Chapter 89: The Unsettling Mage
“What the hell…” Leona muttered, coming to a halt, her mind clouded.
An overwhelming drowsiness washed over her, accompanied by a strange mix of anxiety and irritation.
She shook her head, trying to dispel the unsettling sensations, but it was futile. The drowsiness only intensified.
Undead weren’t supposed to need sleep. Leona knew this. The only time she had slept after her resurrection was when Abyss had personally hypnotized her. Even a necromancer of his caliber had needed her to relax completely before he could induce sleep, highlighting the difficulty of hypnotizing a high-ranking undead.
“What is this power… It’s so uncomfortable…” Leona said, holding her head with one hand, keeping one eye fixed on the mage’s figure.
It had to be a projection. The mage’s real body couldn’t be far, as Leona could still sense his magical energy signature nearby. However, it was now dispersed, emanating from all directions due to some kind of interference spell. Leona, not a skilled mage, had no way of pinpointing his exact location.
“Projection… Projection…” Leona fought to stay awake, her undead resilience against sleep helping her, but it still required a significant effort to maintain her consciousness.
The mage’s projection ignored Leona. His mouth, the only part of his face visible beneath the wide brim of his hood, continued chanting incessantly. The sounds of battle from the valley below were still audible, indicating that powerful and destructive magic was being unleashed. But Flora was there. As long as she was protecting Abyss and Veronica, no one in this world could harm them.
“Screw the projection!” Leona’s eyes narrowed, and she charged forward, throwing an uppercut at the mage’s figure!
Her fist, blazing with Dou Qi flames, passed through the projection, smashing into the ground.
But Leona didn’t seem disappointed. Instead, she grinned, looking up at the mage’s eerie projection.
Boom!
A powerful shockwave erupted from her fist, traveling through the ground at incredible speed. The tremors were so strong that even the battle in the valley below momentarily paused—neither the dwarves nor the mercenaries could maintain their balance.
And the mage, lacking any physical training, was no exception. The projection, caught off guard by the shockwave, stumbled and fell to the ground.
“Hah! Coward!” Leona laughed, raising a hand. The Dou Qi flames around her solidified, forming an incredibly long staff crackling with lightning. She slammed the staff into the ground, her immense strength driving it dozens of meters deep!
Then, aiming in the direction the projection had fallen, she heaved with all her might!
The staff, embedded deep in the ground, was ripped out by Leona’s slender arm, splitting the hill in two like a knife. A figure, unearthed by Leona’s attack, was flung into the air, landing heavily on the ground over twenty meters away. Leona stepped forward, the Dou Qi staff dissipating back into flames.
At the same time, she felt the drowsiness receding. Looking back, the mage’s projection was gone!
“Bastard, face me!” Leona taunted triumphantly. “You were hiding underground!”
The mage, flung from the earth, didn’t collapse in pain as expected. He slowly got up, his face still hidden beneath the hood, only his mouth and stubble-covered chin visible.
Strangely, his exposed skin was as pale as a necromancer’s… with a sickly purplish hue, an unsettling sight.
Whoosh!
Without a word, the mage moved his lips, seemingly chanting a short incantation. The ground beneath Leona’s feet rapidly heated up, and a jet of flame erupted!
It was a variation of the fire pillar spell that had attacked the wagon, capable of incinerating enemies with sustained high heat.
However, Leona stood within the flames, unharmed. Her Dou Qi protected her, leaving her clothes and even her long silver hair untouched by the intense heat.
“Give up. Just let me beat you up. You think these pathetic spells can hurt me?” Leona said with a cold smile, staring at the mage. “Don’t waste your effort. You think you can trick me with that smoky illusion again?”
Behind Leona, a strange, multicolored cloud of smoke had materialized where the mage’s projection had been.
The mage was trying to lure her into stepping back, forcing her to pass through the smoke again!
High-ranking Dou Warriors could indeed channel their Dou Qi to protect themselves from blades, impacts, and even extreme temperatures. But this mage hadn’t anticipated that Leona’s Dou Qi was so powerful that she didn’t even need to dodge!
“Your tricks are over. Now it’s my turn!” Leona said with a confident grin. Dou Qi flames condensed in her left hand, forming a short bow, while an arrow materialized in her right hand.
It all happened in an instant. Without hesitation, Leona drew the bow, aimed, and released. The Dou Qi arrow flew over twenty meters, striking the mage’s foot, pinning him to the ground.
The mage didn’t seem to feel pain. He tried to pull his foot free, but the Dou Qi arrow was firmly rooted in the ground. He couldn’t budge it.
Before he could chant an escape spell, Leona was standing before him.
Then, his stomach met Leona’s fist—she had tried to control her strength, but it was still enough to incapacitate an ordinary person.
With one foot pinned and his abdomen struck, the mage had no way to absorb the impact and collapsed to the ground.
“Who are you hiding from under that hood?” Leona asked, grabbing the mage and ripping off his cloak.
But the sight that greeted her made her gasp and cover her mouth in shock.
Beneath the hood, the mage only had half a head. The upper part was missing, leaving a gruesome mess of exposed bone and flesh.
And his lips were still moving, chanting a spell…
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