It was truly stupid for Noc to suddenly attack Lin Yun after he returned under such circumstances. The Holy Light Alliance couldn’t have been completely ignorant, even though it wasn’t the most powerful organization. He shouldn’t have been so reckless and irrational as to kill everybody’s last hope at that moment.
Come to think of it, Lin Yun thought that everything was highly abnormal, and that there had to be some sort of secret in it. Unfortunately, Noc was as dead as could be. His body and soul were both gone. There was no telling what secret he had been keeping.
Lin Yun seemed to be the winner for now. Whatever trick there was, it seemed to have been resolved. Still, he felt uneasy.
The Bloody Lich’s scheme fell through. The rabid dogs within the Holy Light Alliance lost their power. All he needed to do was to end the plague and find the five missing Saint Alchemists.
After they drove undead creatures out of the channel, and set up a massive Hexagonal Array in the channel, everything would come to an end.
Lin Yun frowned and considered the questions, but he couldn’t see the sign of anyone manipulating the whole thing. It seemed that the situation had only escalated because he was unlucky and because many crazy schemers intervened. That was why it was so terrible.
Duke Redbud reported all the intelligence he knew. Seeing that Lin Yun was solemn and silent, he couldn’t help but ask, “Sir Merlin, is it very difficult to resolve the weird plague? You’re the most talented alchemist of Noscent right now. You’ve made so many mind-blowing potions. You’re our last hope…”
Lin Yun nodded and looked at the bumps on Duke Redbud’s neck.
“This weird plague is not just a plague. Some sort of other power is involved. I need to consider how to make a potion to contain it. By the way, does anyone know what the scepter that the skeleton king held looks like?”
“I’m sure that someone knows. I just need to ask around…”
When facing Lin Yun, Duke Redbud had cold sweat constantly, and he remembered what Noc said before his death.
It didn’t matter whether Sir Merlin was a reborn god. At least, he didn’t seem to have done anything unacceptable. This time, he had even saved everybody from the dangerous situation. Even if Sir Merlin was a reborn god, he was still doing everybody a favor.
They would’ve been completely screwed if it weren’t for Sir Merlin’s potions. Noc was probably just spouting nonsense when he was dying…
Lin Yun didn’t notice Duke Redbud’s unusual behavior. He rose and left the meeting room.
“I need to study the plague. If anyone knows how the skeleton king’s scepter looks, please draw it for me. It’s very important.”
Leaving the meeting room, Lin Yun entered an alchemy lab to study the sample tissues he fetched from the infected mages.
All the tissues were used up in no more than an hour. Staring at the black power inside the bottle, Lin Yun furrowed his brows.
The power inside the bottle was like smoke or a drop of ink that was slowly dispersing in water. It was filled with death and desolation and mixed with a horrifying toxin that seemed to belong to zombies.
The toxin spread under the boost of the power of desolation. It was most effective on creatures that were vigorous. The weaker a creature was, the less effective the toxin would be. It was absolutely useless against creatures that were already dead.
Therefore, the toxin specifically targeted living creatures…
Once the toxin contacted vitality and extraordinary power, it would melt with the power of desolation and burst out. That was why the low-level Heaven Rank experts died even faster than Archmages after being infected. Only the stronger Heaven Rank experts could resist the toxin with extraordinary power.
However, such resistance was like quenching thirst with poison. Even though it was possible to temporarily suppress the toxin with extraordinary power, the toxin would also grow and accumulate—until the final outburst.
At the time of the final outburst, even level-7 Heaven Rank experts wouldn’t be able to resist, and they would die for sure.
Lin Yun injected a bit of extraordinary power and a drop of blood into the bottle. Instantly, the smoke in the bottle seemed to be enlivened. It crazily swallowed Lin Yun’s extraordinary power and blood. In only a couple of seconds, the extraordinary power and the blood were gone. The smoke, on the other hand, expanded twice in size.
At this moment, Xiusi flew into the alchemy lab with an image stone.
Lin Yun opened the image stone, and a hideous bone dragon and a skeleton king standing on its back with a ragged cloak and a scepter were displayed. The scepter was mainly made of bones, and looked like a combination of countless tiny skeleton arms.
On the top of the scepter, a lot of skeleton hands were holding a rotten heart that was surrounded by pale green light.
Lin Yun became gloomy the moment he saw it.
Damn it, I knew it. Who else could’ve infected a level-7 Heaven Rank light mage except for the famous Plague Horseman? It’s Page’s scepter. That son of a b*tch has given his scepter to a level-47 skeleton king.
He really shouldn’t have done that even if he wanted to suck up to the King of the Undead. As one of the earliest zombies born, he has given his scepter to a skeleton. That son of a b*tch…
The Plague Horseman was said to be one of the earliest zombies that had appeared in the Plane of the Undead. There was also the theory that Page was the first zombie to boast the power of plague.
Plague was useless for the undead creatures, because it was meant to kill living people. In the ancient times of Noscent, a lot of weak creatures died in a war. Then, a plague, which was always unkind to weaklings, finally burst out.
In the outburst, human beings, who were still weak back then, had a lot of casualties. Even the races who considered themselves superiors had a lot of victims too.
At that moment, a weak human being turned into a zombie, and appeared in the Plane of the Undead. Then, he gained the power of plague, and quickly grew into the famous Plague Horseman.
There were a lot of theories, but these two were the most reliable two. In any case, Page, the Plague Horseman, was truly the first undead creature to boast the power of plague in the Plane of the Undead.
His own heart was embedded on top of his scepter, and was known as the Heart of Plague.
Once infected by Page’s power of plague, unless the people in question were stronger than Page, or they weren’t badly infected, and removed the power of plague as quickly as possible, they wouldn’t be freed from the plague unless Page personally absorbed it.
At this moment, the best solution was to rob the skeleton king of Page’s scepter, and destroy the Source of Plague. Only in such a way could the permeating plague on the battlefield be contained.
If the Source of Plague wasn’t destroyed, all the infected mages here would die sooner or later…
The Bloody Lich had been plotting in secret, and the Plague Horseman was joining in too. Lin Yun was feeling a strong headache. It would be fine if the Plague Horseman was alone, but if the King of the Undead behind him paid attention to this place too, then it would be a disaster.
At this moment, only the Lionheart Prince and the forest elves’ king were in the rear. Neither of them could defeat the King of the Undead, who was beyond the Heaven Rank. They didn’t have to fight him only because the channel couldn’t endure the battle.
But if human beings counterattacked in the end, and the King of the Undead realized that it was hopeless to conquer the Leviathan Plane, it was possible that he would attack and destroy the channel, wreaking havoc on the Leviathan Plane.
If he couldn’t have it, he would destroy it. That was definitely something that he would do.
That was the greater problem. To avoid it, the timing of counterattack had to be calculated precisely with regard to the establishment of the Hexagonal Array. As the space in the channel stabilized, the experts in the battle would be stronger.
The odds of success would be the highest if the Hexagonal Array was activated when the space completely stabilized and the channel was expanding.
It was extremely difficult to control the escalation of the situation when it was already as terrible as it was.
Lin Yun shook his head, and began to make potions.
It was not very difficult to make a potion to stop the plague from spreading. He knew the recipes of some potions that could be made by normal Artisans.
After making a sample, Lin Yun handed it and the recipe to the Gilded Rose, asking the Gilded Rose’s alchemists to make the potions.
The potions they made would be distributed to the infected mages according to the severity of their symptoms.
It was possible to stop the plague from spreading with the potion. However, another solution was required to cure the infection.
Lin Yun was confident of curing the infections if he had Page’s scepter. The problem was how to take it from the skeleton king…
Could he just charge at the ocean of undead creatures and kill the skeleton king? Certainly not. The skeleton king was not stupid. There were countless flying undead creatures around him, not to mention the tide of undead creatures on the ground.
Besides, it remained unknown whether or not he could kill the level-47 skeleton king who held Page’s scepter…
Another meeting was convened, this time by Lin Yun.
“I’ve worked out a potion that can temporarily stop the plague from spreading. However, it isn’t effective enough to cure the infections.
“The plague comes from the Plague Horseman, or more precisely, his scepter, which is being held by the skeleton king. To end the plague, we must destroy the scepter.
“However, it remains a question how we can kill the skeleton king and take away the Plague Horseman’s scepter.”
Lin Yun informed everybody of the situation. Immediately, all of them fell quiet. They were all infected to different degrees. They couldn’t display all their strength, and certainly couldn’t kill the skeleton king.
In a duel, the skeleton king with Page’s scepter was able to escape from the level-7 Heaven Rank light mage, so it was even less likely that other level-7 Heaven Rank mages could kill him.
Besides, not thousands, not millions, but a billion of undead creatures were protecting the skeleton king.
All the experts were silent for more than 10 seconds. Finally, Duke Redbud pointed at the bumps on his neck, and opened his mouth with a bitter smile.
“Sir Merlin, there’s nothing we can do. Even if we want to help, we’re no match for the skeleton king. No experts above level 7 of the Heaven Rank can fight in the channel. There are also so many undead creatures in there. It’s impossible for us to kill the skeleton king…”
Lin Yun frowned quietly, wondering how he could kill the skeleton king. The fire wall he established had temporarily stopped the undead creatures, but they would come back when it died out. Then, it would only be a matter of time before the defense line of the half-disabled mages was broken.
While everybody was silent, a young mage who wore a white robe and a sunny smile opened the door of the meeting room and walked in.
“Sir Merlin, allow me to introduce myself. I’m Prome. Please allow me to fight with you, if that’s fine with you.”
Prome was wearing a sunny smile. He approached with great serendipity. His eyes were gentle and wise. He was what everybody expected of a powerful holy light mage. No, he wasn’t exactly powerful. His power could not be felt. All that could be felt was the kindness and wisdom in his eyes.
Even an ordinary person wouldn’t feel any pressure in his presence. They would feel like they were basking in the warm sunlight in a winter noon. They wouldn’t feel any discomfort or maliciousness, and could drop all their vigilance…
When Prome approached slowly, Duke Redbud was the first to stand up and greet him with a smile.
“Sir Prome, why are you here? This task is indeed a problem, and battles are inevitable. But you should know that the channel between the Leviathan Plane and the Plane of the Undead isn’t stable enough to endure the extraordinary power of a level-8 Heaven Rank expert yet. You cannot fight here.”
“You haven’t recovered from your exhaustion yet. You never took any rest. You’ve done us a great favor…”
Next to Duke Redbud, another mage persuaded him too. 10 seconds later, even Levis, who was the shrewdest one, joined the persuasion.
Lin Yun stood in silence, with admiration in his eyes.
Prome was known as the purest holy light mage. Ever since the Holy Light Alliance’s founder disappeared and devoted himself to ceaseless asceticism, Prome had been the only person who always persevered in his faith.
He believed that the power of a holy light mage couldn’t be measured by destructiveness, but only could be measured by the contributions it could make to the holy light. One had to make contributions that were pertinent to the favor of holy light one received. That was the only way to seek the truth of holy light.
Prome had all the virtues a real holy light mage who walked the earth as a representative of holy light should have. He was perfect even if gauged by the strictest standards.
Modesty, honesty, pity, valiance, fairness, self-sacrifice, honor… Prome would surely pass even if he was vetted by the standards of the Paladins.
After the Holy Light Alliance’s founder went missing, the fanatics of the Holy Light Alliance started a rebellion. Prome once fought bravely for the honor of the Holy Light Alliance.
However, as the internal conflicts intensified, Prome saw the ending of the Holy Light Alliance’s civil war, which was that everybody’s hands would be stained with blood, and the Holy Light Alliance would be destroyed.
Unwilling to let that come true, as a level-8 Heaven Rank expert who had the best expertise of holy light in the Holy Light Alliance, he sacrificed himself for the fanatics’ vow that they would not retaliate against the other members of the Holy Light Alliance, or persecute the mages who were still purely pursuing holy light.
Ever since then, Prome had been caged in the deepest dungeon of the Holy Light Alliance, a cage that had been built for him alone. It was impossible to feel any light in the cage. For a holy light mage, it was a living hell.
Everybody thought that Prome might have died there. After all, it had been 1,000 years since he was put there. The members of the Holy Light Alliance who followed Prome weren’t eliminated by the fanatics thanks to the vow, but they lost their power.
Without their power, they could only count on themselves. They grew stronger and stronger. Although there weren’t a lot of them, they couldn’t just be cleaned with a random excuse.
Those mages became ascetics who called themselves Reverends of Redemption. They hoped that they could save Prome someday, and believed that he wouldn’t forget the holy light even though he had been caged in the darkest dungeon for 1,000 years.
