Academic gathering with a lich-Chapter 755 - 697: Taboo Challenger
Andrey’s nights were chaotic and bleak, and for the Liches who never closed their eyes, the moonlight flickered like a candlelight, lit and extinguished. Time passed like sand falling through fingers, and the Liches cared not for such meaningless things, after all, they had no deadline to meet.
With their fleshly disguises, the Liches grew a new anticipation for the sun. What once irritated the undead became the most exquisite dinner bell, offering a different definition from the constant companion of moonlight. But this distinction between day and night, the fine times and true indifference, brought only temporary satisfaction to the Liches, akin to the fleeting sweetness of food on the taste buds, silently slipping through the gaps in the bones.
But tonight, not just the Law, but all Liches, whether Suppressors or rebels, felt the pressure and agony prolonged through time.
If punishing evil was the greatest merit of every Paladin, then tonight Lyle once again demonstrated the worth of a Purifier.
The Warriors of Light clenched their teeth and persisted, while the Executors found the resistance headache-inducing. The methods to dampen the Literary Society’s morale had failed. Those spineless creatures had been brainwashed by the Plague Doctors into resilient warriors, possessing their own resolutions and obsessions. Regrettably, the Law, who wished to see Andrey prosper, could not find joy in this.
"Give up resistance! Haven’t you realized your anomalies yet? We are rectifying your mistakes! This is aid among comrades!" 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎
Raised along with the voice were the Literary Society Liches set for correction. They had made a dark deal with the Executor behind the scenes—if they could entice the Warrior of Light to surrender, the Executor would consider lessening the sentences for several, and as one of the important figures to be "saved," Mr. Reporter nodded vehemently.
"I am a negotiation specialist!" boasted one of Andrey’s Three Musketeers, although he had been better known as an extortionist who had a knack for catching people’s little secrets.
Mr. Reporter stepped up.
He waved his hands, all smiles, cloaked in a humanoid flesh disguise, his unchanged attire. He looked like Rushio with no grave harm done. Then, he took a tumble, his hide skidding five meters across the ground, bones clacking on impact. The awkward fleshly disguise lifted its tendrils, nimbly scurrying back onto the reporter’s skeleton.
And indeed, he managed to bring the struggle to a halt.
Two minutes later, the Law rescued his skull from the even more ferocious Holy Light Barrage.
The Law let out an abnormal laugh.
"You’re wondering why I’m happy? It’s simple, I have a legitimate reason to torture you twice as much, Reporter. Until now, my heart had been wavering between the bigger picture and personal vendettas."
"Thank you for your expertise, Reporter."
"You’ve spared me the trouble of choice."
The Law secured the skull that bore the Reporter’s soul with a runic device, as if treating his most precious treasure. He leaned out from the skeletal barrier, his sinister gaze sweeping over the Warrior of Light.
"Go ahead, make a fuss~ It won’t be long until you meet the same fate as him."
The formidable presence of Mr. Law further aggravated the Warrior of Light’s resistance, and under such stinging scrutiny, the Warriors misinterpreted the Liches’ words for another meaning.
United by their common enemy, they came together, and even the Warriors of Light, somewhat unsociable due to their own character flaws, did their utmost to provide assistance to their companions.
"If we fail, they’ll turn us into the same Skeleton Monsters! We’ll be controlled! Turned into toys gnawed on by flesh-worms, we cannot lose!"
Having been tricked by the Literary Society once more, Mr. Law’s mind was devoid of anything but the vocabulary of a full-on attack. Perhaps sensing the commander’s fury, some of the stalled confrontations began to give way, as Andrey’s forces further compressed the living space of the Warriors of Light.
They had the solid Andrei Barrier at their backs, a sturdy cage constructed from the energy of death, much like a colossal coffin. It was Andrey’s protective umbrella and could also be an iron cage filled with despair.
Frost densely covered the barrier, and within seconds of contact, several Warriors of Light had their fingers and palms permanently left behind on it, as skin and bones froze and detached, unable to feel the pain.
They were the Warriors of Light, but their bodies were not made of Holy Light.
The despair in front of them was like towering mountains, like the dark curtain of night. Andrey—or rather, the malice of this world—seemed to gather into a ferocious beast, clasping the throat of the Warrior of Light.
"Edward!" The excited young people called out his name, and the following Executors, Liches, moved through the parted crowd, noticing that key figure.
The dust stirred by the battle adorned his tattered robe like ripe fruit, and his adult-like composure seemed like a chronic disease. Amidst his comrades, his body appeared somewhat skinny, his steps disorderly.
This Warrior was also one of the few who had come into contact with the Andrei Barrier at the very front. He had lost a leg and could only kneel by the barrier on the ground, the break frozen over, but his shattered body only amplified his aura.
His severed leg lay before him, embedded in the wall like a failed sculpture. Yet he remained calm, decisively turning to face the multitude of ghostly images of the Liches.
"Looks like we’ve fallen, just as Rushio predicted..." he spread his palm open, the withered rosebud was pinched in his hand, subconsciously preserved with care.
"...Gentleman." With every step the Purifier took, the earth below seemed to cry out. Spellcaster flames ignited upon his body, pale fires that wrapped around the laws. The Purifier could thrust these orbs packed with law into the skull of the seated boy. "Just sit there quietly waiting for death; don’t try any tricks."
Edward Alphonse’s head hung low, as if he had accepted his fate. Meanwhile, more Warriors of Light rushed toward the Purifier, using the divine powers granted by the God of Light in an attempt to contain the slowly approaching Liches.
The attempt failed, the Purifier’s presence, his magical aura, could not be captured.
As one of the two leaders of Andrey’s Executors, the vice president of the Magic Study Society, a compiler of Andrey’s Code of Law, the Purifier was naturally a high-ranking combatant. However, he rarely took things seriously.
"The Shadow Under the Light" could also be referred to as the self-awareness of an Executor, the talent for pilfering from one’s guardian charge.
The Purifier had striven all his life for better governance, but like his past when he broke the old Laws for revenge, his other side became a talent, like a joke of fate.
The self-proclaimed unyielding Executor possessed the ability to erase his presence under any rule. Any rule, any order, would no longer fall upon this Outlaw. No matter the strength or range of the rule’s authority.
The Purifier’s talent was to become the loophole in the rules: the elusive fish beneath the law’s wide net.
Unable to be locked by Holy Light, unable to be hit by attacks, Mr. Purifier strolled leisurely amid the gunfire. He deliberately slowed down, straightening his twisted collar, reversing his cuffs, pulling out a charge sheet waiting to be signed, with his right fist held behind his back.
He would pluck off the Gentleman’s skull, stuff the signed confession through his eye sockets into his skull, and watch the Gentleman’s soul flame burn the letter to ash, forming a compulsory soul contract.
There were no absolutely reliable contracts in the world, the Purifier understood that. But the most formidable outlaw of miracles was right beside him, and the Purifier believed in his brother’s absolute, precision.
"It’s over."
Just as he had imagined, without much effort, the Gentleman’s skull was easily removed by him. His delicate face was in his palm, the determined gaze making it appear more like an artwork.
"Have you heard? Without sacrifice, nothing can be gained. To obtain something, a price must be paid. That is the rule of equivalent exchange, that is, the rule of us Alchemists."
In the Purifier’s palm, Edward’s head wore a grin that was asking for a beating.
"At the price of my freedom..."
"The grand Alchemy Array that envelops the entire castle and land of Andrey."
"I have completed it."
