"Don"t get in my way!" Xue Tu hollered furiously."Huh? I thought you wanted a fight scene?" I asked, genuinely confused by his sudden change of att.i.tude.
"Shut up! I"m going to marry my beloved Lilith, no matter what! Get them, zombies!"
With a furious cry, Xue Tu lunged at Princ.i.p.al Porter again. I tried to intervene, but a horde of zombies clumsily but firmly shambled to put themselves between me and their master.
b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l…thanks to the zombies being very weak, Xue Tu could summon them fairly easily – he only required a very short casting time, especially since these poor zombies were literally cannon fodder.
However, they were still enough to delay me for a few seconds. And a few seconds were all he needed to close the gap on Princ.i.p.al Porter.
"d.a.m.n it! White Tiger! Leo! Leo Minor!"
In contrast to the pitiful zombies, my Constellation spirits were far stronger, and they demolished the entire line in almost an instant. However, the sheer number of zombies appeared to weigh them down, even as they incinerated or fried them with spells and lightning. I also found my path barred by a group of zombies that had broken off from their comrades to hara.s.s me.
Taking a deep breath, I cut through them by summoning Gemini – that was the only spell I could summon in one second. I didn"t have time to summon a flying Constellation spirit to soar above the horde of zombies. I could draw Hei Yue and Bai Ri to help me, but I decided to rely on the speed and mobility that the lighter Gemini twin swords afforded me for now.
Fortunately, I could afford to not worry because Anastasia was here. Even as I was bogged down by hordes of zombies, I could trust my partner to pick up the slack. Vaulting over the zombies, she landed on the head of one of them, and then propelled herself off the poor thing to intercept the bounding Xue Tu. Seeing her poisoned daggers flash toward his throat, his eyes widened and he arced his head back to avoid a fatal strike.
That was the problem with fighting a poison user. Be too careless, let your guard down, and sustaining even a single attack could potentially prove to be fatal.
"Great!"
I realized that Anastasia was our best bet for eliminating a high-priority target such as Xue Tu. The moment she took him out, all these annoying zombies would be gone along with him. So the best thing I could do for now was keep the zombies off her back.
The other Silver Wolves mercenaries appeared to have the same idea, for they were crouching down and laying a line of suppressing fire. Their shots were pretty accurate. Even with me and my Constellation spirits being in the line of fire, none of them hit any of us by accident, their precise shots taking out selected zombies with terrifying ease.
"Get lost!" Xue Tu shrieked as he bombarded Anastasia with a series of blood blades, weapons and projectiles. Almost as if she was waltzing, Anastasia whirled and spun around to avoid getting impaled. With the melodic grace of a dancer, she weaved through the wildly stabbing appendages while simultaneously deflecting them with her daggers. Appendages recoiled, writhed and died as poison spread across them, only to amputate themselves ruthlessly to prevent the corruption from spreading to other parts of the main body.
Swearing, Xue Tu hopped back while throwing another blood lance at the advancing Anastasia. She twisted her body to avoid the deadly projectile before hurling a poisoned knife in return, the lethal blade sinking itself deeply into a hastily conjured blood s.h.i.+eld before it could cut the panicking blood mage"s skin.
"That was close!" he muttered, paling considerably. He tossed his knife and broke the poisoned s.h.i.+eld before the toxins could spread into his body. While retreating, he sent another volley of blood spears that would have impaled Anastasia, but she destroyed them with a swing of her daggers, sending crimson fragments falling through the air like b.l.o.o.d.y rain.
I cut down the last of the zombies, and with the mercenaries helping me out, I could direct both White Tiger and Leo toward more fruitful endeavors. The two huge Constellation spirits split up before attacking the half-distracted Xue Tu from each flank. Gritting his teeth, he threw out both hands in opposite directions and sent countless spikes erupting from the ground like lava. Both White Tiger and Leo twisted in midair to dodge the volley of cruel lances, and landed a relatively safe distance away.
Growling, White Tiger unleashed a storm of lightning upon the fence of blood that had now grown around Xue Tu. He was panting at trying to consecutively cast so many spells at a high speed. Fortunately, the spells he was casting were relatively basic, so he didn"t need a long casting time unlike my more complex summoning spells. Similarly, his zombies were weak, but in exchange they gave up lots of casting time to gain the ability to be summoned quickly.
Even so, the simple spells were crudely effective. I watched as the devastating lightning splashed against the fence and shattered them. Despite their instant demise, they had served their purpose in s.h.i.+elding Xue Tu for that specific moment when it mattered.
"Tsk…"
I clicked my tongue, especially since I keenly exploited that logic the most. Basic, elementary spells, which I often made use of (or my Constellation spirits made use of) were very simple to master and cast, and didn"t require a lot of time to cast, but they could be very powerful as long as you pump a lot of mana into them. Conversely, they were not as efficient as intermediate or advanced spells, which often used like half the amount of mana to produce the same effect or firepower, but in exchange for requiring perhaps twice the amount of casting time (for example). But brute force remained a surprisingly effective method or strategy.
It also meant that you wouldn"t necessarily lose just because you only learned basic spells and your opponent mastered advanced spells. As I said, that whole level or ranking thing was bulls.h.i.+t. Advanced spells gave you a ma.s.sive advantage, but you still had to cast them. Fortunately, this meant that basic spells would never be obsolete. If I were to give an a.n.a.logy, it would be like Magic: The Gathering. Essentially, one-mana or two-mana or cheap spells, though simple, would never be obsolete and could be surprisingly effective in overwhelming your opponent through speed. The more expensive spells, such as those that cost seven or eight mana, could be devastating and deal the finis.h.i.+ng blow to your reeling opponent, or change the tide of the game when employed correctly, but if you opponent could overwhelm you with cheap, fast spells before you placed down your fifth land (or ramp up to having seven or eight mana), then you would still lose the game, no matter how many rare and powerful cards you had in your deck. Similarly, control decks could often frustrate opponents with cheap denial spells, such as fog cards preventing combat damage, counter spells preventing stuff from going off, or perhaps a two mana spell granting you protection from a specific color for a single turn. Not enough to win the game, but enough to keep you alive until you acc.u.mulated enough mana to cast your big game changers or pull off a combo.
That was just a simplified version, though, and battles were a lot more complex than that. Nonetheless, I was sure that readers weren"t here for a ma.s.sive info dump.
Even so, because of our constant pressure, the poor guy couldn"t pull off his advanced spells. Thanks to my support, Anastasia was able to go on the offensive and push Xue Tu into the defensive. Coordinating with her wordlessly, I had White Tiger and Leo launch their spells at the beleaguered Xue Tu. Lightning bolts and Regulus hurtled toward him, smas.h.i.+ng apart his b.l.o.o.d.y defenses and almost engulfed him.
Almost.
"!!!"
To my surprise, the spells were dispelled by a new volley of blood lances.
"Incoming!"
"Take cover!"
The Silver Wolves mercenaries were yelling behind me. Spinning around, I saw a second bombardment of blood lances arcing over the night sky and cras.h.i.+ng down upon the ranks of scattering soldiers.
They never hit them.
Water sprouted out and formed a sh.e.l.l over them, absorbing the blows of the blood lances and causing them to diffuse harmlessly. Lowering my raised hand, I nodded to my recently summoned Black Tortoise and directed him to crawl toward the regrouping mercenaries.
"Reinforcements?"
Anastasia too was forced to draw back, along with White Tiger and Leo, when a salvo of blood weapons were thrown at them. I cast a small water barrier over Anastasia to help her out, and she skidded backward under my protection.
All of us turned toward outside the barrier. A new group had finally shown up, a bunch of weirdly dressed guys with blazing red eyes similar to Xue Tu"s.
"That"s got to be one h.e.l.l of a fas.h.i.+on statement," I remarked, staring at their black tunics that wouldn"t look out of place in an ancient China setting, yet was evidently not something normal people wore even back then. And what was with the bandages wrapped all around their faces, necks and hands? Were they trying to be mummies or something?
"Elder Liu!" Xue Tu brightened up. "You"ve finally arrived!"
The leading figure scowled, a man who looked to be about in his late forties or fifties, what with the wrinkles and long, flowing grayish hair. He set his piercing eyes on the errant blood mage, his frown deepening.
"Xue Tu, I know you"re currently the sect leader, but you shouldn"t recklessly run off on your own. Remember your position! Just because you"re the new head doesn"t mean you can do anything you like!"
I watched the new group cautiously, several thoughts running through my mind. This must be the Blood Slaughter Sect or whatever edgy name they called themselves. Swallowing, I steeled myself and sent silent telepathic directions to my Constellation spirits in case this would erupt into another battle.
"Don"t tell me you"re here to help Xue Tu threaten Princ.i.p.al Henry Porter into marrying his granddaughter to him."
"Huh?" Liu turned to me, his mouth hanging open. Then he blinked, glanced at Xue Tu, and burst out laughing. "Of course not! I apologize for the nonsense our sect leader is spouting. Even though we"ve known of his stalker behavior and obsession with the Holy Maiden of the Porter Clan for so long, we have been lax in disciplining and reining him in."
I felt some relief creeping over me. Perhaps these guys weren"t here to fight, after all. That made sense. It would be nonsensical if the elder of the Blood Slaughter Sect would spout bulls.h.i.+t like, "how dare your granddaughter refuse such a great honor and not realize how good it is to be recognized and loved by our young master? If you refuse to accept his request, then we"ll destroy your entire clan!" Like, seriously, do you go commit genocide and exterminate an entire family just because their granddaughter refused to marry your young master? No matter how rich and powerful a sect was, it would be extremely stupid to flippantly waste so much resources, money, and manpower in squabbling over something as petty or trivial as the arrogant young master"s whim.
"Well, then take him away please." Anastasia sighed, probably also relieved. "He"s interfering in our expedition."
"About that…" Liu stroked his neatly trimmed beard. "Sorry about that, but I think you"re misunderstanding something. We"re not here to take him away."
Immediately I felt some sort of chill. Linked to me spiritually and telepathically, all of my Constellation spirits, including the pride of Leo Minor that had wiped out the zombies, tensed instinctively. The sheer bloodl.u.s.t that emanated from the Blood Slaughter Sect elder was setting all of us on edge.
"We"re here for the tomb." Liu"s smile widened. "I apologize, but I hope you won"t resist. I promise that we will make your deaths as painless as possible."