Arcane Journey

Chapter 345 Instantly Killing the Lich
Opening the door of the room, Brian and Braines came to the third area of ​​the underground mausoleum without any risk, which is where the Lich Arokal lived.

Just as the fear armor explained, the entrance is a huge rift valley, and in the center of the rift valley shrouded in deep dark mist, there is also a large platform suspended.

Seen from here, the ceiling is about 20 meters high, and the bottom of the rift is so deep that it looks like a frightening bottomless abyss.

Green torches hung in two places, illuminating a passage to the south and a passage on the other side of the rift.

The only access through the rift is two narrow stone bridges, which connect the stone platform from the north and south respectively.

This narrow stone bridge winds its way up the sidewall of the rift.

The boulders in the sky kept colliding and rubbing, crushed dust filled the air, gravel kept falling from the sky, and the sound of impact echoed in the rift valley, reflecting back and forth, forming a thrilling bang.

Normally, if Brian and Braines wanted to continue walking, they would have to cross this stone bridge.

However, what is surprising is that there are countless huge rocks flying in the dim rift and mid-air, wrapped in the faint magical aura, they are like meteorites in the starry universe, constantly colliding, pushing each other, sending out huge waves. sound.

Bryan also noticed that due to the continuous impact and crushing of flying stones, a thick layer of rock powder fell on the stone bridge and platform.

These thick powders have well preserved the footprints of several humanoid creatures.

This means that under normal circumstances, Arocar's guests or subordinates can pass through normally without being disturbed by the flying stones.

Thinking of this, Brian looked at the shadow prince beside him who was looking thoughtful.

As if sensing his gaze, Brenas came back to his senses, spread his hands, and smiled helplessly: "I can't help this time, these magic circles made of stones look like an ancient and powerful A product of earth magic."

He looked thoughtfully at the dark abyss of the rift, and speculated: "The lower part should be the leyline node of the Shadow Valley, which contains rich leyline energy, so it can maintain the operation of the magic circle. If we want to pass , can only take the risk of being exposed... choose to break in."

Brian didn't answer, but carefully observed the changes in the stone.

"Actually, the progress of exploring the Lich's lair this time has completely exceeded my expectations." Seeing Brian who was silent looking at the abyss, Breners continued: "The two of us have not yet entered the lair until now. Being noticed by the Lich, even if Arokar himself saw it, his jaw would drop in shock."

Bryan nodded approvingly. The two of them explored along the way, basically by Brenners, evading the guards and cracking the traps and illusions. It can be said to be very smooth.

At this time, the other party suddenly claimed that there was nothing they could do about the stone formations in the rift valley, so there was really nothing they could do. If they wanted to pass, they could only risk their exposure.

"Let me try it." After thinking for a moment, Brian looked at the countless flying, floating, constantly colliding and rubbing stones in his sight, and began to prepare for the ability.

Brenners heard the words, made way for him, and observed with great interest.

In the darkness, along with Brian's deep eyes, an unstoppable light mist gradually diffused, and all the stones in the narrow stone bridge area were frozen in midair almost the moment Brian locked his eyes on them. As if the pause button was pressed, he remained motionless.

"We only have five seconds, let's go there as soon as possible." Seeing that the method he came up with was really effective, Brian immediately confessed and rushed towards the opposite side of the rift.

The Shadow Prince came back to his senses, turned into a puff of smoke, and floated past.

"What's going on here?" Brenner, who turned into a human form, looked at Brian in confusion, "What ability did you use to freeze these stones?"

"Time stops." Brian replied simply.

"I see."

Brenners looked stunned, "Combined with the ability of the nine-ring spell to stop time, it is indeed possible to temporarily control them for a few seconds. Why didn't I think of it at the time?"

"Because you're not a psion, naturally you wouldn't consider this situation." Bryan smiled slightly, motioning for Breners to go ahead and lead the way.

In the silent underground world, only the faint fluorescence brought by the luminous fungus made Brian realize that they might have reached the Underdark.

Just as he had imagined, the two had just walked out of the winding rock tunnel when they noticed something strange in a huge cave that was fairly vast.

A torch emitting green light was inserted on the wall of the cave, and two oversized subterranean lizards were tied to the stalactite pillars, carrying heavy packages on both sides of their saddles, and crawled to rest on the ground.

"It's the drow." Brenners said nonsense.

Three drow merchants were resting near the sublizard. They were short, slender and graceful, with black jade-like skin and silver-white hair, wearing well-made chain armor, and carrying small crossbows and short swords.

Brian and Breners looked at each other, and after confirming that there was no abnormality around them, they suddenly appeared and casted silent psychic powers and magic spells, killing the three drow merchants on the spot.

In the process of cleaning up the loot, Brian accidentally found a leather map case from the merchant.

Drawn inside is a map of the underground passages of Shadow Valley.

From the map, we can know that they have come to the dark area at this moment. The passages at the bottom of the Shadow Valley extend in all directions. There are roads leading to the ruins of the drow city Mere Midra, and there are passages leading to the fortress at the bottom of the Twisted Tower. There are also roads leading to other areas around the valley.

It can be seen from the map that on the opposite side of the rift valley is a hidden fortress.

There is no doubt that this fortress is definitely the real lair of Lich Arokar, and the underground mausoleum the two entered before is similar to an outpost.

After confirming the destination of the trip, the two followed the instructions of the map and went up a cave dug by hand, heading towards the fortress deep in the mountainside.

The cave finally ended in a stone door that depicted the three-spiral mark that Brian had seen several times.

Apparently, this was the mark of Arokar, the witch, which meant that they were looking in the right place.

Thinking that they were getting closer to the Lich Arokal, they used their spells more cautiously and passed through the stone gate blocking the way.

In the gloomy and icy hall, Brian noticed that there were ten life-sized statues around them, displayed in different poses, in this room.

All of the statues depict human men or women in aristocratic attire, with expressions ranging from serene to melancholy or mournful.

"This is a human from the time of Netheril." Like an archaeologist, Brenas carefully inspected each statue and told Brian that he had reached a conclusion.

"Obviously, this witch, whose mind has begun to go mad, is often immersed in the glorious memory of the empire. If she can't resist, she will be greeted with perdition. No wonder she chooses to serve the Lost Lady. There is another reason. "

Brian nodded silently. Although transforming into a lich allowed them to break free from the shadow of death and have a nearly eternal life, there was still a defect that most liches could hardly avoid.

That is the nature that is gradually lost under the erosion of negative energy.

As the years passed, if they couldn't resist the erosion of the soul like Iolum, Laroch, and Owo, the old Nethers, they would gradually forget the past that they were living beings.

This means that the undead form of existence expected by the Lich itself has come to an end, because the long years are like the wind turning rocks into dust, and after their rationality and memory are exhausted, they often make their decisions. Secluded in its ancient tombs, forgetting about ingesting souls.

This kind of terrible sequelae will make the lich gradually forget the spells it has learned in its consciousness, no longer drive arcane energy like a lich, and degenerate into a demilich with only one head left.

Although there is only one head left, the demilich is still a deadly and powerful existence, but this is just a small fragment of the vicious life force of the lich, so small that once it is disturbed by any means, it will be scattered in the air together with its entire remains In the midst of it, it turns into a spirit-bound form until it perishes.

Brian continued to look at the room. He saw that there was a stone door on each side of the wall, and the west side was a large double-leaf stone door. The walls were painted with colorful ancient lime, blue, black, dark red……

Obviously, this should be the door leading to the Lich's room.

After carefully pushing open the stone door, Brian found that the room looked absolutely gorgeous and luxurious a long time ago, with red carpets, colorful tapestries and ancient furniture placed in the room.

But at this moment, everything is old and rotten.

There is a candlestick by the door, as the only light source in the room weakly illuminating the room, people can vaguely see that the room is densely covered with creepy skeletons.

After checking all the rooms here carefully, Brian and Breners continued walking toward the depths of the hall.

For about half an hour, after avoiding countless scalp-numbing traps and patrols, the two finally found the real body of the witch Arocar in a messy room.

The room was littered with long work tables, dilapidated bookshelves, heavy boxes, and what looked like a throne chair in front of a crystal ball.

It seems that the place was once gorgeously decorated with splendid carpets and tapestries. However, these former wealth have been dilapidated and covered with thick mold.

Niches in the wall housed two rows of immobile, eerie stone statues.

The witch Arokar sat calmly at the desk. She was wearing a rotten red robe. The robe looked very expensive, and it seemed to be the kind that was often seen on those powerful mages.

She sat calmly on the chair, with a terrible crimson flame burning in her empty eye sockets, as if she had anticipated the two's intrusion in advance.

As the expected result, she has already made sufficient preparations in advance.

The Lich himself was guarded by two gargoyles, expressionless hiding behind two alcoves, doing their best to disguise themselves as two real statues, like those next to them.

Several pillars also stood in the room, each surrounded by a statue of a coiling serpent.However, between Brian and the opposite door hovered a terrifying creature:

A large spherical creature with protruding eye-stalks growing from its body and a large mouth full of fangs.

However, it is obvious that its flesh and blood have long since dried up and fallen off.

The creature turned slowly, aiming at them with the giant eye in the center of its body, but Brian could notice that the eye was no longer there, replaced by a huge black hole.

The Death-Eye Tyrant, he recognized the true identity of this beholder variant at a glance.

"You arrived here faster than I thought." The Lich spoke first, "As I expected, the Shadow Princes are really useless."

"Do you think so, little crying prince, Mr. Braines?" She looked at Breners in a mocking tone.

"Then I am sorry to tell you, Ms. Arocar, that soon, you will be killed by a crying man." Brenners was unmoved, but smiled and said: "Just thinking about it , makes people unconsciously feel ashamed and thrown into their lair."

Brian didn't answer, but used his legendary blessing of true vision and detection magic to carefully detect the specific information of the lich in front of him.

Although he could clearly feel a strong negative energy aura emanating from the opponent's body, and he couldn't conceal the arcane fluctuations, what surprised him was that he didn't detect the spirit belonging to the Lost Lady Shar on the opponent. sexual power.

For him, this undoubtedly found an opportunity to target the opponent.

Thinking of this, he calmly prepared his attack method.

"Just the two of you?" The slender and haggard finger bones of the witch Arocar lightly tapped the magic circle on the table that she had engraved in advance, and said disdainfully: "The magic net of this land has been polluted. , using any spell here will poison your soul, and if you are not careful, you may become slaves of the Lost Lady."

"Really?" Breners took a step back, showing a terrified expression on purpose, "I'm so scared, should I still thank you for your kind reminder?"

Although Brian didn't believe the Lich's words, he still carefully checked the surrounding situation for safety.

He did sense a chaotic magic web energy, but it was not enough to become a slave of the Lost Lady as Arocar said.

Regarding Breners' teasing, vicious crimson flames flickered in the hollow eye sockets of the witch, accompanied by her cold smile like a whisper, the light of the teleportation circle illuminated the spacious room.

In an instant, the negative energy that was strong enough to suffocate spread, and skeleton warriors with flames all over their bodies appeared from the magic circle.

At the same time, the gargoyles guarding both sides of the lich, a blue light jumped out of their godless eye sockets, followed by piercing screams, flapping their powerful blood-red bat wings, and leaping forward, Hovering in mid-air.

"It seems that the Lich is well prepared." Brenners said solemnly to Brian: "You help me delay the Lich for a while, and I will clean up the surrounding undead creatures."

"Go ahead." Brian said calmly.

As soon as the words fell, he suddenly took out the artifact, the Staff of the Archmage, and without warning activated the only legendary spell in it, "Advanced Time Stop".

With the faint divine radiance emitted from the top of the Archmage's staff, the witch, who was about to release spells to attack Brian and his claws, was suddenly frozen in place.

——"Remove the magic!"

——"Advanced dispelling magic!"

——"Chain dispelling magic!"

Seeing the lich successfully controlled, Brian did not hesitate to use the ability of the archmage's staff to instantly cast low-level spells, and unstoppably broke all the defensive force fields around the lich.

——"Arcane Sequence!"

Then, in a flash of his mind, he activated the spell against the Lich: Ma Youfu Micro Meteor.

Countless fist-sized bolides, under the blessing of the passive skill "Advanced Dispel Magic" of the Archmage's Staff, dispelled all the triggers activated by the Lich, and bombarded her solidly for thousands of years, refining On an indestructible skeletal body that emerged.

Clusters of gorgeous magical flames exploded on the Lich's body, and the terrifying explosive and penetrating characteristics of the Bolide blasted a witch who hadn't even released her spells into a pile of residue in the blink of an eye.

And at this time, the ghost prince Brenas who was on the side had just released his dispelling magic.

Seeing the lich killed in an instant, even Brenas, who has always been calm, was stunned. After all, his original plan was to let Brian hold the lich for a while, and wait for him to deal with these undead creatures that got in the way. , turned around to deal with the Lich.

Who would have thought that just by turning around, Brian had already dealt with this lich that gave him a headache.

And the relaxed look on the other side's face was as simple as killing the weakest skeleton, which simply refreshed the three views of Prince Yinhun.

After finishing off the Lich neatly, Brian didn't waste time looking at Prince Shade's stunned expression, but immediately put away the staff of the Archmage that had a slight crack, and used the Word of Chaos to cooperate with Brennus' dispersal Divine art, to clean up all the summoned objects and constructs of the Lich.

This encounter can be said to have ended more smoothly than expected.

After cleaning the battlefield, Brenas suppressed the shock in his heart, squatted on the ground, looked at the ashes left by the Lich, and speculated: "I can't predict where her phylactery is."

He shook his head in disappointment, stood up, and said in an uncertain tone, "This feeling is more like she put the phylactery..."

"The phylactery and the Shadow Demon's Web are fused together, right." Brian expressed his point of view.

Theoretically speaking, as long as the Shadow Demon Net doesn't blow up, then Arokar can be resurrected infinitely, but the control of the resurrection is not in her hands, but in the hands of the Lost Lady.

"That's right." Breners nodded slightly.

"Then don't waste time." Brian felt the magical energy in the air, which had become obviously more chaotic than before the battle, and said:

"Since she has fused her phylactery with Shadow Demon's Web, it means that the priestess Eswell noticed her at the moment of her death. Let's rush there as soon as possible."

…………

(End of this chapter)