Chapter 91: Civil War of the Death Knights

The aura of death arrived without warning.

It was nothing like the pure, winter-sharp chill of Eldara’s knighthood. This was an energy thick with decay, filth, and a cloying, viscous malice. A stench, like a century-old tomb being cracked open, wormed its way into every pore. It shot straight to the brain, an invasive miasma potent enough to stain the very soul a filthy black.

“Woooo—! Woooo—!”

A shrill, ear-splitting horn blast shattered the silence, jolting the entire outpost from its slumber. The magical lights that had dotted the area like fireflies suddenly contracted, hardening into cold, sharp points of combat illumination.

Countless figures—Elven Rangers and mages—flashed between treehouses and along suspended corridors. Bowstrings were drawn taut, and the heads of staves ignited with arcane power. In a split second, the outpost’s entire defensive network roared to life, the air growing thick with lethal intent.

“More undead?” Selene immediately hefted the greatshield, the Immovable Mountain, planting it firmly before her and shielding her sister. Her gaze was fixed warily on the source of the encroaching aura.

“No, not like that cannon fodder from before.” Su Wan’s face was deathly pale. A frigid mist swirled around her fingertips as the moisture in the air rapidly condensed into visible ice crystals. “This magical power… it’s incredibly concentrated. The level is terrifyingly high!”

Celeste narrowed her eyes. She could feel it, too. This enemy wasn’t even in the same dimension as the shambling horde they’d cut through in the canyon.

If the previous undead were a shambling rabble pieced together from rotting flesh, then the force approaching now was a legion of Death Knights forged from tempered steel.

“Stay close to me!”

For the first time, Eldara’s voice carried a true, obvious gravity. She didn’t remain within the outpost’s fortifications. Instead, she strode forward, heading straight for the main gate. The Apprentice Knights behind her didn’t hesitate for a second, drawing their weapons and following with firm, resolute steps.

“We’re… taking the initiative to attack?” Celeste was a little surprised.

“Their target is me.” Eldara didn’t look back, her voice as cold and clear as glacial ice. “Staying here will only allow the flames of war to consume this outpost and cause unnecessary casualties.”

Her silhouette, framed by the swaying lights and shadows, seemed both resolute and aloof, imbued with the glory and responsibility unique to a knight.

Celeste and her three companions exchanged a look and immediately fell in line behind her.

‘No kidding we’re following,’Celeste thought.’She’s our only guide and bodyguard to Silvermoon City. If she bites it, we’re completely screwed in this forest.’

The moment they stepped through the outpost gate, the scene that unfolded before them stole the breath from their lungs.

In the forest ahead, a force of over a hundred pitch-black figures had assembled. They too were clad in heavy armor and astride skeletal warhorses, but the style of their plate was hideous and twisted, covered in sharp bone spurs and inscribed with runes that seemed to writhe with agonizing wails. In the eye sockets of their mounts, it wasn’t the ghostly blue soulfire that burned, but a tyrannical and bloodthirsty crimson.

A visible miasma of black resentment coiled around their bodies like mist. Wherever they passed, the verdant grass rapidly withered, turning a charred black as its life was forcibly stripped away.

At their head rode three Death Knights whose presence utterly crushed all others.

The one in the center was exceptionally burly, and the skeletal warhorse beneath him was a full size larger than the rest. Its giant hooves struck the earth not with a thunderous roar, but with a deathly silence that made one’s heart feel stifled. He carried a massive axe on his shoulder, its head seemingly forged from countless wailing skulls, an ominous dark purple light flowing along the blade. Most unnerving was his helmet; behind its slits was not soulfire, but a bottomless void. It felt as if staring at it for a second too long would get your very soul sucked inside.

The knight to his left was lean, holding two scimitars shaped like poisonous fangs. His entire being exuded a ghostly, lethal stillness.

The one on the right was not on horseback but hovered in mid-air, clutching a spellbook bound in some kind of ghastly white leather. Its pages turned without wind, emitting bursts of eerie whispers that seemed to claw at the edges of one’s sanity.

[High-density energy reaction detected! Deep scan automatically activated!]

The job panel unfolded before Celeste’s eyes, and a series of glaring, bright-red data streams made her eyelids twitch.

[Death Lord · Mogras Lv.???]

[Death Lord · Ghost Blade Lv.???]

[Death Lord · The Witherer Lv.???]

Three BOSS-level enemies.

Behind them, the levels of the hundred-plus black-armored knights were uniformly displayed as [Death Knight Lv.33 – 35].

Celeste was speechless.

‘Seriously, Queenie, are you some kind of prophet? You call it, and bam, it happens. Also, is that mage-looking dude a Death Knight too? Damn, you guys have some diverse job trees.’

“Mogras.”

Eldara stared at the giant-axe-wielding knight, her voice devoid of any inflection, yet it made the surrounding air drop several degrees colder.

“You gutter rat. You finally dared to crawl out of your grave.”

“Eldara!” The knight called Mogras spoke, his voice like a tombstone being dragged across gravel, every word scraping at the eardrums with raw madness and malice. “You traitor! Look at what you’ve done! You actually dared to let these… living things… whose hearts still beat and whose blood is still warm, touch the supreme art of death! Look at these half-baked, defective products behind you!”

His great-axe pointed from afar, first at Eldara, then at the Apprentice Knights who were nervously gripping their weapons.

“Death is the end! The destination! It is absolute tranquility! It is not a toy to be used by ‘fakes’ like you, who cling to the residual warmth of life just to please the living!” he roared, his voice echoing through the forest with the fervor of a fanatic. “Today, I will personally correct your mistake! I will grant you true death, and then I will gloriously convert you into the most loyal warriors under my master’s command!”

Celeste, listening from the back, understood immediately.

‘Oh, snap. It’s the fundamentalists coming to call out the heretics.”So one’s a’reformist’—death is just another power source, use the enemy’s own strats against them. The other’s a ‘conservative’—death is sacred, only for pure-bloods, all about that pedigree.”This is way more interesting. A Death Knight civil war is way better than just grinding skeletons!'”Your’destination’,” Eldara retorted, her voice not loud but sharp as an ice pick, easily piercing through Mogras’s roar, “is nothing more than an excuse for you to indulge in destruction and hatred.”

“You have long been enslaved by death, turned into a walking corpse that only knows how to spread decay. You are not the master of death; you are its dog.”

“You silver-tongued witch!” Mogras was completely enraged. “Eldara, today, I will represent the true will of death and purify you and those ignorant apprentices! I will make everyone understand that only by embracing eternal decay can one obtain true power!”

“Then try.”

Eldara slowly raised a hand and gripped the hilt of the sword at her waist. It was a simple-looking silver knight’s sword, devoid of any superfluous decoration.

But the moment it was unsheathed, all sound vanished.

An energy of death, pure to the absolute extreme, spread out in silence. It had no temperature, yet it felt as if it froze everyone’s souls in place.

“Knights of the Silent Watch!” Eldara’s voice rang across the battlefield. “For Her Majesty the Queen! To protect the Order behind us!”

“For Her Majesty the Queen!” the dozens of Apprentice Knights roared in unison. Their voices were still young, some even carrying an uncontrollable tremor, but their will was incomparably firm. They raised their weapons, a similar cold aura emanating from their bodies, converging into a weak but resolute barrier against the filthy tide of death opposite them.

“Stubborn fools!” Mogras had lost all patience. “Attack! Tear them apart! Let them understand in their final wails who the true master of death is!”

The hundred-plus Death Knights behind him let out an inhuman roar, urging their skeletal warhorses forward. They became a black torrent, a wave of steel and bone that launched a thunderous charge. The earth trembled under their iron hooves as the air wailed with their resentment.

“We’re not joining the boss rush!” Celeste barked, her voice impossibly calm amidst the chaos. “Su Wan, Ice Wall! Divide the battlefield! Xia Lian, traps on the flank! Selene, prepare to engage! Hold back that cannon fodder, don’t let them break our formation!”

Just as her orders fell, a pressure far more terrifying than anything before erupted from Eldara.

It was a deathly silence akin to absolute zero. With her at the center, the ground instantly frosted over with a thin layer of black ice. Even the flow of air seemed to stop.

The next moment, Eldara moved.

She took only a single step forward.

Then, her figure vanished.

When she reappeared, she had already torn through space, crashing into the very vanguard of the enemy torrent to face Mogras head-on.

Simultaneously, Ghost Blade and The Witherer moved, flanking their leader. The three instantly formed a perfect triangular killing formation, locking the impossibly fast Eldara tightly in its center.

“Your opponents are us!” Mogras’s wild laughter echoed through the sky. “Eldara, today, this place shall be your burial ground!”

Before Celeste and the others, a civil war between top-tier Death Knights exploded in the most shocking and brutal way imaginable.

[Elysian’s Note:

Having a good time with the story?

Every single bit helps immensely:

Thanks a ton for making this journey possible!]