chapter 14
"Your Majesty I am telling you that the necromancer could be worse than he actually is! You need to go in there with either a well thought out plan, at least two other knights or you need to avoid it at all cost."
A crazed soldier who had the horrible fate of battling Iratus was warning Artoria what was going to happen to her if she was caught and it made some the other knights in the room gag.
"That goes for all of you! If you get caught kill yourself! That is the best advice I can give to you because if you don't die while he gets you, then you will be left alive screaming on his operating table as he carves you open."
Iratus. A infamous necromancer with anatomical knowledge that would push the medical world forward centuries, and enough dead bodies to fill up a lords land which was usually about three kilometers in area.
Sirius was going to go in fully prepared. In these five years he had traveled with Artoria he had grown proficient with whips, bows, spears, staffs, and swords. He was not going to go into that death trap without a myriad of mystic codes built on exploding lots of different things.
That when Sirius spoke up. "Lets do this. We will have the archers under Sir Tristan's command fire my specially built arrows at the tower first. The when the dust settles we can wait for them to come to us with whatever strugglers are left."
The roundtable liked this idea as it involved them attacking from a distance so they wouldn't run the risk of losing anyone be it soldiers or knights.
…
The morning of the battle Sirius stood next to Artoria fully prepped for what was to come. He had a utility belt full of different explosive jewels he had crafted for himself. His red robe would defend his back from close attacks, his chest plate and forearm guards were designed to redirect the force of an attack evenly into his body so as to limit damage.
Finally, he was loaded and ready to rumble anytime now.
That's when the hill started blacking when it should be lighting up with the sunrise. The battle was on!
"Aim....Ready...…Fire!" Tristan dropped his hand down signaling the archers to shoot the arrows made by Sirius. The amount blocked out the sky and when they collided with the ground each and every arrow exploded.
Sirius was really into explosions when he made the jewels and arrows wasn't he?
The attack looked as if a carpet bombing went off as thousands of bodies were strewn across the plains. Artoria raised Caliburn in the air silencing everyone as they waited for the stragglers to come.
However no matter how long they waited they never came. Instead a rumbling sound overtook the army as the earth began to shake with such ferocity it was as if the very earth they stood on was now....pissed.
SCREEEECHHHHHH!
A giant hole opened up right in the middle of the army swallowing any in its path. Then undead soldiers came out in the hundreds killing any in their wake. Sirius was the first one to protect the soldiers from harm as he transmuted the ground to rise, making a large wall of earth that separated the two appear.
Then he clapped his hands once again and transmuted it into water washing away any in its wake. Sirius single handily annihilated an entire undead force with nothing but alchemy, he was man to be feared and respected in the eyes of the soldiers.
"Fall back from the hole! I'm gonna patch it up!"
Just as he got close enough to the hole to plug it it. He caught a glimpse into it, petrifying him. "Merlin! Get over here and help me you lazy cunt!"
Standing on either side, Sirius and Merlin started to slowly plug the hole when a giant skeleton of mismatched bones erupted from Artoria's side. On its shoulder was a black robed individual carrying a black staff that had two motes of light orbiting each other just above it.
"Go."
That one command sent the bone giant into a frenzy. Artoria started to heat Caliburn and charged head on at the giant with her knights by her side.
The giants power was unimaginable. Its fist broke open the Earth and caused tremors that could be felt around the entire country. Artoria's Caliburn burned a hot orange as she fed more and more of her ode to combat the undead.
The other knights following her were busy keeping the entourage of undead at bay. Thanks to them Artoria was able to cleanly cut off four bony limbs, crippling the monster.
Sirius, meanwhile, just finished plugging the hole with Merlin's help when his instincts kicked in. But it was too late and a magic circle appeared under him, whisking him away from the group.
…
When he opened his eyes he found himself in a dark room. There was also someone with him!
"Artoria?"
"Sirius?"
The two, flabbergasted at the development of what happened, stood there silently. The plan was supposed to work, and they were going to be fine, but fate had other plans for the duo.
"You're awake, this was unforeseen, hmmm no matter you will end up on my operating table either way. And you have turned out to be even better specimens than I first thought...." The man murmured at the end, his emotionless façade on the entire time as if he was bored with what was happening.
"Artoria. I think we might be in some doodoo."
Then the man flashed a black staff that had a black horned skull on top. When he smashed it down on the ground the skulls eye sockets lit up with dark red flames. "Yeah we are in some really deep doodoo...."
The ground opened up with thousands upon thousands of hands reaching out to grab the two, their numbers easily eclipsing the armies they fought above ground. Sirius, however was no normal mage. He was the adoptive brother of Vivian, Lady of The Lake, and student of Merlin, Mage of Flowers.
Sirius stabbed Arcane into the ground and ignited his circuits causing mana to crawl over the ground lighting up a white alchemical circle. Then he began to chant, as fast as he could.
"Life is but a beginning of a story. Death is but the end of a book. Both begin and end continuously for all eternity."
Then he raised Arcane high above him and unleashed the stocked mana in his jewels, as he didn't have enough in himself to power the spell that was a combination of magecraft and alchemy.
"Ategenos!"
The undead stopped and started to wither, only to regress into healthy looking humans, wither, and repeat, slowly losing mass each cycle. The cycle went on and on until there was nothing left but ash....
"I hate chanting! Though I fucking love alchemy~"
With the undead delt with, Sirius and Artoria focused on Iratus.
The man was covered in a large black robe that was dragging on the floor. On his face was a skull like mask.
Artoria started to reheat Caliburn and Sirius started to begin a mana burst. However Iratus shook his head.
"You will not be fighting me....You will be fighting him."
Then a black armored hand shot out of the mans shadow planting itself on the ground and launching the rest of its body out of Iratus's shadow.
The monster was large 2 meters. The armor covering its body crawled, and morphed continuously with a red plum shooting out the top. In its hand was a large sword with a red aura, the presence it gave off equaled that of Artoria's Caliburn.
"Go Igris show them your Clarent."
Then the monster flashed forward almost unseen to the naked eye. The subsequent clash made Artoria fly away with force, with Igris now showering his attacks on Sirius.
Sirius kept up with his mana burst and reinforcement only problem was his reserves were not good at the moment and his spells were running out of juice.
"Artoria I could use some hel- Holy hell!"
Sirius tried activating his incomplete magic but the spell fizzled out render it useless as he rebounded off the blade and landed on the wall horizontally. When he looked back at the monster he found nothing, that is until it appeared in front of him in a dash of speed.
"Ha!"
Artoria stabbed the monster straight through the chest, pining it to the wall next to Sirius. Sirius, while running on fumes, transmuted the monsters body. Its whole body was welded to the wall becoming one with, and Sirius also broke the bones making the monsters whole body immobile.
When the two landed back on the ground Iratus was waiting for them.