Even though their improvised trap had been a success, Lith lived it as a defeat. The enemy had forced Solus off his arm and stolen her from him. She had left of her own will, to prevent Lith’s limb from being ripped off and then planned the counter attack with him via their mind link.
Lith appreciated the brilliance of their plan. It had created an opportunity and broken the slippery stalemate they had been stuck in, yet he didn’t like it one bit. He had already spent one lifetime being robbed of everything and everyone he held dear.
Lith wasn’t willing to lose anything or anyone else. After losing Carl to a drunken driver, after almost losing Solus due to Nalear’s scheming, Lith had sworn that as long as he drew breath, his destiny would be his own.
Clean Slate had hurt Solus, and her pain was his pain. In Lith’s eyes, Yozmogh was Nalear back from the grave, attempting once again to take Solus away from him. Lith was happy the Balor couldn’t die, because it meant there was no end to the pain he could inflict him.
Solus did her part, forcing Yozmogh to focus on his rotting body and almost forget about Lith’s existence. When he darted forward, the Balor activated his other four eyes. Ratpack emerged from the shadows on his blind side, spinning above his head the bundle of chains and envelops that was his ‘enchanted chainmail’.
The small undead threw it at Yozmogh’s head and hitting him with a thud. The chains melted over his face while the burning letters set the Balor’s hair ablaze. The sudden distraction plus the close range made the elemental beams’ trajectory telegraphed.
Lith dodged them and struck at the white eye, pumping bolts of lighting inside of it so that they would strike the Balor’s brain and burn the surrounding tissues. Yozmogh screamed in outrage as his light wing went dark.
“It works! I knew not even master so cruel to deceive Ratpack. Chainmail really is Balors bane.” He said as his Coward’s Mantle made him ethereal again. Taking a cheap shot was one thing, facing Yozmogh was another.
Without the eye to store the light element, the white wing was no better than a pigeon’s. Now only the black wing’s jamming effect remained. Solus pushed forward with the last of her energy and spread the dark energies to the creature’s lungs.
Darkness fusion prevented Yozmogh from feeling pain, but he still needed to breathe. His body wasn’t able to follow Lith’s speed anymore. The Balor extended his left arm to grab the Ranger, only to have it deflected to the side as Lith struck at its exposed elbow with his own.
No matter how strong the enemy was, joints couldn’t be trained. With his right arm turned into a pulp and the left one shattered at an unnatural angle, Yozmogh couldn’t react when Lith moved behind him and ripped off his black and yellow wings.
Solus’s spells had corrupted his lungs to the point that he could barely breathe. After that, she focused the dark energy against the Balor’s eyes until only empty sockets remained.
Yozmogh was helpless as a newborn in front of an adult as Lith removed his wings and then his legs.
‘Are you alright, Solus?’ Lith asked as soon as she returned to him.
‘Peachy, thanks. I’m just exhausted for going all out. I need to use Invigoration or it will take me hours to recover.’
‘Take your time while I fix the last details.’ Lith took out the Gatekeeper sword and opened a Warp Steps that sent Yozmogh inside one of the closed cells.
Lith couldn’t afford to kill him, otherwise Dann’Kah would become even stronger by assimilating the lich’s life force that resided within the Balor’s battered body.
The Skinwalker Armor was still inactive, but it had suffered only minor damages. The Gatekeeper, however, seemed to be on the brink of shattering, so Lith placed it on a nearby silver table, waiting for his enchanted items to reactivate.
Solus stored both the Invisibility Mirror and the Clean Slate Sphere inside her pocket dimension, alongside with all the artifacts she had stolen from Yozmogh while pretending to be under his control.
They still bore his imprint and couldn’t be used until he was dead. Only when she was sure that their defeated enemy had no way to harm them did she activate Invigoration to refill her green mana core.
While she wasn’t linked to a mana geyser, her only medium with the world energy was Lith’s body. It made her recovery speed much slower than a normal Awakened and put stress on her companion who had to absorb and refine the world energy for her.
Performing the breathing technique with his mouth while keeping his strain to a minimum required her full focus, making it impossible for her to use any of her magical senses.
It was the reason why she avoided taking part in the fights unless it was strictly necessary. Not having much to do, Lith studied the items on the Forges looking for something useful.
Unluckily, Dann’Kah and Yozmogh had already taken all the artifacts the lich had completed, leaving behind only items that had yet to be enchanted. Even the library proved to be off limits for him.
The translucent blue barrier didn’t harm him but didn’t let him reach the books either.
‘I can’t give it a try at cracking those protections until I know what happened to Zolgrish. If he comes back and finds me messing with his stuff, he will not be pleased.’ Lith thought.
As soon as the monsters who had died during the previous battle resurrected, Lith crippled them too before sending them in an empty cell. At that point, Clean Slate’s effect wore off.
Lith imprinted and restored the Skinwalker Armor before moving to the Gatekeeper. Invigoration revealed to him that although the sword’s pseudo core was still intact, the damage was so extensive that even a weak impact could bring it beyond the point of recovery.
It was like a patient on the verge of starvation. Lith couldn’t infuse it with massive doses of mana, otherwise the same energies meant to save it would make it crumble. He injected into the blade small amounts of mana, triggering its self repair properties.
Now that Solus was done recovering, she helped him by coating the blade like a mold and redirecting the energy where it was needed the most.
‘It’s better if we stop now.’ Solus said.
‘The pseudo core is almost exhausted. It needs some time to recharge.’
Lith observed the sword for a moment before sheathing it. It was still too damaged to be of any use in battle, but at least it was no longer in danger of shattering.
“Ratpack?” Lith called.
The small undead emerged from the shadows a few seconds later, when he was sure that no enemy was still around and that Lith wasn’t angry at him.
“You welcome.” Ratpack said.
“I told you chainmail powerful artifact.” He puffed out his chest with pride.
“Your ‘help’ was unnecessary. I was about to Blink, but your meddling ruined my plan. If Yozmogh had started shaking his head in pain, no exit point would have been safe.”
“You welcome.” Ratpack didn’t budge.
Hope you enjoy the extra chaps.
