Li watched the battle unfold before him from a rather neutral position. He floated above a gathering of roots and leaves wreathed in green energy, taking a high vantage point to see where everything was happening. He saw as Tia surged forwards with an interesting mix of chaotic energy created from childlike glee and raging battle fervor.

With the widest smile plastered on her face, she dived deeper and deeper into the purple mist, her tiny feet almost barely touching the ground as they stepped past stone to stone, each step having so much force in it that they sent her gliding across the air like she was flying.

The rattle of bones and the groan of zombies filled the choking air, and were Tia any regular human fighter, then certainly she would have felt the terror of the scenery around her. The mist that seemed to get thicker and thicker, swirling and moving as if having a mind of its own, settling and thickening around all living intruders. And in that haze, there were countless threats. Unfeeling undead whose dead limbs felt no compassion, no mercy, only an instinctive desire to bring down the living.

But Tia was no regular human. She was a dragon, and a dragon merged with Li's own strength. She shredded through the mist like a whirlwind of unbound violence. With each step she took forward, her claws flashed, her tail whipped, and her wings batted, sending clouds of shattered bone and pulverized zombie flesh sputtering from the air.

"Careful, Tia!" said Li as he kept up from a fair distance behind her, wanting to see how she would handle the situation relatively on her own. "Conserve your energy. The undead mist grows stronger and stronger as you travel further in – wasting mana and skills on these lesser enemies is a bad idea."

"Okay, papa!" shouted Tia as she took a brief pause and breath. She ducked under hulking swipe from a zombie brute before moving again. This time with more controlled agility, leaping up and tearing off the zombie's head with one quick and clean motion instead of tearing it apart excessively.

"Good, good," said Li. He checked on the others.

Old Thane was in front of Li, the same childlike glee on Tia emanating from him as well. He laughed as he wrapped his brick-like hands around a zombie aarakowa's head and squeezed, splattering the rotted skull like a watermelon.

"Gods, lad!" said Old Thane. "It does do good for mine health to have some exercise now and then!"

"Careful, old man," said Li. "If gardening gets your back stiff, I don't know what all this moving's going to do."

"Nonsense, lad." Old Thane grunted as he took a step back, sensing that a Skeletal Pillar had risen from the ground in front of him. The pillar was an amalgamation of several skeletons and zombies attached together with tendons and sinews like string, and its shambling mass lashed out at the old man with dozens of limbs.

"This body of mine was never meant to work the earth. But this – this, it remembers well."

He shot out his left arm in a flurry of punches, casting the Brawler subclass skill [Jab Rain]. His arm began to blur as punch after punch came out in succession, and as he moved into the Skeletal Pillar, his hardened fist began to carve out rapid chunks from it with the same efficiency and explosive force as a machinegun.

Meanwhile, Zagan trotted behind the old man with an easy walking pace. Occasionally, he would turn his head towards an undead that slipped past Old Thane's range and loose a glare infused with cursed energy that disintegrated any lesser undead that happened to fall victim to it.

The demon did not grant the old man any strength, and Li could understand why. The old man wanted to fight, and he wanted to fight with his own strength for now.

And besides, it was not like the old man was any weakling. He was nearing level 60 – the peak of human strength – but as Li observed, old age in this world affected mortals by severely deteriorating their stats, locking them out of the stat requirements for the higher level skills.

Even so, Li could estimate that Old Thane was still around level 40 at base combat capacity, which was still leaps and bounds above almost every other human. However, even he could not match the ferocity of the beastwomen.

Vilga and Sheela were ahead of Old Thane, standing right by Tia, actually, making sure that the dragon's sides were covered while she charged forward. 

Vilga, despite being an impressive specimen of muscle easily comparable to any bodybuilder, moved with the grace of a world class gymnast and used her strength with a poise characteristic of a trained martial artist.

Li recognized she was a warrior primary with her first subclass being a brawler just like Old Thane. But where Thane relied on raw strength to weather blows and dish them out with his two subclasses of brawler and berserker, Vilga used equal parts agility and strength as brawler and monk, dancing across the rocky battlefield with compact punches, roundhouse kicks, and deadly throws all chained together by flourishing twirls.

Sheela was the most savage fighter. Her primary class was as an assassin, but she used her subclasses as hunter and blood shaman to be more like a frontline fighter. With blood pact sigils glowing all across her body in crimson gleam, she moved like a complete blur, disappearing and reappearing only to inflict devastatingly lethal single strikes.

"Are you two holding up fine?" said Li from his root platform, his hands behind his back. Every so often, a skeletal bird or zombie bat or some pesky flying creature would try to flutter up to him, completely devoid of any rational thought capable of recognizing his threat level. He would simply will his bed of roots to lash forward individual tendrils to swat down the flies.

"Of course, good seer!" said Mason as he used his longsword like a battering ram to push back a particularly big zombie brute. The hulking corpse stumbled backwards, and Mercer appeared above it, twirling with twin daggers mid-air as he sliced apart the hulk's neck, decapitating it.

As his brother landed, Mason provided cover, using a heavy two-handed thrust over Mercer's shoulder to skewer an approaching skeletal hound's head.

"Never better!" said Mercer between controlled breaths.

"Hm. Do let me know when you need to come up here. When the haze gets thicker, I should assume stronger creatures like Abominations, Geists, Wraiths, and Shades will make their appearance. When that happens, recognize your limits and take shelter here."

"We fight til' we can no more!" said Mason as he used [Whirl], spinning once with his longsword while charging forwards to cleave apart a small crowd of skeletons.

"And with the lady aiding us, it is unlikely we shall ever face defeat," said Mercer as he followed close behind his brother, though the two of them could not muster up enough power to step more than a few meters past Li.

They were left struggling to try and catch up to the backs of Old Thane, Zagan, and ahead of them, Tia and the beastwomen. Behind Li, the Vukanovi was essentially like a rear vanguard, the roots at its stem acting like impaling stakes that picked off any undead that the charging group ahead left behind. 

"When I can, I shalt use mine magics to aid thee," said Asala from the root platform, for her priority was in recording. But every so often, she would flit a gaze to the two humans and grant them some minor assistance, casting a sand barrier or using a spell like [stone shard shot] to weaken clusters of skeletal enemies for the brothers did not have bludgeoning weapons suited for breaking them down.

"Ah," said Mercer as he witnessed Asala use another stone shard shot to shatter off a zombie knight's legs. "I will be certain to treat you to a fine dinner after this ordeal."

Asala did not look up from her tablet but did respond. "If thou art able to survive, then certainly, I will not deny myself a free meal."

"See that, brother!" said Mercer as he looked up to Asala. "My charm never fails me."

Mason turned around and roughly shoved his brother to the side, preventing a rotten arrow from landing. Mason turned his shoulder forwards, letting the arrow instead bounce off a shoulder plate. "And you, little brother, must learn to think with the smarter of your two heads."

The brothers quickly regained their stride, looking after each other's backs with a particularly close unity that even Li could appreciate.

Li spoke to Asala. "Why is it that you spend your time to aid them?"

"When I was yet a hatchling, tales of heroes have always grasped mine interest. Heroes forged unto gold from nothing. I amuse myself seeing some potential of such story with those two," said Asala.

"Well, I do not know about that," said Li as he watched the brothers press forward. In their perspective, even if they knew that they had strong allies ahead and a divine messenger behind them, they were still walking into a storm of undeath that would have frozen most of their peers in fear.

That was commendable, but in the end, bravery alone was not enough. But it was a start. "Yet, I can see some potential. In any case, will it be fine for me to leave you two with you for now? I will begin moving ahead."

"That is agreeable to me," said Asala as she put down her tablet, putting it into a pouch slung by her waist. She prepared more actively to defend and use her magic, and Li could trust her, for in actuality, she was the strongest one here aside from Zagan and Li.

She was near level 50, and it was evident that she was no empty minded scholar either, for though one of her subclasses as clairvoyant was not too combat oriented, her other subclass as geomancer gave her more than enough combat ability to hold her own.

Li took a step forwards, and another root platform rose up from the ground, hovering him forwards.