"I've got a way!" Unas cried excitedly.
"What way!?"
Unas didn't waste words and began casting immediately.
The space between his brows burned painfully, and a current of heat spread through his body. It felt completely different from casting before. The heat gathered between his hands for a long time, like a casting bar filling up, before a ball of golden light began rolling over Hal's corpse. The gaping hole in his chest began to heal at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Hake wiped away his tears, his eyes wide as a glimmer of hope rekindled in his heart.
But hope didn't seem inclined to favor him.
A rapid chorus of bowstrings suddenly sounded in the distance. Hake turned in shock and saw a great volley of arrows coming through the night sky. He knew bows well, and he despaired completely. At that distance, with arrows covering such a wide area, it was an attack he could never dodge.
Screaming in despair, he threw himself over Hal's body. At least let me block them for my brother!
That was the last thought of his life.
Puff, puff, puff, puff. Blood sprayed as several black arrows pierced the bodies of the brothers, Hal and Hake, pinning them to the ground in a 69 position.
Several arrows also struck Unas as he concentrated on casting, but they failed to penetrate his thick armor. They only sent him staggering, and the golden light over Hal's corpse vanished.
The sudden interruption left Unas feeling as though his head would split. The space between his brows felt as if it had been struck by a sledgehammer, and dizziness sent him swaying down onto one knee.
Another volley came. He managed to cross his arms over his head, and the arrows thudded off his armor. He watched Hal and Hake's bodies undergo another baptism of arrows, and the helplessness of being unable to do anything was utterly miserable.
The arrows stopped, and clacking footsteps sounded. Seven or eight skeleton soldiers with green flames flickering in their eye sockets emerged, swaying, from the darkness.
The cunning undead wizard had used Qiao, whom he had turned into a zombie, to assess the camp's defenses. Now he had finally launched a frontal assault.
I can't die here!
Unas forced himself to rally and glanced at the gruesome state of Hal and Hake. Their bodies had been pierced by seven or eight arrows, and they couldn't have been any deader.
Compared with these two NPCs, his own life was more important after all.
Unas mocked himself, then left their bodies behind and hurried back into the camp, shutting the gate tightly. The defensive strength of this gate made from wooden stakes was highly questionable, but it was better than nothing.
The enemy seemed to understand that arrows did little damage to Unas in his heavy armor. The skeleton soldiers dropped their bows, raised an assortment of weapons, and charged.
Faced with a fight to the death, Unas found his fighting spirit aroused instead. Ignoring his headache, he opened his skill panel and activated Seal of Righteousness (holy energy infused the Paladin's body for thirty minutes, causing each melee attack to deal additional holy damage) and Devotion Aura (increased the physical resistance of the user and all teammates within a forty-meter radius). Heat filled his body once more, and a shield-shaped aura appeared beneath his feet. Unfortunately, he had no teammates at the moment.
The space between his brows throbbed violently, and dizziness washed over him again. It seemed his energy had reached its limit, so he didn't dare use any more skills.
Seal of Righteousness began to take effect. Holy energy infused his body, and the current of heat flowed through his hands and spread to his greatsword. A faint white light radiated outward, enveloping Unas and the sword in his hands.
He stepped back twice, raised his greatsword, and quietly waited for the skeletons to arrive.
The clacking of bones knocking together drew steadily closer. Yet at this moment of life and death, another question occurred to him: where the hell had that so-called elite ranger Joseph Gordon gone?
Joseph Gordon crawled through the woods, taking great care to make as little noise as possible. His chest still ached in waves, and the wound seemed to have reopened.
He had pinned his hopes on the Paladin who had suddenly appeared, but the kid was only an apprentice Paladin. His weak level-one Holy Light could only ease Joseph's pain a little; it wasn't enough to heal his injuries. He had no choice but to resort to this, hoping the kids could hold out until he found the enemy.
These woods near the camp were the best hiding place, and they were also within the undead mage's casting range. He predicted that the enemy would be hiding here. After concealing his warhorse, he found a thicket to hide in as well.
When the faint white mist rose, he knew the enemy had arrived. It was a trick some undead mages commonly used.
The stench of decay began to fill the woods. He had bet right! The undead mage had indeed chosen this place to hide.
He began crawling around, searching for traces of the enemy.
A continuous din came from the direction of the camp. Hal, Hake, and the others must be under attack!
Gordon was frantic. He could feel that the undead mage was nearby, but he just couldn't find him!
A powerful stench of corpses suddenly arose from all directions. Gordon's heart jolted as a rustling erupted around him, and four Ghouls reeking of an intense stench charged out of the woods.
The ambusher had been ambushed!
But he was a battle-hardened warrior, and he proved it. He sprang up instantly, spun 360 degrees, and struck four times in succession. Tainted blood burst out as he hacked off half of one Ghoul's enormous claw, while the other three nimbly dodged.
The four undead surrounded him, watching him hungrily as they circled him, but they didn't pounce again.
"Hee hee hee hee." An eerie, chilling laugh echoed all around. "I was wondering who was lying there like a dog. So it's the famous Flame Knight, Lord Joseph Gordon. But now that you've lost Firekiss, I wonder if you can still produce flames?"
"You can try me, you rat who only dares hide in a hole. I'd quite like to see your true face." Gordon wasn't provoked by the undead mage's mocking tone. He knew full well that the enemy was stalling for time to summon more undead soldiers, but he also needed time to work out the enemy's position.
"Heh heh heh heh, my appearance isn't worth mentioning, but the young hunks under your command might disagree. Fresh young, handsome corpses are my favorite."
Gordon's heart trembled. If the undead mage wanted to unsettle him, he had indeed succeeded. No more sounds were coming from the camp. Those kids might already have...
"There's no need to worry, my lord. I've already brought them under my command. I'll summon them here right away so they can get close to you in their new identities. Hahahaha!"
Amid the wild laughter, more undead emerged from the shadows of the woods.
The camp.
Unas panted, leaning on his sword, while dry white bones lay scattered all around him.
These skeleton soldiers looked terrifying, but unexpectedly, they were all trash with a combat power of only five. At the start of the fight, they had rushed over and hacked at the wooden fence, and Unas had thrust wildly through the gaps in the gate, somehow killing three of them that way.
The other five stopped approaching, and Unas, acting on impulse, threw open the gate and charged out to trade blows with them.
The white Holy Light radiating from his body as Seal of Righteousness infused it had been a great help. Although these skeletons had no consciousness of their own, they instinctively feared Holy Light energy. Unas defeated the five cowering skeletons one by one, chopping them all to the ground.
These skeleton soldiers were still quite strong. If they had surrounded him, he probably wouldn't have escaped death either.
But trash was still trash. The eight skeletons had given him only seven percent experience in total. Had a counterfeit product sneaked in among them?
He checked his experience. With the two percent from the zombie Qiao, it had reached ninety-two percent. He would level up soon, but unfortunately, there were no skeleton soldiers left for him to grind.
The bodies of Hal and Hake lay quietly stacked to one side. Unas went over and separated them, carefully pulled the few arrows from their bodies, and tried casting Redemption again on Hal, whose corpse was relatively intact.
It still didn't work. As soon as he tried to cast, his head began to ache as though it were splitting apart, and he couldn't concentrate at all.
Just as he was at a loss, firelight suddenly flashed in the wooded hills not far away, and faint shouts drifted over.
Has that knight finally found the culprit? It looks like he's run into trouble too.
Should I go help him? Unas hesitated.
Run away? It was pitch-dark, and he didn't know where to run. If Gordon died in battle, he couldn't outrun the skeletal warhorse either. The man's attitude was a little unpleasant, but he seemed like someone he could rely on.
With that thought, he went back to camp for a few mouthfuls of water, then picked up his sword and quietly made his way toward the battle in the distant woods.