness! Aren"t you the grandson of the Holy Emperor??"

I was one, sure, but too bad, I was a regular person now.

I stared at the village chief. These villagers seemed to be taking the banished Imperial Grandson for granted here.

A member of the Imperial Family who got banished would lose his ‘status" and become no different than a commoner. The exiled ones arriving in this place would have to work as lowly gophers running errands for the villagers and receive no compensation in return. There was no prior case of an exile taking revenge on them, either.

So, they probably thought that they found themselves with a nice little servant here.

I wasn"t that unhappy about it, though. The villagers seemed to be happy enough to help me out occasionally, too.

It"s just that, I wasn"t planning to smile and bear it if these folks were shameless enough to think I"d ‘oh-so obviously" sacrifice myself for them.

I"d not quietly swallow that at all. In that case, I should put forward a condition. I smirked and stared at the village chief. Using my [Mind"s Eye], I confirmed his Status Window.

[Name: Parok.

Age: 75

Speciality: Snitching, farming, petty tricks.

+ Currently in a scared state.]

My smile became one of contentment as I studied him. "Fine. I"ll help you."

The two farmers from the night before were smiling brightly now. On the other hand, though, the remaining men carried this unmistakably bleak expression.

Their reactions were rather lukewarm at best. Even if I pounded on my chest and declared, "Who am I? I"m none other than Holy Emperor"s grandson!". I wouldn"t be able to convince anybody.

Because, I was a mangnani Imperial Prince, after all.

I used my background to beat up servants and s.e.xually a.s.sault maids. h.e.l.l, I even tried to rape a lady-in-waiting too, so who in their right minds would trust me?

The village chief hesitated greatly before opening his mouth, evidently having decided to grasp at straws if it needs be.

"T-then, we shall be in your care."

Right, since there was a ‘Priest" here already, might as well believe him and follow his lead, right?

However, his att.i.tude was rather arrogant, to say the least.

I guess one could blame his shamelessness on all those times he ordered around the exiled formerly-high-ranking ‘gophers" around as he pleased. Such a habit must"ve been deeply ingrained in his bones by now.

Well, it didn"t really matter.

Helping them out was the only way I"d be able to spend some peace and quiet myself, after all. Besides, I wasn"t going to ‘personally" deal with the zombies, anyway.

"However, there"s a condition."

The village chief flinched and tilted his head, before asking me in a confused expression. "When you say a condition….?"

"I"m thinking that it"s time you start handing over some necessary funds. It"s rather unfair that I"ve been performing free service until now, right? Don"t you agree?"

"are you asking me to pay you wages? B-but, everyone who was exiled here so far were…."

I quietly stared at the village chief.

My silent pressure forced him to shrink back and nod his head. "I, I understand."

"Don"t rat on the Paladins later, got it?"

As long as I stayed in the monastery, I"d get a bit of food and water for free. However, that was all. I had no funds to spend for myself right now.

Once every month, a merchant would show up in the village, so it"d be a good idea to fix up the monastery with the funds. The Theocratic Empire had given up on me already, anyways. I might end up spending the rest of my life here, so wouldn"t it be a smart idea to spruce up the place with a few decent furniture?

"Oh, and one more thing." I pointed at the dilapidated monastery. "I want you to fix that while you"re at it, too."

"Pardon?"

The village chief looked at the building. Although old and worn-down, it was still large enough to house 100 or so of his fellow villagers. Meaning, repairing it would require a considerable sum.

After a lengthy deliberation, the village head spat out a groan and nodded his head. "I understand. Within limits, I…."

"And, periodically provide supplies for free."

"….I"ll see what I can do within our means."

Nice! With that, all my problems had been sorted out.

You see, the rain water leaked into the monastery and that caused me a lot of grief for a long while.

Not only that, provisions I received as compensation for maintaining the cemetery was potatoes and vegetables. I should get myself some meat using this chance, and since winter was coming, I might as well get the villagers to diligently bring me my deserved rewards so that I wouldn"t have to go get firewood personally.

"Your highness!! Imperial Prince-nim!!"

While I was in the middle of my ‘chat" with the village chief, a man hurriedly ran over to our side. He shouted out with a pale expression. "The zombie horde is here!!"

I was stunned to hear that.

Zombies were actually coming here?

I didn"t have to go where they were personally? Could they be gathering here in order to prey on the living? Pretty loyal to their base instincts, then.

Which was a relief, actually - I now didn"t have to search around and purify them one by one this way. This was the same thing as the amount of work I had to do decreasing.

"Niiice! All of you, get your tools ready!"

Every villager, including the village chief, all began tilting their heads. Their confused, dazed gazes were focused on me.

"What are you, uhm, talking about, your highness…?"

I shrugged my shoulders after hearing the chief. "What"s up with your expressions? Didn"t you ask me to sort this crisis out for you?"

"Y-yes. But, why….?"

His voice trailed off with the words, "Throwing around an ugly word like ‘tools" at us…..?"

"That"s obvious, isn"t it?" The corners of my lips arched up.

Yup, so b.l.o.o.d.y obvious.

I had four ‘jobs", as it were.

One, the Imperial Prince of the Theocratic Empire.

Two, a gravekeeper.

Three, a Priest, at least nominally.

And finally, a Necromancer.

None of them were the kind of professions where you"d march to the frontlines and perform a sword dance or something.

"From now on, you lot are going on the zombie hunting."

"…..!!"

The village chief and his fellow villagers stiffened up in an instant.

"Don"t you worry. You won"t become a zombie just because you get bitten by one. It"ll just sting a bit and you"ll run some high fever for a couple of days, that"s all. Rest easy, because my heart shall ache alongside your pain, too."

The village chief forced out a smile as cold sweat formed on his forehead. "Y-your highness. This is no time for jokes. You said you"d help us earlier, so…."

I s.h.i.+fted my gaze over to him and grinned refres.h.i.+ngly. "Did it sound like a joke to you because I smiled?"

He openly formed an expression that cried out, "What kind of a dogsh*t is this….?!"

If you don"t like it, then forget about it, then.

I stared at him and cackled loudly in a rather evil manner.

Well-built men gathered in front of the monastery; there were about 50 of them. Each one was armed with farming tools, logging axes or saws, or hunting bows and arrows.

They were all built rather st.u.r.dily, perhaps owing to the fact that they were farmers, woodsmen, or hunters during their daily lives.

Nice. They didn"t forget to pack their weapons before running away even when the situation was so urgent. The survival instincts of this world"s denizens were pretty outstanding, indeed.

"Oh, about the equipment you took out from the monastery? Make sure you don"t damage them, alright? I"ll be charging you money if you break even one."

The villagers now carried fed-up expressions.

I cleanly ignored them and simply nodded my head in satisfaction. "Nice. This should suffice. They might be zombies, but as long as we aren"t dealing with animal types, we should have no problems as they are all very slow."

Also, even if there were animal types mixed in, their ability to attack was limited so it didn"t really matter, either.

"Alright, everyone. Let"s do this carefully. Your safety should be a priority. So, don"t be too tense about hunting zombies. If it gets too tough, help each other out. As long as we pace ourselves, no one will get hurt, and….."

It was then - I reflexively blocked my nose in a hurry. A truly horrendous stench was wafting out from the distance. The demonic energy was reverberating within the air as the disgusting stench of death.

I cautiously s.h.i.+fted my gaze towards the forest. Eyes glowing in crimson hue were surrounding the perimeter of the monastery. Soon, the staggering zombies marched out of the dense fog. And their numbers were in several hundreds.

"Why the h.e.l.l…."

….Are there so many?!

I called out to the village chief, currently backing away from sheer terror. "Oii, Mister Village Chief."

"Y-yes??"

He looked back at me with a pale face.

"Didn"t you say there was only around 30 or so back in the village?"

"T-that is… That"s what we saw…."

Even the chief himself looked confused, evidently not understanding what was happening here.

I began ma.s.saging my forehead. "Four… No, one of them was completely decimated, so…. How many people were living in the remaining three villages?"

The village chief hurriedly counted by raising and folding his fingers. "W-well, that is… the biggest village has over 200 folks, and other ones are between 50 to 100. It"s at least over 300."

"Okay, so 100 survivors are here, and you saw about 30 zombies. In that case, where is the rest?"

The chief flinched and stiffened up and while dazedly staring back at me, muttered out helplessly. "I, I don"t know for sure. We were too busy running away, so…."

"….With this, it"s pretty clear to me now."

A sizeable portion of the escaped villagers must"ve been hunted down, it seemed. Maybe, these creatures simply wandered into the ‘Land of the Dead Spirits". Well, the very distant northern tip of the frontier wasn"t called the haven for undead for nothing, after all.

My eyes twitched as I observed the slow, lumbering march of the zombie horde. The villagers were crying out to me in sheer panic now.

"Y-your highness, what should we do?!"

"Imperial Prince-nim!!"

"Should we run away?"

The village chief b.u.t.ted in at the end and asked me.

I ma.s.saged my temples even harder. "Is there any other way to deal with zombies?"

"No, there isn"t."

"Even when there are so many of them??"

The chief wiped his cold sweat and replied. "An event like this one rarely occurs, you see. If we"re faced with such a crisis, we inform the feudal lord and wait until he dispatches his troops."

I formed a miserable expression next. "Why did my workload have to increase like this?! Hang on a minute, could it be that I"m paying for all the blasphemous c**p the previous owner of this body committed in the past?"

Although I was kidding just now, I couldn"t help but feel a bit bitter after thinking about it. It was possible that my situation was exactly the result of that.

Since magic existed for real in this world, I couldn"t discount the possibilities of G.o.ds really existing, too. Not that I was religious or anything, though. Still, if the G.o.ds really did exist, then there was no way they"d sit by and do nothing when someone cussed them out, right?

"You dumba*s former owner of this body…!!"

I facepalmed grandly.

The crime of blasphemy this body"s former master committed was pretty d*mn hefty, to say the least. If I was really paying for his transgressions, then h.e.l.l, I was neck-deep in trouble here.

"Ahh, the G.o.ddess of love and mercy, Gaia!"

When I called out, the village chief and the men all looked at me. Was it because I offered a ‘prayer" just now? They were looking at me in a renewed light.

They probably found Priests using divine powers in front of undeads rather rea.s.suring. Indeed, the holy men and women of this world did pray before gathering their divinity to cast their magics, didn"t they?

However, I was different.

I refres.h.i.+ngly trampled on the expectations the villagers held of a Priest like me.

"Love and mercy, my a*s!! If you"re putting me through a wringer just because I cussed you out once, then f*ck, Imma cuss you out even more!! You cheapskate stinker of a G.o.ddess!!"

< 005.="" imperial="" prince="" is="" cracking="" heads="" -1=""> Fin.