Bro, I'm not an Undead!

Chapter 1021: How To Deal With Him (1)

Chapter 1021: How To Deal With Him (1)

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The Severed Union was particularly brutal.

As an organisation that existed mainly to keep track of the world's nastiest potential disasters born from either extremely powerful Clusters that spawned away from the mainland; sentient magical weapons that could threaten civilizations; obscene natural disasters bolstered by the world's magical nature, and more, it was imperative for it to have a core circle.

The possibility of all the Factions being wiped out in one dangerous incident was extremely high, especially with an assignment of the calibre of the one all the current Factions were currently participating in.

An assignment with the sole objective of capturing and killing the masked man before he reached Edagon to achieve his goal.

Such a mission was quite easily the most difficult the Severed Union had had to deal with since the Unbeheaded Nightmare, Rezna, a fearsome Tier 92 Cluster General that had exploded out of a horrifically large purple-red Cluster.

As fatal as some of these missions were though, there were a few Faction Leaders who were likely to remain standing against all odds, making sure that the Union persisted.

Eaniss and her Head Faction was one.

The Bishop and her Faction, the Faux Cherub Light were another.

Warding Pride counted with her Faction, Dryad of the Scarlet Desert.

There was the Round Arrow.

... And finally, there was the Four Meridian Hands, a Faction led by a man who had, as of late, begun wearing around his neck a precious spherical gem decorated with equal portions of black and white over it.

"You suggest that we ride out the wave? Allow the masked necromancer to reach Edagon? I was under the impression that we were after the opposite," said man spoke with a taut tone.

He had quite a long face with a pointed chin. All his features were sharp, including his dark eyes and the eyebrows that towered above them.

Em-Sul looked very much like a typical villainous character one would find from a generic children's tale. His grey hair was even gelled and slicked back as one would expect, though, he lacked the sharp goatee to complete it.

Em-Sul sat on a large, couch-like armchair in a lavish, well-lit space with three other figures on all his sides.

"I agree with this crystal-faced bloke. I was under the impression that we needed to kill - or convert this sock-wearing fool immediately! I don't know about you, but I intend to get a lifetime's worth of bread with the reward for this mission!"

An old woman adorned in a religious set of robes that might have belonged to a particular variant of church leader in another world, boldly offered her input.

On top of her long, pale hair fashioned into an innocent perm, was a tall crown about a meter in height jammed into it. This, along with the robes, would have made the old woman look approachable, if a little deranged, but the fact that her sockets spotted no eyeballs, erased that possibility.

The Mad Bishop was as viciously insane as ever.

"It's never been about what we should do. It's always been about what we can do. I don't think I'm the only one who has yet to notice that our enemy has too many tricks up his sleeve, am I?" Eaniss said.

She was no longer decked in the flaming armour which she had previously adopted during the skirmish with the Ardent Curses. Instead, a large, familiar, velvet cloth, much like a mythic ribbon unbound my natural laws like gravity, wrapped around her naked body as she sat freely.

Her sharp eyes scanned across the people before her.

"Besides, I have a feeling that the masked man's warning was something more than a threat. If we push him too far with an assault right now, he may just let loose all the reserves of strange creatures he has along with the other powers he has acquired," she added.

"Sounds a bit cowardly to me," a man with long white hair, tinted in blue at the sides and tied in a ponytail, sneered.

He wore a large, fuzzy jacket that might have been a blanket. As he folded his arms, occupying the fourth chair in this room aboard Eaniss' ship, he asserted himself as her equal.

Naturally, this wasn't necessarily true.

Eaniss turned her gaze to Aurolio without the slightest hint of emotion.

"I almost forgot you are rather green on matters to do with the Union. Let me enlighten you. The five of us here are the pillars of the Severed Union, but that does not only speak to our status. We have different, integral abilities that are necessary for the Union's continued existence and also for almost all kinds of perils," she explained while Aurolio raised a brow, slightly intrigued.

"The Bishop here, because of her unusual techniques can solve difficult situations that can't be brute forced by raw might. Even though there are conditions involved, that power of hers is indispensable for critical emergencies."

"Em-Sul is a connoisseur of all types of ancient, powerful and unusual treasures. As it were, he also tends to understand them more than anyone else in the Union, which makes him remarkably useful when dealing with enemies with ridiculous artefacts."

"Warding Pride - who so graciously rejected my invitation it seems - is a master of seals and shields. She can craft all manner of barriers, even ones capable of detaining much stronger opponents for a time."

"There's also Everde of the Round Arrow. Sadly, we lost him when the world broke apart. He must have been bundled with the weaklings on the other side of the rift the masked man made. If he were here, I might have considered launching a surprise attack on our enemy. You see, his expertise in nearly costless, massive-ranged attacks is important in situation like this. Better yet, each of his voluminous attacks are quite brisk, and capable of dealing damage to the target via anything with a connection to them. This would have worked splendidly

against the masked man."

And indeed it was true.

Each of these individuals in the Severed Union were considered pillars.

And while it seemed as though Eaniss was merely hesitating, she had seen her fair share of lesser enemies overpowering Factions not because they were stronger, but because they matched well against them.

Currently, the masked man was likely to be immune to divine powers and be a carrier of them on top of his insane capability as a necromancer.

There wasn't much in the way of numbers as far as what was left of the Union was concerned given that of the 34 Factions that had set out days ago, only less than 20 remained, and 7 of those were stripped of their privilege to continue this assignment.

The Scorching Tears, the Reverse Clusters, the Ardent Curses, the breaking of the world and inside conflicts had reduced the number of Factions.

Of the 12 that remained, most were expendable., which made the situation, rather dire.

Aurolio folded his arms and made a neigh sort of noise with his mouth, prompted by the cold

he alone felt.

"Yeah well, behind all that is uncertainty, as known as fear, isn't there? Just because you don't have some convenient method you've grown used to, you won't even take a risk? Doesn't really change how I see all this. And what exactly are you useful for?"

Aurolio's piercing eyes stared right into Eaniss' as Em-Sul watched, amused, the Bishop

leaning forward from her seat with childishly expectant grin.

Eaniss wasn't bothered by Aurolio's provocative approach.

"My role is a little more niche. As are my abilities. They work where they do," she said succinctly, leaving Aurolio visibly unsatisfied.

She then turned back to the others.

"Besides my note of caution, I'm also considering something else that we stand gain if we

allow the masked man to reach Edagon."

"What is that?" Em-Sul asked.

"Pseudo-allies," Eaniss said with a sweet smile. "I'm willing to bet that the Giants, or at the very least the Herald on Edagon knows that the masked man is coming. There may very well be a welcoming party waiting for the necromancer when he reaches the shore of Edagon and I do believe he can't simply skim over it. Granted, it may be easy for him, but as long as he is stalled for at least a minute, we can press him in the middle while he is torn between us and the Giants. That's how we end this."

"Oh-ho!" the Mad Bishop voiced before rapidly clapping her hands. "I like the sound of that. There will probably be thousands of Giants waiting to be converted to the faith! Ah, I wonder

what they look like!"

Only Aurolio wore a face at the Bishop's remark which went in a totally different direction to

the one he had thought.

That said, Eaniss' plan made sense.

It was said that millennia ago, the Giants once travelled the world, reaching all continents to teach about the Deities. Hidden in their friendly approach, however, was the sinister objective to take over the world and build themselves up as rulers of Opungale, Feinheath and Amanas,

and yet they failed.

Apparently, the Giants were driven away by the rising experts from each nation.

Yet... apparently that wasn't true.

Regardless, they had to be strong given that there weren't that many of them.

Everyone had been intrigued by them.

No one had seen them since the First Grand Wars.

Well, a certain skeleton had.

The Central Boundary was guarded by the premium Paladin Champion because the Purity did

not want anyone getting any ideas about Edagon.

That idea had stood for a while... until now.

In humanity's first voyage towards the land of Giants, what would be the result?