172 Finding the hideou

Whether it was the memories of the humans or the undead that walked amongst them, they were both equally useless for Leilade. Because the undead were either formed with mindless creatures or the souls of deceased humans, they didn't possess knowledge from before their lives. As for the living beings, the only thing they truly knew was when the One Reborn freed them from the demons. And even then, it was a bit unclear when this happened precisely.

The common belief was that it happened before the grandparents of their own grandparents were born. As for the life expectancy of the humans, it was probably 50 years, at most, leaving her with an approximate estimate as a century of conflict. As for the description of the One Reborn himself, it was … a fantasy. She hardly could know which one truly saw him or only imagined his shape. She had someone with the size of a demon, someone with the size of a normal human and even a few looking like babies. And all of those forms were the truth for the ignorant humans that believed in them.

As for the undead, it was no better since their souls were far too close to the ones of the humans to be truly reliable. It was really a waste of her time to have slaughtered everyone, seeing the complete lack of results. As for where she currently was heading, it was strangely the same path she previously took. Like the very symbol that lead her to this place was also making her meet this creature. The moment she returned to that planet and go freed that Candaith, she definitely will talk with him about doing things too mysteriously.

Not having to use mana just to hide, she noticed the complete lack of reactions of the undead on the ground. Sometimes, she passed right in front of them, merely a few meters away. But besides looking at her with their empty eye sockets for a few seconds, they didn't do anything else. Breaking into their minds, she extracted the orders they received, to kill anything that was alive. Including the humans apparently, as she couldn't see anything about them.

"Are they saved by the undead or also captives?" Without a lich to accompany the humans, Leilade would bet they would be immediately slaughtered by the roaming zombies and skeletons. Meaning that even if the dead were protecting them from the demons, they were not in any way less captive than before. But it did not seem to bother them too much, as none of the memories she obtained talked about that obvious issue.

Not wanting to think too much about human rights, she kept moving forward, until she reached another town. This one was slightly bigger, and could probably shelter a few dozens of thousands of heads. Circling around, it was however not her final destination. But looking at all those reserves of mana that were moving, talking and eating, she felt that she could waste a bit of time. Landing in the center of the small city, she was this time met with hostility.

"I saw you once before. Who are you and what do you want?" Hearing the equally cold voice of the lich near her, she acted like she was not surrounded at all. The small plaza was beginning to feel empty, as the humans were running away, feeling that something was off. Not that they were wrong, but it will not matter at all if they were 10 or 100 meters away.

"If you saw me once, you also know what I will do." Gazing at the frail liches, she began to count them. At first, only three were present, but more and more were coming, all provoking various fluctuations in the surrounding mana. In some of their hands, she could already see the beginning of a spell.

"No. The One Reborn transmitted your image, saying that you were a great threat to all of us. So I repeat my question, for the last time. Who are you and what do you want?" Even as he was saying this, he did not seem to be scared. Once more, even if they were undead and shouldn't feel anything, their souls were a weakness. Too many sentiments could plague their judgments, like right now where a few of them were watching the humans, filled with worry.

"Hahaha. You don't ask the questions, I do! Unfortunately, you are not useful to me." The small soul seemed awfully tiny when compared to the now large amount of undead surrounding her. But instead of panicking or even showing fear, only sheer arrogance could be seen on her face. Realizing that she couldn't be discussed with, the de-facto leader of the liches ordered the attack.

"Kill her!" Multiples spells began to be cast, throwing a stream of colors toward the lonely dark soul. Whether it was fire, ice, water, lightning or anything else, none of those could even touch her. Either they vanished into the darkness that surrounded their enemy, or they were blocked centimeters away from her. It only took a few seconds before they stopped doing that, all starring at each other wondering what they should do.

"I guess it's my turn then." Raising her left hand, Leilade closed it into a fist. All of a sudden, all around the liches, a sphere of dark flames appeared, even blocking their exit toward the sky. And when the first undead tried to touch it to escape, he burned into a pile of dust in a matter of seconds. But not without screaming so hard that it was heard in the entire village.

To make things worse, the sphere began to diminish in size, slowly closing on them. Seeing this, the liches had no choice but to attack the caster, as none of what they did manage to slow down or open something in the magical trap. Unfortunately, they realized that even getting closer to Leilade was a deed none of them could accomplish. The moment a lich stepped too close, a dark tentacle would immediately grab it, swallowing it all.

For the bystanders that were close to the dark flames, but on the other side, it did not seem to have taken a very long time. In less than a minute, the plaza was once more visible, with only one single thing remaining. A small little dark girl, with her eyes and hair completely white. As for the large number of liches, none of them were in sight, having disappeared without letting a single trace of their existence.

Getting some height, she used the same spell again, only this time, she encircled the entire city. Unfortunately, even if she could expand the darkness to its maximum, it was not large enough to swallow everyone here in one go. And it was also troublesome to chase after some survivors. Therefore, she had to expand her mana just to keep everyone in here, and then methodically cleansed every part of that place.

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No matter how hard their shouts, prayers, cries or pleas were, no one survived their encounters with Leilade. Not even focused on the slaughter that was happening in front of her, she was more concerned by the once more complete lack of reliable information. All she learned was that the One Reborn did manage to transmit her image to the undead casters, but that was it. In a way, it seemed to be one-way communication, but he couldn't know about her if he couldn't also collect the memories of the liches. Since the only times, she appeared to the undead were when she killed them afterward.

Extinguishing the dark flames that did not burn a single grass, she gazed at the now empty town. The only things still standing were the buildings, as it was a bit longer to convert in mana and quite frankly, not really that efficient. Most non-living materials found in nature were like that, and even grass had more mana than a wall made of stone. Right before leaving for good, she heard the loud cries of a baby, that luckily managed to survive.

However, as she was already high in the sky, she was reluctant to return on her steps just for one living being. Considering as it was lucky for the human child to survive, she did not stay any longer, granting him or her the right to live. After all, she knew that the darkness was seemingly intelligent, but didn't possess true senses. Meaning that when she did not actively control it, it would not manage to discover some truly well-hidden preys.

While she kept moving, she noticed a few additional cities, with this time proper farms around them. Due to the fact that they were extremely deep inside the undead territory, it was logical that the demons could hardly prevent anything from happening there. Unlike the much closer towns that could at most shelter one thousand humans, those were comparable to the remote cities of Massalia or Avenio.

At the same time, the number of roaming undead were greatly reduced, almost not visible at all. Otherwise, it would be a shame if a farmer, unfortunately, died under the claws of a random zombie, just because of an oversight. However, if they were far less present, there were a few other creatures that did not reduce their numbers. In fact, she could spot more of them in here than in any other places, making her cast another invisibility spell.

The green discreet ratmen, seemed to be on something, as they strangely took the same path as she. Probably also searching for the One Reborn themselves, their numbers grew more and more as she got closer. The mana link she obtained from the liches was telling her that he was in the vicinity, and at that moment, she noticed a large number of ratmen discussing something. They were well hidden near a stone formation, that formed a very small mountain.

Approaching it, she noticed the paintings and drawings on the rocks around it, all representing symbols of the Demonic Empire. One was even her own, the mark of the Death Corps she was so proud of. Thinking about how they all died, even Akama, she starred at the rest. Counting them one by one, she had to admit it was a pretty huge collection, of the most important troops located in Arsene and Artosis, the two planets they were on before The End was activated.

Before she could descend and enter through the opening in the mountain, she noticed the group of ratmen beginning to move. Unlike the others she used to see, that were mainly wearing light armors and had a few weapons, those were having a piece of equipment comparable to the killers of the Black Gauntlet. Without a single doubt, they were assassins, tasked with the killing of the One Reborn. As for how they were absolutely certain he was here, even she had no idea.

After all, they couldn't possibly use the same technique as her, killing a lich and breaking his soul in pieces, allowing her to easily obtain what she wanted. But since someone else was looking to test the defenses in her stead, she would hardly complain. At the same time, it would be great, to see if some special spells created by the Demonic Army would be used. Meaning that she may have potentially killed a lot of her future subordinates. May have.