Imagination is infinite
Wise words from a wise man.
What that wise man didn't take into account was humanities predictability.
So even if Human Imagination was theoretically infinite, at least once in your life you would've imagined something floating in the air as if controlled by magic.
If you imagined floating islands then you would be one of the many who genuinely dreamed.
+And if also imagined floating islands then I didn't need to go into much detail explaining it+
Walking out of the yellow door, golden sunlight streamed out from the clouds above.
'I can't even curse in surprise.'
I had seen it from a long distance away, but up close, the floating islands were genuinely beautiful structures.
From afar, they looked something akin to a beautiful but inevitably fake diorama.
But up close, the impact of the scene in front of me was beyond most words.
To put some terms, it was beautiful, it was grandiose, and it was aweing.
If only there were less giant undead monsters roaming around I would've seen this as something otherworldly.
'They just had to ruin this scene.'
Staring at the numerous undead that had spread like a literal plague across the entire kingdom, it seemed that even the snake believers who resided here weren't untouched by the malaise.
'If they're infected by it, they probably didn't spread it in the first place.'
If that was the case then the diary of a religious man I had found in the Prison wasn't as useful as I had once thought.
'Or maybe they did try to quarantine themselves like the book said, but would a disease with an above 100% mortality rate really be stopped by that?'
Now that I see it, it seemed that the edges of the islands had ropes dangling off of them with rusted over hooks stuck into the dirt and stone.
I don't know how the undead with rotting brains climbed those up, but they were once people, the chances were high that carriers hid amongst refugees and climbed to what they thought was a safe place.
'Then one thing led to another and stupid people did stupid things.'
Now that I see it, most of the undead here were wearing distinctly unique clothes
Sure they were just like any of the other zombies spread across the island, but they at least followed a standard theme of clothing.
So to speak, the prison and the forest had zombies in plain attire, and the Ramparts mostly had zombies in rotting leather armor.
Here, most of the zombies were adorning what used to be fancy clothing.
'I think these are the nobles.'
Accompanying these normal sized zombies were a retinue of less fancily dressed zombies, a few skeletons and one oversized skeleton in all black.
'I'm guessing those are the guards.'
The composition of these groups varied just like every other group, but there was usually at least one giant skeleton and one fancy zombie.
'What were people feeding them for them to grow this big?'
Staring at the giant skeletons, their jaws clacked underneath the black hood as they dutifully guarded their charges even in death.
'I really wish they weren't so loyal though.'
Thankfully, not all of the fancy zombies were accompanied by those giant skeletons wielding a sword half of their length
'There are a stupid amount of bombardiers th- What?'
Seeing a murder of crows suddenly take to the skies, the reddish brown feathered birds crowed loudly as if to announce the arrival of something.
Strangely enough, instead of ignoring them like they would with everything else on this island that was infected, the infected undead reacted violently.
Excessively so.
The giant skeletons raised their blades in preparation of a downswing which instantly cleaved the red crows out of existence followed up quickly by a swift upswing.
Pausing, their hands trembled for a brief moment before every single of the giant skeletons brought down their swords in unison causing a wave of light to suddenly arc out forwards.
Cleaving the space in front of them, several of the crows were instantly cleaved, bursting like a balloon.
But the birds had done their parts as they continued to fly, bursting against the undead and sending them tumbling.
Whatever it was that the crows had set out to do, they seemed to have succeeded in it.
Especially when snakes with red and green scales instantly began to follow the path cleared out by the crows.
Slithering forwards, much bigger snakes joined their smaller companions in the rush with their tongues tasting the air and their slitted eyes glaring at the undead.
Twisting and coiling around each other, they formed makeshift bridges which allowed the much bigger snakes to slither across effortlessly.
Unhinging their jaws, they rushed at the giant skeletons trying to raise their sword for another strike.
Crashing into the undead like a break water dam, they instantly slithered around them, coiling around their bodies
The zombies and undead archers flanking the Giant Skeletons tried to harm the large snakes only to have all their means helplessly bounce off of their red and green scales.
The sound of bones cracking resounded ruthlessly across the floating islands as the snakes unhinged their jaws and tried to bite off the skulls of the skeletons that they were coiled around.
Not going down with a fight, although most of the giant skeletons had their heads bitten off causing their bodies to crumble helplessly under the constricting bodies of the snakes, quite a few of them were able to break free and counterattack.
Stabbing their swords deep into the necks of the snakes, they instantly began to writhe in pain.
It was a bloody battle.
Sort of.
Snakes shedding their lifeblood, the undead continuously aimed to rid the snakes of their life.
Guttural roars met visceral hisses as undead met life.
Then the second wave of reinforcements came from both sides.
'I thought I just left you.'
Raising an eyebrow, I hid in my little alcove, completely content in watching this oscar worthy war in front of me.
That wasn't to say I wasn't surprised when the pink grenadiers began to lob explosives into the battlefields like cannons while flanked by the white robed and red horned inquisitors.
Waving their hands majestically, a bolt of purple light struck the snakes trying to devour the bone giants as more and more undead continued to rise out from within the islands to meet the snakes.
And the snakes, not one to be outdone revealed their own second wave filled with reinforcements.
Honestly, I should've expected it of a religion that worshipped snakes and built monuments to enshrine them, but it was surprising to see men and women to start pouring out of the sword shaped building.
Especially when they moved in the same way as the first wave of snakes.
Gliding across the bridge made of miniature snakes, they waved their javelins and threw them at the backline, piercing the line of shieldbearers straight through.
And although they had the lower half of a snake, they somehow were able to coil their body like a spring and leap over their normal giant snake brethren, retrieving the previously thrown javelins as they started to massacre the backline.
Black hood shaking on their shoulders, the three glowing purple eyes in their skull blinked as they coldly assessed the battlefield and instantly began to fight.
And fight they did.
I was no snake man or whatever they were called,
+Lamia+
But I could appreciate a good fighter when I saw one.
Swinging their tail, the waist width bodypart instantly turned into a wrecking ball as their tails whipped at the undead archers, turning them into bone meal.
Twisting their body unnaturally, they were able to sink and rise whenever needed as they stabbed and spun the tip of the javelin at the numerous undead.
Gutting numerous zombies like fish, the javelins turned into skewers as bodies began to stack on its sharp edge.
Letting out a chorus of hisses, it didn't take a genius to know that the fight was in favor of the purple eyed snakes that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
'I guess I have to reevaluate.'
Staring at the snakes in a new light, they clearly didn't succumb to the malaise and instead fought it off.
I may not know how many times they have repeated these very actions, but it definitely was to the point that they weren't dying of infection like I had intially thought.
'The problem is what those purple eyes mean.'
Since orange eyes seemed to equate to infection by malaise, I wondered what purple eyes meant, snake transformation?
Of course, I wasn't going to stick long enough to experiment.
Sneaking out of the cubby hole formed from an altar, the battle which was already leaning in the snakes favor instantly became a guarantee as those red crows began to fly out of nowhere.
Impacting the few undead such as the inquisitors and the Giant Skeletons still fighting, the brief loss of balance spelled their doom as numerous javelins flew from all over and stabbed them
'Now to make my getaway.'
Slinking away like an egyptian hieroglyph on those pyramids, I seemed to forget one crucial detail.
Feeling a chill on the back of my neck, I glanced backwards and was able to appreciate the sight of a dozen cold blooded snake people turning all thirty six of their eyes to me.
"..."
"..."
A tense silence fell over us as the dozen snake people slowly retrieved their javelins from the pile of writhing snakes happily eating the corpses with their unhinged jaws.
"Can you pretend that you never saw me?"
"HISSSS!!"
"I'll take that as a no."
Instantly transitioning into a dash, I noted that I shouldn't pull this move in a place that was clearly not the pyramids.
+++
Please note that my family is going through a rough time so I may not be able to upload as consistently, thank you