A strange chill went up to his spine as Abium stared at the mysterious blue screen in surprise and gripped his sword tighter.
Meanwhile, Nicolaus also showed a shocked look and asked in anxious.
"Is this the death game I read in the books?"
On the other hand, Abium let out a deep sigh and consoled him.
"I don't think so. First, we should find some safe place and then decide what to do next."
After hearing Abium's words, Nicolaus finally relaxed a bit and nodded.
Then, Abium saw an open grassland-like area around 200 meters away from where they were standing and decided to make that place their base.
"Go towards that tall oak tree. I'll take care of these skeletons."
As he spoke, he noticed three skeletons were coming from the left side, carrying rusty weapons in their hands.
They also didn't wear any clothes like the assassins and appeared naked and weak.
Shaking his head, Abium took a step forward, sprinted towards the three skeletons, and slashed his sword at them multiple times.
Bones creaking sound echoed whenever his sword met the skeletons' body parts and broke them into multiple pieces.
Within three seconds, all those three skeletons were broken into multiple pieces and lay on the ground motionlessly.
Then, he turned around and followed Nicolaus.
Two minutes later, Abium and others entered the grassland-like area and soon arrived near the giant oak tree.
But they saw a lone undead soldier standing underneath the tree shadow and stared at them with its reddish fire-like eyes.
Unlike other human skeletons, this Skeleton wore a strange cloth made of black leather and gave off an aura of coldness.
Abium knew that this Skeleton was not some random soldier and scanned it.
"An elite skeleton with the strength of 3.4 points, huh." Nodding, he sprinted towards the Elite Skeleton, arrived in front of it in a few seconds, and thrust his sword at it with full force.
But the Skeleton managed to block his sword attack and stood firmly.
Meanwhile, Abium raised his eyebrows in surprise, gripped the sword hilt tighter, and moved his sword again.
Multiple clangs reverberated as Abium and the Elite Skeleton parried against each other and looked at each other.
No, Abium gave multiple sword slashes at many parts of the Skeleton's bones and even forced it to take two steps back.
'It even predicted by attacks and blocked it like a skilled warrior. Should I finish it off?' He furrowed his brows and decided to study it more.
He attacked the Skeleton once more and started studying its sword movements.
But after a few parries, Abium noticed that the Elite Skeleton stumbled back and forth and almost lost its balance.
"Hmm, it seems to have lost its energy."
He took a deep breath, aimed his sword at the Skeleton's neck, and swiftly cut off its head.
As the decapitated skull flew up in the sky, he took three steps forward, raised his left hand, and caught the reddish web-formed skull.
Then, he sheathed his sword and looked into the two dimmed reddish eyes.
"I think I've seen this before." He muttered solemnly and smashed its skull with his hands.
The bones soon cracked into multiple pieces and revealed a small reddish-black stone deep in the head.
"Chaos Stone." A grave look appeared on Abium's face.
Meanwhile, Nicolaus also arrived near him and asked in confusion.
"What's that?"
"As long as one exposed to the chaotic atmosphere for a longer-term, their heart would be consumed by the Miasma or the Abyssal Chaos Power and turn themselves into a Chaos Beings. If I'm not wrong, these skeletons seemed to have been exposed to the chaos power for a long period and later became chaotic skeletons. But what puzzled me more is something else." Abium said in a gloomy tone and stored the chaos stone in his space ring.
Although it doesn't have much value now, these stones would become helpful when it comes to exchanging materials with evil organization members. They would pay a hefty price to get these stones and use them to increase their strength.
Although inclining towards the Chaos Power would consume their rationality and even turn them into pure-formed evil beings, many humans would agree to choose that path to seek revenge or other reasons.
In truth, many people wronged by the Nobles got themselves blinded by the hatred in the past and became prime members of many organizations.
Not only that but they were even consumed by the chaos power at the end and summoned demons and devils from Abyss and Hell to erase every being in the Easica Plane.
Because of this reason, the final Planar War became more ruthless and chaotic and caused the whole Easica Continent to become a battlefield.
Tens of millions of humans, Elves, Dwarfs, and Beastkins died at the end of the Planar War.
"Something else?" Nicolaus asked in confusion.
Nodding, Abium looked at the Skeleton and furrowed.
"Our main enemy should be a necromancer. Undead skeletons are nothing but puppets for the necromancer. But something else is indeed strange about the current situation." He paused for a moment and soon fell into deep thoughts.
Abium had battled against these Undead skeletons, but he felt something different this time.
'Why did I feel like I was battling against a human earlier?' A question appeared in his mind.
Soon, he shook those thoughts, focused on their current situation, and started to speak.
"Nicolaus, we should make this place our temporary shelter and move with a plan. Your job is to stay near this tree and guard Umi and her mom. Meanwhile, I will try to kill all these undead skeletons alone and complete this mission."
"I agree. I also want to help you a little, but I'll be only in the way." Nicolaus waved his hand as he understood their situation and agreed to his suggestion.
Abium nodded, turned around, and moved towards the woods to finish the remaining skeletons.
'First, I will kill all these skeletons. Then, I will explore the other parts of the woods and find out more about this strange mission.'
After walking into the woods for ten minutes, he saw a few skeletons standing more than a few hundred meters away from him and moved cautiously.
Although vines and shrubs blocked his pathway, he nimbly climbed onto the tree branches, swung like a monkey, and moved forward.
Once he arrived closer to the group of undead skeletons, he slowed down his footsteps and hid near a bush.
Then, he raised his head above the bush and saw a group of skeletons standing around 10 meters away from him.
At that moment, they stood in an open space and appeared organized like army squad members.
'Something is odd about these beings.'
He noticed that all those skeleton soldiers were elite like he had met earlier and appeared stronger.
But among the group, he also saw 1-meter tall skeleton covered in a black cloak, and it looked more like an Assassin!
'It looks exactly like the one I killed when we teleported here.'
That Skeleton also held a bone dagger and gave off an eerie aura around it.
'There are a total of ten Elite Skeletons and one Skeleton Assassin. Can I kill them all in one go?' He furrowed.
After all, there were no ordinary skeleton soldiers among the group.
'These Elite Skeletons also have different kinds of weapons. Two of them have bows and arrows, five have swords, and the remaining three have spears.'
When he thought of casting a spell on them and catching them off-guard, a strange creaky voice came from the Skeleton Assassin and startled him deeply.
"***** ******** ******* *********"
Soon, he noticed that one Elite Skeleton moved closer to the Skeleton Assassin and said something in the same creaky voice.
Although Abium couldn't understand anything, he was sure of one thing.
'These skeletons are interacting with one another. But how?'
He never heard that the skeletons had emotions on their own and got confused inside.
'Are they living beings like us?' Such thought appeared in his mind.
He always thought that the Necromancers were the ones who created the Undead Skeletons and were even capable of moving them like puppets.
But what he saw here was entirely out of his imagination.
At that moment, a suspicion arose in his mind.
'Are they originated from somewhere? What if they are real living beings like Humans?' He knew that it was absurd thinking, but the presence of Chaos Stone in the Elite Skeleton's head defied the common sense.
He hurriedly shook those thoughts away and shifted his attention toward the current situation.
'A strong one is among that group. I need to be more careful during battle.' Abium nodded his head and scanned the Skeleton Assassin.
[Name: Unknown
Age: Unknown
Race: Undead
Class: Skeleton Assassin
Attributes
Strength: 3.5
Agility: 3.2
Spirit: 1.5
Skills: ????, ????, ?????.
Spells: None]
'Hmm, even with this scan function, I can't read the enemy's skill names. Moreover, where is the 'Mana' option in the status?' Another question appeared in his mind.
'Could it be? Does it have something to do with the Chaos Stone? Now that I think about it, why do monsters in Easica World has Magic Stone? I should have found a goblin in the Baxbron Woods and looked at its status.' He shook his head and stealthily crept near to them.