Bang! Bang!
White motes of light burst forth.
Two Guardian Angels, armed with gleaming spears, materialized at Minori's sides.
Minori's expression remained grim, yet within his golden eyes shimmered a flash of excitement.
"Although I have some knowledge of Khajiit's abilities, it's unlikely he has revealed everything," Minori murmured, voice low. "His experience in real combat... cannot be underestimated."
This Khajiit, despite his weakness in comparison to Nazarick's standards, had survived direct confrontation with Narberal Gamma—Even if Narberal had been holding back initially, her level was 63, while Khajiit barely reached Level 21.
To avoid instant death against such an overwhelming opponent spoke to a certain baseline competence.
He was not to be dismissed lightly.
Moreover, Khajiit was a subordinate of Zuranon—a group that warranted Minori's caution.
—
"Camouflage."
A scroll unfurled in Minori's hand, shimmering with green light.
He flung it toward the Guardian Angel on his left.
The spell activated instantly.
The angel's outline flickered, twisted, and blurred—until it faded seamlessly into the night.
Minori nodded slightly in satisfaction.
"The darkness here works as well as a forest," he muttered.
Objectively, it was inefficient to burn a second-tier scroll on a first-tier camouflage effect.But for Minori, who had the resources and knowledge to craft magic scrolls en masse, it was a trivial waste.
—
Under his mental command, the invisible Guardian Angel moved forward.
Advancing around fifty meters, it stopped—then began moving sideways, creating distance from Minori's current position.
From a bird's eye view:
Minori and the ruined temple were connected by a straight line.
The hidden angel now formed a triangle with them, positioning to flank.
Perfect.
Minori acted again.
Swish!
He produced another second-tier scroll and summoned a third Guardian Angel.
Half of his precious second-tier scrolls were now expended.
He didn't hesitate.
"Advance into the temple," Minori commanded.
The new angel flew forward, while Minori himself blurred into shadow behind another visible Guardian Angel.
"Sneak."
This was a special ability he had gained during his encounter with the Eight Fingers' thieves—a movement technique that blended his form into surrounding shadows, drastically reducing his presence.
The new Guardian Angel charged into the dilapidated temple.
Inside was barren—just broken stones and crumbling tombs.
Only a single sarcophagus, centered like a grim altar, stood out amid the emptiness.
It blended so naturally into the graveyard that most would overlook it.
But Minori noticed.
"Destroy it," he ordered telepathically.
—
Bang!
The Guardian Angel struck the sarcophagus with its radiant spear.
A heavy thud reverberated through the ruins.
Cracks spiderwebbed across the stone lid.
Bang!
Another strike.
The sarcophagus shattered completely.
And beneath it—a dark, gaping entrance into the underground.
Without pause, the Guardian Angel plunged into the darkness.
Meanwhile, Minori remained motionless, cloaked in shadow, waiting.
He had issued only one command to the Guardian Angel:
Destroy everything inside.
He had no intention of venturing recklessly into a necromancer's lair.
Better to force Khajiit out into the open.
Boom! Boom!
Within moments, tremors rippled through the earth beneath the temple.
The sounds were brief.
Too brief.
Minori's sharp mind immediately deduced the truth:
The Guardian Angel had been destroyed.
But the disruption had served its purpose.
The silence was soon broken.
Hiss!
Grrrr!
The smell of rot fouled the air as a dozen low-level zombies clambered from the underground passage.
Rotting, groaning, yet surprisingly organized—they didn't scatter randomly.
Instead, they formed a perimeter around the entrance.
Minori's gaze sharpened.
Testing the waters, are you?
This was Khajiit's doing.
Careful, methodical.
As expected.
Had Minori flooded the passage earlier with all his angels, perhaps he could have overwhelmed Khajiit immediately—
—but if the necromancer had prepared an escape route, Minori would have lost the chance to eliminate him permanently.
Risk without certainty was foolish.
A voice echoed.
Low, cold, and filled with disdain.
"Second-tier... Guardian Angels?"
"This level of magic shouldn't belong to a mere adventurer."
The voice carried clearly through the cemetery's stillness.
Footsteps sounded from the broken temple.
Out of the darkness emerged a withered man:
Blood-red wizard robes.
Bald head.
Sickly gray skin.
A necklace bearing three small skulls hung around his neck.
In his left hand—a twisted black staff.In his right—a black stone roughly the size of two fists.
The aura he exuded was palpable—a miasma of death and power.
Minori narrowed his eyes but kept himself perfectly hidden within the shadow of his angel.
Despite appearing to be in his fifties or sixties, Minori knew Khajiit was closer to forty.
The premature aging was the price paid for consorting with negative energy.
Those who controlled the undead without becoming undead themselves inevitably suffered this corruption.
Only two paths existed for such people:
Abandon humanity, achieving immortality by becoming an undead being;
Or be consumed, falling and rising again as mindless corpses.
Khajiit—for now—still clung to the former.