Blacksmith of the Apocalypse

---Outside of Delta---

“Who would have thought this would be all I end up doing?” Cromwel thought in derision, setting up the last part of a wide formation, surrounding a valley in the vicinity of Delta. At the bottom of the valley, the remnants of Spatia's army were camping, at the edge of a massive gate.

This was Natina's camp, they had set up after their odyssey. With plans constantly changing, Cromwel had not expected they would end up returning here to set up an ambush. Apparently, the probability that Spatia might just retreat was high.

Nobody could stop them from running away if they used Home Call. That was if they were able to use the system skill. Although setting up space locks was not Cromwel's forte, that didn't mean the researcher had not learned how to use them.

“It's done, should I activate it?” he contacted the blacksmith and asked, after fixing the last focus of the array. Although it was a rough setup, the scientist was confident in its functionality.

“Activate it. We will be there shortly.”

...

Natina was hesitant to leave. The old man was just one legend, but her instincts told her that he was bad news. Yet, she couldn't run. What would the imperial family think if she simply retreated at this point because of a vague feeling?

She still had three legends with her and there were still two fighting in the city. Although she had not been able to see much of the fight through the thick foliage at the foot of the tree, she knew that things had taken a turn for the worse.

Any other time, she would have felt gratified to be right and see the people who tried to steal her achievements get decimated, but the gaze of that old man had disturbed her. She would have already, left if she didn't know what people would say.

Objectively, this was the perfect time to attack. There were two legends keeping the enemy distracted. The chosen of Kali could take her legends and undead army and raid the enemy's main base. Even if she didn't take down the tree, destroying Mina Mar here would be enough of a victory to save her face in the empire.

Unable to make a decision, she prepared for either. She told the soldiers to get ready to leave while she kept an eye on the situation in Delta. The old man had vanished under the tree together with Vermar and she had not seen him again.

Should she attack and risk it? She doubted the man could win against Kalzemir... but she wasn't afraid of her undead losing. if she was honest with herself, it was the first time she feared for her own life.

If the old man aimed for her instead of the skeleton dragon, she didn't believe she stood a chance. Not after seeing what happened to the lycanthrope. As she was observing the district with rapt attention the portal suddenly flickered.

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her heart dropped straight down to her undergarment, seeing a sign of static in the supermassive portal. This was a pathway created by a legendary artifact given to her by the imperial family! It wasn't supposed to just flicker out of nowhere!

Urgently, she lifted her gaze and hectically looked around, only to realize that all the smaller portals used to send out her troops had closed. All but the legendary gate had vanished. She froze. There was only one possibility for this to happen. Someone had deployed a spatial lock in the area!

“Use ! Hurry!” she commanded decisively. Most spatial locking formations couldn't block the system skill or needed time before they could, however-

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Just like her own attempt, nobody succeeded in using . They were stuck here. As the roughly 3000 soldiers left of her expedition force were in various states of confusion, the ground started vibrating.

Covering the hills and valleys, every inch of ground was suddenly covered by a flood of undead meat gushing over the surrounding ridges. Zombies, skeletons, abominations, giant insects, and undead beasts were mindlessly rushing down toward the camp.

Hidden in the crowd were also higher-ranking undead like Death Knights and Zombie Warriors. A creature resembling a giant baboon, jumped out from the mass, crashing into the camp's shield like a meteor. It actually managed to cling to the shield membrane and started bashing its fists against it while letting out psychotic roars. This thing was at least on the level of a doom knight.

More beasts jumped at the barrier, covering the dome in bodies that frantically tried to break it. Natina had experienced this often enough to immediately recognize Urth's weird zombies. However, their numbers were incomparable to before. There were thousands, no tens of thousands. Even more than she could ever dream of assembling in her own army.

“What are you doing!” she barked, her voice enhanced with magic. “Get in formation and defend the barrier!” she commanded the soldiers, as she summoned her liches, to meet the untiring flood with her own.

Frustrated, she chose to call out Piotr. Kalzemir could have handled this army with a few breaths, but with the living imperial soldiers at her side, she couldn't use that. They would die even quicker to the putrid miasma than these infected corpses. R̃Ά₦ОВÈṢ

“Piotr, get rid of this flood,” she commanded the lich. People may believe that a lich was not the best candidate to fight undead, as the enemy had a high resistance to necromancy and curses. But this was not necessarily the case.

Although Sokolov was a legendary lich now, in his life he was an Elemental Archmage close to reaching the legendary status. He finally became a legend shortly before death but it couldn't save his life. He turned to dark magic and necromancy because of a disease cutting his life short. Now he not only possessed the battle magic from when he was alive, he also knew most of the enemy's weak points.

The half-skeleton nodded and began casting. Giant, green fireballs kept forming a dropping from the sky in quick succession. Where they hit among the undead, they didn't explode but splatter. As if the fire was a viscous liquid, it splattered everywhere and stuck to the corpses rushing toward the bottom of the valley.

Green Flames quickly started spreading, burning whatever they hit relentlessly. It was a spell specialized to deal with these zombies that were able to regenerate. The fire was cursed and would not stop spreading and burning until nothing was left of the one it hit.

The bulk of the enemy army quickly wilted away while they were still charging at the barrier, but not all. The stronger ones just endured it and continued to attack, burning like green torches. Yeah, although they were a little troublesome, once a legend was involved, these zombies were nothing.

However, this was just the advance party. They had to get away. If that old man appeared... Natina truly feared for her life. her thought raced, when her eyes fell on the artifact portal. It worked despite the spatial lock. On the other side was the airspace of Delta.

The camp was covered in a formation that blocked their escape, but the district wasn't! If they ran into the gate, they would fall toward Delta, but they would be free to use home calls.

“Retreat into the gate! Use when you reach the other side!” the necromancer cried out, urging the remaining soldiers to flee forward. Advancing on Delta was their only way out! It was at this moment when she heard a faint beat, like the marching of boots echoing in the mountains.

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