Chapter 408 - Corpse Explosion
There were way too many mages in Anril. Even Andoine, who held an important position in the Supreme Council, could only describe their number as “hundreds of thousands” when he talked with Lin Li…
However, hardly a thousandth of them had seen a Legendary-mage in person, much less witness a fight between two Legendary-mages.
This was not an exaggeration, as most mages in Anril did not know how Legendary-mages dueled; they were not much different from an average person in that aspect. Many mages thought that a fight between Legendary-mages would be as grand as the battles in historical records, where they hurled Legendary-level magic at each other, and that the Elemental Power would be enough to shatter the ground. Hence, they were thought to only use Archmage-level magic sparingly as an accent to the fight.
The truth was the opposite, however, as Legendary-mages rarely used Legendary-level magic when they fought each other, and even if they did, it was often for other reasons—they would use them to distract their opponent or to pressurize them. These were merely tactics, however, and did not determine if they would win in the fight. They still relied on level-18 and level-19 magic to truly win.
This was because when a mage entered the Legendary-realm, their understanding of magic also reached new heights. They started to realize that they could simplify all the complicated theories, and began to take on a more straightforward approach towards magic. However, this did not mean that their approach became crude or superficial, as it was a blend of their profound understanding of complicated techniques as well as the most essential of core magical mantras, thus resulting in a new style of magic.
This style of magic could never be replicated, as it was something that developed naturally after one reached the Legendary-realm.
Just like Lin Li now…
Lin Li felt his hair stand on ends at the sight. God knew how scary it’d be if hundreds of corpses exploded at once…
Lin Li knew very well that he could not allow the Lich to use the Corpse Explosion. Even if he was capable of protecting himself, the rest would surely perish.
He could not care less now. He had already retreated out of the area using the Power of Flight, but he paused in midair as he concentrated all of his mental strength before speeding towards the area with the most corpses, chanting quickly at the same time…
It was an Ice Wall Spell. After mastering level-18 magic, Lin Li had been using it quite often as he found it more sturdy than the Four-element Shields. Besides neutralizing most magical attacks, it could also block physical attacks, which made it more practical than the Four-element Shields.
Of course, it was merely practical…
He would be dreaming if he thought that an Ice Wall Spell would be able to shield them against the explosion of hundreds of corpses. Even though Lin Li now had the ability of a Legendary-mage, and was able to conjure 20 Ice Walls at once, there was no way that would be enough to resist the terrifying Corpse Explosion.
Luckily, it was not Lin Li’s aim to completely neutralize the Corpse Explosion. All he wanted was to buy some time to stop the Lich from casting his spells.
The speed at which he moved thanks to the Power of Flight was astonishing indeed as he moved as quickly as lightning. In a flash, he had flown into the center of the corpses. At the same time, Ice Walls appeared everywhere, and shielded the advance party reliably.
Just as these Ice Walls appeared, the Lich in the sky had raised his magic staff, and the corpse nearest to these Ice Walls exploded with a booming noise…
What more, this explosion spread like wildfire, and continued endlessly. In a short span of time, nearly a dozen corpses exploded, and this was done by the level-20 Lich too. The scale of this explosion was worlds apart from what the Necromancer did back in Blackhills Town. A hole had appeared in the half a meter thick Ice Wall in a split second, and as sounds of explosion continued endlessly, this hole grew bigger…
“This… this is too scary…” No matter how brave he was, Adelo was still scared half to death as he heard the loud sounds of explosions from where he stood at the center of the Corpse Explosion.
“Shut up!” Lin Li had his hands tied with continuously re-enforcing the Ice Walls. At the same time, he channeled mana into the Aether Staff like his life depended on it so as to activate the Dragon’s Eye at the tip. He had no time at all to care about how scared Adelo was.
As Lin Li channeled mana into it, the Dragon’s Eye began glowing brighter and brighter. Finally, faint yellow light seeped through the thick walls of ice, and was reflected off the glossy walls of the cave.
The Lich raised his magic staff as well, and a thick death aura started spreading from the black crystal at the tip of the magic staff. More and more corpses appeared from the ground, and exploded right before the Ice Walls. This was the impressive thing about Legendary magic—he was executing a level-15 Death Revival and a level-14 Corpse Explosion at the same time flawlessly.
While they were both Guided Magic, there was no need for elemental sequencing during the process of guiding it; besides that, they were not that much different from average magic. They still required the control of magical elements and the channeling of mana, and any mistake in that process would immediately result in the bite of mana.
Neither of these spells was high in level, as one was level-14, and the other was level-15. This might seem like nothing much to others, seeing as these were merely Magic Shooter-level spells, which were seemingly incomparable to level-20 magic of the Legendary-realm. However, people who truly understood magic would know that the Lich had demonstrated casting techniques of the highest level, for even amongst Legendary-mages, only the most experienced and the most powerful would be able to pull off such an impossible feat.
Using the most profound of casting techniques would naturally result in the most terrifying effect. The Death Revival continued to produce corpses by gathering death aura, and the Corpse Explosion continued to cause explosion after explosion. This meant that as long as the Lich was continuously guiding the spells, this attack would never cease, and even walls of steel would be blown up by it.
Truth was, that was the case…
Corpses continued to appear everywhere amidst the earth-shattering explosions. There were now close to 300 corpses even though there had previously been less than 100 of them. These creatures created from death aura continued to grow in numbers, and inched closer and closer to four walls of ice…
In the end, the whole place was densely covered by corpses.
If they completely surrounded the four Ice Walls, perhaps even Lin Li would not be able to withstand the effects of the last Corpse Explosion, much less the people of the advance party.
In the end, it was an expletive that ended all of this.
“For f*ck’s sake, are you done?”
As the expletive left Lin Li’s mouth, a faint yellow light enshrouded the Lich as the Arcane Wall Spell within the Dragon’s Eye was released at last. As the faint yellow light flashed, the Lich’s chanting ended abruptly, and the endless sounds of explosion suddenly stopped. The ground beneath their feet did not rumble anymore, and the stinky corpses collapsed before Lin Li’s feet as though they were controlled by an unknown force at the same time…
Then, they heard a crunching noise as Ice Walls that had held up against over 30 Corpse Explosions finally fulfilled their last mission after the Arcane Wall was released. Cracks appeared in the walls following the crunching noises, and they grew into deep gashes in the blink of an eye. When these cracks intersected with each other, the Ice Walls finally gave in to the pressure, and fell down with a loud boom.
“Alright, I take back my words. This bastard isn’t more troublesome than Ujfalusi…” Lin Li mopped the cold sweat on his forehead as he walked out from amongst the shattered pieces of ice. “Bloody hell, he’s so much more than just troublesome!”
Ujfalusi had been way too predictable compared to this Lich as all the Necromagic he used right from the first Tide of Death to the Humerus Wyrm failed to pose much of a problem to Lin Li. While the Tide of Death was a level-20 magic, the Undead creatures it’d summoned were too dumb, and could easily be dealt with using a Thousand Miles of Ice. The Humerus Wyrm was slightly more impressive, but unfortunately for him, Lin Li had the Holy Light with him, and managed to blow up the Humerus Wyrm with just a light blow, even bringing down the Humerus Domain with it. In the end, even the Lich himself was forced to make a Soul Contract with a human.
This Lich was different, however…
Lin Li was willing to bet his head that this bastard had received the most proper kind of education in magic possible!