Seeing the reaction of Myrkul's followers, Anser confirmed once again that these people probably had never been to Durlag or the surrounding area. Otherwise, there was no way they would not know him.
That meant they had been aiming for this ruin from the very beginning.
"Kill them!"
The black-robed man immediately hid himself completely behind the powerful werewolf zombies and issued the order to attack.
The surrounding undead went from stillness into motion, sprinting along the edge of the pit, naked malice showing in their eyes.
But before they had taken more than a few steps, a low, clipped phrase in Draconic suddenly rang out.
The black-robed man glimpsed a flash of light rapidly closing in. With no time to warn his companions, he instantly curled up and threw himself flat on the ground. Two werewolf zombies pounced over at the same time, shielding him beneath them.
The next instant, the flash landed among the zombie horde and exploded with a thunderous roar. A blinding red-yellow fireball appeared out of thin air on the ground, a full twenty meters in diameter, so bright that no one could keep their eyes open.
A dozen or so zombies and skeletons were swallowed by the flames at the same time. The oxygen burned away in an instant, and the negative pressure sent the air surging violently, sweeping up dust and smoke in every direction.
The Shield of Faith on the black-robed man shattered instantly. His robe caught fire, he could not breathe, and the exposed skin on his body curled and festered. Fortunately, the werewolf zombies blocked most of the damage, so his injuries were not fatal.
[...Myrkul's devout follower was hit and took 29 fire damage. Current Hit Points: 52/81]
[...Werewolf Zombie was hit and took 55 fire damage. Current Hit Points: 37/92]
[Target slain. Gained 178 experience points.]
The ordinary skeletons, zombies, and that minor cleric within the Fireball's range were all turned into charred corpses by a single instant-cast, Empowered, fifth-level Fireball. Only the werewolf zombies could barely withstand it.
A string of experience notifications flashed through Anser's mind. The corner of his mouth lifted. His opponent was extremely sharp, but while he could dodge control spells, he could not dodge a large-area Fireball.
'I'd like to see how many of these you can endure!'
He was just about to continue casting when he looked up and saw the cleric, his hair burned clean off, sticking his head out from behind the zombies. The skull staff in his hand was pointed at him from afar.
With a bang, the skull atop the staff shattered, and a streak of black light vanished in a flash.
Anser's scalp tightened. Instinctively, he raised his shield in front of him, but he still felt an icy, stabbing chill run through his body. Dark magic descended without warning, and even his skin was covered in a layer of shadow.
The Shield and Mage Armor on him were utterly useless.
[Myrkul's devout follower casts Harm on you. Forced to make a medium-difficulty Constitution saving throw (16)... Saving throw successful. Protector's Bracer takes 33 necrotic damage for you.]
'Sixth-level Harm!'
Anser's heart went cold. He had not expected the other side to still have this kind of trump card. From the look of it, it was not normal spellcasting either.
But he had no time to think further. He moved the shield aside, raised his hand, and fired off another instant-cast Empowered Fireball.
Metamagic: Enhanced Quickened, Empowered, Transmuted + Fifth-level: Fireball—Lightning!
A bright flash streaked over the pit and caught up to the space above the black-robed man's head in an instant. Then it violently exploded. Rampaging blue-white lightning swept through everything like thunder serpents.
The cleric of Myrkul still wanted to use the same trick, but unfortunately, this time it was not fire. The lightning conducted through the zombies' bodies and into him, shocking him until he convulsed nonstop, his skin covered in branching burn marks.
[Target slain. Gained 715 experience points. Level up!]
The two werewolf zombies died on the spot, but the cleric did not.
Enduring the pain, he struggled to push away the dead, heavy zombies and flee, only to find that his body was numb and stiff, with no strength to draw on. He could not help letting out a mournful sigh.
Only then did he realize that he should have hidden himself. Being surrounded by zombies looked safe, but against a spellcaster, they could not protect him at all.
But it had been a very long time since he had encountered a proper spellcaster.
Anser's face was expressionless, though in truth he did not dare relax in the slightest.
After an extremely brief silence, another bright flash streaked across the pit and exploded with a roar, lightning serpents raging wildly.
[Target slain. Gained 1860 experience points.]
Everything had happened too quickly—so quickly that those undead had not even finished circling around this pit that was neither large nor small.
With the death of the cleric of Myrkul's church, all the remaining undead lost control. They stood dazed for a moment, then roared again and charged toward this side.
The air elemental swung its cloud-whip wildly, smacking the fastest werewolf zombies around like spinning tops as peals of thunder rang out one after another.
Sergei quickly directed the others to assist while drawing his bow himself and nocking arrows, doing everything he could to hold back the undead.
If it had been in the past, he would have found things somewhat troublesome. After all, arrows were not particularly effective against undead.
But now, with a genius Sorcerer standing beside him who had instantly annihilated the enemy leader, his mentality was extremely relaxed. Calmly aiming at the zombies' vital points, he unleashed a triple-shot volley that pierced straight through a werewolf zombie's skull, killing it with ease.
Iris did not make a move. Instead, she guided the flying carpet closer to Anser and asked with concern, "Anser, are you alright?"
"I'm fine." Anser waved his hand and continued casting. The experience points from those werewolf zombies were too valuable to waste.
To avoid friendly fire, he only used Chaos Bolt, occasionally hurling out a shrieking mass of ever-changing chaotic energy. Sometimes the chaotic energy would leap to nearby zombies and attack them as well, making the efficiency fairly good.
The ordinary skeletons and zombies were wiped out almost immediately, while the dozen or so werewolf zombies also died one after another. Most of them fell at the hands of Anser and the air elemental.
Werewolf zombies were stronger and tougher than ordinary werewolves, but they had no brains and sluggish reactions, so they were not actually difficult to deal with.
Iris still did not intervene. Instead, she hovered in the air on guard in case the wyverns launched a sneak attack.
The adventurers were exhilarated. First they killed the half-dragons, then wiped out the undead. This ruin had basically fallen into their hands now. Perhaps the next step would be figuring out how to delve deeper and excavate the treasure within.
"This fight was easy…"
"The President of the Union is so strong…"
"I feel like he could handle everything by himself."
"Seriously…"
"There are gaps even among high-level professionals…"
"..."
Sergei's face darkened. He did not think he had been slacking off at all, but every class had its specialties. Hunters excelled at single-target kills, while their methods against groups were relatively lacking.
He waved his hand to interrupt the others' whispers.
"Stop standing around. Split into groups and clean up the battlefield quickly. No one is allowed to pocket anything privately, or don't blame me for turning hostile…"
Most of these adventurers were not actually subordinate to him, but his class level was higher, so it was not strange for him to step forward and take command in Anser's place.
No one objected, and everyone hurried to work.
Anser walked alone over to the death cleric's body and raised his hand, storing both the corpse and the staff missing its skull-head into the Black Tower.
However, he did not hold much hope for that obviously damaged staff. Perhaps it had been some kind of single-use magical item.
'You really can't underestimate anyone.'
He checked the attributes of the Protector's Bracer. The magic barrier only had 63/120 Hit Points remaining. The loss had been significant.
Fortunately, the Death Ward attached to the "Carved Dragonscale Amulet" could automatically recharge it, restoring 8 Hit Points to the magic barrier every three days, which was barely enough.
If he could learn barrier-type spells himself, he would be able to recharge the bracer proactively.
He quietly pulled up his character sheet. His experience pool had reached 27,016. In just today's battle alone, he had earned more than sixteen thousand experience points—a sudden windfall.
'You really do have to fight high-end battles.'
He sighed inwardly and took out a telescope to observe the surrounding situation. Aside from the few wyverns circling above the forest, there were no other abnormalities nearby.
Sergei strode over and quietly said, "President Holrewen, what are your plans? People are getting restless. After this battle, those adventurers probably won't be able to suppress their impulses anymore…"
He did not finish speaking, but Anser understood.
The powerful enemies had all been eliminated, and everyone now knew how to deal with the hallucinogenic mushrooms. There was no way the adventurers would obediently stay outside and just watch. Entering the ruins to explore was almost inevitable.
"Do whatever you want." Anser waved his hand indifferently. "Everyone's free. I don't have the authority to restrict others."
"Uh… alright." Sergei had not expected Anser to be so generous. If it were someone else, they definitely would have used the opportunity to establish rules and prevent others from obtaining the treasure first.
In ruin exploration, being strong was not necessarily useful. A lot of the time, luck mattered more than strength.
"If you want to go, then go. If you want to come with me, then wait a bit. I need to head back and prepare first," Anser added.
He did not know whether treasure truly existed down there, but he did know that this trip would definitely earn him battle experience points, and that was tangible profit.
So he was absolutely going down there.
Just not yet.
Raising his level to 11 first was the most important thing.
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