Warlock Apprentice

The searing blaze, which should not exist in this world, went for the two women on the opposite side, completely unaffected by the presence of water.

Boom!

A giant explosion created a natural curtain made out of bubbles and vortexes.

When everything cleared out, people saw a long-handled scythe, which blocked the fire attack, right in front of Carveline and Sinehowze.

As the others wondered why such a thing showed up out of nowhere, a shadow slowly emerged from behind it.

First, it was a white, skeletonized hand that held the scythe. This was followed by a tattered black hood, under which lay a white skull with golden markings drawn on it.

Apparently, this reaper-like being just materialized and dispelled Keely’s attack with a swing of its scythe.

“A fine meal from the underworld that invites Death itself to dine with us…” Sinehowze spread her hands and chanted. Several trails of smoke unaffected by water came from her as she released different food materials into the environment, which were soon carried away by tides.

“Keely, watch out!!”

Keely heard Shan’s words and looked back, only to find nowhere to go under the overwhelming scythe attacks.

For the first time in the battle, she panicked. Getting distracted by Carveline’s display caused her to overlook the skeleton’s moves. And when it sneaked closer enough in its ethereal form, Keely’s speed would not help her get away from the well-prepared trap.

Before the shadows could hit her head-on, a violent tide came lashing out and carried with it a series of illusion nodes. It created a white mist that obstructed a large area from view.

“That’s Acoustic Illusion! Damn it, it’s Angor!” Sinehowze quickly moved farther from the battlefield and saw Carveline doing the same. She had been watching the fight without doing anything so that she could keep an eye on Angor’s movement. Unfortunately, she let her guard down when Keely was about to get killed by the skeleton, and this allowed Angor to intervene.

“Oh no, you don’t!” Carveline moved toward the illusion again as her outfit gained bright colors and a pair of butterfly wings.

The wings spread glittering scales into the environment that quickly broke Angor’s illusion nodes before the mist could fully build up.

But Carveline did not find Angor or Keely behind the mist. There was only the skeleton that was still looking around while being completely confused.

Carveline jerked her head in another direction and saw that Angor and Keely were standing at a safe distance while they looked at her with relaxed expressions. It seemed Keely was totally unharmed.

Angor was looking at Carveline’s new outfit with a curious expression. To Carveline, however, Angor’s inspecting gaze was humiliating. It was as if Angor were mocking her failure.

Carveline always believed in her speed. It only took her a second or two to break Angor’s illusion, so she was confident that she would get to Keely before Angor did.

But the truth proved otherwise. In two seconds, Angor managed to take Keely far away from danger, which meant Angor was a lot faster than her. Probably even faster than Keely’s enhanced speed.

“Why you—” Carveline felt her face burning in rage. She was about to taunt Angor when she heard something behind her that sounded like glass shattering on the ground. At the same time, Sinehowze screamed in pain and covered her mouth. There was blood leaking from between her fingers.

Sinehowze is hurt? When and how?! Carveline hurried back to Sinehowze’s side anxiously.

When she moved past the skeleton, the water flow she caused knocked into it and created several cracking noises. As both Carveline and Sinehowze watched in horror, the skeleton’s skull gained a large crack that slowly moved downward until it reached both its feet.

In a split second, the skeleton snapped into a pile of shards as the long-handled scythe slowly disappeared as it returned to the underworld again.

“It’s… dead??” Carveline glanced at Angor, who actually nodded to her as an answer.

Carveline immediately felt cold sweat running down her back.

He killed that thing?

But how?? Did he do it while rescuing Keely?

The only explanation was that Angor grabbed Keely away AND shattered the skeleton while at it. However, Carveline couldn’t believe her assumption.

“Man… I just gave it a little knock on the head and this happened? So fragile,” said Angor, who was still smiling casually.