CHAPTER 699: WITH LOVE

It rained skeletons over the two fighters. The thralls landed everywhere around them their bones shifting with the [Bone Arsenal] to become something else. The arms of slashers became bone blades, the guardians became taller and larger, their arms like large shields, and the few archers started shooting bone arrows. A single knight thrall emerged from Tartaros’ skeleton, becoming bigger with its own bone armor, sword and shield, before the [Exalted exoskeleton] overlapped with it.

There was no big fight or struggle. Sen and Ezerid were both already tired, having unlocked offensive abilities instead of their stamina, and they easily got surrounded. Their movement restrained, Pareth jumped in and killed Sen with a slap, while Ezerid was captured by the knight thrall. Restraining someone without killing them being right about the absolute limit of how complex an order a thrall could understand under [Skeletal Frenzy].

‘You have eliminated [Sen]’

‘You have received [Minor Unlocker*1]’

‘You have received [Major Unlocker*1]!’

Sofia down, grabbing the keys and turning toward Ezerid.

“Doing well?” she asked, while the knight thrall held both of the andarian’s hands behind his back. He was not even trying to struggle out.

“I have had better days… Are you not going to kill me?” he asked.

“There’s no rule against teaming up, is there?” Sofia answered.

“Is this your idea of teaming up?” he asked back, looking at all the skeletons.

“Hoy hoy, I see what you’re doing with your mana, you better stop that before you do something you will regret.”

“... Sorry,” Ezerid apologized, whatever magic he was preparing fading out.

“I’ll act like I didn’t see anything. So, simple, you come with me gang up on my sister’s fake, I let you have second place. Deal?”

“The ‘no deal’ option is to die here?”

“You’re quick on the uptake,” Sofia teased.

“... I will graciously accept second place then…”

“Great! We have about a minute left to kill her, just give me a second to use the unlockers…”

Minor is active skills, major is another any skill…

Here, Pareth, take this one, I get [Heat Death] for safety. Sofia thought as she threw the minor key to Pareth.

‘(Twin) has unlocked [Sanctified grounds]’

‘You have unlocked [Heat Death]’

“Can you fly right now?” Sofia asked Ezerid.

“Taxing on my stamina but I can.”

“Alright the skeletons will carry you then, let’s go!”

Sofia took up to the skies, followed by a swarm of skeletons, each with their own skeletal wings. Saria was somewhere in the last, desert-themed zone, and she was rather easy to locate as the only person left alive on that side of the island, followed by a trail of skeletal thralls on her tracks. Whether it was the thralls’ doing or hers, they had gotten rid of everyone else.

Not many people still alive in general, it looks like…

Sofia watched the desert area from above. She’s in that pyramid out there. It would be dangerous to go in there myself. “Ezerid, she’s in there, do you have any way to force her out?”

“I do but that will be all of my mana.”

“Do it, I can take it from there.”

Ezerid nodded, closed his eyes, and started channeling a spell.

Sofia recognized the same mana structure he had used to unleash the light beam that had killed Pestle and Happy cloud during the first night’s event. But instead of being an instant spell, this time, it slowly started to create glowing ritual circles in the sky above the pyramid Saria was hiding in.

At this rate my demon form is going to run out before he’s done…

Sofia patiently waited as Ezerid powered up his spell. She checked her thralls in the meantime. They were all over the island, quite a few of them carrying unlockers pilfered from their victims, there were not many people who had progressed fast enough to fight back against the skeletons, and even those were starting to get overwhelmed by the sheer number. Any monster they killed to get stronger turned into one more thrall, bolstering their numbers. Not to mention that the thralls had started also hunting the island’s monsters to turn them.

The demon form ran out. Sofia did her best not to show anything as her body morphed back inside of her armor. [Infinity Engine] kept her mana unaffected but her body would still be weak for half an hour, which was only worsened by her currently abysmal stats.

At the same time, the pyramid exploded, a four-winged blue dragon flying out like inverted lightning in Sofia’s direction. Ezerid unleashed his spell, even incomplete, but an instant too late. It only severed half of Saria’s tail as she flew out and up, activating several of her own spells on the way. With the health of a level 20, Sofia couldn’t take a single hit. Sofia ordered Pareth and the thralls to stay behind, as she cancelled every single of Saria’s offensive spells before they could even materialize. That left the main issue to deal with, the dragon itself.

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Ezerid was almost completely out of mana, but he still cast some kind of wide mana screen between Saria and the group. The dragon shattered through the barrier, and flew directly to Sofia, claws ready and maw open, about to spew draconic flames.

Stop!

With a perfect timing, Sofia exerted her control over Saria’s bones. Her sister’s claws just centimeters away form her chest.

She would not be able to hold her for long, the dragon’s strong aura fighting back against her own, stopping her from reshaping Saria’s bones at all because just stopping her was a strenuous exercise in and of itself.

Thankfully, Pareth and the thralls were there, and Saria found herself attacked from all directions by flying skeletons, completely unable to defend herself.

It was a matter of seconds before she was weakened enough for Sofia to finally get enough control to shatter all of her sister’s bones. The broken fragments form a hand that moved inside of the draconic body, and grabbed the mana heart, before wiggling its way out of an open wound like parasite snake with an egg in its maw.

‘You have eliminated [Saria Aphenoreth]’

‘You have received [Minor Unlocker*4]’

‘You have received [Major Unlocker*1]!’

“Sorry, sister,” Sofia said, “but your fake is really lackluster compared to the real thing, isn’t it? Didn’t even try any emotional manipulation or anything, just a straight up surprise attack. Honestly disappointing, don’t you agree?”

“Do you have a way to communicate with her?” Ezerid asked, still held by the knight thrall.

“No but she must be watching,” Sofia answered, gathering the unlockers, unlocking random things, hoping it might give her bonus points.

“Right… I’m surprised we’re not hearing Love and Er’Gakk’s commentary right now, are they watching someone else? Saint Tartaros?”

Sofia shook her head, “Tartaros is the skeleton helping you fly right now,” Sofia explained, pointing at the knight thrall.

“Oh…”

“Yeah. I also got Sonia, this only leaves Happy cloud unaccounted for.”

“Haven’t seen him since the start… But he ran in this direction, I think.”

“He wasn’t far from Saria, so I could see that. She probably killed him, then.”

“Is it already down to just us?” Ezerid asked, flabbergasted at the realization.

“Maybe. There are many mana signatures all over the island still, but they could be monsters. My skeletons are searching everywhere as we speak.”

“... in what is perhaps the most anticlimactic finale ever! Is it time to activate an island event?” the trio heard Love say, her voice gradually coming closer.

She appeared out of nowhere, a human-sized fairy, wearing garish clothes and with a face covered in colorful makeup, “Or will you duel to the death?! What is it going to be?!”

“It’s an honor to meet you,” Ezerid greeted with a curt bow, “Is it only us three left?”

“Indeed! This has been one of the fastest rounds of last-man standing on record! Unless you kids want to stay for the ten minutes mark meteor shower?”

Ezerid looked at Sofia, “A deal’s a deal,” he said with a nod, before casting a tiny light beam aimed at himself. He plunged his hand in the light beam carved in his torso and fished out his own mana heart. “Second place… Isn’t so bad,” he mumbled as his body convulsed and died.

“Woah! He just killed himself!”

“... Is the event not ending?” Sofia asked after five long seconds of silence.

“Ah! Gakk! What are you doing?” Love asked, tapping on was what probably a system window that Sofia couldn’t see. “This isn’t in the script at all!”

“Did I break something again?” Sofia asked.

“No, no! It’s Gakk I don’t know what he’s doing! StoooOop!”

All over the island, things started to move. The trees of the forest unrooted themselves, becoming walking monsters, strange towers started rising out of the side of the mountain, meteors appeared in the sky, geysers of lava erupted from the desert, a giant wave came from the sea toward the mangrove while parts of the plateau on the other side started sinking into the ground. The entire island seemed instantly engulfed in a giant cataclysm.

Did that stupid Kleptra just press all the toggles?! Does he want to see me die that much?

Love herself seemed to be frantically trying to fix things through an invisible system window, while Sofia and Pareth could only watch as the event broke.

I mean… It’s not like I would lose points by dying now, right?

A shrill sound pierced Sofia’s ears, and suddenly, everything faded to black, aside from Sofia herself, Love and Pareth. The thralls, the island, even the sky itself all disappeared.

“Ah! Oh!” Love looked back at Sofia, “I think I broke it.”

“I can see that. First time?”

“No… But we’re stuck here until someone outside fixes it…”

“Business as usual then. Why is it all black instead of all white this time?”

“This is the last failsafe instance before the entire Ark collapses… But Nex is here! I’m sure this will be fixed quickly!”

“If you say so… Well… Nice meeting you, I guess? This is not how I imagined ‘Love’, I have to admit.”

“This is not how I imagined someone chosen by the four forbidden ones either!”

“How did you imagine that would look?”

“I don’t know? More… Full of eyes and stuff?”

“That’s you gods, I’m perfectly fine with just two eyes, thank you.”

“And what did you think I would look like?”

“Hmm… More… Elegant?”

“WHAT?! I’m very elegant! I even had Zoth help me dress up today!”

“Zoth? Like… The Kleptra?”

“YOU KNOW MY SAINT? She’s sooOo cute, isn’t she! My lovely lovely Zoth!” Love said with exaggerated motions. She was very expressive with her body language, a bit comically so. Especially with her current outfit and makeup, she looked like a royal buffon ready to bust out jokes and a musical number.

Your saint? The saint of Love is a Kleptra? That’s… Uh… Yeah…

“Haven’t met her but I have heard the name…”

There was a bit of an awkward silence.

“Soooo… You wouldn’t be interested in lending a few essences, by chance?”

“Lending implies you will give them back,” Love seriously answered back, her extravagant and whimsy personality gone in an instant.

“Wrong word, my apologies. But you do get the point. Since the answer was not a straight no I assume we can negotiate something?”

“Perhaps…” Love said with narrowed eyes, “But that’ll have to wait for after the trial! No mixing work and personal life! That’s a big no no!” she leaned forward, holding her face, as if lying down on a bed, her feet kicking up in the air, “Maybe if you manage to beat the final boss I can consider gifting one for free.”

“Deal,” Sofia answered right away, putting a hand on Pareth’s shoulder. “Watch us.”