Chapter 554: RESONANCE
In response to her powerful martial strike, the High-Lich responded with his own attack; the mighty undead waved his hands, and hundreds of dark pockets opened behind him, forming an arc of dark halos from each of those dark pockets.
Black chains oozing with Death Energy shot out, chaotically dancing through the skies as if they had a mind of their own.
Osiris also attacked in his own way; he formed a ring of dark red demonic flames, as if surrounding the entire area of their battle.
But despite their efforts, Sophia’s attack, due to its nature, involved probability itself.
All her attacks performed through this technique were always destined to hit the target. Her two sword stabs, ignoring all reason, hit directly on Zabiur and Osiris.
Though the attack did hit, it did not do any significant damage, as Osiris already knew of that attack’s nature.
The High-Lich seemed somewhat surprised by it.
The undead’s expression turned ferocious, as a pulsing scepter appeared in his hand; Zabiur became furious at the mere prospect of a third-phase seeker being able to last a single second against him, which felt like the greatest insult, Valkyrie or not. He didn’t care about the other party’s status.
To regain his honor in the eyes of the Ghost Emperor, he could not show any lackings on his part.
For the first time, Zabiur removed his hood; his glistening white skull was revealed, and a pulsing white scepter appeared in the Lich’s bone hand, which grew ever stronger.
The Deathly Hollow chanted, "Rain of Endless Undead..."
The instant the High-Lich said those words, in the crimson skies more than 100,000 peak 1st-phase skeletons appeared, and they were not hovering but falling.
Falling like rain, but their sunken eyes danced with intelligence and knew who their collective target was; it was none other than the eye-catching Valkyrie overflowing with darkness.
Sophia’s heart trembled upon witnessing that apocalyptic scene.
Even Osiris stared at the scene in utter shock, as more than a hundred thousand skeletons were raining down, all targeting Sophia. He stared at her for a moment and hesitated, but in the end, he quickly shifted away from his position, hurriedly getting out of the range of the Rain of Undead.
As Sophia witnessed the entire crimson heavens being enshrouded in nothing but skeletons overflowing with Death Energy, even she felt despair clutching at her heart.
She could not shift away from that position; the Dreaded Lich had locked the space, nor could she transform herself into the element of Darkness, as the Death Energy could hurt her even in the incorporeal form.
She could only face it head-on, as resolve returned to her face once more; by sheer instinct, all the negative emotions in her heart, all the doubt, vanished.
The armor-endowed Valkyrie started to charge upwards, even if it signified her certain death.
Sophia slashed out with all of her might, cleaving a massive chunk of the incoming wave of endlessly raining undead.
But that might as well be a drop in the ocean. So, she gave herself completely up to her subconscious battle instincts, and she continued to cut, pierce, smash, and sever repeatedly.
If it wasn’t for the fact that she already had much experience in fighting off against a nearly endless horde of unkillable beings due to her Arcane aspect chambers’ challenges, where she has to face off against endless numbers continuously.
But the true horror of Zabiur’s attack was in its positioning; the raining undead formed like an inescapable net through which she could not simply slip past with any gaps. Nor could she descend onto the ground and face hellish rain like that, which would make it even worse.
Sophia had already lost her mind from constantly fighting; even a milisecond of the slightest mistake could spell her doom. In every split second, she had to make subconscious micro-decisions; perhaps the biggest problem was her own stamina and endurance.
Her entire body was bloodied, most of her bones broken, her lung pipes felt like they were being crushed, she could barely breathe, countless bones of destroyed undead skeletons had pierced through her dark armor.
Due to the sheer quantity of them she had to face.
Even one of her eyes had been pierced; eventually, under the endless onslaught of the raining bone undead, her stamina ended. She could no longer fight against the rain; her body gave in, and her figure fell.
Like a comet whose end had arrived, despite her status as the Divine Valkyrie, no one came to save her; her lone figure, with a loud boom, smashed onto the ground filled with broken bones of the undead that pierced her fallen body.
Sophia’s dark armor had long dissolved; her entire figure was battered beyond recognition.
She could feel it; her thread of life was about to snap. This time, there would be no miracle; it seemed the world itself wanted her dead.
At this moment, for some reason, the handsome, blue-eyed runecaster’s face seemed to flash through her mind. And she also remembered the words said by Osiris....
You do not know who you are, Valkyrie,
You do not know what you fight for,
And as long as you do not know what you fight for,
You will never be able to win,
Sophia growled in defiance, finding within her the strength that did not even exist. Through sheer will, she yanked herself out of the countless bone spikes that pierced her, her body riddled with holes, yet there was not enough blood remaining in her to bleed any further.
Sophia gritted her teeth and shouted,
"I fight..."
"To live..."
"Is that not enough??"
"Arghhhh,,,,,"
"I fight... to become free...."
"Is that... still not enough?"
She screamed in fury, towards the heavens, for she never wanted any of this. All she ever wanted was to be free....!!!
Zabiur Ulpranak appeared right in front of her. As the space rippled, he watched the bloodied Valkyrie trying to drag her body forward; only her left hand remained functioning.
She truly was on the verge of death, yet still holding on through sheer will.
The Deathly Hollow watched this with an amused smile; in his eyes, it was the struggle of a dying ant.
The High-Lich pointed his scepter towards her; he spoke no words, because there was no need to, and neither would he make the mistake he did last time; he would disintegrate her to the last atoms, so there would be a 0% chance of error in his kill.
Shing!!! Shing!!!
His scepter pulsed, just as Zabiur Ulpranak was moments away from firing a powerful death ray at the Valkyrie, destroying her completely.
All of a sudden, his bone hands shook for a moment.
An unnatural... cold wind blew through the carnage-filled sky and earth of the battlefield, making the High-Lich’s black clothes flutter violently.
An unseen and incomprehensible mystical force rippled through the warzone; heavy dark clouds resurged upon the crimson heavens, and thunder started to rumble.
Osiris, who was just about to move closer, halted in his tracks as his heart skipped a beat. The ominous foreboding in his heart reached its absolute peak, as the demon hurriedly moved back with gritted teeth.
The sheer hatred and killing intent coming from his bloodline source could not be described with any words. He almost regretted not intervening any sooner before the Valkyrie had been reduced to such a state.
Upon the spreading of the unknown mystical force...
Every Rune weapon, whether weak or powerful, broken or functioning, being used or not being used, in the hands of a seeker or lying beneath the mud and blood.
Every single one vibrated at the same time, in the same frequency, throughout the battlefield, as if resonating with something or... SOMEONE.