Orion had enchanted the rapier so that it could emit all the six elements, even light, so as to give his daughter the greatest versatility in battle.
She could even use it to heal her allies or to stab and heal her target at the same time, making it easier to capture someone alive. Friya used the light element to lit the corridor and regain part of her dimensional abilities.
Unlike War, Dreadnought didn’t channel and amplify its wielder magic, but it produced simple spells on its own, without them needing time to be cast nor requiring any mana from Friya.
The mines were too close to use Steps, but now all of them could Blink. She appeared right behind the two undead, unleashing the tier four Blood Dusk spell against one Ghoul while lunging with her rapier at the other.
Yet once outside the dimensional door, Friya’s movements were akin to slow motion to them. Due to the confined space, she couldn’t appear below them nor on the sides, making her strategy predictable.
They turned around a split second after the Blink, dodging the attacks with ease. The spell and the darkness infused blade hit only air, making Friya curse her bad luck. As long as the Ghouls were outside Full Guard’s range, she could barely follow their movements.
Quylla racked her brain in search of a way to help either of her sisters, but everything happened so fast that her plans would become obsolete before she could formulate them.
She had practiced hard since Kulah, but one year was a drop in the ocean compared to the lifelong effort of her sisters and the decades of experience of the undead.
Quylla was barely able to follow Friya’s movements when they sparred, Phloria and the Ghouls looked like demigods to her eyes. Her fear grew with each passing second as she helplessly watched Phloria being wounded and surrounded while the best Friya could do was Blink to stall for time.
She wished that her parents were there and then that Lith was there. When both failed, she prayed the gods to give her the strength to do something, but only grunts and blood ensued.
She hated herself for being so useless and the Ghouls even more for considering her so weak that they didn’t hesitate to show their backs to her. The problem was that they were right.
The natural resistance to the elements all undead shared coupled with the Ghouls regenerative abilities would make most of her spells a threat only to Friya. Darkness magic would hurt them, but it was so slow that from that distance the Ghouls would dodge it easily, with the risk of Friya getting in the line of fire.
Quylla remembered the day when she had killed Yurial. Back then, her body refused to obey no matter how hard she tried whereas now she wasn’t even trying. She stepped forward without even noticing, closing the distance between her and the Ghouls blocking the only escape route.
Thanks to their natural affinity with darkness magic, the two undead perceived the spell Quylla had conjured before it was fully formed while their enhanced senses allowed them to pinpoint her without even the need to turn around.
When a little girl met monsters, death was the only outcome.
“Make another step and we’ll kill you. We only need one hostage.” The male Ghoul said while conjuring an earth wall to block both Friya’s sword and spells.
She was going all out just to keep up with them, whereas the undead could focus solely on the defense and wait for the moment she was too tired to fight back. Friya’s prowess was well known and no one dared to underestimate her dimensional magic.
The Ghouls used earth spells to hinder her line of sight, afraid that she might turn the tables with a single spell.
Quylla ignored the warning and never stopped moving.
The two Ghouls regretted wasting such delicious meat, but the mission was more important than their appetite. Their hands moved so fast that they were just a blur, filling the air behind them with a swarm of enchanted throwing knives coated with poison.
With a little luck, one of them would hit the effeminate man as well and put an end to the fight.
Quylla took another step forward. Now that the Ghouls were inside her Full Guard’s area of effect as well, she flicked her wrists and a silvery blur darted out of the ample sleeves of her Assistant Professor uniform.
Two Adamant chains deflected the throwing knives and then wrapped themselves respectively around the left arm of the male undead and the right leg of the female. The sharp hooks at their extremities dug through the protections and flesh, allowing Quylla’s spells to reach their targets without fail.
Orion had tried to teach her how to use a weapon, but due to the little time they had to practice together and Quylla lacking even the basics, he had failed to find a tool suited to protect her life.
A shield would block, but without attack, there was no victory. Weapons required that she got close to her enemy, but with her skills, Quylla could consider herself lucky to survive two moves.
Long-distance weapons would always be less powerful and versatile than the tier five spells that she could guide with her willpower. Only after realizing there was no answer to his problem did Orion invent Bloodbind.
The enchantment on the mystical chains was simple but effective. All the energy from the mana crystals that would usually be used to fuel offensive abilities allowed Bloodbdind to move according to Quylla’s will.
Unlike her body, they weren’t affected by poor hand-to-eye coordination nor lack of muscle mass. They would move as she wanted them to the moment her mind willed them to do it.
On top of that, once Bloodbind grabbed their target, they were capable of transmitting Quylla’s spells as if she was touching them. They were akin to another set of limbs that would put her thoughts into action.
Thanks to Full Guard, Quylla could perceive all the incoming projectiles and trace the shortest path to deflect them in sequence before going on the offensive.
Bloodbind was far from perfect. The farther it got from her, the weaker it would become. To make matters worse, the chains had almost no offensive power by themselves and their defensive abilities were bound to Quylla’s ingenuity.
They were a last resort in the case everything went wrong and an enemy arrived too close for comfort. Exactly like it was happening down in the mines.
The golden aura of Bloodbind weakened the undead while the darkness magic they carried damaged their bodies faster than they could regenerate. The chains also restrained the Ghouls’ movements long enough to allow Friya to kill them.
“Come on, we need to run!” Friya said.
“Do it and he’s dead.” A Ghoul said while holding Phoria from the neck while twisting her dislocated dominant arm behind her back.
Reaver lay on the floor, protected by a golden aura that made all the undead step back as if it could bite them at any moment. Her left shoulder bore a deep wound that bled profusely and her stomach another.
Phloria had killed most of their assailants before her body had failed her. Each injury she suffered and each spell she cast weakened her whereas her opponents would simply learn from the mistakes of their fallen comrades until none of her tricks worked anymore.
Thanks to Ales F and Salim B for their support.
*Author’s bow*
