Chapter 122: Thinking for you
Tall and angular buildings were erected within the cemetery of death that was strewn with bones. All of them drew Duke’s attention. In that instant, he concerned himself with looking around wildly and didn’t continue making a move against Han Shuo.
However, when Emily rushed into the cemetery, her first task wasn’t to take in the surroundings. Rather, she flew to Han Shuo instead and asked anxiously, “Are you alright?”
If it’d been an ordinary person falling from such a height, they might have actually been injured. but Han Shuo, of course, wasn’t injured at all. He shook his head at Emily and stood up with a darkened face, fixing his gaze tightly onto the wind archmage Duke in the distance.
Looking around with excitement, Duke said joyfully when senior swordsman Erick arrived next to him, “This is the cemetery of death, there’s no doubt about it. Who would’ve thought that we’d actually make it inside?”
“Master Duke, we didn’t discover anything after a such a long period of studying, but the boundary to the cemetery of death opened when green light was emitted from that person. It’s very strange!” Erick looked at Han Shuo from afar and said lowly to Duke.
Nodding, Duke said, “That’s right. It looks like there’s something odd about this person. That green light just now also gave me a familiar feeling, it seems to have come from the Eye of Darkness!”
Erick was greatly astonished when these words were voiced. “How is that possible?”
Grasping the Demonslayer Edge in his hands, Han Shuo recited an incantation and the little skeleton, wielding a bone dagger and sporting seven wings, appeared. Three zombie warriors also appeared. They all held wooden clubs and barred the path to Han Shuo and Emily along with the little skeleton.
“You were the one who opened the boundary to the cemetery of death?” Emily breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that Han Shuo was unharmed. She then recalled what had just happened and asked Han Shuo with great confusion.
Nodding, Han Shuo said with a darkened face, “That’s right. The cemetery of death was opened by something on my body. Duke and Erick must die now. You help me take care of Duke, and I’ll explain to you after we kill them!”
Emily didn’t ask anything else after hearing Han Shuo speak thus, and docilely picked up her magic staff, setting her sights on the approaching Duke with a look full of killing intent.
“He’s also a necromancer to boot, it looks like this will be a slightly difficult fight!” Erick had traded blows with Han Shuo and could feel that Han Shuo’s strength was not in the slightest bit weaker than his own. When he saw that Han Shuo had even summoned zombie warriors, his brow creased as he spoke.
“Kill them first. We’re excavating the secrets of the cemetery of death!” Duke snorted lightly and floated over. Erick didn’t say much else after pausing for a moment and following Duke in a charge over.
A string of incantations leisurely surged out of Emily’s mouth. The magic staff in her hand suddenly shot out a few strands of black air and like snakes twisted and twined towards the approaching Duke. When Duke saw the black air attacking him, his face became incomparably grave. A tornado formed suddenly in front of him and churned up all the white bones on the ground. It made for the black air and twisted all of them into the tornado.
Snorting coldly, Emily said, “Be careful”, to Han Shuo and also flew towards the black air. She waved the magic staff in her hand and started fighting fiercely with Duke within the air.
“We shouldn’t just idly stand around either.” Han Shuo grinned and gave a long laugh. The little skeleton led the three zombie warriors in heading towards Erick. At the same time, Han Shuo kept an eye behind Erick and Duke, via the original demons, observing their every gesture and move.
“Do you think three zombies and a skeleton are enough to stop me?” Erick snorted lowly with disdain as dark green fighting aura flared out of the longsword in his hand. His body was like a bulldozer as he sent dirt and dust flying as he charged directly towards Han Shuo.
Continuously laughing coldly within his heart, Han Shuo made use of his mental strength to manipulate the zombie warriors and little skeleton, blocking the way in front of him. The little skeleton’s usual speed was as fast as lightning, but was now being purposefully curtailed by Han Shuo so that he was as slow as the zombie warriors. Dashing over, Erick’s dark green fighting aura formed a ball of light as it enclosed a zombie warrior within it.
The sound of bones exploding suddenly emitted from the zombie warrior’s body. Beneath the effects of the dark green fighting aura, the first zombie warrior had its body shattered. Its wooden club also broke into several segments. Turning his body sideways with a disdainful smirk, Erick’s nimble body evaded the crashes from the other two zombie warriors’ wooden clubs and stabbed forward with his longsword, slashing open the neck of another zombie warrior. The zombie warrior swayed and looked like it was about to fall down.
The little skeleton raised the bone dagger and pressed itself against the other zombie warrior, jerkily raising the bone dagger in its hand and stabbing it towards Erick. Erick could easily handle even the zombie warriors, so he paid absolutely no attention to the little skeleton’s upraised dagger, raising his sword rather impatiently to block the strike.
At this moment, the originally abnormally slow bone dagger suddenly increased more than tenfold in its striking speed. The previously stiff and slow little skeleton became so agile that it caused Erick’s eyes to bug out. Erick’s longsword had just started rising and he hadn’t had time to make his move before the bone dagger was already landing on its target.
Erick retreated in horrified fright, but he was still a beat too slow. A puncturing sound rang out as a large piece of flesh and blood flew out from his chest. As Erick cried out in pain, he also called out with incredulity, “How is this possible?! What kind of skeletal warrior is this?”
It was a pity that the little skeleton had no reaction to Erick’s astonished yells. When he’d succeeded with one of his blows, he didn’t relax and immediately followed up afterwards. He didn’t wait for Erick to stabilize his footing before appearing in front of him. As Erick’s fighting aura gathered anew on his longsword, the seven bone spurs on the back of the little skeleton’s spine flared out at the same time and they flew in a semi-circle, landed accurately on Erick’s body.
The seven bone spurs pierced through Erick’s neck, forehead, and heart. He didn’t even have time to release the fighting aura that he’d gathered before his body fell backwards. The frightened and terrified expression on his face didn’t even vanish in death.
Duke and Emily had been fighting when they both noticed the disturbance on this side. When they saw that Erick had died a gruesome death, both were surprised. However, Duke’s worry and Emily’s joy followed closely after that surprise.
Emily had already witnessed the little skeleton’s miraculousness last time, and even she, a dark archmage, had been powerless in the face of the little skeleton’s pursuit. The little skeleton’s nimbleness and speed had left a powerful impression on Emily. Upon seeing that the seven bone spurs on the back of the little skeleton could even harm someone, she had a deeper understanding of Han Shuo’s mysteriousness.
Duke was already having trouble fending off attacks from Emily alone, he’d actually been hoping that Erick would help him after taking care of Han Shuo. He hadn’t thought that the seasoned and well experienced Erick would die so quickly. Han Shuo was still standing there, having made not a move. This made Duke panic momentarily.
“What, you want to run? Do you think you can get away today?” After killing Erick, the original demon noticed that Duke’s eyes were darting around. Han Shuo drew near to him with a shadow of a smile as he opened his mouth in mockery.
Duke’s face suddenly grew frosty as his usually benevolent features twisted as he stared at Han Shuo, “You’re seeking death!”
Many sharp shards of bone fragments on the ground suddenly shot towards Han Shuo as Duke waved his magic staff. The sound they made while shooting through the air was extremely ear piercing, and their momentum was quite frightening. When Emily saw that Han Shuo was under attack, she was even more nervous than Han Shuo as she hastily chanted a dark magic spell.
An inky black opening appeared out of thin air before these sharp bone fragments reached Han Shuo. When the bone fragments arrived, they were all attracted to the black opening and completely sucked in.
After releasing his attack, Duke didn’t continue to attack, but rather hurtled his body towards the outside in an attempt to escape. It looked like he’d counted on Emily being concerned for Han Shuo. That’s why he’d attacked Han Shuo so that Emily would save him, and then take advantage of the opportunity to run off.
However, it was easy to enter the cemetery of death, but quite difficult to leave. After the Eye of Darkness had revealed itself, it’d once again sank back into Han Shuo’s space ring. Without the Eye of Darkness, even him, a wind archmage, would be unable to open the boundary.
He crashed headfirst into the boundary, and a large bang sounded out. A ball of green light flared out from the boundary as Duke was affected by its power. He was unable to maintain his levitation spell and fell from midair. Some broken pieces of bone happened to pierce his calves, stomach, and waist, causing immediate injury to his body.
“My condolences!” Han Shuo approached Duke with a cold smile as Emily and the little skeleton surrounded Duke. Han Shuo ripped the mask off his face and said, “Long time no see, benevolent Mister Duke!”
Duke, crying out painfully, immediately spoke with fear when he saw Han Shuo reveal his true face. “Why is it you? I remember that I once saw you in the Babylon Academy. Aren’t you that necromancy student?”
Nodding, Han Shuo smiled sinisterly and said, “That’s right, it’s me.” He then took out the Eye of Darkness and placed it on his palm, lighting it up. “The small errand boy, whose tracks you guys discovered last time, in the cemetery in the mountains at the back of the Academy, was also me. Heh heh, I was the one who gained the Eye of Darkness that Dylan buried in the ground. You guys didn’t think that I wouldn’t die, did you? It’s come full circle not too long afterwards!”
“So you were the one who obtained the Eye of Darkness! No wonder the boundary to the cemetery of death was opened after that light came from your body!” Duke spoke in sudden enlightenment.
Three more zombie warriors appeared, making it a total of four zombie warriors and one little skeleton. They walked slowly towards archmage Duke. Han Shuo raised his crossbow and took aim at Duke, Emily chanted a dark major spell, officially sealing Duke’s fate as the little skeleton’s seven bone spurs flew around in a dance.
When the seven bone spurs flew out, Duke used wind blades to rapidly defend against them all, but the approaching four zombie warriors and little skeleton made him feel quite troubled.
When Han Shuo’s crossbow had shot it, the bolt pierced through the hastily dodging Duke’s thigh and nailed him to the ground. Emily’s dark magic had already enclosed Duke before Han Shuo had taken out the Demonslayer Edge. Thick smoke rose up from Duke’s body in that instant as he became another set of stark white bones within the cemetery of death.
The little skeleton drew close to Duke and took off the space ring from the white bones of his hand. He handed it over to Han Shuo along with the pouch of the senior swordsman Erick.
Emily stared at the little skeleton with clear eyes and was dumbfounded for quite a while by the little skeleton’s motions. She finally couldn’t hold it in any longer and asked Han Shuo with an exceedingly high amount of curiosity, “Can you tell me what was up with that wondrous little skeleton?”
“Heh heh, nothing much. I refined it with a secret art. That’s why its performance is so wondrous!” Rubbing the little skeleton’s clean and smooth skullcap, Han Shuo smiled as he picked up the spoils of battle being offered up to him.
Emily glared fiercely at Han Shuo and said huffily, “Just how many more things are you hiding from me? Why do you have the Eye of Darkness and how come you’re able to refine such an amazing skeletal warrior? You’re just a small necromancer, yet you also have uncommon fighting techniques. Just what is going on here?”
Some things had to be explained at this moment. Han Shuo explained everything that had happened in the necromancy major, including the discovery of the cemetery of death, to Emily. However, he still didn’t mention anything with regards to refining the little skeleton and the magical yuan.
This conversation caused exceedingly great shock to Emily. As she contemplated silently, Han Shuo started searching through Duke’s and Erick’s things.
But after rifling for a while, Han Shuo discovered that Erick was one heck of a poor guy. There wasn’t anything valuable in his pouch. Duke should’ve had some interesting items on him, but he’d set up a magical boundary within his space ring and Han Shuo was completely unable to break it to obtain anything from inside.
After a while, Emily looked at Han Shuo with a grave face. “Does anyone else know that you’ve obtained the Eye of Darkness and that you can come and go from the cemetery of death, apart from you and me?”
“No one else knows.” Han Shuo looked at Emily and hesitated before asking, “What do you plan to do?”
“In that case, then we’ll continue to keep this secret. Duke and Erick are dead anyways, and the agent that the organization had sent to chase them is gone. No one else knows about this matter. Then, in the future, the cemetery of death is still your secret alone, the foundations for you to train your body to slowly control the Dark Forest.” Emily gazed deeply at Han Shuo as she spoke lowly.
Staring in stupefaction for a bit, Han Shuo smiled slightly and suddenly yanked Emily into his arms. He smiled, “You’re my woman alright, I thought you’d want me to offer the secret of the cemetery of death to the organization!”
Rolling her eyes in a display of ill temper at Han Shuo, Emily said, “Do you think I don’t know what you’re thinking? If you wanted to tell the organization about this secret, you would’ve done so a long time ago, why would you wait until now? I understand what the cemetery of death means to you, and it seems very important for your future development. We’re already like this now, I would naturally think for you.”
Han Shuo was really a bit touched upon hearing Emily’s words. He privately thought to himself that women were incomprehensible creatures alright. Once their bodies and hearts were captured, then all their previous resolutions would completely collapse. When she spoke these words, it meant that Emily had chosen to lean towards Han Shuo between the Dark Mantle and himself. If Han Shuo had any conflicts with the Dark Mantle in the future, it looked like Emily would be willing to make a stand against the Dark Mantle for Han Shuo.
“Right, you said that your goal this time was to investigate where those weapons had gone. I used the forest trolls to rob that batch of resources this time, will it affect your mission?” Seeing that Emily was thinking on his behalf, Han Shuo thought for a bit and suddenly recalled what Emily had mentioned last time, and so opened his mouth to ask her.
Smiling merrily for a bit, Emily looked soulfully at Han Shuo in the midst of his surprise. “You bad boy, you’re finally willing to think of my situation. How nice!”
Han Shuo was speechless as he thought back to prior events and discovered that he really had never thought on Emily’s behalf. He’d thought for himself from start to finish, and he now felt a bit embarrassed by her words. He laughed a bit awkwardly.
“Don’t worry too much about this matter, I actually had a fair guess of where these resources were going. I just wanted to catch him in the act so that he’d have nothing to say. Although these resources have been intercepted, many of the McGrady Guild’s men have made it out. They’ll surely think of a way to ransom back the siege weapons from the forest trolls.”
“If anyone wants to purchase the siege weapons from the forest trolls, just let them handle the matters they usually would. You’d be doing me a great favor that way. When they obtain all their items, they’ll still deliver it to my target. I’ll arrest him then, and it won’t affect the greater picture.” Emily looked at Han Shuo and said with a smile.
Nodding, Han Shuo said, “No problem, I’ll go back to the Empire and get my hands on some rations. I’ll return to the Dark Forest after that. I’ll go speak to the forest trolls so it won’t impact your mission at all.”
“Oh right, you can’t open Duke’s space ring either. So why not give it to me? I’ll think of a way to break through the barrier and see just what’s inside.”
“Okay, you take it then.” Han Shuo straightforwardly handed Duke’s space ring over to Emily, and then suddenly remembered Yuna’s pretty space ring from his previous encounter when that thought struck him. Yuna was only an adept mage. Theoretically, the boundary that she’d set up should be easily broken by Emily.
Therefore, he took out Yuna’s space ring and gave it to Emily. “There’s also a boundary placed within this space ring, but that person was only an adept mage. I think you should be able to break the barrier inside and see what’s in it?”
Emily took the space ring without asking how Han Shuo obtained it, took a deep breath, and focused her concentration.
The jade green space ring suddenly lit up, and abruptly dimmed when a strong pulse of magic was felt. Breathing out slightly, a few items suddenly appeared in Emily’s hand. There were some female personal effects, a crystal card, a book on water magic, and some medicine to treat injuries.
Staring at Han Shuo oddly, Emily asked, “To think you would be such a brutal person as to destroy a feminine flower. How did this woman die in your hands?”
Turning the items over after taking them from Emily, Han Shuo put away the jade green space ring when he discovered there wasn’t anything valuable. He smiled, “A wanton woman betrayed me. I was so angry that I killed her. This is quite normal.”
“Pah! I don’t believe you!” Emily said.
“Alright, I have two more days before I need to report to the organization. I must hurry and leave the cemetery of death. You already know my identity and origins, so we can temporarily leave this place. Go about your business first, whether you are going to report to the Dark Mantle or the Academy first, I think it’ll be easy for me to find you. We should part ways here.” Han Shuo remembered that he had a ton of things to do and spoke to Emily.
“Alright, although you’re a dishonest brat, it is indeed easy for me to find you. I’ll ask you a final question, between Bryan and that weird name Han Shuo, which one should I call you by?” Emily asked.
“How about Han Shuo? This is the new name that the person who passed on the martial arts technique created for me. Call me that in the future!” Han Shuo thought for a moment and responded.
Nodding and saying nothing else, Han Shuo took Emily on a quick tour around the cemetery, and the two left via the transportation matrix amidst Emily’s repeated exclamations of surprise.