The moment he noticed my approach — on a rapidly growing root — the lich stopped his attempts to seal the breach completely and started moving away, not willing to deal with an unknown enemy.
Unfortunately, he was just too tempting a target for me to let go. Not just because I wanted to get rid of a tempting target, but also because I noticed that with the breach still open, the undead army had to stop their attack and focus on dealing with the spreading Aether particles, banishing them back to their rightful place taking a significant dimension.
A good excuse for my huge treant to suddenly move faster and start dealing with the undead.
{+54 Purified Spark}
A death knight pulled late from the frontlines, turning into my food as I used the treant to absorb the spark once more.
A profitable endeavor all around, giving me another reason to chase the lich even as he tried to escape back to the main army.
He was fast enough to escape me if I relied on the root to follow him … so I cast another spell. From the halfway point, the root broke, but before it could fall, it sprout two thick branches, growing in opposite directions. Soon, those branches sprouted further, followed by leaves. The main root transformed at the same time…
And, soon, I was perched on top of a huge wooden dragon, one that was flying even faster than the bone dragon the lich had been using, each flap of its wings spreading a thick rush of mana, enough to momentarily suppress the necrotic mana.
It was another trick I had learned from the memories of the god. Apparently, gods loved to create draconic mounts — much to the distaste of actual dragons, if the scraps I got were any indicator — and even better, my memories had much more impressive specimens of the same spell…
Which meant, my fake draconic mount was not suspicious when cast by a diminished god who had just woken up from his long slumber.
Of course, the memories showed that such a beast would have required a sentient center and a lot of Divine Spark to function properly — and mine was essentially a pupped linked to my God Forest — but the show was sufficiently impressive.
“Being challenged by an actual god. As a little demigod of Necrodes, I’m honored,” the lich shouted even as I closed in the distance.
I chuckled at the dig the lich threw, trying to trigger the pride of a god to create an opportunity for himself.
And, amusingly, based on the memories I had watched, I could see that such an attempt actually had a high chance of working. The nature god had been a prideful creature, and he might have actually stopped because chasing a demigod was beneath his glory. The memories showed that, even as the battle that forced him to slumber turned desperate, he rarely took the role on any battlefield that didn’t have a ‘worthy’ foe.
Instead letting his worshippers die in droves.
“Do I need to bother horror when I slap down disgusting mosquitos that had disturbed my sleep,” I shouted back, my magically enhanced voice exploding in the opening, the mana radiated turning into mana arrows and destroying the zombies underneath us.
Along with that, I sent several wooden bolts dense with nature mana to the lich, but he easily dodged them. Nature mana was hardly the most fitting choice for a high-speed flying chase. I wished that I could use my light mana without raising too many questions, as it would have worked excellently during a desperate chase.
A good way to deal with them while still acting the arrogance of a god.
The lich didn’t answer, continuing to escape, though I had noted that he had already changed his direction, likely trying to bring me into a trap.
I was tempted to turn back, but seeing that the first stage of the undead siege was finally broken and elves were trying to recover from the intense battle, they could use the time to heal, rest, and erect some wards.
The wards I had established kept them safe from the ever-increasing density of Necrotic mana, while the sight of a god counter-attacking should be enough to temporarily dissuade the remnants of the undead from attacking — especially with the constant Aether particles making their lives more difficult.
That would change if they tried to counterattack, but I used my treant to give them another order, asking them to create a stronger defensive line.
Of course, even at a distance, I could see a few arrogant ones ignoring those orders and moving forward, but I ignored them. With the necrotic mana getting denser and denser, such an attempt was equivalent to a suicide attempt.
And I was too busy to save the lives of morons.
I ignored them and focused on my counterattack. My rush was valuable because it made the forward undead force shatter and retreat — which would be critical if I ever wanted to create a safe corridor for the tribal elves to arrive.
I continued following the lich deeper into his territory … but then, I felt a flicker from inside. I was about to write that off as another sign of damage, but another flicker followed … and I realized where it was coming from…
The necrotic spark.
It was suddenly far more livelier, moving with an intent, outside my control.
That was not good news, not at all.
{+90 Purified Spark}
{-99 Necrotic Spark, Chosen}
I immediately followed it in two moves, which explained the mismatching numbers of the notification. First, I immediately converted the most into a pure spark, keeping it separate from the rest for a moment to make sure that effect didn’t continue before letting it be absorbed into the rest of my purified spark reserves.
At the same time, I pushed the remaining necrotic spark into the crystal, carefully watching its movements. It started to shuffle more as I followed the lich, for about twenty seconds, then stabilized.
If I hadn’t been familiar with a necrotic spark — both with using and storing — I might have been convinced that it was just a momentary magical effect, of the increasing necrotic mana intensity around me, but I was able to notice it.
The necrotic spark was … for the lack of a better term … obedient.
That couldn’t be good news, especially with the subtle route change of the lich. I was being led by a trap, clearly, but I started to feel that the trap was not just there to delay me while the lich retreated. Luckily, testing was easy.
I pulled back the mana output of my wooden dragon slightly, as if I was slowly reaching my limit as I got away from the capital. A good display of fake weakness that explained my sudden slowing.
The effect was not too pronounced, as I acted unaware as I sent another wave of wooden projectiles toward the lich, the kind that he easily dodged several times. Yet, this time, one of them clipped the wing of its bone dragon, and it slowed down slightly.
Just to make sure I still had the hope to catch him.
It gave me all the evidence I needed to confirm my guess. Whatever trap he had was not about saving his life — well, unlife — but taking me down.
Whether it was to disable, injure, or kill, I had no idea. I wished I could cast some diagnostic spells to check, but unfortunately, at this point, the increasing density of Necrotic mana worked against that option, ready to disperse anything but the strongest and structurally-sound detection spell.
And, any such attempt would shout that I had detected their trap, making them act earlier. I could turn and retreat, and the distance would make their planned ambush much less effective … but unfortunately, that option was blocked due to another reason.
The arrogance I had displayed earlier.
It was a beautiful tool. The pointless arrogance of a god provided a convenient explanation for many of the seemingly stupid moves I had done, preventing my allies and enemies alike from digging too deep. It was too convenient to lose.
Instead, I decided to double down, and suddenly ordered my wood dragon to stop and dive. The lick took a second to react to that sudden change, and at that moment, the dragon had already landed on the empty field, the plants already dead — and a few hundred zombies easily demolished.
“I don’t have all day chasing a useless pile of bones,” I said as I waved my hand, and a forest started to grow around me. It was something an arrogant nature god could do, creating a new forest rather than chasing the enemies further, like they could be dealt with any time.
Of course, the fact that a growing forest around him could be weaponized very aggressively against an attack was just a coincidence.
Certainly.
The only thing that saddened me was the inability to draw some of the Divine Spark of the Forest to ready myself for the upcoming battle. With the forest split between two locations, it was tempting to bring all of my lagging stats to twenty.
Would that make a great difference … no, but it would have given me some psychological confidence.
Pity.
{Strength: 19 Charisma: 22
Precision: 19 Perception: 19
Agility: 19 Manipulation: 22
Speed: 19 Intelligence: 19
Endurance: 24 Wisdom: 19}
{Purified Divine Spark: 2600}
{Pseudo-HP: 5800 Mana: 15000}
{ADDITIONAL SPARKS
Light - Chosen 7.4
Nature - Chosen 10}
{MINIONS
Guardian God Forest - 26458}
Elven Priestess - XXXX}
[Level: 36 Experience: 631374 / 666000]
