Everyone present seemed small before the new arrival, garbed from head to toe in haphazardly sewn and tied together fabric, horrendously long hands and fingers emitting cracking noises with every motion, a low, guttural sigh escaping the creature's mouth, pulling away at the clothes wrapped around the head, frozen fog coating the air expelled.
"Here… I… Am…" speaking each word carefully, the being that had just dropped through the ceiling and crashed against the floor was none other than the one who stalked the undead army in the mountains since the very first day of their arrival, they had once sent it running with a mere volley of projectiles heated to incandescence, but right now, he had just enduring a much harsher and compressed volley with nothing, he had just stood in the way, no arms had been risen in defence.
The cold emitted from his body was so strong that it snuffed any flame that tried sprouting into existence upon the fabric, soon enough, the bolts and arrows embedded into the flesh lost their incandescence.
The undeads weren't the only ones who had not seen this coming, Jir was surprised, shocked even.
"Jarl?" he said in a daze, the humongous accursed, around three meters in height, turned his neck to look at the paladin, and nodded, as though acknowledging him.
Then, the accursed moved.
All of the monastery rumbled as though under assault, the densely packed snow beneath his feet was force into an even more condensed state, this sudden burst of speed placed the accursed right in front of the axe-wielding undead knight, and without hesitating, the accursed kicked the corpse straight a wall, his tongue shaking like that of a snake in displeasure.
His target had somehow had the time to raise their guard in time, moreover, that little grey knight, with some sort of beast pelt wrapped around their waist was an awful lot more durable than expected, the accursed's foot was tingling, like a regular person who had the misfortune of hitting a furniture's corner.
Pumping his chest, the monster that was apparently called Jarl let out a blood-curdling howl that echoed throughout the whole of the monastery, the rather unpleasant sound wave being of no effect upon the undead mass who was already ready to fire another volley at him.
Meanwhile, Jir was debating what to do, he had believed that Jarl would not be showing up at all, as he had not heeded the pope's orders and not done anything to stop the undead from massacring the wandering accursed and taking over the hidden villages, but it seemed like the paladin had been mistaken, only, that he had no clue how to fight side-by-side with Jarl.
As the great accursed moved again, he targeted the knight holding a warhammer, fist and hammerhead meeting as the undead, just like the one before, proved capable of either reading the living's intentions, or clearly not being that impressed by his speed.
Indeed, an undead's ability to perceive the world was always flawless, especially to undeads of the current empire who existed in times of reign for their kind, refined death force permeated their every bones and bits of decayed flesh, all of their deathly aspects were at their best possible.
As such, even if the undead in question wasn't faster than the great accursed, they could take in information and clearly see moving objects of impressive speed, with this advantage, it gave the impression that the knights were matching with the accursed's swiftness.
A loud crack reverberated, the forced of the colliding strikes was so potent that even the undead's grasp wasn't enough and the weapon in their hands was flung back, whilst the living recoiled and hissed at his broken fingers, but most importantly, at the black arcs of lightning that had coursed through at the same time, small patches of necrosis were forming upon his skin, which was especially bad as he really needed to keep his flesh intact to get some use out of his hand now that several bones were broken.
As followers of Alkayne, many had obviously dabbled in the sorceries adapted from their lord's innate ability, it was obviously not nearly as potent or versatile as what it had been inspired from however, sorcery was much more rigid than an innate ability, still, the damage inflicted wasn't anything to laugh about, if stricken too many times, the accursed would probably lose control of a limb.
Jarl took a few steps back, further away, the axe-wielding knight landed on the ground, already on the way to rejoin the fight.
'I was correct, they had more tricks up their sleeves, they just didn't have to use them when it was just me alone…' Jir breathed out, and the cold steel that covered his body groaned, he hadn't wanted to use the divine body before as it would have only made his situation worse, but with assistance from someone as resilient as Jarl, he decided to go for it.
Unlike Julo, whose divine body was limited to his right arm, his entire body was affected, his pale skin took on a greyish complex, a layer of fat manifesting all over, his now flexible skin was stretch out the armour fell off, no longer capable of holding on as the paladin become even taller than Jarl, the lower portion of his face splitting into two like an insect's mandibles, a tail with two parallel claw-like protuberances, their pointy tips arching and pointing toward another as a strange maw opened and close in between them.
Like the tail was alive, it bent around over the living's shoulders and looked at its surroundings, or so it seemed, but the lack of eyes made that possibility seem thin.
Turned into a monstrosity even worse than Jarl, Jir still remained hidden from the ranged undeads, the problem with this form was the extra fat it caused his body to produce, it was so thick and resilient that pretty all types of physical damage would fall short against it, only, that as a kalt, Jir knew very well that fat burned very well, meaning that despite the enormous strength and power he earned, one good hit from the undead with their searing weapons and he would turn into a ball of flame.
But since he had assistance now, and since the situation was already a losing battle anyways, he might as well turn himself into a glass cannon and attempt to cause as much damage as possible.
Without hesitation, using Jarl as a cover, he crouched and weaved around, his tail lashing out toward the nearest undead, which was the one with the warhammer again, but like before, the shield-bearer step forward, the shape of his tail would allow him to seize that shield for certain however.
The instant his claw-like appendages touched the shield, however, the paladin pulled back, a small arc of dark lightning lingering on.
'Their kits are much too advanced compared to ours…'
Both the cursed livings seemed to think the same thing, the undead didn't even need to go all out to suppress them and force their enemies to focus solely on defending themselves.
As Jir tried thinking about a plan, a small, cone-shaped figure landed on top of Jarl's head, and both suddenly disappeared as black feathers flew everywhere.
'I shouldn't have used the divine body…'
The paladin had no choice but to run right through a nearby wall to take cover.