Episode 257: The Skeleton Horde (2)
Out of nowhere, a swarm of skeletons burst forth from the underbrush.
“Kiieeek!”
“Kyaaaah!”
The skeletons, now out in the open, let out triumphant cries as they charged forward. Their eerie wails momentarily froze the battlefield. Humans and dwarves alike stared in shock at the advancing skeletons.
“Skeletons? Who on earth summoned them?” Bolas, one of the Weapon Master’s apprentices, shouted in bewilderment.
“Wait, why are they coming towards us?”
Dozens of skeletons were rushing towards the human camp. Watching this, Bolas’s expression turned icy.
“Whoever summoned them, they’re not on our side. You three, go smash those things to pieces!”
Three knights, who had been locked in combat with the dwarves, turned to face the skeletons, blocking their path.
“Whoever summoned them… do they really think they can attack us with mere skeletons?” Bolas scoffed incredulously.
It was a natural reaction. Most of his subordinates were seasoned warriors of the middle class. Skeletons wielding rusty swords were no match for them.
Given the disparity in strength, sending three knights was overkill. One would have sufficed. However, skeletons had a tendency to regenerate even after being destroyed, so Bolas sent three to finish the job quickly.
The knights swung their swords at the skeletons, who raised their weapons in a feeble attempt to block the attacks.
“How cute,” one of the knights remarked.
Their weapons were imbued with a dark aura. No rusty sword could withstand such power. The skeletons and their weapons would be sliced clean through.
Or so Bolas thought.
Suddenly, a crimson aura erupted from the skeletons’ weapons. The two auras clashed, and the knights’ strikes were halted.
“What…?”
Bolas’s eyes widened in disbelief at the impossible sight.
“Skeletons with an aura?”
But the real shock was yet to come.
Every skeleton’s weapon was now glowing with aura. Dozens of weapons simultaneously radiated a deep crimson light.
Bolas’s eyes nearly popped out of his head.
“This… this can’t be happening…!”
The aura emanating from the skeletons was incredibly intense. Only knights of at least middle-class rank could produce such an aura.
“Are all of them middle-class?”
As the aura-infused weapons descended, the three knights were reduced to mere chunks of flesh in the blink of an eye.
“Kiieeek!”
“Kraaaah!”
The skeletons, having tasted blood, didn’t stop. They began to attack the other nearby subordinates.
“What are these things?”
“Skeletons with aura? This is absurd…”
The subordinates, flustered, fought back against the skeletons. But the skeletons skillfully parried their attacks and countered with deadly precision. Limbs were severed, and blood splattered everywhere.
The tide of battle shifted in an instant. The skeletons relentlessly pressed the humans.
But the humans weren’t about to go down easily.
Suddenly, a massive aura strike swept through the skeletons, shattering more than ten of them in one blow.
“You boneheads dare challenge me?”
A knight wielding an axe roared, his fierce presence spreading in all directions.
“Well done, Korpski!” Bolas shouted to the man.
Unlike the other knights, Korpski was a high-class warrior.
“You don’t expect me to deal with these things, do you?”
“Of course not! Leave it to me!” Korpski bellowed confidently.
Meanwhile, the shattered skeletons had fully regenerated, returning to their original numbers.
“Regenerate all you want. I’ll just smash you again,” Korpski snorted, exuding confidence.
No matter how many middle-class opponents there were, they couldn’t handle a high-class warrior.
Then, something flew down from the sky. Korpski looked up, startled.
“A… child?”
A small girl lunged at Korpski, swinging her tiny fist.
“Kaeng!”
Sensing danger, Korpski blocked the punch with the handle of his axe. The impact was tremendous, pushing him back.
“This strength… You’re an undead, aren’t you?” Korpski shouted, charging at the girl.
Focused on the girl, Korpski failed to notice the shadow beneath him rippling like water.
From the shadow, a black wolf emerged, sinking its teeth into Korpski’s neck.
Crunch.
With a chilling sound, Korpski’s head was torn off. His headless body collapsed to the ground.
Bolas stared in shock, his face blank. Slowly, veins began to bulge on his forehead.
“How dare you… How dare you kill my subordinate!”
Bolas unleashed his magic, a vast power exploding outward, scattering everything around him.
“I’ll crush you all right now!”
At that moment, Bolas’s gaze fell upon someone. A man stood behind the undead, wearing a wooden mask.
Bolas instinctively knew. This man was the necromancer leading the undead.
“So it was you!”
Bolas immediately changed his target, charging at the masked man.
“Kaeng!”
“Kiieeek!”
The undead and skeletons tried to block him, but it was futile. They couldn’t even slow down a master-class warrior.
“I’ll cut off your limbs and drag you back!”
Bolas swung his sword at the masked man, who spoke softly.
“Dominico.”
A massive sword appeared out of nowhere, intercepting Bolas’s strike. With a thunderous crash, Bolas was sent flying backward. He looked up to see a man wielding a greatsword standing in his path.
“A death knight? How did a mere death knight block an aura blade…?”
Bolas stared at the greatsword the death knight held. Astonishingly, a black aura blade enveloped the sword.
“A master-class death knight?”
Dozens of skeletons with middle-class strength. Two undead capable of killing a high-class warrior in an instant. And now, a master-class death knight.
“Who… who are you? Why is a necromancer of your caliber attacking me?”
Bolas glared at the masked man, demanding answers.
“This is the domain of the great Weapon Master. Attacking me is akin to opposing my master.”
Bolas warned the masked man, but he remained unfazed.
“Dominico, what are you doing?”
The masked man spoke briefly.
“Bring him to his knees before me.”
At that moment, a murderous intent emanated from the death knight. Bolas’s face hardened.
“You’re really going through with this? You’ll regret it!”
Bolas charged at the death knight.
The two master-class warriors clashed, their weapons slicing through the air with deadly intent. Each collision sent shockwaves through the ground beneath them.
It was a battle of titans. Neither side gave an inch as they exchanged blows.
“Damn it!” Bolas’s expression twisted with frustration as the duel continued.
“A mere death knight dares to block my master’s swordsmanship? Do you have any idea how arrogant you’re being?”
While Bolas raged, the death knight remained calm and composed.
Suddenly, the death knight’s movements changed. His forearm bulged as he swung the greatsword upward with tremendous force.
With a dull thud, Bolas’s sword was knocked aside, soaring into the sky. Bolas gritted his teeth, gripping the hilt tightly.
He barely managed to hold onto his weapon, but his front was left wide open.
The death knight seized the opportunity, lunging forward and bringing the greatsword down.
The death knight’s blade severed Bolas’s forearm. The hand holding the weapon fell to the ground.
The attack didn’t stop there. The death knight slashed diagonally across Bolas’s torso.
The blade cut through Bolas’s body, blood gushing from the wound.
“Urgh!”
Bolas collapsed to the ground. The death knight hooked the greatsword onto his back.
-My lord, it is done.
The masked man approached Bolas, who looked up at him with a pale face.
“Apprentice of the Weapon Master. I have a few questions for you.”
“Go to hell,” Bolas spat defiantly. But the masked man remained unfazed.
“Answer willingly, and I’ll grant you a swift death.”
“You bastard… acting like you’re doing me a favor… when you’re going to kill me anyway…”
The masked man opened a spatial rift, retrieving a travel bag from within.
“Take a good look. If you don’t answer properly, this will be your fate.”
From the travel bag, an undead creature emerged.
The moment Bolas saw it, his eyes widened in shock.
“Jeremy Demang?”
There was no mistaking him; they had been fellow disciples.
“H-how are you… How is this even possible?”
Bolas couldn’t help but be horrified as he examined Jeremy Demang.
“Don’t tell me you resurrected Jeremy as an undead?”
“You’ve got it right,” the masked man said, shaking Jeremy Demang’s head back and forth. “I thought this guy might know something since he was a disciple of the Weapon Master too. But he was always out and about, so he knows nothing. You’re different, though.”
Unlike Bolas, Jeremy Demang had been the favored disciple, the one who basked in the Weapon Master’s affection. Now, here he was, transformed into an undead, standing right before Bolas. The shock was indescribable.
“If you don’t want to end up like this, you’d better spill the information willingly.”
“You’re wasting your time. I’ll never betray my master.”
“You’d better not hold out for long. If it comes to it, I can just kill you and extract the memories from your soul.”
Bolas burst into laughter at the masked man’s threat. “Go ahead, try it. You won’t get anything from me! My soul is bound by a seal that prevents me from revealing anything harmful about my master!”
For the first time, the masked man reacted to Bolas’s defiance. He placed a hand on Bolas’s head, closed his eyes for a moment, and then opened them again.
”…It’s true. There’s a seal.”
“See? You’ll get nothing from me, you fool!”
“Well, I suppose if you’re using the corpse of a duke-level demon to forge a cursed sword, you’d need that kind of security.”
Bolas was struck as if by a blow to the back of his head. “What? How do you… How do you know about that?”
“If there’s a seal, then there’s no point. Time to die.”
The masked man stepped back, and the death knight raised its greatsword once more. Even with death looming, Bolas couldn’t focus on anything else.
“Tell me! How do you know… How do you know about that?”
Finding out how this man knew about his master was all that mattered.
“I said, tell me—!”
The death knight swung its sword down.
Bolas’s head hit the ground.
“It’s done, my lord,” Dominico said, wiping the blood from his sword.
The skeletons, Mia, and Munch had finished off the remaining enemies and were awaiting Damian’s orders.
“You’ve all grown remarkably stronger since I last saw you. Especially you, Dominico. Your skills have improved the most.”
“You’re too kind,” Dominico replied.
When Damian first met Dominico, he was merely high-class. But he had the talent to reach master-class at any moment.
“Now that things are settled…” Damian turned to the dwarves. “I have some questions for you. It would be wise to answer honestly.”
The dwarves looked terrified at Damian’s warning.
“Who… who are you?” one of them stammered.
Normally, Damian wouldn’t have bothered to answer. There was no need to reveal his identity. But now, he needed to spread his false identity far and wide.
“My name is Victor,” Damian said, meeting the dwarves’ eyes. “I’ve come here to claim the glory of the Weapon Master.”