A New World, An Immersive Game Experience

'Well, seems this is manageable,' Eldrian mumbled while dancing to avoid the ghouls' attacks and controlling the reanimates' positions via a combination of water jets and shock waves—and some ether punches. Doing damage to them was hard, but simply keeping them occupied with a few spells was simple, though draining.

This was the first time Eldrian needed to push himself since reaching Tier 5. His spars with Vivian had been fun, but the sheer difference in stats had been too large. And while the same applied against a single ghoul or flaming reanimate, there were a total of seven undead attacking him. The split focus to control the reanimates while managing the ghouls certainly helped Eldrian grasp his true abilities far better than any sparring match ever could.

Taking a few seconds to get used to the pace of things, Eldrian split some focus to channel mana from his soul to reactivate [Elemental Alignment]. Instead of fire, he chose ice. While less effective against the ghouls, it would still add more damage to each hit that landed and would enable him to effectively damage the reanimates without needing to switch the element.

Slipping past one ghoul's attack, Eldrian summoned a carapax to block the attacks of the other. Wishing that he could put enough force behind his ether manipulation to simply send the undead flying. Instead, he had to stabilize the floating shield with wind magic as the ghoul's claws ate through it with ease.

'Shit, that's sharp!' Seeing how effortlessly the ghoul's attacks broke through the carapax, Eldrian raised his guard. This carapax had been one of the weaker ones, but regardless, it being able to cut through with ease showed how deadly the ghoul's attacks were. They did not need to rely on their venom, it only amplified their deadliness.

Deciding that he would have to deal with the ghouls first, Eldrian tried to escape the encirclement of the reanimates. Keeping them controlled with spells was not only an extra burden on his mind but also a continues drain of his mana along with the [Elemental Alignment] covering his spear in ice. While he had plenty of mana, it wasn't infinite.

Sadly, the ghouls read his intention and aimed their attacks to keep Eldrian confined. The seven undead around him working as a well-oiled machine.

'Do they have a way of communicating?' Eldrian pondered, throwing a glance towards the lich and Theas. There fight was a strange one if looked at without mana sense, and currently Eldrian didn't have the leeway to tune mana sense to their location. Thus, to him, it appeared that Theas was simply standing and, from time to time, dodging something invisible.

Theas was actually fighting to stop the lich from summoning a magic barrier around everyone while dodging souls which the lich controlled as suicide attackers. Lower undead wouldn't even be able to break through the dwarf's armor, but a single soul invading his mind would be devastating and give the lich the edge it needed to complete the barrier and deprive the surroundings of all magic not related to death.

Vivian, on the other hand, was having a fierce battle with her ghoul target. She was breathing deeply but unhurt while her undead opponent was sporting many charred wounds and a few missing claws. Nelida's Flame wasn't just for show and Vivian's flames did significant damage to the undead, even though her attacks never landed against a vital. Already, the ghoul was slowing.

Sadly, she was kept from finishing off the ghoul as the flaming reanimates ignored the daggers controlled by Two and jumped to interrupt her 1v1. Their actions had cost the one a head and the other its arm holding its sword, but neither cared. The wounds weren't significant and it could be repaired easily should they simply hold the dismembered part against its original location.

Sadly for the reanimates, Vivian's flames were not normal. Whether they acted selflessly or overconfidently—or perhaps they had no thoughts and were simply ordered to act. Regardless, their actions allowed the ghoul to retreat, but cost them their undead existence. Vivian's sword cut through their bodies with ease and her flames easily overpowered their own, turning them to ash as it did.

After dealing with them she immediately turned her attention to the lich, trusting that Eldrian would be able to manage and even if he couldn't, that his status as a Chosen would protect him. She would not waste her time chasing the ghoul who, if it wished to escape, would be fully capable.

No, she rushed toward Theas, letting her blue flames rage and expand to engulf the dwarf. He blinked in surprise for a second before smiling. The souls were now incapable of distracting him.

"Why didn't you just let your flames burn the ghoul?" Theas asked as he quickly took the lead between himself and the lich. Stopping the creation of a barrier was luckily far easier than setting one up from scratch, and them charging seemed to panic the lich which helped Theas even more.

Falling back to the miasma, the lich sent all the remaining souls towards them. All of which disappeared upon contact with Vivian's blue flames, the miasma too, falling apart as they chased.

"It doesn't work quite as you might imagine." Vivian replied as Theas aimed a heavy blow for the lich's body, his halbert glowing gold and the lich incapable of forming much of a defense without its puppets. However, its soul escaped without a problem to its phylactery.

"Then how does it work?" Theas asked as they turned to help the others, only to find that no help was required.

Myropsis had calmly cleansed the undead with a unique runic spell she had created. Using runes allowed her to incorporate divine magic without the requirement of faith. She only needed to rely on blessed crystals such as she had used for the secondary barrier to be her source of divine mana. While blessed crystals were rare, they weren't so rare that a duke's daughter would struggle to gather more than enough for a single mission.

After she had dealt with the undead still attacking her barrier, she had offered Eldrian support in the form of stopping two reanimates from moving for a split second. Just long enough for him to escape from their enclosure.

Once free, Eldrian built some distance between himself and the group chasing him. Just enough to allow him to focus and activate Crystoi's ability, Tempest Chase.

Vivian and Theas had turned just as the tornado died down. Even with the element being ice dealing no extra damage to undead, it was more than enough to kill all caught in it within the standard 30 seconds.

Of course, the ghouls had tried to escape. But Eldrian had been one too fast for them, blocking their escape with either a carapax or reaver claw, sending them back into the heart of the storm.

'Mmm, feels like I used around half my mana soul...' Eldrian felt slightly shocked, while he didn't have an accurate measure such as with the system. It was highly likely that he had used ten thousand mana. He would prefer to take some time to refill his mana soul, but who knew what was happening to Old Sword and the other people kept alive somewhere in the fort.

And with the other lich and two revenants staying by their side, there was no time to waste. Eldrian had this nagging feeling that they might be too late. And of course if they were then it was all his own fault, a terrible feeling which ate at him and willed him to rush even more than they have.

Luckily, he was not alone.

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