Every single Exorcist, registered or not, always brought a Spirit Talisman with them.

It was simply a matter of necessity.

A battle against strong Ghosts—with their Minor or Major Presence made it a requirement for Exorcists to always have a Spirit Talisman on them, or else it would be the same as putting themselves at a severe disadvantage going into the fight.

But another purpose for this was to prevent them from losing their sanity.

Mana descended from the intangible dimension.

It was alien to the tangible dimension, so there are side effects for native people to use it.

Exorcists who used that mana to fight Ghosts are putting themselves at an immense risk.

Excessive usage of mana would cause immense strain on the Exorcist's mind—and cause them to easily lose their sanity. Having an unstable mental state, like depression or even exhaustion, would also cause a similar effect.

Against a strong Ghost, an Exorcist would rapidly lose their sanity by simply being near it.

This is especially true for lower-ranking Exorcists.

So, naturally, wearing a Spirit Talisman to strengthen their minds is basically a must.

After all, once their minds couldn't handle the pressure anymore, it would already be too late.

Once that happened, their mana would turn into poison.

It rotted the Exorcist from the inside and turned them into a Zombie.

The process of turning into a Zombie is simply called a Zombification—and it's a gradual process, not an instantaneous one. And most of the time, the Exorcist who experienced this didn't even realize what was happening until it was already too late.

Since the process was gradual, it was hard for the Exorcist to detect it.

Like a frog not knowing that the water it was in was gradually rising to a boiling point.

Most of the time, the people around spotted the changes first.

Based on the established guide, there are several stages of the Zombification process.

And the first one is a shift in personality.

Next one was the blackening of the Mana Veins, first around the chest area.

The Zombification process is the most studied process as it was directly tied to humanity's survival, so there are cures out there as long as the victim hasn't reached the final stages. But the resources to do so were far beyond what a normal person could come up with.

It was extremely expensive as the ingredients to make the cure are rare.

And without that cure, only strong Exorcists could help reverse the Zombification process.

Unfortunately, there was none right now who possessed that strength.

Kaelyn blinked her eyes and noticed the black veins peeking from Zayne's collar.

He was well in the second stage.

Realizing what was going on, Kaelyn clenched her fists hard as she should've seen this sooner.

For days that bled into nights, her group had been in relentless flight—their pace broken only by sudden, bloody ambushes. Every Exorcist under her command was frayed to the breaking point—their strength and spirit eroded by a continuous grind of battle and survival.

A deep, bone-weary exhaustion had settled into them all.

Not to mention the stress.

And Zayne was at the forefront of it all.

Kaelyn failed to realize that not everyone was as strong as her.

He was the one leading and warding off the assassination attempts.

And added to the humiliation he endured against Deklan, his mind simply collapsed.

Oblivious to what Kaelyn was thinking right now, Zayne reached the cowering survivors and raised his sword overhead. A nasty grin crossed his lips as his pupils turned white—like he was already dead, "If you're angry, blame your leader for not being able to protect you. Now die!"

Clang!

Just as the sword arced down, it stopped mid-slash.

Kaelyn intercepted the sword with her katana, staring at Zayne reluctantly.

Now that she was here, she couldn't stand by and watch Zayne kill more innocent people.

Her mouth opened to say something, perhaps even try to snap him out of this condition he was in.

After all, he was almost like a family to her.

But at the same time, her eyes caught two figures appearing from around the corner.

Deklan and Marsha.

It was shocking to see them, especially Deklan.

He was supposed to be a mangled corpse by now, dead, yet there he stood, not twenty paces away.

Upon emerging from around the corner, he stopped, staring at Zayne and his bloody sword first, then at Kaelyn. Both of his eyes were widening in stunned disbelief. Just like Kaelyn did earlier, he was rooted in her spot at the sight.

From his face alone, it was clear that he was struggling to process what he was seeing.

At the sight of them, all hesitation evaporated from Kaelyn's system.

She knew that she was given a choice right now, and the choice she made would reflect what was going to happen in the next ten minutes. Kaelyn gripped the handle of her katana harder, and while Zayne was distracted, she made her move.

Swish!

In one, gentle stroke, Kaelyn slitted Zayne's throat all the way to the major arteries.

Blood immediately sprayed from the cut.

Zayne's eyes widened; he stared at Kaelyn in disbelief as he grabbed his neck, trying to stop the blood.

Gritting his teeth, eyes bulging with anger and the sword clenched in a white-knuckled grip, he took a single, shaking step toward Kaelyn. He wanted to attack her—but he did not manage to take the second step as his legs buckled.

He dropped to his knees.

A wet, choking gurgle escaped him before he collapsed sideways, the sword slipping from his grasp.

The thudding sound of Zayne's body collapsing to the ground was loud.

Kaelyn didn't even turn around to look; she kept her gaze toward Deklan and Marsha—as she sheathed her katana.

And the moment she did that, Marsha snapped out of her daze.

Tears blurred the horrific tally before her—dozens of corpses, still and silent, on a pool of blood. Nearly half of the people are gone, slaughtered while she and Deklan were away dealing with the Alpha Ghost that threatened their safety.

A sob tore from her chest, raw and wrenching.

She clapped both hands over her mouth, as if to cage the scream, but a fractured whimper escaped.

Her tear-filled eyes could only stare ahead, wide with a disbelieving, devastating horror.

'I saw him earlier,' She thought inside, her body trembling uncontrollably. 'I saw him, and yet I…'

Marsha felt sick, like she was on the verge of throwing up.

Even though he saw that man earlier with her own two eyes, she dismissed it, thinking that he was there because of the commotion. But no… he was there to slaughter the people. The red tower only blocked Ghosts from entering.

It doesn't block humans, and now, half of the people are dead.

On the other hand, Deklan's expression turned ashen.

He stared at Kaelyn, who couldn't meet his eyes, and then raised a foot to take a step.

And when his foot touched the ground, he moved.

Deklan dashed and slammed into Kaelyn, tackling her—one hand locking around her throat tightly. The impact drove her back into the wall of a house with a brutal crack, forcing a burst of air and spittle out of her mouth.

He held her there, pinned, his grip crushing her windpipe.

Even though he was battered and exhausted earlier, now that he had gotten his physical body back through the repair, he was back to full strength again. It took time to repair his body, a long time if this was a battle, but the process was already finished.

On the contrary, Kaelyn was still wounded from saving him earlier.

Now, she was not at the same level as Deklan.

"It wasn't her!" One of the Exorcists screamed, voice ragged. "Zayne turned! It wasn't her fault!"

Kaelyn's vision swam, darkening at the edges as she fought for air, as Deklan's hand was squeezing hard around her neck, but she still gave a signal for the Exorcist to stand down with her hand. Doing or even saying anything more right now would only make things worse.

"What did he mean by that?" Deklan asked in a whisper.

"Zombie…" Kaelyn said through a choked throat. "He turned into a Zombie…"

For a few more seconds, Deklan kept her there, studying her expression to see if she was lying.

And when she was on the brink of passing out, he let go.

She slid down to the ground, coughing severely as she reached for her neck.

Deklan turned his attention towards Zayne's corpse on the side, hesitating for a second before he finally approached. He went down on one knee and flipped Zayne's body before touching it to scan the corpse with the system.

…

[Zayne Douglas (Zombified)]

Rank: 2-star Bronze

Poten…

…

Just as Kaelyn said, Zayne has turned into a Zombie based on the brackets beside his name.

She wasn't lying.

Even from the scene when he first arrived, it was obvious—that Kaelyn wasn't the one who killed these innocent people. On the contrary, she was the one—who was preventing more from being killed. Zayne was the culprit.

He knew that.

Additionally, there was simply not much time for her to do this since she was with him earlier.

She probably came back to see this… Damn it.

Deklan let out a deep sigh as he felt like he was to blame for this.

I'm the one who taunted him. This is my mistake… Just like what Paul said, my behavior hurt others.

He got carried away when he encountered Zayne back then, and his past version slipped out—causing yet another trouble. Perhaps—had he not taunted as much as he did, Zayne wouldn't have come here to seek vengeance.

Not to mention, it was also he who lured the Alpha Ghost to the hamlet.

Deklan tilted his head down as he slowly came to realize that today was mostly his fault.

Slowly, he turned to Marsha in the distance.

She was still crying profusely, kneeling weakly on the ground while covering her face with her hands.

At the moment, she was unable to look at the bloody scene.

And the sight of her wailing like she had lost a part of herself was heartbreaking to watch.

It must've been extremely hard for her to realize what had happened.

Deklan approached her and embraced her gently, giving her the comfort she desperately needed.

For a good moment, she cried hard—burying her face on his chest.

Even though the day was won as the hamlet survived, it doesn't feel like a win as the loss was too much for the hamlet to bear. Losing half of their population is detrimental, especially seeing that most of the ones who died are the men.

Probably because they tried to stop Zayne but ultimately failed.

No normal person can fight a full-fledged Exorcist.

Haah… Damn it.

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