Former General Is Undead Knight

Five brilliant white spheres appeared around Alante, then went away from him before stopping and releasing crackling purple lightning.

The spheres of light controlled the heat around them, generating heat ionization that could be freely controlled.

Complex patterns of purple lightning bundled together to form a figure.

Five plasma beasts formed with shining cores.

The five plasma beasts then raised their heads to the sky.

「…A familiar sorcery after being cornered, eh. I see now, so that’s your real identity.」

Lambert remembered that he met a sorcerer who once used heat ionization sorcery after he entered Viscount Le Gael’s territory.

It was the old sorcerer Gilldoum Janus who was deposed by Lambert who happened to investigate Viscount Le Gael’s territory.

This reminded him that the old man once said something akin to admiration to someone in this area.

Lambert suddenly realized that the ones who knew Alante’s true identity were only a small number of sorcerers.

「Heat ionization, eh… Teslagoz, huh. I never met him in person back then, but… I did hear the rumor that he was a rare kind of sorcerer, a man of integrity. But I never expected that he would be this unremarkable youth. I guess that’s rumors.」

Alante frowned, eyes opened wide as he glared at Lambert as if the latter was his parent’s enemy.

There was no gentleman’s smile on his face anymore.

Even Lambert would never have expected that Alante would show such vivid emotion.

「DON’T PUT MY TECHNIQUE IN THE SAME CLASS AS THAT FOOL! MY HOUND, HUNT HIM DOWN TILL DEATH!」

Alante cried toward the five beasts.

The five beasts of lightning rushed toward Lambert all at once.

Alante himself rushed toward Lambert with a new light sphere deployed in his palm.

Lambert brandished his greatsword, severing the core of the lightning beast.

One and then two cores were sliced by his greatsword, split apart, and then vanished.

But the third one only got its form torn apart, which was restored immediately as it opened its maw, trying to chew Lambert alive.

Alante dared to spend extra mana on the plasma beasts.

Though he would be put at a disadvantage if he kept going all out, he had no choice as to prevent Lambert from getting used to his patterns.

In the first place, the plasma beast was highly resistant toward physical attacks.

He expected Lambert’s slashing power to become slightly weaker after slashing three beasts.

Thus, all he needed to do was keep piling up such results.

「HAAAAH!」

Unexpectedly, Lambert threw himself forward instead of waiting for the beast to come to bite him.

The beast exploded into millions of light particles as the Organ armor crashed against it.

The beast fell on the ground, lying prone on its flank.

「Such clumsy movements. An opening.」

Alante didn’t miss that chance and pressed the heat ball in front of his palm toward Lambert.

But the ball that released strange light was only a little bit bigger than the core of the plasma beast.

At that moment, Lambert guessed what Alante was trying to do.

As a veteran who survived the most gruesome war in history, Lambert could read his opponent with just a glance, no matter how cleverly they tried to hide it.

It wasn’t just once or twice he was forced to see someone else die due to a sorcerer’s counterattack.

But when probing around the surface, Alante’s eyes and expression were too inhuman.

From Lambert’s perspective, Alante, who was moving like a strange man, had already quit being a human.

To escape from that situation, Lambert performed a body blow on the plasma beast and leapt to the side.

The shining sphere in Alante’s arm unleashed countless sparks.

The sphere passed the place where Lambert was a while ago and scraped the ground like scraping butter with a hot knife.

A plasma beast that was lying on the ground was caught by that and died.

The moment the lump of light was fired, not even Lambert could stop it.

After narrowing Alante’s aim, there was no way to win except for outsmarting Alante by reading his tactics ahead of him.

There were only two plasma beasts left beside Alante.

「Fufufu… As expected, the fame of the Four Demon Generals isn’t just for show. No one can match this technique of mine that has been polished for two hundred years. Fine then, let me tell you: I am the strongest of the Eight Wisemen.」

Alante was laughing like a monster as he spoke.

「…It’s harder than expected. I thought that I would have a bit more leeway to see your movements.」

Upon hearing that remark, Alante’s face turned red in anger.

「Hmph, an empty bluff wo—」

「Which reminds me… You are definitely not Teslagoz.」

Lambert cut into Alante before the latter managed to finish his sentence.

「Come to think of it, the one called Gilldoum who seemed like your apprentice was still researching homunculi of thunder. If the inventor Teslagoz were still alive, the research about that wouldn’t be left in that sorry state, incomplete even after two hundreds years.」

Although the plasma hound Tindalos was used during the Eight Countries Unification War, it was only a mindless beast that moved according to complex order.

Including the fact that it consumed vast amounts of mana, it was rarely used on the battlefield.

In addition, it moved on its own without the instructions of the user for unknown reasons. That had caused many excellent sorcerers to die under the fangs of the demon dog.

Although Teslagoz had researched the way to improve that spell, he was unfortunately assassinated before he completed his research. He died way before Lambert.

The only way to use it without risk was compensating its enormous fuel consumption with an abundant amount of mana and having incredible physical abilities like Alante, which made Alante a monster in his own right.

As for the other sorcerers, they still had to risk their lives when they used it. 𝒇𝘳ℯℯ𝚠𝙚𝑏𝗻𝑜ѵ𝑒𝙡.co𝑚

On the other hand, if Teslagoz were still alive, he wouldn’t give something like an imperfect plasma beast to Gilldoum. It was against his code as a perfectionist.

「The fact that you are only playing around with your frogs and are unable to improve the imperfect heat ionization even after two hundred years is the undeniable reality that you’re nothing more than a dunce. And from the way, you spoke now… The way you call yourself sounds like a big joke to me.」

「HAHAHA! HOW PITIFUL! THE LAST THING YOU DO IS ACTUALLY A USELESS BLUFF! DESPITE BEING HAILED AS THE GREATEST SWORDSMAN, YOU CAN’T EVEN TOUCH MY HAIR! LAMBERT, YOUR BLUFF IS TRULY BEFITTING A LOSER!」

The skin on various parts of Alante’s body tore, and blood started seeping out from his body.

His body couldn’t withstand the huge amount of mana.

「HEAT BALL, GATHER IN MY HAND!」

Including the remaining two magic dogs from before, another five magic dogs appeared around Alante.

And then, Alante raised his left hand.

A giant sphere that cast ominous light appeared on top of his palm.

「For a sorcerer who takes pride in their knowledge, a fool like you is what we hate the most. You must pay the ultimate price for your cheap provocation.」