Ellie continued her battle, leaving Lucas behind to watch a fight that he could never hope to set foot in. Since fire was the most effective element against ghouls, Ellie had not used anything other than flame to attack the doll—but now she had to get serious.
The mana around the place once again concentrated around Ellie, but this time, it formed into different colors instead of just red. While Ellie still focused on her spell, the doll had already made its move. A group of ghouls covered in dark mana headed toward Ellie, moving even faster than the ones Lucas fought against. But before they could reach her, Ellie had already finished chanting:
"Earth spike, wind gale, water blade, thunder prison, rain of fire."
A series of level 4 magic spells were continuously cast in front of her. From the ground, earth spikes started to grow, piercing through the ghouls and holding them in place. Wind gale and water blade carried the water to strike all of the ghouls in that area, and then an electrical cage surrounded them, slowly closing in. Within seconds, all those ghouls hit by the water combo spell were electrocuted by the cage, to the point where some were even grilled into charcoal. When the thunder prison spell stopped, fireballs rained down from the sky, hitting the remaining electrocuted ghouls and causing strong explosions on impact.
'How could she use so many spells at the same time, and they all synergize so well with each other???'
Lucas questioned the scene he was witnessing. A normal person could use at most two spells at the same time, and they would have to be low-level for them to do so. But in Ellie's case, she had used five different elements, all of them level 4, with perfect timing so each could support the other without canceling its opposite element.
The explosions caused tons of smoke and blocked both their visions. They did not know if the doll had been destroyed or not. But deep down, Ellie knew things would never be that easy. To her expectation, when the smoke faded, the barrier around the doll was still intact.
'How strong is that thing? And who could possibly do this? This level of magic should not be possible for a normal human to handle, so the doll must belong to a demon or a demi-god. But who would target me specifically—and what for?'
'The whole incident is already weird in itself. This place is far away from the city, and the village I mostly take commissions from doesn't know about my identity. Even if it were someone from the village, they would never do something that could harm their lives just to set me up.'
The more she thought, the more dead ends she hit. No matter how much she tried to recall, nothing was relevant to the situation they were in. Before she could sort things out, the doll had already summoned another horde of ghouls.
'At this point, I will exhaust my mana before I destroy that thing. Is there anything I could do?'
Ellie then looked toward Lucas. After a short pause, she spoke up:
"Lucas, I need you to buy me some time. Try your best not to get killed."
"Huh? What do you mean? Hey!"
Before Lucas could ask anything, Ellie floated into the sky and started gathering mana around the place. The werewolf knew for sure that there was nothing he could do but follow her orders for now.
Lucas used True Sight to observe the surroundings. Besides a burned-up graveyard caused by the lava tsunami Ellie had summoned, there was nothing—not even a place for him to hide. Although True Sight was active, Lucas could hardly see any runes in the air, nor any structure among the surrounding objects.
'So stuff that has been damaged hardly ever has anything remaining, huh,' Lucas thought.
'But now I need to do something or else I'll die!!!'
Lucas observed the incoming ghouls. They were all covered in three to four lines of magic symbols, and there was a connecting point for all of them. Without hesitation, Lucas pulled out his gun and prayed he wouldn't miss. After two missed shots, the third one managed to land on one of the connection points. The ghoul then collapsed and exploded into dark energy. The explosion also caused some other ghouls to be killed or pushed back.
Seeing that landing a shot could push back a wave of ghouls, hope filled Lucas' eyes. The werewolf then rushed toward the remaining runes in the air to create more bullets while shooting at the ghouls. He managed to land two more shots before running out of bullets.
With the desire to live, Lucas managed to collect all the remaining runes and create 20 bullets for his gun. But the problem wasn't the amount—it was how accurate his aim was.
As expected, all of his effort to gain more bullets only helped him land seven more shots, and it hardly did anything to the horde in front of him.
"FOR GOD'S SAKE, HURRY UP, ELLIE!!!" he yelled.
Above his head, Ellie had finished her preparation. This time, even more types of mana gathered around her.
"Elemental Hydra!"
As Ellie cast the spell, each group of mana slowly formed into the shape of a dragon. Seven dragons, matching the seven elements, appeared around her and charged toward the doll. 'This spell should be at the top of level 6 magic—and could even reach level 7!' Lucas thought as he looked at the dragons.
The seven dragons swallowed the doll one by one, and when they did, they created elemental explosions. The area around the doll was badly damaged. A large hole could be seen from a distance, looking almost like a miniature nuclear bomb had exploded there.
Smoke filled the place when the spell ended. At this point, if that spell couldn't destroy the doll, Lucas didn't even know what could. The doll's dimension slowly faded away, revealing the sun still above their heads. The two smiled, as this meant the doll must have been destroyed.
But the joy didn't last long. When the smoke faded, the doll was still there.
"Impossible! How could..."
Lucas couldn't even finish his sentence when he saw what the doll was trying to do. Around it, different kinds of mana had already gathered, and the feeling was exactly the same.
"Now I know why that thing could block my magic. The doll is nothing but a tool to gather my mana. The real core of this dimension must be something else—we've been tricked from the start!"
"So you mean that thing is about to..."
"Yes, I'm afraid that's correct."
Seven dragons were formed around the doll, and they attacked the two. Ellie formed a barrier to block the attack, but she couldn't last long as she had already used too much mana. Then the barrier cracked.
This was the most painful moment Lucas had experienced in his life. After being crushed by a strong force, he was burned with intense heat, followed by an extremely cold sensation. His body couldn't move at all. Everything felt numb and painful at the same time. Before he lost consciousness, a strong current entered his body and destroyed all his organs.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Lucas opened his eyes, breathing as hard as if he had never breathed before, then reached his hands all over his body to feel it again.
"What are you doing? Are you really that tired just because of a 30-minute walk? We are not even there yet," Ellie complained.
"Yeah, I'm sorry, don't worry about me."
'Phew, luckily I had set an anchor before, or else it could have ended badly for me.'
What Lucas had just done was his special "gift" he had since he was young. Lucas could temporarily "set" a return point for himself and go back to that moment when he wanted… or died. The return point could only last for 24 hours, and if Lucas did not set a point before, he was a goner for real.
Lucas had always set an anchor every day when he went to sleep due to an accident that almost cost him his life when he was young, and until now, before he did something dangerous, he would set a return point beforehand. Yet there was still a weakness to this power. Besides the 24-hour expiration, the power also cost him a great amount of energy. He normally could return two times at most, and as a werewolf, he could do more—but based on how much it had just cost him for a rewind, he knew that being a werewolf only helped him to do it one or two more times.
Before he could do anything, the two had already arrived at the cemetery.
'I need to do something to bring us out of this situation. Ellie did say that the doll isn't the core, so this time I should try to find it before she fights the doll.'
But there was one problem: how could he even find such a thing inside a cemetery filled with ghouls that he could barely manage to defeat!