‘No wonder he treats the High Lich as if plaything, he is a Rare Elite with a much higher level,’ Jack thought. This Garland was even more powerful than Duke Alfredo, his rank of Lord Commander also sounded like a higher rank than Commander Quintus.
While Jack was amazed by the man’s data, intense electricity crackled from Garland’s two eyes. “I grow bored. This ends here!” His body was soon covered by innumerous lightning snakes. The lightning snakes continued to intensify until Jack could not see Garland anymore. All he saw was intense lightning crackling around in the air.
The High Lich tried to cast a spell with its staff, but the staff was gripped by several lightning snakes. The spell formation that was just being formed was shattered. The speed of the lightning snakes was too fast. More lightning snakes nabbed at the High Lich’s different body parts, constraining it.
In its restrained condition, it could do nothing as more and more lightning snakes stabbed into its body.. What had happened to the Lightning Golem was now been reversed. The High Lich was being bombarded with electricity from the inside, Jack could see its innard glowing up brightly.
The bright light continued to build up in intensity until the lich’s whole body was shining. When it seemed that the energy buildup had reached its tip, the lich’s body exploded spectacularly.
Garland Thunderhand looked at the scenery around him, every opponent inside the lightning fence had been defeated. There was still much undead on the outside. He lifted his hand high, a spell formation of seven runes was formed.
The lightning fence which was unaffected by the large explosion or the Crypt Ogre’s brute strength was now distorted as if undergoing an extreme pulling force. The fence was unable to withstand the pulling force and got sucked into the energy core in the middle of the spell formation. Some strands of lightning snakes also came down from the sky above and merged into this energy core. Jack also felt a portion of the lightning energy inside him getting pulled.
When all the lightning elements had been sucked. Garland gripped at the energy core and threw it down. The energy core exploded and turned into innumerous lightning snakes that radiated outward.
Jack was so stunned by the display of power. He thought that he would die for sure as the countless lightning snakes passed by him. Yet, none of the lightning touched him. He looked around and saw the countless lightning crashed into the undead and continued without stopping. Each undead touch by the lightning was disintegrated into ashes. None of this lightning touched any soldier from the Themisphere army nor the players, only the undead.
‘Peniel, is this spell an AOE or targeting spell?’ Jack asked in his mind.
‘It’s an AOE spell, Perpetual Lightning Judgement,’ Peniel answered.
When Peniel explained about the Mana Manipulation after seeing Domon’s feat of delivering damage while unarmed. Peniel mentioned that this mana manipulation could be used to not only enhance a skill or spell’s strength but also its aim. In the hand of a skillful mana manipulation expert, an AOE spell could be controlled to only harm foes while sparing allies. Jack saw now the application of this ability. But to be able to achieve the current result he was witnessing, he must say that Garland Thunderhand’s precision on the spell was Godly.
He had asked Domon to teach him this mana manipulation, but the degree of complexity of this ability was much higher than mana sensing. He could only try to learn it slowly.
That spell just now had taken out almost one-third of the remaining undead. Since the black fog that birthed the undead horde was no more, their number continued to dwindle as the Themisphere army now outnumbered them.
Garland Thunderhand looked around for a while, before he lazily said, “I leave the rest to you people, don’t lose the face of Themisphere’s army to these weaklings.” He turned around and was about to leave when he heard a voice calling out to him. He looked back and saw a man was talking to him on the ground.
Jack had come over to greet Garland after his Perpetual Lightning Judgement spell was over. He said, “Thank you, Sir Garland, for your help. Our guild, Everlasting Heavenly Legends, is in your debt.”
Garland looked down at him, his eyes carried disdain. He replied, “Outworlder. Know this, I care not of your kind. If it is up to me, I will have driven you out of this kingdom myself. But a duty is a duty. I have done my share here. Do not attempt to talk to me again.”
He then flew away, leaving trails of lightning in his wake.
‘Such arrogance,’ Jack thought.
“Try not to approach him next time,” Jack heard a voice from behind. Jack turned and saw Diego. “He is amongst those that disagree with the king’s decree to welcome Outworlders into this world.”
“I see,” Jack responded, then said to the Knight Captain with a grin, “Well, at least I know sir Diego was amongst those that welcome us.”
“Don’t just go and make an assumption. I am simply following the king’s order. I care not for your kind either! There is still some undead around, I will go and rout them. Don’t get killed! Otherwise, it’s a taint to our duty.”
Diego then sped away rejoining the fight. Jack didn’t think this Knight-Captain dislike outworlders as he tried to make it look like. He won’t have come to talk to him otherwise.
But Garland, on the other hand, the scorn in his eyes was genuine. Jack contemplated about this. This meant that this insanely powerful Lord Commander was under Crown Prince Therribus’ camp. This did not bode well.
With the undead losing their most powerful leaders and without continuous supply. The rest of the undead were soon wiped out.
Once the last of the undead was killed, the battle ended since there was no longer any enemy. The coalition army was too far away to be considered within the battlefield. Everyone from the Everlasting Heavenly Legends heard a notification voice.
“Congratulations to have successfully defended your Guild Headquarters. Every participating member received 500 guild contribution points. Guild receives 20,000 reputation points and 50 gold coins, 200 food, 50 minerals, and 50 lumbers.”
Jeanny heaved a relieved sigh. Although the resources weren’t as many as when they conquered the Bandit Outpost, they would still be a great help in retraining those lost units.
Everyone cheered from the notification. But as they were cheering, another notification followed, “Guild has successfully defended against an activated Disaster Item within its territory, receiving 30,000 reputation points and High Lich Summoning Crystal.”
Jeanny, who was the main leader of the guild, received a notice that the summoning crystal had been placed inside her inventory. Jeanny immediately checked the item.
High Lich Summoning Crystal (Unique consumable, for guild purpose only)
To be used on the Guild Power Crystal. Summon a level 55 rare elite High Lich to defend the Guild Headquarters.
Duration: 3 hours
‘Yes!’ Jeanny exclaimed. With this item. They should be able to easily defend the Heavenly Citadel one time.
Although they lost quite a lot, the reputation acquired from this battle was also very generous. A lot of guild quests would have been needed to gain this amount of reputation points. Some good still came out of this invasion. Of course, that was in the condition that they won.
The cheering continued for a while. The Imperial Rescue lasted six hours, so the army continued to station outside the Guild Headquarter, guarding it. Jack and the others returned into the Heavenly Citadel to review their losses. Their biggest loss was of the Squires, they had lost more than eighty of them. Since these units assumed the main tanking role during the battle. It would take some time and resources to retrain them.
Most of the players also lost their Amulet of Rebirth. Some were already teleporting back to the city and on their way to re-buy the amulet. Jeanny arranged so the cost of the amulet they bought this time was replaced with an equivalent amount of contribution points and was released from compulsory guild contribution for a week.
Some had died twice and ended up falling back to level 1 and losing all their equipment. Jeanny gave them the promise to power-level them back to mainstream level and provide them with equipment. They were also given extra contribution points and were relieved from compulsory guild contribution for the next few weeks.
All those that were still with them after this battle was being upgraded to Veteran rank. Members who were at Trainee rank were automatically upgraded to Associate rank after two weeks passed. While for Veteran rank, a decision from either a Leader or a Councillor was needed.
Before the battle, the membership of the guild had reached 900 members, almost filling up the guild’s capacity. After this battle, outside of the 56 core members, only 439 members still stayed with them. John had recorded the ones that left the guild and put them on a blacklist. Those players were no longer welcomed in the guild.
