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[+2 Arcana]

[-316 Mana]

However, as we walked, I could feel a slight stirring in connection with Titania. Curious, I followed the connection, only to realize her emotional-suppressor from her light magic stirring in discomfort, pushing against the bondage I created. It was an ineffectual thing, barely pushing back before my own Companion Core worked its magic to reinforce the bonds, making them even stronger. Still, it was an interesting reaction against an arcana spell, even the slightest component of darkness stirring against.

Such an inconvenient ability. No wonder until now, Titania was a furious hammer of destruction on the battlefield. Her powers didn’t allow it to be otherwise.

Surprisingly, her next words proved that she was already moving ahead of her earlier instincts. “We should try to steal the information from their headquarters,” she whispered.

I was glad to see her already leveraging subterfuge in her thinking, though still elementary. “Normally, it would work excellently, but under the current situation, it doesn’t work for two reasons, one tactical, and one strategic. Do you want to guess why?” I questioned, wanting to encourage her sneaky approaches. I was starting to like her more and more, above and beyond her power, so I was willing to spend the necessary time to correct her thinking.

Luckily, with her spectacular mental stats —spectacular for the rest of the world, not in comparison to me— I didn’t expect our impromptu lessons to take too much time. I had all the confidence that she would prove a quick study, and if she didn’t, there were several more interesting lessons in subterfuge we could employ back in Silver Spires.

“Umm,” she murmured as her face scrunched in concentration. “Their defenses should be activated, and that would make sneaking in too risky,” she offered.

“Good, that’s the tactical challenge we’re facing. If we wanted to sneak in, we should have done that before our initial assault. But what’s the strategic challenge?”

She thought for a bit as we closed in the distance between us and their operational headquarters, even though we had to take a few detours, whenever my Biomancy waves alerted me to a nearby undead presence. “I’m not sure,” she murmured, disappointed.

“No worries,” I said as I patted her head while she preened, a part of me still unable to believe her changes, from the indomitable head librarian to the girl eager for my approval and a liking for chains. “It doesn’t make strategic sense, because I have already raided that place and discovered their most important advantage, all without making them aware. It doesn’t make sense to risk getting caught.”

“Can’t we just burst out together if we get caught? We’re certainly strong enough,” she offered.

“Not exactly,” I explained. “First of all, I was able to sneak in the last time because I was able to engineer a distraction without implicating me, mostly due to luck. Without that, the headquarters are too crowded to sneak in, even for my abilities. More importantly, if we get caught while trying to get in, it’ll alert them about a possible breach of information, forcing them to change their plans. We want them to hit our perceived weakness,” I explained. “Sometimes, a hidden card is more valuable than ten out in the open.”

[+3 Speech]

She nodded as she tried to process my explanation, while I received a nice surprise. Apparently, teaching someone could also improve Speech —though I suspected it was mostly about it changing her general outlook to the strategy, and not just acquisition of the new knowledge. However, before we could delve any deeper into the topic, we arrived at the entrance of the secret location. “I’ll attack first, stay hidden, and wait for my order to attack, even if you think I’m struggling,” I explained, even as I gripped my dagger tight. I left her quite a bit behind, shouldering the task of handling the first response alone.

It was time to test my new weapon.

I walked toward the headquarter, using my arcana to examine the wards as I got closer. I was happy to note that the ward scheme was the same, confirming that they had no idea about the earlier breach. And since I had studied their wards intensely before, it was almost trivial to trigger an alarm, informing that there was someone in the outer wards, trying to break in. I even avoided the most obvious trigger, and instead touched one of the hidden ones, to better sell the attempt. Otherwise, my presence inside wouldn’t be convincing.

[+1 Arcana]

[+2 Subterfuge]

[-13 Mana]

There was no visible alarm, but I could feel more than a dozen presences inside moving, along with another dozen signatures patrolling the corridors suddenly changing their patterns. A much better response than I had been expecting. Apparently, without the presence of a rampaging dragon, they were much more competent.

Too bad they hadn’t expected someone to be brazen enough to ambush the bulk of their army in the middle of their base.

The first assault of the necromancers was spectacular enough to take down a lesser man. Four of them appeared from behind me, launching a volley of death bolts, while six others appeared on the front, some relying on death bolts, while two of them relied on elemental spells, one casting a large fireball to obscure my vision, while the other cast earth spikes, bursting from the walls.

Even more impressively, none of those was the real attack. No, the real attack came in the form of a hidden presence, its death energy throbbing like cancer to my magical senses. I had no doubt it was a strong lich, stronger than any I had faced to date. I could feel its mana gathering, mixing with the defensive wards as it prepared to launch a devastating strike. I had no doubt that I could protect myself with my magic, but that would reveal a lot of secrets that would best be kept hidden.

Luckily, while my physical stats were lesser in comparison to my magical ones, that inferiority meant little when compared to others, not when my weakest stat, Endurance, was already at thirty, which was supposed to be an unreachable target.

I turned back and dashed toward the four on the back, straining my Speed to the limit for the first time even as I imbued my dagger with the life energy. The spikes exploded against the walls, while the fireball exploded behind ineffectively, leaving only the death bolts to contend against. They had planned their assault well, with death bolts aiming to reach me simultaneously, but their assumption neglected my speed. As I dashed, I first met with an attack wave of four, dodging them without even reducing my speed.

I was among them before they could cast another batch of spells, which was the worst thing a traditional mage, be it an elementalist or necromancer, could experience. Before they could even finish their emergency spells, my dagger flashed, cutting the neck of the first one, and stabbing the neck of the second one, all in the same movement. Both of them collapsed despite the negligible life energy I had injected into the dagger, only around fifty points of mana.

Oeyne’s craftsmanship was truly excellent. Not only the dagger didn’t hemorrhage mana like my earlier attempts, allowing me to use it much more effectively, but the effect was amplified as well.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have enough time to admire the dagger with the other four death bolts arriving. This time, rather than dodging, I grabbed the third necromancer and pulled him in front of me, manhandling him with my strength like a toy, using him as a shield, while I stabbed the last one in the hearth. Two of the death bolts hit him, while the other two went wide, missing us altogether. He absorbed most of the energy, though a small part of it splashed over me, with an effect that would be devastating to a lesser man.

[-129 HP]

After receiving the bulk of the energy from two death bolts, the necromancer was still alive without noticeable damage, which didn’t surprise me, as they were quite adept in handling death energy. He would have got stronger if he had completed his transformation to lichdom, but in his current state, reducing the impact was the best he could do. However, his wellness collapsed significantly when he received my dagger in his kidney, the life energy I converted through Biomancy wreaking havoc in his system. Rather than finishing him off directly, I pumped him with life energy, before I kicked him, launching him toward the new wave of attack I received from the other side, skewered by the earth spikes and burnt by the fireball.

Then, I turned back and dashed away, escaping the impact area of the ward before the lich could complete his spell. The angry cry of the lich as the spell exploded the area I vacated was a song to my ear, though I was still received quite a bit of impact from the splash, enough to remind me that playing with them was dangerous.

[-351 HP]

I turned a corridor, then cast another simple Biomancy spell, faking life energy getting away while I crouched in the shadows, letting the necromancers escape. Of course, the necromancers didn’t chase me blindly. Even they were smart enough not to do so after my display of physical superiority. I felt their flares of death energy, and several strong signatures walked closer, their purity of death energy more like the regular necromancers rather than pure like the lich, but much stronger. In total, there were eight of those.

I stayed stuck firmly against the wall, waiting for those figures to pass. Four of them pushed forward, while four of them stayed with the necromancers. Soon, four armored figures with glowing eyes passed me, unable to detect my presence.

Death Knights, I recognized them. Essentially, they were not exactly undead, but not exactly living as well, kind of like a necromancer going through a transformation, but unlike the necromancers, they stayed in that state. According to what I found out during my library trips, they were made from captured warriors, through a unique and very difficult method, preserved most of their stats, and even some of their skills, only without a mind to drive them, instead of following the commands of the lich that bound them. And due to the cost associated with their crafting, the liches rarely bothered to convert anyone lower than Level fifteen. They were rarely seen, because then they were precious enough that only a minority —the strongest ones— of the liches possessed one.

I doubted the lich that was directing the wards were strong enough to possess eight of them, so, either they were a combination of effort from a bunch of liches, or they belonged to a much stronger one, one that was not afraid of the others trying to steal its possessions.

Regardless of the reason, I was facing an opportunity to damage their strength much more than taking down a bunch of useless necromancers, or even a couple of low-tier liches. And it wasn’t just about the battle potential. Death knights were an integral part of the lich’s power, and destroying them might affect the leadership structure of the horde, as creatures that were willing to surrender their humanity for an eternal cursed existence weren’t the kindest when it came to power struggles.

Still, I let four of them walk away, while sending a subtle signal to Titania, asking her to attack them once they turned their back to attack me. I gripped my dagger, tight like a spring, ready to launch forward. Then, two more death knights passed me, followed by the necromancers and the lich, and two more death knights behind them.

It was time to strike.

My dagger was shining as I escaped the cover of the shadows as I pushed it to the limit, filling it with life energy.

[-361 Mana]

Even then, however, when I stabbed the first death knight, it barely staggered, still swinging its sword. They were stronger than I expected, and much more resilient. I dodged the swing and damaged it again, this time managing to disable its arm. Behind them, I could see the necromancers preparing to attack. I didn’t have a lot of time to waste, but I still didn’t want to reveal my magical abilities, so I did the next best thing, and dumped even more mana to the dagger.

[-819 Mana]

It was cracking badly under the strain of mana, so, I did the best I could do, and stabbed the dagger at the mouth opening of the armor, which was pointless to exist on an undead as they didn’t need to breathe, but I was more than happy to abuse the stylistic choice. Then, I dashed away, doing my best to get away before the dagger malfunctioned. It proved to be the correct choice, as the explosion was spectacular, sending pieces of death knight’s armor around like a bomb, killing the nearest two necromancers, and wounding four others.

And just like that, with the high cost of a specially-crafted magical dagger, I was able to take down a death knight without revealing my magic.

Titania chose that exact moment to hit the other regiment, and her light magic filled the corridor, however, it was much more concentrated as she tried to burn down four death knights. Still, among the brightness, the death knights changed direction and charged toward her. I had the hope that she could take them down.

Then, things went horribly wrong. A cry of anger reverberated in the corridors, laced with death energy, strong enough to damage me without touching.

[-193 HP]

The damage itself was trivial, but the reaction of the death knights was the scary part. Their eyes started to burn with ethereal blue light, and the closest one swung its sword —now burning with a blue flame that radiated coldness and death— while the others started to move much faster. And like that wasn’t enough, a deadly presence appeared on the depths of the base, enough to blanket my death senses.

It seemed that my earlier guess was correct. Those death knights belonged to a much stronger lich.

And by destroying one of its death knights, I managed to anger it thoroughly.

The presence was getting closer to us, and in the background, I could feel some kind of magic going haywire. Apparently, it was busy with something important, and when it decided to take revenge for the destruction of its death knight, I caused whatever magical experiment or ritual it was busy to be destroyed. Like it needed another reason to chase me down…

As much as I wanted to test myself against such a presence to understand my true limits, I decided to follow the better part of the valor, and escape. Not only I was horribly undergeared for such a confrontation, the middle of their base, while surrounded by hordes of undead and the untold number of wards was not the best time to test my limits. Instead, I decided to dash through the crowd in front of me to meet with Titania, hoping to rely on my Speed. Not the best option, as I managed to receive a bad wound from one of the remaining death knights, which hurt much worse than I had been expecting, even though it was a glancing blow.

[-792 HP]

However, it only made me dash forward faster, because I didn’t want Titania to be locked between four of them. She might survive a blow. Might. She wouldn’t survive four of them.

Luckily, even with the boost from their owner, they weren’t as fast as me, and since the four of them were focused on them, dodging those was much easier. “It’s time to go,” I said to Titania as I grabbed her in a bridal hold, and dashed forward, as fast as I could.

Realizing the situation, Titania started using Arcana to cast impediments rather than trying to kill them with her light magic, but the death knights were able to shatter them with a stab, barely slowing down. “Why are they so strong,” she gasped.

“I have a feeling that we stumbled upon the opponent of our dear headmistress,” I quipped even as I dashed, not bothering to hide as I run through many of the weaker undead that tried to cut our path, none fast enough to even touch me at full step.

Still, a smirk appeared on my face as I slowed down slightly, just enough so that the four death knights were just a few steps behind us when we finally entered the secret passage I had prepared.

The secret passage that I filled with a great number of traps. Then, when I arrived at the middle of the passage, I cast an air-elemental, much stronger than the ones I cast before. Not the most efficient way to leverage my mana, but with a frenzied lich trying to catch up, it wasn’t time to be stingy.

[-4915 Mana]

I jumped on top of the air elemental, and it dashed away faster than a tornado. The moment we left the cave, I triggered all the traps I had created the previous time, where I had spent hours and a great number of magical reagents. I would have waited a bit more, but I was afraid one of the necromancers recognizing the trap and warning the death knights.

Then, we rode into the dark of the night, with a white glow covering our escape, leaving behind four death knights which almost certainly turned into glitter in the core of the explosion…

[Level: 30 Experience: 439500 / 465000

Strength: 36 Charisma: 51

Precision: 33 Perception: 35

Agility: 33 Manipulation: 38

Speed: 32 Intelligence: 42

Endurance: 30 Wisdom: 44

HP: 3455 / 4920 Mana: 936 / 6300 ]

SKILLS

Master Melee [100/100]

Master Tantric [100/100]

Master Biomancy [100/100]

Master Elemental [100/100]

Master Subterfuge [97/100]

Master Arcana [90/100]

Expert Speech [66/75]

Advanced Craft [31/50]

PERKS

Mana Regeneration

Skill Share

Empowerment (1/1)

Teleportation

COMPANIONS

[Cornelia - Level 17/25]

[Helga - Level 13/17]