Chapter 386 R-Ritual...?!
-Clank! Clank! Clank!
-Booooooom!
-Crackkkk...
The sound of metal colliding with each other, large explosions, and the breaking of bones, or more like cutting of bones, was ringing throughout the open cave area.
In the vast plain area with dim lights illuminating the surroundings, a cluster of undead skeleton soldiers, knights, mages, as well as some strong zombies were in a sudden turmoil.
Their day had been going normally as it had always been, but today, suddenly, they engaged in a battle first time after an unknown period of time since their creation.
It started with a sudden explosion that blew away the skeleton bodies, and these explosions went off simultaneously at many places in this open area.
Many of their troops were wiped out because of these explosions that happened out of nowhere, but that wasn't all.
After these trap-like explosives went off, an intruder appeared and started slaughtering the skeleton soldiers, knights, and mages. f𝐫ee𝘄ℯ𝚋no𝐯𝐞l.c𝘰m
And the first targets were naturally… mages.
The intruder appeared at the very back of their formation out of nowhere, as it had been there for the whole time or as if it teleported there.
But the mages didn't sense the intruder at all.
All they had sensed was the power of light elemental, and that was enough for them to lift their guards.
It would have been easy if the mages cooperated with the knights, but the intruder who held the power of light started slaughtering the mages!
It was strange, the mages could detect the presence of light element but they couldn't even feel where the intruder was even after using their skills and magic...
The intruder appeared, disappeared, and every time a strange sound rang throughout the cave, more than one body fell to the ground, either cut in many pieces or blown away by the large shockwave.
It was strange and dangerous...
But they couldn't detect the intruder with normal means either.
There was only their kind, the undead, in this cave.
However they tried, there was no being who looked different from them, felt different from them, or didn't have the dead energy around them.
They were all the same and still the mages were falling... or had fallen.
Mages were wiped out in a matter of minutes, but that didn't stop the intruder.
This strange being who seemed to have no form or possessed a form similar to theirs was coming, hunting, and vanishing from their senses in such a precise manner that not a single one of them could detect the intruder.
But then, after a while, when one-fourth of their troops had fallen to the ground, every one of the 'stronger' knights sensed something.
It was faint, but they definitely felt a strange aura from one of their own soldiers.
It was strange, as if someone was disguised as their kind.
And this disguise was even enhanced by the unmistakable aura of death that they possessed.
It wasn't possible for an alive being to possess the aura of death or even recreate something similar through normal means.
But this particular solder's aura was fluctuating.
Something that shouldn't happen to a true undead.
So... they now knew the cause of the sudden turmoil they were facing!
The intruder was capable of changing its form and even able to duplicate their presence for a short time.
But now, after finishing off a large number of their troops, the strange power that granted the intruder the presence of death was fading away.
It was simple what they had to do now.
Just attack anyone in sight!
"Ktktktktktktkt!"
"Ktktk! Ktktktktktkt!!"
The knights, the remaining strongest ones that possessed some form of intelligence among these mindless skeletons, gave the order to the remaining troop and the soldiers, as well as the knights themselves, started fighting among each other.
It was a clever decision from their point of view, but from the point of view of the intruder, our smart Rein, this was precisely what she was aiming for.
[[ "You are amazing Celes~!" ]]
[[ Nuuuu... I can't do much through the clones. I could have helped you a bit more if I were there! ]]
[[ "No~. This much is plenty. Those skull heads will do the rest of the work and the remaining traps will work as catalysts, increasing their doubt, confusion, and fear.
Let's just hope their cores are safe after this internal fight~." ]]
[[ Sister Elle is awesome~! ]]
[[ "Not at all, dear friend. You are the most amazing~! My skill can only change appearance, but with your help, this obvious fake appearance becomes a perfect disguise~!" ]]
[[ Hehehe. But sister Elle did everything~. You are strong~. Very strong! Even I can't move through shadows like you do and set magic traps like that~. ]]
[[ "Oh? I think Celes is strong enough without these simple things. You are strong~. And you are still young and growing. I know you will be even stronger and protect my fool darling~." ]]
[[ Yeeeiii! I will always protect master~! ]]
-Boooooom!
"Khaaaaaa!"
"Ktktktktktktktktkt!!!"
The girl was covered by a darkness attribute spell (Dark curtain) as she set some distance away from the internal fight of the skeleton monsters.
There were hundreds of skeletons when she came here. All set in a battle formation.
Parties of knights and soldiers at the front, and the mages at the back. The zombies were used as shields, so the whole formation of main damage dealer knights, front support soldiers, tanking zombies, and rear support mages was a formidable opponent even without the presence of a leading figure.
If the death knight she had fought before these small ones were here, she knew things would have been three to four times more difficult than right now.
But without the presence of a dominant figure, destroying the battle formation, creating turmoil, and conserving energy became easier for her~.
And she received Celes's help, so it was even better for her.
She took her time, and set explosive and illusion traps throughout the formation after using her disguise skill with Celes's perfect disguise ability.
She had to use a large amount of Mana in this thing, but she had already recovered her Mana using potions. She didn't even need Clover's help in this fight.
It was easy to kill the mages who couldn't sense her presence thanks to Celes's ability, and killing them was easy with the power of light elemental.
Mage also didn't have any great defensive skill, so even though they created magic barriers around them, the magic of low level was nothing in front of her who possessed the ability to use [Old magic).
She was also trained by her darling, who possessed an absurd sea of knowledge, so destroying their weak and simple magic barriers was no different from cutting fruits for her.
So... her work here was easily done.
And she now had a good time playing with her familiar old crow and spirit partner, Clover.
There was a pretty fun fight happening among the skeletons and knights and it was quite a decent show to watch them for the passing time.
Her opponent in the competition, her darling, had wasted a lot of time analyzing the power of the lizardman and coming up with the idea of obtaining him, anyway.
He was still just doing something...
[[ "What's he doing, actually?" ]] f𝐫𝑒𝗲𝙬𝒆𝚋𝐧૦𝘃𝗲l.c𝚘𝘮
[[ Master had his usual weird smile when as he was talking with lizard uncle but then he stopped. And now... ]]
She stopped for a moment and then suddenly shouted in an excited voice, [[ He took out the fun furballs~! I'm going to play with them~! ]]
[[ "Huh...?" ]]
Her face was covered with a confused expression.
It was strange how he would take out those cute little dangerous creatures before his fight with the giant lizardman.
Was he going to use them as magic support?
He surely wouldn't need them against a single lizardman, right?
And he couldn't even gain him unless he defeats him in a 'fair' fight.
What was he doing there?!
Celes didn't answer her for a while... but she kept calling her from time to time as she watched the knight and soldier skeletons dying.
They were actually quite slow and their proficiency in destroying the opponent was quite low, but at least everything was happening without her lifting a finger, so she was fine with this.
The more questionable thing here was... why the hell did that lizardman just stood still that whole time?!
He should have just attacked a lone boy like him from behind. Things would have ended quickly for both of them.
But the big strong lizardman just stood there? Without doing anything?
Well... his pride was commendable.
Even she wouldn't let go of a chance like that. It was just too easy a way to get killed by her amazing darling.
Anyway... she definitely thought that the reason he didn't attack him was that he had good senses and already knew of the consequences, but, well, it was fine.
The warrior was going to lose, anyway.
'But what were they doing with some weak furballs there?! Preparing for some ritual?!'
[[ He is doing something like a ritual~! ]]
[[ "Heh...?!" ]]
'What the fuck kind of ritual was he performing with a big male lizard?! That bastard!'
She couldn't hide her emotions and wanted to shout out loud… but there were still some skeleton knights who could sense loud noises fighting his own kind there.
So she held back her curses and Celes explained how this ritual thing was important to the warrior collection thing.
She understood her simple explanation and was relieved.
The thought of her darling and a big strong lizard... definitely no! Surely he wasn't into 'those' kinds of…
Well, anyway... the last fight on his end had finally started, which meant the end fight on her end should start too, right?
The opponent next was a lich. And a lich was a master of magic which also possessed close to infinite energy.
It would be a difficult match, but she was ready.
But before that...
[[ "Let's collect the loot~!" ]]
[[ Yeeeiii~! ]]