Chapter 3471: Undying Cancer (Part 2)

“What are you doing?” The moment Phaso managed to avert his eyes from Lith, he discovered he had been surrounded.

Feela, Zoreth, Aalejah, Solus, Lotho, and Menadion had assumed a six-pointed formation, forming a second smaller barrier with only Lith and Phaso inside.

“I wouldn’t do this if I were you.” The Horde snarled at the Tiamat, turning into what looked like a swarm of silvery droplets. “I’m not stupid. Not all of my body is here. Even if you destroy me, I’ll recover and join forces with your dear brother, Orpal.

“I know where he is, Verhen, just like I know your dirty little secrets.” The droplets formed two rows of shark-like metal teeth bent into a smile. “You have nothing to gain and everything to lose from making me into your enemy.

“Let me go and give me the fragment in your possession or I’ll put the knowledge of the World Tree at your brother’s service.”

“Nice bluff.” Lith scoffed. “Too bad the guy who gave me this fragment had a spine on top of a horrible sense of humor. The Sapling didn’t give in to the madness and told me their fragments contained the record of Mogar’s secrets and the perfected Forbidden Spells.

“The Sapling also told me each fragment is unique so the only thing that using my brother’s name just earned you is more suffering.”

With that, Lith broke Ragnarök’s seals and let out a burst of Origin Flames. Sword and swordsman became wreathed in fire as they charged in a lunge at the center mass of the blue humanoid.

The pose, the blade, and the fire triggered the trauma of the World Tree’s fragment, paralyzing Phaso like a deer in headlights. Lith also activated the black crystals on his armor and blade, infusing them with darkness energy.

Pain snapped the Horde out of his stupor and Ragnarök came to a halt with a screeching of metal against metal. Phaso’s armor had neutralized the brunt of the energy and then countless armored spores had clung to Ragnarök like tiny little pincers.

The blow had been painful but the Horde had enough mass to snuff the Flames out and launch a counterattack. The spores swirled around the angry blade, locking it into place, and slammed against the Tiamat in a torrent of razor-sharp Adamant blades.

“I was right. You know shit about me.” Even while in human form, Lith’s mass was that of a Divine Beast.

On top of that, his Voidwalker armor was made of an Adamant-Davross alloy that weathered the storm of blades like they were raindrops. The Horde grunted and changed his approach, sending his spores through the small space between the scales to bypass the armor and reach the flesh.

Another breath and a burst of Dread Flames vaporized the spores and the Adamant coating them.

’How much did Verhen change since Urgamakka and why is there nothing about him in the Tree’s archives?’ Phaso cursed his bad luck as he retrieved the molten metal and produced new spores.

With the silvery flames shrouding Lith, physical attacks weren’t an option. The Horde tapped into his natural affinities, earth and water, to conjure his tier five spell, Frozen Wasteland.

The ground of the cave trapped Lith’s feet while the ceiling came crashing down like a jackhammer. Both were infused with water magic that dropped the temperature of the room by dozens of degrees per second, sapping the Tiamat’s strength.

A flash of Lith’s blue, red, orange, and yellow eyes sparked a combination of Domination and Void Magic. The stone spikes burst into a hail of ferromagnetic fragments that unleashed the equivalent of a thunderstorm on the Horde.

The moist spores offered no resistance to the electricity and neither did the metal. As soon as the violence of Frozen Wasteland abated, Lith also switched the water element into fire.

The Horde’s Adamant armor became a pressure cooker that sealed the heat and steamed the spores inside out. Phaso dispelled the elements and backed away but the first Spirit Barrier slowed him down enough for Lith to catch up and plunge Ragnarök into the blue cloud.

The Horde opened a hole in his body so that the angry blade grazed him without dealing any real damage. Much to his surprise, Ragnarök carried a powerful healing spell that propagated through the spores, hastening their recovery.

“Damn you!” Phaso felt the tier five healing spell straining his vitality and his predicament got much worse when light turned into darkness.

The light element had seeped deep inside the spores and when Void Magic turned it into darkness, there was no time to offer any resistance. A huge chunk of the Adamant armor fell to the ground with the clink of dozens of coins.

The Horde was about to counterattack when the Awakened unleashed a barrage of surgical tier four Spirit Spells on him from every direction. It disrupted Phaso’s focus and weakened his cohesion, creating an opening Lith didn’t miss.

He released a powerful bolt of lightning that bounced off the countless Adamant droplets, magnetizing them. Then, a single pulse of Void Magic forced them to clump together and sealed them inside a thick layer of solid rock.

The infected Horde tried to Blink to a safe haven he had prepared before the meeting, but seven other creatures like him fueled the space-compressing array. No matter how much mana he poured into the Blink, he ended up wasting his strength.

Cursing his brethren for their betrayal, Phaso used what strength he had left to keep a few strands of spores away from the main body and escape the trap. Awakened had a hard time following so many small energy signatures at the same time, but the Hordes had no such problem.

Enjoy new tales from empire

They shot each and every strand of spores down with emerald blasts of Spirit Magic.

The earth prison soon became thick and dense enough to prevent further leaks. Light magic encased the stone prison with a construct that cut off the supply of air and humidity. Without them, the spores couldn’t multiply and once they ran out of oxygen, they would wither.

The blue Horde forced his way through the multiple layers of his prison by unleashing the enchantments of his weapon and rings. Lith countered by switching earth into lightning and light into darkness.

Phaso’s spells hit only air while Lith’s further drained the already weakened vitality of the infected Horde.

’Now it’s my moment. I can escape!’ Phaso collected what was left of him and charged past Lith.

The Eyes filtered the other magical auras, making the Horde easy to follow, while the Ears read Phaso’s mana flow and with it predicted his path. Phaso had traversed less than a meter before Void Magic trapped him again.

Earth and light were rich with new mana, his prison sturdier than before. As for the Horde, he had less spore, less mana, and his magic-holding rings were depleted. Phaso looked around the cave and found no mercy in the eyes of his captors.

’I can produce one more burst of power and most but even if I sneak past Verhen, I wouldn’t have the strength to force my way through his allies. Let alone my brethren.’ That last word left a sour taste in Phaso’s countless mouths.