Bro, I'm not an Undead!

Blood oozed, dripping into the dark waters as the large body of the carp overhead stood still, the light in its eyes having died down.

Its entire body save for its head was pierced by large ice spikes that looked rather extraordinary under the sun but their victim couldn’t appreciate it.

Just like that, this powerful monster was killed off.

It seemed a little disappointing that it had only amounted to this much after all that Primus that it absorbed.

Of course, this wasn’t anyone else’s view other than Tulnas’.

With the carp’s death as it was steadily held up by the spikes, the group felt changes over their bodies, their masses bulging up in an instant as soon, they all popped out of the water, returning to their original sizes!

As they appeared, they saw that they were near land, at the shallow end of the lake.

Skullius looked around and sighed in relief.

The nightmare seemed to be over.

He hoped at least.

His eyes turned to Tulnas who still had the massive elephant behind him while he looked down at the waters with his eyes squinted.

The creature’s unique appearance was still causing Skullius to marvel and appreciate now that the tense situation had subsided.

Gertreld saw Skullius’ confusion and giggled while Natalika walked up to the dead carp._.

The giant hazy elephant floated a meter above the ground with its figure imposingly radiating extreme power.

Ripples emerged over the waters even as it floated above them, as this depicted its undeniable authority over the element.

“What is that?” Skullius finally voiced to sate his curiosity. “Are you some kind of Summoner?”

Tulnas turned to Skullius from his investigation of the waters.

“Oh, please don’t assume something so distasteful. Naming me a Summoner could get me hunted down, you know?” Tulnas said as he flashed a smile. He then turned to elephant behind him and caressed its trunk which coiled. “I guess its also my fault for not properly introducing my abilities.”

“I’m a Tamer.”

Skullius cocked his head. With all the knowledge he had absorbed, he knew quite well about Tamers, though what Tulnas had said about Summoners was new to him.

Tamers were a respected class in the Energy Forming category.

They had the ability to tame beasts and turn them into their companions that fought with and for them.

The process of taming wasn’t easy though, as unless one had the additional miraculous ability to sweet talk beasts into a lifetime contract, they would never be able to tame them.

To tame beasts one had to indulge them with intricate tapestries of intertwining energies that would appeal to the beast. When the beast was attracted by the right tapestry of energies, one would use this tapestry to imprint a contract in their souls.

For this, a unique sensitivity to energies was required.

Of course the process of imprinting a contract was easier with less intelligent beasts as the more intelligent ones tended to resist.

“This is the Aquatic Starphant. It’s a name I came up with myself for his species. I call him Alphat. He was a Cluster General in a blue Cluster. Tough bastard to beat. But…here we are…” Tulnas said with a smile.

Alphat nudged Tulnas lightly as its bright eyes showed a subtle gentleness.

Red Rage poked Skullius who turned to him.

The Apostle then nudged Skullius gently but the Discount Human wore a horrifying face full of murderous intent which prompted Red Rage to take a few steps back.

Skullius shook his head and turned back to Tulnas.

“How the hell was… Alphat able to pull that final move? I mean… weren’t all our abilities limited because of our sizes or was I the only one who was affected by this?” he asked.

Tulnas smirked at the question.

“No, you’re right. We were all affected. It’s just that Alphat here has the innate ability to control all nearby water in their entirely at a basic level. Changing shape and state. Its a no mana cost affinity of his. Higher level Cluster beasts usually have such odd absolute abilities. Of course, distance dictates his efficiency but that’s another story. <Sigh>.You sure like to draw information from me Festos,” Tulnas said.

Natalika walked back to the group holding a large purple eye that she had taken from the dead carp.

She had figured that since Tulnas hadn’t obliterated its head, he was interested in this.

“You wanted this, right?”

“Ah, thanks,” Tulnas said as he handled the object, giving it a few glances before pulling it into his spatial storage ring. “There’s something under the water. I assume we’ll have to break it in order to get to our target. Alphat, clear the way.”

The large elephant blew from its trunk in acknowledgement before floating away from the group.

It quickly reached the centre of the waters where over the section it hovered above, violent ripples of water pulsed as suddenly, in a circular motion, all the water parted and rose up simultaneously!

The massive water body had settled flooded upwards in its entirely and a few seconds later, partly dry ground was revealed under the swirling waters that Alphat extended his trunk to, pulling them into his expansive both with an insane suction!

The body of the creature showed no reaction from taking the massive amounts of water at all.

Tulnas led the group to the very centre of space where he crouched down and touched the ground.

In his advanced senses, he could clearly sense an expansive formation where Primus leaked excessively.

A magical construct was erected, barring entry to what was underground.

A seal of sorts.

The ladies could sense it, but not as well as Tulnas could while Skullius could vaguely detect the presence of the energy.

‘So far, it’s appearing as if this was just a mistake. Those bladed monsters, even these fish and this construct. Is this a ploy or did those guys really slip up, allowing us to find them?’ Tulnas thought.

The application of Primus energy was different from the way it appeared on the creatures that they had been fighting which was the basis of Tulnas’ theory to begin with.

“There’s a magical formation here that’s blocking our entry. I’m guessing that even if we dig from another position we’ll still have to deal with it. It looks to be made of Primus energy, which complicates things a little but hey, we have a Mage in our midst,” Tulnas said with a smile.

Everyone’s eyes turned to Skullius who looked at the ground with a puzzled expression.

“Seriously?”

Skullius had been made known what Primus was after their battle with the Ghouls and he was quite intrigued by the idea.

However, he didn’t know if he could solve this magical construct.

He wasn’t actually a Mage, after all.

“I can’t sense the Primus energy very well…” he tried to give an excuse.

“That’s fine. I’ll show you where the concentration of Primus is strongest, and then you can do your thing.”

‘Damn it!’

Tulnas led Skullius to a spot near the centre where he then pointed at an indistinct patch of dirt on the ground.

“This looks like where most of the energy is coming from. If you can disrupt the supply to the construct, I think we can then pass through.”

Skullius took in two deep subconscious breaths.

This was intense.

Could he really do?

No, that was too optimistic!

What was he even doing?!

What could he even break apart such a thing? Wasn’t this made by a genuine Mage or something?

Wait! Wait! If he could use that…

“Let me try this…” Skullius said before he extended his hand at the spot where Tulnas pointed him to.

A stream of [Evil Darkness] poured from his hand and jutted over to the ground.

Everyone paid attention as they were especially curious about this unique power that they weren’t familiar with.

‘Maybe…’ Skullius thought as he sent the darkness over.

The pure black that seemed to want to reconstruct reality to its liking touched where this construct supposedly was and a shocking visual peculiarity occurred…!