Chapter 232: Retreating to safety

Knowing this, Evale realized she couldn't just keep fighting. While she would like to get more used to the revenant's aura and try and find a way past its armor. Having managed to slowly whittle down the former's effect on her, to now around 3%.

She realized that doing so would take too long, certain that more undead were rushing to her location. A few stragglers had already joined the horde, if a higher undead were to arrive her life could really be in danger. Then it would no longer be a case of her struggle to kill her enemy, but rather her needing to fight for her life.

As such, she realized she had to end the fight as quickly as possible, or retreat. She naturally didn't want to run without killing the revenant, having fought it she felt more and more that she had to kill it. As such she sealed her resolve, jumped back, and created enough space between herself and the revenant to allow a second of distraction.

With enough space and time to use her dimensional storage, pulling out a mana crystal. Frustrated that she had to fall back to this, and even wondering if it will be worth it. However the doubt didn't last for long. She slammed the crystal into the hilt of her blade without any doubt, resolved to kill this revenant. Quickly the blade started glowing. Her hands soon becoming scorched from the heat it was generating.

Not minding this Evale charged again, the revenant quickly realizing the danger it was now in. Raising its shield it tried to block, but Evale moved past it. Opening her side to attack, but the revenant didn't take the opportunity. Instead, it tried to block her attack, truly afraid of the now blindingly bright red/orange sword.

Evale's second sword interrupted its defense, stopping its from interfering with her glowing blade. She struck this blade into its chest without any form of grace. In a barbaric charge with little regard to the danger to herself, her clothes catching fire from the heat of the blade.

Even with the added momentum from her charge she only barely managed to get the sword to penetrate. However this was enough as the armor started melting, and with one final push Evale forced it in.

At that moment the revenant looked at her in mockery, Evale smiling in return. Sending her final command to her sword, she struck at the revenant's sword again before retreating. Leaving the now pure blinding white sword inside the revenant, who quickly tried to pull it out. Its gauntlets melting as it tried to touch the blade.

Unfortunately for it, at this time its resilience worked against it. Its armor didn't like melting, nor having a hole created in it. So it tried to repair the damage, consuming a large part of the revenant's energy. At the same time as it repaired the damage, that was caused by the sword, it caused the blade to fuse inside it. Making it nearly impossible to be removed.

Just as Evale managed to cover five meters and the revenant realized the futility of its actions, the sword exploded. The explosion sent most of the undead surrounding them onto their backs while causing even her to stumble. Her hair, and all her clothes, burnt to a crisp from the explosion, the darkening sky becoming brighter than day for a moment.

Turning around Evale looked at the pieces of armor scattered onto the floor, quickly deciding to try and gather them up. To analyze and hopefully find a weakness later, as she rushed forward and used wind magic to lift the pieces up, she found a beating blackened heart with a slight green glow.

She was shocked seeing this, but not having time for emotions or wandering thoughts, she picked it up and retreated. Leaving the rest of the armor pieces. The undead just about to reform their ranks, Evale resorted to a fast wind attack to send them back down as she retreated.

As soon as she was out of the encirclement she turned in the direction of the fort. As she ran she could feel that the heart was releasing an aura of death. It's still alive? Dammit, how much does it take to kill a revenant? She wondered, not daring to store the heart in her dimensional storage. As such she emptied her quiver and threw it inside. Hoping that this heart would allow them to discover the weakness of revenants, and if it is the cause of the corruption.

...

By the time Evules finally stopped running they had covered more than half the distance they had traveled before. If he continued they would certainly reach the fort before sunrise. The reason for this was because they had moved slowly when going out, trying to memorize the best routes to retreat if it were ever needed. Along with setting up a few fallback points in the cabins they passed.

They were now at just such a cabin, Thesolis quickly having activated the arrays upon arrival while Kydone headed out to scout the surrounding area. Katania quickly started healing herself and the others, while Eldrian simply stared at the arrays in wonder. Trying to figure out how they worked, how they differed from simple spells, and what they were meant for.

Only once things calmed down did he stopped contemplating and asked Thesolis, who simply told him the effects of the array. Not wishing to explain how they worked or the theory behind them. She wanted to rest and recover as quickly as possible should any trouble come for them. The ride had been tough on all of them, Evules actually the one in the best condition.

There were actually three arrays, the first and largest was similar to a silent alarm. Upon triggered it would create a ball of light at its center. The second was a mana gathering array, allowing everyone inside to recover faster. It also worked to stop the flow of foreign mana, such as what the aura of death from a revenant was made off.

The last was a magic barrier, only large enough to cover the inside of the cabin, the walls not at all protected. The reason for this was simple, the smaller it was, the stronger it would be. At this stage it was actually semi-active, using enough power to be activated at a second's notice. But not actually forming the barrier yet, as even without blocking anything it would drain quite a bit of mana.

"Now what?" Eldrian asked, knowing very much that he had to logout as soon as possible. He wondered just how bad his condition was going to be IRL.

"We'll rest for the night and return to the fort in the morning," Evules replied as he looked nervously back to where they had left Evale. Naturally, he couldn't see that far, the tree's blocking sight past a hundred or so meters. This didn't change a thing though, he looked and hoped that his younger sister was alright.

The more he thought the more he wished he had ignored her order and just gone with her. He felt confident he should be able to deal with a few hundred weaker undead, even if they were being boosted by a revenant, and he himself weakened.

Yet here he was, now hoping without being able to do anything. Promising himself that next time he will disobey in a similar situation, his training having forced him into action this time. He would not allow it again.

Seeing that no one was willing to converse, Eldrian sighed and decided to log out. For a while he wondered if he should ask the system to keep his avatar in the world, or let it dissipate into particles. Strangely the former was actually safer, it would appear that he was sleeping to the other. But in this case, if he logged in too late they could carry him up as they had done before.

Eldrian quickly told Evules this, who simply nodded. Not minding Eldrian's words, only replying that he would carry him again if needed. This was enough and as such Eldrian quickly logged out.

...

"Constantin, check this," Joren called out, pointing to a particular post on the forum. "Another player, this one also seems promising."

"Well he is only feeling a vague connection, but that in itself is already surprising at this stage. Still, it is nothing compared to the High Elf players." Constantin replied as he read the post.

This player only mentioned that he had felt a vague connection to things. This was special since most players wouldn't feel connected to their spells, as the system usually cast it for them. Yet, in some cases, it seemed that the system only helped them cast, instead of casting for them. This case seemed to again be such a one, though both Constantin and Joren were unsure if this was truly what was happening.

"True, I mean most of the players who are still playing as High Elves have managed to make some progress. Many of them have actually managed to gain access to a Magic Crystal, and following Eldrian's advice they all used nature magic to try and learn." Joren replied.

"Almost all who did that gave up though." Constantin countered, with Joren adding further.

"But those few who didn't have shown great progress. They are still unable to actually use magic, but they have managed to enter the magic abyss. So this clearly shows that High Elves have a massive advantage when actually learning magic."

"Yet none of them have managed anything more than that. So they aren't much further than the other players." Constantin countered again, "Those players just need some more guidance and they might quickly start growing far faster than the High Elf players ever could."

"Are you kidding? Out of the almost 11 million players, under a hundred have managed to feel something. Yet out of the two thousand remaining High Elves, more than half of them have posted managing feeling something. And how are you going to guide the players when you can't manage the same as them?" Joren countered, causing Constantin to fall silent as he indeed hasn't managed to feel connected to his spells.

Naturally many of the posts may in fact be false positives. With players believing they managed something, but not actually having managed anything. A placebo effect of sorts. Still with the amount they had found, they hoped some would be the true deal such as Eldrian.