Bro, I'm not an Undead!



Darwel had turned towards the ferocious fire coming from the far distance as she rode the large, humanoid tree, and her face had scrunched up in disgust.

Undeath.

Unlike death, it was an enemy of living things. An enemy that even the Sif had faced across millennia.

She loathed it as much as any other living thing.

Darwel was only several hundred miles from the GOAL, but she couldn't help turning towards the gleaming flame, a part of her urging the instinct borne within her to go and try to stamp out that dreadful presence.

This confirmed what Festos had been saying, didn't it?

Because of the tense atmosphere here, she had almost forgotten about the specifics of the suspicions Festos had shared with her about the EverSword House and the Premium Age Royale: the connection to the Green Neolists and the Evenfall organisations.

But this...

It was clear now.

Darwel still had only a little over 8,000 Glass Units anyway, and given the sudden shift in the situation, she didn't think Festos would ignore this.

'I can't ignore it either...' she thought as she turned her striding, wooden ride.

Suddenly, a hand lightly gripped her shoulder, causing her to flinch.

Then, something seemed to stream through her, and surge upwards to the top of her head.

"This is the only chance I'll give as a respectful gesture to you, princess. Leave through the gateway before it's too late, or I'll be forced to kill you," a voice said, whispering in her ear.

By the time Darwel turned, whoever it was that had spoken was gone, but she didn't struggle quite as much to figure out who it was.

Above her, the shining light of a '10,000' was now glowing above the illusory, square pane.

***

Skullius' reaction to the sudden burst of the green and black flame which oozed of a powerful stench of Undeath, was even more pronounced than Aurolio's.

In one moment, he had been puzzled, and slightly annoyed at Vali's arrival to rescue him – blocking the long arrow of Aura that had been milliseconds away from taking his head – and in the next, his eyes had turned into bulging saucers, a deep set urgency flaring through his body and soul.

Everyone around him shared half the amount of shock as him.

Vali, while being carefree when she arrived, had turned serious when the glow in the distance appeared, and the four enemies a distance from her and Skullius had too.

They looked to the sight with grave expressions.

Grutus, the hook nosed blondie cursed.

"Dammit! So we were right to be cautious about this whole thing! Is the EverSword House in league with undead?!"

"That couldn't be true, right?! How would they get away with it?! Do they plan to kill us all?!" Hun, the short man cried with a look of terror on his face.

Mandon, who was still recovering from dying just moments ago, gulped.

Indeed. Death, was very different from the rotten, repugnant stench flowing through the air from that massive pillar of fire. He would know.

He had tasted the bland, pure, inevitable pull of death, like a black hole. One couldn't hope to escape it.

It was different from this, which seemed more like the ugly maw of a disgusting colossus, huffing greedily at them!

...

Amidst everyone's apprehensions, Skullius' will flared.

'So this is it, huh?' he thought quickly. 'Then... I can't afford to hold this back anymore!'

...!

To contrast the dark green glowing in the distance, a hollow, dark blue light dimmed the brightness within the area the six were standing in.

Hun, Grutus, Mandon, Liura – with her two Retrievers – and Vali turned to the closer, much more vivid power that suddenly rose explosively.

Around Skullius, mana had fired off in every direction, before turning into a blue-ish warping carpet so dark, one could mistake it for black!

It was greedy!

It was ferocious!

It made the muddy ground bubble, and rumble, darkening the already scarcely lit space!

The tendrils from this dark mass gave it a look akin to raging fire, mimicking the one afar.

"What... what in the world...?" Liura scowled as she gawked at Skullius who still had chunks of himself missing, with grievous burns about his body.

"That... What is that?" Hun called, unable to properly identify what exactly was cloaking the Hybrid Luman.

Grutus' face turned graver.

"That is...." he said, before pausing.

Most wouldn't have believed it, but this truly was just a Full Body Aura!

A terrifyingly potent one!

Such an Aura could only enhance an Advancement Stager's power by up to 400% or 500% in rare cases, but this one....

Vali who was close to Skullius smiled enthusiastically, and moved aside.

Even she was astonished at how fearsome Skullius' Aura was.

Was it really just the common Aura of a Advancement Stage expert?

BOOOM!

Skullius' body shuddered with another explosion, the odd power from the brand on his chest, reacting late to his activation of Full Body Aura, blood flying in many a direction!

But... Skullius' hands were still mostly intact, and with a vicious glare, the coat of Aura boosted his overall ability by an amount everyone around wasn't sure of, he drew Demion's Dance with a whipping motion reminiscent of a snake's venomous strike!

To call fast was an understatement.

To call it elegant was disingenuous.

...!

Liura felt a crippling wave of bloodlust that made her turn pale, and she grimaced as she tried to turn the Retriever she was riding away!

"Curses...!" she cried.

However...

The attack she predicted didn't come for her.

Instead, she heard a roar of agony behind her, where she had left the first Retriever she had summoned!

Looking back, she saw the creature split in half by something unseen, blood splashing from its head to its behind in a crimson shower!

She turned back to Skullius while the Retriever she rode dived to increase the distance between him and them.

'You'll regret that, you idiot! Don't you know...?' she thought.

Immediately, as if to express her point, the clouds overhead spat out a large bolt of lightning that smashed towards the dead Retriever to revive it!

Liura scoffed at Skullius, as fragments of miniscule time passed, perception such as this enabled by the enhancement from her Aura.

She saw his hand explode into dust, yet his sword, which she presumed he had used for the attack just now, remained in its sheath somehow.

'He moved faster than the brand on him could register, and burn away his hand!' Liura thought, shocked, but she remained calm. 'No matter. As long as the Retriever is revived, that brand isn't going anywhere. You'll continue to suffer nomatter how strong you get!'

As Skullius' right hand and body healed, he watched as the bolt of lightning from the skies reached the Retriever.

Yet...

...!

That same bolt of lightning, surprisingly appeared over Mandon, the bulky man who had just been resurrected with the Revival Star, and smashed into him with a blinding, jarring explosion!

Hun who was close to the man dashed back, and his partners turned to Mandon in shock.

What was going on?!

The lightning... how did it...?

In the same clout of confusion, rapid footsteps rushed and reached the blaze left in the wake of lightning, where Mandon, cloaked in his Perfect Aura, was more or less unharmed.

Then...

Unheard, and nearly imperceptible, something ripped the bulky man into several pieces that flew out of the hissing fires of the explosion!

A quarter of a head, a neck, part of the chest...

"Mandon!" screamed Hun in horror upon seeing this, but Grutus rushed to him and pulled him away desperately, a bombastic orange Perfect Aura smothering the two like a wide orb!

Fractions of a fractured moment later, Skullius was standing where Hun was just now, but he wasn't idle. He swiped with his sword so fast that his hand couldn't be seen attached to his torso, and...

Unlike Baddan, neither Grutus nor Hun were tough enough to only receive a mere gash from Demion's Dance.

They were cleaved cleanly through, their cut bodies falling to the ground, with them screaming loudly in pain!

In that same moment, another bolt of lightning fell from the sky, hurtling towards the dead Retriever on the ground in a second attempt to revive it, but it didn't even make it halfway before being intercepted by something unseen... again!

BOOOM!

The lightning emerged from above Grutus and Hun, before smashing into them just as the former's Aura disappeared!

Liura had on a petrified look on her face as she witnesses this. She shakily turned her head to Skullius who, after making so many rapid moves, finally had his body noisily burst with several fiery ignitions!

Because of the dark Aura around him though, his body healed even faster. So much faster in fact, that by the time the noise from the explosions on his body ended, his body was already halfway through healing all the damage!

Vali looked on jovially, quite impressed.

Liura looked to be about to say something carved from rage when a reddish flame devoured the body of the dead Retriever suddenly. The fire was so fierce, and so eager that by the time it finished burning so greedily, only a large, hard crater remained, the Retriever's body gone.

"You better have something much more potent than that," Skullius suddenly said, and the glowing brand under his reforming blackish crimson armour faded from his body.