New Life As A Level 0 Undead Mage

Mat would celebrate this little victory, he really would.. if that damned piece of bones were to let him. If only.. if only life was so easy.. so simple, and he could celebrate such little victories without worrying about anything else. If only people could celebrate and live their little highs in life gracefully without having to worry about their boss coming after their ass the very next Monday.

Mat wasn't keen on explaining much about that very last part for various reasons, although the main one had to be the shitty undead uncle in front him.

Without waiting a moment for the Lich to recover, Mat pulled its iron slab of a sword out of the ground and ran back to the door that lead out of this garden. Taking a long breath, he enforced his whole body's strength with mana, and hurled the object up into the crimson night sky.

It flew, and it flew, and it just flew away into the skies. Beyond the door, out of the bounds, out of his opponent's reach.

Maybe Mat would have had that fate too if he didn't move away from the path of the Guardian's oncoming fist.

Barely missing, the Lich swung its other fist at Mat, although calling it a fist would be anatomically inaccurate. It was but a wrist—broken, cracked, and healing.

The splintered bone grazed past his cheek as Mat tried to dodge it, fracturing his face in the pattern of a cracked mirror as a result. He stifled a pained cry, running, and making more distance between himself and the Lich.

The Lich followed, using its higher agility to catch up to him easily. Mat was aiming for his staff, but he had to turn away halfway and skid away towards the big tree. Not losing any time, he enforced his body to quickly dig through the tree's bark, climbing up the first branch he could.

Mat took a moment to coldly look down at his assailant, that giant, little, 2 meters tall piece of bones. It stared up at him in fury. Its arm looked like it was healing, but it didn't seem like this dum-dum's healing magic was too strong. Mat smirked in superiority and bent down on his knees to truly look down at this puny being. This little motherfucker. Pulling his hand out, he showed it his middle finger. He would have also pointed out his tongue, but unfortunately, or fortunately, he didn't have one. Maybe it was a good thing, because just the finger seemed to have hurt this guy's ego beyond repair, and it rushed to climb the tree behind him.

Mat was truly glad at this moment that he had bitten of its wrist. It used its only functioning arm to try and climb up the tree, but having the other hand entirely useless didn't do it any favour. Mat loved every moment of seeing this guy struggle doing something as basic as climbing. Maybe he shouldn't be mean, after all, this man—or guy, and on a rare chance, woman, or girl—served his house once.. but then again, he did it when he was alive. And he had made an enemy out of Mat… although it wouldn't be fair to say that. That shitty old man had made them each other's enemies. Mat took a breath, and ceased anymore of his teasing. He would show his enemy a warrior's respect, and finish this fight as soon as possible. The tide of the battle was now in his control after all.

Clicking his metaphorical tongue, Mat jumped down from the tree's branch—right at the spot his staff had been—making sure to enforce his joints using mana, just in case they broke. He was so glad he could use it instinctively.

Picking up his staff, Mat circled back to the Lich—who'd just turned around to his direction, and was about to rush to in his direction—and fired off a single beam of mana from his one staff.

Oh, the way the beam hit him. Oh, the way he stumbled. Oh, the way it was the one on its knees now. Mat loved seeing all of it. What had once been inevitable—a few hours ago—was now actually struggling against him.

Maybe he was celebrating too soon though, because although it stumbled, the Lich raised itself again, and took a large step towards him with his two legs.

That armour..

Mat cursed the old man in his head, who put him in this situation for gods know what godforsaken reason. Not wasting any more time, Mat stopped his attack. Indeed, just as he'd expected—not hoped, but unfortunately, expected, and he hated that he was right—the Lich was completely unharmed, its armour glowing green in defensive magic, with a tint of red due to heat barely melting a few particles on it, and heating up the ones surrounding the impact point.

Mat ran around the Lich with his staff, looking for any point of weakness, hoping to find any source of weakness that may let him kill it.

Although maybe that was not the best plan, because the moment Mat stopped his attack, the Guardian was on him, hurling fist after 'fist' in his direction, which Mat could barely half dodge.

Although the Lich was large, and wore a heavy armour, its superior agility made it fast enough that Mat had to do his all to avoid its attack by a hair's width.

Did my instincts from previous life carry over somehow?

Mat wasn't any fighter, but spending years trudging mountains everywhere in the world made him instinctively quick and sharp on his feet, although this body had its pros and cons—he was faster, due to his increased stats, but he was also less used to it, making him effectively less efficient.

He had one advantage over the Lich though. Unlike that tall, wide piece of bones covered in half a quintal of iron, he was smaller, thinner, and lighter, allowing him to twist and turn away relatively easily out of its attack paths. He had to push his body a lot, strengthen it with mana all the time, but it worked, and so far he'd not seen any limit to his mana, it felt like he was only limited by his body's capability to channel it without overheating.

Who would have thought that someday, I would be like an overpowered GPU stuck on an under powered laptop motherboard.

'That Time I got Reincarnated as A Low TGP Laptop GPU — probably the title of my biography.

Mat laughed in his head, and took step to his side to dodge the Guardian's oncoming attack, when he suddenly felt something strike his shins and he fell.

He was too focused on the Lich's hand to see its legs at such close distance… and it seemed like it was game over.

Mat didn't have much time to curse his oversight, because suddenly, he felt his legs being pulled and in a moment, he was flying.. like he was in a really fast merry-go-round. The world revolved around him at an increasing angular velocity, and he saw it blurring past him like.. lumberjack Lionel lolling loud in a lull lake.

Okay, maybe it is not a good time to show my adequately average appreciation for alliteration.

Mat thought in his head as he was let go off by the Lich, and his angular velocity now converted into tangential velocity, reaching speeds he'd never reached before.

He wished the Lich was only avenging its sword's fate, and just tossed him up in the air.. Mat really did wish that.. unfortunately, the gigantic wooden door zooming into his vision only made him despair. Mat hurled his mana pool towards his mind, and willed it to push him the opposite direction of his motion like a spaceship landing gear working against gravity. And surprisingly, it did seem to work. Maybe not as well as he'd have liked though.

He speed was decreasing.. but it didn't seem like the Lich spared any efforts in accelerating his launch, because the door was still zooming into his eyes at an incredible pace.

Mat really tried to do everything he could.. alas, that would not be. It was.. game over.

He felt his head crack and break apart into thousand tiny pieces as it impacted the door's enchanted hard wood—rapidly decelerating in a fraction of a second—resulting in a shock impulse.

The pain filled his senses, tearing apart at his sanity.

Cutting off two of his toes hadn't felt as painful back when they'd gotten frost bite on Annapurna.

The only silver lining for him was the fact that the pain disappeared as soon as it came, and his world darkened into all black as he passed out.

___

The Guardian watched in satisfaction as the little bony living person crashed away into the gate. The little thing had been an incredible annoyance to his awakening. First some crazy necromancer awakened him, and then he found himself commanded to fight this little living thing.

He would give the little thing credit, it had strength, it had resilience, and it did its best to use it. But it was too stupid, too reliant on magic. It was so easy to kill it the first time. He didn't feel any accomplishment knowing he defeated that little thing, but he was glad that he was done with the task and could now be free, even if undead, he had to do his duty to protect the castle, however dilapidated and empty it looked.

He just waited for that old goon to appear and open the gates so he could patrol, he could sense him nearby after all. He waited and waited for an hour, two hours, but nobody came.. he was getting irritated. But then, something happened. That little being woke up, and beyond all his disbelief, it revived itself, healed its injuries, and came at him again. It even bit off his fucking hand.

He was furious. He decided there shall be no mercy, he would show this little thing why it should not be messing with him, who served this castle for decades, protecting against any and all sorts of intruders. But then, that little shit threw away his sword, and ran around him like an adult fiddling with a child. It climbed up a tree, and when he couldn't follow after, it had the audacity to insult him.. insult him.

Frustrating.

It did seem to have some brains though, it was taking full advantage of its smaller stature, and higher dexterity, but in the end, it was still weak and inexperienced in battle. In the few moves they exchanged, he knew it was only focusing on his hands, not his legs. A little sweep, and it was down like a bottle of wine hit by a toddler's slingshot toy.

Then it was a matter of him just practising his throwing, and it flew, flew like a plate of iron thrown by an adult man after taking ten rotations to accelerate—illegal in sport, but effective when inflicting damage.

It crashed into the gate, its head shattering like glass and rest of its body just as much disintegrated, in thousand pieces all around.

He was sure of its death this time. It had to be dead.