The Holy Man of Another Century Gospel

Chapter 11: Heartache
After walking into the mine for a while, Leslie suddenly stopped and threw the torch in his hand forward.

"Encountered the enemy!"

Seven or eight less decayed undead were limping towards them from the other side of the mine, and their speed was surprisingly not slow, and they all held pickaxes or sticks as weapons.

The battle is about to break out.

Leslie stared ahead with his sword in hand, "Master..."

"I understand, just deal with them directly." Eric also drew his sword and was ready to join the battle at any time.

The mine is narrow, which is not conducive to combat. In this situation, we can only act according to circumstances and have no time to consider the consequences.

pat!

A fist-sized stone was thrown over the undead, but it missed the person and slammed heavily into the rock wall, sending tiny pieces of stone flying everywhere, demonstrating its considerable power.

"And the thrower?"

Leslie squinted his eyes and looked into the depths of the cave, but unfortunately the torch's light had a limited range and he could not see anything.

"Take the initiative." Eric quickly stated his plan, "You go and deal with the thrower inside, and the danger will retreat."

"what--"

Leslie roared in response, and his body shot out at the same time, instantly appearing in front of the undead several meters away. He swept his sword across and directly chopped off the heads of the two undead in front of him.

[You have mastered the technique of 'Storm Footwork'.]

"..."

Eric was stunned for a moment, then he found that there was a new "Storm Step" in the swordsman's skill column, but it was currently unable to be released.

Leslie had already fallen into the enemy's formation, and he didn't have time to look closely before rushing forward immediately.

The undead rushed forward in a rush. There was no formation to begin with, and they became even more chaotic after Leslie's charge and slashing. Eric rushed forward and chopped down a rotten corpse with one sword, which had attracted all the attention of the captain of the guards.

Black blood splattered, and the fallen corpse was still struggling. Actual combat proved that against this kind of undead, no matter whether it was a big hit in the groin or a stab in the heart, it was not as effective as directly cutting off the neck.

Eric immediately added another knife, and when he looked up, he saw another corpse rushing towards him, and subconsciously kicked it.

As a result, the corpse only paused, and his entire foot sank into the rotten flesh of its belly.

"Fuck!"

Eric suddenly felt a chill on his feet. The juice from the rotting corpse seeped in from an invisible place. It didn't have any corrosive or infectious effects, but it made him feel nauseous.

Then, two rotten hands grabbed his leg and scratched it, trying to break through the leather armor on the outside of the leg guard.

"..."

Suddenly becoming passive, the first thing that came to Eric's mind was the memory of a past combat training where he had kicked a similar kick, but his uncle quickly kicked over his other leg and he fell to the ground.

"If you throw that kick on the battlefield, you're committing suicide!"

He still remembered his uncle's words, and even more so the pain of the back of his head hitting the ground, but he still kicked out today.

Only the most real battles can forge a true warrior.

It only took a moment for Eric to think of all these things. He pulled out the silky left foot from the belly of the corpse, took a step forward, and slashed out with an unstoppable sword.

"Uh... ah..."

The flying corpse's head was still spinning in the air. Leslie, who had already rushed deep into the enemy's territory, took a quick glance to confirm that the young master was fine, then turned his attention back to the front.

The entire lineup of the attackers was in sight. In addition to the seven or eight zombies behind him charging with weapons, there were also two throwers.

They looked similar to ordinary undead, with no good parts on them. The biggest difference was that they had broken backpacks hanging behind them, which seemed to be used to carry ore.

Even as he was examining them, both throwers were reaching back for stones.

Cut throats and slash continuously!

Of course, Leslie would not give it a chance to attack. He flashed forward and launched two decisive and precise attacks, killing both corpses and sending them falling to the ground.

The cave suddenly became bright, and a ball of light flew over his head along the top of the rock wall, covering the light of the torches on the ground. It was the magic of the head nun.

Leslie glanced inside for a few seconds, then looked back. Behind him, Eric and the other guards were fighting against the few remaining corpses, and the battle was nearing its end.

Pfft!

The sword stabbing the heart was just a hasty act, but it also prevented the corpse from making the next move. Eric held his breath, remained calm, drew his sword and went straight for the head.

The flying rotten head hit the rock wall, lost its strength and fell to the ground, and its body also fell to the ground.

Eric exhaled heavily, kicked the body in front of him away, and looked at the captain of the guards inside, "No more?"

"No more." Leslie picked up the torch and threw it deeper. "I haven't seen any other undead yet."

"This wave is probably just a test," Eric said. "The next wave won't be so easy."

Leslie didn't come back after hearing this. "I'll go check it out ahead."

Eric nodded, "Okay, be careful."

"Understood. Everyone else, clean up the battlefield and tidy up so that the road is not blocked."

"Yes!"

The encounter happened suddenly and ended quickly. Alena and several monks immediately took action and started purifying the nearest corpse.

But as she had said before, the monks were inexperienced and had difficulty performing the purification spell. Eric hadn't seen a single one succeed. So Alena demonstrated it for them again.

“…When visualizing the gods, you must first clear your mind of distracting thoughts, otherwise you will easily fail.”

During the teaching process, she stopped and cast a spell to calm the minds of these nervous monks.

How serious and responsible she is, thought Eric, who was listening. It was obviously not her job to teach these monks.

However, he also understood the head nun's helplessness: without teaching these monks, she alone would not be able to purify so many undead in the mine.

Should we arrange for someone to go back to Orui City and invite some reliable monks and nuns to the monastery?

Eric was thinking when a prompt suddenly popped up in front of him.

"..."

Although the results were minimal at the moment, Alena still patiently instructed the monks in front of her, but she did not expect that the vibrations of a successful divine spell would come from behind her.

She turned around and saw Eric with one hand on his chest, holding a sword against the corpse on the ground with the other, muttering something.

As he prayed, wisps of black air continued to emerge from the corpse and then dissipated into nothingness.

Eric didn't stop until the corpse on the ground had rotted and decayed, leaving only a pile of bones.

He pushed the remaining bones aside so they were out of the way. "His soul has been purified and will no longer suffer the pain of the curse."

The monks stared at him blankly. Alena felt even more complicated and was speechless for a long time.

Eric certainly understood their feelings and could only say sorry in his heart.

Although they are all NPCs, he has special learning skills.

[You have mastered the technique of 'Soul Purification'.]

Soul Purification: Divine spell. Purifies undead targets, removing the curse of soul binding. Requirements: Spirit 3, Faith 5.

This was just a basic divine art, and Alena explained it in great detail. As Eric listened and watched, he got hints on how to learn this divine art.

He just happened to have the attributes required to perform the skill, and low-level divine arts did not require any medium such as holy scriptures or sacred objects, so he tried to cast it.

What surprised him a little was that successfully purifying the dead soul also gave him some experience in the monk profession, which was about one-third of the experience of directly killing an undead.

Any experience in the initial stage is precious. In the previous battle, he killed four undead and finished off two more. The experience he gained allowed him to upgrade his swordsman profession to level six and his monk profession to level five, and his attributes improved a little.

After a brief silence, Alena looked at the monks with a complicated expression, "See, it's not that difficult. Try again."

I don’t know if it was because of the encouragement or stimulation from the fact that ordinary people like Eric could cast divine spells, but not long after, a monk finally succeeded in releasing the purification spell.

Then the second and third successful people also emerged.

While the monks were busy purifying, Eric opened the attribute panel again and looked through it. He remembered that he had learned a skill from Leslie that he could not cast.

"Found it... Storm Step."

Storm Footwork: Combat Technique. Unleashes a burst of lightning-fast speed, using a unique footwork technique to instantly close in on a target within a certain distance. Requirement: Dexterity 20.

This was a short-range charge skill. He had seen Leslie use it several times, and it was quite effective for a surprise attack.

However, the skill requirements are not low. If he does not use the free attribute points, he needs to get 20 points of agility in one turn to meet the requirement.

"Let's talk about it then."

After the monks had almost finished purifying the several decaying corpses on the ground, Leslie, who had been exploring the area ahead, returned. Judging by the increasing amount of blood stains on his body, it was clear he had been through another battle.

"The mine tunnel is very long. Going forward, there is indeed a hall inside. There are a lot of undead, all crowded there." Leslie described what he saw.

"That's the end of the road," Eric said. "Have you spotted any undead that look particularly special?"

Leslie thought for a moment and shook his head. "There are too many of them, and they all look the same...and the torches won't illuminate very far."

Eric said it didn't matter, there was only one exit in this mine tunnel, so they could just block the road and kill their way through.

"Keep going inside."

The team continued to move forward, and after a while, more than a dozen undead came towards them.

Although there were many more of them than before, their strength was average. Leslie and Eric rushed in and started hacking and killing them, and it didn't take long to solve the problem.

What takes even more time is the purification of the nuns and monks after the battle.

And seeing the young master holding the sword and muttering to himself, doing the same thing, Leslie felt a little numb.

...Forget it, he has seen miracles, this is nothing.

"According to the young master, there are at least several thousand undead in the entire mine. Do we have to purify them one by one like this?" What he cared about was the issue of efficiency.

"There is also a way to purify oneself during battle," Sister Alena suddenly said, "but not many people can do it."

Seeing her looking at him, Eric understood.

When it comes to divine arts, one must also have certain combat capabilities. There are probably not many people here who can do it, but he is the only one.

"Tell me about it."

Thanks to the book friend [Greenspan_] for being the leader.

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(End of this chapter)