It was his folly, to believe that crooked old man honest. His fault.
Mat shook his head in disgrace at his own naivete, and held the two staffs in his hands. At least he didn't take away his staff. Nor did he forbid him from using it.
I can't use the Noxfire? Fine with me. I'll show you what I can do, even without it. Just you wait, shitty old man.
Mat swore he was going to avenge himself someday. He may be weak now, but the fact that he was transmigrated into a magical world with a level system meant that he would get stronger. He was in a progression fantasy.
Taking a deep breath, Mat locked his eyes with the Lich. The Guardian was looked more like a giant than what had been a human at some point, standing over twice his height. Mat had certain ideas about how he could defeat him, he had plans.
Plan A: Hit him with a lot of firepower.
Mat held both the staffs in his hands, and willed his mana to flow. He didn't wait for the Lich to make the first move, there was no time for it. As his core warmed up, both of his staffs' gemstones shone bright cyan in the sheen of crimson moon.
Boom!
A sonic boom resounded as two thick beams of cyan light surged toward the Lich at high velocities, breaking the sound barrier in conjunction. Mat was blinded by his own attack, unable to see what it did to the Lich. But he did not stop, he took no risks, as long as there was opposition, Mat did not cease his relentless attack.
More and more of his boundless mana flew out, and more and more did his body warmed up. He hadn't pushed himself so far in any fight, in fact, not even remotely close to it. He was going all out. He needed to go all out. Because the Guardian seemed unaffected. His attacks didn't seem to be having any effect at all.
It was possible that he had fried the Lich to double death, and his corpse just sat there taking all the damage, but there was also a possibility that it was completely unaffected, just casually standing there. So Mat needed to go all out. He couldn't afford to lose any chance.
Mat wasn't sure how, but he pushed himself even further, and the beams lights from his staffs became thicker, and bigger, like horizontal pillars of light, like the great staff of Sun Wukong, relentlessly hitting its foe with no respite.
There was only one problem, Mat couldn't keep this up for long. Maybe he should have tried this before, practised to check his limits, but then again, he only woke up a few hours ago. There was no point, or the need to do so. Now that he was going all out, Mat realised he may not be as invincible as he had thought himself to be. Because while his magic was active—looking very strong and effective–was actually very taxing on his body. He realised he had a limit. The longer he kept up the beams of lights, the more his body was heating up. He didn't even have the human body's advantage of sweating the heat out. He had no flesh, he could not sweat, had no way to cool himself.
If anyone else were to see Mat right now, they would see the husk of a human body, a mere skeleton, glowing red hot like molten iron while holding two sticks that were firing continuous beams of light at another skeleton, who just casually stood there blocking his opponent's attach with his green flowing, defensively enchanted sword. And the part of the beam that got past his sword hit his armour, leaving him entirely unscathed.
Mat was growing more and more weary, he felt exhausted, he felt hot, he felt feverish. He would not be able to keep this up for long. But he did not give up, he focused his sight on the Lich, on his attack where the two beams joined each other and were melting anything around the area they targeted, and hopefully, the Lich too.
But something was amiss. He was noticeably surprised at how things were going, he did not expect it to be like this.
He was more surprised when a white silhouette from behind the focal point of his light beams took a step forward, and the focal point moved a foot closer, and foot lower.
Another step. Another foot closer. Another foot lower.
Mat struggled to keep his eyes open, the heat was too much. He felt like he was melting in a pot. He struggled to hold his attack, when the Lich took one more step down, now on the plain ground from the stair steps.
His beams of light started thinning out as the Lich took one step forward after the other. They waned as his body screamed in exhaustion. His over heated limbs and core told him to stop. Mat wished he could, but the Lich did not stop, it took another, and then another step towards him. He could not stop. If he did, he would die. He did not want to die. Not again.
As much as he wished to continue, Mat simply could not. His fingers gave out first, losing all control—the staffs they held fell, no more light surged from them. His legs gave out next, and Mat fell on his knees; steam and smoke rose form the ground as his glowing hot limbs hit the ground. Looking up Mat only saw darkness, his eyesight adjusted to the blinding beams of light, now barely letting in any of the crimson moon's dim light.
His whole body ached in screaming pain, the undead's numbness provided him no reprieve from this suffering. And, as his eyes gradually gained their sight again, Mat saw the Guardian Lich, completely unharmed, walking towards him with slow steps, his sword held in defensive position, glowing red hot yet still strong from the relentless force it had just withstood.
Mat was too exhausted, too feverish, too hot to think anything anymore. He gave up. When the Guardian Lich swung his sword at him, he faced no resistance. Mat's head flew off his spine, landing several meters away from his body. His eyes gave way to darkness, and his body crashed into the ground, burning away more of the wet grass into steam.
___
+++
Mordain Noxleigh
[First of the Graveborn]
Age: 10 (154)
Level 4 Undead Undead [Undead Mage]
VIT: -1 (4)
STR: 9
AGI: 13
INT: 15
MAG: 17
+++
Mat opened his eyes to a dark red sky, brightened only by the light of half a crimson moon hanging up there. Only now he noticed how clear the sky was, he could practically see thousands of stars littered all over the it, from the one corner of his eyes to the other. He tried turning his neck towards the horizon, where the crimson moon would eventually set, when morning came. He couldn't. His neck didn't move.
He lifted his arms to check his neck, but they found nothing. There was nothing over his shoulders.
"Oh," he realised his situation in quiet understanding. His body was disconnected from his head. As his status showed, he was -1 vitality. He had reasons to believe that he could only die 3 more times after this.
Mat wanted to get back to his body as soon as possible, but he also needed to figure out how he would do that. He could possibly try and use the same magic he used to float fireballs, and float his head to his body on the same principle… but that would most definitely alert the Lich. Although that did not entirely eliminate the option; if he was going to do that, he just needed to be fast, and have a plan. Plan about what he would do after that.
His fire magic didn't work, so he certainly couldn't depend on just that. He was already forbidden from using Noxfire, so that option was also out. The only thing he hadn't tried yet was physical attacks, but he had little hopes about them working, considering the Guardian wore that thick ass armour.
His Plan A was total failure. He had to come up with a Plan B.
Hmmmm… let's see. I can't kill him with magic, I can't kill him with Noxfire, and I am too weak, and he is too strong for me to do anything physical. Or…. maybe I can? I certainly haven't tried.
Something brewed in his head; it wasn't a plan, per se, but it was an idea. Maybe he could actually fight the Litch hand to hand, and somehow disarm him. A scene played in Mat's head:
He fought the Lich with his ancestral staff.
He dislodged the Guardian's sword from its hands.
He rained firepower on it. It died.
Considering it was a 'legendary' staff, it was bound to be enchanted enough to handle attacks from a sword.
Maybe it could actually work. It was a solid plan in his head, now it was all up to his execution.
He didn't know how long it had been, but it had to have been an hour at least, since his body and mind felt completely cool now. He felt quite ready to try again. It was certainly astonishing that although his physical connection with the rest of the body was cut, he could still feel every magical connection that existed between his neck and his head.
He silently willed the magic to flow, and his head floated in the air, finally gaining the ability to turn now. And as he saw, rest of his body rose too, using its limbs, the good old hands and legs. Mat made sure to have a look at the Lich, and he found him casually leaning against the gigantic tree in the centre of the garden, just watching him without care.
Although it wounded his pride, it wouldn't be wrong to say he deserved such disrespect. He died too easily after all. It was a one sided beat down, in the previous fight. Mat sighed in a sorrow, and slowly floated to his body. Since the Lich didn't consider him a competition, he was also going to take advantage of its lowered guard.
Sitting on top of his body, Mat felt the physical connection snap, and he was whole once again. He stretched his hands, bent down, touched his toes, and twisted his neck around, just to make sure all the connections were secure. Feeling assured, Mat bent down and picked up his ancestral staff. Its wide, blocky build would work well for defending against the Lich's attacks. Just in case though, he decided to enchant it with any defensive spell he could imagine. He didn't really know how they actually worked, he just imagined a strong layer of defensive magic on the staff, and it appeared.
Feeling prepared, Mat now looked at the Lich. He pointed his staff towards it in challenge. He will show that motherfucker who was the true undead, he will have to pay for underestimating him.
This time, Mat was on defensive, so as he walked towards his opponent, he made sure to keep his guard up, and wait for him to attack first.
Once in his range, Mat infused magic in his grip to hold the staff tight, and waited for an attach. The Guardian casually swung its sword, bringing it down on Mat, which he dodged with ease.
Seeing Mat dodge his attack with ease, the Lich took a step back, and tightened his grip on the sword. The green flame in his eyes burned brighter, and he exuded a whirlwind of mana.
"So you're finally taking me seriously, huh?" Mat chuckled in foolish sense of pride. The Lich turned his head up for a moment, wondering what his stupid little bone person was laughing about, before it focused again.
Mat sighed in embarrassment at such a dismissal and swore to revenge even harder.
The Guardian Lich took a step towards Mat, and swung down with a speed that left Mat speechless. He barely lifted his staff in the last moment to defend, and even then, it flew off his arms like a thread-less kite, landing several feet away from him.
Now that.. certainly was not a part of the plan.
I guess I really will have to do it then, huh? My last resort.
Mat thought in resignation.
He bent down on his knees, getting low, and forcing the guardian the swing down even lower to the ground. Just as the Lich swung, Mat twisted using all his agility, and stepped on top of his sword with his mana infused leg, burying it further into the ground.
Mat controlled as much of mana he could from his body, and controlled it to flow towards his head, his face.. his mouth… and when the Lich's sword was down, buried in the ground, he bit down on its wrist with all his mana infused strength.
The Guardian looked down at Mat, biting on his wrist. Mat looked up at the Lich, gazing into his eyes. Even though his eyes were just hollow sockets filled with green flames, Mat could somehow guess what feelings they portrayed in the moment.
They were filled with ridicule, surprise, and a growing wrath. From the corner of his eyes, Mat saw the Guardian moving its other hand towards his neck.
Mat prayed to any and all the gods that existed for this to work. Instead of feeling ashamed, he pulled all his mana towards his mouth, to the point it started heating up again, and then.. he doubled down. He clenched his teeth so hard that some popped out, and flew in many directions. He mouth started steaming white fumes, but he ground harder, harder and harder..
..until…
Scrunch!
A sound of something cracking, something breaking, something giving way resounded… and the great, strong, and tough Guardian Lich.. screamed.
___
Alternate Title
Plan B: Be the Monstrous Younger Sibling