The chains wrapped around Lucian’s body bit into him like ice.
Thresh seized him by the throat and lifted him high into the air.
Lucian could feel his strength draining away, his heartbeat growing slower and slower.
“Struggle! Squirm like a worm on a hook. Now, how shall we go about this delightful torture?”
Thresh raised his lantern and let out an eerie laugh that sent chills through Lucian’s entire body.
Countless wandering souls were clearly visible inside the lantern, their agonized wails painfully shrill.
Thresh lifted his scythe and leisurely shifted it through several positions above Lucian’s head.
Lucian felt as though his soul were being dragged out through every inch of his body.
His life was slipping away.
Then the locket beneath his clothes fell free.
Inside was a picture of Senna.
“Live on, my love.”
Lucian knew that voice better than anyone’s.
He stared at the lantern.
There might have been thousands upon thousands of souls trapped inside, but he recognized her at a glance.
“You didn’t kill Senna? Senna’s still alive?”
“Of course. How could killing her possibly be more entertaining than tormenting her soul for eternity? And now, I’ll harvest yours.”
Lucian’s eyes widened with fury.
With a sharp twist of his head, he flung the locket against the lantern.
Crack!
Thresh immediately sensed that something was wrong, but it was already too late.
Struggling with everything he had left, Lucian pulled a silver spike from inside his coat and drove it into Thresh’s wrist.
The sudden burst of pain forced Thresh to release him.
Lucian collapsed and gulped down one breath after another.
That last attack had drained nearly all his strength, but now he could finally feel his soul settling back into his body.
Thresh had not felt pain in a thousand years.
Now, rage filled his hollow eyes.
The prey that had already been in his grasp had escaped, and worse, it had bitten back.
Furious, Thresh raised his lantern, but the tormented spirits thrashing wildly inside no longer offered him any protection.
In the blink of an eye, countless beams of sacred light tore through his black robes and pierced his body.
Flames erupted from the wounds, burning like hellfire as they consumed his spectral form.
But Lucian’s rage was nowhere near spent.
A relentless barrage of sacred light followed.
Unable to withstand the overwhelming power of the relic weapons, Thresh staggered backward and toppled from Serpent Bridge.
Lucian coldly watched the burning Chain Warden plummet below until the surging Black Mist swallowed him completely.
Elsewhere, Hecarim tore himself free of the webbing.
The wounds covering his body had driven him into a frenzy.
Levi struggled to defend himself against the Shadow of War’s whirling blade, and then Hecarim’s halberd slashed across his chest.
Pain like searing fire tore through Levi’s body, twisting his face in agony.
Hecarim immediately pressed his advantage and charged at the wounded Levi with all the crushing momentum of armored cavalry.
A direct hit would have reduced an ordinary man to paste.
A flash of yellow light erupted.
Hecarim struck nothing.
The human who had been directly in front of him disappeared from sight, and the sensation of all that tremendous force suddenly hitting empty air nearly threw him off balance.
“Mortal! I will grind your bones beneath my hooves!”
Hecarim roared.
Taking this long to kill a single human was an unbearable humiliation.
Levi staggered back onto his feet, his lips pale.
Green light washed over his body, and the wound on his chest began closing at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Only then did he gradually steady himself.
The Shadow of War was a specter who embodied war itself.
Of course his martial strength was terrifying.
The enemy before Levi was simply too powerful.
“Time to get the hell out of here.”
Using Flash, Levi instantly closed the distance to the temple entrance.
With the help of Piercing Light, he quickly destroyed several undead before Miss Fortune pulled him inside.
“You okay?” Miss Fortune asked anxiously.
Levi gave her a miserable grin and pointed at the enormous gash across his chest.
“Lucky I’m hard to kill. I almost didn’t make it.”
Miss Fortune was just about to answer when a huge blade suddenly punched through the wooden door and stopped directly in front of them.
Both of them swallowed hard and backed farther into the temple.
The entire building began to tremble.
Black Mist seeped through the cracks around the doors.
“They’re here. Get ready to fight.”
Levi wiped the sweat from his forehead and stood.
The Black Mist in front of him gradually gathered into the form of a wraith.
The instant its head appeared, Levi blasted it with Piercing Light and reduced it to ash.
“Is that magic?” Sarah asked in amazement.
“More or less.”
Levi scratched his head.
He could fire sacred light without using a relic pistol, so calling it magic was probably close enough.
A woman screamed.
She grabbed her child and fled from one corner of the temple as numerous evil spirits poured through a hole in the wall.
Ghosts soon began appearing everywhere.
Levi was the first to charge toward them.
A few swift slashes destroyed one specter, and as soon as Piercing Light came off cooldown, another blast eliminated several more.
Miss Fortune led her remaining men in desperately holding back the spirits emerging throughout the temple.
The main doors shook violently and looked ready to collapse at any moment.
Blades hacked and guns fired as the survivors barely managed to hold the undead at bay.
Chaos swallowed the temple.
Gunshots, clashing steel, the screams of the living, and the howls of the dead echoed from every direction.
“Sarah!”
That was Rafen.
The doors had already been battered inward, their surface bulging under the pressure.
Ghostly claws occasionally reached through the numerous holes punched through the wood.
Rafen and several others pressed themselves desperately against the doors, but the violent impacts were quickly overwhelming them.
A wraith’s claw shot through one of the holes and seized Rafen by the collar, trying to drag him outside and tear him apart.
One of the men beside him hacked at the arm with his sword, but the attack had almost no effect.
Levi lunged forward.
Piercing Light shot through the hole and blasted straight through the specter’s head.
Only then did Rafen collapse onto his rear, finally free.
“Get back!” Levi shouted.
The doors were tilting inward and were seconds away from falling.
Levi grabbed one man who hadn’t reacted in time and yanked him away.
The doors crashed down with a thunderous boom, throwing clouds of dust into the air.
Levi coughed several times.
At the same moment, the roof of the temple was ripped open.
Countless spirits poured down from above.
And at the ruined entrance, that towering figure appeared once again.
The Shadow of War, Hecarim.
Illaoi and the other worshipers continued chanting in a language no one else understood.
Veins bulged across Illaoi’s face.
Whatever she was doing clearly required an enormous amount of concentration and strength.
“Illaoi, whatever you’re doing, hurry it up!”
Sarah hacked down a wraith with her sword.
The unnatural cold radiating from the creature made her feel as though she’d been plunged into ice water.
Hecarim stepped into the temple.
A group of spectral riders followed behind him.
With a single sweep of his halberd, he cut apart the lesser spirits blocking his path, drawing their souls into the Shadow of War’s weapon.
The sickly green flames around the blade immediately surged higher.
The hearts of everyone inside the temple sank even further.
Even the undead already filling the building recoiled from Hecarim’s presence, moving aside to clear a path for him.
“This is the House of Nagakabouros. You know the Mother Serpent stands against the dead.”
Illaoi struggled to remain upright.
The stone sphere in her hands radiated white light, while sweat poured uncontrollably down her body.
“And what of it? Every soul here belongs to me.”
Hecarim pointed his weapon directly at Levi.
“Especially yours.”
Blue fire burned in his eyes.
Their earlier fight had clearly enraged him.
Hecarim’s voice carried the harsh screech of grinding metal, and the horrifying sound made Miss Fortune instinctively curl inward.
Levi stretched out an arm in front of her and moved Sarah behind him, shielding her with his body.
It was an unconscious gesture.
But Sarah’s eyes lit up.