Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead

The way Loimos moved and switched between his targets made it most difficult to predict anything that he might do next, he did not press on despite having clear occasion to end both Menhirel and Msir just now, actually ran past Dasato and instead targeted Neige, all of that in just a few moments whilst throwing a projectile at the wounded champion of fire, just as the champion of snow managed to barely deflect the first blow, Loimos stomped down onto her ankle before swiftly hooking the back of the same leg he had just stepped upon, throwing her off balance, allowing him to easily position himself in away that used her as a shield from everyone else.

But with only one arm operational, he could not restrain the champion to use her a meat shield for much longer than that, so with a rapid motion, he slid the blade across her throat, blood gushed everywhere as the forceful motion spun her around, Neige facing him for a brief second before her face collapsed right against the undead's chest, soon sliding to the ground as Loimos swiftly drained her.

By this point, the rest of the livings were focused back on him, and were already preparing to blast him with spells, but although Loimos did not look any better than before, he had indeed recovered enough strength for a powerful attack, he swiftly stomped the ground with all his might, bone spikes and ribs emerging all over the area, aiming to skewer the livings, many of them were cut, but none were actually pierced, but that was no problem, as Loimos's real aim had been to call upon a whole bunch of bones everywhere, all of sudden, the battlefield was covered in obstacles, ducking low to the ground amidst the initial confusion, Loimos went out of their direct lines of sight.

The livings could still see one another through gaps in the bones, Menhirel helped Msir up to her feet, the shieldbearer's nose had been absolutely crushed by the headbutt from earlier, and the champion of sword was pouring blood from her severed hand, hastily ripping her sleeve to stop the heavy blood flow.

Merno focused on his sharp mana senses to detect the undead, but his signature was identical to that of the spikes and ribs protruding from the ground, so pinpointing his location was not as simple as it may seem.

"Everyone, be careful! He doesn't seem to be moving- He must be hiding somewhere near the spikes, get away from them!" the talented mage shouted, the champion of water, Defoim'nocle was by his side right now.

Marl was with Forven and Alosfit.

Whilst Menhirel was with Msir, Dasato and Filiusorci, who had just managed to get the blood out of his eyes.

Logic dictated that the undead should target the group with either the lowest amount of people, or the one with two wounded fighters, but trusting logic when fighting Loimos was a good way to get yourself killed, the skeleton was a master of misdirection and mind tricks, he seemed always know what options his enemies had better than they themselves did.

For several seconds, absolutely nothing happened, if not for the great range of his mana sense, Merno might have believed that the undead had just left the area to go and slaughter some non-combatants to replenish his strength, but the blind mage was confident, taking into account how Loimos had behaved since the very start, even if he was one to play absurd mind games with his opponents, if he had been able to repeatedly use powerful moves against them, there was no reason for him not to do so, especially when he was receiving so much damage already.

As such, the manifesting of those bones had to be all that he could manage right now, there shouldn't be room for him to do anything to make himself disappear in his current state.

Which meant that the pure undead was lying, waiting in ambush somewhere nearby, close to the bones to conceal his energy signature, but somehow hidden from direct sight, probably not moving at all, or very slowly…

"Everyone, do not move… If you see any movement, it should be him" he said in a low tone, everyone nodding in understanding.

Defoim'nocle could not help but glance at where Neige had just been killed, eyes livid behind her glasses, the undead was so weak right now, that the champion's corpse was only slowly rotting away right now, and yet, they were still pitifully struggling against him, just like back then, it felt like they were doing nothing but proving that they did not have the shoulders to fight such an enemy.

Palms sweaty, Filiusorci grasped his mace's handle with both hands, eyes darting from side to side, trying to catch sight of anything that could be suspicious, him, Menhirel and Dasato had silently surrounded Msir, who with a missing hand and having lost a lot of blood, was far from being in peak health to fight.

Marl was continuing to channel healing for Alosfit and Forven, both had been rather severely injured by Loimos, and even if patched up, would not be able to fight effectively for a while longer, the champion of fire had nearly gotten his ankle bitten cleanly through, and the champion of wind had a hole in his liver, Minli might be able to do something better if she was there, but none of them had even thought of suggesting to bring the little healer anywhere close to Loimos.

Surprisingly, the first sign of disturbance was not an immediate attack, but the sound a bone breaking, all livings instantly turned to the source of the sound, only to find that one of the rib-like spikes at seemingly been intentionally formed with a defect, the pointy end abnormally thin and weak, actually showing itself to be partly hollow.

In the next instant, a sword came slicing through the air, narrowly blocked by Dasato, but the undead was not coming for them, instead bursting from the cover of the bones, grabbing a spike of pulling it out of the ground right as he slammed into the champion of water, both Defoim'nocle and Merno casted a water spell at the same, summoning a great wave of water to prevent the undead from getting to them easily, but once again, the skeleton seemed to have just already thought of such a scenario, and wielding the bone like a javelin, launched in through narrow gaps in between bones toward Marl and the two wounded, just before jumping back to where he had come from, climbing and jumping from spike to rib, and rib to spike with egregious agility.

Dodging the spells thrown at him before jumping back down behind the cover of the bones.

The bone javelin was narrowly blocked by the cleric, but there was no time to celebrate, as Loimos quickly emerged near the group of four, heading straight for Filiusorci.