Chapter 99
Chapter 99
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 99
Chapter Title: Chapter 34: Festival of the Dead (1)
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"The Golden Grass Clan's elven rangers are said to be elite enough to rival the ranger legions of the Highfel Empire."
"We can't overlook the spirit mages either. It's one of the few elven cities on the Western Continent. There must be plenty of high-ranking spirit mages as well."
"The walls are tall, too. Almost on the level of a small kingdom's capital. The garrisoned forces won't be insignificant."
In the darkness, figures clad in black robes with hoods pulled low voiced their cautious concerns. They were the necromancers under Rodin, the Night's Executioner.
All of them prophesied that it would be a grueling siege, but Rodin didn't waver in the slightest. Instead, a creepy grin spread across his face.
"Heh."
The chilling, eerie chuckle trickling from the corner of his mouth made the necromancers flinch.
"Lord Rodin?"
"Wouldn't it be more fun than just crumbling helplessly?"
He looked positively delighted.
"The end has finally come. I am the one who shall bring them eternal night."
As Rodin removed his hood, pointed ears and radiant golden hair came into view.
"Rise, ye departed souls..."
He extended his hand, and a staff forged from bone burst up through the earth. Rodin seized it and shook it vigorously, unleashing a sinister green mana that spread outward. From the soil touched by that ominous energy, figures in black armor emerged.
From beneath their helmets gleamed hollow, ghostly lights. They were death knights. Radiating a ferocious aura, they lined up before Rodin.
"Do you plan to join the fray yourself?"
"No. Having them trampled by my subordinates will be a greater humiliation than if I crushed them personally."
The necromancer subordinates nodded in agreement at Rodin's words.
"Then who will act as your proxy?"
They were asking who would carry out the bloody vengeance. Rodin turned to the necromancer who had posed the question and opened his mouth with a sly smile.
"Send Gilliam and Delcris."
"Lord Gilliam will pierce their gates in one strike."
"With Lord Delcris, the 4th Legion will mobilize. That should suffice."
The subordinates voiced their approval. Rodin nodded and raised his hand. A skeletal lich, reduced to nothing but bones, tore open a subspace and appeared. One of the death knights stepped forward from the ranks.
"You know what you must do, don't you?"
The quiet question already had its answer predetermined. First, the death knight Gilliam slowly raised his head.
"My sword belongs to my lord."
Rodin nodded in satisfaction, and then the lich approached, rattling its bony frame.
Delcris raised his bony hand, and behind him, thousands of undead forces erupted from the ground. A mana fluctuation of this magnitude would surely have been detected as an anomaly even in the Golden Grass Clan's city, some 3 kilometers away.
"The war has already begun. Gilliam and Delcris, lead the Ebony Knight Order and the 4th Legion in assaulting the Golden Grass Clan's city."
The lich and death knight moved out. The 4th Legion's undead followed. A massive wave of calamity marched toward the elven city.
Rainkio, a high elf of the Golden Grass Clan, a high-ranking spirit swordsman, and the honorable leader of the Kingsguard sworn to protect the city's king, received an ominous report and headed to the central watchtower—the tallest and largest in the city.
The moment the Kingsguard leader appeared on the watchtower, the chaos bordering on pandemonium began to settle somewhat.
An elven woman who appeared to be the watchtower's commander rushed forward and bowed deeply before Rainkio.
"It is an infinite honor to meet the lord of the Kingsguard."
The elven woman fussed dramatically. It was a natural reaction. Among the Golden Grass Clan's elves, only high elves or those of their bloodline with exceptional skill were permitted to bear the name of Kingsguard.
And those who rose to the position of lord among them were almost always extraordinary individuals.
"Are you the shift commander for the watchtower today?"
"Yes, that is correct, Lord of the Kingsguard."
"Call me Rainkio."
"Yes, Lord Rainkio."
The shift commander bowed once more.
"What in the world is happening?"
Someone muttered.
The position of Kingsguard lord in the Golden Grass Clan was never a lowly one. Especially in Rainkio's case, unlike his predecessors, he rarely showed himself outside of the king's official schedule.
He had always shunned external activities, but recently, as he stood on the cusp of the swordmaster realm, he had become even more reclusive. Aside from fellow Kingsguard members and clan council executives, even catching a glimpse of his shadow was difficult.
For such a man to appear at the central watchtower meant something gravely amiss was afoot, the elven sentinels thought.
"I'll escort you to the secure room, Lord Rainkio."
The watchtower had a small, windowless room prepared for reporting sensitive information.
The shift commander gauged the atmosphere around them before offering to guide him there. Sensing the unusual tension himself, Rainkio slowly nodded and followed her lead.
Two accompanying Kingsguard stood watch at the entrance, while Rainkio entered the secure room with the shift commander.
"Report the details."
"About thirty minutes ago, we detected suspicious mana fluctuations that agitated the spirits."
"Did you send out advance scouts?"
Rainkio asked. As a spirit swordsman, he possessed deep knowledge across various fields, including the rangers' methods.
"Yes, we dispatched wind spirits, but they were intercepted."
At the shift commander's words, Rainkio's eyes widened as he spoke.
"You mean the wind spirits were shot down?"
"Our long-range surveillance from the watchtower suggests it's black magic."
The Golden Grass Clan's watchtowers, which monitored dangers outside the city, had alternative scouting methods in case their primary wind spirits were neutralized. However, these were less precise than direct spirit deployment.
"Black magic?"
Rainkio furrowed his brow. Necromancers hadn't shown themselves for a century since their last successor perished.
"Assemble the rangers and send them toward the detected black magic aura. We need to know what's happening in the forest."
Rainkio's voice was sharp. Twenty rangers were immediately summoned and departed for precise reconnaissance.
For now, it was the only way to identify the unknown threat, so tense anxiety filled the air as time dragged on.
"Ranger mana signatures!"
A wind spirit detected the elven rangers' mana.
The watchtower sentinel urgently reported it, and soon after, three bloodied elven rangers who had been out scouting returned to the central watchtower.
They were the only survivors.
"What did you see?"
Rainkio asked in a voice stiff with tension. One of the surviving rangers stepped forward as representative.
He steadied his ragged breathing and spoke with a strained expression.
"Undead. An army of the departed is marching toward us!"
"Transmit orders to the defense forces: assume defensive positions immediately!"
There was no doubt or hesitation. Rainkio issued the command at once, and the city swiftly prepared for defense. Soldiers lined the walls, and the gates were sealed shut.
Shortly after they finished preparations, the undead horde appeared on the horizon.
Their numbers exceeded six thousand—a full legion.
"Rangers! Nock arrows!"
At the commander's bellow, the rangers atop the walls drew their bowstrings in unison.
"Rangers! Loose!"
Releasing the taut strings sent hundreds of arrows piercing the sky.
The bows and arrows crafted by elven artisans were incomparably powerful to human ones, and the elven rangers' marksmanship was superb.
But they inflicted little damage on the undead. Dozens of zombies fell to the arrows, but that was it.
"Spirit mages! Concentrate all firepower! Do not let them approach!"
The spirit mages extended their hands. Blue mana erupted like explosions along the walls, summoning spirits of every variety.
Rocks surged from the earth, fiery rain poured from the skies, and blades of wind severed the corpses' limbs.
"See that? Even the departed are nothing special!"
By focusing spirit firepower, they felled over a thousand undead in one go. The elven commander was already drunk on victory, but Rainkio, watching from the central watchtower, kept his expression grim.
He knew better than anyone why necromancers' undead were so fearsome.
Sure enough, the fallen undead began to rise again, infused with sinister green mana. Behind the advancing horde stood a black-robed lich waving its bony hand.
"Damn it! There's a lich!"
"Necromancers too!"
"We have to take them out first!"
Without eliminating the lich and necromancers, the undead legion would keep rising.
They were the top priority, but there was no way to reach them. Breaking through over six thousand undead to get there was impossible, and with the Golden Grass Clan's limited forces, launching a gate charge was out of the question.
"Damn it!"
In the end, the commander spat a coarse curse. Rangers kept loosing arrows without rest, spirit mages summoned until their mana ran dry, but thanks to the lich and necromancers, the undead legion pressed on undeterred, right up to the walls.
Boom!
"Reform the lines!"
A sudden roar accompanied green energy slamming into the walls. Some necromancers, focused on repairs, had joined the attack.
"Cease offensive support and focus on wall defense!"
A magical duel erupted, intercepting each other's spells. Most black magic aimed at the walls was blocked as spirit mages prioritized defense, but the true calamity hadn't even begun.
The lofty lich Delcris had taken direct action.
As he waved his skeletal hand, a corrosive poison with intense acidity rained down on the walls.
"Gaaahhh!"
Elves screamed as their bodies melted in agony. But that was merely the beginning—not just Delcris, but another colossal calamity was charging the walls.
"Something's coming!"
Someone shouted. Amid the foul chaos of battle, the approaching disaster's presence was unmistakable. The legion's vanguard—zombies and skeletons—reached the gates, and the calamity revealed itself.
Leaping onto the walls were death knights clad in black armor.
Their numbers were few, but each one's prowess was beyond imagination. They were the Ebony Knight Order under Night's Executioner Rodin, undead forged from high-ranking knights' corpses. Their leader, Gilliam, had even touched the swordmaster realm's threshold—far beyond what elven spirit swordsmen could handle.
In just thirty minutes, eleven death knights neutralized the walls completely. Hundreds of rangers perished, and the lines atop the walls descended into chaos.
"Fall back! Withdraw and regroup!"
The defense commander issued orders. Runners relayed them. It was a hard-won decision, but the outcome was disastrous. The moment the retreat command rang out, the elves' barely suppressed fear exploded.
They fled without even maintaining basic formation. In that gap, death knight Gilliam shattered the gates, and thousands of undead surged in like a tidal wave.
"Damn it! Engage them in the city streets!"
This, too, was the wrong choice. They should have endured some losses and fallen back to the inner citadel for a siege defense.
But the defense commander opted for street fighting, and the Golden Grass Clan's army was brutally crushed by the undead.
The inner citadel fell in an instant, leaving only the royal palace. Thousands of undead encircled it, and the Golden Grass Clan's king took the field with his Kingsguard. Rainkio joined as their leader.
Delcris waved his bony hand, issuing commands.
They were no mere mindless horde. As an army of the departed led by intelligent beings, they could employ strategy and tactics.
Gilliam led the death knights in charging the king. Rangers threw themselves in the way but bought no time. The Kingsguard fell one by one. Even high spirit swordsman Rainkio faced death before Gilliam.
"My lord desires your deaths."
"No!"
Gilliam pronounced their doom. Rainkio could only watch as the king he served had his throat pierced by a death knight's wicked blade.
"Don't grieve. You're next."
With a cold voice, Gilliam stepped toward Rainkio.
The instant he raised his sword high, a sharp ice spear flew in and embedded itself before him.
Gilliam hastily retreated, and a blond man in a uniform blending red and gold blocked his path.
"Rest assured, high elf. In the emperor's name, I promise you protection."