“Excuse me?!” Balthazar excimed. “You wao kill someone for you?”

  “Well, when I say ‘kill’ I simply mean kill again,” said the ghost floating in front of the crab.

  “What?!”

  “Also, the someone I wish you to kill again is me. In a way.”

  “I am so fused right now…”

  “Allow me to expin,” the ethereal spirit said. “My name is Sir Edmund Aucir Alrd, and I was on advisor of the court. Sadly, I perished some time ago in a pot too far from here.”

  His levitating form ale white with faint hints of a light blue hue whenever he moved. Despite being incorporeal and very much dead, the ghost was wearing what clearly used to be exquisite travel robes. As for the shoes, Balthazar could not tell, as his translut form faded away below the knees, into a trickle of spectral mist.

  “My… dolences?” said the mert. “Is that even the right thing to say in this situation?”

  “Thank you. They are appreciated heless.”

  “Well, I’m Balthazar,” the crab said. “And those two shy ones back there are Druma and Blue.”

  The phantom bowed. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

  “So, what, you’re looking for revenge on whoever killed you, or something?” the puzzled mert asked.

  “No, certainly not something so mundane as petty vengeance,” Sir Edmund said. “My demise was my own careless doing. I was traveling these winding roads, parched, and upon finding a spring fountain, I walked up to it too hastily, slipped o stone, and hit my head on a rock.”

  “Ouch,” Balthazar said with a wince. “Should have brought some Potions of Hydration with you.”

  “Pardon me?” said the ghost.

  “Never mind that,” the crab said dismissively. “This is all very tragic, but if you already died, why and how would you want to be killed again?”

  “Ah,” sighed the spirit, his floating form slumping down slightly, “As, if only that rock had been the end of me. But it was not fated to be. I found myself in this form, a ghastly vestige of the man I once was, likely uo move on from this world due to the sudden and shog nature of my untimely death. And probably also because I had left far too mufinished business in my previous life.”

  The crab nodded. “Oh yes, that would do it. Probably some unfulfilled promise, or a debt of honor? Perhaps revenge? Or maybe even unfessed love?”

  “No. I just had these tomes I checked out from the library’s archives that I never returned.”

  Balthazar stared at the phantom, unblinking. “Seriously?”

  “I dread to imagihe fihey must have incurred at this point,” Sir Edmund said, a quick shiver running down his immaterial body. “Regardless, that is not a relevaail to my present drum. As if me perishing in su embarrassing manner and then being an apparition haunting the side of a road was not enough misfortune already, something even worse happened.”

  “Well, go on, tell me. I’m ied in your tale now,” said the mert, pnting the bottom of his shell down on the ground aing his on a cw. His two panions, meanwhile, remai a safe distan the road, watg the crab chatting it up with a floating spirit as they exged gnces ned fusion.

  “For you see,” the dead nobleman tinued, “not long after my perishing, along came a man wearing dark robes and carrying a staff. He was a foul neancer, but clearly a novie at that.”

  “Oh yeah, I hate the type, they always stink to high hell,” Balthazar ented. “Heh, did he try to buy your corpse for a few gold s? That happeo me once. Well, it wasn’t my corpse, they were… uhh, actually, never mind that. Carry on with your story.”

  The ghost raised an eyebrow at the crusta, but tinued his tale.

  “I hid from his sight, unsure of how the living might reay uling form. Unfortunately, I could not do the same for my inanimate body. The wicked death-dweller saw in it an opportunity to practice his dark arts, and waving his magical staff, he cast some intation upon my remains.”

  “Damn,” the listening crab said. “What’s with neancers and never asking for sent before raising the dead?”

  “Indeed,” said Sir Edmund, with a weary nod. “I watched on, aghast, as my physical form was magically lifted from its resting pce, and puppeteered into some unholy mockery of life.”

  Balthazar nodded in agreement. “Yeah, exactly. So rude. Anyway, what then?”

  “The neancer was quite pleased with himself and his foul work,” the undead storyteller tinued. “He had gotten himself a zombie follower. It was uny and uling, to watch my own self standing there, gawking, drooling, half rotted. Not a thought or memory behind his eyes. A most abysmal sight to behold. And what’s worse, my robes were ripped on the sleeves.”

  “Oh yes, terrible,” the crab said with a roll of his eyes. “Death is no excuse to not look presentable.”

  “Precisely!” Sir Edmund excimed. “I am so gd you uand.”

  “So what then? The neancer went on to cause some trouble with your body, and now you want him killed for it?”

  “Oh, no, not at all,” the ghost quickly said. “The neancer is also very much dead. He was so thrilled with his successful reanimation that he slipped on the same wet stohe fountain and broke his ne the fall.”

  “Gee, remio watch my step if I ever go hat spring,” Balthazar said. “Well, where’s his ghost? I don’t see any other semi-transparent floaters around here.”

  Alrd shrugged. “I wohe same, but I suppose he had his affairs in order and simply moved on to the afterlife directly.”

  “Pfft, I guess he had no pending books to return,” said the scoffing crab. “But after all that, I still don’t get it: who the hell do you want killed?”

  “As I’ve been trying to tell you: me!” excimed the ghost. “You see, when the neanded on his neck, for whatever reason, my zombified remains remained reanimated. Now unshackled from his dark master, he has simply been wandering these woods aimlessly, chasing any living beings he enters while grunting and groaning like a mannerless lout. It’s dht embarrassing!”

  “Oooh, I finally got it!” said Balthazar. “You want someoo put down your zombie so you finally move on from this world in peace.”

  “Well, yes, that too, possibly,” Sir Edmund said. “But mainly just to avoid the risk of some of my former peers ever seeing me behaving in such a shameful manner during their travels. I would be the talk of the court fes in a most humiliating way. The embarrassment alone would kill me. Again.”

  The mert chuckled while standing back up to his feet.

  “Heh, everyone’s got their priorities,” he said, while dusting himself off. “Anyway, thanks for your fasating story. I was really eained. Good luck with your zombie problem. See ya!”

  Sir Edmund watched the crab walking back to the road with his mouth ajar.

  “Wait, you’re not going to help me?” the ghost excimed in disbelief.

  Balthazar looked back at the spirit and then around himself, before pointing a pi his own shell. “Who? Me?”

  “Yes! I just told you my whole quandary, and you’re simply going to walk away?!”

  “Of course I am!” the eight-legged traveler said. “I’m a crab, mate! Do I look like one of those silly adventurers going around solving and making everyone’s problems?”

  “I… but…” the haunted nobleman stuttered. “You were the only one so far who hasn’t simply tried to sy me! I thought you’d be willing to aid me!”

  “Nope, sorry,” the mert said while walking back to his friends. “That ain’t me.”

  “But I am—I was—a traveler in need!”

  “Sucks for you, but I got things to do, pces to be, and no opposable thumbs.”

  “If you do not help me, how will I ever rid myself of my foul former self?!”

  “Sounds like a you problem. I’m sure some more killing-orieraveler will e aloually.”

  Sir Edmund stared baffled at the crab for a moment, befliding over to the road and floatio him and his crew.

  “Surely you know helping me is the right thing to do?!” he said.

  “’t say that I do,” Balthazar said nontly, while adjusting the straps on his backpad sing the path up the road.

  “I would be ever grateful to you!”

  “I’m sure you would.”

  “You’d have my undying gratitude.”

  “I bet,” said the mert, while walking past the ghost.

  “I… I would tell you the location of a treasure chest I found while floating through these woods!”

  “So where was this zombie of yain?” the crab hastily said, turning back to the phantom with a snap and pg his eyestalks right up to him.

  Alrd looked at him with a mix of surprise and relief. “So you will take my quest and help me?”

  “Well, I’ll help you get rid of your problem,” said Balthazar, “but I’m not taking no quest. I’m not an adventurer.”

  “But you accept to take on this task for me… in exge for a reward, correct?”

  “Sure, if it pays, I figure something out.”

  “Yes, I’m fairly certain that still ts as taking on a quest,” said the spirit.

  The crab’s shell defted i. “Ah, damn it, you’re right…”

  [Quest accepted: Capture the zombie of Sir Edmund Aucir Alrd]

  The things I do for treasure…

  H0st