Since my Intelligence was pretty high, I dealt a fairly decent amount of damage with the wand that I had made but my damage output was nothing compared to what Kelly and Iris were capable of. Kelly’s Fire Magic Core wasn’t her most powerful Core, but she had apparently just unlocked a spell that sent a large gout of flame into the horde of undead that was approaching the wall.

Sadly, most of the undead were just skeletons and fire magic wasn’t that effective against them but the few zombies in the crowd ignited instantly. As they burned the zombies started releasing foul-smelling smoke that thankfully didn’t seem to be harmful other than making it harder to see and breathe.

Iris’ Light Magic was also wreaking havoc in the ranks of the undead since that was their greatest weakness. Sadly, since she had mostly focused on getting healing magic, she only really had single target spells, but they were nonetheless effective against the targets that they hit.

Tylie’s chakrams were also surprisingly effective against the undead since she had brought some vials of Undead Bane with her that allowed the otherwise ineffective weapon to deal much more damage than it would normally do. Even if the weapon failed to kill an undead it at least removed a limb. If the limb happened to be a leg, then the undead was quickly trampled under the uncaring feet of their fellow undead and if it was an arm then it made them considerably less dangerous to fight so I decided to focus my attentions on the uninjured ones as much as possible.

Even Warren was doing pretty well with the wand that I’d given him since his Intelligence was almost as high as mine. However, since he hadn’t used a wand before his damage output was still fairly limited compared to anyone else even Fern who had a lower Intelligence Stat than he did purely because she had Levelled Up Soul Core in her wand.

Most of the farmers were individually much less effective than we were but since they outnumbered us considerably, they were able to bring down large numbers of the undead. There were a couple of older looking farmers who obviously had more combat experience than the others but even they paled in comparison to Tylie’s uncle.

While Earth Magic wasn’t really an offensive type of magic compared to something like Fire Magic but apparently that didn’t matter when you could create massive holes under the feet of your enemies and then bury them under several tons of earth and rock. I wasn’t sure if that was going to kill the undead but at least it took them out of the fight for the foreseeable future. He also created fields of spikes that made it harder for the undead to approach the walls.

But even all of that was unable to prevent the veritable tide of undead from making it to the base of the walls that Lionel had created with his Earth Magic. This meant that the farmers who didn’t have ranged weapons were finally able to act. Their spears were only barely long enough for them to be able to attack the undead but since they didn’t have enough Undead Bane to go around their attacks were only really effective at keeping the undead from climbing the walls.

The next problem occurred when the Skeletal Archers got into range. Most of the Skeletal Archers weren’t very effective archers but there were a few that were able to use Weapon Skills that made them much more dangerous than their weaker counterparts. As soon as I realized what 2was going on I quickly conjured a barrier that started just below the wall so that we could fire our weapons either around or over the top of it. I also told Evie to focus on taking out the more powerful archers while Warren, Fern and I took out the weaker ones. Kelly already knew that she would be best used to take out larger groups of the undead with her Fire Magic but also made sure to work with Lionel to make some crenellations on top of the wall that the farmers could hide behind.

At first, I was a little confused as to why Lionel hadn’t already done this but then I realized that he wasn’t expecting to be attacked by this many undead that were as well organized as these ones seemed to be. The undead also learned more quickly than I would’ve liked. What few Skeletons that were equipped with shields had started to make their way to the front of groups as they approached which made it harder for us to target them.

Another real problem was going to rear its ugly head pretty soon. With the amount of SP that we were burning through we were going to run out fairly quickly and we hadn’t really brought enough potions to keep up our assault for that much longer. When I broached the issue to Lionel the burly man had just laughed at me before turning to one of the spear-wielding farmers and asking how many SP Potions they had in stock.

“We have 50 Minor SP Potions, 70 Moderate SP Potions and 20 Major SP Potions,” the man replied quickly causing my eyes to bulge out of my head in shock.

“SP Potions are the main product that this farm produces,” Lionel explained with a chuckle. “We grow and mix all of them ourselves so I can assure you that they’re of the highest quality available. This farm is actually one of the major suppliers of SP Potions in the entire country which is part of the reason that I was so sure that we would be able to hold off an attack. I’m sure that you’ve already noticed that some of my men are retired soldiers which means that they’re pretty tough compared to the younger ones. With a steady supply of SP Potions, we should’ve been able to hold off a smaller group of undead pretty easily.”

I looked around at the preparations that Lionel and the farmers had made before we’d arrived and nodded in agreement. While Lionel had definitely underestimated what they were up against it was becoming obvious that why he had thought that they would be able to handle being attacked. It was just a bit unfortunate that he hadn’t known how bad things were.

Lionel asked one of the farmers to get some SP Potions from their stores which should last us quite a while. The Moderate SP Potions restored 100 SP and increased regen by 25% for 1 minute after use which was much more efficient than the Minor Potions that we had brought with us that only restored 40 SP. The Major Potions on the other hand were far more than we needed and were basically reserved for Lionel who had been burning through his SP Pool at a speed that would’ve drained me dry in less than five minutes and that was being generous.

Things basically continued the way that they had been for another fifteen minutes or so before the more powerful Skeleton Knights started to approach the wall. I wasn’t sure if it was the Lich or something else that was controlling this group of undead, but it looked like they were starting to get a little impatient. These Skeleton Knights were all over Level 15 and had a full set of plate armor and a shield equipped which meant that they could tank almost anything that we could hit them with. Evie’s Light Magic still dealt a decent amount of damage to them and both Lionel and Tylie should be able to take them out pretty easily. However, the real problem was that whatever was controlling them had obviously figured out how dangerous grouping up was with Lionel controlling the battlefield like he was, so they were pretty well spread out.

This meant that Lionel would have to expend a significant amount of his SP to take out more than one of them which just wasn’t really worth it so instead he just opened up large holes in the ground underneath the Skeleton Knights that also swallowed several other undead before refilling the hole over the top of them. Whatever spell he was using to do that had a cooldown over nearly two minutes. So, while he was waiting to be able to use that spell again, he instead turned the ground just in front of the wall to mud causing the corpses of the undead that we had already killed to start sinking into the ground a bit. This was a pretty good decision since the bodies were starting to stack up which had actually allowed some of the skeletons to attack some of the farmers.

As yet there were only a few people that had been badly injured, and they had been quickly healed by an older woman who was apparently Lionel’s wife. It was honestly impressive that none of the farmers had been killed yet which was probably a testament to the preparation that they had made before we’d arrived more than anything else. However, I knew that could change at a moment’s notice.

In fact, I was willing to bet that things were going to change any minute now since the Siege Thrall suddenly unleashed an enraged roar and started surging towards the walls. Seeing this Lionel cursed loudly before shouting at us to focus our attacks on the Siege Thrall while he and his men kept the other undead off our backs. I stared at the massive mountain of patched together flesh with a dumbstruck look on my face for a few seconds before nodding in agreement. My Lightning Magic was relatively effective against the few undead that still had flesh on their bones.

One of the interesting things about undead was that Skeletons kept some of the Weapon Skills and Magic that they’d learned while they were alive but lost Stats and Levels thanks to the loss of most of their flesh Zombies and hopefully things like this Siege Thrall were different. Zombies instead kept most of the Stats that they had while they were alive, particularly their physical Stats but lost their Skills and Magic. Since their bodies were still powered by flesh this meant that things like Fire and Lightning Magic were still relatively effective against them. Fire Magic was naturally more effective than my Lightning Magic, but I’d take what I could get when there was a patchwork Zombie the size of an elephant making its way towards us.

The real problem now was that it meant that the Skeleton Knights would be more likely to reach the bottom of the wall, but it was pretty clear that the Siege Thrall was a much bigger threat than they were right now. It was Level 35, and its name was silver which Katy quickly explained meant that it was a Miniboss. While Minibosses in Soul Core Online weren’t as strong as a Boss was its Level meant that it was quite a lot stronger than the Rabbit Matriarch that we had killed and what’s some of us weren’t even able to attack it with our main weapons.

Kelly suggested that we focus on attacking the places on the monster’s legs where the flesh had been sewn together in the hopes of slowing the thing down or even immobilizing it. I immediately agreed with her because I couldn’t think of any other option that we had.

So began the most aggravating part of the entire night. To my surprise the Siege Thrall was smart enough to understand what we were doing. The problem was that it didn’t really have any method to prevent us from attacking its weak points. Instead, it picked up its fellow undead and hurled them at us. Katy and Warren switched their attacks to knocking these makeshift projectiles out of the air as best they could. This worked pretty well for the Zombies because they were more likely to stay in one piece, but the real problems were when it threw Skeletons at us. Even if they didn’t kill the Skeleton before it landed on our side of the wall any damage that was dealt to them tended to create dangerous fragments of bone that acted like shrapnel as it flew, and more than one farmer was hit.

Of course, it was still worse if they managed to land inside the walls but the fact that they were dangerous even if they were killed was a big problem for us. But the Siege Thrall was such a threat that I knew that we couldn’t really afford for me to change my target to the undead that the Siege Thrall was throwing at us. So, all I could do was grit my teeth and continue to pummel the Siege Thrall with a s much magic as I possibly could and hope that everyone else could deal with any undead that managed to make it over the walls.

Eventually we finally managed to damage the leg that we were targeting enough that the Siege Thrall fell to one knee. Upon seeing this Lionel immediately cast the same spell that he had been using to bury the undead on the Siege Thralls injured leg covering it with earth. I wasn’t sure how long this was going to last but I decided to not waste time by asking. I downed a Moderate SP Potion and cast my Lightning Stream spell while Kelly did the same thing wither her Flamethrower spell in an attempt to do as much damage as we could before the Thrall regained its feet.

It was at this point that the thing that had been commanding this group of undead finally made an appearance. A howl of rage came from the back of the horde which parted as a mounted figure charged towards the Siege Thrall. I cursed angrily as a purple barrier appeared in front of the massive monster just begore our spells struck then fell silent when I saw the thing that had protected it.

“Please tell that thing isn’t the Lich,” I muttered to a grim-faced Tylie as I stared at the wizened thing which looked like suspiciously like a mummy wearing a robe. The hideous creature was on the back of a similarly desiccated looking horse and was carrying an intricate looking staff.

“Well, it’s definitely a Lich but it’s not powerful enough to be the one that raised all of these undead,” Tylie replied. “It’s far too weak.”

“Seems pretty strong to me,” Kelly muttered to herself, so I decided to quickly check the hideous monster’s Level. Much like the Siege Thrall it was a Miniboss which pretty much confirmed Tylie’s theory that it wasn’t the Lich responsible for the attack on Polson’s Warding Crystal. However, at Level 40 it was even stronger than the Siege Thrall and I was pretty sure that there was no way that we were defeating both it and the Thrall without losing a pretty significant number of the farmers.

A chill ran down my back as its glowing blue eyes stared back at me. We had killed almost half of the undead that were under its command at this point, and I could see that it was trying to judge whether it was going to be worth it to keep attacking us or not now that we had also damaged the Siege Thrall.

We stared at each other silently for a few moments as everything around us came to a halt. For some reason I knew that if any of us attacked the Lich it would immediately attack but thankfully no one was foolish enough to do that. After nearly a full minute the Lich turned around and started riding away causing me to breath a sigh of relief just as the undead started continuing their assault on the wall.

I raised my wand towards the Siege Thrall as it too clambered back to its feet but then paused when it turned around and started limping off in the direction that its Lich master was heading in.

“Looks like it left these undead behind to cover its retreat,” Kelly guessed as she launched a fireball at a group of undead. “And take out as many of us as they can while it does so.”

“That seems about right,” I sighed as I fired a small bolt of energy at an already damaged Skeleton from the tip of my wand. “Although if they can afford to throw away this many undead then that doesn’t bid well for when they finally attack Polson.”

“That’s a good point,’ Tylie agreed as she hurled one of her chakrams into the fray.

“It does look like the remaining Skeleton Knights are withdrawing though,’ Warren pointed out as he gestured towards the armored forms that were pushing their way back through the throng of their fellow undead. “Which means that they’re not very common.”

“Another good point,” Tylie nodded. “Sadly, it means that we’ll probably fighting the people that the undead have been kidnapping when they finally attack Polson.”

“So, we should be trying to take out as many of these undead as we can before they decide to pull back as well,” Evie said, and we all nodded in agreement.

“That’s right, the more undead that we can take out now the less we have to worry about later,” Tylie agreed. “Speaking of which, what are you planning to do after this Uncle Lionel?”

“I get it already,” the large man grumbled irritably. “We’ll come back to Polson with you. We’ll just need some time to pack everything up. And before you ask yes, we’ll be bringing all the stock that we have with us.”

“Thank you, uncle,” Tylie said with a triumphant smile. “I will make sure that you are compensated for any potions that we use.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Lionel grumbled but I could tell that he wasn’t actually that upset.

It was past midnight at this point and now that the real threats had retreated, we should be able to get through the rest of the night without too many casualties. About an hour later Lionel even started letting some of the exhausted looking farmers take a break while the rest of us continued to thin out the horde which was much smaller now.

That didn’t mean that everything went perfectly. One of the farmers was killed when his spear got stuck in the body of one a Zombie and was pulled from the top of the wall and torn to pieces. This caused the morale of the already exhausted farmers to drop even further and lead to several more casualties throughout the rest of the night. Luckily, we managed to save most of them but there were a couple that were pretty badly wounded. Hopefully we would be able to get them healed when we got back to town but for now, they were just going to be in the way, so they were holed up inside the farmhouse.

By the time that the sun was beginning to peak over the horizon the undead were already starting to retreat back into the shade of the trees. One of the Zombies got caught in full sunlight before it could make it back into the forest and started losing large chunks of flesh. It wasn’t enough to kill it, but it was clear just how much weaker undead were once the sun was up. However, our priority had to be getting the farmers and Lionel back to Polson rather than chasing down the remnants of the undead.

I also had several blinking symbols in the corner of my vision telling me that I had Levelled Up some of my Soul Cores, but I decided to ignore them for now while we helped the farmers prepare to leave.