Witch Troupe and the Undead

"..." Lulua remained silent. The Night Clan never communicated with their enemies during battle. They were the Night Watchers of the Church of the Night, the punishers of darkness, and the messengers who delivered the final prayers for evil. Silence was their greatest weapon.

If you remain silent, do not listen or see, no matter how many grievances you have, no matter how eloquent you are, no matter how pitiful you seem, you will only face death.

“…Instantly,” Lulua uttered a muffled syllable. The black cloud patterns and brown skin that had been wrapped around her calves began to fade, returning to their original snow-white and delicate appearance. This surprised the thieves. However, the next second, a violent burst of black mist erupted from the soles of her feet.

"Bang!" In the blink of an eye, a round, snow-white knee was right in front of the thief directly in front of him. He only had time to raise his short knife, the blade pointing forward, and as it pierced the girl's waist and abdomen, his vision was instantly plunged into darkness.

Lulua used her momentum to roll forward half a circle, her legs and skirt stained with pink blood mixed with brain matter and tissue fluid. A shark-tooth dagger was deeply embedded in her side abdomen, which she then ruthlessly ripped out and threw away, its serrated edges covered with tiny pieces of flesh and blood.

“Black Sky…” The girl looked at her second target. As the latter instinctively retreated in fear, she stomped her feet hard on the ground, leaving a bloody footprint. “…Hit!” The black cloud patterns on her arms also burst and disappeared instantly. She struck the thief’s raised arm, which was blocking. Nothing happened to the arm, but the chest cavity behind it exploded backward as if a miniature bomb had been installed.

"Hoo~" Lulua swayed her body and struggled to pull a bottle of pale gold potion from the small pouch on her lower back. She tried three or four times before she could open the cap and bring it to her lips. Only a small portion of the liquid actually went into her mouth; the rest spilled all over her body because her hands were shaking so badly.

The medicine took effect immediately after entering the mouth, changing from light gold to golden green and finally to a rich turquoise green. The lost strength began to gradually recover, and the pain in the wounds gradually subsided.

"Crescent Moon..." Lulua adopted a peculiar stance, converting her recovered stamina into the power to heal her injuries. This was an advanced version of the Night Clan's battle stance, a special stance different from the three basic stances. It was only suitable for use when there was excess stamina, converting the excess stamina into life force to heal battle injuries.

Otherwise, given the Night Clan's method of killing without weapons, relying instead on hand-to-hand combat, and the lack of a cure, they would inevitably suffer from hidden injuries and die prematurely.

"Purify!" Lulua exhaled. Like the two extraordinary martial arts techniques she used before, "Instant Collapse" and "Black Sky Strike," "Purify" could absorb the residual life magic power on the enemy's corpse into her own body to accelerate the recovery of her physical strength and integrate it into her own life through divine grace.

In layman's terms, it's like absorbing experience points, but this doesn't level you up. At most, it can only strengthen your current life to a state called "Blazing" in order to unlock the highest level of [Light] and [Fire] stances.

However, no matter how advanced the stance is, it is ultimately developed from the three basic stances. As for the "Wind" stance, it has nothing to do with vitality. That requires strengthening the body to a level that can withstand the tearing and destruction of one's own power.

The wounds on his arms and thighs quickly healed and disappeared under the combined effects of the potion, vitality, and the Crescent Moon stance, without even leaving scars. The wounds on his side abdomen and shoulder were particularly deep, so they were still bleeding, but they only needed simple bandaging and would be fine as long as he didn't do any strenuous exercise.

Moreover, she had several bottles of potions on hand; once her body had absorbed the toxicity, she could take another one. Inside the carriage, two thieves and a knight slumped against the edge, the knight's face bearing three charred, hollow holes.

The mechanical damage from the Shark Tooth Dagger resulted in a thief having most of his shoulder cleaved open by the knight's half-sword. Their inner chainmail was not very effective against a knight with genuine superhuman strength.

The other was pierced through by the "glowing fragment" in Alessina's hand. Similarly, ordinary, unenchanted chainmail was not much stronger than parchment when facing this genuine "artifact" blessed by the goddess.

However, the two short swords in Black Raven's hands, one scarlet and one jet black, were genuine high-level enchanted weapons. The red sword represented "eyes," and the black sword represented "feathers," just like the two colors that make up a raven.

"Clang!" The fragment of the luminous blade struck the base of the black feather precisely, sending the enchanted dagger flying high into the air. However, the next second, it transformed back into black feathers and wrapped around Alessina's neck. Before it could even leave a bloodstain, it was repelled by the burst of crimson flames.

"Blood Rage Outburst?" This is no ordinary extraordinary martial skill, especially for beastmen. After all, beastmen are "subhumans" rather than "beastmen." They can learn this kind of beastman berserker technique, but that doesn't mean they can learn it casually and use it easily.

Blood Rage Burst is similar to Lulua's [Entangle] stance, but it consumes the user's stamina and life force. In other words, it is only at its strongest moment when the burst begins, and then it quickly declines.

Therefore, experienced berserkers will try to unleash their power only at crucial moments, using techniques such as Residual Heart to conserve energy and methods like Bloodlust to restore vitality through meat and alcohol to maintain an appropriate combat rhythm.

However, this outburst had already taken a huge toll on Alessina; her arms began to tremble slightly, but with several thieves surrounding her, it was impossible for her to pull out the potion to drink.

Livia's situation was also quite bad. She had used up everything nearby that contained magic and soul energy, and the only thing she could still use was the wind that was pouring in through the broken window.

But now the train has stopped, and the wind is too weak to create something from nothing. Or rather, after her mystical spells, including esoteric arts, have been restricted, her only remaining special ability is not to create something from nothing. This weak wind can only be used to disrupt the thieves' actions.

This futile state caused cold sweat to begin to seep from the girl's forehead. Livia's weaknesses of having too little combat experience and poor stress resistance began to be exposed. Fortunately, Roach and Leslie were there to help her. As for Vivi, she could not accomplish anything in this environment and could only rely on her thick skin and the dragon scales covering her body to fight against the opponent's short sword.

As for Rhine and Jasmine, they did try to fight with short axes, but... in this high-level game, the help they provided was really limited, especially for the older Rhine, who was directly cleaved in the chest by a sword. Although it didn't penetrate the chainmail forged from dwarven steel, he was still suffocated for a while and his face was still pale, clearly unable to catch his breath.

"You have no way out, surrender..." Black Crow caught the rebounding black feather and looked at Roach and the others, saying, "We came prepared. Master Roach, your alchemy skills are very high, but they are not suitable for use in a closed environment; Miss Livia, you do have some abilities that exceeded our expectations, but we have studied you."

She is physically weak and therefore not suitable for long journeys. As a result, the team will not choose to jump off the vehicle and run away, because they cannot go far with Livia in their arms. She has low stress tolerance. As long as the situation is bad enough and the pressure is high enough, she will have difficulty casting spells. In fact, her spells will go out of control when she is frightened. Moreover, as a sorcerer with the top title of "witch", she has the ability to quickly activate various mystical rituals.

"We have arranged a number of targeted solutions for you, from smoke to traps set outside, and to the special environment of this carriage."

The reason why they didn't take action directly in the town but instead risked attacking on the train is this: most of the powerful magic that Livia can activate has amazing range and destructive power, and her personality analysis shows that she is a kind-hearted and good girl who would not make the kind of strategy of sacrificing her teammates and burning the enemy to a crisp.

Therefore, there is no need to worry about her operating the train's largest source of magic power and the available environmental forces—the magic core itself. In fact, Livia can indeed sense the scorching heat and rage of the magic core. She only needs to utter a single byte, a single command, and the blue pure magic power-constructed magic fire will erupt from the front of the train, engulfing everything except herself like a tidal wave.

Enemies, carriages, companions, innocent people caught in the crossfire, and everything within range would be completely vaporized into ions by the demonic fire. Therefore, she could only keep her mouth shut and ignore the urging and seduction of the volatile core, which longed for a magnificent explosion, an explosion that was not restrained by human intervention.

The intricate mechanics and alchemical rituals have kept it in a vicious cycle of "explosion" and "not exploding," much like an engine on Earth. This cycle makes the magical core, which was born for a massive explosion, exceptionally irritable and easily angered. Its "soul" is already restless and agitated, waiting only for the witch's command—a command to release all its constraints.

“Miss Leslie, your bow and arrows are unusable in this environment. As for you, Sir Rhine…” Black Raven paused for a second, “whatever your mission may have been, it has failed.”

"Who sent you?" Rhine asked, panting. The elderly dwarf stared at Black Raven with a wise and profound gaze that was unusual for his race.

“I don’t know,” Black Crow said naturally. “What kind of employer do you think would tell us the whole story, and what kind of idiot would ask such questions so clearly? Knowing too much is the fatal flaw in this line of work.”

“You’ve done too much, child,” Rhine gave him a deep look. “You’ve fallen into a deep quagmire you don’t know about, and from the moment you stepped in, you couldn’t escape.”

“Perhaps, but a cunning crow always has a backup plan,” Black Crow shrugged. “Now it’s your turn, dear young lady. We certainly underestimated your guards, but now… are you coming over yourself, or…”

"..." Livia nervously clutched her staff, looked around, bit her lower lip, and a hint of wavering and hesitation appeared in her emerald eyes. Finally, she slowly took a step forward.

"No, Miss!"

"Go, bring her here." Black Crow gave one of his men a look. Livia cautiously extended her right hand, but the thief in front of her grabbed her wrist roughly and was about to pull her over when she felt four cold, soft fingers wrapped around her wrist.

Inside this carriage, there is a special kind of magic, or rather, something special that Livia can manipulate, but it requires physical contact and, for her, means breaking a certain taboo and agreement—that is, "human beings" themselves.

Do you remember how Roach was resurrected? While his special constitution certainly played a role—his soul and flesh were fixed together, and sewing flesh together was equivalent to sewing soul together—it also meant that Livia could manipulate the flesh and soul of a living being through contact.

Reversing the sewing process would turn it into "cutting," and this process was easier than she had imagined, perhaps because she had practiced on Roach so many times. Like a mother who was skilled at mending her naughty child's clothes, she could almost feel the cracks and weaknesses in the fabric with just a touch of her fingers.

Normally, she would sew up these cracks in advance and add patches to the vulnerable parts so that the garment could last longer on those naughty children. But now, she chose to use scissors and her fingers to tear along these cracks and vulnerable points, just like tearing a piece of cloth from an old garment.

"Ah ...

When the little witch punished him, she only tugged at his exceptionally tough canvas clothes, or pricked them a couple of times with a needle. At most, she would just tear off or cut off his overly ostentatious loose threads. Even so, it was enough to inflict pain on a great demon like him that he would rather be a beast of burden than disobey her.

And now, a living, complete soul, a perfectly intact garment, has been brutally and cruelly cut into shreds and torn into chaotic lines.

Silver-gray soul flames shot out from every pore of the thief's body. The shattered soul, like countless worms, finally broke free from the constraints of flesh and blood, forming bumps and pits of all sizes on his body. Under the watchful eyes of everyone, amidst screams and wails that encompassed not only reality but also the soul, he transformed into something indescribable and unspeakable.

The flesh was deformed and twisted, as if it had been stuffed into a meat grinder, shredded, and then stuffed into a whole human skin. The connection between the bones and muscles was completely detached, and the blood, under the influence of gravity, pulled the skin down, causing the white bones to pierce through the skin and be exposed.

A living person was "dissolved" like that, with internal organs, muscles, blood vessels, and flesh filling the pockets formed by skin without any connection, and sharp, hard bones piercing the pockets, allowing these soft things to flow out through the rupture.

Only the small section of wrist bone that Livia's fingers were holding remained intact. As she released her fingers, this small section of wrist bone, along with her arm which had slumped into a sail shape, landed on the fleshy bag on the ground with a dull "plop".

The terrifying, nightmarish scene caused even seasoned thieves, skilled in murder, torture, and interrogation, to involuntarily take two steps back. Their eyes, hidden behind their masks, revealed utter terror. It was no simple killing; the screams, in particular, were a shock to the very soul.

Livia swallowed hard. The little witch who had caused this tragedy seemed even more afraid than her enemies. She didn't even dare to glance at the ground, but she insisted on putting on a brave and indifferent act. Her emerald eyes were devoid of any light, staring at the crows and thieves like a pair of deep, tranquil jade eyes.

Those familiar with the Little Witch know that she is currently in a state of mental disconnection. However, precisely because of this, the thieves, stared at by those lifeless and indifferent eyes, cannot help but feel an urge to turn around and run away immediately.

Meanwhile, in the rear carriage, Kanger and his men were also surrounded by thieves. Outnumbered and lacking equipment, they inevitably found themselves surrounded after dealing with a few Shadow Raven thieves.

Just then, Alessina suddenly froze. "Horses' hooves? Reinforcements?"

"No..." It was Black Crow who answered her. He looked out the window and saw a troop of cavalry rushing towards the train. There were 6 knights and 12 squire cavalrymen, followed by 30 or 40 infantrymen dressed like thieves but carrying standard weapons.

"Hehe~" Rhine chuckled憨厚ly. "What did I just say? Child, you've already stepped into this vortex. There's no way you can get out. If everything goes smoothly for you, now is the time for you to make your last use."

“You have no idea what Miss Livia represents, nor do you understand our mission. But now I can tell you,” Rhine said gloatingly. “Our mission is to go to the capital and lift the curse on His Majesty. Do you understand? If we disappear or something happens to us here, His Majesty’s anger will definitely need an outlet. This is not a feud between nobles, child.”

"This is a conspiracy involving the heinous crime of regicide, and you are merely the most insignificant victims in this conspiracy, with no possibility of escaping far away," Rhine said earnestly, and the other party understood these truths without him having to say them.

In ordinary noble feuds, these tools still have value and can obtain the protection of the nobles. After all, which noble doesn't have such needs at times? But if it's "regicide and usurpation," their only fate is to be silenced. And now, the silencers have arrived.

These people might even have another group waiting to silence them. At the very least, the thief-like infantrymen following behind the knights are certain to be silenced—their attire speaks volumes—a single Shadow Raven is not enough to quell the royal family's anger.

"So...do you want to cooperate? Kid, now we're really all in the same boat."

"..." Black Crow took a deep breath, looked at his equally terrified subordinates, and let out a special whistle. At the rear and the front of the wagon, the thieves immediately stopped what they were doing, looking at each other in bewilderment. Conger and the others also saw the cavalry charging towards them.

"Silence them?" Sylvie asked, while the Shadow Raven thief in front of her, wearing the same black mask, nodded painfully. "Cooperation?"

"Hmm!" The two groups that were just moments ago wishing they could fight to the death were now forced to stand in the same trench, fighting for the same secret. After Black Raven quickly relayed the situation to his subordinates in code, every Shadow Raven thief clearly understood one thing: they were truly stuck now. Their only chance of survival was to escort this group to the capital and reveal everything they knew.

Only when the mastermind behind the scenes is completely eliminated can they escape their inevitable fate of death.

[PS]

Two dockworkers were squatting in a corner of the tavern, gnawing on black bread.

"Have you heard? A color-changing dung monster crawled out of Count Roderick's toilet!"

"Ha! That thing must have swum across from the council chamber—after all, that place produces more shit every day than the slums accumulate in ten years!"

"Now do you know why the master was willing to pay for fixing the sewers?"

"Because he finally discovered that his backside and the poor man's drinking water were in the same pipe!"

"You don't understand!" the drunken beggar interjected. "That slime monster must be quite something—after touching the old man's butt, he'd rather swallow holy water and commit suicide. If I were to lick a nobleman's toilet seat, I could live three more years!"

Chapter 196 The Witch and the Rough Wizard

"Turn off the jammer!"

"What?" The two spellcasters operating the jammer outside were stunned for a moment. They looked at the knight rushing towards them from a distance, unsure whether they should turn off the jammer. However, Black Crow did not give them time to hesitate. Two short swords, one red and one black, spun out and directly stuck into the brass mechanism next to the track, jamming the gears.

As the crystal, which was moving along with the gears and metal rings, stopped moving, the disruptive ritual field surrounding it slowly dissipated. For an ordinary arcane mage, it would take at least 2 to 3 hours to regain the ability to cast spells. However, for Livia, she could use her magic the moment the disruptive ritual field disappeared.

The little witch's power comes from three aspects: her mastery of arcane magic, her knowledge of potions and alchemy, and her innate ability to command anything with magic or a soul.

The last one heavily relies on the power of the summoned entity itself. She cannot create a sun from the flame of a match, at least not by simply using this last ability. She can only utilize the energy and properties inherent in the summoned entity itself.

However, in normal times, since she is also an arcane mage, she can create a cycle by using the magic and faint soul reactions of the summoned things to construct the ritual field, and using the magic and elements absorbed by the arcane spells to enhance the summoned things. By repeating this process, she can set the entire city ablaze with just the flame of a small oil lamp, or turn the earth into giants.

The witch spread her palms out, focused her attention, and caught the sudden increase in noise outside the carriage. The noise that had been interfering with her senses had disappeared, and now every sound echoed clearly in her ears. So, the witch uttered her command.

The first thing to change was the wind that had been blowing gently. The wind's direction changed in the next second. For the knights who had already reined in their horses at a distance—after all, you can't fight an armored train with a lance—they were completely unaware that the direction in which the grass on the ground was drooping was wrong.

The wind is like an invisible paintbrush in the girl's hand, galloping back and forth across the grass, outlining an invisible boundary and pentagram structure for a ritualistic field. The soil, insects, and grass on the ground, upon receiving the command, either droop in their respective directions, either obeying the wind or defying the power of the atmosphere.

Pollen and grass leaves are temporary incense, soil is a hastily constructed altar, and wind is the messenger of the ritual and the chalk that outlines the magic circle.

"Crackling~" The magic power of the lighting magic crystals on the carriage was extracted, and the steam that was sprayed out formed an invisible chant. The wind began to gradually accumulate in the ritual field, like a distorted lens. When the power accumulated to the limit, the witch released the boundary of the ritual field and gave the long-awaited storm the simplest command: "Go!"

"Whoosh~" In just a few seconds, the breeze turned into a strong wind, and the strong wind into a storm, swirling up grass, soil, and dust, stretching towards the sky like a giant black python, before rushing towards the astonished knights.

The scene caused Black Crow's lips to twitch slightly. If he hadn't been cautious and set up an anti-mystical spell device, they would have been completely wiped out by now, because Livia quickly created a second pillar of wind.

Compared to ordinary occultists, Livia's biggest flaw is that she cannot multitask. In fact, she can only focus on controlling one spell or one thing being commanded.

However, this is difficult for anyone to notice in practice—because she cannot control multiple spells, but she can generate multiple spells and then give a simple command to the "entity" created by the spell.

As for how the command was understood and executed, Livia didn't care at all, nor could she care. This is why, once the little witch was frightened or interrupted her spellcasting for some reason, the spell didn't directly become ineffective, but instead turned into an uncontrollable and devastating disaster.

Three jet-black pillars of wind approached the knights and the infantry behind them. Under Livia's command, these three pillars of wind formed a new secret ritual, and the wind began to carry arcs of electricity and sparks.

"Get out of the way!" The knights finally realized that something was completely wrong. They decisively ordered to scatter. The biggest weakness of storm-type spells is that they cannot deal with skirmishers, especially when people are spread out and lower their bodies. Unless they are directly caught in the thin wind column, the wind pressure generated around them is not enough to blow them away.

"I knew those thieves were unreliable..." The knight commander's face darkened, but fortunately he was prepared for the thieves to betray him and for the situation to spiral out of control. "Throw the spell-destroying bombs!"

Several mechanical balls with brass springs were thrown towards the train. There was no explosion, but Livia involuntarily covered her ears. In her perception and world, the thunderous noise directly caused her to lose her ability to perceive the outside world, which also meant that... she had to relinquish control of the wind column.

Following the witch's last command, the wind pillar suddenly accelerated its movement, rushing forward at high speed. Every now and then, unlucky people were sucked into the wind pillar by the negative pressure and disappeared. As the wind pillar moved, it was also constantly collapsing, throwing stones, branches, and even human bodies that had accelerated to a terrifying speed in all directions.

"Snap!" The knight expressionlessly plucked an organ, the contents of which were unknown, from his armor. The column of wind dissipated completely after moving more than two hundred meters and destroying a small patch of forest.

This single spell evaporated nearly half of the attackers, leading the Knight Commander to believe that there was a significant misunderstanding in the plan, and that this was definitely not the power of an ordinary "witch."

Even though it's the highest-level title of a ritual mage, ritual magic still needs to be based on reason. The three elements of a ritual—symbols, incantations, and the venue—are nowhere to be seen. How did she summon such a terrifying storm?

Creating such a storm requires at least 30 minutes of preparation time, the use of high-quality light green turquoise as a symbol, and the chanting of incantations for at least one minute to summon the storm in the pre-set location and, under the guidance of the ritual, launch an attack on the enemy.

The knight forcefully shook these distracting thoughts out of his mind. "Attack, before the magic-annihilating bullets wear off!" The magic-annihilating bullets were a new piece of equipment they had recently developed. Although they had been proven effective in the laboratory, no one knew how effective they would be in actual combat, and no one knew whether their actual effective time would be the same as in the test field.

The knights spurred their horses and galloped around the train, while the squires took a new weapon from the south from their saddle straps and aimed it at the carriages, wielding a sword.

"Holy shit!" Roach grabbed Livia and slammed her under the seat. The sounds of shattering glass and crossbow bolts hitting armor and metal were deafening. An unlucky thief was also caught in the crossbow bolt, which ripped off his ear.

“Master Roach, this couldn’t be…” Rhine’s voice trembled slightly as he heard the familiar sound of the attack, “...is it your weapon again?”

"Hmm, they've even improved it!" Roach complained. He had a premonition before, and now that ominous feeling was completely confirmed. Although he had only given the basic version of the "Roach Livia Magic Crossbow" and hadn't given out the improved version yet, the workings of this world did not change according to human will.

He wasn't the only alchemist in the world. There were many genius alchemists and mechanics, and after their minds were inspired, they would inevitably use their own knowledge systems and skills to improve or enhance this weapon that could "kill a dozen infantrymen without much effort or trouble."

Perhaps these improved versions cannot be deployed to the military due to a lack of systematic guidance, and may have defects such as low reliability, high price, excessive weight, and rapid ammunition consumption. However, this does not mean that these equipment cannot be used in certain special situations.

"Whoosh!" The supersonic crossbow bullet, or rather the bullet, grazed overhead with a sharp whistling sound, then slammed into the wooden lining of the carriage with a bang, scattering a shower of sharp wooden splinters.

"Damn, it even has an explosive effect..." Roach looked at the sparks falling from above and the ruby ​​fragments that had completely turned into shards on the ground. Obviously, the Improver used expensive rubies instead of cheap green glass as the warhead. However, considering that this involved regicide and intercepting royal envoys, it was really unnecessary to save money on equipment.

"Can the armor plates hold up?" Leslie leaned against the armor, holding a machine gun-style magic crossbow in her hands, her shoulders and hair covered with shards of glass and broken wooden splinters.

"Hard to say..." That was all Rhine could say. This armor plate was designed to deal with normal spells and crossbows. Its maximum protection was probably against light magic cannons or heavy piercing crossbows, but it was unclear how long it could withstand attacks from magical "firearms."

"Leslie~!" Roach tossed the mithril cord from the rune disk over, and Leslie caught it and stabbed it into the butt of the magic crossbow. "Overhead Shot!"

She nodded, raised the weapon above her head, and pulled the trigger in a manner common among African men. "Whoosh~" The crystal disc on the side of the crossbow began to spin, emitting a roar like an engine. The next second, the mermaid almost lost control of the recoil, and it was only thanks to the help of the thief who was dodging bullets that she was able to avoid losing control.

"Whoosh whoosh whoosh! Whoosh—" The continuous shrieking sounds eventually merged into a sound like someone whistling. The wind crossbow bullets do not produce sonic booms. The entire bullet body is wrapped in wind elements, so it only produces such sharp whistling sounds. Rather than a "bullet" that penetrates and kills, it is more like countless supersonic blades flying by.

The gunfire outside was completely suppressed by Leslie's barrage. Roach and his men couldn't see what was happening outside, and could only judge from the occasional terrified cries of horses that some unfortunate horses must have had their legs cut off.

Meanwhile, Lulua, who was on the roof of the carriage, climbed down the other side of the carriage at the beginning and went around to the distance along the waist-high grass. She avoided the fierce battlefield of the two sides exchanging magical crossbow fire in front of her. The knights also realized that the situation was not good, so they stopped firing and let the mercenaries carrying large shields, short swords and magical crossbows exchange fire with the enemies on the carriage.

On Earth, most shields are ineffective against firearms, especially machine guns. However, in this world, shields several centimeters thick, crafted from metal, monster leather, wood, and crystals, are sufficient to withstand attacks from crossbow bolts and even more powerful bolts.