(Author: Hello all. Been busy writing Jade Immortal and played a bit of Skyrim. Never played as a necromancer, or mage for that matter besides healing magic, in Skyrim so I spent a lot of time playing my other characters while looking for new spells to see what they would look like. Anyway, Elgar punished his bullies and now arrives in front of the door to the heart of the catacombs. Inside, Tristan believes a lich guards the treasures and the Urn of the Demon King. As Elgar is only a rank 1 mage, apprentice mage, his magic will have no affect on the lich itself. How will he support Tristan who will fight the lich head on? Enjoy.)

Chapter 4: Ancient Lich

Elgar looked into the memories of his past life about a lich.

He had only eaten a few in his past life. An ordinary mage had a tenth of the amount of mana of a lich on the same level. They lacked any physical strength and dominated their enemies by using magic and summoning minions. As Elgar's new form was only a rank 1 mage, his magic would have no affect on the lich. Elgar finished replenishing his lost mana and gripped his spear tightly. Luckily, he was part demon thanks to his father being a quarter demon and half dragon thanks to his mother. He could protect himself using sheer power. After all, that's why he wielded a spear infused with a mana stone instead of a more powerful staff.

He wanted to be a necromancer like no other, which meant using a sword. However, his family only had spears with mana stones. He hoped such a sword was in the catacombs. After all, everyone loved swords. Tristan took out a black wooden staff with runes etched from the bottom all the way to a brilliant amethyst orb on the top.

Amethysts were highly valued by warriors and mages as they contain massive amounts of spirit energy. Mages used amethysts to augment their spells while warriors absorbed the spirit energy inside amethyst, a loss compared to a mage as they can still use the amethyst. Enchanters of high abilities were the most paid mage in any kingdom as they had the ability to turn amethysts into mana stones. Mana stones were crystals that augmented a mage's spells and rituals. Amethyst mana stones were obviously the of the highest quality in the Mortal Realm and the most coveted for all mage of any degree as they were the only mana stones that were indestructible.

"I will fight the lich," Tristan began as he put his hand on the door. "You are a smart lad with very powerful genes in your body. True, you are a freak, but what makes you a freak will allow you to survive this ordeal. Lich minions are merely skeleton warriors. Pay close attention to your surroundings and kill the archers with magic while you fight the warriors and avoid fighting near me as I fight the lich or its magic might kill you.."

"Yes master," Elgar nodded, knowing he couldn't hurt the lich.

Tristan stared grimly at the door and pushed it open. Inside was a huge, wide open chamber full of treasure and gold coins laying in piles on the walls. Stairs were seen leading to a second floor above the treasure filled with upright coffins. Bodies of dead tomb raiders lay scattered on the floor and one hundred coffins were visible on the second floor with a coffin about fifteen feet high behind an old jade urn about two feet in diameter. When Tristan and Elgar walked in, the large coffin slid open and a rotten corpse with ram horns walked out in a tattered maroon robe wielding a large crimson staff with an amethyst mana stone one feet in diameter.

The lich lifted its staff and violet energy zapped from the staff to the hundred smaller coffins, animating the dead warriors within. Tristan put a firm hand on Elgar before running toward the ancient lich with his staff, rivers of lightning blasting forth. The lich waved its staff and a barrier of dark magic blocked the lightning before five fireballs four feet in diameter soared toward Tristan.

Elgar breathed deeply before rushing toward the undead warriors on his left. Poison magic had no affect on the dead so he used bone magic to decapitate a foot of one undead warrior, killing it as it stumbled forward. Elgar had no idea how to use a spear as he had only used a sword in his human form back in his previous life out of boredom. He used his superior strength to stab the warriors blindly, augmenting his strikes with lightning magic. If he got surrounded, he used plant magic to stab the feet of the undead warriors with vines, planting them to the ground.

The undead warriors felt no pain or emotion and continued carrying out its command to kill the intruder. Elgar constantly ran all around the second floor, avoiding running on the first floor where Tristan and the ancient lich fought. Bolts of lightning and multiple fireballs clashed below, the heat making Elgar sweat as he fought the undead warriors. He formed a spear out of dark magic and threw it as the undead warriors approached him in a line. The magic spear pierced through the first undead warrior and second warrior, stabbing the third. Elgar cursed as the undead warriors only seemed to grow stronger with every death of the others.

"They're absorbing the soul energy of the fallen minions," Elgar realized. Elgar quickly used plant magic to connect the undead warriors to the floor in a large group. Elgar then used water magic to make a small stream of water beneath the undead warriors, strengthening the vines as they absorbed a few of the water. Elgar shouted loudly as he concentrated all his mana into the mana stone in his spear and cast a four small lightning bolts at the pool of water beneath the undead, incinerating them to ash.

"Argh," Elgar shouted as the mana stone burst, shattering the spear. Elgar was slammed into the wall by the force and fell on the floor, clutching his chest which suffered the most from the blast. He felt ashamed for struggling against simple undead warriors and felt envy as he watched the lich and his master fight using powerful magic.

With the death of its minions, the lich could no longer sneakily absorb the soul energy as Elgar killed them. Tristan was relieved as he was struggling to use magic as he was afraid he would destroy the catacombs. He was clearly stronger but the lich had strong defensive capabilities. With the undead warriors dead, Tristan no longer feared an attack by the warriors and began casting more powerful magic.

"IT'S OVER! Return to the land of death!" Tristan roared as a massive pillar of light surrounded the lich, burning it with holy light until it finally screamed.

"You've no idea what you desire! What you want is power that could destroy this world!" the lich laughed until it finally turned to ash, leaving its staff behind.

Tristan felt his legs weaken as he picked up the staff and admired it. It was made from Immortal ranked wood, which explained why the lich was able to use such strong magic and animate and control a hundred undead warriors. Immortal ranked materials where materials that only mages and martial artists with qi could use. It was indestructible and the higher the tier of material, the more powerful the wielder could be.

"You did it," Elgar said as he helped Tristan lay on the wall to rest.

"Thanks to you killing all the undead warriors. I had no idea it was using you to kill them to absorb their soul energy. I was also afraid they would fight me as I attacked the lich. Although, I don't think you're suited to a spear. Search the treasure piles first while I rest. Then, we'll take a look at the urn," Tristan sighed. "You did well young master. You used your magic wisely to kill the rest of the undead all at once when you realized they only got stronger with each one you killed. You made a wise choice to learn how to fight with a weapon while being a mage."

Elgar nodded and searched the treasure piles for something valuable. He smiled as he found a sword whose blade was made entirely out of stone. The stone blade seemed to had runes made of lava on it, but the lava only seemed to swirl inside the blade and never leaked out or made the sword feel hot in his hands. It also had a small amethyst mana stone on the pommel of the sword. He laughed with joy as he realized the sword was indestructible and ever-sharp. With it, he never need to polish the sword, sharpen its edges, and could still perform spells above his ability through the amethyst.

He also stored all the gold coins he found while saving most of them for his father as agreed. He cared little for human jewelry and found a peculiar black ring and ash wood necklace in the shape of a six-pointed star. He wore them and was disappointed nothing happened but kept them anyway as a reminder that he survived in the catacombs.

Elgar stared silently at the bodies around him and smiled. He laughed with evilly as he meditated to draw the souls to him and ate the souls of the undead warriors and the tomb raiders. He did hesitated before giving the lich's soul to his scorpion. He wasn't able to absorb it anyway and the scorpion devoured the lich's soul. It seemed to shudder and he saw its maximum size expand to a foot long in diameter before ordering it to return to its smaller size. His eye's widened as he realized the scorpion had become sentient and able to think on its own. While unable to speak, the scorpion's carapace developed small runes seemingly made of shadows as it constantly traveled over its body.

"Good. It has gotten so strong so quickly," Tristan said. "It seems we both made a profit. I was going to give you my old staff as the lich's staff is better for me, but you found a sword with an amethyst mana stone. It is strange as it seems to be made out of some Immortal rank stone yet maintains lava within. Perhaps its power will be revealed at another time. First, store the Urn of the Demon King in your storage bag and we will quickly leave this place to report to your father. You will open the urn in a safer place. There may be other dangers in this catacomb as we took the main route and did not venture into other routes or any hidden passageways."

Elgar nodded and walked toward the urn. It seemed to be made of basic materials, but his hands burned from the sheer intensity of the spirit energy it permeated around it. Eager to open the urn and access the power within, he quickly stored the urn and followed Tristan safely out the catacombs.

Chapter 3: Relatives and Tombs Main Page Chapter 5: Global Tremor