Chapter 449: Invasion [15]
Soon, the pair reached the battlefield, where they saw Zarah battling another goblin they were both familiar with.
Wes.
Zarah quickly raised both hands, and a thick wall of ice erupted from the ground in front of her, forming a solid barrier just as Wes closed the distance.
His fist slammed into the wall.
BOOM!
The impact sent cracks spreading across the frozen surface, and pieces of ice broke away from the point of contact. However, despite the force behind the punch, the wall didn’t shatter completely, forcing Wes to pause for only a fraction of a second.
Then a hand suddenly gripped the edge of the ice wall.
Wes pulled himself forward, his fingers digging into the frozen surface as he prepared to force his way through.
Zarah immediately recognized what he was attempting and moved before he could fully breach her defense.
But Wes was already committed.
With a sudden burst of strength, he drove both feet forward and smashed them through the remaining section of the ice wall.
The barrier finally exploded apart, sending chunks of ice flying in every direction.
Yet Zarah was already gone.
She had used the brief opening created by the wall to reposition herself, putting enough distance between them to avoid being caught in the debris.
The moment her feet touched the ground, she swung both hands toward Wes.
Mana surged through the earth beneath him.
Several sharp spikes of ice suddenly erupted from the ground, shooting upward in rapid succession as they converged on the unsuspecting Wes.
But instead of the ice spikes impaling Wes, they struck his elastic body and sank only slightly into the surface before the material around them stretched and compressed under the force. His body drew inward around the spikes, absorbing their momentum like a spring being forced down, before suddenly snapping back into shape.
The stored force was redirected almost instantly.
The ice spikes were launched back toward Zarah with enough speed to make her eyes narrow.
She immediately raised her hand.
A translucent dome of mana formed around her just as the returning spikes crashed into it, the impact sending sharp cracks of light across its surface before the projectiles shattered against the barrier.
Wes landed on the ground a short distance away and burst into laughter, seemingly more entertained than threatened by the attack.
"It’s going to take more than that to defeat me, missy."
Zarah didn’t respond.
Her expression remained serious as she stared at Wes, carefully watching his movements instead of wasting her breath on his provocation. She had already learned that his carefree attitude didn’t mean he was careless, and the strange elasticity of his body made attacking him directly far more difficult than it should have been.
Meanwhile, Kharos and Drel, who had been watching the battle from a distance, couldn’t help but wonder why Zarah had torn the sigil in the first place.
From what they could see, she seemed to be handling herself just fine.
Still, there had to be a reason she had called for them.
The two exchanged a brief glance before moving closer, their attention remaining fixed on the battlefield as they approached.
Almost immediately, the gazes of both Zarah and Wes shifted toward them.
"Commander..."
Kharos barely had enough time to get the word out before something pierced through his chest.
His eyes widened.
There had been no enemy behind him.
No attack from Wes.
Instead, a sharp hand made entirely of ice had suddenly formed from the ground beneath him and driven straight through his chest.
And the hand belonged to Zarah.
A look of pain and confusion appeared on Kharos’s face as he stared down at the icy hand protruding from his chest. He couldn’t understand what had just happened, nor could he comprehend why Zarah, the very commander he had rushed to protect, had suddenly attacked him.
"Why?"
Zarah’s expression didn’t change.
"Protect the grave."
Those were the last words Kharos heard before the pain faded and darkness consumed his vision.
His body went limp, the ice hand releasing him as he collapsed to the ground.
Drel stood completely frozen.
For a moment, he could only stare at Kharos’s body, his mind struggling to process what he had just witnessed.
"Wow... you’re crazy."
Wes’s grin widened as he looked from Kharos’s fallen body back to Zarah.
"To kill your own ally so easily."
He then turned toward Drel, clearly amused by the reaction.
"Drel, is this the kind of goblin you serve now?"
"Shut up!"
Drel’s voice came out louder than he intended, his anger immediately directed toward Wes.
But beneath that anger was something else.
Confusion.
At first, Drel had assumed Zarah had been compromised somehow, perhaps controlled by an enemy ability, or that the goblin standing before them wasn’t actually her.
But the words she had said to Kharos before he died echoed in Drel’s mind.
Protect the grave.
And he quickly realized why she had done what she did.
Kharos, like everyone else in the clan, was bound to the graveyard. If he resurrected there, then Vale could potentially find himself facing Kharos the moment he arrived, especially if the resurrection happened before Vale managed to locate the graveyard.
But that was the problem.
It depended entirely on whether Kharos could resurrect in time.
If Vale found the graveyard before Kharos’s resurrection was complete, then there would be nothing stopping him from destroying it before Kharos could even get back on his feet.
Still...
It was a good idea.
Zarah, by killing, weird as it may sound, had sent Kharos closer to the very place they needed to protect.
But...
Drel gave Zarah a conflicted look.
He understood her reasoning.
He even understood why she had made the decision.
What he couldn’t easily accept was how easily she had done it.
There had been no hesitation. No warning.
She had simply killed Kharos the moment he approached her.
Zarah gave him a look.
"You understand why I did what I did, right?"
"Indeed," Drel responded in a low voice. "Is that why you tore the sigil?"
"Yes."
Drel’s expression remained serious as he glanced briefly at Kharos’s body before looking back at her.
"And you would have killed any goblin that showed up?"
Zarah paused for a second, before...