Lich for Hire

The moment Ambrose quoted a price of twenty billion gold, Roger Ángelo wanted nothing more than to bring down a Sacred Slash on the lich's head right then and there.

But he knew it would accomplish nothing. However much contempt he held for the Silvermoon Knight as a brute, the man had possessed one capability that set him apart from every other paladin.

The Silvermoon Knight's Sacred Slash could chase a lich's soul all the way to its phylactery and shatter both at once.

Without that capability, the most you could do against a lich was destroy its body. You couldn't actually take its life.

But twenty billion gold was out of the question. Even if you sold off all of Lavarun and threw in Roger Ángelo himself as a bonus, you wouldn't get twenty billion gold out of it.

Roger Ángelo smiled warmly. "There's been a small misunderstanding, my friend. I apologize for my momentary recklessness. We don't have time to waste. Even if you won't tell me everything, can't you at least help save Alfredo? You know the truth, so surely you must know how to save him. You wouldn't deceive me, would you?"

He put deliberate emphasis on the last sentence.

Both men were cunning, and Ambrose caught Roger Ángelo's meaning at once.

Business could be discussed, but Ambrose would have to produce something that proved his information was real. Otherwise, that would be the end of their deal. Roger Ángelo couldn't kill him outright, but he could make Ambrose's life considerably more unpleasant.

Ambrose shook his head. "How would I solve something like this? If you want to save him, you'd have to cut the curse off at the source. As I said, this is the work of a god in collaboration with the tiflings. Either kill the Lord of Hell or destroy the Unholy Kingdom. Otherwise, there's no saving him. The most you can do is buy time."

"Buying time is fine!" Roger Ángelo answered, urgent now. Alfredo's right arm had completely turned necrotic, and the flesh was beginning to rot and stink.

"Time Stop. That's the only way to delay his death. You have Time Stop scrolls, don't you?"

"Time Stop scrolls?"

Roger Ángelo didn't bother considering the cost. He sent someone to fetch them immediately.

Lyon really was wealthy. High-tier scrolls like these went for hundreds of thousands of gold, since transcribing one took such a toll that it was effectively done at the cost of one's life force. And yet Lyon was able to produce three such scrolls at a moment's notice.

As the Time Stop unfolded, Alfredo froze instantly. Within the field, no magic could take effect, and the undead curse spreading through him finally halted.

But Roger Ángelo's expression remained dark. Alfredo's shoulder and half his chest had already been consumed. If that much of his body had to be excised, he'd be dead.

The Time Stop would only last for a few minutes. Once it lapsed, the curse would resume and turn Alfredo fully into an undead.

Roger Ángelo drew a deep breath and turned back to Ambrose. "There still isn't much time, but we can have a frank discussion now. Master Megaman, how much do you actually know about this?"

"Not a great deal, but I'd advise against any other method of stopping the transformation. It will only make him suffer more. Better to give him a clean death. Although, if you really can't bear to let him go, I happen to perform soul-transfer surgeries that could let him live on in another form..."

Roger Ángelo gave a cold snort. "As if that wouldn't make him an undead, too. What a suggestion."

To his ear, what a lich called "soul transfer" was just turning a man into an undead by another name. It might preserve some of Alfredo's self-awareness, at best. That was absolutely unacceptable. A paladin turned into an undead would be a stain on Lyon's history.

Ambrose shrugged. He had been about to suggest using a mercury slime as the paladin's new vessel, but on reflection, becoming a slime wasn't much better than becoming an undead. The suggestion was best left unsaid.

"Fine. If you won't accept that, you could try reversing time instead. If Time Stop can halt the curse, then turning back time should be able to restore him to before he was cursed. Lyon does have ways of reversing time, doesn't it? I've heard that, at the celebration in Lyon's capital, your emperor used the Draconic Armaments to roll back time on the entire crowd by a full year..."

Ambrose watched Roger Ángelo's face closely. This was the real reason he was here: to gather intelligence on the Draconic Armaments. Could the set of artifacts really be used without restriction?

Roger Ángelo didn't seem to relax. He simply turned and instructed his subordinates, "I will write to His Majesty at once. Take Alfredo to the capital with my letter and a full account of what's happened. Whether he lives will depend on His Majesty's decision."

The reaction left Ambrose uneasy. For the life of a single paladin, Roger Ángelo was prepared to petition the emperor to deploy the Draconic Armaments. Was its power truly unrestricted?

If that were the case, who could possibly defeat Lyon on the battlefield?

A single Time Reversal could regress every enemy soldier to their infancy and every city to barren wilderness.

But Ambrose didn't dare press for more. Roger Ángelo was a wily fox. Only the unexpected emergency with his subordinate had let his composure slip even slightly. With Alfredo about to be sent away, he wasn't likely to expose more information of his own accord.

Ambrose would have to manufacture new vulnerabilities himself.

He waited until the letter was written and dispatched. "General Ángelo, I trust I've demonstrated my sincerity. Shall we get back to business? I'll tell you everything I know about this matter if you provide satisfactory compensation."

Roger Ángelo shook his head. "Twenty billion gold is impossible. There's nothing to discuss. And while I lost my composure for a moment, that doesn't make me a fool. A curse like this must have prerequisites. If it could be cast without restriction, I'd have died long before Alfredo. You don't have to tell me about them. I'll find out on my own."

"Will you?" Ambrose asked. "And how long will that take? How many will die in the meantime?"

Roger Ángelo gave a cold smile. "Master Megaman, you underestimate paladins. The unknown may unsettle us, but we don't fear death. I'll see to it that my men are prepared."

Ambrose didn't argue. That was the truth, after all.

Most armies collapsed due to flagging morale when their frontline casualties exceeded thirty percent. Lyon's paladin legions routinely produced staggering battle records, treating seventy or even eighty percent casualties as nothing remarkable. They even fought down to the last man with some regularity.

That was how Lyon had remained undefeated for over a thousand years despite being surrounded by enemies on every side. It was how they had brought their neighbors to tears.

Religious fanatics could be exploited easily enough, but once they went mad, they were genuinely terrifying.

"In that case, I'll be on my way. Best of luck, General Ángelo."

Ambrose moved to leave, but Roger Ángelo blocked his path.

"Master Megaman, the information you possess is so important that I can't allow you to leave just yet."

"That's hardly fair. I came here in good faith with useful intelligence. Not only do you refuse to pay, are you now intending to imprison me? General Ángelo, I'm currently a recognized citizen of Lyon. Is this how you treat civilians?"

Roger Ángelo shook his head. "No, you misunderstand. I'm not detaining you. The letter I just sent to the capital described the situation. I can't produce that kind of gold, but His Majesty might. Perhaps you could wait here for his reply?"

His hand was already on the hilt of his sword. Ambrose could read the subtext easily enough: if he tried to leave now, Roger Ángelo would draw his blade, and Ambrose's body would stay in Lavarun for good.

Ambrose considered. "Fine. I'll wait, but I'd like somewhere quiet to rest. Surely that's not too much to ask?"

"Of course not. I'll have a room prepared. No one will disturb you."

Roger Ángelo escorted Ambrose to a modest little house, a freestanding building within the castle compound. A large detachment of paladins and priests of the Holy Light surrounded it inside and out, ensuring there was no possibility of escape.

Ambrose was ushered inside. The moment the door closed behind him, he was already walking back out.

Leyla's True Illusion was powerful enough to deceive gods themselves.

With Leyla restored to godhood, the spell's effect had only grown stronger. The dozens of paladins and priests outside didn't even register that Ambrose had walked away.

Fortunately, Ambrose had picked up an exemption token for the city's defensive arrays on his way in, so moving freely within Lavarun wouldn't trigger any alarms... at least for now.

"That wily old fox is hard to handle. It's a pity I'm short on time."

Roger Ángelo was a difficult opponent. He had the seasoned experience of his years and the quick wit of a young man. Ambrose had tried several times to lure him into a trap, only for the general to step neatly around every one. He simply wouldn't take the bait. Ambrose had no time to waste on him. It was better to investigate Lavarun's actual strength and then skedaddle.

Hidden under the illusion, Ambrose moved through the city without disturbing anyone, surveying it as quickly as he could.

The armory and the granaries were the two places that mattered. A glance at each was enough to estimate Lyon's mustering strength. Paladins wore distinctive battle-issue gear when deployed, different from their training equipment, and an experienced eye could pick out the difference and tally the count.

"A legion of paladins—that's ten thousand. Plus a regiment of priests of the Holy Light, then conventional infantry..."

A rough estimate suggested that Lavarun could field an army of a hundred thousand.

That didn't include troops being funneled in from the other border cities, either. Even setting aside elite forces like the paladins, Lyon's army numbered perhaps three or four hundred thousand.

A common Lyon soldier would qualify as an elite in any other kingdom. This wasn't an inflated figure that included logistics—Lyon possessed three to four hundred thousand combat troops.

Without its Hellgates, the Unholy Kingdom couldn't possibly hold out.

Ambrose sighed. "I'll have to convince Vladimir to accept reality. There's no winning this. Several hundred thousand Lyon elites, plus the Draconic Armaments, plus however many legendaries on top of that—even the Unholy Kingdom and the dwarves combined can't withstand it. Not unless the druids and the orcs joined the resistance."

As Ambrose stepped out of the armory and was preparing to leave Lavarun, he noticed a furtive figure climbing down from a distant section of the city wall. The figure moved with great speed, bypassing the patrolling soldiers and weaving toward Ambrose's position.

Ambrose was startled upon identifying the man. As the man passed close by, Ambrose reached out to seize the man's shoulder.

But the man seemed to sense the strike coming. He dodged just as Ambrose's hand reached for him, ducking awkwardly to the side and only barely avoiding the grab.

As a legendary ranger, even a half-baked one, Ambrose was almost guaranteed to succeed at the sudden ambush. And yet, somehow, his target had dodged.

The man immediately drew the sword at his hip and scanned his surroundings warily.

Ambrose dropped the illusion and stepped into view before he could cry out. "Allen, what are you doing here?"