Ferris almost guffawed. The dominion finally showed itself! If she killed it, the fog would disappear, and Ryu would be able to sense them.
"Yosh." Ferris cracked her knuckles. Eyes blazed in focus. Her target, the wraith.
But before she could take her leap, Dorian barged her way, screaming, "Are you crazy?! That's a Rank-A monster! We couldn't defeat it even if we combine our strength!"
"Huh?" Ferris scowled. "That's our fast pass in finding the carriage."
Dorian shook his head. "It's not worth it if it caused our lives."
Ferris smirked. "You're awfully twisted. You seem friendly at first, but the truth is . . . you're the most empathetic out of them."
Dorian's expression dropped. "I'm alive to this day because I know to pick my battles."
"Dorian, you coward! You're always like that!" Isaac spat.
Ferris looked Dorian in the eyes. "Either way. You'll never get out of here as long as it's alive. It's a dominion, remember? This is its domain."
Dorian's face twisted, and Ferris flexed a brow. He gritted his teeth before he blew some air. He wielded his sword and forced a smile.
"You're right. That's unlike me to lose my cool. Sorry."
The mercenaries all held their weapons and were ready to fight, but the wraith just looked at them without doing anything.
"Why isn't it moving?"
"Is it a trick?"
"Should we attack it first?"
"It's holding us, hostage," Ferris said.
Everyone looked at her. "Hostage?"
Ferris didn't explain as she pulled her knives and leaped into the air.
"Hey, wait!"
The wraith's head cracked in Ferris's direction, and its hallowed eyes glowed green. It raised a finger, and beams of greenish light shot forth in all directions.
Screaming souls rippled throughout the greenish beams, raising Ferris's fine hairs as she avoided the greenish rays. One hit from that, and it would suck her soul. That meant instant death.
Damn! Ferris cursed. Those green rays like tentacles couldn't be deflected by physical attack. She could only avoid it. But with her tiny human form, it was asking too much.
A beam of greenish light grazed her skin, sizzling her flesh, and before it would get infested, she cut it. As it healed, her momentum didn't stop. She was getting closer, knives seeking the wraith's head, and the beams of light that went past her change course and pursued her from the back.
Fuck! Those things could be controlled?! Ferris aborted her plans and immediately cast a spell.
[Shadow Rain]
Volleys of dark shadows shot forth from her hands and collided with the rays of greenish light.
BOOM!
The impact sent Ferris flying against the branches of the dead trees. It softened her fall, and she landed on the ground in all fours.
"Grr . . ." Ferris's eyes dilated, and her fangs almost came out as she eyed the wraith. Fighting it with her human body was impossible. Her skin was torn from the force of the explosion, and there was a bone sticking out from her calves.
How weak the human body is. If she was in her demon form . . . She eyed the dreaded faces of the mercenaries, and her blood boiled in excitement.
Ferris shook her head and snapped out of the control of her inner demons. She healed her broken calves and torn skin. In seconds, she was up and wiping the blood from her mouth.
"Don't fight it on your own! We need to cooperate to bring it down," Dorian said and instructed the others, "All mages support as at the back while the rest of us attack it together."
Ferris wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. "What kind of plan is that?"
Dorian didn't spare Ferris a glance. His whole focus was on the wraith. "We don't know what it's capable of. If we attack it together, we might find an opening."
"I think its main source of power is that tentacle-like greenish rays," said one of the merc.
Isaac glanced at the others. "Physical attack won't work on it."
"We have to try, at least." Dorian jumped forward, leading the charge, and the others followed suit. The mages cast a spell. Their mouth never ceased mumbling incantations.
The wraith's tentacle-like beam of rays moved in a whip-like manner.
Agghhh . . .
The souls it absorbed from all over the mountains produced screeching cries, and they shot forth towards Dorian and the others. Isaac and the two mages finished their chant, and protective crystalline armors wrapped the mercenaries' bodies, decreasing damage from the undead while their armors and weapons were imbued with elemental affinities to combat its immunity with physical attacks.
[Holly Blessing]
[Reinforce Armor]
[Reinforce Weapon]
Ferris was omitted, but she didn't need those useless armors. Flexing her daggers in both hands, she cast a spell, and the knives were wrapped in twisting dark light.
[Demon's Rot]
Infused with demonic aura, the slightest touch of her daggers would disintegrate the wraith into ashes. It was the perfect spell for the undead.
Dorian, Ferris, and a total of two mercenaries attacked the wraith simultaneously, and as they did, Pedro shot arrows after arrows towards the wraith. His arrows were made of his mana, so Pedro was confident that he could at least kill it with those.
Barraged with attacks from all sides and sensing danger from Ferris's dagger, the wraith roared, an eerie cry that almost shattered everyone's soul. A loud and powerful pulse shot forth from its body, and all attack physical and magic were repelled.
Ferris, Dorian, and the others were flung away by the force, and the arrows broke and shattered into particles before they disappeared.
In mid-air, Ferris's eyes rounded when the wraith's tentacles swept towards them. The howling cries of thousands of souls ripped the air. It curved with no fixed pattern. It was impossible to escape!
She bit her lip and cast a skill.
[Shadow Double]
Ferries created a doppelganger fifty meters away from the wraith, and just in time, the tentacle struck her, she changed position with her replica. The ray of greenish light passed through Ferris doppelganger's body, and the latter dissolved into dark smog.
At the same time, Dorian saw the approaching rays of greenish light so fast he didn't have time to think when he depleted almost half his mana to use his skill.
[Blink]
Within a hundred meters away from the tentacles, Dorian appeared and caught his breath. The aftermath of the skill always left him dizzy. He controlled his breathing and looked at the others.
Multiple tentacles directly hit the two swordsmen who didn't dodge in time, and not even the protective spell on their body prevented their soul from being sucked out.
Within seconds, the two mercs' bodies aged, wrinkled skin fitted their bones, and not long, they were just dried skin and skeletons.