Kevin McLaughlin

Chapter 133 - Homecoming

Coming home felt good.

It was nice to see our growing walls, even at a distance! They were proceeding well. The basic structure of the inner wall was already in place, with steady construction continuing there to bring them higher still. Those inner walls would be our final bastion. They surrounded all of the main buildings of the farm proper. We had a large farmhouse, a big collec...

Chapter 132 - Masters of the Country Club

I gave a small shrug. “I’m in worse shape on that score than Turner is for his, unfortunately. We’ve been wholly focused on getting walls up around the farm and bringing in supplies from the mall, now that it’s clear of enemies. In fact, we’re actually tearing the mall down, chunk by chunk, as a source of raw materials for our walls. We’re clearing out most of the stuff from ...

Chapter 131 - Military Intelligence

I eyed Turner carefully. He looked impeccable in his military uniform, which was a stark contrast to myself; I was still wearing the body armor I used whenever I was traveling outside the farm. I’d had it repaired and reinforced after taking a couple of near-mortal injuries during the fight against the Forgotten King. It wouldn’t be as easy to punch through as it had been. Carver was...

Chapter 130 - Necromancer’s Fortress

It wasn’t long before we came into sight of Carver’s fortress. I had to admit that even from a distance his place was a hell of a lot more impressive than mine, at least so far. Of course, he’d been at it longer, but holy hell, he had a damned castle in the middle of downtown Burlington. That was gonna be tough to beat.

He’d cleared away all the nearby houses,...

Chapter 129 - Raids and Rumors

One of the pack of burly, pig-faced humanoids rushed me, and I grinned in anticipation. My sword flickered in the sunlight as I dashed toward him. He was tier five—no easy foe, this one. But I was confident anyway. I’d faced much stronger opponents than he and won. One on one, these fights weren’t difficult. It was the fact that these raids always involved a lot more ...

Chapter 128 - New Friends and Foes

(This is the final chapter for book 2! I should have the beginning of book one ready for you on Monday, so stay tuned!)

We rose early the next day and prepared to march on the Guard base. I didn’t know what we were going to find when we got there, or what sort of welcome we were going to receive, so I pretty much went all out on the pageantry of the moment.

I’d ...

Chapter 127 - Celebrations

(One more chapter for this book, after this, and then we'll be moving on to book three next week!)

It ended up being an extra day before we could get back out to the Guard base, because Patches showed back up the morning we’d intended to leave. He’d been gone most of forty-eight hours, off to round up more of his people. He arrived back at the farm a few hours after d...

Chapter 126 - Tier Ten

(One, maybe two more chapters left of book two after this one. I suspect I will wrap book two this week, and then we'll be moving ahead with book three's adventures starting next week! I hope everyone has enjoyed how this one is concluding. :))

The first morning after setting up my new Domain went by pretty quickly, mostly because there was so much to be done tha...

Chapter 125 - A Kingdom of Her Own

I knelt there, staring at the Forgotten King’s corpse for a long moment. I half expected him to get back up and start fighting again. You know, that moment at the end of a horror movie where everyone thinks the monster is dead, but then it comes back to life? Yeah, that was sort of what I was figuring would happen. But it didn’t. There was no more movement, no sudden la...

Chapter 124 - Kingbreaker

Lyonius didn’t hesitate. The moment I leapt forward with that stolen greatsword in hand, he charged to meet me, his own blade swinging into a ready position. The flames of his eyes brightened as he closed the gap between us, casting flickers of cold light across the bloodstained field.

Our swords clashed mid-charge with a shockwave of force that rang through my arms and echoe...

Chapter 123 - Unexpected Ally

I didn’t know where that blast of energy had come from, but I wasn’t in any position to look a gift horse in the mouth! The bolt of black light slammed into Lyonius, knocking him away from me. He sailed briefly through the air before crashing back to the earth a dozen feet away, bouncing twice before he came to rest.

What spell was that? I had no idea, but I defin...

Little Chapter Delay

Hey folks! I've been at a conference all week, and I've managed to get a chapter each day anyway, but things got too hectic today and I'm wiped - I'm not going to be able to finish the chapter today like I'd planned. I WILL get it finished and out to you tomorrow. Sorry about the day of delay in finding out what happens next! I know you're excited to see the following scenes, but I don't want t...

Chapter 122 - Shadow Bolt

Gideon cursed under his breath. The trip was taking too damned long. Driving from the lake shore to the mall was a matter of ten minutes, maybe fifteen on a bad day, back before the Event screwed up everything.

Now, it was an hour’s walk.

His people were in good shape and making excellent time, but it wasn’t good enough. They were near enough now that they could hear the ...

Chapter 121 - Defiance

No shit, there I was…

Always wanted to start a story like that. This feels like one where it works, right? The Forgotten King was on his horse, bearing down on me, sword in hand, ready to cut me apart. His wraiths were soaring around overhead, so it wasn’t like I could just escape into the air. He’d thought of that, cut me off from that avenue of escape.

I briefly consi...

Chapter 120 - The Forgotten King

We were deep in the shit now. There was no doubt in my mind that the being riding toward us was the big bad, the leader of the zombie horde and ruler of the Domain based at the mall. What, precisely, it was, I didn’t know, but the power radiating from this being was palpable even at a distance.

Row after row of zombies parted for his horse, while the remainder of the horde stayed...

Chapter 119 - A Figure Steeped In Shadow

The pressure on my mind grew more intense by the moment. The entity challenging me for Control of my undead was strong, enormously so, and as sweat trickled down my forehead I realized I might not be able to prevent it from capturing my minions. If it could wrest control of my undead away, we were all in a lot of trouble. My creatures represented about a third of our force.

One of ...

Chapter 118 - Battle of Wills

When I dropped out of the sky directly in front of the oncoming zombie horde, I wasn't sure what was going to happen. Would they stop? Keep coming? I had no way to know. There wasn't time to think about it, either. I knew my people needed time, and the only way they were going to get it was if I bought them some.

A human army might have stopped in its tracks. A zombie army? As it t...

Chapter 117 - A Mystery, And Dangerous

Gideon jumped over the side of the boat as it cruised into the dock. His booted feet landed firmly on the wooden planks with a hard thud. It was good to be back on land—well, near enough to land, anyway. He’d never been much of a seaman, although you couldn’t live in Burlington as long as he had without spending at least some time on the water. It just wasn’t his preference.

Chapter 116 - Out Of Time

The enemy gave us almost a full hour to prepare before they came after us. I was surprised, because I figured they’d charge across the road much sooner, but instead they waited until literally all of the sunset was gone, not even a hint of pink remaining in the sky. Only then did they begin their approach.

It was more than I possibly could have hoped for. The extra time was a god...

Chapter 115 - A Fighting Chance

I raced Sue over to where the others were already forming up defensive lines in the fields between the mall and farm. The place still looked mostly intact. There were a lot of broken windows and some other minor damage, but only one of the buildings was in ruins; the northernmost barn had burned down, leaving only scorched timbers behind.

We dismounted, Kara sliding down next to me...

Chapter 114 - Food Courts Are The Pits

Back during round one with the wraiths, I’d tried to go one on one and seriously gotten the bad end of the deal. I’d almost died. If it hadn’t been for my friends, I probably would have.

Round two, no more miss nice guy. Those wraiths were absolutely deadly, so I wasn’t mucking around with them anymore. As I streaked across the passage like a dark comet, I hammered one with...

Chapter 113 - That’s Why I Worry!

We set about gathering the stones from the dead zombies. There were a lot of dead zombies, so it took us a little while, but Farnsworth and Kara were adamant it was worth the time cost, and even Alfred chimed in to agree with them. I didn’t have a lot of options after that.

While we gathered stones, Henry went about casting healing magic on everyone who’d been inj...

Chapter 112 - Men Like You

Gideon made his way back down to the waterfront. The ruins of the Echo Center still smoked from his attack. The undead rats had done their job perfectly, spreading out around the building before deliberately smashing the bottle-bombs tied to their backs. Once one went off, that was the signal for all the others to do likewise, and the resulting explosions had torn the building to shreds....

Chapter 111 - My Turn!

The wraith’s grip tightened on my neck, but that wasn’t the worst of it. His eyes flashed with brilliant green light, and behind him four zombies turned toward us, mouths open as they approached. I realized that he intended to make good on his promise. He wasn’t going to kill me—he’d have his zombies finish me off, which would turn me into a zombie.

My concentration was a...

Chapter 110 - And Now, You Die

It took some doing to get Sue out of the Target and into the main hallways of the mall itself. The doorways were simply too small, so I had my dinosaur blast the metal and glass framing above them, blowing the whole thing out. The resulting passage was big enough to accommodate Sue, just barely.

As soon as Sue stepped through the gap, that’s when they hit us again. Tons of undead...

Chapter 109 - Beachhead

Farnsworth had talked me into doing a quick scouting loop around the mall, using Sue to expedite the process. Kara stayed behind to help keep things organized with the ratkin; they liked her almost as much as they liked me, and even the avians seemed to understand she was important to me, and therefore someone to listen to.

We set off at Sue’s best sprint, racing across the road ...

Chapter 108 - A Real Strength

Now that we had tacit approval from the avians, we were able to cut directly past the old airport where they lived, rather than going all the way south around it. That would shave a good hour off our trip, so it was worth doing. We slipped out through the airport gate and continued on our way, using White Street toward the mall. The road would let us out on Route 2 just a short distance ...

Chapter 107 - Allies

We made our way south as rapidly as everyone could move, pushing steadily along the open space of the runways. I had to set Sue’s pace down a few notches from max, because I was mad enough to go racing off and leave everyone behind if I wasn’t careful.

Holy shit, had that man pissed me off something fierce.

Turner wasn’t wholly in the wrong, and I knew that. Early on, u...

Chapter 106 - Built On Honesty

Turner’s face went red at my words, and for a moment I had this idea he was just going to throw down with me, right there and then. There was something in his look, a mixture of rage and barely controlled fear, that made me reach for my magic, ready for whatever was coming next.

Then Sue’s head raised and the dinosaur gave a low-powered roar. Not the magical one that sent enemi...

Chapter 105 - Lessons in Leadership

The cheering picked up as we approached, and I grinned in spite of the circumstances. What can I say? It was nice to be appreciated! And they were cheering really loud. Sue was the belle of the ball around these parts, and least for today.

The gates were already opening as we approached them, which was nice. I had worried they might be iffy about allowing such a large...