Merlin spent a lot of mental energy in order to infect more dead people with a curse. Finally the fog lifted and the job was done.

- Let's go back. - Merlin said.

Beside him were two True Knights and a whole platoon of Knight Disciples as an escort and protection. He was helped onto his horse and the procession moved back to its camp. Soon the signal to retreat was given to his men as well.

- Do you think it will work? - asked the True Knight Oren looking back.

- Should work. I don't have any other options. - Merlin replied.

The king sent them on this punitive mission, but their strength was clearly not enough to win in open battle. Although Merlin did not want to upset the king, he was not going to risk his own skin, even if he did not have much left to live. He had no protective artifacts to guarantee his safety. He preferred to operate remotely and was always under the protection of the Knights.

Soon they returned to the camp, which was already retreating in an organized manner to gain distance from the living dead that flooded the central battlefield. They reached the middle of the camp and started to move away with slow pace as people in camp around them. Somewhere behind them, the remnants of the surviving peasants fled, but this did not particularly worry them.

Suddenly, a vigilant Oren screamed, pointing to the sky.

- Look!

Merlin looked back and saw that a blue spot was flying towards them from the direction of the battlefield, leaving a trail behind it. Merlin turned around as his knights surrounded him from all sides. It was moving very fast and when the bird was not too far away, Merlin realized that it was an artificial bird created by a spell.

He cast a spell himself and sent an arrow of negative energy towards the bird. The arrow collided and completely destroyed the bird about ten meters from Merlin. However, there was a small explosion and a small white sword shot out from the collision site, approaching at great speed directly towards him.

Simultaneously with the initial explosion of the stone, everyone heard the word.

- Scram! Scram! Scram!

This word loudly sounded in the air and was accompanied by an endless fading echo.

At the same time small glowing sword were still approaching Merlin very fast. Due to high speed and altitude, the Knights were unable to block the attack in time.

Merlin summoned a shadow shield in front of him. However, a powerful explosion occurred during the collision of his shield and glowing elemental sword. Although his shield stopped the elemental energy and most of the blast wave, the sound effect could not be stopped. Merlin felt as if he had been hit on the head with a huge hammer.

All the blood vessels in Merlin's eyes burst at the same time and they were filled with blood. Even in the head the vessels burst and hemorrhage began in the brain. He almost immediately lost consciousness, fell off his horse and limply landed on the ground head first. His neck was broken.

The few Knights behind the shield for whom Merlin blocked the blast received similar damage and lost consciousness falling to the ground as well. Scared horses began to trample on their bodies. But everyone else who was in front or on the side of Merlin got to the fullest.

In addition to the sound effect, they fully felt the power of the sound wave. It seemed that they were scattered across the battlefield along with the horses as if they were all toys. Broken limbs and heads instantly took the lives of most of the Knight's Disciples who were closest to the explosion.

Those Knight Apprentices who were a little further away were hurt less, however, one could only guess how many of them were lucky enough to survive.

The True Knights, sensing something was wrong, ignited their life energy in advance, although the sound effect could not seriously damage them, but still deafened them for a moment. On the other hand, the blast wave swept them away as well as the rest. Of course, given their powerful bodies, they were injured, but survived.

Many ordinary people in the retreating camp died without having time to understand anything. Within a radius of about 100 meters, people were scattered everywhere. Many collided with each other and with the horses turned into a bloody mess. Everywhere in this radius lay corpses, mutilated to varying degrees, bleeding. Few managed to survive.

Although it was a small part of the camp, the damage was catastrophic. The survivors seemed to have lost their minds and screamed madly without hearing their own voices, bursting into bloody tears. Much of the camp was thrown into chaos.

- Oh my God! Oh my God!

- Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

- I do not see anything! I hear nothing! Lord forgive me!

- Help! Help! My hand! Where is my hand!

Oren hesitantly got up, coming to his senses and grimacing in pain. There was still a ringing in his head, but he was already gradually beginning to hear the surrounding sounds. Listening, he began to look around.

Hell! For a moment, he felt like he was being sent straight to hell. Mutilated bodies and their counterparts lay everywhere, only a few were still moving. Blood flowed like a river covering the ground. He took a couple of steps and looked down at his blood-stained legs. The screams of people combined with what he saw forced even him to feel indescribable horror.

So many Knight Apprentices have died. Each of them was a pillar of the kingdom, most of the worthy noble families with influence. Turning his gaze, he saw the mutilated corpses and other mortal nobles and commoners who were nearby. Tears of blood poured from his eyes after everything he saw.

- How is that possible? - he mumbled incomprehensibly.

Being a True Knight, although he was afraid of Merlin, he did not think that he was so defenseless against him. However, after seeing the result of this unknown Mage's spell, he realized that he was a fool. Is this the true power of Mages?

Suddenly, someone took him by the shoulder. Oren shuddered and shrugged it off in horror, jumping to the side. Another True Knight stared at him with red eyes.

- Lets run. - he said.

Oren was startled, but looking around he said.

- And what about them? - he gave another look to chaos around - we should help them...

- Well then do it yourself. I'm not going to die here.

The True Knight ran towards the surviving camp, jumping over the corpses. There he caught the first horse that came across, dropping the unfortunate rider who did not have time to accelerate and rushed into the distance.

At the same time, it seemed that the rest of the camp began to move like an anthill, people fled trampling each other to death, spreading fear and chaos everywhere . Soon only corpses and cripples will be left here!

Oren's heart fluttered. But really, the fight is not over yet. What if the Magician comes after him? It was not for this that he had worked hard for so many years to finally become a True Knight in order to die here like an animal. For a moment he kept his eyes on Merlin, but still did not dare to touch the Magician. He will see those mages in his nightmares.

He ran.

 

I sent a gift in retaliation to the necromancer. In fact, the principle of my trap was the same as his own, but with minor improvements. The blank exploded with little force, but it was enough to clear the way for the main spell. This main spell clung to the mental energy of the enemy magician, heading straight for him.

As far as I understood, this was the trick used by this acolyte against me, although there were other options.

Unfortunately, the creation of such a toy was too costly. I could place my spell in a rune with a radius of about half a meter with no problem. But a small rune on a small pebble is not enough to contain the full power of the spell.

I had to use the rune overlays method, but even the creation of one such small rune requires effort, and with the method of imposition, the required mental effort increases tenfold, if not a hundredfold. I spent almost 4 months of hard work on this trap, it was simply counterproductive to create such a one-time use traps.

Although my first mind rune was thousands of times more difficult than real runes, visualizing a rune in your mind and creating it in the real world were completely different things. Theoretically, I could never bring the rune out of my mind into the real world.

Although I wanted to take revenge on this Magician and cut off his head, but I did not intend to rush into the enemy's camp, it would be too unwise. It remained to be hoped that the Magician would receive at least some damage and would not stick around here anymore.

Our camp retreated half a kilometer and most of the dead fell behind. Only small remnants remained, still following the horrified retreating peasants. The main troops cleared these remnants without any problems, after which they began to collect the scattered soldiers.

During the retreat, a thunderous sound sounded in the distance, the echo of which reached even here. Many were surprised, but for them the sound was distant, so there was no particular panic.

Most likely, the enemy also simply retreated and is waiting, hoping that we will suffer the main losses. In fact, we did lose a little more people than the enemy, but fortunately my authority was enough so that we were not too late with the retreat.

I was doing my own thing sitting in my tent when I suddenly felt another sound wave. This sound wave was inaudible to humans, however, I felt the remnants of the elemental wave from the instrument left in the city.

This was a kind of warning trap, and I could feel its operation within a radius of three kilometers from the city. Obviously someone came to visit. Is it True Knights or another Mage?

My eyes hardened and I went outside. Not far from my tent was a special wagon. Approaching it, I ordered.

- Take off the tarp.

The soldiers quickly uncovered the contents of the wagon. On it was a platform with a radius of three meters, on the platform there was one large rune and a couple of small ones were intertwined with it. The formation itself was tilted and directed towards the city, which was about a kilometer from here.

First I took the wings out of the wagon. I had to suffer a lot to finally find the optimal design that allows you to maintain balance and plan, thereby increasing the flight range.

After securing the wings, I climbed onto the platform at an angle and grabbed the rails to get into the right position. Rock climbed into my bosom.

Some people noticed that I was up to something again, and knowing that I was a Magician, they watched me with interest. The wings combined with the small magic formation surprised them quite a bit and the hubbub rose.

Finally, I used some of my mental energy to activate the formation. The formation itself was activated by a magic crystal embedded inside.

The runes flared brightly and there was a silent explosion that sent me flying into the air like a torpedo. The formation was set up in such a way that the blast wave spread only in the narrow radius I needed, this in turn only increased the effect.

People screamed in shock and surprise as they watched me fly into the sky at incredible speed.

- Mage Tarrister has flown!

- He's flying, damn it!

I felt nauseous from the enormous pressure and had difficulty breathing. However, the launch acceleration gradually slowed down as I gained altitude. Finally, I spread my wings and with a little help from the wind element, I was able to level the flight.

This was only possible for me because I was a True Knight. Otherwise, I would have flown into the air already as a dead man. Nevertheless, I still received internal injuries, fortunately nothing serious.

The Dark Golden Knight was gliding in the sky, slowly losing altitude and fighting the wind. My weight in combination with the armor was rather big, so the most problems arose with the balance and strength of the wings. But over time, all problems were solved.

Whoever showed up in the city, he probably hoped in vain that the owner was not there. On the other hand, I gave away three such alert toys. If the signal was given by Bertram, then perhaps someone strong gave me a visit this time.