Chapter 339: I did not come here to fight
Blood Wraith grinned from ear to ear. "Boss, you’re actually coming with us? Hell yeah!" he whooped, pumping a fist into the air. "The Iron Fangs, the tribals, whoever’s in that mine, none of them stand a chance if you’re on the field! This is gonna be legendary!"
Phoenix gave a faint smile before starting to walk out of the Blood Hall with an embarrassed expression. Clearly, she wanted to put some distance between herself and her brother, making it look like they did not team up together.
"Sis, wait for me!" Blood Wraith shouted and chased after her.
Damon could only laugh at the two as he watched them leave. Soon after they left, he started activating Blood Gate again, preparing a portal for the Hollow Graves, a location where most of the undead players typically gathered.
It was time to meet his next customer.
The scarlet gate hissed open like a wound in space, bleeding tendrils of blood and nether mist. Damon stepped closer, his mind already calculating. This was going to be a difficult negotiation. He knew it.
He decided not to bring Erin here and meet up with the guy alone. The entire thing was going to be extremely unpredictable, so it was best to do it alone. It was very important that he remained low-key while negotiating, and Erin was not exactly low-key.
That little bastard had probably already prepared some sort of ambush for him. He might actually need to kill him a couple of times just to get his message through.
Damon sighed. This was going to be troublesome. Being a good guy was sometimes really difficult. He then stepped into the portal and disappeared. The next second, he appeared in the familiar territory of the Hollow Graves.
A wave of deathly chill slammed into him, thick with the stench of rotting flesh. The entire landscape was shrouded in a half-fog, half-nether haze. Jagged tombstones jutted out of the ground like broken teeth, while skeletal hands occasionally clawed free from the dirt before collapsing back into restless silence.
The entire place looked very creepy and somewhat scary, but it wasn’t exactly deserted. All around him, players were walking about. There were quite a few players too. After all, just like vampires, the necromancer class also had a huge following.
In fact, in his last life, it had been one of the top classes players chose. Not many converted into the undead race because of how ugly most of the undead avatars looked and the fact that most women found them creepy, but necromancy itself? It was quite popular.
All around Damon, many hooded necromancers marched with skeletal minions in tow, bony warriors clattering with rusted weapons, stitched abominations lumbering after them like patchwork nightmares. Even though the place reeked of death, it pulsed with activity.
Damon had fully covered himself, a hood hiding his face, so he silently moved through the crowd. Being a dark faction player helped him not stand out, even if he was a different race.
He quickly walked out of the main area and into the deeper part of the Hollow Graves, where fewer players lingered. The air here was thicker, the fog swallowing sound, and every step crunched against bones half-buried in the blackened soil.
Damon knew exactly where to go. Sure enough, at the far edge of the graveyard, the ruins of a collapsed cathedral loomed, its spires broken, its stained glass windows shattered and replaced with pulsing necrotic wards. A dozen skeletal knights stood guard at the entrance, their soul-flames flickering like watchful eyes.
As Damon approached, several skull-helmed heads turned toward him in eerie unison. The guards crossed their weapons, forming an ’X’ that barred his way.
Before he could speak, the great doors of the cathedral creaked open, a hiss of cold mist spilling out.
From the shadows within, a short and thin kid emerged, draped in black robes embroidered with bone-white runes. The robes were a little baggy for him, the edges even trailing on the ground. He was also holding a staff in his hand that looked oversized.
Damon could tell that the whole ensemble was pretty high-tier, perhaps even a full set of epic-grade gear, but it still only ended up looking very comical on a person that size. It was as if he were wearing a costume for Halloween.
It took a lot of effort for Damon not to burst into laughter at the sight of the kid. His fiery green eyes, glaring at Damon with an intense murderous aura only made everything that much worse.
Damon knew he had already insulted the guy quite a bit before, but he no longer wanted to do that. There was no point. He had been catfished just like everyone else from his last life.
This was the Necro God everyone loved and cheered for. This was the dark hero whom the masses loved. There was no other option here except to accept the hard truth.
"I did not come here to fight." Damon quickly decided to clear up the misunderstanding. His crimson eyes glimmered beneath the hood as he raised his hands just slightly, a gesture of truce.
The boy’s staff trembled for half a second before slamming against the stone floor with a sharp crack. Deathly green sparks hissed upward like fireflies. The skeletal guards rattled but did not advance. The kid’s voice then came out shrill and venomous. "Why? Are you afraid of me, now, Blood God?"
"No, I am not." Damon waited a moment as he felt too cringed to even say it out loud, but he did anyways. "Necro God."
The kid, however, didn’t seem to care at all. "Blood God vs. Necro God! Shall we see once and for all who is the stronger God?" He slammed his staff on the ground again.
The next second, without warning, the ground split open beneath Damon’s feet as several skeletal claws erupted from the cracked stones, reaching for his ankles.
***
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