From Player To Npc

It didn't take them long to reach the end of the corridor of the cave, where a vast room existed. A lone throne existed in the otherwise empty place except for some stone humanoid statues at the side.

There wasn't somebody sitting on the throne, but instead, there was a weird jar on it. Around the jar, there was weird writing that even Shingi didn't know how to read, but he recognized it. This was a specially written language used by Liches and other high intelligent undead.

This strange jar was the lich's phylactery, where its soul would reside in case its undead body would get destroyed. It was something that Liches kept well-hidden as if it got destroyed, they wouldn't have any way to return after death.

The phylactery shouldn't be out in the open like that, and there were no signs of the Lich of any other undead.

Shingi kept looking for what the source of the corruption was, but everything led to the phylactery. This could mean only one thing; the Lich was dead. Of course, just killing the Lich wouldn't make the corruption end, but no new Semi-Liches or non-mindless Undead would get created.

The corruption by itself created mindless undead, but the Lich had to make everything else. So when the Lich was in its phylactery focused on making a new body, it still released corrupted energy, which kept making new mindless undead. As for the Semi-Liches, they couldn't tell when the Lich died, only get a message by it in case of danger.

This meant that somebody had killed the Lich without destroying the phylactery and fast enough for it not to call for backup. So the real question that Shingi wondered for was who was behind it? The Dark Guild or Mikhail?

Shingi used his PERCEPTION Skill, which wasn't affected by his weakened state, to check for any signs of anyone being here recently. There were no signs, which made him think that Mikhail was most likely behind it and not the Dark Guild. The member of the Dark Guild he had encountered until now wasn't showing signs of dominant power, but Shingi knew that the group had some aces up their sleeves.

Shingi started moving closer to the throne while he kept examining the room. He told others to keep their guards up and keep looking, as there was always the chance of him missing something. Also, the closer he got to the phylactery, the voices of the spirits were getting louder and seemed to increase in number.

Shingi also noticed that Syra remained at the entrance of the room while looking around. He didn't order her what to do, as she was experienced enough by herself, and he didn't think she would follow his orders either way. She was willing to teach him and help him with some projects, but that didn't mean she would just follow him blindly.

He signaled the others to keep their distance while he and Dark Shadow got closer to the Throne. He wanted to have Dark Shadow with him to use his MANA MANIPULATION Skill to open the phylactery. Just breaking it wasn't the best way to deal with it, when the Lich's soul was in it, as it had a chance of the Lich getting out with a body, even if it would be imperfect. The body's quality depended on how much time it was in the phylactery, which Shingi couldn't know.

When they open the phylactery, sealed with Dark Element Mana, they must keep the soul into it by making an artificial cover with their Dark Element Mana. Then they would fill it with Light Element, which was weak against, and it would get completely destroyed.

Dark Shadow would destroy the Seal and make the Dark Element cover, while Shingi would make the Light Element attack. Dark Shadow had nothing to boost his mana, as he couldn't use a staff or a wand, but still, its MANA MANIPULATION Skill was closer to Shingi's skill when he wasn't weakened.

When the Seal broke, a wave of corrupted energy was released before Dark Shadow finished making its cover. The soul was still in the phylactery, but the energy enabled some defense mechanics in the room. The statues weren't really statues, but petrified Semi-Liches, that got petrified, so they didn't count on the limit of Semi-Liches that could exist on the floor.

There were ten Semi-Liches, and they acted differently than the others they faced. They were faster, stronger, and had a high HP regeneration skill because of the Lich's soul being in the same room as them.

Shingi's students drew their weapons and tried to keep them away from Shingi and tried to keep them away from Shingi and Dark Shadow. Dark Shadow had to keep focusing on covering the top of the phylactery that they opened while making an opening for a short time for Shingi's Light Element mana to get in. Their timing had to be as perfect as possible, as each time there was an opening, some energy could leak or the soul getting out.

Shingi was using Light Mana that he had stored in his store for mana ring, but it hadn't benefited as much as he wanted as it wasn't in the ring for a long time. It was powerful enough to affect the Soul but would take some time and needed to use a lot. It was more than what he had in his ring currently, but not as much as he could make.

At his current rate, he would need 30 minutes to destroy the soul. His students were strong, but they couldn't kill all those Semi Liches or keep them busy for that long. Also, he couldn't ask Dark Shadow to use its Light Element to attack the Soul, as he wasn't able to use both Dark and Light Element at the same time currently.

He could boost his INT since he had spent enough time on the previous floor and going around this one for it to get restored, but even then, it would reduce the time to maybe a little over 10 minutes. His students could last for maybe 5 to 8 minutes max.

As for joining the battle and destroying the Soul after dealing with the Semi Liches wasn't an option, as even with his help, he wasn't certain if it would make a change. So he had his MANA DOUBLES to help while he enabled his blessing and had his Fire Element MANA DOUBLE join the fight.

Before he started focusing on just feeding mana to his MANA DOUBLES and attacking the Lich's Soul, he noticed something weird. Syra was standing at the entrance, almost frozen, with a clear look of pain and fear. Shingi had never seen her look like that, mostly because few things could affect her spirit form, and she was a brave woman.

He didn't have time to think about it and couldn't do anything as he focused on the task at hand. Instead, he tried to increase the amount of Light Element mana passed with each time Dark Shadow opened its way. The more mana, the more damage, but the opening time was just a split second, and even the Light Element wasn't fast enough to get in the phylactery a sizeable amount at such a short time.

His speed got increased a bit, but still, it seemed not to be enough. He might have to use his cure for the Minor Spirit Madness. He didn't think he would use it that soon after getting affected, but they couldn't leave and try again later. Leaving now would free the Lich, and even if it will be at an imperfect body, but would empower even more the Semi-Liches.

As he was ready to use the cure, he felt something pushing his body down, like he suddenly got an extra weight on him. He wasn't the only one affected like that, as everyone, including the Semi-Liches, started falling to the ground like their bodies got heavier—everyone except Little Phoenix and Syra.

Syra was too far away to be affected, and Little Phoenix was the source of this phenomenon. It was actually a Spell that he was working on but hadn't successfully cast it until now. The Spell was called GRAVITY AURA, and it enabled its user to make a sphere with them as its center and increase the Gravity in the Sphere.

Semi Liches had above average human STR, but not too much, so they got affected by the Spell. Wild Tycoon and An were the only ones of his students who could move as their STR was quite high.

Dark Shadow seemed unaffected, and even if Shingi couldn't see his STR, he knew that it was pretty high. So the Spell would only ignore the user as a target; that's why everyone in range got affected.

Shingi, even in this situation, didn't lose his focus and continued his task, as he didn't need to be standing to do so.

Little Phoenix held the Spell for a little under half a minute, and it used almost all her MP to do so. Still, even those few seconds would make a difference.