Suddenly Apinya was enveloped in a massive pillar of golden light. That was when all hell broke loose.

Apinya's spell nearly blinded me with its luminescence, but I could instantaneously that the effects were much, much worse upon our enemies.

From Apinya's own pillar of holy light, several diverging streams of golden color emerged and streaked above the battlefield, and fell onto the undead. Two of the beams struck directly on top of a pair of charging champions, while the remaining three blasted in neat intervals throughout the marching horde positioned in the wake of the behemoth's charge.

While the physical damage was hard to see, as there were no... Massive explosions, flying debris, or exploding balls of fire; it was easy to tell that the immediate aftermath did not bode so well for the impacted undead. As the beams of light crashed onto the ground, they did indeed cause their own detonations as the surrounding areas were enveloped in the golden light. Despite the lack of heat or fire of any kind, the spell itself caused a literal sizzling of the undead's bodies.

I looked towards Apinya utterly surprised. "When the hell did you learn a Tier 2 Conjuration!?" I exclaimed. I was understandably surprised, considering Apinya's supposed level and class, that should have been practically impossible.

Apinya only turned my way as his pillar of light receded. Then, panting in visible exhaustion, he smiled, "The gods have blessed me."

I mentally facepalmed, 'of course that's the extent of his explanation.' The spell he had just used was one that he shouldn't have been capable of at his level. It only added to the mysteries of our resident Priest.

Regardless, the impact of his spell was quite hard to miss, as similar to my own spell, his impact left numerous amounts of undead strewn across the battlefield, either completely dismantled, or paralyzed by the impact. There were quite a few undead whose previously glowing eyes had been extinguished. Still, others only seemed to be incapacitated for the time being, as they struggled to maneuver bodies that were suddenly brittle.

Of more immediate interest to me, however, was the effect that the spell had on the undead champions. Of the five charging undead champions, two had been hit by Apinya's magic. It was obvious that they were much worse for wear. Even though they weren't dead, their charge had been forcefully interrupted as they fell to the ground. It was almost as though a massive amount of electricity had momentarily paralyzed them, causing their fall. To our good fortune, it seemed that they would at the very least be incapacitated for a few more minutes. That left us to face the immediate threat of three of the champions. The fight certainly had just become a lot more manageable, as Kevin, myself, and our three heavy-hitters -Alex, Dante, and Antonio- stepped forward to confront the charging champions.

Wordlessly Kevin charged towards the champion on the left side, I moved towards the one in the middle, and Alex, Dante, and Antonio rushed to intercept the one on the right. We would only have two or three minutes tops to take out the champions before the undead horde recovered and swarmed us.

While the fighting would be tough, I was sure that we all would rise to the challenge.

Focusing on my own opponent, I ran forward, with my sword in hand to confront the champion who was unfortunate enough to be my opponent. As soon as I neared the towering monstrosity, the behemoth raised its lumbering arms and brought them down in front of it, fully intending to crush me under their weight. However, it was clear that the giant brutes were just that, brutes. As soon as I noticed the incoming strike I sidestepped to the right side of the undead behemoth and dodged the attack, only to follow up with a subsequent attack of my own as I slashed the side of the hulking beast. To my surprise, my strike didn't puncture nearly as far as I thought it would, and I only managed to impale a few inches before my blade was stopped and I was forced to pull it out.

I only just managed to remove it when my undead foe began to turn its body, nearly pulling my impaled sword along with it. In turn, I jumped back a dozen feet to put some quick distance between us.

'Well, that didn't work nearly as well as I thought it would', I thought. The constitution level of the beast was definitely nothing to scoff at apparently. So, even though I was hoping to conserve my mana for the fight that would surely come with the [Lich], I decided that I couldn't avoid the matter. There was one more trick up my sleeve that I decided would fit the moment. In a split second, I shifted my attention to my mana flow, and began charting my mana once again along my mana network, and into my right hand. As it began to gather in place, I siphoned it into the metal of the sword. I could feel the metal blade fighting against the sudden influx of mana, but kept at it.

While it wasn't perfect, and certainly crude, I had augmented my understanding of heating fire mana, and applied it to my sword. I moved the mana through the blade causing it to vibrate. Almost instantly I could feel the heat begin to radiate from the sword as it began to heat up and simmer. Now, with a superheated sword, I could strike back. It was just in time too, as the lumbering behemoth once again made a charge towards me.

Once again, my higher agility stat came into play as I maneuvered past the incoming strike. As the attack struck the ground, a hailstorm of debris rocketed around the area. Despite the behemoth's immense strength and constitution, its agility was laughable and I was capable of dodging past any strike it delivered without too much effort. However, I needed to finish the fight quickly as the hordes of undead were already getting uncomfortably close.

With the sword now encompassed with a scalding heat, I could already notice the durability value of my weapon beginning to tick down, which meant that whatever I wanted to do, I was going to need to do it quickly.

As the behemoth began pulling at its fist that was currently lodged into the pavement, I lowered myself, and then jumped into the air, sailing towards the undead champions' head. It could do little to prevent my incoming attack and it only watched as I came closer. It didn't appear worried about my imminent strike, likely expecting it to have a similar effect as my first had. This, of course, proved quite wrong for the lumbering giant, as my superheated sword connected to the flesh along the nape of its neck. The strike passed through like a knife through butter severing the flesh and bones that comprised the cervical spine. The head of the undead champion went soaring, as its body went limp and sunk to the ground. I landed back on my feet and, after making sure that the beast was dead by looking at my new experience notification, turned around to survey the other two fights.

Kevin was currently pummeling the behemoth he was faced against. Kevin's physical attributes had already increased a fair bit past my own, and it looked like it was already bearing fruit. He was fighting on par with the behemoth meeting its blows squarely. Kevin's agility was lacking in some ways, so he could not avoid its attacks as well as I could. However, he was still holding his own. His shield fared well in glancing off any hits from the behemoth, although it was beginning to show signs of wear. It was clear that in this fight, Kevin would come out on top, as slowly, but surely, Kevin whittled down the champion.

Turning my attention to Alex, Dante, and Antonio, I also made sure that they were performing well. Despite the level difference, the three of them were manifesting a remarkable knack for teamwork, and it showed as one would constantly take the attention of the behemoth, while the others hacked away. Even though their individual attacks didn't do much damage, they were managing to whittle the behemoth down, little by little.

As such, I turned my direction to the two remaining undead champions that had been incapacitated by Apinya. With the way they were now, it would be easy to take them out, and frankly, it would be the smarter move. If we allowed the two of them to recover in time for the main undead force to arrive then we'd have quite a few issues. I had to be quick though, as they were about to be under the protective cover of the throng of hundreds of undead making their way towards us.

Choosing to conserve my magic, I rushed forward, fast enough where I was sure I would have even made the Olympic runner Usain Bolt proud. In a matter of seconds, I reached the fallen body of the first of my targeted champions. I was taking a massive risk here, the undead army was already nearly fifty feet away and their groans were beginning to drown out any other audible noise.

I sprung on top of the champion's head. It laid face up and looking into its mutilated face, I could sense that the beast was in the midst of a struggle to regain control over its own body. It was too late, however. I quickly siphoned another wave of mana into my sword, causing it to glow once more with its overflowing amount of mana.

As soon as I felt it reach a sufficient threshold, I slammed my sword down and straight through the forehead of the undead beast. It took several seconds, but as the searing heat flooded the small cavity of its head, the behemoth succumbed and died.

Just a dozen feet away lay the other behemoth, but once again the mass of undead had drawn even closer. There was no way I could defeat it without having the undead swell around me. I had to try though.

I leaped through the air to land the dozen or so feet away on top of the behemoth. Halfway through my leap, I suddenly picked up a searing noise tear through the air, and just as I came down onto the last of the undead champions, a torrent of spellfire erupted behind me, engulfing the line of undead closest to me.

With a cursory glance behind me, I noticed that it seemed our spellcasters had finally joined the fight with the undead finally within range of their spells. Taking the scant several seconds that the barrage just bought me, I thrust my sword once again into this second and last behemoth, and upon verifying its death, I felt a sudden shift in my body signaling I had just leveled up. I quickly pulled up the list of notifications, and subsequently discarded them soon after verifying my level increase.

Skill [Basic Mana Manipulation] has advanced to Level 9

65 experience points received.

...

Skill [Intermediate Fire Elemental Affinity] has advanced to Level 6

100 experience points received.

...

[Reanimated Decomposing Champion of the Lich] [Unique] defeated.

105 experience points received.

...

[Reanimated Decomposing Champion of the Lich] [Unique] defeated with the help of others.

76.17 experience points received.

...

Skill [Intermediate Fire Elemental Affinity] has advanced to Level 7

110 experience points received.

...

[Reanimated Decomposing Champion of the Lich] [Unique] defeated with the help of others.

81.33 experience points received.

...

833.11 / 767.64 experience points until Level 14

...

Congratulations!

You have now advanced to Level 14!

+4 Strength, +3 Constitution, +2 Agility, +3 Wisdom, +4 Intelligence, & +1 Charisma awarded!

+4 Free Attribute Points Awarded!

...

65.47 / 882.78 experience points until Level 15

I began to dash back to our line near the palisade wall. I made sure to watch my footing, avoiding the many pitfalls that had been prepared for our undead enemy. Luckily we had engaged the undead champions before they could expose the multitude of traps arrayed in front of our defensive. At this point, all we could do now was wait for the horde to trigger them before we descended upon them.

Kevin and the other three had also successfully defeated their targets while I had been busy defeating the remaining champions, and they were well in front of me, already in the process of making their way back to our defenses. As I looked closer though I noticed our three lower-leveled fighters appeared to be boasting a new host of scratches and injuries, but none of them seemed too wounded.

Almost out of nowhere, a screech was heard. Quite different from the ambient moans and groans of the undead horde on our tail. The Lich was angered, and the loss of his champions had evidently enraged him. I abruptly felt a shift in the mana behind me. Even though I saw nothing, I still felt the swirling vortex of mana that appeared to be centering itself around the lich himself, transforming into the dark, and sinister hue of death mana that I had grown accustomed to seeing in the ambiance around us.

Suddenly I felt a discharge, and within an instant, a barrage of dark-blue bolts cascaded around our retreating group. I maneuvered just slightly, avoiding a bolt that had been directed towards my back, however, some of the others weren't so lucky. Kevin was barely clipped, but even the scant impact dealt enough unexpected damage to where he yelped out from the mere intensity of the agony he experienced. Even though the attack missed both Dante and Alex, Antonio wasn't so lucky. He didn't even have the chance to see it coming as a bolt of the death mana impaled his side. The dart sailed straight through him and dissipated on its impact into the ground, but the damage was done. A significant segment of Antonio's side had withered away at the touch of the death mana and with a hoarse cry, he fell to the ground.

"Shit, shit, shit!" I yelled out.

Both Dante and Alex noticed the sudden and terrible turn of events and started to stop and turn around.

"Keep going!" I cried out, "I'll handle it!"

With slight hesitation, Alex and Dante continued their retreat, while I diverted my trajectory to intercept Antonio's fallen body. I could only pray the man was still alive.

As I rushed to his side, I took several precious seconds to verify he still had a pulse.

It had already begun to weaken, and blood had begun to pool out from the wound in his side. Albeit knowing it was basic knowledge not to move a victim of a tragic accident, it was invariably better to drag him with me back to our lines rather than to leave him to succumb to the undead hordes advance. I could only hope that Apinya possessed an arsenal of healing magic capable of saving Antonio before he bled out.

Fortunately, Antonio was light in my embrace, as I thrust the man into my arms and dashed with him behind our line of shaken draftees. I could tell everybody was unnerved watching one of our own fall, but that was of little import to me as I focused first on stabilizing Antonio. As soon as I squeezed through an opening in the cars marking our impromptu gate I laid Antonio down. Alejandro was the most concerned of all of us, as he watched Antonio begin to give in to a wound that would surely take his life without some sort of divine intervention.

I looked towards Apinya, and the normally crazed man had a serious look in his eyes, one overcome with the purpose of his calling as a priest. He rushed forward and knelt by Antonio's side, just as Alex too knelt down next to Antonio and began some rudimentary first aid he had learned as a medical professional.

"He won't make it with the amount of blood he is losing," Alex somberly announced as he ripped off a strip of clothing from the hem of his shirt, attempting to staunch the flow of blood.

Apinya, positioned on the opposite side of Antonio began to raise his arms in the air, and pray. Though, before the apocalyptic advent of the system I may have been quite skeptical of any positive outcome of the Priest's actions, my perspective on the world had drastically changed. Apinya now possessed some inexplicable, and very real, powers over the forces of the divine. Hopefully enough to save Antonio's life.

The past two weeks, despite its short time frame, had felt like years in our small community as we sought to survive day-to-day. Our bonds had grown dramatically in that short timespan and none of us were eager to see one of our own pass on.

"Oh holy deity," Apinya began, "Grant this humble servant your mercy, your benevolence, as he has fought as a holy warrior under your watchful guidance. His efforts to bear the torch of the good against the forces of evil merit the reaping of the holy deities' divine help..." As Apinya continued his chant, I could only briefly watch before I was forced to turn back towards the oncoming horde of the dead. The true battle was about to begin, and unfortunately, we had just lost one of the stronger members of our defensive force.

However, as I felt the circulation of divine mana coalesce around Apinya, I could only hope it was enough to save the man's life. As of now though, he was no longer capable of participating in our struggle for the survival of the community. With a grim face, I once again marched to the front of our arrayed forces.

"We knew sacrifices may have to be made," I began as I trudged forward, "but despite the challenge arrayed before us, we will not go down without a fight!" I yelled to the strengthening resolve of my community members.

As the first line of undead fell upon our pitfalls, I bellowed, "We will not fall into the depths of despair quietly!"

Without warning, I felt as though a sense of restorative energy flooded into my being and those around me. It was no skill I had activated, or by any of the others for that matter, even Apinya was evidently not the source despite the divine nature of its effects. I knew and subsequently determined, that our mysterious Benefactor had apparently been watching us closely this entire time.

So with renewed vigor, we anticipated the clash between our two forces.