The OP Lich is a Returnee, Chapter 118 (Patreon)

Chapter 118 – Warrior of Light

Five hours. It took five hours for the Lieutenant to solve the puzzle. It was, apparently an average attempt at such a feat, according to what a search online told me, when I stepped out to the cavern’s edge to get a bit of fresh air while the Lieutenant worked. Not spectacular, but still slightly faster than it would have taken me to safely penetrate and disarm the wards.

As she placed the glowing cube back upon the stand, the wards shimmered, and then fell. There was the grinding sound of stone upon stone as the doors swung slowly inwards, pushed open by magic. I nodded to the Lieutenant as I passed by her, staff in hand. “Good work, Lieutenant. You’ve pushed off promotion for another year, at least.”

I chuckled at her sigh of relief, before turning my attention to what was before me. A high chamber, decorated with glowing blue crystals that lit the room so that even an unaugmented human could see with crystal clarity. And, standing upon the other side, a form, two, maybe three times the size of a mortal man, garbed in ornate white, hooded robes, with accents of purple and gold. The top half of his face was hidden behind a red mask.

I knew right away that he was no mortal, even if he looked to be breathing, and my ability to sense life told me he was alive. The color of his soul was different. Overshadowed and merged and sundered all at once. As though someone had overlaid the memories of countless souls before him, before coalescing them into a great gestalt, and then, somehow cutting them away from something greater? That is what it felt like to me, at least.

“So, the seals have begun to fall at last. And a foul lich comes to hasten their fall, and bring doom to the world.”

I chuckled as I moved into the chamber, my knights flanking me. “Foul? That’s rude, considering we’ve only just met. And doom comes, whether we release the seals or not. The primary seal is failing, has been failing for forty years. The knowledge to rebuild and repair the seals has been lost, for it has been long enough that even the existence of magic was thought to be nothing but myth and legend. If the seals are not released, then they will fail, catastrophically so.”

“And I am to believe that a lich, a being that forsakes death, even as they embrace Death, is acting to try and, what, make things better? That you care about what happens to the people of this world? Impossible.”

I sighed, shaking my head. “While it is true that I have no feelings one way or the other for most of the people of this world, I protect that which is mine, including those who are important to me. And, for them, I shall see the seals safely unmade.”

The figure shook his head. “The seals cannot be allowed to fall, nor the UnNamed to return. Though it take a thousand thousand years, upon my honor as Thelidibus, Emissary of the Convocation of Fourteen, I will see you fall.”

I readied my staff, as I analyzed the mana flows that began swirling around the figure, invisible to the naked eye, but all too obvious to one such as me. “Then I will strike you down, with all of my power. For I am the Lich Queen of Risen Athelia, and I shall suffer none to oppose me!” As I said that, I unleashed a bolt of magic. A simple necrotic bolt spell, but using my full power. I was only slightly surprised to see that a magic barrier arose to ward it off, but I would have smiled if this form had lips as the blast made the figure take a half-step back. This was not outside the range of possibility, then.

Thelidibus roared in defiance. “No! NO! It will not end here!” He held his hand up to the ceiling, and Light mana began to surround him. “Champions from beyond the rift, heed my call! The time is come to deliver your brethren from darkness! My heart’s sole desire is a world free of sorrow. Join with me now in hope and prayer, for the salvation of all!”

I bristled at the sight of what was happening. This was a Grand Summoning, akin to the Hero Summoning ritual! But it was purposefully and wickedly shortened. It did not summon a Hero and grant them strength, but it pulled their souls from across worlds, and infused them into the being before me, increasing their power, transforming them into a Hero. It was, in many ways, worse than the Hero Summoning, for those souls wrested from their worlds ceased to be, subsumed into the greater Hero.

“If you would usher in the end, then with my all shall I oppose you, as the avatar of those mortal Heroes who fought unfalteringly, in all their imperfection! As the Warrior of Light incarnate!” As he spoke, the Light broke around him, and revealed a man with pale skin, like marble, which was fitting, as he had a beauty only found in statues. White robes became a tunic, worn under a breastplate of blue and gold. A helm with two curved horns sat upon his head, with white hair flowing down. Sword and shield with the same motif filled his gauntleted hands, and he pointed that blade at me. “Come, Warrior of Death! Let us finish this!”

“So be it,” I said, and raised my staff high. “Soldiers of the Unending Scourge, Death Knights of Athelia, minions of Death: hear the call of the Lich Queen! RISE!” As I spoke, I cast a spell, one I was all too familiar with. Twenty Death Knights were around me, and the spell caused each of them to double in size and multiplied their power several times over, for the moment. I pointed my staff at the Hero, and said, “SLAY THE WARRIOR OF LIGHT, IN THE NAME OF THE LICH QUEEN!”

With a roar, my knights advanced. They were well-disciplined, and well-trained. For forty years, my army had proven itself to be the dominating force upon Onerth, such that even the Demon King’s armies fell before them like wheat before the scythe at the end. But their foe was no mere demon.

Thelidibus met their attacks with sword and shield. Parrying some blows, blocking others. His attacks were powerful, but a simple melee was not enough to overwhelm my knights. His sword glowed, with rings surrounding it, no doubt charging some attack, but one of my knights took that moment to bash him with their shield, disrupting his cast.

Sometimes the Warrior of Light got a heavy hit in on one of my knights, but my magic healed them. A sword of golden light slashed through the area, creating a triangular pattern upon the floor, which then erupted into light, damaging all of my knights at once! But I was expecting something of the sort.

At one point the Warrior managed to force a bit of separation with a wide sweep of his sword. He tried to use some sort of binding spell, conjuring chains of light to try and trap my knights and I, but I shattered them with a pulse of magic from my staff. More and more, he began to use magic to augment his attacks, and I was forced to step into the role of healer and counterspeller, using my spells to block his, while also keeping my knights from being overwhelmed.

If I had been a mortal Necromancer, just starting out on my path, then it would have been impossible. Healing twenty-four death knights, while also countering and dispelling hostile magic? I would have outstripped my mana pool long before now. But I was a Hero, myself, and I had forty years of training, of growing my power, as well as being a Lich, empowered by the deaths of all those my army had slain. My mana pool was an ocean to dwarf the Pacific, and it would take more than this to drain me.

Slowly, the tide began to turn. The warrior’s blows grew less heavy, and his wounds began to pain him more and more. When he tried to heal himself, my magic countered him, and one of my death knights took the moment of distraction to add another wound to the tally.

But the Warrior of Light was no fool. Realizing that I was the key to the battle, he gathered his strength, and pushed through the cordon of death knights, taking several wounds in the process. “It matters not! You are the enemy, and you will fall! Even should it cost me everything, I will not forsake my duty!”

His sword descended, but I raised up my staff, and summoned a barrier between us. The impact was enough to drive me to one knee, but the barrier did not falter, even though it took a great deal of my mana to hold it in place. Thelidibus looked as though he were about to strike again, when he jerked back. A blade plunged through his back, armor and all, emerging from his chest. Another followed, and another, as my Death Knights obeyed my command, and put my enemy to the sword.

He fell to one knee before me, even as I rose up once more. He spat at me, eyes full of determination. “Fool! I am immortal, and I will never surrender!”

“Your surrender is not required. For I am the Mistress of the Dead and Ruler of the Damned, Archlich, High Contractor of Murena, Archmage of the three circles of Death. I am the Agent of the Goddess of Death, herself. It does not matter that you are immortal. YOUR SOUL IS MINE!”

With that last statement, I unleashed black lightning from my staff, and Thelidibus screamed as it struck him. He was still powerful, despite everything, and drawing his soul out and binding it within crystal was no ‘snap of the fingers and it was done’, like it was when dealing with the mortals of this world. It took some time, and effort, but I managed it, trapping his soul into a crystal shard which glowed with light.

A clattering sound caught my attention. As his soul was ripped from his body, the power maintaining it vanished. He had been Light made manifest, and into Light he returned, along with his weapons and armor. The sound I had heard was that of the blades piercing him hitting the stone floor when the body was no longer corporeal enough to hold them up.

I took a deep breath. Looking down at the glowing crystal shard, I breathed easily, now. “You fought well, Warrior of Light, but even though Light stands against Death, in the end, it only delays the inevitable. Death comes for all, in time. Even immortals and undead may one day find themselves in the halls of the dead. Even should they be immune to all the hazards of a world full of Life, eventually, when existence weighs heavy upon their souls, they shall know death, by their own hand or that of another.”

I slid the shard in my pocket dimension without another thought, and pulled out my phone. The time was clear. Two days had passed since we ventured up to the mountain. Most of it spent in combat. That would explain why my mana pool was ebbing low, only a quarter of its normal level left. Of course, a quarter of my normal level was still magnitudes more than even my disciples, much less the thaumaturges of this world. I was down to just about the level I had in the tenth year of my time in the other world.

I shook those thoughts out of my head, and sent a message to my disciples, letting them know that the guardian had been dealt with, and I was sending steeds to bring them to me. Sure, I could have let them pick their way through the mountains, but that would have been pointlessly petty, and a waste of time. The sooner we dealt with this problem, the sooner I could move on to the seal of Fire.