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Above the moonlit streets of E-Rantel, the griffon beat its wings in frantic, powerful strokes, hurtling toward Nfirea's pharmacy at breakneck speed.
Whoosh!
Quaiesse's golden hair lashed wildly across his face in the rushing wind. He narrowed his eyes against the sting, jaw set, heart hammering with raw urgency.
I absolutely cannot let Khajiit succeed.
As a member of the Black Scripture's elite, no one grasped the Crown of Wisdom's danger better than he did.
The relic's activation conditions were brutally strict—yet once worn, it granted the bearer the ability to wield seventh-tier magic.
In the New World, where even the legendary Fluder Paradyne could barely reach the sixth tier, and only awakened God-kin like Zesshi Zetsumei pushed further, such power in the wrong hands spelled catastrophe.
If Khajiit claimed it, the chaos would be bad enough. Retrieving the artifact afterward might become impossible.
The thought made Quaiesse's knuckles whiten around his sword hilt. He barely resisted the urge to wheel the griffon around and drive his blade straight through Clementine's treacherous heart.
"We're here!"
The griffon touched down with a sharp thud at the pharmacy entrance. Quaiesse vaulted off before it fully settled and charged the door.
The instant he reached the threshold, a thick, cloying stench of rotting corpses slammed into him—deep, lingering, the kind that only settled after death had time to fester.
His heart stuttered. He shoved the door open.
The reek flooded his lungs. Inside, the Swords of Darkness lay sprawled in the hallway, unmoving. But Nfirea was nowhere to be seen.
"I'm too late…"
Just then, a bright, lively voice cut through the night from outside. "Helant, it smells so bad here."
Mino's voice. Helant and the others had arrived.
Quaiesse turned toward the commotion. Moments later, Helant and the armored Momon strode in, Mino and Nabe close behind.
Nabe wrinkled her nose at the foul air, her beautiful features hardening. With a flick of her wrist, she cast a gentle air-purification spell; the stench began to thin and fade.
Momonga dropped to one knee, quickly scanning the fallen adventurers. "They've only fainted. No serious harm."
"Nfirea was kidnapped, I—" Quaiesse started, but Helant's calm movement silenced him.
A soft holy light bloomed in Helant's palm and flowed outward, sinking gently into the unconscious bodies.
"Ugh…"
One by one, Ninya and the others stirred, groaning as they pushed themselves upright.
When their eyes finally focused, Ninya shook her head sharply and turned to Quaiesse. "Mr. Quaiesse—after you chased that woman out, another necromancer appeared. He took Nfirea!"
"A necromancer?" Helant asked quietly, feigning ignorance. "What did he look like?"
Quaiesse answered for her, voice tight. "Khajiit. A necromancer who's already crossed into the Hero Realm."
Shock rippled across the Swords of Darkness' faces. Quaiesse pressed on. "He kidnapped Nfirea because the Crown of Wisdom—our Theocracy's most guarded secret treasure—has extremely demanding usage conditions. Nfirea is one of the few who can meet them."
Momonga's tone deepened with gravity. "The Crown of Wisdom? What would Khajiit want with it?"
Quaiesse exhaled slowly, though he'd rehearsed this explanation in his head a dozen times. "Khajiit has been plotting something called the Spiral of Death for years. Our intelligence suggests it involves a lich. The target… is likely the entire population of E-Rantel."
A bitter, ironic twist tugged at his mouth. The most insane part? Khajiit probably planned to turn himself into a lich through the mass sacrifice.
Helant listened in silence, then nodded gravely. "Since the enemy is a necromancer, he's most likely hiding in the cemetery."
With that, he turned and led the group out of the shop.
They had barely stepped into the street when a monstrous presence erupted from the direction of the cemetery beyond the city walls.
A lich swelled upward at terrifying speed—five meters, ten, twenty, fifty—until it towered over the rooftops. Its illusory body shimmered, wreathed in ghostly blue flames that lit the night like a second, malevolent moon.
Quaiesse stared up in stunned disbelief, mouth dry. "What… what kind of monster is that?"
The lich's crimson eyes swept toward E-Rantel. Its voice rolled out like thunder, shaking windows and rattling bones. "Khajiit… I thank you for helping me break the seal."
"I, the Lich King, am finally free."
Each syllable carried a sonic wave that made ears ring and teeth ache.
Quaiesse clenched his jaw, hatred burning cold. "I underestimated you. To think you were planning to break the seal of a Demon God-class entity…"
High atop the distant clock tower, Clementine tightened her grip on her short cones until the leather wraps creaked. The Lich King's words echoed in her ears.
"Khajiit… you stole my Crown of Wisdom just to release this thing."
A venomous smile bared her teeth. "Good. Very good. So you never planned to cooperate from the start."
Her gaze sharpened into something lethal, as though she could pierce straight through stone and bury her blades in Khajiit's chest from here.
The colossal disturbance yanked awake every citizen still clinging to sleep. People poured into the streets, staring upward in naked terror at the fifty-meter nightmare dominating the sky.
"What kind of monster is that? It's huge…"
"Mommy, it looks so scary…"
"A devil… the devil's here!"
As the Lich King sensed the spreading panic, its blue flames flared brighter, illuminating its decayed features in cruel detail: a stiff, rictus grin stretched across rotting flesh, crimson eyes blazing with raw bloodlust.
"Hmph. If I kill and devour the hundred thousand souls of E-Rantel, I will return to my peak."
The words landed like a death sentence. For one frozen heartbeat, the city went deathly silent—every face fixed on that monstrous visage.
Then chaos erupted.
People scattered like ants on a hot griddle, screaming, shoving, running in every direction.
"Run! That monster wants to kill us all!"
"I don't want to die!"
Amid the rising tide of fear, the Adventurers' Guild President and the City Lord of E-Rantel exchanged grim looks and clenched their teeth.
"All adventurers—arm yourselves! To the city walls!"
"Guard Army—detail a squad to organize the evacuation of women and children. Everyone else, to the walls. We hold the line!"
Orders snapped out. Instantly, the city began to move with practiced urgency: families hurried toward shelters, adventurers grabbed weapons and armor, guards slammed the massive gates shut and raced up the stone stairs to the battlements.
The Lich King watched the frantic preparation with contempt, a low, disdainful laugh rumbling from its vast throat. "Weak humans… I will show you that before me, all effort is futile."
A terrifying aura exploded outward. Pitch-black undead magic coalesced into a thick, roiling dark mist that swallowed the sky.
Moonlight vanished. Stars disappeared.
The world plunged into unnatural darkness.
The Lich King's voice echoed in every ear, cold and final: "Tenth-Tier Magic: Undead Calamity."
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