On the stone wall, the magic apprentices stared in shock at the scorched battlefield. Their teacher had annihilated hundreds of thousands of skeletons with just five scrolls—an efficiency hundreds of times greater than their own. The scrolls' power was impressive, but it was the teacher's abundant mana and masterful casting that made the real difference.
Excitement buzzed among the apprentices. They'd traveled hundreds of kilometers over the past month without encountering suitable foes. Tonight's thrilling battle finally gave them satisfaction—a story they could tell for a year after returning home.
"Teacher, there's a live one!" A handsome young apprentice spotted Ryan. His aristocratic features lit up with excitement. "I'll catch it and present it to Father as my trophy!"
Without waiting for a response, the youth leaped from the wall. Mid-air, he smoothly chanted a Feather Fall spell—a short five-syllable incantation—slowing his descent before landing gracefully and sprinting toward Ryan.
"Ah, don't..." The black-robed mage on the wall realized it was too late. He watched the young man's retreating back, brow furrowing deeply. *This secret mission is too important to the Mage Association. I never should have agreed to bring this troublemaker along.*
The other apprentices, oblivious to their teacher's concern, cheered excitedly: "Go, Alec! It's just a Gray Bone—no attack skills at all. Beat it with your fists!"
Apprentices fresh to magic were always overly sensitive about comments regarding their physical weakness. Most were eager to prove their strength—a distorted mentality that wouldn't fade until they became true mages. Only then would their interest shift from proving physical prowess to pursuing magical mysteries, eventually becoming the physically frail mages the world knew.
Young Alec was only sixteen. His body was well-proportioned and strong; years of limited meditation hadn't ruined his physique. He truly had the capability to fight a Gray Bone bare-handed.
But Alec wasn't entirely foolish. The night's fierce battle had taught him respect for war's horror. He untied a thin rope from his waist and quickly fashioned a slipknot—a hunting trick his father had taught him as a child, useful for capturing small game.
Ryan watched Alec approaching, confusion and excitement warring in his hollow chest. Finally—his turn. The gods were actually granting him a one-on-one chance. He would kill this boy, then find a way to survive!
'Kill.' The thought crystallized, and Ryan realized he needed a weapon—even a hard branch would do. He lowered his clumsy skull, scanning for anything useful. Around him lay only mud and fragile Gray Bone fragments. Nothing.
Ryan spinning in place looked utterly awkward. The apprentices laughed, but the black-robed mage's expression darkened further. 'The Gray Bone isn't charging madly at Alec... This is abnormal!'
Gray Bones were the lowest skeleton rank. They possessed no skills, barely any strength. A fourteen-year-old child could smash one with a bamboo pole. Their bones were scarcely harder than the empire's delicate vases—one touch and they shattered.
Yet Gray Bones were terrifying precisely because each was a potential evolver. They could ascend to a higher rank: Red Bones. And a Red Bone's strength typically exceeded that of an ordinary adult man. The empire's senior mages had long studied these undead creatures' evolutionary mysteries. Though they hadn't fully understood skeleton evolution's essence, rumor held they'd reached one conclusion: the more aberrant a skeleton's behavior, the more likely it was to evolve.
For example, skeletons that acted alone during an army's charge.
For example, the one currently wandering with lowered head—the very one Alec was rushing toward!
The black-robed mage's fingers twitched. A fist-sized fireball materialized in his palm. He could easily launch this Fire Bolt, shattering the potentially evolving Gray Bone. But he didn't dare—Alec was in the line of fire. And Alec's full name was Alec Lambert. The Lambert family ruled nearly the entire Rodinlun Continent.
Whoosh—
The rope slipped around Ryan's body with a faint whistle. Alec whooped in triumph, yanked the rope tight, and turned to run back toward the wall.
The rope bound Ryan's arms. His fragile body soon lost balance, crashing to the ground and dragging behind Alec like a lifeless sack of bones. The uneven field, littered with broken remains, bounced Ryan mercilessly. His cervical spine screamed in agony, feeling like it might snap at any moment.
"I'm already bones—I don't want to die again!" Ryan's low roar escaped his throat. His bony arms thrashed against the rope, scrabbling uselessly on the ground, clawing two shallow pits. For a Gray Bone, his strength was considerable.
Where the fire walls had vanished, smoke and mist dispersed to reveal another row of black skeletons charging forward. These were the leaders of the previous cannon fodder—Battle Bones!
Each Battle Bone wore tattered rags, marking their elevated status. Their bones were hard and powerful; each leap carried them further than any Red Bone. They swept toward the stone wall like a black whirlwind.
"Run, Alec! Those are Battle Bones!" an apprentice shouted desperately.
Alec's face showed tension—but more excitement. He was only twenty meters from the city gate. If he could drag this living Gray Bone those twenty meters, snatch a live trophy from under hundreds of Battle Bones' noses, he'd finally make those arrogant elder brothers look at him with respect when he returned to the palace.
"No—I won't be dragged in!" Ryan frantically grabbed at everything within reach. The closer he got to the stone wall, the stranger he felt—a foreign power seeping into his body. His strength was growing.
Suddenly, his right hand struck something hard. Ryan rolled instinctively, gripping it with both hands. It was a stone stele, carved with three words: River Valley Village.
An ancient village-name marker. Ryan clutched it like a lifeline. If he could just hold on until those black Battle Bones arrived, maybe—just maybe—he'd survive.
Alec tugged twice. Nothing moved. He hadn't expected a mere Gray Bone to possess such strength. Glancing at the approaching black whirlwind, fear flickered in his chest. But the thought of returning home and being mocked for being weaker than a Gray Bone made his noble blood boil. His handsome face flushed crimson. Gritting his teeth, he abandoned the rope and charged directly at Ryan.
"Alec, get back here! Now!" The black-robed mage panicked. He hastily deployed his last Three-Layer Fire Wall scroll to block the skeleton army, then screamed at Alec.
Alec ignored him completely. He reached Ryan and raised his fist, slamming it into Ryan's skull. "Let go, you damned skeleton!"
Ryan's head nearly detached. The blinding pain and the pungent stench of living flesh made him dizzy, but he clung to the stele. Strange sensations flooded him from all directions. His bones vibrated continuously; an alien hum resonated through his hollow frame. The sound grew louder, drowning out the Battle Bones' footsteps, drowning out Alec's shouts.
"Let go! Let go!" Alec kicked at Ryan's hand bones with his jewel-inlaid boots. To his shock, the supposedly fragile bones didn't break. He failed to register what this anomaly meant. Instead, he kicked Ryan's spine—a Gray Bone's weakest point.
Crack! Crack!
The sound of breaking bones was unmistakable. A huge fissure opened in Ryan's spine—yet stubbornly, it refused to completely shatter. Agony overwhelming him, Ryan's mouth opened in a silent scream, his grip on the stele unbroken.
Ryan sucked in a breath he didn't need, staring fixedly at the three fire walls newly risen in the distance. The black Battle Bones didn't charge into the flames. Instead, they climbed atop each other like building blocks, vaulting over the fire walls' peaks. Soon, over fifty Battle Bones had cleared the first barrier.
Buzz...
The enormous roar nearly drowned Ryan's thoughts. Only one remained: 'I can't die. I can't die...'
"Fine—you're tough. But you're NOT getting out of this alive!" Alec's patience finally snapped. He pressed his right hand against Ryan's bare skull and began chanting the most complex incantation he knew: "Fars, God of Fire, I am your most devout believer. Lend me the power of flame, let me cleanse these wretched creatures from this evil battlefield. I invoke the Flowing Fire's power to purify this form..."
As the alien syllables left Alec's lips, sparks gathered in his palm. Ryan felt the temperature spike; unbearable heat seared his skull... *He's going to kill me.* The realization jolted through Ryan. He looked up at Alec.
'This is chanting. He's going to burn me alive with magic... No—I have to stop him!'
Ryan surged upward. His thin right hand shot out and seized Alec's throat. "No! No! Don't kill me!"
Alec's chanting choked off instantly. His face purpled as he struggled for air. He tried to pry free Ryan's five finger bones—and found them hard as blacksmith-forged iron.
"WHY DO YOU WANT TO KILL ME?!" Ryan roared, his voice merging with the humming in his bones.
For the first time, fear filled Alec's eyes. He saw red spots seeping across Ryan's gray bones. Ryan looked like a skeleton afflicted with some crimson-spotted plague.
"NO!" The black-robed mage's face went ashen. He leaped from the wall, hurtling toward Ryan and Alec. His feet stepped on empty air, each footfall igniting clusters of red light.
Across the valley, Strong Bone Carol seized the moment. He burst forward like a meteor streaking toward the stone wall five kilometers away, shouting: "Augustus, NOW!"
The other Strong Bone, Augustus, moved simultaneously. He loosed a low roar and snapped his head toward the black-robed mage. Two snow-white horns detached, transforming into twin lightning bolts that streaked across the sky above the skeleton sea, piercing the three fire walls effortlessly and reaching the mage in an instant.
"Fire Shield!" The black-robed mage didn't chant—he raised his hand and summoned a massive fire shield, upon which the God of Fire holding a flame vessel was engraved. One horn shattered against the shield. The other grazed its edge, clipping the mage's shoulder and spraying a cloud of blood as it continued into River Valley Village's stone wall. With a thunderous crash, half the wall collapsed from the impact.
The black-robed mage grunted, hurled backward over ten meters by the force. He'd missed his last chance to save Alec.
"AHHHHH!" Ryan's scream was primal madness. Surging power poured into him—from the black-robed mage's wounded shoulder, from the slaughtered militiamen on the wall, from the death all around. His arm, still gripping Alec, ached as if it would shatter...
Then—POP.
A sharp bone needle erupted from his right palm, piercing straight through Alec's throat!
"No... Impossible..." Alec watched blood fountain from his neck, dyeing Ryan's body crimson. A desperate groan escaped his ruined throat.
The black-robed mage's heart plummeted into darkness.
'It's over.'