Chapter 86: Accident (1)

“A lich… a monster?” Looking at the suddenly appearing dark blue creature, Lisa instinctively stepped back a few steps, her face filled with fear as she whispered. Clearly, she was simply terrified by its terrifying appearance.
Bernie’s fear was even more evident than Lisa’s. Obviously, he knew just how terrifying a lich could be.
Good heavens! There was a lich here in Alton? The branch had sent people to investigate this place a couple of years ago—which idiot was in charge of that investigation? Damn it!
With deep fear in his eyes, Bernie swallowed hard, standing in front of the children and speaking in a low voice, “Run! Hurry up—run if you want to stay alive!”
But to Bernie’s great annoyance, the children around him seemed dumbfounded, standing there frozen as they stared at the lich. So he shouted in a low voice, “Run!”
Yet the lich moved faster than the children. A pale blue soul flame burst from its hollow eye sockets, and immediately, the temperature dropped sharply, sending chills through everyone—chills that seemed capable of freezing the soul itself.
“Damn it!” Seeming to sense something, Bernie quickly recited a few spells, creating a deep purple arcane shield to protect everyone inside. But the next second, a frosty blast erupted from the lich’s mouth. With a series of cracking sounds, the arcane shield shattered like fragile crystal.
“Run!” Bernie screamed. Although his strength was only above average among the Gallic Magic Association’s branches, he never expected such a huge gap in power between them. That shield was his most proficient defensive spell, yet it could only hold up for just two or three seconds.
The lich exhaled frost, staring at the humans before it in silence. Then it spread its bony arms wide. As waves of magic rippled through its body, countless ice arrows rapidly formed around it. Those arrows, as thick as little fingers, were crystal clear, sometimes flashing with a deadly cold light.
“Bang!”
Suddenly, without any warning, a flame exploded on the lich’s terrifying skull. The fierce flames instantly engulfed most of its body.
[Flame Flash]
“Huh?” Bernie was stunned. He instinctively glanced at the boy named Thors beside him, because he had just sensed a fluctuation in the boy’s magic.

“What kind of magic is this?” Bernie glanced at Jiang Zhe in confusion, only to see him frown. He had to frown because the flames didn’t cause any harm to the lich at all; on the contrary, the icy cold emanating from the lich froze those flames. Watching this incredible scene, Dia covered her mouth and murmured, “Fire… flames… frozen?” It wasn’t surprising she was shocked—after all, they had never heard of ice freezing flames. They could clearly see the shape of the flames through those ice blocks. “Crack, crack…” The ice on the lich’s body gradually peeled off. He glanced at Jiang Zhe and said emotionlessly, “Flames of this intensity can’t hurt Amos Hallwell—give up, humans. The extreme cold will knock you out in an instant. You won’t feel any pain!” “Oh my, is this your idea of kindness?” Rubbing his head, Allen drew the knight’s sword from his hand, slung it over his shoulder, and said with a smile, “But it’s still unacceptable!” Next to him, Scott pushed up his glasses and said calmly, “Since returning to Galic, I haven’t cast a single spell, let alone practiced daily…” Lowering his voice, he added calmly, “Allen, Thors, be careful!” “Hey!” “Mm!” “Hey!” Stunned by the three ready to act, Bernie was shocked by their actions and said nervously, “Don’t do anything stupid—run! Reid and I will hold him off. You guys, get away from here as fast as you can!” “Run?” Allen looked at Bernie in surprise and asked bewilderedly, “Why run?” Hearing those casual words, Bernie felt a tightness in his chest. Lowering his voice, he said, “I’m starting to doubt the teaching standards of the Rexox Academy—don’t you know what a lich is?” Allen shook his head and turned to Scott, “Do you know, buddy?” Scott pushed up his glasses and said uncertainly, “I saw a little bit in the library before. It seems to be related to necromancers. Specifically… that book only gave a brief introduction.” Good heavens!

Bernie weakly covered his forehead and said with a bitter smile in a low voice, “Run away quickly! Reid and I will buy you time. That guy… isn’t someone we can handle!” By the end, his voice carried a hint of bitterness, as neither he nor his companion Reid was sure they could escape from a lich.
Is it over?
My life… Damn it, I’m not even thirty yet! I’m still young! I’m not even married… It’s so unfair!
Struggling to suppress the tightness in his chest, Bernie’s voice sounded hoarse as he said softly, “Reid!”
“I know!” Reid, who was usually quiet, had already rushed to the front of the group along with Bernie the moment the lich appeared, protecting the children behind them.
They had thought about escaping—if it were just the two of them, they would have run away long ago. But not now, because they were national magicians; they couldn’t just abandon a group of children and run.
Taking a deep breath, Bernie said softly, “It’s time to go…” But before he could finish, his expression froze as he saw Allen already charging forward with his knight’s sword.
“Come back!” Bernie shouted loudly.
Under Bernie’s shocked gaze, Allen rushed a few steps toward the lich. Red runes appeared on the blade of his knight’s sword, and soon, it burst into flames with a roar.
“Ah!” With a loud cry, Allen swung his sword downward, sending a wave of fire toward the lich.
However, the lich named Amos Halwell simply raised his right hand, and the wave of fire instantly froze at a visible speed, turning into an ice block that fell to the ground and shattered with a bang.
“Hey, try this instead!” Seeing that his attack had no effect, Allen swung his sword again. Blue runes appeared on the blade, and a giant scythe-like wind blade flew toward the lich with a whooshing sound.
Lich Halwell raised his right hand once more, but halfway up, his movement stopped. Upon closer inspection, thin black energy strands like threads tightly wrapped around his hand—it was Scott’s [Binding Spell].
“Snap!”
With a crisp snap of his fingers, the flames from Flame Flash became even more intense, completely engulfing lich Halwell’s entire body.
“Hehe! This should work now, right?” Allen said cheerfully, still holding his knight’s sword.

Impressive… The strength of these kids is really remarkable…
With deep surprise in his eyes, Bernie was speechless. Though he didn’t think such attacks could seriously harm that lich, they should at least have some effect, right?
The others thought the same, but in reality, the flames were once again frozen by the cold. As the huge ice blocks gradually cracked and shattered, Harlewell still floated unharmed in front of everyone.
“I don’t want to repeat it—magic of this level can’t hurt me, Amos Harlewell!” With everyone staring in stunned disbelief, the lich Harlewell slowly raised his right hand, pointed forward, and the numerous ice arrows beside him adjusted their direction toward Jiang Zhe and the others before shooting forward with whooshing sounds.
“Damn it!” Bernie exclaimed. Before he could finish casting his spell, a semicircular wall of water already covered everyone—the careful Dia had prepared a protective spell in advance.
[Water Wall]
Unfortunately, against the dense barrage of ice arrows, the water wall was clearly inadequate and could only buy them some time.
[Mud Wall]
With a loud crash, a thick wall of earth rose from the ground, blocking all the ice arrows at the last moment.
Looking at the wall completely frozen over, Bernie wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and muttered, “Good thing we made it in time…” He glared at the kids irritably, about to speak when another crash sounded—the frozen wall collapsed abruptly.
“Why not give up?” The lich Harlewell said in a tone tinged with confusion, looking at the humans before him. “No matter how hard you struggle, you’ll die here anyway—why not stop this futile struggle? Amos will let you die painlessly!”
“Tch! What a joke!” Bernie spat inwardly, glanced at the kids, and whispered, “Run now if you want to. Otherwise, don’t blame me if you die!” Then he began chanting spells.
As he chanted, a green, poisonous claw suddenly appeared on the lich Harlewell’s head.
At the same time, his companion Reid crouched down and slapped the ground, creating a black magic circle. Soon after, a rock puppet struggled its way out of the ground and spat foul-smelling mud at the lich Harlewell.

But neither that green poisonous claw nor the sludge spat out by the rock puppet achieved the desired effect—Harrowell, infected with the toxin, recovered to normal in just a short time.
“Tch! Even toxins don’t work?” Bernie was frustrated. After all, he and Reid only knew alchemy and earth magic, and these two spells were clearly not strong enough to deal with the lich before them.
“Hey, he hasn’t even been hurt at all!” Allen said in disbelief. “Are all liches this bizarre?”
“Nonsense!” Bernie snapped, staring intently at the lich. “Liches ignore physical attacks, are immune to mental magic, and tch—even toxins don’t work on them!”
“What should we do then?” Allen was stunned. He had earlier mocked Bernie and the others for overreacting, but he never expected they would encounter such a tough opponent!
“The only thing that can hurt them is elemental magic…” Bernie said, recalling the scene in the graveyard. He turned to Jiang Zhe and whispered, “Hey, kid, can you raise the level of your fire? Orange flames can’t hurt them!”
“What about blue flames?” Jiang Zhe asked softly.
“Blue flames?!” Bernie was shocked. That was a flame three levels higher than orange flames! A teenage apprentice could actually use blue flames? That was insane!
Thinking Bernie didn’t believe him, Jiang Zhe added, “But it takes time to compress the elements—can blue flames hurt him?”
“Mm!” Bernie nodded firmly and asked quietly, “How much time?”
“About ten seconds each time!”
“Ten seconds…” Bernie shook his head. Seeing the rock puppet’s movements growing stiff and no longer able to buy them any more time, he said anxiously, “Ten seconds is too slow. What if we use an enhancement spell? You know how, right?”
Jiang Zhe opened his mouth to speak when he heard Ravia say sarcastically, “He knows enhancement spells? Ridiculous—I do! It should reduce the compression time by two to three seconds…”
“That leaves seven or eight seconds…” Bernie sighed reluctantly and lowered his voice. “Considering you, I advise you to run now. I’ll try to delay him as much as I can…”

“Can you escape?” With a cold sneer, Ravia said calmly, “It took us over ten minutes to get here just now. Even if we ran at full speed, it would still take about ten minutes. Can you hold off this lich for ten minutes? Unfortunately, I’ve studied some information about liches…”
“Ten minutes…” Bernie smiled bitterly and shook his head. “Then this is our only option—we have to buy as much time as possible. I have a magic stone that can send alerts. When the lich appeared, I secretly crushed it. If we can hold on until reinforcements arrive, we might have a chance to survive! We need to buy time, so… conserve our magic and strength!”
“Hey, haven’t you guys decided yet?” Reid, who was alone holding up the shield, shouted loudly. Clearly, he could hold on no longer.
“Hold on a little longer, Reid!” Bernie yelled at his companion. After briefly understanding the magic the children had learned, he said solemnly, “Listen up. The magic Reid and I know is ineffective against liches, so it can only be used for defense. Allen, you have a magic sword, right? Magic swords rely on engraved runes and gems to exert power, so try to harass the lich as much as you can… Young Count, you’ve learned curses, right? Most curse spells don’t work on liches, but they can at least restrict them. By the way, can you cast aging? Yes? Great! Please try to restrict the lich’s movements… As for those two girls—uh, your names are… Lisa? Lelira? Oh, what have you learned? Summoning and illusion magic? Well… basic summoning spells won’t work at all. Illusion magic is a type of mental magic that’s ineffective against liches. So, basic arcane defense, right? Um! You’re Dia, right? I saw you use a water wall skillfully just now. Use defensive magic then. The power of a lich isn’t something one or two people can withstand. As for you…” He turned to Ravia and Jiang Zhe and lowered his voice. “Attack as much as you can. Don’t give the lich enough time to cast spells. Otherwise, no matter how much we defend, we’ll still be overwhelmed. Once our magic runs out, it’s over. But we need to conserve our magic…”
“Haven’t you guys decided yet?” Faced with the lich’s fierce attacks, Reid, who was holding up the wall alone, had clearly reached his limit and shouted.

“It’s begun, Thors!” Ravia whispered a spell, and instantly, a faint red glow appeared on Jiang Zhe’s body. Beneath his feet, a crimson halo in the shape of a hexagram could be faintly seen.
[Flame Flash]
[Withering]
[Fire Wave]
[Water Wall]
[Arcane Barrier]
In just a few seconds, over a dozen spells were cast in succession. Reid, taking the opportunity to retreat, gasped heavily. Seeing him out of breath, it seemed he had exhausted all his magic.
“Boom! Boom! Boom!” Allen’s wind blades and Ravia’s Fire Wave struck the lich violently, along with Scott’s curses. Though these couldn’t inflict any real damage, they could still halt the lich’s movements for a moment.
“Do you still choose to be my enemy, human?” The lich, Halverell, gradually grew angry; his patience seemed to be running out.
Just then, with a loud explosion, a burst of blue flames erupted violently in the lich’s chest. Before the heat could be frozen by the cold air, it left a scorch mark on the lich’s bones.
“Roar!” The lich, reappearing from the ice, became enraged. With his anger, a powerful pressure enveloped everyone’s minds.
“Is it working? It’s working!” Bernie exclaimed joyfully.
“Damn you, reptile! You ignore my kindness and still dare to hurt me! Unforgivable! Unforgivable!” The lich’s voice trembled, causing the air around him to vibrate as well, as if it were an extension of his endless fury.
Immediately afterward, the moisture in the air condensed, and countless ice arrows were fired at Jiang Zhe and the others.
“Shields!” Realizing something was wrong, Bernie shouted loudly.
As soon as he spoke, four or five shields were cast in succession, barely blocking this wave of attacks.
“Roar!” Having his attacks blocked several times in a row, Halverell clearly lost patience. He exhaled a blast of cold air, and then, with a loud crash, the shields protecting the group shattered. Jiang Zhe and the others felt dizzy.
“Is it Ice Blast?” Bernie said loudly, trying to endure the dizziness. “Shields! Quick, cast shields… Keep harassing him…”
Fortunately, this lich named Halverell was much weaker than the one who fought Argus, so following Bernie’s tactics, they could still buy some time.
But as for how much time they could buy or whether they could hold out long enough for help from the Gallic Magic Association branch, even Bernie wasn’t sure.

So, over twenty minutes passed. Although everyone had used up a considerable amount of magic power, at least they were still able to withstand the attacks from the supposedly incredibly powerful lich, though it was extremely difficult.
But was Amos Harwell, as a lich, really only this good?
The answer was no!
After fighting against Jiang Zhe and the others for about half an hour, lich Amos Harwell’s patience was completely exhausted. He stopped all his movements, spread his arms, raised his head, and began to chant loudly, “Slaves asleep in the land of extreme cold, heed my call! In the name of Amos Harwell, kill these humans before you, tear open their chests, and bring them the most severe death!”
As he chanted, the entire massive library trembled as if in an earthquake, and a strange white pentagram magic array could be faintly seen on the ground.
“What… what’s going on?” Allen asked, surprised and puzzled as he stopped moving.
“Damn it…” Bernie showed signs of anxiety and murmured, “He’s casting a summoning spell. I was wondering about this lich’s strength, but I didn’t expect him to be an expert in summoning magic…”
The shaking of the library finally stopped. But unbelievably, skeletons wreathed in pale blue flames crawled out from beneath the ground. Unlike ordinary skeletons, these ones, like lich Amos Harwell, exuded a cold aura, their bodies covered in frost, with pale blue soul flames burning in their hollow eye sockets.
“Good heavens… Could they be Frost Skeletons from the Land of Death?” Bernie muttered. He quickly warned, “Be careful of those blue flames on those skeletons. They’re flames at over minus 100 degrees. Not only will they freeze blood, but even the soul will be frozen if touched by them!”
“Look at those skeletons—only a fool would want to touch them. But… with this number, it’s impossible not to get attacked. It’s too hard!” Allen said with a bitter smile as he looked around. The once relatively empty library was now filled with dozens of Frost Skeletons—seventy or eighty of them, at least.
Jiang Zhe and his group, who had initially had the numerical advantage, were now completely at a disadvantage. Nine people were already struggling to deal with just one lich, let alone seventy or eighty Frost Skeletons that clearly posed a huge threat. It was a complete disadvantage.

The first to suffer was Allen, for at the moment he was nothing more than a knight in disguise as a mage, with a significantly shorter attack range than the others. To harass Halwell, he had stayed outside the group, and now he was naturally surrounded by those Frost Skulls.
“Allen!”
“Brat!”
“Hey!” Hearing the warnings from his companions, Allen, trapped among those vile Frost Skulls, felt the chilling aura emanating from them and gripped his knight’s sword tightly.
“Kill him! Kill all humans!” Lich Amos Halwell roared fiercely.
At Halwell’s command, over a dozen Frost Skulls immediately launched a fierce attack on Allen. Though these skeletons had no bone shields and only bone knives, making them seem extremely fragile, who would dare to touch their icy flames? Hadn’t they seen what happened to those bookshelves? Just a slight brush and they turned to ice—what if it were a human?
“Allen!” Lisa called out anxiously, tears welling in her eyes.
As everyone worried and fretted for Allen, with a whoosh, he suddenly disappeared from the Frost Skulls’ siege. When he reappeared, he was eerily standing beside Jiang Zhe, leaving everyone present stunned.
“Huh?” Still with tears in her eyes, Lisa stared in shock at Allen. Beside her, Scott, also worried, confirmed Allen’s identity before asking in astonishment, “Teleport? When did you learn that?”
But Allen’s expression left the others even more puzzled. He glanced at his companions and said helplessly, “Teleport? I can’t do that. Even Thors hasn’t mastered it fully—how could I?”
“Then how did you suddenly disappear from there and appear here? Isn’t that teleportation?” Ravia asked in surprise.
Just as everyone was astonished by this, a loud “boom” came from afar. They turned to see that among the dozen Frost Skulls, there was a rock puppet four or five yards tall, struggling to fight back. Its rocky body was covered in ice spikes from the Frost Skulls, slowing its movements greatly, but it was clear its strength was immense—its powerful punches could shatter those fragile Frost Skulls, though it often missed.

Yet this guy’s resilience was astonishingly strong. The bone knives in the hands of a dozen Frost Skelets kept slashing at the rock-like skin on his body, but aside from producing a series of crisp clanging sounds, they seemed to cause no harm to the rock puppet—although its movements became extremely slow.
“Hm?” Bernie glanced at his companion and said in confusion, “Did you summon another rock puppet?”
Reid shook his head and whispered, “It wasn’t me who summoned it!”
“Then who…?” Bernie looked doubtfully at the children, who all shook their heads in turn.
“Huh? That’s strange…” Before Bernie could finish speaking, Lisa tilted her head and stared at the giant rock puppet, murmuring, “Huh? That’s so weird…” She glanced around and then exclaimed in shock, “Where’s Kanso? Kanso is gone!”
“Kanso?” Bernie asked puzzledly, “Who’s that?”
“It’s Allen’s puppet. When we went to the Mage Tower of Vandel, an old professor gave it to us. It’s the short, chubby puppet that’s been with Lisa the whole time…” As she spoke, Scott seemed to remember something. He turned to look at the rock puppet fighting against the Frost Skelets in the distance and said with a strange expression, “Allen, don’t you think that rock puppet looks a bit like him?”
“No way?” Allen stroked his chin while looking at the rock puppet in the distance. Soon, a look of disbelief and shock appeared on his face.
“Kanso? Hey, it really is Kanso! I can feel the mental connection between him and me…”
Really Kanso? Scott frowned and glanced at Allen—Castle Kanso, Soldier Sogjes, Knight Knight, Queen Queen… Those four weren’t ordinary puppets. Not only could they grow stronger as their master did, but each also possessed unique special abilities. If he wasn’t mistaken, Allen’s sudden return to the group from afar wasn’t due to magic teleportation, but rather…
“Everyone, watch out! They’re coming!” Just as Scott was deep in thought, he suddenly heard Bernie’s warning. He looked up and happened to see a Frost Skeleton charging at him, raising its bone knife with a faint blue cold flame.
*Clang!*
Amidst everyone’s astonished gazes, a fully armed knight appeared before Scott out of nowhere. Holding a long spear in one hand and a shield in the other, the knight blocked that attack for Scott.

The knight wore heavy silver armor with a red scarf wrapped around his neck. Of course, these details weren’t important—what mattered was the emblem on his armor and shield: a red sword and shield emblem, one that seemed familiar—extremely familiar!
Scott instinctively glanced at his side and, indeed, found no trace of Knight, the knight puppet who had been following him.
“Knight?”
As if in response to Scott’s muttered words, the brightly armored knight bowed slightly toward him, then swung his shield in his left hand with force, shattering the frost skeleton on impact.
“No way…” Like everyone else, Ravia also noticed this and stared in disbelief, covering her mouth. Suddenly, she felt a cold wind blow by her side. Turning around, she saw two hideous frost skeletons rushing up to the group.
“Hmph!” With a cold snort, Ravia was about to use her fire wave spell to attack the two frost skeletons when she unexpectedly felt a gentle breeze. The skeletons stopped about twenty yards away from her. After a brief pause, countless neat cracks appeared on their bones, as if cut by the sharpest knife, before they exploded into piles of bone fragments.
Next to those piles of bones stood a very beautiful woman, smiling at her affectionately.
She wore a black-purple evening gown, her long black hair slightly tied up. Her gaze held an alluring charm, resembling that of a mature noblewoman. However, the flaw was two red lines on her smooth cheeks, running diagonally from her forehead through her eyes, down her cheeks, and continuing to her neck, hidden by the gown. Along either side of these lines, hexagonal patterns were faintly visible.
“Queen?”
As if in response to Ravia’s astonished murmurs, the beautiful woman smiled at her affectionately, then raised her right hand, rubbing her smooth cheek with the back of her hand. Her slender, pale fingers had a faint metallic sheen.
At the same time, Jiang Zhe turned to look beside him and saw a swordsman dressed as a mercenary standing there, nervously staring at the ice skeletons surrounding them, occasionally glancing at Jiang Zhe with fearful and questioning eyes.
“This… these…” Bernie was too shocked to speak, as he had never encountered such a thing before.

“Hey!” Allen said with a smile as he swung a wind blade, sending several frost skeletons near Kanso flying several steps away. “It seems we’ve made up a bit for the numerical disadvantage!” He patted the rock-like surface of his puppet; given his height, it could only reach Kanso’s waist.
“Time to go, buddy!”
“Ugh…”