NOVPUBWhen Zac and Curtis cleared their way to the top floor of the mall, the pair felt the air getting chilly to the point where they could see their breath.
A large source of necrotic energy could be felt coming from a clothing shop, and even when they had their talismans, the air was heavy and hard to transverse.
Curtis stood still for a moment as he tried to inspect the necrotic energy, but Zac continued walking towards the clothing store with his baseball bat in hand.
Inside the store, a few brainless zombies wandered around with no apparent objective. However, near the cashier's desk, the pair could see a large teal orb glowing and producing strands of shadows.
"A necrotic core?" Zac pondered aloud.
The redhead hadn't seen a core from up close. The only time he even heard about them was during his mission in the Alanigan Mountains, and that core ended up being destroyed by Sami.
Still, he could recognize it as it looked exactly the same as Dante described it, so Zac took a few steps forward and clenched his bat to prepare himself to shatter the orb.
As soon as he stepped inside the store, all of the zombies turned their heads and locked their gazes on the redhead, rushing and screeching in a crazed manner.
Curtis pointed his finger at the zombies and began casting fire bullets that traveled in a straight line, piercing the zombies' heads and making them burst into flames.
Meanwhile, Zac used his baseball bat to slam them to the sides, each strike so powerful that their heads were utterly smashed with one hit.
After a few minutes, the pair had cleared the entire store of any undead, prompting them to approach the necrotic core, which started humming and whispering in their ears.
"Help us…!" The voices of the dead could be heard by both Curtis and Zac.
As the whimpers of the dead kept echoing in their heads, Zac gulped and took a few steps forward, his expression devoid of any emotions.
With one hand, he waved his bat horizontally and shattered the orb into hundreds of pieces that turned to dust, followed by whispers of thankfulness from the souls that were freed.
"Man, this sucks…" Zac commented after smashing the core, leaving the pair in a somewhat awkward silence.
"I agree," Curtis replied in a somber tone.
Suddenly, while the pair went back downstairs to the ground floor, the environment got chilly once again, making them believe that the core had somehow fixed itself and prompting them to go back up.
However, right as they reached the top floor, Curtis looked up at the glass panel ceiling and noticed a shadow coming down towards them like a meteor.
"Zac!" Curtis exclaimed, grabbing the redhead by the collar of his shirt and pulling him back.
Not even a second after Zac was yanked by the shirt, a massive pillar of energy crashed from the roof and left a hole that traveled from the top to the ground floor, making them tumble on their rears and leaving the pair speechless.
'What the hell was that!?' Zac thought, standing up and peeking from the hole left before them.
At the bottom floor, he spotted a large man wearing dark armor covering his entire body. The man had two flames coming out of his shoulder plates, and even his helmet seemed to filter smoke out of its visor.
"That's a Death Knight…" Zac muttered.
When the redhead glanced at the armored undead, he could feel the same eerie sensation he felt at the underwater cave, where he saw his first Death Knight.
"Are you sure?" Curtis pondered.
Compared to Zac, who encountered a Death Knight who couldn't speak, Curtis had battled with Saturio, and the difference in strength between the undead barbarian and the Death Knight that just showed up seemed quite high.
"It's the same weird sensation as last time… But this guy seems to have an affinity for fire," Zac replied.
Suddenly, the fire Death Knight raised its head and looked up at the pair, who were standing on the top floor.
"Shit…" *Boom!* A fiery explosion detonated right next to the pair, blowing them away into different shops.
Both Curtis and Zac instantly stood up and rushed back outside to the mall hallways, finding the Death Knight already there waiting for them.
Zac took a deep breath and exhaled, clenching his weapon and locking his gaze on his opponent.
'I'm really not in the mood for this…' Zac thought.
When the Death Knight raised his hand to cast another fire spell, Zac took a quick step that placed him right in front of the undead, swinging to the side and hitting his arm before he could cast anything.
While the Death Knight retracted his hand and jumped back to avoid getting hit a second time, Zac scoffed with dissatisfaction as he expected to blast away the knight's arm.
The fire Death Knight opened both of his palms and produced a shadow that slowly turned into a long, double-edged sword fully encased in fire, and when he waved it overhead, he released a wave of flames forward.
Curtis, whose specialty was fire magic, was able to dispel the wave of flames before it could reach them.
He knew that his fire magic probably wouldn't have that much of an effect on the Death Knight unless he used his most powerful spells, so he decided to focus on defense and support while leaving the offense to Zac.
The moment Zac rushed forward with his bat in hand, the knight tried to keep him away by blasting different-sized fireballs at him, but Curtis dispelled all of them, making them fizzle out like a candle.
Nevertheless, the Death Knight wasn't only capable in fire magic—his swordsmanship was also quite advanced.
When Zac stood less than a meter away from his opponent, their weapons clashed and released a shockwave from the impact that blasted the edge railings away, followed by a cacophony of metals striking at a fast pace.
