Genshin Impacti: This Priest is Cringe, But She's Also Unbeatable — Chapter 81

Chapter 81: Amen! Pink Holy Light, Salvation for the Undead!

Celeste executed a precise, horizontal sweep, her staff tearing through the air with a sharp whistle.

Crack!

The spines of three skeletons shattered in perfect unison, their bones collapsing into a clattering heap on the dusty ground. She planted the end of her staff into the earth, her chest heaving as she caught her breath. Despite the exertion, her gaze remained razor-sharp, sweeping across the chaotic battlefield to assess the situation.

Things were certainly not looking good, but they were a long way from hopeless.

The sea of skeletons seemed endless, a tide of white bone crashing against the guards’ defensive line. The line was teetering, but like stubborn nails hammered into a board, they refused to break.

That stout captain with the fleshy face was a true force of nature. He swung his massive, mountain-cleaving axe in a whirlwind of steel so dense that not a single drop of water could have passed through. Bone fragments sprayed from every impact. Though fresh wounds now crisscrossed his body, his momentum only seemed to grow, his battle cries growing fiercer.

Two of his men had fallen, but their comrades had swiftly dragged them back toward the relative safety of the carriage. The old priest accompanying the caravan was already there, whispering a purification spell that dispelled the necrotic toxins spreading from their wounds. The injured men were pale, but their lives were not in immediate danger.

“There are too many of them!” Selene’s voice cut through the din, laced with a hint of gravity, though her composure was unshaken.

She held the very front of the line, a steadfast anchor. With every thunderous bash of her heavy shield, one or two skeletons would crumble into piles of splintered bone. Arrows launched by skeletal archers pinged harmlessly off its surface, failing to leave so much as a scratch.

Xia Lian leaped gracefully from the roof of the carriage. To conserve her precious enchanted arrows, she had stowed her shortbow. The twin blades at her waist were already unsheathed, their cold light dancing like twin butterflies as she precisely severed the cervical spine of a skeleton. The entire motion was a fluid, seamless arc of death, with not a single wasted movement.

Three more skeletons immediately closed in, but with a barely perceptible shift of her feet, she slipped through their encirclement. Her blades flashed again, and two more clattered to the ground, their soul-lights extinguished.

Su Wan stood slightly behind the main formation, her staff tapping the ground with a light, rhythmic cadence. She carefully controlled her frost magic, confining it to a very small area to perfectly freeze the feet of a charging ghoul. That momentary delay was all Xia Lian needed, creating the perfect opening for a finishing blow.

Fine beads of sweat dotted Su Wan’s forehead, but her breathing remained steady. Her mana consumption was still well within a manageable range. Like Xia Lian, she was holding back, conserving her strength and remaining vigilant for any greater threats that might emerge.

‘They’re just trying to wear us down,’Celeste concluded with cold, gamer-like logic.’An undead army this big doesn’t just consist of cannon fodder. The mini-bosses are coming.’

As if her thoughts had summoned them, the relentless assault from the sea of skeletons suddenly paused. The white tide of bone parted, and a stench so thick it was nauseating washed over them.

Dozens of hunched figures scrambled out from the gap. 【Ghoul Lv.25】. They dashed forward on all fours, their speed unnervingly fast, their jet-black claws aimed straight for the weakest point in the defensive line.

“Watch the claws! They’re poisonous!” an old guard roared, his shield already rising to meet a pouncing ghoul.

The intensity of the battle skyrocketed in an instant. A young adventurer, reacting half a beat too slow, cried out as sharp claws tore open his shoulder. A black, necrotic aura immediately began to spread from the wound. But he was tough. Gritting his teeth through a muffled groan, he didn’t retreat. Instead, he lunged forward, his longsword burying itself deep in the ghoul’s eye socket.

“Priest!” he bellowed.

From the rear, a soft white light descended upon him just in time. Amidst a sizzling sound, the ominous black aura was swiftly purified, dissipating into nothing. His companions immediately pulled the wounded man back. The formation was in chaos, but it had not broken.

What truly sent a chill down everyone’s spine, however, were the three figures that emerged slowly from behind the ghoul pack. Three 【Necromancer Lv.26】, shrouded in tattered black robes.

They held their bone staves high, and a stream of obscure, evil incantations echoed across the battlefield. A dark green halo pulsed outward from them.

The scattered skeletons littering the ground began to tremble violently. Under the shroud of that sickly green light, they reassembled, bone clicking into bone. In their empty eye sockets, the extinguished soul-fires ignited once more.

“Damn it! They can resurrect them!” the stout captain roared. He cleaved a ghoul in two with his axe, but another one streaked past, its claws leaving a bloody gash on his arm so deep it exposed the bone.

The black aura began to seep from the wound, and his face sank. A moment later, a beam of white light from the priest washed over him, and the toxin quickly receded.

He spat a mouthful of bloody saliva onto the ground. “Pah! Filthy cowards only know how to play dirty!”

“This will never end if we keep this up.” Xia Lian sheathed her twin blades. With a deft backhand motion, she drew two short daggers from their sheaths on her thighs, her gaze locked on the three Necromancers. “Should we charge in and take out the casters?”

Su Wan shook her head, her brows knitted together in a tight frown. It was the first time she had shown such a grim expression since they had entered the Domain. “No. They’re positioned too far back, and… there’s a Stitched Abomination guarding them.”

A Stitched Abomination.

Every eye involuntarily turned toward the very rear of the undead army.

The huge, dark shadow finally revealed its true form—a grotesque monster standing over six meters tall, crudely pieced together from countless severed limbs and rotting remains. A hideous, giant mouth on its abdomen opened and closed, dripping a viscous, filthy liquid. The massive beast bone it wielded as a club, as thick as a support pillar, dragged on the ground, carving deep trenches in the earth.

With every lumbering step it took, the ground transmitted a dull, heavy vibration.

【Stitched Abomination Lv.32】!

This was a siege weapon of the undead legion. This wasn’t some unlucky encounter. This was a premeditated, fully-equipped ambush.

“Prepare for alternating cover fire! We’re breaking out toward the southeast corner!” the stout captain decided instantly, issuing the most rational order possible. “The terrain there is narrower. It’ll restrict the movement of that Abomination and the skeleton horde.”

Su Wan was about to follow the order when she noticed that Celeste wasn’t retreating. In fact, she had taken a step forward.

Her eyes were burning as she stared at the undead tide, and the curve of her lips held no fear. Instead, it was a predator’s smile, radiating an almost manic excitement.

“Qingyue?” Su Wan frowned, sensing something was very wrong.

Celeste didn’t answer her. She took another half-step forward, holding her staff horizontally before her chest.

“Sis?” Selene turned her head, confused, and then her eyes widened. She recognized that stance.

The crystal at the tip of the staff began to gather a soft, pink light. That posture, that expression…

Selene instantly recalled the unlucky Necromancer from the college entrance exam Domain, the one who had been “healed” into a pile of ash by her sister’s “Healing Spell”!

“Could it be…” Selene’s mouth formed a perfect “O.” An intense, almost fanatical light erupted in her eyes, and her voice trembled with unadulterated excitement. “Sis! Are you going to use that again?!”

Xia Lian and Su Wan stared, completely baffled. Use which one? A healing spell?

Celeste shot her sister a quick wink before closing her eyes, her mental energy focusing to a fine point. This time, the spell she was chanting was a large-area healing art—”Halo.”

She guided the unique and majestic Holy Light Power within her, and the crystal at the tip of her staff suddenly blazed with blinding light.

But what poured out wasn’t the sacred, golden-white radiance one would expect. It was a sky-covering tidal wave of brilliant, bubblegum pink light.

This light carried a kind of absurd sanctity as it swept out from Celeste, washing over the entire battlefield.

“Oh, Holy Light,” Celeste’s voice was ethereal and solemn, creating a powerful sense of dissonance with the ridiculously pink glow. “Please purify these lost souls and grant them… eternal peace.”

“Amen!”

[Ding! Detected Host is using a proper skill with a straight face to do something extremely improper, while attempting to drape it in a holy cloak. Elation Coins +888!]

‘Who’s being improper?’Celeste shot back internally.’Where is it improper? The Holy Light purifying the undead is the most natural thing in the world. This is perfectly proper!’

The pink tide of light swept past. The world seemed to fall silent, as if someone had pressed the mute button.

The ghouls charging at the very front froze mid-stride.

Their gray, decayed skin, their jet-black claws, their rotting flesh—all of it silently softened and melted under the illumination of that pink light. There were no screams, only the sizzling sound of fat and putrescence being rendered away.

In the span of a single breath, they dissolved into pools of viscous liquid that emitted plumes of black smoke.

The fate of the skeleton army was even more direct. The moment the pale white bones touched the pink light, they instantly collapsed, decomposing directly into the most primitive bone powder.

A gust of wind blew across the now-empty field, kicking up a cloud of dust that filled the sky.