Swordsman's Regression: Reawakened as a Necromancer-Chapter 61: Contract Quest Completed
"Ngyahh!"
"Ahhh!"
"Oewww!"
"Ahh!"
Slice!
Slink!
Boom!
⸢You have killed an Awakener⸥
⸢Class: Fire Mage (Lvl. 15)⸥
⸢You have killed an Awakener⸥
⸢Class: Knight (Lvl. 18)⸥
⸢You have killed an Awakener⸥
⸢Class: Wind Mage (Lvl. 15)⸥
⸢+200 EXP | +170 EXP | +190 EXP⸥
⸢Warning! Your mana is running low!⸥
⸢Mana: 302/1800⸥
The inner corridors of the Old Fort had transformed from halls of prestige to a narrow, blood-slicked slaughterhouse.
All of it, the work of a single rage-filled sword-wielding Necromancer and his brutal army of dancing Skeletons.
Percival moved like a force of nature. Relentless and absolute.
Behind him, a phalanx of his Skeleton Soldiers marched. The Rangers held the rear, shooting arrows at the far threat.
More waves of resistance approached. Amongst these soldiers were Awakeners, some of which held the Highbard name.
They protected other nobles, more of the Highbard extended family.
These were the cousins, the aunts, and the distant relatives who had lived in the comfort of stolen prestige.
Mercius’s desire had been clear: All of them must die.
Some of them emerged from the side-chambers, protected by guards and Awakeners as they attempted to flee the carnage.
"Stop him!" a Highbard cousin shouted. "It’s just one man, what are you doing!"
Percival gestured towards them, and his skeletons—replenished by the corpses strewn along the way—lunged forward.
The Skirmishers used their Water Swords to slice down the guards that protected the man. But before they could strike the noble, they were rebuffed by a shimmering wall of magical light.
Percival lifted his gaze.
He saw a squad of six Awakeners, around the youthful level of the ones he’d just butchered.
Two of them were Arcanists, and had created the mana shield that blocked Percival’s advance.
Three were Knights and the last was a Swordswoman. All stood ready to engage should Percival breach the barrier.
They looked terrified. None of them expected to be fighting the rogue Hero and an army of the undead, but the Highbards had given them their order.
"Go!" The Swordswoman urged the noble, sweat beading on her brow as she maintained her stance.
She held her blade tight in her grip. Like the rest of their gear, it was an exorbitant weapon for such a low-level Awakener.
It was the reward they had exchanged their autonomy for.
One of the Knights held a buckler glowing with a pulsing light that Percival recognized as ⸢Aegis Seal⸥, while another brandished a rapier dripping with ⸢Corrosive Frost⸥.
"If we kill the Hero, the summons will vanish!" their leader shouted, his own ring glowing as he prepared a ⸢Mana Bomb⸥.
"Hold back a bit! We have to buy them time to evacuate!" the Swordswoman said.
Percival’s eyes remained hollow.
Suddenly, he triggered ⸢Grave-Step⸥.
In a burst of blue mist, he vanished. The Awakeners jerked their heads up, eyes wide.
"Where did he go?"
Then, they felt their chest burn cold, like a presence had suddenly tilted the temperature. Fear crawled through their skin.
One of the Knights glanced over his shoulder and saw blue eyes of death.
"He’s here!" he screamed.
Percival had reappeared in the center of their formation, and before they could all react to the Knight’s warning, his scythe went into motion.
The Knight with the buckler raised his shield, the ⸢Aegis Seal⸥ flaring to life in a dome of golden light.
It created a spiral shield like the ⸢Aegis Seal⸥ always did, taking the shape of whatever the wielder desired to protect.
Percival’s whirling scythe slammed into the barrier.
KRAKRA-KOOM!
The sound was like glass shattering.
Percival poured the dregs of his strength into the strike, channeling ⸢Soulfire⸥ into the tip of the blade.
The scythe bit through the enchantment and the shield alike, shattering the magic into bits and scattering their formation as the Awakeners were thrown backward by the shockwave.
With the ⸢Mana Shield⸥ removed, the Skeletons swarmed the vulnerable casters.
"Get up! Fight!"
Percival left the Awakeners to his summons and chased after the fleeing noble.
"No! He’s going after Gullon!"
Percival was already racing down, his greaves clanging on the cobblestone. He didn’t use ⸢Grave Step⸥ as his mana was already running low.
But with his high Speed stat, catching up with the noble was no problem at all.
The Awakeners hurled ⸢Mana Bombs⸥ at him; the Swordswoman even used ⸢Sword Projection⸥.
Percival leaped over the attacks, planting his feet on the wall. His momentum defeated gravity for a few seconds, allowing him to wall-run past the chaos, closing the distance faster.
Gullon, running for his life, glanced over his shoulder and saw a nightmare sprinting at him like a spider.
His face contorted in pure terror.
"Save me, Azrael!"
Percival leaped from the wall, spinning his scythe mid-air. The blade took the noble’s head cleanly off his shoulders as Percival landed in a crouch.
Thud. Thud.
The head fell first. Then the body.
Another Highbard was dead.
Behind him, Percival’s Skeletons had finished off the Awakeners too.
⸢You have killed an Awakener (×6)⸥
Percival didn’t revitalize them with their corpses, instead, he stored the expensive gear in his Undead Inventory.
They were too valuable to waste on ⸢Soul Draught⸥.
From then henceforth, his journey to the Treasury was a massacre.
Percival’s Skeletons outsmarted all their guards in battle, the training was showing its worth.
With his Necromancer mana bar dipping dangerously toward the red line of zero, he relied more on his Swordsman mana, on raw, muscle-memory and the boiling heat of his rage.
He carved through the enchanted mail of the household guards, his blade finding the gaps in their high-tier equipment as if they were wearing nothing but paper.
But the hallway leading to the Treasury was where the true resistance waited.
This wasn’t just panicked family members; it was the Highbard Vanguard.
Four elite mid-level Awakeners stood in a diamond formation before the massive mythril-reinforced doors.
Their leader, a Lvl 52 Knight clad in heavy armor that held ⸢Kinetic Dampening⸥ enchantment, stepped forward.
He held purpose and pride in his eyes.
"You’ve carved through the weak, boy," he spat, raising a massive war-hammer that crackled with Earth mana. "But you won’t touch the Highbard Head."
...
"Ugh..." the Knight, the last of the Vanguard, groaned in agony as Percival lifted him by the throat.
"Mercy," he begged, his face leaking crimson, his armor broken, showing the scars of a brutal battle.
Percival spent the last of his Necromancer mana, summoning ⸢Soulfire⸥ into his palm and scorching the man’s face till he was lifeless.
He released his grip, and the Knight’s massive form collapsed, joining the broken bodies of his squad.
⸢You have killed 4 Awakeners⸥
⸢Class: 2 Knights (Lvl 50)/(Lvl 52) | 1 Berserker (Lvl 35) and 1 Healer Mage (Lvl 40)⸥
⸢+920 EXP⸥
Percival stood still for a while.
He was not free of the wounds of battle. His armor was rent across the chest and stomach; blood dripped from his shoulder, chest and his mane of raven-black hair.
His breathing was heavy, ragged. His Necromancer mana was effectively depleted, and his summons had faded.
His muscles screamed in protest, every fiber feeling like it was being pulled apart. But as he stared at the doors, he realized he didn’t need mana anymore.
Percival kicked the doors open.
The Treasury was dark, filled with the glint of gold and the shimmer of artifacts. At the far end, cowering behind a massive oak desk, was Tristop Highbard.
He looked smaller than Percival imagined. Thin, with an even thinner beard and shifty eyes that betrayed his own propensity for betrayal.
"Did you get him?" Tristop called out to the figure entering, not yet seeing clearly in the gloom. "Is the Hero dead?"
Percival was silent as he walked closer, his boots clinking against the gold coins scattered on the floor.
Tristop’s eyes widened, seeing the long hair, and the scythe glinting from the tiny strands of light.
"No..." he muttered, stumbling backwards.
"It’s over, Tristop," Percival said.
His voice was a low, rasping vibration, devoid of any mercy.
Tristop’s eyes were wild, darting toward the exits he knew were blocked. "You... you shouldn’t be here. The guards... the Awakeners..."
"Dead," Percival replied, taking another step. "All of them."
Tristop fell, slumping backwards onto a pile of gold coins. "Why are you doing this?!" he cried. "I have done nothing to you! Why are you doing this to me?!"
Percival stopped walking.
His Necromancer mana had regenerated by a fraction. With it, he summoned Mercius.
Blue flame erupted beside him, and the spectral form of the Brackenbutcher coalesced.
Mercius stood tall, his translucent armor gleaming with a haunting light, his eyes fixed squarely on the man who had stolen his future and his family.
Tristop’s jaw dropped. "Mer— Mercius. You’re... alive?"
"You remember him?" Percival said. "Do you remember what you did to him?"
The terror in Tristop’s eyes was absolute. He tried to speak, but only a pathetic, high-pitched whimper escaped his throat.
"I— I.... "
Percival looked at Mercius, then back at Tristop.
Mercius glared at the former baron with a heart full of ash, with pain and anger on his rigid face. "For all you did to me, Lord Tristop, I would have forgiven you if you at least cared for my beloved."
Tristop gulped. "A— Alenya... She got... sick. I tried."
"You abandoned her. You discarded her like you did me. You turned her entire life into a tragedy!"
Tristop immediately scrambled to his knees, bowing before Mercius. "I have angered your spirit, I understand. Please forgive me and I will make sure Alenya is taken care of from now on!
"I will do all I can to find the cure for her illness. I will rebuild her chambers, get her finer clothes, and feed her richer meals. Anything you ask of me, I will do i—
"Arghhhh!!"
A silver portal ripped open above Tristop, unleashing seven spectral swords that plunged through his body, pinning him to the floor like an insect.
⸢Blade Rain: Unleashes barrage of spectral blades that plunge from above, impaling everything within the target zone⸥.
⸢B-Grade⸥
"Too late," Percival said.
Tristop lay there, dead, his blood pooling beneath Mercius’s feet.
It was over. The Highbards were all dead.
⸢Contract Quest Completed⸥
⸢Mercius Seagrave can now be contracted⸥
⸢Requirement: 7 Summon Spaces⸥
