I became a legion lich

173 Violent conclusion

“That was close. That crazy woman almost got me, didn’t anyone tell her that using alchemical items was against the rules?” Athos complained as he watched Malti from the top of a partially destroyed building, taking care to mix his presence with his surroundings and not be detected.

His body was half-destroyed, with all the bones in his lower body gone. All of his skin and muscle had been consumed to heal his cracked bones and replenish the mana lost in the fight, so he was bare bones.

“I was lucky my escape went unnoticed, or I’d be dead by now.” He said half relieved half furious at having lost.

Athos had survived thanks to his quick thinking and his ability to separate his bones. The moment the sensory field detected the leather bags, Athos felt the danger against his life and released the meteor spear spell against the ground, intending to use the spell as a shield.

The ensuing explosion of fire and lightning dissipated the tornado of blades and sent Athos flying, or at least what was left of him. He was thrown until he collided with the building he was currently in, his legs lost at some point in the explosion.

Luckily, it looked like Malti suspected he had escaped through the sewers instead of through the air, so he was safe for now.

“I’ll recover a bit and then I’ll be back for the second round.” Athos spoke in defeat and turned away, conjuring winds to get himself moving.

He crawled over to the nearest soldier’s corpse before draining him to dust. Athos spared nothing, using dark magic to regenerate himself and his magic organ. It would take time for Athos to manually regenerate his body’s mana, but it would still serve to heal him if he got hurt again.

Athos regained some of his mana, though the amount was not enough to fill his core. A single corpse wasn’t enough to restore the entire magic organ, but there were dozens around him and many more around the fortress, so there was no rush.

.....

‘Simogo, how are things on your side?’ Athos asked as he fed on the next corpse.

There was nothing left alive in the fortress except Malti, so Simogo had left the fortress, hunting the few who managed to escape. For all his speed, he was still one and the fortress was large, so a few humans escaped, though it only delayed the inevitable.

“He should be back in a few minutes. I better kill that woman before then.” Athos spoke and ran towards the crater as soon as he finished recovering. He threw himself without hesitation, using wind magic to silence his arrival.

Athos looked around and quickly found Malti, as she hadn’t moved away after going down. Malti tried and failed to find any trace of him inside the sewer, confusing her.

Athos took advantage of what Malti hadn’t noticed, conjuring a shower of spikes of corrupted mana. It was a spell that Finn had used and Athos remembered it and secretly practiced it.

Malti felt the spell and turned using mana vision, being surprised by the unexpected and impossible to dodge attack. The sewers were narrow corridors and the thorns occupied the entire corridor, preventing escape.

She can only conjure a mana shield to defend herself, firing lightning arrows at Athos. The spikes of corrupted mana hit the shield all over, causing cracks here and there, but Malti kept feeding the shield.

But his resistance had a limit. She was consuming her mana to endlessly create arrows and cast spells, so her core was already reaching its limit. She was having headaches and suffering from a lack of mana, her movements getting slower and slower.

“You’re not taking it anymore, are you?” Athos smiled maliciously, noticing Malti’s slow movements. The arrows were so slow that Athos didn’t even need the cool mind skill to dodge them.

Athos on the other hand, had absorbed the remaining energy in his magic organ and that of corpses, so his mana was half full, but it was enough.

He covered his fist with a corrupted mana gauntlet and punched the mana barrier, shattering it into pieces. Malti tried to hit her in the face with the bow as she approached, but Athos caught the bow easily before kicking her in the stomach.

Athos also conjured a small blast of wind through his foot, hurling it hard against the wall.

“This thing really made things difficult.” Athos threw the bow away from them, disarming her while preventing her from using magic.

“Cough!” Barely coughing as he got to his feet, pulling a hunting knife from his belt and assuming a defensive posture, but that was just false bravado.

“You know, it’s been a long time since I’ve had fun. Since becoming an undead, I’ve had many opportunities to torture my enemies, but I’ve always been too busy to play with my victims.” Athos said and snorted in irritation.

“The most I could do was human experiments, but even that was just for work rather than fun. But you gave me a good spanking and I’m going to have fun returning the favor.” Athos spoke and pointed his palm towards, conjuring black lightning.

“You coward!” Malti swore furiously and tried to roll away, but the black lightning followed her movements and hit her in the back. Her armor protected her from harm, but she still stumbled in her footsteps.

“Come on, come on, you can dodge it.” Athos fired lightning after lightning, aiming at her feet and forcing her to jump to avoid being hit.

“Go fuck yourself!” Malti screamed as she hurled the knife at him and ran towards the archway, but Athos stood in her way.

“You are not going to spoil my fun.” Athos spoke as he grabbed the knife thrown at him and stuck it in Malti’s thigh, making her fall to the ground.

She tried to cry out in pain as she fell, but Athos’ fist hit her full in the face and hurled her head back.

Athos grabbed Malti by the neck and knocked her hard to the ground, shooting lightning at close range. The armor didn’t protect Malti this time and she took the brunt of the lightning, convulsing to the ground as the darkness sapped her strength.

Malti grabbed Athos’ wrist and released alchemical items from the storage ring, intending to blow herself up and take Athos with her, but he stopped her.

“No more annoying tricks!” Athos grabbed her left hand where the dimensional ring was, before brutally biting her fingers off. He spat his bloodied fingers onto the floor amidst Malti’s screams of pain, licking his lips as he tasted the blood.

‘I’ve never tasted another person’s blood in my life. I wonder what human flesh tastes like. If I eat human flesh in my current condition, is it still cannibalism?’ Athos thought, tasting blood in his mouth.

He hadn’t realized it yet, but just like his vision, other senses had undergone changes after becoming an undead. His palate was now that of a predator, feeling immense flavor in the flesh and blood of any prey, even other humans.

“You freak!” Malti was now terrified, all her earlier bravado vanishing as she desperately struggled to get away from him. She removed the dagger from her own thigh and tried to stab him, but Athos grabbed her wrist and crushed it.

He shut her mouth so she wouldn’t scream and climbed on top of her, conjuring winds to levitate the alchemical items away, just to be safe

“Let’s start by getting rid of those annoying magic items.” Athos grabbed her hunting knife and cut the straps off the armor before removing any magic items he detected.

He left her half-naked before starting to heat the knife until the blade turned red and ran lightly across their ribs.

“You know, I feel like I’ve done this before. Torture, dark tunnels, helpless victims. It almost reminds me of childhood.” Said Athos nostalgic while suffocating Malti’s screams.

She writhed with tears in her eyes in an attempt to pull away, but without mana that would be impossible. Malti had spent everything she had left trying to blow herself up with him, so her core was dry.

Athos began to cut her body slowly, taking care not to get close to any vital areas. The red-hot knife cauterized all the wounds the moment they were made, preventing her from dying from excessive bleeding.

At the same time, he used wind magic to thin the air around them. causing Malti to suffocate. She gasped for air as her face turned red and changed to a shade of purple until she almost passed out, only then did Athos allow air to come in and she took another breath, only to start again.

In the end, it took nearly half an hour and over a hundred cuts before Malti was unable to take it any longer and died of shock.

“Huuh...that was therapeutic. I think I lost all the accumulated stress. I feel like I could work non-stop or listen to Emilia’s scoldings for days without getting tired.” Athos sighed as he felt his head grow light despite the absence of lungs or a brain.

He lightly touched Malti’s chest and cast the raise undead spell. “Come on, it’s time to wake up. We both have a lot of work to do.”

Malti’s skeleton rose slowly and Athos could have sworn its empty eye sockets were quivering with fear as they stared at him.

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