Chapter 22: E-Rantel (1)

[4:40, E-Rantel]

The desperate battle continues, sounds of crushing bone sounds are resounding the streets as the forces of E-Rantel used their blunt weapons against the many undead — many are Skeletons.

Most Adventurers and Mercenaries have reserve blunt weapons because they are prepared if they ever cross paths with Undead or Slimes, or any enemies that are weak on Blunt attacks, but most soldiers and militias do not have such weaponry and been supplied by the city.

Ainzach, the guildmaster of E-Rantel's Adventurer's guild, is currently overseeing the battle while on top of one of the administrative buildings on the city, with a shocked face.

"O-One of our Gold-ranked team are gone?!"

Ainzach then immediately calmed himself after hearing what his assistant had just said, but after processing it inside his mind; anger flared inside him and shouted.

"If there's a strong undead, why you didn't send one of our Mithril teams immediately?!"

"I-It happened so fast sir! But It's not undead, It's a human!"

"What?!" Ainzach exclaimed.

He then hurriedly run to the other side of the building to look over that said sector.

He arrived at the place, and he can already see the ongoing commotion at the sector; the line of men with their shields up is slowly regrouping, there seemed to be an explosion there earlier evident by the crater and burning corpses and equipment.

Some are dead and others in critical conditions getting pulled by their comrades, but they are steadily retreating backward as the humanoid figure walks in their direction.

It's a young woman with short blond hair, she walks forward stepping to the armed men laying on the ground. Ainzach thought that it must be the Gold-ranked adventurer 6-man team.

"Did you already sent a Mithril team to her?" Ainzach asked the assistant who just arrived.

"N-No sir. We sent a Platinum team, following the protocol."

"I see. Order them to not engage, and let a Mithril team handle it instead."

"Eh? S-Send a Mithril?" The assistant face's paled.

"And give the green signal to the magic casters to assist."

"Y-Yes sir!" The assistant replied before disappearing from his sight to do the task.

'K-Killing an entire team of Gold adventurer team... b-by herself.' He kept his cool outside but deep inside he's panicking. That's a Gold adventurer team! It's like the strong Royal Knights of the Re-Estize King.

"This is bad."

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(Earlier)

"Push!"

Hearing the commander, he and the others collectively raise their shields from the ground and then use it to push the horde of undead that are bashing their shields.

After pushing the undead, Miguel and the others move forward, and raise their blunt weapons to bonk the fragile bones of Skeletons.

Just as they finished bonking them, they heard a shout again.

"Ten paces! Forward!"

It's an order. It seems they gained more ground from this horde of false life.

Miguel smiled under his helmet, the sun will come out soon. He's not sure if It's true, but he heard from a comrade that undead are weak under the rays of the sun.

'Whatever; the pay will be good for sure.' Miguel thought, the Fortress City did tell them that they are going to pay them.

And reinforcement will come, he's sure. The strong adventurers have been taking out the strong bunch of undead that had appeared. Everything is going smooth.

If he comes out here alive, he will sure drink a lot till he passes out. Well, he's kind of feeling it.

"Brace yourselves!"

The words of the commander disrupted his thoughts and he immediately dropped the bottom of his shield to the ground and prepared for impact, hiding himself behind it.

It didn't come faster than he thought and cannot help but curiously peek when he sees an incoming ball of fire heading to the center of their formation.

*Boom!*

After the fireball hit one of them, it just exploded. It was so fast the moment it hit the center of their line and Miguel is sure that he was sent flying by the explosion.

"T-The hell..."

Like an experienced mercenary that he is, even though he might have broken a bone or two, laying down while there's a horde of undead will be a bad idea.

Like other mercenaries and adventurers on the line, they immediately start standing.

He adjusted his vision, picked the nearest weapons beside him since his shield and mace are not at his hands anymore.

Within a minute, he's ready again and the gruesome scene started to unfold in front of him and cannot help but feel lucky.

His not-so-fortunate fellow battle mates are now burning pieces of corpses.

There's a crater at the center, he's sure that one of the strong guys of their mercenary group — the one that commander them here/ and shouts order — is dead. Really dead.

Then there's a shout behind the lines.

"E-Ey you lot! Grab the injured ones and regroup!"

Four men with very decent equipment ran through the crowd and to the center as they shouted for them to regroup.

Miguel's body is still aching but there's no time to waste and started moving.

He recognized those guys who just ran to through a lot of them. They are Gold-ranked adventurers that stayed at the back of their lines, those guys are responsible for holding or killing strong monsters/undead that he cannot hope to contend with.

They either kill the undead or hold them long enough for a Platinum or Mithril adventurer team to come.

"T-This is bad. An undead capable of t-that." Miguel can't help but voiced his thoughts. Fear started seeping to his heart.

He gripped tightly the newly-picked mace he got from the ground just now to suppress his fears.

All things are just going smoothly earlier and here is it now. Some of his fellow countrymen just died from that explosion alone.

Miguel is not well-versed in magic, but he did hear some and recognized that the explosion earlier might be the cause of the 3rd-Tier spell [Fireball].

It's one of the most well-known and recognizable spells, but It's just a hunch, he just heard the description of it from his mates.

He's from the Holy Kingdom after all, [Divine Magic] is the focus there.

'I-I just want to survive.'

His eyes then follow the direction of those adventurers, and he sees a strange figure in a cloak in front of the team. The one responsible from that explosion.

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"Did Clementine go?"

His words could easily be heard inside the catacomb, there's a bunch of undead roaming around and that are being ordered to go outside.

"Yes, master." One of his disciples replied.

These disciples of his, are the ones that he taught a lot about the art of Necromancy. Khajiit is a fairly strong magic caster himself; being able to cast up to 3rd-tier, but he's mostly focused on healing and strengthening his undead minions and relied to an "item". Well, an item with sentience.

Khajiit still can't help but click his tongue.

"Tch!"

'That woman! Who does she think she is?!' Khajiit thought.

The "woman" he is referring to is Clementine, a recent member of the organization and also one of the executives of Zurrernorn.

He continued holding the sphere-shaped item in both of his hands. Caressing it, because of this item, he's stronger and also because of this item that he could use his trump card.

For half a decade he feed this sphere-shaped ball with negative energy, and also prepared for this day.

"... If that woman mess this operation... I will kill her!"

His disciples cannot help but tensed up after hearing him said that. They didn't even doubt what he just said.

The disciples then continue the tasks they are given. They are maintaining a ritual that used the [Death Spiral] with the help of that talent-holder boy; he's "boy" no more now, he's a literal item and used to cast the spell [Undeath Army]

Khajiit continued observing the operation, while he's annoyed to that woman, he's a bit thankful for her stealing that "item" that she got from her homeland, betraying her nation in the process and getting hunted by one of the scriptures. Which is a pain in the ass, for sure.

But then—

"What?!"

His disciples tensed up again and looked at him.

One of his disciples started asking him if he's okay or something because he just stood there with an incredulous expression.

"Ha... Haha... HAHAHAHAHA!"

His laugh resounded in the whole place. He's laughing because the sentient ball just informed of something amazing.

He doesn't know how there's many negative energies already but...

"For Five years... FOR FIVE YEARS FINALLY!—" He shouted.

"— Everyone, be ready. I will start sealing it now..."