I became a legion lich

75 Battle against Emilia

‘It’s her?’ Athos mentally asked Finn’s skeleton, just to confirm. There was no way an ordinary person, even an adventurer or mage could dodge such an attack without warning. Only a mage slayer would have the dexterity and nerves of steel to dodge it.

Finn’s skeleton nodded, his entire body shaking as he continued to resist. Normally, the fear of disappearing would have made him stop resisting and made him a spectator of his own body, but the anger at being killed and the concern for Emilia motivated him to resist.

He wanted Emilia to kill the skeleton in front of him, or at least run away and report its existence to the order. Finn hoped that once the skeleton died, he’d get his freedom back or at least he could die for real, rather than become a bony bastard’s slave.

“Well, if we’ve already confirmed the target, there’s no point in standing here talking and giving her time to cast her spells. Follow the plan and attack.” Athos ordered, making Finn jump off the roof and run to Emilia. He was the vanguard of this fight, while Sevenus cast magic to stop Emilia’s movements.

Finn advanced quickly, using his superior speed to attack first. He conjured dozens of arrows of darkness and launched them at Emilia, at the same time shooting dark aura blades through the daggers. Unlike wands used by mages, the mage slayer’s spellcasting rings were magic items and would be destroyed after one use, so Athos ordered Finn to use his best spell at once.

“That spell...are you Finn?” Emilia asked in surprise. She fired blades of aura mixed with the light element of the daggers themselves, while advancing covered by a shield of light. Arrows of darkness were cast from her front and sides to ensure she would be hit no matter where she fled, but as she advanced, only a third of the spell hit her barrier.

The barrier of light around her cracked and wheezed as the arrows hit it, but it didn’t break.

Emilia arrived in front of Finn, quickly attacking with daggers covered in light. Finn tried to defend himself, but her attacks were agile and fluid and exploited every breach in his guard. A cut on his left forearm, another on his right thigh bone, a punctured rib.

The damage quickly built up in his body. To make matters worse, the light burned into the wounds and purified the darkness that moved in his bones, weakening him with every blow. Wanting to back away to avoid further damage, Finn blocked the next blow using his weapon break skill, blasting his own dagger against Emilia’s.

.....

“Kuh!” Emilia let out a pained noise, feeling her hand being cut by the pieces of the daggers. Finn’s bony hand was also damaged, but he didn’t care, using his free hand to launch a black aura blade at it.

Emilia jumped to dodge it, while kicking Finn’s chest with both feet and propelling herself away. Emilia also activated the boost ability on both feet, causing her to fly away while pushing Finn to the ground with his ribs cracked.

Emilia somersaulted in the air and tried to fall to the ground, but the earth opened and a stone spear tried to impale her. She hurriedly conjured a platform of light from under her foot and jumped, but the stone spear still grazed her leg, drawing blood and flesh. She used a simple light spell just to stop the bleeding.

Emilia fell to the ground and got up, only for Athos to appear behind her and swing his sword at her neck. The black armor was still watching the fight from a distance, but that was just a decoy. It was a spell called stone guardian, a spell Sevenus cast as a distraction.

Athos had concealed his presence and had been hiding from the start, waiting for a breach. He slashed with all his might, aiming precisely at the back of the neck, where it was supposed to be a blind spot.

Even so, his sword only hit a shield of light conjured at the back of his neck, causing the bones in his arm to shake from the impact. Emilia didn’t miss the gap, holding her remaining dagger upside down, before turning around and trying to stab the dagger into Athos’ face.

Athos reacted to his absurd speed thanks to his cold mind ability and threw his head back, but the dagger still left a deep cut just below his eyes. His gray skin writhed around his face like worms, the light burning through the darkness that formed the skin.

Emilia conjured a dagger of light with her free hand and tried to attack him, but Athos cast his heat wave spell, trying to gain distance. The spell was true to its name, sending a wave of heat 20 feet in all directions. A barrier of light would be useless against the heat, so Emilia just jumped away while clucking her tongue in anger.

A stone spear rose from the ground once more, but Emilia didn’t fall for the same trick twice. She fired an aura blade that cut the stone spear in two, before running towards Sevenus, the annoying mage who was hampering her movements.

‘Stop her!’ Athos ordered Finn through the mindlink, causing him to jump in Emilia’s path. He was circulating mana through the bones the entire time, improving his physical ability and passively healing himself, but he was far from having recovered all of his injuries.

He tried to block Emilia’s path, but she activated an acceleration ability and charged at him, breaking his guard with a dagger swipe and piercing his sternum with the dagger of light, before jumping and stomping on his skull to propel herself towards him up.

“Die your nuisance!” Emilia screamed, arriving in front of Sevenus in an instant as she crossed the daggers in front of the body, trying to quickly decapitate him. She activated the slash skill on the enchanted steel dagger while using an aura blade on the dagger of light.

The stone armor stepped forward and raised its shield, ready to block the attack. Despite its weight, Sevenus could control it with mana and make it float slightly, making its movements much more agile than its appearance would suggest. The crosscut successfully cut through the stone shield, but the knight threw the sword aside and grabbed Emilia in a bear hug, before jumping off the roof.

“Shit!” Emilia cursed loudly, realizing that she had fallen into such a stupid trap. Her left arm was trapped, but she used her right arm to plunge the dagger into the crevice of the stone helmet and twisted before pulling with all her might. The helmet was broken, revealing that the interior was hollow.

Emilia gave up on freeing herself and hurriedly conjured a thin layer of light around her own body to break her fall. Even so, the moment she hit the stone floor, the thin layer of light shattered into pieces, the weight of the stone armor crushing her bones and knocking all the air out of her lungs.

Emilia tried to quickly push the stone armor away, but a strange noise came out of the armor. She peered into the hollowed-out armor and saw a half-open bag with torn sacks, releasing colored powders that quickly began to glow.

Tssssss

Boommmmmmm!

A burst of flames, lightning and orange energy engulfed Emilia, destroying the nearest houses and sending Sevenus and Finn, the closest to Emilia, flying away. Athos was relatively far away, but he still had to stab his sword into the ground to hold his ground. The bag inside the stone armor had alchemical powders of different elements, absurdly increasing its destructive power.

The orange energy caused the ground to give way, knocking the nearest store to the explosion in the sewers. When the heat had subsided enough to bear, Athos approached the hole and tried to look down, but all he saw was wreckage.

Sevenus and Finn joined him a few seconds later, coming back after being blown up. Sevenus’ condition was relatively good as he had used an earth spell to turn the ground to mud, but Finn was in a deplorable state. He hit a stone wall of a nearby building, breaking countless bones in the process.

His right leg was missing from the knee down, while his pelvis was split in half. All of the ribs on the left side were broken, while his left arm had been ripped off and Finn was carrying it in his other hand. He was crawling over to Athos, but the latter didn’t give him a second glance, fully focused on using death vision to search the hole.

But no matter how much he searched, the lingering energy of the blast blinded his senses.

“My lord... I avoided asking... but what is that... on your body?” Sevenus asked curious about his skin.

“I have no idea. I’ll investigate as soon as things settle down, but let’s focus on the kill for now.” Athos answered honestly. There were many mysteries about his new species and he still didn’t have time to investigate.

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