World of Disorder, an unknown region.
Suddenly, a soft, pale blue light illuminated the otherwise dark cave. In this narrow, dark space, this faint light was as dazzling as a sun in a different color.
Several slender, long fingers danced in the surrounding darkness, constantly influencing the glimmer of light.
After a moment, the light gradually receded, shrinking into a transparent hexahedron gemstone, burning slowly like a blue flame frozen in amber.
There was no sound of communication in the cave, only the increasingly rapid and heavy breathing.
Footsteps suddenly echoed in the empty cave, getting closer and closer. A few seconds later, an anxious female voice came:
"Teacher, they... they've surrounded this place."
"Snap."
The pale blue gem floating in mid-air was instantly grasped in his hand, and another middle-aged woman's voice rang out:
Give me your staff.
A short cane was handed to the thin figure, and then snatched away.
Her slender fingers flew up and down, applying an unseen, immense force to the slightly bent short staff. She roughly pried open the gem-set slot at its top, discarded the emerald that had been embedded inside, pulled out the soft, shimmering stalactite, wrapped it around the dark blue cube, and stuffed it inside.
Those hands shoved a thick notebook and a short cane into the anxious woman's arms:
"Take this; it's our last hope."
"Your experiment?"
"Success! The final model is correct. From now on, it's up to you to continue."
During their brief exchange, the young woman was pushed onto a magic circle, while the other person headed towards the cave entrance.
"Start it, Willow, and leave with hope."
Aren't you leaving?
The middle-aged woman reached out and shook her hand at her waist, where there was a huge gap that exposed her spine.
"The magic circle can only teleport complete life forms, and I'm already... lacking too much."
"No, teacher, I can't do it. I'll get stuck inside the rock..."
As the teacher walked further and further away, the young woman, clutching her notebook and cane, began to feel terrified and instinctively started to refuse him.
Upon hearing this, the teacher she was referring to turned around. With the faint moonlight streaming in through the hole, she could even see the teacher's slightly twisted spine exposed outside.
The "teacher" looked at the "student" and said earnestly yet gently:
" Willow, Willow Seretima, you have learned all that I know; it is time to take a new step."
Amidst the students' continuous shaking of their heads, the teacher rubbed his fingers against the cold rock wall, and something was activated!
And her tone instantly turned icy:
"This place will explode in one minute, so if you can't do it, then die."
"This is your graduation exam as a lich sorcerer."
And what about you?
I'll go buy you a minute.
The teacher disappeared around the corner of the cave, and Willow realized that he wasn't joking.
The flashing frequency of the nearby nested magic circles was increasing rapidly. If she failed to seize this one and only teleportation opportunity, she would be forever merged into this barren mountain.
With his life at stake, the lich, who had just been saying it wouldn't work, immediately began a self-rescue operation:
"Hmm, let me think, the guidance and infusion of Psionic Energy..."
What should the height be set to?
"The direction... must be far away from the Demon Realm, at least teleported to the edge of the Demon Realm..."
"Aaaaaah, why is this thing flashing faster and faster?!"
At the cave entrance, a tall, slender lich emerged and surveyed the surroundings, discovering that countless monsters had already taken up residence around the cave.
Some of these monsters resembled humans, some were exceptionally short, and some had strangely shaped horns and tails... but they all shared one thing in common—
Eyes that are a mixture of blood red and grayish-white.
The moment the lich revealed herself, hundreds of monsters opened their massive jaws and pounced on her.
Before these hideous monsters, the lich's seemingly frail body was as powerless as a piece of dried-out cured meat.
"Smack!"
A flicker of Psionic Energy flashed and disappeared at the lich's fingertips. She said:
" Disorder."
In an instant, the distorted rules Descent upon the spherical area centered on the lich, encompassing all the hundreds of bloodthirsty monsters of varying sizes.
They remained in a lunging posture, but their bodies had already begun to change.
In the next two seconds, some of these terrifying monsters transformed into various kinds of trees, landing on the ground and taking root; some became wild beasts running around; and some even grew several Aberration wings and wobbled away into the distance.
The lich completely ignored these transformed monsters; the moment he snapped his fingers, they ceased to be a threat.
She looked towards the highest point not far away and softly murmured a name:
" Wens."
Beneath the silver moon, a pair of blood-red eyes, powerful enough to steal a soul with a single glance, opened at the highest point. A man with sickly pale skin opened his eyes as well.
"Willing to talk now, old friend?"
The lich reluctantly nodded, while the vampire in the distance laughed wildly.
"Wouldn't it have been better to do this sooner? I've always needed a wise lich as my second-in-command, while you need eternal life amidst the Demonic Tide. You should have agreed to this deal long ago."
The gaunt lich's expression was not pleasant, as if he did not want the other party to say such things directly.
Not far away, the vampire had already unfurled massive black wings large enough to blot out half the sky and swept towards the cave, as if he were darkness itself.
The vampire landed beside the lich, his massive, sky-covering wings transforming into a shadow as he returned to his back. Moonlight streamed down once more, and he walked straight past the lich, speaking in that flippant tone:
"I did reserve a spot for the Embrace, but it's not for you."
The lich suddenly turned his head and stared intently at the vampire's back, the exposed half of his ribs and spine making a twisting and grinding sound.
The vampire, however, paid no heed to this, and as he bent down to disappear into the cave, he continued:
"I know you have another daughter. Let her come out; it's an honor for her to undergo transformation under the full moon."
"Don't look at me like that. There used to be so many demons in this world, but now they all have only one name: vampires."
"Compared to you, old lich, I definitely prefer my younger followers..."
The vampire, adept at sensing emotions, could detect the lich's anger behind him, but he paid it no heed—if the lich could truly harm him, why would he have played a cat-and-mouse game with his entire race for decades?