Saintess Summons Skeletons

“Did she survive?” Saria asked, watching the two planets collide on the screen, “It’s not cutting off.”

Zephir scratched his stubble, “Hard to say,” he finally answered, “You checked the historic first, right?”

“Oh… Yeah… you think it’s possible he survived? He didn’t survive during our round, though. I kinda just assumed he got lucky in his real run and his entire team survived the whole way through.”

“Well, from what I understand, it is quite a rare occurrence, but he does survive sometimes. So I think that might be what’s happening here,” Zephir explained, “Or your sister survived again, which honestly wouldn’t even be that surprising at this point.”

“Yes, pretty much everyone here predicted she would find a way to make it,” Cinthia added, following her chat.

“Well, let’s hope so,” Saria said, ”Would suck if she lost her chance at the pin without even making it to the finals. I really want to see if she can repeat the Victory stunt.”

“That’s what everyone is waiting for,” Zephir said, ”but almost nobody seems to have much faith in her from what I’ve heard in the other rooms.”

“Damn, really? I think she has a fair chance,” Saria said, “Is everyone underestimating her, still?”

“No, but even then, just look at you, performed perfectly all the way up to the finals and we know how that ended. The track record for this one is just too bad. Victory was only you and Sen, but this one’s had quite a few challengers.”

“I think if I had a second try already knowing what I know I could do it. So it’s not that out of reach,” Saria said, “What does the chat think?”

“It’s a bit more of a contentious topic…” Cinthia said, “Cautiously optimistic seems to be the general sentiment, but I think they’re just trying to spare Sorrow’s feelings…”

“Well… We’ll see,” Saria said, staring at the screen, “the view started moving again, we might get answered for this event soon.”

Exactly one minute after the two planets collided, the broken and half-molten pieces of Sofia’s mana heart were teleported to a vast open field of green grass under a blue sky.

IT’S OVER?!

The intense healing from her specialization quickly fixed her mana heart and regrew her body, bone armor included. In a few seconds, she was back to normal. Bookie’s book form laid on the grass next to her, Victory’s crown on top of it.

Sofia picked them up, putting on the crown, and looked around.

“Still in the event” , she noted, “I don’t see… Wait, is that someone else?!”

While Sofia did not see anything other than grass as far as the eyes could see, she noticed the weak mana signature of another person, laying in the grass some two hundred meters away.

Crossing the distance in a single jump, Sofia found the badly burned body of someone, from the bone structure, Sofia could tell it was a man, and they were still alive, but it was hard to identify the person beyond that.

Sofia crouched down and poked the charred husk, “Hello?”

That seemed to wake the burned man, he moved, sitting up with difficulty, scales of his charred skin cracking and falling off as he did.

Pestle finally came out of hiding, landing atop Sofia’s head.

“Kill?” she asked.

“I don’t think we would even be allowed to, this isn’t that kind of event, Pestle.”

They watched as the burned man’s body slowly regenerated from the inside out. A censor bar materialized out of nowhere to hide his private parts as his body regained a healthy hue.

To think I’m not the only survivor.

No wonder they recruited this guy.

“Hey, feel fine? I was not expecting another survivor,” Sofia told him as opened is eyes.

“I have had better days,” Sen answered, “How did you survive that?”

“I dodged the initial impact by hiding in the spirit plane. After that, it’s just a high resistance to plasma and a very strong self-healing specialization,” Sofia explained, “What about you?”

“Defensive signature skill. As long as I have mana I’m almost immortal. This really pushed it to the limit…”

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

“I saw that. Did not expect you to make it through honestly. But I haven’t see you use much of your magic at all so far so hard to judge.”

“I like to keep it simple and subtle,” Sen answered, “Is the Kleptra around?”

“Er’Gakk? Not that I can see. I healed up and went to check out the burned corpse right away.”

“Hmm… This might very well already be the next event then…”

Sofia shrugged, “Probably. If I followed things correctly my team probably has more points that yours right now, though. I saw your team looking for a fourth member after the stairs. So I’m not too worried. If we both die now I win.”

“Ahahah… I should have gotten better teammates. You’re right I’m at twenty four points now. You?”

“Twenty eight.”

“Ah, well, I suppose I can take a loss, I was already not getting a Master item anyway.”

“Lost another round aside from the rooms?” Sofia asked.

“Too many strong contenders this time. I really did not expect that so early, honestly, makes one wonder if the system was even needed in the first place when we have so many promising people around.”

Right…

“Well. Let’s keep going, just because you’re probably slated for second place doesn’t mean you can’t aim for a higher historic score for glory, right?” Sofia asked, holding out a hand.

“Sure, let’s see what that Kleptra has in store for us yet!” Sen answered, grabbing Sofia’s hand and standing up. “Hum… Say. Would you happen to have anything I could use to cover myself up?”

“If you don’t mind wearing bone clothes I can quickly make something for you.”

“Would be greatly appreciated, thank you.”

Sofia quickly made some kind of bone war skirt and chestplate for Sen to wear.

“Not what I’m used to, but this will do, thanks.”

“You’re welcome… What now?”

“I imagine the issue will present itself soon like it did with the planet?” Sen guessed.

“Maybe? It’s nice to have some time to regenerate mana I suppose.”

Er’Gakk must have heard Sofia’s words, as ‘the issue’ presented itself already. Quite a distance from them, a few kilometers away, the ground erupted, as a creature burst out from underground. From afar, it looked like a very small Kleptra with fewer features.

“Oh, we are done…” Sen said as he watched the creature shake off the dirt from its wings from a distance.

“Is that a young Kleptra?” Sofia asked, starting to channel a piercing bolt.

“No, but not much better. This is a Kleptran drone. It’s a monster, but with Kleptran heritage…”

“Oh, like the Drakes? Interesting.”

“Pesle fight, but Sofia am die, very danger!” Pestle warned, pulling back on her horns.

“I know Pestle, I know. I’m pretty sure this is the point. I don’t think we we meant to survive the previous thing anyway. Might as well end it with a bang.”

“It saw us,” Sen noted, preparing a spell of his own.

“Great! We have plenty of sunlight. Bookie, we go with the Chimera tactics!”

Sofia’s mana plummeted as seven pages flew out of Bookie, draining all of his mist. An army of skeletons materialized between Sofia and the Kleptran drone on the open fields. There were 200 Kidjikkik guardians as the front line, 300 Kidjikkik Soldiers behind them, 5 Sandworms to control the terrain, and the high priest to give army-wide buffs.

Additionally, Sofia summoned her choir of five huge sandworm skulls, which were much larger than Bookie’s summoned ones.

“Pestle, you’re up. Let’s get this party started.”

The Kleptran drone charged with a deafening roar.

It took a few short strides before disappearing, reappearing in front of the skeletons. In a spin and a tail swipe, half of the Kidjikkik army was sent flying into the air like toy props swept away by an angry child. The Kleptran drone disappeared again.

Sofia froze the toybox.

Oh fuck.

In the special sight the time freeze gave her, Sofia now had the leisure to observe the drone’s gaping open maws in front of her face. Pestle diving straight into it with her claws extended out.

To her right, Sen’s was probably already dead, as the entire middle section of his body was missing, only the top of his head and his legs from the knees down remaining. Sofia had not even seen it happen.

Yeah, maybe, just maybe, we are a bit under-leveled for this one.

Sofia summoned herself as far as she could to the left, hoping to extend the fight by even a second. The time freeze stopped, and the drone bit down on nothing, swallowing Pestle whole.

If I can surv-

The drone’s scorpion-like tail fell on Sofia from above.

[Final score: Eternal Lights - Times survived: 28]

Sofia opened her eyes in an empty white space.

“Neh, that looked painful,” Kuli reacted.

Sofia laughed, “Did it? I didn’t feel anything. I should have been immune to dying in one hit, but it looks like that didn’t help.”

“Your immunity probably worked,” Mornn commented, “the thing had time to strike the spot you teleported to at least five times before the event ended, and not even that, it already struck that spot before you even appeared there. Some crazy shit.”

“How did Sen die?”

“No clue,” Mornn answered, “the screen was focused on you, he just died while not even on the screen. You don’t seem too mad about the loss.”

“We probably still get first place, so… It was a humbling experience, I suppose. Who lost where?”

Kuli pointed at a dejected Pareth laying sprawled on the floor, “Neheh, it seems our friend Pareth is not too good at navigation or swimming. He was already here when we died in a planetary collision.”

“Crazy that you survived that, by the way. Kinda wish I would have died earlier to see how you pulled that off.”

“Let me get my best moping skeleton off of the floor and I’ll tell you.”