Although Vatel had undead swarming him like hornets after stirring their nest, none of them managed to put a scratch on him. And from his laid-back attitude, it was clear that he wasn't struggling in the slightest. Hassandra's situation was the same. She wasn't actively beating her opponent to smithereens, but she also wasn't losing.
If things continued like this, it wouldn't take long before the two robed figures from the Tribe of Death were beaten and captured without Toz and the cats contributing anything. And it would take even less time if Kaler and Hullie started participating in the battles.
Toz threw a glance at Kaler and Hullie, who seemed like they wanted to confirm his and the cats' state. But since time was quickly running out, that was all he did before wrapping himself and the cats in a layer of darkness and void combination magic that effectively made them disappear.
After vanishing from sight, Toz and the cats headed for their targets.
In order to do as much as possible to both robed figures, Toz and the cats split up after agreeing to a plan of action. Mindle and Lucy headed toward the robed figure in charge of summoning and controlling the undead, and Toz, Scrael, and Asilean sneaked their way over to the robed figure covering its surroundings in waves of death magic.
Since the necromancer seemed to be the stationary type, letting his zombies and summoned undead do everything for them mage, they were a compatible target with Mindle, who excelled at dealing with a lot of weaker enemies at once and enemies who stayed in place. However, in case the necromancer could either move around quickly themselves or could summon undead with incredible mobility, Lucy accompanied her so that he could tie them down in that case. Or if anything else happened and Mindle needed some support.
The other robed figure, on the other hand, seemed like an opponent one would have to dodge all attacks from since even one could cripple or kill. And Toz, Scrael, and Asilean were the three in their group that were best at dodging attacks, so they were in charge of defeating the death attribute demonic mage.
Mindle conjured her four flames as soon as she got in position. Lucy stayed hidden, but he was ready to help at less than a moment's notice. The four Tongues of Flame flew out and surrounded the necromancer, rapidly bringing the surroundings to boiling temperatures. Since their aim was to capture, not kill, Mindle held back a little and concentrated most of her heat on the undead swarming out of the dark grey orb, not the necromancer.
The zombies quickly started catching fire and bursting into flames due to the heat that was enough to cause the air to tremble. The unexpected bouts of fire surprised Vatel, but after looking around and finding Mindle, he kept fighting like before, gradually decreasing the amount of undead by scorching them into oblivion with his blue lightning.
Almost at the same time as Mindle started burning the necromancer's summons, Toz and the other two revealed themselves while attacking the death mage.
Since Toz had a sword and didn't use his actual body to attack, he took the lead. If the cats were to engage directly with the mage, it might be too late for them to retreat in case their target has some kind of defensive magic that afflicts them the same way the demon's attacks affected the ground.
Scrael had her prosthetic leg, so she wasn't too worried, but it would be better if Toz, who could more easily find a replacement or make do without his sword, sacrificed it to find out if it would be alright to attack the death mage.
And in order to really test it out, Toz used nothing but a small amount of metal mana to enchant his sword as he reached out to stab into the robed figure's upper body.
However, before his sword reached, he felt its movements stalling as if something was killing its momentum. Toz sensed that the magic around the death mage reacted to Toz's sword, so that was probably the cause. Fortunately, it seemed like the magic didn't do any noteworthy damage to the weapon itself, so Toz and the cats could attack freely. They only had to worry about their attacks reaching the death mage.
Unwilling to give up the advantage of his surprise attack, Toz pulled back his sword before thrusting again. But this time, he filled his sword with darkness mana.
Due to the properties of darkness, Toz's pitch-black sword had an easier time slinking through the transparent layer shielding the death mage.
Toz sensed the death mage begin to panic as the sword neared their body, but even while panicking, the mage concentrated its magic on the spot where Toz's sword pierced through the layer of defensive magic. After passing through only halfway, the magic gripped Toz's sword like a vice, preventing him from both pushing it further inside and pulling it out again.
His sword was just about to reach the death mage, but after confirming that it refused to budge, Toz didn't hesitate for even a moment as he let go of the sword and instead used magic to attack and defend himself in one go. He threw out a Fireball before the death magic could reach him.
Toz's Fireball and the death mage's lump of dark grey death magic collided in the air. Toz had made his spell with a concentration on how flashy the explosion would be, so when the two magics crashed into each other, the ensuing burst of fire and light filled their surroundings. It barely did any damage, and Toz only had to make sure he avoided the fragments of death magic falling around them to ensure his own safety.
At first, it only looked like Toz's magic was to allow him to back away and get to safety. At least until Scrael and Asilean appeared.
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