The Advocate delivered his speech, or his perspective, to be more precise, and he didn't care to hear Clayton's answer. He said what he had to say, and then he walked back towards the Followers of Thaleena.
In a matter of five minutes, the Advocate then explained to the followers the offer that Clayton was giving them.
For most of the Followers, this was an offer of a lifetime without a doubt, as they were given an option to fight the same Kingdom that had ruined so many of their lives. Considering the fact that they also knew that Clayton's offer wasn't a mere bluff, as they saw him fight, and saw him raise the dead too, Clayton figured that a lot of the followers were going to join him, and trot the 'Path of Doom' along with him.
He had a great goal, and had great advantages to back him up on his goal. He was no fool, and he wasn't barking just for the sake of barking. Under the right condition, he could challenge the Kingdom in its entirety!
For that matter, he was confident that all of the twenty-something surviving Followers were going to join him, and follow him, for e a change, rather than the path of forgiveness. He watched them from afar, but he couldn't make up what they were saying.
As the group approached him moments later, he greeted them with a wide smile, certain that they would join him, but then he was shocked to see that most of the followers walked right past him! They trampled the many brittle skeletons across the ground, and headed towards the rocky tip of the mountain.
They were silent, and some of them nodded at him as they passed by, greeting him, but overall, their silence itself was their answer. Most of them did not wish to join him.
The Advocate of Thaleena was done talking to him as well, and he didn't mean to be rude, but he figured that they said their goodbyes already.
"That's odd…" He muttered, his voice low. "What's the matter? They can't be that scared of the Kingdom, can they? They went toe-to-damn-toe with an army a moment ago… what changed?"
Out of that entire group of bald-headed followers, only two of them stopped, and silently expressed their wish to join him.
They joined the chapel, and adopted the Path of Forgiveness about two months ago, a few days apart from one another, so he didn't know them quite well. All he knew was their names, Rufus and Lara.
Rufus saw the bewilderment in Clayton's eyes as the rest of the Followers walked away. He was aware of the confusion, so he quit being silent, and shared his two coins on the matter.
"They're scared of you, sir," Rufus said, "But you're not going to kill them, are you?"
"What? No…" He jerked his head back, and stopped staring at the group. "I'm just surprised, that's all. I expected all of them to join me, but… why would they be scared of me, the man who saved their lives today?"
"Playing around with the undead tends to scare most people, I suppose?" Rufus said. "You have a handful of undead soldiers following you around, sir, and if you ask me, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the Followers pissed their pants as they passed by you."
"Odd… I've known some of them for years, called them my friends, so I'm having a hard time accepting that they didn't join me." He sighed, "Well, they can follow whatever path they choose. I just hope they don't end up killing themselves."
As the Followers of Thaleena headed towards the top of the mountain, Clayton and his new acquaintances stopped paying attention to them, and spent some time getting to know each other instead.
After all, they only knew each other for two months, and likewise, Clayton was unaware of what magical branch these two people belonged to. He figured that their branch leaned towards the dark arts, either that or their wounds were too fresh, since they hadn't had enough time to practice forgiveness of the enemy before the chapel was burned to the ground. He believed that the latter was the leading reason why these two chose to join him.
Rufus was a chatty man, and he appeared intelligent, or at least, whatever he said through his many rambling strings of sentences didn't sound like the words of a fool. He was thirty years old at most, tall, and with some muscle on him, and he was quite confrontive. He wasn't scared to share his thoughts, or ideals, which was what might have gotten him in trouble to begin with.
"Forgiveness is for the weak, sir," Rufus said, "I only came up here so I could avoid the King's Guard. There is a prize on my head that has been following me through three Kingdoms."
"Oh?" Clayton raised his head, "Why? What did you do?"
"Grave robbing," Rufus admitted directly, "I'm a Necromancer, just like you… although, you're obviously a lot more skilled than I am. I can raise ten of the undead at most, you can raise hundreds."
"That's because I'm not a Necromancer," He followed along, "I'm a Fleshmancer. I can take the life of the living before they even get the chance to blink."
"Never heard of Fleshmancers before," Rufus stroked the beard stub on his chin, "Perhaps Fleshmancers are just better Necromancers? I wouldn't know, sir."
"It's new to me as well," He admitted, "I've read about it a little bit, but I'm far from understanding my abilities."
Clayton wanted to keep his cards close to the chest. He didn't know these people long enough, after all, so he didn't want to admit that he was not in fact directly involved in raising the dead. He didn't want to admit that there was a 'system' in his head, which granted him such abilities, because he didn't want to be seen as a madman, not more than he already was, at least.
There was a distinction between the delicate details of blood-thirsty craze, and plain craze itself. He'd rather be seen as the former.
Anyway, as they spoke, he noticed that Lara, the equally bald lady who had joined him in the Path of Doom, remained silent. She hadn't spoken a single word yet, and she seemed nervous, scared perhaps.
Clayton did not like this. He was old enough to be bothered when younger people kept to themselves, to a fault, so he looked at her for a moment, and prompted her to speak.
He asked, "We never formally spoke. What branch of magic do you belong to, Lara? What can you do?"