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'It would be too difficult to explain,' said Rezolo. 'Just prepare yourself. Either they will leave us alone, or this will be one of the worst fights you ever experience.'

Loren gave a wide-eyed frown as he kept scanning the horizon. The half-rotted soldiers were close enough now for the other servants on patrol to begin noticing the abnormalities about them. The confusion in the air spiked to an almost palpable degree, and then--

The riders vanished.

Like smoke. They disappeared into swirling plumes of black.

Loren wanted to ask Rezolo for answers again, but he didn't get the chance before the riders reappeared.

Right next to him.

And in front of him. And already passing him by. They were mid-stride, running through the encampment--through tables and chairs and tents and walls. Even through people.

One passed right through Loren, too, and as it did, he felt a biting shiver across his entire body. And the smell. Rotten flesh mixed with ash. He might've vomited if he hadn't already smelled the like several times before in his life.

He didn't understand in the slightest. Were they incorporeal like reapers? They could phase through objects undeterred, but that feeling just now hadn't been the same as when a reaper passed through his body. Not at all.

Panicked shouts arose throughout the camp, and he could see his fellow servants lashing out at the riders, trying to attack them and failing. Nothing was landing. Like throwing rocks at smoke.

And there were so many of them. They just kept rushing past. Hundreds. Maybe thousands, even.

Until, just as quickly as they had arrived, they were gone.

Loren, along with everyone else, was left looking around, dumbstruck.

What the hell had just happened?

It was all the more confounding, because he couldn't see any obvious damage that had been done to the camp, either. The riders had surged through it like a crashing wave, the countless hooves creating almost that exact sound.

And yet, as Loren inspected his surroundings, nothing seemed disturbed. Everything was just the same as before the riders arrived.