Chapter 73 Cutting Them Down Like Weeds

Whoosh…

The shrill whistle rang through the cemetery.

A cold wind suddenly swept across the open grounds.

The already chilly air plunged several degrees lower.

Faint gray-white light began to materialize like mist, visible even to the naked eye.

The undead aura had grown thick enough to see.

Clatter, clatter…

The skin-crawling scrape of bone against bone rose from beneath the trembling earth.

Dirt broke apart.

Stones rolled aside.

Pale shapes pushed through the ground like shoots forcing their way through soil.

Within seconds, nearly thirty Skeletons of different sizes had clawed their way out of the graves surrounding the wooden hut.

Empty eye sockets turned toward the people by the door.

Silently.

Xia Nan had already expected something like this.

He had been through more than one sudden battle by now.

Even so, his scalp prickled.

The monsters of the Misty Forest had been dangerous and ferocious, but they were alive.

They snarled.

They roared.

They lunged at you with obvious violence.

The cold white Skeletons surrounding them had no flesh, no throats, and no voices.

They simply stared.

Then, wrapped in drifting gray deathly energy, they began walking forward one clattering step at a time.

That silent pressure was somehow worse than facing twice as many Goblins.

Anyone with weaker nerves might already have dropped their weapon and run.

“Haa…”

Xia Nan drew a slow breath.

White vapor spilled from his lips into the freezing air.

The hilt of [Green Pine] grew hotter in his palm.

Hummm…

A fierce, uplifting melody suddenly burst out behind him.

The oppressive silence shattered.

The stiffness in the air vanished with it.

Their spirits surged.

Xia Nan drove forward.

As he closed the distance, his eyes quickly swept over the enemy.

Most of the skeletal undead were already spreading out, gradually surrounding the three of them.

But the Skeleton that had climbed from beneath the cemetery keeper’s bone whistle was different.

It was clearly one of the stronger ones.

Its frame was much larger and heavier than the rest, standing nearly two meters tall.

Its bones were a more striking shade of pale white, and gray-white light clung faintly to its joints, reinforcing the structure and making it less likely to fall apart.

Half a filthy suit of leather armor still hung from its body.

A small round shield was strapped to its left forearm.

In its right hand, its jagged fingers gripped a rusty one-handed sword riddled with cracks.

The whole thing looked like the remains of an adventurer dragged back out of the grave.

Xia Nan had never fought this kind of enemy before.

He had no idea how strong it was.

So he did not rush in blindly.

His gaze measured the distance.

He stopped just outside the Skeleton’s sword range, where a single forward step would put his own weapon within striking distance.

Then he shifted into a safer guard and began circling, waiting for an opening.

The result was unexpected.

For all the drama of its entrance, the adventurer Skeleton seemed to be running half a beat behind the world.

It was almost as though it had not yet adjusted to the Material Plane.

By the time Xia Nan had already left its front and circled toward its flank, the Skeleton finally reacted.

Its rusty sword came crashing down.

At the empty ground in front of it.

Thud!

The cracked blade buried itself in the mud.

It did not break.

The impact, however, sent a violent shudder through the skeletal arm gripping the hilt.

Xia Nan could even see little chips of bone flaking from its ulna.

His focused expression turned strange.

[That’s it?]

His body moved before the thought fully settled.

An opening was an opening.

Xia Nan bent his right arm, gathered strength, and stepped hard with his left foot.

[Spinning Slash]!

Whummm!

The dark brown wooden sword tore through the lingering mist in a sharp arc.

A brilliant streak of searing light flashed across the battlefield.

The thick pale bones that had looked so sturdy a moment before offered almost no resistance.

The blade tore straight through them.

Cleanly.

Smoothly.

As though they were made of paper.

For a moment, even Xia Nan failed to process how easy it had been.

Then the adventurer Skeleton split at the waist and collapsed like a broken toy.

“Huh?”

Xia Nan stared at the upper half writhing on the ground.

It had landed facedown and could not turn itself over. Its sword arm could only flail uselessly at the dirt.

“That’s it?”

Had he been a little too cautious?

Thinking about it, maybe he had.

His [Spinning Slash] had already reached the maximum Lv. 5. His actual combat ability had surpassed that of an ordinary low-level adventurer.

And [Green Pine] was a blue-grade weapon with a damage bonus against undead.

Against low-level undead like Tim and these Skeleton grunts, the combination was almost unfair.

Touch them and they were injured.

Catch a vital point and they were dead.

One swing, one kill.

It really was like chopping vegetables.

Xia Nan stepped in and casually finished the job, splitting the adventurer Skeleton’s skull in two.

Then he cut off the right arm that still gripped the one-handed sword.

Only after confirming that the thing had completely stopped moving did he retreat a few steps and glance toward the rest of the battlefield.

At some point, the lute music had stopped.

For Alton’s small frame, the instrument was rather bulky. It now lay quietly on the ground.

Most Bard schools could not rely on music alone to carry an entire battle before gaining a class level.

Even genuine class holders who had yet to reach the transcendent tier and still possessed limited spellcasting ability usually needed teammates.

They also carried weapons.

When necessary, they fought personally, no differently from Assassins or Warriors.

As a Lightfoot Halfling destined to spend his life traveling across every corner of the Aifala Continent, Alton naturally knew how to handle himself in a fight.

Two finely crafted miniature scimitars flashed in his hands.

His small body darted between the Skeletons with startling agility.

He moved like a weasel, slipping beneath arms and around legs faster than the stiff undead could follow.

A Skeleton would barely take a few steps before its leg bones were sliced apart.

Then it would hit the ground and stay there.

Meanwhile, Ingram, sheriff of Kalanfor, finally showed Xia Nan what he could do in a real fight.

Thoom!

A one-handed mace flickering with golden light smashed into a Skeleton’s forehead.

The moment the weapon struck, brilliant gold erupted across the head of the mace like a tiny explosion.

When the light faded, half the Skeleton’s skull was gone.

The holy light was brutally effective against undead.

Ingram destroyed them almost as quickly as Xia Nan did with [Green Pine].

One hammer blow usually crippled a Skeleton.

A second finished it.

His fighting style matched his broad, powerful build perfectly.

He barely dodged.

He simply charged straight into the mass of Skeletons and started hammering.

Bang.

Crunch.

Thud.

Even when one managed to get close enough to strike him, its weapon could usually do no more than scrape a pale line across his light plate armor.

Xia Nan watched for a moment.

Then envy quietly crept into his heart.

[That standard-issue equipment was probably issued by the authorities.]

[He didn’t even have to pay for it.]

A thought followed.

[Maybe they reimburse the maintenance costs too.]

Tsk.

[I wonder if Rivervale Town still needs another sheriff.]