《The Ruined Death Knight》


 Chapter 1 - Prologue

    Hearing those sounds or rather those voices.


    Screams full of fear and panic cries from pain or the inability to change their current fate, together with shouts of anger or poor naivety. Thinking that they can change everything just because of their positions in society.


    I hate such kinds of people.


    Nevertheless, all those voices and the smell of blood were was covered by the sounds of gunshots and gunpowder.


    What was going on?


    How did this happen?


    Why did this happen?


    His was just supposed to be one another concert which was a little more important than the other ones... and yet...


    There was a Terrorist attack going on right now. Afterining internally of the turns of events. I started crawling away from the stage. But pain followed in shortly.


    "Agh...my legs!" after moving he noticed what state this body was in.


    The explosion from the stage beforepletely cut one of his legs while the other one was barely being kept together from some muscle tissue. He also realized that he was bleeding heavily from this head since blood was starting to cover this eyes slowly.


    Of course, the pain was enough to make everyone cry out from the pain but he tried to keep this voice as low as possible so that he didn''t get any attention from anyone.


    Unfortunately, this struggle was meaningless.


    While he was slowly crawling away, someone kicked this back with a huge amount of force making him cry aloud in pain and make him unable to move.


    The one who kicked was a Terrorist.


    After saying something in anguage that I couldn''t understand. Two other Terrorist came up and startedughing sinisterly for some reason.


    But soon enough I realized why.


    Baaam!


    An incredible amount of pain came from my back together with a loud noise.


    "Arghhhhh!" I screamed so loud that my vocal cords felt like exploding. I felt my consciousness fainting away.


    But I was naive.


    Baam! Baam! Baam!


    Multiple bullets were shot at my body. At first my shoulder, then left and right leg, and at the end in my palms.


    The pain was enormous...enough to bring my consciousness back.


    I pained, despaired, confused, and atst.


    Anger.


    "Why!? Why are you doing this! For what purpose! For what reason! What will you achieve by doing this! Tell me!" I shouted with all my strength at them.


    The Terrorists that wereughing a moment ago stopped and looked at me with a serious look. One of them bend to his knees and started talking in anguage that I can understand.


    "Why you ask? Isn¡ät it obvious?" The man''s serious face turned into a sinister smile suddenly


    "Because it is fun!"


    ...huh? what did he just say?


    "It is because have the power of doing this. As a sinner like you, you should be grateful for our kindness which will put an end to this sinful life of yours. Also, If what I am doing brings me happiness at the cost of your happiness, why should I care?"


    He puts this handgun at top of my hand while I was dazed for this reason.


    "Afterall, that''s what humans are"


    I gritted my teeth and my eyes became bloodshot. How can someone like him be a human!? Ruining the life of others for their benefit can be understood. Since in our current time making enough for a living is extremely hard. But ruining the lives of others for what? Fun? Pleasure? Those are a madman!


    "You guys aren`t human! If that''s what humans are I wish I was never a Hum-"


    Baam!


    That was thest sound that I heard before everything went nk.


    Seeing my surroundings there was nothing, just pure darkness. I could only feel that I was slowly sinking into some kind of water. The more I sank, the more my conscience was leaving my body.


    "Mother...Brother...I should have listened...I am sorry that I...I...what was it again?" When my whole body sank beside my head I felt like my whole head was cleaned from any memories or any kind of information.


    "Wait... where am I?" Now that I sankpletely I felt like my whole body became numb.


    Inside there Ipletely lost the sense of time.


    A moment felt more like a whole decade.


    Not that I know what a moment felt like...


    So I kept sinking like this on what felt like decades. Completely Emotionless with no sense of Touch.


    But for some kind of reason, I could feel one single Emotion...Hatred towards the so-called humans!


    I didn''t know the reason why but I despised humans to the very core.


    I kept hating and despising these so-called humans for what felt like an all eternity.


    Until I saw a massive silhouette before me.


    And then the feeling of being pulled from my inside out came.


    I felt like being crushed and then remade again so that this circle can continue.


    But what was more strange was that I could feel all these things. Feelings that I never experienced or rather... Forgot.


    As I was confused by all this I heard a very cold and low voice inside my head.


    "Your wish...has been acknowledged."


    Before I could think about, what the massive silhouette meant. The terrible feeling of being pulled from inside out faded away and the feeling of falling came.


    *Ssh!


    "What the hel-!" Wait, I can talk? Howe? And why can I see colors now?"


    I tried to reach out my hand to check the area around me but... I felt a resistance!


    It wasn`t like this before!


    Before I couldn`t feel anything but now I felt a sense of...touch? I could feel the pressure of me pressing the ground with my hand but nothing else...as if something was missing...


    I quickly dismissed these thoughts and I tried standing up.


    After I fully stood up a different view came to my sight. In front of me was a beautiful-lookingke that was sparkling with blue light. Looking around me I saw some shining blue rocks on top of theke to which I assumed are the light source of the blue lights.


    Seeing this beautiful sight one would feel a sense of peace and appreciation.


    "That`s weird...how did I end up here?" After collecting myself for a while a sense of confusion came straight to my mind.


    "Huh? who am I?"


    [Your Status is now avable]

 Chapter 2 - My Skeleton Self

    I stared nkly in front of me...


    There was a blue-looking window in front of me that contained some familiar-looking words, even though I don''t know why... I can still read


    them.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 1


    ss: -----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 200


    Mana: 10


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 5 Agility: 2 Intelligence: 1 Endurance: 3


    [Talents][Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] -- [Remark: Weakest Undead that there is...Although there are spooky and scary their Strength is at rock bottom!]


    " Status? ss? Talents? What is this?"


    I tried touching the window with my hand but it passed right through it. After toying around for some time I found out that I can close the window wherever I want if I try to think about it.


    "So the status is part of me...but what purpose does it serve? It seems like it has some kind of information that I can read them but...What do these words mean?"


    I tried touching all around the status to find some clues about it. Even though the sight of him swinging these hands in the air at nothing would have seemedical to another person, he did found something by this.


    [Status]: Information about the capabilities of the person possessing it.


    "It seems like if I press on the following names an exnation wille out...Let us see, how about my Race?"


    [Skeleton]: A former living being that was either resurrected as an undead by the use of necromancy or was resurrected by the nearby death energy. One of the weakest Undead.


    This kinda pisses me off...telling me I am weak...Next!


    [Undead]: As one of Undead you possess hate for the living. Although many consider this a curse others consider this a blessing for the benefits of Immortality. They Never Hunger, Never Tire.


    This doesn`t sound too bad, it does say it is a curse but also a blessing. I didn''t think much about it and went right after the other talent.


    [Sin of Wrath]: Of the seven deadly sins, you have been judged to possess the sin of wrath! It strengthens the feeling of anger and hatred. While fighting an enemy with feelings of anger or hatred you gain 10% of every attribute. It also Increases the bloodlust that is being generated by 50%.


    I am not sure about this one though... It does sound positive but also not, the increase of strength sounds good but the others are kinda weird... that by not counting whatever bloodlust is.


    But I can''t forget that the description says that I have been judged by someone, which means this talent has been given by me by someone... Right?


    But why wrath though? Let''s see, what other sins exist.


    [Seven Deadly Sins]: The seven deadly sins can only be acquired by some specific conditions. The Sins are the following: Pride, Sloth, Greed, Gluttony, Wrath, Lust, and Envy.


    "Hmm, it does say that something specific has to be done for me get a sin but... I don''t remember doing something at all!"


    Dismissing the status window, he started taking a better look at this surroundings.


    "How did I end up here? I remember I that fell into that dark swamp and then...then?"


    For a minute I nkly stare ahead of me as if I was having some deep thoughts, but that didn''tst for long.


    "I should get out from now" Right before I left the water, my feet did hit something.


    Reaching my hand out to see what it was and I was somehow surprised.


    [Rusted Sword]: A de which longst has lost the ability to cut. Even though the edge is pathetically weak, It does have the ability to poison the ones that were cut by it...


    "This sounds really useless... But it wouldn''t hurt taking it anyway." After confirming how pathetic the edge was, which to no surprise was pathetically weak, he nodded this head and started roaming around the area until he found a kind of tunnel.


    "Well...there is nowhere else to go other than this way" sighing internally, he started moving inside this tunnel until he met a new with a new sight, to which was...


    *crack


    A skeleton...like him!


    Getting excited about finding someone that was like him, he waved this hand and started talking.


    "Hey! You! Skeleton friend! How are you doing, all good? I would like to ask some questions about where we are!"


    The skeleton with a Rusted Sword like me stared at me without showing signs of any movement. After what felt like 2 minutes it turned around and started walking away...


    ...


    Seeing this I felt a kind of rejection...but I still tried to follow him since why not? I haven`t anywhere to go besides and being alone here reminded him of the dark swamp. Hence I followed! Like a baby duck would follow the mama duck!


    But...even though I followed the fellow skeleton for what felt like hours I realized that we walking in a circle. After confirming my thoughts I went to confront him.


    "Hey fellow skeleton, can I ask you why we repeating the same path time after time? Is there a reason behind it?"


    No reaction...


    At this point, I started to have some doubts... Could it be that he...I reached my hand to grab this shoulder bone and used my system to Inspect him as I did with the talents. And what came out shocked


    me.


    [Skeleton]: One of the weakest undead that there is, there are either puppets born by use necromancy or mindless undead born from nearby death energy.


    "Mindless undead? more importantly, the description changed...but why?"


    Why would the description change when we are both of the same race? And it says that this skeleton fellow in front of me is mindless, in other words simply stupid. But inparison to me, I am clearly more intelligent than him. Is that why?


    Unfortunately, my thoughts were interrupted by some kind of shrieking voices from our left. Looking in the direction of the voices I saw three small and awful-looking creatures to which one had a club and the other two had a smaller version of a sword.


    Looking at them I felt some kind of difort in my chest and head.


    Looking at my chest I was nothing there to which didn`t help me with my confusion.


    "What is going o-" before I could finish this happens.


    "Kghhhh...!" The skeleton fellow beside me screeched with a high pitch voice which made me flinch slightly.


    After he was done he ran awkwardly to these three small creature and swung this rusted sword at the one with the club.


    To my surprise, the skeleton fellow was able to inflict arge scar on the one with the club. Although it didn''t look like a deep wound, it still surprised me.


    Wait, is that rusted toothpick able to cut something? What about not having an edge at all?!


    Meining about the status internally. The fight was still happening.


    After the one with the club being shed by the skeleton fellow, it started screaming and swinging this club in the air. Doing that made the other two start screaming and attacking the skeleton fellow with their small swords.


    This made me realize that the one that held the club must be their leader.


    "I should help the skeleton fellow before he..." sadly the skeleton fellow didn''t like the idea of teaming with him.


    "Kghhh..!" Seeing the two green creatures attacking this legs and chest, to which made some of these bones began to crack or right of break. He started swinging this sword at them.


    With a swing from the top of this head, he was able to cut halfway through one of the creature''s necks. Seeing this made itugh sinisterly.


    But before it could remove this sword from the green creature''s neck...


    "Skeleton Fellow! Behind you!"


    Before he could react, the one with the club jumped behind him swinging this club at this head, which resulted in breaking this whole head into pieces...


    "Fellow!"


    With Fellow down, the two remaining creatures started to focus on me...maybe if I had chosen to run the moment I saw them I would have been able to get away but now...that''s no longer an option!


    Dashing to the one with the small sword I tried to mimic the attack that Fellow performed but instead one hand I held my rusted sword with both of them. Due though our high differences between our bodies and our weapons, I managed to hit this shoulder where he only touched my rib bones by the tip of the small sword.


    The result was obvious...


    "Kghah!"


    "With this, there is one down and One remai-" Unfortunately the feeling of victory went away as fast as it came.


    "...ing?" Seeing the one that I hit with my whole strength to just have arge scar.


    Hey, how crappy is this sword? I know it said it doesn`t have an edge but still the skeleton fellow sword made a deeper wound while using only one hand...


    Seeing that the two creatures were approaching me I cursed inwardly.

 Chapter 3 - Rewards

    "If I run away now I will probably getaway, but..."


    Looking in front of me there is the one with the club and the one with the dagger. Both were injured so if I run away they will either get tired of chasing me or ignore me.


    By one look you could clearly see that both of them were breathing heavily and sweating. It was the perfect opportunity to either run or finish them off. If there wasn`t this hot feeling I might have chosen the former but...


    "This will be for Fellow!" I didn`t wait for them to recover and I struck while the iron was hot.


    "You with the sword will be the first one!"


    I tried to do the same thing but this time aiming this neck simr to how Fellow had done it, but to my surprise, it was able to block my swing. Although it did block the first strike...it let itself an opening for my next following strike. The strength differences between us were simply too much.


    Even the rusted sword was able to cut through the soft flesh of this neck.


    "Kgh!...ahhh!" Seeing the creature grabbing this neck in desperation to save itself from this demise. The feeling of my body burning came back stronger but it quickly disappeared upon seeing the one with the club sneaking behind me.


    As if I fall for that!


    I turned around swinging my rusted sword to hit the one with the club. But the only thing that I achieved by this was hitting the empty air...


    The one with the club stared at me and I stared back with a dump face. Not like I got a face...


    "..."


    "..."


    After like 3 seconds we both realize that we were still in a fight of life and...death? Wait, aren`t I suppose an undead that lives after dying? So this fight would be for life and undeath?


    Sadly the one with the club interrupted my nonsense by striking back at me. Which was blocked by me.


    After a few exchanges, I realized that it`s getting the weaker cause of Fellows previews wound.


    But that quickly changed...


    "Kual keah!" a faint green light came out of these legs, after the faint green light ended the thing that I next saw shocked me.


    The one with the club jumped at me with incredible speed with the intent of smashing my head!


    I raised my rusted sword in a panic to block the club from hitting my head. The rusted sword wasn`t able to handle the strength from the club and got destroyed into pieces!


    Although I blocked the attack from hitting my face it allowed the club to hit my chest bones!


    "Dammit! You useless piece of junk!" What the hell was that!? The strength and the speed are totally different from before! Was it because of the ligh-"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Goblin


    Level: 3


    ss: Warrior Lv. 1


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 78/400


    Mana: 8/30


    Attributes: Strength: 4 Agility: 1 Intelligence: 3 Endurance: 7 Stamina: 12


    [Talents] ---


    [Skills] [Sprint Lv.1] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1]


    Status!? But I didn`t think of it. Wait, that status isn`t from me but the one with the club! That dammed thing is called goblin!


    "Hm... the Attributes are lower than mine except for Endurance and it also got stamina which I don''t, is it because I am an undead?" If the sudden strength didn`te from the attributes then it can only be from these skills.


    [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1]: You learned what purpose weapons of any kind should be used and how to handle them.


    [Sprint Lv.1]: By Forcing mana into your leg you are able to surpass your limits thus being able to move at extreme speed for a limited amount of time. Though this method brings a heavy burden to your body.


    "So that was it...although it seems dangerous if it uses it again, but...."


    Seeing the Goblin falling with this shaking knees with a pale expression ce on this face It probably can`t move right now.


    "So that was ast-ditch effort? You probably didn`t think that I will be able to block it right? how..." I walked towards Fellows "corpses" and pick up this sword and slowly approached the goblin which had a despaired expression on this face.


    "Foolish"


    *thud


    Seeing now the headless goblin falling down like a puppet whose strings had been cut, a feeling of satisfaction came towards me. As if a great burden has been lifted off my body.


    [You received 300 Experience points]


    "Huh?"


    Experience points? what are those?


    [Experience points] By using experience points you can Increase your current Level, Skills and possibly being able to gain new Talents.


    Experience points can be gain through doing specific actions.


    So that is how I can increase my status? Sounds rather simple, right now I have 400 experien- ah let''s call it XP for convenience sake. Right now I gained 400 XP from the goblin with the club and...


    "Wait a moment...!" I turned swiftly checking my surroundings only to see the goblin that I cut barely breathing.


    "It`s still alive huh... let''s check this status"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Goblin


    Level: 1


    ss: ---


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 5/300


    Mana: 0/10


    Attributes: Strength: 3 Agility: 1 Intelligence: 1 Endurance: 5 Stamina: 7


    [Talents] ---


    [Skills] ---


    "To believe its still alive..."


    I walked towards it and pierced this heart.


    [You received 150 Experience points]


    "Weird, I was able to pierce this skin easier than before with Fellows sword" At first nce of my current owned sword it seems like the trash of a rusted sword that I had but at a closer look this edge is still there except for some small pieces.


    [Iron Sword (In the state of decay)]: A sword forged from iron. Although the material is of the lowest quality, the craftsmanship to great this de is of the highest ss. Currently, the de has already decayed and lost most of this quality. A truly sad fate for any sword.


    "No wonder that Fellow was able to damage them more...with such a treasure in this hand everything is possible!"


    Now that I got myself a new sword I should see what all this crap with the XP is all about. As long as I understood it correctly I can use those to somehow reinforce myself...Let us see if there is something that I can use that 450 XP for.


    "Status"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 1


    ss: -----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 200


    Mana: 10


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 5 Agility: 2 Intelligence: 1 Endurance: 3


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] --


    [Remark: Weakest Undead that there is...Although there are spooky and scary their Strength is at rock bottom!]


    Nothing changed...ah If I think of how much XP I currently it shows up simr to the status window. Well at least I can check how much XP I have, otherwise, it would have been quite awkward keeping count of it...


    Let''s see what I can get with 450 XP, first of all, let us see what the skills have to offer!


    [Skills]


    [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1]: 1000 XP required


    [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] 5000 XP required


    "Oh! oh...." Seeing that I can actually get something out of the XP and I can get simr powers to that goblin sudden strength boost excited me for a moment, but only after seeing that I cant buy them do I feel cheated... That''s too cruel!


    "Well, If I can get enough XP I would be able to get [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] pretty soon, but what is that Miasma skill? Let''s see.


    [Miasma Corruption Lv.1]: A rare trait is seen upon the undead, to the lowest ranking undead at least. When an undead with a considerable amount of time existed, they begin to release dead mana to their surroundings which slowly destroys the environment around them. Undead in such an environment experience a small amount of improvement over time.


    Increase of all attributes by 5


    Lowerst the cost towards Dark, Curse, and Death based Skills by 5%.


    Every 10 years, 1 attribute point is being granted.


    "Increase of all stats by 5 sounds so good...but expensive as heck! of course, the discount sounds good if I get any of the affected skills.


    This ie of attribute per year should be the small amount of improvement over time that was mentioned before...It is alright since as I undead I am an immortal being but...isn`t that too pathetic? Seriously! In order to gain the same amount of stats that I have right now I would have to wait for what? 110 years!?"


    Afterining for a while, I sigh heavily and dropping to the ground while holding my head.


    "Sigh, I can''t get anything from only 450 XP. I would have to somehow get more to get these two skills. let''s see what there is on the talents to buy..."


    [Talents]


    ---


    "...Seriously?" Nothing? Like...at all?"


    "No talents and no skills, what''s left are the levels, please be cheap enough for me to effort" With trembling hands, I reached out and pressed on the level screen. And seeing what came out made me jump from my butt instantly.


    [Level]: 400 XP required


    "Ohhh!"


    I instantly pressed on the window without any second thoughts.


    [Level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv.2]


    [Strength increased by 1, Agility increased by 1 and Endurance increased by 1]

 Chapter 4 - Draugr And Target

    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 2


    ss: -----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 200


    Mana: 10


    Attribute Points: 0Attributes: Strength: 6 Agility: 3 Intelligence: 1 Endurance: 4


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] --


    [Remark: Weakest Undead that there is...Although there are spooky and scary their Strength is at rock bottom!]


    "So leveling up increases my attributes, I can feel the difference of power right away, I should find a way to gather more XP in the future..." But for now, I should get out of here before something else like the goblinse at me".


    After confirming that I got everything that I need I continued to walk the path from before. But suddenly I heard something.


    *Thud!


    "Where did that sounde from?" I heard an echo of a sound, although faint, it seemed like it came from somewhere at the top...


    "It''s probably a rock that fell into theke...It shouldn''t be anything to worry about."


    With that, I continued to walk the path until my silhouette couldn`t be seen.


    ***


    "Open the gates! They have returned! Hurry and open the gates!" Sounds of chains being pulled could be heard behind the massive gate which was slowly opening. From that gate emerged soldiers with two different kinds of armor. Ones with shabby armor that didn''t look like they were being cared for at all. The other soldiers had better-looking armor that wasn`t damaged at all together with some red cloth and a crest on their chest that had as a symbol of a hand holding an orb. Leading these soldiers with the crest was a man with a massive build of 2 meters tall, with this full-body armor and a deep red cloth that resembles blood he looked like a knight that has bathed in blood. This very person called out those who wereing from inside the gate.


    "Young Master! Are you alright!"


    Coming out of the gate were three simr-looking soldiers with those with the red cloth but only with fancier armor and one young man that had an incredible-looking armor with some red kind of crystal in the middle which was barely glowing which showed that this young man wore enchanted armor.


    This very young man answered the call of the blood knight "So you even came...Raph-." Before the young man could finish he fell to this knees while gripping this shoulder which began to bleeding.


    Seeing the pale face he dashed towards him and reached him in an instant. "Young Master! Are you alright?! What happe-" This re that had some killing intent in it went towards the three soldiers beside the young man. Seeing this the soldiers shivered from fear on the outside.


    But on the inside, they felt more ashamed.


    We couldn`t protect the young master...


    But before the blood knight could finish he was interrupted by the young master "Rapha... I am sorry...It took the sword that was given to me..."


    Hearing this, the blood knight Rapha raised this brows and asked back "Wait, by that do you mean the sword that the son of the master cksmith has given to you!? Who stole it! Which bastard dared to take it from you?"


    Seeing the surprised Rapha, the young master''s head looked down from shame. "I am sorry Rapha, I didn`t know that something like this. Something like this wasn`t supposed to show up inside that dungeon! This monster..."


    Hearing this, Rapha''s eyes went wide open. There shouldn''t be anything strong inside that dungeon though? I trained the young master myself and I know this strength myself at best, the worst that cane out from this dungeon can be some goblin or some mindless undead...


    With doubt in this voice, Rapha asked " What did you meet inside there?".


    "It was a..." Recalling those dead blue glowing eyes from this monster cold sweat came from this back.


    "Draugr!"


    ****


    "K-Kgh!"


    In the dark path inside the dungeon, a Screeching voice could be hurt.


    Those were Screams of Goblins.


    Here was I fighting another group of 4 goblins not long after my first fight... or rather than fighting it was more like chasing them to death.


    Since this group didn`t have a `warrior goblin-like the other group I was easily able to kill this group without much difficulty after my attributes Increased. Even though my attributes Increased, my overall strength was only slightly Increased.


    But to the weaklings that these goblins are, the strength I showed terrified them. The Usual Skeletons that these goblins had faced before were the mindless one which would focus on one of them, only changing targets when the targeted goblin had either died or had ran away.


    To the goblins, sacrificing one of their kind to kill their foe was a win-win situation for them! Killing their foe and looting their possession was their nature, but sharing the loot was not. Lowering the numbers allowed them to have to get more of the loot.


    Two birds with one stone!


    Well, that was only in the case of the mindless Skeletons though.


    "Sigh, chasing this guy was quite annoying but at least they get tired pretty fast."


    Now I understand what to not tire means... always able to move even though your opponent is exhausted.


    "Kihaha, Undead are indeed the superior race!" After fooling around for a bit I decided to continue my path.


    "Hmm, but still where do these goblinse from? They always seem to be in a group which means that they live somewhere together."


    After walking for a while longer it suddenly hit me...


    "...A home huh? Right now It should be fine since I don''t carry much but I eventually would need a ce to keep the items I carry..." I gazed at the fellow''s sword with worry. Although it was a good sword it already showed signs of the de losing this edge and slowly breaking apart.


    "Sigh, I shouldn`t worry about that right now, I gathered around 800 XP with those goblins, I should think if I should use them or not"


    The three goblins had given me 200 XP while one gave me 150 XP. Since the three were Lv.2 goblins they gave me a little more XP than the one goblin that was Lv.1. This confirmed that the stronger the enemies were, the more XP they would give me.


    "What should I do now though? Spending 500 XP to increase my level or wait to get enough for [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1]?"


    After thinking about it I decided to wait until I can get [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1]. Since the only enemy seems to be goblins I don''t really need to increase my level. And If I find myself in an urgent situation I can still use the gathered XP to increase my level.


    "Well, nothing that can be done about unless I find another group of goblins. I should focus on finding a ce to stay to ce the collected items that I find, ''cause it doesn`t look like my sword willst for long..." I looked at my sword again only to find myself sighing.


    "Sigh, maybe I should find another skeleton and get this weapon...He wouldn`t mind, right? They are mindless and the fellow was fairly friendly towards me (I think), maybe if I rece this weapon with one of the goblin''s weapons he wouldn¡ät notice, right? I mean, since they are mindless they wouldn`t notice the difference between a dagger and a sword, right?"


    With such thoughts, several hours have passed. In those hours I was able to have a basic understanding of the area around theke. They were two different paths that I haven`t explored yet but that didn`t matter right now.


    Why?


    Cause I already found the ce where I was going to make myself at home!


    Near the opposite side of theke where I started from, behind some stacked rocks that looked like they were yed by someone else was a cave, although the rocks were supposed to hide the cave behind it didn''t help much. The cave that I had my eyes on had unfortunately been already taken by goblins and what seemed like a muchrger group than the group of 4. But that didn`t matter.


    "Ah, unfortunate, so, unfortunately. It''s truly sad" I shook my head with an expression (not that I have one) simr to when you drop you a double ball of ice cream after one lick.


    "Well....it isn''t like it is I that will face this unfortunate here though" Unconsciously I had put a vicious grin on my face and my eyes showed a spark of dark green light which instantly disappeared right after appearing.

 Chapter 5 - A Cruel Death

    Inside the cave were several goblins running around doing all kinds of tasks. Some were making clothes and others were making weapons. In the middle of the cave was a group of 5 goblins that were holding some buckets.


    As these goblins waited in the middle of the cave, a massive silhouette suddenly appeared behind them, although this silhouette was only as big as 5,8 feet tall.


    This figure had the same skin color as the goblins and a simr face too. He seemed like the adult version of goblins.


    "yOu...briNG...WaTeR...Elder...." the adult goblin spoke with a hoarse voice and moved his mouth as he was trying to eat something and talk at the same time.


    The response that he received was some kind of screeching from these 5 goblins, only to leave with their buckets shortly after this weird exchange of screaming to each other.


    ****


    "Ha, I know that they needed to sooner orter leave their cave to gather supplies. Waiting here was after all the right choice".


    Seeing the group of 5 goblins I walked back to theke to ambush them knowing that this group wille there.


    When I found the cave I knew that I wasn`t able to go in recklessly and kill every single goblin in there. After all, going in there without a n would be suicide with their numbers. Even though I am able to handle a group of goblins alone, that is cause I keep them in check all the time. Their daggers do no damage to my body except some scratches, but the goblins with the clubs will just smash me into pieces!


    The moment I let theme closer with their clubs it will not be long before I meet Fellow again...


    That`s why I decided to wait quietly for a group to go out to resupply and ambush them to reduce their numbers. As long their numbers are down It will be easier to control them and not to forget that I will get stronger after killing some groups.


    Me being level 2 is already overwhelming enough for those goblins, but what will happen If it increased by level 3 together with a skill?


    There are hopeless!


    "Oh, I can already hear them, I better hide..." I crouched down and hidden behind some ratherrger rocks and tried to stay in the shadow of the rock as much as possible and did what all Undead are best at...


    y dead!


    As the noises became louder, the group of 5 showed up with their buckets and their dagger small daggers on their hips and went directly to theke and started drinking right off the start. They drank as if their life was depending on it.


    After a short while, 1 out of five goblins seemed liked it had enough of drinking to the point that this belly had swollen. It picked itself out of the ground and signaled the others that he was going to take a leak. Seeing that he was being ignored by these fellow goblins he scoffed and went to let nature take ce.


    Walking a little bit farther away he dropped this pants and released the flood. After releasing it, a form of pleasure came right to this mind as if some massive weight has been taken off this body, while doing this business he took a look at these surroundings so that he can enjoy the view.


    But while seeing these surroundings he suddenly froze and the flood that was taking ce was also stop as if a massive rock stop the flow. The reason for it was that after looking for quite some time he noticed a skeleton lying down near some rocks. Although it was quite hard to see the skeleton cause it of the darkness he still managed to.


    Seeing this the goblin was about to scream but a sudden thoughtes to this mind.


    Was this skeleton there alive? It didn`t move like the other skeleton and if it did it would already have rushed at him to get a piece out of him...


    After calming himself down, he started to have doubts inside his mind. With this pants down he stared at theying skeleton directly into this eye socket. And he stared intensely at that too!


    "..."


    "..."


    After a while, the goblin turned around and shook this head only to start to continue this business.


    But before he could release the flood again, something came behind him and before he could even finish this business a massive pressure came to this neck and before he knew...there was no head in this body anymore!


    The head that was flying in the air came shortly to the ground making some noise, enough to rm the other 4 goblins.


    The goblins turned around to see what this noise was but they were shortly shocked at what they were seeing. Seeing their fellow goblin with these pants down they felt disgusted but what shocked them more was the Skeleton that was behind him!


    Seeing this skeleton beheaded their fellow goblins while he was taking a leak...


    A cold sweat came behind their backs and shortly fear came!


    Seeing the skeleton that killed their friend was running towards them they dropped their buckets and equipped their small daggers in their hands.


    But before they could equip their small daggers I was already in range!


    I held my sword with both my arms and instead of swinging with just force I pierced the neck of the nearest goblin with my sword until it reached the other end of this neck.


    This was the power of the skill [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1]! The moment I killed the first goblin it gave me enough XP to be able to purchase the skill!


    Although doing that I learned something very important, that is when I get a skill it seems like a bunch of Information is being transmitted directly to my mind which bought me to stagger for a moment.


    But other than this downside there was nothing to worry about.


    If you were to look at the skill [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] you could say that it didn`t give anything else other than how to use different kinds of weapons. But that was the reason why this skill was so strong!


    You could say that knowledge is power!


    "And how to use it is the key!"


    If it were me before without [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] skill I would just have shed at those goblins with full force but now with the skill, I managed to urately aim at the goblin''s neck and finish it off with almost no effort!


    I twisted my sword and pulled it out of the goblin''s neck only for blood toe out of the wound.


    Seeing this the 3 remaining goblins started to shake. Withing an instant this skeleton killed 2 of us! There is no way we can win against this thing!


    Overwhelmed with fear, the 3 remaining goblins decided to make a run for it.


    But it was futile.


    Since I was in front of the path to where their nest was, they either had to go past me or run in other directions and abandon their nest.


    Seeing that they chose the first option there fate was already decided!


    I dashed at the middle goblin out of the three and raised my sword to sh at him with all my strength. Seeing this the goblin tried to change directions but to no avail. My de hit this small body resulting in sending him flying while spinning and lying shortly to the ground.


    Lifeless.


    [You received 200 Experience points].


    The whole processsted no longer than 2 seconds.


    By this amount of time, they managed to make about 2 m distance with their small children''s legs.


    Nowhere near enough to avoid my grasp.


    Comparing with my long legs and my superior agility I shortly managed to catch up with the second goblin and swung my sword towards this waist. Although I didn`t manage to kill it instantly like the first one that didn`t matter since I managed to inflict a wound and push it into the ground.


    Ignoring the fallen goblin I kept chase with thest one. Seeing that this Skeleton instantly killed this colleague cold sweat came behind this back. But not for the fact that he ughtered these fellow goblins with ease.


    No.


    What scared him the most was this gaze... The skeletons he knew were mindless creatures that always showed their bloodthirst the moment they saw something alive.


    But this skeleton was different.


    This one was silent, focused and it seemed like it had a... mind!


    This whole bloodthirst was focused on this eye socket and this de which made it a whole another level of scary versus the one usually seen in skeletons. While knowing that it was a matter of timing until the bloodthirsty de came and strike him down, he turned around to make ast-ditch effort.


    But in end, it was a futile attempt.


    [You received 200 Experience points].


    "With this, I have 400 Experience points left... dammit, It`s still not enough to increase my leve-"


    "Kg-Kghh...." *


    Hearing the low growl of the goblin that I ignored before I subconsciously grinned. Damm I forgot about you!


    "Well, since you are thest one I will make it quick just for you"


    Seeing that the skeleton wasing for it it couldn`t help but scream out for help.


    "K-Kghhhh!"

 Chapter 6 - A Broken Friend

    [Level has increased from Lv.2 to Lv.3]


    [Strength increased by 1, Agility increased by 1 and Endurance increased by 1]


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 3


    ss: -----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 250


    Mana: 10


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 7 Agility: 4 Intelligence: 1 Endurance: 5


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills][Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1]


    [Remark: A slightly skilled skeleton among the other undead of this kind. Although you show improvement, a shiny rock is still a rock.]


    "It was worth the trouble going after this group. Although the ambush didn`t go as nned, the end result is what matters..."


    Remembering the goblin that first saw him made him feel ufortable for various reasons.


    "Still I finally got my first skill [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] which was better than expected, but learning a skill while in a fight is quite risky"


    *Crack


    "..."


    Hearing the sounding out of my sword I made a anxious face.


    Upon a closer inspection, I saw some cracks appearing in the tip of the sword, probably from the time I stabbed this goblin in the neck...


    "Sigh, I know this would have happened but to think that it was this early..."


    I wished it could havested until I cleared the goblin nest but it seem like it will probably break mid-fight.


    "I will have to change ns...Although I could wait for another group toe out to ambush it didn`t mean I could kill them as fast that I did with this group of 5 without this sword." After pondering for a bit I could only see a conclusion.


    "I will have to use the weapons of those goblins to clear the nest though ... Although I should make full use of this sword for now".


    I walked towards the corpses of the goblins and ripped some of their cloth and stored 2 of the best daggers between the 5 inside the cloth.


    After I decided what I will be using. I dragged the corpses of the goblins together with their remains deep inside theke and I used their buckets to wash away the blood from the ground. Although he felt ufortable while going into theke cause of this past experience, it was something that was needed to be done.


    "With this, there should be no traces remaining that this group of goblins died here. Since this goblins look rather stupid they probably wouldn`t think that they got ambushed. I hope so at least...."


    Since I cut their water supplies they probably would send another group here. When that happens I would be ready.


    Seeing the power, or rather a knowledge that [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] bought me I got really curious at the [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] skill. Not about the increase of all attributes.


    But about the dead mana.


    I have been wondering for quite some time what mana really is. Since I met the level 3 goblin with the movement skill I considered mana as some kind of fuel that was needed to activate active skills.


    But what about dead mana? Why not just mana? How are there different?


    "Still too much that I don`t know..."


    After thinking about how much I don''t know about this ce I sighed heavily and went to make the preparations for the next ambush


    *****


    Different kinds of sound could be heard inside the goblin cave.


    Sounds of the screeching goblins, equipment being carried around, and stuff being thrown at the walls.


    Although the stuff being thrown were goblins.


    "Kha! W-Where... is gRoup that I SeNd!"


    While the adult goblin was enraged he kicked the surrounding goblins with enough power to send them flying into the walls of the cave to calm this rage. Even though all these goblins were these own children he didn`t care.


    After sending the first group of the goblins to bring water to this brother the elder he sent another group of 5 goblins to fetch some water for everyone in this cave.


    ...But after several hours he noticed that the group he sent still haven`te.


    "These bastards! Ho-w dare them MakIng me WaiT! You T-ten! Go bring those bastards to me...ALIVE! I wiLL personally eAt them!"


    Seeing the rage of their father they imminently picked up their daggers with only a few picking some buckets and headed out with a rush. The sight of their father eating their fellow goblins or rather brothers were even for them gruesome.


    Since it wasn`t done quickly. No, it was the opposite!


    Their father was eating them very slowly by cutting small pieces of their flesh and slowly torturing what were suppose to be these children.


    In at worst case, their father would eat one to two of their limbs and let them live for the next day for the circle to continue until they died.


    Seeing the reaction of these children he scoffed loudly and went to the far end of the cave to seated on what looks like a throne made of stone and some wood.


    And so he waited.


    1 hour past


    2 hours past...


    3 hours pa...


    ....


    After several hours passed.


    No one came.


    Veins from all over the adult goblin were showing as if there were to explode any moment!


    Normally it takes about 1 hour in order to get to theke ande back or maybe 2 if there were in a fight. But before he could explode in this rage a sudden thought came to this mind.


    What if there were all killed? No, that should be impossible. They were a group of 10 so they shouldn`t lose to anything unless it`s...


    There shouldn`t be humans since my brother guards one of the paths and the other path is being guarded by th-


    A sudden thought came into this mind. About the one that was guarding one of the paths...


    "Blue eyed.... It has to be!" After making this own conclusion he stood up in panic.


    "YOu twO! Quick! Go to elder brother tO sEnd help! The blue eyed ising!"


    The two chosen goblins flinched for a second upon seeing their father in fear. Although thatsted for a second before they went to bring the message to their elder.


    ******


    *Thuds!


    Sounds of small metal pieces falling into the ground could be heard near theke.


    "I guess 15 was still too much after all. Sigh, nevertheless it has done a good job until now but It`s time to say goodbye atst...."


    While standing surrounded by 10 goblin corpses. My whole attention was on the sword that I held. Or rather the former sword as of now was just the handle of the sword which had a small piece of metal still on it.


    Seeing the broken de I felt somehow dejected. I really was starting to like this sword too...


    "You have even done enough, now rest..." I gently ced the sword underground and moved on.


    There was no point feeling sad about a broken tool.


    "Sigh, those little guys have done a really good job at me this time... They even broke some of my bones"


    The previous fight was really intense to the point I was thinking of running away. At first, a group of 5 goblins came again which was an easy pray after my level up. But when 10 goblins came I really got overconfident cause of the previous two groups, but 10 goblins really were dangerous. I shouldn`t have done it but in the end, it was still worth it.


    Eleven level 2 goblins and four level 1 goblin... the end result was gaining 2800XP, if we count the 100 XP inside my storage I should have 2900 XP. I still got a long way to go until I reach 5000 XP...


    I had some doubts if I really should aim for the [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] skill instead of leveling up but I decided against it. Although the strength that I will gain is less than of leveling 5 times, the information behind the skill is crucial in a ce where I know nothing around me.


    "I would need around 15 more goblins to acquire [Miasma Corruption Lv.1], but for now I should focus on recovering since my body is a mess"


    After seeing my status I long noticed that my HP can recover by just waiting a bit.


    In about 2 hours I should have recovered...


    "After that, I can try to invade the nest of the goblins.... if there are still too many goblins inside I can just run away but for now, I need to know their numbers."

 Chapter 7 - Countdown

    "I don''t see any more cracks from my body and I can see all my bones. That means that my body has been restoredpletely, It''s time to put the n into action."


    I started running.


    My goal was the goblin cave!


    "I don''t know how much water they have inside their cave but I am sure they don''t have an infinitive water source inside there, If they had there wouldn`t be a reason for them to go out their way to secure water from theke. As long as I can keep them away from theke they will be dehydrated sooner orter, which should at least give me an opening for me to kill 1-3 goblins."


    Even though I already made a n inside my head I actually thought that the n was way too slow. Since the goblins were pathetically weak I could easily crush a group of 5 and if given the room to maneuver taking 10 goblins would be still possible.


    "As long I can get enough XP to require the [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] skill those goblins shouldn`t be able to be much of a threat with their small daggers. Although if they had clubs as a weapon like the one with the movement skill it would still be dangerous for me."


    After some time, I hid between some nearby rocks near the goblin cave and inspected my current equipment before I raid the cave.


    In the cloth that I carried were the best 3 small daggers that were among the goblins and the remaining cloth that they weari- cough cough I mean caring around.


    I decided to wrap the remaining cloth between my ribs to hide my front bones. I did this in hopes that they might attack me between my front bones.


    I ain`t doing this because I feel embarrassed that my handsome-looking bones are being exposed to the whole world! This is purely a tactical decision in order to raise my chances of victory!


    Definitely! Surely!


    ...


    Maybe!


    After finish the wrapping, I got out of my hiding spot and rushed towards the cave.


    Two goblins were standing at the cave entrance which I presumed were the guards. Seeing a skeleton rushing towards them with full speed they both freaked out. Sadly that didn`t stop them from calling for help.


    "Kghaa! Kghaaa!"


    Seeing them call for support I cleared all stupid thoughts that I had and started to focus on the current task.


    "You think calling for help will save you!"


    Although they already called for reinforcements, that didn`t change the fact that I already reached them!


    "I will bash your skull in!" With the momentum that I build-up, I kicked one of the goblins in the face and sending him flying towards the wall.


    *Baakck


    The sound of the wall cracking together with the blood on the wall clearly showed that the skull of the goblins was broken. Seeing the fallen goblin caved in the face I hastily turned around and pulled two daggers out of my cloth bag and rushed towards the second goblin.


    Seeing the face of this fallen brother together with the skeleton that instantly turned around made it terrified beyond belief!


    Out of panic he stabbed in front of this nightmarish-like skeleton in the hope to kill it, but after piercing through the cloth... he felt no resistance!


    And before he could pull this dagger out of the cloth I pierced both my daggers towards this chest.


    "KGHHHA!"


    While both my daggers were inside the goblin''s small body I dragged the goblin high enough until both our eyes(eye socket) met with each other.


    "K-kGha!...kha!" The sight in front of him made it ahead tears from pure horror while this bodyweight dragged him down which made the remaining daggers make the wound bigger and more painful.


    Seeing the action of the goblin I further confirmed another difference between the living and the undead.


    "You acted upon your fear and not for your reasoning. If you had run away inside the cave you might still have survived but you instant choose to be a fool with a hope which never existed".


    *kgha, kgha, kgha


    While I still kept the goblin high several other goblins showed up but what they saw made them freeze in ce.


    The sight of a skeleton holding one of their brothers while covered full in blood was a terrifying sight to see.


    "Faster than expected...but your group shall be enough!"


    Pulling the daggers out of the body of the goblin made it fall like a puppet that had these strings cut but I don`t pay attention to that.


    "I shall make you guys my nourishment!" With blood all over my body and my daggers, I rushed towards the goblins!


    ******


    In the city of Nexvarres


    One of the territories from the Berum kingdom is focused on mining natural resources and rare magical ingredients from nearby dungeons. Which makes it a ce of high importance.


    Although natural resources are important for the Berum kingdom it is nothingparable to the rare magical ingredients that the dungeons offer.


    The reason being that dungeon can only be created when the nearby mana is constantly being flowed through a specific ce for a long period of time. Which might take over several decades or even a century!


    But that isn`t the reason why those ces are being called dungeons. The namees from the monsters that are being generated inside those ces.


    Though the constant mana that is being flowed down there allows the various life forms to mutate and evolve.


    The most famous cases were when a normal lizard was able to evolve into a mighty dragon or when an enormous fight between two different kingdoms has turned into thousand of casualties inside led into an extremely powerful elder lich to be born and resulted in the downfall of both those kingdoms.


    Although those are the extremes of the extremes.


    Usually, corpses will be skeletons and lizards will mostly turn into smanders, but the fact that those very dungeons can produce such natural disasters as liches and dragons gives all kingdoms no choice but to put some military in those locations to secure the rare resources and to eliminate future disasters.


    How the Berum kingdom does this is by sending a powerful noble house on those very locations to serve as the military and oversee these very locations.


    Meanwhile in the city of Nexvarres.


    The streets were lively with people going out and talking to each other while merchants were showing their goods to the people. In the center of this lively city was the mansion of Darcy. The noble house that oversees the city of Nexvarres with the symbol of a hand and an orb.


    Currently in the mansion...


    "Why can`t I go too, father!"


    The young master. No. Allen Darcy together with the blood knight Rapha were currently in the presence of the family''s head, Darius Darcy.


    "Son, you should know the reason why I don''t allow you to go back inside that ce."


    "But..."


    "No buts! Do you realize what you have done!? Forget about the sword, you could have lost your life down there! If you were to go a little deeper inside that dungeon you would have already been dead and leaving none to inherit this Damm household!"


    Hearing this, Allen could only lower this head by this father''s words. After all, that was simply the truth. If he were to go to the secondyer together with these knights they would already have died.


    "I... am sorry father, I know it was my fault and my ignorances but... I still need the sword! I promised him that will take good care of it... it wasn`t only enchanted but the sword also had runes! We can`t just let that sword rot in the hands of this damned draugr!"


    Seeing the obsession that this son was having he could only sigh internally. He thought that weapons are only tools to be used by the hand of their masters and that it wasn`t worth risking your life for just mere tools.


    But he also understood the worth of those very tools.


    "Sigh...tell me Rapha, will you able to go down to the dungeon and retrieve Allen''s sword?"


    Hearing this lord question Rapha scratched this with awkwardness.


    "Of course my lord, I am fully capable of killing some mere undead that took the sword of the young master but...My teacher, the swordking will arrive by tomorrow morning for our lessons. Leaving now might bring him dissatisfaction and-"


    Seeing Rapha¡äs troubled face Dariu interrupted "It¡äs alright Rapha if it were for you to lose your lesson just to get a mere sword it would be against our contract."


    "But father!"


    "Allen! although the sword is indeed precious, we can¡ät just offend a swordmaster and disrespect the contract that I and Rapha have made!" observing Allens face it was clear that he disagreed with my chooses...


    "Cough, cough, but I heard that the lessons don''tst that long, am I right Rapha?"


    Realizing that this lesson with this teacher wouldn¡ät be interrupted this expression made a turn of 180 degrees with a smile simr to a child''s first time eating sweets.


    My lord is the greatest after all!


    "Of course my lord, our lessons usually take about a week to end. After that, I would be able to go down to the dungeon to get young masters sword."


    "Then after you finish your lessons with the swordmaster choose some soldiers and go down to the dungeon to get the sword"


    ncing at this son "Would that be alright for you, Allen?"


    "But..." Seeing this son pouting he couldn¡ät help but be happy.


    "How about it? I let you follow Rapha down to the dungeon, with you guards of course"


    Hearing that he was allowed to go back to the dungeon he made the same expression that Rapha had.


    "Thanks, Father!"


    Seeing Rapha and Allen getting so excited about swords and swordsmanship training he felt a little sad inside...


    Tch.. These muscle heads with their swords. Magic is way better than swinging those metal sticks around!

 Chapter 8 - Arisen Darkness

    [You received 200 Experience points]


    Currently inside the goblins cave...


    [You received 200 Experience points]


    "K-Kgh..."


    "Finally done..." After piercing the current goblin in front of me right into the chest with one of my daggers could I finally rx for a little bit.


    Removing the dagger from this chest, I moved back towards the cave entrance and seated to some nearby rocks, and waited outside.


    After some time passing I thought back at the fight I had with those goblins.


    While fighting with those goblin daggers I experienced some difficulties that I didn¡ät have with my sword. The first obvious difference would be the length which greatly increased the difficulty to kill those green blobs.


    The second would be the quality of the daggers which were beyond terrible, I would even say that it was crap!


    The moment you tried to pierce something with those things you will realize that it was easier to abandon the dagger than to pull it back since the whole action was more like ripping with pure force rather.


    Heck, when I first tried to pull it out it didn¡äte alone, instead, I dragged organs out of this poor goblin!


    Even I was shocked at first!


    And I bet it wasn¡ät a nice sight to those goblins either, since seeing one of their own getting this organs pulled out from this inside wasn`t in particr nice.


    Rather, it was terrifying!


    After I have done this I could clearly see their knees shaking out of fear and their loud voices became even weaker.


    "Still, I made quite the gruesome mess, didn`t I? But even though this whole mess was happening why didn¡ät a new groupe over to help? It can¡ät be that these were thest goblins inside the cave....right?"


    Seeing that no other group wasing I felt quite depressed and d at the same time.


    d cause I was able to eliminate the group of 8 without any problems and depressed cause my focus was on keeping an escape route at ready the whole time so that I don`t get surrounded. But what was the point of keeping my guard the whole time when in the end it was going to be wasted effort!?


    "Sigh, It can¡ät be helped, better safe than sorry I guess. Anyways why aren¡ät theying out? it can¡ät be that they didn¡ät hear our battle right? or did they underestimated me and sent just this group...?"


    Shaking my head helplessly I stood up and headed deeper inside the cave. but before that...


    "I should carry more than 3 daggers this time around and properly rece my cloth "armor" with some new cloth...."


    After kindly taking the cloth from the goblin corpses together with some of their daggers I continued deeper inside the cave. While going deeper I found what looked like the sleeping ce of those goblins.


    On the walls, I could see multiple holes that were crudely dug out together with some of the same cloth that the goblins wear as some kind of decoration. In front of me is what I would describe a garbage dump, in the floor were some small pieces of the same metal used for the dagger while in the corners was some meat that was floating in some kind of yellow-looking water which I haven¡ät seen before. Other than that there were only some half-destroyed barrels with many scratches and holes and something that had meat attached to it by some strings.


    Looking at the meat I bought myself a question...


    Where did ite from?


    "Did I by any chance miss another kind of creature while I was exploring? That shouldn''t be it, although I haven¡ät explored everything I should at least have met 1 by now..."


    After thinking for I while I still had no clue what kind of that meat, but suddenly an idea came to mind.


    "Status should work right?" without much hesitation, I gripped one of the pieces of the meat and used status.


    [Dried Goblin Meat]: A dried piece of goblin meat. They say that the meat from around the belly has the most fat in it, but that is false. In actuality, the part with the most fat is a little more below the belly between bot-"


    "Dammit!" I immediately threw this piece of fat and stepped on it until I was satisfied.


    "To think that I actually touched this piece of trash with my hand..."


    At first, I was in disbelief at the fact that they were eating each other but as I continued to read the description I became disgusted.


    I cursed my curiosity for a while I continued to go deeper inside the cave since there wasn¡ät much to see other than trash.


    After walking for a while, I could finally hear screeches for far in the path.


    "So they choose to hide instead of fighting huh...are they stupid?" Why attack me in the first ce when you are going to hide in the?


    "Kgh!


    "Kghhah!"


    "Kgwha!"


    It seems like they noticed me...well, it isn¡ät like I tried to hide or anything but these particr goblins were for some reason louder than the other ones that I had killed.


    Annoying...


    The current room that I was, was quite different than the one from before. This room didn`t have holes in the walls or trash all over the ce. The only noteworthy inside this room would be the 3 goblins in front of that were near to what looks like a seat. Which I found quite weird for several reasons. Why was this the only room with a seat and why was this seat sorge? It was way toorge for those goblins.


    "Let¡äs see, one, two...only three? And I thought that there will be more. Quite dissapoi-" Just before I could finish I heard a loud behind me as if something heavy has fallen.


    "-ing?"


    Just before I was able to turn around a clubrger than the ones that the goblins were using hit my side with a massive force which sent me flying and rolling for a few meters.


    "KGHAGHAGHA!"


    A massive voice that was simr to a roar wasughing.


    Simr to the goblins with green skin together with a vicious face with a club on this hand.


    It wasughing.


    "Status!"


    Dammit.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Hobgoblin


    Level: 8


    ss: Warrior Lv. 2


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 550


    Mana: 80


    Attributes: Strength: 11 Agility: 6 Intelligence: 8 Endurance: 11 Stamina: 25


    [Talents] [Leader]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.2] [Sprint Lv.3] [Heavy Strike Lv.1]


    Dammit!


    Dammit!


    "DAMMIT!" I was shocked. I was too careless. I should even be more careful!


    How did this guye from behind me!? I already passed through there so how!?


    I observed the huge goblins which sent me flying or rather this hobgoblin. Seeing this status I freaked out for a moment. I can`t win against this thing! Not only did it had the same skill sprint as the lvl 3 goblin but I faced but the skill was already level 3!


    And it has a second skill!


    [Heavy Strike Lv.1] Blend your mana with your weapon to increase the force behind an attack. Although the method is crude and unrefined it gets the job done.


    Forget about the attributes This skill sounded really terrifying!


    He even blocked my escape path...! How can I possibly kill this bastard...


    AH!


    "Show me my status XP!"


    [XP: 4400]


    Although I could just show the interface by just thinking in my head, the current me wasn¡ät calm. It wasn`t fear or anything the like. It was the same hot feeling that I was experiencing when I first fought with the level 3 goblin.


    "I just need a tiny little bit more...just a little MORE!"


    I immediately picked myself up and rushed with my daggers towards the three goblins!


    I just need to kill them!


    *crack


    Although my left side arm had some cracks I still pushed myself to kill these three goblins!


    Seeing this the hobgoblin gave chase. Although he was a tiny bit faster than me, the direction that he sends me flying was towards the three goblins and the distances weren¡ät that small. Even though it was only a few meters it was enough for me to reach the three goblins first.


    "K-Kghaa!" The three goblins cried out of panic by seeing meing for them. Even if they wanted to run away they couldn¡ät. Behind them were nothing more than a wall and the throne that I thought was a seat at first.


    Having no other option, the 3 goblins went to the throne and picked up different kinds of weapons from a barrel that was beside the throne.


    One picked the axe, while the other picked up a spear with thest one to pick a shield with a dagger. After they were done they turned around to face me with their weapons high.


    When I first saw all the different kinds of weapons that the goblins had I became worried that these three goblins might be the elite force with the hobgoblin that was chasing me being the king.


    But the moment the goblin swung the axe towards me I noticed that wasn¡ät the case. The hands of This goblin were trembling and when they attacked me they would close their eyes for a short moment.


    I dodged the axe by sidestepping it and stabbed the goblin right in the throat the next moment I could, killing it in less than two seconds.


    [You received 200 Experience points]


    After taking a look at the status of the goblin I killed I realized that although this goblin was level 2, it had lower stats than the normal goblin thus far.


    "KGWAAA!"


    Hearing the enraged voice of the hobgoblin behind me I realized why these 3 goblins were this weak.


    "I see, these are your female goblin aren¡ät they".


    Three more left.


    I jumped towards the two female goblins trying to kill both of them before the hobgoblin reached me.


    The female goblin with the spear tried to push it through my chest, only to go right through my cloth armor ande from behind, thus hitting nothing. I quickly shed my dagger through her neck halfway through abandoning my dagger insider her neck.


    [You received 200 Experience points]


    Two left.


    I quickly turned around only to see the female goblinpletely hiding her face with the shield and point her dagger towards me.


    "Stupid..." I gripped the shield and pulled it towards me.


    Between my physique and my superior strength, I easily lifted the female goblin in the air and pierced her through the chest.


    [You received 200 Experience points]


    I abandon myst dagger in her chest and I quickly equipped the shield in my left arm and the female goblin dagger.


    "One lef-"


    "KGHWAAAAGHA!"


    Right before I finished equipping the shield and the dagger. The hobgoblin''s legs and club shined with a small green and white light.


    Before I knew the hobgoblin was right beside me ready to smash me apart!


    "Shi-" I quickly put the shield in front of me in hopes to block the hobgoblin''s strike, but what I didn¡ät expect was the power behind this strike.


    *Crack


    "What!?"


    Even though I shielded myself it wasn`t enough. The moment the club met with my shield my hand started to break. Although I blocked that, I was send flying and crashing to the throne.


    *Baahm!


    "Seriously..."


    I was seated on the throne with my whole body still trembling by the impact. And seeing the hobgoblin slowly walking towards I could grin viciously.


    "You trashed me enough don¡ät you think?"


    I bought the status up and with a whisper I said:


    "Acquire...Miasma!"


    With that.


    An enormous dark death aura wasing out of my body.


    Engulfing me and the throne inplete Darkness!

 Chapter 9 - Wrath

    I was astonished by the current sight that was ying in front of me.


    The ck like-smoke.


    No. The dead mana that was leaking out of my body bought me a strange feeling of...pleasure. It was as if nothing could trouble your mind and body. The more I released the better I felt... and the stronger I became.


    "Those feelings....feel wrong" The pleasure wasn¡ät that bad, to be honest, but I didn¡ät like it. It was like something was forcing these feelings into you.


    I dislike it.


    No.


    I hated it.


    "Kghaa.."


    Hearing a sound like a growl, the feelings quickly disappeared and my senses came back to me.


    "Right...there is still this one to be dealt with." Seeing the before cocky hobgoblin being wary against me, the one that heughed at. I found it quite funny.


    "Haha...Look at you whoughed at me some moments ago! We will see which one of us will be thest tough you bastard! Status!"


    The next moment I stood up, all the dead mana that was around me gathered inside of my bones in instant.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 3


    ss: -----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 343/500


    Mana: 60


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 12 Agility: 9 Intelligence: 6 Endurance: 10


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although the current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    I slowly walked towards the hobgoblin until we were about 4 meters away from each other. By just seeing this face I could tell that he was wary of me. But he shouldn¡ät know by how much stronger I got... Although my current me is stronger, he still has these two damned skills to be on guard which makes things difficult...


    "Let¡äs see how much juice you have left in you...."


    Name: ----


    Race: Hobgoblin


    Level: 8


    ss: Warrior Lv. 2


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 550


    Mana: 50/80


    ...


    Quite a lot left... not to forget he isn¡ät injured unlike me. That will be hard.


    I gather the information needed thanks to the status. I already knew what I have to do.


    "I wonder how long you canst!" With my battlecry done, I ran straight to get a piece out of him.


    Seeing meing this way the hobgoblin didn¡ät just wait there and watch. He stepped forward with this club high in the air and smashed it towards me to end me once and for all.


    But I wouldn¡ät let that happen. Just before the club was nearing my skull I stepped back fully dodging the cruel fate that was my skull about to face.


    *Baahm!


    The club that was supposed to hit me smashed to the ground with enough force to great a small crater.


    Chance!


    Without hesitation, I jumped at him aiming to pierce this chest with my dagger.


    But when I thought I could finish him off in one go, the unexpected happened.


    The hobgoblin raised this left hand and let himself be pierced by my dagger in this hand.


    "Kghehe...." Although this hand was trembling from the pain, he wasughing with a cruel smile on this face.


    No good! I got to take it out!


    I hastily tried to pull the dagger out of this arm, but when I did the hobgoblin turned this body and kicked me right into my stomach.


    "Crap!"


    Thankfully I barely managed to put my shield in front of me, but it only managed to block most of the damage and not the force behind it.


    *Crack


    With the sounds of my hand breaking even further I was sent rolling to the ground.


    "This dude isn¡ät as simple as I thoug~." Before I could even collect my thoughts, I saw the hobgoblin almost being at top of my head with these slightly glowing legs aiming to literally stomp at my skull.


    "No good!" I pulled my body and rolled to the side to dodge this foot.


    I could already picture what would have if these feet managed to hit my skull... I would have been pasta!


    I tried to get up from the ground as fast as I could but I wasn¡ät in the best position for that...


    "Khgwaaaaah!"


    Before I could even fully stand up, the hobgoblin already held this club with both this hands high in the air while preparing to use this [Heavy Strike].


    After I saw that I froze for a moment.


    Was that it?


    I couldn¡ät survive being hit with that and I can¡ät dodge it while being only in my knee.


    ...


    Was that it?


    Am I just going to die just like that? After not so long ago is everything going to just end?


    My life...again?


    "Wait...again?" Suddenly my thoughts got interrupted by one short but terrible pain from my head. When that happened the hot feeling in my chest got stronger for a moment to the point that I thought there was a real fire inside of me.


    Although painful, it helped me regain my focus.


    I ground my teeth and stood with one knee on the ground while raising my shield to wee the impact that was about toe.


    And when the club met with my shield...


    *Cracked


    After the club collided with the shield, after a short resistance from the shield. The shield broke. Maybe because the hobgoblin didn¡ät expect my shield to break or I somehow managed to change the path of the club.


    Instead of the club hitting me on the face with the [Heavy Strike] that was supposed to be my doom. It went slightly to the left, thus hitting my left arm shoulder.


    Sadly my already broken arm couldn¡ät be saved either. If I were a living being I would even be in extreme pain and shock from the loss of one''s arms.


    But I was an Undead!


    "I am an Undead you fool!"


    I didn¡ät let this chance go away and I went right for the kill!


    I stabbed the hobgoblin right through this chest with everything I could.


    "KGHAAAA!" Seeing him throwing blood out of this mouth and this pained expression I put on a vicious smile subconsciously.


    "Hey, do tell me. How does it feel to have a dagger right through the chest? doesn¡ät it feel good? No? Well too bad!"


    I left my dagger inside this chest and pushed him to the ground while gaining some distance.


    But to my surprise, the hobgoblin stood up and pulled the dagger out of this chest.


    "You bastard! Can¡ät you just die already!?" I was frustrated. Although looking at this status this health was rapidly decreasing. But the more I looked at him the more hatred I could feel.


    Not because of things like frustration or the like.


    No.


    The sole reason why I felt anger was the cause of my missing arm and the feelings that wereing out of it.


    It wasn¡ät pain that I felt. After all, undead as far as I know can¡ät feel any pain. That fact didn¡ät change for me either.


    But the feeling that I was feeling was simr to one that I already experienced once.


    The feeling of emptiness and the inability to move. The exact same feeling that I felt while I was in the darkke before I could see.


    If I were to describe the feeling of it, it would be like someone took my arm and put it under cold ice. Even though I could feel my missing arm.


    I couldn¡ät move it.


    The cold was always there.


    And the worst part was that I could feel all that...


    It was as if someone took a part of me...


    "...Again..."


    The hot feeling in my chest that had already calmed down from before started to increase again.


    Slowly but surely.


    [Sin of Wrath]: Activated


    The death aura that was held into my body started to leak out and dark green ethereal light simr to small sparks started to build up from my sockets.


    The exhausted hobgoblin was terrified upon seeing this. or rather the killing intent that was mixed with the death aura.


    But what terrified him the most wasn¡ät these things.


    It was this ethereal eyes of the skeleton in front of him!


    Although the hobgoblin could sense the killing intenting out of me.


    He couldn¡ät sense the fact that my strength has increased.


    "Yeah...let¡äs put an end to this..."


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 3


    ss: -----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 96/500


    Mana: 60


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 12(+1,2) Agility: 9(+0,9) Intelligence: 6(+0,6) Endurance: 10 (+1)


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although the current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    I ran towards the hobgoblin and punched it right through the face.


    Though the hobgoblin realized and punched back.


    From this point on it just became a slugfest.


    After some minutes that felt more like hours of exciting our fist.


    The hobgoblin leader had already reached this limit.


    "KGWaaahhaaah!" He put thisst remaining strength inside this body into this fist and punched at me everything that he got.


    But...


    It was ast-ditch effort in the end. I easily caught the fist with my remaining hand unmoved. Between him who is exhaust versus me with higher stats, I was easily able to catch thest remaining hope of the hobgoblin.


    "Undead never tire neither fear. Remember that well you piece of green cloth!"


    I increased the strength of my grip and dragged this hand towards me and headbutted him directly to this face!


    *crack


    But this time, it wasn¡ät my bones that cracked.


    [You received 1500 Experience points].

 Chapter 10 - Class Change Unlocked!

    "Finally..." Seeing the corpse of the hobgoblin I could finally rx and the burning feeling that was in my chest dissipated slowly together with the bonuses that [Sin of Wrath] provided me.


    "I should have been more careful... I almost died cause of it, it was way too dangerous to even for my taste." I slowly walked towards the throne and was seated there.


    "Not that I have a taste! hahaha...haaah. Status"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 3


    ss: -----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 46/500


    Mana: 60


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 12 Agility: 9 Intelligence: 6 Endurance: 10


    [Talents]


    [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakend this death aura. Altough you current you is pathetically weak, you potential just started to sprout.]


    [XP:1500]


    "It truly was close this time...but in the end, it was worth all the trouble! what do they call that? High-risk high rewards? And this overgrown piece of goblin truly gave me a lot of experience! 1500! That¡äs like what? Around 16 goblins in one go? He sure gave me a lot of juice, but for what should I use this XP for?"


    But after thinking for a little bit there was only one ce that I could ce my hard-earned XP into. And that was towards my levels. Sure I could level my [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] towards [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.2] by spending my 1500 XP but after experiencing the battle versus the hobgoblin I didn¡ät notice that much difference between my level 1 and this level 2 [Lower Weapon Mastery].


    And let¡äs forget about leveling [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] right now. This thing cost was whole 6000 XP! And it gave almost nothingpared to when I first got it. It would only slightly decrease the time needed to get the free attribute point together with the dark or what not skill cost that I haven¡ät even seen! And what was this +1 increased on all stats! Isn¡ät that like paying 6000 XP to only get around 4 stats and some empty promises!?


    I ain¡ät getting scammed!


    "Well, increasing my level isn¡ät that bad either although it is a little nd, I don''t mind it much."


    And the XP contentedly matched the amount that I needed to increased my level up to 2.


    I casually pressed the button on the screen and Increased my level by 2.


    [Level has increased from Lv.3 to Lv.4]


    [Level has increased from Lv.4 to Lv.5]


    [Strength increased by 2, Agility increased by 2 and Endurance increased by 2]


    [You unlocked the ss change option! Please choose wisely as the path that you choose cannot be turned back.]


    "Wait what?" That came out of nowhere! And here I thought about how I can unlock the sses and more skills. Is it maybe though increasing my level? Anyway, I let¡äs see what this ss is all about.


    [Undead Magic Caster]


    [Undead Warrior]


    [Undead Rogue]


    "Undead Magic Caster, Undead Warrior, and Undead Rogue? Is it because I am an undead that the sses have "Undead" on them? If I remember right the hobgoblin had the warrior ss. Are they the same?"


    Well, there was no point thinking about it right now. As currently, there was more important stuff to think about...


    "It seems that once I choose one ss I can¡ät change it...let¡äs first read the descriptions"


    [Undead Magic Caster]: A practitioner of magic is what Magic Casters are. Through the use of magic, they can cast all kinds of different spells being for defense, offense, or even creation. The possibilities are endless! But as an Undead, you gain better affinity with certain spells and disadvantages with other ones. Choosing this path you focus will be more spell-oriented but that doesn¡ät mean that you are only limited to use spells. Magic Caster is the embodiment of "Knowledged is Power." And here is the start towards the path of Magic!


    "So the Undead part in the ss name is the cause of my race it seems. Nevertheless, being a Magic Caster sounds pretty attractive...but currently my lowest stat is Intelligence and it doesn¡ät seem to increase by just leveling up. The knowledge part would also be a problem if I were to choose this one. I should probably read the other ones before I choose this and if there isn¡ät anything better that I will just pick this."


    I slide my finger on the screen and saw the next description.


    [Undead Warrior]: Mastering one''s weapon is what Warriors are. Through the mastery of their weapons and their enchanted bodies, they can withstand and destroy things just their mere body. Warriors are the embodiment of "Skill is Everything" and Mastering your weapon is the true goal of life. But as an Undead, you are able to surpass all the limitations that living has. Choosing this path you focus will through the use of your chosen weapon but that doesn¡ät mean that you are only limited to use your weapon and usage of magic is still possible, only less focused. And here is the start towards the path of being a Warrior!


    "Damm that also sounds pretty good. If I were to pick this I would probably be able to get simr skills to [Sprint] and [Heavy Strike] that the hobgoblin had used. Not only that but If I remember right the [Sprint] skill had some disadvantages after use but If I were to use it I shouldn¡ät be affected by such skills and it also says that I will be able to learn magicter on. Even though I would not be the best at using magicter on I would still able to use my weapon!"


    Seeing both options I got really excited. If both of these options were that good what will thest one be like?


    Without waiting any longer I read the description of thest ss.


    [Undead Rogue]: Those who lurk in the darkness are called Rogues.


    Through the use of shadows and assassination arts, they slowly find their target vulnerable and strike at the moment of carelessness in the most lethal way! As one that wields the power of immortality, the Undead though they higher affinity for dark magic they can hide even deeper into the darkness that no man can see. Rogues are the embodiment of "Nothing else matters if you reach your goal". Choosing this path your focus will be more on assassination weapons and arts with dark magic being your specialty. And here is the start to where you be one with your inner darkness and aim to be the master of darkness!.


    "Ehm...what should I say. Isn¡ät this ss. No, Isn¡ät this description somehow...too edgy? Isn¡ät the guy who wrote this description even embarrassed?"


    No matter how many times I read this description I had a hard time taking it seriously halfway through.


    Way too edgy!


    Being one with your inner darkness?


    Master of darkness?


    Who would even say stuff like that!?


    But well I get the gist of it. Basically, sneaking around your enemy through the use of dark magic or something right?


    "All right, let¡äs Ignore the rogue ss, and let¡äs choose one among the Magic Caster and Warrior."


    Although I said to choose, I even already chosen what my ss will be while reading the rogue ss. Even though the rogue ss description was beyond edgy it let me confirm one of my worries. And that was that being a Magic Caster isn¡ät the only way of using magic!


    And so I choose the [Undead Warrior] as my ss!


    As it was the best ss (in my perspective) for the Undead!


    And sooner orter I would be able to experience magic, but for now, using weapons wasn¡ät that bad.


    [You ss has been changed to Undead Warrior]


    [You will start gaining Attribute points]


    [You unlocked the passive training for the Warrior ss]


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 5


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 46/500


    Mana: 60


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 14 Agility: 11 Intelligence: 6 Endurance: 12


    [Talents][Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    "Passive training? what¡äs that?" I pressed towards the passive training on the screen.


    [Passive training allows you to gain XP by doing Warrior rted training. Although the XP amount isn¡ät that much ]


    "Oh, that sounds pretty useful! Now I don¡ät have to look for a fight every time I need to increase my XP."


    I swiftly stood from the throne up and went to test the passive training right away until My foot bumped into something.


    Or rather someone.


    "Oh yeah, you guys are still lying around...."


    Seeing my surroundings with the corpses and blood of the goblins and hobgoblin that I killed, together with trashying down I couldn¡ät help scratch my head.


    "Well...before that I should clean this ce up shouldn¡ät I?"


    I picked one of the female goblin corpses and I dragged it towards the exit of the cave. Doing that let me remember that I was still missing my left arm. Although it was slowly healing with some dead mana leaking out of the wound. I could only sigh...


    "Sigh...."

 Chapter 11 - Shaman

    Meanwhile in one out of three paths of the dungeon.


    The two goblins that were sent by the hobgoblin finally reached their destination.


    They paused in front of a cave entrance to get a breather cause of the continued running.


    The cave entrance although simr to their cave was clearly different from their cave. The stone in the sides was better dugout while the path was smooth with no sharp stones to see.


    But what clearly differentiates the two caves was the wooden structure that looked like a totem.


    The totem which had the form of a cross made out of wood had three overlyrge skulls that couldn¡ät have been from any other goblins. These were attached to the front, while on both the sides were some kind of cloth that had a deep crimson color to it.


    After a short while, two other goblins with a spear in their hand and helmets came out of the entrance from the cave.


    "Kgha? Khgaa! Khgaa!" Seeing the two exhausted goblins outside they at first got confused but after a short exchange of screetching, they looked at each other with shock.


    The blue-eyed attacked them!?


    What happened to the warrior chief then!?


    That''s out of our scope! We must let the elder know about this!


    After a quick nce, they both nodded at each other and dragged the exhausted goblins deep inside the cave.


    While the exhaust goblins were being led inside they took some nces of the cave and what they first noticed was that it was weirdly... cleaned!


    Compared to their cave that reced more a trashcan than a home, this cave looked liked an untouched maiden with pure white cloths!


    This is weird!


    Although this cave also had holes in the walls together with simr equipped but only more organized.


    It felt kind of alien to these two goblin¡äs that were used to see so much junk around.


    While they nkly stared around they soon reached their destination.


    They stopped right in front of some cloth that was hiding what was on the other side. Seeing the 2 goblin guards point to go inside they suddenly became anxious.


    Since behind this cloth would be the elder that even their father feared and admired!


    With some hesitation, the 2 goblins walked inside.


    But what they saw bought them the chills...


    *Kgwhh


    In the middle of the room was a goblin who held a staff and wore some messy robes. The only difference between this goblin and all the other goblins was this age. He had wriggles all over this face and a messy white beard. If it weren¡ät for these eyes that clearly showed madness inside them you would have thought that it was just an old goblin.


    But that wasn¡ät what scared these two goblins...


    "Visitors? That¡äs weird, I even told them not toe in...wait, you guys aren¡ät from here right? You must have been sent by my little brother, right?


    If someone were to just see the sight of this old goblin casually talking to the two goblins it would have looked quite peaceful as if a grandpa finally meets these grandchildren.


    But the current sight couldn¡ät have been more wrong!


    Although the voice of the old goblin sounded quite calm, the thing he was currently doing was terrifying!


    While he was speaking he never ever nced at the two goblins but instead focused on this current task at hand. Literally.


    This hand never stopped, not even a second. And the ce where this hand was working towards...


    "KgKh...!"


    Besides the old goblin was a stone tablet, which had a goblin shackled on top with some rope. The shackled goblin was trying to break free but to no avail.


    "Oh, this? Don¡ät mind it too much, do tell me though, why are you two here in front of me?"


    While speaking he drew a circle that had four circles in all four directions in the belly of the shackled goblin.


    And he''s slowly and carefully was piercing the shackled goblin with some wooden spikes to all the four located circles in the belly.


    "Kghhh!!!"


    Seeing this scene the two goblins couldn¡ät help but shake in fear.


    "Didn¡ät I already asked? tell me why you guys are here"


    The before smiling grandpa goblin smile was now never to be seen and frowned towards the two goblins. The look of this face while frowning put together with this wriggles looked like a crazed man who couldn¡ät decide which one to kill first.


    Realizing the danger these two were in they hastily started to exin the situation to the grandpa goblin.


    "So you guys are telling me that the blue eyed skeleton has attacked your cave?" he asked with doubt.


    The goblins just nodded in confirmation of this question.


    Resewing the same answer from before the look of the grandpa goblin suddenly turned even uglier.


    "That¡äs simply impossible! I have studied the path¡äs that the blue eyed skeleton is taking and the direction of my brother¡äs cave is nowhere near enough! The blue eyed goes either to the path that leads to the first floor or the path with the most death mana around!" The voice of the grandpa goblin was as vicious as it was loud.


    The two goblins tried to exin themselves but they were cut before they even could.


    "You dare toe in front of me and disturb me!?"


    The grandpa goblin stopped working on the shackled goblin in the table and point this finger at one of the goblins and started casting quitly.


    "Lightning..."


    The two goblins were confused by this actions and tried yet again to exin themselves but before they could even open they mouth, a lightning jumped at the first goblin from the tip of this finger.


    Fully prating this goblin and leaving a ck spot in the goblins belly.


    *bahm


    Seeing this brother dying so suddenly by some lighting he was terrified. He hastily turned around to run away but he bumped into the two goblin guards from before.


    "Bring him over to me! Thest experiment already had lost this liveliness."


    Seeing the two goblin guards grabbing him by this hand and dragging him towards the stone table he paled at what was going to happened to him.


    "K-Kgha!! Kgha!!!" He trashed around in hopes to break free.


    "You should make a good recement for my experiments. hehe"


    And I should check if what this goblin said was true...


    but that can wait forter.


    "KGHAAA!!"


    ****


    Currently in the hobgoblins cave...


    "Finally done! Who would even thought that it would take this much to clean up this space..."


    Seeing my surrounding with no goblin corpses or goblin trash I was finally able to call this ce home.


    I walked towards the throne and seated on it.


    "What should I now do is the question"


    I open the status and I started thinking about what I should do.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 5


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 46/500


    Mana: 60


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 14 Agility: 11 Intelligence: 6 Endurance: 12


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    "Oh yeah! I already gotten my ss so there should be some new talents or skills right?"


    With excitement, I pressed towards the Talents with anticipation


    [Talents] ----


    Only to meet disappointment...


    "If my ss doesn¡ät show any talents, then how do I even get new talents? Can I even get new talents or does it just tell me that I am talentless?"


    Just thinking about that pissed me off.


    "Let¡äs hope that there is something on the skills...


    [Skills]


    [Piercing] Enchant your weapon by the use of mana to greatly increase the pration ability of your weapon. * Can only be used with weapons that are capable to pierce.


    [Sprint] By Forcing mana into your leg you are able to surpass your limits thus being able to move at extreme speed for a limited amount of time. Though this method brings a heavy burden to your body.


    [Shield Smash] Generate force through mana and store it inside a shield waiting to be unleashed to an enemy. * Can only be used with a shield.


    [Wind de] Though mastery of your weapon and mana you are able to create a sharp de made out of the wind and shoot it out from the direction you shed towards. * Can only be used with a weapon that is capable to use shing attacks.


    "Wow! Four skills just because of my ss!?" just seeing the effects and the names of the skills my excitement grow even bigger!


    "I knew that [Skills] option wouldn¡ät disappoint mepared to someone else!"


    If the [Skills] option were to be the sessful child, then [Talents] should be the disappointment of the family!


    Perfectly bnced.


    As all things should be!

 Chapter 12 - Exploring Options And Passive Training

    I quickly calmed down and taken another look at the 4 skills that are avable to me.


    But after reading through them a lot of questions came to my mind.


    "Why isn¡ät the skill [Heavy Strike] listed on the skills to obtain? Does it get unlocked by raising my ss level or is there some kind of condition that needs to be met to unlock it?"


    As I have experienced the power behind [Heavy Strike] I really hoped to see it in my avability to my [Skills] to purchase.


    Although I was somehow disappointed by not being able to learn [Heavy Strike] I didn¡ät mind it too much.


    Since there was something more hundred time better than [Heavy Strike].


    I am talking about the [Wind de] of course!


    "Just imaging to being able to shoot a projectile out of nothing sounds way too powerful. But..."


    [Wind de]: 10000 XP required.


    The price for this thing is way too high!


    The cost is double the amount that [Miasma Corruption] had costed!


    It costed me to fight through tens of goblins and almost made me lose my life to the overgrown goblin!


    That battle cost me my whole arm which took me a whole day to grow back!


    And now you telling me to work twice as much for this skill!?


    You might as well tell me to cut both of my arms and give you my wallet!


    ...


    "The skill does sound cool though..."


    For now, I could only look helplessly look at the skill and get it in the future where I have enough XP.


    "At least the other skills are reasonable pricedpared to [Wind de]."


    [Sprint]: 1000 XP required.


    [Shield Bash]: 1500 XP required.


    [Piercing]: 1500 XP required.


    Although not cheap, it is still a reasonable price. This is the cost that I would have expected to see from skills!


    "But now the question is... what should I get first?" I put my hand under my chin and I started thinking about the choices I have.


    "[Sprint] is overall a good choice to make and it is very versatile. It can be used for either surprising the enemy with a small burst of speed or dodgingst-minute attacks. And the downside shouldn¡ät take effect on me since I am an undead..."


    Probably.


    "As for [Shield Bash] and [Piercing], it is kinda hard to put the value of both these skills since I don¡ät know how powerful they are. Maybe If I had used [Shield Bash] on the fight with the hobgoblin I might have been able to block [Heavy Strike] and save my hand." I recalled the memories of my hand being torn apart.


    Only to shake my head.


    "But [Piercing] doesn¡ät sound really useful...I don¡ät have much difficulty killing this goblin neither I should have any difficulties killing one hobgoblin... Although a convenient skill it isn¡ät necessary for the moment..."


    I already made my decision on what my next skill will be!


    I decided to get the skill [Sprint] first for the various usages it has while being followed with the skill [Shield Bash] to increase my option with the shield and atst will be the [Piercing] skill which would improve my offense capability.


    "Without further ado let¡äs get and test out [Sprint]!"


    I dragged my finger towards the window and pressed to get the skill [Sprint].


    But...


    [More Experience Points are needed for this option]


    ...


    Huh?


    "Not enough XP? But I swore I had around 1500 XP in the bank...Status! show me how much XP I got."


    [XP: 0]


    "Wait, what? Where did I use my XP...for?"


    After some thinking about it for a moment some shbacks of me increasing my level came back at me.


    "Right! The levels dammit! how did I forget about it!" I faced palmed myself and stood up from the throne.


    "I killed all the goblins inside this cave so there shouldn¡ät be any more XP that I can get any time soon...Ahhhh! How should I gain XP now!?"


    Maybe if I wander around I might be able to meet some goblin¡äs or other creature for me to get XP but that might take hours if not days! I only met goblins that wereing from this cave and Fellow, but other than that there isn¡ät anything else for me to kill is there!?


    I walked around circles inside the throne room in the hope to get an idea of what to do now. After a short I finally got something.


    "Oh yes! Damm I am stupid, how could I forget about this!?" I opened my status and bought the previous report in front of me.


    [You Unlocked the passive training for the Warrior ss]


    "Right, I can gain XP by doing some kind of training! Let¡äs use that!" I quickly picked my new sword and a wooden shield that had metal covering the sides.


    I found the sword and the shield near the pile of weapons where the female goblins took their weapons from. Although the quality was about the same as my previous shield and Fellows swords it was still better than using those crappy daggers. I am not sure why but it seems like the goblins don¡ät like to use a weapon such as swords or shields.


    "So...what do I need to do?" Although I thought I could start right away...


    I had no idea what I should do!


    What kind of training is for warriors?


    Muscle training? No, I am all bones that shouldn¡ät be it.


    "Cough, cough...Let¡äs ask the status and hope for the best." I opened my Status andmanded.


    "Status! What does Warrior training referring to?" After a moment of awkward silence, my answer was finally answered.


    [Warrior training is referred to getting used with the weapon your chosen weapon or your Warrior-rted skills. Getting the right posture, a better grip of your weapon while in motion can be considered as training.]


    "So basically swinging my sword and getting a better feeling? That should be easy enough."


    I walked towards the middle of the room and I started swinging my sword as I had done against these goblins.


    Although it was quite awkward at the start I got the hang of it shortly after.


    And after a whole hour, my efforts finally got rewarded!


    [You gained 300 Experience Points through training]


    "And here I thought I was doing something wrong, but it seems like it just takes a lot of time, but that shouldn¡ät be a problem"


    After finding a new way of gaining XP I didn¡ät stop there and continued the training.


    But this time I started only to swing my sword without moving as much to confirm one of my suspicions.


    And after yet another hour...


    [You gained 100 Experience Points through training]


    "So it¡äs telling that if I don¡ät take it seriously I will be wasting my time huh?"


    Although It was telling me to work hard to get rewarded I didn¡ät mind it too much. After all, I am an undead that doesn¡ät tire! And the training isn¡ät that much of a waste of time since I can learn how to use my sword.


    And mostly it gives me a goal to work towards instead of sitting the whole day on this throne...


    And so I continued training for many hours.


    If someone were to be outside the cave entrance they would hear echoes of wind being cut.


    But that would only be if someone were outside...


    However, at the time where I was focused on my training. I couldn¡ät hear that the low screeches that were slowly approaching the cave entrance...


    "Kgha"


    "Kghwa"


    "Kgawha"


    *


    Currently at the cave with the totem.


    "Tch, It seems like this experiment also has failed..." Seeing the gory mess that the old goblin had created he could only shake this head helplessly. Not for the fact that he killed another specimen, but for yet another failer.


    "I was, even so, damn close to creating my own undead and yet..." he mourned with a low voice.


    "I will need more and better specimen to make a breakthrough in my research. This ves of mine aren¡ät suitable enough..."


    After feeling thinking about it he suddenly remembers the words of the two goblins that came from this little brother.


    "If their words were real cough, cough then my brother should be long dead by now. Maybe if I can get the corpse of my little brother I should be able to finally make a breakthrough in my research..."


    Although he doubted the words from these two goblins he finally reached this bottleneck of this research and without a stronger body to test on there was no hope for breaking through...


    "Hey, guards!e here!"


    After a short while, the same two goblins with the spears and the helmets came inside the old goblinsboratory.


    Seeing the mess that their elders have created they flinched for a second, but they calmed down right after as if they were used to this sight.


    "Send some scouts to see if my brother is still alive and if not to bring the corpse of my brother to me, understood?"


    The two guard goblins swiftly nodded their heads and left the next moment as if they were afraid to be the next ything of their elder.


    Seeing the two goblins leaving the elder goblin snort loudly.


    As if I need some trash like you for my specimens.. What I need now is either my brother''s corpse or I even better corpse.

 Chapter 13 - New Skill And True Gentleman

    Meanwhile in the captured cave...


    Several hours passed from when I started training on my own with my swords and shield. The time spent training was really worthwhile even without the passive XP gained. It helped me familiarize myself with the shield and the sword a lot more than I even thought.


    Before I felt really awkward using the shield that the sword. Most of the time I would forget that I even had the shield on me and use the sword to practice, but using the sword with only one hand also felt awkward at best.


    But the training allowed me to be at least a little bit morefortable with using the shield together with the sword. Even though that improvement was at best minimal.


    Is not like you can be a master overnight with just a few hours of training.


    Another thing I learned through this training was the actual value of the skill [Lower Weapon Mastery] that I possess.


    When I first got this skill I didn¡ät think much of it cause it seemed so...normal?


    The knowledge it gave me felt more likemon knowledge to me which made me feel a little bit dejected by getting it, but now I realized what this skill is for.


    As long as my suspicions were correct I would assume that the higher the skill went the more advanced knowledge it would give me to the point where It will make me a master of the sword and the shield.


    Just imaging being able to block every single blow from the enemy''s and right after striking at the perfect moment!


    Wouldn¡ät that be awesome!?


    But right now that would seem kind of impossible...


    Be it skill or equipped I have nothing at the moment...


    What?


    The shield and the sword?


    You can hardly call them weapons!


    The shield from before broke the moment the hobgoblin used one single skill and the sword is literally ying with time. You never know when it will break while being mid-fight.


    Other than tha-


    [You gained 300 Experience Points through training]


    "Oh? Another hour passed?" I quickly cleared my thoughts and focused again.


    "How many times did I see that message already? Let¡äs take a quick look."


    [XP: 1900]


    "So... about 6 times? No. It should be about 7 times that I have seen this message" I nkly stared at the XP amount.


    "So about 7 hours is it...?" I unemotional dragged my hand towards the status window and quickly purchased the [Sprint] skill.


    "Status..."


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 5


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 650/650


    Mana: 60/60


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 14 Agility: 11 Intelligence: 6 Endurance: 12


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    After digesting the information that the skill brought together I was honestly surprised. The knowledge was about how to guide the mana from inside my body into my legs together with the process of how to reinforce then. But what surprised me the most was that this method didn¡ät use the dead mana that I saw from the [Miasma Corruption] but instead it used pure mana.


    Although I didn¡ät know the difference between dead mana and pure mana and I was curious about the differences. I left those questions for another day.


    "Now I should finally be able to use my mana value with the [Sprint] skill." With excitement in me. I went right off the bat to try my new skills.


    I walked towards the rooms entranced with my sword and shield.


    "Let¡äs see how far I can go from here until the throne! Skill [Sprint] Activate!"


    I slowly guided the pure mana from inside of me towards my legs. Since this was my first time it didn¡ät activate as fast as it did for the hobgoblin, but in the end, I was able to activate it.


    A mix of white and green ethereal light slowly showed from both of my legs, together with the strength. Seeing this I rushed towards the throne with all I got.


    But...


    The first step that I did had so much strength that made me jump and fall like an idiot with a face forward.


    *Bahm


    "Agh...What the hell was that!? I thought that the skill will be easy since the hobgoblin and even the level 3 goblin were able to do it.But that isn¡ät the case at all!


    "At least now I know that the skill actually works...but it seems like I will need some practice with it so that I don¡ät make a fool out of myself." I stood up and removed the dust from the cloth between my rib cage.


    "I wonder how much mana the whole action of me falling in the face has cost"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 5


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 650/650


    Mana: 48/60


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 14 Agility: 11 Intelligence: 6 Endurance: 12


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    "Wait...Did I use 12 mana? Didn¡ät the level 3 goblin use much less mana than I did? Did I used too much mana or do I leak mana from somewhere?" Seeing that the mere level 3 goblin was even better than me I felt somehow dejected.


    "Sigh, I guess I have 4 more tries to familiarize myself with th-" But my thought got suddenly interrupted by the echoes of screeches that wereing inside the cave.


    Hearing the echoes I unconsciously put a vicious smile on my face


    "Hehe, it seems like some guest has arrived at the perfect time." I checked my equipment and went out of the throne room.


    "What gentleman would I be if I weren¡ät to greet my guest inside my home."


    ***


    Currently outside the captured cave


    A group of five goblins was screeching at each other or rather talking.


    "Weird! No guards!" one of the goblin with a dagger in this hand screeched.


    "True! Suspicious!" the one goblin had a spear in hand screeched towards the dagger goblin.


    "Warrior chief dead? Warrior chief dead?" two goblins with simr looks and the same axe screeched at the same time.


    "Stop talking! If chief dead, then corpse inside!" After this goblin screeched that the other 4 goblins closed they mouth at the same time.


    This one wore a helmet and carried a spear which by the looks of it were of better quality versus the other goblin with the spear.


    A level 4 goblin!


    "But boss, corpse inside cave!" The spear goblinined.


    "Quit I said!" kicking the spear goblin. The helmet goblin pointed to the cave.


    "We go inside and retrieve the corpse! Now!"


    The four goblins looked at each other and sighed internally. Normally they wouldn¡ät follow orders from the helmet goblin, but this mission given to us from the elder. Any mistakes might lead them to be the next toy of their elder!


    No mistakes are allowed!


    Without further ado, the group of five goblins walked towards inside the cave and after a short moment there looked turned strange.


    "Hey, Leader. Was the home of chief that clean before?" The dagger goblin asked.


    "No... the first time was chiefs home so clean..." The helmet goblin put a strange look.


    At first, the home of the helmet goblin wasn¡ät the one from the elders but instead was the home of the warrior chief so he was familiar with these surroundings, but seeing this house so clean he felt that something wasn¡ät right.


    "Suspicious...let¡äs leave" Hearing what their leader said the other four goblins got flustered and confused.


    "We can¡ät! Elder will punish!"


    "Right"


    "Right"


    "Need to find warrior chief..."


    "Quiet!" The helmet goblin screeched loudly.


    "Something is wrong! The cave too clean with no food! No guards either! Too suspicious!"


    "The blue undead might be here! Too dangerous! Neverle-" As the helmet goblin tried to reason with the other four goblins he noticed something.


    Near the wall where the spear goblin was standing was a hole where normally goblins were sleeping in was a cloth.


    After watching the cloth for a short moment he noticed a very small white and green lighting out of the hole.


    Seeing that the helmet goblins face paled.


    "Run!" The helmet goblin used the skill [Sprint] and jumped behind as far as it could.


    The other four goblins made a puzzled expression.


    As they were confused something rapidly jumped at the spear goblin out from the hole.


    And the next moment they knew the spear goblin was pinned down to the ground with a sword in this chest.


    "KGWAAAH!"


    Seeing there friend in the ground screaming for help they were shocked! They all took a step behind and pointed at the figure which had a cloth covering this body.


    After removing the sword from the chest of the now-dead goblin the figure threw away the cloth covering.


    Only to see a Skeleton!


    "Wee to my home, fellow guest!"

 Chapter 14 - Grievous Wound

    K-Kghwa!"


    "Kgwha!"


    "Kgwah!" x2


    "Oh? Didn¡ät they like my heartwarming (crushing) wee?" Seeing that my ambushed worked I was currently in a good mood. Not only was I able to control my mana to activate the skill [Sprint] and not fall in my face but I also managed to kill one of the goblins with it!


    Without the usage of [Sprint], I wouldn¡ät have been able to kill the goblin as I did just now. They would have noticed me otherwise and just like this helmet goblin might have dodged my surprise attack.


    [You received 200 Experience points.]


    "Nice! About two more goblins and I should be abl-" But before I could finish my though¡äs I got interrupted by the helmet goblin.


    "Kgwaah!" For some reason, the helmet goblin was point towards my head. Although I didn¡ät know the reason why that was, I guessed that they are somehowmunicating with their screeches.


    Although I had no idea what they were talking about...


    "Kghwaa...!


    Annoying...


    "Don¡ät you guys ever shut your mouth!? I would even be damned If I had ears!" Seriously though, how the heck did these guys talk to each other with those screeches?


    After shaking my head from the useless thoughts I focused on the current task at hand.


    "One versus four is it? Isn¡ät that a little bit unfair?" I slowly started walking towards the four goblins while I guided the mana in my body to my legs.


    "Unfair for them that is..." White green light started emitting from my legs and the skill [Sprint] activated.


    Seeing that, the helmet goblin screeched loudly and warned the others. But knowing what is toe didn¡ät mean that you can block it.


    With my reinforcement legs, I leaped towards the goblin with the dagger with my sword up high.


    The goblin wilding the dagger tried to dodge to jump to the side and although he seeded...it seemed like that he forgot that I was only one meter away from him.


    Noticing this mistake, he tried to stand up but the only thing he met was my sword cutting through this whole face.


    When the other goblins saw this gore scene yed in front of them they have unconsciously taken a step back. And slowly the fear of death was crippling behind their back.


    The twin goblins turned around and screeched at the helmet goblin something.


    The helmet goblin nodded at them and pointed at one of the twins.


    The chosen goblin looked surprised and then sadden. He turned to look at twin brother only to receive a nod from him instead.


    "Hmm? What the hell are they doing?"


    Swinging my sword through the air to get the blood off of my sword I was right about to start walking towards my next target. But what I didn¡ät expect to see was the goblins rushing towards me.


    "You guys are rather cocky aren¡ät you? Don`t you guys underestimate too... much?"


    After a closer look towards the goblins, I realized that something was wrong. And that was that only two goblins were rushing towards me. Not three!


    The third goblin with the axe started running away!


    "Wait...!" Before I could chase the third goblin the one with the axe stood in front of me and blocking my path.


    "You..." I coldly looked at the goblin in front of me.


    Seeing the goblin not moving an inch I rushed towards it.


    Although the goblin realized better than I had expected. In the end, it met the same fate as the other goblin did.


    Dead.


    The exchange took about six whole seconds. Although six seconds to kill a goblin didn¡ät look like much. But in actuality, it was a really long time!


    I could barely see the third goblin running away by now!


    "If I chase it now I might be able to catch it, but..."


    Turning my head I could still see one remaining goblin which ¡ähad a helmet and a nice-looking spear.


    If it weren¡ät for that goblin I would even kill the goblin with the axe even faster, but instead, I had to pay some attention to this creep...


    As I was thinking about how to kill the goblin in front of me a sudden idea came to my mind.


    Why do I need to fight him now? If I chase the other goblin now I should be able to catch it and kill this goblin after I kill the escapee...


    Maybe the helmet goblin realized that too and instead of keeping this distance it rushed towards me.


    Seeing this I felt frustrated for not chasing the escaped goblin the moment I killed the goblin with the axe.


    I cleared my thoughts and focused on the helmet goblin.


    The helmet goblin tried to stab me with this advanced of reach.


    Through my superior strength, I was easily able to block these blows with my shield. The moment I blocked the fourth hit I advanced it and swung my swords towards it. Although I barely scratched this chest cause of him stepping a step back at thest moment.


    "Status"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Goblin


    Level: 4


    ss: Warrior


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 738/750


    Mana: 42/50


    Attributes: Strength: 4 Agility: 3 Intelligence: 5 Endurance: 6 Stamina: 14


    [Talents]---


    [Skills][Sprint Lv.1] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1]


    Level 4 huh...pretty much the same as the level 3 goblins.


    After seeing this status I scoffed from inside of me.


    Seeing this low status I instantly rxed.


    But that was a mistake.


    The goblin legs emitted a small white light and this speed increased for a short instant. I ready myself to receive the attack and kill it at the same time.


    But what I didn¡ät expect was that the white light has yet to disappear!


    As the helmet goblin was about to reach my range of attack, he used the skill [Sprint] for a second time which allowed him to move at my side within an instant.


    "What!?" I was dumbfounded! I always thought that the [Sprint] skill could only be used once a time!


    I hastily turned my position so that I can receive the attack, but things didn¡ät go as nned.


    "KGWAAH!" The helmet goblin screamed with all this strength and jumped at me with these still glowing legs!


    It used [Sprint] for the third time!?


    "I got to move away..!" I guided the mana inside of me and hastily tried to activate [Sprint] too. But sadly it was toote.


    The spear prated my cloth armor together with my whole right side of the rib cage!


    The bones that fallen to the ground emitted some dark mana before slowly bing dust.


    And a sudden feeling of weakness came at me.


    Seeing the abnormal feelings I kicked the helmet goblin away and opened my status.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 5


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 135/650


    Mana: 60/60


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 14 Agility: 11 Intelligence: 6 Endurance: 12


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    "The damage is too high..." Seeing how much health I lost I was surprised.


    No.


    Shocked!


    One attack leads me to suffer such a wound!?


    That was too dangerous!


    With the burning feelinging back, it cleared my head and allowed me to focus on the enemy in front of me.


    But what I saw made me stunned for a second.


    The goblin which inflicted such a grievous wound was sitting on the ground running in fumes while with this legs were shaking no stop.


    "I see... the aftereffect of [Sprint] finally kicked in didn¡ät"


    At first, I was quite puzzled at why he was behaving like that, but then I remember the description of the skill [Sprint].


    [Sprint Lv.1]: By Forcing mana into your leg you are able to surpass your limits thus being able to move at extreme speed for a limited amount of time. Though this method brings a heavy burden to your body.


    "Brings heavy burden to your body huh? Just imaging how it would feel using it three times in a row." I shook my head and slowly walked towards it.


    The goblin was screeching with a low voice, probably begging me to show mercy.


    "No, chance" I kicked this spear out of hand and picked it the next moment.


    Seeing that the goblin was trembling from fear.


    I put my foot towards this chest, forcing him to the ground. As I was


    about to pierce the goblin''s chest with this spear.


    The goblin suddenly started crying and thrashing around. It tried to push my foot or drag this body away from me.


    I emotionally looked at it screeching at me and quickly pierced this heart with this own spear.


    The goblin''s eyes quickly started losing color while this strength was rapidly declining.


    "I wonder how much far away the escaped goblin went..."


    As I was about to chase the escaped goblin a voice suddenly came from right behind me.


    "Please..."


    Hearing this voice I unconsciously dropped my sword and turned around as fast as possible.


    Only to find nothing behind me...


    "Where did this voice...e from?"


    I nkly stared around me as if I was frozen in time.


    "Or rather.... Where did I hear this voice from?"

 Chapter 15 - Shaman: You Will Be My Key!

    [You received 500 Experience Points]


    I ignored the report of me killing the level 4 goblin and focused on my surroundings instead.


    "This voice...from where?"


    Recalling the voice that I heard it was somehow a gentle and yet a fierce voice. As if someone with a gentle voice tried to yell with all their strength, begging to stop...


    But what puzzled me the most was that the voice sounds so familiar and yet so foreign for some reason.


    As if you could remember someone''s voice, but not their actual name or who they were.


    The longer I tried to remember whose voice that was. The stronger my headache was bing until the point I couldn¡ät take it anymore.


    "Ah!" Holding my head with my hands I turned around and started walking towards the cave exit.


    "Right... I should focus on chasing the remaining goblin. The way this group behaved was as if they were trying to buy enough time to let the remaining goblin escape..." Shaking my head off the headache. I walked out of the cave to chase the goblin but...


    "Tch, It got away..." Seeing no traces of the goblin I felt troubled...


    "If only I didn¡ät take that long killing that damn goblin I would even be able to chase thest one but now" Seeing that there was no hope at catching the goblin I could only do what everyone else would do..."


    "Welp, I guess I will give up" Without a second thought I turned around and headed back to the gave.


    It wasn¡ät like I couldn¡ät catch the goblin If I ran after it.


    After all, as an undead, I wouldn¡ät get tired and there would be no need for me to rest. But that wasn¡ät the case for the goblin. Not even considering the difference between our stats I would easily be able to catch up to him.


    But I didn¡ät do that chase for various reasons.


    First of all, I had no idea where it went. There were three paths that I haven¡ät explored yet and the chance of taking the wrong path is rtively high.


    Secondly, my body is still damaged and the only way to recover my body currently is simple by waiting.


    Without recovering I wouldn¡ät be able to be in my prime while fighting another goblin with skills such as [Sprint]. This fight made me realize that stats aren¡ät everything and with the correct use of skills or talents even the weakest enemy can be a threat.


    "I guess I should practice more in using my skills. If I master how to use my mana I would be able to use [Sprint] multiple times at a time as the helmet goblin did. But the only difference between us will be that I will be able to [Sprint] as many times that my mana allows me without having the disadvantage as the goblin did have in the end!"


    Just thinking that every step that I make will be reinforced with the skill [Sprint] makes me excited.


    Speaking of skills...


    "Right, I should have enough XP by now to get [Shield Bash] right?" With just thought the XP storage window came to my sight.


    [XP: 3000]


    Seeing the amount of XP in my storage I somehow felt awkward.


    For a mere fight that didn¡ät even take five minutes, I earned 1100 XP and training like crazy for a whole seven hours earned me just about 1900 XP!?


    Now understand what it meant that the amount of XP wouldn¡ät be much!


    "Sigh, Although I don¡ät regret it does bring a sure taste in my mouth...Not like I have one"


    Afterughing at myme joke for a little bit I went of to train more...


    "I should probably learn how to use the two other skill¡äs too while I am at it"


    [Shield Bash aquiered]


    [Piercing aquiered]


    ***


    POV of the Shaman.


    "Rise! Rise Imand!" Dead mana was filling the wholeboratory. As if small ck mes were dancing in the air and slowly moving towards a single position.


    The ce the dead mana was moving was the experimentation table which contained a skeleton. To be more precise, I former undead Skeleton.


    The dead mana was a circle around the "dead" skeleton and slowly entering this body.


    "Yes! It is working! Just a little more and I will finally be...Wait, No!" As he was about to celebrate this hard-earned sess, the body of the skeleton started showing signs of breaking apart and leaking the dead mana that it had absorbed until yet.


    Seeing this the Shaman''s face suddenly turned pale and put this whole focus to control the dead mana around him, so that the skeleton doesn¡ät break apart.


    "Why!? Why wouldn¡ät you rise!? Rise and obey! Obey my cal-" Sadly these wishes turned to be rejected by reality.


    The Skeleton that was until now holding the dead mana in this body started to break down until only dust remained.


    "Dammit!" Cursing out loud. The shaman went to this working table and picked some green-looking paper that had some kind ofnguage written on it.


    "All calction and measurements were all correct but why didn`t it work!? What I am doing wrong!" The Shaman picked from some nearby box the same green paper that he had in hand together with some dark red liquid that was used to write on the paper.


    "Now I have to start all over again and find recements for the experiments! And I also have to make sure tha-" As he was cursing out loud a sudden screech came behind the cloth that was hiding the entrance.


    "What do you guys want!? If ain¡ät in a good mood right now so if it isn¡ät important I will make sure that you will be the next experiment of my!" As he says that.


    The two goblin guards together with another goblin which was holding a axe.


    "Hmm? Weren¡ät you one of the groups I send to retrieve my brother''s corpse? Howe you came back so fast?"


    Under the question of the Elder, both the guards and the goblin with the axe got cold sweat crippling to their backs.


    The goblin gripped this axe even tighter than before and started telling what they met in the warrior''s chief cave.


    The clean cave, the ambush of the abnormal skeleton, and this usage of mana.


    When he finished the shaman¡äs goblin had a confused face.


    "Wait, you said you saw a skeleton use mana?"


    Seeing the goblin nodding by this question the shamans face darkened suddenly, making the three goblin¡äs treble slightly.


    "Did this skeleton had blue eyes?"


    Seeing the seriousness this elder was making the goblin thought of the events where they met the skeleton. Even after thinking for a while, he couldn¡ät remember seeing blue eyes.


    So he shook this head.


    Upon that action, though he froze in fear.


    No.


    He and the two-guard goblins were frozen too.


    And the reason was out of fear!


    The shaman''s eyes suddenly turned mad and he startedughing as if he was crazy.


    "MUahhahah! Finally! I found the key to my research! Heheheh, an undead skeleton that is ever so close to evolving but has yet to start this evolution! If I am able to get my hands on that I will finally be able to break through my bottleneck from my research!"


    He hastily ran to the side of this working table and picked stuff that had a skull attached to it together with a small dark crystal.


    "Gather everybody and tell them to prepare their weapons together with a bunch of supplies!" He passed through the three stunned goblins and put on this cloak.


    "We will start marching towards my brother''s, the warrior chief''s cave, and reim it as ours!"


    Wait for me Skeleton!


    As You will open my first steps towards Immortality!

 Chapter 16 - You Guys Are...

    In the captured Cave.


    It has been a little more than five hours that the against the group with the helmet goblin.


    In that time I focus myself wholly on training so that I can master the mana in my body. Although mastering would be too much. More like getting more familiar with how mana feels like.


    Just imagining using [Sprint] just like the helmet goblin did bring me excitement!


    [You gained 300 Experience Points through training]


    "Another hour done, huh? Maybe it¡äs time to take a short break and take a look at my status. And with my bones now healed I might as well make another cloth armor."


    I went out and picked out some cloth that I had previously gathered from all around the gate and sit on the throne.


    While I was making my new "cloth armor" I opened up my status though using my mind.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 5


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 569/650


    Mana: 54/60


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 14 Agility: 11 Intelligence: 6 Endurance: 12


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash Lv. 1] [Piercing Lv. 1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    "Hmm, still not fully recovered even after five whole hours, huh?"


    Even though my ribs have been fully restored the feeling of coldness and emptiness still lingered around my ribs. Although not that strong.


    If I had to describe it, it would probably be like having a bruise or something the like. Although the wound is closed, the pain is still there.


    "Tch. I will never get used to this feeling. Anyways I should be able to level up by the XP that I gathered by now. Show me my XP storage."


    [XP: 1500]


    [Level]: 900 XP required


    "I can Increase my level by one now and the next level should be around 1000 XP. Maybe If I increase my level high enough I might unlock the sub-ss just like I unlocked my ss."


    [Level has increased from Lv.5 to Lv.6]


    [Strength increased by 1, Agility increased by 1 and Endurance increased by 1]


    [You received 1 Attribute Point]


    "Oh? It seemed like I needed to unlock my ss to receive attribute points. I wonder where I should spend in on."


    Seeing that I finally got an attribute point I was somehow excited. I have thought for a long time what the requirements were to gain attribute but it seemed like it was just by increasing my level or by use of [Miasma Corruption].


    Well, although I said a long time, it has been barely more than four days since I awaken from theke.


    ...


    Anyways!


    Where the heck should I put my attribute point into?


    Strength?


    No, I already have enough Strength, and putting more points into it would be just kind of overkill. Heck, if my Strength increases anymore I would have to worry about not breaking my sword when using it.


    Strength, Rejected!


    Other than Strength, the other stats need to be considered thought...


    Agility would allow me to move more smoothly and faster than before, even if it is only a slight increase. A good choice overall.


    Intelligence would probably increase my mana amount by around 10 points...Although it wouldn¡ät improve my basic Strength, it might allow me to use one of my skills one more time.


    And Endurance will just inly increase my health by 50 points. Even though it doesn¡ät sound as amazing as the other stats, it shouldn¡ät be underestimated. Been able to receive one more hit is already amazing enough.


    After thinking it about for around a few minutes I came to my decision.


    [Intelligence increased by 1]


    "Status"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 6


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 619/700


    Mana: 64/70


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 15 Agility: 12 Intelligence: 7 Endurance: 13


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash Lv. 1] [Piercing Lv. 1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    I decided to choose intelligence over the other stats cause it can¡ät be raised with just level-ups. Sooner orter I will get multiple skills to use which would require mana. Having my Intelligence stay at such a low mana pool would only limit me in the future.


    "With that decided... I still have 600 XP left in the storage. And I would need about 4600 XP to increase my level to level 10 if the current price increases only about 100 XP. If I do that I might be able to unlock my sub-ss but that isn¡ät guaranteed..."


    Thinking that at level 10 my sub-ss will get unlocked might be a little too naive. I might just get level 10 and nothing gets unlocked!


    That would be awkward!


    "Maybe I should Increase my ss level? I might unlock some new skills or just increase my attributes but other than that...Wait, how much does even the level-up option cost for my ss?"


    [Undead Warrior Level]: 500 XP required


    "Oh my, just 500 XP? I guess it shouldn¡ät hurt increasing my ss level by just 1" I reached my hand and pressed the level up option for my ss.


    [Undead Warrior Level has increased from Lv. 1 to Lv2]


    [Strength increased by 2, Agility increased by 1 and Endurance increased by 1]


    [You received 1 Attribute Point]


    "That¡äs..." Seeing the amount of stats that my ss level up gave me I felt somehow d and somehow dejected at the same time...


    Why would it give me 2 points at Strength and the others 1 point? Couldn''t you just spare me the 2 points of strength and just put 1 point into intelligence!?


    "Sigh...I might as well start using the spear, for now, although I prefer the sword rather than the spear, I don¡ät think it willst long with my current strength increase. If I am lucky with it maybe some swings..." After looking around the status window for a little more I stood up from the throne and picked up the spear from a nearby barrel where I stored all kinds of stuff including some other weapons that the goblin was using.


    Although most of them were some rusted knives and axes or worn-out spears. Basically junk.


    The best weapons that I could find inside this whole cave were the sword that I was using together with the shield.


    Well, the shield had about the same quality level as the junk that the goblins were using, but since there is only one of them, you could technically say that it is the strongest shield from inside this whole cave!


    As for the sword that I kept using I would say that it had about the same quality as the spear that the helmet goblin had if only it wasn¡ät worn out and rusted.


    "Sigh...Why do weapons have to rust and get worn out? Isn¡ät there a weapon somewhere out there where it doesn¡ät get damaged or having this edge lost after some swings?


    "...Or maybe shoot fire from the tip and being able to float with just using the mind?" As I was fantasizing about some useless stuff, I started training using my spear in one hand and the shield in the other.


    Although I felt somehow awkward using a new weapon, it wasn¡ät as bad as when I first started using the shield.


    While I continued my training to get familiar with the spear, I got interrupted mid-training by some low screeches.


    "So they even came back..." Hearing the screeches I stopped my training and prepared to head towards the outside.


    But the next moment I turned around I was stunned.


    "I see...you guys learned your lesson and tried to sneak up to me didn¡ät you?"


    What surprised me were the five goblins that were in the throne room entrance walking slowly towards me.


    Normally I would be able to notice the goblins the moment they came inside the cave. Since if they screeched just a little bit I would be able to hear it from inside the throne room through the echoes of the cave.


    But them being here without me noticing means that they tried to stay silenced so that I wouldn¡ät notice them.


    "And here I thought that those goblins were just inly stupid..." I turned around and started walking slowly towards them.


    Seeing me walking slowly towards them, the five goblins screeched out loud and started running towards me at full speed!


    "Hmm? Do you guyse at me without any weapons? You underestimate yourselves!"


    As the weaponless reached near me, I ruthlessly pierced the first goblin through this chest while dragging him with my spear and throwing it at the side.


    "Pathetic..." Seeing the goblin just rushing towards me without anything I felt somehow dissatisfied.


    I put my guard up and you just jump towards my spear without a second thought? What did you think will happen if you jump at me like that?


    Removing the useless thought from my mind, I turned around expecting the other goblins to run away as the other group had.


    But...


    "Kgwaah!"


    The four goblins were still running towards me without a sign of stopping.


    "Hmm?" Aren¡ät you guys too brave to run at me like that?


    Seeing one of the goblins jumping at me with this mouth open full of saliva I nkly stared at it with disgust.


    "You n to bite me or what?"


    I raised my shield and hit the goblin directly at this jaw bow!


    *crack


    "Kgwha!"


    The hit sends the goblin rolling to the other side while flesh and teeth flew out of this mouth.


    Seeing that the other 3 goblins were unfazed, rather they rushed at me with more vigor. I felt something was wrong.


    "Weird..."


    Just as I was about to pierce the next iing goblin with my spear. The unexpekted happend.


    The already pierced goblin jumped at me from behind me and bit my corbone.


    "What!?"


    Surprised, I hastily pierced the goblin that was rushing towards me and abandoned my spear inside this body. With my hand now free to use I gripped the goblin that was biting from the neck and throw it in front of me.


    Though my superior strength and bodyweight of the goblin such action were easily done.


    The goblin that I threw crushed towards on top of one of the rushing goblins while thest goblin that was stilling at me receive a taste of my punch which caved in on part of this skull.


    *Cracked!


    After carefully observing the goblins I was honestly shocked.


    The goblin that had this jaw bone destroyed still tried to make the motion of biting while the goblin with this skull half crashed was still slowly moving and trying to rise.


    Heck! One goblin literally had my whole spear inside this body, directly where this heart was supposed to be pierced and still moved like the spear wasn¡ät in this body!


    "There is no way that these things are normal goblins! Status!" With a singlemand, the status of the goblin with the crushed skull came to my sight.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Zombie Goblin (Undead)


    Level: 2


    ss: ----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 28/350


    Mana: 10/10


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 5 Agility: 1 Intelligence: 1 Endurance: 6


    [Talents] [Undead]


    [Skills] ----


    [Remark: A mindless Undead created from a living being. The process of creating this mindless puppet could be called one of the most embarrassing excuses of necromancy.]


    "I see..."


    Seeing the goblin slowly standing up and ready to pouch at me at the next second I couldn¡ät help but had I awkward look at me.


    "I see now why you guys are so brave! You aren¡ät goblins! You are Undead!"

 Chapter 17 - Brain Damaged Undead?

    "An undead puppet is it? No wonder you guys behaved weird."


    If I were to take a good look at these guys I would even have noticed sooner...Pale skin, without fear nor pain. No wonder these guys were undead.


    "K-kgh..."


    "But still...too weak."


    I raised my foot and stomped the head of the goblin in the ground, full destroying the already broke skull and splitting the head in half.


    [You received 400 Experience Points]


    Although they are a little bit stronger than the living goblins they are still no match for me.


    "I don¡ät even need a weapon for those guys"


    The zombie goblins didn¡ät stay idle and instead, all rushed towards me with their mouth fully opened with the intent to get a piece out of me.


    "The same thing? Don¡ät you guys know anything else except running towards me? If you do that..."


    The first one to reach me was the zombie goblin with this jaw broken as it was the nearest.


    The sight of the zombie goblin with this mouth full of blood mixed with saliva together and this hands reaching out to grab me would even terrify most people.


    But I only scoffed at this sight.


    "Nothing will change!" As the goblin was about to reach me I focused my strength towards my fist and punched at the goblin''s face without any mercy!


    Through the momentum that the goblin had built up and my punch, this face got awfully informed and it was sent rolling in the air beforending behind me without showing any signs of recovery.


    [You received 400 Experience Points]


    "Three to go..." Thest remaining zombie goblins were the two that crashed with each other and the one with my spear through this chest.


    Ignoring the one with the spear through this chest I moved towards the other duo, ready to smash the crap out of them!


    "Kghwaa!"


    "Kgwhaa!"


    They both howled towards me and rushed at me as if I were a high-grade steak ready to be served.


    "These guys are even more stupid than Fellow, he at least used a weapon but those guys could be considered brain damaged even among the undead."


    As they came in front of me, I pushed the one that had bit me before with my shield to the side while gripping the other goblin from the neck and lifting it in the air.


    "Kghwa, Kghwaah!" Seeing the goblin trying to reach out to me instead of trying to release itself I scoffed from inside.


    "Hmpf, mindless puppets!"


    As I say that, I started repeatedly hitting these goblins'' faces with my shield directly to this face.


    Each hit echoed through the whole cave while my shield was digging deeper into this face by each hit.


    *Baahm!


    *Baahm!


    *Baahm!


    *Cracked!


    [You received 400 Experience Points]


    "Finally these strings have been cut, huh..." I realized my grip towards the goblin''s neck, which made it fall like a puppet had these strings being cut.


    After a nce towards the goblin with my spear in this chest, I moved towards the goblin which had bitten me.


    "Did you think that I will forget about you licking my beautiful corbone!?"


    "Kgwha!" Seeing me so close the goblin licker tried to jump at me with this young full out.


    Seeing this I stepped aside and fully dodging the pathetic attack. As the goblin turned around I gripped this head while kicking one of this legs, making it fall with face forward.


    "Do remember...that is payback!" I raised the head of the goblin and smashed it the next moment to the ground!


    "K-Kgwah!"


    And that continued.


    *Thuad!


    "K-Kghwa-"


    *Thuad!


    "K-Kghw-"


    *Thuad!


    "K-Kg-"


    *Thuad!


    [You received 400 Experience Points]


    Seeing the face of the goblin being beyond recognition I smashed it onest time to the ground.


    *Baahm!


    "Too bad you were a mindless undead...otherwise I could even kill you slower"


    Cleaning the blood out of my hand I nced towards the remaining goblin with my spear inside this chest.


    The way it walked seemed quiteical, every time it moved forward the spear would hit the ground walk left and right.


    "Fellow would probably be able to pull the spear out of this chest, but this undead...what were they called? Zombies? They are simply too stupid!"


    I slowly walked towards the goblin and gripped my spear.


    "Kgwah!"


    Although the goblin was trying to rush towards me with all it got.


    In the end, it wasn¡ät able to!


    As I was gripping the one end of the spear while the other end was still inside the goblin''s chest it just seemed like it was walking towards me without being able to move an inch!


    "Are those guys really puppets? The status report did say that these zombie goblins were created through the use of magic but aren¡ät they just...inly stupid?" After nkly staring at it for a few seconds I bought out my sword with one hand while my other hand was holding the spear.


    "Or maybe the master out of this thinks was simply too stupid to give those guysmands?"


    Raising my sword high with one hand, I told with a ck face.


    "Well, thanks for the XP anyways."


    *Seehn


    And at the next moment, the head of thest goblin was send flying.


    Rolling to the ground.


    "Now, where should I spent my XP into..."


    As I was thinking about where I should spend my newly acquired XP.


    I failed to notice something.


    A small dark light was emitting through the ground.


    More specifically, the light wasing out of the eyes of the decapitated goblin head!


    And at the next moment where the dark light has faded away...


    The goblin shamans'' eyes have opened!


    ***


    Currently near theke...


    The Shaman''s eyes had suddenly opened.


    Seeing their elder open this eyes so suddenly the nearby goblin flinched for a second.


    "That my zombies to bepletely defeated so easily...It seems like I underestimated this skeleton."


    Seeing that this creation of several decades of research has to been so easily defeated had but a sour taste into this mouth.


    "Although I could create more zombies out of the nearby goblins around me, it wouldn¡ät work against this undead..." Remembering how these zombies haven¡ät even done any significant damage other than licking the skeleton''s bones.


    He could only scratch this head out of frustration.


    "Kgwha! Aren¡ät skeletons suppose to be mindless undead!? No matter how you look at it this skeleton wasn¡ät mindless at all! Moreover wasn¡ät it too smart to be one of the undead!?"


    Instead of hatefully charging towards this enemy it calmly watched over these enemies and slowly but efficiently killed them one by one!


    "It might even be smarter than the blue-eyed skeleton..."


    Even though he hadn¡ät met the blue-eyed skeleton, the few time it did he already realized this intelligence. Although it still showed the nature of the undead hating the living, it still killed a bunch of the goblins without letting this guard once!


    "Can we even kill this think...? No, It still hasn¡ät awakened this color so it should still be possible, even If every goblin has to die I still need the corpse of this skeleton!" At this point, the goblin Shaman had eyes filled with madness and this face with excitement.


    Hearing what their elder was saying they felt enormous fear to the point where one goblin had copsed in theke.


    But they couldn`t go against their elder. After all, so was the nature of the goblins!


    The strongest rules the weak!


    But that wasn¡ät the only reason why they obeyed their elders.


    The true reason was the cause of fear!


    Every single goblin knew what would happen if they didn¡ät follow the orders of the elder!


    Those who don¡ät will be the toys of the elder, while those who follow must pray not to be chosen as the next toy of the elder!


    Bing a toy of the elder was even worse than death itself!


    Seeing the pale faces of the goblins around him the shaman scoffed inside of him.


    As if I need the bodies of such trashes. It is even more embarrassing calling that livestock my own race! They should even feel grateful for being able to be used towards my research!


    "Tch, Stop nkly staring at me and get moving! We will be moving towards the warrior''s chiefs cave! So get your asses moving and pick up everything we need!"


    Afraid of angering their elder, they hastily picked up the buckets of water and the bags with different weapons and goblin meat.


    "Be prepared to fight! Once we reach the warrior''s chief cave we will face an undead skeleton! And for those who ck off, I will personally make them to my meat puppets right now! So get to moving!"


    Seeing the goblins hastily preparing their equipped the shaman started towards the path of the cave.


    "Wait for me undead, your body will soon be mine!"

 Chapter 18 - A Warm Welcome

    "Now where should I spend my XP..."


    "The fight against the zombie goblin¡äs had given me 2000 XP. Counting what I have in my XP storage I should have 2100 XP in total. Quite a lot for just some brain-damaged undead."


    Although The XP that I gained was quite plenty full, that didn''t mean that I could just spend it carefree.


    No.


    It was actually the opposite!


    "Even though those undead were quite weak, their purpose properly wasn¡ät to kill me but to gain information. Killing those guys should even alert the one controlling those undead..."


    That means I shouldn¡ät have much time to prepare. At worst the enemy is right outside of the cave...


    Without much time to waste, I quickly decided where I would use my storage XP.


    If I were to follow the goal of reaching level 10 as fast as possible I could increase my current level twice with the XP that I got. That choice would even be given me 2 Strenght, 2 Agility, 2 Endurance, and 2 Attribute points which would go on intelligence.


    But I didn¡ät choose to do that.


    Instead of increasing my own level, I decided to increase my ss level. Although it goes against my original n that didn¡ät matter currently.


    What mattered the most was increasing mybat capabilities to the absolute maximum at the time!


    Currently, I haven¡ät met anything that can threaten my current life. The most dangerous moment during the whole four days was my fight versus the hobgoblin and my current strength has already surpassed the hobgoblin!


    Even if I fight against two. No, maybe even against three hobgoblins I might able to win against them!


    The question now is, Why should I go against my n if there is nothing to threaten my life?


    The answer is obviously...


    You Fool!


    Even I ain¡ät that naive to believe that!


    It hasn¡ät even been a whole day and I was almost killed by the helmet goblin already. Even if we don¡ät count that I wouldn¡ät be so naive as to think that there isn¡ät a stronger existencepared to me!


    The dude who sent those zombie goblins obviously isn¡ät a small fry!


    The report from the zombies mentions that he used some kind of necromancy to make those zombie goblins. And by tranting what necromancy means with the help of the status the one creating the zombie goblins wouldn¡ät be as simple!


    [Necromancy: One of the branches of Magic. It focused on creation and control of death.]


    Although a sort description, the content that it provides is very important.


    The important information isn¡ät about how necromancy allows you to control death and such.


    No.


    The most important information in this description is just one word.


    Magic.


    That dude knows how to use Magic!


    What is magic you ask?


    The hell I know!


    I never faced an enemy that was capable of using magic. Only enemy¡äs that used the skill [Sprint] and the [Heavy Strike], which both are considered martial arts by the status.


    Through this reasoning, I decided to increase mybat capabilities to the maximum! And to do that I would have to increase my ss [Undead Warrior] level instead of my original level!


    "The first level cost 600 XP. With the second costing 700 XP and the third costing 800 XP...That should in total be 2100 XP points!"


    Without much hesitation, I tapped at the level-up option in the status window.


    [Undead Warrior Level has Increase from Lv. 2 to Lv. 5]


    [Strenght Increased by 6, Agility Increased by 3 and Endurance Increased by 3]


    [You Received 3 Attribute Points]


    "My strength increased by so much..."


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 6


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.5]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 723/750


    Mana: 66/80


    Attribute Points: 3


    Attributes: Strength: 23 Agility: 16 Intelligence: 8 Endurance: 17


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash Lv. 1] [Piercing Lv. 1]


    [Remark: A abnormal Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    "Hmm? The remark changed from skeleton to abnormal skeleton huh?


    Maybe though the increased of my stats?" After ncing at the remark for a second I quickly moved to put my attribute points to my Intelligence.


    [Inteligence increased by 3]


    "Now with this done, I will have to check the outside first!" After cleaning the spear and the sword from the rotten blood I dashed towards the exit of the cave.


    After reaching the outside I sighed out of relief.


    "The magic caster still isn¡ät here, that means I still got time." After staying silenced for a few seconds I could hear some quiet echoes through the distance.


    "If my guess is right the magic caster should being from theke to here, that means a few hours before theye here..."


    After realizing that I still got some time left I unconsciously put a vicious smile on my face.


    "What gentleman would I be if I weren¡ät able to prepare a wee for those guest of my?"


    Hehe...


    ****


    Three hourster at the entrance of the captured cave, the shaman''s group had arrived.


    "Kghwa!?"


    "Kgwha!?"


    "Quite! ce the luggage to the ground and prepare to go in..." The shaman currently had a weird look on this face.


    The current sight bewilders him. Instead of before where there were nothing special sights or decorations aside from some rocks, the cave entrance looked quite boring. But now if he had to describe this current sight he would say that it was quite...gory!


    In front of the cave now were more than ten stakes which impaled the five goblin zombies that he had sent not long before and five different goblins which looked decayed to the point you could see the bones through the skin!


    But what scared the goblins the most was that in the middle of those stakes was the head of their warrior chieftain.


    The hobgoblin''s face had a look of fear, which further enchanted the fear from the goblins.


    If someone were to watch this sight it would remind them of the decorations of Drac''s front door castle [1].


    "Those things weren¡ät there before..." Did the skeleton make this knowing that we wille? Indeed, this skeleton is way smarter than even though...


    "But this skeleton is obviously underestimating us, to wee us like that..." Seeing this brother''s head ced to the ground like that he somehow felt a sense of sadness in him.


    "My little brother...who would even though that to see you like this..." The shaman''s face grew gentler and sadder for each second that he looked at this brother''s remaining head.


    Seeing their elder getting so sad cause of the death of the warrior chieftain they saw their elder in a new light!


    The goblins wanted to go to the elder and ensure him that their warrior chieftain is now in a better ce.


    But before they could even do that, the face of their elder turned vicious and this eye was madness to see.


    "You useless pig! Even to the death, you became useless! If your body weren¡ät torn to pieces I could already have seded with my research!"


    Goblins: "...."


    Shaman: "What are you guys looking at? Get to work! This undead isn¡ät going to kill itself!"


    Seeing that their elder has returned to this original self they could only sight internally and move towards the cave entrance.


    Walking between the impaled goblin¡äs they couldn¡ät help but show signs of fear and disgust.


    No matter which race you were, seeing one of your own race impaled and decayed at a stake. It wouldn¡ät be a nice sight to see.


    Seeing the expression of this goblin, the shaman scoffed loudly.


    "Tch, they are just corpses! Nothing new to see! The same meat you guys eates from your fellow colleague''s corpses! Get over it and move on!"


    Hearing what their elder has said most of the goblins got a sudden sense to puke out of disgust. But every goblin held these feelings down, afraid to displease their elder by puking in front of him.


    "No matter how strong of a skeleton you are, against our number and my magic you will wish that you haven¡ät underestimated us!" Saying that the goblin shaman took the lead of the group and headed Inside the cave.


    But as they moved inside the cave they failed to notice a small detail outside.


    If you were to observe carefully you could even see the earth of the right-most corner move.


    Or rather vibrate.


    And with the group moving inside the cave the earth vibration suddenly grew stronger until a skeleton arm came out of the earth!


    And after the hand appeared, a skeleton with some cloth armor through these ribs and a spear with a shield in this hand appeared from under the ground!


    "Hehe.."


    [1] In a series of Netflix.. Called Castlevania there is a character called d Drac Tepes which he decorations the path towards this castle with corpses that are impaled by stakes.

 Chapter 19 - Warrior Vs Magic Caster

    POV of shaman¡äs.


    "Light up your torches and continue forward!"


    Hearing themand of their elder, some goblins dropped their bags to the ground and pulled torches out of the bags.


    Lighting up the torches made the surrounding goblins go blind for a sec cause of the sudden appearance of light.


    He nkly stared at the goblins getting used to the light before getting to move forward.


    "Even though we are able to see greatly through the dark, it isn¡ät to the point toplete night vision..."


    Unlike the undead.


    We would at least need a single spark of light to be able to see throughplete darkness.


    Since most of the undead have by default night vision it shouldn¡ät be strange that there is no sight of a light source inside the cave.


    "Anyways...this skeleton did quite some work didn¡ät he?"


    *Ssh


    Shortly after they lighten up their torches they noticed that the path leading to the warrior¡äs chief throne had signs of something being dragged over together with some blood mixed in.


    "K-Kgh..." The first goblin to notice this sight quickly sucked up this breath. Seeing where the tracks in the ground wereing from they quickly got afraid.


    The tracks wereing out of the throne room.


    Every single goblin knew this room. This room represents either their execution point or their promotion into a warrior.


    Except the female goblins and these two reasons, no one else was allowed to go inside without the permission of their warrior chief.


    Every goblin that was called inside that room has as high expectations as they had in dread!


    "Quite!" Although it was quite hypocritical for me to scream at them to be quiet I didn¡ät care.


    "Inside there is only a single skeleton waiting for us! With my supreme magic and our numbers, there is nothing to be afraid of! No get to moving!"


    Suppressing their fear from the throne room, they moved ording to the elder''smand.


    After all, they feared more their elder being dissatisfied with them and turning them to these toys, rather than the throne room.


    Entering the room, the first thing they took to notice was the throne and a silhouette sitting on the throne.


    Cause of the darkness they couldn¡ät make up what exactly that silhouette was. All they saw was that it wore some of the same cloth their wearing in this chest and legs.


    But before they could make up what this was their elder tookmand.


    "Charge at the skeleton from left and right! I will cast magic at the front!"


    Upon hearing themand of the elder. It was as if a hidden switch was turned on the goblins. And the before scary cats that the goblins were screeched out loudly and put a ferocious face while charging with all they got!


    "Kghwa! Kwhaw! Kwhaw!"


    While those goblins were charging with all their might. I was in a deep concentration.


    That¡äs right, I was casting magic!


    After around 3 seconds the shaman opened this eye and faced this palm towards the now sitting skeleton!


    "Firebolt!"


    And like an instant, some me materialized from out of nothing and formed a small ball of fire which was shot directly at the throne with immense speed!


    *Baahm!


    The ball of fire although small, the moment it came into contact with the skeleton on the throne. The ball of mes exploded and engulfed the whole throne with fire!


    At this sight, the goblins stopped rushing towards the throne, and they all stand still.


    Waiting for the skeleton to emerge out of the mes.


    But after a short while, they started to have some doubts.


    Where is the skeleton?


    Why isn¡ät iting out of the mes?


    Did maybe their elder finished to skeleton with just one move?


    Our elder is indeed the greatest!


    And so, their cries (screeches) of celebration could be heard from all over the cave.


    But the shaman only had a heavy look while staring at the mes.


    While intensively watching over the me, he noticed something.


    After the cloth was burned he could finally see what was hidden between the mes. At what he saw wasn¡ät bone, but instead...


    "...Flesh?"


    And like an instant, a terrifying idea came to this mind!


    But before he could ry these findings.


    Something happened among the cheerful cheer.


    And that was a scream of pain!


    "Kwha!!"


    ***


    [You received 300 Experience Points]


    "So that¡äs the caster!"


    Seeing the goblin that was holding a skull staff and perform magic it was obvious at this point that this one was the master of the zombie goblins and the leader of those 20 or whatnot goblins that were all over the room.


    "It went better than expected!" Although I had some doubts about my n inside my head. In the end, the current situation was way better than I had even thought!


    The original n was to decorate the entry point of the cave in order to make it seem like I was waiting for them inside while burying myself outside so that I can ambush them.


    Not only would that allow me to have the jump on them but if things go south I will still have the opportunity to run!


    If we don¡ät count that I had to wait for almost a whole hour underground...


    The perfect n!


    As for the decoy that was sitting on the throne I just used the remains of the hobgoblin and put some cloth to hide this flesh.


    Although I didn¡ät have much expectation on the dummy itself being able to fool the goblins.


    But who would even though that the caster goblin would reveal this magic!


    All the effort wasn¡ät for nothing!


    I tossed the goblin that I had just killed and I rushed towards the caster!


    The distance was only 10 meters!


    Seeing me rush towards it, the caster goblin made an anxious face before screeching out loudly!


    That helped the other goblins to finally realize my existence.


    But.


    "Toote!" Even if the goblins were toe rushing to me I would even have reached the caster goblin. If I kill the caster the others would soon follow after!


    But as I reached the 6 meters, something happened.


    The caster goblin raised this skull staff up high and p it to the ground. Realizing some faint brown lightly.


    The next moment he did that that the ground started moving!


    The ground started to rise and moving like some waves. And like an Instant, a 4-meter tall earth wall came to my sight.


    "What the..?" But before I could make sense of what was going on. The 4 meters that have risen like an instant elerated towards me.


    "What!?" I halted and tried to use [Sprint] to dodge to the side.


    But it was already toote.


    The wall smashed right in front of me and as if disregarding my existence. The wall continued to move and pushing me forward.


    And right after the wall reached a distance of 15 meters away from the shaman. The wall stopped and crumbled into pieces, leaving only some pile of stones at the ce where the earth wall stopped.


    Although the wall stopped, it did push me away from the caster goblin.


    Though the momentum that had built up and the sudden stop of the earth wall, made me roll to the ground and further increasing the distance between us.


    "To be able to raise a whole 4-meter tall wall like an instant..." I wanted to curse out loud but before I could do that I saw the caster goblin through the corner of my "eye" pointing this palm towards me.


    Seeing that, I immediately panicked and activated [Sprint] in a hurry.


    Pure mana flowed through my body and directly to my legs. While stillying to the ground I activated the skill [Sprint] and jumped away from my current locations.


    And a short moment after, the location that I was a second ago was engulfed with mes!


    "That guy is too dangerous to be left alone..." Disregarding all useless thoughts, I stood up with my spear and shield in my hands and rushed towards the caster goblin.


    "You must die!"


    The goblin caster was bewildered, he originally thought that he could finish the skeleton once and for all with this [Firebolt] and [Earth Wave]bo. Seeing the skeleton dodging thisbo attack it screeched towards the surrounding goblins and pointed towards the skeleton.


    And at the next moment, all the goblin¡äs rushed towards the skeleton with a mad expression.


    Seeing that I scoffed loudly.


    "You think those mere goblins can actually stop me!?"


    I raised my spear and pierced right through the first goblin that came in front of me,


    [You received 300 Experience Points]


    The beginning of the first blood [1] was the signal which started my mass ughter!


    When the goblins were nearing me I either pierced them with my spear, punched, and even kicked them.


    Each punch and kick made broke bones. Although that didn¡ät kill me, I had some other priorities in my mind. And those were not the half-dead goblin¡äs lying to the ground.


    The caster was the problem!


    While I was dealing with the goblin¡äs to move forward, most of my attention was ced on the caster goblin with the skull staff. Every move he made was under my watch!


    But shortly after the caster made this move!


    He pointed this skull staff towards my direction, which made me confuse.


    "You going to shoot that fireball with that goblin¡äs around me and at that distance?"


    I ced myself between some goblins and stayed at full alert while watching the caster goblin every move closely.


    "What is he doing...?" And while I was watching, I notice a chance!


    Some sparks of lightning came out of the staff which instantly turned into lighting that was shot towards me!


    The lighting pierced right through the stomach of the goblin in front of me and directly hitting me too! Which made us two get electrocuted for a full 2 seconds.


    The goblin that was hit fall to the ground with no signs of life while I in another hand was still standing.


    Although some smoke wasing out of my body I didn¡ät receive as much damage as I had expected. I lost only about 125 hp through this attack.


    "So fast..." Even if I know that this attack wasing I doubt I will be able to dodge it. I need to reach the caster faster.


    15 meters away


    12 meters away


    9 meters away.


    Seeing that I was slowly approaching him, the shaman goblin started to screech while holding this staff with both these hands.


    And at the next moment, dead mana came out of caster¡äs goblin directly to the fallen, almost dead goblin¡äs.


    The next moment the fatally wounded goblin¡äs stood up and screeched loudly at the same time. Though the 12 targets were hit by the dead man, only 5 goblins died and became zombie goblins.


    "So that¡äs how he does it..." Seeing that that zombie goblins wereing at me I scoffed inwardly.


    What can does mere 5 goblins do,pared to the 16 that came at me?


    But at the moment all the goblins that were surrounding me attacked me at the same time. I simply waved my spear and knocked most of the goblins away.


    Almost.


    3 goblins managed to somehow dodge and instead of attacking me with their dagger¡äs or axes they instead jumped at me in the hopes of holding me down.


    "The heck you guy¡äs doing?" Just these three want to stop my movement? Dream on!


    But at the next moment, the 5 zombie goblin¡äs jumped at me. or rather hugged me in the hopes of holding me down.


    "What the...!" Although I was confused at first, seeing that goblin caster pointing this palm towards me I panicked!


    Distracted by the sudden attack, I forgot about this guy!


    "Let me go!" I punched the goblin¡äs that were holding me down so that I can move freely. But they were too many!


    "Kghwa!" The caster finished this spell and a fireball came to my sight.


    "Sh*t! [Shield Bash]" Seeing no way out, I used my skill [Shield Bash] to meet with the fireball.


    The fireball exploded in front of me, engulfing both me and the 8 goblins in mes.


    *Baahm


    "Kwha!"


    "Kwha!"


    "KSwa!"


    With the explosion ruing, everyone stopped moving as if a switch was turned on.


    They were anxiously watching the fires, hoping that the damned skeleton to be dead.


    But their hopes were crushed the next moment.


    A burst of bloodthirst came out mes and at the next moment a skeleton came out mes.


    [Sin of Wrath] Activated


    A skeleton with green ethereal eyes appeared out of the mes. With this chest still in mes, he rushed towards their elder!


    "Die!" I used [Sprint] and reached the caster.


    "Kwgah!" The caster goblin ps this staff to the ground and a simr earth wall appeared in front of me.


    "Not this time! [Piercing]" a faint green and white light came out of the tip of my spear which crushed towards the wall.


    After a short pause, the spear showed signs of breaking apart. But so did the wall.


    The spear pushed through the wall, thus destroying and turning the wall into pieces, but it also resulted in the spear breaking.


    The caster goblin was shocked and was about to turn around to run away.


    But it was already toote.


    I throw the spear away and bought out my sword.


    "Your death is already here!"


    And with a swing towards the caster¡äs head.


    It was dead.


    [1] In the game League of Legends, the first blood refers to the announcement that yers get to when the first yer is killed.

 Chapter 20 - Did I Just Got Kill Stealed?

    [You received 3000 XP]


    Blood sprayed from the wound all over the ce, including my skull.


    "Finally dead you piece of sh*t" Seeing the XP report I drew my sword out of the caster''s head and checked my own status.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 6


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.5]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 187/750


    Mana: 9/110


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 23 Agility: 14 Intelligence: 11 Endurance: 14


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash Lv. 1] [Piercing Lv. 1]


    [Remark: A abnormal Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    [XP: 6900]


    "I received a ton of XP but the damage that I have received is way more than I expected..." ncing at the corpse of the caster goblin I could only have one thought in my mind.


    "Magic is way too powerful..." Being able to attack these enemies at arge distance, destructive and fast attacks while distancing yourself with this earth wall...


    Even if we don¡ät count that he is able to turn these almost dead allies into zombies and make them join the fight yet again. I couldn¡ät help but be amazed at what magic can do.


    "If only this goblin had the body of a hobgoblin...I would even have died." I could only shake my head from such thoughts.


    "But in the end, I seded" I turned around and watched the remaining goblins which were staring at me with fully opened eyes. And then I noticed their number¡äs.


    "They were more than 20 goblins..." I killed 17 goblin¡äs in total if we count the caster too. But in front of me were still 11 goblins left. Those goblins would even be easy to deal with, but what concerned me the most were 2 goblins.


    They wore both the same helmet and a simr spear to the one I was using. They both reminded me of that one goblin who inflicted me once that serious wound.


    "If those guys are as strong as the helmet goblin that I had killed once this wouldn¡ät be easy with my current condition."


    Be it mana, health, and even equipped. I almost had nothing more left...


    Since my spear broke I could only rely on my sword which looked like it was going to break at any time and my shield got blow away from this damned fireball. The man might be enough to use [Sprint] once if I were to force it but I ain¡ät confident of doing that. My body isn¡ät any better either! Almost all my bones had ck spots cause of these damned mes that were thrown at me. Even my cloth armor was burned.


    Wait...cloth?


    "Is still burning...?" I just noticed that my cloth between my rips was still burning and before I could even be shocked the 2 helmet goblin¡äs screeched out loudly!


    "Kghwaa!"


    I raised my head expecting all the goblins toe rushing at me, but what I waspletely bewildered me.


    Some goblins dropped their daggers while some others have fallen to the ground out of fear. But the moment they heard the 2 helmet goblins screeching they immediately picked themself up and started running away!


    "What?" Why would you guys run away when I am almost dead? Isn¡ät this moment suppose to be the perfect time toe at me?


    Of course, I was confused. I originally thought that those goblins just came after me cause of revenge. But I didn¡ät know that this wasn¡ät the case at all!


    Revenge wasn¡ät in the goblin''s nature. They would mercilessly kill others and even torture their enemies out of amusement, heck they would even eat their own kind so that they can survive. Why should they care if another tribe has been eliminated?


    They did respect their warrior chief yes. But it wasn¡ät to the point of total loyalty. They mostly respect him cause he was an evolved goblin.


    A hobgoblin.


    And not for him being a warrior.


    In the first ce, their goal was to either retrieve the warrior chief''s body or kill the skeleton so that their elder can use their bodies as toys. With the elder now dead, why should they care and risk themself at fighting this skeleton?


    But that also wasn¡ät their true reason for them running away.


    The true reason was the cause of fear!


    With the help of the status, I could clearly see how damaged I was.


    But the goblins didn¡ät!


    In their view, I looked like a terrifying ck skeleton which was emitting crimson mes through this chest and had dark green ethereal meing out of my skull sockets, while the blood that was sprayed in my face looked like I was crying blood out of my eye sockets!


    With their reason to fight gone and that terrifying sight.


    Of course, they would run away!


    But at that time I was clueless as to why they ran away.


    As I was nkly staring towards the running goblins I was reminded of what was going on now.


    I was burning!


    I quickly removed the burning cloth from my rips and throw it to the ground.


    "Ugh...I even lost 20 HP though those stupid mes." Seeing the goblins running away I was honestly relieved. I wasn¡ät worried cause they had more numbers but because of those two helmet goblins.


    Although the chance was small for me to lose, I couldn¡ät say that I would have won for 100%.


    "After my body recovers, I should check where these guys live...It¡äs time to get a new weapon." Seeing the current sword in my hands I felt dejected.


    Why do you guys break so easily?


    But such thoughts reminded me of something.


    "Right, this caster used some kind of staff as this weapon. Let''s have a closer look at this staff..."


    With this, I picked the caster''s staff and inspected it.


    The staff was nicely carved and the wood was cleanly shaved and no splinter was to be seen. Other than the wood quality the staff had a skull at the top together with a dark crystal.


    "Status..."


    [Dead Wood Staff]: A staff that was made with extreme care. It increases the efficiency of nature spells and decreases the focus needed for such spells, Although the improvement is minimal. Through the help of the dark crystal, the staff also amplifies the strength of dark magic.


    "Wait isn¡ät that..." I nkly nced at the staff.


    "Realy useless?"


    Maybe useless is too harsh? Although the staff sounds really useful, for me it¡äs at best a walking staff. The wood was really good so maybe I could beat the other goblins with it? No, I can already do that with my fist.


    After thinking for a while about how to use this stuff. And my final conclusion was...


    "That is sooo useless..."


    With the staff in my hand, I headed towards the throne to sit. Only to realize that the throne was already destroyed...


    "Tch" I let the staff near where I was keeping the other goblin weapons and sit on a nearby stone.


    "Now that everything has ended I kind of regret making a decoy directly at the throne..." Although you did bring some results...at what cost!


    Shaking my head from such thoughts, I opened my status and looked at my XP storage and what I should do about it.


    "6900 XP... I got quite a lot this time around." Although it was quite a lot, I was somehow disappointed.


    In the whole battle between me and the goblins. 26 goblins died, but I only got the XP out of 17 goblins!


    The goblins that died from the fiery explosion and the lighting didn¡ät give me any XP at all! If that isn¡ät a fraud then I don¡ät know what either!


    Didn¡ät the caster goblin basically stole my kills!?


    Making me work so that you can rip the benefits out of my work!?


    I wish I could f*cking kill you twice!


    After feeling frustrating at this kill stealer for some amount of time I continued thinking about where to put my newly acquired XP.


    "6900 XP should be enough for me to increase my level to 10 but...I could also wait and get the [Wind de] skill!


    "It¡äs only 3100 XP, If I go and kill those goblins and train a little It should be enough to get the [Wind de] skill! This battle made me realize that long-distance attacks are truly needed!"


    It wasn¡ät like I wanted to get the skill just because it sounded awesome!


    Shooting a projectile from your sword out of nothing sounded really powerful and awesome at the same time!


    I ain¡ät buying it just because is awesome!


    Alright?


    Just because it is powerful!


    ...


    Realy!

 Chapter 21 - Choosing A Path

    Several hours have passed when I fought the group of the caster.


    I used that time to recover and get rid of the corpses. Since I killed so many it did take me quite a while to clean up this whole mess.


    I ced all their weapons in the boxes near the throne where I kept all the other weapons while dragging the corpses outside of the cave. I even put down the "lovely" decoration together with the remaining corpses and started a fire outside.


    The corpses didn¡ät actually bother me much, but that didn¡ät mean I liked them either. After all, seeing a decayed corpse with flies and worms eating to what was left to this Flesh wasn¡ät that nice of a sight.


    Even though I cleaned up the whole mess they were still some stuff that I couldn¡ät do. For example, the throne waspletely destroyed while blood and ashes were still in the ground. Although I could try to make a new throne or a chair to sit down and bring some water with some buckets to clean this whole mess I decided not to do it.


    Since I had other ns in mind.


    "I should even have recovered enough for me to start..." I silently called the status interface.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 6


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.5]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 664/900


    Mana: 80/80


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 23 Agility: 16 Intelligence: 11 Endurance: 17


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash Lv. 1] [Piercing Lv.1]


    [Remark: A abnormal Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    "Yeah, it should be fine even without having my health maxed out..." I went towards the weapon box and picked some daggers and headed outside the cave.


    My goal was to chase down the remaining 11 goblins!


    Although I don¡ät know which one of the paths they went.


    In the end, there are only 3 paths they could go! Even if I don¡ät find them at one of the paths, those goblins could only be at the other two paths!


    Finding their home would only be a matter of time.


    I didn¡ät really want to hunt those goblins for the sake of revenge.


    No.


    I had three goals in mind.


    First of all, XP!


    I by now realized that the status is a pure endless abyss to spend your XP into! Currently, I was only increasing my level and not my skills. Even though increasing my level seemed rtively effective thus far, that didn¡ät mean that it will always be so.


    The caster goblin in a sense only used these skills and he was already a threat.


    Second! I need weapons.


    As for weapon¡äs I mean the spears that those two helmet goblins got. Their spears seemed rtively the same as the one I was using and the quality wasn¡ät that bad...And if I am lucky enough I could possibly find a sword with a shield as a recement.


    Andstly... a new home!


    Even though I cleaned most of the mess, it is by far not all!


    I have already notice flies gathering to the ground and to in the holes of the walls! Not to forget that without any water nearby I can¡ät clean up the dried up blood in the ground. Just imaging walking on top of dry-up goblin blood with flies all over the ce makes me already disgusted.


    Sure, I could get some buckets of water and clean all of this mess but that would take way too long!


    By the time I went to theke and back at the cave I could even explore the remaining paths or simple train!


    It isn¡ät that I amzy, ok? I am simple for maximum efficiency!


    Alright?


    Notzy at all!


    Anyways those are the reasons for me to go and hunt down those goblins.


    But as I went outside the cave a sudden thought came to my mind.


    "Oh yeah, I forgot about it!" I went back inside and short after I was outside yet again.


    "Much better" Currently I had the staff that I got from the goblin caster in my shoulder resting with a self-made bag tied to the staff.


    Having checked all the stuff that I need I went towards theke!


    And after a little more than two hours I already reached my destination!


    "Even though I have already seen it, it still amazes me how beautiful thiske is..." The shiny stones which beautifully illuminated theke were as beautiful as I remember them. Even though it wasn¡ät that long ago the sight still amazes me.


    "I wonder what is up there..." I raised my head and my gazended on what was directly above theke. Above theke, you could see a giant hole that almost had the same length as theke that was beneath it. The whole shape was so circr that it almost seemed artificial.


    "One of those paths might lead directly at the top of this hole, but this isn¡ät my goal for now..." I shook my head and regained focus on the current task.


    I picked myself up and headed towards the two paths that I haven¡ät explored yet. As both two paths were rtively close to each other I nkly stood their bindery which one to take.


    "I might as well with those two since they are both so close, but the question is which one first?" They look rtively the same in my eyes, so it shouldn¡ät matter too much which one to take. At the very least I can go back to the other one if there isn¡ät anything to see.


    While I stared at those two paths like a frozen statue my eyes got a glimpse at the path of the left.


    In the left path, I noticed some tiny amount of blood on the top of a pointing small rock.


    "Hmm? Blood? Did a goblin step up to this stone or something?" I went to my knees and picked up the stone for a closer look.


    "Dry, as expected. It doesn¡ät prove much but a lead is a lead. The chances of the goblins being in this path are high."


    Having found some kind of lead I headed towards the left path hoping to meet those goblins.


    And thus, my figure faded through the dark path only for my silhouette to be seen.


    And even my silhouette has faded through the darkness, for nothing to been seen.


    But at that time I didn¡ät know that the decision of me choosing to go to the left path might as well saved my life.


    A few minutes after going to the left path...


    *Thuad


    Some noises could be heard.


    *Thuad


    Noice of multiple footsteps could be heard from far away.


    *Thuad


    And slowly some Silloutes came to sight out of the right path.


    Those with no blood nor flesh have emerged from the right path. With swords full of blood followed by voices of emptiness.


    "Kghhh..." The sounds of cold breath came out of those who can¡ät breathe.


    And he was not the only one among them.


    Several skeletons walked almost in aplete union which amplified the sounds of their footsteps. Those skeletons looked and acted the same.


    Weapons full of blood with the same feeling of emptiness.


    Except for one.


    In the middle of that undead, there was one exception.


    It had just like the other skeletons a sword full of blood, but this sword was longer andrger than the others with some dark glowing runes in the middle of the de. Which made it easier to see the amount of blood in the de.


    But suddenly some dead mana surrounded the de and like an instead, the huge amount of blood that was on the de vanished with no traces to see.


    And as the group of undead came out of the right path they suddenly stopped and made some space for this skeleton to wall forward.


    Walking in front of the other skeletons he revealed these dark blue ethereal eyes! They looked like some raging mes put inside this skull.


    With the middle of those mes being the brightness as if it was an iris of an eye.


    This blue-eyed skeleton turned its head and gazed towards the left path.


    "Another...born...?" With a low voice full of emptiness. He stared at the left path for a short amount of time before changing this face to another direction.


    "Follow..."


    And that direction was towards the third path.


    With thismand told, the rest of the undead follow without hesitation.


    The noise of the footstep could almost be heard from all over the ce.


    But the noise slowly faded away in the distance of the third path.


    Together with the dark blue ethereal mes.

 Chapter 22 - The Calm Pain

    Several hours have passed.


    As it was a straight path I didn¡ät found any difficulty such as losing myself or anything the like. Since it was a pure straight-up path it was quite boring, to say the least.


    But that didn¡ät matter.


    At first, I had some doubts about picking the wrong path and that I should return back to choose another path.


    But choosing to continue this in path wasn¡ät a wrong choice after all.


    Since I finally found their cave!


    A cave that had a totem in front of it with two normal-looking goblins.


    "You guys sure are careless for leaving traces for me to find..." After quietly saying that. I boldly revealed myself to the two goblin guards.


    Seeing me the goblins showed quite an abnormal reaction.


    They jumped the moment they saw me and fallen backward while trebling.


    "K-Kghh!!!"


    Seeing those two screamings and heading back inside the cave I scoffed internally.


    "I don¡ät even need to hide to kill such trashes..." Even though my health wasn¡ät fully restored and my weapons were at best useless, that wouldn¡ät stop me from killing those mere goblins!


    I have long surpassed the strength level of those goblins. To the point that I can basically stomp at them without getting any resistance!


    The only thing that can truly endanger me is those that possess skills such as [Sprint].


    And by how things looked back then it seemed like they had only the caster and those two helmet goblins that were using skills. Other than those three guys the rest are just cannon fodder!


    Walking towards inside the cave I noticed how clean it waspared to the hobgoblins cave. Seeing that I couldn¡ät help myself but say...


    "They even cleaned the house for me? How nice!" Since there were no goblins to be seen I started walking even deeper to the cave while looking behind me every so often.


    "Noone to be seen..." Although I was quite confident about being able to kill those goblins, I still remember how that hobgoblin had ambushed me before and almost seed in killing me.


    After confirming that there isn¡ät anyone hiding for an ambush I continued walking until I reach a room that was cover by some cloth.


    Getting closer to the cloth I noticed some low voicesing right behind the cloth.


    Moreover, low screeches.


    Hearing those screech I put on a vicious smile and hastily dragged the cloth that was in front of me. Making it rip into two pieces.


    "I finally found...you?" The current sight in front of me confused me quite a bit.


    It wasn¡ät the fact that they were about 17 goblins in front of me instead of 11.


    No, what confused me was the whole room.


    Observing the room, in the middle of the goblin group I could see a stone table while on the corners of the room were wooden tables with all kinds of different stuff.


    In one pile of the table were dry up meat with a bunch of dried up meat, while on the other side were some crystal which emitted barely enough light to make them glow.


    Other than that stuff there was a bunch of paper on those tables.


    Seeing all those awakened my curiosity.


    But as I thought to inspect all that stuff with the use of status my thoughts got interrupted.


    "Kghh!"


    "Kwhaaa!"


    "Kwaaah"


    Tch, those guys sure are load.


    "Thanks for reminding me about your guy''s existence...Now that you got my attention it would be rude if I were to ignore you guys!"


    I threw the staff to the ground and used [Sprint] towards the nearest goblin.


    The goblins panicked seeing me rushing at them with incredible speed thanks to [Sprint].


    It didn¡ät even take 2 seconds to reach the first goblin. With my sword raised high, I shed the goblin towards the neck and shoulder area.


    *thread!


    "KGHHHH!"


    Sadly my sword broke halfway through the goblin''s neck. Although my sword broke, the broken part of the de was still stuck at the goblin''s throat. Which made the dying goblin suffer even more, while the more it tried to remove the broken part of the sword, the deeper it went while making it even more painful.


    Naturally, it died after some moments of agony.


    [You Received 300 Experience Points]


    I bent down and picked the dagger of the now-dead goblin.


    And I just stared at all surrounding the goblins which were trembling with fear.


    "Tch...such losers" Even though it was the perfect timing for them to attack me. But instead of using this chance they just stood there trembling.


    This somehow irritated me.


    Why don¡ät you guys try to use this chance?


    Why wouldn¡ät you guys just stand there and not fight?


    Aren¡ät you afraid?


    Why...


    "Why would you guys give up...?" And as I said that.


    A short yet intense pain hit my mind and my chest started boiling up.


    The pain felt like some thousand needles pierced my mind as fast as they disappeared, while the heat that wasing through my chest was even more intense than when I was hit with that fireball.


    But weirdly enough, I felt calm.


    Even though the pain in my mind dissipated. The burning feeling did not.


    Butpared to the pain I was feeling I was calm.


    Too calm to be exact.


    "Again..." I knew instantly what this pain was.


    Hatred.


    And this very feeling came every time I met something that is "alive".


    In other words...


    Hatred towards the living.


    "Now is the best time to practice that..." I slowly let the hatred flow through me. The more hatred I let lose the more I lose my previews,poser. The more I let the hatred take over me the less pain I felt through my chest.


    "I see...this is how it works" My smile turned even more viciously than before.


    [Sin of Wrath]: Activate


    The goblins almost choked by the amount of bloodlust I was emitting.


    I guided the mana from my body directly to my legs and used [Sprint].


    With the incredible speed that [Sprint] bought and the terrified goblins. They didn¡ät even notice that theirrade had died before they heard this scream.


    "Kghh!"


    All the goblins made a step back out of fright, but some screech came from behind them whichmanded them to fight.


    Those screeches came out from the two helmet goblins.


    After some hesitation, all goblins decided to attack this skeleton with their full might!


    But it was hopeless.


    Every goblin that came near this skeleton got either this skull crushed or cut open by the dagger.


    One lucky goblin managed to hit the skeleton with a club which was known for the skeleton crusher.


    But the skeleton just looked at the lucky goblin for a few seconds before breaking this neck.


    The end result was horrifying.


    All 14 goblins had died only for the two helmet goblins to remain.


    "You guys sure like to hide between others don¡ät you."


    Even though the two goblins didn¡ät even fight they sweated an awful lot.


    And as I made the first step towards them. Both their legs glowed and the next moment they rushed towards me!


    Well...not exactly.


    The first helmet to reach me tried to pierce through my neck with this spear. But the spear was caught with just one of my hands, which made the helmet goblin flustered.


    Well of course. If someone were toe at you at such speed you would expect that it wouldn¡ät be caught. At most you would expect that the enemy will dodge.


    "But now I!" I raised the newly acquired sword that I had picked out from a pile of [Rusted Swords] near the bones.


    And with a sh to this neck, the job was done.


    Well almost...


    I turned around and saw the other helmet goblin running away with all this might.


    "Abounding yourade to survive..." I summoned the status screen and with my bony handy I pressed towards the screen.


    [You acquired Wind de]


    A huge amount of information was transferred through my mind which made me stagger for a few seconds.


    "Let''s see..." With the help of information that I got I guided the mana towards my sword.


    The technique wasn¡ät like the skill [Sprint] where you just keep the pure mana into your legs without letting any mana got out.


    No, the [Wind de] required you to push the pure mana towards the whole de while moving it back and forth like a wave. And after the "wave" is strong enough you push all the stored mana at once. The end result was creating a sharp de made out of the wind and pure mana towards the location you shed towards.


    I started creating the mana waves in my sword while looking at the running goblin. Although it was difficult. I sessfully finished the wind de and shot it directly at the helmet goblin.


    *Fsheeen!


    But sadly, instead of hitting the head like I aimed it only hit this leg.


    "Kghaaaaa!"


    Maybe because of the distance it didn¡ät fully cut the leg of the goblin, but instead, it dug around 90% of this leg which made it fall.


    "Not bad for the first time"


    [Sin of Wrath]: De-activated


    Damm that was exhausting...


    I did try to manually activate wrath by following the burning feeling which I found out is some kind of anger?


    Anyway, using wrath puts too much pressure on my mind which makes it difficult to think clearly. I even got hit by a level 2 goblin...


    "K-Kgh..." Seeing the goblin trying to crawl away I scoffed out loudly.


    "You try to run away in your current state? What a funny guy" I picked the spear of the fallen helmet goblin and I slowly walked towards the now crippled goblin.


    Seeing me slowly approaching him he freaked out and he started to crawl even faster.


    But before he could go far away I gripped this not injured leg and dragged him back towards the stone table.


    "This who betray shall meet their deserving end..."


    The goblin''s eyes trebled even more and started to cry right off the bat the moment I was dragging him towards the stone table.


    Originally I thought that there were cries of pain.


    But I didn¡ät know what this stone table meant to those goblins.


    To the goblins of this cave.


    Sitting on that table meant a fate worse than death.


    The moment a goblin sits on that table...


    They be the elder''s toy!


    And he, one of the elder''s guards. Knew best what fate awaited to those to be the elder toy!

 Chapter 23 - Logs And Magic Scroll

    "K-Kgh...."


    [You Received 500 Experience Points]


    After ending the well-deserved misery of the goblin I could finally rx and take a better look at my surroundings.


    Seeing all the corpses lying down on the floor I had some mixed feelings. But I could only sigh out loudly in the end.


    "Sigh...I still have to clean in the end don¡ät I..." Even though I won the fight, the end result felt more like a defeat...


    Shaking my head for such stupid thoughts I opened up the status interfaces and pondered what my next move shall be.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 6


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.5]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 823/900


    Mana: 23/80


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 23 Agility: 16 Intelligence: 11 Endurance: 17


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Wind de Lv. 1]


    [Remark: A abnormal Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    [XP: 2100]


    "Not bad at all! Instead of finding gold, I found the whole damn vein!" The amount of XP that I even gained this time was truly enormous!


    Not only was I able to finally gain enough XP to get the wind de, but I even gained enough XP to increase my level a few times!


    The XP gain of killing just a bunch of goblins can¡ät even bepared to the training Xp that I gain! Just killing one goblin brings the same value as painstakingly train for a whole damn hour. Even though I can¡ät really feel any pain or get exhausted by such training, you miss the point!


    "I somehow lost motivation to train after thinking that 1 hour is a single level 2 goblin..." Even though I said that I had no ns on stopping my training.


    Even though repeating the same training was getting boring at times, it wasn¡ät like I had something better to do other than look at the t walls around me.


    And the training does help me get more familiar with my skills.


    Not to even mention that I recently started to speak with myself even more than before...


    ...


    "Right, I should properly use the remaining XP..." I cleared my head with such thoughts and raised my hand to press at the level-up interface.


    [Level has Increased from Lv.6 to Lv.7]


    [Level has Increased from Lv.7 to Lv.8]


    [Strenght increased by 2, Agility increased by 2 and Endurance increased by 2]


    [You received 2 Attribute Points]


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 8


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.5]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 973/1000


    Mana: 23/80


    Attribute Points: 2


    Attributes: Strength: 25 Agility: 18 Intelligence: 11 Endurance: 19


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Wind de Lv. 1]


    [Remark: A abnormal Skeleton that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    "Just a little more and I will be able to reach level 10. I wonder if I get my Sub-ss by doing that."


    Putting my two remaining attribute points in my intelligence I quickly turned around and headed towards the wooden tables.


    [Intelligence increased by 2]


    Looking at the table the first thing to watch my eyes were the bones and the crystals, as they looked the most interesting.


    [Worn out Bone]: Former bones of an undead being. Since the bones already served as the body of the undead, the efficiency of using those bones for creating an undead has severely decreased. Although that depends on how they would be used.


    [Lesser Mana Stone]: A stone which though the exposer of content mana manager to gain the ability to hold pure mana. It is currently through the process of crystallization.


    "So those guys held bones from other skeletons? Why though? They sound pretty useless. And I guess that those stones be crystals like the one on the staff?" I went back and picked up the stuff from the ground andpared the dark crystal with this mana stone.


    "Hmm, they do show resembles. About same size and form, just missing the color..." Thinking that I guessed right I put the mana stone to the ce it has been.


    "They sound useful but in my hands, they are noting better than some pretty glowing stones..."


    ncing all over the table they was nothing else interesting other than some papers to see. I reached out and picked one of the papers only to frown.


    "Can¡ät read..." After pondering for some amount of time I decided to appraise it with the help of the status.


    And what came out surprised me.


    [********** Damaged Trial Log 41#]: I finaly found **** **** *** *** promote myself **** ***** goal ***** **** ****Further progress needed **** ***** ***** ***** Phctery.


    "Huh? Why are the words of the status report all marked with ck? Is it due to the the the "Damaged" part?"


    After being stunned for a bit I tried to make sense out of this mess.


    "So the one wrote this...found something to promote himself? And apparently, this goal is a phctery? What¡äs that?"


    [Phctery]: A Phctery. Otherwise known for the Heart of an immortal lich. A tool made out high tier Necromancy knowledge that serves as a soul container. As long the phctery stays intact, the body of a Lich can be reconstructed.


    "What the hell did I just find!?" Is it alright for something like this to be inside a goblin cave!? There is no way that this caster goblin was actually the one that wrote this. Although I don¡ät know what High tier Necromancy looks like, I am absolutely certain that this caster goblin had no clue about the high-tier stuff.


    I let the logs in the table and I reached my hand out to pick another paper out.


    [********** Damaged Trial Log 72#]: ******* ***** ****** n has seded! **** ***** I managed to fully cpse the ***** ***** ******. Need to prepare ****** *****cking resources.


    "Another one with the same gray spots...Except for the number that has changed, the paper is called the same." Reading through this log confused me even more than the first that I read.


    "What did seed? And how does copsing something fit withcking resources?" I ce this log down and grabbed another one.


    Every time I picked a paper, I would see the same gray spots in the text and the same name but with a different number.


    After reading through some more of these logs I started to reorganize them by their number. It was then that I realized some numbers were missing.


    The highest log number that I found was the number 162 with the lowest being 23.


    I found exactly 34 different logs and the lower the number was, the more gray spots were covering the text.


    "If the highest number is 162, then that should mean that there are at least 162 different kinds of logs somewhere around. Rather, they should have been 162 logs but they somehow had disappeared with only 34 logs remaining...."


    With a frown on my face (he doesn¡ät have a face) I started looking at the whole room in hopes to find a missing log.


    I pushed the tables, moved the barrels, and even tried to move the whole stone table.


    Were I miserably failed at.


    And as I was going to give up on the search I spotted one glowing spot behind where I moved the wooded table.


    Taking a better look I could barely see a small piece of paper leaking out of the spot.


    I headed there and what I saw was a stone barely blocking a hole.


    The stone didn¡ät help much at hiding this piece of the paper cause of this shape.


    Although it looked like it was badly hidden, that wasn¡ät actually the case!


    Since this was supposed to be hidden from the eyes of goblins. The one that properly hidden this didn¡ät expect an undead with a perfect night vision to look for it. Which in the eyes of goblins was almost an invisible spot.


    "Let¡äs see what number this time will be" I slowly pulled the stone out of the hole and gently gripped the piece of paper, afraid to further damage it.


    And when I inspected the paper I was shocked!


    No.


    bbergasted!


    [Magic Scroll: Curse of Vigor]: A Magic Scroll which contains the process of the Spell [Curse of Vigor]. 1000 XP is required to have ess to this spell.


    "What!?"


    Is it what I think it is!?


    Does this mean that with this I will finally be able to use magic!?


    "I never expected that I will be able to use magic this soon! Truly a blessing!" My excitement went through the roof and up to the sky the moment I realized what treasure I just found.


    Truly a miracle!


    "Then without further ado let¡äs quickly learn it..." I raised my hand and pressed the confirm button.


    But...


    [More Experience Points are Needed for this option]


    ....


    ....


    "DAMMIT!!!!!!"

 Chapter 24 - End Of Exploration And The Call

    In the Shamans cave.


    In the current cave that I was in.


    Low echoes of ringing noises wereing out of the cave. The sounds were simr to when some wind was getting cut.


    But more loudly.


    "..."


    I focused upon the mana inside my body and slowly guided it towards my sword.


    And the next moment the mana in my sword spiked!


    I raised my hand and shed towards to opposite wall.


    "Wind de!"


    *Fsheeen!


    And what appeared was almost a projectile made out of mana and wind. As the projectile met with the wall it raised the remaining dust all over the ce.


    After the dust dispersed, there was a clean-cut to be seen in the wall.


    Although it was quite a small cut, it didn¡ät matter.


    What matter was that I finally hit the target.


    "Finally I somehow familiarize myself with this think..."


    I had to say that using the [Wind de] skill wasn¡ät that easy. Controlling the right amount of mana needed for and using effectively was quite the hard job to do.


    If I provided too little mana the de would either too weak to actually matter in a fight or right off not activate, thus wasting a limited amount of mana. But at least it would be easier to focus to actually manage to shoot out the wind de.


    Too much and there would be too hard to control, making it a game of luck to where this thing would go.


    Even though having all those difficulties I actually managed to shoot a wind de at full power!


    Well, that was while I was standing still and burning my head from the amount of focus that is needed of course...


    "Maybe it should be around time to increase the levels of my skills..."


    Maybe that¡äs the limit of level 1 skills. I can¡ät see how I should be able to shoot a fully powered wind de while I am in a fight.


    Although practicing wind de was somehow hard.


    In the end, all the hard work that you have done will be paid back!


    [You received 500 Experience Points through training]


    "..."


    Ehem...was burning my no existent brain cells worth only 200 XP more than the regr training?


    It¡äs not like I wouldin or something but...


    Aren¡ät you too cheap!?


    Was my whole mental pain worth a little more than a level one goblin!?


    I even spent all my mana!


    "Sigh...forget it, at least now I have enough to learn this magic scroll."


    Giving a mentalmand, the storage interface came to my sight.


    [XP: 1100]


    "Good enough..." I walked towards the table and put the sword to the table while gripping the magic scroll with my other hand.


    And without further ado, I pressed towards the confirmation button and prepared myself for the sudden information toe.


    [You learned the Spell: Curse of Vigor]


    But the only thing that came was just the notification and nothing else.


    "Where is the information...?"


    Even after waiting for a while, nothing came.


    Seeing that nothing wasing I slightly panicked.


    Did I just got scammed?


    Weren¡ät I suppose to finally wield some magic!?


    What the hell did you do with the 1000 XP just now!?


    Sorry for calling you cheap!


    Please refund!


    ...


    Pretty please?


    And as I waited...


    Nothing came.


    "Wait a moment... what did the notification say again?"


    [You learned the Spell: Curse of Vigor]


    ...


    "Why does it say "learned" and not acquired?" And as I say that a sudden thought came to my mind. I hastily opened my status window and pressed towards the skill option.


    And there I found it!


    [Curse of Vigor]: 2375 XP required.


    "So it¡äs like that huh..."


    It seems like the 1000 XP were there to make the spell avable for me to acquire.


    Tch, it¡äs like paying to just get a glimpse at the product in the end...


    Truly cheap!


    "Well, it seems like I should get going and find some other goblins to kill."


    I picked up my luggage and went out of the gave to explore the remaining paths. I am saying luggage but I only held my shield with the helmet goblins spear on my left arm while having the staff in my right arm.


    Counting the sword that I had in my vast thanks to some cloth holding it that would mostly be it.


    I could rece the staff with another spear but I finally decided not to.


    Since I was about the learn some magic I thought it would be more useful than carrying a spear weapon when I already have two on me.


    With such thoughts in my mind, I headed outside the cave and made my way towards theke.


    After some few hours, I finally reached where everything has begun.


    "Sigh...You really can¡ät get a tired look at this sight." Seeing the simr sight that I have first seen a little more than 6 days ago really bought nostalgia.


    "No, I shouldn¡ät get distracted by that. I already seen it yesterday anyways" Turning my head to the side I saw the path that was near where I came from.


    "I guess I should start with this one since it¡äs closer by." Saying that I headed towards the second path.


    Unfortunately this path a lot moreplicated than the one I was before. This one had many twists and turns which made it exploring it quite annoying. The only things that I was capable to see are some dried-up blood to the ground and nothing more.


    At first, I tried to follow the blood leads in hopes to find some juice XP waiting for me, but that quickly backfired...


    The leads ended up leading into just some mere walls with no goblins to see. I continued to follow the blood leads of the other turns but they end up the same, which made me quite annoyed.


    "From where did all that bloode from? Did a goblin run around while being wounded and naked?" After imaging this sight I quickly regretted even saying that.


    And like this, I spend about 5 hours walking around all the different paths until I managed to reduce the number of paths to one.


    "This one, in particr, has a lot of more dried-up blood than the others..."


    Seeing that I hasten my speed towards the path.


    And what I found shocked me.


    "What the hell happened here?"


    The path that I grossed upon had a pile of goblin corpses stacked up to each other in the middle of the room. And they weren¡ät in a good shape either.


    Some corpses have already mummified and be almost only bones, while other goblins hadrge wounds in their already cold bodies.


    "Who was able to do such a thing?" By the look of the different body states of the goblin corpse, they didn¡ät all die at the same time. The one that probably done this was just collecting the corpses and piling them up in this ce.


    But the question is why though?


    For what reason?


    "Still...to be able to kill so many goblins it means that the one that had done this is probably strong." After being stunned for a moment I turned back and headed back to theke.


    "Since the goblins are already dead there isn¡ät much to do here. Tch, all the juice XP has already been taken..." After sighing internally I headed back to theke and prepare myself to head to thest path.


    "Well, that was quite pointless if I have to say. At least there is only one more path left to explore."


    After observing theke for a little while I headed towards the third andst path.


    "Hmm? This actually goes up?" The way the path was made was simr to some roughly shaped stairs which made me realize where this path goes.


    "Does this actually leads to the top of theke?" Even though I expected it a little bit, I was still honestly surprised and excited to go up above.


    After a short while, I finally reached the top of the stairs.


    But what I saw made me freeze suddenly.


    "Why is a group of skeletons here?"


    Seeing the group of 6 skeletons I was honestly surprised. Since other than the Fellow, I haven¡ät seen any other skeleton yet!


    Are we like some rare undead species or what?


    But as I was thinking of stupid stuff in my head I noticed a skeleton which had a nice looking sword and dark blue glowing eyes. Which was looking towards me!


    "Why is he looking at m-" Before I could even finish my sentence a cold voice came out of the blue-eyed skeleton.


    "Obey the Call....." The cold voiced said

 Chapter 25 - Higher Tier Undead

    The moment I heard this cold voice a sudden pressure came towards my mind. It felt like my whole mind was ringing constantly with loud noises. Rather than noises, it was more like ovepped voices was being said directly to my mind.


    "Kghhh!" I let my stuff out of my hand fall and grasped my skull with my now free hand.


    "Obey the call!"


    "Follow me!"


    "Move on!"


    "Join us, quickly!"


    "Be made to serve!


    "Obey the call!"


    "Follow me!"


    ...


    At this point, I was scratching my skull hoping to get those ovepping voices out of my head.


    "What is this...!" I nced back towards the blue-eyed skeleton with a hatefull re.


    Seeing my reaction the blue-eyed skeleton asked with an indifferent face (It¡äs not like he can change this face in the first ce).


    "Why...doesn¡ät work?"


    He must be the cause of those voices! But what the heck is th-.


    But before I could finish my thoughts a notification came right in front of my sight.


    [You are affected by [Undead Domination]. You will is being offered]


    [Undead Domination]: As a higher tier Undead being, you are capable to make mindless undead of lower-tier to serve you as your ve.


    "A higher tier Undead!? Even with a control-based skill...!" Making a step back, I took the spear in my hand and was trying to resist the effect of [Undead Domination].


    Seeing me showing hostility upon him, he scoffed out loud.


    "I see... of course, it wouldn¡ät work, of course. You are like the one with robes! I should...had known!"


    Pointing the bloody long sword towards my direction, the ovepping voices stopped ringing through my mind.


    "I order you! All of you go and destroy this one!" said the blue-eyed skeleton.


    The moment thismand was said, the other 5 normal skeletons instantly turned around and looked towards me.


    Without showing a hint of hesitation they all rushed towards me with their weapons up high.


    "That bastard, to actually control others to do this biding" Seeing that scene happened in front of me I felt slightly angry. And that feeling was transmitted to me physically with the hot feelings that were slowlying out of my chest.


    Experiencing that feeling I tried to forcibly activate the [Sin of Wrath].


    But seeing the normal skeletons reaching me I cursed internally.


    "Tch, not enough."


    All five skeletons seemed to have the same rusted sword that I had once used at the start.


    "But still, aren¡ät they...too slow?" Seeing the sluggish movements of the skeletons I even put my guard up, while question why they were running so slow.


    Are those guy¡äs pretending to be slow to put my guard down?


    I will not fall for that!


    As the first skeleton came into my range I used the superior range that the spear was giving me to directly pierce their skull!


    "Let¡äs see your true colors..." As I was expecting the skeleton to use some kind of movement skill simr to [Sprint] or right dodge my attack.


    The unexpected happened.


    *Cracked!


    "????"


    Seeing that my spear went right through the skull of the skeleton I was honestly confused. Why didn¡ät he dodge such a predictable attack? Wasn¡ät he suppose to use some kind of skill?


    Don''t tell me! Did he take the hit knowing that he will survive!?


    "I must go away...!" I hastily pulled the spear out of this skull and made some distance between us while preparing for a counterattack.


    [You received 500 Experience Points]


    "????????"


    T-That¡äs it!?


    You just ran at me and let yourself be pierced to the skull!


    As I was confused by this whole thing, another skeleton came at me.


    Seeing I was stunned for a second I carelessly let the other partye in range.


    Seeing the skeleton swinging this sword from high up I Immidiedly regained my focus and pushed my shield to interrupt the sword.


    As sword and shield met with each other. The Impact that I felt was...none existed!


    While pushing the sword away I said emotionally: "Aren¡ät you guys too weak?"


    With a strike of the shield in this skull. This whole skull broke off!


    [You received 500 Experience Points]


    Witnessing how both these skeletons got so easily destroyed I somehow felt sour.


    "Weird...aren¡ät we the same race? Why are you guy¡äs so weak?" Realizing the strength differences between us I no longer held back!


    Instead of staying in the defensive, I went to the offense!


    I changed my grip on the spear and instead of using it to pierce through the skeletons, I swung it like a staff towards their skulls!


    It wasn¡ät as powerful as piercing through their skulls, but it was enough to crack their skulls and throw them to the ground.


    ncing towards the blue-eyed Skeleton and seeing that he didn¡ät seem to have any intention to join the fight too, I quickly wrapped things up.


    [You received 500 Experience Points]


    [You received 500 Experience Points]


    [You received 500 Experience Points]


    "Those guys weren¡ät much different than those goblins..." Seeing the XP that I gained I was quite satisfied. But it wasn¡ät the time to use it now.


    Turning around and watching the blue-eyed slowly approaches I gotten in my battle stance.


    "Indeed...you the same as the robe one, yet different..." He stopped 5 meters away from me and raised this sword to this chest.


    "You more like me...Unfortunately." As he said that dark smoke started to wrap around this whole body untilpletely covering him.


    Before I could even get surprised he dashed towards me!


    The mist that was wrapped around him made it look like he was floating rather than running. Seeing him in front of me I reacted as fast as I could.


    I pierced directly through the middle of the dark mist with all the strength that I had.


    Seeing the spear going directly through the dark mist, I felt a sudden feeling of relief.


    But that sudden feeling disappeared the next moment.


    "It felt like I hit nothing..."


    The confusion started to hit me from the sudden turn of events.


    Where is this body...?


    "Inexperienced" A dark cold voice came right behind me. Hearing this voice my whole body flinched for a second.


    I tried to turn as fast as I could but I was toote.


    With just using one of this hand, he swung this longsword directly at me.


    Even though I managed to block the sword from taking my whole head off, it still cut managed to cut through several of my ribs.


    I jumped backward to create some distance and threw my spear towards him.


    Although the spear hit this target. The position that I was in and the fact that I never used the spear-like this before didn¡ät allow me to put enough strength to actually damage him.


    It was just enough for a scratch.


    "Such a pathetic attempt..." Seeing the skeleton abandon this sword just that he can inflict a tiny scratch upon this body he could only scuff.


    But he didn¡ät know that was just enough...


    "Status..." Pulling the sword out of my vast I used the status on the blue-eyed skeleton. And the next moment this whole status came in front of my sight.


    Name: ----


    Race: Draugr (Undead)


    Level: 11


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.2]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 1108/1200


    Mana: 164/180


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 30 Agility: 19 Intelligence: 18 Endurance: 23


    [Talents] [Undead] [Undead Domination] [Uniqe Conciseness] [Leader]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.3] [Miasma Corruption Lv.3] [Dark Mist Robe Lv.3] [Battle Sense Lv.1] [Low-Undead Creation Lv. 1] [Heavy Strike Lv.2]


    [Remark: A Undead that broke through the barrier of being a mindless skeleton and managed to create this own conciseness. Cause of this not too long break though, he is one of the weakest of the draugr race.]


    Seeing this whole status I became worried.


    "Even though he looks simr to a skeleton, he isn¡ät the same..." Seeing the dark misting out of this body again I gripped my sword more tightly.


    "This one evolved from a skeleton to a draugr...that means he is a higher tier Undead!" As I said that.


    The draugr that has this body surrounded through mist dashed at me.


    "The next....will be thest!"

 Chapter 26 - Fight, To Suprass The Enemy

    "Tch, Again...!?" Seeing the Draugr closing up to me I cursed out loudly.


    "I got to create distance..."


    Without any hint of hesitation, I turned around and started sprinting.


    Rather, I started to run away!


    No, run away isn¡ät the right word.


    More like a tactical retreat!


    Even though I was technically running, I was still keeping the distance between us two in check.


    What I needed was time! Time to read this status!


    "Let¡äs see how this mist works..."


    [Dark Mist Robe Lv.3]: Through the use of dark magic, allow yourself to shroud yourself with a robe made of dark mist which conceals your presence. The higher the level this skill is, the more mist you can move farther from your body and the more mist you can generate.


    "Dark magic is it...?" The first part of the description doesn¡ät sound too strong. If you can see your opponent then what use does counseling your presence to have?


    But this isn¡ät the strong point of this spell...


    "The mist isn¡ät limited only to this body..." Indeed that was the case.


    When I first attacked him I thought that the mist is permanently stuck to this whole body.


    "Damm I am stupid..." He probably just pushed the dark mist to the front to make me believe that he was there when he wasn¡ät!


    "To fall for such a petty trick..." Judging between our distance I didn¡ät have much time left.


    `Dammit, he doesn¡ät even let me enough time to read!


    Priorities first!


    [Heavy Strike Lv.3] I know, and seeing it at level 3 already gives me the chills.


    [Low-Undead Creation Lv.1] huh... I can already imagine what this thing is doing so pass on that.


    The stuff that¡äs left to read is the skill [Battle Sense Lv.1] and the talent [Uniqe Concioness].


    [Battle Sense Lv.1]: Through the experience of hundreds of battles you gained the ability to perceived your surroundings in better detail.


    `A passive skill this time...doesn¡ät sound too strong at least. And now atst...


    [Uniqe Consciousness ]: Every Undead that has been born at least at tier 2 has this inherited. The sign of an Undead having a unique Consciousness lies towards this ethereal eyes and intelligence. Based on the color of the eyes, the following undead Gaines different bonuses. The owner of this skill gains +5 bits of Intelligence, 5% proficiency, and cost reduction on dark magic-based skills. The higher the tier, the more bonuses are gained by this talent.


    "So that¡äs where this robe skilles from!" At first, I found it weird for a [Undead Warrior] to be capable to cast magic that reached level 3. Maybe the talent [Uniqe Concioness] ys a role in unlocking this [Dark Mist Robe Lv.3] and [Low-Undead Creation Lv.1].


    "This will be hard..." While running, in my sight I caught a massive hole that was made in the ground.


    Seeing the massive hole I felt bitter inside of me.


    "I didn¡ät want toe here in such a situation..."


    But I got no choice...


    Seeing that there was nowhere to run away anymore, I decided to face this draugr...


    "To think...you would run away...!" This rage within him, together with this cold voice made this hate even more obvious.


    I got in my stance, and whispered: "Status..."


    The moment the Draugr was 5 meters away, a deep cold voice came out of him.


    "This who don¡ät obey...shall be made to serve!" As he said that, the mist that was shrouding him suddenly burst out of this body and headed towards me.


    With this, I will take him down before he even notices where I am. That is what he thought.


    But then...


    "[Wind de]..." The moment the lowly skeleton swung this sword in the air, it felt a sensation that he almost forgot.


    Danger.


    Seeing an almost invisible de cutting through this mist like a hot knife, he hastily swung this glowing longsword towards the invisible de.


    "[Heavy Strike]..." The moment the longsword with the skill [Heavy Strike] met with the wind de it...The wind de disappeared, simr to how ss was thrown into a stone wall. The wind de got instantly destroyed.


    "Hmpf, weak...did you really think tha-...where?" Seeing no traces of the skeleton left he got slightly confused. But the next moment he felt the same simr feeling of dangering to this right side.


    "...!" With Incredible speed he turned around while swinging this sword at the mist that was behind him.


    And if he hasn¡ät done that he might be dead...


    What came out of the mist was the same lowly skeleton swinging this sword at him. At first, he thought that this was a joke or an attack.


    But the dark aura that was engulfing him, together with this dark green ethereal eyes made it think otherwise.


    And as des met a loud sound of metal hit the whole cave.


    *Thuad!


    Loud echoes of metal shing with each other engulfed the whole cave.


    "I-Impossible!" Surprisingly, the draugr was losing the fight of strength.


    "How!? How is a mindless one capable of being stronger than me!?" A normal skeleton to be stronger than me!?


    While being shocked at the currente of events, he heard a simr yet different cod voice of this own.


    "A mindless...you say?" Seeing a skeleton that has to glow ethereal eyes and capable of talking he slightly flinched.


    "You...! You aren¡ät a skeleton!" He pushed the sword away and created some distances but doing that he let this front open for a single moment.


    And yet a single moment was all that I needed.


    The mana that flowed through my body went to both my legs and both of my hands. Doing that bought my whole body to burn from inside my bones.


    The reason was though activation of multiple skills all at once!


    Simr to how the helmet goblin that inflicted a wound through my chest used [Sprint] three times in a row. Currently, I was trying to do the same!


    Even though I didn¡ät feel any pain or exhaustion for abusing my muscles (cause I don¡ät have any in the first ce). The pain came from the abuse of mana!


    While I was training I learned that I was capable to use multiple skills at the same time, but the downside of doing that was the boiling pain that I was feeling. Not only that but controlling those skills was almost impossible.


    That was the case of using the skills in long to mid-distance.


    But what if those skills were used in the point-nk range?


    The Draugr feeling immediate danger tried to quickly get to this stance, but it was toote!


    "Sprint..." With the faint light in my legs, my speed increased to the highest. Like a flying rocket going hitting this target.


    I crashed with my shield on the draugrs body and I activated my second skill.


    "Shield Bash...!" With the kic energy that was stored in my shield. The draugr was slightly pushed back, while some cracking sounds wereing out of this chest.


    *crack


    "You..." Before he could even finish. I beat him to that


    "Wind de!" With myst remaining mana in my body, I swung the wind de towards the Draugr containing myst remaining mana.


    Seeing the clearly stronger wind de from before the Draugr flinched in panic.


    "S-Summon Undead!" Dead mana separated from this body and created 3 normal skeletons in front of him with the same [Rusted Swords] in their hands.


    But it was useless.


    The moment the wind de met the skeletons. They cleanly got cleave though. They were so weak that they didn¡ät even affect the wind de itself.


    "Dammit!" The draugr swung this sword using [Heavy Strike] in hopes to block the flying de.


    *Fsheeenn!


    The longsword met with the almost invisible de. Although he seeds in cutting the de in two... He expects that the remaining parts of the de to still fly towards him.


    The split des hit this pelvis and this shoulder. Almost cutting through the whole arm bone. Making it fall.


    "Kghhh!" The draugr screeched in rage.


    Not out of pain, but of the feeling of weakness!


    And I didn¡ät miss this chance.


    "It can¡ät be...." Seeing the skeleton swing this sword towards this neck it knew.


    With this skull flying to the air and finally crashing to the ground.


    It was over.


    [You Received 4500 Experience Points]


    "Finally..." Even though the battle was over...The burning feeling of abusing the mana was still there.


    After the feeling got bearable enough, I finally opened my status.


    Name: ---


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    Level: 8


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.7]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 435/1100


    Mana: 86/130


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 29 Agility: 22 Intelligence: 13 Endurance: 21


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1]


    [Shield Bash] [PiercingLv.1] [Wind de Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Skeleton with a unique consciousness that awakened this death aura. Although current you are pathetically weak, your potential just started to sprout.]


    [XP: 5200]


    In the battle versus the draugr, I took a slight risk of spending my XP while in a fight.


    Out of the 2600 XP that I had, I used 1900 XP to increase my ss level from Lv. 5 to Lv. 7!


    Using the 2 attribute points that I gained to increase my Agility. I managed to even so sligtly suprass the draugr.


    Even though I had a stronger body than him, though the strength difference was ever so slight, I decided to use the 3 skill strategy.


    After all, he was stronger overall...


    With a better sword and a skill like [Heavy Strike], it was a matter of time to when either my shield or sword would break.


    And with this [Battle Sense] together with [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv. 3], he was obviously more skilled than me.


    My only chance was to take him by surprise and finish him off while I had the momentum.


    "He even gave me a ton of XP for me to use. Now I can finally reach my goal of bing level 10."


    Without any more hesitation, I opened my status and increased my level.


    [Level has increased from Lv.8 to Lv.9]


    [Level has increased from Lv.9 to Lv.10]


    [Strenght increased by 2, Agility increased by 2 and Endurance Increased by 2]


    [You reached the maximum level of the skeleton race!]


    [Evolution option has been unlocked!]


    "W-what?" Before I could even make a sense out of this window in front of me. The dead mana inside of the body started to act on this own and getting outside.


    And before I could react I was engulfed by the dead mana. I felt my whole body shaking through all this pressure. The dead mana was moving simr to how the thousand of snakes were eating their food.


    It wasn¡ät only the dead mana that came from my body that engulfs me. The now-destroyed skeletons that I destroyed a moment ago together with the Draugr started to leak dead man out of their body.


    And like a whirlpool with me in the middle, the dead mana started gathering!


    [Please choose the race that you want to evolve into.]


    [Wraith]


    [Skeleton Mage]


    [Draugr]


    [Please make haste to your decision!]


    "W-What..? Evolution!?" Although the pressure of the dead mana was getting stronger by the time. I somehow got excited by the current situation. Choosing one out of three options will allow me to be a tier 2 undead!


    "Got to pick fast...who knows how long I canst through this whole pressure..." I quickly skimmed through all the evolution options.


    [Wraith]: By abanding your physical body, you manage to be an ethereal entity made out of sole mand and your very own soul. Wraith is known for its almostplete physical resistance and weakness against magic. Well-versed in every kind ofbat, they also capable to possess a dead body to serve as their portal to the physical world.


    [Skeleton Mage]: A skeleton that awakened this unique consciousness. Being enlightened in the ways of magic, they can manipte the elements and create various spells. But physically they are not better than the normal Skeletons.


    [Draugr]: A skeleton forged through the endless battle against their immortality. Through decades of their existence, they managed to awaken their unique consciousness. The transformation grants them a tougher and stronger body than any normal skeletons and with their newfound intelligence their also capable to use magic, although to a small degree.


    "There is only one viable option there isn¡ät..." Reading through the option that I had I quickly managed to make a process of elimination.


    `Choosing the Wraith I would be an existence simr to a ghost, although it says that I can possess my body. It doesn¡ät say if the possed body also gets the same strength as my soul body. It has some appeal but I would rather walk than flout around.


    As for the Skeleton Mage, I...already passed the line of no return. Since my ss became of a warrior than of a mage it wouldn¡ät be wise to choose to be a mage now...thus only one option remained!


    [You choose to be a Draugr! Evolution will pred!]


    An undead who is capable of little magic and has a reinforced body!


    That was my choice!


    [Choose 1 out of 3 talents to permanently gain]


    [Undead Domination]


    [Reinforced Body]


    [Reinforced Soul]


    "So [Undead Domination] is a basic talent to choose among the draugr? anyways skipping on that for now...let¡äs take a better look at the other two..."


    [Reinforced Body]: A rare trait is seen upon the draugr race. Through this talent, their body¡äs be tougher and are capable to absorb 10% more blunt damage.


    [Reincforced Soul]: A rare trait seen upon the draugr race. Through this talent, their soul is being strengthed which makes them more resistant to abnormal effects. It also gives +5 to all stats.


    "If I were to choose [Reinforced Body] it will basically cover of my weakness against attack from clubs or simr weapons which doesn¡ät sound too bad. But I would rather pick [Reincforced Soul]... not only does it increase my stats but it also increase my resistance to...abnormal effects."


    [You Acquired Reinforced Soul]


    I mostly picked [Reincforced Soul] cause of the experience that I got versus the draugr. Maybe if I were a little weaker than him he might even seed in turning me to this ve with this [Undead Domination].


    "This time I will be..."Before I could even finish, the dead mana that was surrounding me was instantly sucked in in my body.


    And then my body started to change!


    The cloth in my ribs got ripped off! The moment the dead mana came inside my body all my bones started to grew denser and bigger!


    By the end of the transformation, other than the fact that I grew 2 inches taller and bulgier nothing else chance.


    [You have been granted the Talent Unique Concioness]


    [Though some abnormality you [Uniqe Concioness] turned into [Superior Unique Concioness]!]


    "What?" I was slightly stunned. After I got thest message, all the pressure that I felt before has gone.


    "Sigh... whatever I will just read through everything once I am back at the cave" I bent down and instead of picking my own sword I picked the one that the now-dead Draugr was using.


    And as I stood up with the sword in my hands I heard a noiseing out of the right.


    I turned my head to look at what the sounds were. But what I saw made me froze in ce.


    The reason that I froze was cause currently in front of me there was a group of 6...


    "Human..."


    The dead mana that gone inside of me was once again realized, but a lot fiercer than before!

 Chapter 27 - Rapha Bloodmane And Ellen Darcy

    In the city of Nexvarres


    In the Underground training area of the Darcy mansion.


    Two crimson auras shing to each other. While one was attacking the other with incredible speed the other tried to helplessly defend against those ferocious attacks, but to no avail.


    "What¡äs wrong!? Already done!?" A helmet simr to the warriors of Sparta and the long red hair that danced through the wind was the only sign that this figure was a woman.


    With her armor made out of material that looked simr to that of gold and blood. Every step that she made crashed the ground.


    She was so fast in fact that she created mirror images!


    A normal person would think that she was creating illusions through the use of magic, but that wasn¡ät the case here.


    She was simply too fast!


    And at that moment she instantly appeared behind the owner of the second figure. She raised her golden cross spear and simply swung at him with a solemn expression. She looked like a valkyrie forged in war.


    Without even realizing what just happened, he was hit to this side and was sent flying in the other direction.


    "Kugh!" Blood spurred out of this mouth, but rather than giving up he fixed himself while mid-air and send one of the strongest attacks at that woman.


    "zing Onught!" This crimson aura mixed with this sword. Swinging this sword came 2 de projectiles simr to [Wind de] but made out of fire. Together they made an "X" shape or a slightly tilted cross.


    But the next moment that he knows those fire des exploded and vanished in an instant.


    "You have even done well, Raph. You improved" With a voice full of pride in it and a face full of kindness sheplimented.


    "Thanks for always...aunt" Although seeing this aunt, one of the Swordkings of the whole Berum kingdom. Complimenting him for this skill with such a warm smile he was overjoyed!


    If only the fact that this aunt didn¡ät point one of the greatest treasures of this kingdom in this throat. He would even be overjoyed...


    "So, ehm. Aunt...Could you please..."


    Seeing the sweat that was emerging out of this nephew she giggled out loud.


    "At this pace, you should be able to experience your own promotion. Even though it has been only 5 years you already so close to promotion.


    Usually, others might need 10 up to 20 years to reach your current level!" She pulled her spear back and pathed her¡äs nephew shoulders heartily. But the strength she used would even be enough topletely destroy a small rock.


    While hiding this difort, Rapha solemnly said "This is all thanks to you aunt...If I hadn¡ät such a good instructor point me the way it would even take me much longer..." Putting this sword back to this scabbard.


    "After all, you are one of the Kingdom''s heroes. The War Born Valkyrie, Selena Blood¡äReas." This tone had a hint of admiration in it.


    Hearing this name, Selena unconsciously twitched her browns.


    "You don¡ät need to call me like that...this name was bestowed by those brain-dead nobles. Just refer me to Selena Blood¡äReas. Of course, calling me S like you used to do when you were small is also fine."


    Hearing this name, Rapha''s shoulders twitched for an instant.


    "How can I, You the Her-" But before he even could finish he was interrupted.


    "So Rapha was calling you by a nickname? I never knew that he had such a cute side in him!"


    Hearing that, Rapha''s face paled in an instant.


    "Master Allen..."


    "Hmm? Did I interrupt you guys while training? Should Ieter?"


    In an instant, Selena''s cross spear turned into red particles until itpletely disappeared. With a smile on her face, she responded to the young man.


    "No, we just finished our training for this time. What bring¡äs you here?"


    Her tone held warm but also no trace of respect in it.


    Seeing that Allen Darcy didn¡ät mind much and continued.


    "I came to call Rapha to go inside today!" He said with this chest full of pride.


    Hearing that, Selena`s face darkened. he nced at Rapha as if she was throwing daggers at him.


    "Why would you need to go inside the dungeon...?"


    "We are going to retrieves the young master¡äs Allen sword..." Rapha said while avoiding eye contact.


    "Hmmm? Did he lose it inside the dungeon...?"


    "No! I didn¡ät lose it! A filthy skeleton took my sword!" Even though he tried to exin the cause of him losing this sword. The only thing that he managed to do was confuse Selena even more.


    "Wait...Skeletons? "Those" Skeletons? the weakest of all undead?"


    "It wasn¡ät a skeleton aunt. From what we know it was a draugr with blue eyes"


    Upon hearing this Selena made an `Ah¡ä face as she understood.


    "A draugr with blue eyes... that should mean that it has higher intelligence than some other draugrs. Even if it werecapable to cast magic though, you guy¡äs should be able to defeat it." With that said, she turned around and walked towards the door where the stairs were.


    "Hmm, is she already going?"


    Looking at Allen back she answered.


    "Being a hero of the kingdom doesn¡ät mean all riches and all fun. I have duty¡äs to uphold. And the time that I spend here is far longer than I originally had nned."


    Seeing her tone towards him, he cursed internally.


    "Don¡ät forget to train by yourself while I am gone, Raph. And be careful inside that dungeon. You never know what resides in there."


    Hearing what Selena told them both Allen and Rapha looked at each other with a strange look.


    "It just one draugr and some skeletons. What reason do we have to be afraid of? She talks as if we are going to face a Death Knight or a Lich."


    "Right..." Although he thought the same as the young master Allen. He couldn¡ät get the words that her aunt said out of this mind.


    "Should we get going, young master?"


    "Yeah! Let¡äs head up to the dungeon!"


    After all, there were already records of an undead getting out of this Dungeon.


    ****


    Several hourster...


    "Young Master, the preparation is done." Rapha, with now this bloody full armor equipped and with this sword on the waist, reported to Allen back.


    "Finally! What took you guys so long?" Sitting outside of the dungeon guard post. Was rtive a boring thing to do. And in the eyes of a 14-year-old teenager like Allen, such think was basically torture!


    "Forgive young master, we had to prepare the supply before we go into the dungeon. Since it isn¡ät guaranteed to find the draugr immediately, we must think as if we are going to search the whole dungeon."


    "Tch, whatever." Clinking this tongue out loudly he noticed 3 knights that wore the same Darcy armor.


    "And those are...?"


    "Eh? Ah, those are the knights that Lord Darius has presented."


    "The one in the left is Bob, the one in the right is John and in the middle is Frank."


    "Rapha...didn¡ät I tell you that I don¡ät need guards?" With a frown on this face, he questioned Rapha.


    But Rapha didn¡ät even pudge and solemnly said.


    "I am sorry young master, but those are the orders given to me "by" you father".


    Seeing the emotionless face of Rapha, Allen cursed internally.


    Tch, Father still doesn¡ät acknowledge me...he still thinks that I am a defenseless kid in the end!


    "If everything is ready, let''s go in." I will show that I ain¡ät a kid anymore by killing this cursed Draugr!


    Seeing this, Rapha could only shake this head. He already knew what this young master was thinking deep inside. But what Allen didn¡ät know though was that it was all a misunderstanding.


    Even though this Father didn¡ät pay much attention to Allen, he still dearly loved him. But through this personality, he is usually cold and uncaring towards Allen. The reason for that is mostly because Lord Darius is a mage.


    Lord Darius isn¡ät like all the other mages. He started as a poor Noble family and climbed at the ranks of the socialdder poorly through this mastery of magic.


    This Talent of Magic was one of the best. Some people even started calling him a genius which only appeared after a century. Many thought that he would be a Magus in the future.


    But through this early marriage and this care of this family, this progress slowed down until it staggeredpletely.


    *Thuad!


    A loud noise of metal echoed through the whole dungeon.


    "Captain Rapha, what was this noise..." Seeing the anxious face of Bob he thought if it even was worth bringing such a scary cat to apany the young master.


    "By the echoes, this sound isn¡ät natural. They are probably sounds of metal shing but I ain¡ät too sure." Turning around, he pulled this sword out.


    "Young Master, shall we see what that sound is? If I am right those sounds are from swords shing with each other"


    Hearing the word `sword¡ä Allen¡äs mood of before Immidiendly vanished.


    Full of energy he shouted, "Let¡äs go!"


    Seeing the big smile of their master, the group of 5 started moving towards where the sounds came from.


    But suddenly Rapha felt an immense death aura ahead of him. At first, he didn¡ät notice this death aura since it was too weak. But now it suddenly got bigger and denser.


    Making him feel a hint of danger.


    "Where does thate from..."


    And when they arrived at the ce where the sound came from.


    They all suddenly froze.


    "Rapha... the one that stole my sword is the one that lies in the ground...."


    Seeing the now truly dead Draugr with the runic weapon in the ground and another Draugr standing in front of him he knew what happened.


    "They fought each other..."


    Suddenly the still standing Draugr eyes lighten up.


    Unlike the Draugr that had these dark blue eyes, this had dark green.


    Just seeing these eyes brought a feeling of difort.


    "You three, Protect the young master While I wil-" Before he could finish they saw the green-eyed draugr bent down and gripping the runic sword.


    And the next moment the draugr turned this head and faced our group.


    "Human..."


    Hearing the cold yet flued voiceing out of this Undead. Rapha¡äs face hardened

 Chapter 28 - How Do You Know Me!?

    With a surge of dead manaing out of my body. My whole body started to trebled slightly, it wasn¡ät a thought of pain.


    No, it was the exact opposite!


    Currently, my whole skeleton body was experiencing a feeling of total euphoria! It was as if the crushing pressure that I felt before never happened in the first ce and just the feeling of pure happiness remained.


    The perfect words for this feeling would be `you have to go through hell, to reach the heavens.


    It was truly addictive!


    But the next moment that I caught a group of 5 humans in my sight, without giving any warning. The amazing feeling of euphoria disappeared, only for the burning feeling of hatred to rece it in short.


    "Human..." With my mood turning foul and without any signs of the burning hatred going away. I got into my stance.


    With the new sword raised in front of me, I prepare to engage him in the group of 5.


    But then I noticed a dark green light that wasing out of my sword.


    Why does the sword glow?


    Turning the sword facing me, I found the source of the lighting.


    "Why are there green mes inside my eyes..." Reaching my hand and touching the mes bough neither a feeling of being burned or of any difort.


    After feeling quite puzzled by this situation, a sh of insight suddenly hit me.


    Right! The new Skill I got!¡ä With an internalmand, my whole status came in front of me.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Level: 10


    Race: Draugr (Undead)


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.7]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 1600/1600


    Mana: 210/210


    Attribute Points: 2


    Attributes: Strength: 39 Agility: 32 Intelligence: 21 Endurance: 31


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Uniqe Concioness]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash] [PiercingLv.1] [Wind de Lv.1]


    [Remark: With your evolution of stepping through the Tier 2 Undead Although there is still a long way to reach. Your evolution broke the fate of you being as weak as a in rock!]


    "As rude as ever huh..." Ignoring the remark part, my focus went towards the [Superior Unique Concioness].


    [Superior Unique Concioness]: A improved version of the talent [Uniqe Concioness] that only Undead that already had consciousness before stepping into the second tier are capable to get this talent. It slightly increases the consciousness intelligence while increasing the bonuses of the following ethereal eyes. Since the owner has dark green eyes, he gains 10% proficiency and cost reduction towards soul-based skills. You also gain +3 of all stats. The higher your Tier, the more bonuses are gained by this talent.


    "So my talent is...towards soul-based skills? Nevertheless, just having 12 extra attributes makes this talent already good"


    "Now...how should I deal with those¡ä thinks?"¡äPutting my remaining attribute points towards my Intelligence and slowly walked towards the group of five.


    [Inteligence increase by 1]


    [Inteligence increase by 1]


    Seeing me advantaged towards them, four of them rushed towards me while one stayed behind.


    Three with the same armor while the one on the middle with a full te armor...


    "Is the one that stayed behind...a caster?"


    `I can¡ät let him carelessly shoot at me with whatever of a spell he got up to this a#s...


    "Slowly...let it..." Letting the burning hatred in my chest engulf me. New Strenght came at me.


    [Sins of Wrath]: Activated


    The dead mana that was surrounding me before exploding with intense bloodlust!


    Hmm...my mind is much more clear than when I tried using wrath before. Is it because of the [Reinforcement Soul]?


    Putting such thoughts forter, I confronted the ted man.


    With mana running in my new long sword.


    Our swords shed with each other!


    *Thuad!


    "[Wind de]!" Before the sh even happened I used the wind de together with my swing to confront the mana with the te armor, Expecting the wind de to at least inflict him some unexpected damage.


    Seeing that no damage was made I realized that the wind de didn¡ät go through this sword.


    But as our swords were at each other, I heard a sudden voice out of this man.


    "-Onught!" As I was confused by this sudden shout, I was engulfed by an explosion made out of mes!


    Though the force behind the explosion, made me fly back about 5 meters away.


    "W-What was that...?" Seeing the man in front of me unscratched I couldn¡ät help but look at the young man behind.


    "Was it...the caster?" As I was looking at the pale young man, the man in the te armor stood in front of me. Thus blocking my sight between me and the young man.


    "So...he is a caster!" Seeing the way this group behaved they seemed to protect the young man in the backline.


    As I stood back up, a loud battle cry came in the corner of my eye.


    "-venge!" Seeing one of the group behind me raising this sword to crush my skull. I quickly reacted and blocked this swing with my shield.


    "[Shield Bash]..." Expecting him to be as strong as the man with the te armor. I used my skill,[Shield Bash] in case he would use a skill simr to [Heavy Strike]. But the oue was totally out of my expectations.


    Instead of the sword holding my shield down, Ipletely reflect the sword! Then I noticed the differences between those guys and the te armor guy.


    "Weak..." Without using a skill I hastily stood up and pierce my long sword inside the guy''s heart!


    "K-Kugh!" Coughing a mouth full of blood, he nkly stared at the sword towards this chest. Before crumpling like a puppet would if you were to cut her strings.


    [You gained 1500 XP]


    "Now fou-" Before I could even finish, the two other ordinary humans shouted at the same time.


    "Frank!"


    "Frank!"


    "How could you do this to Frank!"


    "Prepared to face my vengeance fuelled by the death of Frank!"


    Ehm...


    Who is Frank?


    Being stunned for a second, what I next saw surprised me!


    "Young Master! Stand back!"


    The Caster, No. The young man that I had thought of him being the caster of this group suddenly ran towards me with this sword in hand.


    Seeing the rtions between the ted armor and the young man I realized that I was wrong.


    `So a servant-master treatment...is it!? He will be a great hostage if I can catch him, and him being dead should affect their morale.¡ä


    Having found my target I quickly used [Sprint] and rushed towards him!


    "Young Mas- You!" Seeing me targeting the young man the one with ted armor got quickly in my way.


    "You two! Don¡ät forget why you are here! Protect the young master!"


    After being stunned for a moment the two reacted quickly and headed to assist the ted man.


    Our swords shed again, which resulted in creating echoes of shing metal!


    Although it seemed evenly matched, it wasn¡ät.


    While I was only able to hit this armor once with my long sword, he already hit and broke some of the ribs while other ces were full of scratches!


    He is stronger... and this swordy is on a different level!


    I can¡ät win...


    Although I wasn¡ät able to inflict much damage, I was capable to see this status!


    [Status]


    Name: Rapha Bloodmane


    Race: Human


    Level: 23


    ss: [Warrior Lv.9]


    Sub-ss: [Spell de Lv. 3]


    Health: 1942/1950


    Mana: 450/450


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 45 Agility: 38 Intelligence: 45 Endurance: 38 Stamina 40


    [Talents] [Human] [Ancestors Blood] [Reinforced Body] [Leader] [Blood Loved] [****] [****]


    [Skills] [Sword Mastery Lv.4] [Sprint Lv.5] [ze Onught Lv.2] [Blood Frenzy Lv.6] [****] [****] [****] [****] [****] [****]


    [Remark: A man that has from this ancestors blood in this veins. This ancestor blood was forged and enchant thoroughly until perfection. Although this bloodline has mixes a little bit, the power towards the enchanted blood runs through these veins.]


    So strong...no wonder he was able to block my wind de!


    But seeing this status I noticed the [****] which quite confused me. But sadly I didn¡ät have the time to focus on them right now.


    ncing at this status the I noticed that the status showed the name of this human. Seeing a name for my first time in the status I couldn¡ät help but mumble lowly.


    "Rapha Bloodmane..." Although I said it with a low voice. The face of the ted man, No, Rapha Bloodmane¡äs faces turned pale.


    "You...! How Do you Know me!?" Seeing him being stunned for a second I didn¡ät miss that chance!


    I used [Sprint] to step to the side and realized my [Wind de] towards the young man!


    "What!?" Realizing this mistake he gathers a terrifying amount of mana in this sword.


    "ze Onught!" With a cross of mes appearing in front of me I used my skill [Shield Bash] to block it. But it was futile.


    The moment the cross made out of fire hit me I massive explosion rued which send me flying!


    I felt all my bones being crashed at the same time. but what I didn¡ät expect was the explosion sent me towards the hole where theke was at!


    "Youn--!"


    "Ar- ight!"


    Falling with my broken body and sword towards theke, I could barely hear the voices of those humans before I falling into theke.

 Chapter 29 - Curse Of Immortality

    "Dammit!"


    *Ssh!


    The next moment I knew, my whole vision darkened.


    "Dammit...that I would experience a simr feeling from back then." Being inside theke reminded me of when I was inside the liquid, where only darkness was to be seen.


    "To think that this Rapha guy would blow me directly to theke. At least it isn¡ät as bad as inside that darkke from before." Even though I was sinking in theke, I was still capable to see my surroundings, although my sight range was limited.


    *Crack


    "He did quite the damage on my body..." Seeing the cracks in my bones I couldn¡ät help but curses internally.


    "Status"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Level: 10


    Race: Draugr (Undead)


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.7]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 132/1600


    Mana: 86/230


    Attribute Points: 2


    Attributes: Strength: 39 Agility: 32 Intelligence: 23 Endurance: 31


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash] [PiercingLv.1] [Wind de Lv.1]


    [Remark: With your evolution of stepping through the Tier 2 Undead Although there is still a long way to reach. Your evolution broke the fate of you being as weak as a in rock!]


    "I almost died...maybe being thrown into theke wasn¡ät that bad, after all..." As I was reading through my status I finally reached the bottom of theke.


    "It isn¡ät as deep as I thought, around 7 to 8 meters at best..." After stabilizing myself at the bottom of theke I started to walk forward.


    Although walking while surrounded by water was quite slow and annoying, I eventually got used to it.


    *Thuad.


    "Hm, what is this?" ncing at the ground, there was some kind of resistance to where I was stepping.


    Bending down to my knee and removing the sand, a familiar object came to my sight.


    [Rusted sword]: A de which long before has lost the ability to cut. Even though the edge is pathetically weak, It does have the ability to poison the ones that were cut by it...


    "A Rusted sword huh...why would such a thing be here? Did someone throw it away from the top?" When I pulled the sword out of the sand I noticed a skeleton hand holding on the sword''s handle.


    "What the!" I quickly jumped back and pointed the sword towards the hand.


    But no reaction.


    "..."


    Seeing it not move an inch I slightly tapped it with my sword and called upon this status internally.


    [Non-Undead]: A corpse that has been for a long time contaminated by dead mana. If the corpse isn¡ät purified or isted from dead mana, the processes of gaining undeath will take ce.


    "So this one will be an undead? Now that I take a better look around..." Ignoring the un-moving skeleton, I continued walking forward.


    The more I walked, the neared to the surface was I getting at. Which resulted in brightening theke more and thus improving the range where I could see.


    As I continued walking for a few minutes I noticed something which made me freeze.


    "What the hell happened here...?" That question wasn¡ät referring to the surrounding dead mana that was all over the ce.


    No.


    My current sight range was about 15 meters.


    What made me freeze was the sight of hundreds of [Non-Undead]! With various weapons at that too! Although rusted simr to the [Rusted Sword], it was still an amazing sight to see.


    Some corpses were half-buried in the sand, while other ones were under some massive rocks, only for their unmoving hands to be seen.


    "From where did so many bodiese from... it¡äs like a graveyard." I kept inspecting the various weapons in hopes to find something interesting. But as expected every single weapon here was rusted.


    As I was walking past the many corpses. Suddenly, something grasped my leg tightly.


    Getting startled by the sudden movement. I pulled my grasped leg and took few steps back.


    Pointing my sword in the direction my leg grasped.


    "..."


    *shhh


    *shhh


    *shhh


    Seeing the identity of the one that pulled my leg made my face turn weird (Not like I have a face).


    "You are quite the unlucky fellow aren¡ät you..." The sight of a skeleton that was stuck between a 2-meter tall rock.


    By the looks of it, the rock didn¡ätpletely destroy this bottom half which usually can be considered good.


    But this created a situation where the skeleton was trapped beneath the rock, making him unable to move for all internally...


    "I guess that¡äs the part where immortality is truly a curse..." Seeing him attempting to pull himself out by dragging the nearby sand made me feel quite...dejected.


    I lightly tapped this skull with my sword, which resulted in this status showing.


    "Status"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Level: 9


    Race: Skeleton (Undead)


    ss: ---


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 139/800


    Mana: 150/150


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 21 Agility: 18 Intelligence: 15 Endurance: 19


    [Talents] [Undead] [Determination] [False Concioness]


    [Skills] [ [Miasma Corruption Lv.3]


    [Remark: A long-lived Skeleton that experienced being trapped for decades.]


    "So this guy was trapped for some decades...he even got some talents.


    [False Concioness]: Being trapped in the same ces for some amount of time resulted in this being to acquired a level of consciousness. Improves memory capacity.


    [Determination]: By wanting to reach the same goal for some amount of time resulted in this being gain more motivation towards this goal. All skill costs are reduced by 5%.


    "He has nice talents, but they don¡ät really help him in this situation, rather they work against him..."


    After some hesitation, I walked beside the rock and moved it to the side.


    Although it wasn¡ät easy, the 39 points of strength weren¡ät there for nothing.


    *Boohm.


    The movement of the rock made nearby sand raise.


    "Just wait there to regenerate your legs..."


    Seeing that the skeleton being finally free, I continued moving forward.


    Seeing the massive rock being removed. The skeleton turned this sight at me and kept watching me leave.


    Thest thing this skeleton saw was the slight red glow of the runes that my sword had.


    And simr to the glow of the runes. For just a few instances the eyes of the skeleton lighted up with the same glow as the runes had.


    ****


    In the city of Nexvarres


    Currently in the mansion of Darcy...


    It was around evening at the time. Since their lord, Darius Darcy finished this meal around an hour ago, it was time for the maids to clean the main hall.


    Around three maids were currently cleaning in the main hall.


    One cleaned the expensive-looking vase while recing the withered flowers with new ones.


    Although they were simple flowers they had a special meaning behind them. With their pedals being white, while the inside being crimson red. It was named the [Rectitude Red Mary] and symbolize the crest of the family Darcy. The silver part represents the purity of their loyalty towards their kingdom while the red part represents the background story of the Darcy family.


    Like the other two maids, they were simply cleaning the dust of various ces in the main hall with their brooms.


    As those maids were humming with a smile on her face.


    The door suddenly opened and a crimson aura engulfed the entire room!


    "CALL AESON! NOW!"


    *Thiittt!


    "Kagh!"


    Though the sudden appearance of Rath screaming at top of this lungs and this aura that made it difficult for the maids to breathe, resulted in the maids falling with their buts first to the ground.


    Sadly enough, the expensive-looking vase that contained the flowers which symbolized the whole darcy family didn¡ät survive...


    Seeing that, the eyes of the maid who took care of the vase started to tremble lightly.


    W-Would I will be made to pay for that...


    Although Raphapletely ignored the despaired that this poor maid was facing. He was about to start screaming again but got interrupted by an old man''s voice.


    "What happened captain Rapha? For you to be so lou-"


    "Merrick! Stop talking none sense and call Sir Aeson! The young master is injured!" Although Merrick, the head butler wasn¡ät happy with the way Rapha talked to him. Seeing the blood that wasing out of their young master''s chest he nodded this head with a frown on this face.


    "Understood. Bring the Young master in this room and I will call Sir Aeton."


    Having said that, he pulled some kind of circr metal te with a red crystal in the middle and started screaming orders at the device.


    Rapha Immidedly went to Allens Darcy''s room and put him on this bed while undressing this chest. After he finished a big scar on Allen''s chest could be seen.


    "O-oh god..." As Rapha was despairing through the following events. The door suddenly opened for a 1.90 meters tall man with golden blond hair with a pure white staff in this hand. With this golden long hair and these golden eyes, most people would consider him as a man that had the highest tier of handsomes.


    "Rapha, what happened to Alle- God! What the heck happened!? How did he-Fuck! Everyone! Get out of the room! I need all my focus in hopes to fix this wound!" Without being able to refute Aeson, everyone within their room was kicked out. Thest thing they heard was some chants.


    As Rapha was in front of the door, he remembered how all this happened.


    "Rapha Bloodmane..."


    On how all this was for a simple mistake! A moment of carelessness!


    If it wasn¡ät for the fact of losing my cool in the heat of the battle, master Allen wouldn¡ät...


    "RAPHA! What happened to Allen!?" A voice that resembled thunder.


    Turning this head, Rapha saw for the first time this service in the Darcy family the enraged look of this Lord, Darius Darcy.


    Darius Darcy with the crimson robe looked that bathed in blood and te armor that only covered this chest up to this neck was to been seen. In the middle of this te armor was a symbol that symbolized the rank that the kingdom acknowledge.


    And the Symbol that Darius Darcy wore was one of the great mage ss!


    Seeing this lord being equipped with this war robe. This gaze instantly went to the ground.


    "I failed you....my Lord."

 Chapter 30 - Runes And Enchantments

    "I didn¡ät ask for you to apologize! Tell me where Allen is!" Darius face currently was vicious. With these veins starting to show on this forehead ready to explode out of anger by any second.


    Seeing this lord''s face being so enraged by the injured this only son has suffered he felt even more ashamed.


    With this face looking at the ground depressed, Rapha said with a depressed tone. "Young Master Allen is currently being treated by Sir Aeson inside this room..."


    "I see..." Hearing that this son is being treated by Aeson, this glowing staff and eyes grew dimmer until no light was to be seen.


    "..." Darius raised this face towards the seeling with this eyes closed and stayed at that position for a few seconds.


    "Thank goodness..." Murmuring so low that not even Rapha could hear him saying these words of relief even though he was next to him.


    Slowly opening this eyes, he turned to this usually cold self and faced Rapha.


    "Tell me, Rapha. What happened down there? Weren''t you suppose to simply kill the draugr that had the sword of Allen? What happened..." Even though he didn¡ät me him, this cold tone said otherwise.


    He could even feel a hint of killing intent!


    Who was Darius Dardy you ask?


    One of the most powerful great mages in the whole kingdom which is capable to eliminate a whole battalion of normal soldiers without even breaking a breath!


    That was the power of a great mage!


    And such mage was currently showing a hint of killing intent towards him! Even though it was just a tiny bit of killing intent that could easily be mistaken for anger. It didn¡ät matter!


    It was as if someone were telling you to pet a lion that was tamed! Even though you knew it was tamed, you still knew deep inside of you that if the lion suddenly tried to take a piece out of you. You wouldn¡ät be able to resist! And if you tried to, the only thing that awaited you was death!


    Gulping this throat, Rapha told Darius about what happened down to the dungeon.


    While hearing the story of Rapha¡äs, Darius already cold face got even colder.


    "So...You guy¡äs meet a newly awakened draugr with...green eyes you said, right?"


    Confused by this lord repeating what he just said, he just nodded this head while saying "Yes, my lord".


    "..."


    "..."


    After a short awkward silence between this two.


    Darius started to mumble to himself.


    "Green eyes... with martial arts."


    "My lord?"


    "Ah, it''s nothing. By the way, you said you blew the draugr directly to the Cursedke, correct?"


    "Yes, my lord! I used my strongest attack towards this filthy undead who hurt the young master!" Rapha said with this back straight up and full of pride!


    But that pride slowly crumpled.


    "So? Did the Draugr got destroyed...?"


    "Yeah of cour-!" As if lightning suddenly struck. He quickly shut up.


    Right...did the draugr actually die?


    Seeing the doubt in Rapha¡äs face, Darius turned this back at him and entered Allen''s room.


    "You disappointed me this time...Rapha."


    *Baahm!


    *****


    Back in the shaman''s cave.


    High pitched noises could be heard deep inside the cave.


    *Fsheeen!


    A 1-meter wide wind de made out of mana flew through an already dead goblin, thus splitting it in half and creating a gory scene.


    But instead of feeling disgusted, I felt...amazed!


    [You gained 800 Experience points through training]


    "This sword is really amazing!"


    Ever since I have undergone the race evolution not only did my body stronger and tougher, but it also increased the XP gain through training!


    Although the increase of XP gain was a pleasant surprise. That wasn¡ät why I was so excited...


    What excited me the most was the sword that I got from the Draugr!


    [Rune Sword: Veren]: A enchanted sword that had modified death runes curved it in. The enchant inside the de helps the user with their mana control slightly. While the once normal runes that used mana to repair the sword have changed to resemble death runes. Though the modification of the sword severally decreases the amount needed to repair the sword, but at the cost of consuming blood. The carver that named this sword, Veren would be dejected to see this once a gift for this friend. Being used by the undead and had their own runes modified.


    "With this beauty in my hands, I no longer need to use these crappy daggers or swords! As long as there is enough blood and my mana, this sword will serve me for all my internity that is my life!" Lightly piercing through the half-cut goblin corpse in the ground. A slight red glow came out of the runes and the next moment the runes slowly drank the blood from the corpse until the sword waspletely satisfied!


    "It also helps me reduce the burden that I receive when I use the wind de! This weapon is such a treasure... I wonder where the Draugr got this hand of this beauty-like sword." ncing at the description of the sword. Two brought upon my curiosity.


    "Enchantments and runes...Maybe these two things are the key to create a sword which shoots fire..." Of course, that silly dream of mine wasn¡ät what got me interested in these two things.


    What interested me was the ability to create the self-repair runes just like the Veren sword. If I am able to replicate those runes I will never have to worry about bing a jack of all trades, master of no one.


    Since I got quite fond of the shield and the longsword I hoped to stick with those two.


    "Well, just in case let¡äs see what enchantments and runes are exactly..."


    [Enchantments]: A art of craftsmanship that relies upon magical knowledge to modify the magical modify, hench the soul of the item, and gives it various effects.


    [Runes]: A art of craftsmanship that relies upon the ancientnguage of different races to modify the physical form, hench the body of the item, and gives it various effects.


    "Hmm, both sound about the same. The enchantments sound like what a mage would be able to do, while the runes sound like knowing the craft by itself..." I headed towards theboratory and I seated on the stone table while holding a rusted sword in my hand.


    Simr to a meditation posture, I put both the Veren and the rusted swords on my knees.


    With a rock that I picked up from the ground, I started to carve the exact same runes that the Veren sword had into the rusted sword.


    Although it took me about 2 whole hours to curve a rough version of the Veren runes, the result that I got was... disappointing.


    The runes did neither work nor emitted the same light as the Veren runes did, which made me quite disappointed.


    "Figures out it isn¡ät just drawing out some weird letters and hope to create the same effect...I guess my only hope is to get a rune-making skill through the status." Shaking my head, I threw the rusted sword away as I have lost interest.


    "Well, nothing to be done for it, I guess. Should probably start training instead of curving..."


    After saying that, the sounds of my training continued to echoes through the shaman''s cave.


    *****


    In the Darcy Mansion...


    In Allen¡äs Darcy room.


    After what have been 2 days. Allen Darcy''s hand flinched and the next moment he slowly opened this eyes.


    "Where am I...?" He said in a weak voice.


    "You are in your room, my son." Suprised from the sudden answer, he weakly turned this head to only see this dad sitting in a chair right beside the bed.


    "Dad...?" Seeing this father wearing a white shirt and these ck bags under this eyes. He tried to stand up, but a sudden pain came from this chest.


    "Kid, stay right where you at. If you start moving suddenly all my effort would have been nothing." Season lightly gripped this shoulders and gently pushed Allen back to the bed.


    "Huh? Oncle Aeson? What are you doing here? And where is Rapha?"


    "You brat! You dare you to call me uncle!? Have your eyes been blinded while getting this injured?" Hearing Aeson saying that Allen scoffed weakly.


    Yeah right, maybe you can fool others but I knew you my whole damn life! You Gramps!


    Although Aeson looked extremely handsome and as a young man around this early 20. In truth, this dude was over 70 years old!


    Just remembering how many times some maids of our household went and asked Aeson out. A sense of disgust came to him.


    Those two red as if two different lightings were shing to each other.


    "You two quit fooling around. And Aeson, could you leave us two alone for a moment?" Hearing this friend Darius emotionless voice, he turned around and left the room with a frown on this face. Not because he felt disrespected by Darius, but by this tone.


    Although he is usually cold and has little of a facial expression, but by the current Darius tone and slightly dense face.


    Aeson knew better.


    Seeing Aeson leaving so suddenly Allen got reminded of his injury.


    Feeling it chest up, a slight pain came through him.


    "Are you alright, Allen?" Hearing this father calling him by this name, instead of "Son". Allen''s face hardened.


    "Yeah... I am alright, father."


    Seeing this father stay silent for a while, Allen asked.


    "Father, about the sword..." But before he could finish, he got interrupted by this father.


    "Allen, I decided to send you to the capital."


    "What?"

 Chapter 31 - Crafbinder And Leaving

    In the city of Nexvarres.


    Two different carriages stopped right in front of the Darcy mansion.


    One had the crest of the Darcy family while the other had a golden hammer with some blue rune letters with the background being of some light green.


    The crest of the Crafbinder.


    One of the Crafbinder servants hastily went and opened the door of the carriage.


    "Why did it take so long?"


    "I am sorry young master, there has been som-"


    "Ah, so annoying, take my stuff and follow me." As he said that, the kid with silver hair that looked around 12-14 jumped out of the carriage and went towards the Darcy mansion.


    Although he wore what nobles would consider average, the visible runes in those clothing would make those very nobles grind their teeth out of jealousy.


    The young man''s name was Samuel Crafbinder.


    "Wee to the Darcy mansion, Sir Samuel Crafbinder."


    "Oh! If it isn¡ät Merrick! Long time no see?" Seeing the head butler opening the door for him, Samuel put on this warmest smile and asked in a sincere way.


    "How is your wife doing, Merrick?"


    Hearing that, Merrick''s eyebrow twitched for a second.


    "Thanks for your consideration Sir Samuel, she is doing well..." This tone was stone cold. Hearing a 14-year-old asking about this wife with such a gaze on this face he didn¡ät even try to hide this hostility.


    Samuel noticing Merrick¡äs expression yed along.


    "How scary, I was just joking, alright? Jeez, you surely turned old..." As much as Samuel wanted to continue to tease Merrick. He quickly shut up by the killing intent that was hidden inside Merrick¡äs eyes.


    "A-Anyways! I came here to go with Allen to the Royal Acadamy. Where is he right now? I heard he got hurt."


    The killing intent inside Merrick¡äs eyes quickly disappeared and before he could answer Samuels''s question, he got beaten by another one.


    "Samuel, over here! I almost finished with my preparations, want toe to my room? I have something to talk about!"


    Hearing the voice of Allen, both Samuel and Merrick turned their heads towards the second floor where Allen was.


    "Yeah, I aming! Anyways, it was nice seeing you again Merrick!" Saying that Samuel walked towards the chair which leads towards Allen.


    But as he was about to go to the second floor he turned around and smiled towards Merrick.


    "Sir Merrick! Don¡ät forget to greet your wife for me! Next time I will bring her flowers!" Saying that he turned around and made a run for Allen''s room.


    As for the Merrick who stayed behind the main hall. This hand was trembling while veins started to show up in this head.


    "Brat...If it weren¡ät for the fact that you are a noble you would even wish to be a dead man when the dayes that you meet my fists...!"


    ****


    In Allens Darcy''s room.


    Closing the door, Samuel asked in a curious tone.


    "So? What did you want to talk about Allen?"


    "What I wanted to talk about is about you -" Before Allen could start, Samuel quickly interrupted him.


    "By the way, I am into girls rather than to men. Although I appreciated your passion...It¡äs not you, it''s me..."


    "That isn¡ät it! For what do you take me for!?"


    "Well, if you weren¡ät seduced by the godlike beauty of my, then what is it?"


    "..." Seeing Samuel making a straight face while saying he almost forget what he was wanted to talk about.


    Almost.


    "Samuel... I lost your sword." Allen made a 15-degree bow with this eyes closed.


    "What...?" As Samuel heard these words, the usually yful him who joked every given chance he was given suddenly had a cold gaze.


    "How did you lost the sword that I gifted you?" Seeing Samuel''s serious tone, Allen became even more depressed.


    "What actually happened was..." As Allen was telling the story about how 2 weeks ago he went to the dungeon and met the Draugr that stole this sword. Returning to the dungeon to retrieve the sword for only to me yet another Draugr, which ultimately almost killed him. Samuel didn¡ät show any hints of emotions the whole time and their interrupted Allen''s story.


    He only stayed there, quietly listening to Allen to finish.


    And when Allen finished there was a moment of silence.


    "..."


    "..."


    While being stared from Samuel, Allen could only stare towards the floor.


    "Can you show me your wound? Allen." Samuel hastily asked Allen with a gaze that was of a man that was betrayed.


    Normally asking for something that got wounded to show this wound be considered rude. And for a noble to say that to another noble it was a taboo.


    "Yeah of course." But Allen didn¡ät hesitate and instead started to remove this shirt.


    As he knew why Samuel had such a look and why he asked to see this wound.


    As the only family in the whole kingdom that is capable of runesmithing. All types of people would try to get into contact with Crafbinder by any means necessary. Samuel was once used of sexually harassing the Duke''s daughter, but in actuality, he simply helped her figure find the way back to the banquets that were held by the king.


    Such a situation caused the Crafbinder family lots of problems through the following years.


    And the worst ident that ever has happened was that a gift from the Crafbinder was sold to another enemy nation which turned the tights in a battlefield.


    Although the king quickly realized that it wasn¡ät the Crafbinder family''s fault, that wasn¡ät much of an excuse for the other noble families.


    And what Samuel probably thinks is that I sold this sword to someone else, thus betraying this trust that he ced upon me... this only friend.


    Throwing the white shirt to the ground, a massive white scar could be seen through Allen''s chest.


    "W-Wha- How did that happen!?" Seeing the scar that went from this elbow until this pelvis. He felt a chill running through this body.


    "Are you stupid Allen!? How did that Undead manage to hurt you so much!?"


    Allen simply shook this hands helplessly.


    "The Draugr used the martial art of [Wind de]. As I didn¡ät expect the undead to be capable to use such a skill, but it was toote when I realized..."


    Hearing that Samuel started to scream at him to the point that the nearby maids could hear him.


    "Are you crazy!? If the [Wind de] was just a little stronger you would even be cut in half!"


    After staying silent for a moment, Allen calmly answered.


    "I didn¡ät want to disappoint you... Since this was the first gift that you gave me, I wanted to show you that I can be trusted...sorry."


    Hearing that Samuel''s hands slightly trembled.


    "You...Agh! Forget it! Never do such a stupid thing again like risking your life for just an iron sword with such low-tier runes!"


    "Well...I didn¡ät n to actually get hurt..." Allen scratched this head in embarrassment.


    "Sigh...And here I thought only Merrick was an idiot, but there you prove me wrong."


    "What do you mean an idiot!? Did you just called me an idiot!?"


    "You question me proves my point you idiot" Turning this back, Samue opened the door and said without turning this back.


    "Anyways...Why are you still naked? Pack your things up and let¡äs head to the capital. Otherwise, Merrick will annoy us to death."


    *Baahm


    Standing in front of the door, Samuel murmured lowly.


    "A friend, huh..."


    *****


    Inside the shaman''s cave.


    [You gained 800 Experience Points through training]


    "I guess that should be enough..." After ncing at the report for a second, I quickly dismissed it.


    "How much time has passed...?"


    After thinking about the time that has passed I quickly realized something that made me worry.


    "My sense of time is getting worse...Status."


    "Status"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Level: 10


    Race: Draugr (Undead)


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.7]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 1250/1250


    Mana: 23/230


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 39 Agility: 30 Intelligence: 23 Endurance: 24


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash] [PiercingLv.1] [Wind de Lv.1]


    [Remark: With your evolution of stepping through the Tier 2 Undead Although there is still a long way to reach. Your evolution broke the fate of you being as weak as a in rock!]


    [XP: 136500 XP]


    "Wait...136500 XP!?" Seeing the number I was bbergasted!


    H-How long have I been down here!? I even went out to explore for several hours for the sake of taking a break!


    T-This can¡ät continue!


    I must leave!

 Chapter 32 - Class Advancement

    "Damn I feel rich! With 136500 XP I will finally able to upgrade my skills!"


    Full of excitement, I open the status window.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Level: 10


    Race: Draugr (Undead)


    ss: [Undead Warrior Lv.7]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 1250/1250


    Mana: 24/230


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 39 Agility: 32 Intelligence: 23 Endurance: 31


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness]


    [Skills] [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash] [PiercingLv.1] [Wind de Lv.1]


    [Remark: With your evolution of stepping through the Tier 2 Undead Although there is still a long way to reach. Your evolution broke the fate of you being as weak as a in rock!]


    [XP: 136500]


    "Alright, now is the time to focus." I walked towards the stone table and sat on top of it.


    "Alright, Let¡äs not get ahead and spend everything on pointless stuff." I quickly calmed down and started to think what the best use of all this XP is.


    "Since my evolution was at level 10, shouldn¡ät my ss also get upgraded when it reaches level 10? Since it is rtively cheap with my current XP storage."


    Upgrading my ss from level 7 to level 10 wasn¡ät that expensive. It only cost me 3600 XP for me to reach level 10, although it was quite a lot for my past self.


    For the current me it was nothing!


    [Undead Warrior level has increased from Lv.7 to Lv.8]


    [Undead Warrior level has increased from Lv.8 to Lv.9]


    [Undead Warrior level has increased from Lv.9 to Lv.10]


    Strength Increased by 6, Agility Increased by 3 and Endurance Increased by 3]


    [You gained 3 Attribute Points]


    [You reached the maximum level of the Undead Warrior ss!]


    [In order to advance into a higher tier ss a mission has been assigned]


    [Mission: Increase your skill [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1] to level 10 to unlock the ss advandged]


    "So it isn¡ät the same as the race evolution, huh? Even a requirement has to be met to upgrade my ss. Well, it doesn¡ät sound difficult."


    Without much of an expression (Not like I can make one, heh) I quickly pressed the upgrade button of the [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.1]


    Since every upgrade cost 100 more in total the amount I need was 13500 XP in total.


    [Lower Weapon Mastery level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv.2]


    [Lower Weapon Mastery level has increased from Lv.2 to Lv.3]


    [Lower Weapon Mastery level has increased from Lv.3 to Lv.4]


    ...


    [Lower Weapon Mastery level has increased from Lv.9 to Lv.10]


    [The Skill Lower Weapon Mastery reached this maximum level]


    [Lower Weapon Mastery Lv.10 turns into Intermediate Weapon Mastery Lv.1]


    [Intermediate Weapon Mastery Lv.1]: Your knowledge of weapons allows you to effectively use all kinds of weapons and to some extent predict your enemy actions.


    "..." Though upgrading 9 whole levels towards a skill, the information that was put in my head made me dazed for a whole minute.


    "Tch... I should even upgrade it slower...now I got a headache." After waiting for a minute for the headache to go away I continued through my ss advancement.


    [Mission Completed! ss Advantaged is unlocked]


    [Undead Spell de]


    [Undead Swordsman]


    [Undead Guardian]


    [Undead Lancer]


    [Undead Mercenary]


    "Wow, instead of three choices I get five on my ss change? Let¡äs see what every ss has to offer..."


    When I opened to see the description of the various sses, I realized that...


    "Ugh..why is there so much text?"


    After taking my time to read through the sses I pondered what to choose.


    "The Spell de is the same ss as this Rapha guy which focuses on magic and sword, which make them a caster and a melee fighter at the same time. But at the cost of neither mastering the arts of magic or the sword..."


    If I were to take this bath I will probably unlock skills simr to my wind de, although it sounds attractive it basically makes you good at every situation but weaker against someone that mastered the arts of magic or of weapon mastery...


    As for the Swordman ss, it is basically what it sounds like. Mastering the way of the sword and only the sword.


    Simr to the Lancer and Guardian ss. While the Lancer masters the spear and the Guardian the Sword and Shield.


    If I were to summarize these three sses it would be either the Lancer or the Swordman as pure offensive. With the Guardian ss being in the middle of those two, good at defense and offense.


    "Hmm... the mercenary ss also sounds interesting... Being able to use multiple weapons at the same time doesn¡ät sound so bad, but it has the same problem with the Spell de ss."


    Basically a jack of all trades master of none!


    "Ugh, why do I have to choose only 1!? Can¡ät I have them all?" scratching my skull with my hand I felt like I was in a dilemma.


    "Alright, let''s eliminate the Lancer and the Mercenary out of the game early on. I already like using the sword instead of the spear and the mercenary doesn¡ät sound that attractive.


    At best the ss sounded exotic.


    "Now, with those gone only Spell de, Swordman and Guardian remain..." Since I don`t have a time limit like the evolution it allowed me to think about the choice carefully.


    And about 1 hourter I finally decided to pick my ss!


    [Your ss changed from Undead Warrior Lv.10 to Undead Guardian Lv.1]


    [You gained 5 Endurance and unlocked various skills!]


    [You gained the skill Sense Danger Lv. 1]


    "Status"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Level: 10


    Race: Draugr (Undead)


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 2000/2000


    Mana: 43/230


    Attribute Points: 3


    Attributes: Strength: 45 Agility: 35 Intelligence: 23 Endurance: 39


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness]


    [Skills] [Intermediate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.1] [Shield Bash] [PiercingLv.1] [Wind de Lv.1] [Sense Danger Lv. 1]


    [Remark: With your evolution of stepping through the Tier 2 Undead Although there is still a long way to reach. Your evolution broke the fate of you being as weak as a in rock!]


    "Sigh... seems like only when my race evolves I get to experience this heavy feeling of pleasure again." Although I felt a little disappointed by it, I didn¡ät think much of it.


    Me choosing the guardian ss wasn¡ät an easy one.


    Although I was mostly interested in the spell de ss since it used magic, I quickly dismissed the idea of bing one.


    The reason why I didn¡ät choose this ss was mostly caused by the human named Rapha. Remembering our fight back then there was a clear difference between our swordy. If for example Rapha had this 45 intelligence somewhere else disrupted I would even not have a change, to begin with.


    Just imaging him fighting an opponent with 90 strength would even be absurd!


    There was only death against such an opponent!


    But fortunately, he had put these stats into intelligence to be able to use magic. Although this magic was powerful, it wasn¡ät able to kill me at point-nk range. Thus making me abandon the idea of magic now.


    As for not choosing the swordsman ss...


    It was mostly through preference!


    Like, I already had a skill that needed a shield in order to be used!


    Yes, I am talking about the [Shield Bash] skill!


    It already proved this usefulness and letting it rot in the skill bar for all my eternity will be unpleasant to see.


    It was simr to a feeling when you get a really rare item in an MMO but cause of your ss you can¡ät equipped it!


    Even though you know that this item is really good, they are no point if you can¡ät use it!


    You will simply look at it frustrated!

 Chapter 33 - New Mission And Gate

    "Sense Danger...being able to perceive danger? Sound like a passive skill..."


    "119400 XP left to use... Let¡äs see the cost of everything this first and then decided..."


    [Skills]


    [Level Up]: 3500


    [ss Level Up]: 4500


    [Intermedite Weapon Mastery Lv.1]: 6700


    [Miasma Corruption Lv.1]: 6000


    [Sprint Lv.1]: 1200


    [Piercing Lv.1]: 1700


    [Shield Bash]: 1700


    [Wind de Lv.1]: 11000


    [Sense Danger Lv.1]: 5000


    [Curse of Vigor Lv.0]: 2375


    "That¡äs a lot of Lv. 1 that I see there. Heck, the XP needed to level up increased by a whole another level!" Seeing the XP needed for all of this stuff I couldn¡ät help but curse internally.


    Striking when you see my wallet full, huh?


    "But still, it doesn¡ät look like I unlocked other skills to buy from my ss advantage. Welp, nothing to be done I guess. I will just settle with the skills I got."


    Although I said that I didn¡ät n to increase the level of my skills first.


    If I weren¡ät going to spend my XP to increase my skills level, then where will I spend it you ask?


    Obviously.


    To Increase my Level!


    My goal...Level 20!


    ...


    No, it isn¡ät because I am addicted to the evolution feeling!


    Although I neither confirm nor denied it, I have a reason to increase my level!


    Realy!


    My goal isn¡ät to increase my attributes.


    My true goal is to unlock the sub-ss!


    Although it is just a guess, I believe that at level 20 I can finally get my sub-ss!


    "Even if it isn¡ät at level 20, it has to be at best at level 23. If that Rapha guy who blew me away was able to get a subss at the level of 23, then so should I..." Raising my hand I pressed towards the level-up screen.


    [Level has increased from Lv.10 to Lv.11]


    [Strenght Increased by 2, Agility Increased by 2, Intelligence Increased by 1, Endurance Increased by 2]


    [You gained 2 Attribute points]


    [Level Up]: 4000


    "Oh? The attribute gains are a lot higher than before, even my intelligence increases now. Is it because of my evolution?" Seeing the attributes I got a little excited, but all that excitement has gone the moment I saw the +500 XP raise to level up...


    Man, I know that you are after my wallet, but would it hurt to do it moderately!?


    "Tch...It isn¡ät showing any mercy on my wallet..." Although I somehow felt grumpy about it. I had no other choice but to pay!


    [Level has increased from Lv.11 to Lv.12]


    [Level has increased from Lv.12 to Lv.13]


    ...


    [Level has increased from Lv.19 to Lv.20]


    [Strenght Increased by 18, Agility Increased by 18, Intelligence Increased by 9, Endurance Increased by 18]


    [You gained 2 Attribute Points]


    A total of 57500 XP spend in an instant!


    But the pain that my wallet felt...


    [In order to choose your Subss, a mission has been assigned]


    Was worth it!


    [Mission: Kill someone who has a tier 2 ss or a subss to unlock the subss option]


    Reading through the mission I could only think of one thing...


    "Ah, crap..." Seeing the mission I somehow felt bitter inside of me.


    I hyped myself so much only to get an `ess denied¡ä like answer!?


    "Sigh...No point feeling upset over spilled milk. What is done is done."


    Pushing away from the mission window, I looked at my XP storage.


    [XP: 61900]


    "Damn...I almost spend half the XP into this." I helplessly shook my head.


    "I could increase my ss level but I will pass this time around. After all, the skill also does need some love."


    Without further ado, I started investing in my XP!


    [You acquired Curse of Vigor Lv:1]


    [Wind de level increase from Lv.1 to Lv.3]


    [Shield Bash level Increased from Lv.1 to Lv.4]


    [Sense Danger level Increased from Lv.1 to Lv. 3]


    [Sprint level increased from Lv.1 to Lv.3]


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Level: 20


    Race: Draugr (Undead)


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 3000/3000


    Mana: 310/310


    Attribute Points: 23


    Attributes: Strength: 65 Agility: 55 Intelligence: 31 Endurance: 59


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness]


    [Skills] [Intermediate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.3] [Shield Bash Lv.4] [PiercingLv.1] [Wind de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Vigor Lv:1]


    [Remark: With your evolution of stepping through the Tier 2 Undead Although there is still a long way to reach. Your evolution broke the fate of you being as weak as a in rock!]


    "Alright, that should probably be enough for now. The rest 16825 XP I can save for rainy days. Wait...what was rain again...?"


    Staring awarding through the cave ceiling I felt something was missing all of a sudden.


    After some 5 long minutes, I got hold of myself.


    "Right! I should prepare to leave" Getting of the stone table I gathered my thinks and went outside the cave.


    "Alright!"


    "Shield?" Check.


    "Staff?" Check.


    "Rusted armor?" Check.


    "Awesome self-repair sword named Veren?" Check!


    "I guess that¡äs it..." I slightly turned my head towards the shaman''s cave.


    "Although it wasn¡ät that long (I think)...It wasn¡ät that bad of a ce to be"


    With my shield on my left hand holding the casters staff and with my right arm holding the Veren sword I headed out fully equipped with some rusted armor from the head through toe!


    You might ask where I got this garb- I mean armor from right?


    Once upon these days when I was doing my breaks, I headed back into theke to meet the skeleton that I freed before.


    I mostly went out to meet him out of boredom but once I went back to the ce he was trapped at I found no traces from this skeleton.


    Although I felt somehow disappointed I mostly did it out of boredom so I didn¡ät mind too much.


    But as I was going back to the surface a sudden idea hit me while looking at all the rusted armor down here.


    And you guess right, I equipped the armor from the bottom of theke into myself!


    Since there was a vast amount of armor down there it made it possible to fully equipped me with rusted armor!


    Not the best stuff.


    But hey, Isn¡ät it better than just some piece of cloth that some goblins wore?


    *2 Hours Later...


    "Finally at the top floor where I was blown away..." Since my Agility has increased quite a lot it allowed me to reach the top floor faster than I had done before.


    "Hmm, No sight of the Rapha guy or anything else...seems good to go" Walking away from the rock I was hiding at, I went out and explored the top floor.


    But...


    "There isn¡ät much to explore with only 1 path in sight. I somehow expected to see a simr number of paths at the top floor too but it doesn¡ät look like that is the case..."


    After hesitating for a brief second, I walked towards the path.


    "It should be fine...even If I were to meet this Rapha guy I should be able to easily win with my current self, the worst-case scenario I will have to run and dive to theke again..."


    After assuring myself I walked towards the path.


    After walking for some amount of time I froze through the sight that I was seeing.


    "That is a massive fricking gate!"


    After all, a 10 meter high and wide iron door was in front of my sight!


    *****


    Outside the city of Nexvarres.


    In the nearby forest of Nexvarres was a guard post that was ced at the Cursed Lake Dungeon.


    A big orb inside a magic circle trembled.


    And the orb started to make low noise.


    *Ping, Ping~


    Although slowly, the noise started to increase over time.


    *Ping! Ping~!


    Hearing that noise a soldier came and frown upon the sight of the orb


    "What the....?"

 Chapter 34 - That Isn′t A Goblin!

    "What the...why is the orb making noise all suddenly?" Seeing the orb in the circle, Alon frowned slightly.


    Alon was a young man of the age of 19. He was 1.85 meters tall and had a brown hair color which wasmonly seen in the Berum Kingdom.


    He recently joined the guard post at the cursedke dungeon. With only 2 years of training, he managed to join the ranks at the guard post in the forest.


    Being able to join the ranks of the guard post was seen as a rtively high achievement for themon man. After all, joining them means having the ability to fight against the monsters of the dungeon.


    Cause of this reason Alon was treated as a rookie with a bright future.


    "Hey~! Do you guys know why this orb is making such noise?"


    Hearing the voice of Alon, three men with the same armor as Alon which currently were ying cards turned around and taken a look at the orb.


    Hearing the orb the three men scorned out loud out of annoyment and continued ying their game.


    "Forget about it Alon, it¡äs nothing important to look at. We just finished our game and we need another yer, so instant of watching this boring thinge over and join us."


    Seeing that Maike, a muscr man in thiste 30 calling him out, he scratched his neck awarding and joined them too.


    Being with men as old as this father made Alon behave awkwardly towards them.


    Although he knew that this was a good man. The age differences between these groups were not easy to ignore.


    With a shy face, he asked.


    "So what are you guys ying now?"


    Seeing the young man Alon getting interested in the game, Maike cleared this throat and started exining.


    "Cough, cough, What we are going to y is called "Games" which needs 2 teams."


    "Games...? Like, the game is called games?"


    Seeing the loss of interest in the face of Alon Maike hastily started to exin.


    "Ah, it''s nothing difficult of a game, here I show you." He picked the deck of the cards and started to deal with everyone''s cards.


    "Well, for starters this is a team-based game. So you are sadly forced to team up with the fool opposite to you."


    Hearing that, the man opposite to Alon named Derrick frown and asked threately.


    "Who are you calling a fool, Maike...!?"


    "You of course! Now let me exin."


    Seeing Maike ignore the disbelief look of Derrick he couldn¡ät help but smile wryly.


    "Now hear me good kind cause I ain¡ät going to exin twice alright?" Ignoring the background curses Maike started to exin.


    "So after teaming up everyone gets 4 cards each and 4 cards are ced at the table. The cards on the table can only be reced by one of your own cards. And when everyone is satisfied with their cards we rece the cards with new ones. Got it yet?


    "Yeah, I mostly understood what you said. But what¡äs the goal of recing the cards and how do you win?"


    "It isn¡ät as difficult as you think. It is rather simple. When you got 4 of the same cards in hand you simply have to make a sign which notifies your teammate that you have 4 of the same cards. If your teammate says out loud "Games" while having 4 of the same cards. Your team wins. But if the other team realizes that you have 4 of the same and calls first "Stop games" The opposite team wins. Got it?"


    "I think so..."


    Seeing Alon nodding this head Maikeugh out loud.


    "Hahaha! I like you boy, You with Derrick and me with Myke. We are betting 10 silver into this!"


    "Wait, what...?" Before Alon realize what was happening, there were already 30 silver coins on the table.


    "Wait we are betting on this!? Sorry but I am out..." As Alon wanted to stand up and leave this bunch.


    A hand was ced on these shoulders simr to when a snake caught this prey in order to eat it right away.


    It was Derrick.


    "Man Alon, don¡ät ruin the mood so suddenly. I heard that your wife is pregnant right?"


    Hearing being mention, Alon''s eye brown twitched.


    "Well, I am just saying but wouldn¡ät it be nice to give her a gift to celebrate when the child is born?"


    Hearing Alon couldn¡ät help but freeze on the spot. Just imagine the smile that this wife would make made him smile unconsciously.


    "Fine...I will just y 1 game."


    Hearing that, all three of them had a smile simr to a wolf.


    Seeing the sheep walking right to their mouths they couldn¡ät help but grin viciously.


    But as Alon had this hand on these silver coins. A loud voice came from behind.


    "You idiots! How dare you guys y cards while being on duty!" A man with red hair and a beard with a height of 1.95 meters shouted towards the group.


    Seeing this the three clicked their tongue.


    "Tch, the red bear came."


    "We even were so close...."


    "Damm bear..."


    But the reaction of Alon was quite different out of these 3.


    "C-Captain Reck! I..." Alon tried to salute but miserly failed.


    Seeing the young man being so polite he nodded this head and smile slightly, but this smile instantly went away when he saw what was going to happen.


    "You fools, aren¡ät you guys too shameless to rip off the new rookie as seniors?"


    "W-We didn¡ät n to rip him off! We were just going to y a game..."


    "Yeah right," Captain Reck rolled this eyes hearing this.


    But then he noticed a strange voice.


    *Ping! Ping


    Hearing this noise, he turned around and looked at the orb with a frown on this face.


    "When did this started to make noise..."


    The group of four looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders.


    "Well, around 5 mins ago?" Alon answered.


    "Why didn¡ät you guys report this to me?"


    "It is probably just a lone goblin by the sound that the orb is making, so we didn¡ät bother to report it..."


    "Why are you guys even here if you don¡ät do your job! Stand up and call the others! Bring the crossbows too!" Seeing their enraged captain giving them orders they all stood up and followed their orders.


    The confused Alon couldn¡ät help but ask Maike what was going on.


    "Oh yeah, I guess I forgot to tell you. You see, when the orb is making noise it means that a monster is near the gate on the dungeon. The slower it repeats the noise, the lower the number of monsters there are."


    "Ehm...Isn¡ät that important to report?" Realizing what the orb was for, he couldn¡ät help but frown towards Maike.


    "Well, usually yes but when the noise repeated itself in a slow rhythm it means that there is only 1 monster behind the gate, which usually is just a goblin or a skeleton."


    "Stop talking already and follow the orders!" Seeing this two talking he realized some killing intent towards them.


    "Yes, Captain!"


    *10 minutester...


    At front of the gate were 20 men with the same looking armor with some having crossbows while others used spears.


    "Has everyone gather already Maike?"


    "Yes, Captain Reck! Everyone has gathered and is ready to head inside!"


    "Alright, as you guys should know we are going inside the dungeon though detecting a foreign threat at the front of the gate! Though the recent increase of security we are ordered to eliminate it at the moment of notice!"


    "Now, starting with the strategy we are going to take..." Before Captain Reck could even continue a loud noise came behind the gate.


    *Boohm.


    "What the..." Seeing the gate shake for a moment and dusting out Captain Reck frowned.


    *Boohm!


    "Captain Reck! The barrier on the gate is breaking out!


    "What!? How can something damage the barrier of the gate?


    *Twich!


    Some light appeared from a moment to only disappear the next moment.


    "Sir! The barrier broke down!"


    "This isn¡ät a goblin! Hurry call the Darcy mansion and call lord Rapha for reinforcements! This thing must be...!


    But sadly, before Captain Reck could finish this line, the gate broke apart and a wind de made out of mana flew towards Alon.


    Seeing that, Captain Reck''s legs glowed and jumped towards Alon.


    "Move you shitty brat!" Saying that he pushed Alon out of the way.


    "Huh?"


    As he wanted to question this captain as to why he pushed him by such force.


    He froze at the sight of this Captain''s headless corpse standing at the ce where he was.


    "How...?" As he wanted to question what just happened.


    A figure came outside the gate.


    `A skeleton?¡ä


    But after taking a better look Alons face palled.


    "Humans..." With a cold voice and a runed sword.


    A Draugr came out.

 Chapter 35 - Outside And I Killed You By Mistake

    The headless corpse fell to the ground near where Alon was. which resulted in him being sshed by the blood that wasing out of the corpse.


    In front of this gory sight, every single soldier present had a paled expression on their face. But Alon''s whole body was telling, unable to ept the current reality that was currently happening in front of him.


    Realizing that the captain sacrificed himself to save him. Alon felt horrible and even started ming himself.


    "S-Sorry, cause of me captain has..." As tears were starting to form in these eyes. He felt a sudden grip on this right shoulder.


    "What are you doing you moron! Stand up before it''s toote!" Being suddenly ordered by Maike, Alon unconsciously standards up through the habits he formed through all the harsh training he received in thest 2 years in the army.


    "Sir Maike, cause of me Captain has.." But he could even finish he received a punch from Maike in this face.


    "You FOOL! This isn''t the time to grief right now! Don''t you see this thing charging another of these projectiles!? If you don''t want to let your unborn child be without any father then move your ass!"


    Hearing that Alon''s shaking body froze almost instantly.


    *Tseeeen!


    The draugr swung this sword in the direction of the soldiers. At the end of the de. the gathered mana was send flying which created loud find sounds.


    Seeing the air deing at them they finally waken up from the previews shock.


    "Q-Quick! Everyone Sprea-" But as the second inmand was about to give orders.


    The air de cleaves through him and a soldier which we''re behind him to half.


    That sight resulted in everyone''s panic.


    "Martial arts!?"


    "It''s a Tier 2 Undead! We can''t win!"


    "Quickly call Sir Rapha!"


    "I wasn''t told that I will fight against something like that!"


    Naturally, all those negative thoughts affected Alon too.


    ''I can''t die here! I ain''t allowed to die here! For the sake of my Wife...! For the sake of my child!''


    Gripping this sword even harder than before, he prepared to face the armored Draugr to death.


    He stepped slightly forward, directly ring at the Draugr eyes, which in this perspective the Draugr looked no different as the legendary Death Knight that he read in books about.


    A full armored Skeleton with eyes that seemed like they were directly looking at your soul...


    As Alon was about to step forward to face the Draugr.


    He was pulled back by Maike.


    "Alon! Hurry and go to themunication device to call Sir Rapha!"


    "But.."


    "This an Order Alon! Now go!"


    Hearing that Alon could only stay silent and follow the orders.


    Not only was an order for a superior, but also the self-sacrifice Maike was willing to make.


    Seeing the young man getting out of here Maike smiled bitterly.


    `I am such an idiot...`


    "Everyone! Prepare to engage! Crossbow to the left and right! Those with melee weapons spread around and charge! This isn¡ät yet the end of us!"


    As a veteran who worked for more than 10 years in the guard post, he was well acknowledged through theserades. If it weren¡ät for the fact that this actual strength was about the same as everyone else he would long be the second inmand or even the Captain of the guard post.


    Seeing the determination among the soldier faces.


    The draugr opened this mouth and scoffed with this cold voice.


    "Hah....Interesting."


    The stone-ground under the Draugr feet grumbled.


    And the next moment.


    The living shed with the undead


    ***


    Now let''s go 10 min back in time.


    Inside the Cursed Lake Dungeon, right behind the gate which connected to the outside.


    There was a moron of a Draugr screaming at a door...


    "What the hell! Why is that gate so fricking massive!?"


    What kind of people go through this gate for it to be so massive!?


    Don¡ät tell me...


    Is the outside ruled by giants!?


    Then...aren¡ät I just an ant?


    Scary!


    Such a thought is too scary!


    Even though I am currently the strongest inside here, that doesn¡ät mean this will stay the same behind the gate!


    "Should I...stay?"


    After a moment of hesitation, I quickly disbanded that idea entirely.


    "No~no, If I do that I will be no different than a big fish in a small pond.


    But in my case, it would be more like a big fish inside a small pond that has no fish! I can¡ät let that happened!"


    Though the several days that I have gone out of the casters cave cause of boredom I quickly realized that there are no more goblins to see!


    Cause they are dead!


    I wonder why though...


    "Hmm, I guess if I wait long enough some Draugr might appear through theke...but if I remember right, in order for a skeleton to evolve into a draugr needs several years which I don¡ät have the patience to wait for!"


    Even If I were to wait wouldn¡ät it suck that the newly appeared draugr would be after my head?


    Even if I were going to reason with the draugr wouldn¡ät be awfully awkward for me?


    Like.


    `Hey man, congrattions on your evolution.¡ä


    `Oh, me? Ah, I simply waited several decades so that I will be able to have a conversation after so many decades of waiting.¡ä


    Like hell I can say that!


    I quickly shook my head out of these thoughts.


    "Tch...If I were to continue staying here I might lose something that I might never be able to regain..."


    Of course, I am talking about my sanity.


    I have long realized that I started talking more to myself.


    "Sigh...for now let¡äs just see what is behind that massive gate. Everything else goes after that."


    Walking towards the gate, I reached my hand and ced my palm at the gate.


    But as I were to touch the wood part of the gate.


    My palm instead touched an invisible wall.


    "????"


    The heck is that...?


    Walking a step behind, I swung the Veren sword towards the gate. Only to be bounced off by the invisible wall.


    "Something is not quite right..." By internally calling out the status


    I saw what this invisible wall is.


    [Low-Tier-Physicall Barrier]: A barrier that has been cast so that it can permanently stay in ce. Although the size of the spell is quite amazing.


    The spell effect is mainly focused to defend against physical attacks. By reducing the magic resistance of the spell, the mage that put this spell managed to reduce the mana consumption needed for this spell to function. The mage that ced this spell here is as amazing as he is idiotic.


    "So that is why my sword didn¡ät manage to inflict some damage. It''s a barrier focused at defending melee attacks."


    `I guess the magic caster who ced this spell here thought that they are only goblin and skeletons in this cave.¡ä


    Walking five meters away from the barrier I raised my sword and mocked the one that made this spell.


    "Is just like what the description said. The magic caster is amazingly stupid. To think someone who can put a barrier covering this massive gate would..."


    Ethereal green mana flowed through my body into the Veren sword.


    "Forget about magic resistance!" The mana that was flowing like waves shoot out of the runic de at created a dense air de supported through mana!


    [Wind de Lv.3]


    *Btchhhh!


    With the air, the de crashed towards the barrier. The whole barrier surrounding the 10-meter tall gate was shaken and created a loud noise.


    With my [Wind de Lv.3] now upgraded, not only did I gain the knowledge on how to effectively guide the mana to the sword. But it also made me realize how to make the waves of mana denser and stronger.


    The end result was of course a stronger air de that was easier to control and to make!


    Truly worth this money!


    Although the whole barrier shook, it didn¡ät break.


    "So one blow wasn¡ät enough...how about another one!"


    *Btchhhh!


    *Btchhhh!


    Air des after air des, after a total of 5 [Wind de Lv.3], the whole barrier broke as it was made out of ss and turned into blue particles.


    "I am not done yet!"


    Seeing the barrier break I was full of excitement!


    At first, I had doubts if I were even able to break the barrier, but it turns out it broke!


    "Let¡äs see how sturdy the gate ispared to the barrier!"


    [Wind de Lv.3]!


    *Fsheeen!


    The air de flew towards the gate.


    And unexpectedly, the air de made a huge hole in the middle of the gate and continued flying to who knows where.


    "Well, that was kind of disappointing. I thought that it would be at least as strong as the barri-"


    [You gained 1400 XP]


    "Wut?"


    Wait, where did that XPe from!?


    "I didn¡ät kill anyone thoug- Ah!"


    I ran towards the whole that my [Wind de Lv.3] made.


    Stepping outside, the first thing that hit me was the bright sunlight. And that made me freeze and look up in the clear blue sky.


    "So beautiful..."


    But as I was immersed into this sight...


    It sadly got ruined by the next thing that I heard...


    "Captain!"


    I turned my head around and what I meet was a group of humans looking towards me and a headless corpse.


    "Humans...."

 Chapter 36 - Massacre

    Seeing the headless corpse falling to the ground I had realised what just happened.


    And I was bbergasted!


    "So that¡äs where the XP came from... I literally headshot that guy!"


    `I didn¡ät even mean to do that!¡ä


    "Nheless, they have quite the number... around 20?" Slowly raising the Veren sword.


    Mana started to flow through my body into the sword.


    "Firstly...let¡äs confirm their capabilities. If there are too many to handle I will have to rethink my actions."


    With my [Wind de] fully charged, the question where...


    `Who should I target first...?¡ä


    As I was troubling myself on who to choose. Someone seemed to volunteer.


    "Quick! Everyon-"


    Him!


    *Tseeeen!


    If you don¡ät know who to choose, go for the loudest!


    `Fortunately, though, the guy didn¡ät even manage to dodge my wind de and simply stood there waiting to be cleaved in half.


    As for the other poor guy who stood behind him...


    Let¡äs call it coteral damage.


    [You gained 1300 XP]


    [You gained 1200 XP]


    `With the amount of XP that those guys give, it''s no better that guy Raphackeys. Heck, they might as well be weaker than those.¡ä


    As I was making about to move towards the group.


    Like a chain reaction, the moment I cleaved these two guys with my wind de all of them screamed out loudly which made me startle for a moment.


    "Martial Arts?"


    "Quick, call sir Rapha!"


    "I wasn¡ät told that I will fight against something like that!"


    "..."


    `What are you guys screaming about!? Haven¡ät you ever see some cleaved in half bodies with all their guts to inly see?¡ä


    Nevertheless, one of these guys did say something interesting though.


    "Rapha...if they want to call him then that means that he isn¡ät here right now." That means one less worry to worry about! Although my current me should be stronger than him. This magic would have been quite troublesome with those meat shields in my way...


    While I was thinking about Rapha''s magic.


    I suddenly noticed someone making a step towards me.


    "Hmm...?"


    Taking a closer look at the one I felt intrigued by him.


    Which I thought was quite a weird thing...


    This human...


    Had the same armor like all the other soldiers.


    The same weapon as the others.


    He even had the same fearful expression on this face.


    By one nce he would seem like all the other humans among him or even inferior!


    Since he seemed a lot younger than the others, that should also speak about this strength.


    If someone elsewhere to take a look at him he would simply say "He isn¡ät any special".


    And that would mostly be the truth.


    But If you were going to ask me, I would say he is special.


    With the same armor and weapon as the others. There is no difference between the other soldiers and him.


    With the same fear as the others, he walks towards me.


    Although some other soldier had done the same and taken a stance towards me.


    He was different.


    I could somehow tell that he was different than the others.


    That was because of this gaze.


    Or rather these eyes.


    As if he had something to protect which was worth putting this life on the line...


    `What is that feeling... why do I feel...some kinship towards him...¡ä


    Tightening the grasp of the hilt, the same burning feeling that I was feeling started to flow through my body.


    But instead of the usual burning feeling, that was spread through my whole body. This time all the burning feeling was focused in one ce.


    It felt as if someone was grasping your whole being while tingling this grip.


    Ignoring the pain, I unconsciously said.


    "It¡äs the same..."But as I said a strong headache came into my mind, which resulted in my vision being blurred.


    "What is happening..." As I was about to scream with all my might...


    [Y** **** **s **e* *o***b** stabil***]


    The moment this bizarre message appeared.


    All the burning feelings dispirited together with the headache.


    Instead of feeling any pain anymore.


    I felt rather refreshed!


    "What has just happ-" As I was still confused by all this.


    I noticed that the young man that I saw before has been reced with an older-looking soldier.


    "Everyone! Prepare to engage! Crossbow to th-"


    Seeing the soldiers regain their focus and moving to surround me by themand of this old man. It made me grin slightly.


    `So you are themander, huh?¡ä


    "Hah, quite of bold of you to make yourself know, at least this makes it more interesting that simple be ughtered! [Sprint]!"


    Reinforcing my legs with my mana, I dashed forward aiming at themander!


    "Shoot him before he reaches us!" The soldiers asmanded, pointed their crossbows at me and fired at me at the same time.


    But with my current speed thanks to the skill [Sprint].


    4 out of 7 arrows missed.


    But even though my speed was probably to another level than those soldiers.


    The crossbows arrows were still way faster than me. Thus letting 3 arrows hit my right shoulder, my chest, and my shield.


    And with the state that was my current armor and shield...


    They didn¡ät manage to hold up...


    "Dammit, do you know how much time it took me to find armor though that damke!"


    Seeing not only my shield getting destroyed but also big pieces of my armor to fall of. I gritted my teeth and activated [Sin of Wrath].


    With the dark green ethereal aura flowing through my body and with the increase of bloodlust.


    All the soldiers couldn¡ät help but flinch.


    "You filthy undead~! Die!"


    Being finally in range of the soldiers, I easily dodge the pathetic attempts to pierce me with their spears and made quick work out of them.


    "N-No!" Since I was right in the middle of their ranks, the only threat that was the crossbow couldn¡ät get a clear shot at me without risking hitting theirrades.


    Which made it especially easy for me.


    [You gained 1200 XP]


    [You gained 1200 XP]


    [You gained 1200 XP]


    ...


    [You gained 1300 XP]


    "M-Mercy...! Please...!" Ignoring the crying man in front of me. I pierced my Veren sword through this chest. Quickly ending this life.


    "And here I thought that themander would be stronger than the others. But I guess I was wrong..."


    Taking a look at my surroundings, I saw around 19 bodies lying there, lifeless.


    "It didn¡ät even take me 3 minutes to finish all this punch...I guess my recent increase of stats made me."


    I walked back to the gate hole and picked the staff that I threw away while pulling the arrows that were stuck in my armor.


    "I lost about 500hp just from their crossbows. I guess even the weak can be a thread with the right equipment..." But as a result of me pulling the arrows out of my armor. The chest armor fell apart and crumbled into the ground.


    "When I finally becamefortable with the armor, did it had to break...At least there are recements nearby." Looking at the remaining corpses again I grinned bitterly.


    "Sigh...will this be my fate from now on?


    "Stealing the possessions of the dead?"


    "What am I?"


    "A garbage man?"


    Even though I was slightly unwilling to undres- cough cough, I mean to steal their armor.


    But knowing that one guy escaped calling reinforcements. That arsonist Rapha is bound toe here...


    What a headache.


    *Thick, Thick


    "Hmm, the armor does fit me more than I thought..." After getting familiar with the armor, I moved towards what seemed like a road.


    "The fact that there is a road should mean that it leads to where people are..." Taking a better look at the road I noticed some drops of blood on the ground.


    "Weird...why should there be a trail of blood in the middle of the road? Did anyone get hurt before I came..."


    I bent down to my knee and through pure curiosity, I touched the blood from the ground. Feeling this blood with my fingers I unconsciously grinned sinisterly.


    "Hehe...the blood hasn¡ät dried yet! Hehe...Right, there were originally 20 soldiers! This guy should be thest one!"


    Standing up, I began running straight through the road at full speed!


    Each step made some metal noise cause of my newly acquired armor.


    *Thick, Thick


    While I was running with everything that I had, I couldn¡ät help but say bitterly.


    "That guy sure is unfortunate..."


    ***


    "Hah..."


    Sorry!


    "Hah, Hah..."


    Forgive!


    Currently in one of the roads that lead to the city of Nexvarres...


    A young man with a soldier uniform was running with all this strength while this face being full of tears and this body with sweat.


    Such a young man was screaming out loudly for forgiveness.


    "Why did such a thin- Why did something like this show up!"


    The young man named Alon was filled with grief.


    He knew very well what kind of strength the undead was capable of.


    `That thing used martial arts...and out of all kinds of martial arts, it knew the [Wind de] one! There is no way that the others will survive...¡ä


    Although the [Wind de] skill was a pretty average skill among the martial arts. It was for one reason an extremely rare skill to possess.


    Not only did you need to have some mastery on controlling your mana but you also had to be knowledgeable towards the arts of swords.


    Combining two professions to create 1 single skill is an extremely hard thing to do.


    "And yet that thing used it like it was nothing...! Dammit!" Alon dropped on this knew through exhaustion.


    "Even though sir Maike sacrificed and the others sacrificed themself...! I let them die pointlessly!" As tears were continuously falling from this eyes.


    This pocket vibrated for a moment while showing a glimmer of red light.


    Noticing that, Alon hastily took themunication device out of this pocket with a face full of hope.


    "That¡äs it..."


    As he activated the device.


    A loud and harsh voice could be heard from inside the device.


    "Quite...what¡äs the situation"


    "S-Sir Rapha! Please...! When will you be able to arrive!?"


    Hearing the soldier asking the question instead of answering them Rapha, The Captain of the knights of the Darcy family frown slightly.


    But not cause he didn¡ät answer this question, but rather cause the voice of this recruit sounds full of despair.


    `What happened of there...¡ä


    "Recruit, calm down, and report the situation. I will be in 10 minutes over there. What happened to the Undead?"


    After calming down for a second. Alon tried to report what happened.


    "The undead broke through and..."


    But Alon was going to tell Rapha what just happened.


    A sound of wind being cut could be heard through the distance.


    "Huh...?" Turning Alon this head, this face was full of terror.


    *Tseeeeeeeen!


    Alon jumped to the side, barely dodging the iing wind de.


    "How could it be...!?" Seeing the silhouetteing neared by the moment. He runs away from the road and right into the forest.


    But although managed to prevent him from being cleaved in half, he identally dropped themunication devices in the road.


    "Recruit! What happened! Respon~"


    Alon couldn¡ät care less about picking this device.


    There was only one thing that was through this mind.


    And that was fear.


    "There hasn¡ät even been 5 minutes! How could this monster manage..."


    Being able to Massacre a team of 19 soldiers in a matter of fewer than 5 minutes...!


    That thing was a monster!


    *Tick. Tick...


    Sounds of metal meeting the ground were getting closer and closer to Alon''s position.


    "I can¡ät die here...Lacia" While running through the forest, he finally reached a ne field with all kinds of different flowers in the surroundings.


    "Ah, this sight...is simr to..."Alons remembered the memories of the past.


    Of how he confessed to this childhood write in a simr field.


    A ne field with flowers in every direction with arge tree in the middle where they were used to ying around since they were kids.


    `It''s truly simr...`


    The day where the young man confessed two years ago was a simr ce to this.


    "Hey...Lacia"


    He remembers every word that was said on this day.


    The wind that day carried the woman he loved her beautiful long red hair.


    "What¡äs is it Alon? Is it another of your dreams of being an adventurer?"


    He remembers how this face was as red as a tomato was back then.


    A truly embarrassing and blessed day that was.


    "No...Lacia, today I got a gift for you."


    "A gift you say? Hehe, Is it another of those `chocte treats you given me once?"


    She sure was a glutton at that time...


    "No...Lacia this time..." Benting this knee and pulling a small box from this pocket.


    Ahh... that face that she made that day was truly the happiest thing that has ever happened.


    "Will you marry me? Lacia?" Showing the golden ring with a small crystal in it. She began to cry.


    Seeing her cry though made me panic at first but the answer that I got was worth it.


    "Yes...Alon, of cour-"


    *Tseeeeen!


    As if someone cut the connection from these memories with a big scissor.


    Alon felt once again despair.


    But right now...


    He felt more pain.


    "Kaaagh!!"


    Falling through the ground only to see where these legs were supposed to be missing and lot¡äs of blooding out.


    "Found you..." Seeing the Draugring out of the woods.


    He felt fear.


    "I-I can¡ät die in such a ce....!"

 Chapter 37 - Alon Agnet

    "Ghh...! My legs...!" Alon tried to put pressure with this hands in hopes to reduce this blood loss, but the only thing he achieved by doing that was yet even more pain gain.


    "Damnit...! I need to go...back to Lancia...!"


    But as Alon started slowly crawling away. Noises of metal stepping to the ground could be heard from inside the forest.


    Hearing the noise behind him, Alon turned even paler than he was already with the blood loss. Slowly turning this head around, what he saw made this fear turn into despair.


    "I-Impossible...! How? N-No! Why do have that on!?" Picking this sword from the ground he started growling until he hit the only tree that was in this ne field of flowers.


    "Found you..."


    A draugr slowly emerged from the forest, it wears the same armor as therades on the guard post were wearing. The only difference that the armor that the draugr was wearing had blood sshed all around the armor.


    Seeing that very sight that was ying in front of him. Different kinds of emotions went through Alon''s head.


    Fear.


    Anger.


    Despair.


    Seeing an undeading to im your life while both your legs were severed but Alon naturally thought fear of death.


    This anger came from this undead killing theserades and stealing their armor very armor so that it can wear it itself. Not long before he and theserades were just fooling around and ying some card games out of boredom.


    "How did ite to this...!" With shaking hands, he pointed this sword towards the approaching undead. Just keeping the sword in the air relied on all of this remaining strength that was left in him.


    And atst, despair, knowing the fact that he is going to die before he even sees this child be born and letting this wife all alone.


    He despairingly tried to think of a way to get away from this situation but to no avail. Thus, causing him to despair.


    "G-Go away! I can¡ät die yet!"


    After finally, the Draugr neared him. He focused all this strength that he had left in him to deliver a strike into the undead in front of him


    But unfortunately for him, the draugr casually blocked this.


    "Weak..."Putting a little more strength, the Draugr threw Alons sword away from this hand though this strength differents.


    Next, the Draugr raised this staff and hit this palm to the tree. Thuspletely immobilizing Alon.


    "Agh...! Put that damn staff away...!?"


    While ignoring the curses that Alon was saying.


    The draugr ce the tip of this run sword to where this heart was.


    With a cold voice, the Draugr opened this mouth and asked.


    "Why do you struggle...for what?


    Hearing the voice of the undead in front of him, Alon froze like a statue.


    After few seconds of awkward silence. Alon was enraged by this question.


    But also puzzled.


    `What kind of question is that? Isn¡ät it obvious that he doesn¡ät want to die by now?¡ä


    `Why would an undead which hates every living being ask such a question...?¡ä


    Even after thinking for a few moments, Alon couldn¡ätprehend the reason why he was being asked such a question.


    Was he being mocked?


    Pitied?


    Looked down before?


    `Although those cases might be the reason behind this question. This Undead tone sounds like he is seriously asking...¡ä


    Gritting these teeth, Alon answered truthfully towards the undead in front of him.


    "Heh, Why you ask...it¡äs for my family!"


    Hearing that, the ethereal green mes of the Draugr eye trembled for just an instant.


    "I see...." The draugr slightly raised this sword and said with the same cold voice.


    "Unfortunately..."


    The de pierced through the heart of Alon and the tree that he was behind at.


    "For you..." Pierced by the run de, the runes lighten up with a crimson color.


    "Kwah.." With this heart now pierced, Alon started puking blood out of this throat. And slowly but surely, this consciousness started to faint away.


    Seeing the hands full of blood and the de through this heart, he knew that he was done for.


    While being on death''s door.


    Alon remembers the conversations that he had with Lacia this morning.


    "Hey Dear, what would be a good name to name our child?" Lacia said.


    "Well...I would be fine with whatever name you give our child, but if you ask me..."


    "How about Alicia if it is a girl and Alex if it is a boy...?"


    Ah...I shouldn¡ät have told her.


    And with this.


    The man once known as Alon A.


    Has died.


    ***


    Staring at the now dead body of the young soldier.


    Drawing the sword out of this body made me think of the young soldier''s answer.


    "For this family huh..." Although I didn¡ät know the reason why put I somehow felt pitter inside of me.


    But with the feeling quickly going away, my focus went towards the Veren sword.


    "Magic is sure impressive...To be able to restore the sword''s durability just for around 30 mana and some blood." Though the Veren runes that the sword had, allowed me to drain the blood of someone else and with some use of my own mana to restore all the damage that the Veren sword has received.


    "Wait, can I even call that magic? It''s more like the runes job, rather than some kind of spell. Nevertheless, having such a sword in my possession is truly a blessing to have. I wonder what other effects items can have.


    Maybe I might be able to have a full set of armor with the Veren runes carved on them!"


    Just thinking about a whole set of Veren armor got me excited.


    `Not only because the Veren runes are generally convenient to have, but getting my hands of such armor will finally allow me to escape the fate of undressing corpses!¡ä


    "Maybe they might be scrolls simr to the curse of vigor but with runes instead! Now that I think about it, it was indeed a good choice to get out from this goblin-infested cave."


    After finally having some decent equipped on me, it made me realize the importance of them. If I were to stay in that cave I would probably not find items such as the Veren sword or spell scrolls.


    `Heck, I would even risk of bing crazy down or losing my mind down there!¡ä


    While I was thinking about what my next move will be.


    The sun just raised and blinded me for a second.


    "Tch... Although the outside is sure beautiful. There are still things that I need to get used it seems..."


    Cleaning my armor from the blood through the help of the Veren runes.


    I checked my surroundings in case I left something. I put my hand inside my armor to where my ribs were and pulled a map that I had stolen from the soldiers from before.


    If you are wondering how I kept the map inside my ribs, the answer would be easy.


    Simr to how I made the cloth armor back in the cave. I simply tied some cloth between my ribs and with some skillful handwork, I managed to make a hanging cloth bag inside my ribs!


    If I were to say so myself...


    Ingenious!


    "Let`s see... I am currently right here so..." While I was scratching my skull in hopes to make some sense of this map.


    All my bones suddenly twitched through a sense of danger that came behind me.


    Without wasting any time, I quickly rolled to the side.


    The moment I rolled aside.


    A huge me passed through the locations where I was and hit the trees in the forest.


    *Bwaaaah!


    "What the..." As I was bbergasted to what just happened.


    An enraged voice came out of the woods.


    "Bastard!"


    Seeing the man that came outside of the forest.


    I couldn''t help but put a vicious grin on my face.


    "Look who is here...Rapha the arsonist!"


    As the remaining me from before was slowly starting to engulf the nearby trees.


    I once again.


    Met the one who brought me to defeat for the first time.


    "Sooner than I actually nned but..." Pointing the Veren sword towards Rapha.


    "This time!" Dark green ethereal mana started to rise through my body.


    "You shall fall!"

 Chapter 38 - Behold And Be Honored! As This Is My Magic!

    Opposite to each other.


    With their gaze to another and there Mana that was ring through their body''s.


    An awkward silence took ce, where neither party was willing to make the first move.


    Hearing the Draugr deration, Rapha frowned at the draugr that was in front of him.


    "You..." As he was about to question the Draugr in front of him.


    The stalemate between this two was broken once the mana of one party started to move!


    Taking a step back, I lowered the Veren sword and put forward the staff that I got from the goblin caster.


    The next moment, the mana in my body started to circle, going directly to the skull and crystal within.


    Seeing the mana go to the staff instead of the sword. Rapha''s eyes turned wide open.


    ''Magic?''


    Raphael was stunned by this sight.


    After his failure to defend the young master by this draugr, he went this way to research the undead race inside the huge library of the Darcy mansion.


    To be more precise, he mainly researched the Undead called ''Draugrs''.


    Upon this research, he found out that Draugr''s mainly use martial arts skills with rare cases of using shadow and necromancy spells.


    But the true reason he was so surprised by the Draugr in front of him is that it used a staff to use magic.


    Seeing someone using a long sword in one hand while staff in another one was simr to see a unicorn with two horns.


    While Rapha had a frown on this face.


    The spell was already done.


    "Be honored! As you will be the first to experience my magic! [Curse of Vigor]!" The dark crystal showed a small purple light in this center.


    Right after some dark mist came rushing out of the gem with immense speed on Rapha''s location.


    The mist travels so fast that it didn¡ät even take 2 seconds to reach Rapha.


    Seeing the speed that the smoke was approaching him, he was surprised but he didn¡ät show it on the outside.


    Increasing the grip on this sword, he swung at the approaching mist.


    But the moment the dark mist meets with this sword. Instead of the mist dissipating like how smoke would usually do. The sword of Rapha passed through the sword as if the sword wasn¡ät even there!


    Of course, that shocked Rapha.


    "What!?" The mist entered this body and slowly fused through every single muscle of this.


    Rapha was about to panic the moment the mist entered this body, but after feeling just this muscle getting a little tighter together and nothing else.


    He realized the origins of the spell.


    "Curse magic of the necromancy tree...that¡äs why..."


    Curse Magic.


    Known for their odd spell effects and their difficulty to deal with.


    The difference between curse magic and other types of magic is the ability to prate most of any defense that an opponent has.


    Since curse magic is more of a spiritual attack aimed at the enemy''s souls, there are few ways to avoid being cursed.


    But such magic has a devastating weakness.


    That is the range limitation.


    Being able to affect someone''s soul to decrease their body capability isn¡ät as easy as it sounds. Compared to making a small fireball and throw it at the enemy and cursing someone.


    The difference is like heaven and earth.


    Thus the further away the caster is, the more difficult it is to cast a curse.


    With such nature that curse magic has, seeing someone that uses such magic is extremely rare.


    Since if you aren¡ät anything else that a master on the ways of curse magic. You will have no hope of surviving any encounter.


    Being a mage and going near your enemies too simple to use your magic is like begging with your knees on the ground to be killed.


    Curse magic isn¡ät even good for assassination or other kinds of simr works.


    Since the moment you curse your target, you basically announce to the whole world that there is someone a magic caster nearby!


    Such cases can be avoided if you are capable to hide your tracks or dy the activation of the curse, but something like that requires the caster to be a master of magic.


    At least an Archmage that is.


    Of course, that was only if a mage was the one cursing you.


    In an instance of a Tier 2 undead such as Draugr, which is known for their meleebability which is capable to use curse magic is a whole another matter.


    "That thing is a monster abnormally..." Rapha finally remembered the content of thest pace of every book that he read about dungeon monsters.


    In rarer cases, the dungeon for unknown reasons will produce a stronger version of the regr spawned monster which is smarter, stronger, and more evolved than other monsters.


    And in every book that he read till yet named such a monster.


    `A Monster Abnormally¡ä


    "This thing is way too dangerous to stay alive...I need to kill here and now..."


    Rapha threw every other useless thought out of the way and dashed towards the Draugr while moving this mana from this body.


    Seeing Rapha moving towards me I couldn¡ät help but grin viciously.


    "Heh, a magic caster closing up the distance...You truly are arrogant!" I threw the stuff out of the way and held the Veren sword with both of my hands.


    With a swing from the top of my head, both our des met with each other.


    *Thuck!


    Spark flew out through the sh with our des.


    Both of them looked like there were in a stalemate, but that couldn¡ät be further than the truth.


    By a closer look you could see how the Veren sword was slowly, but surely pushing Rapha''s sword.


    Realizing what was happening, Rapha was shocked.


    "You..." But before he could finish this sentence.


    With my cold voice, I said.


    "You weak..."


    *Thk!


    Rapha''s sword was pushed out of the way with pure physical strength.


    And with such an opening right in front of me, there was no way that I was letting this chance go!


    Seeing me swinging at him, Rapha quickly stepped back.


    But that didn¡ät stop my assault on him!


    *Thuck!


    *Thuck!


    Sparks simr to the me that was spreading through the forest could be seen.


    With the echoes of shing metal, Rapha was still on this feet.


    But not unwounded...


    ncing at the blood of the tip of the Veren sword, my grin grew bigger.


    "Look at this blood Rapha, hehe. I wonder from where it came from."


    "You rotting pieces of bones..." Touching this side of the stomach, a sense of pain came. Seeing the small cut that was made and the blood that wasing out he was shocked as he was confused.


    `How did mere undead acquire such strength in a mere of 2 weeks!? This thing wasn¡ät that strong back then! Is that a monster abnormally is? I can¡ät let such a thing run freely outside!¡ä


    Rapha at the moment felt a duty that a knight should have and the dread of a fight.


    It has been a long time since Rapha felt like that. If not the first.


    He remembered the duty of a knight that was taught by this aunt.


    The strong should protect the weak and those that stand on the samend as you shall be protected with twice the effort.


    "I can¡ät let this thing grow stronger than it is already..." With this determination to destroy the very undead in front of him, he began chanting.


    But such determination came also with the dread of failure.


    What will happen in the case he fails?


    What will her aunt think about him? What about lord Darius?


    If he were to let such an undead unchecked, the ident of the past decade will repeat itself.


    Who knows how many lives will this undead take and ruin at the same time.


    Just imagining such a thing brought dread through this heart.


    "Essence of fire, forge my body...[Reinforcement]" A red light showed through raphas whole body.


    Seeing that light, I stopped in my tracks and my grin for before disappeared.


    "Magic huh... that `Reinforcement¡ä spell didn¡ät show..."


    Seeing that arsonist using an unfamiliar spell, I couldn¡ät help but grow weary.


    But I didn¡ät stop my advantage.


    `Letting someone that is part of a magic caster alone screams for trouble. If I don''t close the distance who knows what other kinds of spells he will throw at me...


    "[Sprint]!"

 Chapter 39 - The Dedication Of Revenge And Miracle

    Dashing towards the slightly wounded Rapha, I readjust my grip over my shoulder.


    With both my hands rooted in the Veren sword handle, I swung towards Rapha with all my strength behind it.


    *Thruad!


    The impact was loud enough to scare the remaining animals that haven¡ät left through the spreading fire.


    But to my surprise, the arsonist Rapha managed to hold on and put up a fight of strength.


    "I see, that spell increased your strength didn¡ät it?"


    Seeing the slightly surprised Rapha I probably hit the mark.


    `Quite the useful spell, but that alone isn¡ät going to cut it¡ä


    With our sh of strength seeing this end, both our swords were pushed aside.


    Changing my grip on the Veren sword, I tried to swing it at him again.


    Before I could make contact with him and my sword, his mana circted through his legs.


    With incredible speed, he managed to dodge my swing by a hairs breath with moving few steps behind.


    "Using sprint to run away? No use!"


    As I was about to give chase.


    I frowned upon the current sight in front of me.


    "This is..."


    Rapha''s mana was gathering towards this sword like a ming whirlwind that was starting to show up slowly.


    Back then I couldn¡ät notice the details in our battle as I was focused on that brat. But seeing it in front of me I noticed the differences between our skills.


    `He moves the mana like a whirlwind while I move it like waves...¡ä


    But I quickly dismissed the ideas that were forming through my head.


    "The same thing isn¡ät going to work!" I raised my sword like Rapha and guided my dark ethereal mana through my sword.


    Slowly forming my skill.


    "[ze~]!"


    "[~de]!"


    *Tseeeen!


    *Feeeesh!


    Rapha realized the contained mana from this sword and unleashed a wave of mes that scorched everything that was touching me.


    Following suit, a de made out of wind and mana cleanly cut the ground to wherever it went.


    Aimed towards the wave of mes, they were fated to sh.


    *Baahm!


    A massive explosion urred through the sh of these two skills.


    The [Wind de] managed to prevent the advance of the ming wave made by the skill of [ze Onught].


    Although the [Wind de] manage to destroy the core where the mes were holding on. The concentrated mes had been unleashed by their bindings and spread all over the ce.


    Seeing the mes blocking my vision I couldn¡ät help but curse out loud.


    "That damn arsonist, does he n to burn the whole forest down?"


    While I was staring at the mes in front of me with a nk face (not like I have one).


    A sudden sense of danger came through the mes.


    "Huh...?"


    Before I could even make sense of what this feeling is.


    Rapha emerged through the mes while swinging this sword at my head.


    "Crap!" I quickly raised my sword to prevent the cruel fate of bing a headless undead.


    Barely enough I managed to block the surprise attack from Rapha. But though my hasty action of wanting my head to stay at this ce, my footing got messed up.


    Seeing that opportunity, Rapha readjusts this body while gathering this mana to these legs.


    The next moment I knew, I was kicked with enough force at my chest that almost was enough to break my ribs. Maybe that would have happened if it weren¡ät for the fact that I wore the new armor that I gently had taken from these soldiers.


    Rolling through the ground, I was secretly surprised at what just happened.


    `You can use [Sprint] like that...? Heck, he even walked through the fire and still seems good¡ä


    Stopping myself from rolling, I dug my fingers through the ground and took a stance simr to a cat about to jump at you.


    "You bastard...you are immune to fire aren¡ät you."


    Seeing his eyes shone I already knew my answer.


    Mostly because this armor was still on fire with no hint of any pain.


    But the answer that I got brought the burning rage running through my body.


    "Guess..."


    "You arrogant...!"


    A death aura started to emit through my body and the dead mana was slowly mixing with the dark green ethereal mana.


    Pleasure mixed with madness started to cloud my mind.


    The dead man that was leaking from me startled Rapha.


    Which was natural, a being emitting such a bloodthirst while containing such a death aura around it was a danger ahead sign.


    "You...I will kill you."


    [Sprint]


    With my before cold voice, my current voice sounded like it was destroyed and filled full of killing intent.


    "Tch, you monster."


    Seeing me approaching him Rapha didn¡ät let that so easily happen.


    Pointing this palm towards my direction, he quietly started to chant.


    "Essence of fire split and grant me control...[Fire Missile]" mes gathered at this palm until theypletely formed a fireball by the size of ahead.


    Finishing this chant, the fireball split into 3 pieces and flew towards my direction one by one.


    "Another useless spell." Looking at the new spell, I snorted out loud.


    Not only were the fireballs small, but they had about the same speed as the [ze Onught].


    While I couldn¡ät dodge the fire wave cause of how wide it was. This didn¡ät count for this spell.


    After all, they were simply some slow and small balls that were made out of the fire. The only positive thing that I could say about these was the number of fireballs that were made.


    But nothing else.


    With my current stats and the effect from [Sin of Wrath]. Dodging these balls was nothing difficult.


    "Such a joke" Moving to the sides I easily dodged 2 out of the 3 fireballs.


    The third fireball instead I shed into the half with extreme precision, which resulted in me taking the mes like a bath.


    But that didn¡ät cause me much of any damage if no one. Since the fireballs were even weaker than the goblin caster ones.


    I simple brushed the mes off and continued moving towards Rapha.


    "Nothing, huh? As expected..." With a nk expression, Rapha took this stance, ready to receive me.


    With no further spells aimed at me, we shed once again with our des.


    And this time, I didn¡ät let him do as he wished.


    I stuck at him harder and better than any glue that you can find out there.


    Once he showed signs of retreating, I would be ready to chase after him.


    Which cause us to be in a stalemate where we fought with only our swords.


    But that stalemate didn¡ätst that long...


    After around 5 minutes of constant fighting with each other.


    Rapha couldn¡ät take it more.


    "Hah...Hah...you damn monster."


    With heavy breathing and sweat from head though toe, Rapha was exhausted.


    Usually, he would have been able tost much longer in a fight, but since our flight didn¡ät allow any mistakes to be made and require the most focus.


    Which resulted in the mind and the body is exhausted and screaming for a rest in which couldn¡ät be allowed in such a fight.


    In such a condition and a curse ced on him, that was aimed to reduce this stamina.


    Having to fight an Undead being whoughs at the words of exhaustion could only mean defeat.


    All this allowed me to find a weak point in this defense.


    Parrying one of his swings, I quickly raised my sword on top of my head and swung at him directly towards his head.


    Seeing death in this sight, he quickly moved to the side, which resulted in him being hit through this shoulder rather


    He did manage to avoid death, but not this demise.


    The Veren sword dug right through this shoulders to the point it almost reached Rapha''s head.


    "Blugh!" A massive amount of blood came rushing through Raphas throat to the point he was forced to cough arge amount of blood.


    "I...can¡ät die here...need to... revenge" Though the exhaustion he suffered and the massive wound he receives, he was forced to the knees and slowly dying in the ground.


    [You gained 8000 XP]


    "Abou time isn¡ät it, at least it was worthwhile all this effort"


    And I wasn¡ät referring to the XP I gained. Although 8000 XP is arge amount where I would require hours of work to get.


    No.


    I was referring to this message.


    [Mission Completed! The subss has been unlocked!]


    "Finally, after all this time. I finally able to pick my subss."


    As I was about to view my subss option.


    Something suddenly grabbed my leg with an intense grip.


    "Huh?"


    Turning around to see what gripped my leg so suddenly.


    I was shocked.


    With pale skin yet crimson red veins going through this whole body.


    Rapha Bloodmane was holding on to my leg.


    "I will not let you get away." Mana started yet again to flow through this body


    "Letting such a vile existence running through my kingdom. MY COUNTRY!"


    He barely raised this other hand into me.


    With this palm showing at my location.


    "I shall take my revenge of my lord and you to my grave! "Essence of fire split and grant me co~"


    I finally realized what this madman was trying to do.


    "WHAT!?" I hastily pushed the arm holding my leg away and tried to quickly go away with [Sprint]


    But it was toote.


    "[Fire Missele]!"


    "Shi~"


    *Baahm!


    *Baahm!


    *Baahm!


    ****


    At the same time when everything was happening...


    In the city of Nexvarres.


    In a house of the middle district, there was a miracle taking ce.


    "Lacia, just a little bit! Just one more push!"


    The miracle that was life was taking ce.


    A beautifuldy was in the middle of giving birth with a pained and pale expression.


    "Aghhh!"


    With thest push, the miracle was born.


    "Madam Lacia! You did it! It¡äs a girl!"


    "Can I...hold it?"


    Hearing Lacias request, the priest quickly cleaned the baby and wrapped it in a towel to give it to this mother.


    "Here Madam Lacia, it¡äs a beautiful girl."


    Even though Lacia had a pale expression the whole time, her carrying smile was enough to cover such details to others.


    "Such a beauty...I wished Alon was here to see it."


    "What would be her name Madam Lacia?" asked the Priest.


    "Name..." Although her vision was getting blurrier by the second.


    She suddenly had an idea that made herugh happily.


    "Hehe...Her name would be Alicia. Alicia A."


    "What a beautiful name Mada~"


    Lacia''s vision and hearing suddenly got worse with a feeling of weakness the following suit.


    With the same warm smile as before, tears started falling from her face.


    "I am sorry Alon. I will be going first..."


    She gently kissed her baby, Alicia to her forehead and told with a weak voice.


    "Be well Alicia...While I am going don¡ät be too rough on you daddy alright."


    Those were thest words, the woman named Lacia A had said.

 Chapter 40 - Consequence

    Inside the city of Nexvarres.


    Several merchant''s carriages were in the hurry to leave the city.


    Some were even panicking.


    "Why haven¡ät we moved yet! Don¡ät they know that I am the great Dominicleas from the merchant union!"


    And he wasn¡ät the only one.


    If someone were to see such a sight, they might have thought that a gue hit the city overnight.


    Nexvarres was a fairly popr city among the merchants.


    With a nearby Dungeon that brings a monthly ie of freshly mined elemental crystals and a huge forest right outside the city that provided all kinds of natural resources and meat.


    Naturally many merchants would get drawn upon the avable resources to trade and sell.


    Cause of the city''s poprity they were lots of high-quality inns for those who could effort them.


    And with a ce where meat was easy toe by, afortable ce to sleep the night, and even being a profitable ce for their business.


    All those points made the city a perfect ce for the merchants to flock in and create profit.


    But such heaven was destroyed overnight without any hint of notice!


    Thus resulting in the merchants panicking.


    The news of the guard post being wiped out and the forest catching up fire resulted in setting off all kinds of rms inside the merchant''s minds.


    At least on those who had a higher IQ than of children.


    With the forest burned down.


    All the previous natural resources and animals that were previously avable are now all gone.


    But what bought the merchants the most anxiety was the fact that a monster had done all of this.


    Although the information that those merchants had was that the monster was simple a Draugr and nothing to worry about.


    Those merchants all had the same thought inside their heads.


    Bullshit!


    Everyone single person who lived inside Nexvarres knew what had happened a whole decade ago.


    Be it, children or foreigners.


    Once stepped inside the city of Nexvarres they all will get to hear about the ident from a whole decade ago.


    On how a monster abnormallypletely eradicated the whole city!


    But that¡äs a story for another time.


    Looking at the current situation, a soldier brought out of this pocket amunications device, and with a pale expression on this face, he activated the devices.


    "My lord..."


    ***


    In the forest of Nexvarres.


    Withered trees were everywhere to see.


    Trees that were burned down turned into a mass of broken charcoal and ashes, without any vitality to be seen in the trees.


    And that wasn¡ät all.


    Animals and beast corpses were shattered all around the forest with no living creature remaining.


    Currently in the middle of the forest.


    A man wearing crimson robes and armor pieces covered this chest area until this neck was standing in front of a pile of ashes.


    Raising this staff in the air, he epted the receiving call of this subordinate.


    Hearing the report of the subordinate this browns twitched.


    "I see...good work soldier. Continue your duties as were given"


    "Yes, Lord Darius!"


    After giving this salute to this lord, themunication spell has ended, resulting in the light of the staff going away.


    "As expected they started to leave...And here I wanted to dy it for a whole week, but to think that I only managed 2 days. It seems like I have grown old, haven¡ät I? For me to miss calcte..."


    With a bitter look on this face, Darius started chanting anothermunication spell.


    "Nothing to be done about it I guess. At least I sent Allen to the capital before all this happened..."


    After finishing casting thismunication spell, he started cleaning up the mess.


    "How is your situation from over there?"


    "My lord, we just finished putting thest bits of mes out. Should we continue searching the area?"


    "No, if the mes are extinguished go imminently back to your post before something else happens".


    "Understood, my lord."


    Finishing giving thisst order, Darius sighed out loudly.


    "Sigh...how did such a urred mess now of all times? I will even have to request help from the capital..." Just thinking of contacting of all the stuff that is needed to be done brought him a headache.


    "That isn¡ät even the worst part..."


    Looking in front of a burned-down corpse this face darkened.


    "How did you lose by a Draugr Rapha! What am I suppose to tell excellency, Selina, now! Tell me!"


    A corpse that waspletely charred ck from the mes and had several gray veins through this body.


    Of course, that corpse was the man Rapha Bloodmane.


    "Dammit, look at the mess you have created! And what am I suppose to tell Allen now!? Take a damn responsibility before you kick the bucket!"


    Even though Darius was angry from the outside, inside of him he was secretly saddened by the loss of Rapha.


    Even though he never showed it to Rapha, he sincerely cared for him.


    Cause of him being a mage and a lord of a whole territory he never had the time to spend with this family.


    And Rapha being simr to an elder brother to this son Allen felt grateful towards him.


    But that also makes it so more painful...


    ***


    In the northeast where the forest of Nexvarres ends.


    There was a small vige named Fera.


    Although the vige was quite small. which supported a little more than 100 people. The people there didn¡ät have any difficulties living their daily lives.


    With the wooden towers around the city and the soldiers of the city of Nexvarres, there was no danger be it from beast attacks of bandits. And since there are around 100 living together there hasn¡ät been any conflict for several years amongst the vigers.


    At most the conflict would be either for some guys wanting to get the hand of a girl or children being what they are best at.


    Making trouble.


    And currently, the vige chief was feeling uneasy.


    In the middle of the vige where this house. He saw several young people arguing in front of him...


    "Chief Baum! The soldiers that left 2 days ago still haven¡ät returned to their post!"


    "Well, you see..."


    "Chief Baum! I saw smokeing out of the forest! Shouldn¡ät we go and take a look!"


    "No, that isn¡ät...."


    "Chief Baum! Have any newse from the city!"


    "Everyone, please...."


    "Chief Baum! When will~"


    "Cheif Baum! Itely saw~"


    "Chief Baum! Isn¡ät the weather nice today!"


    "Chief Baum!~"


    "..."


    Seeing that no one is willing to let him speak. The vige chief Baum was currently feeling kind of helpless.


    "Everyone, please calm down and..." Baum tried to calm the small group of the young people that formed this house but to no avail.


    Ever since he grew old, not only has he turned physically but so did this voice. Which made him quite depressed innerly.


    Back to when he started leading this vige and was in this prime, he was known as the `Baum Thunder Roar¡ä through this loud voice and charisma.


    And he was proud of this title!


    But now...


    As he was trying to think of how to calm this bunch in front of this house.


    A thunder-like voice appeared from behind chief Baum.


    "What the hell are you guys even doing here! Don¡ät be so loud this early on the morning!"


    The voice was loud enough to get the attention of those young men and the rest of the vige.


    Startled by the sudden voice, all the young men turned around only to be shocked.


    A woman with bright brown hair appeared behind the chief Baum.


    With her oily-looking brown hair which even reflected the sun. With her hair reaching until the shoulders and the louse tight clothing which resembled a T-shirt, which resulted in showing her huge F-sized melons just enough for the young man to subconsciously get aroused.


    With her curved body and fat being in all the right ces. Together with her smooth skin and the sweat she had all over her body made her look like the incarnation of sexual arousal.


    "Hey, Grandpa! Why are those guys here!?"


    "Mia..." Seeing her sweet grandchild calming this bunch for this stead he secretly felt proud.


    `She is indeed my granddaughter!¡ä


    "Grandpa! I told you again and again that you should be harsher with those guys!" Melina crossed her arms between her melons and pouted cutely, which created reinforced her previews charm through a whole another level!


    Upon seeing that, the virgins in front of chief Baum''s house felt light-headed and had a strong urge to jump at her.


    Differently from these animals over there, chief Baum was only seeing her cute granddaughter being cute.


    "Hohoho, Mia, don¡ät be so harsh on them. Otherwise, you never will get married"


    "Grandpa!"


    After teasing her adorable granddaughter and feels that things calmed down a bit.


    He gathers everyone''s attention and with a serious tone, he started exining the things that happenedtely.


    With this exnation done.


    One among the young bunch named Troy raised this hand in question.


    "Chief, you told us that the soldiers went out to help put out the fire, but you didn¡ät tell us when they will return."


    "Oh, you''re right Troy, it seems like old age is getting ahead of me haha. And as for your question, they shouldete in the night or at least by tomorrow morning."


    Seeing that no one having anymore question left. He was about to end this day gathering.


    "Now that everyone has no more question I..."


    "Chief Baum!"


    "...!"


    As Baum was about to curse out loud at the one that interrupted him with all this remaining strength.


    The moment he turned and saw the man running at him he froze.


    "What...?"


    The young man running at the chief''s house had a look of horror.


    The man''s clothes had scratches all over the ce and were full of bloodstains.


    The blooding from this head covered this eye while one of these hands was a bend in ways it shouldn¡ät.


    Everyone was shocked upon seeing him in such a state.


    As everyone was about to ask what happened and help him. The injured man was faster than them.


    "Everyone run! vers are here!"

 Chapter 41 - Slavers And Blood Loved

    Upon hearing what the wounded managed.


    Everyone had the same look. of dread in their faces.


    "vers are here!"


    Suddenly mes started to rise in the various houses and sounds of horses running could be heard from far away.


    "Why has a fire appeared?"


    "Dammit! that''s where my house is!"


    "What should we do!?"


    "Are there versing?"


    "Shouldn''t we run away?"


    As everyone was in a staid of panic.


    A burst of roughughter came through the distance.


    "Bha haha! Don''t let anyone escape! Kill anyone who resists except the woman! Bha haha!"


    And in just like an instant, the whole vige fell intoplete chaos with screams echoing through all over the ce.


    "You aren¡ät going to get away!" 3 men with horses came dashing directly in the direction of the wounded viger.


    "P-Please!" And with a face full of despair.


    One of the men reached the wounded viger and with this shortsword in this hand.


    He sliced this neck without any hint of hesitation.


    "Tch, I didn¡ät get this head off..."


    Seeing their friend grumping through himself, the two other menugh at him.


    "Oh? Hey guys, look at that group over there."


    "Ha, are they nning to put up a fight against us?"


    "Hey, isn¡ät that babe behind that old man of the highest quality?"


    "Damn you right! Go quick and call boss over here!"


    Upon hearing about the men''s discussion, the vige chief Baum''s face darkened even more.


    "Everyone here! Evacuate in the forest right now!"


    "But chief Baum...what about the monsters..."


    "This wasn¡ät a suggestion! Leave right now!"


    With Baum''s voice sounding like a p of thunder, everyone present here got startled.


    "Leave and - cough, cough!" Sadly reawakening this voice made this throat feel like burning from the inside out.


    "Cough, Leave- Cough! It`s an order from the head of the vige! We can¡ät let anyone be caught by such people! or else..." But as he was going to finish.


    The rough voice of before s


    "Or else what? Old man"


    A massive caravan being pulled by 3 horses appeared through the middle of the road. Sitting in the front was a man with a long scar through this face and the body of some ripped-up bodybuilder.


    Resting through this shoulder was mberge which bought a feeling of intimidation on others.


    Beside him was a man as 1.69 meters tall, although this cloth was much fancier than all others, these clothes barely held this big belly in this ce.


    With no hair in sight and this Stalin mustache, the man bought a feeling of arrogance to this presentation here.


    "Mr. Oliver, how many am I allowed to kill?" The scarface said.


    "Hmph, I don¡ät care. As long as all the women are unhurt do as you wish."


    "Yes, yes. As usual it is then...You guys heard him! Kill everyone except the woman! If I see just a single scar on them you dead!"


    "Understood, boss Bend!"


    As the group of vers approaches with a malicious smile on their face the group of pale vigers.


    They didn¡ät know that right outside the vige in the forest, that someone was watching everything happening.


    A silhouette wearing badly damaged armor and a deformed helmet that looked like this mouth opening had merged.


    With a runed sword in this hand and this cold voice, he said.


    "I found you"


    ***


    Two days ago in the forest...


    "Dammit...!" I cursed outside.


    Supporting myself with the Veren sword, I slowly raised from the ground up.


    Remembering what happened I truly felt frustrated.


    "That damn arsonist bastard... to think that he hand such an ability..."


    Remembering the ability that this guy Rapha had used made me grid my teeth even harder.


    The ability which he made me lose my guard was this talent [Blood Loved].


    [Blood Loved] talent was a simple yet impressive ability.


    That talent simply allowed the user to revive and make the user unkible for a short amount of time!


    But if that were all I wouldn''t have been had like this!


    Although the talent didn''t let the user die, you could still hurt him.


    And the talent didn''t active imminently.


    If you were to know about this ability beforehand, you could simply cut the enemy in pieces before he would never revive!


    Which made the talent, in a sense a torture ability!


    Since nobody would be voluntarily be cut in pieces while still being conscious!


    Though it was easy to counter, that was only if you knew about the ability.


    Back then in the cave, I didn''t have the time to look thought to this ability which made me get fatally damaged yet again!


    All my bones in my body are cracked and some even broken!


    If it weren''t for the iron armor I would even be dead!


    And all that cause of my carelessness!


    The moment I saw the status notification appeared with the XP showing Ipletely let my guard down, thinking everything was over.


    But damn was I wrong!


    If the [Blood Loved] we''re to just prevent the user not to die I would even never been hurt like that!


    But it had to be a damn resurrection instead!


    What did this mean?


    It means that the status counts him being already dead!


    Which is a sense he was.


    After all, when the duration of immortality has ended he would be no more than a dead fish.


    "It hasn''t even been a day and my armor is already a mess! Heck, my helmet no longer has a mouth opening!"


    "Sigh...at least it happens now and not in the future, now I know that not all people die when they are killed."


    ncing onest time on then now dead Rapha I started to move in the other direction to where the mes were.


    "The fire should even attract other humans nearby, and with my current straight I don''t even dare to fight anything any time soon"


    After moving far away from the mes and site behind a big rock to take a break.


    Not that need it since, well...cause of being undead and stuff, but because I am mentally exhausted.


    With my current broken body, I felt extremely weak and ufortable.


    Since the more in damage, I was the closest to a feeling of being drowned into the sea of darkness I felt.


    Which till yet was the most ufortable feeling that I felt till yet.


    Anyways...


    Casting aside such useless thoughts.


    Putting my hand inside my chest, with great difficulty I dragged a piece of paper out.


    It was the Map that I have stolen from the soldiers before.


    But upon seeing the map I froze.


    "This is..."


    The map of before which had every single detail of the nearby area is no more.


    Instead, a piece of paper with multiple holes and missing parts was to see!


    It wasn''t even 1/4 remaining of the map!


    "Ghhh...! dammi- No, calm down. There isn''t any reason to get angry. It''s not like my only way to see where I am going inside this forest has been destroyed...SHIT, Who am I kidding!? How should I now find my way out of this forest!?."


    Reading through the almost destroyed map, only two ces were remaining to been see.


    One was a vige named Fera that was a little further up ahead and a ce a little further away from the Fera vige.


    The second location simply had a sort of warning sign on top of it.


    Which in my professional opinion meant ''Don''t go or you die''.


    "Hmm, it should be done to reach that vige in around 2 days...I think."


    Putting away the burned piece of paper to what you would call a map.


    I finally was ready to get in the juice part.


    [Mission Complete: Subss has been unlocked].


    [Please selected one of the following options]


    [Once a choice has been made, there is no turning back so proceed with caution]

 Chapter 42 - Subclass

    [Sub-ss]:


    [Spell de]:


    [Curse Caller]


    [Runesmith of Undeath]


    [Protector]


    "So 4 choices are this time avable to me huh? I even got the Spell de ss that this Rapha guy had as one of my options."


    `Although I probably can guess what those sub-sses do, it wouldn¡ät hurt taking a look just to be safe¡ä


    "Yeah, let¡äs start with this guy''s sub-ss."


    [Spell de]: Those who choose the path of magic and mastering their chosen weapon are being called Spell des. They are vastly versatile in various situations with their magic and difficult to deal with the cause of their meleebat capabilities. They are considered as one of the most annoying enemies to deal with as they are spell casters who aren¡ät to be underestimated in meleebat. But cause they seek to master martial arts and spells at the same time, causing them to be inferior to someone who mastered the ways of meleebat or magic.


    `Most annoying enemies to deal with, huh...? Quite a funny way of describing this but it certainly holds some truth. Getting close to them is a pain in the ass while killing them is even more annoying...¡ä


    Just remembering that guying back from the dead just to do a double suicide act on him bought a shiver through my still cracked spine...


    My dude, even though my charisma can not be resisted, isn`t it a little too much to throw yourself at me and drag me to your death bed?


    Shaking my head of such thoughts I quickly went to read the next one.


    [Curse Caller]: A type of magic caster who focuses on fast casting various curses on these enemies. They mostly specialize in affecting the enemies that are near them, but at the cost of abanding the path of longsting curses. Which makes them a rare breed of magic casters.


    "Curse Caller...that sounds like an abomination of a spell caster. Although their ability is such impressive in a group fight, in reality, they will simple shooting themselves in the foot! Just by casting a spell, it will be enough for the enemy to ce a death g upon you! Although my main ss is of warrior type, I would rather not ce a bounty for others to collect..."


    "And the curse of the vigor that I put this Rapha guy didn¡ät impress me that much...although useful it seemed kind of the overkill."


    In the battle between me and the Rapha guy, the curse of vigor only hastens the defeat of the Rapha guys and nothing much. Even without the curse, I would have been able to defeat him sooner orter.


    "Casting wind de instead might have been better. Oh, well let¡äs head right next to the other one.


    [Runesmith of Undeath]: Those who turned the ancientnguage of the Undead into Runes are called Runesmiths of Undeath. Their runes that are called ''death runes'' specialize in exploiting the benefits of the undead race to bring the most out of the runes.


    "I will be damned! Aren¡ät those the runes that the Veren sword has?"


    ''Doesn''t that mean if I were to pick this ss, I would be able to make a whole set of Veren armor and such!?"


    Just thinking about it brought me a strong urge to immediately pick this sub-ss.


    Wouldn''t picking this sub-ss change most of my current problems?


    No more would I require to steal others'' armor and weapons every time some goes suicidemando on me!


    The days of the naked skeleton will be no more!


    "Calm down me...although the path of a bright future is right in front of me, there is still one option to look at. Picking without looking through all actions is the fool''s work!"


    Giving ast nce at the Runesmith subss. I opened thest option description.


    [Protector]: A warrior that uses various martial arts of the body and the shield are what Protectors are. With their motto being `Defense is the best Defense¡ä they are considered as a trusted shield for anyone who is their allies and an imprable wall on those that he considers as enemies.


    "This sub-ss might fit quite well together with my main ss as Guardian since I will be using a shield in the future. But it somehow sounds like being a meatshield for others..."


    Although the idea of being incredibly sturdy and hard to kill sounds kind of attractive, that description makes it sound more like a support type...


    "Hmmm, I might have to pass on that one. It isn¡ät like I got someone to protect and bing a meatshield with just bones doesn¡ät sound like a good idea."


    Sitting down cross-legged on the ground I started considering my avable options.


    `If I want to start using magic now then Spellde and if I were to learn curses then Curse Caller is the way to go. Both of those options would give me various advantages in a fight to where the Protector sub-ss would further enchant me being a warrior type.¡ä


    "Although those options sound appealing...it has to be the Runesmith of Undeath after all!"


    [Your Subss has been changed to Runesmith of Undeath]


    [You acquired the Talent Dead Rune Knowlegde]


    [You acquired the Talent Rune Vision]


    "Status!"


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Level: 20


    Race: Draugr (Undead)


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 3000/3000


    Mana: 310/310


    Attribute Points: 23


    Attributes: Strength: 65 Agility: 55 Intelligence: 31 Endurance: 59


    [Talents] [Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    [Skills] [Intermediate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Miasma Corruption Lv.1] [Sprint Lv.3] [Shield Bash Lv.4] [PiercingLv.1] [Wind de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Vigor Lv:1]


    [Remark: A Undead who possesses the knowledge of ancient knowledge and has an extraordinary future. Although the current him knows jack shit about such ancient knowledge, the potential is still there]


    "Oh! Two Talents right through the start! Not even my main ss was so generous!"


    Seeing the two Talents that I got, all my worries of before have vanished.


    "Tch, and here I thought that the status had a change of heart...At least I made the right choice after all..."


    Although my decision was swift, it didn¡ät mean that I haven¡ät thought about it carefully.


    The sole reason why I chose the Runesmith ss instead of the other ones was simple for one single reason only...


    I couldn¡ät learn runes!


    As silly as it sounds that simple reason was why I chose that subss!


    But what about the magic you ask?


    I already learned that with the help of magic scrolls I can already learn magic even if my ss isn¡ät one of a caster!


    Even with the risks of there being only basic spells avable on the magic scroll that wouldn¡ät have been a problem.


    After all, by simply dropping my whole wallet of XP into the spell and make it Lv. 10, I can simply make it evolve into a stronger version!


    It isn¡ät like that I need licenses for magic casters to use Magic!


    As for the Protector sub-ss...


    Let¡äs just say I haven¡ät had enough meat on me.


    "Alright! Let¡äs see what those two beauties have to offer!"


    [Dead Rune Knowledge]: You can understand and learn Dead Runes.


    "Hmm...well... I ain¡ätining but isn¡ät that a little...too short?"


    Confused, I raised my finger and pressed at the [Dead Rune Knowledge].


    And in an instant, a massive new screen appeared in front of me.


    "Woah!" Startled, I tried to quickly stand up, but though me being in a cross-legged position I only managed to halfway stand up and the next moment falls to the ground with butt first.


    "Dammit, I didn¡ät expect that a new screen would suddenly pop up..."


    Inspecting the new screen in front, a lot of questions appeared in front of me.


    Literally.


    "That screen is sure weird... the only thing that is readable is the word [Common] with everything else being a question mark..."


    On the left of the screen was a smallne which had a punch of [???] in it, while at the top of thene was the word [Common] written there.


    Pressing the word [Common] 3 lines of further [???] appeared on the right.


    "Weird...pressing at the [???] seems to do nothing. Except for the fact of scrolling the [???] of left on right there doesn¡ät seem to be anything else that I can here..."


    After testing the new screen for a little while I finally managed to find something.


    [Common]: Cost 10 000 XP to learn a Random Rune.


    "I see...pressing the [Common] button twice was the key after all." Taking a better look at the screen in front of me I couldn?t help but frown (Not like I have a face).


    "It seems like, the talent [Dead Rune Knowledge] works simr to how I can buy skills through the use of XP. But...is it necessary to make it random?"


    That is just a bottomless pit for my wallet to fall in!


    Isn¡ät that straight up a rip-off!?

 Chapter 43 - Trash Items Of A True Gentleman

    "10 000 XP for a single rune..."


    `With such an amount of XP, I would be able to increase my skill levels by a ton too! Damnit!''


    "Sigh...at least I found a way to learn runes now. As for the cost..."


    Shaking my head bitterly I pressed towards the buy option.


    [10 000 XP have been used to learn amon random rune]


    [You acquired the normal Rune Ese]


    "O-Oh...!"


    The newfound knowledge which strained my mind flowed through me.


    "This is..."


    The Rune symbol, the mana flow art, and the use of the rune was gradually being in branding in my mind.


    "Agh...I will never get used to this feeling. Even though I am one of the undead I somehow feel exhausted..."


    After taking a break to short out all the information that I got. I nced towards the description of my newly learned rune


    [Rune Ese]: One of the most simple runes amongst themon Runenguage. It slightly increases the shock/Impact absorption of any kind of armor part.


    "Ohhhh~ that doesn¡ät so bad at all. If I were to put this rune in my armor I would be more resistant against blunt-like weapons or attacks!"


    Probably!


    "With this in my hands, I can finally say goodbye to the days with cracked bones!" Just moving my body low noises of bones being ground together could be heard.


    Although as undead I technically couldn¡ät feel any pain. Well...not the physical pain that¡äs it.


    But even though theck pain that I felt I still felt uncoverable with my whole body being in such a mess. After all, the feeling of weakness was still lingering through my body, which honestly wasn¡ät much appealing.


    Well, I can say all that cause I am one of the undead of course.


    If by chance someone of the living were to get simr wounds like my I bet he wouldn¡ät be as ignorant as I were currently.


    The feeling of weakness that I was feeling would probably be a 24/7 torture course for them.


    Anyways, while ignoring the `small¡ä wounds of my body.


    I secretly felt amazed at how runes were made.


    "It¡äs such a relief of me picking this sub-ss. If it weren¡ät for that, I probably would never have found a such how to create runes..."


    3 steps go into rune creation.


    The first one being the symbol of the rune.


    It was the process of marking the ce where the mana will flow and how the rune will look like in the end.


    It could also be referred to as the Logo of the rune.


    The second and the most important step was putting the mana flow into the rune.


    It was the part where you had to channel mana into your rune which in end gave this effect.


    But simple putting mana wasn''t enough.


    The process needed extreme precision of mana control which you had to change the power input of your mana constantly in a given way.


    If the symbol was the capacity, the mana flow would even be the code of the whole rune.


    And thest step would permanently imprint the rune by activating the whole rune with mana.


    In short, it was...


    "Drawing with some extra steps in it huh? Should be easy enough."


    ''With the status already giving me the method and the knowledge. There is no way I would mess this up!''


    While un-quipping my body armor, I suddenly remembered another talent that I got.


    pping my forehead I opened my status again.


    "Right...I forgot about these. Maybe I have been the too excited cause of the rune." While hiding my embarrassment with some excuses.


    I opened the status window and read the next description.


    [Rune Vision]: This allows you to ender a state of full concentration, which shows you where runes are capable to be build on.


    "Entering a state of concentration...? Giving it a try wouldn¡ät hurt I guess."


    Standing up from the ground my ethereal glow eyes lighted intensely up.


    "[Rune Vision]!" Suddenly, everything seemed to stop moving as if everything was time froze.


    And within the next second, everything around me lost its color and everything started to move again.


    Confused by this colorless vision, I tried to exin it outloud.


    But...


    ¡äWhat the hel-!?¡ä


    Withplete silence around me that I couldn¡ät even voice out my thoughts. I somehow felt creeped out.


    `So that¡äs what [Rune Vision] does, huh? Doesn¡ät seem like it would be useful in any battle...¡ä


    Looking around me, I tried various things such as throwing rocks around, pulling grass, and such. Everything that came to my mind could potentially create a sound.


    But to no avail...


    Getting frustrated, I raised the Veren sword, ready to throw a [Wind de].


    To my surprise though, the Veren sword was surrounded by a red and some small pieces of green aura.


    `Why does Veren have color and anything else not?¡ä


    After fulfilling some tests with no response from the red aura, I didn¡ät have a choice that to simply appraise it!


    [Rune Vision Limitation]: Through the use of talent [Rune Vision] you can understand which spots on any items can contain runes. With red meaning impossible for either too damaged or an already printed rune in that spot. Yellow meaning that only certain runes that either fit or are small can fit in that spot. Andstly, green means that there is a free spot to curve runes.


    `Ohhhh~! And here I wondered if there are limitations on the number of runes that an item can have! That talent is the answer!¡ä


    And as if a thousand-piece puzzle finally started to form up in my mind.


    I excitedly threw all my armor in the ground while gathering my mana in my index finger.


    Right about when I was to start and curve some runes in my armor...


    All pieces of my armor showed a bloody red aura at the whole armor!


    Not even a spot that didn¡ät have the red aura was to see!


    `Why!?¡ä


    Seeing the intense red aura in the armor I knew what it meant. And I felt cheated!


    Suddenly the thousand-piece puzzle that was forming in my mind turns out to miss thest piece of the puzzle!


    Which turned out it was intentionally made to miss a part!


    If this wasn¡ät a low blow then I don¡ät know anymore!


    Putting my frustration away, I tried thinking of the reason why the red aura was emitting in the armor.


    And though some inspection of my armor, I soon found the reason why.


    With an awkward tone, I said `Well, now that I take a better look at the armor it is indeed quite damaged... That damned arsonist! To think he would even melt my armor!¡ä


    De-activating my [Rune Vision], I gripped my armor off the ground and started to re-equip myself. After finishing putting on my armor I pulled out the remains of the map.


    "Sigh...If I were to curve some runes I might need to get myself a new piece of armor and maybe...a sheath for the Veren sword would even be nice..."


    ncing upon the map, I mourned.


    "Let¡äs hope that this vige has something to offer..."


    Putting the map away, I started walking towards the vige of the map.


    And in the final two days of marching towards the vige.


    Since with a trait of the undead race, the travel was quite easy to make, with no hunger, no exhaust, and with my current strength. There was nothing that was able to stop me except my boredom.


    Finally reaching the edge of the forest with a vige in front to see.


    But the current site of the vige wasn¡ät as I expected.


    "I didn¡ät even reach the vige yet and it is already burning(Not like I was going to start a fire)? Did the mes of that arsonist Rapha already reached this town...?"


    `This shouldn¡ät be the case...I don¡ät see any trees of the forest to have burned down.¡ä


    `Maybe they are having a festival over there...?¡ä


    "Anyhow, the reason behind the fire doesn¡ät matter. As I went through all this trouble to found you, it would even be rude of me If I weren¡ät to introduce myself, wouldn''t it?


    "After all, I am a `True Gentleman¡ä"


    With a vicious grin on my face, I rushed towards the vige.

 Chapter 44 - The Last Will Of A Old Man

    Currently in the small vige of Fera.


    Looking at the 3 versing at them.


    All the young men gulped and some even took a step back.


    With an anxious voice and a face full of despair one said.


    "Chief...it''s impos~" But before he could even finish, the old man quickly shut up this ignorant brick.


    "Didn''t I already told you to run!? If those guys were to catch all of you then something even worse than death will happen! Now Go! I will win you youths some time."


    Standing up from this seat, he grabbed a staff that was slightly taller than himself.


    Looking at this, Melina couldn''t stay idle anymore.


    "I can''t ept this, Grandpa! If you aren''ting then neith~"


    As she was about to get inside the house and get a sickle of her own. The Chief quickly interrupted her.


    "No, you don''t"


    "But!"


    "Enough! Troy! Take my Melina outside of the vige! You, other guys, do the same with the people you meet on your way! I would not repeat myself!"


    Being suddenly called out Troy trembled slightly, but he quickly got a hold of himself.


    ''The Chief is right...If we don''t run away right now we all will be killed''


    Taking the lead, Troy quickly grabbed Melina''s hand and yelled with all this strength.


    "Don''t simply stand here and space out! We need to run away!"


    "Huh?"


    "H-He is right!"


    "Hurry and run away!"


    "To the forest everyone!"


    Simr to a chain reaction, once someone took up the role to lead and showed the way. Everyone else will quickly follow.


    But there will always be one exception to this rule.


    "No! Troy you bastard! Let me go! Grandpa *Sniff...Grandpa will die!" With tears on her face, Melina was struggling violently to shake off the hand Troy.


    Seeing the number one beauty of the whole vige cursing him, Troy felt dejected inside. But that didn''t make him lose this grip.


    ''Melina...Please Forgive me


    With the exhausted Melina from today''s work in the field and her current mental state. Troy quickly gripped Melina''s belly and putting her on this shoulder like a sack of potatoes while sprinting with everything he had in the direction of the forest.


    "Nooooo~!"


    Seeing her Granddaughter tears made the old man Baum feel like someone had pushed some nails directly into this heart.


    But he didn''t regret it.


    "Now you lowlives, If you dare to touch a piece of hair from my lovely granddaughter you will have to pass through me first!" He said while taking a stance with this staff.


    Looking at that the vers looked at each other before breaking intoughter.


    "Bahahahha! You Guys heard him?"


    "Bahaha! So it wasn''t me hallucinating!"


    "Did you already go senile old man!? Bahaha"


    "..."


    Seeing the old man keeping this stance without any chance of expression and their pray getting further and further away the 3 vers look darkened.


    "Oi, You serious Old man?"


    "Tch, this old man is so arrogant!"


    "You arrogant senile old man! Your death wouldn''t be an easy one!"


    The ver that killed the viger of before, riding this horse he charged at the old man while holding this short sword in this arm.


    "Now die! Old Man!"


    Raising this sword, he aimed at this neck.


    But before the de managed to reach the old man.


    With a quick maneuver to the left, he went out of the path of this horse.


    "Fool..." with a quick strike to this chest. The ver of before falls off from this horse while gripping this chest area cause of the pain.


    Seeing that all present here got surprised and enraged.


    "Old Man! How are you...!"


    "You aren''t going to get away with this!"


    As the 2 other guys rushed at him.


    They slowly met the same fate as the first one to rush in.


    After making sure that no one of these 3 idiots could pull a fast one of him. He solemnly said.


    "Before I and my wife lived in this vige. I was once the second inmand of the guard post from the Cursed Lake. Although I am retired now...Don''t expect taking this vige with me still standing!"


    Seeing the determination of the old man. Oliver frowned slightly.


    "Hey, are you going to sit here and see how your pay is running away, Bent?"


    "Tch, these idiots. They can''t even take a single old man down!"


    Stepping down from the caravan.


    With this mberge in this hands, he slowly walked towards the vige chief Baum.


    "I saw through your skill old man and honestly I am quite surprised. Who would have thought that someone who knows martial arts would be hiding in such a rat hole while like this one."


    Upon hearing that the face of Baum slightly flinched.


    ''So he figured me out, huh...''


    "Now, I wonder what you are talking about..."


    Shrugging, Bent said, "Well, I don''t give a damn if you are going to hide it or not..."


    A violent aura of mana appeared on the mberge. The mana that engulfed the whole de was slowly expanding and shrinking back.


    Such reaction resemnce a living heart made out of violent mana.


    "Be blood to my sight...[Sprout Wounds]."


    Without further ado, Bent charge at Baum with almost the same speed as the horse did.


    ''Fast...he is nowhere near from for 3 cutbacks from before...''


    Seeing himing closed Baum took up this stance to wee the iing strike of this mberge.


    ''The way he walks shows that he is a self-taught idiot with no technics or disable. As long as I manage to parry this one attack, my chance of bashing his head wille.''


    "Don''t mess with a veteran!"


    He quickly put this n into action. Moving a bit to the side and this staff to parry the iing de.


    But instead of letting the de slide out of the way.


    The de instantly started to dig through the wood that the staff was made of.


    "Fool!"


    "...!?"


    What astonished Baum wasn''t t the fact he didn''t manage to parry the sword. Deep inside of him, he knew that he wouldn''t manage to parry a weird like a mberge he this weak and old body.


    But what he never expected was that this staff which was made from high-quality wood to suddenly explode in this hands!


    Being stunned for a moment, Baum reacted a moment toote which resulted in him being scratched through this chest.


    "Tch, for an old goat you sure are nimble"


    ''Tch, me and my old age. Back in my prime, I wouldn''t have spaced out like an idiot. At least it was just a scratch.''


    "Hehe, Let me guess. Do you think this was just a scratch?


    "What do you me-" Without Baum noticing, the violent mana that was lingering to this wound suddenly expanded.


    "Huh?"


    ''I was sure it was just a scratch and nothing more. So How!?''


    "What did you..."


    "Oh, a corpse wants to order me? Get lost!"


    Piercing this mberge through this chest, arge amount of blood exploded from this back which made Baum lose all this strength of this body.


    "Tch, this old man. I can''t believe we wasted so much time on this one..." As if he remembers something. He walked towards these still dazed subordinates and threw a kick at all of them.


    "You damned Sloths! Get your asses up and chase the remaining vigers already..."


    "Yes, Boss..."


    "Understood, Boss..."


    "Boss?"


    While these 3 were being scolded and halfway beaten up.


    Baum lies to the ground motionless and full of regret.


    ''Forgive me, Melina. I guess that''s the end for me'' By each second that passed, the darker Baums was getting.


    ''So this how death feels like? How stupid.''


    ncing at the vers getting farther and farther away he tried grinding these teeth, but this body had failed him even in thisst request wasn''t allowed to him.


    ''I am sorry, everyone...I hope that thisst pathetic moment of my was able to buy you enough time for you to escape...''


    As he was going to give up the struggle and ept this death.


    ''I curse you''


    While the feeling of being engulfed by death was slowly devouring. This will stillst.


    ''I curse you till thest day of your breath. May the dead drag into your death! At that time I will be waiting! And thy known that the man Baum Stronelf will be waiting for all of you even In the deeps of hell!''


    With this evesting will in this death.


    Baum Stronolf died.

 Chapter 45 - A Knight Hiding In The Fields?

    *p, p


    "Well done Bent, seeing your skills is as terrifying as ever."


    "It was nothing, Mr. Oliver. Honestly, I am ashamed of showing you those subordinates of my..."


    Feeling the cold stare from their boss, those 3 got chill running through the backs.


    "Let''s hurry...!"


    "The Boss is angry...!"


    "Go after them before the boss kills us...!"


    Seeing those 3 running like they got shit on their pants, Bent shook this head helplessly.


    ''Tch, how dare their embarrassing me in front of a new client. Those idiots will need a beatingter on...''


    "If they haven''t underestimated their opponent they would even have won..." Bent looked at the 3 with disdain.


    "There is no need for excuses Bent, just tell me if that old man was strong or not..."


    Not expecting such a question, Bent nkly told him the truth.


    "No...Not at all. That man had no talent nor training in him. At such age, he only learned twomonly seen skills that Tier 1 warriors use. Although he was quite skilled with the staff for a Tier 1 warrior... But being at such age a Tier 1 warrior isn''t even apliment..."


    Hearing Bents''s exnation Oliver nodded in understanding.


    In this world seeing someone be capable of winding martial arts, magic or anything else of spiritual arts was a rare sight to see.


    Since learning such arts doesn''t depend on only resources of growing.


    But of talent and mastery for such arts!


    If one wasn''t born with such talent then he was fated to never reach a higher realm of individual strength!


    Although different kinds of resources do help of increasing one''s strength.


    There was always a limit on that.


    As for those that strive for greater individual strength but with no talent...


    ncing at the corpse of the old man Oliver felt bitter inside.


    Of course not out of pity.


    ''Wemon men shouldn''t strive for things beyond our reach...''


    "At any rate, Bent. Tell you, men, to gather the ''goods'' here and get out of here before the soldiers arrive."


    "There''s in no need to worry Mr. Oliver. We have enough time until the soldiers of the city arrive here to us. Please rx and let us do our jo-"


    "Big Boss! Trouble!" A middle-aged man screamed out loud.


    Being interrupted while talking to this client Bent felt like beating this guy to the death, but upon seeing the desperate look of this subordinate he frowned slightly.


    "What is it!? Can''t you guys not even catch some vigers!?"


    Falling to the ground while breathing heavily, the middle-aged man said.


    "Hah...this isn''t it hah...Boss!" The middle-aged man''s voice sounded hoarse and sweat like crazy.


    Recognizing that the middle-aged man being one of the few that he trusted among this band this frown grew even bigger.


    "Tell me already what happened"


    "Boss...someone came and started to kill everyone!"


    Hearing that Bent started to feel anxious


    "What!? Did the soldiers of the city already came!? How many!"


    Shaking this head, the middle-aged man said.


    "Boss! Is just one guy! They aren''t the soldiers of the city! It was just one guy! One!"


    As if someone grasped this heart extremely tightly. Bent felt a cold sweating from this back.


    ''I-It can''t be!''


    Gripping the shoulders of this subordinate, he said with a shaking voice.


    "W-Was it Darius of the Darcy Family!?"


    "H-Huh?"


    "Huh?"


    Seeing each other confused look a moment of silence fell upon them.


    "So...who is it?"


    "R-Right! The one who killed us was..."


    "A Knight with deformed-looking armor!"


    "...?"


    ****


    10 minutester in the Fera vige...


    "Noooo!"


    "That wench! Catch her already!"


    "Remember not to hurt her! See will fence a good price!"


    While two vers were chasing a young maiden around near outside the vige.


    Currently, inside one of the wheat fields, someone was wearing a deformed-looking armor lying there with a longsword right beside him.


    That, someone, was me...


    "What the hell are those guys doing..."


    Looking at the trio running after that girl Ie to the conclusion that does guys were ying...tag?


    "Why is that girl screaming so loud...? And the way those two guys are chasing seems odd..."


    As I was trying toprehend what this trio was doing, the 2 men catches up with a girl and pushed her to the ground.


    "You damn soon to be whore! Making us chase you through the whole down!"


    "No! Please, forgive!"


    "Tch, so annoying. We might as well discipline first before we hand her over for some coin"


    "Hehe, Nice idea brother! That damn scar face and this damned rules! We will be done before anyone notices!"


    Realizing what was just about to happen, the girl started to struggle even harder than before.


    "Please! Anyone please! Sob...Saved..."


    Looking at this scene it finally clicked on me.


    "So there is was no festival after all..."


    Now that I take a better look at them, I finally realized the current situation at hand.


    ''If the girl is one of the viges, then these two other guys should be some type of bandits.''


    "I guess I should start moving..."


    Gripping the longsword beside him, he went towards the trio over there.


    "Hey brother, can you hold my sword for me while I finish with her?"


    "Whatever, just get it over with so that I get a turn as well."


    "Dammit man, give me just a minute!" Reaching out this hand. He grabbed the girl''s clothing and started slowly to rip her clothes off.


    "Let me go! Nooo!"


    Feeling headacheing out of her loud screaming he came up with an idea.


    "Tch, so annoying... brother. Can you put something on her mouth or something?" But even after several seconds, he received no response.


    "Brother?"


    "Huh'' Who are y-"


    As he was about to turn around and check on this brother.


    A swift air de flew right beside him and went crushing to one of the nearby houses.


    *Fsheeeeeeen!


    ncing nkly at the clean-cut made in the house wall, a slight came to this spine.


    "What did just happened...brother?"


    After finally turning around, the sight he was expecting was nowhere to be seen.


    Instead of seeing this brother standing behind him and being as usual annoying. He saw this brother''s headless body standing there and a figure looking like a knight running at him with full speed!


    "Brother!?" Finally realizing what was happening, he bends down and picked up this short sword from the ground.


    "You bastard! You will pa- huh?"


    These words came right back through my throat.


    The figure that was more than 10 meters further away from him, has suddenly in less than 3 seconds came right in front of him!


    "Slow..." Saying so with this cold voice and this runic longsword in this had.


    With no hint of hesitation, he pushed the runic de right through the chest of the man.


    "Bgluh!" Coughing up blood the man felt everything being surreal.


    "H-How..."


    After a slight red glowing out of the Veren sword.


    Pulling out the de the second men now lifeless body fell to the ground.


    [You received 1000 XP]


    "These guys were even weaker than I had expected to be...maybe using [Windde] was kind of the overkill."


    Shaking my head I walked towards the shivering girl on the ground.


    "T-Thanks for saving me, sir...Knight?


    But betraying her expectations of a charming knight saving her in times of trouble.


    I was different.


    "You are wee..." Raising my Veren sword with one hand above my head I said unemotionally.


    "Huh?" As confused by my gesture the girl tilted her head to the side.


    But I didn''t let her figure the cruel reality out.


    Swinging the Veren de with a fluent emotion on her head.


    [You Received 600 XP]


    "Just 600 XP...But I guess it''s better than nothing..."


    Calling internally my XP storage and seeing the XP amount I felt surprised.


    [XP: 71 425]


    "It hasn''t been that long and I am already rich again..."


    Although I felt happy upon having such arge amount of XP.


    I felt somehow bitter inside too...


    "Sigh... It seems like mass genocide is the fastest way into power huh..."


    Most of this amount of XP came from the soldiers that I had killed and that wanna able to undying arsonists


    Just those guys gave me around 55 000 XP in a single day!


    "Tch, If it weren''t for the fact that I can gain XP through training I would even think that this status-system thing would even try to manipte me into bing a mass murderer..."


    Though ncing at the 3 lying corpses I didn''t have much empathy towards them. It more like I felt none.


    "I don''t mind killing them though..." As I was thinking about what to do with my remaining XP in my storage.


    Someone called out to me.


    "You! Who are you! Did you do this to those guys!" he said while pointed in my direction.


    Looking at the middle-aged man pointing this finger at the corpses I shrugged my shoulders off.


    "And what if I did?"


    "You...what did you say...?" Suddenly more men showed up behind the middle-aged man.


    "You seeking death!"


    "Sigh...Ignorance sure is a blessing..." While circling my mana through my legs I said.


    "But sadly it onlysts until someone meets the consequences of Ignorance."


    Running at them with the help of [Sprint].


    Another ughter has begun.

 Chapter 46 - We Arent Going To Be Fooled!

    Strengthening my legs with my mana, I kicked the ground and dashed towards the group in front of me.


    Such sight startled the vers.


    Just looking at the eerie dark green mana and the speed that I wasing at them made the group feel a sense of dreading at them.


    But no one except the middle-aged man understood what their current situation was.


    "Everyone! This guy is a warrior! Someone go and cal-." He said rapidly with a pale expression through this face.


    But as those guys'' were still trying toprehend the situation that they were in.


    I had already reached one of the groups.


    "Dammit, how is a warrior in suc-"


    Not bothering to answer this question, I raised my Veren sword and swung it at this right shoulder with both my hands.


    Maybe cause my attack was a way of obvious, but the man hurriedly held this short sword in the path of my swing.


    ''Heh, if he is still inexperienced, then he shouldn''t be that strong of a warrior!''


    But this thought was brutally crushed when the two des crushed each other.


    The moment when my Veren sword collided, even with the help of both these hands supporting this sword, the man felt incredible pressureing behind this sword.


    "Too weak..."


    Instead of the Veren sword stopping at this track, it started digging into the man''s shoulder.


    "Ahhh!"


    Not being able to withstand the paining from this shoulder, dropping this short sword and created some distance between me.


    Well, at least he tried.


    Instead of staying there frozen like a statue and let my prey getaway.


    I followed suit and raised my hand to my right side. Gathering all my strength, I hit the man with my knuckles directly at this jaw!


    The result wasn''t a nice sight to see...


    *Cracked!


    "Gweh?"


    With this jaw now broken, he fell to the ground.


    [You received 1200 XP]


    "Die you bastard!"


    Since the others weren''t just going to watch me killing them one by one. They all decided to rush at me to get my head.


    All but except one guy.


    "No, Stop! Don''t underestimate him!"


    But the words of the middle-aged man fell into


    deaf ears.


    "Get him!"


    "He is only one!"


    "Kill him!"


    Watching them scream until their saliva was flying out of their mouths wasn''t only disgusting butughable as well.


    ''You think that your numbers will make a difference?''


    Although I thought that, they did make a difference.


    With the current stats different between me and them I was easily able to kill three more of those "thieves".


    But things started to look for the worse the I was surrounded.


    While the Veren sword was, in my opinion, a first-ss item, which always has a sharp edge and in a sense infinite durability with these runes. The core weakness of it was easily seen by those thieves...


    The weakness of a longsword that is.


    "You idiot! You can''t even use your weapon!"


    Seeing me that I had already swung to one of these now-deadrades, one of them jumped at the moment of opportunity and swung this sword at my shoulder.


    The de dug right through my armor into my shoulder bone, stopping halfway beforepletely cutting my shoulder bone into two.


    ''Huh? This sensation...it''s almost as if he doesn''t have any fles-''


    Before the man could finish these thoughts, a chilling hand gripped this shoulder with enough force to bent this knees and rooting him in ce.


    "You think that would be enough?" Raising my Veren sword in the air, I pierced the man through this chest.


    "Huh...?" Realizing what just happened he was shocked!


    He thought that the wound he made on this knight would even be enough to finish him off or at least close to.


    But this knight didn''t even care about the wound on this shoulder! Rather it didn''t even hinder these movements!


    Losing this strength in this body, he slowly drifted to this death.


    Thest thing he saw was the hollow eyes behind the knight''s helmet.


    [You received 1200 XP]


    ''So annoying... these guys aren''t just stronger than the goblins in the cave but they also have the brains to not mindless rush at him...''


    But as I was thinking of my current situation, my thoughts got interrupted by a shallow feeling of danger from behind me.


    But before I could even turn around, another one of the thieves stabbed me with this short sword through my stomach area.


    "Heh! How about tha-"


    Not letting him finish, I turned around and swung the Veren sword at him, beheading him on this ce.


    ''Tch, where do you guys even aiming at?"


    "*Gasp!"


    "How is he still standing!?"


    "His liver should even be pierced! Doesn''t he feel pain!?"


    As the vers were shocked at my endurance and thoughts of running away started to appear on their mind.


    One of them pointed at me and with full confidence he said.


    "Guys, I figured it out!"


    Saying that everyone''s focus was on him.


    "I know what this guy is!" He said out loud while straightening this back full of pride.


    Hearing that even I stopped my ongoing ughter.


    ''Did this guy figured out that I am an Undead...?''


    As everyone had different kinds of though, one of them couldn''t bear the ongoing silence.


    "Tell us already! What did you find out!"


    Launching mysteriously, the man shared this unbounded wisdom.


    "Thisck of pain and fear of getting injured! There is only one race capable of that!


    ''This guy...!'' He already knows!?


    "Tell us already!" every ver said in union.


    "Hehe, this guy''s race is..."


    ''No good, I got to kill him before he says that I am an undead!'' I hastily gathered my mana into the Veren sword.


    But my reaction was toote!


    "This guy is a troll!"


    "Eh?" As if someone throws some ice-cold water into my bones, I froze.


    But all others exploded in understanding as if the math problem that was plugin their minds for several days has been finally answered.


    "I see! No wonder he is still standing on these feet! All these wounds regenerate the moment the wound is made!"


    "This guy is using this body to lure us in!"


    "Vicious!"


    "Pervert!"


    "We aren''t going to be fooled!"


    "Idiots..." I mumbled to myself.


    ''One thing I was sure about. If Ignorance was privileged of fools, then do guys were dumbasses!''


    ''How did those guys end up in such a conclusion? And the heck is a troll!?''


    What else surprised me was that instead of them being more careful around me they were more...reckless?


    Before they self-dered me as a troll, these guys were simply circling me looking for opportunities to get a piece out of me.


    Which were quite effective methods with me winding a longsword.


    But now instead of them ying it safe with less risk on their lives, they started swarming me continuously.


    Although that created more holes in my armor and some of my bones to be cracked. The result of this of them dying more quickly!


    "Continue attacking him! He slowed down!"


    "If we managed to make him our ve, we will be rich!"


    "He is getting tired! just a little more and we got this troll bastard!"


    "..."


    At this point I was speechless.


    Make me a ve? Don''t you see that you guys are getting ughtered?


    And I am getting tired?


    I am a fricking UNDEAD!


    If I can get tired, then so can pigs fly at 20 match speed!


    As I wasughing at the stupidity of those guys, I didn''t know that these punch actions did actually have a point.


    The demi-humans that are trolls have a well know racial ability that most people know in this world.


    And that was regeneration.


    But such an ability can either be considered a curse or a blessing.


    In battle, trolls are easily able to regenerate small wounds, organs, and even some of their body parts such as their hands if given enough time.


    And simr to how the world is...


    Nothinges without a price!


    Since their regeneration doesn''te out of nothing, they still need nutrients for it to work.


    And regeneration without enough nutrients quickly exhaust trolls, which make them extremely safe to catch and sell as they are highly valued in the alchemy industry...


    Thus a curse.


    And since I wasn''t a troll myself.


    Those guys'' actions were truly pointless!


    And I wasn''t the only one who noticed that.


    Some of them had already run away unbeknownst to others!


    ''Hmmm, if I remember right do guys have a boss or something the like...I guess it''s time to try the new trick''


    Slowly gathering my dark green mana in my hand, I cast [Curse of Vigor] upon the middle-aged man who just started to run away.


    Previously with my fight against the Rapha guy, I realized a hidden function on curse magic...or at least the [Curse of Vigor] spell.


    Although it isn''t much, I somewhat am capable to sense the mana ced upon my spell''s victims.


    This makes at the same time tracking spell!


    ''Hmpf, consider yourself lucky of being the chosen one! After I finish with those idiots I wille and guide you through your fate!''


    Pretending to have been exhausted, I continued killing these idiots while watching my XP storage filling up....

 Chapter 47 - Making Myself You Enemy

    "U-Ugh!"


    There I was.


    Holding the neck of the ''genius'' who dered me as whatever a troll might be.


    The battle with those guys was a short-lived one.


    At the start, this thief''s who turned out to be vers was quite an annoying bunch to deal with, but after killing half of them they lost almost all morale.


    Which in turn makes things all the more annoying to deal with since I had to chase after them.


    "Hey, you listing to me? If you don''t want to join your friends you better start using that mouth of yours" I said while increasing my grip on this neck."


    The man that has this throat gripped looked ghastly pale. This skin was starting to lose color with its eyes trembling.


    "Plea-...nee- breat-..."


    Looking at the man''s eye slowly to turn around and salivaing from this mouth I realized my mistake.


    ''Tch...disgusting.''


    I turned around and threw him like at the remains of the previews fight.


    "Cough~Cough! Please! I will ta- gasp!" He hastily tried to beg for this life but was shortly after shocked and disgusted by the current sigh in front of him.


    Seeing thisrade who was just yesterday night having a nice drink and shared jokes with each other being cut right through the middle until this belly.


    He imminently turned around and threw up what was remaining of this breakfast of this day.


    Since it''s not an everyday event to see the innards of someone else lien down on the ground like a merchant would show this warrs in an everyday bizarre.


    Such a reaction was normal.


    ''Good thing that I tossed him away before I was sshed with the "green juice"...''


    Shaking the remaining saliva in my hand with a heavy face, I picked up one of the short swords of the dead and walked towards the man.


    "I ain''t repeating, tell me where the other guys are and the one you call "Boss" before..."


    Without hesitation, I stabbed the mentally and physically exhausted man with the short this sword that I picked up through his thigh.


    "Ahhhhh!" Enormous pain overwhelmed the man to the point where this vision was blinded by own tears.


    But these screams and tears imminently stopped when he saw the dreadful knight picking another of these short swords, while this gaze still being on this other thigh.


    "Please! I already said I talk! I will talk...please!"


    Seeing this determination toply I stared at him nkly and hinted him to continue.


    Ignoring the pain from this thigh, he began talking faster than he could breathe.


    He didn''t dare to wait with the gaze of this dreadful knight before him.


    "We..! As I told you before we came here to raid this vige and make the vigers...ves" He mumbledst and took a peak at the knight.


    Seeing no reaction he sighed in relief inside of him and continued exining.


    "As for your question... Most of us died here or runoff as you saw. We originally came here because one of the produ- I mean one of the viger girls had escape and the guys chasing her took too long toe..."


    ''I see... the XP ba- the girl that I killed was the reason why so many came here. They finished their job and probably came to y with her while ming the two guys for "damaging" the product.''


    "So? It can''t be that everyone came here to simply ''y'' with her right?"


    "Y-Yeah, only the few who manage the ves inside the wagons with our B-Boss leading the caravan. They should be in the middle of the town right now. T-That''s all! I really don''t know anything else! Really!" He said with trembling and hups.


    "I see...in the middle of the town you say?" I said while looking far through the distance.


    "Y-Yeah, Just walk straight this path if you want to go there." He pointed at the path behind him.


    "Alright, thanks for the info then."


    Seeing the dreadful knight put the short sword down and walking behind him towards the path.


    An invisible weight from this heart disappeared and relief came to this mind.


    ''I Survived! Nothing else matters!''


    Nothing else matters to him now.


    Even though he felt the adrenaline in this body going away, thus regaining the pain in this leg.


    He didn''t care!


    Feeling bad for betraying thisrade?


    Ha! They can die a dog''s death by this knight of all I care!


    Even though this body was trashed around and this mind was a mess.


    The man currently had a moment of pure euphoria.


    He was just d he was able to survive.


    "As long as I can live, nothing else matt-"


    *Wsheeen!


    "Huh?"


    The next moment he knew, this worldview became upside down and simr to when he watched himself in the mirror.


    There was this headless body standing there.


    Thest thing he saw was the knight of before standing behind this body.


    [You received 1200 XP]


    As for me I simply stabbed the Veren sword inside his body and activating the runes to repair what damage was done in the fight.


    After the repair has finished I walked towards the direction that the now dead man had pointed out while shaking my head by thest words of the man.


    ''Surviving wasn''t an option. It wasn''t you guys making an enemy out of me. It was me making an enemy out of you.''


    After all, My sole reason foring here was simply to find new armor and a scabbard...


    "I hope that their boss has at least armor on him..."


    My gazended in the direction where the man showed or rather to where I sensed my mana!


    "Hehe, although that guy told the truth, it never hurts to be prepared!"


    Without further ado, I ran off towards the chosen one!


    Shortly after I already got a glimpse at the middle-aged man far away!


    "Oh, there are the wagons that should have the ves in."


    After scanning the surroundings I felt disappointed.


    "The man with the scar on this face should be the so-called " Boss" based on this equipped and the egg looking guy should be the one that takes care of the ves...?"


    Although I said that the scarface had better equipped, that only counted at this sword...


    "My expectation was too big... I should end this quickly..."


    What if I want armor?


    What if I want a scabbard fitting exactly my Veren sword?


    Am I greedy?


    Maybe.


    Do I care?


    Hell no!


    Concentrating the mana in the Veren sword and moving it like waves I shot out the always reliable [Wind de]!


    *Fsheeeeen!


    The de made out of mana and air cut through the very wind it was created towards the financially poor Boss!


    "Boss! you got to believe me!"


    "You dare say such nonsense like a troll pretending to be a knight? What is this one of the pranks that you got forced into?"


    "No! Boss! I swear I would never tell suc- Huh? What is this sound?" As he was about to turn around and see the high-pitched sound that was getting closer and closer.


    He was violently grabbed and pushed in front of this boss by this boss?


    "Boss?"


    As these words came out of this mouth he felt an incredible pressureing out of this back to the point where almost thisplete body was cut in half.


    "...!"


    The middle-aged man couldn''t even cry out of pain as he was instantly killed by an almost invisible de.


    Although Bent was used to simr sights of horror like the man being split in two cause of this shady job that he had done, he was still shaken by the method that this trusted meat bag was dealt with.


    ''A highly concentrated mana de...to think this town would be so absurd...''


    Not only was an old geezer capable of showing the strength of a warrior, but there is a guy who is capable of shoot projectiles with such an affinity?


    It wasn''t the first time that Bent had seen this skill, which is the reason why he is cursing Bn.


    By the simple use of the skill, he could tell that itcked speed and stealth.


    As far as he knew this martial art was called [Wind de] which was quite simple but also quite difficult to master.


    The supposed peak of the skill was supposed to be an incredible fast de that was almost invisible in themon eye.


    And the martial art that he just saw was definitely the [Wind de]! Although that ominous mana sticks out like a jester in a royal pce. It wasn''t less dangerous than of the peak of such skill and if yes only by tiny best weaker.


    "To think that you will throw one of your subordinates just to block that." said a cold voice.


    Seeing the man that this terrifying skill toward being a 1.95m tall with a menacing sword in this hand and a heavily damaged armor which looked like the metal had once melted down.


    With the many holes that the armor, Bent felt like he was staring into the abyss as the only thing he saw in these holes was pure nothingness.


    "I guess this will take longer than excepted," said the chilling voice.


    Hearing the tone of the knight in front of him he could almost swear that he saw a vicious smile forming behind the knight''s helm.

 Chapter 48 - Boss Fight

    Gathering the ethereal mana in the Veren sword I threw the next end de.


    "Another"


    *Fsheeen!


    The wind de cut through the soft earth and through the air in the direction of the ver boss.


    But unfortunately, the guy used a secret technic called ''moving away...


    "Of course it''s too slow ..." Well of course it was too slow.


    Considering the distance between us and the obvious projectile that was lightly glowing with my dark green light. I should even have realized that it was bound to miss...


    "Tch, waste of mana."


    Although I knew I still did it...


    Why you ask?


    Well...since I got one, wouldn''t the second be on free?


    "I guess a close confrontation is needed..." Digging my boots to the soft ground, I dashed towards the guy in front of me with caution.


    It would even suck if that guy was to show to be simr to the Rapha guy which had long-distance attacks.


    But even after moving no further than 5 meters away from him, I saw no hint of magic or the like.


    ''He shouldn''t be a magic caster...maybe a swordman?''


    At the 4 meter mark, I elerated with the use of [Sprint] and jumped at him to hank him at one go.


    *Thiiid!


    Our des met with me winning the contest of strength and slowly pushing this de away.


    "You brute! Why the heck is someone like you in such a punny vige?"


    "You talk too much..."


    Breaking the standoff, I guided the mana in my sword.


    "The same trick again? You think I am stup-"


    "Shut up..."


    "You..!"


    Swinging my sword, another wind de appeared out of the runed de.


    The man has already anticipated it and moved to the side before the de even came out.


    Looking at the gaze of the knight in front of him he got a feeling that something was wrong.


    And the moment he saw the direction that the de was pointing it was toote.


    ''This bastard! It can''t be...!''


    "Mr. Oliver! Take cover!"


    *Fsheeen!


    As he was awakened from a deep slumber. The poor ve merchant saw the ever-closing mass of mana and wind.


    This face imminently turned pale and cold sweat runner through this back.


    "Seriously!?"


    The merchant quickly fell from this seat face forward before crawling inside the wagon.


    Fortunately for him, he just got away right of time before the violent wind de cut through a massive piece of wood at the ce where this seat was.


    "I even missed that one...It sure isn''t my day..."


    "..."


    Although nothing has happened, Bent was still shocked at what just happened.


    What would have happened if Mr.Oliver ,his employer had died?


    Where would he get his pay!?


    Considering that this guy killed most of my subordinates, this business model that had been built by sweat and tears would overnight copse!


    He couldn''t let that happen!


    "Bastard...you asked for it!"


    Suddenly, the violent mana that was inside of him busted out of this body, governing both this whole body in mana before vanishing.


    "Be blood to my sight! [Sprout wounds]!"


    After the same violent mana went inside the man''s sword, he elerated towards me.


    "And here I thought that magic was rare..." I murmured.


    ''It''s obvious that he is using the skill [Sprint], but this guy chanted something just now...''


    *Thiik!


    Like the previews sh with our swords, I still hold on to the strength superiority.


    As I were to push forward to end this pathetic life, my sword was suddenly pushed back out of nowhere.


    "Huh?"


    "You feel for it! [sh]!"


    With a slight glow in this arms, the speed that he swung greatly hasten.


    With no time to block the iing de, I quickly took a step back to avoid saying goodbye to my shiny head mine.


    Which resulted in the mberge to dig deep inside my armor and break 2 of my left ribs.


    Fortunately, he didn''t hit the rib that held the self-made bag that was made out of cloth that I was so proud of.


    Even though I avoided the items that were inside of me falling off, the attack still did around 450 damage in total.


    The damage I receive was quite big but it didn''t hinder my movements a bit.


    ''Hmm? Why does the armor glow so suddenly...? Mana''


    Just before I could touch this strange mana, it suddenly brightened up and the holes grew by half as much


    *Krggh


    I nkly looked at them together pressed metal and the expanded hole that happened in the spend of fewer than 2 seconds...


    "Bhahahsha! You idiot! That''s what you get off under-" As Bent, we''re about tough at the monstrous knight, these words stuck to this throat when he saw the knight nkly watching him.


    Taking a better look at the knight the sight became even more blizzard.


    ''Why is he still standing there looking at me as he was fine? I surely hit him at this vitals but why isn''t he screaming of pain and beg to spare him...?''


    "Huh? Why isn''t blooding out of you?" Looking at this mberge he still saw no hints of blood in this de!


    No matter how the gears turned inside this head, only further confusion overwhelmed him.


    But this brainstorming came to a halt when he saw the mana of the knight flowing through this de.


    "Dammit!"


    He quickly used [Sprint], stepping aside from the iing wind de.


    But this relief was short lived when he saw long sword of this knighting crushing towards this head.


    "You-!"


    *Thiiikk!


    The loud sound of metal echoed through the whole vige.


    The strength behind the long sword was nowhere as strong as the one of before!


    These knees were starting to bend slowly and shock was written all over this face.


    "How did yo-!"


    "Didn''t I tell you..."


    Using the skill [Sprint] I kicked him with immense speed to this thigh.


    As if my leg dug through this flesh, sounds of bones cracking could be hurt and the ''Boss'' of those guys was blown away and rolling to the ground.


    "That you talk too much?"


    *Cracked


    "Ahhhhhhh! Bastard! My leg...!"


    Even though he felt immense paining from this leg, he still tried to stand up and fight.


    But in short the runed de pierced this shoulder, rooting him to the ground.


    Stepping the hand that held this sword, I coldly stared at this sword.


    After making sure that he couldn''t move this other hand I lightly tapped this mana engulfed sword.


    Every time I tapped it with the Veren sword I felt some weird resistance.


    "So that was the trick you used on me...sadly it isn''t suited against me..."


    "You! Let go! Do you know who I am!? You aren''t going to get away with hurting me!"


    Ignoring the rumbling of the scarface. I read through this skimmed through this status.


    [Status]


    Name: Bent Terres


    Race: Human


    Level: 18


    ss: [Warrior Lv. 5]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 560/1500


    Mana: 35/130


    Attributes Strenght 47 Agility 38 Inteligents 13 Endurance: 30 : Stamina : 35


    Talents: [Human] [Leader] [Cruell]


    Skills: [Lower Weapon mastery Lv. 8] [Sprint Lv. 2] [Sprout Wounds Lv. 4] [sh Lv. 6]


    [Remark: A cruel person who makes a living through selling this own kind.]


    ''Other than 3 things and him being an idiot. nothing else is noteworthy...''


    [Sprout Wounds]: Comming from the blood and dark magic school is a weapon-based enchantment. The enchanted weapon in question that will cause a wound lets some mana in the target and soon forcibly expands the wound of the target. Since the mana flow resembles the one of a heart, there is a small possibility of disrupting the enemy''s weapon.


    [Cruell]: Those who are under fear will unconsciously fear you!


    [sh]: Though the use of mana you are capable of simting seeing your arms with your own mana and physical strength without burdening your body.Can only be used on swinging motions.


    ''There is a thing like blood magic? Well, I can image this [Sprout Wounds] to be amazing to use but against an opponent without blood is kinda...''


    As for the talent [Cruell] and the skill [sh] I wasn''t much impressed with the magic enchantment that the guy used.


    "Well, I guess it''s time to kill you."


    As if a p of thunder strikes down inside Bents''s mind, he began to sweat from all over this body.


    "W-W-Wait! Didn''t you hear what I said!? I-If die you wouldn''t be to..."


    Without any hesitation, I pierced this stomach with the Veren sword.


    "Kyaahhhh! P-Please! I even got money! I got connections! S-"


    Pulling the sword out I pierced him again at a different location.


    "Ahhhh! Why!? Please show mercy!"


    The longer I continued this painful torture, the burning feeling inside of me turned even cooler and at some point, I didn''t feel as unpleasant as before.


    With this throat having lost this strength, Bent murmured.


    "You...will regret this."


    Hearing that I could only scoff at him.


    "Dead men tell no tales"


    After ending the man life the heat in my body slowly dissolved.


    [You received 5800 XP]


    "Sigh...although it always feels unpleasant..."


    ''This time it wasn''t as bad.''


    After activating Verens rune and draw some blood I walked towards where the 3 wagons was.

 Chapter 49 - Deal

    Stepping in the rider''s seat was a wooden door.


    "Hmm, locked. Not surprised." Looking at the damage that someone did of course they would close the door.


    After thinking about I decided to knock on the door since as a true gentleman and someone who values the privacy of others is entitled to.


    Mhmm, yeah. Thatsted about 3 seconds.


    "Open up you little shits!" Out of patience, I kicked the door open.


    "Kyaaah!"


    "Hkkkkk! Bent! What are yo- huh?"


    "The so-called Bent is outside lying dead on the ground. And you guys will soon meet them." I said while looking around.


    The guy supposedly called Oliver seemed like he fell butt first on the floor and the two guys around him seem to be a part of these minions.


    As for all the others...


    ''They really sell their own race...''


    On the left and right side were mostly women n holding on to their knees and with so little clothing that it hid their private areas.


    Some were shaking in fear while others stared aimlessly at the distance with dead fish eyes.


    "Y-Y-You, guys! W-What are you still standing there!? Get him!"


    "But Sir Oliver...We can''t..."


    "Who do you guys think is paying here! I will pay 10 gold coins on who kills this bastard."


    The moment money has been bought up, the fear they held vanished and in turn became the man''s greed.


    "How dare you insult the great Oliver!" With words full of rightness and eyes full of greed one of the vers dashed forward.


    Indeed, the power of money couldn''t be underestimated as when enough was ced in front of someone they will purge their fears and control someone''s actions purely in the face of profit.


    "Idiot..."


    Swinging the Veren sword with one hand at this mindless creature''s head.


    Holding this short story with both hands he tried blocking the attack, but upon contact of both des, I simply pushed the de aside and cut this throat.


    "Bluhh! Wh- imp-"


    Without even being able to say thesest words he fell to the ground.


    [You received 1000 XP]


    ''He is even worse than the guys outside...''


    Everyone was shocked at the current sight in front of them.


    The two of the ver crew in the middle had pale faces while the what I guess are the ves had...interesting faces.


    Some were shaking and grabbing their heads while whispering gibberish.


    Others had even paler faces while that the vers themselves but for the most part they had vicious faces and smiling eyes.


    That sight made it even the more creepy for the merchant and the minion beside him.


    "These mere products...!"


    "You done?" Slowly walking towards them I said with my cold voice.


    The sound of the screeching wood made all inside the room feel the temperature drop.


    "S-Stay away! Or else..." Feeling this death slowly crippling upon him, the man''s minds overloaded on what to do.


    And in the moments of this demise, an idea came to mind.


    He quickly grabbed a stunning beauty from the side and put this short sword at her throat.


    "Stop right there! Move any closer and she dies"


    "He, a hostage? You serious?"


    "Didn''t you hear what I said! If you get any closer she is dead!"


    With tears running on her beautiful face, she pleads with a low voice.


    "Please, save..."


    "Be quiet! And you over there stay right where you at!"


    ''I should be saved for now, unlike that idiot I got a brain in my head. If this knight is here then that means the boss should even be dead by now. I am lucky enough that this guy is a knight that holds the stupid beliefs of virtue.''


    "You! Back away and throw your weapon where I can see it! or else..."


    "Or else what?"


    "Huh?"


    Using [Sprint] I dashed at the guy and without hesitation pierced him and the woman right through the chest.


    "You..!"


    [You received 1200 XP]


    "Why...?"


    [You received 700 XP]


    "You guys sure misunderstood why I am here..."


    My actions together with the blood in my armor made my words sound even more ominously for everyone inside here.


    Pointing the sword at the merchant I said with my cold voice.


    "I am here to kill you all..."


    "W-Wait! Sir Knight! If you were to kill me the merchant union will..."


    Before he could finish I griped him on this neck as you would do on a chicken.


    "Whatever this union crap is. As far as I know the dead tell no tales."


    "I-Is it gold you want!? How about 30- No 50 Gold!? Let me leave and I promi-"


    "Not interested."


    I raised my sword ready to pierce through this chest.


    But the next thing he said made me halt.


    "Please! Is it magic items that you want!? I have enough influence to get you whatever you want! Please spare me!"


    ''Magic items? Does he mean something like my Veren sword?''


    Looking through my armor I grimace slightly (Not like I can...).


    "And where are these magic items that you speak of?"


    Hearing that Oliver''s face changed color drastically.


    As if holy light descend in the dark cave that he was in.


    He saw Hope!


    "I know a great smith in the capital! They should match the strength of your sword of not surpass it! Let me live and I will get you whatever you want from there!"


    "..."


    ''Maybe I can use this guy...''


    "How do I know that you aren''t lying?" Of course, I will doubt it.


    It sounds too good of an offer to give on someone who is holding your neck to lick a dead duck.


    "I-If I was to lie you can end my life wherever you want! N-Nevertheless without any kind of influence most can''t buy magic items!"


    ''If that guy is telling the truth, then magic items should be monitored on who buys them...''


    He basically saying that without him I can''t get buy magic items from anywhere...


    "Sigh..." Letting my grip go the merchant fell butt first on the wooden floor.


    "Cough~Cough, I promise you you aren''t going to regret this!"


    I could only shake mine internally at this sight.


    ''I reviewed my desires too fast..."


    That guy was smart, from the little information and time that he had he found my interest in magic items too fast.


    He''s saying that some kind of authority is needed to buy magic items also makes him a necessity for my interest...


    ''The only disadvantage thing here is that I can''t prove these words...''


    "How long?"


    "Huh?"


    "How long until we reach that ce...?"


    "I-It should be around 2 to 3 weeks if we were to start moving now..."


    "Alright...but a warning before that..." Gathering my mana in my hand I cast [Curse of Vigor] on him.


    "What did you...?" He asked slightly shaking and breathing heavily.


    "That''s my warning on you. What I just did was cing a curse on you."


    These eyes widen up and a feeling of dread came at him.


    "A curse...?" He managed to say in a slightly shaking voice.


    "Yes, although this was just a temporary one, we know that the next one shall be a permanent one..."


    Seeing these eyes shaking I almostugh out loud.


    ''He fell for it...''


    Of course, a permanent curse is a thing.


    And also what I just said was pure bullshit!


    Me a permanent curse?


    Bah! Didn''t your mother tell you not to believe everything that others say?


    I almost feel bad for him!


    Almost.


    "Anyways...lead me now to the other two wagons..."


    "Sure..."


    And with that, I and the guy Oliver left the stunned ves and went to the other wagons.


    Of course this time we used the keys that Oliver had instead of gently pushing the door open...


    Of course, I aimed to kill the remaining vers and kill some rebellious ves.


    After finishing the second wagon and entering the third I noticed something unusual.


    "Huh? Why is this wagon so...empty?"


    "Sir! be careful that''s cause..."


    [You are being affected by the status effect [Nightmare]]


    "Huh?"


    It was as if someone closed the lights.


    Everything was engulfed in total darkness.


    "This ce is..."


    Suddenly an old woman''s cry came from the distance.


    "Please...!"


    "Who!" Turning around I saw nothing.


    "You will regret this...!" Then a male''s voice sounded through the distance behind me.


    "You!"


    Same as usual...nothing was around me.


    "It can''t be...that I returned to this c-"


    [Effect [Nightmare] has been removed.]


    "I am back?"


    "Sir are you alright!?"


    After confirming that I am back from this ce that resembled the dark swamp I calmed down.


    "Yes...But wha-" But as I were to ask what was going on, two voices interrupt me.


    "Sis!"


    "Big sister!"


    "You two...quickly hide behind me..."


    Looking in front of a were 2 small dark-skinned girls with chains on their necks and legs while in the middle of them was a mature-looking one which resembled the two other girls.


    Looking at these girls made the invisible heat lessen but still being there.


    Such a reaction obviously confused me.


    "These three are..."


    Hearing my question made the merchant straighten this back and say in pride.


    "This sir, are our greatest products that I own! They are of the Dark Elve race!"


    Upon hearing him saying what this three are I frowned.

 Chapter 50 - Into The Capital

    "Dark elves...not humans?"


    Asking that made the bald Oliver look weird at me before answering.


    "Haha, of course, they are elves! it might be hard to see cause it''s dark inside here, but look at their ears. It''s clear that they are rtives of the elve race!"


    ''Hmm, taking a better look at their faces they do have long and pointing ears...''


    "So...why are only these three inside this wagon?"


    For 3 ves 1 wagon?pared to the other wagons this one could be considered empty.


    Scratching this bald head, Oliver started exining.


    "Well...they are two reasons for this, Sir Knight. Since these three are of the highest quality I couldn''t possibly risk them being damaged by the mercenaries I hired..."


    "By mercenaries, you mean the guys that I killed?"


    "Yes..." he said with a bitter smile.


    If we are talking about these idiots then I do understand the reason for keeping these 3 away of them. Heck, the moment I came here I cached 2 guys about to ''damage'' this product.


    "That sure is reasonable...what''s the other reason?"


    "The second reason is..." Pointing this finger at the older dark elve he said.


    "This wrench over there is capable of dark magic. More specifically illusion magic. Even though I restrained her with mana draining chains she is somehow still able to cast her magic. Cause of that she is too dangerous to be let with others..."


    Hearing that it suddenly downed me.


    The message of being effect by [Nightmare] and immediately after appearing to the waters of pure nothingness.


    And these voices...


    "You lead me inside here, without letting me know about her and her magic?" With my cold voice and the small realize of killing intent I looked at the bald guy.


    Realizing this mistake, this face soon turned deadly pale by the deadly aura of the knight.


    "S-Sir, I didn''t mean any har-"


    Before he could finish I punched him directly at this stomach while controlling my strength.


    It wasn''t enough to kill him, but it was just enough to send him flying to the wooden walls and throw whatever he had from breakfast to the floor.


    ''This bastard...he probably wanted to backstab me while I was dazed by that damn long ears over there.''


    The ethereal me on my eyes soon turned cold.


    Seeing me who just sted the fat guying at them the 2 young girls behind the older one started to weep.


    "Sister..."


    "Sis..."


    "Shhh, everything will be alright. Big sister will protect you guys." With a sweet voice, the older elve assured the two behind her back.


    Turning towards me her face turned serious and no sight of her previews smile was to see.


    "You can do whatever you want with me! But don''t you dare touch the sisters of mine! I will take their c-"


    I suddenly grabbed her neck and lifted her in the air.


    "You think you got the privilege to demand whatever you want after you made me remember ''that'' ce!?"


    "Sis!"


    "Let her go you beast!"


    The two small elves leaned over me and started to pull at my armor.


    "..."


    Now that I am closer at them I finally noticed the simrities between this two.


    They both had ck hair and purple eyes.


    ''Are they twins...?''


    Ignoring such thought I pushed the two aside.


    "Kyaah."


    "*Sob* Sis..."


    "You...!


    Even though I didn''t use much strength, it was still too much...


    "It doesn''t matter what you think of me and even if it does your death should make it so."


    The runes of the Veren sword are shown in ominous dark red light.


    Holding the Veren sword right in front of her chest ready to pierce through.


    But before I could even do the act...


    "Cough~Cough, Sir Knight! Don''t kill her! You will get cursed!"


    "Huh?"


    Seeing my confusion he started to rify what he said while holding this big belly out of pain.


    "Sir! Once you kill one of them you will be marked by the curse of the dark elves! It isn''t worth it!"


    "..."


    ''Does he want me to spare them so that she can sell them or do they really have a curse like that? Never less it doesn''t matter, once I use status on her I will know...''


    It was natural for me to doubt this guy''s words, after all, he might even plot to kill me by using the night elves.


    What I didn''t know though was that my assumption was almost right.


    Yes, the merchant Oliver wasn''t very fond of me making him this servant, not forgetting killing these ves.


    This forming a n to kill me with this dagger while I was under the illusion of influence.


    But this will to rebel against the dreadful knight that I had instantly removed or rather punched out by him.


    Scared to gain the wrath of such a figure he didn''t dare to lie anymore!


    ''Status''


    [Status]


    Name: Melina Darkwood


    Race: [Dark Elve]


    Level: 43


    ss:[ Dark Mage Lv. 3]


    Sub-ss: [Illusion Conjure Lv. 8]


    Health: 540/570


    Mana:0/1510


    Attributes: Strength: 17 Agility: 34 Intelligence: 121 Endurance: 57 Stamina: 67


    [Talent]: [Dark Elve] [Curse of Vengeance] [...] [...] [...] ...


    [Skills]: [Dark Sphere] [...] [...] [ Mindmare]...


    [Remark: A great sorcerers that strived to learn the magic school of illusions. Unfortunately for her, the love of her family reduced her to the current state that she is now.]


    "!!"


    ''What the hell is with this status!? Level 43? 1510 mana? If her mana wasn''t at 0 she would have obliterated me!''


    Watching her huge amount of skills that I couldn''t read bought a feeling of dread in me.


    And I was supposed to be an undead who doesn''t know fear!


    After being stunned for a moment, I cleared my head and read whatever I could for status.


    [Dark Elve:] A distant rtive of the elves. Simr to the elves, the dark elves aging process is massively reduced by the age of 20, and their life expectancy is on average 300 years. They have a natural talent for the dark arts and dark vision.


    [Daek Sphere]" A concentrated ball of darkness that can be shot. Although powerful, the power of the spell lowers by 20% against any kind of barriers.


    [Mindmare:] Abination of dark and illusion magic. It allows putting someone''s mind into this worse nightmare that he had lived. The duration depends on the enemy''s strength. Although the spells don''t use any mana and only the mind, it''s highly demanding on the mind. Can be cast once per day.


    [Curse of Vengeance]: A spell put by the Elders of the Dark Elve to the children of their race. The curse''s sole purpose is to transfer to the one who killed the original owner so that the members of the Dark Elves can know who to enact their revenge upon.


    "So this is what you mean..."


    Looking at her stuff made me almost curse out loud.


    Sure, her race talent and the Dark sphere spell sounded pretty average, but putting your enemy''s on their worst nightmare? Marking the killers?


    Fu#k are those guys, lunatics, to put such things on them!?


    Moving my gaze towards the two small ones, I slightly scratch both of them on their knees to see if those two are some kind of level 43 monster like her.


    "You bastard! What the hell are you doing to my sisters!"


    "..."


    Damn, calm down woman. You make it sound like I cut their legs or something.


    Anyways, the two were named Serah Darkwood and Senna Darkwood. Fortunately enough both of them were level 2 with no skills none talents to see.


    Expect of the curse and race talents of course.


    ''Hmm, that''s a problem. I can''t kill them nor can I take them with me. Killing them is like shooting myself in the foot while screaming to the whole damn dark elve race that I killed one of them and taking them with me in the carriage is also a no go.''


    Since we will be taking only one carriage I will be forced to stay with someone who potentially can put me in a nightmare.


    ''That''s way too dangerous...''


    After a short moment of awkward silence, an idea came to my mind.


    If you can''t deal with the stench of trash then thrown them outside!


    Gathering my mana into the Veren Sword I used [Wind de] at the wall.


    *Baahm!


    "Sir!"


    "Be quiet, you. Talk once again and I will break those legs of you..." I turned my gaze towards the dark elve I was holding.


    "You guys are lucky."


    With a swift strike of my, the chains of hers broke into pieces.


    "You...what are you?"


    Everyone in the room had a stunned expression on their face.


    But I didn''t care enough to exin.


    "Tell me, dark elve. Have you ever heard the saying..." I said while lifting her outside the hole I made.


    Melina would have appreciated the warm light and the clear sky that she hasn''t seen for a long time if it weren''t for the fact she was held by her neck.


    Before she could question the one that held her from her neck, she was cut short by these actions.


    "An eye for an eye!"


    Without letting herprehend my words, my actions shortly did!


    Circting mana in my legs to active [Sprint] I kicked her to the left knee, this breaking her one leg and sending her out of the carriage.


    *Crack!


    "Ahhhhh!"


    "Sis!"


    "Sister!"


    Looking at the other two, I simply cut their chains like their older sister and thrown them outside.


    Although I didn''t break one of their knees, the height of the carriage was still enough for such small children to get their knees scratched.


    But the pain of the fall didn''t stop the twins from rash towards their hurt sister.


    "Big Sis!"


    "Sister! are you alright!?"


    The pain of her broken knee quickly faded away looking at both her adorable little sisters.


    As she were to assure both of them, a dark mist engulfed the twins before entering their bodies.


    Seeing that happens she froze like a standing corpse, knowing the indication of this mist.


    Her face turned full in horror, before she yelled at the one who did that.


    "You..!"


    "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. What you have done to me I will do to you twice as worse. Don''t think me as cruel."


    Turning my back towards them I said.


    "You leg and the curse of these two was the price of you putting me into this nightmare. The curse is temporary and if you go further away from me it will break. And I advise you to do as such. The soldiers of the city areing to this ce. And I truly wonder what these guys will do to you, especially these two..."


    Melina''s eyes opened wide upon hearing what I said.


    She seemed to want to say something but I already went inside before she could utter something.


    I just didn''t care what this three want to say.


    Feeling the mana of the curse that I ced on these twins going further away it seemed they followed my advice.


    Which was good for me, since it would even be annoying if they were to follow me.


    "S-Sir Knight...why did you let these three go?"


    ''Right... this fat #ss is still here...was this name Oliver or something?''


    "You, choose 10 of you ves and put them at the first carriage"


    "Huh? Why..."


    Raising the Veren sword at this throat. With some killing intend and my cold voice, I said.


    "Don''t question me, I ain''t repeating myself."


    "Y-Yes! I will do it right away! So please put the de away..."


    "You got 5 minutes to choose, no longer."


    "Yes!"


    And after that, in less than 5 minutes Oliver choose 10 of these ves which were unsurprisingly all women...


    Originally each carriage had had 20 ves not counting the one that held the dark elves. Which in total were 40 ves in total.


    But I didn''t have any ns of bringing every single of them with me.


    After my previews massacre, they were 31 ves in total.


    Counting the 10 ves that I will take their still were 21ves left.


    And unlike I did with the dark elves.


    I ughtered the remaining 21 mercilessly.


    After all, those guys'' parents weren''t such lunatics like the dark elves who put curses on their children.


    Which in my hollow eyes make them no different than some kind of walking XP bags, ready to be harvested at any time.


    After finishing the ''clean up'' and entering the carriage.


    The 10 ves'' bodies started to shake abnormally with everyone avoid to make eye contact with me.


    I simple shrugged my shoulders at them.


    It wasn''t that I didn''t understand the behavior.


    After all, if they killed off 21 people that you knew simply entered the same room. You couldn''t help but be scared and stressed.


    That or this guy heard the voices of the agony of those unlucky 21...


    "Hey, I finished already. You can start the carriage."


    "Y-Yes, Sir Knight!"


    *Higaah


    With the horse pulling the carriage and the newly 15500 XP in my storage.


    We headed to the capital!

 Chapter 51 - Superior Undead

    Currently in the Royal Academy in the capital.


    "The Main different between martial arts and Magic is how the mana and our life force in our body is being used~"


    Inside a huge room that had at least 60 students was an elderly man with a long gray beard and hair.


    "But remember that our life force between us and other races arepletely different. Therefore knowing your enemy''s life force traits is a piece of crucial information if you were to fight someone of a different race~"


    Dozen of writing sounds could be heard the whole time from students.


    Some were writing small descriptions while others were copying word from word of the old man''s lecture in their notebooks.


    And among those very students in the very back was a silver-haired kid with this arms lien on this desk with his head buried in them.


    "Ah, so annoying. When is it ever going to end..."


    He said while watching the lecture with 1 eye open.


    ''That''s basic stuff, what need is there to write all this crap?''


    "Therefore-"


    *Ding, Dong


    Hearing the bell sounds the old man sighed out loud.


    "Sigh, Tomorrow we will learn about our life force more. ss dismissed!"


    Looking at the joyful expression of these students he couldn''t help but be somehow disappointed.


    ''And here I thought you guys were taking my lesson seriously! When you were waiting to get out of here!''


    "Aghhh, finally it has ended. Where should we go now, Allen?"


    Turning to the side expecting to see this friend Allen.


    There was no Allen to see...


    "Tch, again?"


    Standing with this bag in this hand ready to leave some voices came from behind him.


    "Sir Samuel! Would you like to eat with us?"


    Seeing the group that formed up behind Samuel most of the other young nobles cursed to themselves.


    "Why him..."


    "This damn yboy..."


    "Silver-haired freak..."


    Although they didn''t say it out loud. It was still enough for Samuel to hear them.


    Turning to thedy''s while ignoring the nearby nobles he said with a smile.


    "Sorry Ladies, I have already done ns for today. Maybe next time..."


    With that, he runs off to this room.


    "Ah..."


    It took him around 5 minutes to reach this room cause of the huge building that the Royal Academy was.


    Getting inside this room he saw Allen sitting on this bed with a dark gray book on this hand with the title of [ Weaknesses of the Undead ].


    "Allen, you still reading this book?"


    "..."


    Hearing no response, Samuel sighted and sit backward on a chair.


    "Look, Allen. I know that Rapha meant a lot to you, but..."


    "He shouldn''t have died. Samuel."


    "Huh?"


    "I have seen the power of the Draugr who supposedly killed Rapha. I even read this book about the undead. And it doesn''t make sense of Rapha dying by it..."


    Confused, Samuel scratched this head.


    "Wasn''t this draugr the one that stole my weapon? ording to the reports, this undead was a monster abnormally right?"


    Closing the book and looking at Samuel''s eyes Allen started exining with a heavy voice.


    "Yes...That draugr was a monster abnormally, but ording to this book such undead shouldn''t be a match against Rapha."


    Realizing the meaning behind Allen''s words, Samuel asked in disbelief.


    "Wait, You mean that undead was..."


    Cutting him short, Allen said with a grim voice.


    "Most likely that draugr was of the same ss as the undead that ruined Nexvarres of a century ago..."


    Clenching with these hands the book enough to ruin the front cover.


    "Ournds sure is cursed...for a simr undead like that Lesser Lich to show up..."


    ****


    "What shall I do..."


    This question gued my mind these past two weeks.


    The journey towards the capital couldn''t be anything more boring.


    Day and night I was sitting there inside that damn carriage looking either on the floor or them sleeping logs.


    That''s when I realized many shorings of being apparently a not-so-awesome-undead that I originally thought.


    Since I didn''t want to show them that I was an undead I didn''t have the choice to do anything productive...


    Wherever we moved I was inside the carriage and when we were stopping at night I had to either stay guard or watch them sleep!


    I once tried to train to get some free XP, but I ended up waking up the others...


    Other than this boredom that I was experiencing 24/7 I wasn''t even able to rx at that time.


    After all, being with those guys made my body feel hot from the trait of me being an undead...


    So yeah, not the best vacation for sure.


    The only positive thing about all this was the fact that I could practice suppressing that burning feeling in my body.


    It wasn''t much, but I did manage to reduce it by a little bit.


    Which was, well... Nice I guess? It didn''t change the fact that I felt ufortable inside the carriage.


    For me to distract myself so that I don''t lose my sanity out of boredom I tried to busy myself with various things.


    One of them was covering the holes in my armor with various clothes, which I honestly think I did a damn good job at.


    Considering it took me a whole week to do it right...


    Nheless!


    The rest of my time I used where to spend my wallet of XP I had!


    Which bough us to the present that we now...


    "Ugh..let''s take another look just to be sure..." With a mentalmand, I bought the XP storage window in front of me.


    [120 825 XP]


    ''Alright, Don''t be fooled by the numbers me! Last time they were gone before I even had realized it!''


    "For now I should focus on the useful ones..." I mumbled to myself.


    The most useful skills that I was currently using were the following.


    [Curse of Vigor Lv.1]


    [Wind de Lv.3]


    [Sprint Lv.3]


    Although in a way [Intermediate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] was what I technically most used. The current level of swordsmanship was enough as things were now.


    Thus these 3 were my main targets to increase to Lv.10.


    If I were to aim for firepower then [Wind de] would be the obvious choice.


    But...


    "It''s so dang expensive..." I subconsciously said out loud.


    Although that cause the nearby ves to look at me weirdly, I simply ignored them.


    ''Although I could max it out right now, it probably would cost me most of my XP I stored...''


    Which put me at upgrading [Curse of Vigor Lv.1] and [Sprint Lv.3].


    ''I guess I should do the obvious one before moving on


    Without further ado, I clicked with my finger on the upgrade button on [Sprint].


    [Sprint level has increased from Lv. 3 to Lv. 10!]


    [The Skill Sprint reached this maximum Level.]


    [Sprint Lv.10 turns into Dash Lv.1]


    [Dash Lv.1]: By surrounding yourself in your mana in a specific way you can reduce your overall weight while forcing your mana into your legs you are capable to move beyond your capabilities.


    ''It seems the same as [Sprint] but with the additional effect of reducing my weight. Not bad for 18900 XP.''


    Pleased with the oue I nodded to myself.


    "Now with the main problem..."


    ''Now I could easily increase [Curse of Vigor] to Lv. 10 if I want to, but somehow doing so is also a waste of XP...''


    When I am referring to being a waste of XP I don''t mean the capability of the spell, but the efficiency of XP usages.


    For example, If I were to increase [ Miasma Corruption] then [Curse of Vigor] would then cost less than 2375 than it is now.


    But doing so would drain most of the XP that I have gathered...


    "Ah, so annoying..."


    Both had pros and cons.


    One increases my current fighting potential while the other is a long-time investment which probably will make things more XP efficient...


    After a long time of hesitation, I have decided.


    While reluctant I raised my finger and pressed the upgrade button.


    [Miasma Corruption level has increased from Lv. 1 to Lv.10!]


    [The Skill Miasma Corruption reached this maximum Level.]


    [Miasma Corruption Lv.10 turns into Undeath Corruption Lv. 1]


    [Talent [Undead] turned into [Superior Undead]]


    Suddenly a massive surge of power overwhelmed me and death mana kepting out of my body.


    If it weren''t for the fact of my armor and cloth hiding the dead mana of my body everyone would have realized that I was Undead.


    But even my armor couldn''t hide the killing intent that I subconsciously was producing.


    The ves around me started to shake and make some distance with me.


    Worried that they would be a victim of this eerie sword of this knight.


    "What the hell was that..."


    After calming the dead mana around me and putting it inside my body I feltpletely energized.


    Feeling that my strength was suddenly increased I was about to take a look at the new things that I got.


    But before I could even my status I was cut short by the bright sunlight that came out of the door.


    "Sir Knight! We reached the Capital!"

 Chapter 52 - From The Very Beginning...

    "Sir Knight! We reached the Capital!"


    "Tch..."


    `It can¡ät be helped I guess...I can take a look at my statuster I guess.¡ä


    "Sir Knight, is something wrong?"


    "Nothing, something just crossed my mind. Let¡äs see the ce that you told me about."


    Stepping out of the door a stunning view appeared in front of me.


    "As promised! We finally reached the capital of the kingdom of Berum! Named after the same name of the first king, Bernes!"


    Walls reaching the height of 15 meters with some extreme artistic carving of shattered wings.


    Just one look at this wings would even question if it took longer to build the wall or the art on the wall.


    "I recognize you look, Sir Knight, I was just like you when I first came to this ce! The wings on the walls should represent that of the immortal being, the Phonix! The story goes that thete king Bernes was a descendant from the phoenix bloodline and~"


    While ignoring Oliver''s rambling on how that king Bernes was awesome and vast this story was.


    I currently was fully emerged with the view in front of me.


    "That should be the second ce..."I mumbled under my helm.


    The first ce that bought me such a feeling inside of me was when I emerged from theke and got to see the beautiful lights from the crystals on the ceiling inside the cave.


    And this sight would be the second one that I would consider beautiful.


    "And when king Bernes wen-"


    "Truly amazing."


    "Huh? Did you say something, Sir?"


    "I said that this sight is amazing."


    Realizing that he was ignored through the whole process of this storytelling time, he felt this veins about to explode out of anger.


    But he kept silent, knowing what best for this life is.


    Shallowing this frustration he continued driving as he did before.


    I obviously noticed that, but I didn¡ät say it out loud. Instead, I focused on the more important stuff.


    Like my surroundings.


    "Hmm, say Oliver. Is it usually so busy around here or why are so many people here?" I pointed in front of me. Although I did expect to see some at the gate by what Oliver had told me. The number of people with carriage and weapons on them still surprised me.


    "This Sir, should be fellow merchants or adventurers who probablye from the same direction as us. since in Nexvarres whole forest got engulfed in fire, cause of this fire I and my crew decided to raid that vige... Normally it shouldn¡ät be as busy as now..."


    "I-I see..."


    Upon hearing I froze.


    `It can¡ät be that he is talking about the fire that my fight between that Rapha guy caused...right?¡ä


    Looking at the knight suddenly go silent he continued focusing on the road, which bought an awkward silence between this two.


    When their turn came to go through the gate, an hour has already passed.


    "Didn¡ät think it would take so long..." I said with my cold voice.


    "Haha...that¡äs usually normal at the gates. Especially when a merchant is going through the gates..." Although he was used by this cold voice of this knight. Hearing talking to him made me always have some cold sweat behind my back.


    "Hmm, is it a reason on why merchants take so lon-"


    "Stop right there and show us your identity!" A sudden harsh voice came at them.


    Looking at where the voice came from, were a middle-aged soldier which had some simr body armor to the guys that I killed when I left the gate with a spear in this hand.


    "Wha-" Suddenly I was cut short by the bald head beside me.


    "Demerik! My friend! how has it been!" Oliver said with a smile that I never saw before.


    "Oh! Sir Oliver! What a pleasure to meet you on such a day! I see you got a new adventure behind you this time around. You guysing from Nexvarres too like does guys behind you?"


    "You sure do know me well, Demerik. We indeede from Nexvarres but you got it wrong on your second guess. That guy beside me is no adventure but in fact a mercenary."


    "Hmph, a mercenary you say? Why would you need those money crazy hooligans when you got adventures? I bet with the same money you bought him, you could even buy severalmoner''s adventures with the same worth as him, so why buy him?"


    Seeing the soldier named Demerik snoring and looking cold at me out of nowhere I frown slightly (not like I could).


    "Hahaha, actually that guy saved my life so..."


    "I see..." ncing at merchant getting awkward he sooks this head and asked.


    "So...will it be the usual or..."


    "Yes, of course, the usual like always..."


    Putting this hand inside this robe, Oliver brought a small bag which he threw at the soldiers.


    The soldier easily grabbed the bag and imminently took a look at it.


    Taking a look inside the small bag he got surprised.


    "This is..."


    "It¡äs a little `bonus¡ä out of my generosity"


    Seeing the merchant friendly face with the unusually extra weight on the small bag, he yelled towards this colleges


    "Those guys are clear! let them him! Let the immortal me shine upon you day, Sir Oliver!"


    "Thanks as always Demerik, Let the immortal me shine upon your day too!"


    And so we entered the Capital!


    ***


    POV of Oliver.


    Currently in the slums of the Capital Bernes


    `Just a little more...¡ä


    "Do you always do this kind of stuff..."


    `This bastard''s voice again...''


    The chilling like voice made him remember the hellish 2 weeks together with this monstrous knight.


    After several observations of him, he already figured that this guy isn''t a human!


    Although he tried to hide it from me and the other trash back in the carriage he couldn''t fool him!


    He knows because if he were a human he would even have died!


    Just the fact that he rarely has eaten though our whole travel is suspicious enough. I even tried to poison this food once he decided to eat it, but the next day I found the bowl empty with him being alright!


    I did hear that the stronger of a rank that someone is the longer they can resist poison and without food.


    But I can swear that this guy hasn''t slept for this god damn 2 weeks!


    This guy is definitely not a human!


    "What do you mean, Sir knight?"


    ''For now, let''s keep him happy and buy some time until we reach the headquarter.''


    "I meant if you always bribe the guards...?"


    "Haha, It''s like some kind of tribute for the soldiers protecting the city after all. I also know him so giving him an extra coin is out of generosity."


    ''Generosity my a#s! I am a fricking ve trafficker! That tribute was not to get our a#ses caught! That with my money bastard!''


    "I see...by the way this guy mentions something about adventures and mercenaries. You even called me a mercenary, so what''s that about..?"


    ''This country pumpkin!''


    "Well, adventures and mercenaries are both simr yet different. The main difference is that the kingdom controls the adventures with what kind of work they can do or outright a job into an army with a higher rank of a foot soldier. Mercenaries on the other hand aren''t being controlled by anyone and are free to choose what kind of job to ept. They are being treated hardly cause they can easily be swayed with money, like you hire a mercenary to assassinated someone only for him to reveal the assassination target you aim for a higher price. Adventures just do the given job from the kingdom and they get the rewards out from it."


    "I see...''


    ''Let''s hope that he final shut u-''


    "Do tell me, where are we going right now?"


    ''He finally asked it...Let''s lie to him now.''


    "Sir, you might not know but my business goes against thew, so running with a carriage full of ''products'' will be bad for us"


    "So... you are going to drop them off first then?"


    "Yes~Yes, after I have done that, as promised I will guide you to the promised shop to get you whatever you want!


    "Well, there would be no need for that..." Suddenly the voice became never so distant and colder than now.


    "Huh, What do yo-" A sudden dark red light lighten up the wooden floor.


    But before Oliver could see the blizzard light, an ice-cold hand grabbed this mouth.


    And the next moment an ominous sword pierced through this stomach with the clear read blood of this glowing with the light that the sword was emitting.


    "GHHHHH!"


    An enormous pain came at Oliver''s stomach, as if someone was burning these insides and drinking this blood out of this body.


    He quickly lost the strength to yell and fell to the ground, looking directly at the knight''s eyes.


    "You think that I am an idiot, don''t you?"


    "Why..." was the only words that he could Oliver manage with this now weak body.


    "Why you ask? And I thought you were smarter, but you really were an idiot." Looking at the confusion inside Oliver''s eyes the knight said.


    "It seems you forgot my reason for being here. My aim the whole time was just to rece my armor and nothing more. And seeing you and the soldier talking about the adventures and mercenaries brought me thinking..." Coming closer to my face I finally recognize the burning eyes inside of the knights this helm.


    ''Monster...''


    "If some of the adventures and mercenaries are indeedmoners. From where did all them outside the gate get their weapons and armor from?"


    "Ah..."


    "In truth, there was no need to influence to get such things right?"


    "Also, didn''t say it at the very beginning...


    Without letting him utter anything else, I pierced this heart with Veren and continued using the rune to drain him dry.


    "That I was here to kill every single of you?"


    Feeling death getting closer by the second, shbacks of 2 weeks ago came into this mind.


    And then a sudden realization came into this mind.


    "You ''ve shown what you were from the very beginning..."


    With the realization of the knight never nning to let him leave, he passed away.


    [You received 800 XP]


    "It should be around here..." With my past experience of searching bodies, I quickly found what I wanted.


    "57 gold coins, huh? Should be quite a lot."


    Putting the money inside my now upgraded self-made bag inside my body.


    I stepped inside the carriage, looking at the remaining 10 exhausted ves.


    "Let''s make it quick..."


    Closing the door of the carriage.


    Screams of the 10 ves began to be heard inside the carriage.

 Chapter 53 - Stat Multiplier

    As if looking at the past and had a feeling of nostalgia, was a knight standing in the side of the road looking aimlessly ahead. Though this armor was best described as scrap with some cloth hiding the holes in the armor. Many who passed him thought what kinds of battles he had fought to get this armor in such shape.


    While this knight looked like a veteran who has lived this whole in a battlefield.


    "Dammit, If there is a thing between the status or whatever system this is I bet it¡äsughing this a#s off! How could I even spent 98 900 XP already!"


    In reality, he was cursing at the fact of these expenses...


    Looking currently in front of me at the number I felt like I could spit blood out of my mouth at any moment!


    And the fact of not having a drop of blood inside of me should speak on how shocked I was!


    Sure, in front of [Miasma of Corruption Lv.1] costing 6000 XP and the whole 120 825 XP that I had in my storage at that time it looked just a small drop into the ocean.


    But that wasn¡ät the case at all!


    I totally underestimated the cost that I will be needed to max the whole damn thing at Lv. 10 and even if I knew somewhat that it wouldn¡ät end cheap.


    80 000 whole XP was like an anvil falling to my head and taking whatever I had left in my wallet with it!


    "Sigh... Maybe I should write this kind of stuff on some kind of paper..." Although somewhat depressed, I moved my gaze towards more important stuff.


    Like my current Status.


    `Nothing to be done I guess, I should distract myself of the cost and look at the benefits


    "Status, Let¡äs see what we go-"


    Appearing in front was what I would have expected was the status, yes.


    "The heck is with those numbers!" I cursed out loud.


    [Status]


    Name:


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 3850/3850


    Mana: 484/484


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strenght 90 Agility 70 Intelligence 44 Endurance 69


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Uniqe Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Wind de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Vigor Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead of Superior Strenght. Though youpletely merging your Lifeforce with your Undeath nature, you now became an Undead fuelled with pure dead mana and hate on the living. Such an achievement can only be seen by either talented or long-lived Undead.]


    "Crap." Thanks though my sudden outburst many eyes were on me.


    After walking away to where I previews was and making sure that no one had these lust full eyes on me I re-opened my status to see from where everything went wrong.


    "Now I understand why I felt the sudden surge of power, it''s because of those numbers! The multiplier is different too..." Even though I currently was very confused by the current state of events.


    I wasn¡ät clueless!


    "This two has to be the culprit..."


    It had to be either [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] or [Superior Undead]!


    If not both!


    Clicking on the names of both skills the truth came upon me!


    [Undeath Corruption Lv.1]: A Undead that fully merged this Life Force with this Dead Mana! Reaching this point the Undead is capable of the extent the time of the released dead mana on these surroundings, but notpletely prevent it.


    All Attributes Increase by 15.


    Lowerest the Cost of Dark, Curse, and Death-based Skills by 20%.


    Every 8 years 2 attribute points is being granted.


    "So that¡äs where the remaining statse from. An increase of all attributes by 15 isn¡ät bad at all, but for 80 000 XP, it¡äs still kind of a waste if I think of putting such an amount of XP into my level or my sses. That doesn¡ät matter though, since my aim was that sweet 20% cost reduction! Although I currently possess only 1 spell that makes use of it it will still be worth it! As for the 2 attribute points per 8 years..."


    I know that technically I am an immortal being, but isn¡ät for 8 years of waiting just to gain 2 attribute points kinda pathetic?


    "Hmmm, although this exins the sudden stats increase, it doesn¡ät exin the sudden increase of scaling multiplier on my attributes?"


    Since I only had 1 culprit left to interrogate, I quickly pressed at new talent as my curiosity reached this limits.


    [Superior Undead]: By fully turning the remaining life force into dead mana that resides in an Undead''s body. With the superior quality of dead mana inside the body of the Undead, this overall capability has increased.


    All your attributes multiplier be 1.1


    "Found- Cough~Cough, So that''s the one..." The talent was so amazing that I almost screamed out loud again.


    Just by having this talent made it like having the [Sin of Wrath] effect permanently on me!


    Just thinking of a world of having [Sin of Wrath] and this talent effectively increase my attributes by a whole of 20% made me grin sinister.


    And the fact that I was living in such a world made me the more so excited!


    "Alright, I have to calm down. Those amounts of attributes should be enough for the time. Compared to my stats, my skills seem to lie they have been neglected..."


    With my examination done, I bought the XP storage window in front of me.


    [28 625 XP]


    "Sigh..."


    Looking at the pitiful amount that remained in my wallet I couldn''t help but shake my head helplessly and start roaming through the side of the streets.


    "Still, if I want to quickly raise my XP the best method would obviously yo begin a genocide..." I murmured to myself.


    It was the best method to increase the XP in my storage, but if it were the smartest choice I doubt it.


    Sure, I could even kill whoever I wanted far outside the city, heck I even killed that egg head Oliver inside here.


    But I only dared to kill him and these ves inside the city cause we were inside the slums where poverty was at its best inside the city.


    The days I traveled with the ve merchant I wasn''t just sitting there and pretending to be dead or something.


    To lessen my boredom- I mean to gain the most information that I could use I asked him about the ce that I am currently in.


    I currently am in the middle district where mostmoners and small-time merchant do their trade here.


    While the slums that I came from are in the left part of the city near the walls.


    I remember the ve merchant saying that cause of the sunlight that the huge wall is blocking and a greedy noble was the main cause of the slums.


    I found it ironic.


    The walls that were supposed to protect this people and the noble who did everything to raise their own pocket was nothing but a curse for the people living there


    Just thinking of such people made my now pure dead mana inside my bodye slightly outside my bones.


    "That was close..." Realizing what I just had done I cursed internally.


    ''Being with the living, no. With humans, it''s indeed dangerous. Although I know it was quite easy to suppress I need to be more careful.''


    Since as I, an Undead who hates the living walks beside the living, this bough forth the burning feeling in my body to be constantly there bringing a slight mix of anxiety and stress in me.


    Shaking my head to remove the remaining thoughts.


    ''I should quickly find this ce and leave already from here.''


    With me regaining focus on my surroundings I nced at the two-man talking in front of a stall.


    The One had simr-looking clothes of the now-dead Oliver while the other had what I would say average clothes to that of amoner.


    What I noticed by walking around through people was that almost everyone had some sort of a feather build in their clothes or essories.


    The mostmon were men having a feather ne and women having a feather holding their hair in ce.


    I walked towards the man with the orange-red feather in this neck andmon clothes.


    "Excuse me, Could I ask where the ''Ouru''Fire Smith'' is?"


    "Hey! Don''t juste in while we have a-" The man who looked like a merchant quickly shut this mouth upon seeing a massive knight in front of him.


    The man with the feather was also stunned with sweat starting to show up in this forehead.


    "Sir...what kind of business do you have with me..?" Said the man with the feather in this neck nervously.


    "Do you know where the ''Ouru''Fire Smith'' is" I said slightly annoying by there reaction.


    "Oh... it''s just just up ahead in the end of the middle district. Turning at the right would be it..."


    Looking at the direction he pointed at I nodded at him.


    "Thanks..."


    Saying my goodbyes at the stunned man I went my way to the location the man has pointed at.


    Looking at the scary knight leaving both men sighed in relief.


    "I though we were done for..."


    "At least he wasn¡ät from the Union...."

 Chapter 54 - Dwarf With A Sinister Smile

    "Ouru¡äFire Smith...That should be the ce."


    Leaving the middle district and entering the area where apparently the big shot among the merchant was.


    The shop that I was looking at just didn''t seem to belong here.


    The stone walls had various cracks into where some moss could seem to grow. The wooden door, although massive there clear signs of negligence.


    Staring nkly at the top of the door was the name ''Ouru''Fire Smith'' written there.


    "Is that truly a smith? Did that guy lied to me...?"


    Since standing there and doing nothing bought me nowhere, I decided to enter that run-down shop.


    *Ding ding~


    "..."


    Surprisingly, the inside of the shop was nowhere near the outside of the shop.


    Looking at my right I saw many kinds of different swords with various lengths and curves which made me wonder how people could wild such things. Since I already had a weapon in my hand I quickly lost interest in them.


    But what caught my attention were the armors on the left side.


    They were about 4 whole armor sets to see and although all of them were different, they all had some kind of feather engraved or ced in the armor to which I guessed was the cause of the culture of this ce.


    "They have armors here, but..." Weren¡ät they way too fancy-looking?


    One of the sets of armor had a bunch of feathers ced near the neck area which looked somehow silly in my opinion.


    Although it probably wouldn¡ät be a problem for me I surely can see those things being a pain in the a#s for others.


    "Now that I am taking a better look at them...why are all of those armors weird?" Just looking at them made my previous excitement turn gloomy as if someone pulled a bad joke on me.


    Touching the armors from the outside and the inside made me realize that the metal was thinner than the actual armor that I currently am wearing before it got so damaged by someone.


    "Why is this so ba-" Before I was going to express my opinion out loudly a voice came from behind me.


    "Ah!A Customer! Wee to my smith, by any chance you interested in that fire born armor set that you are touching?"


    Turning around at the rough voice behind me I saw a man at least half my height which surprisingly with arge beard that covered half of this face.


    "You are...not a human?" Noticing that the unconvertible heat in my body is lessening is what lead me to this very question.


    "..." Stunned by this customer''s question this race he frowns at him, but after realizing that the guy in front of him was serious he couldn¡ät help butugh out loud.


    "Bahahaha! Me a human!? Good one!" The mansughter echoed through the whole shop.


    While pping the back of my with enough force for my bones to vibrate slightly.


    Though this action looked especiallyedic cause of our height difference.


    "If you aren¡ät one then what are you..."


    "Hahah- wait, you realy don¡ät know?"


    "..."


    "..."


    The echoes of the halter had stopped and an awkward silence fell upon the room.


    "Sigh, from where did a country pumpkin as youe here..." The short man replied while going back to the reception ship desk.


    "Wait, did you just call me -"


    "Dwarf"


    "Huh?"


    "I am a dwarf you country pumpkin!" The dwarf replied while mumbling to himself.


    "Did the dwarf be so unpopr..."


    *Sigh


    "Well, It''s my first time meeting a dwarf so I naturally wouldn''t know."


    ''I have awakened only more than one month ago from the waters of nothingness! Of course, I wouldn''t know the heck of a dwarf you are!''


    Sure you are short, but wouldn''t short humans exist at your height!?


    What would I have to call does?


    "So, why are you here"


    Looking at this previews merchant act going away while turning straight forward I pointed at the armors.


    "I would like armor..."


    "Hoh, do you now? Just pick one of them and-"


    "Can I ask if you got some better sets of armor than...those?"


    Hearing that the dwarf frowned.


    "Why you ask?" the dwarf replied with a serious tone.


    "I ain''t want to be rude, but those things wouldn''t survive a blow at all." Although I consider myself a gentleman. You got to point that this crap over here is truly crap.


    The metal in the armor is so tin and with so many unnecessary parts on it which makes it useless.


    "Well, if you aren''t a rude piece of crap..."


    "I just..."


    "But it''s the truth" The dwarf replied.


    Confused and stunned I asked the dwarf.


    "If you know that those things are useless, then why are you selling those? Can it be that you can''t..."


    "Do things that you see are traps?" Replied the dwarf with a dark face.


    "Huh"


    ''Traps? Are does things cursed of something!?''


    Looking at the still confused customer of this he sighed out loud.


    "Sigh...Follow me, I will show you my true inventory."


    Still confused by the dwarf words, I followed him right behind him.


    "Hey, pumping boy" Opening a door behind the counter were stairs that went to what seemed like the basement.


    "I ain''t a pumpkin, you dwarf."


    "Hmpf, whatever. As for your previews rude question. Let me ask you a question instead. Do you know what a scarecrow is?"


    "Scarecrow..?"


    ''What the heck should a scarecrow be? Something that you can eat? ''


    I Shook my head while my confusion was growing ever bigger.


    "Not even that...? You truly are a...never mind. A scarecrow is a tool to scare of the annoying crows that eat your stuff."


    Nodding that I understand I asked him what truly was. on my mind.


    "What are you talking about?"


    Man, you got to speak cleared that that.


    If I started to answer questions with questions we will be sitting here all day!


    "Heh, what you saw before was just like that. A scarecrow."


    Opening the door at the end of the stairs many different kinds of armor sets and weapons came to my sight.


    "And here is the good stuff."


    Looking at some slightly glowing weapons and armors I was stunned.


    "If the top of the shop is the scarecrow, then what is the crow?"


    ''So that''s what he meant with the trap. He kept the fake at the disy while keeping the real deal done here.


    "Well, who else would it be other that does nobles and adventures"


    "Hmm, why would you need to hide your wares from those? Aren''t this two suppose to be your best customers?"


    The dwarf turned around and stared directly into my eyes which made me unconsciously stare at him back.


    "It''s not about money but more of pride. Most nobles are politicians who can only scratch their back while others do their dirty work. A sword made to kill going in the hands of such a man would be an insult towards us dwarf! As for the adventure...most of them are dreamers who think they can y dragons to where they can''t even bear to kill a chicken! Those guys mostly like to cart fancy stuff which will raise their poprity."


    Hearing this reasoning something in my mind clicked on me.


    "So the reason you sell good-looking but bad armor is for those guys?"


    ncing at the dwarf that sinister smiled at my question I couldn''t help but think on all the people that died cause of their bad armor.


    ''I guess those guys are also at fault of being stupid enough to be fooled by him.''


    Thus, I couldn''t care less for those idiots.


    "So...bringing me here means that I can buy stuff from down here right?"


    "Well, if you got the money for that"


    Bringing my small bag of coins in my hand I couldn''t help but feel sad.


    Not only has my XP wallet have been drained, but now my actual wallet (From Oliver) will be drained too...


    Sad.

 Chapter 55 - You Can Actualy Runesmith!?

    "Your mind me taking a look at those before making a decision?" I pointed at the armor stands to the side.


    "Hmph, go ahead if you still doubt my work. I will be back there, so call me when you are done."


    Looking at him go I scoffed internally.


    `I would be a fool not to check it when you sell faulty stuff.¡ä


    Forgetting about the dwarf''s behavior, I turned around for the more juicier stuff.


    Walking towards the armor stands I even realized a big problem right off the bat.


    "Seems like there aren¡ät that many sets with the right helmet..." I murmured somewhat disappointed.


    This time the problem wasn¡ät the quality, but more of the design.


    Not every set had a helmet that covered my whole face. And that was no small problem.


    It wasn¡ät like that I could walk outside without giving any care to the whole world with my skeleton face.


    If I were to do that I might charm someone with a weird fetish, but at the same time call doom upon me.


    "I could buy the set without the helmet and buy another helmet that isn¡ät part of the set..."


    `But I would much prefer buying the whole package...¡ä


    After some look around there were about 3 sets that had all my requirements.


    [Heavy Steel Armor]: A armor made by a journeyman dwarf cksmith. By the arts of a dwarf cksmith, the heavy armor turned tougher and ticker than this actual weight tells. The armor holds an Enchantment of the lower tier earth attribute which makes the armor slightly more resistant towards blunt and piercing attacks.


    "An enchantment, huh. That¡äs a first." I said slightly surprised.


    `If I remember right enchantments should be simr to runes and yet different.¡ä


    Touching the next armor set the information of it came right in front of my eyes.


    [Smander Steel Armor]: A armor made by a journeyman dwarf cksmith. By the arts of a dwarf cksmith, the armor managed to make an armor made of smander leather andbine it with steel while holding the traits of Smander. The armor is slightly more resistant towards the fire and the enchantment on it makes the mana that goes through your body flow more smoothly if the mana is used for a fire-type spell.


    "Lether from Smander..? It would even be great for Rapha but on me. I rather pass." As far as I knew those smanders were simple just overgrown lizards which breathed fire. At least that¡äs what I understood when I talked with the different ves.


    The idea of the armor using some monster parts did sound somehow appealing. but the armor was wasted on me.


    "One more left I guess..." I reached my hand to touch the armor that had bints gold-looking metal while the rest was of steel.


    Touching the armor made the description appear in front of my eyes.


    But before I could even read it a slight hot feeling came towards my palm that was touching the armor.


    "The heck?"


    I quickly withdraw my hand. Seeing that the heat disappeared and my palm was still fine, I gazed towards the description


    [Blessed Steel Armor]: A armor made by the corporation of a journeyman dwarf cksmith and a priest. An armor forged by the arts of a dwarf cksmith from steel and some parts by asherrim. The armor was blessed and enchanted to further increase the efficiency of holy and light magic spells.


    "So this once increase holy and light magic and it isn¡ät just made out of steel?" Clicking at the words in the window the description came into my sight.


    But after reading them I was shocked.


    [Holy Magic]: A magic allowed only the believers of a certain holy deity. The bane of dead mana.


    [Light Magic]: Magic is heavilybined with Life Force, which makes it more effective on beings with more dead mana or less if the beings don¡ät have any dead mana in them.


    [Asherrim]: A rare metal that is as tough as iron but holds extremely well light and holy properties. Also goes by the name of [Blessed Iron].


    "So there was such a thing...Isn¡ät this kind of magic basically against every undead?"


    As a being who has pure dead mana inside my body make holy and light magic literally into anti-undead magic in my book. The same goes with that asherrim stuff!


    "Just touching those things makes my hand feel like burning...is such magic seriously that powerful against me...?" I mumbled to myself while touching the blessed armor with all the inappropriate ways one would think about.


    "Hey! Stop touching that armor already! This thing isn¡ät for sale!"


    Being reminded that someone else was watching me, I took my hands of the armor.


    "I wasn¡ät going to buy it anyway...but I already decided on that heavy armor over there"


    "Wait, you mean that armor? Are you even able to effort it?" replied the dwarf with a frown on this face.


    "Well, why aren¡ät you telling me the price first and see if I can pay."


    "Heh, for the whole set it would be 20 gold coins. Take it or leave."


    Hearing that made me flinch unconsciously.


    Although I had 57 gold coins in me the 20 gold coins that the armor cost also made me somehow dumbfounded.


    ording to Oliver 100 silver coins have the same worth as 1 whole gold coin which is enough for amoner to live almost a whole yearfortable.


    And that guy right now is telling me that this armor has the same cost as almost a year offortable but 20 times more expensive?


    "I got the money, but isn¡ät that too expensive?"


    The dwarf simply shrugged this shoulder at me.


    "Of course it isn¡ät expensive. do you think that you can find many shops selling enchanted armor like me?"


    "...Fine"


    Although recently, I gave him these 20 gold coins to this hand.


    "Do you have a room where I can change into that armor..?"


    "Oh, sure..." said slightly stunned the dwarf.


    After following the dwarf into a small room together with the set of armor that I bought.


    "You can change here..."


    Nodding towards him, I closed the door.


    "I guess I don¡ät need those anymore..."


    *Thuad!


    Piece by piece, the armor fell to the ground together with the cloth that I had hidden my body.


    After removing everything in my body except the small cloth in my ribs. I started wearing my newly bought armor.


    The armor chest piece was bulge but not to the point of restraining my movements. But what surprised me the most was the weight differences!


    Though my recent increase of attributes, the previews armor that I had felt extremely light inparison to this armor. Although armor being light isn¡ät a bad thing, but the cause of my body being pure bones I am extremely light myself! Which makes the extra weight in my opinion a plus.


    "It fits nicely too..."


    Going out of the small room I see the dwarf smile awkwardly.


    "Is something wrong?"


    "No..."


    "Good, cause I will need to buy something else too."


    With a frown on this face, dwarf asked somehow tired.


    "What else would you need?"


    "I need a sheath for that, "I said while showing Veren at the dwarf.


    "So you would like to make a custom order for it, right? If you let me take some measurements of it I can finish it by tomorrow."


    Removing the ck cloth from Veren, I shoved it to the dwarf.


    "Here..."


    "It will take just a moment-" Before the dwarf could finish this sentence, he choked midway out of shock.


    "Y-You! How!? From where did you get a runed weapon!?" The dwarf said with a crazy smile on this face.


    `What kind of reaction is this for him to go crazy? Does he whose sword that is? I better don¡ät say anything stupid...¡ä


    "I got the sword from someone..." That should be enough to calm him down-.


    "Who!? From who did you get it from!?"


    `Why is he so crazed up to know from who it is!? He has to know who made the runes. Will have to find an excuse first.¡ä


    "My father gave me the sword..."


    "What!? You father you say!"


    "Yes..." That guy is crazy.


    "Was he a runesmith!?"


    Looking at these eyes turning crazier by the second I unconsciously made a step back.


    "And what if he was..?"


    With the dwarf making a stupid smile at my response, I was about to grab a sword from this armory and end this crazy man''s life.


    "Does that by any change mean...that you are also a runesmith?"


    As I was about to bunch at him and retrieve the Veren out of this hands, I suddenly froze.


    "How did you know...?" I whispered to my stunned self.


    But the dwarf ears did by god knows how to manage to hear that whisper of mine.


    "So you are one!"


    Without being able to react to the joyful voice of this dwarf cause of how stunned I was, he let the Veren on top of a table and quickly grabbed my hand.


    And with a voice full ofpanionship and joy, he said.


    "Would you like to work with me!?"


    `???¡ä


    "Huh?"


    Confusion overwhelmed my mind and without any knowledge of what I just did.


    I stared nkly at the dwarf Mr.happy face in front of me....

 Chapter 56 - In A Battlefield

    "Why would I ever do that?"


    Who would even want to work with someone as screw as him? Not only is he annoying to talk with but this smile is also creepy.


    "Why wouldn¡ät I!? Just by putting any kind of a working rune in my stock would bring fortune upon us!"


    So that¡äs why...


    "I pass, you can find someone else to ce runes in your stuff-"


    "That¡äs why I called you a pumpkin you idiot! There isn¡ät anyone who can carve runes! Or rather there is only one among the whole damn kingdom!" the over-enthusiasm dwarf said.


    Removing the grip of the dwarf I looked at him confused.


    "So you are telling me that I and that noble guy are the only ones who can runesmith? If so what about enchanting?"


    As far as I remember enchanting is all about magic and runes about ancientnguage. They both had simr descriptions if my memories serve me right. Which why I thought they should be somehow rted to each other , but after looking through all this stuff down here being enchanted with no single rune insight made me realize that something was wrong.


    "Of course you are! Compared to enchanting, Runesmithing is almost impossible to learn anymore! While enchanting is by many levels simr to magic. Runes require you to know aboutnguages that were lost in time!"


    "Seriously...? I said in disbelieve.


    Aren¡ät you just telling me that everyone forgot to record the runenguage?


    Of course, the so-callednguage was more or less the symbol of the whole rune, which honestly is the easiest part of runesmithing.


    Maybe they didn¡ät know about the mana output? If that were the case they probably could brute force it if they knew the symbol.


    "Hey! stop spacing out already!"


    "Ah, my bad...where were we again?"


    "At you working here."


    "Oh yeah, you''re right. Forget it." I took Veren from the table and started to move towards the stairs.


    "Wait, wait, wait! At least stay here and hear me out!" Looking at the dwarf blocking my way, I was honestly surprised and pissed off.


    He sure is quick on this foot...


    "What else is there to hear from you? I ain¡ät interested in work here for what? Some mere silver coi-"


    "No silver! only gold! Don¡ät you get it? We will have the monopoly! Just a simple rune and the price of your armor would have doubled at this price!"


    Hearing that my hand twitched a bit.


    `Are runes worth that much!?¡ä


    Although I was tempted by the money that was to gain, my choice was still the same.


    "Thanks but no thanks, I ain¡ät much interested for any coins. I just came here to buy some nice armor with a sheath."


    Pushing him to the side, I moved to the upper floor.


    "Huh?" Doubtful was the face of the dwarf


    If I were to turn around to see him I either would simplest with him orugh out loud just by looking at this face.


    With panic written all around the dwarf''s face, he sprinted towards the stairs chasing after me.


    But when he arrived at the first flower I was already one step away from the door.


    "Stop!" Jelled the dwarf with all this strength.


    I turned my head just enough to nce at.


    "It will be done. That sheath of yours will be done in the early morning. I will make it for free too so..."


    *Crigggh


    Looking at the gunsmith leaving this shop, despair filled in the dwarf''s mind.


    "Fine..."


    "Eh..?"


    Hearing the cold voice that would usually be ufortable for a normal person. Instead, eyes showed filled with hope.


    "Don''t forget your promise..."


    Leaving the stunned dwarf there, I left the shop.


    "Now what should I do..." Looking left and right of me I went deeper to the high-end shops.


    But after hours of walking around aimlessly until the sun went down, I realized a tiny slight problem.


    "Ehm...where should I stay for the night..?"


    ****


    Far away from the capital, in a in battlefield.


    Cries of horror and despair were ying in that field.


    Soldiers with different types of armor were fighting with each other.


    Ones with some red color paint in their armor with a feather draw were currently fighting some other soldiers with in but sturdy armor against each other.


    Blood sshed to each other swords and spears with some rarely seen ice spikes prating the enemy.


    Both of the parties knew that here only the death of the other party was the solution.


    Even though both of the parties were fellow humans, they have still done it.


    "T-This isn''t what I signed here for..." A voice full of despair sound among the thousand.


    Both parties had hope, pride dreams, and ambitions.


    But the cause of the very those they shed and seemed blood of another.


    But among the vast battlefield where thousand of soldiers fought.


    That expect one ce.


    "Monste-!"


    A crimson light shone through the distance and in the block of an eye like a meteor crashing to the ground.


    *Baaahm!


    Raging mes engulfed the whole area and stones made to magma flew through all directions of the impact.


    Have it been fried or for, the mes sparing not even ashes of their remains.


    And those were the lucky ones.


    The unlucky ones who either got hit by the shock wave or the flying magma had it worst.


    The one hit by the shock wave had been pushed high enough for them to die from falling or if they were strong enough to survive the fall, death by broken bones was not that pleasant.


    As for does hit by burning magma...


    Even less pleasant.


    Both soldiers of either party looking at the disaster that happened not so far away from them couldn''t help but shiver out of fright.


    Suddenly though, the raging mes disappeared with the ground hardening from this previews molted state to stone like it was before.


    In the middle of this whole crater was a shining spear that illuminated the sunlight that appeared nted to the ground.


    Although no one saw it, a feminine figure appeared out of nowhere.


    "To think that they will put me for trash cleaning like this..."


    With her red hair flowing the air the figure pulled the cross spear out of the stone like it was nothing.


    It was no other than Selena Blood'' Reas.


    Pulling a red gemmunication device out she started yelling at it.


    "Hey, I am finished here! Am I good to go?"


    With a low groaning out of the gem, a man''s voice replied.


    "I am sorry to say you Excellency, but order tells to continue to assist the battlefield until further notice..."


    Hearing that she crashed the gem with just her hand and scoffed out loud.


    "So stupid! What''s the point sensing soldiers if you can''t even win with me!"


    Even though she felt no empathy towards her allies that she killed, she still felt bad for all those kingdoms soldiers fighting here.


    In her opinion, just her alone was enough to destroy that whole army with ease, which makes them being here simply useless.


    Less worth that cannon fodder!


    But that wasn''t the reason why she was so agitated.


    "Goddamnit, this Darius bastard. How could he let my nephew die! Once I am back I will have to give me a beating of this life-"


    Selena frown, she was cut short by the sudden emerging of mana not far away from her.


    What appeared was a blue portal that warped the near-space where it was.


    Coming of the blue portal was a man fully covered in robes with only some gauntlets in this hand.


    "Yo, we meet again." said the man emotionlessly.


    Look at him that just appeared, Selena could already feel a headacheing now.


    "Ugh...I expected someone toe, but to think that it will be you..."


    Pointing the appearance towards the robed figure she imminently dashed towards him.


    Leaving mes to where she went.

 Chapter 57 - A Rainy Night

    In the Kingdom of Bernes, somewhere underground.


    Three men in a small yet luxurious room had some paintings and high-quality furniture.


    The two of the men wore the same ck clothing with a silver emblem of a coin, under the coin was the word `union¡ä written in gold.


    Apposite to those men, sitting there was a man with white and blue clothing of simr quality as the two men or even much better. That man was around this early 40 with bright brown hair which was pushed back and seemed like he always had a serious face the whole time.


    The man''s name was Allerk St Dni, the current head of the St family which controlled the slums and was a massive figure in the ve trade.


    Taking a sip from this ss filled with tea, he raised this head and closed this eyes, enjoying the taste of this beverage.


    This joy was short-lived as the taste has already gone by now. Putting the ss back to the table, Dni with a frown on this face said.


    "I have waited long enough, where has my order been that was supposedly dyed?" This voice sounded calm and rx, but behind these words was a hidden meaning.


    "As embarrassing as it is to say that to the one you Sir Dni, we will have to give you some apology ording to for you purchase." Bowing this head towards this client, he continued.


    "There has been an ident with one of our providers, thus canceling your order...We of the Merchant union promise you an equalpensation and more." The man bit lightly this lips while cursing from the inside.


    At first, he thought that he will be promoted as a higher officer and given the chance to make deals with the nobility, by epting this job. He viewed it as a form of test given by the union to prove this worth.


    But in the end, he was turned into a mere scapegoat instead!


    Looking at both men bowing towards him, Dni''s mood turned sour.


    "What¡äs the meaning of this? I didn¡ät ask for some worthless apologies. What happend to my order?"


    Griding these teeth, the man pushed slightly this partner to the left, which result in him bringing a purple gem out that showed hovering pictures of the carriage that of Oliver''s.


    "The order that she Sir Dni had was procured by one of our people named Oliver, a ve merchant who work under us for more than 5 years. He was supposed to bring you to order yesterday, but he and these products were found dead near the `storage¡ä in the slums." Turning around and pulling some papers from this bag, he throws them on the table while pointing at them.


    "Our current suspects are three in total. We think it was either of the two dark elves that you had ordered or an unknown mercenary that was seen together with Oliver before entering the capital. Unless it was assassination for another party, these are our suspects..."


    "Hmm..." Taking a nce at the papers, Dni couldn''t scoff out loud.


    "You think that someone would dare to harm the products of the merchant union and my? Do you think I am stupid!? The dark elves would even kill that ipetent guy even before entering the Capital! That leaves us with the mercenary scum! Did you already catch him?"


    "That..." Looking at the awkward face that both of the men were making, the previews calm expression of Dni turned of an enraged one.


    "Tell me already who the man is that dared to do this! I will deal with him myself without the help of you ipetent fools."


    "Sadly sir we got to no information behind that man''s identity...He gave himself as a mercenary, but after taking a look at our information there was not a single mercenary that fitted this description. The only thing we know is that he was seen around the middle district."


    Hearing that, Dni got off this sit and went towards the door that was opened by a maid.


    "Tell your higher-ups that I might have to consider stopping my funds towards the union if the bastard isn''t going to be found any time soon. Oh yeah, I will also be expecting the promisedpassion that you guys talked about."


    Both men with ck clothing paled upon hearing that.


    Losing the funds of such noble would be a one way to the afterlife for both of them, followed by torture before meeting their end.


    Taking ast nce at them, Dni said.


    "I when you find him I want him alive! I want to personally kill him with my own two hands!"


    ***


    *Ssh


    "Ugh...How did I end up like this." I grumbled while I was on my way towards the weird dwarf.


    It has been a day since I came here and I was already looking wet from everywhere...


    Compared to the beautiful sunlight that was illuminating this whole ce yesterday morning, the night wasn''t all that nice.


    Leaving the dwarf shop made me realize that I had nothing else to do for the next 24 hours, which at first I didn''t mind.


    I simply started doing some window shopping just to pass some time.


    But out of the clue clouds started to suddenly show up and the next thing I knew it started raining heavily everywhere...


    The first idea that came to my mind was to look for an inn for the day.


    Reality though was ever so cruel...


    Every inn that I went inside asked me for some kind of modification card or other stuff that could prove to me who I was...


    Thus forcing me to sit under a big tree somewhere in the night, while although the tree helped to keep some rain away, it didn''t stop the rain from falling above me.


    "Sigh...let''s hope the armor would start rusting out of the blue..."


    After Drying myself with some cheap cloth that I bought, I reached the ''Ouru''Fire Smith''


    Entering the shop, I was slightly surprised to see the dwarf on the first floor right away.


    "You finally decided to- what happend to you?" Pointed the dwarf towards the wet ground under me.


    ''Crap! I forgot to dry my inside bag!''


    Pretending to be ignorant about the mess I was making, I jumped right to the case.


    "So, you even done with my sheath?"


    "Hmph, who do you think I am" the dwarf scoffed out loud.


    Removing the gray cloth from the table, a long brown sheath with the sides being from a dark material was to see.


    The brown leather had the design of scales and we''re capable to reflect some light in where the dark part looked sturdy and not slippery at all.


    "Can I..?"


    "Sure..."


    Putting the Veren into this sheath and going in smoothly made me honestly impressed.


    After all, I haven''t given the dwarf that much of a time to look and take measurements in Veren since I left so fast...


    "Hehe, you sure like it don''t you"


    Although I was hiding my face with the helmet, it felt like the dwarf knew that I was happy with what he had crafted.


    "Although I promised you that I will give the sheath for free of charge. Wouldn''t be fair to at least hear me out before deciding to leave?"


    Thinking about it I nodded at the dwarf.


    After all, leaving after taking this goodwill will not only be rude but make my future purchases on armor here more awkward.


    Since I currently do not possess the rune Veren that repairs my equipment. Looking realistic the current heavy armor that I wear wouldn''tst forever on.


    "Alright, as I said before I want you to work on cing runes on what I want to create. And since gold doesn''t interest you as much I thought of what could sway and that is...connections!" The dwarf said whileughing proudly.


    But I simply continued to look at him confused.


    "Connecting? On what kind of connections would you possibly be talking about? I replied.


    "Of course I am talking of the ck market! With my help, you will be able to buy whatever you might need! Even a better-enchanted armor that you already wearing!"


    Hearing that my glowing eyes lighten up for an instant.


    ''If what he is saying is the truth then staying here would even be for the best if they have those things...''


    "By everything, do they for example also sell...Magic scrolls?"


    The dwarf eyes widen as he was surprised by my question.


    "Hmm, magic scrolls huh? They do sell some but not that many simr to a grimoire."


    Nodding in understanding, I made my mind.


    But before that...


    "I ept your offer, but under one condition..."


    "And that will be?" The dwarf arm trembled slightly as he was trying to keep this excitement to himself.


    "The condition is...give me a room for me to stay!" I said shamelessly to the dwarf.


    "Sure, I have a room left on the upper floor. You can use it as you please."


    "Alright, it''s a deal then," I said while I pushed my hand towards him for a handshake.


    "It''s a deal." Shaking our hands the dwarf added.


    "My name is Iffuro Gerak, your friend?"


    Suddenly I froze.


    ''A name huh... What should I even call myself?


    Being asked what my name was made me fell into a deep contemtion with myself, which resulted in awkward silence in the room.


    Scratching this beard, the dwarf said.


    "If you don''t want yo-" But before he could finish I cut him short.


    "My name is...."

 Chapter 58 - First Rune

    "As promised, this will be your room from now on. Although it¡äs quite messy, I hope it would be enough," said Gerak embarrassingly.


    The room had one small window that allowed the sunlight toe through and a bed to the side. If you were to ignore all the lie in chunks of metal and some old-looking weapons, then you could call the room rather neat-looking.


    "Well...would it be possible to move all this tra-"


    "Weapons." Gerak cut my mind sentence.


    "Yes...could we move those `weapons¡ä somewhere else?"I asked slightly annoyed...


    Scratching this beard, Gerak sighs out loud.


    "Haa...fine, let¡äs bring all that stuff down to my smith and see what I can do with them."


    With that, we started carrying all those chests with metal chunks and weapons downstairs and by the time we were done with cleaning to my now own room, it was alright evening.


    "Ugh, I feel like I lost 10 years of my carrying all that stuff. Compared to me you sure are a monster of your own." Gerak said while holding this back out of pain.


    I just scoffed at him back.


    "I ain¡ät no monster, you just old..."


    "Me, old!? I will have you know that I am in my strong sixty-three years! I am still young!"


    I could only roll my ethereal me-like eyes at him.


    `It hasn¡ät even been 1 year that I came out of the waters of nothingness and he wants to tell me that he is young. If living sixty-three years is considered young, then what am I? An infant!?¡ä


    Generally speaking though,paring your age against an undead such as I am kinda pointless. Since we are kinda, well, Immortal beings. No matter how much time passes, we the undead will never change physically, excluding us evolving into a higher tier undead of course.


    In turn, as far as I know, mortals will with time grow old and weak until death decides to embrace them.


    So yeah, trying topete with an undead with age is not the wisest idea that one could think of. Another idea as bad as that one is trying topete with who got more stamina than the other.


    Being able to wear heavy armor while being able to carry boxes of the chunk is only the question of the undead strength that the stamina of an undead. As long as an undead has enough strength to do a task, he will without a doubt be able to do that exact task for the close to integrity toe.


    "By the looks of it, we are done for the day right?" I quickly changed the subject to make the old dwarf stop talk about this age and all.


    Looking at the window that it was already evening, Gerak grumbled.


    "Yeah, there is no point working anymore today, even though you look like that I can guess that you too are exhaust. We will start the real work tomorrow." Having said that Gerak left down the stairs.


    Closing and locking the door on my side I felt strange.


    "It¡äs not like I am tired, but saying that might result to an increase of my workload that I would rather not have..."


    Standing in the middle of the room silently I couldn¡ät help but remember the recent days that I experienced, it reminded me of how I was back then in the gloomy hobgoblin cave.


    Butpared to the cave that was gloomy with only stone to see, the room that I was now felt more...calming. After all, these days have been nothing but ufortable for me. Being constantly with humans around me made my whole body heat up from hatred which I had to, by my pure will to stop myself to let loose on those around me.


    Even though my body knew no fatigue, it didn¡ät help much with mental fatigue...


    And now being here alone made me finally rx my body.


    "Although I want to stay so and rx for a little while more, I still have the stuff to do."


    Removing the bed nkets to cover the window, I sat down on the bed and removed my armor piece by piece.


    With me being nowpletely naked I went right away to start what I had been waiting for all this time.


    That`s Runesmithing!


    "I should probably start with the chest piece since it seems the easiest."


    With nothing else stopping me, I guided the mana in my body towards my hand.


    "[Rune Vision]."


    The nearby color of the room was slowly fading away until everything became ck and white. The effect of that talent always somehow creeped me out. It was as if someone removes all sound and color, leaving only a nk world before my sight.


    All color except that of my armor.


    It was as if my whole armor was glowing ever so slightly with most of the green and yellow colors with a mix of some red in the mix. The green light was mostly to see.


    "If I remember right the green area should be the ce where I need to incrave the rune in."


    Without further ado, I started marking the location as given by the information in my head. Simr to how the rune was called, the marking ended up resembling the words Ese in some way. But marking the words wasn¡ät as easy as I originally had thought. A single waving of my hand could ruin the whole marking process which in turn makes the second step all the more difficult for me.


    The marking process felt like drawing the rough lines of a picture with your finger which in the case of failing makes the end product all the worst.


    The only good thing about this process was that I could make as many mistakes as I wanted. Didn¡ät draw it right?


    Remove the markings and start again, it wasn¡ät like I was in a rush or anything.


    After removing and re-doing the markings several times until I was happy with the end result, it was time for the hard part.


    Touching the start of the letter E of the rune, I started to channel the correct mana amount inside the rune with my utmost focus, while discarding all my worries aside.


    In this soundless and colorless word, only my finger moved ever so slowly ording to the markings that I had ced before. I didn¡ät dare to remove any focus at anything else other than channel the correct amount of mana in my finger.


    One mistake and I wouldn¡ät be able to ce the Ese rune in my chest te anymore.


    No mistakes allowed!


    Seconds felt like minutes and minutes like hours.


    But in the end, I removed my finger from the armor, thus ending engraving the mana in my armor.


    It took me several seconds to notice that finished it.


    ''Alright, now that I am done with it I just need to activate it and see how it turned out.''


    cing my hand above the rune I constantly pour in mana inside it to permanently engrave the rune in the armor once and for all.


    In a way this whole process looked like the heat treatment that is used on cksmiths, maybe that''s why runesmithing is called runesmithing instead of rune carving.


    The whole process took a whole minute to finish.


    And when it was done a status window appeared in form of me.


    [Common Rune Ese sessful engraved, Rating: Average]


    I tried to cry out of joy looking that it was sessful, but then I forgot that I still had [Rune Vision] activate...


    Deactivating the talent and letting me speak once more I picked my armor and started to touch it like some hungry dude would when a high-quality steak was in front of him.


    "Oh! Hitting the armor makes it glow slightly, is that the rune''s effect?"


    After being done with testing my armor around, my gaze fell upon the message.


    "It says ''Rating: Average''.. does that mean that I could make the rune better?"


    Pressing the ''Rating'' in the window, another window showing what all kinds of ratings exist.


    Apparently there is Poor, Bad, Average, Good, Well-done, Perfect and Beyond Perfection.


    "So I am right around the middle huh..."


    Although it felt slightly depressing not achieving the best result.


    In a sense, though it was reasonable for me to make a rune of the rating average, if not being an achievement for this own.


    After all, it still was my first time trying to carve runes in something real.


    Although my rating did worsen my mood ever so slightly.


    It did raise my motivation though!


    It showed me that there was something to work on, something to aim at!


    Knowing that there is more to it was enough to lift my spirit and try again!


    Picking another piece of my armor, I started engraving the same Ese Rune in every piece of my armor.


    When I was done and equipped with my now runed armor I felt a sense of aplishment inside me.


    They all were at the average rating, but I did notice a slight improvement in them.


    "I will have to study and see how I could better myself on this rune. And then I have t-" While I was calction the best way to make my tunes better, I heard some banging in my door.


    "Danzel! Come out already! It''s already time for work!"


    Hearing Gerak''s voice I was confused, but when I saw the lighting from the cover window I realized it was already morning.


    "Coming..."


    Cursing how time flew so fast, I went down to the workshop.

 Chapter 59 - Earning XP By Making Runes

    Somehow depressed, I walk towards the underfloor where the real shop was, there I found the Dwarf Gerak waiting for me.


    "You arete! And that is your first day at that! Danzel!"


    "How should I even know If you didn¡ät even tell me..." I, Rue Danzel replied.


    That¡äs right, yesterday when Gerak asked for my name I panicked for a moment. It wasn¡ät like I could just say that I had somehow hit my head and got amnesia from it. That would be beyond stupid.


    Not only did I mention that I had a father but that I also knew about creating runes that almost no one can.


    Considering all that, I had toe with a name out of the fly that would be decent enough to be called that.


    Thus ending up with the name of Rue Danzel.


    And surprisingly my name in the status window changed too by that.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 3355/3355


    Mana: 462/484


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strenght 90 Agility 70 Intelligence 44 Endurance 61


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Wind de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Vigor Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead of Superior Strenght. Though youpletely merging your Lifeforce with your Undeath nature, you now became an Undead fuelled with pure dead mana and hate on the living. Such an achievement can only be seen by either talented or long-lived Undead.]


    [XP: 28 625]


    "Sigh...and here I thought you had somemon knowledge in that head of yours. Most people would be at their work at this time."


    "Did you call me here toin or for me to make some actual runes?"


    "Sigh, follow me..."


    Following the old dwarf, we reached this workce where I guessed made these weapons. Looking at where Gerak was pointing at an anvil with a towel at the top.


    "This is..?" I asked confused.


    "That my friend..." With excitement written in the dwarf''s face, pulling the towel off was a sword with a menacing aura around it and a crimson red crystal in the middle of the handle.


    If it weren¡ät for the sharp edge that the weapon had I would even consider it a decorative weapon made for sadistic people.


    "Is what I hope you put a rune on!"


    Upon hearing that, Ipletely froze in ce, looking dazed at the dwarf.


    "Y-You want me to put a rune into that sword..? Wouldn¡ät an armor be more suitable?" Danzel hurriedly said, while trying to rack this mind for various excuses to avoid carving a rune in that sword.


    s, these freshly made excuses were imminently shot down by the dwarf.


    "Hmm? What are you talking about? Of course, it has to be a sword if we are talking about selling our first product in the ck market! Although armors are important to use, they are nowhere as attractive as a weapon!"


    `Damnit! The Rune Ese is only for armor!¡ä Danzel cursed internally while putting all this no one existent brain cells to work to think of a solution.


    And like a sh of insight that came from this ingenious mind.


    "Would you mind if I were to look at this sword first? I will have to check if there would be enough for the rune to fit the de."


    "Sure~sure, go ahead and take a look," Gerak said with a grin on this face.


    Danzel on the other side wanted tough at this face right now.


    `Hah! Your ignorance will be my blessing!¡ä


    Nodding to the dwarf I went ahead appraised the weapon.


    [Ravagers Sword] A sword made by a journeyman dwarf cksmith. The de was crafted with pure dwarf iron and by the arts of a dwarf cksmith, which resulted in the de bing more durable with a sharper edge. The sword holds a low middle tier enchantment that is fulled of a fire crystal. The enchantment allows any wound made by this weapon to either have the effect [Bleed] or [Burning Wounds], the choice is is for the user to make.


    `This weapon surely sounds nasty to get wounded by. Heh, not for me though!¡ä The weapons effect had a clear intent in mind, that is to leave a devastating wound on your enemy. Which does sound powerful.


    But that is if you were one of thoseme mortals you reliant on flesh!


    Who needs flesh when you have such bones as mine!


    Shaking lightly my head to remove the useless thought, I focus on the task at hand.


    What I told Gerak about was neither the truth nor false.


    Yes, I did need to see where I have to ce the rune, but ording to the information in my mind about runes is that as long the given object isn¡ät in a bad condition or has already a rune in it. Carving a Rune should be possible.


    By a nce, you could see that the [Ravagers Sword] was in top condition with no runes carved in it.


    "Alright...let¡äs begins." Raising my finger to the status window, I pressed at [Dead Rune Knowledge].


    My n to get out of my current situation was quite the simple one.


    Rely on luck!


    If I didn¡ät have a rune for a sword I simply had to buy it!


    [Common]: Cost 10 000 XP to learn Random Rune.


    `Alright, I have 28 625 XP in my storage which means two tries before my whole wallet runs dry!¡ä


    Full with determination, I pressed at buy [Common] option.


    [10 000 XP have been used to learn amon random rune]


    [You acquired the normal Rune Vis]


    "Please be a sword rune..." mumbling to himself, Danzel opened the runes information.


    [Rune Vis]: One of the most simple runes amongst themon Rune Language. It allows the user to have the same visual ability as if he didn¡ät have a helmet, to begin with. Can only be ced on Helmet armor parts.


    `You useless thing!¡ä


    The rune by itself did look really good and that it will be convenient If I were to put it in my helmet, but it wasn¡ät what I was searching for!


    Bringing all my remaining hope in my finger, I pressed at the buy option again.


    [10 000 XP have been used to learn amon random rune]


    [You acquired the normal Rune Ser]


    [Rune Ser]: One of the most simple runes amongst themon Rune Language. It slightly increases the cutting ability of an edge. Cannot be used on blunt weapons.


    "Ugh, my head...at least it was worth it." Grabbing my head out of pain from the information overload that came in my mind from those runes, that didn¡ät stop my eyes to red up for a sec out of excitement.


    It was an unconscious reaction of my body. Simr to how my eyes would me up when I used [Sin of Wraith].


    "Hey Danzel, how is it, can you ce a rune in that sword?"


    "Everything is fine...give me some time and the rune will be in the sword before you know it." Taking the [Ravagers Sword] in my hand I walked towards the stairs leading to the upper floor which got a weird look from the dwarf.


    "Huh? Where are you going?" Gerak said with a frown on this face.


    Turning around, I looked at him as if he was an idiot pretending to be a dumpass.


    "Wait, you didn¡ät expect that I would runesmith in front of you right?"


    Although he couldn¡ät see my face cause of my helmet, he pretty much guessed that I looked at him with dead fish eyes.


    Scratching this neck embarrassingly, he looked at my eyes full of hope.


    "So I can¡ät after all..?"


    "No." Danzel bluntly replied.


    "Tch, fine! But at least tell me what rune you will be putting on that sword! I worked my a#s off to make that thing!"


    "I will ce a rune that will make the edge sharper than it was before. Now if you excuse me..."


    Leaving the stunned dwarf at this workshop, I left for my room.


    Sitting in my bed, I searched for the information inside my mind about the Rune Ser.


    "Huh, that rune seems easier than the previews one. Is it because of the equipment difference? I might pull it off this time."


    After making sure that I closed the door and covered the window, I activated [Rune Vision] and went right into carving the rune into the now colorless world.


    And within an hour, the rune wasplete!


    [Common Rune Ser sessfully engraved, Rating: Good]


    [You received 2000 XP]


    "Huh, where did that XPe from?" Looking at the XP window that appeared, I was confused.


    But after thinking about it only one exnation came to my mind.


    "Is just a guess that I will have to try out, but... is this part of the passive training?"


    What if I were able to gain XP by making runes of at least Good quality?


    Do I gain more XP by making a more high quality rune?

 Chapter 60 - Chaos In The Auction

    Although it was just a guess of my, if that was the case then working here with that dwarf would even be a much better deal than I would have imagined.


    `Compared to my previous n of going somewhere far away and abuse the passive training to earn XP, doing this is much profitable!¡ä Grabbing the now finished runed sword, Danzel unlocked the door and walked towards the stairs leading to the workshop.


    With now having a viable XP source in hand I had nothing else to worry about. After epting to work with Gerak I was reminded that I would need some spare XP to buy the runes and magic spells that I buy.


    My ideaing to the capital was to quickly rece my armor and get as fast as possible out of here.


    After all, being with anything alive makes my body being dense the whole time. Going somewhere remote with my immortality and train in peace was the original n.


    But now with money and XP in hand, my strength will steadily rise, be it equipment or actual strength.


    I will have both!


    `Before that, though I will have to make another rune at the good rating¡ä


    "Sigh...Gerak! I finished the carving! Where yo-"


    *Thuad!


    A deafening sound of metal being hit engulfed the whole room.


    With a hammer in this hand, Gerak started to hit a chunk of metal repeatedly until it formed to what looked like a de.


    With the de still have orange color out of the heat, the dwarf quickly moved the de into the oil for the heat treatment with no waste in this movement to see.


    Normal people probably wouldn¡ät have noticed it, but with my current strength, I saw the vast experience that the dwarf had through the whole process of making this de.


    Every hit of this hammer hit the right ce with the required amount of strength needed to make that de.


    "Oh, since when were you here?" Gerak said while wiping this sweat from this forehead.


    "From the beginning, I tried to call you out but got no reaction."


    "Hahaha! Sorry for that, it¡äs hard to get bad habits. Enough for me though...how did it go?"


    Looking at the excited dwarf in front of me I couldn¡ät help but sigh out loud.


    "Everything went well."


    "Great! I have a straw dummy around here for testing some of the swords. Let¡äs go and see what the sword is capable of!"


    Shrugging my shoulder at him, I followed along as I too were curious about the sword.


    Compared to Danzel''s expectation of the dummy being made just out of straw-like Gerak said. The dummy had a pretty worn-out armor on with a helmet on. Even though the equipment was worn out.


    Hey, armor is still armor, right?


    "Alright, let me give a swing to this old piece"


    Picking the now runed [Ravager Sword], he took this stance with the sword facing the dummy.


    Though the scene looked kind ofical to me cause of the height difference between the dwarf and the sword.


    The stance Gerak took suggested otherwise.


    After standing still for a few seconds, Gerak finally made this move.


    "Huff!"


    Moving this de with this weight together, the sword met the armor dummy and cleaved it right through the armor, letting only two remains of the straw dummy fall in the ground.


    ''He doesn''t look as weak as I had thought." Denzel though slightly impresses by the dwarf''s skill.


    "So, how is it? Are you satisfied with the result?"


    "..."


    Gerak brought the de close to this face with a frown of this face.


    Which made me slightly panic.


    ''Did he possibly not like it? d


    Damn, I knew that this rune was useless right off the start!''


    "Although it isn''t one of the best, it''s still-"


    "Amazing" replies Gerak while this eyes still being on the sword.


    "Eh?"


    Putting the sword to the side, Gerak turned this head towards me.


    "That rune of yours is simply amazing, it cut through the whole armor like it was nothing. This beauty will be enough for our first sell."


    "So~ now that we confirm that is good for enough, when will you sell it?"


    "I guess I will have to go now if I were to sell it today. Has been a long time since I sold something in the ck market."


    Putting the sword in this sheath, the dwarf picked a nearby robe and put it on.


    "Wait, you are going like, right now?" said Danzel slightly stunned.


    "Of course, the auction should start in around four hours. This will be for today''s work so you can go ahead to see the city around while you can. From tomorrow on only work is ahead of us." Having said that, Gerak left with the sword behind this back.


    Being now the only one standing inside this whole ce I went back to my room.


    ''I guess I will try putting another rune in that helmet of my''


    ***


    In the ck market of the capital of Bernes.


    The ck market, a ce that was said to have anything that a person desires, be it forbidden knowledge, rare items, or even persons'' live.


    With money in one''s hand, those things could easily be earned.


    Of course, such a notorious ce was quite appealing for people of influence and power.


    And currently, somewhere underground, there was an auction taking ce.


    Of course, such a ce was against thew.


    "General, today I heard there will be an interesting item in ce, what do you think it will be." Someone wearing the kingdom''s army armor said.


    But simr to a big tree, there would be some rotten apples hanging in the shadows of the leaves of the tree.


    "Don''t mention our ranks in such a ce, Merrick." The man with gray hair and a serious face said. This looks reminded others like the elderly that you will see in the streets, but this body built suggest otherwise.


    Clear lines of muscle could be seen from this shirt.


    "And I also heard about today''s item, we will have to make sure that it doesn''t fall in the hands of the union or one of the nobles. That item will be own by the army!"


    With these eyes burning with determination.


    The auction began.


    As usual, the first toe items were the not-so-impressive ones.


    Like a various crystal or rare resources and at some point even ves.


    On the opposite side of the auction were 2 men wearing ck clothes with an emblem union written in them.


    "Tch, Tch. Look at those nobles buying all that useless stuff that they will never use! Sometimes I wonder how they even became nobles!" Said the man with brown hair.


    "It''s mostly heritage from their family. Don''t trouble yourself with those pigs. Never less, the more they buy the useless stuff the better is for the union, right?" The man with ck hair and the same kind of ck clothing said.


    "I guess you''re right."


    While each party continued watching the auction.


    An item got the attention of everyone.


    "Now from our next product!" A beautiful blond-haired girl with a cocktail dress pulled a small bottle out of


    luxurious-looking box.


    "The famous known Frost Body Essence made from an Expert alchemist! The effects will allow someone to touches this body with no side effects! The starting price goes by 500 gold!"


    "Oh!"


    Everyone currently presents exined out of disbelief!


    A portion of this grade was extremely rare to see even in a ce like this.


    Not where the potions of Frost Body Essence were hard to make, the ingredients were also hard to find.


    One of the cores of them being the blood of an ice troll.


    For this rarity and able to permanently increase the toughness of one''s body, it was extremely costly.


    Even though the effect was rather pretty small.


    "600!" The elderly General raised from this seat with one finger open.


    "700!" One rather chunky noble followed suit.


    "Dammit, it has already begun, 850!" The ck-haired man of the union joined in the fray.


    And this a fierce battle of bidding and flying saliva came to life.


    "Ahh! 1595!"


    "..."


    "..."


    Hearing the total 1595 gold that the noble was willing to bid both the side of the union and the army fell silent.


    "No one else 1595! Last chance before it goes for 1595!"


    Raising her hand high, the blond girl started counting.


    "3, 2, 1. Sold! The Frost Body Essence is sold for 1595! The item will be brought to your room after the auction."


    "Hahaha!" Theughs of the noble who bought the potion could be heard from the background.


    Which obviously pissed the general and the union people off.


    They both wanted it but the price to get it was way too high, with 1595 gold it was enough to equip a while scout of elites with high-quality armor and weapons.


    As for the union side, they would even hope to sell the potion for profit.


    "Sigh, to think a potion like it would be wasted on a fat a#s..." the brown-haired man said.


    ''What was done was done? We will have to go empty-handed this tim-.''


    "Now for ourst item! In which I am very excited to present to your guest today!"


    Huh, there is more?


    "May I present you! A recently crafted Runed weapon with enchantments in it! And I know what everyone is thinking, but no. This isn''t made by the Crafbinder!"


    Almost everyone''s eyes widened up and we''re bbergasted.


    Those who weren''t we''re only the ignorant ones.


    "I-Impossible!" The union duo exined


    "Merrick! Go and quickly report this to the higher-ups!"

 Chapter 61 - Find Him!

    Upon the appearance of the runed de, the whole auction fell into a state of chaos and confusion.


    That was because of the words that the blond hair woman said. As the woman pointed out that the sword was recently made, it suggests that the crafter is at this very capital right now or at the very least nearby.


    What hit the nail in the coffin was that it wasn¡ät made by the Crafbinder family, which was the only known capable runesmiths in the whole kingdom.


    But suddenly, out of literally nowhere another runesmith had shown up in the whole kingdom!


    Since most people were regrs on this auction this hit thempletely unprepared.


    It was simr to how you will go to school and expecting the same thing to happen over and over again, but on yourst day of school, you see usually serious teachers going dressing like a clown and behaving like one.


    These people were caught off guard.


    "Of course for such a valuable item that you dear guest is seeing from the auction prepared what would be a worthy test to showcase the runes ability!" Moving to the side, the bulgy men came dragging a cage with dem


    "Waghhh!" A high-pitched roar sounded through the whole auction.


    Inside the cage was what was know as a Night Stalker.


    The Night Stalker was an infamous creature for its ability to hunt at the night. Most of the Night Stalkers reached 4 meters tall with some rare causes of 5 meters. Their body resembled that of a gori with this head and arms showing bat features like their pitch-ck wings and big ears with a nibble yet powerful tail.


    They were swift and deadly natural hunters of the night and a nightmare to fight against. Not only did they possed night vision, but they could extend their body and jump at you before you knew it.


    "To think that the auction would catch a Night Stalker..."


    "Just by looking at it makes me nervous already."


    Of course, the creature was scary enough to most of the people here feel tense, but that was also a part of the show.


    "The presentation will be made from a hired adventured named Serras Scorched." A man with bright red hair wearing a scaled armor with a sheath on the left hip.


    "Now, Sir Serras, please proceed." Bowing slightly towards the Serras, the blond girl gently gave him the sword and walked quietly away from the stage.


    "Wagh!! WaGhhhhh!"


    "Sir Serras! We are letting it out!"


    "Let the beast out, do not worry..."


    Opening the cage, the Night Stalker imminently rushed out of the cage and jumped to quickly fly away as this instincts told him, for it to crash to the ground while looking confused.


    "Wagh!? Waghhh!" Looking at these arms the Night Stalker saw these wings be torn apart.


    These eyes turned bloodshot red searching were to throw this anger at.


    Looking at the juice human in front of him this mouth was full of saliva!


    Extending this body, it jumped at the human with the extreme speed with these talon-like nails raised at him.


    "Hmm, this times sword has a nice bnce to it..." Serras nodded with a look of admiration towards the sword.


    "As for you...You are too loud!" Just as the Night Stalker was going to cut Serras into hundreds of pieces. The human dodge this jump by a hairsbreadth and moved behind him.


    *Baahm.


    Before the Night Stalker could even realize, this big bulgy arm fell to the ground followed by what seemed an endless stream of blood.


    "Wagh? WAGHHH!" Noticing that he had lost a piece of himself, the beast eyes seemed to had lost their light with only an enraged beast remaining there.


    "Dear guest, as some might have noticed the sword has the enchantment of a bleed effect..."


    "Wa-! Wag-! Waghhh!" With this mouth opened abnormally, the beast now saw only to devour and kill!


    "Hmph, a beast will always remain as a beast. Mindless."


    With the Night Stalker losing all these senses, Serras could easily predict this way of path and dodge ordingly. Dodging sessfully, Serras delivered the finishing blow.


    With a swing towards these chest sides, burning mes emerged which burned the Night Stalkers inside and outside at the same time.


    "Wagh! Wagh!" After wriggling this body out of pain the Night Stalker eyes regained their light, for only death to remove this light as fast as he had regained it.


    "And as you can see the sword can also produce mes with no need of any of my mana thanks to the fire crystal." Moving towards the fallen arm of the Night Stalker, Serras picked it up and showed it to this audience.


    "As for what I guess you guys are most curious about is the rune. The rune of the sword''s edge and make it sharper without having any negative effects. Although simple, cutting that thick arm of the Night Stalker was as easy as cutting some butter. Don¡ät let the simplicity of the rune fool you."


    Letting the people digest what he just said, Serras slowly said.


    "As for the starting price it will b-"


    "2000!"


    "2100!"


    "Dammit! 2200 and favor from my house!"


    "..."


    `You guys don¡ät even know the starting price and you already bitting! Dammit, let me finish at least¡ä Although Serras grumbled internally, he already knew that this was going to happen.


    With another bidding war starting far greater than the one before, many people started throwing money and false promises to another, hoping to get an opportunity to get such a sword.


    Of course, most of those who did that were the stupid ones.


    The smart ones who knew the worth of the item have already left the auction.


    "General...Why are we leaving already? Aren¡ät you interested in that sword?" Merrick asked while looking behind as he was getting further and further away from that awesome sword.


    Seeing the drool forming in this soldier¡äs mouth, the General sook this head disappointed.


    "Merrick, what do you think it¡äs the most valuable point that this sword represents?"


    Scratching this head Merrick replied. "Ehm, the added strength from the rune..?"


    "Sigh, I will have to take a look at your academic score when I go back...look here. Buying this weapon from these auctions isn''t worth it at all. Most people will see it as a novelty cause of the rarity of the runes, wasting money for one sword to where we can get a better enchantment one would be better."


    "Huh, If that were the case General then why ask me to report it to the higher-ups?"


    Annoyed by this stupidity, the elderly man started exining.


    "One sword at such quality will be useless for the army. What we need isn''t the sword, but the actual source!"


    Stunned, Merrick hurriedly said.


    "So you want to find the Runesmith behind the sword!?"


    "Now you finally up to speed huh? If you understood move you a#s and investigate who made the rune! Found him no matter the cost!"


    ***


    An hourter outside the auction.


    "Young master...do you think it was a wise idea to buy this sword." A man in this middle thirty said with a Butler suit on.


    "Of course it was! This sword will be the key to my goal!" Said a man around this twenty.


    "Young master... Isn''t 3200 gold a little too much..?"


    With a frown on this face, the following you master replied with a fierce tone.


    "You should be fully aware of my situation! With me being thest child and the less talented out of my siblings, I have almost to no change beating my siblings for the head family position! I spent my all remaining funds on this sword to finally after so many years to have a chance!". Walking towards this carriage, he mmed the door and went inside.


    "I ain''t in the mood to discuss this anymore! Bring me back home."


    "Yes..."


    *Hiigh!


    With the horses moving the carriage, the young master bought the box from this side and opened it slowly.


    "With this now runed sword I will finally have the change-" The carriage suddenly stopped, making him almost drop this newly bought sword.


    "Hey! When did I say that you can stop! I don''t pay you fo-huh?"


    Opening the door of the carriage, instead of this aid to greet him was instead a flying dagger flying right to this face.


    Without even realizing what just happend, the young noble dropped death instantly.


    Appearing in front of him were cloaked figures that quickly grapes the box that had the runed sword and left.


    After making sure that they were safe, with a voice that couldn''t tell this gender the figure said to this college.


    "Hey, call the Union. Our job is done."


    "Yes..."


    Activating thismunion device, the other figure said with the same kind of voice.


    "Our mission has beenpleted. Make sure to pay us ordingly..."


    "Yes, Yes. It will be done the moment you bring that sword to the union. After doing that I would like to put another job on you guys."


    "And the will be..."


    "I would like you to find a person for us! Find the runesmith that made this rune! Find him no matter what!"


    After a short moment of silence, the cloaked figure replied.


    "It will be done..."


    ***


    Currently at the same time at the ''Ouru''Fire Smith.''


    [You acquired 2000 XP]


    "Finally finished with the helmet. At a good rating at that too."


    Stretching these bones, Danzel stands up and looks outside the window.


    "Ah, it''s so peaceful here."

 Chapter 62 - Starting To Filling My Wallet

    "Now that I put a whole two runes at my helmet, I wonder how it looks with [Rune Vision] on..."


    Without wasting another thought, I activated [Rune Vision] to put my idea to practice.


    "It seems like I was right..." Danzel said after de-activating this [Rune Vision].


    The previous bright green light on the helmet had already dimmed by putting one single rune in. But now that I put the new rune vis in my helmet the green lightpletely had faded with a yellow color to rece this ce.


    Learning that made me once again aware that there was a limit on how many runes I can ce in a piece of equipment.


    For now, it wasn¡ät much of a problem, but by the rate, I gain XP from the passive training. If I were to spend them on learning runes, then I might be forced have to throw my current helmet so that I can rece it with new runes...


    `I will have to at least unlock enough runes to fully engrave in all my equipment first though.¡ä Since now I found a pretty reliable way of making XP I obviously wanted to maximizes my gains.


    Although the dwarf promised me that he will let me enchant this stuff, there is a limit on that. Uponst time I saw the dwarf making a new item it took him around two to three hours to finish it. Such a feat of being able to create a whole weapon under three hours might be a great achievement among other cksmiths.


    If it¡äs a great feat or not I don¡ät know. After all, I am simply ignorant of stuff like cksmithing.


    Nevertheless, this speed will be nowhere enough for me.


    Just creating a single rune took me around an hour and that was me doing it for the first time! The rune ese that took me before an hour has already been shorted into forty minutes! And that is because of some hours of training!


    Every time I carved a rune with my mana, the better I got!


    It was simr to painting the same kind of picture over and over again. At some point, the previous difficult parts of the painting will be easier to the point where you will not even consider them as the difficult part.


    If we consider the part where every piece of equipment can at least hold two runes for the time being, sooner orter the dwarf will be out of stuff to put runes on!


    "Sigh, I guess I will cross the bridge when the timees, but for now..."


    Looking from the window a small cloaked figure appeared outside the shop.


    "I guess I should take my ie first hand."


    Leaving the room towards downstairs, the cloaked figure entered the shop.


    "How was it?" Danzel said while sitting at the receptions table.


    Putting the cloak to the side, Gerak put a frown on this face, slightly annoyed that Danzel was sitting on this favorite chair.


    "We will talk about that down to the workshop. So move you a#s before I make you so!"


    "Hoh? You will?" Raising from the seat a sudden killing intent seemed to engulf the whole, making the room feel colder than it should be.


    Geraks face took a turn for the worst from sensing the sudden killing intent. From this perspective, the surroundings darken with Danzel figure seemingly growingrger by the second


    "You..."


    "Hahaha! You had to see your face, it was just a joke."


    Like it wasn¡ät there, to begin with, the killing intent faded away and everything seemed to turn back to normal.


    "Didn¡ät you say that we are going to disguise this down there? Why are you still spacing out." Leaving the spacing-out dwarf, Danzel went downstairs.


    "...Joke?" Gerak said while holding this shaking hand.


    The thing that Danzel considered a joke was in Gerak¡äs opinion the joke itself. For someone to emitted such blood lust has to either be a mass murderer or an extremely powerful person. And for such dense blood lust to form to simply y a joke on him?


    That itself would Gerak find funny.


    `In what mess did I bring myself into this time around. The fact that this guy is seeking my items for this equipment should speak loud and clear that he doesn¡ät hold the strength to generate such blood lust. If I were to consider this fact that should mean...Crap, I work together with a mass murderer!¡ä


    Of course, the dwarf obviously misunderstood something.


    Calling Danzel a mass murderer with the number of people he killed would be too out of the stretch.


    The effect that Gerak was talking about we''re only possible if you in more than a thousand people or if you had the strength to cut a whole house in half without breaking a sweat.


    What actually had happened was that Danzel used [Sin of Wrath] consciously. Making the dwarf believe that he was either of the two options.


    Although the idea of working together with a murderer didn''t have much of an appeal. The idea of working with a runesmith was enough to overshadow this fear.


    Walking down to the workshop, Gerak saw Danzel waiting for him there.


    "And here I thought you wouldn''te..."


    Ignoring Danzel''s remark, Gerak went right into the business.


    "The auction went better than it thought it would, as per our mutual agreement we both get a half of how it sold." Bringing this hand in this pocket, he bought out arge brown bag.


    *Thuad!


    Letting the bag go, a metal sound could be heard.


    "That''s your share, 1600 gold."


    "Thanks, for- Wait what?"


    ''Did I hear wrong?'' Daniel asked himself.


    "The runed sword was bought for 3200. I was surprised as well."


    Daniel froze while trying toprehend the meaning behind the dwarf''s words.


    And there wasn''t much to understand in all honestly.


    "S-So you are telling me that a single sword went for that much? It wasn''t even a good rune..."


    The dwarf shrugged my question of and replied.


    "Well, you might be right, but most of the goldes from this rarety."


    "I-I see." Taking the bag full of gold coins in my hand, the first thing that I realized was how heavy the bag was.


    ''You could probably bash someone''s head with this...''


    Feeling the bag with my hand bought me a simr feeling to when I had over a hundred thousand XP in my storage.


    The feeling of being rich!


    "Hey Gerak, you mentioned that this auction house sells magic scrolls too, right? Around how much does one cost?"


    "Hmm, depends on the spell I guess? it should be around 500 to 1000 gold coins for the lowest tier spells. Finding any higher-tier spells is next to impossible. Are you nning to be a spell caster or why you as?" Gerak replied while looking at me strangely.


    "I am merely interested in learning magic. Staying on the topic, why only low tier spells or higher ones?"


    "Sigh...I almost forgot that you aren''t from here. The reason is cause it''s forbidden not only inw but thew of the spell casters such as mages. Sharing their secrets is being frowned upon, where only low-tier spells can be learned with enough training.


    "I see..." Danzel words carried some disappointment in them.


    ''It''s a pity that I can''t learn the good stuff right away. That problem can easily be solved by just throwing XP at them.


    Excited from the idea of learning new spells, I hurriedly asked the dwarf when the next auction wille.


    Sadly though, the dwarf had to crusty already forming dreams in my mind.


    "Sorry Danzel, but you have to wait until next week before we can go to the auction."


    I felt like someone poured cold water on top of me.


    "Why is that?" Of course, I wasn''t going to give up so easily without a proper exnation.


    "For the safety of course, currently you are one of the most famous people in the capital, or rather they know you as the anonymous runesmith."


    "Oh..."


    Well, I can somewhat guess why...


    The dwarf took before this time to exin to me in detail why the professional runesmith is worth it.


    I have the power to open a second market of runed goods on my own.


    Many people would like to either restrain or use me for their gain, after all.


    That''s what most if not all humans are.


    "Well... since we are going to have to wait until thest week, what shall we do?"


    Standing up from this seat, Gerak said.


    "Isn''t it obvious? We are going to work ourselves to death this week!"


    Hearing that I put a small grin on my face.


    ''Working myself to death might be a little hard for me...''


    Such an arrangement didn''t bother me at all.


    I weed it!


    ''This week''s XP harvest will be plenty full.''


    With that said, a week full of runesmithing began.

 Chapter 63 - Going Into The Auction

    In the Royal academy.


    In arge t room where it was enough to hold up to 500 people. Standing to the side of this room were a group of students that were admiring a battle of two people.


    The two students were standing inside a white circle, which was the arena that the battle was taking a ce.


    One of them had a wooden sword in this hand while the other held a staff with a small blue crystal in.


    The one holding the sword dashed right towards this opponent by using this life force to enchant these legs.


    The other student, Samuel Crafbinder tapping this stuff to the ground, a magic circle appeared and the next moment earth spikes formed at the predicted path of the other student.


    While the other students were in amazement from Samuel¡äs casting speed, what surprised them more was that the other student managed to dodge the sudden earth spikes like it was nothing.


    "Dammit Allen! You aren¡ät supposed to dodge that!" Taking a step back to gain some distance, Samuel started to prepare for this next spell.


    "Was I?" Being 1 meter out of this reach, Allen Darcy put this whole strength in this legs and arms to swing at Samuel.


    Unexpectedly to Allen, a 3-meter earth wall raised under Samuels''s legs, saving him from the pain that was about toe.


    Jumping from the other side of the wall, Samuel de-activated this earth wall which soon turned into hundreds of stones, another 3 magic circles appeared around him.


    Casting the spell [Earth Shots], three slightly sharp stones formed upped in the air with soon to beunched towards Allen.


    When Samuel had finally thought he had won, he was soon bbergasted by Allen dodging two out of three shots and crashing thest one with this wooden sword.


    "How can a piece of wood survive my Earth shot!?"


    Seeing Allen approaching him without even breaking a sweat made Samuel snap out of this confusion and quickly prepare for this next spell.


    Only to realize how short their distance was to each other.


    "Got you!" Swinging this wooden sword, Allen aimed for Samuels''s head.


    Realizing the dread that wasing to this face, Samuel quickly moved to the side while bending this body. Barely managing to dodge the swing.


    Knowing that he was doomed at Allen¡äs next swing, he jumped and tried to kick Allen¡äs face as ast-ditch effort.


    Unfortunately for him though, Allen managed to block this kick effortlessly.


    "Wha-" Before being able to finish this sentence, Samuel soon came to greet the cold floor.


    "Are you alright, Samuel?" Asked Allen''s concern.


    "Ahhh that hurt...how were you even able to dodge that?"


    "Simple because of yourck of knowledge and ability, student Crafbinder." Like out of nowhere, a man wearing the teacher uniform of the royal academia appeared in the middle of them.


    The man looked around this mid-thirties with a height of 1.9 meters, this body looked like it was just built by muscles alone which made the teacher''s uniform barely able to hold these muscles at by.


    "What does she mean by that, teacher?" Samuel asked slightly annoyed, being told he was weak seemed to strike a nerve on him.


    "It means every word what I say. Don¡ät misunderstand my words of you being weak, Student Crafbinder. The capabilities that you two had shown were amazing and even astonishing. But the result of your loss is simply because of your professional difference." The men made a short pause for the young man to understand these words.


    "So what you are saying is that...I lost because I was a spell caster and not a melee fighter like Allen? Does that mean that spell casters are weaker than melee fighters?" Samuel replied without taking a single breath through this whole question.


    Sighing out loud, the teacher started to exin as he knew that Samuel was going to ask this question.


    "Samuel, don¡ät you ever dare to ask that question in front of any spell caster. As for your question, the answer is neither yes nor no. Compared to Allen that follows the path of a warrior, you follow the path of a spell caster. The early staged for a warrior is to train their body and techniques where a spell caster is in a period of gathering knowledge."


    "Do you know why the kick of yours failed at the very end?"


    Scratching this back of the neck, Samuel hesitantly replied.


    "Because Allen is stronger..?"


    "That is indeed the case, but you got it wrong. If we were topare your magic abilities to Allen you should be stronger and yet you lose. For that, there is a single reason."


    "The reason being that Allen can dodge your attacks is because he can perceive these surroundings faster than you. What looked to you fast seems slow before Allen."


    The reasoning behind it was quite the obvious one, with a stronger and faster body you will be capable to react much quickerpared to a spell caster with a weak body.


    Although Samuel understood this point he couldn''t help but feel bitter from inside.


    "If that were the case teacher...what should I do?" He asked with a slightly desperate tone.


    "Do not be the concern of that, those who practice the ways of magic for long enough can unlock an ability so-called [Mana Vision]. Once you have gotten yourself that ability you will be able to keep up with the fast movement of warriors."


    *Ding Doing Ding.


    Hearing that break time has alreadye, the teacher told all the students to go to their breaks except this two.


    "Don''t forget you two, practice makes one the master. You two have immense talent which the kingdom will be proud to have. Keep up the hard work as, without practice, even genius fails to raise." Having spent this whole wisdom of the weak together with this 5 minutes of this break, the teacher left the two boys to go.


    Both Allen and Samuel went to them to avoid all the stalkers that were hunting Samuel down, with mainly the girls being that.


    "Sigh...finally able to rx." Said Samuel while greetings this bed.


    "Hey Samuel, do you want and practice together this afternoon?" Asked Allen while cleaning this wooden sword.


    "Ah, sorry but I can''t today. My father told me to go in a ck auction this afternoon." Replied Samuel with an apologetic look.


    "Auction? But we aren''t allowed to leave the academy without any good reason."


    "Well, It was an order from my father so if I were to refuse the next time I go to my house I will have to deal with my father..."


    After few seconds of gathering these thoughts, an idea came across Allen''s mind.


    "If that were the case, would you mind me tagging along?"


    "Sure, might as well make the trip less boring with you," Samuel said excitedly.


    "Hmm..shouldn''t we hide. our face then? Seeing how famous you are with the girls here I worry how it will be outside." Said Allen.


    "Ohe on! It wasn''t like I wanted to turn out like this! Jokes aside though, I have already thought of that. "


    Bringing out a bag under this bed, inside it was revealed to have two cloaks big enough to fit both of their body and two masks.


    One mask resembled that of a crow''s head with the other mask being that of a demon with two teeth being bigger than they should.


    "We simply have to use those!"


    ***


    Currently in the ck auction...


    "Hey, Danzel! You heard anything of what I just said!?"


    "No" Looking at all the people gathered here I was somehow surprised.


    Ever since I came to the capital I haven''t seen so many people in a single ce. Moreover, almost everyone had different-looking clothing on.


    Since most people that I saw were Gerak andmoners, I always thought it was normal for them to wear simr clothes.


    ''I guess themoners don''t have much of a luxury to dress around. That or everyone here is a hired clown.''


    "Stopping spacing out already! And the very least try to lie!" German shouted at me, which resulted in us getting some attention.


    ''Sigh, poor me...''


    "I heard you crystal clear, While you go registered our items I will wait here, that''s what you want right."


    Danzel said while making the dwarf aware of the attention that we are getting.


    "Cough~cough, yeah. Wait here until I go register our item."


    Moving the carriage that we rented, Gerak went towards the reception.


    It has been already a week since we sold the runed sword, but today that is going to change.


    The whole past week I and Gerak spend our time making runed items no one-stop.


    Except for the moments that I pretended to go for a walk and eat outside and Gerak need to sleep.


    We were working no stop.


    "I even got myself a good chunk of XP inside my storage. I am curious if there would be any magic scrolls to buy, I ain''t seeing a list of the items toe too...Maybe I should ask someone."


    Looking around me on who I should ask for advice, a group of two people caught my attention.


    "Hmm...Let''s ask those guys."


    Walking towards the group in front of me, I gently asked the one wearing a crow on.


    "Excuse me, could I make a quick question...?"

 Chapter 64 - Eyes From The Shadows

    Surprised by the unknown man''s appearance.


    The crow mask hastily turned around while quickly moving this hand towards this hip to where this sword where, this quick and decisive reaction might have looked somewhat intimidating if the tip of the crown mask hadn¡ät hit directly at the fully armored knight.


    The scene made Danzel almost burst out ofughter if it weren¡ät for the fact that he wanted to ask some questions.


    "Agh..."


    "..."


    "..."


    Looking at the poor guy trying to fix this mask result in an awkward silence between us.


    `Let¡äs ignore the bird and go for the...demon?¡ä


    "So...would you mind If I were to ask you some questions?"


    "Sure..."


    While both of us ignored the panicked crow mask, I felt like I and the demon mask were on the same page which made me morefortable talking with him. But upon noting that the heat in my body was slightly raising, my mood turned back as it was before.


    `These guys are humans...¡ä


    It wasn¡ät like I picked those guys randomly among the hundred people here to ask questions. Since every single one of them was humans, speaking with them would only ruin my mood. I hoped that those two guys were of a different race simr to a dwarf. A small figure and rare enough to need to hide your face.


    `But to think that they are just a bunch of kids...''


    "I was searching for a list of the items that will be shown in today''s auction, but I can''t seem to find anything of that shorts," Daniel asked.


    "...Hey mister, is it by any chance your first time here in this auctions?"


    "..." Daniel was dazed by the kid with the demon mask asking if it was this first time.


    ''F#ck! First Gerak and now this kid!? How can they guess that I am not from here!'' Danzel calmed this mind and quickly recovered from this dazed state.


    "Hmm...Was it that obvious? Nevertheless, could you answer my question? Since your bird friend of yours doesn''t seem to have taken a liking in me..."


    Even though that crow mask hadn''t said anything yet, this posture alone was screaming for me to get lost.


    ''Cheeky brat, If it weren''t for the fact that they are so many people around I would even beat the crap out of you!'' If I were hostile, to begin with, I wouldn¡ät havee so casually to your guys after all.


    "Well, there¡äs isn¡ät much to answer, to begin with. The auction doesn¡ät reveal these items so casually. Most people here including us have connections that inform us about some of the auction items."


    `Ah crap, he says that the list is for the rich...¡ä


    Realizing what the demon mask said I felt like someone hit my skull.


    `I guess I will have to hope on my luck that there is something for me inside the auction. Asking that dwarf would probably be useless too since he is always in that damn forge. Sigh, I didn¡ät want to ask but trying wouldn¡ät hurt...¡ä


    "By `including us¡ä, do you guys by any chance know the list..?"


    Shaking this head, the demon mask said.


    "Not really, we just came to see if the ongoing rumors are true or not."


    "Rumours? What kind of rumors? Mind filling me in since I am new here?"


    "Sorry-" Before the demon mask seemed about to reject my request. He was shortly cut by thispanion.


    "Agh! You are so annoying! It¡äs about the runed weapon that showed upst week of course! Being clueless has this limits!" Both Danzel and the demon mask were surprised by the bird finally opening this beak andsh out at me.


    Danzel though was more surprised at what the crow mask mention in this outburst.


    `Does that guy talk about the runed sword that Gerak went out to sell?¡ä


    "That¡äs-"


    "Danzel! Here you are! I have already registered our stuff in!" Like out of thin smoke, the dwarf Gerak appeared out of nowhere with a cloud of annoyance following him.


    "Sigh, lower your voice already...I am on my way." Sighing out loud, I turned around and went towards the screaming dwarf.


    "Oh, yeah. Thanks for the info you two. Here, catch." Throwing the two masked kids 1 gold each I went towards our reserved seats on the auction.


    "..."


    "..."


    Looking at the scratched gold coin that both the crow and the demon mask received, they both had the same thing in mind.


    `You cheap sake! Giving a single gold coin to a noble and pressing to be smug about it!? At least give us a good quality coin! Using that will bring more shame than it¡äs worth.¡ä


    ***


    Currently inside the auction...


    All kinds of voices went through the whole ce.


    Some were raising their bids on the item they wanted while others were just pure out of frustration of losing that particr item.


    Since the very start of the auction, it has been like this.


    Of course in different levels at that.


    ording to Gerak, the auction always puts the resources at the start, and then they go to the rarer and most unusual items.


    But if you were to ask me, the start was nothing more than a game for the nobles. They simply threw money at the floor whileughing at their actual loss. The twenty lower-ss crystals that were supposed to cost at best 15 gold coins, went for 40 gold coins in the end.


    Simple because two nobles didn¡ät want to give in and consider it a humiliation if they weren¡ät to buy it after being challenged...


    My only question watching that was what do two guys drunk beforeing here tough at their loss.


    I don¡ät care where this guy wastes this money at. But at least use it effectively dammit!


    The feeling felt like watching your teammate in a game selling their item just to buy the same item again!


    What exactly did you think about doing that!?


    If you were going to tell me that you were drunk I would even totally believe you!


    Anyway, we are getting out of point...


    What I wanted to say is that is damn boring inside here!


    Watching all those guys throwing more money than I had in my damn wallet at useless stuff made me both frustrated and bored!


    Heck, at some point that blonddy over there bought arge egg that was supposed to be of a wyvern! Everyone inside couldn''t help but be surprised at the possibility of owning their damn wyvern!


    I too was surprised.


    Until I noticed the dead mana inside the damn egg...


    `The fetus in there dead! There is no way that someone is going to buy thi-¡ä.


    Shortly after, it was sold for 1000 gold...


    "Hey, Gerak...when is this going to end again?" Danzel asked the dwarf with this cold voice.


    "Hmm, until we sell our stock I guess? Why?"


    `Sigh...¡ä At this point, I could only curse internally and give myself in the endless boredom toe.


    "And for our next item that had made this appearance a week ago! We are d to show our guests many variations of runed weapons and armor! They are 25 of each category so do not fret! We will slowly show them until the end of the auction!"


    *Ohhhh!


    "What the..."


    "Hahaha! You sound exactly like I did a week ago!" Gerak said.


    The moment the blond girl showed our runed items everyone went into an uproar which honestly surprised me.


    "So you are telling me that it was like that..?" Danzel asked.


    "No...it was worse." Gerak said with a grin on this face.


    "..."


    Shortly after our discussion the biddings soon began to take ce. The auction of course wasn¡ät stupid enough to sell everything in one go. Doing that will scare everyone who wasn¡ät interested away after all. They instead sell 3-5 at a time and then going to another product.


    This reason alone made people want to stay longer and see if anything good was left for them.


    And atst, an interesting item finally showed up.


    "For the next item, we got the magic scroll of [Mana Arms] written personally by an archmage himself when he was younger! The starting price is by 300 gold!"


    looking at the scroll andparing it with the one in the cave, the difference was too great


    Neither holes nor dirt was to see in the paper.


    The paper looked like it was written and made at the same time.


    "Hey Gerak, do you know by any chance what the spell [Mana Arms] is?"


    "Huh? You interested in that?" The dwarf said with a frown on this face.


    "Well, it isn''t forbat that''s for sure. If I were to describe it I would say that it is a quality of life type of spell."


    "The spell simple generates two floating arms made out of your mana. Their only purpose is to bring or drag your stuff. The weight that they can hold is extremely limited."


    Hearing Gerak''s exnation I got the basic idea of the spell [Mana Arms].


    Although it hadn''t anybat capabilities, it still sounds useful.


    "I am going to buy it," Daniel said firmly.


    "Huh?" Gerak looked at him confused.


    But I didn''t care.


    "500 gold!" I shout while holding my fingers high like a piece sign.


    What I learned today in this auction was better to pay more at the start before you struck the nerve of a proud full idiot who is ready to throw this money for fun.


    "No one higher than 500 gold!? The magic scroll will be sold for 500 at 3, 2, 1. Sold!"


    And to my surprise, I managed to buy it with no resistance to see. I frowned slightly at that.


    "Did I overpay?" I asked the dwarf.


    With this hand-holding this mouth, Gerak replied.


    "Guess."


    ''Dammit! I did overpay! At least I got it...''


    The reason why no one bidded on that scroll was that the auction was about to end and everyone here still wanted to give it a try to get the runed items. The fact that the spell container in the scroll didn''t help much either.


    The time for thest runed items shortly came after which bought another bidding frenzy on everyone with enough money to spend on.


    With our items being thest of the auction, Danzel and Gerak went to get their buys and gold before shortly leaving for the workshop.


    "How much did we made?" Daniel asked while already reading this scroll.


    "Hmm, about 12 000 gold. Not as good as I had thought it would." Break said with a depressed looked.


    I of course was stupefied.


    "Seriously?"


    While those two wearing some identical robes were moving towards the ''Ouru''Fire Smith''.


    They weren''t able to see two hiding figures stalking them in the dark.


    "Add them to the list.." said one of the figures while both of them were slowly disappearing from the shadows.

 Chapter 65 - The Dread Of Time

    Returning to the workshop Danzel and Gerak decided to call it a day. Since it was already midnight by now, working on something wouldn¡ät make much sense.


    At least that was Gerak¡äs case.


    He has long ago gone into a state of fatigue in both mind and body. The dark circles under this eyes with this messy beard all betrayed the fact that he was tired. And it would even be weird if he wasn¡ät.


    Since the past week, he didn¡ät do much except work, eat and sleep. Danzel even told him to take it easy and sleep more. He didn¡ät say that because he was feeling pity from this old dwarf, but rather a jealousy.


    Although this undead body of his had quite some good traits on. It wasn¡ät everything rainbows and rays of sunshine.


    The two biggestints that I had in this undead body would probably be this weight and the incapability to sleep.


    The first has already been resolved with my armor adding in the weight that I originally hadn¡ät. But thetter was much more difficult to fix, if not impossible.


    Most of the time I didn¡ät mind the fact that I couldn¡ät sleep, but sometimes when I was bored it felt like torture.


    Nheless, though we getting out of topic. The reason why Gerak started to work so hard was probably because of me. He must have already noticed it.


    The fact that I am working faster than he was.


    "Wasting this sleep for something like this...stupid." Danzel genuinely meant that.


    Although he liked to be as much efficient as possible with these methods, he didn¡ät mind if that guy would take it easier.


    After all, what Danzel was doing was basically rushing to aplish something while he holds immortality in this hands.


    "I should probably distract myself with something before [Sin of Wrath]es to y..." Having said that, the perfect idea to pass time came at me.


    "Status..."


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 3850/3850


    Mana: 484/484


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strenght 90 Agility 70 Intelligence 44 Endurance 69


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Wind de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Vigor Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead of Superior Strenght. Though youpletely merging your Lifeforce with your Undeath nature, you now became an Undead fuelled with pure dead mana and hate on the living. Such an achievement can only be seen by either talented or long-lived Undead.]


    [XP: 130 625]


    "What else is better than spending your wallet!" Danzel said with a mischievous grin on this face.


    From the previous 4 625 that I had. I made a whole package of 126 000 XP in just a week! And that by just drawing runes!


    Even though I almost stayed indoors the whole damn week.


    I still will call it a win!


    "Since I already got the goods...on what should I spend them on?" Danzel asked himself while looking through this whole status.


    There were many chooses to pick from.


    Should he upgrade these skills?


    Buy more rune knowledge?


    Or simply increase my ss level?


    "Hmm... I should probably stick to my previews n rather than spend everything in a single thing." Clicking in the skill I wanted, I pressed the upgrade button.


    [Curse of Vigor has increased from Lv.1 to Lvl.10!]


    [The skill Curse of Vigor reached this maximum Level.]


    [Curse of Vigor Lv.10 turns into Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1]


    [Curse of Exhaustion]: A curse intended to exhaust one to these limits. It makes the victim of this curse lose more stamina and slowly draining this energy. If the curse it¡äs ce enough long enough it¡äs starting to drain the very vitality of the unfortunate being hit by this spell. Until they be a mummy.


    "Damn! A whole another level of improvement! With the 32 400 XP that I used, I could even say that this is my greatest buy till yet!" Danzel nodded to himself.


    As the preview nned to get [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] 20% discount to get the Curse of Vigor to max level. In the results, though I gained far more than I thought I would. Although the [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] was expensive to get it was still worth it.


    With now 98 225 XP left in my storage, I felt tempted to push it all into my sses level. But there was still one single skill that I wanted to max out too...


    "Even though I currently am in a safe spot. Letting my strongest skill [Wind de] rot in Lv. 3 would be a crucial mistake If I find myself in a fight...But it''s so damn expensive!"


    `Upgrading it from Lv.3 to Lv. 4 would be a whole 11 000 XP! And a 1000 XP additionally for every single level!¡ä


    With a pained expression on this face ( he can¡ät make expression...) Danzel pressed on the upgrade button with a shaky finger.


    [Wind de has increased from Lv.1 to Lvl.10!]


    [The skill Wind de reached this maximum Level.]


    [Wind de Lv.10 turns into Gale Mana de Lv.1]


    [Gale Mana de]: The advanced martial art of Wind de. It¡äs sharper, stronger, and more durable than this previous inefficient technique. The mana inside the de has been improved drastically.


    "An overall improvement it seems, huh? Not bad, not bad..."


    With the knowledge slowly going through my mind, I felt like someone answered an easy question that I struggled to solve.


    How to draw mana into my sword faster and with more efficiency was solved by just upgrading this skill. If I were to use the [Gale Mana de] now, it would have double the range and speed of my previews one!


    If I had anyints it would probably be that the skill didn¡ät get any special abilities like the curse of vigor did.


    "Maybe that¡äs the difference between magic and martial arts..?" After throwing himself in these thoughts and finding no answer to this question, he took thest peak in status.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 3355/3355


    Mana: 484/484


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strenght 90 Agility 70 Intelligence 44 Endurance 61


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.1] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1]


    [Remark: A skilled Undead of Superior Strenght. Though youpletely merging your Lifeforce with your Undeath nature, you now became an Undead fuelled with pure dead mana and hate on the living. Such an achievement can only be seen by either talented or long-lived Undead.]


    [XP: 225]


    "Agh..." Seeing how in an instant 98 000 XP were gone like they weren¡ät there in the first ce I couldn¡ät help but groan in the pain that my wallet had felt.


    "I should probably start solely leveling my sses the next time I got my hands in some XP... I guess I should start making some runes to-"


    *Knock, Knock


    Hearing the knocking on my door I subconsciously turned my head towards the opposite side of the door.


    "Seriously..?" Looking at the lighting out of the window, my body shook slightly.


    "How...?" Seeing how I once again lost myself in time I felt a sense of dread inside of me.


    `How much longer would I had stayed inside here if I weren¡ät disturbed...?''


    "Hey, Danzel! Ie already out! I got something to tell you!" Gerak said behind my door.


    "Coming..." Shaking this head from these thoughts, Danzel got up from this site and opened the door.


    Looking at the serious face that he was making, Danzel frown slightly.


    "So? Did call me to make some more runes? Just that you know I got some item already ready to be carved upon."Danzel pointed out at one chest with some swords of different sizes.


    Shaking this head, Gerak brought some keys out and gave them to him.


    "Those are..."


    "It''s the keys for the workshop. I came here to tell you that I will have to go out and buy some more supply before I can some new stuff."


    "So you are saying that you will be gone for a day, right?" Daniel asked while this nce was on the keys.


    "Basically, yes. I gave you the keys in case you were interested to go outside for once." Gerak replied.


    "Sure..."


    "Although I don''t think that I need to tell you that, but make sure to lock the door before leaving..."


    "Hmph, get lost already." Danzel scoffed out loudly.


    "Alright then, I will see you tomorrow."


    With the dwarf no more, I simply looked at the keys and the door of my room with aplicated expression (he can''t make one).


    "I guess taking a break wouldn''t hurt much...."

 Chapter 66 - Trouble

    "Wow, this thing is so fun to use." Danzel said while seeing the keys being hold by some ethereal blue arms.


    *Tick


    Locking the door of the workshop, I imminently canceled the spell [Mana Arms] with an internalmand.


    "The spell works as it was written in the scroll. The flexibility and speed are good, but the weight limit is kind of annoying."


    Putting the cloak that was given to me by Gerak around me. I went out to finally take a break from those four walls surrounding me the whole time.


    Gerak has already left since the morning and by now it was already evening. My decision toe out now was the current time has the less amount of people walking outside. That, and the fact that I wanted to get those badly [Mana Arms] to - I mean to train with them!


    And for the penniless me who had no XP to show, I decided to work just enough to buy my second actually spell. Surprisingly though, the spell cost even less than [Curse of Vigot] had!


    By just making two runes I managed to learn and buy the skill directly for the total price of 1500 XP!


    Compared to [Curse of Vigot] that was 3500 XP, it was cheap.


    As for the reason why I had some guesses, but no definitive answer in hand.


    One of them was that the spell was simply inferior to another.


    The stronger the better, right?


    Well if we consider this status of my it would more likely be `the stronger the more expensive''.


    Another guess was that the quality of the scroll was better with better quality ink is written and paper.


    Nheless, I could try to figure the reason why. Doing that though would be too bothersome...


    Finding a mage to make a bad and a good quality scroll of the same spell sounds too much work even for me.


    Maybe if I somehow get an opportunity in the future, but for now that idea is scratched out from my to-do list-.


    `Crap, here I am trying to take a break while thinking of working again.¡ä


    "I even caught a bad habit..." Saying that, Danzel came to a sudden halt.


    "Hmm, what¡äs going?"


    Looking in front of him, many people were standing there looking at two guys arguing.


    "Hey, hey. You know what¡äs going on?" a nearby man of the crowd said.


    "Did you just came? A merchant from the union and a foreigner had their carriages crashed together and now is blocking the road." Replied another man beside him.


    Upon hearing from the nearby people about what seemed to happend, I frowned slightly.


    "Sigh...I guess I will have to find another path..."


    Turning this head behind, Danzel saw more and more people standing in the crow. Looking left and right he was a small opening between two houses.


    "If I remember right beyond that path should be the slums that Oliver bought me..."


    After giving it a thought, I decided to go on that path.


    `I might as well take my break and see the beautiful walls there.¡ä


    The houses between this path blocked all sunlight which made the whole path be engulfed by darkness.


    Of course, for me, such a thing didn¡ät even bother me. Heck, since my race itself has perfect night vision, sometimes recognizing how dark a room is proving to be a challenge.


    *Ssh, Ssh~


    The previous road made out of cut stone was no more, instead, this path seemed to abandon fully made of dirt. Every step that I made left marks of my boots on the dirt.


    "Ugh...cleaning this will be a bothe-" Before Dantel was even able to finish this sentence, a sudden feeling of danger came directly from behind me.


    "What!?" Danzel turned around with hastening while pulling Veren from this sheath.


    *Crack!


    A small de dug through my armor directly to my right ribs and breaking two of them.


    "Heh, you quite the resilient aren¡ät you?" Said a cloaked figure with a mocking grin on this face.


    Although him breaking some of my few ribs made me lose around 600 HP, that didn¡ät stop me at all.


    *Fsheeeen!


    With Danzel drawing this Veren out, he turned around and used this new skill [Gale Mana de] towards this attacker.


    "Oh~" Seeing that, the cloaked figure half body was engulfed in shadows which made him move like a snake and slip right to my other side before the Air de was about to cut him in half.


    The upgrade air de carved the sides of the buildings like a sharp de cutting tofu. The cut in itself wasn''t that deep inside the walls, but if you consider that the walls are made out of stones it¡äs already lethal enough.


    With me being wide open, the cloaked man of course didn¡ät let this opportunity go and aimed this dagger in hand directly at my shoulder bone.


    That¡äs at least what he thought.


    As I realized early that my air de wouldn¡ät get him through this weird movement ability. I raised my foot early to kick him at this stomach.


    Surprised at my kick, the cloaked man put this attack on hold and blocked my kick with this dagger that was supported by both these hands.


    Seeing that he was pushed back by around a half meter, the cloaked man''s grin disappeared with a frown to rece this grin.


    "You are quite strong and flexible..."


    `How was he able to move this body so well without feeling any pain` The cloaked man thought internally.


    Usually, when you add lots of strength into your muscle to either run faster or swing something with more strength and then suddenly halting that process the muscles in one''s body will receive extreme burden.


    Worst case the burden can be enough to break someone''s.


    Being with no muscles and a strengthened body from these attributes. Such a problem didn¡ät exist for the undead Danzel.


    Physical pain?


    What¡äs that?


    Looking at the cloaked figure, Danzel with this cold voice asked.


    "Who are you?"


    Gripping Veren with both these hands and taking this posture towards the guy in front of him. Danzel started to realize mana into Veren, ready to send another [Gale Mana de] towards this cloaked man.


    "So annoying! Hey, Kerres! Can¡ät we already kill this guy?"


    `Who is he talking to..?¡ä Asked Danzel himself.


    But this question soon got answered.


    "Of course not you idiot. This guy might know where the runesmith might be!" Coming literally out of the shadows, a much older man with a cloak around him appeared behind me.


    What surprised Danzel though was, that those guys were searching for a runesmith! aka me!


    ¡äBased on what the guy just said they don¡ät know that I am the one runesmith.¡ä


    "What are you guys talking about!? What runesmith?"


    `Let¡äs y the fool and see. Messing with those guys that use what looks like dark magic isn¡ät would be more than a pain in the #s that it was worth. And I can¡ät feel any pain!¡ä


    "There is no point in ying dumb. We have already seen you guys leave with the money of the auction from the runed weapons. As long you tell us where the dwarf runesmith had gone, we might let you live."


    `Ah, crap...¡ä Danzel cursed internally.


    "Hey, Kerres! You promised me that I was allowed to kill him after we got our information out of him!"


    "..." Danzel.


    "..." Kerres.


    `I guess there is no other option than fighting...¡ä


    Bringing to an end upon the awkward silence between us three, I imminently turned around and pointed my finger at the cloaked man who was apparently named Kerres.


    Recognizing the biggest threat being Kerres with going into the shadows. I imminently cast [Curse of Exhaustion] on him.


    A dark green ethereal mist came out of Danzel''s hands and flew directly as Kerres with immense speed.


    "Wha-!" Without being able to respond, the curses sessfully hit the old man.


    I didn''t him just because I felt he was the more dangerous one, but because of me being able to sense the people under my curse spell!


    Danzel hoped that when he goes into the shadows, he would be able to track him down!


    "T-That''s... a curse!?" Kerres eximed out loud while looking horrified.


    "You dare to ignore me!" Seeing their target facing this back towards him, made him feel like he was looked down upon...


    The younger cloaked man dashed in my direction to take a piece out of me.


    Moving a step to the left, the dagger hit my armor and slide to the side while creating some sparks.


    Raising Veren up high, Danzel swung the longsword directly aimed at this head.


    Unfortunately for Danzrl though, the young man slipped just about he was to be hit with the same shadow technique.


    "Tch, I can''t use Veren at this best with so small space to work with." Denzel mumbled to himself.


    Being surrounded with stone walls by each side required me to put much more care to not hit the walls while swinging a sword by the length of Veren.


    "Dammit, I should even asked Gerak to make me a shield..."


    Regrets stayed regrets of the past.


    And into the now current present.


    The fight between me and the two cloaked men begun.

 Chapter 67 - Dark Magic

    *Thing!


    Sounds of metal echoed through the abandoned path.


    "Tch, thick bastard." Using what Danzel called `Shadow movement¡ä, the younger one came towards Danze? blindspot, while he was distracted by this college in a sword battle. Unfortunately for him though, the moment he tried to sh at this armored mercenary the de simply slide off to the side while creating sparks.


    Seeing that he lost yet another opportunity the young man decided to create some distance and try this luck on this next chance.


    "No, you don''t!" Gathering this mana and spreading it through this whole body, he disappeared the old man and used this new skill [Dash] to give chase!


    Danzel body glowed with ethereal green mana with these eyes glowing the most like an enraged beast. Holding Veren up to this shoulders, with this bloodlust never-ending, he swung it towards the young cloaked man.


    *Baahm!


    "Hey, old man! Do something!" Engulfing this body until this pelvis with shadows, the man¡äs moved a step faster before this face could meet the mad de. Although he was confident in dodging this mercenary rush towards him, the blood lust that this guy let out made him feel anxious.


    What the man didn¡ät expect though was that this mercenary rush would continue after this big attack.


    Dragging this de through the ground Danzel used the same tactic that a certain goblin had used on him before. Using a skill multiple times.


    Danzel originally attack using [Dash] though made him lose most of this momentum. This though didn¡ät stop him though of abusing this body by using [Dash] yet again. With this body being one of the undead he didn¡ät feel the actual side effects of this teaching with only this mind getting the burden.


    Currently, though Danzel didn¡ät care about this headache.


    He saw the young cloaked like a big mosquito that was right to this left air the whole time! He was so annoyed by him that this blood lust covered the pain that was happening in this head.


    *Wrrhhh!


    "You crazy bastar-"


    "AGHHH" Leaving a trail in the ground, Danzel quickly closed up the distance. Being just about 3 meters away from him, he guided this mana in Veren and used [Gale Mana de] While dragging the sword to the ground.


    Swinging this sword, the air de ground through the ground raising whatever was in this path towards the young man.


    Be it carbage, dirt, or even small stones. They soon became a wave of wind going through the whole front path!


    "Ahh!" The cloaked young figure covered this head with both this arms to protect himself from the sharp carbage or stones that were flying towards him.


    He tried to resist the wind that was made.


    s, the wind was too stronger.


    "Cough~cough, this bastard! Dare to throw trash at m- huh?" The cloaked figure curses suddenly came to halt when he saw the armored mercenary with menacing green glowing eyes looking at him and this swording ever closer to this neck.


    All the colors on the young man''s face were drained instantly with only a thought showing in this mind.


    Death.


    Even if he were to use this shadow movement. In this current position and the deing closer by the sec, it would be toote.


    "N-No!" the young man cried out with tears forming in this eyes.


    And as if the gods heard this plea, the menacing sword changed this direction to mercenaries'' side.


    *Think!


    "Ho~, too bad..."


    "You think I even forgot about you!"


    Looking beside the armored mercenary this senior holding a straight contest between them, he almost wanted to kiss the old geezer.


    "You idiot! What are you standing there for!" Hearing Kerres call, he quickly activated shadow movement and made the distance between the two shings.


    Looking at these legs shaking out of fear, the young man gritted these teeth with hatred.


    `I will kill him! No, I have to give this guy the most miserable death that there is!¡ä


    `I even let that bug escape...¡ä Danzel though frustrated.


    "You sure are noble to save you subordinate in times in need. But do tell me though...aren¡ät you tired?"


    "Ho~ho, I wonder what you are talking about," Kerres said with a grin on this face.


    Pushing our des, we both created some distance between us.


    Although he was ying it call, Danzel did notice the sweat that was forming in Kerres head.


    "You can keep your activity as long as you want. I don¡ät care. Do know though, that messing with me was and will be yourst mistake."


    `For started I am the Runesmith that you guys are looking for!¡ä


    "You sure sound confident..."


    Dark mana came through the old man''s body and this shadow which made it look lifelike. Although the man''s current mana looked simr to my natural dead mana. In reality, they couldn¡ät be more different.


    Although they have the same color and have some simr attributes like the name says.


    Dead mana is dead and dark mana for itself was living mana which was one of the elements of the world.


    And the name dead mana doesn¡ät point towards the cease of the existence of that current mana. But rather than the attribute that it holds which is the attribute of the dead which is the very base of every undead creature.


    But dark mana was different.


    It allowed someone to manipte these surroundings and almost prate anything except constructs made out of holy or light mana.


    In short, dark mana was the mastery of trickery and assassination with some certain other unique ways to use it.


    And the current Kerres is using one of the unique ways of dark magic.


    "It has been a while since I moved those old bones of my..." With this sword in this hand, Kerres dashed towards Danzel at full speed.


    But after this fourth step Kerres sunk into this shadow.


    Sensing the danger and the cursed ce on Kerres, Danzel quickly turned around and blocked Kerres that appeared and disappeared as quickly.


    "..."


    `He is faster...¡ä


    Before Danzel was able to sense this new location the same thing happend to my right side. but this time he wasn¡ät able to block it


    *Cracked!


    "..." Looking at the cut that Kerres made in my left chest area I removed every useless thought in my mind, letting me concentrate on the current enemy in hand.


    And this same assault went on.


    Jumping from one side of the shadows to another, he slowly managed tond some hits on me which didn¡ät damage me that much as they he didn¡ät hit any of my bones except that one time that I was surprised.


    `That guy is clearly using this `shadow warp¡ä the whole time. but is that even possible? How can someone cast the same kind of skill so many times without getting tired? His having a mortal body makes it even less believable. Is it the same skill or two different ones?¡ä


    Danzel of course was puzzled by the man using the same skill for the eighth time on him.


    Even though with the help of the trait of all curses and the sense danger skill, he still was somewhat able to block most of the strikes.


    But this armor had limits.


    Thankfully he covered this upper body with some old cloth he found in Geraks home, otherwise, the secret of Danzel being undead would even go out of the box.


    And the less thing that Danzel now wanted was for those guys to run away and rat me out to the whole capital.


    If that were to happen I might as well get out from this ce and pursue my first n.


    On how things looked now though he didn''t wouldn''t need to do this though.


    ''At any moment he should..."


    Coming out of the shadows with sweat in the body, the now exhaust old figure shes swords with me.


    *Tinkk!


    "Kid! Do it now!" Kerres screamed out loud.


    Confused at the words of the old man, I was soon reminded by a sense of dangering out of me.


    ''Right! There was another guy!"


    Pushing the exhausted Kerres to the ground, I hastily turned my whole body around.


    Turning around, the only thing that Danzel saw was a daggering directly to this face.


    *Crack.


    Piercing through my helmet, t first a sense of weakness came at me.


    "Hahaha! That what you get messing with me!" Seeing the before terrifying mercenary takes a step back and losing this footing he almost wanted to startughing like a maniac.


    Even though he wasn''t supposed to kill him, he didn''t care.


    "You should even listen to us instead of y the big boss-"


    As the armored mercenary Danzel seemed like he was about to fall.


    These legs took this previous footing and the arm that he let the Veren sword out quickly grabbed the young man''s head.


    With this dead and affinity manaing from this body, Danzel let out a burst of maniacalughter.


    "Hehe..."

 Chapter 68 - A Moment Of Instinct And Leaving Traces

    "Mhhm! Mhmm!"


    "You annoying fly. You aren''t getting away this time!"


    Gripping this mouth even tighter than before, he raised him high from the ground while the man was iling to get away from this cold grip.


    Danzel brought the man high enough until the shadows from the man''s leg slowly got ripped off.


    This action looked simr to how you would uproot the weed from your garden.


    The man''s face took a turn for the worse with this face bing blue.


    Being in the process of suffocation. The moment the armored mercenary loosens this grip. He felt buoyant about this situation.


    But soon this hope was crushed.


    Letting this grip go, Danzel putting this whole strength in this fist. He showed a punch in the cloaked man''s face with this steel glove.


    The fist that had the strength of a normal adult man swinging a sludge hammer with this whole strength sent the young man flying towards the wall.


    *Cracked!


    "Gaaah!"


    Hitting this head to the stone walls, the man falls like a broken puppet who had these strings cut off to the ground. Blood oozing out of both this mouth and head.


    Groans of pain came out of the young man out of the pain he never had experience in this whole life before.


    He tried to stand on this knees, only for him to fall again.


    At the end of this miserably struggle he only managed to turn this body around and to look at the sky up high.


    The sun was already setting down with the night circle to soone.


    The young man that was named Heratheas started to think twelve years back in time to the simr night that changed this life for the better.


    He who had the name of Heratheas was once a nameless orphan living in those abandoned slums that had to scrap for food that even rats had avoided.


    Like most kids in the slums, he was an unwanted child who was thrown away by this mother who was a prostitute working in the red district of this capital.


    With neither of these parents, the young orphan had to fight for this life this whole life just to get some grumps of bread in this mouth to appease this hunger.


    The kid who wasn''t even at this seven years old was forced to kill another one in the same situation as him just for food.


    Heratheas never regret this choice back then.


    But he also never forgot.


    With every day the kid that was supposed to y with a stick in this hand as if it were the most priced artifact out there started to get colder and more uncarrying of human life.


    Not even this own.


    That all though changed when he was at this ten years.


    In a fight in the slums where he killed the ones that stole this food, a man appeared.


    This man offers him a ce to stay out of the cold days, a job to earn money, and the power to protect himself. Atst, even a name that he can im this own was given to him.


    Of course, at first, he didn''t believe that man that wanted to recruit him in ''that'' organization.


    But after he was beaten close to death the man''s words never sounded more believable than then.


    Although the things he had done would seem with the most disgust.


    He didn''t care.


    That¡äs where life lead him after all, if there was someone to me then it was this very life.


    *Thuad!


    Upon hearing the loud noise, Heratheas turned this dazed sight away from the sky towards in front of him.


    There was a figure wearing dark clothes with green glowing eyes. Maybe it was the cause of the pain he received, but what he saw was a skull ring directly at him.


    He felt confused as to why he was seeing something like this. He thought he was hallucinating or something the like.


    In the end, the only thing that made sense to him was...


    "Death came to im-" Without even letting Heratheas finish, a punch came to this head.


    Turning this head into a destroyed pasta.


    [You received 5500 XP]


    "Hahahaha!" Danzelughter was engulfed in poor madness.


    Even though this enemy died, Danzel continue throwing punches at the lifeless body in front of him.


    Each punch broke bones while turning the flesh one with the ground.


    The amount of blood lust that was put into each punch was disgusting in Kerres view.


    The previews calm mercenary who could predict every `shadow warp of this turned out of nowhere into a blood-lusting beast.


    "There''s is no doubt...this guy shows the ability of a berserker," Kerres said while thinking if he should leave or not.


    If Danzel were to hear this he would even question the mental health of this old man. Of course, both of them would be mistaken.


    The reason why Kerres thought Danzel was a berserker was because of this suddene of power and what seemed like a loss of sanity.


    Those things were the most characteristic points of a berserker. A heavy fighter with an incredible amount of vitality and insanely powerful.


    What both didn¡ät know though was that the undead gets quite aggressive when they are hit in their head, especially skeleton-type undead. After all, that was most of the undead weakness. Except for some of the special types of undead like the Vampires of Liches.


    Both of those two have their own set of weaknesses like their heart or the Liches phctery.


    But for the usually out of the mill undead.


    Once the head is gone you are out.


    With the [Sin of Wrath] and Danzel eye socket being cut with almost this skull showing some cracks.


    The usual anger that Danzel felt with just [Sin of Wrath] was nothing to the hatred he was feeling right now.


    *Thad!


    "Haah, I have even done it now..." Danzel said after regaining these senses.


    Looking at this gloves metall being misshaped he could already feel the pain of this wallet.


    `Tch, I sure made quite the mess with him. Following your instincts sure is dangerous...¡ä


    Ignoring the blood sshed all over me, he turned around to see Kerres standing there with a conflicted look.


    "So what will you do, run away?" Danzel said he a mocking tone.


    "..." Kerres gridded these teeth in silence.


    Turning this gaze towards the Veren in the ground Kerres didn¡ät know what to do.


    These instincts were telling me to run away, but this logic said otherwise.


    He had several reasons not to run.


    One of them was this curse that this mercenary had ced on him. Being one of the banned schools of magic there was little information about them. At first, he didn¡ät think much of the curse as it seemed that it made him a little more tired. But after some time he started feeling this vitality going away!


    What worried him the most was that this curse was a permanent one!


    There have been many stories about how a curse that seemed nothing at the first, turned out to have a crippling effect on this victim or right of cause death! If that were such a curse he would be screwed for good!


    If he didn¡ät end this now this life would be in danger!


    Killing the caster of the curse would be only this choice!


    The other reason he hesitates is cause the current mercenary is unarmed!


    Even if the mercenary is stronger physically by just a little bit. He was confident to win with this sword in hand. Leaving also meant abanding this current mission.


    `Abanding the single clue of finding the runesmith would bring me more of a punishment! I have to do it!¡ä


    "Dammit!" Removing this cloak Kerres dashed towards Danzel.


    ''I shouldn''t have used all my mana...''


    Feeling this every step get heavier and heavier, Kerres just realized how worse the curse got.''


    "Oh? You are approaching me?" stretching my hand towards the running assassin, I cast my spell.


    ''[Mana Arms]!''


    Two ethereal blue hands made of mana appeared behind Kerres unbeknownst.


    One arm trapped the handle of Veren while the other gripped the de.


    Using a mentalmand, the arms flew towards the directions of my hand.


    With the now exhausted Kerres through my curse, the Veren came into my hands.


    With our three meters distance from each other, I guided mana through all of my body and used the skill [Dash] towards Kerres.


    Kerres surprised by the de of the mercenarying to this hand tries to force whatever little mana he had left to use ''shadow warp''.


    s, with limited mana it was too slow.


    The Veren de shed towards the belly of Kerres.


    Removing this upper body with this lower part, Danzel cut him in half.


    With the two parts of Kerres on the ground and this blood painting the walls. He died with a look of unwillingness in him.


    [You received 7500 XP]


    "Nothing is useless if it''s used the correct way." Giving a hive up to the floating mana arms, I quickly left the crime scene before someone was to investigate all the noise that we made.


    And after 10 minutes that Danzel left the two body''s in that abandoned path, a man with silver armor and a golden white cloak appeared, leading a group of soldiers with him.

 Chapter 69 - Paladin

    Arriving at the path where Danzel¡äs battle had taken ce, the soldiers behind the man gasped out of surprise and disgust.


    Both sides of the walls had a long rough cut in them with the path in itself faring no better. It looked like a sudden whirlwind had appeared and created a mess over there.


    What disturbed them the most were the two lie in bodies in the ground. With one body showing this inner guts for the others to see and near that already gruesome sight, there was another bloody mess to what the soldiers guessed was a previews human being.


    Just thinking of what this poor guy had even done to experience such gruesome fate made cold sweat run down their backs.


    They wouldn''t wish for anyone to experience what this man had experienced. Even if they were the bastard who cheated on their wives.


    Compared to some of the soldiers who started to throw up to the side of the road. The man with silver armor was unfazed by such sight.


    "Sir Lewis...just who might have done such a thing?" A soldier asked the silver armored man.


    "..."


    Walking towards the two corpses in silence, the man named Lewis gripped the head and lifted it off the now-dead Kerres.


    Which results in the insides of the corpse flowing further outside and make the soldiers who just stopped puking puke one more round again.


    Giving a constion look to these fellow soldiers, the man asked in confusion.


    "Sir...what are yo-"


    "Kerres Schatman."


    "Huh? What does she mean sir..."


    "This very man is named Kerres Schatman, one of the notorious contracted assassins that had made a name here in Bernes. He left no traces behind these deeds." Heartlessly letting the head fall to the ground, Lewis turned around towards the bloody pasta.


    "And even though that guy is unrecognizable...I bet he is Heratheas, the apprentice of these bastards down there. He recently got noticed by the church. They weren¡ät men that would be missed." Lewis said with a casual tone.


    Even if the death of two well-known assassins were nothing to Lewis, the soldiers weren¡ät on the same page.


    "K-Kerres the assassin!? Why would such a figure be here? And dead at that too?"


    The soldiers upon hearing that were shocked with only a few ones who didn¡ät know who the man who died here was.


    Of course, they were.


    Since one figure that many noble had feared before died in an abandoned street that nobody walked before. If it weren¡ät for the fact of the loud noises and theints of the nearby merchants they would even never found out that such a figure died a dog''s death here!


    The nobles who had used hundreds of gold to hire magic casters as bodyguards would even cry if they didn¡ät hear of this!


    They would even waste their own money to protect themselves against someone who had already died!


    Kerres Schatman was so much feared not because of thisbat capably. But rather from this ''shadow warp'' magic which he was so infamous about.


    After all, with no magic caster to detect or block Kerres magic, the nobles would be at the mercy of Kerres.


    Even if they were powerful enough to resist the assassination. Kerres could simply hide and hear every single secret from them inside the shadows.


    Just the idea of whatever you said could be leaked from the color of your underwear to illegal was already quite tired some.


    And for such a man that brought many nobles nightmares to die in such a ce was surprising.


    "S-Sir, could see have any idea on who might have caused it?"


    With a frown on this faces Lewis replied.


    "Sadly nothinges to mind by just looking at that. What I know though is that the one that did this had done is a big favor..."


    "I see...what would be our orders sir?" said the same soldier.


    "Go report this case to the higher-ups. As for the two corpses over here...let me handle them."


    "B-But..."


    "That''s an order, I was given full authorization by the general himself and you still doubt me?"


    With a pale expression on this face, the soldier salutes while saying "Sir, yes sir!"


    Leaving the confused soldier go, the previews emotionless face of Lewis fell apart with this frown turning for the worst.


    Turning this head around, Lewis cursed out loud.


    "Dammit... to think that such creatures would appear inside the walls! Simply unbelievable!"


    The reason why he let the soldiers go wasn''t that he wanted to handle the corpse.


    But rather than feint Miasma lurking around the corpse of Heratheas!


    Such a thing to appear here could only mean one thing.


    The culprit who done this wasn''t a human! But rather an Undead walking among the humans!


    If such thing we''re to go out in public it would cause chaos everywhere.


    "That dumbass of assassin...He probably made an enemy with those parasites or something.


    Bringing this sword out of the sheath, golden light started to engulf it with the next meant the light turning into bright yellow mes.


    "[Holy Fire]..." Piercing slightly their bodies, the golden me started to eat at their bodies and the nearby miasma that had gathered around.


    After making sure that no traces were left behind, Lewis walked out of the abandoned road.


    ''I will have to report this to the church immediately before something worse happens.''


    Although two assassin Dieng was considered a good thing for everyone.


    Lewis didn''t.


    As an undead being inside the capital was enough of a red g.


    Since an undead being here never spelled good news.


    With many stories revolving around necromancers bringing the casual gue out or a damn undead army made by the citizen remains.


    "Dammit...yesterday was even the timeline to pick my long waited reward too. Let''s hope they don''t put me up to work in the name of the pdin''s code..."


    Lewis, one of the pdins serving the goddess mumbled to himself.


    ***


    Currently in the slums.


    "It has been quite a while since I even came here," Danzel said while wetting a cloth in this hand.


    The sun had longe down with the night taking this ce.


    He was back in that rundown house where he spend this first rainy night out.


    With the blood of the previews battle still being there.


    Running out for the people wouldn''t have made me question as a psychopath right off the bat.


    The first thing he had to do was to remove all those blood stains in this armor and hands.


    Although it felt awkward using the cloves cause of the misshapen, it wasn''t all that bad.


    "Tch, my armor is pretty roughed up too." Looking at the tends and searches in the armor I could only sigh out loud.


    *Sigh... how great would even be if my armor had the Veren runes. I guess mourning over spilled milk would not bring me any further."


    The man named Kerres was the third one in this opinion who could use magic.


    With the shaman to Rapha, they both had simplistic and straightforward magic spells which could even be stopped or dodged.


    But this guy made me look at magic in a totally new light.


    The ability to stay in the shadows and teleport around sounded really incredible.


    If it weren''t for the fact of using the curse with a sense of danger I would long be dead.


    That''s how powerful this guy''s skill was. If he hasn''t run out of mana juice, in the end, there, I would long be dead or lose the element of surprise with my [Mana Arms].


    Talking about [Mana Arms], he was currently using that very skill to hold the wet cloth and clean my armor slowly and precisely.


    "Those people who called this thing trash might even be retarded.


    As the saying went.


    4 arms are better than two arms!


    Or was it heads..?


    Anyways, Danzel was currently thinking about what to do.


    Return to the workshop or leave the Capital?


    Leaving would mean finding a new house with no weapons to make runes, but also safer.


    Staying on the other hand would change nothing.


    Having a house to stay out of raining days, a reliable XP source, and training my runesmithing skills at the same time.


    Although it sounds great and all. The danger behind it must be considered.


    Remembering what do yep guys told me, they didn''t seem to know that I am the runesmith.


    If they had known they wouldn''t have tried to kill me...


    I think.


    Which let me know that they weren''t sent by Gerak to eliminate me or anything.


    My best guess was that either the auction house betrayed these customers or that we were trailed back to the workshop after we got the money...


    "Sigh...I will have to meet up with Gerak and have a talk about this. As for now..."


    I will have to somehow find a way on how I should spend the night in this ce without getting bored

 Chapter 70 - Meeting The Light

    With another day embracing the capital of Bernes.


    Currently in the middle district where all kinds of merchants and shops were. In a shop that had a sign of a middle and some cloth, a man wearing a ck cloak walked out of the shop.


    Or to be more specifically an Undead.


    "Thanks forming~." A charming voice waved at the leaving customer


    "Ugh...I should even go to one of those merchants instead of here." Holding this newly bought ck cloak that was made from dark shephards wool or whatever the woman called that thing and quickly left this ce.


    Although Danzel didn¡ät like to spend this gold on pretty much anything, he soon realized through the amount of gold that he had.


    It was getting to the point that he couldn¡ät carry more than 100 gold coins with him. Anymore more and the self invendended rib bag would break through the weight alone!


    That by itself annoyed him to the teeth.


    The great thing about this bag inside these ribs was the secrecy and security of the items that were put inside it. After all, what other ce would be safer than inside your body itself? Even if they wanted to steal your stuff, what would they even do?


    Put their hands inside of me and drag their loot out?


    `Damn, just thinking about it already gives me the chills.¡ä


    The first solution that Danzel thought of was some small bags and put them around this waist. But that idea was quickly dismissed as the amount of gold that he had couldn¡ät be resolve by a small bag.


    Without any solutions in hand, he just right of decided to spend some of this gold.


    Thus, the reason for him being in this tailor shop.


    As clueless as Danzel was, walking inside that shop gave him more of a headache than it was worth.


    He just went inside to get himself some actual leather to upgrade this bag and a cloak to go back to the workshop.


    Nothing more, nothing less.


    What he thought would be a five-minute of going in turned out to be an hour-long of poor torture.


    The moment I mention to the girl running the shop that I wanted to buy a dark cloak and some lether she bought out a whole box of all kinds of different ck cloaks.


    No matter what she showed me I couldn¡ät find the difference between the...


    It was to the point that she asked me if I was color blind or not.


    Lady!


    ck is ck! There was nothing else!


    What made him more awkward was when she asked me to take my armor off to take the measurements. Which I could tell was a lie.


    I wasn''t sure why but her eyes showed a hint of greed inside of them...


    It got to the point that I forced the money in her hand and run off after saying some excuse with the goods in my hand.


    The leather that I bought wasn''t one of good qualitypared to the cloak. The reason why that was the case I would use it only to try out is it would work on not to rece the cloth material with leather.


    If I were to buy the best studs right of the bad I would even waste them.


    After all, giving a beginner cksmith the rarest ore there is to make a weapon is beyond wasteful.


    That, and because fixing and making a bag has be somewhat a hobby of mine, mainly to pass time.


    As the saying says, practice makes the master.


    The cloak was differently tough.


    Coming from a monster called the dark shepherds that weren''tmon in this kingdom made it rare and expensive.


    It was a monster closely resembling a sheep but with long legs that made them at least five-meter tall and dark wool.


    Although they were looking adorable as a normal sheep would do.


    That was only on the day.


    Dark Shephard, we''re a hunter of the night. Their gaze could use an ability called [Dark Sleep] which was hypnosis.


    Looking at the eyes of that creature spelled doom for whoever was unlucky enough to meet this gaze.


    This creature would force its prey into a deep sleep before calling this herd to see this achievement.


    What afterward would happen was...


    Not that appetizing.


    "Let''s hope that this cloak does what the woman said it does. If not I will go back request a refund wherever she wants or not."


    [Cloak of Night] A cloak made of durable wool of a Shephard. Holding one of the Shephard traits, the cloak will reduce the wearer''s presence only by little when it''s night.


    "Alright, this should be goon enough."


    Leaving the streets, Danzel made this way towards the ''Ouru'' Fire Smith'' while covering this face.


    Reaching the workshop, what he saw surprised him.


    "What the hell happened here?"


    The door in front had a big hole in the middle where the sign on top looked like it was burned.


    Making sure that no one suspicious had followed him, Danzel went inside with this hand ready to draw Veren out.


    "Gerak! Where you!"


    With my cold voice echoing through the walls. There was silence.


    "Weird, he should already be here but...did he left after seeing this whole mes- Hmm?"


    *Ba, Ba, Ba


    Running from the stairs with these short legs, Gerak appeared with a messy beard and this hammer.


    "You bastard Danzel! I told you to lock the god damn door! What did I give you these keys for!?"


    Running straight at me, he swung this hammer in my direction with an enraged expression.


    Daniel reach out this hand and grabbed the hammer with this hand alone, surprising the enraged dwarf.


    "First of all calm down. And secondary did lock the door..."


    "Huh? You didn¡ät?" This genuinely shocked look kinda pissed me off


    ''Does this dwarf think I am stupid not to lock the door?''


    "That isn¡ät important right now..."


    "What did you say! What could be more important than someone breaking into my shop!"


    "Sigh...The thing is..."


    Removing my hand from this hammer I started to exin the encounter that I had with does two guys yesterday. When he realized that I wasn¡ät joking one bit this face went as pale that a corpse would.


    "T-Tell me the truth, are you serious," The dwarf said with a shaking voice.


    "Well, unless you think I made these cuts on the armor that I bought myself..." Lifting my cloak showing all the cuts that my armor receive through the fight seemed convincing enough for Gerak.


    "Ahhh! I knew that this was going to happen for the hammer''s sake! I knew that I should hasten our preparation! Dammit!"


    Looking at the previews dwarf who cared so much about this shop throw the hammer at the ground and breaking the wooden floor made me question this mindset.


    "Wait, you knew that this would happend?" Danzel asked after thinking about what the little man just said.


    "Of course I knew you, idiot! Are you that naive to think that no one will search for the seconding of a runesmith in the whole kingdom!?"


    "..."


    `Dammit, although it pisses me off that guy is right. I still haven¡ät understood the significance the others hold of my runesmith ss.¡ä


    "I guess our partnership is over..." Putting this cloak back on he turned around towards the door.


    "Danzel, if you leave now you will die," Gerak said.


    "You..threatening me?"


    "No, I..."Understanding this mistake Gerak quickly tried to exin.


    Without being able to finish this a hand grabbed this throat and lifting him to the ear.


    "D-Danzel! Hear me ou-"


    "And how exactly am I going to die, little dwarf?" Danzel tightens slightly this grip while realizing some blood lust in this surroundings.


    "T-They will never allow for a runesmith to leave the kingdom. Willing or not, they probably have someone already in the gates keeping guard to find someone-"


    *Baahm


    Letting the dwarf fall to the ground I moved in a circle while cursing internally.


    `I should even know that thinks looked too good to be true! Dammit, I should even left once I bought the armor.¡ä


    Knowing how much shit I have a step on I tried to calm my mind.


    There is no pointining about spilled milk.


    The deed was done and what I had to do was damage control.


    "Well...what¡äs your n?" I asked the dwarf nowpletely calm.


    "Cough~Cough, Don¡ät worry... I already prepared another ce for us...No, for you to work in." Gerak said hurriedly, clearly out of breath.


    He was convinced that this guy would choke him to death.


    `I was mistaken to think of this guy as someone with a simr upation. Feeling in up closer this blood lust is too intense!¡ä


    "A ce for me to work, you say?"


    "Yes...But it will be more like buying you a base of operation. I will bring you the weapons and when you finished making the runes I will take them back and sell them! It will allow you to hide your traces on guys like you met yesterday."


    "..."


    Standing opposite to each other both of them were silent.


    After a long pause between both of them, Danzel turned around.


    "Alright...when will it be ready?"


    The dwarf replied with a tone of relief.


    "I can show you after someonee pick something up. Before that, it will be difficult..."


    "Is it that important? can¡ät you just tell him toe tomorrow or something?" Danzel of course was annoyed by this. Knowing that another group of assassins could show up at any moment he was nowherefortable with staying inside this building anymore.


    "Unfortunately I can¡ät. This guy is..."


    *Krgghhh


    With the door screeching and opening, a man with silver armor appeared with an aura that bought peach to others mind


    "You talking about me?"


    "Oh! Sir Lewis, we have been expecting you!" Gerak that one second ago was all nervous put on this same vicious smile when he first had met me.


    But I didn¡ät notice the sudden change of Gerak.


    Or rather, my whole attention was aimed towards the man named Lewis.


    The aura that would be considered pure and bringing someone''s mind at peace.


    Was to me, the total opposite.


    It was light a towering bright light that made me dread to make any movements.


    Currently, two total opposites of feelings were going inside my mind.


    One side told me to draw my sword and pouch on him with everything I got.


    The other side of me though told me that if I were to move...


    I would die.


    If one side represents the hatred of me.


    The other side was the dread facing him.


    I knew If I were to touch this light I will be done for.

 Chapter 71 - Moving Out!

    Noticing that I was looking at him dazed he frown slightly.


    "Who might this man be, Berrick? I thought you work alone..."


    "Oh, you mean him? He is..." straightening this back as if showing this pride, Berrick patted my back and dered out loud.


    "Hehehe, that guy over here is Rue, my newly acquired apprentice!"


    "Oh! Out of all people I would never have guessed that you would even get yourself an apprentice. A human at that too... I guess age does change someone''s minds."


    "Hahaha, anyway...I got the item that you ordered town stares." Hiding this annoyance in him, Berrick went towards the stair with the silver knight Lewis soon to follow.


    Leaving me behind to watch over the shop.


    I stood there bbergasted.


    Who was this terrifying man and why was he here?


    Since when did he be the apprentice of this old dwarf?


    And most importantly...


    Who the heck was Berrick!?


    "Did that guy lied to me..."


    Was Gerak¡äs name Berrick or the other way around? It didn¡ät sound like thest name or anything simr to it. The only possibility that came to mind was that he either lied to me or that Lewi guy about this name.


    Heck, he might even lie to both of us with this actual name being Jeffry.


    Not that the name Jeffry was bad by itself, but that wasn¡ät the point.


    "I can¡ät trust him..." Regretting my past decisions, I picked a splitter from the wood table and following the two of them.


    `It doesn¡ät matter if that dwarf tried to hide this name or not. I got my ways to see what this actual name is.¡ä


    Though the man in silver armor made me feel a huge amount of pressure it should be safe as long I don¡ät do anything suspicious.


    `Right, Gerak or whatever he is called did mention that he came here to pick something...¡ä


    "Ah...could it be?"


    Opening the door of the workshop downstairs, the man Lewis had silver armor on. Was now wearing the previous Asherrim armor that I saw back then.


    "So this guy was the one that bought the [Blessed Steel Armor]..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Realizing the reason why this guy was here, connections started to form inside my mind forming the answers that I had from the previous light.


    `If my guess is right, then that light of before was either of two thinks. Holy or Light magic.¡ä


    With me being undead with only pure dead mana within all of my body. Holy and Light magic were the few weakness that I knew about. With light magic being slightly inferior to holy magic towards the undead. You could say that those two kinds of magic were the absolute nemesis of any undead.


    Just touching an armor with some asherrim in it brought me difort. The armor didn¡ät even glow in my eyes. if not so little that I couldn¡ät even notice it at point-nk range.


    Looking at this light though...


    `How powerful needs one to be to reach this level?¡ä


    The light that looked liked it would never fade away.


    Was for me terrifying.


    And this very fear inside of me motivated me.


    ¡äI need to get stronger...¡ä Danzel thought firmly.


    Facing such an enemy will spell my demise upon me.


    What I need to achieve is powerful enough to defeat someone like him


    A power that will allow me to stand my ground against people like him.


    At the very least I have to be able to run away with my life.


    ''I even got my mainbat skills evolved once so that I can now focus towards my level and sses.''


    "So how do you like it, Sir Lewis? Are any measurements wrong?"


    "Hmm, it does fit rather well if I had to say. As expected from a dwarf Smith."


    After some stretches and nodding in improvement, Lewis threw a small bag into the table and turned around to live.


    Seeing him getting closer I cleared all my thoughts and focused on him with every single one of my senses.


    "Well the Berrick, I will see you sometime in the future! And you Rae! right. Make sure to study hard, although that guy is a misser.


    Walking towards the stairs and leaving the shop.


    I turned my head around and watched the dammed dwarf straight into this eyes.


    If sight could kill he would be already dead.


    The shameless dwarf stood there whistling to the air as if nothing had happened.


    After moving close to this side did the dwarf show any reaction.


    "Now that I had finished business we can go and ta- Kiagh! What are you doing!"


    Japping the dwarf''s arm with the splinter.


    ''Status...¡ä


    [Status]


    Name: Iffuro Gerak


    Race: Human


    Level: 14


    ss: [cksmith Lv.18]


    Sub-ss: [Enchanter Lv.3]


    Health: 2150


    Mana: 340/340


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 60 Agility: 23 Intelligence 34 Endurance: 42 Stamina 80.


    Talents: [Dwarf] [Hardened Skin] [...] [ Gifted Crafter] [cksmith knowlegde] [Enchanters Knowledge]


    Skill: [Smellting] [Keen Focus Lv. 7] [ Hammer Strike Lv. 3] [...] [..] [...]


    [Remark: Although he has the skill of a dwarf, The same for this personality cannot be said.]


    `It seems he didn¡ät lie for this name, at least not on me...¡ä


    Knowing that fact though didn¡ät change my attitude towards him.


    Though this status was surprisingly quite high, the only thing that got my attention though was more this remark.


    "Hey! what was that Danzel! Are you mad cause I told you name!?"


    Looking at the dwarf half my height throws a fit around I couldn¡ät help but sigh internally.


    `Sigh...how did I end up here?¡ä


    "Hey, Gerak."


    "What?"


    "It seems like you got a bad personality for a dwarf," Danzel told the truth.


    But Gerak didn¡ät seem to like my remark.


    "Huh? What are you talking about!? Are you looking for a fight? I will have you know that I am stronger than I look!"


    "Sure, whatever you say."


    `I have seen your status and it¡äs made out of pure muscle mass.¡ä


    Maybe it¡äs because of this ss being a crafter one, but he severelycks the speed to be an actual threat for someone with abat ss. The young assassin could probably kill him even though he was weaker than this dwarf.


    Not even mentioning Kerres.


    If I myself didn¡ät have the two skills [Curse of Exhaution] and [Sense Danger] I would even be dead a long time ago.


    Even if he were to overgear himself to the teeth he would still lose against that `shadow warp¡ä ability.


    Perhaps it was because I didn¡ät exin my inner thoughts out loud, but the dwarf seemed to misunderstood something.


    "You bastard! Don¡ätpare me with your monstrous strength! In my prime, I could even kill a Tier two monster with only my hammer!" He said while pointing this hammer at me.


    `You are pointing your hammer at a Tier two monster right now...¡ä Dantel though while starring at the dwarf emotionally.


    Although I didn¡ät consider myself a monster, I bet others would.


    "Anyway, when will we go to that ce that you told me?"


    "Wherever you finished packing your stuff we can go." Gerak scoffed, realizing me changing the topic.


    "Well, other than does gold coins that I have in my room, there isn¡ät much to pack."


    "Sigh...Let me show you the new base and I will bring you the coins there. My back still hurts from carrying themst time."


    After three hours of fixing the shop''s door, I followed Gerak towards the base that he told me about.


    ***


    "The base that you so proudly told about is...this?" I asked unemotionally.


    After an hour of walking around the city and making sure that no creepy stalker was watching us, we finally arrived in my new hide spot.


    Apparently...


    "Don''t be like that Danzel. As the saying goes, never judge a book by this cover."


    Gerak replied while opening the door of the house.


    The house was between the entry point of the slums and the living quarters of mostmoners. It wasn¡ät as run down as the houses in the slums and not of the same quality as themoner''s houses.


    It was just in between with a sturdy door and some cracks in the walls. For a house for me to stay in, I would give it a pass.


    But for a ce where I was supposed to hide and carve runes all day?


    No, at all.


    Entering the house it had little to no furniture inside with some stairs to the side that went upstairs. I followed the dwarf though up the stairs.


    "Look" Bought out around key, Gerak put it in a small hole of the wooden wall.


    *Thik


    "The heck!?"


    After Gerak turned the key around, the wall opened like a door with some stairs leading underground.


    "Ah, secret entrance...Seriously?"


    Walking down the path we reached a room simr to the workshop in Geraks ce if there wasn''t a smithy and all these tools.


    "Since you sit in your room like a damn mage all the time I just tried to replicate your room with some stuff that you might need. With some paper and ink too."


    The walls had no cracks and the whole room was lightened nicely by what I guess were crystal.


    At first, I was worried that Gerak would bring me into a trap or something. But looking at this room now I quite liked it.


    `I decided...¡ä


    I am moving out!

 Chapter 72 - One Month

    Currently in the gates of the capital of Bernes.


    In a line of many merchants with their carriage and farmers, was a particr carriage.


    "What do you mean we have to wait to enter the capital!? Do you know who you are talking to!?" A man with a buttle uniform told to the soldier guard.


    "Sir, we are strictly pointed out to follow the protocol. Please cooperate." The soldier said with an annoyed tone as if he had done that many times.


    `Dammit, another one of those proud full fools. I hope whoever orders us to do this for a whole month will fall to this death.¡ä The soldier cursed internally.


    And he wasn¡ät the only one.


    A month ago,pletely out of the blue they were ordered to inspect everyone passing through and though with no exception allowed. And at first, they didn¡ät think much though since that¡äs what their job was.


    Until a soldier got bribed to let someone in...


    When the new supervisor got a notice of that, the soldier was imprisoned for disobeying the kingdom''sws.


    The soldier that was taken away had a look of shock on this face until thest moment. The same was for the other soldier guards too.


    After all, it was like the untold rule among the guards that bribes were eptable. Except for a few exceptions, it was whoever could pay could enter. Even among the fewmoners who were simple farmers or the like had to pay, when they didn¡ät have to.


    Not much, but still a small hole for a small wallet.


    And for the soldiers who bathed in dirty money every single day on work to suddenly got their daily ¡äadditional` ie cut off by the new protocol.


    They weren¡ät pleased about it.


    But they could only grind their teeth and do their actual work.


    Which leads them to hear theints of almost everyone passing through the gate.


    "Sir, we will just make a quick inspection and nothing else. Please cooperate and let us take a quick look."


    "You! How dare disrespect the house of-" The butter was visible furious ready to punch this guy to death at any moment.


    "Merrick, what''s going on outside?" Coming out of the carriage was a man wearing a robe with an iron chest te that protected this chest neck parts.


    Holding a staff with a huge crystal in this hand with those sharp eyes looked towards the soldier and this little cause trouble.


    "Why have we halted?" The man asked towards the guard soldier.


    As he was about to repeat the same he said to the butler, he finally noticed the crest on the carriage and the mage cloths.


    ''Shit! A noble!''


    Although he didn''t recognize the crest on the carriage. The staff alone from that mage looked more expensive than he would make this whole life.


    ''He must be the spell caster from the family.''


    "Sir, we apologize for the inconvenience, but we will have to inspect before we allow you to enter."


    "You!"


    "Merrick, it''s fine." Turning towards the nervous soldier he replied.


    "I, Darius Darcy will allow you to search under the condition to inform us the reason behind this inspection."


    "Sir, although we aren¡ät allowed to tell you the details of it. The most that I can say is that we are searching for someone. Saying any more would bring me problems so please understand Sir Darcy." The soldier bowed at 90 degrees while this college started the inspection.


    "Sigh...for the capital to tighten the security in the gates the situation should be serious..." Darius messaged these temples.


    "And here I thought I could take my mind by visiting my son¡äs ce. But now I have to worry for criminals walking loose."


    "Sir, you the inspections are done, you are allowed to enter"


    Entering the carriage, they entered the city.


    ***


    "Tch, after so long they are still at it."


    Danzel said with annoyances.


    Wearing this cloak, he stood near the gate entrance where he came from.


    He was quite in a bad mood currently.


    Today morning in this hideout where he has done this usually study and carving runes thest patch of equipment he heard Gerak calling him out. At first, I was annoyed since he interrupted my study towards the Veren runes.


    Letting him in he told me he told about a new deal that he was going to. He told me that the month that we worked together making runed weapons no stop, it was the time to final sell our stonk. Since the past ident, we were now more careful about where to sell our weapons.


    After all the auction was a big no-go ce now.


    But that wasn¡ät important right now.


    Reading between the lines of the dwarf, I now realized that a month had passed since I killed those assassins. The idea of spending my whole time in a ce did somewhat made me uncounterable, but I didn¡ät regret it.


    Except for the few times that I have gone out to check on the gates, the rest of it I spend in my hideout. Except for the weapons that Gerak bought me, the rest of my time was trying to figure out the Veren rune and understanding magic better.


    With some of the imprinted knowledge about runes and the pattern of the Veren rune I thought I could simply brute force it and find the correct mana input.


    The process was simr to opening a safe without knowing the code.


    Sadly that didn¡ät work out as I wanted.


    Hours if not days of constant work resulted in the end in multiple failures. The worst part of it was that I couldn¡ät remove the failed rune of the weapon, which resulted in getting jelled by Gerak for myck of care for this work.


    In which he wasn¡ätpletely wrong.


    He simply didn¡ät care about making the dwarf work more. I even suggest buying some cheap daggers for me to practice on, but this so-called dwarfs pride wouldn¡ät let him do so.


    Which in my opinion was a stupid of a reason to have.


    Nheless, this resulted in running out of stuff to carve runes. And with nothing better to do in here, I decided to grab the [Mana Arms] scroll and give it a read for fun sake.


    Although it was just to kill my boredom at the time. I quickly realized that I could understand the content and make some sense out of it.


    This should be obvious since I acquired the [Mana Arms].


    Something so simple made me think " What if I were to learn a spell without the use of XP."


    On that day I couldn''t get this thought out of my mind and was eager to test my theory out.


    s, finding magic scrolls isn''t easy.


    Though I had Gerak look one for me in the auction or the ck market.


    No magic scrolls to be found.


    The reason for that was most likely of the recently what I like to refer to as a lockdown.


    It wasn''t like no one could leave the city or anything of that sort.


    But leaving or entering without an inspection was impossible.


    For that very reason, most people who were smuggling and trafficking illegal products were the most that suffered from this.


    As whoever the fault was for such a thing to happend should drop dead.


    although many wished for it to happens.


    I was already dead.


    Or rather I am undead.


    Getting out of the point though, with the ck market suffering, the chance of another scroll appearing any time soon was ording to Gerak almost to zero.


    With nothing else to do, he decided to observe the gate for today since he had nothing else good going for.


    Looking now in the present, he saw a carriage of higher quality being halted by the guards.


    Recognizing that it must be a carriage of a noble being stopped, he realized that getting out of here legally would be risky.


    "If they even have to stop a noble for an inspection, then I might as well give up to run off for now."


    ''I should probably go back to the hideout''


    Leaving the area of the gate entrance.


    Danzel entered this house and quickly used the key to open this secret hideout.


    Lieng down to this bed, he opened this status in front of him and still couldn''t believe how much XP he had acquired yet again.


    "With so much XP in my hand, I might finally upgrade the long yet not forgotten...


    ss levels!"


    Upgrading guardian would most likely increase my attributes more than my subss since it evolved once.


    But on the other hand, this could be my chance to evolve my Runesmith sses and hopefully unlock some new neat stuff.


    Each of those options had its pros and cons.


    And the question now was with which one I should start from.


    Following an hour of silence inside side the room.


    I came with my decision.


    " I guess I should start by that....

 Chapter 73 - New Mission

    [Status]


    Name:


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 3850/3850


    Mana: 484/484


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strenght 90 Agility 70 Intelligence 44 Endurance 69


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead of Superior Strenght. Though youpletely merging your Lifeforce with your Undeath nature, you now became an Undead fuelled with pure dead mana and hate on the living. Such an achievement can only be seen by either talented or long-lived Undead.]


    [Storage: 328 225 XP]


    "Has been a while since Ist saw my status. Was it around two weeks?" Reading through the floating window in front of me I was surprised to see the amount of XP in my storage.


    "Wow, I even reached a new record this time around! I totally of 328 225 XP!" Just looking at the huge number made Danzel''s hand twitch with excitement.


    Though he did enjoy studying the runes and the magic scroll. Spending this wallet was still yet the most fun thing to do.


    "Let¡äs see how the status will rob me this time..."


    Pressing through the window, the cost of the upgrade shows up in front of me.


    [Undead Guardian Lv. 1]: 4500


    "Damn, it cost more than I thought." Danzel mumbler to himself.


    Of course, for him who now had 328 225 XP in these pockets, it didn¡ät look that much. He knew very well how such a huge amount of XP could vanish before he could realize it. The seemingly big number that he had to work for days to be achieved has been spending in less than a minute!


    "Tch, this won¡ät be cheap." Casting my hesitation aside, I pressed the upgrade.


    [Undead Guardian level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv.2]


    [Undead Guardian level has increased-]


    Looking at my XP storage being quickly drained I felt like I made the wrong decision. Though if there was a better option or a better way to spend my XP on started to gue my mind into stopping the upgrade process.


    But I held on.


    Currently, I didn¡ät need fancy skills and runes to carve.


    Sure, If I were to get more runes I might be able to put multiple runes in equipment and gain at the end more XP out of a single item.


    Focusing on skill wouldn¡ät be a bad idea too either.


    Having to witness someone with a powerful skill I realized that strength itself wouldn''t seal your victory for good. Though I was faster and stronger than the assassin named Kerres. This shadow warping ability was enough to bring him the edge to the fight.


    So putting my focus into a skill and making it my trump card didn¡ät sound like a bad idea. Increasing either skill [Curse of Exhaution] or [Mana Arms] to the limit was among those ideas.


    With the former, I could probably just cast the curse into an enemy and wait for the XP toe. As simple as that.


    For thetter, though I hoped that the [Mana Arms] would be capable for actualbat. Just the thought that I could choke some with those arms ten meters away from me sounded cool enough.


    What if they wielded weapons instead?


    The very thought made me more than once put my finger away from the upgrade button. And yet I resisted the temptation.


    I knew very well what I needed the most to protect myself against enemies like that Pdin.


    And that was pure power and power alone!


    Without being able to exchange des and hits it wouldn¡ät even be a battle anymore. That¡äs considering he doesn¡ät use any of these skills though. In case he does use these skills that I guess are of the light or holy element, then I am in several ways screw.


    Considering all those facts I went with the option that would give me the biggest amount of power.


    [Undead Guardian level has increased from Lv.9 to Lv.10]


    [Your ss skills has been unlocked]


    "ss skills?" Upon looking at the new message Danzel halted for a second before ignoring it and continue upgrading this ss.


    `I will have enough XPter on anyway. What¡äs now important reaching the limit of this ss.¡ä


    [Undead Guardian level has increased from Lv.10 to Lv.20]


    [Strenght Increased by 40, Agility increased by 20, Intelligence Increased by 20 and Endurance Increased by 20]


    [You gained 40 Attribute points]


    "Aghhhh!


    " Aghh..." Right after having finished upgrading my ss at 20. Death mana was being released out of my body and filling the room with it.


    Currently, every single bone in Danzel''s body was shaking a bit.


    "Dammit, I upgrade too fast..." said Danzel annoyed.


    What he was experience was simr when he bought a skill. Instead of knowledge though, this time it was his body.


    Compare to learning a skill though, this was in this opinion better


    Instead of feeling the usual headache every time, now he felt more ufortable than painful.


    It was like his body couldn''t handle such a sudden increase of strength. This body felt stiff and somewhat numb though all this body as if only this mind was being there.


    Shortly after few minutes this what little he had of senses came back to him with the nearby dead mana flowing inside this body.


    Feeling this body he was both impressed and yet annoyed by it.


    "It will take so long to get used to such amount of strength..." he said dejectedly.


    Considering that there was multiyer by 1.1 in every attribute, he almost got half as strong as he was before.


    That''s assuming if he didn''t use these remaining attribute points to further increase these attributes.


    "The effect is way too good, but..." Turning this head, he nkly stared at it.


    As the saying goes, nothing is free in this world.


    "To think that once again my hard-earned fortune was spent in an instant..."


    Looking at the previews 328 225 XP that I had turn instantly into 23 225 in total...


    "Sigh...at least I have some crumbs leftover, unlike the other times." Shaking my head of how poor I am.


    I went ahead and distribute the attribute points still left evenly through all four attributes.


    ''Let''s see the numbers now''


    "Status"


    [Status]


    Name:


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 814/814


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strenght 140 Agility 100 Intelligence 74 Endurance 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead of Superior Strenght. One of the strongest natural draugr that there is. Though her tier undead far surpasses this strength. For your current tier of strength, you can be considered a powerhouse.]


    [Storage: 23 225 XP]


    "Oh, the remark changed for good this time. Before it barely changed..."


    After reading I went towards the missed messages to look around if I had missed something.


    And at the very top of the list, there were indeed three.


    [You reached the maximum level of the Undead Guardian ss!]


    [To advance into a higher tier ss a mission has been assigned]


    [Mission]: Evolve every ss skill at least once or kill a tier-three being.


    "Nice, it doesn''t sound hard to do. At least the first option doesn''t."


    Realizing that the mission was just to buy the new skill he felt imminently relieved and sat on this bed.


    "I wonder what the next ss option has to offer." Saying that ouload.


    Standing up from this bed, Danzel went out and buried himself in this research

 Chapter 74 - Clues Coming By Themselves

    "Damn, what did I think when I bought this house?" Gerak cursed under this breath.


    When he went out and bought this house for that freeloader, he might have overlooked some of the details.


    For example, walking here from this shop took him more than a half-hour on foot alone. Which mademunication beyond practical between that blockhead. That¡äs not considering delivering the items too.


    Since carrying multiple boxes of weapons was simply impossible.


    Having realized the issue a day after dropping Danzel in this house he face palmed himself of how stupid he was.


    With no other choice at hand, he had to rent a carriage and two horses around every four days. The worst part of it was that it came from this money!


    Nheless, he couldn¡ät go toin at that workaholic. After all, he was the one making the money for him!


    Even they couldn''t do something so shameless...


    Opening the door, the first that greeted Gera was the dust that had umted in the door.


    "Bah! This guy..! I even told him to clean this ce up , but nothing has changed since a month ago!"


    Beating the dust from these cloths, he went towards the stairs with this key.


    *Click


    "I swear that I will make him clean up this ce for goo-"


    Without being able to finish, a grip of cold metal and a de as long as he was ced an inch away from the neck.


    "What will you make me do again?" Danzel behind Gerak said rather ominously.


    Processing what was currently happening Gerak became in an instant ghastly pale. With the cold grip and voice behind the one holding the cold de. He felt like the grim reaper came for him to im this soul.


    Seeing that the Dwarfs legs were shaking slightly, Danzel removed Veren from this neck.


    "Hey, don¡ät make a scene here which I have to cleanter on."


    Moving towards this bed, Danzel sat down and asked.


    "So? Why are you here."


    Grasping this chest, Gerak replied rather dispirited.


    "Did you have to do that?"


    Looking at the serious dwarf, he simply shook shoulders.


    "Well, you entered without knocking. Thus, it¡äs your fault."


    `This bastard...I almost died from a heart attack!¡ä


    This was the second time experienced such a fear such as it. The first one was on this own damn shop to where the second time was in the house that he damn bough!


    But I still couldn¡ät say anything because he was right. The times that I entered without making my presence knowing he imminently went drew this sword with full of hostility. And I do understand the reason why he bes so rmed.


    I too would have been if I experienced an attack from assassins.


    What he didn¡ät expect though was him appearing behind him without even noticing him!


    `And this overall aura has changed...¡ä


    Staring at Danzel, he felt like he was more threatening than he was before.


    `Maybe I am thinking too much...¡ä


    Shaking the remaining of this fear and calming himself down, he went to business.


    "I came here to pick you up. Don¡ät you remember what I told you yesterday?"


    "Ehm...No? Await, was it about the new deal or something?"


    "At least you remember that part. Since we are going to find another supplier I guess that you might want to be present there."


    "Hmm, wouldn¡ät that be dangerous?"


    "Don¡ät worry about it, the guys we are making a deal with are this time on the legal side. As long you pretend to be the mercenary that I hired everything would be fine."


    Picking our stuff up, Danzel followed Gerak out of the house.


    "Well, that I can do. But who exactly are the guys who will make that deal with?" He said while putting this cloak on.


    "You should try and remember the stuff that you are being called."


    Seeing no reaction, Gerak sights out loudly.


    "The deal this time will be with the kingdom himself."


    "Huh?"


    "To be more precise..."


    "The army."


    ****


    Currently in the Administrative Building of the army.


    On the upper floor of the building, a man with a dark circle under this eyes was sitting there frustrated.


    "Tell me Archman, how long has it been since I issued that order?" The man said while pointing at the papers that he was holding.


    "General...it has been already been a month."


    *Baahm!


    "If it has been a month already, then why haven''t I received any news of it!" He peeled out of anger.


    Looking at the fist that broke the table surface, Archman said emotionally.


    "Sir...the desk is new."


    "..."


    Looking at the ice-cold re from the General towards him he racks this brain how to change the subject.


    "R-Right! There was a report about how one day after the auction took ce, a duo of assassins were found near the slums area. It could be somewhat rted to that case."


    "Hmmm." He Reached this hand to pick another piece of paper among the huge pile on this desk to read.


    "Ah, You mean those two annoying parasites. The investigation here suggests that nothing has been found that could rte to those two cases. They probably hit the end of their road by sticking their hands in a sleeping dragon."


    "Other than this report, no further clues were found that could rte to this case..."


    Scratching this head, the General raised this hand ready to smash the table again.


    *Tock Tock.


    "General, I bring important news that I have to report imminently"


    Hearing the voice outside the. door, he halted this first advance and called the soldier in with a frown on this face.


    "What would be the case soldier? Know that wasting my time will bring consequences"


    Unfazed by the soldier by this superior''s threat, he handed a sword covered in white cloth.


    "That''s..?"


    "General, in around five minutes ago, a dwarf with a man appeared in front of the building saying to want to make a deal. Considering the recent orders and the item that they gave me. I thought the best action would be to report directly to the general.


    Confused by the soldier''s speech, he unwrapped the cloth.


    Taking a better look, he quickly became flustered.


    "T-This is..!"


    Staring at the beautifully made de with some runic letter , this previous tiredness was nowhere to be seen.


    "Where are those two people that you told me about? The General asked seriously.


    "They should be outside the civilian''s area."


    "You have done well to report directly to me soldier. Archman, go with him and bring those two into my office."


    "Sir, yes sir!"


    With the two leaving this office, they generally were left alone.


    "To think that they woulde to me." The man mumbled to himself.


    Heading the surface of the desk to hide the previews damage.


    He quietly waited for them toe.


    ****


    "That ce sure is huge."


    Following the preview soldier with an additional one with Gerak together.


    Leaving what the soldier said ''civilian area'' and entering the real deal.


    I was surprised at how many people wearing practicing with either swing their wooden stores at a dummy or duels.


    Just by looking at them, I would guys around 200 people training inside here.


    Though some of them were in my opinion pure garbage, they were few who impressed me.


    They were some cases where I would say that they had better swordy than me.


    It was clear that those were the training grounds.


    Following the soldier, we quickly found ourselves into a big wooden door.


    *Tock Tock.


    "General! We bought them here."


    Getting inside the room, a man gazed at us seemingly full of expectation.


    "Please, do take a seat."


    With both parties being present.


    The start of the agreement began.

 Chapter 75 - Becoming A Part Of Something Big

    "Then don¡ät mind If I do." Walking like he owns the ce, Gerak sath to the offered seat.


    "..."


    Standing beside him, he frowned upon the dwarf''s behavior.


    And he wasn''t the only one.


    "...Archman, close the door so that we can have some privacy between us."


    "Yes, sir."


    Closing the door, the rather muscr elder turned this head straight at me.


    "Don''t you want to take a seat?"


    Before being able to reply, the mass of wasted air got ahead of me.


    "You don''t have to worry about him. He is just a mercenary that works with me."


    "..."


    ''You bastard! Are you so petty to make me stand like that the whole time!?''


    Though I am undead and standing still for all eternity would in theory be possible. It didn''t mean that I would be happy about ying the statue.


    At least those were my inner thoughts.


    Regardless of my enmity, I knew that the despicable dwarf did that to make me look more like a bodyguard.


    While I was currently cursing the dwarf internally.


    To the others though, which consider mainly of the Elder and the one named Archman. I seemed more like a statute staring in the far distance.


    "Anyway, before we begin our discussion about this thing" He pointed at the runed sword.


    "Let''s introduce ourselves. As you might well know, I am Nikzel Swift, the greatest from one of the ten generals in the whole kingdom army." The Elder, said with a pride tone.


    Seeing the soldier named Archman face palm himself and the dry smile on Gerak''s face, we all seemed to have the same opinion of the elderly.


    ''Sorry, I will just call you Nikzel''


    Ignorant that he just embarrassed himself in front of three people, he looked at us implying to do the same.


    "My name is Gerak Iffuro, a journeyman cksmith from the Earth Circle Hammer. I came in this capital to full end my trial ced upon me. As for this guy...he is a mercenary named Rue Danzel."


    "So you even came from the dwarf kingdom..." Nikzel said with a slight frown on this face.


    `Wait, why haven¡ät I heard anything from it? The Dwarf Kingdom? Earth Circle Hammer? The heck is that¡ä Danzel thought as this curiosity was ignited. He asked himself why the dwarf hid such a thing.


    To when in reality it was this own fault. In the past month and more that he was freeloading at Geraks ce and taunt him to work harder than usual. For a dwarf, they saw their craft with the utmost pride and considering working and finessing their craft to the limit as their life goal.


    Those habits of dwarfs made them quitepetitive among fellow craftsmen. Considering the stamina of a undead unending stamina, literally. With the fact that he was telling Gerak from time to time not to work as hard as him and to get some sleep.


    In Geraks point of view, it was the same as telling him `Hey, Since you can¡ät work as hard as me, you better of sleeping¡ä.


    At first, he thought that this runesmith was just being an arrogant brick, but after knowing him for a month.


    Gerak realized how wrong he was.


    That guy wasn¡ät a brick, he was a clueless unsociable brick!


    The times they talked were only about work that needed to be done and the moment he has gotten the chance to, he would rush towards his room and continue what he calls `research¡ä.


    "So Gerak, this mighte upfront but why do you have this kind of weapon in your possession?" Nikzel said with a serious tone.


    With a tone as if he was asking how the weather was, Gerak replied.


    "Oh, you mean this runed weapon? I came here to sell some of them here."


    As if hearing something absurd, Nikzel questions the idle sitting dwarf in front of him.


    "May I ask you what you mean by saying `some¡ä weapons?"


    "Hehe, exactly what I said. That sword in front of you isn¡ät the only one."


    Shocked, Nikzel hurriedly stands up.


    "It can¡ät be! Are you a runessmi-"


    Before he can finish this sentence, Gerak was a step faster.


    "No, you are wrong if you think that I am the runesmith."


    "Then from where did you get those?" Nikzel asked confused.


    "Well...consider me and him as the representative of `that person."


    With a tired sigh, Nikzel fell in this seat and asked.


    "By `that person I consider you mean the runesmith...so what are you doing here?"


    Turning suddenly serious Gerak went right into the case.


    "We want to make a deal with you."


    "If you want to make a deal with us about those things, then why didn¡ät the runesmithe too?" Nikzel said.


    "Please, General. I don¡ät want to be rude, but my client isn¡ät stupid enough toe right here in the middle of the kingdom''s army. Considering the rarety of this specialization."


    `Hey!¡ä


    Ignoring the cold re behind him, he continued.


    "I see... but is it the same for you two?" Nikzel said realizing some killing intend to those two.


    "Please, General. We both know that if you do something to us you will lose here." Gerak said unfazed.


    "What do you mean..." He asked, finally noticing this subordinate Archman making X signs with both of these arms behind those two.


    "Well, because if we don¡ät go back and report to `that¡ä person he will simply run away from the capital." Pausing for a sec, Geraks eyes turned chilling cold.


    "And isn¡ät your guy''s kingdom currently at war?"


    As if something just exploded in Nikzel''s mind, he cursed internally.


    "In case you aren¡ät aware of, General. If I, a member of Earth Circle Hammer suddenly die or get missing in your kingdom, until you guys are proved innocents, forget about getting a weapon delivered by any dwarf."


    "..."


    "..."


    `Oof, that¡äs a mood killer¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    After good long moments of silence, Nikzel was the one to put an end to it.


    "Tell me the deal..."


    *****


    Currently in the hideout...


    Opening the door two figures are gone inside.


    "Hahaha, I told you that it would work!"


    "..."


    Ignoring theughing dwarf, Danzel went to the stairs and opened the secret door.


    "Hey! Stay here and celebrate a little! Everything went as you wanted!" Following my steps, we both entered my room.


    "We not only solved the supply problem, but we are also get paid for it! They even promised us that you can select one out of three magic scrolls for free!"


    "I am not upset about the deal."


    ¡äBut more about the scale that it had be...¡ä


    The deal had three important points.


    The one was that the army had to supply us with their weapons carve runes on them. That request was decided by me and the dwarf.


    By myst spending that I did before, I realized that in the future XP would be hard toe by. With now a level costing around 25 000 XP, I can¡ät possibly imagine how much it would cost when my ss evolves...


    With increase cost, I had to increase my earning of XP.


    `At least they gave us this item...¡ä


    Looking at my finger was a ring with a dark crystal with spots of purple and blue around it, as if a whole gxy was trapped into the crystal itself.


    [Ring of Spatial Storage]: A ring that is capable to hold an item within a sealed space of 10 cubic meters. Souls cannot be contained within the rings space.


    With this item, I now have a huge bag at my fingertips.


    Without this item, in our hands, the deal wouldn¡ät even find a ce in the first ce. Since carrying boxes of weapons through the streets will undoubtedly bring us unwanted attention.


    The second point was that I could choose some magic scrolls from the armies collection. Which didn¡ät go as well as I had wanted.


    It seems, requesting for an outsider to see the technique that all magic casters of an army would use is a serious no-no.


    After all, you wouldn¡ät want to let your enemies know how to use your own weapon against you.


    Their reasoning was pretty fair and I gave up.


    Gerak though didn¡ät seem like he was on the same page as the general.


    After a lot of arguing we managed to choose one out of three scrolls from the lowest of magic.


    And thest of thing that we agreed upon was obviously our payment...


    Which I honestly didn¡ät care as much.


    The thing that troubled me the most was that I suddenly became an arms dealer supporting a war between two kingdoms.


    "Sigh, how did things turned out like this..." While I was deeply contemting my whole short unlife.


    ring at my status window to distract myself from the excitement dwarf, I red at the mission for my ss advantage.


    `Hmm, evolve every ss ability at least once...¡ä


    Clicking on the window to see further details, a list of skills that I have and didn¡ät have appeared in front of me.


    Among them was a skill that I hadn¡ät use for a long time.


    "Hey, Gerak."


    "Hm? Did you by chance finally recognize how great I am?"


    Ignoring this statement, I said with my cold voice


    "Since you called me an idiot before I guess you will be willing to listen to a request of my."


    "..."


    "Don¡ät tell me that you aren¡ät going to do it?"


    Looking at the image of me staying still while stroking Verens handle send chills running through Geraks back.


    "What will it be..?"


    Pulling out a pure dark crystal from my chest, I gave it to the dwarf while having a grin behind my helmet.


    "I would like you to make something...."

 Chapter 76 - I Will Simple Scam You!

    Walking towards the office of General Nikzel, Danzel remembered what Gerak said to him.


    "Listen to me well, Danzel. Though you probably realized I will just say it again."


    "What we are doing right now, is no different as walking on thin ice while carrying a chest of gold in our hands. So don¡ät you dare do anything other than pick one of those damn scrolls!"


    It was one of the few times that I saw Gerak talk so seriously.


    The other times that I saw him talk so serious was when he first learned that I was a runesmith and when he talked about this homnd, the dwarf kingdom.


    Since I was curious about this homnd, I asked purely out of curiosity.


    The most what I gotten though was how the dwarf kingdom was the number one seller of weapons in the entire continent and this n called Earth Circle Hammer.


    When he exined to me all these things it finally hit me why I haven¡ät seen any other dwarfs in the streets like Gerak.


    Apparently in their n, when a dwarf reaches the level of a journalist in their craft, they are being sent on a journey to a nearby allied kingdom and build their shop for five years. It was like a sacred ritual of their Earth Circle Hammer to send their future craftsmen to gain enough experience of their craft.


    In the five given years, there had to make their reputation as a cksmith and learn to make the exact weapon that their customer wanted. After all, learning to make the sharpest and most durable sword for one not to bring this full potential was seen as wasteful.


    If the sword himself feels awkward using the crafted sword that they spent their whole week making, both sides of the trade would feel unsatisfied.


    To fix this very issue this sacred ritual was made by the three big groups of the dwarf kingdom. One of them was of course the Earth Circle Hammer, which focused on learning cksmithing together with enchantments.


    When I heard that I subconsciously looked at my enchanted armor that was fixed with the help of aining dwarf.


    "If I remember right, he mentioned that the ritual would be ending in three months..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Though the ritual itself was like a tradition to the Earth Circle Hammer and the other two ns in the dwarf kingdom. There was a hidden benefit in that ritual, which was the main cause of Gerak wanting me so much.


    That was the chance to get an apprentice by a master himself.


    After all, for a dwarf bing a master of their craft was the same thing as amoner bing a noble.


    Those chosen by masters will gain enormous resources, further knowledge for their craft, and most important one.


    A mentor to guide them.


    Though to gain all those benefits you had to prove yourself first.


    And how did they do that?


    They crafted of course!


    The better quality and the more unique the items were, the better the chances to be chosen as a apprentice!


    "That¡äs why Danzel, in my followingst months, I will have you put your best runes in the pieces that I will make for the presentation."


    "Tch, such an annoying guy..." I cursed to myself while I finally reached the front door of Nikzel¡äs room.


    Though I honestly hated this dwarf''s guts, I could help but have a grin on my face.


    "Hey! You probably think that I am shameless about outdoing that, but let me tell you! Ifachieveive my apprentice, you will have a future connection with a master cksmith! Considering how young you are I will still be able to craft you something fancy in a decade or so."


    It seemed that the dwarf considered me so young, because when he asked me how old I was and I just pointed two fingers at him, which Gerak took as I were in my twenty.


    In reality though, by showing him two fingers I didn¡ät mean that I was twenty years old.


    But more like two months!


    *Tik Tik


    Knocking at the door, I heard some footsteps from the other side through my increased awareness sense.


    `The agility increase sure is useful.¡ä


    Hearing the footsteps stop, a soldier which I recognised as Archman from our previous meeting opens the door for me.


    "Come in."


    Nodding to him, Danzel entered the same room he was before.


    `It seems they cleaned up this time around.¡ä Danzel thought to himself as he saw less paper and books on the General''s table.


    "Sir Danzel, pleasee she in, I prepared the things as promised." General Nikzel, said with a fake smile on this face.


    `He probably hoped that the runesmith wille to pick this up. Hehehe, if he knew.¡ä


    Removing all the useless thoughts from my mind, I went right into the business.


    "Where are the scrolls?"


    Surprised of how blunt I was, Nikzel followed suit and dropped this act.


    "There are here."


    Going back to this desk, he went and grabbed three rolls of paper that were held with a small red string.


    Upon watching those three, scrolls shown in front of me, the ethereal mes in my eyes sparked for an instant.


    Reaching my hand to take a look at those, Nikzel frowned a little before pulling the scrolls back.


    "First though...show us the stuff."


    As if someone threw water and extinguish my ethereal mes.


    All my previous excitement was gone.


    "Fine...take a look." With my cold emotionless voice, I activated the ring of spatial storage.


    Then one after the other, weapons and armor pieces started to appear from what looked like thin air.


    Though both Archaman and Nikzel knew what will happend, they still were surprised by the number of weapons that appeared in less than a few seconds.


    "Archman...take a look," Nikzel said with an expressionless face.


    Archman just nodded and started to take a look at every single weapon that was ced on the ground.


    Waiting for Archman to finish this inspection, the two looked at each other in silence.


    `Damn that¡äs awkward..¡ä


    "General, the products all seem to be alright."


    "So all of them are runed weapons..." Nikzel said while he was having deep thoughts.


    Though it would be polite to wait for them to get their minds cleared.


    I didn¡ät care for that.


    "Since you now confirmed that they are real, show me the stuff."


    "Fine, take a good look at which you choose. I am not giving you more than one." Nikzel said with this arms crossed.


    Opening the magic scrolls, I used them on all three of them inspections.


    [Earth Wall]: A lower-tier magic that conjures a wall of earth from the ground.


    [Silent Steps]: Through a hellish amount of training you managed to control your body weight to make yourself as silent as an assassin needs to be.


    [Leap]: By forcing your mana into your legs, you can jump twice as high as you originally were capable of. Depends on a lot of armor.


    "So I can only choose one of them, right?" I said while still looking at the scrolls.


    "Yes, as the deal we made you are only able to take one out. I will not allow for any exceptions." Nikzel said with a firm tone.


    "Hm..."


    While thinking of what I should pick.


    A brilliant idea came to my mind!


    `Status!¡ä


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 814/814


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strenght 140 Agility 100 Intelligence 74 Endurance 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead of Superior Strenght. One of the strongest natural draugr that there is. Though her tier undead far surpasses this strength. For your current tier of strength, you can be considered a powerhouse.]


    [Storage: 23 225 XP]


    `Damn I am so ingenious!¡ä


    "I even decided," I said with confidence.


    "Oho? Which one will you pick?" Nikezel said with curiosity.


    "I will pick none!" I dered loudly!


    "Huh?"


    "What!?"


    Both Archman eximed and Nikzel exined.


    They were confused beyond belief!


    While both were trying to see the reason behind my choice.


    Iughed internally.


    `Why should I pick one if I can learn all three in here.¡ä


    I will simple scam you!

 Chapter 77 - Skills Of A Guardian

    [You learned the spell: Earth wall]


    [You learned the skill: Silent Steps]


    [You learned the skill: Leap]


    `Now that I got them in my skills list I should be able to purchase them any time I want. Though all together coster 10 000 XP in total, it¡äs still worth it.¡ä


    "Can I ask you what you meant by that?" The general looked at me with a frown.


    `I guess they would be confused by my action. Let¡äs see if I can get something else out of their pockets.¡ä


    "I mean every word that I said, General. If I were to bring any of those three scrolls to my master he will be displeased." Cause he already has them, hehe.


    Nikzel frown grown much worse after hearing it.


    "Is the runesmith a magic caster..?" He mumbled to himself low enough for no one to hear.


    "If that were the case what will happen to our deal?"


    "Well, since those three are no use to my master would it be possible to show me some other scrolls to choose from"¡äI asked with a vicious grin hidden behind my helm.


    `Since I am already in the store, I might as well pick whatever is left!¡ä


    As I was already picturing what else I could gain, him shaking this head made my grin fade away.


    "Sorry to tell you, but that wouldn¡ät be possible. Though those three scrolls contain information of the lower tier, we can¡ät let it casually spread to the public. After all, we can¡ät have people use random magic on the street."


    The following three scrolls that he bought together were originally two that allowed for the civilization to learn. Those were the scrolls that contained the knowledge of [Silent Steps] and [Leap]. Two skills that were focused on mobility.


    He threw the spell [Earth Wall] in the mix to show this generosity to the runesmith. Though this lower tier, it was a much-used spell to all magic casters of the earth element.


    That¡äs why when this mercenary ignored the spell [Earth Wall] he felt that he was justmitted. Finding a scroll that¡äs isn¡ät from the army is after all extremely rare.


    Since for most magic caster¡äs sharing their knowledge was one of the biggest taboos. Only the most desperate magic caster make scrolls just for sale.


    The mostmon use of the scroll was for masters to give their disciples their spells without showing them their grimoire.


    "That¡äs too bad...canceling the deal would be problematic too," Danzel said with this usual cold voice.


    `They even more of a cheap sake that me, dammit! I guess I can¡ät get anything else out of them.¡ä


    Though I could try and make them give me resources such as gold or even crystals.


    The current me what no use from those.


    "I will have to go back and ask my master what he might want other than these scrolls."


    "I guess it can¡ät be helped then, Archman. Show him towards the prepared weapon before he leaves." Nikzel said


    Following the soldier named Archman, Danzel left towards the weapons that he was going to take back.


    With the on his office closed, Nikzel preview''s face turned serious.


    "Tch, mercenary..."


    Moving this hand to this chest, he took a purple crystal in this hand.


    "The mercenary just left the room, make sure you follow through everywhere. And whatever you do, do not engage. I understood?"


    After some moments of silents, a low voice came from the gem.


    "Yes, general."


    As he said that, the light of the gem died out, showing that contact has broken.


    "Sigh...I can¡ät believe that I would be ever used those guys again..."


    Copsing to this seat, he looked towards the window.


    "If you think that you can hide from us, you sure are naive..." Nikzel said while pouring himself some wine in this ss.


    ***


    "Dammit, they didn¡ät even let some room for me. If I weren¡ät for the fact of me being undead I would even think that they want to work me to death." Closing the hidden door of my hideout, I crumbled by the number of weapons they gave me to carve runes on.


    I purposely went out early to look around and maybe find a hidden gem amount the items that the merchants were selling, but with those guys in the army filling the ring of spatial storage at max I had no ce to put the things that I wanted to buy.


    "Sigh...I guess I can drop this stuff here the next time I won''t go shopping." I said slightly dejected.


    Most of the stuff that I wanted to buy wasn¡ät anything fancy too. They simply were books of a different kind, such as what monsters exist out there, basic knowledge of magic, and such.


    Of course, those books cost three to five gold coins each, which were for themon people absurdly expensive.


    For me though, who had gold to throw away, the price was nothing.


    "I am not even motivated to carve this rune on these guys'' sword anymore." I looked at the lien weapons with hatred.


    It¡äs because of you guys!


    Falling down to the bed, I looked at the seeling thinking what I should do.


    "Ugh...I guess I could check the mission again."


    Summoning the status window, I clicked towards the ss advancement mission for more details.


    "ss skills huh? Let¡äs see which one it means." Pressing the words ss skills with my skeleton finger, another window with further details came in front of me.


    [ss Skills: Undead Guardian]


    [Piercing]: Iplete!


    [Shield Bash]: Iplete!


    [Armor Preserve]: Iplete!


    [Dash]: Complete!


    [Gale Mana de]: Complete


    [Sense Danger] Iplete!


    [Riposte Defense]: Iplete!


    "Uwah...that¡äs a lot to level up..." Looking at the number of skills that I needed to level up, I had to put the ss advancement n to hold. Though the skills [Piercing] and [Shield Bash] were honestly dirty cheap to level up.


    The other three skills weren¡ät.


    "At least I got two skills out of the list, but..."


    Looking at the XP required to get those unfamiliar skills I almost wanted to close the window and pretend that I didn¡ät even saw them exist.


    [Riposte Defense]: As a guardian, your pride lies towards blocking your enemy''s attack and letting them despair by the fact their attacks don¡ät go through. By guiding your mana towards your arm and shield. You can move your arm equipped with a shield at a faster speed with quicker reaction times. Last 5 seconds.


    [Armor Preserve]: If one defense is broken, it¡äs better to have another one in hand! By guiding your mana through your armor, it bes tougher for a short amount of time. If the attack waspletely blocked off, the energy that was generated and your mana will be realized upon the attacker, creating a knockback effect. The best defense is more defense!


    Both of the effects of the skills were better than I had ever thought. One would help me block the enemy''s attack more easily while the other skill would be my saving grace from attacks with a chance of counter-attacking them by surprise!


    Overall those two skills were amazing and what my ss missed for so long. After all, a guardian who only used a sword was a waste of the ss itself.


    My mind went on the battle one month ago against this two assassin that ambushed me on that abandoned path.


    If I had the skills [Armor Preserve] back then, the first attack that broke my ribs could have been prevented! Not only that, the attacks of the shadow warping assassins would have been so much easier to block or fend off with a shield and the [Riposte Defense] skill in my hands!


    Though the skills use some mana, I had mana to spare in that fight back then. Crushing them would even be so much easier than almost having my damn skull destroyed!


    "If only they didn¡ät cost so much..." Danzel said while ncing at the cost price of both of the skills


    [Armor Preserve]: 10 000 XP


    [Riposte Defense]: 5000 XP


    "Sigh...I guess I would have to give up." He sighed while turning the status window off.


    "The skills are so expensive. Upgrading the [Wind de] into [Gale Mana de] was a pain in the pelvis already. But having a second skill that cost this much will make my wallet bleed a hard time."


    I shook my head while standing up from the bed.


    `I will have to change my ns now. Working towards my ss advancement will take far longer than I originally had wanted. I will simply get them to level 1 and upgrade them in the future.¡ä


    "Dammit, I wanted to see what is next after the guardian ss, but I guess that would have to wait."


    Turning my head towards the weapons that Archman gave me, I stand up and began carving runes.


    "I will have to increase my XP ie, I just got three more months...."

 Chapter 78 - Raphael Crafbinder

    At the same time in the Crafbinder territory.


    In the front gates of a huge mansion, a carriage with the same crest arrived.


    Coming out of the carriage, was a boy with silver hair came carrying a small wooden box with him.


    Looking around this ce he sighted under this breath.


    "Sigh, I guess this ce hasn¡ät changed much from the time I left."


    Though invisible to others, he could see the whole ce full of ancient runes and magical enchantments. Just by the sight of the pure amount of those two things would make the average magic caster puke blood from their mounts while at the same time trying to see how much this all stuff cost.


    `If those prideful old goats at the academy would know the maintaining cost, they might faint by the numbers alone.¡ä The boy showed a smile at the thought of that sight.


    "Did father ced even more by the time I had left?" Noticing the few runes that he saw for the first time in the ground, the boy shook this head in disapproval.


    "He is working too much..."


    Coming out of the mansion, a dark-robed figure with a silver line made this way towards him.


    "Young Master, the preparations areplete..." The robed figure said after opening the gates.


    The boy, Samuel nodded at the robbed figure.


    "It has been a while, Morgan. Has anything changed by the time I wasn¡ät here?" Samuel asked entering the mansion.


    "The usually, young master," Morgan said with a slightly deep voice.


    "I see..."


    Morgan Gern, though many mistake him as the head magician of the crafbinder family. Was in reality the head butler of this house. In these early years in the royal academy, he quickly became famous for this mastery of dark magic.


    Though dark magic was always frowned upon by the magicmunity for mainly being either a utility type of magic or of how close it was by the dark arts of magic such as necromancy. This reason alone leads him into many difficult situations in this early years.


    The reason for this poprity though wasn¡ät because of that, but rather turning the so-called utility magic into destruction from which many called chaos magic.


    And the reason why a man that held the title of a great mage such as him was being the head butler of this family was from one single reason.


    His father.


    "Tell me, Morgan, where can I find father now? I have something to give him." Samuel showed the wooden box.


    "The lord should be at this working ce by this time..." Morgan said with a troubled face.


    "Don¡ät worry Morgan, this time I am going for a reason," Samuel assured him.


    He knew that his father didn¡ät like wasting time.


    Moving to the second floor, Samuel together with this small wooden box in this hand arrived at a door that had several crystals with many different colors.


    Knocking at the door, Samuel waited for their silence.


    After five whole minutes, the crystals showed a small light, and the door opened by itself.


    "Come in..." a male voice said.


    Going inside the room, the head of the family, Raphael Crafbinder with a deep blue robe looking at this mid-thirties with pure silver hair was standing there. looking at a piece of armor ce on the table.


    If the men''s hear was a little short Samuel and him would have looked almost the same.


    "Samuel, I hope it¡äs something important for you toe here. I recently got more work ced upon my shoulders."


    "From the royalty or private?" Asked Samuel from curiosity.


    Though this father was a workaholic and somewhat cold. Their rtionship between father and sons wasn¡ät terrible.


    "From royalty this time. The fierce woman has gotten her a#s kicked by the book worm from the Arcana Kingdom and now I am forced to craft her new equipment. Enough for that, why are you here? Wasn¡ät today your first day at school?" Raphael said while these eyes and hands were drawing runes in the armor.


    "Father, it isn¡ät a school but the royal academy. And the first day was more than a month ago..." Samuel said with a dead fish eyes look.


    "Huh..?" Raphael turned around and look at Samuels''s face for a second before turning back at this work.


    "If that were the case, why are you here?" Raphael asked, making Samuel want to curse at him.


    `I am here cause you told me so!¡ä


    Keeping these inner thoughts to himself, Samuel walked towards his father and put the wooden box on top of the table.


    "Father, you send me to retrieve a runed item that wasn¡ät made but us, remember? Since I found one, I came here to show it to you." Samuel exined.


    As if a revtion came, Raphael stopped what he was doing, he looked at this son and this box next to him.


    "So it was true..." Opening the box through the use of magic, Raphael frowned at what he saw.


    Inside the box were some te gloves of higher quality than the other cheap ones that you will find in the market. Though that wasn¡ät the reason for his frown.


    "By the craftsmanship itself I can see it was made from a dwarf, but those runes..." Taking the ted cloves for a closer look, this frown grew even worse.


    Which surprised Samuel greatly.


    `I have never seen father make such face, except the time I tried asking where my mother was...¡ä


    "Father... did you find something wrong with the runes?" Samuel asked.


    After a minute of whole silence, Raphael put the ted gloved back in the box.


    "The runes themself aren¡ät anything special. There are draw poorly and the tier of the rune is of the lowest tier... If I were to teach you you could probably do better than this amateur that drew this. But..." Raphael replied to this son.


    "Huh? If that¡äs the case is there something else that concerns you on the runes father?" Samuel asked.


    `If what father says is true, then there is no way that he would be making such a face. There must be something else.¡ä


    With this look still on the cloves, or more specifically on the runes, Raphael replied.


    "Well, I ain¡ät too sure either but the mana used for these runes is weird..." Raphael said.


    `It¡äs as if a different kind of mana was used to create these runes. Mana much different that we use...¡ä


    "Samuel, tell Morgan toe in my room."


    "Eh? Ah, yes. I will go and call him." Samuel said slightly dejected by this father''s look.


    He knew, once he made this face he will care for nothing else.


    `Though the rune itself it¡äs clear enough that the guy who carved this is a beginner at this. But what mana did he use to carve those runes? It¡äs neither elemental mana nor a mixed one. I will have to meet the person who made those.¡ä


    Raphael''s curiosity was awakened, and with it came a hundred different theories in this mind that could exin this phenomenon.


    As one of the few Archmages in the whole Berum Kingdom.


    Raphael Crafbinder, one of the Feathers and the Pirs of Berum kingdom.


    Had this curiosity awaken by the unknown knowledge in front of him.


    *****


    Four days had passed.


    Currently in the hideout underground.


    Danzel who was carving the final item that was given by the army, has just ended.


    "Ugh...I will never do this again..." Putting the final runed sword inside the ring of spatial storage, he got up from the bed and looked around him.


    "Though I got quite good at carving this rune, drawing the same all the time is quite tedious work." He said while opening this status window to see this earning.


    `Status.¡ä


    [Status]


    Name:


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 814/814


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strenght 140 Agility 100 Intelligence 74 Endurance 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead of Superior Strenght. One of the strongest natural draugr that there is. Though her tier undead far surpasses this strength. For your current tier of strength, you can be considered a powerhouse.]


    [Storage: 97 225 XP]


    "Well, I sure worked myself to the bones this time... a whole 84 000 XP points for the whole crap of weapons and armors. Not bad for the time patch."


    ncing now at my XP storage nearing the 100 000 XP, I didn¡ät felt as much surprised as the other times.


    I have gotten quite used to it.


    "I will have to go to Gerak and give him the ring. If I remember right he wants to get himself something from the scroll that I didn¡ät get." Though the scrolls were supposed to be my reward, I didn¡ät mind giving the chance to get something for free to Gerak.


    "I am sure he will get something more useful than me..."


    Looking towards the storeage window, I had a small grin on my face.


    "Now....should I get myself some new runes?"

 Chapter 79 - Silver Ranked Adventurer

    Looking at this status window, he quickly shook the idea of this mind.


    "Maybe learning new runes wouldn¡ät be the wisest idea... My subss is still at this first stage and upgrading it might allow me to unlock the hidden boxes in the [Dead Rune Knowledge]."


    Scrolling through the [Dead Rune Knowledge] window, there was only one window unlocked to me and that was themon one.


    Though I unlocked three runes in themon box, there were what looked like hundreds if not thousands of question marks in themon runes.


    With the measly number of three, god knows how long it would take me to unlock every single one of them.


    Though I bet among those thousand of runes a hidden gem must be there. But even if that were the case, the other hidden boxes should have better stuff in them.


    "Upgrading my sub-ss doesn¡ät seem that expensive too. Only 4000 XP for the first level..."


    Compared to the cost of my first ss though, 4000 XP was way too much.


    Back then when I still was an undead warrior, the current cost of my sub-ss might seems expensive.


    "Maybe the reason for it being so expensive is cause it¡äs my sub-ss and not my main ss?"


    Considering the names it somewhat makes sense. The ss is your primary focus, thus probably cost less XP.


    While sub-ss should be considered as a side job.


    Since it¡äs isn¡ät your main focus its should also cost more than your primary focus.


    That¡äs though just a guess of mine.


    "Anyway, I should probably get going and give this ring to Gerak." Gathering my things, he went out of the hideout and made this way towards the Ouru¡äFire Smith.


    It was still early in the morning and many merchants were to be seen to prepare their stalls for the day toe.


    Seeing how early it was I didn¡ät rush to reach the workshop.


    Taking this time, Danzel walked through the streets and looking for something interesting.


    "A device to keep track of time would be useful..." Danzel shook this head disappointed.


    He asked several merchants for such an object, but no one seemed to have what I had described.


    He long ago notice this problem with time, and now he was trying to fix it by keeping count of time. After all, if now someone were to ask him what day it is, he would have no idea.


    The closed thing that a merchant told me is about a magic item that had a simr function as what I had described.


    "I should probably ask Gerak about this. He should know a ce or two where I can buy such a magic item."


    Making a mental note, I decided it was time to go to the workshop.


    Walking for another ten minutes, he finally reached Gerak''s ce.


    "What is going on here?" Looking outside the shop, there was a group of people standing outside.


    `Who are these people? Did Gerak finally be popr out of suddenly?¡ä


    Looking at the group of four I noticed they weren¡ät simple.


    Though most people that came to this shop were new adventures with rarely some mercenary. These guys looked neither of them.


    `They don¡ät look like soldiers or newbies who started out. Their equipment is rather good too.


    Two girls holding staffs in their hands wore robes with small backs to their sides. If I were to guess these two were magic casters.


    Beside them was a shorter man with leather armor that many small knives with thest one of the party being a bulgy man with a mix of te armor and leather armor. He had a towering shield to this side and a mace hanging tightly around this back.


    `This guys should be veterans adventurers...¡ä


    Though I remember Gerak mentioning that they are different kinds of ranks among the adventures. I didn¡ät pay attention at that time.


    `They don¡ät look like there are here for trouble...¡ä


    Walking quietly towards the door, the group of four exchanged some res.


    "..."


    "..."


    Ignoring their stares I quickly went inside.


    "Gerak, there is a group of people-"


    "Don¡ät lie to me Gerak! I know that you were the one!" A man with bright red hair mmed the table and yelled out loudly.


    Being suddenly cut off, my ethereal eyes narrowed even more.


    `Who the hell is this beetroot?¡ä


    "Serras, I told you already to get lost! I don¡ät know who I sold that weapon!" Gerak yelled while pointing this hammer towards the door. Clearly annoyed by the guy.


    "Don¡ät you lie to me old man! I know exactly what your weapon looks like and that you wouldn''t sell them to randoms from the street! Now tell me!"


    The man with the red hair, apparently named Serras said while hitting the table yet again.


    ''Does he have a grudge against the table?'' Daniel thought to himself.


    Gerak, who was getting the more annoyed by the second swung this hammer in the air towards Serras.


    "Be quiet already! Can''t you see that you are a caring my customers!"


    "What are you talking about! I am your only customer that there is! Did you finally gone senile?" Serras scoffed out loudly.


    Sensing the directions the conversation was going, I quietly turned around ready to leave.


    ''That smell like trouble...''


    You guys do yours, don''t mind me.


    "Hey! Danzel! Come back here!" Break yelled at me, determined to drag me in their drama.


    Hearing the unknown name, Serras turned around and looked at me strangely.


    ''You damn dwarf! I will remember that!'' Cursing internally, I was forced to reply.


    "Hey, Gerak...I came to ask if you got the thing that I ordered ready." Daniel said while walking towards the two men.


    ''For Gerak to call me customer he should want to keep our rtionship a secret from this guy.''


    Serras, looking surprised at me, this face turned into a frown.


    "And who are you?" Serras said with a hint of coldness in this tone.


    "And who are you to ask me that?" Danzel asked back with the coldness.


    Only his is the real deal.


    With a frown on this face, Serras turned around and looked at Gerak.


    "Hey, Gerak, who is this guy? Don''t tell me he is your customer." Serras said with a low voice.


    With this frown turning for the worst, Gerak yelled annoyed.


    "What''s so wrong with me having customers at my shop!? That guy is a mercenary who is a long client of mine! Now if you got nothing else to discuss go out already! Compared to you I ain''t jobless!"


    "I am an adventurer for damn''s sake! Not jobless!" Serrasined.


    "It''s the same damn thing with prettier words! Now get out of my shop before I call the guards!"


    Seeing how serious the dwarf was, Serras turned around mumbling to himself.


    "I wille back..."


    ncing at me thest time, he left heavy steps.


    "Haaah...nice timing there Danzel, you sure saved me a lot of effort," Gerak said.


    "Who was this guy?" Danzel asked while making this way to the table.


    "Oh, him? He is a silver-ranked adventurer who has been a client of ever since I scammed him once."


    "I see...and why was he here?" Daniel asked emotionally.


    ''If that were me who you scammed I would even beat the crap out of you.''


    "Well, apparently that guy Serras used the first runed sword that we sold in the auctions, unlucky enough he recognized my weird and came here asking for the runes."


    "..."


    ''If too would remember the guy who sold me faulty products and possibly endanger my life.''


    "Anyway, why are you here so early Danzel?"


    "Ah sorry, I space out for a moment." Shaking my head from useless thought, I removed the ring of spatial storage and gave him to the dwarf.


    "Here, the first patch of weapons have finished"


    "Oh, so early?" Taking the ring in this hand, Gerak had a wry smile on this face.


    "Sigh, I guess I will have to make a trip to the army"


    Though he was slightly annoyed by the fact he had to walk so far away, inside him he was excited.


    ''Thanks to Danzel I might be able to get ''that'' thing from those guys of the army. And with the money, we earn from those weapons I might be able to craft what I have to mind.''


    "Hey, Danzel. Since you finished how about you eat some breakfast with me before I go and bring new weapons? Gerak said while making this way towards the upper floor stairs.


    Scratching my helmed awkwardly I shook my head.


    "Sorry Gerak, I...Had ns to go to a shop that sells magic items. I somewhat hoped you will point me where it is..." Daniel said somewhat depressed.


    ''It''s not like I can eat anyway...''


    With a sigh on this face, Gerak walked back to pull a map from under the table.


    "Sure." Marking the map with some ink in a wood, he made several circles in the map.


    "Those are all the shops that I know of. I let you borrow my map."


    Gripping the map, Danzel nodded slightly.


    "Thank you, Gerak."


    With the map in this hand, he turned around walking towards the door.


    Gerak, who was looking at Danzel back, thought to himself.


    ''I thought we got close enough to have a meal together. But I guess I was wrong...."

 Chapter 80 - Magic Shop

    "ording to the map that Gerak gave, this should be one of the shops."


    Taking his sight off the map, he was in front of a shop called [Handy Caster''s].


    The shop waspletely built out of sturdy wood as a material with a teal color that was unique to all other shops nearby.


    The shop had onerge window which showed various items such as books and staffs with some other that I didn''t know.


    With this building being the single one with ss windows and color, it was as if a swan was pretending to be a group of ducks.


    It was too different and beautiful to miss.


    "After the other flops that I visited, this brings me the most expectation."


    Putting the map away with several X on top of the circle that Gerak drew, I walked towards the inside of the shop.


    *Ding Ding


    ''Hmm? They even have a bell at the door?''


    Looking above my head there was indeed a bell.


    ''The other shops didn''t gas ones, and looking all that stuff that I had no clue what they were made me think that after all the four hours of walking were now worth it.¡ä


    Staring like a curious child, Danzel couldn¡ät help but touch everything that he was curious about.


    As he was engulfed by his own curiosity, a voice from behind made him flinch for a second.


    "Knight at the door! Knight at the door!"


    Startled, he put the jar that he was holding away and turned around with this sword drawn, ready to the one behind him into two pieces.


    What he saw though wasn¡ät what he was expecting.


    "A crow..?"


    Seeing a crow with few red feathers in the birdcage next to the door made Danzel feel awkward.


    `I can''t believe I drew Veren against a bird¡ä Embarrassed, he sheathed Veren back, pretending that it never happend.


    "Old man! Old man! A knight drew the sword at me! He drew the sword at me!" The yells echoed through the room.


    While Danzel was cursing the crow being so loud.


    He heard some footstepsing from back at the shop with a *Ting* every now and then.


    Turning his head towards the sound he saw an old man walking towards him.


    `The shop owner?¡ä


    The old man that I guessed was the owner, had a dark robe with brown symbols that seemed to glow and staff as tall as him in this left hand with the other hand being behind this back.


    Though he had this back slightly crunched, these steps seemed to be steady with no signs of weakness that one would usually have at this age.


    Walking towards me, he opened this mouth to say something but was shortly cut off by a certain bird.


    "Old man! Old Man! He tried to kill me! kill me! He also tried to steal! steal" The crow opened both of these wings wide which made him look more dramatic.


    Seeing the bird screaming around I couldn''t help but curse at it.


    `You damn drama queen of a bird! Who tried to kill you and steal you damn lier!¡ä


    My red ethereal eyes were glued at the crow full of bloodlust. But I didn¡ät do anything since the owner of this ce was in front of me.


    The owner instead of ming me turned this head towards the crow and then at me with the same expressionless face.


    "Sigh... close that beak of yours in front of customers or else they will be no food for the day."


    With a panicked expression on this face, the crow closed these wings and turned around pretending to be your everyday bird drinking some water.


    `That shameless...¡ä Danzel wasn¡ät sure if he was supposed tough or cry at the sight of it.


    Seeing that I was distracted, the old owner tapped this staff to the ground and looked straight at me.


    *Ting


    "You must be an adventurer...No, a mercenary perhaps? I take it you are a customer yes?" The old owner said with a low voice, but loud enough for me to hear.


    I was slightly surprised by this appraisal, though I wasn¡ät really a mercenary I still pretended to be one among other people.


    Which made me curious why he thought I was one.


    "How did you know?" Danzel asked. with pure curiosity.


    "Well, it isn¡ät a hard thing to guess. Someone at your strength should even be famous already, but the fact you don¡ät point towards being a mercenary that adventurer. Nevertheless, your equipment is far better than those adventurers with simr strength. Did that answer your question?" The old owner said indifferently.


    "Yes..."


    `I guess I should take my cloak next time I leave my hideout...¡ä Making a mental note in my head, I noticed something else in these words.


    "I understood your reasoning, but how did you know my strength? In your eyes, I might as well be a rich noble pretending to be a knight, no?" Danzel said.


    In response, the old owner just shrugged this shoulders.


    "As the saying says, with agees wisdom. And you aren¡ät the only mercenarying to my shop." he showed a small smile.


    "Now enough with that, you wouldn¡ät want to make an old man stand up to you young people right? Are you in search of something foring to my shop?"


    `He changed to the topic...¡ä Sighing internally, I started to exin things that I was in search of.


    "Hmm... a device that helps you keep track of time? A got a few of those over there." Walking away for a moment, the old owner bought out a circr green crystal with some metal parts.


    "This is called a [Sun Timer], It can measure the time of the day and night."


    Giving it to my hand, he exined how the [Sun Timer] worked, which wasn¡ät difficult to say thest.


    The crystal showed an image simr to a sun clock inside the crystal which worked in the first twelve hours like a normal clock and the other twelve hours went backward.


    The metal parts were able to close and open, which made it easy for you to hide your crystal from others, which in my opinion was quite a neat feature.


    "Oh, that¡äs exactly what I was searching for. How much does it cost?" Danzel said while still looking at the [Sun Timer]


    "The [Sun Timer] cost 15 gold coins, dear sir."


    Hearing that Danzel suddenly froze.


    "Isn¡ät that too much for such a device?" Danzel asked doubtfully.


    With a sighing out of this mount, the old owner looking to the said as if he was watching something in the distance.


    "The [Sun Timer] original cost is about three to five gold coins..."


    "Then..."


    "But." He turned and looked at me directly into my eyes.


    "That price would be only at the Arcana Kingdom which is in the war currently with the Berum kingdom. Dear customer, you should remember that magic items in this kingdom are strictly forbidden unless you got roots with nobility or the army himself."


    Picking a book from the side, he said with a sad tone.


    "This book over here was the first ones that I wrote and tried to sell here, but to sell it legally the army had to approve of this content and even change the content inside."


    Looking at the old owner ncing at the book with pity in these eyes I finally realized something that I ignored.


    `So that¡äs the other magic shops were more of a pharmacy that actually selling magic items such as this shop.¡ä


    Understanding that thought came another question in mind.


    "If that were the case then, why are you shop allowed to sell magic items and the others not? Before I came here I visited the other rment magic shops but none were like yours. Why?"


    Putting the book back to this ce, he looked back at me.


    "It¡äs because of guys like you. Adventurers and Mercenaries aren¡ät will always be a part of society. And those who went the path of magic and still want to be free from duty need such items. Be it potions or magic staff, we offer everything other than knowledge. Well, at least the basics." He replied with a wry smile on this face.


    "I see..." I nodded in understanding.


    "Thanks for telling me such info, I am kinda new at this part," Danzel said


    "It¡äs nothing worth mentioning." the old owner smiled at me.


    "Well, since I am here and all. Is there something else that you would rmend for a mercenary to buy?" I asked while scratching the back of my neck armor.


    "Depends on what you want dear customer. We offer various options and other handy magic consumables that can be of use in a battle. And if you are interested in magic we also sell some basic books." Looking me directly at my eyes he said.


    "You interested?"

 Chapter 81 - New Path Of Runes

    *Ting Ting


    "Leave already! Leave already!"


    Closing the door of the shop while carrying a bag in one of these hands, Danzel turned around to give the shop thest look.


    "Tch, such an annoying bird." Cursing the damn overdramatic crow, he took a nce inside the bag.


    ''At least I bought something rather neat to pass some time.


    Daniel didn''t only buy the [Sun Timer] from the old owner but decided to get some other things that the old owner rmend.


    Though most rmendations that he made were awkward for me to use such as various potions.


    Some gave you rich nutrients that helped with the overuse of healing magic or some that increased your strength for a limited time.


    They were many more with the stamina potion being the most expensive one.


    But I simply shook in every potion that the old owner showed me.


    Danzell wasn''t sure why, but his rejection seemed to offend the owner, which turned to watch the owner present his collection of potions to me with excess enthusiasm.


    However, I could only have a wry grin on my face.


    It wasn''t that I was not interested in potions'' effects themselves, but the reason I rejected to buy any potions was for one reason alone.


    I was a fricking Undead!


    With my pure and shiny bones alone drinking the potions was impossible.


    It will after all just go past my mouth and fall directly to my ribs bag inside my armor!


    That would be another kind of a mess.


    Nheless, do things coated two gold coins each!


    I might have the money to buy this entire stock, but I was nowhere ready to start and thrown money to the ground.


    Though that didn''t stop me from wasting my money where else.


    Inside the bag were four different items that had coated me a whole of 8p gold coins.


    With one of them being [Sun Timer], the three were the following.


    [nk book]


    [Knowledge for every Caster]


    [Mana Pen]


    The two items were self-exnatory.


    The book of every caster that was rmended by the owner had various information of magic such as thew, the types, and arts of magic.


    It coated my total of thirty-five gold coins and the nk book ten gold coins.


    Danzel''s first thought was that this old man was trying to scam some coins out of this wallet. But he sold me those books at the market price.


    At least here in the Berum kingdom.


    Since the methods of creating paper haven''t been developed much here,the books target more of a high-end buyer such as nobles and great mages.


    As for the [Mana Pen], It was overall handy to have.


    With the use of some mana of yours, the pan could create just the amount of a substance simr to ink.


    The pen itself was sturdy with a blue gem in this tip, with the low mana cost it had I decided to buy it.


    Though 20 gold coins were extremely expensive for what it was.


    The gold lies in the hideout took enough space for me to care of now.


    "Now it will be easier to keep track of notes..." he said with a grin on this face.


    ''Keeping everything in check in my mind was already a pain in the*s, but hopefully, this book will help me with that.''


    Closing the bag, he turned around walking in the direction of the Ouru Fire Smith was.


    "It has been five hours already, Gerak should have delivered the weapons by now."


    After a thirty-minute walk, he could already see the sign of Geraks ce.


    "Why is that res hair here again?" Looking at Serrasing out of the shop and leaving with a group of the four adventures that I had seen this morning.


    ''So they were a party of five...'' cancel said as he saw the group of five leave together.


    "He sure likes to pester this old dwarf."


    Moving inside the workshop, I saw Gerak standing there with an annoyed expression on this face.


    "Gerak, I am back"


    "Didn''t I tell you to leave already-! Oh, it''s you..."


    Seeing Gerak lowering this hammer that he was ready to throw at me. I couldn''t help but have an evil grin on my face.


    ''He must be pissed.'' Daniel thought to himself.


    "How did it went Gerak? Was there a problem with those guys?"


    "Sigh...there is nothing to worry about. They followed the contract." Gerak showed a small smile on this bearded face.


    If someone else were to watch him smile they would have thought that he was relieved that everything went well.


    But I knew better.


    This wasn''t that kind of smile.


    It was the one that he would always make when he would be scamming a newbie adventure and sell this overpriced crap on this floor.


    ''He probably got the item he wanted...''Though I didn''t know the worth of the item he got, it sure must be expensive for him to grin so viciously.''


    "Good, does that mean they got more stuff for me?"


    Showing me an even more vicious grin, Gerak tossed the [Ring of Spatial Storage] which I watched.


    "Yeah, and more than before."


    "Huh? What do you mean more?" Danzel said subconsciously.


    The dwarf simply shrugged this shoulder off from my surprise.


    "Well, can you me them? You finished a whole unit''s equipment in what? four days?"


    Staring nkly in the [Ring of Spatial Storage] I mumbled to myself.


    "How did they manage to fit everything..."


    I thought it was full the first time...


    "Sigh...there can only be a few more words in that ring. Anyway, I will take my leave Gerak." Putting the ring on he turned around towards the door.


    "Sure, take your time with this patch," Gerak said while walking towards this smithy on the down floor.


    ****


    *Tick


    "Ugh.. finally somewhere quite." Closing the hidden door, Danzel fell the moment he saw this bed in front of him.


    "Dammit! They even gave me half more than they were before! Isn¡ät that abuse!" Danzel said annoyed.


    "Sigh...Maybe I will be able to finish all those if I work the whole damn week."


    Bringing the bag from the [Handy Caster''s] shop closer to me, I put all the stuff that I got on the table.


    "At least now I wouldn''t be lost in time..." Put the [Sun Timer] to a ce that was easy to see.


    "I guess it''s time..."


    ''Status.''


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 814/814


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strenght 140 Agility 100 Intelligence 74 Endurance 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead of Superior Strenght. One of the strongest natural draugr that there is. Though her tier undead far surpasses this strength. For your current tier of strength, you can be considered a powerhouse.]


    [Storage: 97 225 XP]


    "Though I wanted to get my guardian ss skills first, with all those weapons with me that would bring more profit."


    Raising my hand, I tapped towards a window.


    [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.1]: 3000 XP


    "Though somewhat expensive for the first tier, it¡äs still fine." Tapping to the upgrade button, windows started to pop up in front of me.


    [Runesmith of Undeath level has increased from Lv. 1 to Lv. 2]


    [Runesmith of Undeath level has increased-]


    ...


    [Runesmith of Undeath level has increased from Lv. 9 to Lv. 10]


    [Intilegence increase by 18 and Agility increase by 18]


    [You gained 9 attribute points!]


    [You reached the maximum level of Runesmith of Undeath ss!]


    [To advance into a higher tier ss a mission has been assigned]


    [Mission]: Carve 50 runes of the quality of [good] in any item.


    [Missionpleted!]


    "Huh? Already done?" I opened my new status and I saw it was indeed true.


    [Status]


    Name:


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 1012/1012


    Attribute points: 9


    Attributes: Strenght 140 Agility 118 Intelligence 92 Endurance 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead of Superior Strenght. One of the strongest natural draugr that there is. Though her tier undead far surpasses this strength. For your current tier of strength, you can be considered a powerhouse.]


    [Storage: 59 425 XP]


    "So my sub-ss only gives me Intelligence and Agility as stats...not bad." I nodded satisfied by my attribute increase.


    But what got me most interested was the next Window in front of me.


    [Please choose your path as a Runesmith of Undeath]

 Chapter 82 - Undead Rune

    [Please choose your path as a Runesmith of Undeath]


    [Choose 1 out of 3 talents to permanently gain.]


    [Undead Carver]


    [Runes of Arcane]


    [Rune Magic Circle]


    Reading the windows in front of me I was surprised and confused at the same time.


    The reason why was because the ss advancement didn¡ät look like the one that I became a [Undead Guardian].


    There I had the option to choose a ss better than the one before better. But this window looked simr to...


    "It resembles the race evolutions options..." Danzel said subconsciously.


    Having the chance to pick up talent was only shown to be possible by the race evolution when I reached the maximum level.


    The windows were the same just with other options to choose from.


    Heck, Danzel thought they were somewhatcking too.


    But when he tapped at the first option all theseints vanished into tin air.


    [Undead Carver]: A Runesmith who yearns to master the ancient runes of the immortal beings otherwise known as Undead. The runes of an undead carver go towards the path of learning the necromantic ways of undead runes. Though there have some handy options for those who are mortal, the undead runes show their tremendous strength in hands of an undead himself. Increased your chance to draw an undead rune from [Dead Rune Knowledge] by 25% and enchants the rune effect by 10%]


    [Runes of Arcane]: There is no end in the ways of magic, no matter which school of magic it is. And though that unending spring of knowledge that ais the Runes of Arcane. A Runesmith who yearned tobine the way of magic and runes is the result of Runes of Arcane. Such runes are capable to hold multiple effects and have more mana efficiency than any other runes. Increase your chance to draw arcane runes by 25% and enchants the effect of the rune by 10%]


    [Rune Circle Magic]: Mostmonly known as Circle Magic. Compared to other arts of magic, circle magic requires you to draw your spells with your mind in a magic circle form. Though the spell takes longer to create and the effect being in a fixed state, thus making it the safest magic. The power output of it is one of the best among the magic arts they are. Being able to learn Rune Circle Magic.


    Looking at all the options, Danzel had to take a moment to process the whole information he was given.


    "The effects are much better than expected..."


    They were so good that I wanted to get all three of them!


    "[Undead Carver] and [Runes of Arcance] both offer something simr yet at the same time not."


    If you go beyond and remove all the vor text, then both of those talents purely gave a 25% chance to find the given art of rune with better efficiency at that too. Though I haven¡ät seen any of those types of runes, I could guess that they were powerful.


    Arcane runes could probably make a sword that is capable to shoot mes into reality, while the undead runes would have simr effects to what the goblin shaman had used to raise the dead. Just ced in the sword.


    Though both options of raising your in enemies and shoot fireballs left and right did sound very much appealing.


    There was another talent to think about.


    The [Rune Circle Magic] though didn¡ät give me any t values such as improving your runes, the knowledge that it was offering was tempting enough to consider it.


    "If I were to pick this I will probably be able to wield magic...but circle magic?" Danzel thought in conflict to himself.


    That talent was the ticket of learning some actually spells, but the type of magic was the problematic part.


    "Right, the old owner''s book should have more detailed information in that kind of magic." Without picking a talent yet, Danzel stood up and picked the book lying on the table.


    Opening the book he found what he was searching for.


    "Circle Magic...a slow casting magic that requires your mental power to manifest..." Taking this time to read the few pages about circle magic, he closed the book and put it down to the table again.


    "Sigh...it¡äs no good." Sighting disappointed he crossed the [Runes Circle Magic] talent away from the list and only focusing on the two other talents.


    Reading the book [Knowledge for every Caster] did indeed had the information that I wanted, if not even more than though.


    The book did greatly highlighted the strength of such magic so much that I thought that the old owner who wrote this was himself a magic caster using circle magic. Strengths such as greater control, more uracy, and overall firepower of the spell were written upon.


    But the biggest part that made me cross it out of the list was the cast time.


    As someone who fights in the melee.


    A type of magic such as circle magic where you had to stay at a ce and concentrate at the same time would cripple my battle style.


    What I needed was some quick cast magic such as [Gale Mana de] where I could use while moving.


    The type of magic by itself seemed more of a passive one going towards the sub-schools of rituals and summoning.


    "I shouldn¡ät strive off the right path...the moment I picked the [Runesmith of Undeath] as a sub-ss I knew that it was going towards more being more of a crafter and I should focus on that."


    Making up my mind, I clicked to what I believed was the most suitable talent.


    "That should be it..."


    [You acquired the talent [Undead Carver]!]


    [Your talent [Dead Rune Knowledge] has been upgraded!]


    "Hoh, where did that upgrade suddenlye from?"


    `Let¡äs see what¡äs new.¡ä


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 1012/1012


    Attribute points: 9


    Attributes: Strenght 140 Agility 118 Intelligence 92 Endurance 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Master Lv.1] [Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead Carver of Superior Strenght. One of the strongest natural draugr that there is. Though her tier undead far surpasses this strength. For your current tier of strength, you can be considered a powerhouse.]


    [Storage: 59 425 XP]


    "I see...the levels of the sub-ss didn¡ät go down but stayed at 10. I wonder if the next advancement is at level 20 or thirty." Putting all useless spection out of this mind, Danzel pressed and opened the [Dead Rune Knowledge] window.


    "Oh! That¡äs what it means by being upgraded!"


    Looking below themon box that he usually bought runes from, there was another one with the name of [Umon].


    "Hahaha! I was right all along! It did indeed unlock by advancing to the next tier of the ss!"


    What stopped this franticugh though was the number shown when he clicked on the [Umon] Box.


    "I-Impossible!"


    [Umon]: Cost 50 000 XP to learn a Random rune.


    Looking at the cost being five times more than themon runes he felt like someone hitting him at this head with a metal bat or something.


    "You greedy thing! That¡äs daylight robbery that you are doing right here!" Danzel punched the floating window only for this fist to pass through.


    "It was already a bottomless pit before...what about now though!? Do you want to dig even deeper than it already is until you reach my damn wallet!"


    If he had veins in this head they would even explode by now out of the frustration that he was feeling right now.


    The worst part of it all was the expectation that he was having towards the umon box.


    "Dammit! This is a taunt directly at my face saying to waste the precious XP that I ved for four whole days! With a whole of 50 000 XP, I could even buy five differentmon runes instead of a single one!"


    s, the curiosity eats the cat.


    "Ugh...I nned to use the remaining XP for my mission, but screw it! I can always get that XPter while the curiosity will make me insane!"


    Tapping the umon box with my finger, a window with a new rune showed in front of me.


    [50 000 XP have been used to learn an umon random rune]


    [You acquired an Undead Rune of Eniv]


    [Rune of Eniv]: A rune inspired by [Drain Touch] the race ability of every Lich. Consumes the vitality by touch from both wearer and target. The rune is only able to be ced upon a glove or gauntlet type of armor.


    "M-My first Undead rune!" He jumped out from this bed out of surprise.

 Chapter 83 - Phoenix Warriors

    In a far of the city of the Arcana kingdom.


    mes were raging through the night.


    Stalls that were selling food were now just pure ashes with the streets filled with burned bodies.


    The ce once known as Seranan holding a poption of over a thousand people was no more with crumpled buildings and mes engulfing the whole city.


    Except for one single ce.


    In the far end back of the walls was a whole castle built on a hill. The mes haven¡ät reached these ys...


    yet.


    *Bouhm!


    In a room with over thirty people carrying swords and staff looked at the direction that the sound came from.


    *Bouhm!


    Splinters of wood flew from a massive wooden door that glowed ever slightly that indicated there was a strong barrier support the durability of the door.


    *Bouhm!


    "City Lord! The door wouldn¡ätst for long!" A soldier yelled in panic towards the person far in the back. Fear was written all over this face.


    The man had long brown hair that went until a bit lower than his shoulder and a staff in this hand, frowned upon the panicked soldier.


    "I don¡ät need you to tell the obvious. I have already called for reinforcement toe, so shut your trap and do the job that you are paid for." Though the city lord has shown no emotions to this face which made him look calm to others, inside of him he was already sweating bullets.


    *Bouhm!


    `The barrier will not hold...¡ä He Tighted his grip on themunications on this hand before putting it back in this pocket.


    `If I panic now in front of my subordinates they will lose quicker hope that the barrier-breaking. I just have to hold out until hees.¡ä


    "Don¡ät stand and watch only! Knights in the front and caster in the back! Show them what you learned in all the years of service! We just need to hold on for a few minutes for reinforcements toe!"


    Hearing the orders that the city lord had to give them, they finally managed to get a hold of themself and follow the orders.


    `We still got a chance, everyone one here is one of the elites that I had nurtured myself these whole years. We just need to hold a bit until hees!¡ä


    With hope in his eyes, he started giving orders to the elite unit.


    And soon enough the glow in the door vanished.


    *Baahm!


    The door was ripped open and a huge wooden ram fly through the front of the room.


    *Bttchch!


    None of the people inside paid attention to the huge ram sliding through the floor. They knew that there was something far more dangerous beyond this door.


    The door that was now open had pure gray smoke, thus making the people even more nervous.


    They stared at the gray smoke with bloodshot eyes, afraid to miss what was about toe. They knew that their current silence was the calm before the storm.


    And soon enough sellouts started to show inside the smoke.


    "Magic casters! Prepare your spells!" The city lord''s voice was like thunder hitting every magic caster''s ears and they reflect started to chant and wave their spells.


    And as soon they started, multiple figures came running towards them outside the gray smoke.


    `Those are!¡ä


    The city lord paled when he saw who this enemy was.


    "For the arcane and arcana! We hold for our kingdom! Fire!"


    Upon hismand, spears and missiles of mana with some elemental spells were flown towards their enemy.


    The figuresing out of smoke had one sword to their arms and the same phoenix helmet.


    Everyone single one of them had an aura of bloodthirst and to the eyes of the knights, their crimson armor and helmet made them look more of a demon.


    "[Fire Emprace]"


    Three voices sounded behind the gray smoke, and soon enough mes slide like snakes towards the phoenix helmet people and forming a burning shield around them faster than the iing spells.


    *Bahm! Thuad! Buhm!


    The spells of the many magic caster soon met their target, with the explosive spell raising smoke at the area.


    "We got them!"


    "There is no way they survived that!"


    Many of the magic casters who cast a smile celebrated imminently upon seeing their enemy turn into dust.


    All except one.


    "You fools! Don¡ät stop casting! They are still-" Before the city lord could finish his sentence, a bright red light came out of the smoke.


    And before the knights knew it, the unharmed phoenix helmet people dashed with a speed far higher than they could follow.


    "Ah..." A knight soldier tried to cry out of surprise.


    And in the next moment, he was cut in half together with this enchanted armor.


    And this didn¡ät happend only to this knight.


    The phoenix helmet people''s swords were like scythes harvesting to where knights were the wheat.


    Though they had more numbers, their enemies were far faster.


    There praised armor that well-known enchanters made in the city were now weighing their movements down.


    "C-City Lord! What¡äre your orders!"


    Seeing the knights dying so fast made them realized that death was slowly but surely crippling towards them, with no ce to escape from it.


    The city lord instead looked surprised.


    `I supplied those knights with the best I could find but their armor is nothing that liability. Though the enemy is stronger than them, their swords are the more terrifying.¡ä


    "It doesn¡ät matter, cast your spells towards the enemy!" The city lordmanded.


    "But..." many of the casters had a conflicted look on themselves upon thatmand.


    You order us to shoot our meat shield?


    Seeing their expression, the city lord couldn¡ät help but curse at them.


    "If we don¡ät kill them everyone will die here! Do it! It¡äs an order!"


    With shaking hands, the caster started to bombard their enemies together with their knights.


    "W-What is going!?"


    "City Lord! Why..."


    "Traitorous Pig!"


    Many knights fell into deep despair upon witnessing their allies as much as their enemies killing them with no hind of remorse.


    With the magic caster behind the smoke casting protective spells upon the phoenix helmet warriors the result was a few seconds of dy before a total inhtion of all magic casters and knights.


    Few seconds were needed for the city lord to finish this spell.


    "Earth''s protector! Heed my call and serve to protect! [Earth Guardian]!"


    Two three-meter radius of the magic circle appeared in front of the city lord.


    And emerging from the magic circle with a brown light, were two five-meter-tall earth golems looking down their enemies.


    "Hahaha! Behold my tier four magic! [Earth Guardian]! Unlike the other nobles, I earned my spot to bing the city lord! Earth guardians! Go and kill thos-"


    Without being able to finish, the three magic casters that were hidden in the smoke before slowly appeared with their eyes glowing.


    Seeing them the city lord mouth open wide.


    `Three Magic casters of Mana Vision!?¡ä


    "[ming Rings]"


    In each caster


    Two rings of me appeared and were shortly shot towards the earth guardians'' limps.


    "Ghhh..." The earth guardians tried to move their limbs but the fire rings in their hands not only slowly made their limbs crack, but they kept them in ce.


    With the two giants now bound, every phoenix helmet warrior dashed towards the city lord, full of bloodthirst.


    "Oh no! [Earth Spi-"


    Unfortunately, those who don¡ät possess mana vision are hugely disadvantages.


    "Gah...Impossible...my earth guardians..." With three swords pierced in this chest, the city lord caught up lord while reaching this hand towards the slowly crumpling earth guardians.


    "Protect me..."


    With the light in this fading away, the body fell lifeless to the ground.


    "These were the final ones. We now fully conquered the city of Seranan." One of the warriors reported towards the three spell casters.


    "Good. Tell me now, how were the new weapons performance?" The magic caster pointed with this staff on this sword.


    "Their performance was better than ourst patch of weapons. Cutting others felt much easier than before and the shock that I felt was less than usual from the enemy''s magic." The phoenix helmet warrior said with a satisfied tone.


    "I see...though, of a low tier, the new runes are indeed useful." Another magic caster mumbled to himself.


    "Great, we will have to tell them to give us more of those. But for now, let¡äs go to the treasury and-"


    *Spark


    Hearing the small sound of a spark behind them, everyone turned around with the magic caster already casting their spells.


    With the sparks turning ever stronger, a massive amount of mana appeared out of blue slowly forming a portal.


    Coming out of the portal, was a man wearing robes and with these gauntlets carrying ahead in his hands.


    "This!" Looking at who appeared their mood of before turned nk and a feeling of disbelieving overcame them.


    "Isn¡ät that the head of the general leading the other battlefield!?"


    Recognizing who heads were they all soon confirmed who the man was.


    "It¡äs the Magus of the tower!"


    "Quick! Cast your spells!"


    "Charge!"


    They didn¡ät even waste a second to start their spells and charge.


    But without even realizing it, the man put this hands behind this back, and spikes of earth appeared below everyone, impaling them without even realizing it.


    "Toote huh..." Saying that the map turned around and was about to leave through the portal again before he realized something.


    "Hmm...what¡äs that?"


    Turning this gaze towards one of the warrior''s swords, it flew in front of him.


    "Runes? They don¡ät seem from the Crafbinder kid too..."


    Gazing towards the sword out of curiosity.


    The hear suddenly rose in the room and everybody of the phoenix warriors was engulfed in mes.


    The mes of all the bodies moved towards one location until it turned into a massive me resembling a bird.


    "Damn bird, it''s finally out.."


    "Kiaghhh!"

 Chapter 84 - I Will Let You Be My First

    "Have you heard? The kingdom conquered the city of Seranan that was a fortress! The war is going well for our kingdom!" A man with a swollen stomach said to another man beside him.


    "Huh? Stop lying on already, since when did you start drinking so early in the morning? Your wife will be fuming if she knew." The skinny man shook this head towards this friend of his.


    "Hey! I ain¡ät lying this time! It¡äs true! Isn¡ät that right Jeffry?"


    The man that stood on this wall slowly opened this eyes and looked towards the two idiots who were his friend.


    He wore a guard uniform.


    "It is indeed true, I heard the news this morning. They gave me a day free, so let¡äs go already get a drink. This time I will pay..." He jiggled a gray back that made some metal sounds in front of them.


    "Seriously!?"


    "Jeffry is the best!"


    Jeffry looked at this guy with a frown on his face.


    `So you celebrate when you are hearing about spending my own money ...¡ä


    As he was doubting about having chosen the wrong friends to hang out with, a deep cold voice sound behind all three, and a shadow was cast behind him.


    "Can you move..."


    "Huh? What do you wan-"


    Looking behind them, all three sucked their breath. Not daring to let a breathe out of their mouth.


    What they saw was a huge man reaching at least two meters high wearing armor made out of pure metal. He had two thick pauldrons on both sides of this shoulder with the left having some small spikesing out and another one being a bit taller than the other one.


    His chest te middle looked like a cross at top of a shield which if it weren¡ät for the dark gray color of the armor the man would even be mistaken as a pdin.With the two tassets that were protecting the sides of his thighs and the helmed that had four single small holes.


    The man itself looked like an imprable dark knight.


    `What is such a figure doing in the alleys?¡ä


    `Did we somehow offend him?¡ä


    `How is he able to carry so much weight without breaking a sweat?¡ä


    The three of them looked at the man with caution with many questionsing to their minds. They stared nkly at the man in front of them as if their spirit had gone away.


    `Why aren¡ät they moving?¡ä Danzel was of course annoyed by those guys'' reaction.


    He just came finished the third patch of the runed weapon after painstakingly working for a whole damn month.


    Of course, it was painstakingly is just a metaphor meaning.


    The undead neither tire nor starve.


    But that doesn¡ät count for our mental capabilities.


    Even I get noticeably mentally exhausted from working 24/7 and doing the same thing over and over again. And even though I could finish the second patch of weapons and armor in a whole week. I didn¡ät.


    Though Gerak received someints from the army for the slow delivery, I didn¡ät care at all.


    After all, I thought my speed of carving runes was quite fast with every rune having the same quality if not a bit better. If we were to consider me as a mortal who has to eat and sleep the speed itself would half at best.


    Thus I decided to spend some of my time in other stuff like reading the books and writing a bunch of stuff like what I did wrong in runes.


    Which was the main reason why it took me so long to finish the third patch of weapons which had even more than the second one...


    I still couldn¡ät solve how his guys in the army could fit everything in that small ring.


    With me finally seeing the sunlight again after a month, I was extremely pissed off from these three guys standing there looking like some dead fish.


    The nature of me being undead didn¡ät help too since it aggravated me the more I stood there.


    `Ugh, whatever.¡ä


    Walking past them, I simply pushed those guys to the side of the walls and continued walking.


    "Ough! You bastard what was that for!?"


    "That¡äs an assault to citizens! You aren¡ät going to get away!"


    "Stop right there!"


    Danzel simply ignored these three guys.


    Though the three of them were afraid of him, their anger took the better of them.


    It wasn¡ät because the man in the armor was rude to them, but rather of the force he used to push them to the wall.


    Though Danzel didn¡ät realize it, the force that he used was enough to hurt them.


    The man with the swollen stomach arm started to show some ck blue parts in this skin bing all the more painful each second.


    As for the skinny man, this arm was a small scar that was made from rubbing this arm through the wall.


    The guard Jeffry was lucky enough to stand farther away from those guys, luckily avoiding the man.


    All three of them felt that he was unreasonable and after being stunned by what just happend they realized something.


    `His guy has neither an army armor nor an adventurer''s badge. Considering that he must be a mercenary!¡ä


    After realizing his fact all three of them put up a small smile on their faces before using him.


    You had to know that in the Berum kingdom, the job of a mercenary was between the gray area of thew with one step of crossing illegal areas. For a kingdom who were control freaks on their military strength, the mercenary was frown upon. Thus making thew in a sense unfair towards mercenaries.


    After all, the adventures system that there is in Berum is an association made to control the mercenaries going by the name `adventures¡ä.


    And one of thews going against the mercenaries was that harming a citizen resulted in a huge fine and possible imprisonment.


    `Looking at his guy armor, he must be an insanely rich mercenary.¡ä


    The anger of their injuries disappeared with greed showing in their eyes.


    "Jeffry! Arrest that guy!"


    Jeffry''s previews frown was reced with a small smile on this face.


    "Sorry guy, but as one of the city guards I will have you to follow me," Jeffry said while putting his hand in the sword of his.


    `Now be good and pay for our drinks.¡ä


    "..."


    Danzel who looked at them couldn¡ät help but ask himself...


    Are they stupid?


    `Even those undead goblins had more brain cells like your guys¡ä


    Of course, he knew what those guys were trying to do right now.


    With me pretending to be a mercenary, Gerak did inform me of some basicws that I had to look after.


    "Sigh, humans greed indeed blind one shelf. I guess I will try Geraks present here..."


    "Huh!? What are you..."


    Looking at the gauntlet a window appeared in front of me.


    [Heavy Dark Steel Armor]: Armor made by a journeyman dwarf cksmith. With the skills of the dwarf, the armor turned tougher and lighter than it was supposed to be. Made from dark steel, the armor can absorb much more blunt force than pure steel is capable of. The armor itself makes it slightly easier to move mana around. Enchanted with a lower-tier enchantment which increases the resistance towards blunt and piercing damage.


    `Let¡äs see this performance...¡ä


    Without even using any of his ability, he dashed forward towards the three men.


    "You!" Jeffry jelled while drawing his sword.


    Just as he drew the sword, Danzel was right in front of the de.


    Jeffry paled upon witnessing the speed of that man and cursed internally.


    Unexpectedly though, the man didn¡ät dodge his de and instead let himself be pierced by his sword.


    "You idio-!" As he was about to celebrate, the unexpected happend.


    *Tchhh!


    The de instead of going through the armor and ending his man''s life. Was pushed to the side from the armor itself while creating smalls sparks.


    "What!?" Dumbfounded, he was about to take a step back.


    But he was swiftly grabbed from his mouth and pushed back to the wall.


    "Mhhm!"


    "Jeffry!" The fatty and the skinny called out.


    "Where did your confidence of before guy?"


    Holding him to the air against the wall, Danzel said towards all three of them.


    "Don¡ät worry, I will let you be my first."


    As the man was still screaming in his hands, a dark green ethereal glow came from Danzel''s gauntlet.


    And soon the man''s eyes were engulfed with fair and he started to y all crazily around.


    "MHHM! Mhmmm...! mhm..."


    Both fatty and the skinny man looked at their good friend scream horsly with fear, but slowly the fear turned into dread.


    The guard''s face turned tinner by the second until his face became like one of the mummies.


    His before healthy skin turned into a necrotic one with no vitality to show.


    [You received 1500 XP]


    *Bah


    Letting the mummy go, Danzel turned towards the other two that fell to the ground. And with a vicious grin on his face, he said.


    "You two are next..."


    The previous dark green glow re-ignited again as he walked towards the two men.

 Chapter 85 - Broken Smithy

    "The effect is indeed quite good..." Danzel said while looking at his gauntlets.


    Having long left the crime scene he created, he found his new undead rune of Eniv quite to his liking.


    In less than ten seconds he managed to turn a human adult into aplete mummy with pure his touch.


    "This umon rune far surpasses themon runes that just enchanted my previous equipment... I wonder how powerful the other level of runes is." Danzel said while tightening his fist.


    Just the pure imagination of the other levels made him excited.


    Of course, he will understand the weakness of the [Rune of Eniv] that it also affected him and not his opponent alone.


    The description itself mentions that it also affects the wearer.


    And when considering the disadvantaged against the rewards, the rune itself would be useless. But that only counted if you have any life force inside your body in which every living being should naturally have.


    But as an undead being who used their dead mana to rece the life force by itself, that negative didn¡ät affect me at all.That point alone was in my opinionughable.


    As the name went, undead runes were best at the hands of an undead himself.


    That, or in the hands of a masochist...


    Though I wasn¡ät sure if anyone would feel the pleasure of having their vitality by itself being sucked off. The world was big enough for at least one weirdo to be into that kind of stuff...


    "I will have to get myself another one of the umon ones. Maybe it will give me another hint towards my research." Danzel mumbled to himself while touching the hilt of Veren.


    Another pleasant surprise in getting the undead rune was the knowledge that was imprinted in my mind.


    In the previous normal runes, I had to carve the rune with my normal green mana and that didn¡ät change until I learned the [Rune of Eniv].


    Unlike the normal rules, the undead runes not only my normal mana but dead mana too. That information alone made me realize why I was stuck at the Veren rune without any progress so far.


    Since the Veren rune was in a way also an undead rune I simply had to not only use my normal mana, but the dead mana itself to carve the rune!


    Of course, that was easier said than done as runes required a precise amount of mana to work correctly. Otherwise, it will fail or into pure quality.


    The process was as hard as trying to replicate a drawing with 100% uracy.


    No matter how it resembles the original piece, there will always be a small difference in the colors.


    That process alone bought me a lot of frustration, but also hope in the future.


    "Sigh...Once I deliver the third patch to Gerak I should take a break and figure the Veren rune out. Though he is probably going toin about my break, I don¡ät want to destroy his armor too before I got the guarantee that Veren gives me..."


    With the previews armor being severely damaged by those two assassins. Gerak gave his armor as a present together with that thing that I ordered before.


    `Though I wouldn¡ät have called it a present since he had me pay for it...¡ä Shaking his head of that greedy dwarf, he made this way towards the Ouru Fire Smith.


    Arriving in front of the workshop he grabbed his [Sun Timer] from the [Ring of Spatial Storage] (Yes, somehow there was still a tiny bit of space left) and saw that it was 4 am early in the morning.


    "If I remember right he opens his smithy around 7 am... Should I go to the old owner beforeing back?" Danzel mumbled to himself.


    `I should even check the [Sun Timer] before I even left... going inside now would only piss him more.¡ä Grumbling internally, he walked past the smithy and went to wander around until 7 am.


    But right as he passed the door of the Smithy he noticed the door handle to be broken and the door is slightly open.


    "This..." suddenly I felt bad premonition at the sight of the broken door.


    `Gerak would never let his door open...¡ä


    With heavy steps, he changed his mind and walked towards the door.


    "It¡äs indeed broken..." Pulling Veren off this sheath and walked inside the smithy with his ethereal me eyes to re slightly stronger than before.


    "..." Closing the door, he stared silently around the smithy.


    The receptions table in front of the shop has been broken down with a variety of poor quality armor leaning on the ground with some right of destroyed.


    "What the hell happend here..." Danzel asked himself with his usually cold voice sounding even colder than before.


    It was as if a whirlwind hit the whole ce.


    Walking towards the reception table, he halted suddenly.


    "Blood..."


    Staring at the bits of blood on the floor, Danzel would frown if he could.


    He walked pasted the blood towards the stairs leading to his actual smithy.


    *Thuad, Thuad, Thuad~


    Every step of his was heavier than the one of before.


    "It¡äs locked..." Staring at the locket up door, he raised his feet and kicked the door down.


    *Baahm!


    "What happend!?"


    "Who is it!?"


    ncing at the bulgy six men carrying boxes of armor in their arms, Danzel eyes turned colder than ever before.


    "I see..." Danzel said in a tone halfughing and half-mocking himself.


    "Guys! This guy is the mercenary on the same list of the dwarf!" One of the bulgy said while looking at a paper in his hand.


    "You mean this bastard over here?"


    "Hehe, now our worries of before are no more! If we capture this guy the reward that we will get is enough to set us for life!"


    The men put down their chest of armor and weapons and bought their weapons out.


    "Mercenary bastard! If youe with us quite we promise that you will suffer far less than you are going through." The man holding a mace in his hand said with a devious smile on his face.


    "Haha...." Danzel though couldn¡ät help butugh.


    "What are youughing at!" The man yelled, feeling being mocked by him.


    Ignoring the man, I guided the mana in my whole body.


    "I indeed hate humans..." Danzel whispered to himself before dashing towards the man with [Dash] and a vicious grin to this face.


    "This guy! He is a tier two knight!" The men paled suddenly before they guided their life force in their respective weapons. Farther enchanting them.


    "That¡äs something new." Danzelment by the look of what he guessed was life force, before dashing towards the two men holding a sword.


    He swung his sword towards the man in the left, before being shortly blocked.


    "Ha! You are just speed-" As he was about tough at his attempt of attack, he felt his sword bing heavier with every moment.


    "Huh?"


    The sword was swept over by the pure physical strength of Danzel and cutting the man''s throat, which shortly made bloode out like a spring.


    "Gah! Geah!" Falling to his knees, he tried stopping the bleeding by putting pressure on the wound, but his attempt was as useless as other man swinging his sword from behind me.


    "You bastard take this!"


    "..." Danzel instead of turning around to block that swing stood still and watched the man approaching with a side look as his skill [Sense Danger] didn¡ät activate.


    *Ting!


    The sword shortly shed at his armor, but instead of digging into the mercenary''s shoulder and crippling him, a strong mana wave pushed the man''s sword and making the lose his bnce.


    "Wha-!"


    "Too weak..." With a diagonal swing, Danzel shed at the man through all his chest while taking the arm that was holding the sword off.


    "Ahhhhh!" With a horse scream echoing through the room, the man shortly died.


    "This bastard! Kill him already!" The man with the mace ordered the other two with a spear in their hands.


    "But..." The two men looked at the men with a shaking voice.


    The one with the mace was annoyed by those two.


    "Move already you cowards! Otherwise, I will not let youe out alive be it defeating him or not!"


    "..."


    A feeling of dread was slowly oveing their minds with the dilemma that was put in front of them.


    On one side they had to fight the mercenary and the other was dying by the man with the mace after everything is done.


    Biting their libs until bloodshot started to show, one of the men used his mana at his legs and life force at his arms.


    "Ahhh!" The man rushed towards the mercenary with a battle cry with his spear in this hand.


    Braver than the other man with the spear whose legs were shaking in fear.


    "Hmm...? You use Sprint?"


    Recognizing the man''s ability, a hint of nostalgia came to Danzel before his grin turning all the more vicious.


    "Sure I will y along."


    Using dash they were three meters apart.


    "Take this!" The life force traveled through the man''s arms and into his spear.


    "Hmm..." Feeling the skill [Sense Danger] activating, he knew that using [Armor Preserve] wouldn¡ät be enough to block it.


    `Better than the other, but stillcking...¡ä


    The men thrusting his spear at the mercenary chest with immense speed.


    At least immense towards his standards.


    "Too slow..."


    Sidestepping the man''s thrust, he punched at caving his face and cracking his skull.


    "Bah!"


    The man was sent flying two meters back and stayed on the ground unmoving.


    "Hihhhh!"


    The other men screamed out of horror before falling back to the ground.


    "Tch, useless trash..." The man with the mace looked at his subordinate on the ground in disgust before moving towards the mercenary with confidence.


    "Don¡ät think of me like those trash that you just killed. I once was a silver adventure for you to know." The man said while rushing towards Danzel.


    `Though I failed the silver rank test, I hold the same strength!¡ä The man thought arrogantly.


    "[Leap Step]! The life force run through his leg and with a crack in the floor, he dashed far faster than the through the use of [Sprint].


    "Take this! [Heavy Strike]!" Being in front of Danzel the mana surrounded the mace and fell towards his helmet with the intent to crush his face.


    Ignoring the [Sense Danger] skill from the iing mace. A bright blue light surrounded his other hand that was not holding Veren.


    "[Riposte Defense]"


    *Thuad!


    A sound of shing metal appeared That resulted from the mace and a dark gray shield with a dark crystal that appeared out of nowhere.


    "How-"


    "And youck technique!" Not letting the man finish his sentence, Danzel swung Veren at the man''s head, decapitating the man.


    "Now.. you." With blood sshed in his armor and sword, he pointed at the man in the ground.


    "Tell me where Gerak is."

 Chapter 86 - Sacred Cross

    In the bustling streets of the capital in Berum.


    In the area between where the middle ss and the wealthy lived, there was a massive church with all kinds of people going in and out.


    That was the church of the Sacred Cross, the main religion that was rooted in the whole kingdom of Berum that worshiped the Goddess of Life.


    In that very church that the size alone resembled a small citadel, a man wearing armor made out of asherrim and steel with a sword in his left thigh walked that church.


    Walking inside the church the man was shortly greeted by women wearing noon clothing.


    "Oh, Sir Lewis. Wee back."


    Seeing that, Lewis stared at them coldly before replying..


    "I am back."


    Moving past them, he felt multiple res behind his back.


    "It has gotten worse..."Ignoring the res of the noons and other men having simr equipment as his, he stood in front of a massive door.


    Going to his knees, he put the sword in front of him.


    "3th-Tier Pdin, Lewis Apollo request to speak to the brightest light." His firm yet not too loud-voiced echoed through the whole room.


    Many people stared at him with a hind of disgust and disapproval.


    Ignoring the gazes ced upon him, the door slowly opens by itself, and a sweet yet stern sounded from the other side of the room.


    "You are allowed toe."


    Picking his sword from the ground, he walked towards the other side of the door. To be more specific the main hall of the church.


    The hall contained many roes of seats in which were illuminated by the sunlight that wasing from the ss windows at the top.


    Walking on the red carpet in the middle path, Lewis looked at the figure that was on a stage who was taking a praying poster.


    Stopping three meters away from the stage, Lewis repeated the same action that he did in front of the door.


    "Lewis Apollo greeting the brightness light."


    After a short moment of silence, the figure raised from her knees and looked at the kneeling knight.


    "Lewis, I told you that such formalities are not needed in front of me." The figure said with the same tone as before.


    "I apologize towards the brightest light, but any less than that would be disrespectful towards the saintess." Lewis raised his head, looking at the woman at the stage with a face that left no room for disapproval.


    "Sigh... Good thing that you haven¡ät changed too, Lewi" The woman sighed with a wry smile on her face.


    She had the appearance of a beautiful woman in her early twenties. With a height of around 1.74 tall. The Saintess had wavy golden hair shoulder-length hair and a pair of two eyes simr to her hair.


    Compared to what the name suggests, she wore a long skirt with two tassets at top of the skirt, Protecting both sides of her legs. Her top piece was a silver-ted armor with strokes of golden lines which indicated the power of the blessings in the armor.


    Holding a ymore with her left gauntlet, she shook she looked like the role model of what every pdin strives to be.


    Holy and Mighty.


    Looking towards the hidden meaning behind her smile, Lewis hesitated before opening his mouth.


    "Saintess...Do she talk by any chance about the behavior of the fellow believers?" Lewis asked.


    "So even you have noticed, huh..." The saintess said as he put her finger in her limp, making a gesture that she was in her thoughts.


    "Though you mind not know this, Lewi. But the current situation of the Sacred Cross doesn¡ät seem good," she replied after making up her mind.


    Of course, that response though raised multiple red gs inside Lewis''s head.


    "W-What!? Has a gue been discovered? Or did the war against the Arcana kingdom gone for the worse? D-Don¡ät tell me, that this dreaded council started to appearing in Berum!" Lewi stood up from this knee position, realizing shortly after the disrespect he showed before going back to his knees.


    "Please forgive me for my manners, oh brightness light." Lewis stared at the ground as he said with a serious voice.


    "No need to apologize for such a small thing, Lewi. It was my mistake of being unclear with my words." The saintees said with a sweet smile on her face.


    Walking back to the stage, she looked at the statue of an angel with six wings. The statue was half-kneeling with one hand holding a staff whole the other holding a book.


    With a bitter smile on her face, she started talking while looking at the statue.


    "What I mean was more of the political side of the church."


    "Political side?" Lewis asked while several question marks were going inside his head.


    "Yes, though I know that you believe is strong among our Sacred Cross, that doesn¡ät go for all believers, unfortunately."


    "Currently there are two factions that are hidden from the sight of normal people. Those two sides are from the true believers and the nobles."


    "True believers such as yourself, follow the correct path that the Goddess had show us while the other faction wants to bend his path to their will for the pure purpose of profit."


    Turning around, she looked directly at Lewis eyes, her eyes glowing with golden light.


    "The faction prioritize the material wealth is being led by the pope and the nobles."


    "While the faction that prioritizes the goddess path is being led by me." She said while still staring at Lewis silently.


    Lewis was shocked by what he heard, and a feeling of disbelieve, anger, and confusion came all at once inside his mind.


    "H-How could his be..." Lewis said with shaking eyes.


    Staring at the shock, the glow in her eyes faded, with a sweet smile appearing on her face.


    "Through our Sacred cross might look peaceful to the outside, the internal conflict will soon re up..."


    "When that timees, I will look like a traitor who needs to be killed."


    "I-Impossible! Saintess-same is the brightness light of our church! S-Such a thing..." Lewis stood up, his eyes bloodshot staring at the Saintess, wishing at what she said would be a lie.


    But the silence that followed was enough for him to see that she was serious.


    He fell to both of his knees, feeling defeated he stared at the saintess and asked.


    "Saintess...why are you telling me all that..." Lewis asked.


    He wasn¡ät stupid, he knew the value of such information.


    Though other minds know the conflict and the existences of the two factions. The information that could result from the death of the Sacred Cross brightness light, the Saintess itself was worth enough to throw the citizens into chaos if realized to the public.


    And such chaos at the times of war might effect the war itself against Berum.


    He stared at the saintness, looking for an answer.


    With a sweet smile and a bright face, her replied made him falter.


    "Cause I trust you."


    "Ah..."


    Those few words touched Lewis to the point he fell to both of his knees and using his hands to support himself. He be so emotional that his eyelids became watery.


    "Please...tell me how I can help you Saintess-Sama. Please..."


    Looking at the shook Lewis, she knew that he earnestly tried to support her.


    After staring at him in silence, her tone became firm.


    "There have been reports of multiple kidnappings and even murder his early morning. We suspect that those were made by some old adventures who joined a group of assassins. Their base ording to our information is in the slums ..."


    "As the Saintess of the Sacred Cross, Imand thee 3th-tier Pdin Lewis Apollo to investigate that matter and if necessary eliminate them if proven guilty."


    "Can you do that?"


    Grabbing his sword tightly, he stands up and faced the Saintess.


    "I, 3th-tier Pdin Lewis Apollo will follow themand of the brightness light!" Turning around, he left through the door where he came from with mes inside his eyes.


    Staring at the closed door, the Saintess had a smile on her face.


    "Silly, it¡äs toote for me..." Looking back at the statue she continued her prayer of before.


    `You will be a great pdin, Lewi Apollo.¡ä


    ****


    Currently in the slums of Bernes.


    A man with dark gray te armor walked beside a man who was shaking from fear.


    "H-Here it is, sir knight." The man pointed at arge building that looked like a warehouse.


    "So this ce is where are you keeping Gerak, huh?" Danzel said while gazing at the building.


    "Yes! I would never lie to you! So please, spare m-"


    "Thanks for showing me the way."


    Pulling Veren out from this sheath, he pierced the mans heart without letting him finish his plea.


    The runes of Veren lighten up with crimson light, slowly sucking the man''s blood directly from his heart and repairing the Veren sword of all this previous damage.


    "I guess continuous maintenance is indeed needed..."


    After Veren sucked enough blood to repair itself to this peak state, Danzel walked towards the warehouse.


    "Let¡äs wreck this ce..." He said with a cold voice.

 Chapter 87 - Dark Knight

    On the second floor of the warehouse...


    *Baahm


    "What do you mean you haven''t found him yet!" A man mmed his hand on the table.


    The man looked at histe-thirties at the height of 1,93 meters tall. He wore leather with some fur on this top, which didn''t help much in covering his chest.


    His brown skin together with muscles on his body and the bald head that he had made him look like an enraged Monk that was ready to punch someone.


    And the people around that table felt like that someone will soon be them.


    "Boss....we even searched for every foreigner and the ones that had recentlye, but the sudden wave of merchants from Nexvarres makes it almost impossible to find the described figure-" Before he could finish this report a sudden wave of air brushed past him, scratching his cheek.


    *Fsooh


    "Hiehh!" Realizing what just happend he fell to his feet, staring at the wall that had a punch carving.


    "You...dare to make excuses in front of me? The ck Fist?" The bald man said while his hand that was stretched flowing with life force.


    "..."


    Everyone went silent after the man''s deration. All of them pictured what would have happend if that wave of wind hit their face and shivered by the imagination alone.


    `Tch, weaklings¡ä Drawing back his hand, he took a seat and looked at them with a frown on his face.


    "It has been more than a month since a trusted aid of my, Oliver had died from an unknown person."


    "I recruited Oliver, and I know by fact that he had a creative mind inside that fat mass that he called himself this body. He always delivered us products with no furtherplexities. I even nned to raise this rank in the association, and I think many of you know that too." The man stared at the group around him.


    As for all the others, they fell silent in response.


    Since Oliver has joined the association, most of those guys here have been feeling anger and jealousy towards him cause of how good he was in this job. And the poor idea of him being promoted by the Dark Fist itself infuriated them all the more.


    After all, in their eyes, a newbie came walking in and somehow managed to lick this way towards the promotion that they always had waited and dreamed of before.


    And this sudden death did not only relieve most of the members here but also made them anxious. Though a ve''s merchant''s death in the middle of the job wasn¡ät that umon. In fact, they were most more likely to die than to live and profit from the trafficking they did. This death in the capital itself raise many rms in there heads.


    "And as some of you might know, our association never let someone alive once they had messed with! But what do you guys bring me here? Zero results after more than a month! You think the association is a joke!?"


    *Baahm!


    A loud noise of wood breaking up sounded through the whole building which made everyone flinched out of fright.


    They subconsciously looked at the table, the bald man included.


    What they saw though was the table only showing a small crack.


    Everyone was surprised that the dark fist managed to produce such a loud sound and leaving so little damage to the table.


    The bald man, surprised by the sound looked at his fist in confusion.


    `What the hell was that? I didn¡ät put that much strength in my fist, so why was it so loud.¡ä While he was staring at his feast with confusion the door was flicked open by someone full of cold sweat to his forehead and pathing heavily.


    "B-Boss!" The man said as he fell to the knees as he was trying to catch his breath.


    "What are you doing here! Don¡ät you see we have a meeting here! Did youe here to die!?" The bald man said enraged at the one disrupting the meeting.


    Upon hearing that, the face of the man pale.


    "B-Boss! There is an intruded! Someone came and began massacre everyone on the first floor!"


    "What!?" Everyone at the table stood up from disbelieve, including the dark fist.


    "Which bastards dare to break into the warehouse! Don¡ät they know who our baker is!?" The dark fist said enraged.


    Remembering the sight down on the floor the man shivered. Opening his mouth, he replied with a shaken voice.


    "It¡äs a Dark Knight!"


    *****


    Outside the warehouse...


    "Now, how should I do this?" Danzel said while staring at the lock of the warehouse.


    "Hmm, this seems to be the only possible entrance..." He said while scratching the back of his helmet.


    Though the building had windows, they were more than 15 meters high. And reaching those was simply impossible, even with the [Leap] skill that I had bought in between this week.


    At max, I probably could jump seven meters up high and that was considering the [Leap] and [Dash] skill too.


    Though I had other ways to sneak in through the window, those would be too loud and making the sneaking in part none existent.


    The worst that could happen would be if I realise that the guys inside are way stronger than me. If that were to happen I will be forced to so escape.


    And based on my current understanding, jumping out of the window wasn¡ät the best way to make my epic escape.


    "Should I...just break-in?" Danzel said while staring at the lock with great interest.


    "Well, if there is no solution in hand, brute-forcing it should be the solution." Danzel said while raising Veren high.


    If the lock were able to sweat, it will be already drenched in a cold sweat.


    Swinging Veren down, the lock was cut in two halves.


    *Thinngk!


    "Let¡äs hope no one heard that..." cing his hands at the door, the doors slowly opened as he was pushing.


    On the other side of the door.


    Inside the warehouse were many cages ced that held way more people than the cages were capable to keep in. It was so bad that the [Ring of Spatial Storage] that Danzel had would even be a joke.


    The worst part was the stench that those cages were making. It was a miracle that those humans, elve, dwarfs, and some beast people hadn¡ät died from infections and other diseases. The light in their eyes had faded and looking aimlessly around.


    Wishing when their death wille.


    The people that held cloth covering their nose and carrying swords to their waist disrupted some yellow substance to the ves, when suddenly loud metal sound came from the door.


    "Hmm? What was that?" one man asked towards the one beside him.


    Both of those two were wearing red robes while carrying a wooden staff in their hands.


    *Brrhhh.


    Looking at the door slowly opening both of the two felt confused.


    "Hey, was there a delivery nned to be today as well?


    Both of them looked at the door puzzled.


    Since both these two were supervisors ordered to look after the ves they were informed on who would being and a what time.


    Seeing now the door open though, made them confused.


    Usually, the door would be slowly pushed with the help of horses.


    But now the speed of the door opening was a bit...faster?


    With a gap through the wall, a man wearing dark gray ted armor appeared from the small gap.


    Walking inside the warehouse, Danzel stared silently around the ce.


    `ves...¡ä


    Seeing the people cramped inside the caged, Danzel remembered the first guy he killed after walking going inside the capital.


    "To think that Gerak would be taken in such a ce..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Though he was an undead who hated the living, he was quite fond of the greedy dwarf. Though it was a bit annoying that I felt hatred towards him, for some reason I wasn¡ät as much affected by it when I met humans.


    After all, he was the single one that I could have a conversation with without having the urge of killing him.


    "You! Who are you!?"


    After being called, the thoughts that I had were cleared, with my focus now being on the people holding swords and the two that held staffs.


    `Magic casters....¡ä


    Ignoring the man, I guided my mana towards the Veren sword, preparing to release a [Gale Mana de].


    "This guy! Intruder!"


    Seeing the suddenly realized mana in my de, both men holding the staff realized that it was anything that good.


    "What are you waiting for! Go and kill him!" One of the men holding a staffmanded while the other one was already mid casting his spell.


    "You bastard! You will regreting in here!" The ones with the cloth mask and swords charged at him full of confidence.


    But that confidence was shortly cut in two.


    *Fseeeen!


    An air de flight through them at speed they couldn''t dodge.


    "Gahhh!" one man screamed as his shoulder opened up.


    The other''s eyes darkened.

 Chapter 88 - Acting To The Ground

    The men rushing towards Danzel came to a halt when they saw one of their friends having almost half body cut in half.


    The previous confidence that they had built up from having more numbers started soon to fade away and be reced by fear.


    "H-He must be from the 2nd-tier!"


    "For him to use such a powerful ability too should make him of a high-end 2nd-tier!"


    "We can''t..."


    Just as the cloth mask people started to have thoughts of retreat, they heard a voice from behind them.


    "Mana head my call and aim at my enemy [Magic Missile]!"


    The man that was casting raised this staff to the air with one hand, three balls of mana appeared beside him..


    And soon enough to three balls flew towards Danzel with simr speed as him.


    Looking at the iing blue balls Danzel didn''t n to stay and see what the balls have to offer.


    ''By the speed and the fact that he used casting magic to create it should have some punch.''


    Though the balls had a simr speed with him, their path was very clear in Danzels eyes.


    The moment the balls flew towards him he immediately run to the side towards the cloth masked people.


    But unlike his expectations, the three balls of mana suddenly changed their direction towards Danzel.


    Looking at this phenomenon Danzel was shocked.


    ''Serious!? Homing missiles!?'' Danzel cursed at his little understanding of magic.


    "Can''t dodge them all..."


    Realizing that he no longer could dodge the iing missiles, he turned around to face the three missiles.


    Swinging the Veren sword at the first missile, a huge pressure came from the ball.


    Though the missile was cut in half and the mana in it had dissipated in the air. The power alone pushed Veren away and almost throw him off.


    "This is..." Before Danzel could finish his sentence the two other missiles came shortly after him.


    *Bnigh!


    *Bnigh!


    With no other choice, he had to bring out this shield and block against the next missile.


    Unfortunately for him, history repeated itself and the second missile pushed his shield away, leaving his back open to wee the third missile.


    And the men who saw this broke into jeers.


    "As expected of a 2nd-tied mage! The overseer is indeed powerful."


    The overseer who was bathing in praise of his colleagues didn''t felt must happy from the result.


    ''Not only did he block two of those, but received one as well. And he is still alive?''


    The man''s frown didn''t go unnoticed by the other magic caster.


    "What are you still standing there! Don''t you see that he is still alive! Move you a*se and capture him already.


    ''By the looks of it he is done for, but taking it more serious wouldn''t hurt...'' He sneered at the dark te armored guy who wasn''t able to stand up.


    The cloth masked mask notice the shaking of the dark knight who a few seconds ago were so scared of.


    "Hehe, you dare toe in here and create such a fuss? I will kill!"


    "Let''s remove his armor and beat him up! I bet both him and the armor would fetch some good coins"


    "Hey, since when we''re you into that kind of stuff? There way more pretty boys to one of the filth cages anyway."


    "You..."


    "Hahaha!"


    Unknown to them who wereughing at someone''s fetish with their confidence back.


    The one who was shaking to the ground looked at them with these ethereal green eyes.


    ''Idiots.''


    Danzel had to admit that the missile was way more powerful than he had expected but to bring him to the point where he couldn''t stand up was not.


    Ignoring the fact that as an undead he wasn''t able to feel pain, the armor that Gerak crafted him wasn''t just for show.


    His shaking body was just an act to let those guyse near enough to massacre them all!


    Considering the rune that I carved into my helmet too, when my helmet faced down to the ground I was capable to look around 180 degrees around me without needing to move the position of the helmet by itself.


    Thus, with my acting and the rune, I created the illusion of someone looking at the ground powerless while shaking from pain.


    In a way, those ignorant fools were literally walking to their deaths.


    ''I have to wait until the very end, the faster I kill those guys the faster I will be able to reach those magic casters. I will never do the same mistake again...'' Danzel swore while still staring at them nearing me.


    Though it was around some months ago, the memory of being held by goblins and right after receiving a damn fireball head on was still vivid in his mind.


    Biding this time, Danzel patiently waited while pretending to be badly hurt .


    10 meters...


    5 meters...


    3 meters...


    "Hmm? Hey guys, don¡ät you find it weird that there is no blood or groans of pain from him?" One of the cloth men asked with a frown on his face.


    `I guess that¡äs the limit...¡ä Seeing that I have been caught, I hesitated no longer.


    [Sin of Wrath]: Activate


    The dead mana inside of my body spiked up and engulfed my armor with dead mana. Newfound strength was slowly creeping inside of my body while the massed bloodlust found its way outside.


    Feeling the sudden increase of blood lust from this knight together with mana they have never seen before the one magic caster who cast [Magic Missiles] cursed out loud.


    "Dammit! I knew he was pretending, this damn rat! Hey! Cast with me!"


    Upon hearing this colleagues, his mind got cleared from the sudden blood loss that came from his knight.


    `Right, we both are 2th-tier mages and he is purely a 2nd-knight. With all of us, we still got advanced.¡ä


    Or so he thought.


    Compare to these two who were fifteen meters away from him, the cloth masked men had it much worse who was just three meters away from him.


    Their faces immediately turned pale and a deep fear was crippling inside their hearts.


    "Ahhh! Kill him! Kill him now!" One of the men screamed out loud, resulting in a chain reaction to all the others.


    "Ahhh!"


    All of them raised their swords ready to smash the dark knight while he was still to the ground out of desperation.


    "Hehe..." Raising his one feet to the ground, he shed diagonally to the oneing at him.


    `[Gale Mana de]¡ä


    The Veren long sword soon ripped the men in front of his path with not even sparing the ones who were behind them that were killed by the massive air de.


    Without even being able to resist, half of them were cut to half with only a lucky one escaping the fate of his now colleagues.


    "High!" Seeing the fate that his colleagues had faced in front of him, he imminently turned around and run away without looking back.


    Though Danzel could probably kill him if he chased after him, he decided against it.


    "Kill him!"


    After all, why chase a dog when the whole pack is here?


    "[Shiled Bash]!" Using one of the skills that I haven¡ät used for a long time, I bashed one of the man''s faces and soon started my massacre.


    Their number was reduced by the second, and it wasn¡ät long before I killed everyone single of the cloth masked people, excluding the coward who escape.


    Turning my attention to the two magic casters, I cursed to myself.


    "Tch, I guess I was too slow..."


    Seeing the blue mana forming into the form of balls I knew that I was toote.


    "Mana head my call and aim at my enemy [Magic Missile]"


    "Mana head my call and aim at my enemy [Magic Missile]"


    Looking at the six missiles forming up, I calmed myself down and raised my hand.


    `Keep it in...¡ä


    [Sin of Wrath]: De-activated


    Being nowpletely in control of my mind, I guided the mana towards my hand and I started to chant my own spell.


    "Let¡äs see how you eat this you bastard!"


    The magic casters yelled, release their magic missiles towards my location


    "I know how your little trick works now, and I won¡ät fall for it for a second time! [Earth Wall]!"


    Casting my spell, the wood screeched and the loud sound of wood breaking down echoed through the whole building.


    And shortly after the sounds started a massive earth wall started to ascend from the wooden floor itself.


    "What!" Both of the magic casters yelled while dumpstuck.


    `He was a magic caster too!?¡ä They asked themself.


    With the wall raising higher and higher, I pierced Veren directly to the wall, which results in me being dragged together to the wall higher.


    The missile soon hit the wall and broke it.


    With the earth wall now crumpled, I was still on the air gathering my mana into the Veren sword.


    "Take this!"

 Chapter 89 - Nothing Works Twice

    "What!?" The two casters had their mouths open wide from their disbelief.


    Both of them were extremely confident in their spell [Magic Missile] and the result that it shown at the first time.


    Though one missile wasn''t enough to defeat that dark knight.


    Surely four would do, is what both of them thought.


    But the sudden appearance of the dark knight using magic to summon a damn earth wall into the facility and use it to propel himself to the air was out of their expectations.


    And the fact that he has done exactly that made them feel dumbstruck.


    Both of the magic casters had different looks on their faces.


    The one that hit Danzel had a frown while the other had an enraged expression on his face..


    "Ahhh! You damn bastard! Look at the mess you caused! The next one will be aimed at that damn head of your!"


    Both casters raised their staff aim towards the airborne Danzel.


    But the other who was cautiously observing Danzel eyes widened open.


    "Quick! Cancel and-" As he tried to warn this enraged colleague, a sudden cold battle cry sound in the air.


    "Take this!"


    The Veren sword glowed with dark green light and the moment he swung it towards the direction of the one caster who threatened him.


    Wind with mixed dark green took the shape of a moon and elerated at the caster.


    The man who was about to finish his spell turned pale and this face showed urgency.


    He stopped his casting and tried to jump out of the way, only for him to receive a simr fate as the other who met this de.


    "I-Impossible..."


    [You received 5000 XP]


    "One gone, one remains" Satisfied with the amount XP that this guy gave me, I guided my mana into Veren and preparing to harvest the next XP bag in front of me.


    *Bregh


    Being over 10 meters high in the air didn''t exactly make my fall better, but with my current attribute and the armor absorbing some Kic force, I managed to fall with one knee standing.


    "-Mana de]!


    Though the position was awkward, it didn''t stop me from releasing the [Gale Mana de] upon that caster.


    *Fresghhhgh!


    Like a shark going after his prey, the air de dug into the floor and heading towards thest magic caster.


    "[Magic Shield]..." In an instant, a blue glow came from outside his chest which formed a though seeing wall made out of mana.


    As the shield finished its form, the preying air de crushed in the wall, creating a loud sound from their sh.


    Soon enough, the wall of mana started fading away together with the air de.


    "..." Standing up from my knee, I silently looked at the caster who seemed to prepare his next.


    ''Though I had fought with that old magic caster goblin and that arsonist Rapha. That guy before me is the first to use some kind of defense magic.''


    Since every time I fired a [Gale Mana de] towards someone, it will be a hit or miss, nothing in between.


    But now that it was blocked I felt somewhat annoyed by it.


    "Mana head my call and aim at my enemy [Magic Missile]!" The caster spread his arms and the manifested mana balls soon elerated towards my location but to three different angles.


    Seeing the iing missilesing towards my direction my gaze turned ice cold.


    "You deaf? I already told you that those won¡ät work again." Danzel scoffed at this pure attempt to y around the spell of [Earth Wall].


    `I don¡ät need to use so much mana just for that.¡ä Digging through my knowledge, the information of the spell came in front of me.


    "[Mana Arms]" Finishing my cast, two arms made of mana appeared beside me.


    `Go...¡ä Using a mentalmand, I guided the hands to fly directly towards the two missiles to my sides.


    *Boofm! Boofm!


    The mana arms crashed at their target missiles, which led them to realize a big shock wave that destroyed the arms and the missile itself.


    "Huh?" The mage who saw him made a confused expression before opening his eyes wide when he realized what just happend.


    "I have already figured how your spell works..." Stabbing Veren to the floor, I equipped one of the many other swords from inside the [Ring of Spatial Storage] in my hands and threw that runed weapon directly at the iing missile in front of me.


    *Boofm!


    The missile released the shock wave and dissipated while throwing the runed weapon towards near a cage.


    The ves who were watching the battle in both fear and hope freaked from the sword that stapped the floor not so much far away from them.


    With both of the three missiles gone, the magic caster shoulders and hands were shaking abnormally.


    "H-How...How can my missiles be defeated by a spell-like [Mana Arms] and a throwing sword..." The man started to mumbled to himself with apparent pride towards his [Magic Missiles].


    With my current attributes, I was able to hear these mumbles, although barely.


    "As I told you, once you figure the trick, the rest is easy. Those [Magic Missiles] of yours work simrly to a wind bomb, right? Once popped the wind is released, with a total of three of those the spell by itself is pretty dangerous if faced directly with the homing effect on them. But because of that reason alone they are much easier to predict." Danzel said while picking the Veren sword back to his hand.


    "W-What do you mean?" The caster said.


    "Isn¡ät it obvious? Those missiles mindlessly targeted me without giving a care if there is something in front of them or not. Though I don¡ät know much about magic, in my opinion, it would have been better to control them manually than letting them go and seek their target by themselves. What you do is nothing more than beingzy." Danzel said while looking at him unemotionally.


    "Y-You... You! Don¡ät you dare talk about my magic like that, you poor excuse of a magic caster! Do you know how many days and nights I spent learning this spell! An embarrassment of magic such as you has no right to talk about magic!" With veins starting to show on his forehead, he raised his staff to the air and started casting with a hoarse voice.


    A cold aura started to realize out of the caster, and with each second water started to manifest from thin air and slowly gather towards a ce and turning to ice.


    Looking at this Danzel hesitated no more, and the mana that he had slowly gather into his whole body showed to the outside.


    `[Dash]¡ä.


    The first step of Danzel already covered four meters and the second followed in short.


    The time he used to tell the caster how bad his spell wasn¡ät wasted, he knew that once he starts rushing towards the caster the next spell will follow.


    With that in mind, he wasted time purely to slowly guide his mana around his body not only to get unnoticed, but to also have a get-go right at the start.


    Not only that, but the abuse of using the skill [Dash] made him with less than four steps cross the distance that he and the caster have.


    `Tch, it started to burn...¡ä Danzel cursed internally of his mana burning inside of him.


    With the caster''s entire focus being on his spell, he didn¡ät notice the two-meter dark knight in front of him.


    "-Turn into spikes an-" Before the caster could finish this spell, the long de pierced his chest.


    "Huh?" The intense pain in his chest made him lose focus and stare at the de in his chest.


    The four small ice spears that had formed in the air soon turned into water and fell on both of them.


    Drenched in cold water and with a cold de in his chest, a sudden feeling of vomiting came at him.


    "Bgu-"


    As he opened his mouth to puke, Danzel grabbed his mouth with his gauntlet.


    "Bghuh!" Though Danzel grabbed his mouth, some of the caster''s blood still managed to pass through a small opening on his gauntlet.


    "You know, my sword was got pretty damaged after stabbing it to my earth wall of before..." Danzel said while a crimson light slowly appeared in the de.


    The caster didn¡ät understand what this light was nor did he try to understand with him feeling severe nausea, pain, and fear.


    "Since you managed to hit me once I decided to make an exception on you though," Danzel said with a chilling tone.


    The man didn¡ät understand what the dark knight meant, but seeing the gauntlet glow in a dark green light his eyes widen up with understanding.


    `His guy! The man from before wasn¡ät dark mana... It was dead mana!¡ä


    "Yo-...Ne-gro..mer?" The man tried to ask but failed miserably.


    With both of the runes activating at the same time, the caster felt intense pain beyond what he could take on!


    Looking at the man who treated them worse than an animal being in so much pain, the ves felt thankful towards the dark knight who put this man in such pain.


    But shortly their engorgement shouts started to fade as they realized by each second that the caster was turning thinner by the second until he became a mummy with ck skin.


    Letting the corpse fall in-ground, Danzel turned around and looked towards the ves behind him.


    Looking at the dried-up corpse a feeling of fear came upon them,

 Chapter 90 - Bald Beast

    Staring at the dark knight that killed all of their abusers, a sense of fear crippled this way to their hearts. It was as if the blinding bright hope that came to his dark ce to dimmer and the closer the dark knight got, the dark the light became.


    Though he killed their abusers, the process he used to kill thest magic caster was way too inhumane for everyone to take.


    "S-Stay away!" A woman in the cage screamed towards the approaching dark knight.


    "..." Looking at the woman who screamed at him he came to halt.


    `So that''s where it is....¡ä Danzel thought before changing his direction towards the woman at the cage.


    That action of my made the woman who screamed at me felt like a scythe was ced at her neck, with a deathly pale face she tried to move away from the front of the cage in hurry.


    "N-No! Stay away!"


    Standing in front of the cage, Danzel silently stared at the woman and the other ves as he was in deep thought.


    The people in the cages had their breath sucked up, too afraid to gain the dark knight''s attention.


    All except the woman of before...


    "W-What are you looking at! If you aren¡ät going to free us to go away!"


    "Hey!" a man beside her whispered


    "Someone close her mouth!" another said.


    Everyone in the cage panicked and quickly tried to closer that woman''s mouth before he annoyed the knight anymore.


    Taking a nce towards the dark knight, everyone remained nervous as he was silently staring at them without speaking a word.


    After some moments of silents, Danzel slowly raised his hand towards the cage.


    But before he was able to reach it a loud voice sound behind him.


    "Hey! Danzel! Over here!"


    `That voice...¡ä Retreating his hand, he picked the runed sword that he threw and turned around,


    "Gerak?" Storing the sword inside this [Ring of Spatial Storage], he walked towards the dwarf inside another cage.


    Danzel momentarily halted as he saw multiple dwarfs inside the cage where Gerak was.


    `So much facial hair...¡ä Staring at the 10 dwarfs with a simr big beard about the same weight I might have mistaken Gerak if I weren¡ät used to his greedy face.


    Looking at me shaking my head Gerak frown towards me.


    "Hey, you thinking of something rude don¡ät you?" He said with a sharp gaze.


    "You probably are mistaken..." Danzel said as he cursed internally of being found out.


    "Anyway, how did you end being kidnapped by those guys? Weren¡ät you suppose to be able to beat a monster of the 2nd-tier?" Danzel said.


    "Not everyone has such monstrous strength like you! How am I able to win against two of the same tier and theirckeys! I am just a cksmith!"


    The other nine dwarfs who looked at us bickering at each other sighted in relief, d that this dark knight is on their side.


    "Hey, Danzel...can you?" Gerak pointed at the cage with a slightly awkward expression.


    "Sure..." Putting Veren back to this sheath, I grabbed the metal bars with both of my hands.


    "Hmm? What is he-" Just as the dwarfs began to ask what I was doing, the low screeching from the metal made them all look at the metal bars surprised.


    `They...are bending!?¡ä Everyone inside the cage thought in disbelieve.


    In fact, every other ve who was watching this spectacle looked dumbfounded!


    `How can someone of the 2nd-tier have so much strength?¡ä Gerak thought to himself surprised.


    He knew that Danzel was strong, but for him to be able to bent metal was unthinkable.


    With each passing second, the metal bars bent more and more, slowly making a bigger opening in the cage.


    But as the bars were about to snap, a sharp howling wind could be heard.


    "Huh?" as I were to turn my head to see where the sound came from, the skill [Sense Danger] activated out of the blue.


    Letting the bent bars go, I quickly turned around while summoning the shield from the [Ring of Spatial Storage].


    The moment I turned around, a strong wind came like a swinging hammer towards the dark crystal shield.


    "This..." Before I could make sense of what was happening, being unable to hold my ground from the sudden projectile, Danzel was pushed back and came crushing towards the cage behind him.


    *Crack


    "The hell was that..." Picking himself from the ground, Danzel cursed internally as he felt the crack behind his skull.


    "Hoh, you sure are a sturdy bastard to survive that..." A deep voice said full of mockery.


    Turning my gaze towards the voice, he saw a bald brown-skinned man walking towards him.


    `Another one..? Nheless, that guy is far stronger than those two magic casters.¡ä Danzel said while getting back to this feet.


    "So you are that dark knight? You sure got the balls walking in here and kill my subordinates wherever you like. Aren¡ät you afraid of the association!?" The man said clearly enraged.


    "I am not sure of what derisive association you areing from neither I care." Unsheathing Veren, he pointed at the man.


    Upon hearing my response the man frowned.


    "Clueless bastard...maybe the name ck Fist will give you a needed reminder of who you are messing with!".


    "ck Fist?" Danzel mumbled confused.


    Gerak who heard my mumbles replied with a frown on his face.


    "Be careful Danzel, the man before you is one of the most powerful 2nd-tier going by Dark Fist. He was an adventurer who wasat the apex of 2nd-tier who uses simr abilities to a druid..." Gerak exined with a low voice.


    `Apex of 2nd-tier, huh?¡ä Nodding towards Gerak in understanding, his focus was ced on the man before him.


    "Still, the name ck Fist is too fancy in my opinion. Why don¡ät you call yourself Bald Fist instead?"


    "You..." While veins started to show up in his head, a sudden blue aura appeared around his arms and legs.


    His legs and arms muscled flexed for a second while his skin got tougher with the blue aura around.


    "I will teach you a lesson that you will never forget! [Beast Bear Form]!" A blue illusion of bear arms and legs appeared before fading away.


    After both images faded away, he started to run at him like a charging bull.


    Each step left cracking parts on the floor.


    `He is fast...¡ä ncing behind me, I ran towards the side.


    With now having some space around me I gather my mana towards Veren.


    "Hmpf!" The ck Fist scoffed as he was already in range.


    "Feel my fist!"


    The punch soon shed with Danzel''s ck crystal shield.


    "[Riposte Defense]..." Activating the skill, the force behind the man''s punch got reduced by arge amount, but notpletely.


    Though It wasn¡ät enough to push me back, it still made me somewhat falter.


    "I am not done!" The man threw punch after a punch.


    *Thud! Thuad! Thuad!


    Each punch was shortly blocked through the help of the [Riposte Defense] skill, but after five seconds the blocks were no more.


    `You thinking of me like sandbag?¡ä


    Even though five seconds didn¡ät seem like much, they were just enough to gather my mana in the Veren de.


    Swinging my sword at the bald fist, an air de glowing of dark green was released towards the man.


    *Fsheeen!


    The Bald Fist who already saw thising jumped back in advance and the previous blue glow in his hand faded with a green recing it to his arms and chest.


    "[Beast Turtle Form]!" A small image of a turtle shell appeared on his chest and when the image faded, a light green shield surrounded him in a sphere form.


    The air de that came crashing to the shield got torn apart, leaving only a big crack towards the Bald Fist shield.


    "Hoh, not bad" The Dark Fist whistle in surprise.


    He didn¡ät think that this dark knight that caused such a mess would be able to almost destroy his shield.


    `He is more dangerous than I though...¡ä


    As the green shield slowly faded away, Danzel dashed towards him and swung Veren at his neck.


    Looking at that the Bald Fist frowned.


    As the Veren was about to reach the Bald Fist, it was shortly deflected by the man''s front side of his arm while the other free arm attacked Danzel using the palm.


    "Hmm..?" Blocking the palm with his shield he jumped few steps back while gazing at the man''s arms.


    `Though he used a palm for this attack, it clearly had less power than when he used the blue aura...¡ä


    Seeing that his opponent was staring directly at these arms he slightly frowned.


    "Let¡äs see how you handle that..." The ck Fist said while the previous green aura faded and a new appeared.


    Engulfing these legs and palms, a bright brown aura came from his body and showing an image of two eyes and a jaw of a monkey.


    "Another one..." Cursing internally, he prepared to wee him while charging another [Gale Mana de] in Veren.


    But unexpectedly, the Bald Fist moved with speed far faster than he was before.

 Chapter 91 - Bald Beast (2)

    "[Beast Monkey Form]!" With total of two steps, the Bald Fist managed to shorten the distance.


    "..." Grabbing the handle of Veren even tighter, Danzel swung aiming for the man''s stomach.


    However, before the de manage to hit the man he did a front flip towards Danzel. Touching the dark knight''s shoulder he sessfully managed to dodge the ripping de while passing beside him and managed tond a kick towards this helmet.


    Upon the kick''s contact with the helmet, explosive strong sound waves were released.


    *Crack


    As the Bald Fist restored this foothold to the ground he saw a big air de with a dark green glowing straight at him..


    "Hoh?" Taking another stance, the brown aura vanished with the green one recing it.


    But unlike before, the image of the turtle shell wasn¡ät fast enough to show up to create the barrier of before.


    Putting his hands together the aura glowed stronger and he catched the iing air de with this bare arms.


    "Dammit!" He cursed while he felt a huge pressureing from his hands.


    The man was slowly being pushed back while the air de was still struggling to escape the grip of the man''s hands.


    After pushing him back for a total of three meters away from this previous position, the air de crumpled and soon faded away, only living a small scratch on both of the Bald Fist hands.


    "Don''t tell me that is all that you can do?" The Dark Fist said with a mocking tone.


    Looking at the dark knight helm still shaking from the sound wave his confidence started to raise.


    `Though I used quite a lot of mana and life force to block the attack, I seemed to have won the trade-off.¡ä


    What he didn¡ät know though was that he was dealing against an undead Draugr. Altough attacking someone directly to the ear by the use of sound waves would usually deafen someone for life, that though didn¡ät count towards the undead. At least that was the case on the skeleton type of undead.


    As the unique existences that the undead are, aiming to defeat someone like them was no easy task.


    Even though they could hear, to them the noise was nothing more than a loud sound.


    Pain from broken eardrums?


    Ha!


    What are those?


    Nevertheless, the sound waves didn¡ät achieve what the Bald Fist had hoped to achieve, the hit itself didn¡ät go waste though.


    Gripping his helmet with one hand to stop the still shaking helmet, his ethereal eyes stared coldly at the man in front of him.


    `The crack has grown...¡ä


    I unconsciously knew that the crack in my skull opened up slightly and that slowly the area began to leak dead mana.


    "You talk too much..." Danzel said with his cold voice.


    The sudden mood swings that he got from the crack in his head made the dead mana inside his to raise ande out of his armor like entrapped smoke.


    Though he felt simr to when the [Sin of Wrath] was activated, this time he felt different.


    The hatred that usually pushed the [Sin of Wrath] to activate was reced with a simr yet different feeling.


    Anger.


    The times he let his hatred guide his judgment were rewarded with greater strength of the skill, but in that state, he was just following his feelings.


    And those were to kill.


    Now though, he wasn¡ät guided by hatred, no. Instead he was fueled by this anger with a clear mind. Though he could let the [Sin of Wrath] take over, he didn¡ät. As he already made his mindto kill that very guy before him.


    "For a dead man walking you talk too much..." The mana rushed through the Veren de with an even darker green ethereal light.


    The Dark Fist who saw this frown slightly before changing his stance back to the brown aura.


    "You mana sure is disgusting..." The Dark Fist said before he rushed with simr speed as before towards Danzel.


    Though he wasn¡ät going to call himself one of the forest-loving druids out there. He still considers himself as a druid, even if he were a bad one in that.


    Usually, the druid consisted mostly of magic casters whobined their life force with their mana to wield the power of nature. That alone made them an anomaly towards all the other magic casters who used purely their mana to cast their spell.


    Though they had lots of limitations, the advantages of thebined life force and mana spells allowed their spells to be cheaper.


    Those limitations were mainly the number of paths that they could choose from.


    Those paths were mainly were the three following:


    The [Elementalist] who were able to control the basic elements.


    The [Druid] wielded the power of nature itself to do this bidding.


    Andstly, the [Beast Shifter] path, which was able to draw the strength of various beasts to either enchant his body or transform into one.


    And every path, including the [Beast Shifter] that the ck Fist were had a certain sense of nature. Thus gazing towards the mana that the dark knight was releasing looked to him simr to something vile and dirty.


    As the Dark Fist reached Danzel and was ready to dodge theing air de, the mana in the de suddenly faded.


    "Huh?"


    Now that both of them were around three meters away, Danzel who his body was masked with dead mana used the skill [Dash] to ram towards the Bald Fist like an iing train.


    Though he wasted some mana just to confused his enemies, he achieved his goal of getting closer.


    The trick he used was purely controlling his own mana and cing it at the sword. Making it look like something will happen.


    Being so near to each other, the Dark Fist wasn¡ät able to get away.


    Crossing his arms, he received the shield head one without much damage.


    `I am too close!¡ä As he predicted, the longsword of the dark knight soon followed behind that charge.


    Fortunately for him, though the help of the brown aura, he escaped by a hair''s breadth by jumping to the left side.


    "Damn, that was dangerous..." The ck Fist mumbled as he hurriedly turned around.


    Only to be shocked.


    "What the hell is that!?" Gazing at the ck misting straight at him, he panicked.


    The mist soon hit this target and was slowly absorbed inside the man''s body, bring together a horrible feeling inside of him.


    `This feeling...¡ä Observing his body he found no hints of the external wound, but he knew that inside of him something was wrong.


    "What did you do to me!?" The Bald Fist yelled with anger at the dark knight, only to meet his silence and cold re.


    "This bastard-" Before he could finish this sentences, the dark knight came soon enough rushing towards him with this longsword glowing with a dark green light.


    "You!" Gathering his mana and life force in his hands, he punched to the air and released a wave of wind at the size of his fist.


    That skill was called [Air st] which allowed you to gather the wind around your arms and shoot it all at once with high pressure.


    Danzel instead of dodging, continued marching towards his target with his shield in front of him.


    Though the [Air st] of before pushed Danzel back to the cage, that was only because he was unprepared.


    It was simr to when you tried to push someone unprepared.


    But if you are going to tell someone that you are going to charge at them and try to push them to the ground while stealing their wallet, they will be able to get a better footing and prepare for your charge.


    Multiple waves of air crashed upon the shield of Danzel but to no avail.


    Not even when he was hit by the shoulder did Danzel stop his charge.


    "You damn brute!" The Dark Fistined before changing his form towards the green turtle shell.


    `There has never been a case where anyone would take one of my [Air st] head on, and multiple times at that!¡ä For the first time in the current fight, he started feeling anxious.


    Though he was stronger against the dark knight with his [Beast Bear Form] active. His weapon, that were this fists was hugely disadvantaged against a full ted armor opponent.


    Not only was he fast enough to block my attacks with his shield in the [Beast Bear Form]. But also durable to survive the attacks of the [Beast Monkey Form].


    His opponent in the other hand had a sharp longsword that could inflict severe wounds on him given the chance and a ranged attack that was simr as deadly.


    This only hope that he had was to block the strike with his barrier and deliver a fatal blow while this momentum was lost.


    "[Beast Turtle Form]!" The image of a turtle shell appeared as quickly as it faded, and soon a green barrier in the shape of a sphere appeared around him.


    Looking at the charging dark knight he took a side punch stance.


    Staring at the stance that the Bald Fist took, Danzel couldn¡ät help but grin viciously.


    Being one meter far from the barrier, Danzel raised Veren up to his head, and instead of swinging yet, he put the dark crystal shield inside his ring before grabbing the handle of Veren with both hands tightly together and swinging at the barrier.


    The moment he swung, a huge bloodlust was released which made the ves around him flinch from fear.


    *Thuad!


    The dark green light shed together with the green.


    Previously the barrier barely held against the [Gale Mana de], but now in nk range together with the swing of Danzel made cracks appear much faster in the barrier before itpletely shatter like broken ss.


    "Wha-!" The ck Fist eyes widen up as he that his, but he didn¡ät forget that now was his chance.


    Though he expected that this shield would be able to block the attack of the dark knightpletely taking this momentum away, he still went for his n.


    After all, beggars can¡ät be choosers.


    It was enough that he blocked the devastating air de.


    `Now that he discarded the shield I just have to block the longsword like before and finish him once and for all!¡ä The Dark Fist though before increasing the power towards his green aura.


    Although the longsword was as dangerous as the air de by itself, blocking it meant letting room for my fist to connect.


    Danzel whose de was still glowing in his mana, held Veren in both hands while taking an inside stance ready to pierce the man in front of him.


    As soon as they got close they shed.


    With the Bald Fist green aura trying to push the de away from him, the dark knight was trying to pierce though him.


    Just when the arm touched the de, instead of being deflected like before it cut a chunk of the man''s arms before the de continued his path towards the man''s neck.


    "Kugh!?" Piercing his neck, the Dark Fist threw up blood while he was still in disbelieve.


    "It has been a long since Ist used [Piercing]..." Danzel said with his cold voice.

 Chapter 92 - Decision

    [You received 12 000 XP]


    Pulling the now bloody de from the man''s neck out he fell to the ground with a shocked expression still frozen in his face.


    I nkly stared at the dead body for quite some time before sheathing the Veren de back to his sheath.


    "Sigh, killing guys like him sure is profitable... he saved me six hours of long work," Danzel mumbled to himself while staring at the notification window strangely.


    The amount of XP has been always been weird in his opinion.


    Though he understood that in a real fight you were putting your own life at risk, the rewards of winning the fight were above anything else.


    It was as if the status itself was encouraging him to begin a damn genocide for the sweet nectar that was called XP..


    In a less than a five minutes fight gave him the rewards of six hours'' worth of carving runes!


    "At least that guy isn¡ät like that arsonist freak..." Although the XP that this Bald Fist had given him was much more than the Rapha guy back then, the fight against that damn arsonist was much more rememberable than this one.


    In his opinion, that guy in front of was way much weaker than Rapha.


    Inparison to the bloody knight swordsmanship and magic, that guy was just a brute.


    If it weren¡ät for the fact that Rapha had the curse on him and me being physically stronger than him I couldn¡ät imagine how I could have won that fight.


    Heck, that revival thing that he did on the end costed almost my life!


    Compared to this brute who showed all his abilities strength, limitation, and reliance on a single ability right of the start, the fight itself felt easier.


    Heck, if you can¡ät even revive from your death you might as well be a joke!


    Pathetic!


    Shaking his head from all the useless thoughts, he looked towards all the cages around him.


    "One...three....five..."


    `Ten cages in total... there might be more than one hundred people here.¡ä Gazing at the ves he fell in deep thoughts while without noticing,his hand was already rubbing the hilt of Veren.


    The ves who were already anxious enough from the current follow of events became even the more anxious from seeing the dark knight ncing at them with a not so warm of a look.


    "Should I do it..?" That thought was rooted inside Danzel''s mind.


    But when the group of dwarfs came to this line of sight, he moved his hand away from the hilt.


    "Rather not..." Moving towards the cages he was soon met with praises.


    "Damn, you guy! Do my eyes trick me or am I seeing rune in that sword!"


    "Not only that, but those pair of gauntlets must be too! Did you see that glow of before!?"


    "You are quite strong my guy! Now tell me, does your armor also have runes in it!?"


    Those praises though were more aimed at my equipment...


    Seeing that I was ring at them like a statue, Gerak had put a wry smile on his face.


    "Sorry Danzel, that just who were are." Scratching the back of his neck he looked at Danzel slightly awkwardly.


    "Ehm... can you open the cage?"


    "..."


    Grabbing the metal bars of the cage, they shortly snapped.


    "Wow! You my guy got some muscles under that heavy-looking armor of yours!"


    "Truly amazing."


    Coming out of the cages, they were amazed by the dark knight''s strength and grateful for his help.


    They were originally the group who came to the kingdom of Berum to finish their trial given from their faction in the dwarf kingdom.


    With their trial sooning to end, they were in a period of preparing their works to showcase to their elders.


    What they didn¡ät know though was that they were thest patch of cksmith doing the trial in Berum.


    Through the recent war that has taken ce, the three factions of the dwarf kingdom decide to avoid sending their future cksmiths to kingdoms gued with war.


    And for those knowing that in the market they are fewer weapons to sell with even more demand. They would always be someone who would want a piece of that very market.


    Even if that method is very.


    One had to know that the upation of the cksmith wasn¡ät all thatmon. Though ten dwarfs weren¡ät much, their quality cover the quantity.


    With their skills being so good, finding a buyer amongst the armies of either the Berum or the Arcana Kingdom would have been a piece of cake.


    Considering those facts, they were a hot target for vers out there.


    "Hey Gerak, let¡äs go already. We don¡ät know when others from them wille and with my mana mostly depleted, I ain¡ät confident to win against another group. I need you to get me another patch from those guys to continue my work anyways." Danzel said while scanning his surroundings in case he missed something.


    "Danzel, though the time working together I realized how smart of a mind you have, but you know... sometimes you really stupid you know that?" Gerak said earnestly.


    Hearing that, Danzel turned around and nced at Gerak in silence. Just the high difference between those two make Gerak seem like a child towards the two-meter-high Danzel.


    "What do you mean by that?" He said with a chilling voice while starring directly at Geraks eyes.


    The other dwarf who saw this fell silent.


    Gerak though just shrugged his shoulders as he was used to his cold side.


    "Do I need to spell it out to you? Such arge amount of ves could never go unnoticed in a ce like Bernes. And now tell me, how do you think that that guy got away from it?"


    `Right, carrying so many ves around and carrying them inside the capital would never go unnoticed even if the guards are being bribed constantly. And now that the gates have be more secure, hiding the ves is next to impossible. Except if...¡ä


    "Do they have a backer behind them?" Danzel asked.


    "You really are smart indeed..." Gerak said with a small smile on his face.


    "There has indeed a backer, at that''s that noble scum who oversees the slums," Gerak said with his voice full of disdain.


    "I see..." Danzel nodded with understanding, but the dwarf who saw this shortly shook this head.


    "No, you don¡ät understand. That noble scum is the one behind all this, and with you creating such a big mess it will never go unnoticed from the army and the thugs of the noble." Gerak said while getting closer to this side.


    "Though there aren¡ät many like us dwarf who can recognize runes, but there should be a few people who can recognize them among the ves. And if the army were to hear this, they might figure that you are the runesmith they were searching for. If that were to happen they might me you for the crimes from those scums and work you to death." Gerak whispered with a serious tone.


    Hearing that made Danzel look at the ves around them with slight killing intent.


    And though by chance, when he turned around to see the ves, his gaze stopped at the annoying woman from before.


    "Hiie!" The woman who was shortly met with the bloodlust from the dark knight shortly fell back to her butt out of horror.


    Gerak who notice Danzel Bloodlust put a frown on his face.


    "Danzel, we don¡ät have much time. If the armyes here there is no way that they will let us walk free after they know our identity."


    `Ugh... to think that I would feel a headache as an undead...¡ä Danzel cursed internally.


    Though he didn¡ät really feel any headache, the situation that he was in was annoying enough to make it feel like having one.


    While Danzel was in his deep thoughts searching for a solution for this mess, Gerak whispered something to the other dwarfs before turning to Danzel.


    "Hey Danzel, we will be leaving the kingdom of Berum and go back to our homnd. After everything that happend, we got to report back imminently and let out elders know. If you want you cane with us to the dwarf kingdom" Gerak said earnestly.


    "And how can I trust you guys? Wouldn''t my situation be the same if I go with you guys?" Danzel answer instantly with a hind of mocking behind his tone.


    "I ain''t really into choosing the lesser demon among two demons. I would rather try my chances alone."


    The dwarfs slightly down hearing the dark knight calling their homnd to be akin to a demon.


    ''He still doesn''t trust me...'' Breakthrough internally.


    "There isn''t a need for you toe to our kingdom if you wish so. We can just leave the capital together and move to our path afterward. I have some connection who can help us out while having you will put us at ease against the monster."


    Seeing that what the dwarf had said to make sense, he looked at the dwarf rather conflicted.


    ''Should I choose to trust him...''

 Chapter 93 - Are You The One Who Did This!?

    Staring at Gerak''s honest look Danzel fell into his train of thoughts.


    `I know Gerak more than a whole month to know when he is serious about on staff like that. But because I know him I can¡ät bring myself to trust that damn dwarf.¡ä


    `He is someone who would sell his crappy items to these customers twice the original price for the sake of this dump pride. Though I don¡ät really care what happens to the ignorant buyer, the items he sells are things someone would put their fate in protecting their lives.¡ä


    `If a guy who bought a sword from him went out to hunt some kind of a monster or a beast while mid-fight his sword breaks, then that would be the end for him. If that were to happen to me and I somehow managed to live that encounter, the first thing that I would have to do was go back to the ce I bought the sword and kill the damn owner which would be Gerak.¡ä


    `The worst thing about this of what he mentions a moment ago...¡ä.


    "Hey, you said that you know some people who can bring us out of this mess, right?" Danzel asked with this voice still being chilling to the bones.


    "Yes, if we move fast enough we will be outside the walls today." Although stiffly, Gerak nodded.


    Though Gerak couldn¡ät tell, he knew that Danzel was staring him directly into his eyes.


    "If that¡äs the case then why are you telling me this now?"


    Upon Danzel¡äs question, Gerak smiled awkwardly towards Danzel.


    "..."


    "..."


    With my question, an awkward silence befell us with us staring at each other as if we were having a staring contest.


    Danzel, who met the silence scoffed internally.


    `This greedy... he didn¡ät tell me on purpose.¡ä Danzel ethereal eyes suddenly turned ever so sharper towards the dwarf.


    Though it annoyed him, he knew why he kept quiet for so long.


    After all, Geraks goal was to make me stay and continue put runes and profit from it, which for him was like hitting two birds with one stone.


    If he suddenly went out this way and arrange for me to get out of the capital that would be like shooting himself in the foot!


    Having realized Geraks motives I couldna help myself but doubt him.


    But...


    "Fine, we will do it as you said," Danzel said.


    Hearing his answer the dwarfs sighed out of relief.


    Having someone as strong as him looking at their backs was some relief they needed.


    "Good, let¡äs us go before the otherse," Gerak said while walking in the direction where someone escaped.


    "Huh, where are you going? Isn¡ät that way the exit?" Danzel pointed at the door he pushed open.


    "Well, yeah, but with how you currently look we will be found out imminently. When they bought me here I came from another entrance in the back."


    Looking down at all the blood that is on my armor he felt somewhat awkward.


    `Right, going outside like that would be awkward...¡ä


    Following behind Gerak with the other dwarfs, we quietly left the building while ignoring the screams from the ve behind us.


    "Hey! Don¡ät leave us!"


    ****


    Half an hour before the Dark Fist death...


    Standing above the roof in a decayed house in the slums was someone wearing tight-up clothing looking half transparent.


    He stared at this target with these deep yellow eyes of his.


    "What the hell is he doing this time..." He asked himself as the dark gray knight who this target was stopped together without another unknown person in front of a big warehouse.


    He has been monitoring that mercenary for an entire month to found out who his employer was. But search till yet bore him no fruits.


    The mercenary behavior was in this as weird as they were suspicious.


    Usually, his job consisted of tailing someone in the dark or right of assassinating them if needed.


    Both those tasks needed exceptional skills.


    But the moment he was tasked to trail that mercenary he couldn''t be less bored than he was now.


    This target, who wore now a dark gray te armor did this month nothing else than staying at his own house for a whole damn month!


    And the moments he left the house, he wander through the streets aimlessly for hours long before vanishing back to this house.


    With such behavior of this target, he could only sit in hiding and stare at the house for days long.


    The worst part of it all we''re that he had to give a daily report to this superior.


    And after so long, he finally saw a change.


    The trip that he would do around every one week in the dwarf''s smithseemed to have changed.


    Instead of walking outside with the dwarf, he saw him dragging an unknown guy out of the shop.


    Seeing the change of the current events, he followed after those two which brought him here.


    "I will have to report that guy to the higher-ups...he might be then runesmith that they are searching fo-"


    As he was about to bring out hismunication, a crimson light appeared which caught this attention.


    "Huh?" Looking at the man that he was about to report as a possible runesmith being pierced by the mercenary de at his heart he slightly frowned.


    This frown though wasn''t the work of the dead body that was on the ground, but rather on the runes of the de.


    "There isn''t such rune in the report..." He mumbled to himself.


    *Thunk!


    With the sound of metal shing with each other, he looked at this target pushing open the door.


    "Why is he going in- Wait, if I remember right this ce is.."


    Seeing this target vanishing inside the building, he hastily brought out thismunication device.


    After some time, the crystal glowed slightly.


    "General, I have gotten some bad news..." The figure said as he began exining.


    ***


    Present...


    Walking with a map in his hand, he gazed in front of him.


    "I found it..." The man, Lewis Appolo who put this map away stared at the warehouse in front of him.


    When he did this first step towards the warehouse he halted suddenly.


    "This is..."


    Staring at a man''s dead body this frozen of before turned for the worst.


    Inspecting the man''s wound he was shocked by what he saw.


    "Traces of dead mana..?"


    Though very small, they were indeed some traces of dead mana.


    ''Might it be the council be responsible..?''


    Looking away from the corpse, both pairs of these eyes turned folded.


    "There is even more than that..." Lewis said in disbelief.


    The traces of the dead mana seemed like some pitch-ck small crumbs in the ground.


    Those traces went tough the big door inside.


    "Did some of those low lives managed to infiltrate the capital?"


    With the light in his eyes fading away, he shortly made this way towards inside the warehouse.


    With this sword in his hand, he was shortly greeted by the sight of multiple corpses being drowned in their own blood and cages around him with many different people.


    Those people had many different kinds of wounds on their body with the stenching out of them was enough to make someone throw up.


    ''The saintess was indeed right...'' He thought to himself.


    cing this thought away, he swiftly moved around with this sword and cut started cutting the bars of the cages.


    "Thank you for saving us" The many ves thanked the knight in front of them out of gratitude.


    "There is no need to thank me as I simply followed the ways of the Sacred Cross," Lewis said with a big smile on this face.


    After rescuing all the ves of the cages,asked starting to ask around who killed those guys on the ground and resulted in such destruction of the floor.


    Upon hearing that, the man asked was about to answer before someone was a tick faster in his tongue


    "The one who did this to those trash in the ground was an obnoxious dark knight who used magic and a sword." A woman said while still trembling from the bloodlust she received.


    "I see..." Lewis nodded somewhat confused.


    ''A caster wielding a sword? I heard those kinds of people are prodigies.''


    Though spreading yourself in two different kinds of paths would limit you on both of them, the sole fact though was learning both magic and swordsmanship was extremely taxing in both mind and body.


    "Why would someone like hime here and kill this guy?" Lewis mumbled to himself.


    While has was trying to make sense out of this situation, he heard sounds of many stepse closer and closer.


    Turning his head towards the sound, people wearing the guard uniform, and while others had a more polished armor with an emblem on their chest.


    As he wondered who those people were, a guy who looked like the leader of this group looked at Lewis closely before pointing this sword at him.


    "Are you the one who did this!"

 Chapter 94 - Purge My Enemies!

    Seeing the hostility of the soldiers, Lewis frown ever so slightly.


    "Hey! I asked you if you did this or not! Do you know who were are!" The man who yelled radiated an aura of immense pressure among the ves around them.


    "H-Hey, don¡ät you guys feeling that it''s harder to breathe out of suddenly." A young man among the ves said while touching his neck searching forfort.


    "Just looking at him makes my hand tremble....what¡äs going on?" A woman in her early thirties said while herplexion turning paler by the second.


    Such cases were happening in every ve who looked at the leader of the new group. And among the current confusion, an old man stepped up and pointed his shaking finger at the group leader.


    "I know this feeling! I experience that when I met a 3rd-tier knight once! That guy must be at least of the 3rd-tier!" The old man said with a hoarse voice.


    Hearing the old man, the ves who just won their freedom went into a panic.


    Before they were freed, most of them hoped to die right there. With their freedom robbed away from them, the light in their eyes had long since faded in the days inside their cages.


    Everyone inside of those cages didn¡ät know if the abuse that their bodies received would cause their death or the chilling cold would slowly im their lives.


    For them, this ce was hell itself.


    Miserably waiting until they would be chosen to go in a different kind of hell.


    Many thought that being chosen to be sold was their salvation, but deep inside of them they knew the truth.


    The men who would be sold will be forced to work themself to death, while the woman will be used as toys and die as ones.


    Facing such fate many thought it was better to die here in does cages that suffer such fates.


    When they had made up their minds, a deem light showed up with the form of a dark knight.


    What they didn¡ät expect though was that after killing their abusers the knight would leave right after freeing a group of dwarfs.


    While they were falling to despair of rotting on those damn cages, the true light seemed to have descendent for their rescue.


    With steel armor with bright silver color and some small pieces of what looked like gold, he destroyed the chains that kept them in following that cruel fate while at the same time showing them hope.


    And that newly acquired hope was shortly after threatened by a man of the 3rd-tier and his group of other soldiers.


    Compared to the 1th-tier where every person lien on with some being stronger than the other, the gap of strength between the 2nd-tier was immense, and trying to fight someone of this tier while being 1th-tier would be considered the same as suicide.


    After all, the 2nd-tier was the gap where magic and other special skills starting to show up, such as the [Beast Bear Form] that the Dark Fist had used.


    Though the 1th-tier could also rarely achieve such abilities and learn magic, that went only towards the prodigies born with immense talent.


    But when is about the 3rd-tier the power gap grows way out of the tiers below reach.


    If the 1th-tier had a tiny bit of chance beating a weak 2nd-tier person, the 2nd-tier could never hope to evenpare towards the 3rd-tier.


    Seeing the man tier rivaling his own tier, Lewis''s frown grew even more.


    `Of the same tier....¡ä


    Moving this hand on his neck, he bought out across and showed it to the arrived group.


    "This is..." The men beside the 3rd-tier started mumbled and having troubled faces.


    The cross that he showed was the one that every pdin of the Sacred Cross that was at least of 3rd-tier carried. It was a cross made out of pure gold with a diamond-shaped hole in the middle, that in the middle of the hole was an upside-down ¡Þ made out of pure silver that represents how the circle of reincarnation went ording to the teaching of the Goddess of Life.


    The cross was made out of pure gold so that it can represent how life is precious and that taking a life is a heavy burden that one would have to carry for the rest of this life.


    The upside-down ¡Þ silver symbol instead symbolist that every soul has its own ce in the circle of reincarnation.


    The soldiers looked nervously towards their leader with a "What should they do" expression.


    Their leader instead, frowned upon the sight of the cross.


    "Hey, if you are from that damn church, then why are you stopping us? I thought that we made a deal that you keep your nose out of our business." The man said while inspecting Lewis from top to bottom.


    "Huh? What are you talking about?" Hearing what the man said, he sharply red at the 3rd-tier man.


    `From what deal is he talking about?¡ä


    Hearing this response, the man startedughing frantically as if he heard the best joke in this life.


    "Bahahahaha!"


    "I see now! Of course! I should even realize it sooner that you are one of those dogs that follow that bright twinkle light that you all like to call a saintess." The man said with a mocking grin on this face.


    "You...take that back!" Lewi sheathed this sword out of his sheath and pointed it towards the man while releasing a killing intent even stronger than Danzel did a few minutes ago.


    "Heh, so scary~, weren¡ät you suppose to be a pdin who holds killing a person a sin towards you precious goddess? Just so that you know, we were allowed to do this by that church of yours! Bahaha! Now, aren¡ät you a hypocrite, Pa~din~san?"


    The ves who heard that subconsciously gazed at Lewis with doubt and wary look in their eyes.


    "Hey, did the church really allow that?"


    "To think that they would do such a thing..."


    "I am actually a believer towards the Goddes of Life, but this..."


    "Is that some kind of ploy to make us..."


    As the ves were putting more doubts towards the church of the sacred cross, a bright golden glow surrounded Lewi.


    "Lies!" He said with a thunderous voice.


    `So that¡äs what the brightest light, the Saitness meant... those guys probably made some kind of a deal with that heretic!¡ä


    Anger surged through Lewis''s body, but that anger did not blind this judgement.


    "As a 3rd-tier knight, I Lewis Apollo from the Sacred Cross, I will follow the brightest lights orders and eliminate the criminals guing our kingdom!"


    Putting this strength on his feet, the wooden floor cracked and Lewis vanished from this position, only to appear in front of the leader of the group.


    *Thunk!


    A loud sound of shing metal echoed through the building.


    "You..." The man''s arrogant smile faded away, with a shocked expression recing it.


    Though with the help of using this life force he managed to strengthen this body to block the attack, the man wasn¡ät confident that he could defend against that attack.


    While he was thinking of a way to strike the pdin back, he felt a scorching sensation going through around this body.


    "What the-!" Disengaging from the pdin he looked around this body only to see that this clothing was still fine, but that wasn¡ät the same case on this skin too.


    "Tch, how the hell did he burn my hands" The man cursed at the burn marks on his hands.


    "What are you all doing standing there! Go capture does ves already." The man order before dashing towards the pdin using this life force.


    *Thuad!


    Both the swords shed with each other, following that came a series of various shes.


    "Let''s go while the boss is keeping that pdin dog at bay!"


    "Yeah!"


    Seeing the other soldier moving towards the ve, Lewis frown slightly.


    The glow around him turned bright and a burning sensation came towards the leader of the group.


    "Again!?" Determinate not to make the same mistake, he quickly created some distance between the pdin.


    What he didn''t know though was that this by itself was this mistake.


    "Light, Purge my enemies by fire!" Casting this spell, a bright golden light engulfed Lewis''s sword with the light extending even more by the second.


    Turning around, Lewis swung this sword in the direction of the soldiers.


    The light suddenly extend with the immense speed that together with the sword it had a length of 8,50 meters!


    The soldiers who saw that panicked at the iing de, but as the light touched their body, nothing seemed to happen to them.


    "Huh? What was that? Was it only to scare u-" As the one soldier was asking the same question as all others.


    mes exploded in their body one by one, bringing together pain and agony.


    "Kyaah!"

 Chapter 95 - Bar And Shameless Gerak

    The day soon past and the night soon greeted Bernes.


    And in the middle of such night where only a fewnterns light up the roads, a figure with a dark cloak around his body with a dark gray helmet with only four small holes run through the roofs of buildings.


    Combined with theck of light on the roofs and this equipment, the way he blended with the darkness could make him close to invisible.


    "That damn Gerak..." Danzel cursed under this breath.


    Reaching the Ouru`Fire Smith, he nced below him at the two soldiers guarding the door.


    "To think he would make me do errands such as this...."


    ***


    Going back to the time when Danzel with the dwarfs left the warehouse...


    "So where is the guy that can bring us out of the capital, Gerak?" Danzel said as he turned towards Gerak and the dwarfs.


    Hiding around an abandoned alley, he gazed towards all the heavy breathing dwarfs with their arms on their knees just so that they could support themselves from falling.


    `Tch, so annoying. Compared to the supreme race that never tires, those guys are simply pathetic!¡ä


    Of course, if I were topare Geraks status with some other human they would obviously be superior, but the short legs of those guys are indeed not made for running.


    The dwarfs who felt a gaze upon them stared at Danzel with astonishment.


    Not only does he carry a long sword to his waist, but he also wore heavy armor on top of that!


    Seeing him not showing any signs of exhaustion or fatiguepletely baffled them.


    After all, as cksmiths of the journeyman rank, they knew very well by just a glimpse of how much that armor must weigh.


    "Haah...You...give me... a second." Gerak said with some difficulty.


    "..." Crossing these arms together, Danzel stared at him unemotionally.


    "Ugh... Alright, I am fine now." Gerak straightens this back before looking at Danzel.


    "As for the guy that I told you about, this base is actually near the slums too."


    "Slums?" Danzel asked.


    "Do you really know a guy who can bring us out Gerak?"


    The dwarfs around him asked Gerak with a slight doubt showing on their faces.


    "Dammit Smithen, when have I ever lied to you and the other guys!?" Gerak raised his voice while ring at them with a hurt expression.


    But those guys didn¡ät buy this act.


    "The time when you told me that you are going to pay for my drinks, then left without me so that I pay for your drink too..." The dwarf Smithen says.


    "Or when you said to borrow a mana crystal for a day, and till yet never saw that crystal before..."Another dwarf voiced his opinion.


    "I still remember buying a bunch of iron of the highest quality at market price from you, to only get the scrap of your work!"


    "Also..."


    ...


    "Enough!" Gerak yelled while looking at this fellow cksmith as if they were traitors.


    Looking at Geraks face, making it difficult for Danzel not tough.


    But he still refrained fromughing as he knew there was other more important stuff to do.


    "So...he is in the slums, yes?" Danzel asked slightly impatiently.


    "Ah, yes~yes" Gerak who realized that they went off topic nodded this head before walking towards the end of the alley.


    "Come on, I will show you where it is, it isn¡ät that far."


    Following closely behind him, Danzel asked.


    "Who is actually the guy who will bring us out? One of the corrupted guards?


    "Hehe, wrong." Putting a vicious smile on this face, Gerak answered.


    "He is a smuggler."


    "Huh?"


    ****


    "Is it here?" Danzel looked in front of him confused


    "Yeah, follow me."


    Opening the door in front of us, I and the dwarfs followed closely behind Gerak.


    "This ce is..." One of the dwarfs said with a low voice.


    "I-Imbossible..."


    "To think I will live the day to see such a ce again..."


    ring at the emotional dwarfs and then at the ce he couldn¡ät help but ask.


    "Ehm...isn¡ät this ce..." Before Danzel could finish this sentence, the dwarfs answered all at the same time.


    "A bar!"


    `Huh? Why are those guys so excited?¡ä Looking at their practically glowing eyes them and back at the bar, Danzel couldn¡ät help but wonder why they were so excited.


    "Tch, damned dwarfs." A man said while looking at our group with clear distance.


    After all, how could they get excited in such an environment?


    The men who were sitting together on the tables all looked at us with hostility with some even drawing their weapons.


    "Ehm...Gerak, are you sure we are in the right ce?" Smithen said as he came back to reality.


    "Those guys..." But towards receiving killing intent, Danzel wasn¡ät so good at it.


    cing this hand on top of Veren¡äs hilt, he released his own bloodlust towards all the others.


    "What the..."


    "This guy is serious..."


    All the men who pointed their killing intent to us quickly turned around like scared kids who were about to be beaten.


    "Dear sir...what would you like to have on such a nice night?" A thin old man wearing ck clothing who. Was cleaning a ss behind the serving table said towards Danzel.


    "Hmm..." Turning around and ring at the old man for a few seconds, he removed his bloodlust and this hand from Veren¡äs hilt.


    `I better not...this guy feels off.¡ä


    As Danzel was about to answer the old man, a dwarf beat him first.


    "Hey, Sebas! Long time no see! How are those bones of you doing?" Gerak said as he sat at the table and talked as he met a long-lost friend.


    "Oh, my. If it isn¡ät master Iffuro himself, what can I offer you this night for?" The old man Sebas said with a smile while his eyes seemed to be still closed.


    "I would like ten falcon shots from that burning forest bottle that you like to hide so much."


    The old man Sebas suddenly stopped cleaning the ss in his hand and red at Gerak.


    "Of course, pleasee this way..." Sebas pointed at the door going behind the door.


    "You have my gratitude, Sebas," Gerak said with a smile before going in the door.


    The other dwarfs who saw that interaction between these two looked at each other before shrugging and following after Gerak.


    As I was about to cross the door, Seba''s eyes turned towards me.


    "Don¡ät make mee, kid."


    "..." Hearing the old man''s remark, I subconsciously nodded, before hastily following the group.


    `This guy is more than bad news...¡ä From this moment forth Danzel swiftly swore to never mess with that old man as he made his bones flinch for an instance.


    Moving together with the group, we soon reached a big room with a man that supervised others at the moment.


    Taking notice of theing group, the man turned around with a smile.


    "If it isn¡ät master Iffuro himself, did you bring another of you grates here? The one of before sold pretty well."


    "Nah, this time I am searching for your expertise. We need to get out of the capital today, can you do it?"


    The man who heard that halted for a second before gazing towards our group with a frown.


    "Of course, that would be of no problem, but the price would be-" Before the man could finish, Gerak pointed at Danzel with a smug smile.


    "Oh, he is paying."


    "What?" Danze turned around and looked at Gerak for a length of five seconds.


    Gerak in response frowned.


    "What? Didn¡ät you say that you got more money to spend than you have? Don''t be a cheapskate"


    Rolling his ethereal eyes at Gerak, he turned around towards the man and asked.


    "How much..."


    "Well, since you all are with master Iffuro. It will cost you the so low as 100 gold coins..."


    "Oh, I guess that¡äs fair-"


    "...Per person" The man awkwardly smiles at him.


    "..."


    `Hey, what low price of 1000! You are robbing us or rather me!¡ä


    ring hatefully towards Gerak, he brought out the gold coins from this ring.


    "S-So many gold coins..." Smithen said surprised.


    "Let me count them for you." The man said with a hind of surprise in this voice.


    After a while of counting the massive amount of coins. The man turned towards Danzel with an awkward smile.


    "Sir...that''s exactly 999 gold coins."


    "..."


    "..."


    "..."


    An awkward silence fell within the group.


    Looking at Danzel pitifully, Gerak said.


    "Danzel..."


    "Oh? My bad then." Danzel bought another gold coin and throw it at the man as he couldn''t handle the pitiful gazes that they showed at him.


    "Exactly, 1000 hold coins. That should be enough to get you guys out of the capital at 2 am at this location. Take it or leave it." Giving a map, he took the gold, leaving the group while making someone bring them outside the bar.


    "So we just need to go to that spot right, Danzel pointed at the map.


    "That''s about it." As the dwarfs sighed in relief, Gerak whispered towards Danzel.


    "Hey, Danzel I need you to make me a favor."


    Danzel who was ring at the dwarf of half this height was speechless.


    "Not only do you take my money, but you also want me to make you a favor? You sure are shameless, aren''t you?"


    Putting a serious face, Gerak said.


    "If you don''t do it you aren''t going toe with us..."


    Hearing that, his ethereal imminently red up with green light while starting at Gerak with a hint of killing intent.


    "What did you just say?"

 Chapter 96 - Is Just The Wind

    "What did you just say?" Danzel said with this chilling voice.


    Even though Gerak tried to keep himself calm and serious, the sudden blood lust from Danzel was like throwing ice-cold water on top of him.


    His heart started racing while cold sweat was already forming behind this back just by looking at him.


    *Gulp...


    Gerak nervously stared at Danzel, while this figure was by the second growing taller and taller.


    "I...."


    "Exin, if the answer is fitting then you might survive." Danzel interrupted Gerak.


    ''Maybe...''Gerak''s grim expression became even worse by that word.


    "Well...the thing is that the sword that I spend all my resources, including the money from you runes were spent into the creation of this work is back at my forge".


    "I nned to deliver this sword for my apprenticeship test in hopes to increase my chances. Going back in the kingdom would be a massive loss on my side and maybe destroy all myst hopes of getting an apprenticeship "


    Putting a brave front, Gerak said firmly.


    "And I couldn''t possibly want to separate myself from his chance!"


    Danzel looked at the dwarf speechless.


    Gripping the sheath, Danzel slowly drew Veren out.


    A panicked look showed on Geraks face.


    "Wait, wait! Hear me out! There are benefits too!"


    Hearing the magic word, Danzel removed this blood lust and looked and hinted to go on.


    "You see... since I ain''t having a [Ring of Spatial Storage] such as you lucky an*s, I usually keep most on my saving behind a small hidden door under the reception table. There should be some left from my savings and the sword".


    "..." Staring at Gerak, Danzel''s silence started to creep Gerak a bit.


    "Gerak, you should know that I got no use of money. What''s the use of mentioning money to me?" Danzel said solemnly.


    "You ungrateful country pumpkin! Money makes the world move! Someone like you will never understand the effort that goes into making money!" Gerak pointed that, feeling greatly insulted by Danzel''s remark.


    Gerak didn''t know much if not anything about runes, but what he knew was, that making runes waspletely free of any costs!


    Compared to enchanting that required rare resources and cksmithing that took hours just to craft an item.


    Rune carving basicallyughs at those two upations right in their faces.


    Dismissing the fact that runes needed a catalyst for them to work, they were no other cost involved.


    And with runes being so scarce and the process of carving being if mastered less than a half an hour.


    One would swim in gold coins.


    After all, runes counted as an additional permanent increase of someone''s equipment.


    The one seeking external power wouldn''t hesitate to throw their gold coins at Danzel.


    Heck, they would even beg him to take their money from their wallets!


    Though as a dwarf cksmith, Gerak received a simr treatment, he who had to worry about finding mana crystals and various resources to continue crafting and improving his skills in cksmithing find it unfair.


    "..." Danzel stared at Gerak and began stroking the hilt of Veren with seemingly no good intent.


    Seeing that, Gerak started to get nervous.


    "Danzel... There shouldn''t be anyone on my smithy and I just want you to pick my stuff for me. Though others except for me and Smithen, the others aren''t aiming for an apprentice. But I do."


    "And my only chance to receive it is by presenting this sword. Without it I ain''t leaving Bernes...and without me present those guys would never help you out of the capital..."


    Gerak bowed. At 90 degrees towards Danzel.


    "Please, I need to retrieve the sword. Consider it as if own you..."


    Geraks bow looked somewhatedic to Danzel as the former was half his height.


    Looking at the genuine look of Gerak, he moved this head and stared at the sky.


    `I should even know thating in the capital was a mistake..." Danzel though.


    Though he gained many benefits froming here, in his opinion. The risk involved wasn¡ät worth the reward.


    The moment he showed this ability of runesmithing, he was doomed to bring unwanted attention to himself. Be that as it may, he could only me himself alone, not Gerak.


    He had many chances to leave while also achieving his original object, which was to get a new armor for himself.


    If he had left after the first auction, he would have the armor at the gold to get by around for a long time.


    `I don¡ät regret it...¡ä Danzel firmly thought while ncing at his [Ring of Spatial Storage] and all other items he got inside of it.


    `Getting myself such treasure and the resources to grind my XP in peace was good enough... I shouldn¡ät be greedy.¡ä


    "You just want me to pick the sword right..?"


    Gerak raised this head in surprise and looked straight at Danzel with a hopeful expiration.


    "Yes..."


    Dark green ethereal mana siped out of Danzel''s armor, wrapping around his armor.


    "Understood..." Leaving traces to the ground, he used [Leap] together with [Dash] to jump up high.


    Gripping a window of the building, Danzels finger dug in the stone itself before using the samebination of skills to jump to the roof.


    "Don¡ät forget, you own me one..."


    Danzel voice echoed through the alley before he disappeared from the sight of the dwarfs.


    ****


    Night in front of the Ouru¡äFire Smith...


    "Ugh... here I epted the transfer from the gates just for the better pay, but to think that they would make me work at night..." A man wearing a guard''s uniformined out loud.


    "That¡äs why I am telling you to hear probable before you ept any new jobs, you idiot." The man beside him with the same uniform mocked shortly after.


    "Are you calling me an idiot, Tedric?" The man frown.


    "Of course I mean you Derrick, do you see someone else around in the road or roof?" Tedric said as if he was stating facts.


    "Tedric, you..." Derrick''s face frowned at this friend.


    "Now~now, at least see the positives. With that money we get for today would be enough to go somewhere and have some fun with a ve or two." Tedric said with a vicious smile on his face


    Hearing that, Derrick quickly dismissed his annoyance towards this friend.


    "Sigh...why are we even sent in that abandon smithy anyway?" Derrick said while watching some insects gathering around the light out of boredom.


    "Man...did you ept the job without knowing anything about it?" Tedric look at Derrick as if he was an idiot.


    "Well... all I know is that I have to stand guard here and the additional pay. As for the details..." Derrick scratches this cheek out of embarrassment.


    He felt quite awkward being caught red-handed.


    "Sigh...dwarf cksmiths have been disappearing suddenly all around the capital and the abandon smithy behind us was where one of those dwarfs was."


    "I see..." Derrick nodded solemnly, with an expression saying `I listen to absolute nothing¡ä.


    "Anyway, will you be paying after our shift is over-" Before Derrick finishes his sentence, arge roof tile fell to the ground, shattering into many pieces.


    *Bh!


    Both Derrick and Tedric pulled out their weapons and pointed them at the ce where the roof tile fell.


    "Who is there!" Tedric screamed while scanning these surroundings.


    ...


    Except for his echoes, silence fell in the dark roads with only somenterns lighting the way.


    "Hey Derrick, go check that alley over there quickly..." Tedric said while looking at the roof tile and a dark alley path.


    "Huh? Why should I go? Is just the wind..." Derrick said annoyed.


    "Go already..." Tedric firmly said while looking warry around.


    Seeing that, Derrick frown.


    "Tch, fine! But you will be paying for the next drink." Derrick said while walking towards the broken roof tile.


    Tedric who stayed behind at the door looked at Derrick and sighted internally.


    `I guess the recent war got me stressed out to make me paranoid.¡ä As Tedric put this sword back in his sheath. A cloaked figure came from above with a long sword covered with cloth.


    When the cloaked figure made a contact with the ground, no sound was made.


    Without noticing the tall cloaked figure, a hand blocked Tedrics mouth, with the long sword shortly piercing Tedrics heart.


    "!!!" Tedric wanted to scream out of pain, but the fingers of the cloaked figure basically sank in this face, making him unable to make any sound at all.


    The cloth covered long sword glowed weakly with crimson light and the cloth that absorbed the blood started to get clean again.


    In less than three seconds, Tedric lost all his strength with the light on his eyes fading away.


    "Hey, Tedric! It was just the wind after all!" Derrick called out as he was getting closer to the smithy from the alley he went.


    The cloaked figure quickly pulled his sword out and in less than a second, the corpse of Tedric vanishedpletely into thin air.


    The cloaked figure hastily jumped to the roof, disappearing without leaving any traces of blood or body.


    "Hey, make sure that you will pay for the nex-" As Derrick came out of the alley and back to the road of the Ouru¡äFire Smith.


    There were no traces of Tedric to be seen.


    "Huh?" Stunned, Derrick looked around nervously.


    "T-Tedric? Tedric! Where you-" With panic showing in this face.


    A shadow befell on him.


    And before he knew it, a runed de pierced this heart.

 Chapter 97 - Geraks Fetish

    *Creak


    The door of the Ouru¡äFire Smith opened slowly with a creaking noise.


    Appearing in the door was a two-meter tall figure with a dark cloak around him and a long sword in his right arm while his left arm was dragging a corpse through the ground.


    *Bah


    Throwing the corpse in front of him, the tall figure removed this cloak, and who appeared was Danzel with this dark gray heavy ted armor with his helmet having only four small holes, it brings the question of how he even saw.


    "Ugh... wearing a pauldron with those spikes on me sure is awkward..." Danzelined as he inspected his cloak..


    Though the spikes weren¡ät particrly long, their sharpness wasn¡ät to joke tough about.


    If it weren¡ät for the fact that this cloak was of high quality, he could say goodbye to this cloak already.


    Heck, they were already signs of damage inside the cloak around the shoulder area.


    `I will have to ask Gerak where I can get myself a better cloak after I got brought this stupid sword.¡ä Danzel thought.


    Even if we decided to leave Bernes, learning if there is a better quality of equipment wouldn''t hurt to know in the long run.


    There might be other forbidden items that are banned formon people to use like [The Ring of Spatial Storage].


    ¡äThough the ring was an exceptional item that could revolutionalize the transportation of goods among themon people.


    Even I can tell how badly this will go if made in public.¡ä


    Releasing the ring would remove the manual work for good but at the same time allow for items to be easily smuggled out.


    Just the imagination that a sole guy can carry all items of a cksmith shop outside the capital by just walking like you every day Joe would be enough for the officials of the army to pull their hairs out of their roots.


    Since in the times of war, losing around 50 swords at first doesn¡ät sound much with the scale that the kingdom of Berum and Arcana kingdom is.


    But if that were to be an everyday thing though, sooner orter they wouldn¡ät be able to take part in these wars.


    But in my opinion, the most useful use that the ring had was...


    Hiding corpses.


    "The ring sure is convenient, if only the space inside the ring was a bitrger I wouldn¡ät have to carry that guy inside here," Danzel said while bringing the corpse of the soldier who was called Tedric.


    Though the [Ring of Spatial Storage] wasn¡ät capable of holding living things that had a soul in them.


    Putting soul-less corpses inside was no problem at all.


    That point alone was enough for me to increase my favorability by +1 towards the ring.


    "After I get rid of those weapons inside the ring, storage issues would be of no problem in the future." Imagining the golden future of me no longer having to scrap around for just a tinny bit more space in that damn ring, was a future worth looking forwards to.


    Instead of dreaming of the glorious future ahead of me, now were more important things to think about.


    For example...


    Going behind the counter table, I broke the floor in the area where Gerak specifically says and what revealed itself was a small brown cloth bag of coins with two small orange mana crystals and a giant sheath with a sword in it.


    "Sigh...why is it so big? How am I suppose to fit all that damn thing?" Danzel cursed at the sword''s length.


    Comparing the two swords, the one that Gerak made seemed to be 8 inches longer than Veren was, which in other words was a damn big sword.


    Drawing the sword out of the sheath, I was quickly surprised by the shape of it.


    "A mberge huh," Danzel said unconsciously as he could stare at his image on the wavy sword.


    Though there were no lights inside the smithy, once the de was out it showed orange light.


    [mberge of Bleeding Rage]: A de crafted by the journeyman dwarf cksmith. The wavy de was crafted with the sole intent to cut deep into the flesh of others while with the middle tier enchantment on it. The enchantment inflicts [Scourging Wounds] and [Running Bleed] effect behind. The material of the de was craft increase greatly the flow of mana with the fire affinity and an extremely sharp, yet sturdy de.


    [Scourging Wounds]: Upon wounding an enemy, infect the area of your target with mana which will continue to burn the flesh and increase the difficulty towards healing effects.


    [Running Bleed]: Upon wounding an enemy, infect the area of your target with mana, which will continue guiding the target''s blood to the outside, leaving the enemy with continued bleeding. Increase of difficulty towards healing effects.


    `Damn, that''s even nastier than the other sword of before! Does Gerak give a hidden fetish with inflicting the most amount of pain to someone?¡ä Danzel shook this hand as he look at the sword.


    Though he wasn¡ät the best example of it, since he sucks both blood and vitality of his enemies. Geraks sword was of another level of pain...


    I think?


    He thought that his runes were a lot less painful than this sword, but he couldn¡ät cast the doubt that was lingering inside of him.


    After all, he was undead.


    He didn¡ät know how it felt to have burning flesh or having one''s vitality sucked up.


    Since, well...


    He was just bones.


    "Putting the mberge aside... Let¡äs see what does two things are." Grabbing both crystals, a window shortly appeared with the help of an internalmand.


    [Medium Fire Crystal (Small)]: A stone that finished the process of crystalization that holds the affinity of fire. It¡äs currently in the process of Removing his impurities.


    "Oh, a medium crystal. That¡äs a first." Seeing the description of chance in the crystal, Danzel was slightly surprised.


    From thest months, he only saw Lesser crystal and at best one was normal crystals. Seeing a new type of tier on the crystal was a pleasant find.


    Since his shield and armor used only dark crystals that crystallized around 90%. The next tier which was the medium was 100% crystalized.


    Though he didn¡ät know much of the use of such crystals other than that they were used in crafting items, it didn¡ät take a genius to figure which one was better than the other.


    "Sadly those two are of the fire attribute and not of dark. Andpared to other crystals, those two make two-thirds of a normal crystal."


    Nevertheless, it seemed worth iting back here.


    After all, two crystals that you can''t find in the market should trante to being forbidden formon use.


    Yet, it was just a guess of mine.


    Putting the crystals safe in the ring.


    I quickly gathered the 36 remaining gold coins which were pathetically fewpared to what I had to spend on the dwarfs.


    Still, it was better than nothing.


    Preparing to leave the smith, an idea suddenly struck my mind which made me hesitate.


    "Should I... Begin my ss advancement here?" Danzel asked himself.


    Though he avoided it for quite some time because of all the work that he had, with no more work left to do. It was time to proceed into the next ss.


    The hesitation that he had thought was that he was still in the smithy where enemies coulde and check on those two guards.


    If he were somehow distracted in the process he was afraid to mess things up.


    What he was most worried about was the seat mana leaking out of this body and leaving traces behind.


    If he were to refrain to upgrade his ss though until he was going to be alone. He wouldn''t be able to upgrade his ss.


    "Sigh..let''s see first what we got on our wallet before purchasing."


    Opening the status window.


    Danzel information shows up.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 1012/1012


    Attribute points: 9


    Attributes: Strength:140 Agility: 118 Intelligence: 92 Endurance: 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Earth Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield Bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Riposte Defense Lv.1] [Armor Preserve Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead Carver of Superior Strength. One of the strongest natural draugr that there is. Though his tier undead far surpasses this strength. For your current tier of strength, you can be considered a powerhouse.]


    [Storage: 200 325 XP]


    "Such a huge amount of XP..." Danzel looked at the numbers as if he was mesmerized.


    He had a hard time not spending his hard-earned juice to strengthen himself.


    But he still decided against it.


    "I am strong enough for now... It''s not like the XP will run away."


    Reaching his conclusion, he put on his cloak and left the smithy with the two corpses behind.

 Chapter 98 - Leaving

    In Administration Building of the army.


    "What do you mean that you can¡ät find them!" Nikzel screamed with rage while throwing his seat to the ground.


    He looked at Archman as if he was about to jump at him and strangle him on the spot.


    Which of course made Archman in turn very nervous.


    He knew, the moment he received the news of the disappearance of those dwarfs and the ones that traded runed items with them, he was bound to get himself in trouble with the general.


    Worst of all, the mercenary who disappeared was suspected to be the runesmith himself.


    That information alone made Nikzel lose his cool.


    "Our troops are undergoing investigation all around the capital, news of their finding will soon arrive...." Archman said while looking down to the floor, afraid to meet the gaze of the enraged old man.


    "Soon!? What are you talking about! They probably have already left the capital by now!" Nikzel said while pointing at his window that the sun has already risen.


    "But general... since months ago we increased the security on the gates. Someone leaving the capital without any notice would be impossible-" Though Archman tried to exin the situationto him, he was shortly cut in the middle on his sentence.


    "I don¡ät want to hear anything of you anymore! Go out and give the orders to continue the search!" Nikzel pointed at the door, making his statement clear.


    "Yes..." Archman said dejectedly.


    Staring at the closed door, Nikzel picked up his seat and sat at it.


    "That damn idiot... to think he would actually do such a thing in times of war" Nikzel whispered to himself while looking at the recent reports.


    "I should even gotten rid of that noble who ys the king in the filthy slums. Even though we warned him, he got bold enough to kidnap dwarfs!" Nikzel said enraged.


    "Heh, ridiculous. The nobles who were supposed to protect the kingdom are instead pushing it deeper into the mes. If only King Bernes didn¡ät have died, this situation wouldn¡ät have ur." Closing his eyes, Nikzel remembered the first time he met the almighty sovereign behind the Kingdom of Berum.


    His death fifteenth years ago was also the beginning of the Fallen War.


    With the main yers being the Arcana kingdom and the Berum kingdom.


    The war was named as such since the fall of their king bought fourth the war itself.


    "Sigh...there is no point about talking about already spilled milk. What¡äs done is done." Nikzel shook his head before staring at the other reports.


    "Although I can work around that problem somehow, that guy...Rue Danzel was it? While he yed the porter, he might actually been the runesmith himself!"


    That guy was already on their suspicious list a long time ago.


    Through many background checks, the man Rue Danzel never existed in the first ce and just simple appeared out of nowhere.


    Going through the reports, they said that he would just stay at a house near the slums for weeks without going out and then magicallye out with a patch of runed weapons and deliver them to the dwarf Iffuro Gerak who was known for selling multiple weapons and different armor sets to the ck market or outside the kingdom.


    The only reason why they didn¡ät arrest those two was that Gerak was a member of the three factions of the dwarf kingdom, while Danzel might be the clue they needed to find the runesmith.


    If they by some chance were to arrest them and turned out to be wrong. There was the chance that they would have scared the runesmith that was backing them away, which if that were to happen would be a huge loss towards the kingdom.


    After all, runes were extremely rare with the only known runesmith through the whole kingdom being the Archmage Raphael Crafbinder, one of the Feathers.


    If they were topare that unknown runesmith to Raphael, he could very well be an archmage himself.


    If they were to receive the wrath of such a being, they would fall in a very annoying position.


    "Ahh! I feel like my brain is trembling! I only got so many years until my retirement and yet such a situation ured. And all that because of an idiot noble ying with lowlifes!"


    After throwing insults left and right towards all the people he could hold responsible for, he calmed down and started to think about how to fix the situation.


    "First I will have to keep that information of going outside the kingdom for as long as possible. If that guy, Rue Danzel really is that runesmith then he might attract outsiders such as the council into the mix...." Getting amunication device out of his pocket, he said with an unemotional voice.


    "Kill all the found ves, leave not a single one alive. Also, make it so that you don¡ät get found..."


    "Yes, General..." Another voice replied from the device and the light of the device faded away, indicating that it was closed.


    "With that out of the way, I will have to find a scapegoat, otherwise either one of the Feathers or the church wille and create some trouble-" As he was scratching his head for any ideas, Nikzel froze as a light of insight came before him.


    "Right! Where was it now..." Searching among the resent reports, Nikzel found what he was looking for.


    Reading through the report, he sighted out loudly.


    "After all those years I refrained to take a side in their business, but it seems like it¡äs time to pick aside."


    Putting the report on the table, he stood up and left his office with themunications device in his hands.


    *Bam.


    The closed-door brought a small breeze through the room, throwing the report that Nikzel ced in the table to the ground.


    Though the report was covered with other papers at the top, a line was able to be seen.


    "-Involved into freeing the ves, Sacred Cross 3rd-tier pdin, Lewis Appolo of the true believer''s faction-"


    ***


    In a run-down house near the walls at 2 am...


    Ten small cloaked figures were waiting outside the house together with a two meters tall figure.


    Suddenly the door of the house opened, revealing to be an old man.


    Staring at the eleven cloaked figures, he signaled them toe in.


    Following the man into the house and closing the door, every one of them removed their cloaks.


    "Thanks for guiding us outside of the Capital Sebas." Gerak said towards the old man.


    "It¡äs nothing worth mentioning" Sebas replied with a smile, before opening a trap door hidden beneath a worn-out carpet.


    "Follow me."


    Going in the trap door was revealed to be a long tunnel lightened up by a few glowing stones.


    Pointing towards the seemingly unending tunnel, Sebas said.


    "Now I will take my leave, you just have to walk straight that path and in around twenty minutes you will find your way out."


    The old man bowed slightly before turning this back towards the trapdoor.


    "And here I thought he would guide us towards the exit..." Danzel said as he looked at the departing old man.


    "Well, they probably have their own reasons for doing that. Instead of chatting away, let¡äs go already." Gerak said as he took the lead towards the long path.


    The other dwarfs who were previously anxious followed behind Gerak.


    Though Sebas mentioned that it would take twenty minutes to reach the end of the path, the old man probably forgot to mention that he meant in human standards.


    With the short legs of a dwarf, they reached the end of the tunnel after half an hour of just walking.


    While some of the dwarfs breathing heavily, Danzel stared at them the whole time silently, which the dwarfs interpreted as "Why are you guys so slow?".


    "So that''s the exit right?" Danzel said while pointing at the door.


    "Ha~ Yeah, it should be..." Gerak said with difficulties.


    Nodding towards Gerak, Danzel bought the Veren sword out of his sheath and walked towards the door.


    The dwarfs who saw this flinched for a second, the scene of this dark gray knight was still vivid in their memories together with his blood-drinking sword.


    Although he killed those bastards who abused those ves and in the end freed them from the cruel fate that was awaiting them.


    The scene of him fighting was still terrifying to watch.


    "Let me go first," Danzel said with this cold voice.


    `His voice is creepy too...¡ä All the dwarfs though at the same time.


    Opening the door, Danzel was greeted by rays of light that would usually blind someone and make them turn their head away.


    But as an undead, he didn¡ät have to.


    And he was d that he didn¡ät.


    As before him was a sight that closely rivaled the cave where he first woke up.


    Coming out of the door, where it was hidden inside a huge tree.


    He stared at the beautiful huge walls that he once saw when he entered the Capital of Bernes for the first time.


    With the sun rising in the right angle, the already beautiful walls seemed to now glow in golden light, making a mesmerizing sight to witness.


    "It¡äs time to leave..." Danzel said, frozen upon that sight.

 Chapter 99 - Separating

    As Danzel was still mesmerized by the beautiful sight before him, he felt a light nudge behind his back.


    "Hmm?" Turning his head around, he nkly stared at the Gerak who had his head raised up with a nervous expression.


    "And? How is it Danzel? Is it safe?" Gerak whispered as he tried to look past my body.


    "Ehm...yeah, nothing to worry about" Danzel said, while stepping aside to let the dwarfse out.


    "Finally! Freedom!"


    "It was so stuffy in there."


    "I can¡ät feel my legs...."


    Watching the dwarfsing out of the tree together with their remarks I would have rolled my eyes if I could.


    `Damn drama queens¡ä Danzel thought to himself as he stared at his status window and was seemingly lost in thoughts.


    Gerak who was equally as tired and saw the absence minded Danzel staring at a tree with worrisome attention, he decided to step in.


    "Alright guys, let¡äs take a small break before we continue. Make sure to check your stuff and eat before we start again."


    Hearing that, the other dwarfs put a relieved face before copsing to their butts before bringing out all kinds of food.


    "..." Looking at the dwarfs starting a pic in the middle of a forest, outside a hidden pathway made Danzel wonder if they realized in what kind of situation they currently were in.


    "Don¡ät be too harsh on those guys, after what happend to those guys they trully are in need of some stress to relieve." Gerak said who noticed my stare.


    `I guess he is right, those guys almost became ves and who knows what kind of treatment they received in there.¡ä Staring at the dwarfs, Danzel remembered the group of ves that he had to silence once.


    Looking back when he traveled together with Oliver and the ves, he remembers seeing their bruised and scarred skin.


    Though their situation was worth pitying about, he didn¡ät regret killing them back then.


    After all, he had no idea what kind of consequence he would receive if words got out that he killed a ve trader.


    Remembering the path where Oliver was guiding the carriage back then, he clearly aimed to bring me to that warehouse full of ves.


    If I weren¡ät for the fact that I decided to kill him and get out of there. I would probably had died back then.


    Meeting that Bald Fist back when I first came inside the capital would even spell my death.


    Heck, the two magic caster¡äs would probably be enough to reduce me into a pile of bones!


    In a sense, killing both Oliver and the ves was actually jumping over a pit of fire!


    Nodding towards Gerak, he pulled out the mberge from his spatial storage ring and gave it to Gerak.


    "This is what you wanted right?"


    Taking the massive sword in his hands, Gerak was almost dragged down by the weight alone. Staring at the wavy de Gerak was all smile as if he met his long-lost lover atst.


    "That¡äs my baby! Thank you for bringing it back to me, Danzel"


    As Gerak was still observing the wavy de with a gentle look, turning the other side of the de he froze like a statue.


    "D-Danzel...are those..." Gerak said with a shaking voice of excitement.


    Staring at the engraved words that resembled the word `Ser¡ä, his hands holding the de began shaking with excitement.


    "You might have guessed it, I put one of my runes into that `baby¡ä of yours. As for what kind of rune it is I don¡ät really have to exin don¡ät I?" Danzel said looking at the excitement dwarf half his height.


    Realizing that he was embarrassing himself, Gerak bowed towards Danzel.


    "I am in much gratitude, Danzel. With this, I am confident to pass the apprenticeship test."


    Looking at Gerak nkly, Danzel leaned his back towards a tree.


    "You know Gerak? On thest day where we ended up in this situation, I was thinking and thinking about not being able to decide something...Do you know what I mean?" Danzel stared unemotionally towards Gerak.


    "Huh? What do you mean by that? If something is troubling you I might be of help." Gerak said confused.


    Shaking this head, he replied.


    "Gerak, to be honest with you, I''ve been thinking if I should kill all of you here right now or let you live. And I ain¡ät sure if you can help with this decision."


    Hearing that, Geraks eyes turned wide open while taking a step back.


    "W-What?" Gerak said with a shaking voice.


    He felt as if he was stapped with a cold de through his heart,pletely frozen in fear with the bright rays of light from the sun behind him turning into a dark light.


    He was shocked beyond believe at what he heard.


    Staring the shocked look of Gerak, Danzel wasn¡ät surprised.


    "Gerak, you shouldn¡ät be surprised by that" Danzel said with this cold voice.


    "Why..? Why would you be thinking of killing us?" Gerak said, still shaken by what he heard.


    Danzel in response just shrugged his shoulders at Gerak.


    "Why you ask? Isn¡ät already obvious?" Danzel said with a mocking tone.


    "Though when I came to the capital I didn¡ät know much of the importance surrounding being a runesmith. Now I know."


    "And the one who contributed the most of me finding that out was none other than you, Gerak." Danzel said before staring silently at Gerak.


    "..." Gerak, who had already dropped the mberge, stared at Danzel with silence as if he realized something.


    "...You should know, that letting you guys live puts my own safety at risk-"


    "Danzel, do you really think that we are going to give away information about you." Gerak said, with this voice sounding a bit betrayed.


    Danzel who noticed that simple pointed at the lying mberge to the ground.


    "Even if you don¡ät say anything, if you were to give that sword for your test, those guys that you mention will find out..."


    "Or are you telling me, that a master cksmith wouldn¡ät realize that this sword has runes when a journeyman cksmith realizes that by just a look?"


    Gerak opened his mouth to object, but not a single word came out.


    He stared at the mberge with shaking eyes.


    `He is right, the moment I give this de to the masters to judge, they will find out that it has runes. Although by rules I should find an apprenticeship, the secret of knowing a runesmith wille out.¡ä


    Realizing that Danzel was right, he turned his head and stared at his fellow dwarfs joking around with food in their hands while appraising each other weapons that they nned to present.


    `I should even listen to father back when I left home, that money isn¡ät everything...¡ä


    `I sold countless weapons in the ck market and dealt with hundreds of sketchy figures. I receive resources that no other dwarf of my age could possibly hope to gain.¡ä


    `Though I knew it wasn¡ät right to do that. With those resources, I could rise my skills in cksmithing and craft items of higher quality, with that mberge being my absolute master piece.¡ä


    `But now in the very end, those decisions seemed toe back and bite him.¡ä Gerak thought while having a bitter smile on his face.


    "Danzel...can you make me a favor?" Gerak said.


    "Favour? You sure got the gut-" Before Danzel could curse at Gerak, he got interrupted by Gerak.


    "Can you let the other¡äs go?" Gerak said with a serious tone.


    "..."


    "Danzel, I am determined to go back to my kingdom with that sword no matter the cost." Gerak pointed at the mberge.


    "Although those guys know that you are a runesmith, they can¡ät possibly prove that and with the one that saved them being you. The chance of them snizzing on you is none existent."


    "But that doesn¡ät count for me. If I go back they will know- No, I will make sure that they know that you are a runesmith." Gerak said as he stared directly at my helmet.


    "Spare them, but kill me, Danzel."


    "..." Danzel, who silently stared at Gerak moved close to him with this hand on Verens hilt.


    Closing his eyes, Gerak prepared himself from the iing de.


    But the long-awaited de never came.


    "Huh?"


    Opening his eyes he saw Danzel going past him and walking towards another direction of the forest.


    "Danzel! Wai-!"


    Danzel who turned his head around replied.


    "That will be our parting now, Gerak. I decided to let you guys live, don¡ät make me regret my decision..." Saying that, dark green ethereal mana re through his body.


    "Don¡ät forget that you own me one, Gerak."


    Saying that Danzel dashed towards the forest, and shortly disappeared from the dwarf''s sight.


    The dwarfs who were eating peacefully by now looked in the direction where the dark knight left before turning their heads towards the frozen Gerak.


    "Hey, Gerak! Did something happend or why did he leave?" Smithen said with his mouth still full of food.


    "..."


    `You are a cold person, Danzel...¡ä Gerak thought before exining to the other dwarfs that he left.

 Chapter 100 - Defense Is The Best Defense

    "This should be far enough..."


    Stopping in the middle of the forest, observing his surroundings only massive trees were to be seen as one would expect from such a forest.


    "Let¡äs see where we are now..." Taking a map that he had bought in the span of thest months, Danzel stared at the map for a while before nodding to himself.


    "I should be near the roads going at the northeast side of a nearby beast territory... the opposite side where I originally came from.."


    Putting away the map inside the storage ring, he summoned the status window with an internalmand.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Race: Draugr


    Level: 20


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 1012/1012


    Attribute points: 9


    Attributes: Strength:140 Agility: 118 Intelligence: 92 Endurance: 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Earth Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield Bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Sense Danger Lv.3] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Riposte Defense Lv.1] [Armor Preserve Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead Carver of Superior Strength. One of the strongest natural draugr that there is. Though his tier undead far surpasses this strength. For your current tier of strength, you can be considered a powerhouse.]


    [Storage: 202 325 XP]


    "It¡äs really a satisfying sight to see the total amount of more than 200 thousand XP. But..."


    Surveying all the skills that I got and the amount that are still in the Lv. 1, it made me grumbly out of annoyance.


    "It¡äs nowhere enough for all those various skills. With those damn things getting more expensive by each upgrade I will be needing a few more than hundreds of thousands of XP..."


    While I was still interested to see what will happend to [Earth Wall] and the other skills after reaching the Lv. 10, that wasn¡ät the priority of now.


    "If I remember right I will have to increase five skills in total to Lv. 10 to finish that mission of my..."


    ncing at the prices of the skills was enough to make him curse Internally.


    [Armor Preserve Lv.1] Upgrade: 10 000 (+1 000 Increase) XP


    [Riposte Defense Lv.1] Upgrade: 5 000 (+500 Increase) XP


    [Piercing Lv.1] Upgrade: 1700 (+300 Increase) XP


    [Shield Bash Lv.4] Upgrade: 2600 (+300 Increase) XP


    [Sense Danger Lv.3] Upgrade: 6500 (+500 Increase) XP


    "So expensive! Though I knew how much each of them costed, now that I can calmly look at them, the total amount is still crazy. Do I even got enough XP to max every single skill of the mission?" Danzel said while he calcted the XP needed in a state like a frozen statue.


    "Ugh... to thinking after carving hundreds of runes in weapons and armor I will still be 100 000 XP short in the end. I should even had stopped wasting my time with experimenting of runes..." With regret showing in his ethereal eyes. He could only stare pitifully towards the [XP Storage].


    He looked at it like a son would do when his father told him to kill his own Shiba Inu dog who was suffering from crimpling cancer.


    Though it was indeed sad, keeping him would make things sadder.


    "After all those days of work, it¡äs still not enough." Danzel sighted


    "I guess I will have to do what I have in my hands for now..."


    Looking at the floating window in front of him, Danzel fell into deep thoughts,


    `Damn, I hate making such choices when I want to pick everything...¡ä


    `Through the skill [Piercing] was quite helpful against that bald fist and by itself its rather cheap, it wouldn¡ät be a bad choice of what it is worth.¡ä


    `Then again, I rarely do any piercing attacks which makes investing any XP into that skill somewhat of a waste. Inparison [Shield Bash] is a much better skill which can be used as both offensive and defensive ways.¡ä


    Danzel pped himself to the head. "What am I thinking, what I need isn¡ät anything offensive, at least not in the from of those two skills. What I need more is..."


    Lowering his gaze at the dark gray armor that Gerak had crafter for him, Danzel knew what he needed to choose.


    `Now that I am all alone, If my [Heavy Dark Steel Armor] that Gerak had crafted me gets somehow damaged, there will be no Gerak to fix it. With him only giving me a set, once the armor is done for, I would even lose the best set of armor that I currently have.¡ä


    "Though I got some other sets in the ring from those army idiots, I truly don¡ät want to say my goodbyes to this set."


    With me being already prettyfy in the mass of cold dark steel that by this weight alone could crush a normal person to death.


    I refused to wear another inferior armor ever again!


    "Hmm, if I were to consider about defense then [Armor Preserve] should be the best answer for this task. After all, by just the use of mana I can make my armor tougher and quite possibly create a chance to counter-attack. Though [Riposte Defense] also sounds great and all, that in turn will force me to use the dark crystal shield more which would in end effect damage the shield..."


    Making already his mind, he pressed the upgrade button.


    [Armor Preserve level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv.2]


    ...


    [Armor Preserve level has increased from Lv.9 to Lv.10]


    [The skill Armor Preserve has reached this maximum level]


    [Armor Preserve Lv.10 turns into Armor Mana ting Lv.1]


    A flow of information was slowly being pushed inside of Danzel¡äs mind, making him grab his head out of pain.


    "Agh...my head!" Danzel stumbles and almost falls to the ground for only to catch his footing at thest moment.


    "Dammit, it has gotten even worse than the other skills. Ugh... my head." After calming himself from the sudden pain, the headache that he was having slowly faded away with only the newly acquired information remaining inside his mind.


    [Armor Mana ting]: By though the use of mana, you can put durableyers of mana on top of your armor which are capable to block and store receiving damage. If the attack receive doesn¡ät exceed the manayers durability, it will shoot out the energy outwards.


    "At least the pain was worth the reward... Instead of just making my armor now tougher, it also puts up a shield around me! Truly amazing!"


    Though he had to pay a low amount of 135 000 XP, the skill itself was not inferior to [Gale Mana de].


    "With one headache gone, another awaits, Sadly I barely miss the amount of required XP to increase [Riposte Defense] to Lv.10 . With already chosen to avoid [Shield Bash] and [Piercing], I guess I should get myself [Sense Danger] and be done with it. It had already proven this worth by the fight with the assassins and being able to evade things easier also goes by the current n of keeping my armor undamaged."


    [Sense Danger level has increased from Lv.3 to Lv.4]


    ...


    [Sense Danger level has increased from Lv.9 to Lv.10]


    [The skill Sense Danger has reached this maximum level]


    [Sense Danger Lv.10 turns into Greater Sense Danger Lv.1]


    As Danzel was preparing himself for the headache toe.


    It never appeared.


    Instead, a weird feeling came at his mind, as if his mind itself removed some invisible cloth that kept it from breathing right.


    "Mhm...this is much better." Danzel said while nodding to himself satisfying.


    [Greater Sense Danger]: In moments that fatal attack are upon you, you will receive a mental warning of the attack. If the user isn¡ät in battle, he is capable of feeling the enmity of others cing on you. This effect is being influenced by the users'' strength, enemeys strength, skill level, environment and only works if the other intent is of physically harming the user.


    "Hoh, a new effect was added on top of the previous one?"


    `Status¡ä With a mentalmand, the updated status appeared floating in front of him.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    Race: Draugr


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 1012/1012


    Attribute points: 9


    Attributes: Strength:140 Agility: 118 Intelligence: 92 Endurance: 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Earth Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield Bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Riposte Defense Lv.1] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1]


    [Remark: A true anomaly among even the Superior Undead, with knowledge of runes and skills, far surpassing that of a Draugr, one would never expect that his powerful Draugr warrior would spend months sitting at home.]


    [Storage: 12 825 XP]


    `Two gone, three more to go¡ä Danzel nodded to himself as he was observing this own status window.


    But suddenly, he felt something weird.


    "Hmm?" Closing this status window, he turned around and look at his surroundings.


    `What is that feeling?¡ä Putting his hand on Veren''s Hilt, he stared at his surroundings as if he was warry of something.


    `Something is wrong,I feel like I am being watched from all sides?¡ä


    *Crack

 Chapter 101 - I Will Take You Guys With Me!

    *Crack


    With mana going through Veren''s de, he drew Veren out of this sheath and swung behind him towards the direction of the small sound.


    *Fsheeen!


    A dark green wind shoots out of the long de, leaving a trail behind his path.


    With less than two seconds the de shortly reached his destination, stopping only on one of the big trees present in the forest.


    "..."


    Danzel stared intensely at the big cut he made in the tree, but what won this attention, even more, was the small window that showed up.


    [You received 5000 XP].


    At the same time he finished reading the floating window, something strange happend.


    In the direction where he shot his [Gale Mana de], a transparent figure tall enough to reach his tight started to slowly appear.


    But as the figure was bing clearer to see, revealing to be a gray wolf of some sort, it suddenly sshed blood in the middle of his body before falling to the ground in two half pieces.


    "A wolf that knows how to turn invisible?" As Danzel was about to take a step forward, he strengthened his grip, looking around warningly.


    "It¡äs still not gone..." Saying that the feeling of enmity grew suddenly stronger from all his sides.


    And before he knew, around 15 meters aways of him, other gray wolves with third red-eye in the middle of their heads started to appear out of thin air on all of his sides, surrounding him with growls and eyes full of killing intent.


    *Growl!


    "Ah, crap..." Danzel cursed under his helmet as he counted the number of wolves they were.


    `A total of 15 wolfs to be seen...who knows how many others are hiding like that.¡ä


    As he was observing the growling third-eyed wolfs, every single third eye of those wolves twitched around all directions for a second before sharply staring at Danzel as if they were to bounce at him at any moment.


    Before he could make any sense of what that twitch was, all the wolves started to move simultaneously, with the 10 of them rushing directly at him from all sides and the other 5 lurking slowlying around him, ready to rece in case one of them were to fall.


    "The heck!?" He cursed out loud as he started casting with mana in his hands.


    Though he was surprised by the simultaneous rush of the third-eyed woods, it wasn''t enough to make him lose his cool.


    "[Earth Wall]!" Injecting the mana inside the earth, the earth started to rise and form a tall wall, making the wolves who were about to jump at him crush directly at the wall face first, making them whelp out of pain.


    "Woof!"


    "You mere dog!" Swinging the Veren at the leaping third-eyed wolf, the wolf''s mouth was cut with only a thread of flesh keeping his mouth together.


    If it weren¡ät for the fine body control that the wolf had, it wouldn¡ät have his head anymore.


    "Growl!"


    Ignoring the wolf on the ground, he turned around and swung at the other charging third-eyed wolf directly at his skull.


    "Wooagh...!" With Veren going through his head, the wolf only managed to yelp a final cry before copsing to the ground


    [You received 5000 XP]


    `It didn¡ät try to dodge...¡ä Danzel starred at the now-dead third-eyed wolf with confusion. As he tried to make sense of the wolf''s suicidal actions he was shortly interrupted by another howl on his side.


    "It will be toote..." As he already swung his sword at that suicidal wolf. Even though he was vastly superior in both speed and strengthpared to the wolves, there were still limits.


    "..."


    But that didn¡ät mean that he was defenseless.


    As the third-eyed wolf jumped ready to bite at Danzel''s throat, a small light appeared in Danzel''s other hand which quickly expand until turning into a spear.


    The wolf opened all his three eyes wide open, staring at the sudden appearance of the spear in shock.


    "Waagh!" With the wolf still being mid-air, dodging was impossible.


    The spear pierced without any effort through the wolf''s flesh until it prated through his body.


    [You received 5000 XP]


    Letting the spear inside of the wolf''s body, he quickly focused ahead of him at the two other charging third-eyed wolves.


    Following suit, he charged at the two wolves with even greater speed, which took them in surprise.


    With him being a mass of metal, he resembled a dark chariot ready to crush these enemies.


    The wolves showed a hind of panic in both of their third eyes, but instead of moving out of Danzels way they instead elerated.


    Though the first wolf who reached him tried to bite Danzel''s leg, it got run downed before it even manage to bite him correctly.


    With the wolf rolling to the side, the other got his neck pierced with the runed sword that glowed with crimson light.


    [You received 5000 XP]


    "You aren¡ät going away!" Staring at the limping wolf before, he got another spear that he was supposed to give the army and threw it at the wolf like a javelin as if he was the original owner of it.


    Though he had not a shred of experience with throwing weapons, the skill [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery] worked as intended in filling the basics of techniques into his mind.


    And as expected, although it was a hit, it didn¡ät hit at the aimed spot.


    Danzel''s original target was the wolf head, but his inexperience only managed to earn him a spot on the wolf¡äs back.


    Which with the strength that the spear was thrown at the wolf was well enough to finish the job.


    "Woogf..."


    [You received 5000 XP]


    "Now-" Before Danzel could turn around to finish the wolf with the cut mouth, a sudden feeling of intense danger came behind him.


    As he couldn¡ät react fast enough, a wolf jumped at his back, bearing his teeth at his neck.


    *Thegck!


    As the third-eyed wolf bit his neck near his shoulder, the tough armor with runes in it managed to block the fangs of the wolf, leaving only some scratch marks and a pained cry of the wolf.


    "You!" Furious, he grabbed the wolf''s opened mouth with one of his hands and threw him at the other wolfs who started toe from the sides of the walls.


    "Growl!"


    Standing with this back on the earth wall that he created, he looked at the eight wolves who in turn were slowly closing their distance with no good intent.


    "Out of all the ces I decided to stop, it had to be a damn wolf-invested territory..." Danzel cursed under his helmet.


    If he could go into the past, he would find himself and kick his own a*s from being so careless and a dumbass.


    As he was staring at the wolves closing the distance, he started to rack his mind to find a solution.


    But in every scenario he imaged himself to be, he found himself bounced by all the eight wolves.


    Though the one bite of that wolf didn¡ät manage to bite through his armor, that was only because the wolf had lost all his momentum by climbing to Danzel''s tall figure, and his own awkward positioning was not best to bite.


    In reality, he wasn¡ät confident that his armor could hold against eight of those wolves.


    And even if it did, his armor would turn into some scrap metal.


    "Growl!"


    `With wolves in front of me and a wall behind me, I can only force my way thoug-¡ä As Danzel was preparing himself to pure force it.


    He was suddenly struck with an idea.


    "Hehe, Right! The wall!" The death mana in his body red outside his body and a massive bloodlust filled the nearby area.


    The wolves who noticed that chance flinched for a second and a hint of fear was inside their eyes. But they still continue closing the distance slowly.


    Danzel who was surrounded with death mana and a strengthened body through the use of [Sin of Wrath], surrounded himself withyers of mana through his new skill [Armor Mana ting] and started casting his spell [Earth Wall]


    With [Armor Mana ting] only requiring to ce mana around your body, as long as you knew the technique it could be activated in no longer than one second.


    Although the spell [Earth Wall] wasn''t that hard to cast and generally took around two seconds to activate, the spell itself was really mana demanding.


    Maybe that was only because it was still on level 1.


    Currently, though, I didn¡ät care about the mana cost.


    The Injected mana in the ground flowed behind the wolves and started raising an earth wall that was growing taller by the second.


    Of course, that action surprised the wolves.


    "Woof!?" With the wall behind them, the eight wolves third eye started to twitch and look in all directions.


    And as soon as their third eye stopped moving, a cold voice sounded before them.


    "You damn dogs, in honor of the two of your suicidal friends let me..."


    Turning around, Danzel threw a punch at the wall behind him with such strength that made the wall grumble...


    Towards the directions of Danzel and the third-eyed wolves.


    The wolves who realized what was going on subconsciously turned around to run away, only to meet a tall earth wall blocking their way.


    Bringing the dark crystal shield out of his storage ring, he ced the shield on top of his head.


    "Allow me to take you guys with me!"


    As soon the wolves started to run to the sides,pieces of the wall started to fall upon them,pletely burying their whole group and Danzel.

 Chapter 102 - Alpha Predator

    A cloud of dust was raised through the air.


    In the ce where the third-eyed wolfs and Danzel were now a pile of rubble lying motionless there.


    But that soon changed.


    Though the middle of the pile of rocks dead mana was seeping out with each second the mana growing bigger.


    And when the dead mana resembled burning mes, the rock at top of such mana was pushed to the side with a tall dark figure emerging out of there.


    "Ugh... to think that I would bury myself once again. At least it worked this time around.." Danzel grumbled to himself.


    After taking a nce at the several notifications that came, he moved at top of the rumble and shook the trapped dirt off his armor.


    "So annoying, after I''m even done with those dogs I will have to clean the dirt trapped in the armor." Patting lightly his armor, he look closely at the window with the notifications.


    Receiving seven notifications in total he could tell that one wolf beneath the rubble was still hiding with either being close to death or pretending to be dead.


    `Count yourself lucky for this one, as I find it annoying to dig you out of there.¡ä Danzel thought while focusing his attention towards the two other wolves that collided with each other and the mouth-wounded wolf.


    "Those are much better targets..." Guiding the mana in his body towards his legs, he used [Leap] to jump at them, closing their distance until they wereseven meters away from him.


    A feeling of strong dread befell upon both of those two third-eyed wolves, but instead of running away, they started to growl at him and even put their own killing intent towards him.


    One had to know that the dense bloodlust that Danzel was emitting was so disgusting strong through the help of [Sin of Wrath] that the bodies of the third-eyed wolfs were shaking no stop.


    It seemed their actions and body spoke two totally differentnguages.


    While one was pressing the gas into a void less hole, the other one was smashing the breaks of the vehicle with all his four pawns while screaming internally out of despair.


    Which those expression''s alone made Danzel wonder if the wolves had some kind of suicidal disorder.


    "Growl!


    "Woof!"


    Both seemingly terrified third-eyed wolves rushed towards Danzel barring their teeth towards him.


    If a normal person were to watch his scene they would already crap their butts and probably feint of fear.


    But that sight in Danzel''s opinion looked like two small dogs walking under the guillotine willingly.


    "They are hopeless..." Raising Veren towards his side, he swung at the approaching third-eyed wolf right towards the head. Resulting in cutting through the head sideways.


    [You received 5000 XP]


    Taking the opportunity that his fellow wolf created, he leaped at Danzel who already swung the long sword.


    But before it could fully approach Danzel, the dark crystal shield glowed with dark green light and came smashing into the other wolf''s head.


    *Crack!


    "Wo-of..."


    With a caved-in head, the wolves dropped dead after a pitiful yelp.


    [You received 5000 XP]


    "..." Staring at the two dropped dead third-eyed wolves in front of him for a moment, he turned around and gazed at the first third-eyed wolf that he wounded.


    "Woof~" The third-eyed wolf who received Danzel''s gaze whipped pitifully.


    As soon as the wolf made a step back away from Danzel, his red third eye twitched to all directions without showing any signs of stopping.


    The wolf''s whole body started to shake as it was thrown into ice-cold water.


    Danzel in turn just stood there observing the third-eyed wolf''s reaction.


    `Why does their red-eye twitch like that? Was I right with them having a suicidal disorder?¡ä As he was trying to make sense of what that wolf was doing, the wolf''s red eyes started to bleed suddenly.


    "A Wooooh~!" The third eye wolf went into a sitting position and howled to the air with his wounded mouth.


    As the howling of the third-eyed stopped, it turned around and started running away.


    "You!" Danzel who was expecting something to happend cursed out loud as the wolf just howled and made a run for it!


    His dark green mana together with the dark dead mana traveled through the Verens de, readying a [Gale Mana de] towards the running wolf.


    Raising the Veren de who was engulfed with both moving mana around it, he was about to release the wind de upon the wolf who was 15 meters away from him now.


    But Danzel halted his swing as he saw something.


    The wolf which was running straight at top speed was suddenly send flying with incredible speed to the left side.


    The wolf who had his bones cracked all around his body, soon hit one of the massive trees.


    *Baaah!


    As if a mosquito full of blood sshed to a wall, a huge amount of blood was sshed at the tree as the third-eyed wolf fell like a broken doll who had his strings cut.


    "Huh?" Danzel stared at what just happend with disbelieve.


    `What just happend!?¡ä


    To him, what just happend looked no different to the wolf being sent flying by seemingly nothing!


    As he was about to look through his surroundings, he noticed the footprints that were in the direction where the wolf was running towards.


    Which were at least four times bigger than the third-eyed wolves self!


    What shocked Danzel the most was that another footprinting appeared out of thin air towards his directions just now!


    "Don¡ät tell me..." As Danzel strengthened his grip on Verens hilt and kept the mana in the de.


    Exactly 10 meters away from him a giant figure was starting to appear as if it was gaining the original color that it once had.


    After the giant figure was at least two times taller than Danzel regained his color, turning fully visible.


    Danzel cursed internally.


    `Crap did the dad of those thingse out!¡ä


    The giant wolf who was twice as tall resembled the third-eyed wolfs but unlike them. This wolf''s iris color was pure gold with the outside part being the same red color as the other wolves.


    The toe bones of all his legs seemed to go outside the skin itself which made it resemble some bone armor. Not only the wolf''s legs, but the neck who was a lot longer from the other wolves had rows of bones that were flexible enough to move his massive head without piercing his throat.


    For a second Danzel thought that his massive wolves were one of the undead with all his exposed bones.


    But after taking a better look at the giant wolf''s chest shrinking and expanding from time to time, it clearly showed at it was breathing, thus in Danzel''s mind he crossed it being a undead out of the list.


    "How can such a thing be so big..." As he said that, he noticed the muscles of the wolve flexing.


    The moment he noticed that he imminently shot his [Gale Mana de] towards the giant wolves.


    *Fsheeeen!


    Seeing that, the wolves elerated towards theing wind de with impressive speed.


    With a small sidestep, the dark green wind de barely scratched the wolf''s side without disturbing his speed at all.


    "This thing..."


    The wolves raised one of his legs and swung them at Danzel''s side.


    With the bones that were on his feet together with his size, the four toe bones were no different from four massive scythes with the support of a four-meter-tall wolve.


    Luckily the wolf''s attack was simple and thus predictable.


    But that didn¡ät mean that it was easily dodged.


    Danzel just in time managed to put up his dark crystal shield to his shied,pletely caught the scythe-like toe.


    Unfortunately, though, he was shortly pushed back and threw to the side 5 meters away from his position.


    Danzel who barely caught himself from falling looked at the giant wolf with wary.


    "This thing..." His ethereal eyes stared sharply at the giant wolves.


    And with an internalmand, a whole new status appeared in front of him.


    [Status]


    Name: Alpha


    Race: Ravenous Golden Eyed Hound


    Level: 40


    ss: [Predator Lv. 14]


    Sub-ss: -


    Health: 8032/8050


    Mana: 420/500


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 150 Agility: 140 Intelligence: 50 Endurance: 160 Stamina: 300


    Talents: [Predator] [Alpha] [Wolve] [Third Eye] [Alpha¡äs Link] [Alpha¡äs Harem] [Bone Armor] [Far Sight] [Tracker] [Leader] [Tyrant] [Silent Hunter]


    Skills: [Camouge] [Packs Call] [Prating Bite] [Tireless] [Howling Dread] [Lesser Mind ration-Eye] [Golden Eye] [Lower Force Regeneration]


    [Remark: A rare species of the Ravenous Eyed Hounds. Their species have developed so that the strongest of them all, the Alpha of the pack to gain a semi-hive mind which allows it to control every single of his own pack. The color in their third eye, though rare, determinates one Hound special abilities and talents. With his hound, in particr, it got impressive regenerative powers and enough stamina tost day and night in a fight. It¡äs especially ruthless, be it his enemies or any of his pack members.]

 Chapter 103 - Alpha Predator (2)

    "This guy was probably the reason for the previous wolf''s behaviors..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    The information contained in the remark was enough for Danzel to realize a few things of apparent Alpha of the wolves.


    Though he hadn¡ät the time to look through every single skill of his, he could guess some of the skill functions, like [Prating Bite] and [Camouge] by just the name alone.


    With the former guessing to be the bite version of [Piercing] and thetter being his way of bing invisible.


    But even though he knew that he still went ahead and check the [Camouge] skill even if could only read so many skills/talents in the given time.


    [Camouge]: Upon activation, the user slowly starts to blend through, making him seem invisible to the naked eye. That skill gets canceled if you are 10 meters away from a target that isn¡ät an ally..


    [Lower Force Regeneration]: Through the use of your life force, recently made wounds are starting to heal slowly.


    [Tireless]: The user can dy the effect ofplete exhaustion for a short amount of time.


    [Golden Eye]: Grants vision of the surroundings life force.


    "Growl!" Baring his teeth, the Alpha looked down to Danzel who was no longer than 5 meter¡äs away from him.


    "You sure are confident by showing that ugly face don¡ät you?" Danzel said with a hint of mockery, but inside he was wary of that giant wolf.


    After all, this was the first monster that was so much taller than him.


    And though the previous exchange it was obvious that even though I am stronger than him, his pure mass alone made the stat difference irrelevant.


    In a sense, size does matter...


    He had already lost half of his mana cause of him sending the mobs at him.


    And with the wolf''s size and health points, it doesn''t seem like he would be able to finish this in one fell of a swoop.


    "Woof!" With the bone digging through the ground, the Alpha wolves raised one of his legs and swung the scythe-like bone ws towards Danzel.


    `[Dash]¡ä With the use of his skill, he took a step back and managed to get out of the swipe of the ws.


    The ws barely touched his shield and creating bright sparks.


    Swinging Veren towards the Alphas leg, he managed to cut through his flesh shallowly.


    Seeing the wound, the Alpha didn¡ät even flinch and continued chasing Danzel with his ws.


    After this short exchange that happend with the wolf, his arm looked like it was thrown in a blender.


    Danzel whose body was burning hot through the abuse of mana got distracted which resulted in being hit to the side and send rolling to the ground.


    Rolling for a few rounds, he quickly stands up only to find the Alpha Wolve in front of him with his now healed leg above Danzel''s head.


    "Dammit!" Cursing out loud, he raised his shield and caught the falling down bone ws above him.


    *Baaahm!


    With the Alpha pressing down on Danzel, the ground itself started to crack with Danzel''s boots slowly digging through the ground.


    He was stronger, that was a fact.


    But with Alpha''s long legs and heavier built it didn¡ät matter.


    As he was now being pushed down by this `weaker opponent''.


    To Danzel the current situation that he was in made him frustrated.


    Never had he been so frustrated since the moment he woke up from theke in that gave.


    It was to the point that he was grinding his teeth.


    "You mere dog...just because you are bigger than I, that doesn¡ät mean that I will allow myself to be best against a damn animal!"


    Mana traveled through his hand that was holding the shield.


    As he was about to bend to his knees by the sole pressure alone, he finished his cast.


    "RISE!"


    Saying that out loud with his deep yet cold voice, the mana traveled through the ground just below the belly of the Alpha Wolves.


    Only for an earth wall starting to rise under the belly of the Alpha wolf.


    "Woof?" As the Alpha wolf notice the chance, he felt his belly being hit by something hard.


    What shocked the Alpha wolf though was that he was rising from the ground until his footing on the ground was removed.


    The moment the wall stopped rising, the Alpha started to fall forwards towards where he was pressing Danzel down.


    Of course, Danzel was waiting with his de glowing with dark green light.


    "I will cut you in half!" Danzel yelled with Veren raised behind him.


    His eery ethereal eyes were full of hate inside of them.


    At the same time, the Alphas'' middle golden-eyed twitched slightly and sharply look at Danzel''s de.


    The Alpha wolf clearly remembered how that pitch-ck food killed his first ve from afar.


    With a quick reaction, he moved his body down with his ws digging through the earth wall.


    *Fsheeeeeen!


    Just before the dark green wind de managed to reach the Alpha wolf, with all his strength it jumped using the wall as his footing towards one of the big trees.


    Unfortunately, the distance was too short to not pay a price.


    "Growl!" The Alpha that stuck with the help of his bone ws to the tree, grinding his teeth as he felt pain at his backside.


    Staring at the wolf who disposition itself like that, something heavy fell beside him.


    Looking at what it was, Danzel grinned viciously.


    "I wonder what the other wolves will think of an Alpha without his tail."


    "Howl!" A dreadful loud howl full of anger escaped the Alphas mouth, strong enough to create a slight vibration through the air.


    `That must be the [Howling Dread]¡ä Danzel thought disappointed.


    From the name of the skill alone, he thought it would be a much more impressive skill, but in the end, it was just a loud bark...


    What Danzel didn¡ät know, or rather didn¡ät feel was that his howl had a bit of life force mixed in, which just by hearing would one put into shock from the vibration in their insides, which created one''s body to tremble.


    If someone else more normal than him, were to get hit by this and face a wolve twice times taller than them, it wouldn¡ät have been weird if they started to panic and fear.


    But for Danzel who was oblivious of that considered this powerful howl as just a loud bark from an overge dog.


    After all, he was undead, want to deafen him?


    Good luck with that.


    Want his inside to vibrate uncontrobly?


    He had none.


    Even then, Danzel who eyes were burning full of killing intent towards the Alpha wolf,pletely ignored the slight vibration that was happening through his bones...


    Seeing all that, the Alpha''s anger increase to the next level, as his powerful howl who dominated all other beasts in his territory was nothing towards that dark food.


    "Woof!" Flexing his muscles the Alpha jumped to the next tree again and again.


    "What is it doing?" Danzel watched confused, as the Alpha was jumping with incredible speed to tree after tree.


    Though it was faster by doing that, it was also further away and clear to see.


    As Danzel started to suspect the wolf to want to run away, the Alphas started to slowly turn invisible.


    "This one..!" Danzel rushed towards the direction of the wolf as he realized what he was up to, but his realization together with his speed was toote.


    "That bastard..." He gripped Veren''s handle with even greater strength out of frustration.


    But instead of throwing a fit or anything, he stayedpletely still as the feeling of ill intent was still here.


    `To think it would do such a thing...¡ä Danzel though.


    Even if he wanted to kill that wolve, he was still impressed by this things intelligences.


    Seconds passed with silence, slowly turned into minutes of silence.


    "When will ite-" As Danzel was starting to doubt his skill [Greater Sense Danger], he felt a sound of broken wood behind him.


    *Crack!


    Out of thin air, the tree behind Danzel had cracked.


    Turning swiftly his back, all that Danzel was a massive mouth open wide and ready to take a piece out of him.


    "!!!" Raising his long sword, Danzel swung at the Alphas wolve face, but just about it was to reach the face, the scythe-like w got in his way.


    He managed to cut through the wolf''s arm, but at the same time, Veren was pushed out of his hand from the wless leg.


    `It sacrificed his hand!¡ä


    He tried to raise his dark crystal shield and use [Armor Mana ting] in his armor.


    After he has done that, the massive jaw of the Alpha wolf came and bitten at his left hand who was holding the shield.


    The sharp teeth with life force fused together slowly dug through his armor, and his entire arm and shield were in the wolf''s mouth.


    "You..." Danzel said as his frustration faded with a feeling of clearanceing to his mind.


    The anger was still there, but the situation didn¡ät call for a clouded mind.


    He looked at the wolf''s eyes who were turned into a moon shape.


    "You arrogant piece of..." Danzel who clearly noticed the mocking hiding behind those three eyes wasn¡ät going to let everything end here like his.


    "You want to eat my hand, huh?! Then have a taste of that!" Grabbing the wolf''s tongue with his left arm inside the wolf''s mouth, a dark green glow came from his gauntlets.


    "Grow..!" The Alpha growled out of pain, which made it a bit even harder.


    The wolf''s eye turned seriously as he couldn¡ät feel his tongue anymore and the pain was getting worse and worse by the second.


    But it knew that as long as his fang breached that dark scrap away, he would win.


    "You think I am done!?" Danzel said with a vicious grin under his helmet.


    Two ethereal blue hands appeared out of the Alphas wolve vision.


    Flying towards the lying down rune long sword, the two hands picked it up and flew towards Danzel.


    The de soon reached back at his owner''s hand, and holding it upside down he pierced the rune longsword at the third golden eye that has widened up from the shock.


    "Owoooh!"


    The Alpha wolf opened his mouth and jumped backed out of pain to the ground.


    Danzel who was still holding the Veren de, gripped the de tightly as a crimson color started to appear.


    "Owoooh!"

 Chapter 104 - Thats My Prey!

    "Owoooh!


    "Does it hurt?"


    With his cold deep voice, he pushed the runed de even further through the wolf''s head, making the Alpha feel enormous pain in return.


    "Owooogh!" The Alpha crazily swung his head around in hopes to throw the glued Danzel off his head.


    Each second that passed resulted in the pain increasing even further while a feeling of dizziness came to his head.


    He felt as if something was sucking his head out which resulted in that maddening pain.


    At that, something did Alpha determined to be the previous dark food!


    For someone as the king figure of this territory, being bested from someone so small was beyond his understanding.


    Only fear and panic were left to be seen in the Alpha¡äs eyes!


    The Alpha did everything it could to get him off, which bought Danzel the feeling of being a rodeo.


    The Alpha only then managed to get Danzel of him by swinging his whole head towards one of the massive trees.


    Danzel who was thrown from the Alpha¡äs head to the ground got up and looked at the wolf who was now scratching the spot where the de was in with his remaining ws.


    Which resulted in self-harming itself.


    Though further wounding itself wasn¡ät that smart in his current situation, the pain was too much even for it.


    "Awooooogh!" Screaming from pain, the ws dug slightly through his flesh and managed to pull the rune de out of his head while breathing heavily.


    "And here I thought that I crushed his skull..." Danzel said while staring at his left arm full of holes and saliva.


    `Though all the effort that I went through to keep the armor in perfect state, in the end, I all those efforts went to waste...¡ä He thought quite depressed.


    He just needed a little bit of time and resources to finally learn the Veren runes.


    He hoped until he learned that the armor would still be intact.


    But that was purely his wishful thinking.


    If it weren¡ät for the armor his left arm would even be gone by now.


    "At least it still holds on nicely...but those holes." With a sh of light, the dark crystal shield disappeared out of thin air with a runed spear reced this ce.


    Taking a throwing poster, he threw the spear at the Alpha wolf.


    Traveling through the air, the spear hit the Alpha¡äs stomach, which made the relief that it had to his face once again turn into pain.


    "Woooof!"


    With bloodshot eyes, Alpha stared at Danzel with anger showing on all his face.


    "Don¡ät worry, I still got another ten of those sweet things just for you!" With a spear appearing in his hand, the next spear was sent flying towards Alpha to his back.


    "Growl!"


    Groaning out of pain, it pulled both the spears out of this body with its mouth and tossed them to the ground.


    Doing that, a short green golden aura engulfed the Alpha¡äs wolf whole body.


    "Awooooooo!" Sending out a cry to the air, all of those wounds including his missing leg started to close and heal


    The speed although slow, was still visible by the naked eye of all the wounds closing up.


    Those actions though didn¡ät prevent Danzel from throwing another of his spear at the wolf.


    Ignoring the stuck spear in his chest, the wolf continued regenerating his wounds.


    After this whole body closed all the wounds, another four spears were stuck in his body.


    "Growl..." The wolf dazed stared at the spears and then at Danzel who was preparing yet another of his spears.


    A hint of fear showed at these eyes as if they had some kind of PTSD against that dark food.


    His exhausted body together with the previous pain made it subconsciously take a step back.


    As the king of this territory, it never felt any fear till now.


    He decided which ones were to be food and which ones were to eat.


    Everyone going against his rule would be the former with the obedient ones thetter.


    And the fear he brought down to the rebellious ves was now given to him.


    Against this hollow being that he thought would be easy prey atst.


    In reality, it was also starting to feel the immense bloodlust emitting out of the small body of a hollow being. Which further enchanted his fear towards him.


    His muscles were screaming out of pain, while this body felt weak from the overuse of life force andcking nutrients.


    The wolve experience such struggle only once in his entire life and that was when his mother abandoned him and threw him out of the pack to these dangerous woods.


    Though daily hardship and death experience it has quickly grown, only to show up back to his pack which abandoned him to be the new Alpha by killing the old Alpha.


    And for revenge, it treated the male of his packs like ves and the females, including his mother as his mates for the future generation of ves.


    It knew that since birth that he was special.


    Stronger than any other wolves, cleverer than any of the oldest wolves, and a superior third eye that no one else had.


    And such existence felt like death was staring at him.


    *Fshen


    "Woof!"


    Raising his leg, it deflected the iing flying spear and turned around, running towards the woods.


    "You think that this trick will work twice!?" Danzel yelled as the colors of the Alpha¡äs body started to fade.


    But unlike before, he was prepared.


    Raising his right arm towards the direction of the running wolf, the dark green mana that he was building up was released.


    "[Curse of Exhaution]!" The mana soon turned into a dark green ethereal mist and shoot with high speed towards the running Alpha.


    The mist speed was even faster than the mages [Magic Missile] ones and was physically immune.


    Just as the Alpha almostpletely turned invisible, the dark green mist hit and entered his body like a dry sponge.


    "Woof!?" The Alpha who was running for his dear life notice a heavy burden ced on his body as if his muscles were trying to keep him shackled.


    Then it moved, the more exhausted it was started to feel.


    But the Alpha didn¡ät care of any of that.


    Since it already has turned invisible, his escape was already guaranteed.


    And once he had recovered he will bring the whole pack and hunt down the one who brought him to this state.


    Unknowingly to him, he was only dying his death.


    "I didn¡ät have the chance to ce that curse before, but now that I got you aren¡ät going anywhere..."


    Raising his hand he summoned the status window and put the remaining 9 attribute points to agility.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    Race: Draugr


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 3218/5500


    Mana: 167/1012


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength:140 Agility: 127 Intelligence: 92 Endurance: 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Earth Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield Bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Riposte Defense Lv.1] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1]


    [Remark: A true anomaly among even the Superior Undead, with knowledge of runes and skills, far surpassing that of a Draugr, one would never expect that his powerful Draugr warrior would spend months sitting at home.]


    [XP: 87 825]


    Feeling his body bing lighter and what little he had for senses getting stronger.


    He followed the curse of the Alphas body with a simr movement speed as the wolf.


    ***


    In the Northeast Road near the various beast territory.


    A group of armed people, with swords or staff they escorted three big carriages.


    With most of them having a wary expression.


    "Hey Serran, are you sure we are going through the tide path? This looks more of a beast territory of those hounds, I heard that a powerful golden eye has been seen in those areas around."


    A bulgy man with a spear in his hand and a scar going through his face said.


    "Hannes, the missiones from the association with handsome rewards awaiting us once we deliver those things," Serran said with staff with his hand.


    "As for the hound you are talking about you don''t have to worry about it. With so many mercenaries in our group, the hounds would never dare to"


    As Serran was about to assure his friend, a loud howling could be heard from the woods.


    "Awooooo!"


    Hearing that, every mercenary bought out their weapons and readied their spells.


    And as everyone had thought to be a long echo, a 4 meter tall third eyed wolf appeared.


    "The golden hound!"


    The atmosphere suddenly felt denser and every gripped their weapons harder subconsciously.


    "Stop it!"


    Hearing the orders, the melee mercenary rushed towards the beast that had countless cuts and some spear tips on his body.


    With his seer body mass, the wolf pushed through the melee mercenary and continue his path straight to the other side of the forest.


    But as it was about to leave the road, the ground felt like turning into water, which resulted in it falling to his ground.


    "Good job Serran! I will do the rest!" Cannes said while dashing with his spear glowing.


    But as he was about to go for the finishing blow a deep cold voice echoed through the woods.


    "That''s my pry!"


    *Baahm


    With the sound of wood breaking apart, a dark armored figure made his appearance clear to the air.


    The giant wolf eyes were filled with dread.


    It tried to raise his leg to catch the falling dark food with his glowing metal in his hand.


    s, it was toote.


    Passing the leg, he got closer and swung the long sword at the wolf''s throat.


    With the wind de releasing too, a massive chunk of the wolf''s neck was cut.

 Chapter 105 - Mercenaries

    "Owooooh!" The Alpha screamed with a hoarse voice.


    The little life force that it had was glowing with a golden-green light and was starting to stitch the massive gap in his neck closed.


    "You sure are persistent..." Grabbing the wolf''s fur, Danzel jumped at the lying down Alpha¡äs chest.


    "Let¡äs see how long you canst..." Being at the lying Alpha¡äs chest, Danzel pushed Veren directly into the giant wolf''s chest.


    "Owoogh!" A deafening scream came out of Alpha¡äs mouth.


    He suddenly felt this whole body getting weak and his vision getting more blurred by the second.


    Every movement it made bough enormous pain while every breath was all the more difficult toe out.


    The world around him turned darker while the ground seemed to slowly turn into a pitch-ck liquid that was slowly dragging him down.


    The Alpha didn¡ät know what was happening and felt confused.


    But one thing it knew.


    That he had to kill that dark beast no matter the cost.


    All of his three eyes were bloodshot and staring at the dark beast pushing a cold object into his chest.


    "G-Growl!" Using all this strength, it raised one of his leg¡äs slowly towards the dark beast.


    Though all the pain that came from that slow movement alone, it still was determined to kill him.


    As long as his scythe-like ws pierced the dark beast nothing else mattered!


    But before the ws managed to reach him, the de in his chest was pushed even deeper.


    "Die"


    Following these words, a crimson glow escape through the Alphas chest


    "O-Owooh..."


    The w that were been above Danzel fell directly upon him with no strength behind them.


    The burning light that was in Alpha¡äs eyes has beenpletely faded away together with all of his strength.


    [You received 18 000 XP]


    "Finally..." ncing at the notification he finally felt relieved.


    He has been chasing that giant wolf for a whole hour until he managed to catch up to it. Which that alone suprised him.


    Not only did that wolf take every remaining spear that I had, but it also had the [Curse of Exhaustion] upon him while running away from me.


    And at the very end of the chase, he still had some life force to heal himself.


    Though he didn¡ät know much of how much 300 stamina points were or how long the skill [Tireless]sted, he had to give it to that wolf for his perseverance.


    Sadly for the wolf, his opponent was one of the true tireless undead.


    Once the curse was ced in that worked simr to a tracker with the fact that both of them had around the same speed.


    Unless something unexpected happend his death was sealed.


    With his target finally meeting his death, the talent [Sin of Wrath] was shortly de-activated and the oozing bloodlust that wasing from his body was slowly dissipating.


    "This one gave the best reward till yet..." Danzel mumbled to himself as he stared at the XP notification.


    But as he stared in towards the floating window he saw a group with weapons and staff¡äs looking at with caution.


    "..."


    "..."


    The group of people and Danzel stared at each other silently.


    "Who are you guys?" Danzel spoke up in confusion.


    `We are supposed to ask that..." Every one of the mercenary groups thought simultaneously.


    While they were peacefully going escorting the carriages as the mission from the association demanded, a four-meter-tall hound came jumping to them, closely followed by a dark knight emitting such a killing intent that made many gulps their saliva back.


    Under such circumstances weren¡ät they suppose to ask who you were?


    Walking through the mercenaries, was someone wearing blue robes and holding a staff in his hand.


    "I am Serran! And we are a mercenaries going through a mission from the association. Who might you be, sir knight?" Serran said with a friendly tone as if he was asking what the name was of vegetable.


    `He must be a magic caster...¡ä Danzel made a mental note before answering.


    "What a coincidence, I also happend to be a mercenary." Shaking the ws from his body off, he pointed with the bloody de towards the now dead Alpha.


    "You can call me Danzel, as you guys can see I''ve been going after this guy for quite a while."


    Following where the de was pointing at, they saw the giant wolf''s head and shuddered.


    `How can one person kill such a thing!?¡ä


    Most of them had the strength of a lower to middle 2nd-tier which was already quite powerful and somewhat respectable in the eyes of the normal people.


    But when they saw that huge hound lying dead to the ground, they knew that not even with ten lives could they stand a chance against that monster.


    And the dark knight in front of them said that he done what they couldn¡ät.


    Which made them grip their weapons even harder.


    But those who also noticed the golden eye in that hound''s body, dreaded by the idea of dark knight deciding to fight.


    The golden eye hound was a famous B-rank mission from the association that received the name of hidden A-rank.


    The sole reason it was named as such was because the target was a Alpha hound which could mind-controlling the other smaller hounds.


    With their ability to turn invisible and their numbers, it was already difficult enough.


    But even if they were to face against the horde of smaller hounds the Alpha that had a rare regeneration ability was like the final nail in the coffin.


    Even if they were lucky enough to deal with all those things and deal some amount of damage to the Alpha. The Alpha would always escape like the coward it was.


    Since the reward was ced upon the Alpha¡äs head himself, all the effort the mercenaries would have gone into killing the hounds would in the end be wasted if the money prize itself runs away.


    `That guy should be a high-end 2nd-tier¡ä Serran thought as he frown slightly.


    The bloodlust he felt before already creeped the shit out of him.


    `And considering that we are already behind schedule, if we fight him now we might gette to our destination and even have some casualties...¡ä


    Just as Serran was thinking of what to do,he was disturbed by a loud voice beside him.


    "To be able to take down such a beast! You sure are amazing brother!" A bulgy man with a scar on his face said, wearing some leather armor that barely contained his muscles and a spear in his hand.


    Looking at the man with a scar on his face, Danzel nodded slowly.


    "You got some good eyes, scarface. Chasing that guy was truly annoying." Danzel wasn¡ät sure why, but looking at that magic caster and the scarface brought a simr feeling to when he looked at Gerak.


    Everyone else that he looked at bough forth a feeling of disgust and hate, looking at that duo brought forth just the feeling of dislike.


    Having lived among humans for months, he was already capable of keeping the bloodlust to be released.


    But his tone talking to them would always be cold filled with a hint annoyance.


    `Are those guys not human? They sure do like it though...¡ä Danzel though.


    "Scarface you say..." Hannes scratched the backside of his neck, feeling slightly awkward being called so by a stranger.


    "Hannes, let me better do the talk..." Serran said as he walked in front of Hannes.


    "So sir...Danzel was it? Since you are a mercenary as well, why don¡ät we both go to the association to receive our rewards?" Serran said with a serious voice.


    "Hmm, association? What are you talking about?" Danzel said as he was gathering the runed spear tips in the Alpha¡äs body.


    Hearing that many question marks appeared in Serrans mind.


    `Did he lie him being a mercenary? We are pretty far from Bernes for him to be a solo adventure...¡ä


    "Sir Danzel...my I know the reason why you killed that Alpha hound?"


    Finishing gathering the spear tips, he turned around and looked at the magic caster in deep thoughts.


    `I can¡ät really say that I have done it for the XP and because it pissed me off, can I...?¡ä After pondering what to say to the caster, he just shrugged at him.


    "Well, after I left the capital of Bernes I met that big guy together with his pack. Since they already messed with me I just decided to finish what I started, I guess?"


    Many of the mercenaries gulped instinctively.


    `Does that mean by messing with you we will end up like that hound?¡ä


    Serran in turned was quite speechless of that dark knight seemingly killing a B-rank target without care.


    "So, what will you do now If I may ask?"


    "..." Staring at the magic caster, Danzel put his hand in his chest from the neck opening before bringing out the map that Gerak gave him from the storage ring.


    "I was nning to go in a city called Nercana, near the ends of the Arcana kingdom bordes by following this road..." Danzel said slowly.


    `The same ce where we go...¡ä Serran cursed internally.


    But as he was about to negotiate to go different paths with that dark knight, he was cut short.


    "Oh! That¡äs the same ce where we are traveling! Since we go at the same ce, why don¡ät youe with us? Traveling together would make those beast-infested woods a lot safer for both parties!" Hannes said followed by his ownugh.


    "Hannes..." Serran mumbled as he cursed at his friend¡äs brain.


    `That damn idiot! Who would want to travel with a stranger who killed a 4 meter tall Alpha hound!?¡ä


    Though he was cursing internally, Serran on the outside had a smile.


    "Sir Danzel, if my friend here bothered you-"


    "Sure, let¡äs go together..." Danzel said with a cold tone.


    Upon hearing that, Serranpletely froze and doubted what he just heard.


    Danzel in turn looked at the big map in his hand.


    `Having a guide wouldn¡ät be bad....¡ä He thought awkwardly.

 Chapter 106 - Bounty

    In the forest at noon.


    The ground was filled with blood from corpses that had every single bone broken. The various beast hade out and dragged the corpses from the rumbled out, only to start feasting upon them.


    Those beasts greedily devoured those corpses that once were the predators of this whole territory of the forest.


    Though most of them came to relieve their hunger, among them was a three meters tall bear with a missing eye that was destroying the corpse altogether instead of eating them,


    Compared to the other beast, he was influenced by the flowing mana which made him gain greater intelligence and a stronger, bigger body.


    Many of the beasts who were to meet that bear would either try to escape or die trying.


    Once he realized that fact, he knew that he was the strongest of all in this territory.


    s, it was naive.


    Once the bear met the golden-eyed wolf, for the first time it experienced defeat.


    Ever since the battle against the golden eyes wolf happend and miserably lost one of his eyes.


    It knew that its dream wasn¡ät ever going to happend.


    But once he saw the terrifying wolf being chased down by a dark beast, he finally found hope.


    It wasn¡ät stupid enough to go and try to help the dark beast kill the wolf.


    If the wolf itself is running away from that thing, it means it¡äs something beyond his capabilities.


    Instead, he went towards the intense smell of blood from the direction where those two came running from.


    Following that he met a whole graveyard of lying three-eyed wolves.


    Guessing what happend, the wolf and his pack fought the ck beast only to lose in the end.


    Once his small brain finally came to that conclusion itughed maniacally.


    If the golden-eyed wolf were to be gone, then he would be the next overlord of this whole territory!


    Imagining the bright future awaiting him without the wolf, he decided to have some fun with the corpses of his nemesis pact.


    Though he didn¡ät know why they were under some rumble and why some pole with a metal stick was stuck in a wolf''s body, it didn¡ät care.


    After he was done, he would be the next king of this ce.


    But as if he was devouring and cutting the corpses into small pieces, five small figures appeared from his side.


    Being in the middle of a feast, the bear failed to notice them.


    "[Fireball]..." one of the figures raised her staff and after a few words, a small ball of fire appeared and shortly shot towards the bear.


    Though the ball was small in size, once the fireball made contact with the bear, it exploded and engulfed his whole body in mes.


    "Gwaagh!" Surprised, the bear fell to the side and screamed for a moment before ncing at the one who did result in such a pain to the new king!


    Taking a good look at the small figure, it ran towards it with pure rage.


    Who dare such an insect harm me!


    The other figure with the staff walked forwards and pointed their staff towards the enraged bear.


    The next moment, a huge circle appeared 2 meters away in front of the bear.


    With the momentum the bear built up, it wasn¡ät able to stop moving from the circle.


    Nheless, it didn¡ät care about his small light.


    But as it stepped into the circle, the whole ground in the circle moved 180 degrees to the left, making the bear fall face forward from the sudden change of footing.


    As it was about to stand up and devour those two small stick-holding figures, a bulgy man was in front of his face with a mace over this head.


    "Haah!"Swinging the mace down to the bear''s head, itpletely crushed his skull together with the delusional dreams that it had.


    "Is it dead?" One of the female magic casters asked that cast the huge circle.


    "Yeah, it was just a huge bear." The bulgy man said as he looked at the burned fur of the bear.


    "Did you have to use your fireball on that? By this state, that damn fatty fur is worthless."


    The other female caster said with a pout on her face.


    "Hmph! It¡äs not like we are after this thing! Isn¡ät that right, Serras?"


    ncing at the red-haired man, he nodded solemnly before this focus went towards the pierced spear in a wolf''s.


    "This is..." Running towards the spear, he picked up before yelling out loud from triumph.


    "Guys! We found it!"


    "Huh?" The bulgy man and the two female magic caster said confused.


    The shorter man with leather armor that had many knives around him, frowns inparison.


    Walking towards Serras, he asked with a quiet voice.


    "Serras, could that be a trace of our target?"


    Nodding, Serras showed the spear to his colleagues.


    "Look at here, that¡äs the Berum''s army mark and those weird letters must be runes!"Giving the spear to the short guy, he pulled a paper with a drawing of a dark helmet.


    "The bountymissioned by the army mentions that a dark gray ted guy stole from the armory of the army itself!"


    "You guys might not remember this guy, but once I went to Gerak¡äs smithy to ask him about wherever he learned to make runes, I saw that guy seeking business with that cursed dwarf!"


    Hearing Serra''s exnation, the other four fell silent for a moment,


    Looking at his confused party mates, Serras said seriously.


    "I have already checked and it turns out Gerak went missing the next day the bounty came up together with that Rue Danzel guy. Though the bounty doesn¡ät say it, I am under the suspicion that he was the runesmith who created the chaos in the auction a few months ago..."


    As the light of understanding fell to the group, the short man said with a thoughtful expression.


    "If your suspicion is truly true, then the gold that we will receive would be more than three times the bounty amount..."


    The other three upon hearing that had their months a gab.


    Nodding, Serras said.


    "That¡äs why I mention searching around the area where people are smuggled out! That guy must definitely follow Gerak to get out of Bernes! And that spear by itself is the proof that they were here!"


    Nodding to Serras, the short man nced at the ground before kneeling.


    "Though it¡äs hard to see, there are still some traces of a battle. If I were to guess there was a battle going in here hours ago."


    Pointing in the direction where the traces were going, the short man said.


    "The freshest traces are this way."


    Taking a nce at the map that she had in her bag, the female magic caster that cast the circle said.


    "In that direction is the road towards the borders..."


    With greed in their eyes, they followed after the traces.


    ****


    Right outside the forest at night...


    "Jeers!"Hitting their wooden cups with each other, the liquid fell to the ground.


    Having traveled for a whole day with worries to be caught, the mercenaries could finally sit down and rx with a beverage in their hand.


    And among those cheerful men, there was one with a dark gray armor sitting in a rock while staring unemotionally towards the group.


    "..."


    Danzel who was bored out of his mind open his status window to pass some time.


    The moment he opponent it though, he turned his head around to look at the duo approaching him.


    ''Sigh...'' Sighting internally, he asked.


    "What do you guys want?"


    Serran who noticed the annoyed tone that Danzel had, was about to apologize before turning back with Hannes.


    Unfortunately, he was a step behind.


    "Hey there Danzel! I bought you some soup that our guys made! I got to tell you that this thing is delish!"


    "Thanks..." Taking the soup in his hands, Danzel felt quite awkward.


    I can''t even eat...


    The duo sat opposite Danzel, with Hannes happily eating his soup without care and Serran ring at Danzel.


    Danzel who wasn''t able to eat for obvious reasons noticed the casters ring.


    "If you got something to say, say it or stop staring at me..." He said with his cold voice.


    "Well, do you mind if I were to ask a question?" Serran said slowly, afraid to offend that scary man.


    Shrugging his shoulders, he replied.


    "It''s not like anyone is stopping you to make that question. Wherever I answer it or not I am not sure..."


    "Well... I guess that''s true..." Serran said after slowly nodding at Danzel''s words.


    ''As long as the question doesn''t go far it''s alright to ask, huh'' Serran thought,pletely misunderstanding that Danzel meant it literally.


    "I would like to ask you the reason for leaving Bernes and moving to Nercana." Serran said.


    "Well...let''s just say that the business in Bernes didn''t go as smoothly as I hoped it would."


    ''Though calling it smoothly would sugar-coating it. I wonder what the army did with me stealing their weapons and killing those vers.''


    "I see...then could I ask-"


    Standing from the stone, Danzel walked past Serran while giving Hannes back the soup.


    With thetter eating the soup happily.


    "I will answer your questionter, I will go...train my mana in the forest. Don''te looking for me."


    Leaving the stained Serran, Danzel opened his status window.


    "Time to advantage...." He mumbled as his figure disappeared through the forest.

 Chapter 107 - I Am Efficient

    "This should be far enough..."


    Observing his surroundings, making sure that no one followed him, he opened the status window.


    "Status..."


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    Race: Draugr


    ss: [Undead Guardian Lv. 20]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 5500/5500


    Mana: 1012/1012


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength:140 Agility: 127 Intelligence: 92 Endurance: 99


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Earth Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield Bash Lv.4] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Piercing Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Riposte Defense Lv.1] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1]


    [Remark: A true anomaly among even the Superior Undead, with knowledge of runes and skills, far surpassing that of a Draugr, one would never expect that his powerful Draugr warrior would spend months sitting at home.]


    [XP: 105 825]


    "Let¡äs hope that no one will realize..." Searching through my storage ring, Danzel held an un-runed sword that he stole from one of the drunken mercenaries.


    With the use of the [Ring of Spatial Storage], he just had to touch the sword and make it vanish in an instant.


    Though it was quite petty for him to steal a weapon from someone else when he had a small damn armory to his fingertips.


    Here he was taking advantage of a drunken man...


    "The sword is pretty worn out anyway..." Sitting with his back on one of the huge trees and started engraving a rune on the de.


    After a total of twenty minutes, he removed the mana from his finger and observed the de.


    [You received 2000 XP]


    "It¡äs still on the good quality... Oh well, at least now I can finish the mission."


    Putting the worn-out sword away, he started raising his skills.


    [Riposte Defense level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv.10]


    [Piercing level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv.10]


    [Shield Bash level has increased from Lv.4 to Lv.10]


    [The skill Shield Bash has reached this maximum level]


    ...


    [Riposte Defense Lv.10 turns into Vanguards Defense Lv.1]


    [Piercing turns Lv,10 into Prate Lv. 1]


    [Shield Bash Lv.10 turns into Shield Charge Lv.1]


    [Mission Completed! ss advancement is unlocked]


    [Undead Greater Guardian]


    [Undead High de]


    [ck Guard]


    [Undead Warden]


    "The choices have thinned outpared to the previous advancement..."


    Although he felt quite bitter about not having five sses to choose from, he didn¡ät mind it too much.


    After all, wouldn¡ät he be torturing himself if he was forced to pick one out of two amazing sses?


    Moving his finger on the first ss, the description came in front of him.


    [Undead Greater Guardian]: A Greater Guardian is a figure who excels at defense with his shield. Though he is no meat shield to speak for. With his weapon, he is capable to unleash a burst of strength which if underestimated would be ones undoing. Truly a guard to be afraid of.


    [Undead High de]: A person who is used on wilding heavy weapons with just one hand is a High de. They learned various techniques to bring the full potential of one de and unleash devastating attacks be it from near or far. His attacks are to be wary of.


    [ck Guard]: Be it a fallen pdin or someone who decided to pursue the dark arts with their weapon and shield in hand. The ck Guards have learned to use dead mana in their techniques just for the purpose to make them all the deadlier. Their ability might be weak against holy magic and light, their knowledge of dark arts together with their physical powers are to be feared.


    [Undead Warden]: A Warden is one of the highest defenses lines to face against. Their techniques can restrict and force an enemy into a fight, be it with the use of magic or other abilities. Although they aren¡ät suited to defend someone, they are the most suited to a fight of endurance.


    Reading through all the given information, Danzel couldn¡ät help but curse internally for his incapability to choose every single option and be done with it.


    s, the world is cruel.


    "Alright, let¡äs do a rundown before I choose."


    "The [Undead Greater Guardian] ss should probably be the upgrade version of my current ss which has a nice bnce between attack and defense.


    "Compared to the [Undead Warden] and [Undead High de] that are mostly base focused, with one focusing on the attack while the other focusing more on Defence. Though I ain¡ät much fond of the [Undead Warden] of his nature of being a meat shield, [Undead High de] does sound quite appealing."


    "Lastly the [ck Guard] one does sound simr to the [Spell de] that I got once offered, but it focuses more on the usage of dead mana..."


    ...


    "Ugh... I know this would happen..." Danzel cursed under his helmet as he was in the same position as back then.


    Three out of four sses were improvements of my current ss with a different focus, while thest one being [ck Guard] is a different path to choose from.


    The description of the ss was pretty vague too, as it didn¡ät want to ce a focus on defense or offense.


    Which at this point itself made it ufortable to choose, as the other three sses pointed the direction where the ss will be going towards.


    But what do three sses didn¡ät have was one crucial point...


    [Your ss changed from Undead Guardian Lv.20 to ck Guard Lv.1]


    [Your passive training has XP gain has been increased]


    [You gained 5 Strength, 5 Agility, 10 Intelligence, and 15 Endurance,] and unlocked various skills!]


    [You gained the talent [Dead Mana Affinity]]


    [You gained the talent [Dead Mana Resilience]]


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    Race: Draugr


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 6325/6325


    Mana: 1122/1122


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength:145 Agility: 132 Intelligence: 102 Endurance: 114


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Earth Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Prate Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Vanguards Defense Lv.1] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead ck Guard nearing the 3rd-tier, with knowledge of runes and skills, far surpassing that of a Draugr, one would never expect that his powerful Draugr warrior would spend months sitting at home and stealing from others.]


    [XP: 425]


    And that crucial point was...


    That he was simply poor!


    With the skills and levels slowly bing at five digits, upping them in the future would be that much harder in the nearing future.


    And the current him doesn¡ät want to go and iste himself into some random mountain and train himself for thousand of years just that he could be an immortal master of some sorts.


    Nevertheless, he was already immortal, to begin with.


    Training for thousand of years just to gain strength didn¡ät sound that appealing in Danzel¡äs opinion.


    Not only did he think that this would affect his mental state for the worse, but the opportunities that he would miss were endless.


    Such an example was the [Earth Wall] spell that he yoinked from those army people and the book that he bought about magic.


    Knowledge was a power that couldn¡ät be underestimated.


    Why should he waste his time figuring something by himself, when he could easily use the work of someone else for his own benefit?


    Efficient progress is good progress.


    With the skill [Undeath Corruption] reducing the cost of skill under the categories of dark arts.


    It was basically having a discount coupon for 20% at all times!


    If that wasn¡ät a killer deal then neither did I!


    ...


    I ain¡ät a cheapskate, alright?


    I choose the ss for the potential that it offers me!


    Since my body has dead mana to begin with, wouldn¡ät it be wise to learn more about it?


    Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom!


    ...


    Shaking his head from the useless thoughts, he focused his gaze upon the two new talents.


    "To think that it would give me two things instead of one. And talents at that..."


    [Dead Mana Affinity]: The option of Death affinity will be unlocked in your skills from now on.


    [Dead Mana Resilience]: With learning how to handle Dead Mana, your body has be more used and resistant against Dead Mana. Reduce the damage taken in dead mana used attacks by 10%. That effect is being increased by an additional 5% if the user is one of the Undead.


    Looking at the description of both talents, I nodded from approval.


    "Though I haven¡ät met any attacks that used dead mana, a reduction of whole 15% does seem quite useful. As what the other talent does I got no clue...."

 Chapter 108 - Improved Skills

    Putting aside the talent [Dead Mana Affinity], he was pretty satisfied with his choice.


    Unlike the previous advancement, where he got just 5 strength added, this time he got 35 worth of attributes in one go.


    Andpared to the skill that he gotst time, he got two talents added instead!


    Which not only was more than one but in his opinion, getting talents were much better than getting those money-hungry skills.


    Although I ain¡ätining of the capabilities of [Sense Danger] as it has already proven this own worth already.


    A skill starting at 5000 XP for the first level was like a hot knife cutting through my ribs.


    Like... couldn¡ät it cost the same as [Piercing] or [Shield Bash].


    s, I couldn¡ätin as the price was quite fair...


    Unlike the times I used [Piercing] and [Shield Bash], most of the time I relied on the more expensive skills, such as [Intermediate Weapon Mastery], [Gale Mana de], and recently the [Earth Wall].


    Of course, the lower-cost skills were by no means useless.


    After all, the [Dash] that evolved from [Sprint] is one of the most valuable abilities that I have in my hand.


    Or rather foot?


    Anyways, if we aren¡ät to count the skills that I learned from those army people. Then I officially evolved all my skills at least once!


    Till yet by each evolution, the skill showed great improvement by his core.


    Which made me all the more excited about reading through the three recently evolved skills.


    Without being able to get over his excitement, he pressed the description of three skills one by one.


    [Prate]: By the use of mana you learned how to engulf your weapon with mana which helps increase the pration ability overall. By your countless usage of his technique you learned that by moving your mana in the arm that is holding the sword, you can force your arm to move faster and stronger for a piercing attack.


    "So the skill turned out simr to [Riposte Defence], not bad. Being able to pierce someone faster with greater strength is good enough. Wherever I start using it or not..."


    "..."


    "Let¡äs go next"


    [Vanguards Defence]: A technique with the pure purpose to maximize the potential with a shield. By using mana at the holding hand of the shield, the weight holding the arm would get degrees much less and the movement speed of the arm would increase, making it easier to react to attacks. Additionally, by engulfing mana in your shield, the shield is capable to hold much more generated energy and the shield alone is capable of. Last 8 seconds


    "Hmm, the skill hasn¡ät changed much other than it generally makes my hand movement much faster though the weight decreasing and the fact that it can absorb an attack better...."


    Although being able to ignore some of the iing attacks force is quite good, he wasn¡ät excited about the skills change.


    After all, where [Vanguards Defence] realy show this worth would be against opponents that are much stronger than he is.


    If he were to use that skill on a much weaker opponent, it will just be overkill and a waste of mana.


    But since the skill was the ideal skill for blocking, I didn¡ät feel bad having it in my arsenal.


    It was just that my expectation was much higher on such an expensive skill...


    Moving his gaze at thest skill, his ethereal eye red up for a second.


    "This is..."


    [Shield Charge]: By engulfing your shield with mana, you learned how to release your mana to create a shockwave. Additionally, through maniptions of mana, you can let out a small burst of mana behind the shield to serve you a small boost.


    "I have to try this." Equipping the dark crystal shield from the storage ring, he faced towards the tree he was sitting before and started guiding his mana as the skill information was inside his head.


    With the dark green mana surrounding his shield, the skill activated.


    `[Shield Charge]¡ä


    With mana concentrating on the front of the shield, a strong burst of wind came from the side of the shield, dragging Danzel to hit the tree first with his shield and second with his face.


    *Creck


    "Ugh...I didn¡ät expect thating" he mumbled quite annoyed.


    The impact with the shield managed to crack the front of this huge tree, which showed the power behind the skill [Shield Charge].


    Although Danzel had the information regarding the skill imnted directly to his mind, that was only in the theory of it.


    As the saying says, actions speak louder than words.


    Though he knew that he was supposed to be pushed forward, he vastly underestimated the burst of speed.


    It was like an explosion happend which forcible dragged his whole body in the aimed direction.


    Though he found the skill somewhat hard to use, he saw the potential that it had ifbined with other skills together.


    [Shield Charge] Wasn¡ät only an attack skill for the shield alone.


    This true strengthy upon that sudden burst that dragged him!


    He could imagine himself using the [Dash] to close the distance and with the built momentum use [Shield Charge] to ram at someone at high speed!


    With him wearing heavy armor, the power that he would be able to generate was quite scary to say the less.


    The skill alone managed to crack the surface of that huge tree.


    If we were to imagine instead of the tree to be someones face, the fate that awaited that poor guy would be nothing good.


    "Other than the fact it¡äs quite hard to control, it¡äs nothing that a bit of practice wouldn¡ät solve. Considering that fact, [Shield Charge] takes the first ce among these three." Closing his whole status window, he put his dark crystal shield inside the ring.


    Taking his [Sun Timer] out he nced at it before putting it back.


    "Around two hours huh? Let¡äs better return." After sighting internally how fast time passed.


    After familiarizing his body with the increase of stats and clearing his mind from all the knowledge, he made his way back to the mercenary camp.


    As he expected to find the mercenaries to continue fooling around and drinking, what he found was a quiet ce with some sleeping on the ground with a wooden cup in hand or sleeping in the carriages with their foot kicking each other¡äs.


    Expect of the one campfire that was lit up, nothing else was there to light up the ce.


    Of course, to Danzel that was of no problem since of the night vision that he had.


    "I guess everyone went to sleep, huh..." Expect the three men sitting near the campfire with an expression as if they would fall asleep at any moment.


    Everyone else seemed to be asleep.


    `Well, it makes sense if they walk from early morning to be tired. They aren¡ät undead unlike me.¡ä


    After thinking about it, Danzel decided to go back to the woods and do something that he haven¡ät done for a long time.


    Training.


    With no weapons to engrave runes on and nothing else to kill, training was hisst option left if he wanted to receive XP.


    And with the recent XP gain increased by the ss advancement, he was curious how much XP he would receive if he were to train for an hour-long.


    He could also y the nice guy and tell those half-asleep guys back in the campfire that he would keep watch through the night.


    With his undead nature, he could keep watch of all eternity if he was willing to.


    But why should he do that?


    Instead of wasting his time and watching the campfire...burn.


    He could make himself productive.


    With him being poor beyond belief, he needed to start and gain XP for either his sses or level. Knowing that his skills and sses level up would cost all the more XP the further he would upgrade them, he needed to shake does bones his and start earning his keep.


    Arriving at the spot he was before, he equipped his shield.


    "Let¡äs practice on the new skills until the sunes back..."


    With dark green mana surrounding Veren and his shield, he started practicing on the huge trees.


    ***


    [You received 5000 XP]


    "Oh? Another hour has passed?" Looking at the notification Danzel stopped his training.


    Looking at the sun that had risen, he put Veren to his sheath and his shield on the storage ring.


    "I should go back..."


    Leaving the overly abused tree behind with many cuts and cracks behind, he was in a good mood.


    He was satisfied with the recent XP gain from training his body.


    As one total hour of training resulted in 5000 XP alone!


    He already gained 35 000 XP in a total of 7 hours!


    Though it was a bit slower if he was carving runes, making runes required the weapons to be `consumed¡ä too!


    Put with him having only to physically use his body, he made up for theck of stuff to engrave runes upon!


    He only had to practice seriously for a whole one hour to gain a total of 5000 XP!


    Though it was quite mentally straining, with the body of an undead.


    I could in theory keep up training 24/7!


    Not only that, that training also allowed me to get better used to my previous and new skills.


    Those points alone were a win-win situation for Danzel.


    Learning and earning XP at the same time!


    Arriving at the mercenary camp, everyone was getting up with still a sleepy expression look on their face.


    "It seems like I arrived at the right of time."


    Seeing the magic caster Serran looking around as if he was searching for something with bags under his eyes, I started walking towards him.


    "Hey guys, did anyone see my sword lying somewhere around?" One mercenary said near Danzel said.


    Which he in turnpletely ignored....

 Chapter 109 - Half-breeds

    Seeing me walking slowly at him, Serran pointed his finger directly at me.


    "You! Where were you!"


    "Hmm?" Tilting his head, he confused stared at the agitated Serran.


    `Why is he yelling at me? Did he maybe realize that I stole that sword?¡ä


    "What do you mean?" Danzel asked with a cold voice.


    Hearing that, veins appeared in Serran''s forehead.


    "I asked you where you have been the whole night!"


    "Didn¡ät I already mention that I will go train yesterday night?" he replied, still confused about where his temper came from.


    He clearly remembers telling him that he was going in the woods to train his mana.


    If he already forgot then either this man was suffering from a short-term memory loss or was partly deaf.


    Whichever it was, Danzel didn¡ät know.


    Annoyed, he crossed his arms together and looked at Danzel with a frown on his face.


    "You really aren¡ät telling me that you kept practicing the whole night long until early moring, right?" Serran scoffed.


    "Didn¡ät I already answer that? I heard that old people be senile by age, but looking at you now you seem to prove me wrong..." Moving past Serran, he went and inspected the corpse of the Alpha on one of the carriages.


    More veins started to appear as he was called senile like an old man.


    If it weren¡ät for his rationality speaking up to him, he would already start casting his own spells on Danzel.


    Knowing his ce though, he guessed that the one that will get his a*s kicked would be him if he were to do that...


    It wasn¡ät that Serran forgot what Danzel said to him yesterday night that lead him to question him. It was rather his own misunderstanding.


    Since Danzel suddenly cut their conversation short and left the party, he thought that maybe it might be too ufortable for him to be together with stranger¡äs


    Which lead him make the excuse of going in the forest to train.


    Serran could understand if this were Danzel mindset.


    After all, he thought the same way.


    Although he thought that his story to be true.


    In the end, Danzel was still a stranger who by chance found them smuggling weapons from Bernes.


    With the risk followed by smuggling weapons out of kingdom to another while they were in a state of war binded together with the mission reward in the end.


    He couldn''t help but be carefull enough and suspect Danzel being a spy of some sort.


    I mean... Who would call himself a mercenary if they had no clue about that association to begin with?


    Having that mindset, he stayed all night long just to make sure that he doesn¡ät do anything suspicious.


    What happend though was him not appearing in the camp at all.


    Which brought forth another possible situation in Serran''s mind...


    What if he already run away?


    Since he probably knew what we were smuggling outside the kingdom, he could decide to just snitch them out and benefit from it.


    Such thoughts were guing his mind all night long.


    The only reason why he didn¡ät mention all those things to hisrades was just for the sake of the benefit of doubt.


    What if he was wrong?


    He doubted Danzel to have amunication device since how expensive they were sold in the market. So even if he decided to run to Bernes and report that, they would have the time to escape, even if it were to get quite to a close call.


    The second reason was because he left that huge wolf behind and mentioned his destination be Nercana.


    Which was one of the main branches of the association.


    From the equipment that he had alone, this best guess was that he was a knight that has fallen from grace until recently and decided to be a mercenary without knowing anything...


    Giving the benefit of the doubt, he decided to wait till morning and if he weren¡ät to show up, he and his group will have to make haste on their journey.


    This resulted in him going sleepless though the whole night.


    Walking like a zombie, he grumbled to himself before preparing his own things like everyone was doing.


    Watching everyone else preparing their own staff, Danzel stared at them with boredom.


    Since he couldn¡ät train or read since that would expose his [Ring of Spatial Storage] he couldn¡ät do much other that watch the mercanaries prepare.


    After removing the traces of being here, everyone continues their journey at Nercana.


    While some were sitting on the carriages, some others walked beside the carriage serving as guards.


    Und as a tireless undead that Danzel was.


    He was one of the former ones.


    It wasn¡ät like he especially went out to say that he wanted to sit on the carriage or anything, but rather them wanting him to sit...


    Though he didn¡ät know the reason why they let some outsiders have an easy time, he didn¡ät reject them.


    I mean, why should he?


    If those guys wanted to walk so much, why should he stop them?


    But now that he was sitting in the carriage he had nothing else to do other than stare aimlessly around..


    Deciding to pass some time, he stared at his gauntlets with the help of [Rune Vision].


    With the help of [Rune Vision], he was able to see through the gauntlets and observe the rune clearly without having to remove the gauntlet.


    `I will have to get better at learning the [Rune of Eniv] as the current quality is quite bad, literly...¡ä Staring at the quality of the rune being [Bad], he couldn''t help but grumble internally.


    Since he had to draw the rune in the inside of the rune to avoid exposer, he didn¡ät have much room to move his finger to carve the rune itself.


    Heck, if it weren¡ät for his talent [Rune Vision] he wouldn¡ät be able to see a thing while carving.


    What made him feel worse was that the effect on the rune, although the quality was bad, the effect was already good enough to be of use.


    He didn¡ät know how much the talent [Undead Carver] affected the skill, but the fact was, the power differencepare tomon and umon runes was a league of his own.


    And that was meparing them with when the umon one was at the [Bad] quality.


    Just imaging the effect with the same runeat the [Perfect] if not [Beyond Perfection] quality made him quite excited.


    s, currently the best he could do was runes of the [Good] quality...


    Since he wascking stuff to practice and was where people could see him, he could only stare at the rune and try to figure out how to make it better.


    At least that was the n...


    "Hey, Danzel! What are you looking at?" Hannes walked in together with a tired Serran.


    Seeing the twoing inside, he de-activated the [Rune Vision].


    "Sorry, did you say something?" He asked, since [Rune Vision] removes all sense of noise and makes him colorblind to some extent.


    Though Serran frowned, Hannes didn¡ät mind much.


    Sitting opposite to him, he asked again while pointing at the gauntlets.


    "What were you look at was my question."


    "...I was just thinking of how I should repair the damage that the wolf cause on my armor. Nothing more." He raised his arms, showing the holes that were made from Alpha¡äs bite.


    Since the metal went innards, they couldn¡ät see my skeletor arm.


    "Uwagh, that seems nasty. Are you sure that you are ok?" Hannes said as he stared at the bite mark with interest.


    "Yeah...wasn¡ät anything serious except my armor getting damaged." He said while looking at Hannes directly to his eyes.


    `He does look like a human, but why can¡ät I feel the same feeling of disgust from him`


    The man in front of him although looked a bit bigger with a more buffed body than others, couldn¡ät find anything else that would say he wasn¡ät a human.


    "Hey, can I ask you two a question?"


    Without being able to solve what does two were, he decided to simply ask.


    Even if they refused or lied about what they were, he could simply scratch them or something to be able to see their status.


    Before Hannes could open his mouth, Serran has already replied.


    "What is it? Serran said with a frown on his face.


    "Is just out of my own curiosity, but what are you guys? You aren¡ät human right?"


    Looking at each other, Serran and Hannes turned to Danzel slightly stunned as if they didn¡ät expect that question.


    "Well..." Pointing to himself Serran said as he move his hair back for his ears to be seen.


    "As you can see I am a half-breed. My mother was an elve while my father was a human. Making me a half-elve."


    "Although he doesn¡ät look the part of it, Hannes is half-orc, half-human. Making him stronger than you usual guy."


    "Hmm..."


    `Although the guy''s pointy ears aren¡ät like the dark elves that I had met, they are somewhat simr. As for this guy...¡ä


    Though he didn¡ät know what an orc was, he wasn¡ät that much interested to ask.


    Losing all his remaining interest, he moved his gaze outside.


    "Anyway, how long will it take us to reach Nercana?"


    Putting his hand on the chin, Serran replied.


    "If everything goes well with no setbacks, then it should be around two weeks before we reach Nercana."


    "Huh?" Hearing that Danzel turned around in surprise.


    Seeing Serran¡äs serious face, Danzel knew he wasn¡ät joking.


    `Two weeks, huh....¡ä Knowing that this boredom will continue for another two whole weeks, he faced the outside looking aimlessly around.

 Chapter 110 - Tiers

    In the church of the Sacred Cross.


    There was a heavy atmosphere moving inside the church.


    The usualheartwarming atmosphere that one would receive upon going inside was nowhere to be seen.


    While some of the pdins and nuns had a heavy look on their faces, most of them stood confident with a smile on their faces.


    Both those groups looked at each other with hostility.


    Someone wouldn¡ät be surprised if they started a fight right now and there.


    But suddenly the heavy atmosphere got broken down by the sound of footsteps.


    Comming inside the Church, a group of hundreds of pdins started toe inside, walking in two lines.


    Each one of those knights released an aura worth of a high-end 3rd-tier which made those at the 1th-tier have trouble breathing correctly.


    And in the middle of those two lines of pdins, was an aura so strong and graceful that everyone who looked at him would be either overwhelmed or feel a warm feeling of security inside of them.


    That aura alone covered the whole room together with the hundred other 3rd tier auras.


    The source of this aura wasing from an elderly looking at his 70 years with a pure white robe with many gold lines. He was at the height of 1.82 meters tall with his gray hair pushed back and a pair of small sses.


    Holding a wooden staff with many small golden marbles, he walked inside the church escorted by those pdins beside him.


    While some inside the church had a grim expression on their face, others had a wry smile.


    Seeing where that group was going, an elderly nun walked in front of them.


    Looking at the nun, the pdins unsheathed their weapons and pointed them at the elderlydy.


    "You dare obstruct the path of the one and only Pope!"


    Unshaken, the elderly looked at both of the pdins with indifference, but that was only from the outside.


    Behind that face, a strong fear was present in her eyes.


    But she didn¡ät let it show.


    "Oh, strongest light, for what reason has the Pope granted us the chance to wee you at this church?" The nun smiled while ignoring the two pdins as if they weren¡ät there, to begin with.


    "Yo-!"


    "Stop." A quiet voice said to those two pdins, making them keep their mouths shut.


    Though his voice was quiet, everyone manage inside the church managed to hear it.


    "Dear, Miss Lysandre right?" The Pope said with a gentle smile on his face.


    "...It¡äs an honor for the strongest light,the Pope to know my name." The elderlydy said little surprised for such a figure to know a mere nun.


    As one who held not a shred of influence in the Sacred Cross, for an important person such as the Pope to know her name was surprising nheless.


    Moving past the nun, the Pope replied while mentioning the pdins to continue to move one.


    "We are just here to remove a heretic out of this church."


    Walking towards the huge door leading to the main hall, some murmured in confusion.


    "Why is the Pope going towards the gate?"


    "Who might be the heretic?"


    ...


    While people were discussing what was going on, one pdin that was standing guard whispered to himself.


    "It can''t be...the saintness?"


    Ignoring the whisper going around, the Pope put his hand in the huge gate while channeling mana.


    *Brrhhh


    With the door slowly opening, the waiting hundred pdins rushed inside the room with many seats and a statue on the stage.


    Walking inside the room, the Pope looked with cold eyes at the beautiful figure kneeling in front of the statue.


    "Former brightness light! Under suspicion of using dark magic and producing internal corruption into our ranks, you will be held under custody and be judged fairly if you decide to cooperate." The Pope yelled out loud.


    The people outside the room were beyond shocked, at least those in the true believer''s faction.


    One had to know that without any permission by the saintness herself, none was allowed to enter the main hall.


    As it was considered the only ce where the saintness couldmunicate with the goddess herself.


    In a way, it was the private room between the sacred cross and the goddess herself.


    Thoughmunication was extremely rare to be achieved and only happend every 200-300 years.


    If the goddess by some chance decide to send an oracle and none was to receive it.


    That alone could write someone as the most sinful man in the entirety of the Sacred Cross establishment for the next thousand years.


    "..."


    Though the constant aura of hundreds of 3rd-tier pdins and the Pope himself, who himself was a near end the 4th-tier individual.


    The saintness kept still kneeling in front of the statue with her ymore beside her.


    One of the younger pdins who realized that they were being ignored couldn¡ät help butsh out.


    "You witch! How dare you disrespect the strongest light, the Pope itse-"


    "ENOUGH!" The pope''s thunderous voice echoed through the whole building while ring at the young man.


    "I-Pop-sorr-I-di-nt" The young man in question was shaking from the sudden outburst of the Pope¡äs aura.


    Removing his gaze on the young man, he looked at the maiden kneeling in front of the goddess statue with dread.


    `Those idiots, they must have gone blind.¡ä The pope cursed internally as he observed his pdins having a simr look.


    The strongest light and the Pope of the Sacred Cross.


    That was the title that Andrew Marken has worked his whole life to achieve.


    From a peasant with no resources in hand, one would have never expected to be a powerhouse on his own that almost was reaching the 5th and final tier.


    In order to ssify someone''s strength, 5 tiers did exist.


    With every tier being a higher league of his lower tier.


    The 1th-tier was ced on themon man with no special abilities to speak of.


    The 2nd-tier was the one where one person was beginning to gain better control on their life force and mana to manifest otherwordly abilities.


    Those two tiers could be achieved by anyone who put enough effort into them.


    But for a higher tier that wasn¡ät the case.


    Achieving a higher tier of strength required one if not many things such as talent, resources, bloodlines, or outsiders'' help.


    An example is that someones re-animates a 1th-tier person into 2nd-tier Draugr as an undead.


    Unlike the 1th-tiers that could defeat one of the higher tier people. The other 3 tiers cut a clear line that could be rarely be grossed by special individuals.


    And the 5th-tier was a monster on their own which could be either described as a walking cmity capable to level kingdoms to the ground by their own strength alone


    Andrew Marken who was from the high-end 4th-tier and about to reach the 5th-tier knew, that if that woman, the brightest light of the Goddes of Life will to.


    None inside this room coulde out of here alive.


    Why?


    Standing up from her kneeling position, she picked up her ymore and looked indifferently at Andrew and the Pdins.


    "So you have chosen this path, Andrew..."


    That was because the saintness was of the 5th and final tier.


    Suddenly a golden aura exploded from her body, engulfingthe whole room with such pressure that made the pdins fall to their knees.


    Andrew upon witnessing this aura frowned slightly.


    "Former brightest light... I receive your actions as an act of rebellion against the whole kingdom of Berum.


    Moving to the side an ominous aura wasing from the gates.


    Looking at the figure, the Saintness frowns slightly.


    "To think you will join them..." The Saintness whispered to herself.


    Andrew who saw that figure put a wry smile on his face.


    "Thus, I will let the third Feather take care of you..."


    An aura matching the Saintess started to slowly engulf the room


    And final.


    Two 5th-tier auras started to sh with each other.


    *****


    Traveling together with the group of mercenaries.


    The days past days went ording to how Danzel had pictured them.


    Boring.


    From morning till night, they would travel towards Nercana with an hour of breaks from now and then.


    Other than one time when we got attacked by some beast, those were the most boring times for Danzel.


    For him who was already used to using his time to work constantly with only taking breaks when he was fed up with work.


    Staying still in the carriage for hours long was for him like torture.


    At the very least his salvation would be at night where he would run of and train for eight hours long before it was time to depart in the morning.


    Other than sometimes talking with the half-elve Serran and the half-orc Hannes nothing would change on his schedule.


    And around two weeks of time, the image of a fairlyrge city was to be seen in the distance.


    Looking at the city, Danzel couldn''t help but say.


    "So that''s Nercana...."

 Chapter 111 - The Association And Arcana Society

    "You are allowed to go in."


    "Thanks, guys! Move on!"


    Escorted by a group of mercenaries, three carriages entered the city of Nercana.


    Compared to the capital of Bernes where the streets were filled with people going through their business, Nercana was different.


    Though they weren¡ät as many people as in Bernes, you couldn¡ät call this ce deserted. And contrary to what one would expect from a city near the borders, the buildings were in quite good condition if not a better condition than most buildings in Bernes.


    And Danzel who was watching by the side inside the carriage found this weird.


    After all, you would think that the capital would be much grander than that of a city in the middle of a potential war zone.


    He originally wanted toy low somewhere with a minimum amount of supply of equipment to engrave runes and maybe find a recement for his armor.


    His goal was only to learn the runes of Veren as quickly as possible so that he can remove the chore of recing his armor.


    He didn¡ät want to admit it, but his skeletor body was siding more on the fragile side.


    The endurance was supposed to increase the toughness of one¡äs body.


    But even then he could confidently say that if he were to receive any attacks from the past months such as the [Magic Missiles], the assassins or one of the smaller wolfs by just his bones.


    He wasn¡ät confident to say that they would hold...


    Which was why he wanted to have armor at all times.


    For him, the armor that he was wearing served as his true body.


    At times, he would even forget that he was wearing armor.


    With the [Rune Vis] ced in his helmet, it granted him vision simr to as if he didn¡ät wear a helmet at all.


    Toppled him with him being an undead, his severelycking senses, and unlimited stamina made him feel that his armor was a part of his body.


    In total, he had three senses.


    Which were sight, hearing and touch.


    As one of the undead, he was granted permanent vision with no way to abstract since they couldn''t blink.


    With no way to blind him and on top of night vision, there were little ways for a skeletor type undead to get his sight disrupted.


    Also, their hearing had an advantage that other living beings didn¡ät have, that being they couldn¡ät be deafened for obvious reason.


    But as the saying says, there is no perfect being in his world.


    With advantagese disadvantages.


    Not mentioning that they had only three senses, a skeletor type undead sense of touch was much worse than those of the living.


    They could feel when they were touching something and how much strength they were putting, but that was all there was.


    Their sense of pressure was decreased by a huge amount while the sense of warmth, cold, and pain did not exist.


    And with the severely bad sense of pressure, at times he would forget that he was wearing armor and treat his armor as a part of his own body.


    That mentality that he had made him want to quickly go and learn the Veren runes to finally remove future damage on his armor.


    `Right, I shouldn¡ät be hasty of such things. Since kingdoms aren¡ät being built at a day.¡ä Danzel thought before turning his head towards Serran.


    Seeing me staring at him, Serran frown slightly.


    Though Danzel didn¡ät know the reason why, but this guy seemed to have something against me.


    "What is it..."


    "Nothing much, I just wanted to ask why this ce looks better than the capital of Bernes" Danzel said as he pointed at the buildings around.


    Staring him with a tired look, Serran couldn¡ät help but sigh out loud.


    "Sigh...you really don¡ät know anything do you?"


    "How should I if it¡äs my first time here?" Danzel said honestly.


    Touching his temples with his fingers, Serran felt exhausted by Danzel''s behavior.


    `He ispletely clueless. To think I would suspect such a guy...¡ä


    Though the whole two weeks he has been constantly trying to figure anything that could categorize Danzel as someone dangerous.


    He kept trying to talk with him with every chance he could get in the hope¡äs that he makes a slip of tongue and spill any of his secrets.


    When that didn¡ät work he tried to follow him to his so-called night training for anything suspicious.


    But the only thing he was was his training really intensely.


    The focus Danzel was putting in his training made him be in awe and somewhat scared as every swing of his long sword would raise dust.


    The only person he knew that was training as intensely as he would be the muscle head, Hannes.


    No, even he felt shortpared to the training Danzel was putting himself.


    In Serran¡äs eyes, he saw Danzel train as if something was at stake that a moment of distraction could make him lose something.


    And the idea of disrupting someone with such behavior was kinda scary for a magic caster such as him.


    Just imaging the strength one needed to carry the weight of all this armor while swinging a longsword like it was nothing made him have cold sweat on his back.


    Anyway, the fact that Danzel was training as he said at night and a day looking like a dead fish onnd made Serrane to one conclusion.


    That Danzel waspletely clueless...


    "Hey, you hear me? Why did you freeze so suddenly?" Danzel said as he waved his hand in front of Serran¡äs face.


    I mean look at him...


    "Ugh...You asked why the buildings are better than Bernes, right?"


    "Yeah." Danzel nodded


    "There are two main reasons as the reason why this is." Serran said as he raised his two-finger for Danzel to see.


    "One is the culture difference."


    "Compared to Berum where magic is being controlled and out of limits to themon people to keep them better in control, the Arcana Kingdom is the opposite."


    "Magic is heavily assessed here with the better one is with magic, the higher they are in the hierarchy of society. For amoner to learn magic they just need to enroll in an academy and pay a fee toe in contract with magical knowledge."


    "And with a society with magic being the trend, there would be nock of mages capable of earth magic that is focused on construction."


    "I see..." Nodding with understanding, Danzel fell in deep thought.


    `A society with a heavy focus on magic. Just imaging everyone here being able to cast those [Magic Missiles] such as those two magic caster makes me anxious. But maybe I might be able to get my hands of few books in magic if I were lucky.¡ä


    Ignoring the fact that I was in my thoughts fantasizing about new books, Serran continued his exnation.


    "The second reason is that Nercana is one of the main branches of the Durendal Association, otherwise known as the Mercenary Association."


    "With Nercana being so far away from both Berum and Arcana, this city became a true neutral territory that is being led by the Durendal Association from the shadows."


    "The reason the city is so well of is though their investment alone."


    "After all, with the current war going on, this ce has be one of the most famous ces for mercenaries to take missions and gather supply with before leaving for their next mission."


    Looking straight at Danzel, he continued.


    "And as you could probably guess by now, our group is going to retrieve the rewards forpleting such a mission."


    "Danzel, you said you weren¡ät registered on the Durendal Association, right?"


    "That¡äs right if you guys haven¡ät told me I wouldn¡ät have known that such group existed." Danzel answered.


    "Then if you were to register and be officially a mercenary, you can simply go and pick the mission that requires that hound that you killed and simply receive the reward for the mission."


    "I see... Thanks for giving me such information, if you were to help me register as a mercenary I wouldn''t mind giving you guys half of the mission reward." Danzel said


    Surprised for a second, Serran shook his head.


    "There is no need to give us anything since you helped us against does beast not long ago. As for helping you register I will do free of charge."


    Shaking his head too, Danzel pointed at the carriage carrying the Alpha wolf.


    "I insist...Without you guys, I wouldn''t be able to carry that thing to his ce, to begin with."


    Seeing Danzel being so adamant about it, he could help but ept.


    "Alright, just don''te backter to get those coins back."


    As those do were continuing to chat about rules and regtions of the association.


    Coming inside the carriage, Hannes mentions the two toe out.


    "We are here."


    Moving outside the carriage, the first thing that greeted Danzel was a huge building with many people looking like mercenaries standing nearby.

 Chapter 112 - The Trio

    Staring at the three-story building in front of him, he would be lying if he said he wasn¡ät impressed.


    There were no traces of crack in the walls to see, while the wood that was used looked as if it was brand new.


    But what impressed Danzel the most were the countless ss windows that they had.


    Though he saw some shops and buildings using ss for windows back in Berum, they mostly numbered in a single digit.


    "This ce sure is amazi-" Before Danzel could finish his sentence, he got interrupted shortly after.


    "Ah, I am tired."


    "Let¡äs get the reward money and rest for some centuries or so."


    "What rest? We should go and get wasted instead of sleeping like the bear you are."


    "What did you say!?"


    "Instead of wasting those coins into that trash can that you call your stomach, let¡äs just find and pay a girl to warm our beds for a night or two~"


    The mercenaries escorting the carriage ignored Danzel and just passed through him while dreaming what to do with the mission reward.


    "..."


    Seeing them walk in the building as if it was their own home andpletely ignoring him, Danzel didn¡ät know what to say.


    Having everyone walk in, thest one to go in turned back and faced Danzel for a moment before turning his gaze towards the two figures behind him.


    "Hey, half-freaks! We will be going and collect our share of the deal, so make sure to take deliver them the package, also handle... that guy." As he pointed at Danzel, he shortly left as the hollow gaze of Danzel creeped him out.


    "Those bastards..." Hannes cursed quietly.


    "What was that?" Danzel asked.


    In the two weeks traveling with each other, those two and the others didn¡ät seem to have a grudge against each other.


    Though they weren¡ät that talkative to others, I assumed it was because they weren¡ät into social interaction.


    But looking at how that guy behaved I guess I was wrong.


    "Sigh...it¡äs nothing worth mentioning, let us just finish the job and we wille back for you to be registered" Saying that, they guided the carriages together to the side of the building and started talking with what looked like an employee of the association.


    "Ah Danzel, the paperwork might take some time to finish so you can already head inside, we will shortly find you there."


    Nodding at Serran, he headed inside the building.


    Opening the door, a spacious room filled with all kinds of people was before him.


    With some sitting at a table together while others were staring at a big board with many papers nailed on it.


    Except for the few that had a simr uniform such as the employed that I saw together with Serran and Hannes, one thing had the other people inmon.


    That was that they were armed through the teeth.


    Some looked like veteran hunters with battle scars from who knows where carrying many weapons in their bodies such as knives and small crossbows, while others looked like knights or even magic casters with the robe and staff set.


    Though he wasn¡ät able to urately perceive it, he could tell that except for the few scrubs here, everyone was at a simr level if not stronger from those two magic caster¡äs that he had fought.


    `So that¡äs the mercenary association?¡ä Danzel nodded secretly to himself in approval.


    Compared to those adventures that he would meet from time to time in Berum, the people here looked more professional.


    "Hey, are you going to move today or not?" A voice sounded from behind him.


    Turning around, he saw a group watching him with a frown on their face.


    But that frown slowly disappeared after witnessing the tall armored figure staring at him.


    "..."


    "..."


    Moving to the side, the group hastily went in and walked towards the reception table with an employee.


    "I guess that¡äs the reception..."


    Feeling rather awkward from the previous encounter, he looked around him in search of somewhere to sit quietly.


    `Over there...¡ä


    Walking over the clear table, he seated on the wooden chair while aimlessly looking around for curiosity.


    `Now I can see what Serran meant with his ce being a hot ce for mercenaries. If they were to gather everyone in Nercana they will practically make a whole battalion on their own.¡ä


    That of course is if they have the gold to pay them.


    "Gold, huh..." Danzel said absent-mindedly as he pretended to pull out a gold coin from his chest.


    `That ring sure is useful...¡ä


    Looking at the gold coin he pulled out from his ring storage, he couldn¡ät help but contemte on what he should do with it.


    With him having a couple of thousand gold coins inside this ring, he wouldn¡ät be financially troubled for a long time.


    Though he was poor on XP, he could probably fill some buckets full of gold coins and still have enough in the end.


    With such money in his fingertips while watching all those mercenaries searching for jobs paying little to nothingpared to his wealth.


    He felt somewhat troubled about where to use it.


    The first that came to his mind was a house and equipment to either keep for himself or engrave runes on those.


    Since he needed arge quantity of those, he could imagine himself spending all those coins and turning them into XP.


    But that logic was far too naive to even for him.


    Though he doubted that he will find a house as good as the one that Gerak provided, he didn¡ät believe it to be a problem finding a ce.


    What the hard part was the equipment.


    He doubted that none will notice such arge order.


    But for the sake of the argument, even if none would notice, he would eventually have to sell all the crap that engraved his runes on.


    After all, without any ie, he will sooner orter be unable to buy other equipment.


    If that were to happen he would be stuck with tons of armor sets and weapons that he couldn¡ät make use of.


    [The Ring of Spatial Storage] had his limits.


    Which by the way has already reached its limits with all the army¡äs remaining equipment.


    The only solution that he thought would be to turn the equipment back into ingots and just sell those.


    But that idea was quickly scratched as it would only dy the process of going poor and bring forth the wrath of all the cksmiths in the world.


    It was as if you were paying someone to make your homework, only for you to shred the paper into thousand of pieces and ask for the guy to make your homework again.


    Seeing your work being destroyed by the very man who asks for another one of your work to destroy, the frustration one must feel would be intense.


    Thus, he was in a dilemma.


    If he were to sell the runed equipment there was the chance for the same thing to happend as in Berum.


    But not selling them would result in no ie for him.


    "Hey~"


    `I will have to find someone to sell the junk and focus on figuring out the Veren runes¡ä While Danzel was formting a n inside his head, he was suddenly interrupted.


    "Hey! Can¡ät you hear me you little sh*t!?"


    "Hmm?"


    Turning around was a trio of men with the middle skinny one yelling at me.


    To the right was one as tall as Danzel with many scars on his face and messed up hair.


    On the left side was a shorter man with a height of 1.68 tall with a slightly circr head.


    Looking at their faces full of arrogance Danzel felt confused.


    ''Who are those guys?''


    "What do you want" Daniel said with a cold voice.


    Pointing his fingers at the table, the skinny man yelled out.


    "Were you sitting at our table! Scram before we make you to!"


    ncing at the table and the people with pitty eyes on me, I replied with a firm tone.


    "I was here first, go find somewhere else to go." Turning my head around, I started ignoring the trio.


    Though keeping a whole table for himself was unreasonable, the way does guy came at him was too aggressive.


    If someone elsewhere to ask reasonable for him to stand up so that this party could sit, I wouldn''t mind waiting for standing.


    After all, I wasn''t a member of this association, at least not yet.


    If a no-member were to disrupt a member of the association, he could picture him getting in trouble since he would be in the wrong.


    But those guys came with an attitude of being the kings of this world.


    If they are going to be a*sholes.


    I will be a a*shole!


    "You!" With a flushed-up red face, the skinny man reached his arm to grab my shoulder.


    But before he could touch me, I shot up from the stair and grabbed his wrist, and turned it slightly around.


    "Gahh!" Falling on his knees, the pain came rushing from his wrist which made him cry out in pain.


    Seeing themotion that we made, the voices inside the building quieted down with everyone focusing their attention on us now.


    But I didn''t pay any attention to them.


    Turning his wrist, even more, more cries of pain came out of the skinny man.


    "Gaaah!"


    "You bastard!"


    "You courting dead!"


    As his friends were about to draw their weapons, a robed figure came and pulled Danzel away.


    "We finished our work Danzel, let'' a go resist now!"


    "Serran..." Noticing what Serran wanted, heplied as he didn''t like the attention he was getting at.


    Followed by Hannes closely behind,Danzel und Serran left for the reception table.


    Unknown of those two hateful res behind them.


    Gripping his wrist, the man started whispering to himself something.

 Chapter 113 - The Test

    "What did you do Danzel?" Serran asked.


    Following closely behind him, I replied coldly.


    "I haven''t done anything really, they just came and seek from trouble."


    Seeing me from the side, he touched his templed¡äs with his finger before sighing to himself.


    "Sigh...If I knew that this would happend I wouldn¡ät have told you toe in..." Serran mumbled to himself.


    "Sorry, what did you say? I couldn¡ät hear you from all the sound."


    "Nothing..." Shaking his head, Serran replied.


    Walking at the reception, the employee that I saw with those two was waiting for us.


    "Is this the guy who wanted to join the Durendal Association as a mercenary?" The employee said as he looked at Danzel front head to toe.


    "Yes, he was the one who disposed of the Hound in the Berum territory." Serran nodded in confirmation.


    Putting a frown on his face he looked at Danzel with doubt written on his face.


    "You saying that he killed that damn hound alone?"


    `Hmm...¡ä Danzel''s ethereal eyes gazed at the man with an ice-cold re.


    It was obvious that this guy wouldn¡ät believe it even if I were to tell him the truth.


    And Danzel wasn¡ät wrong about that.


    After all, this mission although it was put on the B-rank, it got infamous for being in truth an A-rank mission on which many mercenaries failed and died upon challenging the mission.


    Even if he wanted to, he couldn¡ät believe that just one guy managed to achieve something of this level on his own.


    "I did in fact kill that guy together with his pack alone, but I doubt you will believe that..." Danzel said his this ice-cold voice.


    Staring at Danzel for good five seconds long, the guy turned around and brought out a piece of paper together with a pen.


    "Here, fill out this with your personal information." The man said ndly.


    "..." Taking the paper out of his hands, Danzel started to read it thoroughly.


    Well... they weren¡ät much to read in the first.


    I just had to fill out my name, gender, race, spection, and other simr things.


    Which were for Danzel quite awkward to answer.


    Like his birthdate...


    He couldn¡ät just write four months ago, right?


    Starting with his name, he decided to instead of writing Rue Danzel to go for Letum Danzel.


    Though he was quite far away from Berum, he didn¡ät really want to risk it by a chance someone from the army recognise his name.


    Writing his new identity done, he went towards the difficult section...


    Gender and race...


    Though he was pretty confident to say that he had the mind of a man, he had no clue if his skeletor body was one of a female or male...


    `I am barely at the 2 meters tall and my bones look pretty thigh to be a body of a woman''s, considering those facts the chances of having a woman¡äs skeletor body should be low...¡ä


    Flinching from the very idea of it, he quickly wrote down male as his gender and human for his race.


    The reason for that was simply because he saw more humans than people of the other race.


    Humans shouldn¡ät gather any unwanted attention which should be avoided.


    That...


    And he couldn¡ät just write down an undead.


    That would be no different than bashing his own skull towards the wall while begging others toe and kill him.


    As for his spection, he just write down to be a knight, since he was often being called one.


    After finishing filling up the paper, he gave it to the employee.


    "Letum Danzel, huh?"


    After finishing reading the paper, he turned around while mentioning to following him.


    "Where are we going?" Danzel asked.


    He is is is thought that filling up the paper will finish his registration in the association.


    "Where are going to test yourbat abilities"


    "My what..?"


    But was wrong.


    As he was following the employee, we shortly reached arge room with weapons lying to the side of the walls.


    "This is..." Before Danzel could ask, he was cut short.


    "Tell me, what do you define strength tier to be?"


    "Excuse me?" He asked confused.


    With a frown on his face, the man said.


    "You tier, what¡äs your tier?"


    "Ehm..." Opening his status he quickly gazed at the remark.


    [Remark: A Undead ck Guard nearing the 3rd-tier, with knowledge of runes and skills, far surpassing that of a Draugr, one would never expect that his powerful Draugr warrior would spend months sitting at home and stealing from others.]


    Ignoring the second half of the remarks nonsense, he focused on the ''nearing the 3rd-tier'' part.


    ''Since it says nearing I should be still at the boundary of the 2nd-tier''


    "I have the strength of a 2nd-tier." He said as he removed the floating status in the window in front of him.


    "I see..."Turning around, he went towards the door and left shortly.


    "Wait here while I bring your opponent here..."


    *Bang


    Closing the door, Danzel was left there waiting awkwardly.


    And after twenty minutes of waiting, the employee arrives with a middle-aged guy.


    "The man beside me is Karl Heston, one in the early steps of the 3rd-tier and your today''s opponent."


    "Hello there." Karl said politely.


    Starting at the man in front of him, Danzel couldn''t help but ask.


    "Didn''t I tell you that I am on the 2nd tier? Why do I have to fight against someone of a higher rank?" Said Danzel


    Though he didn''t have much of tiers, the things that he heard were that the higher the rank, the stronger the someone where.


    Fighting a losing battle was a big no-no in Danzel''s book.


    Showing for a second a wet smile, the employee replied.


    "The reason of it being the case is to have an expert figure out your strength while avoiding any kind of harm..."


    "I see..." Danzel nodded in understanding.


    He would be lying if he wasn''t excited.


    As long as he is aware, that guy was supposed to be his first-time fighting someone with a superior tier.


    Gripping the hilt of Veren, he was about to unsheath the de before he stopped.


    ''If I were to draw Veren out of this sheath, wouldn''t they know that it has a runed weapon'' As Danzel was contemting on what to do, Karl raised his hand and pointed at the wall.


    "Wait wait. We aren''t going to use actually our actual weapons in our possession. We will be using those ones.


    Looking at the direction he was pointed at, he was slightly surprised.


    Though he didn''t take a good look before, seeing now all kinds of dull weapons being lined up there. You can choose whatever weapons you are mostfortable with.


    " I see..." Sighing internally, he turned around towards the weapons.


    ''So that''s the target that kid wanted to give a beating'' Karl thought to himself as he watch his boss the employee.


    Though he didn''t like doing such a dirty job, he wouldn''t mind doing it against a cheater who lies before even joining the association.


    Of course, the gold coins he received also yed a big continuation in convincing him to do the man''s bidding.


    Starting at Danzel who picked himself a longsword together with a shield, he walked towards Karl slowly.


    Though the de was dulled on purported, the de was still made out of metal which could also inflict heavy wounds.


    Since they couldn''t use wooden swords for a spar because of the strength that people were too cause they break so easily, they had to settle down with dulled des.


    At first, Karl found thebination of Danzel''s white weird weapons.


    It wasmon knowledge that holding a long sword required both arms while the shield limited the user to hold a much smaller weapon.


    But seeing that guy break thatmon knowledge, Karl was slightly surprised.


    Going to the side of the wall, he picked a random sword and walked away from Danzel only to stop around 15 meters far away.


    Karl nodded towards the employee so that he can start.


    Raising his hand high up, he bought it down as he yelled.


    "Go!"


    As Karl was about to rush towards Danzel, he suddenly halted and stared in surprise towards his opponent.


    Looking at the eerie killing intenting out of his body, Karl frown.


    "This guy..."


    As he said that, dark green mana started to engulf Danzel.


    As a veteran mercenary, Karl had seen many things in his whole life.


    From monsters to weird spells, he saw many things.


    But what he was currently seeing was a first in his whole life.


    Having operated mostly on the Arcana kingdom he saw many magic casters.


    But for him to see the color of mana bring dark green was a first.


    Putting some strength on his legs, Danzel dashed forwards with the shield in front of him with incredible speed


    Leaving to small crates at the ground where he previously was.


    "This speed!"

 Chapter 114 - Calming Hate

    As if he were suddenly thrown from the side road right in the middle of some train tracks and witnessed a ck training right at him.


    Karl''s first instinct was to jump to the sight.


    Using some of his life force to enchant the muscles on his legs, he sidestepped the charging dark knight 2 meters before they made in contact.


    Though right after he moved to the side, he saw the dark knight swinging that longsword diagonally right at him.


    "Hmpf!" Scoffing out loud, Karl blocked the swing with his own sword.


    *Thinck!


    Moving a few steps back after their sh, both looked at each other in silence.


    The employee watching this stared in awe at those two, clearly not expecting to get so intense so fast.


    Karl also had a frown on his face.


    He was informed to take care of a 2nd-tier idiot who was going to take the entrance test.


    Usually, he wouldn¡ät ept such requestion as he couldn¡ät bother with them, but when he heard that this guy killed a B-ranked target alone at his 2nd-tier he decided otherwise.


    He saw many party''s left to challenge the so-called hidden A-ranked only to never be seen ever again.


    One of those parties even had a 3rd-tier assassin who was famous for his ability to hide in in sight.


    So for one 2nd-tier knight to say that he finished the mission alone would be worth scoffing about.


    Karl couldn''t believe that multiple stronger people didn''t achieve the same result as a sole weaker person.


    He would even believe him if he were to say that he was the sole survivor of a party challenging that mission.


    But that wasn''t the case.


    And for that, he felt his pride getting insulted.


    As he was the member of the few parties who managed to get away from the Alpha hound.


    He was one of the members that had a 3rd-tier assassin and three other high-end 2nd-tier members that challenged the B-rank mission that was famous for being called a hidden A.


    s, greed blinds.


    Chasing after the reward, they failed to see the danger behind epting that mission.


    In the end, only he and another one of his party mate survived with him losing a whole arm.


    Because of that, no one else knew better the strength that this Alpha hound had other than him.


    The hound¡äs invisibility always brings them the advantage to ambush or escape their enemies


    High regeneration and undead-like stamina.


    The advantage of numbers.


    If he were to choose one out of all his already outstanding abilities, he would choose his sight.


    The beast reflexes were so great that it could react to almost any attack and avoid fatal damage which would heal shortly after by his high regeneration.


    But that wasn¡ät the reason why he chose his sight.


    It was the ability to see the invisible target¡äs


    Though the hound was strong, it was still lying on the high end of the 2nd-tier.


    Against our assassin who was at the middle state of the 3rd-tier, such beast would have been a breeze to kill.


    At least so it should have been...


    He still remembers how his friend who turned invisible to be bounced by all the smaller and Alpha hounds, turning him into shred before they could even provide support.


    Their morale quickly faded before turning into deep despair from the hound''s attack.


    With no other choice, they had to run away for their dear life.


    But with the invisible hound¡äs chasing after them, one after the another of his party mates were turned into dog food.


    Karl still remembers those smiling eyes of the Alpha hound till now.


    And with someone saying that he killed such a beast at the 2nd-tier, he felt insulted.


    ncing at his hand slightly trembling, he nced at the dark knight with a frown.


    `His strength is as strong as him, if not stronger...¡ä Karl remembers the spar that he had with his 3rd-tier assassin friend. The strength behind his attacks was on a simr level.


    He had great difficulty blocking his attacks before, but now...


    `I am of the 3rd-tier¡ä


    "You are still too far to challenge me..."


    Using his life force, he enchanted his legs and dashed forward with a much higher speed than Danzel.


    Reaching before him, he swung his sword, aiming for his head.


    The attack was fast but far too simple.


    *Kbaah!


    Blocking the man¡äs attack with his shield, he prepared to pierce his stomach.


    But something unexpected happend.


    The life force forcibly dragged his arms and made him do a quick swing to his right shoulder.


    "Hmm?" Seeing the sudden change, he made a step back and positioned his shield to the right.


    *Kbaah!


    Blocking the attack, another one came soon after even faster.


    With blocking that, the same thing repeated again.


    Through the continuous attacks, Danzel was forced into the defense with no chance of attacking.


    `I see that¡äs how it is...¡ä Figuring the trick that he was using, he activated his [Vanguard Defence], making him able to stand on his own ground.


    Seeing the same mana flowing through the dark knight¡äs shield, he frowned slightly.


    He, who was pushing Danzel back a few seconds ago came to a halt while continuing his onught.


    `His guy uses a skill simr to that of prating which forces him to make an action much faster...¡ä Danzel thought as he was slowly channeling mana through Veren.


    Though such techniques were strong to use, they also had disadvantages.


    *Kbaah!


    Blocking his swing without much difficulty, the expecting another swing never came.


    Such as running out of juice...


    `Now!¡ä


    Using [Shield Charge], he speed up to him and swung the practice sword from his side.


    Sensing the concentrated mana on the de, Karl''s frown turned for the worse.


    Using the same technique as before, he enchanted his legs and created some distance before a dark green wind de flew in his direction.


    The wind de dug through like a shark while creating air-cutting notice.


    *Fseeeen!


    "Hmpf!" Scoffing, he quickly sidestepped the wind de, letting it pass from his right.


    "You will never hit anyone with his thing-" Turning his head, he noticed the dark knight rushing at him with an unsettling aura around him.


    *Tingh!


    Both des shed with another,


    Karl tried to push the de back, but to his surprise, he couldn¡ät.


    `You are telling me that this guy is of the 2nd-tier!?¡ä Karl thought surprised.


    Though he only advantages two months ago, he was still a 3rd-tier warrior! Finding out that a 2nd-tier was no any weaker than he woke his anger.


    But that anger quickly faded away as he noticed the traces of the wind de.


    The wind de cut more than 15cm deep through the ground which speaks of his sharpness alone.


    `That¡äs no longer a test...¡ä He thought concerned.


    He signed with the mind of beating a rookie to let some of his frustration out, not for a deathmatch.


    `The guy already showed his capabilities, let¡äs end it...¡ä Though his pride was hurt, the damaged that they created on the testing fields was already enough.


    Since he was testing him, he would be ounted for the things that guy breaks.


    Dealing with him can be der, now avoiding the punishment toe is a priority.


    "Hey-"


    As Karl tried to say something, another swing came much heavier than before which with difficulty he blocked.


    And the eerie aura that he felt from that knight suddenly turned much more intensive by the second.


    Noticing the bloodlusting from the knight, he felt rmed.


    "You! The test-!" Before he could finish, another swing came at him.


    Each swing that he made forced Karl to take a step back.


    The previous situation that Danzel faced was now happening to Karl.


    Danzel who was currently affected by the [Sin of Wrath], waspletely dominating Karl.


    Compared to the other times that his [Sin of Wrath] was guing his mind with madness and anger.


    What he felt now was rather...rxing?


    There were two ways he learned for [Sin of Wrath] to activate.


    One was to be engulfed by your anger.


    The other was to forcibly activate it by controlling your anger, or how Danzel would like to put it.


    Embrace your hate.


    Though his natural hate of the living, especially the humans for some reason.


    The trigger to let the [Sin of Wrath] activated had decreased, making him keep a rather cool mind.


    Since the hate was real, the hate hadn¡ät increased that much.


    It only made him want to kill him.


    "You! I said-!"


    Swing diagonally at him, the de soon came to a standstill.


    Feeling the intense killing intent right in front of him, Karl¡äs expression paled.


    Turning his head slightly towards the shocked employee, he yelled at him.


    "You! go call for help!


    "Wha-?"


    "Hurry!"


    "Don¡ät get distracted on me..." Danzel said with a chilling voice.


    Pushing the de towards him, both des were pushed to the side.


    Letting of the practice sword go, he tightly grabbed Karl''s arm that was holding the sword while hitting him with his shield right on the face.


    "Kagh!" Letting his sword fall of, Karl fell to the ground with a cry of pain.


    Staring at him, Danzel said with an ominous voice.


    "Don¡ät worry, I ain¡ät going to kill you..."


    Walking towards him, he thought internally.


    `Although I really want to....¡ä

 Chapter 115 - Brute Forcing With My Fist

    The employee who stared shocked at those two quickly turned around and left the room running.


    "..." ncing solemnly at the closed door, Danzel realized that he went too far.


    But he wasn¡ät feeling any concerned at all.


    As long as this guy lived in the end, I could call it the result of the spar.


    Thinking along those lines, he walked closer to his sparring partner.


    Compared to the other times where his life was on the line, fighting against such an opponent felt refreshing.


    Though the guy had the muscle power and a quite annoying skill, it was nothingpared to the opponents he had faced before.


    The goblin magic caster that he faced before had quite the handy spells on his fingertips which made him difficult to approach.


    Raphael and the assassin inparison had both skill and technique in their arsenal that required all his focus to fight against.


    If he were to choose what the most challenging fight was he would have to choose either one of those two.


    Although that Bald Fist was stronger than those, Danzel found the way he fought to be barbaric.


    I mean...who would fight a person with a longsword in his hand with just their two fists?


    Even if one of the punches were to hit, he wouldn''t have been being able to pass through his armor.


    With the exception of his head of course.


    Since it was one of few undead body weaknesses of his.


    If we weren''t to count the weird barrier that he was able to manifest, the Bald Fist could be seen as a slightly stronger manpared to the others.


    And now him facing against someone with mediocre strength with no ability to be wary of, Danzel could focus on the small details that he would usually miss in a battle.


    Such as the man''s bodynguage, his breath, and eyes who showed that this man was nervous.


    Things that usually one wouldn''t pay attention to in the middle of a fight.


    The man was no doubt strong, but in Danzel''s hollow eyes he seemed to be of no threat.


    Compared to the feeling of urgency that he got when the Alpha wolf bit his hand, he could finally enjoy and understand the instincts of the undead with no further concerns.


    "I told you that the test is over! Any more and you will be considered as-"


    Having cast my spell, two arms made of mana appeared beside him and shortly after flew and brought his training sword to his hand.


    "You-!" Karl said with his voice full of anger.


    But Danzel paid him no need.


    After all, even if they were to reject him in the association he wouldn''t mind it too much.


    In the first ce, he only joined out of curiosity and for the sake to sell Alpha''s body for a bit more pocket money.


    He could also give the body to Serran and Hannes so that they take the money of the quest for me.


    Although ording to Serran that way would be more troublesome, the option was there.


    Moving towards Karl, I swung the sword at him.


    Seeing that I wasn''t listening, grinding his teeth, he quickly pulled out a dagger from his back, barely blocking the iing sword.


    But something unexpected happend.


    With life force running through the dagger, it cut 3cm deep through Danzel''s sword.


    "What..?" Withdrawing his sword, he swung at the now standing Karl again.


    The current him had now more strength than his guy.


    But the weapons they used were at a different level.


    Upon the sh with both des, the sword that Danzel was holding snapped, with the half de flying right past him towards the ground.


    "Seriously..." Looking dumbfounded at the broken sword, he couldn''t help but curse internally.


    ''That sword is worse than one of the daggers that the goblins were using!''


    And that couldn''t be helped, since the swords were made from just iron, they couldn''t possibly handle the strength of a 3rd-tier with life force put into it.


    Compared to the dagger that Karl managed to retrieve from his friend''s corpse and the life force enchanting the force of the dagger.


    The blunt iron sword was nothing inparison.


    ''Crap...''Danzel thought as he dropped the broken sword.


    He was too used to Veren''s durability.


    Looking through the side of his eye, he looked at the weapon stash where Veren lie down.


    As he was about tomand the mana arms to go there and pick it up, Karl who regained his confidence move forward to stab Danzel.


    Pushing the shield in front of him, it blocked the dagger to go any further.


    At least that was the idea...


    The dagger pierced through the shield, almost hitting Danzel''s arm that was holding the shield.


    "..."


    Staring at the dagger going out of the shield and how far the mana arms were, I abandon the idea of getting Veren to deal with this guy.


    Sometimes you have to brute force your way out of tricky situations.


    And what better way other than brute forcing with my fist was there to use?


    Dragging the arm equipped with the shield to the side, he threw a punch aim at Karl¡äs face.


    Seeing that, Karl managed to take a step back dodging experiencing getting punched again.


    "Ha! As if something like this will wor-"


    But as he wanted to scoff at him, Danzel hand equipped with the shield grabbed the fist that Karl dodged, pushed his own arm forward which resulted in a painful elbow right in Karl¡äs face.


    "Bagh!" Karl screamed from the pain flowing through his nose.


    Perceiving through this pain, he caught himself from falling down while ring at Danzel full of killing intent.


    `I will kill you!¡ä Grabbing his dagger as hard as he could, he jumped at Danzel with life forceing out of his legs.


    "Die!" With cracks showing in the floor, he pushed his dagger forward with the intent to kill.


    s...


    "Too obvious..." Stepping to the side a moment before Karl''s attacks, Karl passed through Danzel''s side bewildered at how the knight managed to dodge his attack from his speed at that range.


    He quickly turned around, to attempt again, but the moment he look at the knight, he already grabbed the shield frame and forcibly removed the shield from his one arm so that he could swing it at Karl¡äs jaw.


    "Gah~!" teeth and blood came out of the man¡äs jaw upon the impact of the shield and he felt the world going to circle¡äs.


    As he was faltering taking three steps back, on his four-step he fell to the ground like a puppet who had his strings suddenly cut.


    He could only stare at the ceiling with hazy eyesight.


    The fact that he was still conscious with his jaw still attached to the man¡äs face showed the resilenced of the 3rd-tier.


    If it was someone weaker they would be lucky to survive that.


    Walking in front of the downed Karl, he looked at him with an ice-cold gaze.


    "..." Staring at the Veren sword that was being held by the mana arms, he grabbed it while still staring at Karl.


    `Based on that guy''s strength, he should be worth 10k to 15k XP in total...¡ä Danzel thought as he rubbed the handle of Veren with his fingers.


    In the past, that would even be a crazy amount of XP, but now with the recent increase of the training XP, that amount was like nothing.


    Sure, it was three whole hours of training, but the trouble that killing his guy would bring wasn¡ät worth it.


    *Pah Pah Pah~


    "They areing..." Danzel said as he heard small footstep soundsing from the door.


    "It should be the employee with the help..." Calming himself down, the effect of [Sin of Wrath] lifted from his mind.


    Gazing towards the dagger from that guy, a sudden idea came to mind.


    "Ugh...I begin to regret my actions." Gripping the dagger that Karl had, he pierced his armor around the shoulder area while cing some blood from him around the dagger and the armor.


    Since most of his armor was hollow, the only pain that Danzel felt was him further damaging his armor voluntarily.


    As he grabbed the broken training sword from the ground, the door was mmed open by armed men followed closely by the employee.


    "Halt!"


    One of the men said pointing his spear in my direction.


    Looking at that, I pointed at Karl on the ground while pulling out the dagger from his armor.


    "That guy over there pulled an actual weapon between our spar, which made me put him at his ce. Here is the evidence..." He said as he throw both dagger and the broken training sword.


    The man looked at both the daggering from his shoulder and the broken sword.


    Looking at Danzel''s bloody fist and then at Karl¡äs face he put a frown on his face.


    "Lies! That guy continued fighting when he was told not to!" The employee who run away said while pointing his finger at Danzel.


    Hearing that, the men''s expressions gotplicated as they couldn¡ät decide who was saying the truth.


    Staring coldly at the employee, Danzel scoffed at the man.


    "Do you really think that I would stapped myself near my heart just that I have an excuse?" Danzel question as he pointed at his armor where the dagger came out.


    "Stop this farce imminently." The employee who tried to say the truth was quickly interrupted by a harsh voice.


    "!!!"


    Hearing that voice, all the armed men and the employee were startled before making a way for an elderly figure with many wrinkles on his face and a long white beard with a holding staff came in the room.


    The elderly man looked at the lying-down Karl and then at Danzel before asking.


    "What happend?"

 Chapter 116 - Terrifying Magic

    "What happend?"


    "..."


    Silence befell the room, the armed men looked at each other unknowing what to say.


    They just got here after hearing that someone was assaulting a member of the association, but apparently, things weren¡ät as simple as they looked.


    The one who question Danzel a moment ago stepped in the front and pointed at the employee.


    "Master Nevvan, we were informed by this member staff that an assault was happening."


    The elderly who went by the name of Master Nevvan turned his head towards the staff, his gaze asking for confirmation.


    Being looked at by Nevvan, the employee gets nervous before nodding his head.


    "I-It¡äs as he said! That guy with the ck armor was taking the entrance test and he was asked to stop h-he continued his assault that went towards a life and death fight. I-I acted ording to the protocol, Master Nevvan."


    Staring at the employee for good three seconds, he stretched his arm and said.


    "Give me the paperwork of that guy."


    "Ah, yes!"


    Given the paperwork that Danzel answered to Nevvan, he started reading it slowly and thoroughly.


    And after two minutes of awkward silence between those two groups, Nevvan turned around and faced Danzel.


    "Letum Danzel? Is that your name?" The old man asked Danzel.


    "Yes..." Danzel nodded in confirmation.


    "Mhhm, strange name."


    `What do you mean by strange name!?¡ä Letting go of the urge to curse at the old man, he stayed silent so as to not provoke him.


    Though he didn¡ät know what status he had, he was at the very least a higher ranking personpared to the others behind him.


    Oblivious to Danzel''s thoughts, Nevvan said with a serious tone.


    "So what¡äs your part of this story?


    `Oh?¡ä Taken aback of actually letting him exin himself, he shrugged his shoulder before exining in detail what happend.


    Though they were some screws removed right and there, the main essence of the story was there.


    Which theme then helplessly defending myself against the one pulling a real weapon on a spar, which by sheer luck and determination managed to punch the guy to the face twice, hitting him with my elbow to the nose and swinging my shield mercilessly at his jaw to the point of almost killing the guy.


    Although the half part of that story was removed, I was sure that they got the main essence of it.


    After hearing my exnation together with the so-called `evidence¡ä, the armed men couldn¡ät help but turn towards the employee.


    A cold sweat came running from his back as all the gazes fell upon him.


    Panicking, he pointed at Danzel and started screaming with anger.


    "Lies! Everything he said was a lie! Don¡ät believe him!"


    "Silence" Though Nevvan¡äs voice wasn¡ät loud, he sounded as if what he said was near their ears.


    "F-Forgive me, Master Nevvan..." The employee said with his voice growing weaker as he continued speaking.


    Waiting for silence to conquer, he gazed at Danzel.


    "So back to you Mr...Danzel? The papers say that you are a 2nd-tier knight. Am I correct?"


    "Yes."


    "Mhhm, strange indeed," Nevvan said as he walked closer towards Danzel


    Witnessing the old man walking closer he felt rmed, but he didn¡ät show it to the outside.


    As bodynguage could sometimes speak louder than words, standing confidently by your statement was key.


    With Nevvan now standing 2 meters away from Danzel, he looked at him from head to his toe, having a surprised expression on his face.


    "Indeed, you are indeed in the peak of the 2nd-tier, fighting off against someone at the lowest height of the 3rd-tier wouldn¡ät be possible..." Moving his eyes towards the trail of [Gale Mana de] that had been created he showed a smile.


    "If we were to consider your ability too..."


    Staring at the lying-down Karl, Nevvan moved closer to him to take a look.


    "Who is this?" Nevvan asked.


    "He should be Karl Heston who recently joined the staff as an instructor and sparring partner for the test, Master Nevvan"


    With a frown on his face, Nevvan turned around and nced at the employee.


    "What is that man doing here? I remember putting him be a sparring partner for tomorrow, not today."


    "I-I just-" The employee''s face was getting paler by the second, as he felt a bad proportioning towards him.


    "Enough, the Durendal association is of no need of unobident staff."


    Hearing that, the employee felt like salivating.


    Realizing the meaning behind his words, he subconsciously made a step back.


    What happend though shocked everyone inside the room.


    Nevvan raised his staff towards the direction of the employee, and after a short light blue light came from the staff as quickly as disappeared.


    The skill [Greater Sense Danger] of Danzel activated never stronger than ever before, which surprised Danzel.


    If it weren¡ät for stopping himself from moving, he would already be running towards the opposite direction of that dreadful feeling.


    He nced around to see from where the feeling wasing from.


    But his attention was shortly moved towards a shattering sound.


    With his whole body turning pale, the moment his foot touched the ground cracks started to appear.


    They started from his foot to his leg and from there on the cracks moved through his whole body.


    And under the gazes of everyone, the employee shattered into millions of pieces of ice.


    The only thing that remained was a pile of colored ice in the ce where the employee was standing at.


    Once again, silence befell the room.


    In a single moment.


    The man was killed in a single moment.


    The only thing that hinted that this Nevvan was the one who did it was the light that his staff let out.


    If it weren¡ät for that, no one in here would know how the man died.


    The guy who was turned into ice probably didn¡ät even realize how he even died!


    `I couldn¡ät see it...¡ä Danzel was equally shocked.


    He couldn¡ät understand what had just happend in front of him.


    He sensed neither mana being generated nor being traveled at the employee.


    That very fact shook Danzel¡äs understanding of magic from the roots themselves.


    `How did he manage to cast a spell without using some sort of energy!? Is it a technique of one being of the higher tier?¡ä


    He racked his mind of how he was able to do it.


    Or rather, how he was able to achieve a feat like that.


    But every possible theory that he had on his mind was quickly crossed out.


    One except one...


    `It¡äs the same''


    Something that was used instantly without using any mana.


    He knew a single skill that was capable of that.


    The skill [Mindmare] that this Dark elve once used on him had those effects.


    He forced himself to believe that this was a skill and no spell by itself.


    Because if that were a spell of that elderly guy, he couldn''t possibly imagine how anyone was capable to fight against that.


    As it bewildered Danzel.


    It terrified him as much.


    ''Magic is terrifying...'' He thought internally.


    Removing his gaze at the pile of ice, he looked at Danzel with a look of a fragile old man.


    "I will have to apologize to Mr...Denzel for seeing this. You already passed the test and will be ced as a lower 3rd-tier ranked mercenary and being able to ept mission ording to your rank."


    "You may leave now." Nevvan pointed at the door.


    Though Danzel would have liked toin of saying his name wrong, the current him wanted to get as further away as that old man.


    He simply nodded and made his way towards the door.


    As Danzel was about to leave, the old man with a smile on his face said.


    "You have a great taste in choosing your rings"


    Freezing for a second, he pretended not to hear it and just went to the receptionist table to meet up with the two ma- I mean friends of his.


    *****


    Moving to his room, Nevvan seethed down on his chair while being in deep thought.


    "To think that someone of the 2nd-tier will be holding a [Ring of Spatial Storage] with hi."


    "Though his size wasn''t in my taste, it''s really rare to see one of those..." Nevvan said as he nced at themunication device to his side.


    "Sigh...better save that sorry." Activating themunication device.


    "What service would you need this time, Master Nerrav." A voice sounded from themunication.


    Getting closer to the machine, he said.


    " Go investigate about the guy called Lerum Danzel. I want to know every single thing about him the following day. The chance of him being a spy sent by Berum is quite high." He said towards themunication device.


    "Understood."


    With the light of themunication device fading away.


    Looking outside the window, he sighed.


    "Let''s hope that he isn''t from Berum." ncing at his staff, he shook his head.


    " It would be a shame to kill...."

 Chapter 117 - Mercenary Rank

    Staring at the ne with the letter B- carved in it, Danzel stood in the lobby of the building in silence.


    With that guy Karl being on the B rank himself, I who beat him was ced a level below him at the B- a rank mercenary.


    Although he beat the living hell out of him, strength wasn¡ät everything in the association.


    The quality of reliability and trust influenced the grade too.


    With the mercenary association finding clients for other mercenaries to finish the job from them, they had to make sure that the guy epting the job actually was capable to finish it without any problems.


    It couldn¡ät be you every day Joe who gets cold feet in the middle of the mission.


    If by chance they were to hurt the client in any sort of way, their reputation will take a hit.


    That¡äs why he got B- and not a B.


    A mercenary of the B rank is mostly referred to as the rank of 3rd-tier beings.


    As one of the other employees had exined to him, B- mercenaries have the strength of a 3rd-tier but aren¡ät seen as trustworthy.


    The B rank was about the same but with the mercenary having been given the trust of the association.


    But the B+ rank was the ce where the powerhouses of the 3rd-tier lie.


    At least that¡äs what the clients and the staff would consider when they were to look for a mercenary.


    The ranks weren''t true to the people''s strength level.


    Just like he has done, someone of the lower rank could defeat someone from a higher rank.


    Still, he who just joined the association was merely thrown at the B- rank or what they consider as an unreliable 3rd-tier mercenary for the reason of being new and all.


    Of course, Danzel didn¡ät care much about it.


    Heck, he who was apparently still at the 2nd-tier to be put at the B- rank is already generous enough.


    But even if he were to be ced at the C+ rank, he wouldn¡ät mind it much.


    After all, he just wanted to get rid of that huge wolf¡äs body and run off with the money.


    He wasn¡ät a glory seeker who aimed for the higher ranks in the mercenary association.


    He just wanted to go somewhere quiet and carve some runes as it became a hobby of his.


    Since he had to work hours long to carve runes in Berum, it wouldn¡ät be weird for him to see it as something else as just a boring grind for XP.


    In a way, he considers it as drawing.


    Nheless, he would also get a small understanding of the runes themselves by observing how some parts of it worked.


    He currently worked on how to recreate the Veren rune, but progress was slow.


    Though he understood some small parts of the rune, like how the blood is being drawn, everything else was a mystery to him.


    What was the point of drawing the blood if you can¡ät even put it into use in the first ce?


    The Veren rune was supposed to drain the blood and some mana of the user to repair the runed equipment.


    Compared to what he learned, it was a little...useless.


    In fact, calling it useless would be praise.


    Once when he tried to put what he learned into a sword and used it on an unfortunate guy, the blood kept being drawn from the guy''s body without disappearing, which resulted in the whole sword and his hands being bathed in blood.


    The sight that it would create was indeed gruesome.


    But on how useful it was...


    Though what Danzel learned was pretty useless to say the less, that wasn¡ät the point.


    The fact was that he learned a part of the rune after such a long time of research.


    He still couldn¡ät forget how he felt when he learned about one part of the whole rune.


    The feeling was just exhrating.


    That was the day where he grew a soft side in runesmithing.


    And with him being unable to carve some runes for two whole weeks had thrown him from his usual routine.


    "Hey, Danzel how did it go?" Hannes said towards Danzel who was still in his own thoughts.


    Seeing the two figures getting closer to them, he raised the ne at their sight height.


    "Oh! You even got the rank of a B- mercenary! As expected of you." Hannes said with augh.


    Ignoring the energized muscle brain beside him, Serran came closer to Danzel and asked with a hushed tone.


    "Hey Danzel, I heard that amotion has happend down in the training grounds, do you know anything about it?"


    Looking at Serran, he nodded and exined what happend.


    Of course, he only told the same story as he told the other guys.


    Hearing what happend, Serran¡äs eyes opened wide in surprise.


    "Wait, you are telling me that Master Nevvan himself came down there and resolved the issue?" Serran asked.


    Which in response Danzel just shrugged his shoulders.


    Seeing my response, Serran nced at him as if he were a flying pig.


    "You really are lucky to be still standing here, I have you know that Master Nevvan is an Archmage whose ice and arcane magic is something to be feared of. He has currently the highest position on the whole Nercana. Even the Arcana Kingdom doesn¡ät dare to offend him in this territory."


    ording to the [Knowledge for every Caster] that he bought from Berum, the title of an Archmage went only to spell caster¡äs who reached the 4th-tier.


    Though that information shocked him, he also felt relieved.


    Relieved as this spell caster wasn¡ät on the 3rd-tier where he was about to reach.


    After witnessing that spell that instantly killed that employee, Danzel really started to doubt the strength of the spell caster¡äs from the same rank as him.


    He just couldn¡ät imagine himself being able to survive that attack.


    But hearing that he was from the 4th-tier, he sighted internally out of relief.


    `I can¡ät imagine facing against that anytime soon...¡ä


    Removing those terrible thoughts out of his mind, he turned his face towards the board.


    "Anyway, since I am a member and all. Where can I find the quest that you told me before?"


    Showing a small smirk on his face, Serran pulled out a paper from his pockets.


    "Huhuhu, there is no need to look after it. I already grabbed it in advantage."


    Taking a look at quest, Danzel fell silent for a moment.


    [B rank Mission: Berum''s forest Hunt]


    Kill the golden-eyed Alpha hound and bring evidence that you killed it.


    Reward: 100 gold coins


    Bonus: Body of the hound, depending on how damage will be rewarded by 10-25 gold coins.


    Requirements: C+ or above.


    ''The reward isn''t much...'' Danzel though.


    Compared to the thousands of gold that he had, what were another 100?


    What Danzel wasn''t aware of was that 100 gold coins were a big amount of money to have.


    With that huge amount, one could practically live well for around 5 whole years if used reasonably.


    For Danzel who one of his times could get the same amount if not more, the 100 gold coins did indeed seem a bit small amount.


    s, he couldn''t do anything much of it.


    Money was still money.


    "Alright, let me im the reward quickly ande back"Turning towards the receptionist''s table, he went ahead to im the reward.


    Though they were some annoying paperwork to be done, after half an hour he walked back towards Serran and Hannes with two small bags filled with gold coins.


    "Alright, this is your guys cut for the help you provided," Danzel said as he threw one of the small bags at Hannes.


    Catching and opening this bag, Hannes''s eyes are shown in surprise.


    "Oh! Serrane and take a look!"


    Looking at the content of the bag, Serran was also surprised.


    Counting the gold coins inside, he couldn''t help but look at Danzel in awe.


    "Are you sure? This amount of coins is..."


    Pausing Serran for continuing, he said.


    "You guys well deserve those 60 coins."


    "Without you guys, I wouldn''t have known about the association and would even have taken me more than two weeks toe to here."


    Looking at each other, Hannes and Serran put a smile on their faces.


    "Alright, then we will dly ept it," Serran said as he put the small bag away.


    "What will you be doing from now on?" Serran asked.


    After a short silence between them, Danzel replied.


    "I have been thinking of finding a home for me to stay in"


    "If that were the case then I could rmend you some of the inns around the area." Cannes mention.


    Shaking his head, Danzel replied


    "No, I ain''t be thinking of an inn."


    "Hmm, what are you searchingthen? " Serran asked confused.


    "...I want to buy a house to stay in. Do you guys might know someone who sells such things?"


    Looking at each as if they wanted to see if they didn''t hear wrong, Serran nodded.


    "Yeah, I know someone who does business like what you describe."


    Moving towards the door, Serran motioned for those two toe over.


    " Follow me, I will show you the way."

 Chapter 118 - Are You By Chance A Paladin?

    "We are here, it¡äs this ce." Serran pointed at a building with the sign saying [Nercana Land Management].


    Although the name was more on the boring side, it did get the point across.


    Going inside the building, the trio nced around only to see not a single soulin sight.


    "Are you sure we are in the right ce?" Hannes said with doubt written on his face.


    And he wasn¡ät the only one with such doubts.


    Without even ring at those two, he walked towards the receptionist''s table.


    "Hey, Jeyckop! Where have you gone his time!" Serran said while lining over the table.


    "Ugh... you half-a*s brat, why have youe this time around." a man grumbled annoyed.


    With heavy footsteps, a giant of a man looked down on the half-elve.


    He had a height of 3 meters tall with a body wide enough to cover two Serran¡äs standing by side together and arms as big of a full-grown adult head.


    Upon the appearance of the man, both Hannes and Danzel were surprised.


    One had to say that both of them were quite tall and bulgy on their own way. Hannes has the muscles while Danzel wearing heavy te armor.


    Butpared to the giant in front of them, they could even be seen as brats dressed up for Halloween.


    While Hannes felt like he lost a battle, Danzel question how that guy was capable to move all that flesh of his.


    And Serran who by far was the shortest among us was more like an 8-year old child in Jeyckop¡äs eyes.


    "Hey, Jeyckop! Look what I brought here for you." Serran said as he pointed at Danzel.


    Turning his head, Jeyckop stared at Danzel with a frown on his face.


    "Kid, I ain¡ät sure what happend through your journeys as a self-proimed mercenary, but I didn¡ät think that you would go so far to introduce your husband to me..." The man, Jeyckop shook his head in dissaprovedment.


    "..."


    "..."


    "..."


    Silence befell the room.


    While Danzel stared coldly at Jeyckop with no hint of emotion, Hannes looked at those two as if he learned the greatest secret of the world.


    Shaking his head like a fish fighting for his life outside the water, Serran started exining the situation.


    "Jeyckop... that ice statue over there isn¡ät my husband by a long shot. Neither that blockhead beside him."


    "What I came here for is to show you a customer of yours!" Serran said with a smug smile on his face.


    "Customer?" Jeyckop asked confused.


    Stepping forward, Danzel pointed at himself.


    "That would be me..."


    "..."Jeychop stared in silence before turning his head at Serran.


    "You ungrateful child! Is that how you want to repay an old man! I have already enough work on my te! But you want to put more work on those shoulders!? I am disappointed in you, Serran!" Jeychop said.


    Serran rolled his eyes at Jeychop¡äs statement.


    "If you mean the none existed souls inside this deserted ce, then you indeed have lots of work to take care of."


    ring grandly at Serran for a moment, he turned his head and faced Danzel.


    "So? What business does a knight have to do at this ce?"


    Taking a peek at Serran, he looked at Jeychop.


    "I am here to buy a ce to stay..."


    "A ce to stay you say? Isn¡ät an inn enough for you?"


    "...I prefer having a private ce for myself." Danzel said somewhat speechless.


    "Tch, isn¡ät he a mercenary like you? Can he even effort that?" Jeychop askedSerran.


    Serran in turned just shrugged his shoulders.


    He too wasn¡ät sure if Danzel had the money to buy his own ce.


    With his brows furrowed, he stared at Serran.


    "Did you seriously bring me a penniless man as a customer? At least if you are going to waste my time, at least make it wort-"


    *Ting!


    cing a bag with 500 gold coin¡äs on the table, Danzel cut Jeyckop short.


    "I repeat... I am here to buy a ce."


    His tone was cold and absolute as if there were no further negotiations to be made.


    "..."


    Once again, silence came in the room.


    Only the sound of Jeyckop grabbing the small bag with coins in it could be heard.


    *Ting


    Jeyckop stayed silent through the whole process of observing the coins.


    `They are real...` Sighing internally, he put the bag down the table and this time looked seriously at Danzel.


    "What do you want?"


    `Is he deaf?¡ä That was Danzel''s first thought upon hearing that.


    "...I would like to find a ce with a big storage room that is further away from the popted areas."


    "...Wait here." Taking the bag of gold with him, Jeyckop walked somewhere inside the staff area.


    A short whileter, Jeychop came again with three pieces of paper in his hand.


    "Here, pick and choose..."


    Serran who briefly took a look at what ces those papers contained frowned slightly.


    "Jeychop, this is-"


    "Be quiet, Serran." Jeyckop said with a stern voice.


    Though Serran would usually get angry if he were to hear that from him, this time he didn¡ät.


    `For the old man to use such a voice...¡ä


    Compared to Serran who looked quite conflicted, Hannes was still bbergasted by seeing 500 gold coins being spent in front of him.


    "Hey, Danzel! Are you seriously spending 500 gold coins just for a ce to stay!? If you were to go to the best inn of Nercana instead, you will be able to live well of for...many years! You could even get yourself an even better armor and sword that you currently have now"


    His attempt to speak some sense at Danzel sadly fell into deaf ears.


    Though Hammes was mostly right at what he said, the points he mentioned weren''t that appealing.


    First off, the inn would be no different than a prison to Danzel.


    Not only could he not eat, but he would also be unable to train as it would probably disrupt people around him.


    His training had to be intense for him to get XP out of it.


    The room space would also be of problem.


    Sometimes he would go and use some of his skills mid-training to get more familiar with mana and the skills themselves.


    Such training was far too dangerous to use in an enclosed room.


    Just imaging shooting out identally an air de sounded terrible enough.


    The other rather the reason why he disliked the idea of going to the inn was the food.


    Since ording to Serran, most of the inns charge for food and the room together.


    And as a skeletor undead, he obviously hadn''t the word eat on his vocabry.


    Which meant he would be buying food that he couldn''t even eat in the first ce.


    And spending money/XP without reason was one of the things that Danzel considered taboo.


    Looking at that perspective, the inn offered him nothing more than a prison cell that he had to pay off.


    Buying his own ce instead sounded much more appealing to him.


    Though expensive, yes.


    The benefit that it would provide would cover the cost.


    He would gain privacy that would allow him to train as much as he want.


    A ce to learn about magic and runes generally out of prying eyes and atst he would gain an inventory for the runed equipment that he had to somehow sell.


    [The Ring of Spatial Storage] had his limits.


    As for the armor, he mention he did indeed n to buy a new one or at least the arm part where it was damaged by that damned wolf.


    Though the other parts of the armor had a few scratches here and there, they weren''t that serious.


    Though some might consider him stingy, which they would be right by fair say.


    He actually thought that moving money is better than lying somewhere to be forgotten.


    In Danzel''s ethereal eyes, money was a reusable tool that could help him grow stronger faster, be it from skills or equipment.


    His stingy side of his came from his want to use his resources in hand to the maximum efficiency.


    Although he wouldn''t call himself a perfectionist, he was indeed closing in that rank.


    Removing all of the useless thoughts of his mind, he grabbed and read through the papers.


    ''Hmm, an abandoned mana crystal factory, huh? The space that it held is massive but other than this it didn''t have much to offer.


    Although the area around the factory wasn''t as popted as here, it still had a decent amount of people living there.''


    "How about this one..."


    Reading through the paper, Danzel would even have a frown on his face if he could.


    Though it met the required space and area, this ce was way too far from Nercana.


    With the ce being almost out of the city, he quickly put the paper down until reading thest one of the.


    "This is..." Reading through the paper, Danzel nodded to himself before showing Jeyckop thest paper.


    " I want this ce..."


    "Hmm..." Showing a confused look, Jeyckop stared at danzel.


    Or rather his chest te in the middle part where it looked simr to a cross.


    Looking at the paper at the cross again, Jetchop couldn''t help but ask.


    "Are you by chance a Pdin?"

 Chapter 119 - Church

    Though the abandoned side of Nercana where destroyed buildings and grown grass were to be seen, a trio came walking in.


    Except for the few people that gazed at the trio between the cracks of the buildings, the whole area was deserted.


    After the group walked for some, they arrived at a big building that was in an even more deserted ce with only some withered grass and weeds.


    If someone were to be here in this ce they would even forget that they are in a city.


    Even the slums in Berum had at least their paths made out of stone and earth.


    For grass to have grown all around this ce, neglectance was probably the main reason.


    As Serran mention, this whole city is being by a mercenary association.


    Since their main customers so to say were warriors and magic casters, the city aimed to satisfy their needs for a greater profit.


    Be it inns, cksmiths, or even small academies for talented magic caster¡äs to take part in, Nercana offered anything that a mercenary would ever need or desire.


    For that reason, the local resident were for the most part abandoned.


    Only the inner part of the city receives better treatment since that¡äs where most of the mercenary find their residents.


    The further out one would go, the worse it became.


    Such as the ce where the trio was currently.


    "Alright Danzel, here should be the ce that you bought..." Serran stared at the silent Danzel with a frown.


    "This Jeyckop, to think he would sell you such a ce for a total of 500 gold! If you want we can turn back and get your money back." said Hannes.


    "...I appreciate your offer, but I would like to take a look first before I judge by appearance alone."


    Looking at each other, Hannes and Serran were out of words.


    ''Who would want to live in there?'' Both though at the same time.''


    "Alright, you do your thing. We will be going then."


    "Make sure to go back at Jeyckop if you are unsatisfied with...that ce. If he doesn''t pay you backe and find us at the association¡äs main building."


    "Alright" Danzel nodded.


    After both of them said their farewell to him, Danzel pulled out the paper that had the detail information of the ce in front of him.


    Reading through it he remembers the discussion that he had with Jeyckop today.


    ****


    An hour ago in the [Nercana Land Management]


    Hearing Jeyckop''s question brought a second of confusion in him.


    After it passed, Danzel knew why he asked him that.


    With his chest te having a cross shape and the ce he wanted to buy, he would of course mistake him as a pdin if he chooses a church to reside in.


    "I wouldn¡ät call myself a pdin..." Danzel answered.


    `What kind of undead would call himself a pdin?¡ä


    "No? Anyway, are you sure you want this ce? Although it has therger base together with a basement level, they say that this church is cursed." Jeyckop said.


    "Cursed? how so?" Danzel asked interested.


    "Well, not exactly cursed. It¡äs just that a few years ago, some crazy guy using forbidden magic created there a cult under the disguise of a church."


    "Though that cult has long since been uprooted by the magic caster of the Arcana kingdom. Although the cult disguised as church wasn¡ät famous to the people since we from Arcana aren¡ät many believers ourselves, many had died down there."


    "But that¡äs all in the past, although they are people calling this ce cursed, I went many times to confirm that it is not."


    Looking at Danzel, Jeyckop said with a serious tone.


    "You still willing to be?"


    "As long as it has what the paper mentions, then yes."


    *****


    Danzel standing in front of the church, put the piece of paper away while bringing out the keys that Jeyckop has given him.


    "Let¡äs hope that it¡äs as promising as it says..." He mumbled to himself as he walked in the front door.


    What he saw though was a slightly opened door that seemed to have broken lock.


    "That¡äs a great start." He grumbled to himself.


    The expectations that he previously had took a big hit at this sight.


    "I will make him repair me that door..." Swearing to go and file someints on Jeyckopter, he pushed the door open.


    *Twwch


    Shaking his head, he ignored the sound of the door and went inside.


    Though the outside of the church had some cracks on the walls, the interior seemed all fine to him. Although there was no speck of light to speak of, he didn¡ät need any since he had his night vision from being a undead.


    The church had two rows of wooden seats that were in a terrible condition, while at the front was a broken statue that had most of his half-broken down.


    Only a half-kneeling figure with only an arm holding a book and a wing remained to be seen.


    Though what got him the most attention were the small figures that were peeking at him though behind the seats.


    "Children..?" Danzel said as he turned his head and locked sight with one of them.


    "Ah..." The child who was directly being stared at, let a small sound of surprise.


    "He can see..." He mumbled to the others around him before they went for cover through the seats.


    "What the hell are you-" As he hurridly his steps, a small rock was thrown from his right side aimed at his helmet.


    Seeing that, Danzel grabbed the small with one of his hands before crashing it into small pieces.


    "Huh!?" The brat who threw the stone cried out in surprise, as he didn¡ät imagine the stone to be broken with just the man''s strength.


    "Idiot, hide!" A voice of a girl said from the front side as she pulled an improvised crossbow fitting her size aiming at Danzel.


    *Fsssss!


    The arrow flied through the air aimed at Danzel¡äs heart.


    But the moment the arrow hit Danzel''s chestte it just bounced off without even leaving a scratch.


    "Realy..." The girl said dumbfounded.


    Turning around she tried to hide through the seats, but before she could do a bright blue light appeared next to her.


    "Kiagh! What is that!?" ncing at her wirst being grabbed by two blue ethereal arms, she started to panic.


    "Let me off!" The girl threw a punch at the arms, with no further results to be seem.


    Danzel who cast [Mana Arms] strolled at the small girl.


    Though the [Mana arms]bat capability were almost no existed, they still had the strength of holding Veren.


    Not only that, but they were extremely vulnerable against physical attacks to the point where a half-a*sed punch from a grown adult would destroy them into oblivion.


    But against a small girl who looked around her 8 years old, her punch wasn¡ät enough to free her from the grasp of both the ethereal arms.


    If he were to use only a single arm to hold her down, she could probably manage and free herself. Though with both of the mana arms holding her down made it next to impossible to get herself out.


    "Anna!" Voices through all around the church sounded with worry.


    A boy around her age appeared near her and started to smash the mana arms with a rock in his hand.


    "Anna! Don¡ät worry, I will get you out!" The boy hit the mana arms with the stone only for them to waver a bit before turning back to how they were.


    "Marcus! You can¡ät! Run away!" Anna said to the boy Marcus next to her with tears starting to form in her eyes.


    "Never!"


    "..." Danzel silently stared at both of them before continuing walking towards them.


    Ignoring the rocks that were thrown at him from all around him, he arrived 4 meters away towards those two.


    "You guys..." Raising his hand, he reached out to rece the mana arms grip with his own hand.


    And as he was about to grab her wrist, he heard a cold voice behind him.


    "Don¡ät touch them!" Jumping from the seeling, a boy with dark hair looking at his teens reached the ground as if he were a cat right behind Danzel.


    And the next moment he pulled out a small dagger surrounded by bits of mana from his wrist out and jumped at Danzel with the intent to pierce through his head from behind.


    With his skill [Greater Sense Danger] activating long before the dark-haired kid touched the ground, he turned around and the hand that was supposed to grab the girl named Anna grabbed the boy''s wrist that held the dagger.


    A glint of surprise shed through the boy¡äs eyes as Danzel managed to react in time.


    Before he even had the chance to struggle against that strong grip.


    Danzel dragged his arm and threw him towards the seats to his left as if he were a sack of potatoes.


    *Baahm!


    Flying through the air, the ck-haired boy soon crashed at the seats, breaking some of them and raising the gathered dust from the seats into the air.


    "Kayn!" The children who were hiding in the seats raised up and called in worry.


    With hasten steps they went towards the ck-haired boy with a worried look written on their faces.


    Among that group were the girl and boy who were struggling against the mana arms a moment ago.


    `I lost my focus way too fast, I guess I have to invest more in my skills...¡ä Danzel thought bitterly as he looked at the fading mana that were the mana arms.


    Shaking his head from those thoughts, he walked towards the gathered brats and said with a cold tone.


    "Why are you here?"

 Chapter 120 - Trespassing

    The children gathered around the ck-haired boy turned around by Danzel''s question with hate full look on their face.


    Some of the smaller ones were being held by the much older children so that they won''t rush at Danzel with their sticks in hand.


    They knew that the chance of beating him was non-existent.


    All they could do was hatefully look at him.


    Of course, Danzel didn''t care about their opinion.


    From his point of view, he just entered the building he just purchased, and not even a minute in his own home he found those guys using a damn crossbow and that guy wanting to crush my skull with a dagger in his hand!


    You guys are at my home! You don''t even have the right to be angry!


    If it weren''t for Danzel restrain, he would already kill those guys.


    The only reason why he didn''t kill them was out of curiosity and wanting to avoid staining the whole ce with the blood of those guys.


    Though the main reason was of wanting to avoid trouble.


    Although Serran told him many things, he didn''t tell himws regarding the murder.


    The onlyws he knew were that of Berum and murder there was punished by death.


    Though he had the ring of storage with him, if he were topletely hide his trace he would have to pull everything out, and even then he would have to make two whole trips outside the city to drop the bodies or something.


    Taking the body of all those guys would be more of a hassle than it was worth.


    ''It''s not worth it'' Danzel shook his head internally.


    He was already nning to give those guys the same treatment that the dark elve had received if they refused to leave.


    "I asked why you guys are staying here!" He said impatiently.


    "Hieeh" Scared from his tone and overall his imposing figure they stepped back with tears forming in their eyes.


    ''Should I just kill them?'' Danzel thought to annoy.


    Although cleaning though all up the mess would probably waste him the day, even for him it was starting to get irritating.


    As he was rubbing his finger on Veren''s handle the ck-haired kid started to slowly raise up, with fighting spirit yet to fade.


    "Ugh...This is our home! I will not let you hurt anyone here!" The boy said.


    "Kayn, you can''t!"


    "If you move more you will die!"


    The children beside him spoke with worry.


    Yet his words didn''t match this current condition.


    His legs and hands that we''re supporting him from standing up were shaking constantly.


    It was obvious that he wasn''t in any condition to fight.


    Looking at that, Danzel would even roll his eyes on him if he had any.


    Also, what the boy just said had an important detail that he didn''t miss.


    This is our house.


    Hearing that Danzel scoffed at them.


    He had a good idea of the current situation that those guys were in.


    They probably are orphans who used this abandoned church as their home.


    With this ce to be called cursed at that, not many people would seek trouble with them.


    In other words he was basically invading their home.


    But the thing is...


    Those guys were doing the exact same thing!


    Pretending to get something from his neck, he got the ownership papers out of his ring storage and showed them to this group of brats.


    "Huh? What is that?"


    "Ehm..something written on a paper..." Marcus said with furrowed eyes.


    "Can''t read it, can you Kayn?" Anna looked at Kayn.


    nkly staring at the paper Kayn said with a frown on his face.


    "It''s too dark..."


    "..."


    Hearing that Danzel wanted almost to p himself.


    ''Right, unlike me, does guys don''t have night vision, if eveb the knowledge to read''


    Though he who had this knowledge printed inside his mind from the moment he stepped out of the waters for some reason, those guys probably hadn''t the same privileges as him.


    Annoyed, he activated the runes in his gauntlet.


    A sudden dark green mana appeared in Danzel''s hand.


    Though it wasn''t that bright, it was still enough to lighten the words and make him look much scarier than before.


    As some of the kids were surprised by the bright light, others that could read had their eyes wide open.


    "This is..." Kayn mutter with a pale face.


    Without letting him finish Danzel pointed at the paper.


    "The home that you guys were illegally were using as your own had been purchased from today by me."


    Moving his finger at the group who stared in shock, he said rather ominously.


    "And you guys are currently trespassing."


    Kayn who read through all the paper had a pale expression on his face, as he understand what that meant for them.


    But those who were much less bright in the head refused to ept it.


    "You are lying! You are trying to kick us out and steal our stuff! We aren¡ät going to be fooled!" Marcus said with confidence.


    The smaller kids who didn¡ät exactly what was happening started to side with Marcus.


    Since he sounded so confident and was one of them, they obviously chose to believe him than the words of a stranger.


    "Marcus... this is-"


    "Yeah! That bad guy is lying to us!"


    "He wants to steal our home from us!"


    Chanting continuously like some vavid believers, the kids already determined that Danzel was lying to them.


    Looking at that Kayn¡äs wanted to say something, but the moment he tried a surge of pain came to him.


    Danzel inparison looked at those guys solemnly.


    `Those guys long surpassed the state of denial and went straight to being sheep...¡ä Danzel though.


    What currently was happening was nothing more than the clueless lot blindly following the loudest among them.


    Since one of them said so confidently then he must be right, right?


    Even though the minority who already knew the truth tried to exin, the majority who believed otherwise strongly rejected them as being `wrong¡ä and them being `right¡ä.


    It was as if you showed someone proof that the was round, but the other party would say that you are wrong and say it¡äs t instead with no further intel to proof there statement.


    Once someone went into that mind state, everything that you would say would be useless as in their mind, you would be already wrong.


    As the chant continued, so did Danzel''s patience.


    Releasing his own killing intent upon his surroundings, the brats stopped their chants and looked at Danzel with horror.


    "You guy seems to get something wrong, If you guys don''t leave in the next 5 minutes I will simply kill everyone here one by one without exception." With this ominous tone, he walked close to the guy who started all this farce.


    Staring down on the shaking Marcus, Danzel said.


    "And since you guys are practically in my home, killing you all would be of no problem."


    Grabbing the seat on the left, using his strength the seat top part broke as if it was nothing.


    cing that very hand that broke the seat to Marcu''s head, a sudden feeling of dread came into Marcu''s heart.


    The fact that this hand crushed a stone and the wooden seat effortlessly was currently on top of his head, he couldn¡ät help but imagine his head exploding any minute.


    Switching his gaze towards the ck-haired kid, Danzel said with a cold voice.


    "You are their leader right?"


    "Yes..." Kayn answer as he looked at the hand on top of Marcus head with worry.


    "I gave you guys 5 minutes to gather your staff and leave this ce. If by the time you guys haven¡ät left, you know what will happen to you..."


    Drawing Veren out of his sheath, he pointed the long de to the group of kids.


    "And them."


    Opening his mouth, Kayn wanted to say something but no words came out. He instead looked at the group of kids who looked scared and almost about to cry.


    `He is serious...¡ä


    Gulping his saliva, Kayn nodded.


    "In 5 minutes we will leave this ce."


    Satisfied with his response, he sheathed Veren back and walked towards the broken statue.


    "You got 5 minutes, once those passes don¡ät expect any mercy of me," Danzel said as he pulled out his [Sun Timer] to keep a track of time.


    "Kayn, are you serious?" Marcus said quietly as he looked at Danzel with shaking eyes.


    The children looked simrly at Kayn, waiting to see his answer.


    With a pitiful smile, he said to all the other kids.


    "Alright guys, start gathering our staff! We finally move out of his shit hole to a better ce!" Kayn standed up with a smile on his face while ignoring the pain from the fall of before.


    Looking at each other, they started to gather their stuff in haste.


    While the smaller children believed his lies, the older ones had pitiful smile''s on their faces.


    With time passing by, Kayn looked at all the children and then at Danzel who was staring at the [Sun Timer] the whole time.


    "We apologize for using your home, Mr. Knight... We will be leaving now." Turning around, all the kids followed Kayn out of the church.


    With none being inside the church anymore, Danzel couldn¡ät help but be surprised.


    "Exactly 5 minutes...."

 Chapter 121 - New Base And New Skills

    Turning his head away from the door, he nced at the paper that had the details of the church.


    "Should be somewhere around here..." Danzel mumbled to himself as he walked to the other side of the statue.


    He didn¡ät walk without reason to the statue in the first ce.


    "Found it..." He said with a grin on his face.


    He instead searched for the hidden trap door leading through the basement level.


    Though the part hidden couldn¡ät be said as the trap door had some holes in it, thus making it obvious at first nce.


    Opening the trap door, he saw some downstairs filled with cobweb and generally dirty from theck of care.


    Walking down the stairs, he soon arrived at a big hall that put in better words, was destroyed.


    The walls hadrge holes carved in as if some spikes were thrown while left to right the ground were small craters of explosions. It looked as if a battle had once taken ce.


    "Hmm, at least the ce looks much better than the cave." Danzel nodded to himself.


    Compared to the filth that he once touched in the hobgoblin cave, this ce was quite good.


    Though the house that Gerak bought for him, looked a hundred times better than this church overall, here he had the benefits of having arge amount of space.


    Since this hideout didn¡ät have that much space to begin with, other than carving runes it wasn¡ät that suitable ce to train with his sword.


    But what impressed him the most was the mana that flowed through the air.


    "Dead mana..." Danzel mumbled to himself as he felt the warm yetfortable feeling around this body.


    Though he had no lungs to speak of and neither he could breathe. If he was asked he would describe this feeling as breathing fresh air.


    The ce here made him rx and want to stand there to appreciate that special feeling for hours if not days long.


    Realeasing this own dead mana out of his body, Danzel quickly noticed something.


    "The dead man isn¡ät even that thigh...is around 50 to 70 worth of MP constantly to the air" Danzel observed with wonder.


    That was the average mana that he would use to cast [Curse of Exhaustion].


    If the mana were to gather around in one ce it will probably be much more, but with its spread through all the hall, it wasn¡ät that much for my body to be surrounded with.


    The only ce that looked simr to this ce was inside theke with all the [Non-Undead] stuck down there. But maybe because of being underwater or the dead mana just being not enough, he couldn¡ät feel the same thing back then.


    That alone improved this opinion of this ce by a whole lot.


    "I wonder how it will feel if there was more dead mana in the area."


    Just that faint amount of dead mana was capable to make him feel sofortable.


    What if it was double if not three times the amount of dead mana in the area?


    "Sadly, other than the [Undeath Corruption] talent, I have no clue how to permanently ce dead mana..." Danzel shook his head slightly dejected.


    The time that took [Undeath Corruption] to work was way too longer, be it this granting attribute points or the corruption part itself.


    After finishing observing the whole hall, nothing interesting was found except a grumbled wall that had some words in.


    Reading through the remaining carved text Danzel just got confused.


    "Following the goddessmand, life should never be vanquished or fade! The ones who offer themselves for the sacred deed shall be granted the true wish of the graceful goddess!..." Danzel read the text out loud until there was nothing more to read.


    "Jeyckop did mention it was a cult being lead by a forbidden magic caster." Putting his finger to his chin, Danzel went into deep thought.


    The more he was thinking about the text of the magic caster and the dead mana around him, he couldn¡ät help but specte.


    `Life should never be vanquished or fade.¡ä To achieve that wish, it¡äs the same as saying to be an immortal. Nheless, one of the forbidden magic that I am certain of is the school of necromancy.¡ä He thought as he looked at the dead mana.


    `And Necromancy as far as I know heavily relies on the use of dead mana which is the source that keeps the immortal beings such as I, the undead moving.¡ä


    Although he had no proof for his spection, given the avable information in hand it was what seemed the most usible.


    A necromancer offering immortality for the service of people, all that under the disguise of a church.


    He wasn¡ät sure what kind of immortality that guy who created this whole ce was giving them and he also didn¡ät care enough to think much about it.


    Who knows?


    Maybe that guy was legit and granted them immortality or made them one of the undead with the use of necromancy.


    He was sure that both those options sounded appealing to others.


    Since bing a undead was in his opinion much better.


    Having lived together with the group of mercenaries he also learned how troublesome one mortal body is.


    Exhaustion?


    What¡äs that?


    Eating?


    Too troublesome.


    Sleep?


    Hmpf, only losers do that!


    An undead¡äs body was much greater than one''s of a mortal in this opinion.


    Sure, we might hate living things by instinct andck some unneeded senses, but other than those points there were no consequences of being one.


    Though I know some might not have the same opinion as I, I didn¡ät care much of them being wrong.


    Shaking his head from all those useless though, Danzel focused on what was needed to be done.


    Thinking more about the backstory of the church didn¡ät have much of a point other than satisfying his curiosity.


    He would rather put this time on more important things than some pointless spections.


    "Status"


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    Race: Draugr


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 6325/6325


    Mana: 1122/1122


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength:145 Agility: 132 Intelligence: 102 Endurance: 114


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Earth Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Prate Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Vanguards Defense Lv.1] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead ck Guard nearing the 3rd-tier, with knowledge of runes and skills, far surpassing that of a Draugr, one would never expect that his powerful Draugr warrior would spend months sitting at home and stealing from others.]


    [XP: 555 425]


    "Over 500k XP, those two weeks of training really made it worth it." Danzel nodded in satisfaction.


    Other than the one day where he spent 7 hours in training, the remaining 13 days he spend a total of 8 hours constantly training through the night until early morning.


    The only reason why he didn¡ät spend this XP already was for the sole reason of being unsure of what he should spend it all.


    There was so much that he needed to spend his XP on, that it was slowly starting to putting pressure on him.


    The [Rune of Eniv] although rather situational, proofed to be quite handy. Which made the [Umon] runes as attractive as their price.


    Also, the collection of his Lv.1 skills was slowly starting to annoy them. Like, every time he would open his status to pass some time, they will be like some quiet yet deep-voiced whispers telling him to press the upgrade button.


    And atst, they were this own levels that needed to be increased.


    Though he wanted to avoid upgrading his new ss [ck Guard] anymore, thest time he upgraded his level was a few months ago.


    He still couldn¡ät forget that amazing feeling that came with evolving into a new race.


    Lastly, he had the choice to upgrade his subss and hopefully unlock the next tier of runes which were pound to be as usefull and...expensive.


    And among all those things he had to invest XP on, he decide to go for...


    None of them!


    Though those all things might improve the quality and overall strength. Ultimately they wouldn¡ät improve his fighting style at all.


    And with him acquiring the ss [ck Guard], new skills were unlocked for me to purchase!


    "Since I am going to buy them anyway in the future, I might as well get them now and learn how to use them thatter" Danzel said as he clicked on the [Skills] Button.


    [Skills]:


    [Cursed de]: 20 000 XP


    [Deaths Influnce]: 30 000 XP


    [Coating Miasma]: 30 000 XP


    Staring at the huge XP cost of each of those skills, Danzel felt his mind getting suddenly heavy as if someone hit him hard on his head.


    The XP required to learn those were equal to 16 hours of training which for learning a single skill wasn¡ät much of a big deal.


    But if it was worth the mental pain that he will receive for having three other Lv.1 skills waiting to be upgraded.


    Danzel wasn¡ät sure.


    But one thing he knew.


    Once he got those three skills, he will be much more difficult and deadly to be dealt with.

 Chapter 122 - Blame Yourself

    Spending his 80 000 XP somewhat unwillingly, the information drilled through his mind and started to take roots in his mind.


    "Ugh!" Danzel screamed from the flooding pain in his mind.


    Throwing his helmet to the ground, he grabbed his head in hopes to lessen the pain.


    The dead mana contained in his body started to rise up as if it trying to drown him.


    While every single bone of him started to get hotter and his headache continued like a hammer striking his head none-stop, the pain was starting to fade together with the heat.


    With the excess dead mana going back to his body, Danzel sighted internally out of relief.


    "I guess spending my XP in this ce wasn¡ät a bad idea after all." Shaking his head, he went and picked the helmet that he threw to the ground.


    cing the helmet back on his head, he stayed silent so that he can shorten the whole information and his body.


    Since this time, 2 skills were activities simr to [Gale Mana de] and the other 1 skill was a passive one.


    The effect that it bought by learning the passive skill was simr to [Miasma Corruption], though this time it was much more stimtive to the point it even surprised him.


    If evolution was feeling like pure euphoria.


    This skill was total the opposite.


    Added together with the headache he received, it sure made for an ufortable experience.


    "At least now the dead man is now flowing more smoothly than ever before." ncing at the skills description he nodded to himself.


    [Deaths Influnce]: Following the path of the dark arts, your body has gotten used to the flowing dead mana inside of you, making it flow faster and the quality of itself bes much better which strength¡äs the effects of skills that use dead mana by 5%. Though the result of that forever closes the path of being capable to use holy magic. If an Undead possesses this skill, natural regeneration is increased by 25%.


    Though a skill that cost a total of 30 000 XP seemed to becking, the most important effect that he cared about was the 25% natural regeneration.


    The reason he cared so much about it was after some experimentation on his own body he learned that his bones were regenerating much slowerpared to when he was in the cave.


    Though taking `good'' care of his body, he learned that his regeneration was for quite a while getting slower and slower.


    At first, he thought that something bad was happening to his body, but he quickly dismissed that idea, since as an undead there wasn¡ät much to go wrong with this body, to begin with.


    After looking at the problem from a different angle, he released where the problem was.


    Though every time he increased his own endurance, not only would his bones get tougher but also his HP would increase.


    Which resulted in him not having a lower regeneration, but that he needed more time to regenerate.


    The bigger the pot, the longer it took to fill it after all.


    If before his whole arm was 200 HP worth, now it was worth 500 HP.


    Since it needed more time to fill the total HP, it would obviously slow the restoration of the body if the cap is increased.


    As for the reason why he does these experiments, the motivation behind it was to learn more about the dead mana that was going through his bones.


    Since it literally kept him moving, not learning of it would in his opinion be stupid.


    Harming his immortal body that felt no shred of pain and could regenerate slowly was a small price to pay for receiving more knowledge.


    "Let¡äs hope that this helps in the future, the strengthing is also not half-bad at level 1." Waving the skills description away, he focused on his second skill.


    [Coating Miasma]: As a ck Guard who should serve as the death''s door of your enemies, both blocking and inviting them to their death by your de. You learn by engulfing your whole body with dead mana and your mana itself, how to increase your resistance against holy and light magic. Last 1 hour.


    Sure it doesn¡ät sound impressive, but having a way to increase my resistance against the so-called bane of all undead would be useful. Since sooner orter he was going to face people who had this such ability.


    The effect alsosted 1 hour long so that was also a plus.


    Having more options was never bad since you never know when one of them would save your life or not.


    "But out of those skills...this is the best one." Drawing Veren out of his sheath, dead mana flowed through the de which gave it an ominous look.


    "I almost feel bad for the guys who would be the first to experience this" Danzel mumbled to himself while his ethereal eyes stuck in the dead mana.


    As he was admiring his new skill [Cursed de], he was interrupted by some small echoesing from the stairs.


    With this cold gaze locked in the direction of the stairs, he stopped canceling dead mana into Veren and walked silently back to the hall.


    `I told them to leave if they want to live, but it seems like their attachment in life isn¡ät as strong as I had thought to be.¡ä Danzel thought as the echoes became louder as he came closer to the trap door.


    "Where is he-"


    "I thought I told you to leav-" Coming out of the door behind the statue, Danzel suddenly froze.


    "Hey! There is he! That was the bastard!" A skinny man pointed his finger at Danzel who came out of the trap door.


    The ten men behind him looked in the pointed direction with a frown.


    "Is that the one who dared to mess with you?" One towering bald man carrying a huge hammer to his shoulder asked


    "Yeah, he is the one." A shorter guy with a circr head beside him replied.


    Danzel who was looking in silence could already guess why they were here.


    `For them toe to look for revenger after I only pressed at his wrist a bit.¡ä Danzel shook secretly his head.


    "So? For what reason have you alle looking for me?"


    A vein showing on his head, the skinny man yelled with an enraged look.


    "Don¡ät think that I forgot what you did to us today! me yourself for what you are about to experience!"


    With evil grins on their faces, the people beside him started to stroll over with their weapons in hand.


    Looking solely at this, Danzel sighted to himself.


    "Sigh, right back at your"


    Jumping off the stage, the moment his feet touched the ground dark green mana red tough his legs.


    As the men were surprised by the sudden appearance of mana, Danzel elerated towards the nearest guy to him.


    "Huh?" the man blurred unconsciously at Danzel cutting the distance at such speed.


    Before he could react, Danzel already swung Veren and appeared behind him.


    *Bahm


    The man''s head was cut off with his shocked expression still remaining on his face.


    Seeing the lifeless body of theirrade fall to the ground, fear and rage came at them.


    With thetter surpassing the former.


    "You! Forget about beating him up! Kill him!" The bald man with the hammer said with an enraged voice.


    "Get him!"


    Running at him, the remaining nine people rushed at him full of killing intent.


    "Ridiculous..." Danzel whispered to himself.


    They were too slow.


    "Take that!"


    The two closed to him rushed with their words and swung at Danzel.


    Using this strength, Danzel simply swung diagonally much faster and stronger than the man.


    Without being able to finish his own swing, the Veren de had already cut through his arm before shing his face which resulted in his Death.


    With him doing, he channels the dead man from his body through the Veren de before swinging it at the other man''s throat.


    "Guah! You bastard!" The man took a few steps back while putting pressure on the wound of this throat.


    `Good thing that the cut is shallow otherwise I would even be dead like him.¡ä


    Unfortunately for him though, the cut was made shallowly intentionally.


    As the man was thinking about running away, a strong pain came where the wound he was holding.


    "W-What is that!?"


    The before healthy skin that he had was slowly starting to turn ck as if it was losing all his vitality.


    "Agh-Poiso?-Agh!" With the man grimacing from pain, he realized that he couldn¡ät breathe anymore more.


    And before long, he copsed dead to the ground.


    The others who watched that were starting to hesitate.


    "Tch! Move out of the way!" The bald man with the hammer in hand sprinted at Danzel with rage still in his face.


    zing at the man, he didn¡ät try to even move from his ce.


    "Die!" Swinging his huge hammer at Danzel''s chest, a loud sound of metal echoed through the whole church.


    Butpared to the result everyone had wanted, Danzel was the only force to take a step back.


    "Still not enough..." Danzelmended as he looked at the [Mana Armor ting] that wasn¡ät enough to hold the full force behind the hammer.


    "H-How?" The bald man asked in disbelieve.


    Without even bothering to answer him, Danzel swiftly pierced Vern through this chest while holding the man''s shoulder with the other hand.


    "Cough!" The towering man coughed blood at Danzel¡äs helmet as he was feeling this strength inside of him fade away.


    With the de being inside his chest, the spot it was pierced started to cken.


    "Let¡äs try this..." Danzel said with a sinister grin hidden behind this helm.


    With the de already glowing with dead mana, a sudden crimson light appeared too.


    What happend next was that the skin that has already been turned ck showed red linesing running from the healthy skin towards the direction of the des.


    "Agh..." With the light of his eyes fading away, the man lost all this strength and copse to the ground.


    "Hmm, although thebination seems to do more damage on one''s body, at the same time it destroys the blood that is needed to repair the de." Danzel mumbled to himself as he gazed at the corpse.


    "R-Run!"


    Without any hesitation, all men turned around and fled without a second thought.


    "Oh no, you don¡ät" Extending his palm towards the direction of the door.


    Mana traveled fast to the ground towards the door.


    "I-I need to report that this to the Association!"The skinny man taking the lead ran faster than he ever had towards the exit.


    "I made-" With his face turning ted with this arm being already past the door, the ground shook.


    And where the door has been a small wall came rising which closed the door''s entrance for good.


    "Gaagh! My arm!" The skinny man screamed out of his lungs out of pain.


    Since these arms were already out, the wall dragged him to the air with his arm being smashed by the frame of the door and the earth wall like a sandwich.


    "N-No!"


    "Shit! We can¡ät get out now!"


    Seeing that their path has been closed, they all turned at Danzel with fear.


    Unfortunately for them, Danzel served no mercy.


    Though they screamed and begged.


    Everyone was soon ughtered, except the skinny man at the door.


    "N-No! Don¡äte closer! Please! Don-t kill me! Forgive!" The skinny man screamed with his running through this face as he watched Danzel walking at him.


    Turning a deaf ear to his words, Danzel pierced the man''s shoulder.


    "me yourself for what you are about to experience"


    Ignoring his cries, He touched the man''s shoulder with his other hand.


    The next moment, a crimson light and dead mana ran through Veren, while this hand glowed with a dark green glow.


    "AGHHH!"


    What Danzel didn¡ät know though, was that everything that happend here was seen from a pair of eyes looking from some cracks through the wall.

 Chapter 123 - Modification

    "Tch, annoying bunch. First those kids and now those dumpasa*ses"Cursing out to the open, Danzel threw thest corpse to the pile that had stacked up on the basement level.


    "At least they bought me some stuff that I could use for a while."


    Separating the guy''s armors and weapons, Danzel''s moods lighten up.


    His end profit from all of those was 6 pieces of armor with 13 weapons.


    Adding the 46 500 XP that he got himself, it wasn¡ät that bad.


    "They also served as a test subject soining anymore would be ungrateful on their efforts." Danzel said as he pierced one of the courses with Veren.


    "[Cursed de]"


    With the dead mana running through the de, the man''s body started to wither slowly until the ck spots started to be dust with only the bones remaining to be seen.


    "This is much more potent than the runes themselves..."


    Moving the remaining skeleton to the side, he started to do the same with the other corpses.


    Compared to the [Rune of Eniv] that sucked the vitality of one body. The [Cursed de] worked differently.


    Instead of sucking it out until there is nothing else to drain, the dead mana burned the vitality at his base.


    That meant that the cursed that sucked burned all the remaining vitality of the spot will start to burn the remaining necrotic flesh until it became dust.


    Even better, this effect wouldst for a few seconds on one''s body after the de separated with!


    Not only would it do more damage to one''s body, ording to the description. The area where the necrotic flesh has appeared would need more resources to restore to his previous state.


    Although the target would bloodless thought that, against a target who can regenerate it was a very useful ability to have.


    He even cursed the fact that he didn¡ät have it in the battle against that Alpha wolf.


    Nheless, his curse fell into deaf ears.


    "Mmm...should I do this?" Danzel looked hesitant at the 11 skeletons in front of him.


    Though those guys'' bones looked a little slimmer than his, they didn¡ät have much difference based on their own appearance.


    Only he was capable to move and them not.


    "Agh! Whatever! That¡äs for the sake of avoiding trouble!" Raising his feet, Danzel directly stomped at the remaining bones none stopped until the bones turned into small fragments.


    After finishing turning the remains into small pieces, Danzel stared for a few seconds at them, feeling rather ufortable.


    `What if those bones were me...¡ä Danzel couldn¡ät help but think so to themself.


    "Sigh...what I am thinking." Shaking his head, he put the remains into a cloth and tied it together before cing it inside the ring of storage.


    "Now, with the floor cleared from the blood, there should be no evidence from me killing those guys If I rece those weapons with some of the rings inventory. All that remains are the benefits!


    Opening his status window, he went into deep thought.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    Race: Draugr


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 6325/6325


    Mana: 1122/1122


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength:145 Agility: 132 Intelligence: 102 Endurance: 114


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Earth Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Dash Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Prate Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Vanguards Defense Lv.1] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead ck Guard nearing the 3rd-tier, with knowledge of runes and skills, far surpassing that of a Draugr, one would never expect that his powerful Draugr warrior would spend months sitting at home and stealing from others.]


    [XP: 521 925]


    After standing staring at his own status for quite a while, he decided to put his level increases to the side and to focus more on his own skills for once.


    Currently, he made three priorities based on the skills capabilities and usage.


    The top priority was the skills that had the most lethality and survivability such as [Armor Mana ting], [Gale Mana de] and [Dash].


    Those three were basically the skills that he always could rely on.


    The second priority went for the skills that although were good,cked immediate lethality. There went the [Curse of Exhaustion], [Earth Wall], [Greater Sense Danger] and the recently bought skill [Cursed de].


    The third and less important priorities were mostly the passive skills or the ones that he rarely had used like [Silent Steps], [Leap] [Prate] and [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery].


    Although the [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery] most one of his best current skills, by observing the status windows of the mercenaries he realized that most of them weren¡ät that experienced in their weapons.


    Even the few middle-stage 2nd-tier mercenaries were rather poor in that area, thus making this mastery of now be sufficient to go against such people.


    "Putting 100k XP to the side for some new runes, the rest should go to the skills."


    With some hesitation, he pressed the upgrade button on the skills he thought needed the most.


    [Earth Wall level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv. 10]


    [Dash level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv.10]


    [Vanguards Defense level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv. 5]


    [The skill Earth Wall level has reached this maximum level]


    [Earth Wall Lv.10 turns into Stone Wall Lv.1]


    [The skill Dash level has reached this maximum level]


    [Skill Dash reached the modification stage!]


    [Choose 2 of the given option for the skill to focus on!]


    [Combat]


    [Overall improvement]


    [Travel]


    [Dead Mana Affinity]


    [Soul Affinity]


    [Burst]


    [Mana Burden Reduction]


    "Huh?" Suprised, Danzel stared at the new window in front of him with wonder.


    He never had seen a window with such information.


    It looked simr when he had to choose talents, but also not.


    "Alright Danzel, one step at the time..." Trying to keep his mind from getting distracted, he pressed at the words `modification stage¡ä.


    Though he knew what the single words meant, what they meant to put together in the status he didn¡ät know.


    [Modification Stage]: Once a skill has been improved for the third time, it enters the stage of modification which allows putting specific aspects to the followed skin to follow on.


    "It¡äs as the second message says...In a way, those options are nothing more than talents of short that will change the whole skill?" Danzel said unsurely.


    Though he got the idea behind it, he didn¡ät know how much that option would affect the skill by itself.


    "I can somewhat guess the three options of [Mana Burden Reduction], [Overall improvement] and [Travel]. But for the other ones I have no clue."


    [Combat] was vague, it could go from totally changing the skills from a movement skill into an attack, which if that were the case would be awful since this is my core cap closer between the enemies.


    [Burst] He could imagine only being able to make one extremely fast step and be done with it. It sounded better than the [Combat] one if actually, that was the case.


    But what got this interest the most were the two affinities of soul and dead mana.


    He quickly realized where do two optionse from.


    [Dead Mana Affinity] would probably unlock the [Dead Mana Affinity] option, while the [Soul Affinity] must havee from [Superior Unique Concioness] that he got once he became a Draugr.


    "My best guess would be that If I pick one of them, the mana that I would use, but what kind of ability will they be after I choose one of them? If not both" Danzel thought.


    Although those questions awaken his curiosity, he wasn¡ät willing to risk such a core ability to go to waste.


    He knew what dead mana could do, or at least a bit of it for him to know that it wasn¡ät suited for things other than inflicting damage or raising the dead. So he couldn¡ät imagine how these two wouldbine together.


    Also, since he has never seen a soul-like ability before, it was hard for him to judge how good or bad in the end it would be.


    "Ugh, forget it. I got enough skills to test does option around, I better y it safe with this one."


    Picking the in his opinion the safest option, he has chosen [Overall improvement] and [Mana Burden Reduction].


    [The modification for the Dash skill has been choosen]


    [Dash Lv.10 bes Swift Movements Lv.1]


    [Swift Movements]: Though find how to move your mana in your body the most efficient way possible to achieve higher speed, you are capable to move for a long time period much faster than you were before.]

 Chapter 124 - Priority: Door

    Sounds of wind being cut could be heard through the church.


    Underground in the church was a knight wearing dark gray te armor that looked much heavier than knights would usually wear.


    It wasn''t that the armor wasn¡ät heavy enough, the knight carried a shield to his left hand while a longsword to his right.


    Even with those conditions, the man''s steps h crushed all bubbles in his path while he moved so fast with these feet that looked somewhat unnaturally since this movement didn¡ät move an inch once he moves.


    With such speed, he still managed to swing this longsword to cleanly cut the stone walls in front of him.


    Only thing was, that he was no man.


    But one of the Immortal Undead.


    Sheathing the long de back and the shield vanishing out of pure air, he turned his head and nced at the wall solemnly.


    Though some would question if he just received an enlistment through long hours of training or if just the guy liked to stare at the walls.


    The undead instead stared at something that couldn¡ät be seen just by the naked eye alone.


    [You received 5000 XP]


    "Two minutes is my limit, huh?" Danzel said as he observed the mana through his body fade away, leaving only a hot feeling thoughts these bones.


    "I should wrap it from here, since the new day came I might as well visit Jayckop. If everything goes well I might have some time to buy some of the needed items." Danzel made his way towards the stairs after he saw the time on the [Sun Timer].


    Before leaving the basement level, he equipped another sword slightly shorter than Veren to his waist.


    Moving towards the door that he blocked with a wall of stone, he straight up punched the wall which showed cracks before copsing.


    After pushing the copsed stones outside, he chanted another [Stone Wall], fully blocking the entry of the church once again.


    Shaking his head, he made his way towards the center of the city.


    "Using such spell indoors is not suitable. I will need a door before the spell destroys the frame of the door."


    Though the skills evolving, the wall has been easier to be cast and the toughness of the wall itself improved to whole another level.


    Although he did cut such a wall in half, that was only because in the basement he intentionally made the walls much thinner to serve as target practice.


    The main problem that he found on his spell was that it would tear down the floor at the same time, which was fine since he was underground.


    But if he were to use it directly above the basement level, the worse thing that could happen would be copsing the whole hall of the church.


    It wasn¡ät that he wasn¡ät confident of surviving the fall, but destroying the home that he didn¡ät even have for a day would suck.


    The reason why he carried two swords instead of one was simple because Veren had runes while the other de that he got the day before had not.


    Danzel couldn''t imagine the trouble that it would havee if he let one of those idiots of yesterday escape.


    Forget about the charges ofmitting murder, once people knew about him being a runesmith he would be forced to leave like how he did on Berum.


    That made it harder for him to put up his n on selling runed items in action.


    Which wasn''t much in the first ce.


    After thinking about it, he quickly realized that he needed the help of someone, if not multiple people.


    He and Gerak were naive back then.


    Although the idea of some unknown master to be providing them runed items for sell that went by his hand first and then Gerak''s for delivery wasn''t half bad.


    The biggest mistake that they made was showing them who was the person closest to the source of the runed items.


    It was a miracle that the army didn¡ät break through his house to investigate without him even knowing.


    The main point is that sooner orter they would have found out.


    That''s why this time, he wanted to make things right.


    Fortunately for him, one of the umon runes that he bought yesterday would help him with this n if only a little bit.


    Arriving in front of the [Nercana Land Management] building, Danzel dismissed all other thoughts aside and started to look at the priorities.


    "First of all, I need a door..."


    Going inside the building, he caught the eye of a giant man sleeping in a seat that was unfit for his size.


    "Zzzghhh"


    "..."


    Seeing that scene, Danzel was unsure how to proceed.


    `Isn¡ät it already morning? How can his guy still sleeping?¡ä Danzel cursed secretly.


    The fact that this guy also had this uniform on meant that he would have woken up, put this uniform on and thene here to sleep again.


    Walking silently to the table with the help of [Silent Steps], he pped the table with his hand.


    *Baahm.


    "Wha- That¡äs my booz- Oh..." Jeyckoped who was still half asleep stopped his frailing upon seeing Danzel in front of him.


    "Tch, it¡äs you..." Immediately after seeing me standing in front of him, he closed his eyes preparing to sleep again...


    "Hey, isn¡ät too much to behave like that to the one that you scammed?" Danzel said with an ice-cold voice.


    Giving him a disdainful look, Jeyckop said.


    "What do you want?"


    "You see, once I went to see the church I found out that the lock has been destroyed. Which is the contract isn¡ät mentioned anywhere." Danzel said while starring straight at Jeyckop.


    "So..." Jeyckop asked with a frown on his face.


    "Well, as the contract says, although the interior is in bad condition. The door itself is broken beyond fuctio-"


    "Get to the main point already!"


    Seeing this impatient look, I just shrugged.


    "Simple, I want you to bring someone to rece my door or at least fix it," Danzel said, only to receive a scoff from Jeyckop.


    "Hmpf, you think that I would care for your door? Go somewhere else if you want to have your door reced, this isn¡ät the ce for such request." Jeyckop stood up and gazed down at Danzel.


    Ignoring his intimidation attempt, he said.


    "If the door isn¡ät repaired on the following week, the contract will be considered invalid, this giving me the right to get my 500 gold back that is clearly more worth that this church." Danzel said with a monotone tone while scoffing back at him.


    ''Heh, you thinking I didn''t read the contract before signing?''


    Moving his hand on Veren''s hilt, he released a bit of his own killing intent before turning his back at Jeyckop.


    "I am sure the leftover gold that probably lying in your pockets are more than enough to fix a door and still have some to spare. Hear my advice and just do it. That way you wouldn¡ät have to worry about your neck through the night." Danzel said in a quiet yet malicious voice.


    With this slight bloodlust leaking at that too, Jeyckop''s frown turned for the worse with a hint of sweat to be seen at his forehead.


    "Are you threatening me?" Jeyckop said while grabbing a 2-meter long stick from his side.


    Walking towards the exit, Danzel said with an amused tone.


    "Yes"


    Stunned by his answer, Jeyckop was about to say something but was shortly beaten by Danzel.


    "After all, I can be extremely wrathful at times..." With his bloodlust spiking to the highest level for a second, he quietly left the building, leaving Jeyckop alone standing there slightly stunned.


    Thest bloodlust that Danzel gave out was even for the giant 3-meter tall man Jeyckop to send chills running through his spine.


    "Bastard!" Throwing his stick to the ground, his face was getting red from anger.


    Usually, when someone was threatening an employee, they just had to report him to the higher-ups and the issue will be resolved.


    But if he were to do this, the fact that he received the 500 gold coins for a piece ofnd that cost no more than 60 gold would get out.


    If that were to happend the remaining 440 gold that was in his pocket would be taken away and his job would be at risk.


    At first, he thought that this knight was bluffing, but after feeling the strong bloodlust he couldn''t take it as a mere intimidation attempt. But as a threat for his life!


    "That kid Serran...where in the hell did you found such a bastard from." Sitting back in his seat, he started grumbling to himself.


    "I guess I will have to take some time and meet up with a carpenter..."


    Outside the building, Danzel looked in the direction where the street was filled with all kinds of different shops and people.


    "With the door issue done, let¡äs go spend those funds of my..." Making his way towards the street, he looked around until he found the shop he was looking for.


    "Hello there, what might it be?" An old man came and asked Danzel who was staring at his shop.


    "Yes, I would like to buy this stack of paper"

 Chapter 125 - Cooperation

    "Hey, have you heard the news already?"


    "Hmm? What news, did your wife throw you out again?"


    "Ye- What! No, you idiot! I am talking about the hammer head gang!"


    "The hammer head? Are you talking about those mercenaries who instead of going into missions they just steal from the weak?"


    "Yeah, Yeah. I talk about those shitheads. Apparently, they have gone missing since yesterday, it¡äs being theorized that someone finally stood against them and managed to kill them!"


    "Seriously!? Tell me the details!"


    "Hehe...as long as you pay for tonight''s drinks."


    Two men conversed together and they weren¡ät the only ones who were talking about their sudden disappearance.


    Though for other mercenaries they would only think of this group of just a bunch of drunken people, for themon people who were doing everything they could to live their everyday life, their name was like the gue.


    Harassed by the daily, they were really grateful that someone final decision to kill those guys.


    Storys of how a rightful pdin finally gave them their deserved divine punishment or how a magic caster obliterated them with just a single spell went through all around the folk.


    They were many variants of this story of how a rightful hero killed those guys. But one thing they had inmon.


    That was the confirmation that the gang''s hammer head has been killed.


    Of course, that news reached the ears of the Durendal association, which forced them to move.


    Though they were equally satisfied with those leeches finally dying, since they were the leading part of the whole city of Nercana, they were forced to take some action as they couldn¡ät just let someone who killed a member of their association go, even if they were of the lower rank.


    That was the reason why many guards and various mercenary were standing outside the streets patrolling.


    Unbeknownst to them though, the almighty hero who got rid of the Hammer head gang was walking among those same streets while humming happily.


    "Damn, this ce is much better than Bernes, not only fewer people but also cheaper stuff!" Danzel looked at the paper stack that he was holding in his hand.


    Now he understood what the old man in the magic shop in Bernes had meant with the prices being ridiculous high for magic items.


    Although the kingdom of Berum didn¡ät openly hate magic caster or generally magic. Theirws though said a whole nother thing.


    The kingdom of Berum was the perfect example of actions speaking louder than words.


    Since the Berum kingdom was more focused on the studies of life force, people who were using life force would usually have higher status.


    The reason behind that was supposed because their first king, Bernes was a being who was made out of pure life force, otherwise known as the immortal phoenix.


    At least that¡äs what he got from reading the book of [Knowledge for every Caster] in the section ofws.


    Honestly though, if magic wasn¡ät that useful that it is, I would even bet that those guys would just straight up forbid the use of magic, except magic that they call light and holy magic.


    That by itself I found biased against all magic!


    What holy and light magic?


    Magic is magic!


    There is nothing more to discuss!


    Why would you even put other types of magic into your hate list without much reason?


    Getting out of the point though, as for now he quite liked Nercana.


    Since everything was dirt cheap...


    "But still... hammer head gang?" Danzel who was still walking back to his church couldn¡ät help but overhear all the stories of that group dying yesterday.


    `Didn¡ät the boss of those guys yesterday use a hammer?¡ä Danzel thought.


    He could still remember how the massive hammer came crushing to his chest.


    Though it was a weak swing, he still remembers breaking the mana ting and forcing to take a step back.


    If that were any other day, he wouldn¡ät have thought of all this crap.


    But...


    "Too soon..." Danzel said before hasting his steps.


    He would understand if the rumors were about them going missing.


    But for them to be dered dead not even 24 hours before their death?


    He highly doubted it.


    `Did anyone by chance see the fight without me noticing?¡ä He couldn¡ät help but think.


    Moving some few minutes, he reached the area where the church was.


    And the moment he walked in, he noticed something unusual.


    ''What are they doing there?'' He thought, noticing all the small figures hiding between the gaps of the houses.


    Danzel quickly noticed that those guys were the brats of yesterday.


    He saw the small girl who shot an arrow with the improvised crossbow at him, that kid who was full of rebellion spirit in him and some others who he wrote as crybabies.


    After all, the hugest impression that he had was from those two brats and that fast ck-haired kid.


    ''Hmm? Where is the ck-haired kid?'' Danzel thought as he looked to his side, but without any sess of finding him among the other children.


    Though he was somewhat curious about where he went, he quickly dismissed those thoughts.


    But upon reaching his destination, he saw the same ck-haired teenage boy standing in front of the door who was blocked by a stone wall.


    Starting him with silence, he put the stack of papers that he bought to the inside of the armor through the neck opening and ced them inside the ring of storage.


    "Didn''t I already tell you? That if you were toe back I wouldn''t show any mercy?" Danzel said with his cold voice.


    Putting his hand on the field of the un-runed sword, he unsheathed it out of his scabbard.


    "Wait, I got to tell you something-"


    Without letting him finish, Danzel dashed forward with his killing intent fullying out.


    "No need."


    "H-Huh!?" The boy who was shocked upon seeing this, bit his lips before taking a step back with around the same speed as Danzel.


    "Hear me out!" The boy pleaded.


    Turning a dead ear to his plea, he moved towards the boy.


    "The moment you came here you epted your fate..." Danzel said as he swung the sword diagonally.


    "Y-You!" Bending his body to the side, he avoided the first swing by a hairs breath.


    The boy pulled his dagger from his sleeve and barely managed to miss directed the next swing to his side.


    Taking a huge step backward, he held his wrist out of pain.


    Since the strength difference was so huge, the boy was lucky to not break his wrist by that small sh.


    "Ugh...Hear me out!"


    A weak dark green light surrounded Danzel.


    The next moment the ck-haired boy knew, he was already in front of him grabbing his neck.


    "Kayn!" The brats who were by the side called out and we''re ready to go and help.


    But upon seeing the eyes of Kayn, they forced themselves to stay put.


    Not minding them a bit, he raised the boy to the air with the de ready to pierce through his chest.


    "Kghhh! Let me go!" Suddenly dark veins showed to the side of his eyes before his sclera became pitch ck.


    Grabbing the hand that was holding his neck for support, he threw out a kick directly to Danzel''s chest.


    And thoroughly surprised, Danzel was almost pushed back and nearly thrown off to the ground by the sheer strength of the kick.


    ''What the hell! That was even stronger than the guy''s hammer of yesterday!''


    Seeing that things were bing more serious, he was about to draw out Veren and go all out even if this mana hasn''t fully recovered yet.


    But as he touched the hilt of Veren, he saw the ck-haired kid''s legs shaking unnaturally while ck tears wereing out of his eyes.


    "What the..."


    Using Danzel''s confusion, the boy bit down his pain and forced himself to talk.


    "We know that you killed the-Ugh, the hammer heads! If you kill me now everyone else here will go out and tell the association that-Ugh, it was you who killed them!" The boy said with growls of pain in between sentences caused by the pain.


    Hearing the kid''s words, Danzel was shocked.


    "How do you know...?" Danzel whispered to the boy.


    He was totally sure that he killed every single one of those guys yesterday, so the fact that the boy knew that it was him threw him off.


    Of course, he didn''t let it show it.


    He only question the boy in a whisper in case he didn''t really know and only guessed it.


    With a weak voice, the boy said.


    "Though the cracks...I saw you how you received a-Ugh...a hammer at your chest."


    Starting him in silence he looked at the other brats while grinding his teeth.


    ''If those guys were to put suspicion on me, then I...'' Danzel though.


    Even if they were to report it, he doubted someone would believe them.


    But just them putting the suspicion on me was enough of a headache that I wasn''t willing to feel.


    Looking at the boy who had ck tears to his cheeks, he said rather unwilling.


    "What do you want..."


    Though the constant pain that the boy Kayn was receiving, in the end, he still managed to show a smile when he heard the knight''s words.


    "We want a cooperation with you."

 Chapter 126 - Contract

    Hearing what the ck-haired boy said, Danzel was in disbelieve for a second.


    `Cooperation, he says. More like ckmailing me...¡ä Danzel thought with anger.


    If one were to hear closely, the sound of grinding teeth could be heard from Danzel.


    "What form of cooperation do you exactly mean?" Danzel said as he stared at the boy.


    "Cough~Cough, We-Agh!" ck liquid came out of Kayn¡äs mouth making him unable to answer from the pain he was experiencing.


    Seeing the boy unable to answer, he moved in front of him with his sword raised up high.


    "..."


    "Agh...!"


    Danzel who was silently standing ready to swing at him seemed in Kayn''s perspective like a humongous dark statue blocking the sun with the de that seemed like it was cutting the sun itself in half.


    A hint of dread red through Kayn¡äs eyes through all the pain as he could already imagine that de splitting his head in half.


    He felt like he was in front of an executioner if not death himself.


    He knew from the beginning that the n was reckless.


    But desperation forced him to do it.


    He tried to speak up to the dark knight in front of him, but his body didn¡ät listen.


    After what felt like centuries had passed, Danzel bought down his sword...


    And sheathed it back to this scarab.


    "Dammit..." Grumbling to himself, he gave ast look at the ck-haired kid before walking to the door.


    "Hmph!" Throwing a kick at the stone wall blocking the door, the wall imminently grumbled.


    *Baahm!


    With dust rising up to the air, the dark green glow around his body faded.


    "Take that guy inside, it isn¡ät suitable for him to stay like that outside." Danzel said loud enough for the other brats to hear.


    The boys were astonished by Danzel¡äs strength, but after they heard what he said they came back to their senses and came running towards Kayn.


    Kayn who saw that bitted his leaps and yelled out.


    "Not everyone! Cough! No-Argh- someone stays behind!" Saying that Kayn fell to the ground while curling his body together.


    The children who were about to rush at him frozen in confusion before realizing what he meant.


    The dark knight who was standing at the door was watching them like a hunter seeing his prey.


    `If everyone goes to Kayn wouldn¡ät he...¡ä


    Upon that thoughting into their mind, a sudden weakness came to their legs.


    Anna and Marcus who saw the reaction of others turned to each other and nodded.


    "Everyone stay outside while we two of us go and help Kayn!"


    Running towards Kayn, Anna who had something simr to a backpack pulled out some bad condition bandages and a bottle of some liquid.


    "How serious is it, Anna!?" Marcus said beside her.


    Looking at Kayn pressing his legs with his hands and ck tears from his eyes, she had a grim expression.


    "...Realy bad." Anna said.


    "Crap..."


    Caring Kayn inside the church with exhausted breaths, they looked around them to see where the dark knight had gone.


    With their eyesnding on a broken statue, they saw him staring at them eerily.


    "Stay here, if you were to follow me don¡ät expect me sparing you." Danzel said with his finger pointing at them before going down the trap door.


    Walking down the stairs, he summoned a stone wall behind him that blocked the entrance.


    "I only have so much mana left now..."


    Walking to the stone table that he made yesterday, he sat to the ground while bringing out the paper that he bought together with the [Mana Pen].


    However, instead of imminently writing down with the [Mana Pen] he ignited his finger with his dark green mana and started to gently draw a rune simr to how he would do when he carved a rune to equipment.


    *h!


    "Ugh...this is harder than expected." throwing the ripped paper to the side, he took another one of the huge pile and started drawing the runes once again.


    Compared to the hard cold metal that he was used to working with, the paper was definitely a challenge for Danzel.


    Not only was the material itself hard to work with, but his strength itself didn¡ät make it any easier for him to draw the rune.


    Just the slight increase of his strength could reap the paper apart and make all his efforts pointless.


    Which was for Danzel pretty frustrating.


    His being on rush wasn¡ät all that well either and could possibly have an effect on the overall rating of the rune.


    And when he was done with the rune, it did have a negative effect.


    "Tch, it came out as a [Bad] rating..." Danzel cursed under his helm as he looked at the piece of paper in disdain.


    "As long as it works it doesn¡ät matter, I can make better ones some other time. Those would serve as a good test subject." Danzel said as he picked up his [Mana Pen] and written down on those two papers.


    "Now it needs my mana and..." Pushing his thumb on top of the rune, dark green mana was injected into the rune itself.


    Doing that, the letter litten up with a weak dark green light for a good two seconds before the light faded away.


    "It should be finished." Danzel nodded as the information in his head matched what he has just done.


    Although the letter should have even glowed for much longer in his memories, he just shrugged it off as the quality of the rune being itself bad.


    Literally.


    Unbeknownst to how many times have passed, he picked two pieces of paper and made his way towards the church''s hall after of course crashing the stone wall he made previously.


    "Let¡äs see how well they will work."


    ***


    Now in the church hall...


    "Ugh...what happend?" Waking up, Kayn looked above him only to see the all-familiar ceiling that he was used to.


    "The church?"


    Trying to stand up, a sudden pain rushed through both of his legs.


    "Ugh...I forgot about this." Kayn fell to the ground again as he touched his face that was burning.


    "Damn side effects..."


    Suddenly, a bottle was pushed in front of his face from the side.


    "Here, drink this."


    Seeing the person who said that, Kayn put a smile on his face.


    "Thanks, Anna" epting the bottle, he took a sip before eximing out of satisfaction.


    "Bahhh~that saved me" Kayn returned the bottle to Anna.


    Marcus who was to the side said with his rye browns frowned.


    "I told you that it was too risky, Kayn. That guy is bad news."


    "Marcus-" Anna tried to say but was quickly interrupted by Kayn.


    "It''s fine Anna, he is right. We shouldn''t have dealt with him..." Shaking his head though he said dejectedly.


    "But we can''t abandon this ce yet. It was the only solution."


    "But..."


    "Anyways, where is he now? Did he leave?" Kayn said in an attempt to change the subject.


    "No, he hasn''t left. He went down to the stairs for the underfloor and told us to stay here. That was three hours ago" Anna said casually.


    Unbeknownst to her, she just dropped a huge bomb at Kayn.


    "W-What!? Three hours? Are you telling me that I slept for three hours? Where are the others?"


    In response, she just shrugged her shoulders.


    "The others are still outside waiting and you sleeping so long is to show how bad your body condition was."


    Gripping him by his hand, she looks straight into his eyes.


    "Kayn, take better care of your body. The others need you. None can rece you who is their leader."


    Upon hearing that Kayn showed a bitter smile on his face.


    "Yeah, I know..."


    After both removing their hands from each other, a tall figure showed up behind the statue.


    ''He is here'' Kayn gulped as the image of him still remained fresh to his mind.


    Moving down the stages, Danzel moved to them before stopping three meters away from them in silence.


    "..."


    "..."


    "..."


    "..."


    An awkward silence befell the whole room.


    "What is-"


    Before Marcus could break the awkward silence, Danzel threw a rolled-up piece of paper at Kayn.


    Starting Danzel in confusion, he asked.


    "What are does..?"


    "You said you wanted to have a cooperation with me right?"


    Many in response nodded in confirmation.


    "Then you will have to sign those two contracts, as they have what I will ept or not."


    "Even with you ckmailing me, don''t think that I will be your ve. Depending on what you guys want, I might as well consider killing you guys right here."


    Gulping their saliva down their throat.


    Kayn and the two beside him came together and read the piece of paper.


    The first one tilted contract had some basic rules which made sense to them.


    They were like, can''t force him to kill, steal, serve, and so on.


    Basically what Danzel wouldn''t do.


    All they had to exchange was that they couldn''t say or hint out that he was the one that killed the hammerhead gang.


    The other paper though was the one that confused them.


    All there was to read was.


    ''You acknowledging that you won against the contractor in battle''


    "Ehm...What does this one exactly mean?" Kayn asked in doubt.


    "As I told you, you just have to sign to reach the negotiation level of your so-called cooperation."


    After a short hesitation,he decided.


    "How do I sign?"


    "You just need to ce a few drops of your own blood in that area." Danzel said with a deep voice.


    "Blood?" Kayn asked in confusion, but he only received silence as a reply.


    Doing what the man in front of him said.


    He bought out a dagger and let a few drops of blood fall on both papers.


    When he did exactly that.


    Something unexpected happend....

 Chapter 127 - Voice

    Once a few drops of blood fell on top of the rune, one of the paper''s words lightens up with a dark green light.


    And on the next moment, the words red up with dark green mes, engulfing the whole paper.


    "Wow! What happend!?" Kayn and the other two screamed out of surprise.


    They were obviously confused as they didn¡ät expect the paper to catch on fire.


    Looking worried, they turned to Danzel who was staring at the ashes of the paper in silence.


    "We didn¡ät do it! It just caught on fire by his own!" Kayn tried to exin but felt stupid from the inside.


    `How can a paper get caught up in fire by itself.¡ä Kayn thought internally.


    As if remembering something, they turned their eyes on the contract only to sigh in relief.


    `At least this one is still intact.¡ä


    Danzel who was still staring in the ashes, was in factparing the current event with the description of the rune.


    [Rune of Uzal]: A rune that was invented by a forgotten warmonger who once ruled through a whole continent. Named by a part of his name, the rune of Uzal was invented in his early years on conquest in an attempt to bind the very souls and bring endless torment to the soul of his allies wishing to betray him behind his back. Unfortunately, though his inexperience led to only managing to make the contract burn by itself if the contractee were to break the contract. The contractor needs to inject mana while the contractee needs to inject blood on the rune for it to work.


    `It works!¡ä Danzel cheered secretly to himself.


    For a moment he was worried that the quality was so bad that the rune wasn¡ät even able to work in the first ce.


    But upon seeing the dark green mes devouring the paper, he felt relief.


    Danzel imminently saw the hidden potential of that rune, to pointed he doubted that it even was an umon rune.


    In short, the rune only burned the paper if the contractee broke the contract.


    Contracts are usually used as evidence that a deal has taken ce and burning your own evidence would usually be stupid.


    At least that would think a shortsighted person.


    The rune effects could basically be seen as a lie detector depending on how you worded the content of the paper.


    And for Danzel''s current situation, that alone would affect all his ns based on the trade of runed items.


    If he were to convince someone to trade with him while signing this contract, he wouldn¡ät have to worry about being betrayed.


    Since once the guy breaks the contract he would be fully be aware that he broke the contract and once he knew that he was exposed he could imminently make a run for it.


    And that was only a fraction of the run''s capabilities.


    As ideas of how that rune could be used were streaming through his mind, he became all the most impressed on the guy who invented the rune.


    The rune did not only give him a glimpse of how dead mana could otherwise be used, but theplexity of it was a new experience for him.


    But what made Danzel feel somewhat awkward was what the guy aimed to create with his rune.


    Like, binding one''s souls?


    Endless torment?


    Jeez.


    Here I thought I was ruthless!


    He couldn¡ät even imagine what kind of rank that rune would be ced at.


    "Hey~"


    Hearing a voice, he quickly dismissed all other thoughts and nced at the brats in front of him with annoyance.


    "Don¡ät worry about what just happend." Taking the contract away, he solemnly looked at them.


    "So? What do you want from me?"


    "We..." With hesitation showing on his voice he replied.


    "Want to live in this church."


    "Taking that you read the contract...do you mean by any chance to live together?" Danzel said with an ice cold voice.


    Gulping nervously, all three nodded their heads as if they were just caught doing something bad.


    Danzel was about to imminently reject their request.


    But after thinking about it he decided to think about it before answering.


    He knew that he had to give them something to keep their mouth shut, that was the current situation he was finding himself with.


    "I am taking it that you want your friends to stay here too or is it just your three?"


    "Huh? Of course, we mean the others too!" Marcus said as if he was suddenly offended.


    "Then what would be stopping me from killing you all and making that this deal never had existed in the first ce."


    As if a bucket full of ice-cold water fell to his face, Marcus stared at the ground.


    With a frown on his face, Kayn walked forward.


    "It¡äs not only us knowing your secret... If we were to be found to be missing we told that person to reveal your secret." Kayn said trying to appear unfazed.


    Seeing that look, Danzel went closer and bent his back slightly as he stared at Kayn.


    That imminently made Kayn nervous.


    "You are quite cheeky for a brat of your size don¡ät you think?" Danzel said slowly as he moved his hand towards Kayns cheek.


    While the three of them were getting all the more nervous, Danzel continued talking.


    "I have been wanting to ask you something ever since you came back with your little friends."


    Activating the gauntlet''s runes, dark green mana sipped out.


    Kayn who saw that imminently was drenched with cold sweat behind his back as dread was crippling through all this body.


    Stopping a few centimeters from touching his cheek, the dark green light brighten both Kayn¡äs and Danzel¡äs faces.


    Making thetter look all the more terrifying.


    "Don''t you value your life?"


    "H-Huh?"


    "Coming here, to this dark ce owned by someone who yourself saw what he was capable of. Didn¡ät you think what would possible happen to you?"


    "Did you tell them what you saw on those two?"


    "What if I killed you without carrying of being found out?"


    "What if I showed those two beside you something much worse than death?"


    "What about those children outside?"


    "Did you ask them if they want to die?"


    "Are you capable to hold responsibility for the death that you will be leading into?"


    "I am asking you?"


    "Did you?"


    "Did you ever think of all those things?"


    "Kid..."


    With this voice continued to grow deeper and louder.


    De-activating the runes, he grabbed Kayn¡äs mouth tightly and dragged him closer to his eye level.


    "THERE IS NO SECOND CHANCE IN LIFE!!!"


    Danzel yelled so loud that Anna and Marcus fell to the ground shaking in fear and tears on their face.


    His voice was so loud that all the other kids outside managed to hear it, albeit slightly.


    "I *Mfgh. I just *Mfgh. I just wanted" Unable to stop these tears, Kayn wept while still being in Danzel¡äs grasp.


    *Baahm


    Throwing to the ground, Danzel stared at the ceiling in silence.


    To those three, he looked terrifying.


    But the current Danzel.


    Felt never so weak as of now ever since he came out of the cursedke.


    This bloodlust wasn¡äting from his undead instinct.


    He just felt...


    Tired.


    Something that undead shouldn¡ät feel.


    He wasn¡ät sure why he said all those things.


    It was just, the moment he saw Kayn¡äs determined face.


    He didn¡ät see Kayn.


    But the face of a man he never saw.


    The moment he saw the mans face a wave of uncontroble anger came into him,


    It was as he was ming the man for something that he didn¡ät know.


    s, he didn¡ät know who that man was.


    Wanting to cool his mind, he stayed silent.


    "You know you could even done better, don¡ät you?" A quiet voice of the same man came from the location of the statue.


    Danzel who by his enchanted attributes, captured what the man said.


    Turning swiftly in one motion around and he stared intensely at the statue with his eyes searching for the one who talked.


    Though there was none to see, he clearly heard that.


    "Not again..." Danzel grumbled to himself.


    He thought those voices vanished upon leaving the cave.


    It has been months since he heard of those voices.


    In the cave, it was of a woman.


    But now it was of man.


    Danzel was feeling overall mentally shit.


    Just looked at the three crying kids.


    "You guys go out and tell your friends toe in. As long as you don¡ät reveal anyone my secret and don¡ät go to the underground. I will let stay here for now."


    Moving towards the trap door as he was dragging this whole body. He gave them ast look.


    "Don¡äte to find me. I will be staying for an hour- No, maybe days down there." Closing the trap door, he went down the stairs.


    The three who saw that quickly tried to calm themselves down before moving towards the exit.


    "Let¡äs call the others in..."


    "But..."


    "Anna, I know. But we got no choice.." Kayn said bitterly.

 Chapter 128 - The Abandoned

    "Hey, big brother Kayn! Is the bad man really underground?" A kid looking at 6 years old asked if the monster under this bed was really or not.


    Being in the middle of sharpening his dagger, Kayn turned around and showed a smile.


    "Yeah...he is still underground."


    "Then why hasn¡ät hee out?" The kid said full of innocence.


    With a bitter smile on his face, Kayn shook his head.


    "That, I don¡ät know."


    "Big brother Kayn, did the bad man die?" The kid said, taking Kayn by surprise.


    "What? No, that man didn¡ät die. He just likes to stay in the basement. Yeah, that must be it..." Kayn said rather uncertainly.


    "But he hasn¡äte out for over a whole month! I can go without any food for a whole week before my tummy starts to hurt. The bad guy must have starved!"


    Kayn opened his mouth but found no words to say since he himself didn¡ät have any answers.


    It has been a whole month ever since the agreement with that dark knight.


    Except for them being unable to go in the basement, nothing had changed in their lifestyle from before.


    If not, their life became slightly better since the door that they broke when they first found the church has been reced with a new one by a man they didn¡ät know.


    At first, they were wary of that man, but once they realized he was called by the dark knight who was supposedly called Letum Danzel.


    And though all that whole month, it was the only time they saw him again.


    Once the man who reced the door and trap door left, that man Danzel closed himself to the basement without any one of them knowing what he was doing down there.


    And since he hasn¡äte out, some of them were doubting if he was still alive or rotting down there.


    Though Marcus and some other children suggested to try and take a look, Kayn quickly dismissed them upon remembering what the man said.


    And frankly, he didn¡ät care about what happend to him.


    Since he gave them a key for the door, they lived as he didn¡ät live down to the basement.


    And that was about the same for Danzel.


    Ever since this sudden outburst that he had, he was rather in a bad mood which made him decide to go into seclusion.


    Wanting to distract himself, he focused purely on this training with the sword and runesmithing.


    Sometimes he trained for days before deciding to chance to carve the new runes that he learned. Though mostly the [Rune of Uzal] since he had the material in hand.


    But the other that he bought was a different story.


    The other rune was called [Rune of Mana] which not only was much more difficult to carve since it was a normal rune and not an undead one, but the materiel the rune had to be carved was a tricky one.


    The material needed was mana crystals.


    As one would expect of the runes name, this sole purpose was to increase the amount of mana that a crystal was capable to hold.


    Though in theory that sounded impressive.


    For him, it was pure junk.


    Or rather trash springled with gold.


    Not only could he not use it, but the difficulty of carving the rune was by far the hardest.


    Not because the rune letters were difficult to understand or anything of that sort.


    The difficult part came with the ingredients he had to work with.


    Since crystals usually weren¡ät t and had many edges, carving a rune was a nightmare of a job.


    Making it worse, Danzel hadn¡ät anything he could practice on except his shield.


    Which wasn¡ät an option either since the crystal had many edged.


    Thus, he gave up on it for now.


    Even if he had managed to carve it, he would either need a skill that could use foreign mana or find himself, enchanter to put that mana into good use.


    With no other choice left, he quickly carved runes on the equipment of those hammer heads or something and focused on improving the rune Uzal.


    Every time he would carve the Uzal rune, the next time would be faster and more precise. Though they were many failures in that process, in a day he finally broke through the rank of the quality to the stage where he could receive XP.


    And the XP he received was much more than he had expected.


    A total of 8000 XP for umon runes of the [Good] quality.


    Once he reached that stage, he went all out on carving runes with all the remaining Paper that he had left.


    That resulted together with his sword training to receive an incredible amount of XP.


    But once he was finally done, a simr feeling as when he was in the cave came at him.


    More specifically the silence of the room.


    *Tah~


    Raising his head to the ceiling sounds so small that if none focus entirely, it couldn¡ät have been heard.


    "Those guys are so loud..."


    Shaking his head, he pulled all the contracts that he prepared through the span of the month and walked towards the stairs.


    Using his key to open the trap door, he was greeted by the sight of children running through ying around and some working to the side to what seemed to build makeshift weapons.


    One kid who was sleeping in front of the statue woke up from a sound behind him.


    Turning his head to see what it was, he saw a 2-meter tall dark knight moving his sight to him.


    "Hiieh!" Screaming from the top of his lungs, he rolled back out of fright until he fell from the stage.


    Of course, thatmotion brought the gazes of everyone at him.


    "He is here!"


    "He isn¡ät dead!


    "The bad man came out!"


    "..."


    Staring at them silently, he couldn¡ät help but shake his head internally.


    `How am I the bad guy if you guys are ckmailing me!? You want even to write me as dead!¡ä


    Looking around, his gaze fell upon the kid who he learned was Kayn.


    "You,e here." He pointed at him.


    A short chill runs through Kayn''s back.


    Nodding his head, Kayn made his way towards him while hiding the dagger.


    "Yes?"


    "Bring everyone here to sign this contract just like you did..." Letting the bag full of contract fall in front of Kayn, he seated at the half-broken statue.


    Kayn stayed silent for a few seconds before nodding his head.


    Although some of the smaller kidsined of having to use the needle on their finger, Kayn shortly convinced them all.


    After Danzel made sure that everyone one of them did it right, he put the contracts back in the bag while he hinted for Kayn toe back to speak privately.


    Nodding, he followed Danzel.


    Anna and Marcus who saw that quickly made their way towards him while cautiously looking at Danzel.


    Danzel only spared them a nce before shrugging it off.


    Going down to the basement.


    Or more specifically to the stairs, he turned around and stared at them with silence before opening his mouth.


    "How long are you nning to stay here?" He said with a cold tone.


    The atmosphere imminently went dense.


    "..."


    "..."


    "..."


    Looking at the silent trio, Danzel crossed his hands together.


    "Let me rephrase that, why do you want to stay here? You could even ask me to give your some gold to get your own ce. Why are you guys obsessed with this building?"


    Kayn in response gave out a pitiful smile.


    "It¡äs because we aren¡ät wee anywhere else other than this area where the poor live..." Kayn wanted to continue but a hint of hesitation was to be seen in his eyes.


    Danzel noticed that.


    "Is it because you guys aren¡ät human?" Danzel guessed solemnly as their shocked look of the trio gave him the answer.


    "You! We are human!" Marcus yelled at Danzel, even taking a step forward.


    "Don¡ät lie to yourself kid, you guys aren¡ät humans" Danzel scoffed at him.


    Marcus who still hadn¡ät enough was about to say something else, but Anna on the side gripped him by his arm.


    "Marcus, please stop..." She said as she bit her lips.


    Kayn who was also angry forcibly swallowed his thoughts down his throat.


    "Yeah, that¡äs the reason why" Kayn said as he knew he couldn¡ät hide the fact after his performance a month ago.


    `I knew it.¡ä Danzel nodded to himself internally.


    "So? What exactly are you guys?" He asked out of curiosity.


    A feeling of anger came through Kayn¡äs chest, as he remembered something terrible.


    Even if he tried to act rationally in front of others, in the end, he was still a kid in his teens.


    Griding these teeth, he pulled the pants above the ankle.


    Revealing a ck color simr to one''s skin that bes necrotic.


    But inparison to necrotic skin, his muscles were well refined as if they were cisseld out of a stone with blue veins going through making it look like cracks.


    "We were abandoned by our own families to those mages of the Arcana kingdom to serve as their experimentalb rats."


    Tightening his grip on his leg, Kayn said full of anger.


    "This is the result of their,` oh so glorious magic` that they liked to call. From humans, they turned us into monsters!"

 Chapter 129 - Emprace The Monster That You Are

    Staring at Kayn¡äs legs in wonder, he couldn¡ät help but get closer to take a better look.


    "So you are telling me that magic has done this to your legs?"


    "Yes..." Kayn nodded as he was about to hide his legs again, but was quickly stopped by Danzel.


    "Wait, will you mind if touch it?" he asked curiously.


    "Huh?" Kayn froze hearing this.


    He minded big time if a stranger wanted to touch these changed legs, but upon looking at the open hand of him he remembered how he tightly grabbed his face and almost suffocated him.


    "S-Sure..." Kayn said in a shudder.


    Having his consent, Danzel quickly moved to his knees and touched his legs with his fingers cautiously.


    Except for Kayn who felt nervous with a hint of panic showing in his eyes, the other two beside them looked with a frown on Danzel.


    "Is it enough-"


    "Does it even hurt?" Danzel interrupted Kayn as he was surprised at how the texture of his leg felt like some kind of metal than of flesh.


    Staying silent for a moment, he shook this head.


    "No"


    "What about when I touch those blue lines?"


    "No..."


    "How about..."


    ...


    So went around ten whole minutes of Danzel questioning him and he replies.


    The whole situation was rather awkward for the trio, especially to Marcus and Anna who just looked silently.


    Raising up from this knee, Danzel nodded to himself.


    "To think that magic is capable of such feat...Truly amazing." He said honestly, not for them but more for himself.


    He once again found how special magic was.


    From freezing one''s body in an instant to raising the dead to serve.


    He thought he knew vaguely what magic was capable of by reading just one book and experimenting with his mana.


    But seeing that, he couldn''t even wrap this head around it how they managed to do it.


    ''I guess I am just a big fish in a small pot in the area of magic...''He thought to himself.


    Kayn who finally hidden his legs again looked at Danzel in surprise.


    "Don''t you find those...disgusting?"


    "You mean those? What''s so disgusting about them?"


    "They are legs of a monster! What''s there to like about them?" Kayn said slightly agitated.


    Once he and the other children had escaped from the caravan transporting them to another ''torture chamber''. He learned how others view him as just an abomination that needed to be killed.


    There were many days he considered cutting both of his legs off, but he knew that the other ones still needed him.


    He despised his legs, which was all the more reason why he was confused by Danzel''s question.


    "The way I see it kid is that this is more of a gift than a curse." Danzel said while cursing internally the moment he was reading Kayns status.


    Kayns attributes went on an average of 70 with int being the lowest.


    That alone made him someone of the 2nd-tier. But although he was severelycking based on skills, he made up for it in talents that even he was jealous of.


    And reading the description of them they seemed like they came from their monster parts.


    [Dark Xeneros genes]


    [Mutation stimnts]


    [Mana veins (Iplete)]


    This first talent seemed to be of the monster that theybine with him which increased all these stats passively for a total of 15%.


    The second one was simr to his [Sin of Wrath] on increasing the owner stats. Butpared to my that increased the stats throughout the whole body. The talent increases by 30% of his legs and eyes but came with side effects after this duration.


    Thest one was that simple that he could travel mana much easier with less strain.


    Just two of his talents were making him capable to reach the same speed that this Alpha wolf, although only in stats.


    So if you are going to ask him those were indeed gifts.


    Though he didn''t seem to have the same thoughts as I.


    "Gifts!? Are you telling me that those are gifts!? They are nothing but a curse that is making me a monster!" Kayn shouted at Danzel while showing these ck legs.


    Shaking his head, Danzel disagreed.


    "It seems you are quite fixated I''m being a monster. Though I don''t really care if you want to be a monster or a frog, let me tell you this."


    "Though my whole life, I see humans call me a monster or just a murderer once I killed some of them. And I believe that you guys think the same."


    "But do you what they recently started to call me?"


    "Either a hero or a savior that killed some low lives for the sake of good. When in fact I have just done so cause they were simply annoying."


    Starting at the confused trio, I chuckled.


    "Don''t you find it funny how they call me whatever they want based on convenience? None of them thought of me as a murderer when they talked about those hammer heads."


    "Hear me, well kid, you aren''t a monster because they call you one."


    "You are a monster because you call yourself one." Danzel said with a deep tone unconsciously, sounding like someone who saw everything there was in life to see.


    Wise.


    The trio stayed silent, thinking what his word''s true meaning where.


    Kayn in response had a surprised look on his face as he understood something but still stayed silent.


    With Marcus having a confused look on his face, it was Anna who broke the awkward silence.


    "Mr. knight, do you mean that if we were to do good deeds and kill all the bad people antagonizing themon people, then they will ept us as who were are and not as monsters based on our looks?" Anna said with a voice full of hope.


    In response, Danzel stared at her in confusion.


    "What? No, what I meant to say is don¡ät give a damn crap about what people say about you. How the hell did you interpret that to what I said?"


    "Oh..." She lower her head looking at the ground dejected.


    "Anyways, you guys still haven¡ät answered my first question. Or are you guys nning to stay here through all of your lifespans?"


    "Well...since our monster parts show up when we reach 14 years old. W-We n to stay here until everyone has their chance. After that, we don-t know... We thought of going towards Berum where we heard there aren¡ät any of those cursed mages." Kayn said somewhat uncertain as he should since he was only 15 years old.


    "What? You guy¡äs want to go to Berum?That¡äs no different as asking to die." Danzel looked at them as he would one attempting suicide.


    "Huh? Why? Isn¡ät Berum the ce where there are no mages?" Marcus said with a frown.


    "You are wrong of their to be no mages. But that isn¡ät why I am telling you that you guys will die. The reason why they say that they aren¡ät mages is that most magic is being controlled by the kingdom. Which created a society that hates magic."


    "If you go there, it¡äs basically asking to die."


    Ignoring their depressed look, he walked right past them.


    "Alright, now get out. I still have the stuff to do.


    Nodding the trio, they left.


    Closing the trap door from the outside, he walked towards the door of the church.


    "I will be leaving for today, though my absence doesn¡ät try to go through the trap door, or else I will kill the ones who do. And trust me, I will know."


    Making a path for me to walk, I opened the door and was about to leave, but right about of closing the door, I turned around upon hearing some footsteps.


    "What do you want?" He asked Kayn who has an anxious face.


    "Sir Knigh-"


    "Call me Danzel. I am no knight for you to call me that."


    "Then...Sir Danzel? I wanted to ask you something before you leave."


    Nodding for him to continue, Kayn said with a rather weak voice


    "Would you consider yourself a monster?"


    "..."


    Staring at him surprised, I broke up intoughter.


    "Hahaha! Do think that you will ask me something like that."


    Going outside, I replied before closing the door.


    "I would consider myself as a monster. Butpared to you that fears to be one. I embrace it."


    *Baahm!


    Closing the door, Danzel made his way towards the inner part of the city while chuckling to himself.


    `Technically Undead are considered monster''s so I didn¡ät lie to him, but let''s not say that part. hehe.¡ä


    Unknowing how this response would affect Kayn¡äs mindset in the future, he bought a list simr to one of the groceries.


    "Let¡äs first buy some new material to practice on. I have grown sick of working with paper.." Putting the list away, he made his way towards the cksmiths.

 Chapter 130 - Small Magi Mask

    "What should I buy first..." Danzel mumbled as he was staring at his list.


    Though the list itself wasn¡ät long, the things in it were either expensive or right of difficult to get.


    "A new set of armor would be nice, not only are the hole a slight eyesore, but I started to feel the weight muss less. Once I spent that XP the armor would be too light..."


    Scratching his helmet, he ignored all the nearby eyes who looked at me as if I was crazy.


    With their right of that too.


    I mean, who wouldn¡ät if someone was whispering to himself in the early morning.


    But he didn¡ät care about those guys'' opinions.


    "But for that, I would need a carriage and after that, I got to find some crystals..."


    `And that¡äs only a fraction of what I need to buy...¡ä Danzel cursed internally .


    "Hey! Look where you going!" A man yelled at Danzel who almost pumped to him.


    "F*ck off," He said without even looking at the man.


    He was afraid that if he turned, that man''s face would be carved in by one of these punches.


    Catching eye on a building with books and even crystals contained into boxes chained to the ground on disy, he put this list away.


    "Whatever, I will just get one of everything and be done with it. How expensive can a mere stone be?"


    Walking inside the building, he called out the stuff and pointed at some crystals.


    ***


    15 minutester.


    Walking out of the same shop, was Danzel holding a small box made out of wood and three books in his hands.


    Butpare how he walked inside frustrated and full of energy,now he couldn¡ät even bepared to a dead fish outside of water.


    Dragging this own feet to move, he bitterly looked at the shop behind him and then at the stuff he bought with doubt.


    "Such a fraud..." Danzel said but knew deeply to his heart that it was worth spending a total of 200 gold coins for just those four things.


    Although such amount was basically nothing to Danzel, it was still a hefty amount to spend on just 3 books and a mana crystal.


    All three books that he bought cost a total of 5 gold coins each and the crystal inside the box was the rest of 185.


    He didn¡ät regret buying those books as it would be great tool to pass time and learn about monsters, magic and thews of this kingdom.


    Though he had to lie if he said he didn¡ät have any second thoughts of buying the crystal.


    In reality, this crystal wasn¡ät necessary for this current n. He just bought for a chance of page in this runesmithing.


    Since no matter how interested he was in how the runes worked and all. Doing the same repetitive thing would get boring.


    "At least is just right for me to practice on..." He said as he opened the small box slightly.


    Inside was a slightly t blue crystal the size of his palm.


    Shaking his head, he closed the box while trying to forget that this crystal was worth one try on making the rune.


    Putting the box inside his improved version of ribs bag made out of leather, he made this way searching for another shop.


    Although he hasn¡ät used that bag for a long time because of this ring, he couldn¡ät bear himself to remove it as how used he got since this stay in the cave.


    Some would consider this strange, but for him, it just feltfortable.


    And in a way, he couldn¡ät exin...familiar.


    As he was pulled out of this list and read what else he should go for, he heard loud voices together withughter on the sound road.


    "Come here,e hear! The days that we will forget our hardship are near as those products are new! The fire festival will soon be upon us! Prepare yourself now for the ring new year toe!" A man wearing red clothing with a cane on this hand said as he showed the nearby kids with their mother their products.


    Danzel who was by the side hearing the men got imminently curious about what this was all about.


    Moving towards the stall while ignoring all the kids who got frightened by him, Danzel looked at the products the man was selling confused.


    "What are those..?"


    The shop had quite the weird items that Danzel didn¡ät even know what they were.


    They went from some sort of red-colored sticks to clothing and even masks of all kinds.


    "Oh? From where do I have the honor to meet such a brave customer such as you" The man said while showing away a small girl with this mother away as if they were an eyesore.


    Danzel who saw that didn¡ät say anything and just pointed at the sticks in front of him.


    "What are those?"


    "Oh-eah? Are you by any chance a foreigner? Those are called Fire sparks that are used on the fire festival. There are used to burn for an extended amount of time, one piece is just 5 silver! And if you buy two then I will sell them to you just for 8 silver just because you are such a brave customer!"


    `I shouldn¡ät havee here...¡ä Danzel cursed under his helmet as of how obnoxious that guy was.


    As he was about to turn around and forget about even being here, he spotted something that got this attention.


    "Hmm..." Danzel nced at this list and then at the object again.


    Seeing the slight growth in interest in Danzel''s bodynguage, the salesperson turned around and looked at where his new gold bag was starring at.


    "Oh-eah? Might you be interested in the Small Magi Mask, dear customer?" The man said somewhat confused.


    Danzel who looked at this list having the mask in it turned to the man and nodded.


    "Yeah, how much is that mask?"


    As if he just said a secret code, the man''s smile brighten up and his eyes showed just with greed.


    "Oh dear customer, that mask is of the lowest quality cost 2 silver, but! But do not dread dear customer! As I got one with much better quality." Going away from the stall, the man came up with a box that looked of the highest quality at first nce, but Danzel imminently recognized the true worth of the box.


    `Fancy trash...¡ä


    "Behold and be amazed! For just not 5! Not even 4! But 3 silver you can get one of the highest quality!"


    "..."


    Looking at both of the masks, Danzel couldn¡ät help but look at the guy thinking if he should just smack him once or not.


    The so said Small Magi Masks werepletely t on the surface with no mouth to see. The only opening that it had were the eyes that had a moon-like shape.


    No future where to be seen other than the area of the eyes which made the mask look really nk.


    The only difference that those two masks had with each other was that the expensive one had some rotating eyes with two small openings that were the size of an eye.


    What made him smack him was that the expensive mask was so much unpractical than the other one.


    Once you moved the mask just by a bit was enough to make the small holes rotate left or right, making it extremely inconvenient, if not usable.


    In other words, he was trying to scam him...


    Danzel who was caressing the hilt of this de suddenly had an idea.


    "Well, if it¡äs just 3 silvers I might as well get the better one."


    "Yes, right away dear sure." The man said with a bright smile whileughing at this idiot.


    After paying up, Danzel looked at the mask and walked towards a nearby alley.


    "Hmm...none is here." Nodding to himself, mana spread through this body.


    Squirting slightly down, he jumped up high through the use of this skill.


    Carving these fingers into the building walls, he once again used [Leap] and got at top of the building.


    "Good" Nodding to himself for these capabilities, he sat down to the roof of a building and turned the mask to the other side.


    "Let¡äs make this useful." Burning mana on his hand, he started to carve runes to the mask after making sure where exactly was enough ce with [Rune Vision].


    Though he could also buy the much cheaper mask, he decided to go for this one just because it covered the eyes slightly.


    Ideally, he would have bought a faceless mask, but that might have raised questions to the normal people of how he can see and such.


    With a rune capable to make him use this sight as the mask/helmet wasn¡ät there, It didn¡ät matter much how inconvenient they were.


    [You received 2000 XP]


    "Tch, I forgot thosemon runes such a cheapskate."


    Standing up to take a good look at the mask on the sun, through the nearby silence Danzel heard a small sound that could be easily mistaken for just the wind.


    But the mask away, he swiftly turned around in the direction he heard the sound with this sword drawn.


    "Who is there!?"

 Chapter 131 - Devils Contract

    <strong></strong>


    "Who is there!"


    Turning this head, Danzel scanned his surroundings.


    And with being on the roof of the buildings, he quickly managed to see someone hiding a roof who was staring at him with widened eyes.


    The man froze for a second, before turning around to make a run for it.


    Seeing that, his eyes light up so bright that dark green light came out of his helmet ominously.


    "This look...!" Standing up, he put the small magi mask into this storage ring and sprinted towardsthe man.


    Jumping from a building to the next, these eyes were focused on chasing the man.


    `That man''s expression and where he looked. There is no mistake. He gazed directly at my mask!¡ä Danzel cursed internally.


    Bringing out a small rock that he stored quite a long while ago, he halted for a second before throwing it at the man.


    *Baahm!


    "What the-!?" Surprised, he fell to the ground as something flew at the wall beside him which resulted in destroying it.


    "Crazy!" Getting up from this feet, he quickly jumped to the other roof.


    Turning around, he imminently got the chills running through his back.


    Seeing his target jumping from roofs while dragging himself forward with his hands on the roofs, he knew he was in some deep trouble.


    "I-I need to report this!" With a boost of this determination, he hastens these steps.


    "Tch!" Cursing at his aiming skills, he guided this mana through his body.


    `Danzel you, idiot! You shouldn¡ät have carved a rune outside!¡ä


    Although using this skill [Swift Movements] with this kind of footing could be considered rather dangerous, he currently didn¡ät care.


    The only thing he cared about now was to catch that peeking bastard before he runs this mouth to someone that he shouldn¡ät.


    He didn¡ät know who the man was working for, but he really knew that once things got out about this runesmithing he would have to say goodbye Nercana. If he is lucky enough to get out that it¡äs it.


    Even though they both were using mana to increase their movement and he was faster than him. Once Danzel realized where the man was heading to a sense of crisis fell upon him.


    "That bastard, he is running towards the association!"


    Although he was closing the gap, by the time he caught up to him they would already reach the main building of the association.


    Once the man reached that ce it would be game over for him.


    "I can¡ät let him go!" Drawing Veren out of this sheath, he guided the mana into Veren while continuing to follow him.


    An incredible amount of bloodlust came crippling through the man''s back to the point he couldn¡ät help but a take look behind him.


    "Crap!" The moment he saw that dark armorer knight swinging this sword at him, he knew he was into some deep trouble.


    And he wasn¡ät wrong.


    *Fsheeeen!


    A wind de filled with dark green light flew in this direction.


    Jumping to the opposite roof, the man barely managed to escape the reaping de out of this grasp.


    But as he was elected that he got away, the wind de that hit the position he was before destroyed a part of the roof with this debris flying at the man''s current location.


    Showered with multiple stones, some managed to hit this legs and shoulder which made him fall.


    "No!"


    Falling from the roof, he tried to grab on the walls in hopes to reduce this fall, s these tries were but a waste of effort.


    *Boohm!


    "Ugh...Dammit." Trying to ignore the pain through this leg, the man stand up and tried to walk out of this dark alley.


    "To think there would be carbage under my fall, I guessdy luck hasn¡ät abandoned me yet! Some few steps more until this horrible is over!" Limbing towards the alley¡äs exit, he could grasp the silhouette of the Durendal Association building.


    Reaching this one hand out of the alley, the moment this finger touched the light he felt a small rumble from the earth behind him.


    "Huh?" Confused, he turned around only to be shocked.


    With this arms slowly curling near him, this face turned pale with dread written on this face.


    "Hehe, Caught you~"


    The next moment he knew, those hands much bigger than his own wrapped around this neck and this mouth.


    "Noo! N-mgh! Reali-mgh! S-Save-mgh!" The man was frailing with absolute horror hitting this head.


    "Shhh~Let¡äs go somewhere more private..." Danzel said ominously as he dragged him and himself further down the dark alley.


    With some muffled sounds, both slowly disappeared into the darkness.


    ***


    Dragging him by this neck, Danzel threw ed the man he was holding to the nearby wall with so much strength that the man felt all this air in these lungsing out.


    "Agh!" The man fell to the ground helplessly.


    With this leg broken and him being dragged then threw down like that was too much even for him who was of the 2nd-tier.


    "To think for such a guy was about to bring me so much trouble..."


    Raising his hand, he concentrates to cast a spell.


    Finish his cast, the earth gotpressed and risen as a square form turning just like the table he has done on the church but much smaller.


    Seeing this abductor distracted, with this sheer will the man tried to run away.


    But Danzel had enough of that.


    Using [Swift Movements], he quickly caught up to him ace kicked him to this already broken leg.


    "AGhhh!"


    Shaking this head, he quickly dragged him near the table before pulling out one of the runed papers.


    "Let''s see if it works..." He mumbled to himself as he wrote something on the paper.


    Turning at the shivering man he said.


    "You, why we''re you following me?"


    "I-I wasn''t! I just run because of how scary you looked!"


    "..."


    In silence, Danzel draw some blood out of him and ced it in the contract.


    In the next moment, the contract was ignited in mes.


    "Hmm, lies." He nodded satisfied


    Since he wrote to tell him the truth on his next question on the contract.


    With him lying, the rune activated.


    "Alright, do you know what does letters are by any chance?" Danzel did the same thing as before but showed the runes instead.


    Shaking his head, the contract simrly ignited into mes.


    Starting at him coldly,Danzel pulled out Veren and raised up to the sky.


    "Since you aren''t much willing to tell me anything other than lies, I might as well end your life here."


    Hearing that, the man''s face showed panic throughout this face.


    "W-Wait, wait! You can''t kill me!"


    ''Oh yeah? Let''s find that out." Raising the de up high, Danzel was about to end him right on this spot.


    "I will tell you, I will you! I work for the Union! The merchant union. They told me to tail you."


    "..." With doubt, Danzel wrote a simr contract.


    After finishing his contract, he made him sign again.


    "..."


    Starting at the.Newly-made paper being turned into ashes shortly after, this killing intent grew so slightly.


    "Since it seems that you don''t care much of your life. I hope you don''t mind dying."


    As if the man had realized something, the man looked at the ashes with wide eyes.


    "Can this paper tell...if I lie or not?"


    "Hehe, Correct. As for your reward let me deliver it to you right now."


    Seeing the de, he aimed at the man''s neck.


    With him being in a life and death situation, he racked this mind with ways of how to save this life.


    And in the moment of crisis, genius struck him suddenly.


    "I work for Master Nevvan!"


    With the de halting right before this neck, the man sighed out of relief.


    ''Nevvan...'' Danzel cursed internally as he bought out a paper to test these words.


    With few blood drops in the tune,pared to the other papers this one didn''t ignite.


    "Why him..." A sense of helplessness started to feel him upon hearing that name.


    The memories of him turning you in an instant into a statue.


    He knew he was no match against that man. But what confused him was why he was searching for information about him.


    ''Did the news of Berum already reach here?''


    He doubted that since he didn:''t goes public with the runes.


    "Why does he want to check me?" Danzel asked confused


    With a miserable look on this face, the man pointed at this ring.


    "Cause of the ring..."


    "Right..." Danzel said calmly outside but cursed to his past seven.


    ''What should I do now..?'' Danzel stayed silent to think out.


    ''If I kill him that terrific magic caster might go after him. But letting him go would result in many more problems.''


    Thinking about of sort time, he suddenly came up with another n.


    Going into writing, he gave the contract that he wrote and gave him to the man in front of him with an evil grin on his face.


    "Sign this with your blood if you don''t want to die..." He said seriously.


    The man realized that this was hisst lifeline. Grabbed the contract before freezing in ce.


    Reading the contract he raised this head at Danzel.


    "Isn''t this the same as a devil''s contract?"

 Chapter 132 - A Mans Greed

    Currently, in the church...


    In the stage where the half-broken was were two boys standing opposite to each other.


    Those boys were Kayn and Marcus.


    With mana ring through their body, they shed each other with their fist.


    And Marcus who was throwing punches left and right had no chance against the 2nd-tier Kayn.


    "Huff-Huff, Why can¡ät I hit you!"


    Stoping with their training, they both seated exhausted on the ground.


    "It¡äs alright Marcus, sooner orter you will catch up to no time." Kaynforted Marcus.


    "And when will that be!? We are just 1 year younger than you and we are a league apart!" Marcus yelled frustrated.


    Looking at this hand, his eyebrows frowned as a small red spot appeared as quickly as it disappeared.


    "Ugh...Are you stronger because of those?" Marcus grumbled slightly tired.


    "Marcus!" Seeing that, Kayn grabbed at this shoulder and looked at Marcus directly into this eyes.


    "Don¡ät do that ever again, Marcus. You know what will happen if you force it out of you own now."


    "But...If we don¡ät get stronger quicker, then sooner orter, that man will kill us all! You know it as well as I do!" Marcus yelled frustrated as this eyes started to tear up.


    Many who heard him had bitter smile¡äs on their face including Kayn too.


    Though the man called Danzel said that he would let them stay as long they kept on the rules, even himself didn¡ät know if he kept into these words.


    A month ago where he got scolded by the man, the words he said still kept repeating through this head ever since, unable to forget them.


    `Can you hold the responsibility of their deaths?¡ä


    And this answer to it would be no.


    Of course, he couldn''t.


    As the oldest and strongest of them all, he was forced to lead them to a better ce.


    However, this task alone is big enough for a kid this age.


    Telling him to hold responsible for the deaths of these family members was even for him who was forced to grow both mentally and physically too much.


    s, they needed someone who could put their trust into and show them the way of a better future.


    ''It''s too much...'' Kayn shook this head internally.


    Seeing Marcus who was usually showing off to the others focusing now to train hurt him even more.


    With their head staring down dejected, Anna who appeared behind them chopped at heir heads with her hands.


    "You idiots, don''t joke around like that. Can''t you see you are ruining the mood?"


    Patting this head out of pain, Margus red at Anna with anger.


    "Why did you do that!? We just told the truth-" before he could finish, an elbow to this stomach managed to stop this tongue talking wild.


    "Hmpf, Don''t raise your tone on your big sister!"


    With Marcus rolling around in pain, many chuckles joined the room, making the other kids continue what they were doing.


    Getting closer to them, Anna whispered to their ears.


    "Don''t talk about him so loud. Everyone here tries to put the effort to forget about that scythe in their neck. We shouldn''t remind them of him for now."


    As soon as she said so, a clicking sound could be heard on the door.


    Unlocking the door, a tall figure wearing dark gray armor with a man leaning towards this shoulder were to seen.


    "Move..."


    Hearing the voice, the kids ying nearby the door made their way to the side.


    The moment he walked in, everyone got wary of him with soon their gazes meeting the man limping to his side.


    ''Who is this? Another victim?'' Everyone thought at the same time.


    Seeing a limping man with his pants full of dirt and his hair messed up would obviously bring such doubts.


    "Anna you jinx..." Marcus teased from the side.


    The duo ignoring them, walked towards the statue until they came to a sudden halt.


    Turning this head around, Danzel stared at the trio looking anxiously at him.


    Raising this finger at them, he pointed at Anna specifically.


    "You...follow me and bring your bag, while at it." Danzel said before opening the trap door with his key.


    Stunned, her legs started to shake.


    "W-Why?"


    Without even looking at her, he replied harshly.


    "Because I am telling you toe. If not I will force you toe."


    "We will being too!" Kayn and Marcus swiftly added with a determined look on their faces.


    Looking at them, Danzel shook his head.


    "No, I got no need of you two. That girl alone is good enough" Without waiting for their reply, he walked down the stairs while helping the guy.


    Watching him disappear to the stairs, everyone got near Anna with looks of worry.


    "Big sister, don''t go!"


    "The man is going to eat you!"


    "He is going to kill you!"


    The children cried desperately to keep her from following the man.


    Starting at her small siblings Anna showed a bitter smile.


    "Sorry guys, I got to go..." She said as he picked up her bag.


    As she was about the walk the stairs, someone gripped her by her hand.


    "Anna, don''t go..." Marcus said.


    "That''s right Anna, we can try using his secret reject this request" Kayn added.


    Shaking her head she replied.


    "I can''t hold the responsibility, Kayn..."


    Saying that she rushed down the stairs leaving the group sight.


    Marcus and some others wanted to follow suit, but Kayn stopped them as if reminded by the contract.


    Walking down the stairs, what Anna saw stunned her.


    Many kinds of different weapons lying around with letters on them and walls cut smoothly into half were to be seen.


    And in the middle of the room was the knight together with the man lying down on a t stone table.


    The moment Danzel turned around, she suddenly felt dread creeping slowly in her heart.


    "You... Come here." With fear and confusion nted in her face, she dreaded forward.


    Looking down at her who had barely half my height, he pointed at the man.


    "Treat that man like you have done by that kid Kayn."


    "Huh?" Looking at the man''s pained expression she nodded somewhat confused.


    Walking towards him she pulled a bandage and other stuff that she would need.


    "Ghh...Sorry kid, having to do this" The man said before this expression turned to one of pain.


    "Don''t move..." Saying that she put all her focus on treating him.


    And after around 20 minutes she put her tools back and looked at Danzel.


    "I am finished, what now?"


    "Mhhh...well done, you might go back."


    "Thanks kid..." The man in the table said.


    Staring Danzel in silence for a few seconds, she nodded solemnly and made her way towards the stairs.


    With them now alone, an awkward silence befell the room.


    Seeing the dark knight staring at him in silence, he gulped and said.


    "What do you want from me?"


    Danzel though didn''t answer immediately and continue torturing the man with this silence for a while.


    "What I want from you it''s exactly what in the contract was. A deal..."


    "Hmpf, stupid. Kill me now and be done with it."


    Danzel though shook this head.


    "That, I can not do. What I can do however is to give this in often bases."


    Putting a bag full of gold coins in front of him, the man had this eyes fixed in the bag.


    ''So many...''


    "This bag can be all yours with many toe if you ept my deal."


    "What deal..?"


    Hearing that, Danzel had a grin of a gambler fooling their opponent.


    Once this opponent sat on the table, they had already lost the battle.


    "Here is the deal. First, you promise not report me to that magic caster. Once you break that promise, the contract will burst in mes and I will be forced to leave. If that were to happend you should be expecting me to go after your neck not long after."


    "Second... you will help me help sell my items without revealing my identity."


    Staring Danzel with a frown, the man shook this head.


    "I-I can¡ät...your deal has way too many holes. Once things go out I will be punished to something much worse than death."


    "Then you have to make it work somehow since your life depends on it." He shrugged this shoulders at him.


    He knew that this n had many holes in it.


    Or rather the n was made pure out holes.


    Telling him that he will hunt him down and all was nothing more than a tant lie of his.


    Why should he care about this life if he were to be running for this dear life?


    Revenge?


    Hell no.


    Once the paper catch on fire he wouldn¡ät even think of staying here for a second more.


    Honestly, he was starting to have a headache from the situation that he was in.


    Killing the guy would probably raise an unwanted red g upon him, but if he didn¡ät the chances of him stitching were high.


    Both options had their own risk and Danzel was willing to bet it on the man''s greed.


    "You might not know, but a single one of those weapons over there could probably sell for hundreds if not thousands of gold coins. Aren¡ät you mercenary? Think about all the wealth that we can manage to amass together. We will be earning so much that bribing one or two to keep their mouth shut wouldn¡ät be a problem." Danzel said while opening the bag full of gold coins to be seen.


    "Hmpf! By bribing do you mean like me?"


    In response, Danzel stayed silent.


    He only put this hand on the hilt while solemnly staring at him.


    Seeing that the man''s breath became heavier and this heartbeat faster than before.


    Although this position on the Durendal Association was pretty well paidpared to the other people who worked directly for the association. This usual ie was around 5 to 8 gold per month which could be considered as sessful already.


    But even he couldn¡ät help but gulp at the amount of gold that was shown in front of him.


    The moment these eyes trailed of in Danzel''s hand that was touching the hilt, the man nodded with a sigh.


    "Alright...I will do it."


    Without showing any reaction, Danzel ces a contract in front of him, saying [Is your choice sincere?].


    cing a dagger in front of him, he pointed at the runic letters.


    "Let a few drops of your blood there." Danzel said while staring at him with a cold gaze.


    Picking anxiously the dagger, he cut this finger and let some blood run out.


    Each drop that fell made him flinch slightly.


    With these eyes glued at the contract, a green light came out of the runes.


    "Wha-!" Shocked, the man''s expression had fear written over all of this face.


    ''Will it re up!?''


    But unexpectedly, the light shortly faded away with the contract remaining unharmed.


    "With this our we have a deal...."

 Chapter 133 - Reaching The Limits

    Having finished putting the smaller details of the deal, Danzel escorted the man out of the church.


    "Come back in a week and I will give you the merchandise. Till then try to find some potential buyers that are at least capable to hold their urge of wanting more than they can chew."


    "Alright...I will do as you say." Nodding his head, the man limped away.


    Although the man broke this leg, this enchanted body that a 2nd-tier had was nothing to scoff at. Though every step that he made was painful, it wasn¡ät to the point of not being bearable.


    Peeking from the door frame, one of the girls quickly made her way holding a big stick towards the man.


    Reaching the man, the girl Anna gave the man the stick and he reply with a smile on this face.


    "..."


    `She is too kind for her own good¡ä Shaking this head internally, he turned around and looked at the ck-haired boy.


    "I will be leaving for around a week, make sure you don¡ät-"


    "Yes, yes~ We should not go into the basement or else you will know. We got it already." Marcus said from the said with a grin on his face.


    "You heard him..." Kayn said with a anxious smile.


    Feeling rather weird, he walked towards the opposite side where the man walked.


    Quicking these steps, he moved towards a dark alley.


    Making sure that this time none one was watching him, he pulled out this cloak and equipped it.


    "Let¡äs see how it is..." With this Small Magi Mask on this hand, he made his helmet disappear making this eery skeleton face to be shown.


    Putting the mask on, he looked at the sky above.


    "Yeah, not bad." Confirming that he was able to see the clear sky, He nodded at the quality of the rune.


    With this disguise done, he began running towards out of forest that was out of Nercana.


    Although the forest was like 8 km away from the city, Danzel who left the city started sprinting towards the forest.


    With his unlimited staminaing from being undead and these attributes, the time it took him to reach the ce was no more than 20 whole minutes.


    Shaking this shoulder a bit, he made his way towards inside the forest.


    "Doing sprints like those isn¡ät that bad from time to time." He mumbled to himself as he cracked this shoulders bones.


    Though Danzel wouldn¡ät dare to say that he is perfect or that he makes the best decision all the time. At least he didn¡ät consider himself to be stupid.


    Putting all this faith on a stupid promise made between the apposites party desire and his threats wasn¡ät Danzel¡äs thing.


    Although the contract would notify him when the man broke it, these real worries came from that magic caster.


    Not only was that gramps two whole tiers above him, but these capabilities were also unknown to Danzel.


    The only thing he knew was that the gramps could freeze someone in an instant. Taking into ount that the gramps didn¡ät struggle a bit of doing that meant that the spell he cast was for him, nothing note-worthy.


    At least that¡äs how it seemed to Danzel.


    That''s why he left the city for now.


    Since from the church, till the association main building is rather far away for a limping man, there was enough time for Danzel to get out of the city.


    He feared if he didn¡ät leave then and waited until the contract burns, that it will be toote for him by then.


    "Ugh...now I can rte to that guy Uzal or something. If I had the contract that he envisioned then I wouldn¡ät even have to worry about those kinds of things." Shaking this head, he seated in front of a big tree while staring at one of the contracts.


    "At least this version is also handy, I wonder how much gold coins I would be able to make with this thing..." Putting the contract away, he opened this status window with a big grin on his face.


    "Let¡äs put those unused XP somewhere that is worth putting."


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 20


    Race: Draugr


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 6325/6325


    Mana: 1122/1122


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength:145 Agility: 132 Intelligence: 102 Endurance: 114


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Swift Movement Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Prate Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Vanguards Defense Lv.5] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1] [Cursed de Lv.1] [Death Influence Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead ck Guard nearing the 3rd-tier, with knowledge of runes and skills, far surpassing that of a Draugr, one would never expect that his powerful Draugr warrior would spend months sitting at home and stealing from others.]


    [XP:1 200 025]


    Upon seeing the 6 digits number, Danzel''s hand felt somewhat itchy.


    Though he only recently checked on the total amount, he was still amazed at the total amount he was able to amass in just a single month.


    Although he would probably earn much more if he just focused on earning XP, the current amount he had satisfied with all the practice that he had from the side.


    And he knew exactly where he would spend it all.


    "I pushed the date way too far, but now should be the time..."


    The moment he stepped out of the cave, he knew that he would have to adapt to whatever the outside world was to throw at him.


    Since then he decided to find new ways and abilities that could expand these options for an unforseen situation.


    That bought him far enough, but now he needed something more.


    Against people like that magic caster who held absolute strength, petty tricks could get him so far.


    To go against people like them, what you needed was strength far surpassing them to crush those who would stand on his path.


    "Here we go" Raising his hand, he pressed on the upgrade button.


    [Level has increased from Lv. 20 to Lv.21]


    [Level has increased from Lv. 21 to Lv.22]


    [Level has increased from Lv. 22 to Lv.23]


    ...


    Every time a new notification came before him, arge amount of XP was removed with gaining newfound strength through all of this body.


    The higher this level increased the less he was able to feel the sense of touch, but that didn¡ät stop him from increasing it further.


    He knew what this meant.


    It was his body reaching the limit.


    "As the remarked said...I far surpassed the level of a Draugr" Danzel said bitterly to himself.


    But soon enough, that would change.


    Having spent 990 000 XP to reach Level 40.


    Multiple notifications started to show up.


    [Strength Increased by 40, Agility Increased by 40, Intelligenz Increased by 20 and Endurance Increased by 40]


    [You gained 40 Attribute points]


    [You reached the maximum level of the Draugr race]


    [Evolution option has been unlocked]


    Ignoring the notification, Danzel stared at his hand solemnly.


    Clenching this hand, a small crack appeared through this arms with dead mana oozing out.


    "I might even have killed myself if I choose to increase the level of either of my sses..." Sighting out of relief, he gazed at these attributes points before shaking this head.


    "I should disruptive them after I have been done with my evolution."


    Moving my gaze towards the side, he went into deep thought.


    [Please choose the race that you want to evolve into]


    [Wight]


    [Bane Walker]


    [Please make haste to your decision!]


    "The choices have been reduced..."


    Noticing his body starting to shake slightly, he knew that he had to pick something fast.


    Pressing on the names, he started reading them one by one.


    [Wight]: A undead who managed to finish his consciousness and create a personality of his own. Simr to the skeleton and a Draugrs body, a Wight had a simr skeletor body much tougher than the lower tier undead. As the 3rd-tier Undead that it is, it''s famously known for this use of death magic and this melee capabilities. Many mistake them as skeletons or Draugr because of their look, but the strength difference between those is as big as the life span from a mortalpared to an undead.


    [Bane Walker]: A undead who managed to wrap this own dead mana around this skeletor body to serve as flesh. It¡äs said that a Bane Walker is a corpse of an Elementalist who was corrupted by dead mana and turned into an undead. The truth is that a Bane Walker is an undead who tries to imitate the flesh that it once lost by the dead mana from this body.. Although the process of making the dead mana wrap around this body is making this own body much weaker, a Bane Walker is seen as an extremely dangerous existence from this control of mana and abilities.

 Chapter 134 - 3rd-Tier Evolution

    Reading both descriptions of the options he went into deep thought.


    `Wight and Bane Walker. Both have their own quirks.¡ä


    `At one side a Wight sounds simr to a draugr other than the death magic that it mentioned. Inparison to Bane Walker, it¡äs rather vague with these capabilities. The ability could referer to this dead mana flesh or whatever it is.¡ä


    `But control of mana sounds indeed appealing, even though ites with a weaker body.¡ä


    Compared to the other time where he was slightly pressured by all the dead mana gathering for him, he felt much calmer than before.


    Though the dead mana was increasing at a rapid pace inside this body as if wanting to explode, with this prior experience he could still manage.


    Looking up at the options, he thoughtfully observed both pictures that they had.


    He couldn¡ät exactly remember if simr pictures were in the prior evolution choices as he was too focused on the descriptions.


    But now he was.


    The picture that the [Wight] option had was of a fully armored skeletor undead who was stepping into corpses with a graveyard-like ce in the background. The way the undead looked was extremely fierce.


    In the [Bane Walkers] picture inparison was a slightly taller figure who had abination of robes and te armor covering this whole body. The parts of what were once able to see were engulfed with thick dead mana. If it weren¡ät for the fact that if you looked closely at the skull that was slight to be seen, Danzel might as well describe it as a walking shadow.


    In the picture, the shadow had let out a pitch-ck beam with one hand and the other holding a long de.


    Just staring at that two undead, Danzel felt much inferior.


    Even if he tried to pose and look intimidating, he hadn¡ät the confidence to be like them.


    With [Wight] being a spitting image of the undead ferocity und undying will.


    The [Bane Walker] looked like someone who was above anyone else.


    *Crack


    "Sigh, it seems I got to choose..." Ignoring the crack of this arm growing bigger, he exchanged looks between the two options until he raised this hand at one of them.


    "..."


    Before he was about to press the [Bane Walker] option, this hand halted only a few inches from the confirmation button.


    Danzel eyes were glued into that dead mana flesh of the picture.


    Though this dead mana was starting to get more and more unstable in this body, he still looked at the picture.


    "No...not this one." Shaking this head, he turned around and pressed the [Wight] option.


    "No more..." Whispering this to himself, a wave of notification came at him.


    [You choose to be a Wight! Evolution will be pred!]


    [Choose 2 out of 6 talents to permanently gain]


    [Undying]


    [Magic Resistance]


    [Lower ss Death Magic]


    [Death Consuption]


    [Dread Aura]


    [Reinforced Body]


    "Hoh? It seems like the option got more generous before. Except for thest one, there are 5 more options." Danzel said with a grin on this face.


    Pressing on each option individually, the description appeared.


    [Undying]: A undead who refused to fade even though this demise, is what truly makes an undead undying. Once per day, when your HP reached 0 points or you were turned into pieces. Your body will restore itself by the ground up by using your mana as a substance. Can only be activated if your mana current mana amount is at least 5% or more. Has to be activated before 10 seconds of your destruction.


    [Magic Resistance]: As an Undead who follows the path of meleebat, your experience with constant harassment through magic made your body more resistant against magic. Increase 10%


    [Lower ss Death Magic]: The curiosity of one''s state and interest in magic allowed an undead to find spells of his one nature. Is Upgradable.


    [Death Consuption]: A undead who develops an increase of disgust of a living turning to an undead, in the radius of 10 meters you slowly drain the remaining mana of mana for yourself. If your mana is full, then 0.1 of the mana amount turns into HP.


    [Dread Aura]: Those weaker than you who still hold on to their mortality will unconsciously feel fear upon watching you. Mind causes the status effect [Nightmare] to the weak-minded.


    [Reinforced Body]: Amon trait is seen upon the Wight race. Through this talent, their body bes much tougher and are capable to absorb 10% more blunt damage.


    Reading through each talent, Danzel imminently chose the [Lower ss Death Magic] without even thinking about the others.


    Though he didn¡ät know what kind of spells the talent has, he was willing to find out.


    They were several reasons as to why.


    The main ones are that he can upgrade those spells slowly to be on par with this current one and the fact that this talent was upgradable.


    As for the other talent that he had to choice, he wasn¡ät as sure.


    He decided to remove [Death Consuption] and [Dread Aura] from this picking list, as he didn¡ät think he would make much use on them.


    For him those two skills seemer more suited for fighting against waves of people or how he would like to call them, War skills.


    Remaining with only three choices left, he felt quite troubled about what to choose.


    [Magic Resistance] and [Reinforced Body] were simr to how they would enchant one body.


    One makes me more durable against melee attacks, while the other one makes him more durable against magic.


    And thest skill was the most special one, [Undying]


    If Danzel had to describe the effect of it, he would undoubtedly say that it was amazing.


    s, everythinges with shorings.


    Though the skill was like a resurrection shortly after your death, what the skill required to be used was a huge disadvantage.


    Since once it¡äs activated you will be without any mana left to defend yourself.


    Sure, being alive is much better than being dead full of mana.


    What would he do if he got revived and the same opponent who beat him was in front of him?


    He who beat me with mana would straight-up bully me once again.


    "I guess it has to be those two." With much difficulty, he pressed on the two followed talents.


    [You acquired Lower ss Death Magic]


    [You acquired Undying]


    [Your Talent Superior Unique Conciness gets upgraded.]


    [Proficientcy and skill reduction of soul-based skill bes 20% and all attribute increase be +10]


    "Huh?" Confused by thest notification, he reached this to see the Superior Unique Conciness description.


    But before he was able to reach the window, the dead mana being held in this body exploded through the surroundings and traveled around this body like a whirlwind.


    Without even realizing what was happening, cracks started to appear all around this body with shortly after pieces of these bones fell apart.


    But instead of the pieces falling to the ground, they were carried into the air by the dead mana to be bigger and stronger until they flew back to this body.


    If one were to see these processes they would think that it was a painful experience.


    But in reality, it wasn¡ät even close to painful.


    Though it felt weird for Danzel, the moment the bones came back to this body he felt satisfied.


    And once all pieces of these bones were reced, the dead mana whirling around rushed back to Danzel''s body, bringing together a euphoria-like feeling.


    "Aghhh~ Nothing beats this after all..." Danzel said sighted satisfied.


    Staring at this body, Danzel noticed many different chances.


    Every single one of his seemed to have grown thicker and more durable with his overall height increasing slightly.


    But what brought most of this attention was the withered grass around him.


    And upon noticing the small amount of dead mana in the air, he knew what happend.


    "Dead mana is indeed incredible..." Complimenting what was literally making him alive he opened this status window and use the attribute points.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 40


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 8910/8910


    Mana: 1419/1419


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength:192 Agility: 189 Intelligence: 129 Endurance: 161


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Swift Movement Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Prate Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.1] [Vanguards Defense Lv.5] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1] [Cursed de Lv.1] [Death Influence Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead that recently became a Wight. Although hecks knowledge about Death Magic. His Strength alone makes him much stronger than your usually 3rd-tier Undead.]


    [Agility Increased by 40]


    "Let¡äs hope that the talent simr to that Rapha guy was a wise choice..." He whispered to himself before walking deeper to the forest.


    "I might as well get familiar with my body around this whole week...."

 Chapter 135 - Decay

    "Awooogh!"


    A pained howl echoed through the forest.


    The four wolves who heard that turned around only to see one of them have this whole body split into two by a tall figure.


    But before they were able to see clearly what this figure was, it vanished into thin air.


    Without even trying to take revenge on the death of theirpanion, they continued running away with heavy breaths.


    The only thing that was on their mind was what they did to deserve this.


    The moment their pack woke up early in the morning and were about to go hunt, something so fast that their eyes couldn¡ät keep track suddenly appeared, killing them all by one without any mercy.


    Usually, such a scene of death could be considered normal in this forest, since the rule of kill or be eaten was the norm.


    But that figure that moved like a shadow killed them one by one just for the sake of it!


    `Why would you kill us if it isn¡ät about our meat! When did we offend you?¡ä The wolves though aggravated.


    `He already killed ten of them, and the only that remained where us four-


    *Baahm!


    A swift wind passed through them.


    And without even realizing it, the two wolves heads in the back were cut cleanly as if a scythe cut through wheat.


    The wolf¡äs still managed to make a few steps before crumpling to the ground.


    Cold sweet runs through the two remaining wolves.


    "Ghhhh!" Knowing that they couldn¡ät escape, they turned around and growled at the cloaked figure.


    Usually, the instinct of every animal would be to run away from danger, but thanks to the mana elerating their grow the wolves although in capabilities were like some normal wolves.


    Their intelligence where increased.


    The wolf in the front turned his head to the female one and mentioned it to go.


    With some hesitation, the female nodded and began running away.


    "Heh, ying the hero huh?" Swiping the blood from Veren, Danzel scoffed at the wolf.


    Walking slowly towards the wolf without much care, the wolf jumped with this maw wide open.


    "Move" Punching the wolf to the ground, he was about to chase after before he heard a low growl from the wolf at he punched.


    "Grhh~"


    "Quite the resilience you have there..." Danzel said while ending his misery.


    [You received 3000 XP]


    "Wooogh~"


    Looking at the cry, the female one stopped and looked in my direction.


    "..."


    Raising this hand, dead mana surged out of this palm.


    "[Curse of Decay]" Casting this newest spell, simr to how [Curse of Exhaustion] worked. A dark mist flowed out of his hand until it pierced through the wolf''s body and entered his body.


    "Embrace yourst moments..." Turning around, he left the female wolf alone.


    Bring out the [Sun Timer], he nodded to himself before putting it back.


    "I guess a week has passed..."


    With this figure disappearing through the woods, only the female wolf remained.


    "Woof~" Walking towards the now dead wolf with a sorrow full howl, she sniffed and even lick the corpse hoping for a response.


    s, to no sess.


    Although the ck smoked scared her and his mate died protecting her, as long as she survived the pact could be revived.


    But the moment she turned around, her throat started to be dry while the feeling of weakness came at her.


    She thought it was because of the whole stress, but after the symptoms became that of pain she knew that something wasn¡ät right.


    Her pelt started to lose color and slowly revealed the necrotic skin that was growing by the second.


    Confusion together with fear showed in her eyes.


    When the unbearable hunger started to erupt, she rushed and eat the corpse of her mate.


    Though after a few minutes, she fell to the ground looking like a mummy besides the now skeleton of her mate.


    ***


    [You received 2300 XP]


    "Hmm, a whole of ten minutes...Not bad for level 1" Danzel nodded to himself as he gazed at the notification.


    [Curse of Decay]


    One of the few skills that were shown in the [Lower ss Death Magic] and he decided to buy.


    Simr to the skill [Cursed de], the cursed would stick to the target and burn this vitality through all parts of the body.


    Although the effect was much weaker of the [Cursed de], the effect generally was good.


    Just imaging the higher level of the skill brought Danzel excitement.


    Although the skill required a whole 10 minutes to kill a wolf at the 1nd-tier and it would take a much longer time for someone at his level of strength.


    The skill could be a nice annoyance and subconsciously put a timer insider his enemy''s mind, which in turn might lead them to make some mistakes.


    Overall, he was satisfied with this skill.


    Although they some other Death spells that he could buy, he decided to just get that for now.


    With so many skills in need for a level up and wanting to increase the sub-ss once more. Putting more on this list to upgrade wasn¡ät that appealing.


    "Even in that week, I was only able to gain only 340 000 XP. Though it¡äs enough for the twice improved skills, above that the cost rises too much..." Shaking his head, he walked out of the forest and looked in the direction where Nercana was.


    "It took me around 20 minutes from here, let¡äs see how much is now." Taking a poster, he pushed the ground and dashed towards Nercana with incredible speed.


    ***


    In Nercana around the poprized area.


    In front of a charming shop...


    "I would like to buy those sks" A cloaked figure with a mask said with a deep voice.


    Hearing that, a woman behind the receptionist table looking at her 40 turned around and gazed at the man in front of him in surprise.


    "Oh, mister. Are you preparing for the fire festival too?"


    "Something like that..." The cloaked figure nodded.


    "Hoh, it¡äs nice to be young~" Putting the items in a neat serving as a bag, he gave it to the man with a smile.


    "That would be 1 gold."


    Giving thedy a gold coin, the cloaked figure who was Danzel walked out.


    After he put the stuff he bought into his storage ring, he made his way towards the church.


    Before long, he arrived in front of the church.


    Opening the door, a simr sight of the kids ying and running around was to see.


    However, thatsted just for a few seconds before everyone''s gaze was upon him in silence.


    "..."


    Ignoring their gazes, he walked towards the trap door while observing if anything changed through the week.


    But the only thing that he noticed was the few children having ck circles under their eyes with some looking at the food the others were eating.


    `Don¡ät they have enough to eat?¡ä Danzel thought for a moment before opening the trap door and going the stairs.


    "It seems none hase down here." He nodded as he observed the contracts that he had left to be still here.


    If a contract were to be missing be it burning or being stolen, he would consider the ones missing to have broken the contract, even if one of them might be innocent.


    Seating with legs crossed in front of the stone table, he pulled out what he just bought together with the contract he did with the man a week ago.


    *Pop


    Opening the lid of a small bottle that had a string attached, he wrapped the contract multiple times before putting it inside the bottle.


    Closing the lid, like a ne he wrapped it around his helmet so that even he moved fast, the bottle wouldn¡ät fly on its own.


    "Hmm...good enough." Nodding to himself, he has done the same with all the other contracts and ced them onto the stone table.


    After he removed some of the non-important items inside the [Ring of Spatial Storage], he moved back to the first floor where the statue was.


    "Why did hee out so early?"


    "I thought he came to spend a month down there."


    "Shhh, be quiet. he will hear you!"


    `I already heard you...¡ä Shaking his head internally, he walked out of the church while ignoring the few remarks.


    Going outside the church, he waited for their motionless.


    And after standing for around half an hour, a silhouette of a man appeared in the distance.


    Comming running, he halted upon seeing Danzel.


    "Ehmm...are you Danzel?"


    "Huh? Oh yeah, that¡äs just the mask." Danzel said, slightly embarrassed of forgetting to put the mask away.


    "Anyway, here is the bag of the contract¡äs tha-"


    "Sorry, Sir Danzel. But I will have to stop you there." The man said anxiously.


    "You got something to say..." He said with this voice growing colder.


    "Well... you see. Though all around the week I tried finding a merchant ording to your description. But amongst them all, I only found one, that demands to see your."


    "Did you tell him that the items are runed...?"


    "No, I just told him that someone is selling some magic items. nothing more."


    Pulling out a contract, he wrote down `Is what you said in the followingst 10 minutes true?¡ä and input his mana.


    "Here, drop some of your blood." Danzel gave him the contract, which the man received with a bitter smile.


    Having done that and seeing that the contract hasn¡ät burned, Danzel nodded to himself.


    "Alright, I will meet him. Where do we need to go?"

 Chapter 136 - Rue Danzel

    Walking down the road of Nercana, the two of them arrived at a fairly decent store that used ss as windows to disy the products.


    Although ss was much moremon here than in Berum, it was still expensive enough to impress themon people.


    "Is the merchant here?" Danzel asked.


    "Yeah, that''s the ce " Nodding his head, he looked at him with an awkward smile.


    "What is it..."


    "Well, do you by any chance have another mask to wear? This one is a little..."


    "What about my mask?" Upon turning his head to the man, the eyes of the mask swung left and right.


    "Nothing..."Creeped out of the mask, he walked into the store


    *Ding, Ding!


    "Hey! Old man Honor! Where are you!?"


    With sounds of stepsing from a door, a middle-aged man with a round belly and a mustache came walking in.


    "I heard you loud and clear, you don''t need to yell so loud! What would you have done if you scared the customers to be outside the shop Merrick!?"


    "Bah, stop coning already and look what I brought you here. Rather than those so-called customers to be outside, I fetch a living one instead! Aren''t you supposed to thank me!?"


    ''I am an undead though...'' Danzel shook this head internally.


    Turning his head, the middle-aged man names Honor observed Danzel from head to toe.


    "Hmm...is that the guy that you talked about? I thought you will bring me to meet a magic caster from the academy by how you described these skills. But looking at him now..."


    "Isn''t he just a knight? And a tall one at that..." Honor said with a dissatisfied tone.


    "Sir Honor, you promised me that you will at least hear us out before you decide." Merrick mentioned.


    "Tch, since you helped me once smuggle some stuff inside that mercenary hole, I might as well return the favor and be done with it."


    Turning his back, he gestured to follow him to the door he came before.


    Falling down on the couch, he looked at the duo with indifference.


    "Be quick with it, I ain''t got all the time of the world to entertain you both."


    "Yes, of course, I as told you before this man here..."


    As Merrick was about to exin, Danzel moved forward and ced a piece of paper in front of the table.


    "Sign this." Danzel said with a cold tone.


    "Hmm? What is this?"


    "A paper that you need to sign..."


    "I didn''t mean that..." Honor said confused before turning to Merrick for answers.


    Seeing the nervous face of Merrick, Honor frown.


    "Can you at least tell me what this paper is?"


    "Didn''t you say to keep it short? Anyway, it''s a disclosure agreement. If you don''t sign it there will be no discussion between us.


    "..."


    Hearing that, Honor''s frown grew to match worse.


    Although he was annoyed by the knight''s altitude, his curiosity about the deal grew much more.


    As even for a sessful merchant like himself, deals involving a contract were either a pretty big deal or a scam.


    Of course in that case he believed to be thetter one.


    ''If you think that you scam the great Honor, then you are seriously underestimating yourself!''


    Picking the contract, he slowly started reading it without leaving the smallest detail unread.


    When he finished reading it, he put it back on the table while having a much more confused face than before.


    ''What the heck is this contract? It is a disclosure contract for sure, but why is it so vague? The sole punishment mention there was of breaking the contract was that the contract will break.''


    "Just to make sure, what will happend if I break the contract?" Honor asked confused.


    "The contract will break..." Danzel shrugged his shoulders, which made Honor even more confused.


    "Right..."


    As he didn¡ät find anything to worry about, he picked the pen to the side and was about to sign.


    "Ah wait, signing with a pen wouldn¡ät work." Danzel mentioned.


    "Huh? Didn¡ät you tell me to sign it a moment ago? How do you expect me to sign it without my pen then?" Honor said with annoyance.


    `Are those guys pulling a joke on me?¡ä He grumbled to himself secretly.


    Straightening this back, he looked down on Honor and replied with a deep cold voice.


    "With your blood."


    "H-Huh!?" As if something exploded inside his mind, he looked at Danzel with wide-open eyes.


    `Are they here to kill me!?¡ä


    Facepalming himself, Merrick quickly exined to Honor what Danzel meant by that.


    "Ahhh, you meant that. And here you scared me for a second."


    Dropping a few drops of blood on the ce where Danzel pointed, he was about to sign this name on the dropped blood.


    But before he was even able to do it, a dark green light came from the words of the contract.


    "Wow!"


    Shocked, Honor almost throw himself behind the couch.


    "What is this!?"


    With the light fading away, Danzel picked the paper and put it into a small bottle.


    "That is the item that we want you to sell for us." Danzel said.


    Seeing that Honor was all the more confused, Merrick shook this head before exining what the contract was actually about.


    After some demonstration and exining that they worked with runes Honor went from shock to greed until, in the end, he went total silent while ring at the two of them.


    After staying silent for five whole minutes, Honor finally replied.


    "What you guys want me to sell is way too big for a merchant such as myself..."


    "I don¡ät care what kind of merchant you are, as long as you sell them without spilling out the beans I don¡ät care."


    "Sir Honor, didn¡ät you tell me that your dream was to one day to be one of the big bosses of the Union? This is your chance! Don¡ät miss it!" Merrick tried to pursue him, Honor to agree.


    Not because he wanted to help Honor, but himself too.


    "When I told you and the guys back then I was drunk..." Shaking his head, he looked straight at Danzel eye¡äs (the eyes of the mask).


    "If I am not mistaken, aren¡ät you..." Gulping this saliva down, he said with some hesitation.


    "Rue Danzel?"


    "..."


    The room suddenly went silent.


    Unconsciously, Danzel released a small amount of killing intent through the whole room for a split second.


    Which was enough to make the two suck their breaths deeply.


    Merrick on the side who noticed looked as scared as he was confused.


    "Rue...Danzel?" He turned this head towards Honor.


    `That idiot, to think he would bring someone that he himself didn¡ät know off!¡ä Cursing at Merrick¡äs internally, he began exining.


    "Rue Danzel, the second Runesmith know though all over the world that first appeared in the Kingdom of Berum."


    "A recently wanted criminal that is worth a total of 8000 gold coins. Having stolen property from the army himself and was suspected of the murder of more than 30 civilians. Also associated with the selling of illegal items in the ck market and other suspicious activities..."


    The more Honor talked about Danzel, the more cold sweat was starting to appear on Merricks back.


    He couldn¡ät help himself but look at Danzel with dread in his eyes.


    `Have I been working with such a guy all this time!?¡ä Merrick thought as he pinched this thigh to stop himself from trembling.


    Danzel inparison who was listening to all his achievements like he was watching staring at a bone fire indifferently.


    "So? Does it matter who I am? What matters is if you are doing it or not."


    After staying silent for a few seconds, he looked at Danzel as he swelled a bitter pill.


    "What will happend if I refuse?"


    "Well, if you aren¡ät willing then I will let you just go. As I believe that someone would do a much better job if they are willing."


    "But if the contract that you just signed is to be broken, I wouldn¡ät mind increasing the count of the people that I killed till yet." He says with a much colder tone in the end.


    "Don¡ät forget that those contracts can make you a fortune." Danzel said as he pushed the contract slowly in front of him."


    Staring at the contract simr to how one would look at the devil¡äs hand, he wanted to turn around and reject it.


    But simr to how a devil¡äs contract work, the reward was too sweet to pass.


    "I-I...will do it." Honor said with much difficulty.


    "Good." Danzel said with a grin behind this mask.


    ***


    After finalizing some of the smaller details, Honor suggests one thing.


    That he should never meet him unless he is sure that they will be alone.


    Since considering my identity as both a criminal and a runesmith, they agreed if he was to be found out then their deal would be over.


    That was more of a reassurance for Honor that even if things go wrong, heter wouldn¡ät find himself being chased by him.


    That rule though also brought a problem.


    And that was that he needed someone to bring the products to him.


    Merrick was a no-go as he was supposed to spy on me.


    Thus, he needed someone who would bring the stuff to Honor.


    And as for who that would be he already had an idea in mind.

 Chapter 137 - Is It A Deal Then?

    Making firstly a trip to the local stores, he went ahead and bought supplies for his runesmithing.


    Since now he had someone who would actually get rid of all of his stuff inside the storage ring, he had to make sure that he wouldn''t run out of items to give Honor.


    Through his experience, he was pretty confident that that item would be sold in a frenzy.


    With Honor having the same opinion as I, he wanted to go and start carving some runes right now.


    As he deeply doubt that those 40 contracts that he gave Honor would be enough.


    Through he had a bunch of runed weapons lying in the church and his storage ring, Honor decided against selling them for now.


    Although he didn''t understand the reason why, in the end, he agreed and shrugged it off as a merchant doing merchant things.


    Since he ept supplying him with weapons and armor in the meantime, he didn''t care much as when the things are going to be sold.


    As long he was getting the resources needed to continue his craft, that being runesmithing. He didn''t care as much.


    But since the supply from Honor would be ready to be picked in a week, he had nothing else to do currently.


    After buying several small daggers and paper, ignoring the weird looks he was getting he made his way towards the church.


    And before long, he arrived at the deserted part of Nercana in front of the church.


    "Hmmm?"


    Feelings a presence watching him from the front, he looked around until his gaze met with a pair of eyes watching him from the church.


    Realizing he was been found, the one watching him more hastily out of the way.


    "From there must that kid Kayn saw me killing those guys..." Shaking his head, he unlocked the door and went inside.


    The first thing that caught this attention was a small boy that nervously looked at him.


    ''This eyes...so it was him''


    With him recently evolving into a Wight and with the huge increase of his agility, his senses have improved for the better.


    ''If it weren''t for having a curse on an enemy, being able to even sense someone like this would be impossible.''


    Naturally, he didn''t just grind XP through the following week.


    Instead, he explored the limits of his newfound body.


    As suddenly acquiring such power and speed took time for him to control. If not he wouldn''t be surprised to identally break the key to his front door.


    Another problem was that armor that he couldn''t feel the weight of his armor anymore, which made it difficult for him to get used to being so weightless once again.


    The first day he tried to use [Swift Movements] after his evolution he almost threw himself to the ground face forward.


    In the first ce, if it weren''t for the wildlife and this body he could probably earn more than twice the amount of XP at the end of the week.


    Although it was quite annoying at first, it was an unavoidable task that he had to deal with.


    And besides how his stats had grown, what surprised him was the difference between a Wight''s body and a Draugr one''s.


    The toughness of his bones the better flow of dead mana was miles better than his body of before.


    It was simr to the Alpha wolf he killed.


    Although his stats were higher than the wolf''s, just the massive body of the Alpha wolf was enough to negate his advantage.


    Putting the key of the door away, he went down to the basement and let all the staff he was carrying down to the stone table.


    "The bottles seem to be still fine...I guess no one came here while I left."


    After organizing the stuff he bought, he nodded to himself and made his way towards the main floor.


    Appearing from the trap door, the kids who were doing their own thing turned around and looked confused at him.


    "Isn''t he suppose to stay another week down?"


    "Maybe he will for another week."


    "..."


    Hearing thosemands Danzel couldn''t help but shake his head internally.


    Those kids sounded as if a freeloader just came without even permission insider they''re home.


    ''What''s wrong being at my own house?''


    Moving his gaze through the hall, he stopped at a particr group.


    ''Over there.''


    Going down the stage, he walked slowly towards that group.


    The group he was referring to was that of Kayn, Marcus, and Anna.


    Anna who was sitting on the side stared at the two boys in front of her having an intense fight.


    Kayn who move swiftly and urately without showing a hint of mistake seemed like he was bullying Marcus who inparison each punch he did leave a big gap for Kayn to take advantage of.


    Although the punch itself was quite strong for a 1st-tier, the hot-blooded nature of his made him make many unnecessary mistakes.


    Even though Kayn could probably end the fight in an instant, since he was going easy on Marcus he had to focus all the more as a hit from him wouldn''t go unhurt.


    With both of them concentrating on their spar, they failed to notice the tall figure that was slowly approaching them.


    But that wasn''t the same for Anna who just saw Danzeling their way.


    ''Why is he. Coming here?''


    "Kayn, Marcus, the knight ising to us-" Anna said in a hurry with a worried face.


    Unfortunately, the two boys being in their own world didn''t hear her warning.


    ''Marcus should be reaching his limit by now'' Kayn thought.


    Seeing Marcus heavy breathing, he dodges the iing punch of him by moving his head to the side and punching Marcus on the guts.


    Falling to the ground, Marcus grabbed his belly out of pain.


    "Aghh, Kayn you idiot. Did you really have t-" stopping mid-containing, Marcus'' eyes widen up.


    The next moment, a big shadow covered Kayn.


    Seeing Marcus'' expression and the feeling of someone being behind him, he swiftly turned around and throw a first as fast as he could.


    "Mhhm, Not bad. You even improved " Danzel said as he grabbed Kays shoulder from behind.


    ''How did he appear from behind me?'' Kayn thought as he gazed at Danzel''s arm as if he was currently experiencing some kind of trauma.


    The pain of him being thrown away like a rag doll was still fresh on this mind.


    "That''s not important right now. What is important is that I got a deal for you guys?"


    Hearing that, the drop fell silent and a feeling of dread came upon them.


    "Hmpf, you just want to use us! Like hell we are going to wo-"


    "Marcus, please shut up," Anna said from the said.


    "..." Like a fish trying to speak the nativenguage, Marcus opened and closed his mouth.


    Moving away from Danzel''s arm, he gazed at Danzel with suspicion.


    "...What might you be talking about?"


    Putting his hand inside the cloak, Danzel pulled out a small bag.


    "You see, I observed you guys being inck of food recently. So I thought I might be able to help you guys with your current situation"


    Handing over the bag to Kayns hand, he stepped two steps back and waited for their response.


    Feeling the weight of the bag, he opened it and what he saw made Anna and him suck their breaths.


    "Gold coins-"


    "So much-"


    Gulping their saliva, they looked at each other as if they found hope once again.


    But remembering what the man in front of them just said the hope turned into doubt.


    "What do you want from us?" Kayn said with a cold voice.


    Shrugging his shoulder at them, he started exining.


    "You see, one merchant friend of mine is currently supplying me with resources that I am in desperate need to further my research."


    "With how busy I am, wasting just an hour to pick that stuff would dy some of my projects. That''s why I want you guys to go and pick it up for me. Nothing more, nothing else."


    "For that, I am willing to give you guys 100 gold coins per month if you help me with that."


    "100!?"


    "Seriously!?"


    Hearing that their which became as big as their doubt.


    "Why us? For you, we should be just a bunch of kids freeloading at your house. Why hire us and not someone else?" Anna said with doubt.


    ''The deal is way too good for us. It''s way too suspicious.'' She thought to herself.


    ''So you are self-conscious...'' Danzel cursed internally before continuing.


    "I could hire someone, but you see... The supplies that I am in need are of a high value to me. And I don''t want to risk it getting stolen after I paid for them from some greedy mercenaries."


    "Inparison, if I hire you, even if you steal from me. You will be forced to leave the church." Danzel said with an amusement tone.


    Reaching my hand out for I handshake, Danzel said with a deep tone.


    "Is it a deal then?"

 Chapter 138 - Hannes Coin

    Upon seeing Danzel''s hand, they couldn''t help but get an eerie feeling from it.


    If Anna and Kayn had to describe it, it would have been like the devil offerings his hand.


    ''He couldn''t be trusted!'' Both of them though at the same time.


    Although they could understand this reasoning for wanting them to work for him if they consider he was simr to those mages.


    They felt like there was more to the deal than they could see.


    Those two couldn''t help but doubt Danzel.


    And for good reason at that.


    Not only did he treat them multiple times, but he was also capable of something that they hated to their core.


    Magic.


    Though they didn''t know much of him, they knew he was capable to raise the ground and create some kind of paper that would burn once you lied.


    ''But the amount of gold coins is...'' Gazing the other kids that both Kayn and Anna considered as their family touching their bellies in hunger, they felt depressed.


    Watching from the side, Marcus who just caught up with the conversation had suddenly a great idea.


    "Hey, if that bag full of gold coins is like nothing to you, then why don''t you share some with us? It''s not like you are using it down in that basement."


    Freezing for a second, Danzel stared nkly at Marcus.


    ''Did the magic experiments also affect his brain?'' Danzel though honestly.


    He looked at Marcus as if he was looking at a dumpa*s.


    "Kid, supply and demand. Nothing is free out there. I am offering you guys gold that many people would bend their knees to have and that for a job that everyone could do."


    Shaking his head, Danzel picked the bag out of Kayns hands and walked towards the trap door.


    "Forget it, it''s not like I am begging you guys. Though more annoying, finding someone else wouldn''t take that long."


    "!!!"


    "!!!"


    Panic shed through Kayns and Annas'' faces.


    The solution to many of their problems was walking away right in front of their eyes.


    The internal conflict of epting or not epting made them feel stressed out.


    Humans being under the influence of stress, would do things thatter would find to regret.


    "W-Wait!"


    As Danzel opened the trap door and was about to go in, a loud call came from Kayn.


    Turning slightly, he nced at Kayn in silence.


    "We..!" He briefly nced at Anna who had a worried expression and then at the others.


    ''As long as it is for them...''


    "We ept! That job that you got, we will do it!"


    "..."


    After an awkward silence between those two, Danzel threw the same bag from before at him.


    "Alright, your first job is next week. I will tell the details then..."


    "Ah..."


    Feeling the heavy bag in his hands, all the previous tension vanished.


    "Guys! Look at those! We can finally have a warm meal again!" Kayn said excitedly to others like a kid would do when they received a new toy.


    He left all his worries of now to be forgotten and embraced this moment.


    Unknowingly that Danzel had the biggest grin of them all.


    ****


    Later that night in Nercana.


    Walking the road, a man with a big belly and mustang stopped in front of a beautiful huge building with the words Union at the top.


    "To think that I would waste this thing like this..." Honor grumbled to himself as he looked at the gold coin in his hand.


    Compared to other gold coins, this one had a one-eyed mask with blue crystal serving as the eye on both sides of the coin.


    "Sigh, that damn Merrick, I should even just give him something instead of promising a favor to him." Grumbling to himself, he forced himself to walk into the building.


    Upon entering the building, what greeted him were people who talked to each other left and right.


    "This ce never chance..." Honor whispered to himself.


    Although it was already night where everyone would usually go to sleep, in here they were still people talking about businesses.


    The business of course being those that were usually not all that honest.


    They were at least 18 people talking to either the staff or to themselves.


    Compared to the number that this huge hall could fit, 18 was a mere amount.


    The people nced at the neer briefly, that being Honor, before going back to talking with their partner.


    Without thinking much of it, Honor walked towards one of the many reception tables.


    "Oh, Mr. Honor. What bring she here at such a beautiful night?" A young maiden with a staff uniform asked Honor.


    "Hello Amatha, nothing important, I just have..."


    Sliding careful the masked coin to the table so that others can''t see, he said.


    "...Business to talk about," Honor said with a smile as he opened a small gap, revealing the masked coin to Amatha.


    "!!!"


    Seeing the coin, Amatha''s eyes widen up for a second before turning back a momentter.


    Taking the coin, she showed a gorgeous smile.


    "Ah, yes Mr.Honor, could she please tell me with whom he has the reservation again?"


    "Of course, it should be with... Mr.Hannes."


    "Of course...now I remember. Could she please follow me?" She said smile.


    Although Honor knew that she was showing him a fake smile, he nodded at the girl''s wits.


    As just mentioning this man''s face would bring either trouble or unnecessary curiosity to him.


    The man inside the hall watched that interaction, before shrugging it off as nothing worth their time (was too far from them to hear).


    Walking upstairs, Amatha and opened a door of a luxurious room.


    "Please make yourselfpensable inside this room Mr.Hannes will soone." Bowing slightly her head, she closed the door.


    Pulling out the ''item'' he was supposed to sell, he couldn''t help but scratch this head.


    "How should I even exin this thing?"


    Sitting on the couch, he let himself get lost on how much this room would cost.


    ...


    30 minutester.


    Sounds of footsteps could be heard outside the room.


    "He is here..." Straight his back, Honor looked at the door.


    "Forgive me for beingte, Mr.Honor. I had some work that couldn''t be left undone." A man with ck clothing that matched the pitch-ck gauntlets in his hand stepped inside the room.


    "It''s nothing to be apologizing for Mr.Hannes. In fact, I should be the one foring unannounced at such hour of the day."


    With Hannes being 1.94 tall with his muscr body and ck hair that was pushed back, together with the sharp gauntlets he looked extremely intimidating for some of Honor''s size.


    Bring some sses together with a bottle of some fine wine, Hannes sat opposite Honor.


    Filling for each drink, he took a slip before looking at Honor.


    "It seems like you finally used the coin that I had given you years ago. Tell me, who was it? Did someone threaten you or do you have a request for the union?" Hannes said with a nk look.


    "Ah, it¡äs nothing of such sort Mr.Hannes, in fact, I came to make a deal for the union." Honor replied.


    "Hmm, a deal you say? Couldn¡ät you just do that by speaking with the staff?" Hannes said looking a little disappointed.


    "Sadly, Mr.Hannes, the thing that I want to sell to the union isn¡ät something that..." Honor said with a meaningful tone.


    Frowning his eyes browns, Hannes put the ss of wine on the table.


    "Are you implying that the item you are referring to is a forbidden one?" Hannes said.


    Shaking his head, Honor replied with a serious tone.


    "No, much worse."


    "Hoh? And what could such an item be? Would it be possible for me to take a look at it?" Hannes said slightly more interested.


    "Of course she can, after all, I came here to start selling it." Taking from this staff three rolled-up paper, he ced them in front of Hannes.


    "A contract?" Hannes asked while nkly staring at the contracts ced in front of him.


    "Not, just simple contracts Mr.Hannes, but a contract with a runed ced in."


    "Huh?" It took several seconds for Hannes to realize what Honor just said, but when he did he jumped up from his seat.


    "Runes!?" Hannes said in surprise while looking at Honor to see if he was lying or not.


    Seeing no response, he seated back on the couch and took a sip from his wine.


    "You better are telling the truth Honor, I don¡ät like being made a fool of." He said with a harsh tone.


    " I would never dare..."


    "Good, now tell me what does it."


    Nodding his head, Honor pushed a contract in closer to him.


    "Could she please input your mana over there Mr.Hannes?"


    "What for?"


    "You see, the one who ces mana in the rune would be the contractor while the one who drops..." Dropping a few drops of blood of the blood he prepared beforehand he continued.


    "Will be the one following the contract. And if I were to break the contract, the contract itself will burn."


    Hearing that exnation, Hannes with some doubt input some of his mana and waited for the contract.


    With the contract being `If the one signed this contracts lies, the contract is broken¡ä Honor said.


    "This contract isn¡ät made out of runes."


    A momentter, the contract signed with green mes!


    "What!?"

 Chapter 139 - First Job

    "What!?" Hannes yelled surprised, or rather shocked.


    Seeing the contract being devoured with those strange mes for nothing to be left, he really doubted if what he saw had just happend.


    Reaching his hand to touch the ce where the contract was, his eyes widened slightly.


    "It''s hot..."


    Retrieving his hand, his gazended on the other two contracts ced in front of him.


    "Honor, are those two things the same as the one just now? Is what you said really true?" Hannes said in quick session.


    "I would never dare to lie to you. I still value my life you see."


    "And yes, those are the same. As you just seen by your own eyes, those things could be used simr to a notification to when someones break the contractor and..."


    "...to see if someone is lying or not." Honor said.


    "Seriously... You did well using that coin to discuss such an item with me. If you haven''t you probably wouldn''t be able to live much more than a week."


    "..."


    Taking a sip from his wine, he pulled out a masked coin and threw it at Honor.


    "Here, take it back."


    "I appreciate it, Mr.Honor."


    Finishing his wine, Hannes''s face turned serious.


    "Now, let''s talk about business. Since you want to sell those, does that mean you got a supplier?"


    "Yes, the person that is making those promised me 40 runed contracts per week." Honor nodded.


    "Hmmm, that''s too few, can''t he make more of those?"


    In response, Honor shrugged at him.


    ''If I hadn''t asked him in the first ce I wouldn''t even know the number of items that he will be sending per week!''


    "He told me that this should be the minimum amount that he will give me..."


    *Tik Tik, Tik Tik


    Silence befell the room, with only the sounds of Hannes gauntlets tapping the table could be heard.


    ''Is he angry..?'' Honor thought nervously.


    Starting at the sharp fingers of Hannes gauntlet that could probably cut him into pieces, he couldn''t help but gulp to himself.


    "Honor, can I meet this person?" Hannes said with a cold tone.


    "..." With a pitiful smile, he pointed at the contracts in silence.


    Seeing that, Hannes frowned before sighing in understanding.


    "Sigh...So that''s how it is. If you tell me something about him, your contract with him will notify him."


    "...I apologize Mr.Hannes, but that''s how things are."


    "It''s alright, if he wants to hide so be it. I can guess who the man you are referring to is anyway."


    Leaning his body closer to the table, with a quiet yet firm tone Hannes said.


    "Is he threatening you?"


    "Huh? I mean..."


    After exining to Hannes about his rtionship with the runesmith, this frown of before turned much worse.


    "So he is nning to make a run of it the moment the contract breaks. Tch, annoying guy" Hannes shook his head dissatisfied.


    ''Tch, if I were to force Honor to spill the beans, the guy behind this will know. Using him either to find that runesmith will ording to Honor break the contract.''


    Though Hannes was cursing internally, that exact situation made him realize the usefulness of the contract effect.


    ''Finding that should be a matter of time, now I got to think how to deal with those things...''


    "Since we only get 40 runed contracts guaranteed and I acknowledge the item as a high tier item, it would be popr. Any price that you have in mind?"


    "I have been thinking that..." Remembering Danzel''s words this morning. He hesitates.


    ''Hmm, the price? Since it''s the first item that you will be selling I should be a little generous with the price, right? How about 1000 gold coins? Yeah, that should be enough for now.''


    1000 gold.


    An amount that could buy you is a nice piece ofnd in the busiest of streets or for amoner to liveparable for the rest of his life.


    Usually, he would start up high and begin to haggle with the other party for a price.


    Not only did this method bring the other party to believe that you are giving them a big discount, but also brought forth the true spirit of how a merchant should be.


    But for this item, he just decided to drop the bomb early on Hannes.


    As in his opinion, the item was worth as much.


    "The price will be 1000 gold coins. It¡äs nonnegotiable."


    Hearing that, the tapping on the table stopped as Hannes stared at Honor.


    "Are you serious Honor?" Cold dark mana was sipping out of Hannes''s body which made him look all the more ominous.


    `If I were to get out of here alive, I swear I will feed that damn Merrick rat potion down his throat!¡ä Cursing the cause of all these problems, he tried to seemposed.


    "I ain¡ät making the prices, Mr.Hannes. Please calm yourself down..."


    "That damned guy, once I find out..." Whispering something to himself, he recalled his mana and seated back to the couch.


    Refilling his ss with some wine, he looked at Honor with annoyance.


    "Fine, that will be the price. But we will cut 20% as our winnings for using our name."


    "Excuse me Mr.Hannes for being so frank, but..."


    With that, a war between two merchants began to fight for the highest amount of their own winnings.


    Honor received clear guidelines from Danzel beforeing here.


    One of them was that 700 gold will go to Danzel and the rest will go to his own pocket.


    Basically, Honor was currently fighting for his own payment in front of a branch manager of the union!


    While some knights would consider it honorable to die in the cause of protecting their lord.


    For merchants, fighting for the cause of receiving gold wasn¡ät just worth their life, but was their own virtue!


    ...


    "Alright...we will stick at 10% of the winning. Anything more at the union you are a part of will make losses." Hannes said looking as wanted to split at Honors face.


    "Now, had over the bag. We will be buying those that you have now and wait for the other batch."


    Appearing from thin air, bags full of coins fell to the table.


    "Yes, of course." Giving Hannes the bag full of 42 scrolls, he looked at the gold coins with an awkward look.


    "Don¡ät worry, I will prepare a carriage for you to carry those back to your ce. You can leave now, I ain¡ät in a good mood."


    "Yes, thanks for taking the time to meet me, Mr.Hannes."


    "Leave..."


    Nodding his head, Honor gather this stuff and walked towards the door to leave.


    But as he remembered something, he turned around and said.


    "Ah, I forgot to mention that soon, other than the contracts, the man will be selling weapons too. Let¡äs have another discussion when the timees.


    Without the energy to be surprised, he waved this hand at the leaving Honor.


    Hannes had already enough work on his te that needed to be taken care of. And those contracts would bring another storm upon the market which spelled even more work piling on top of him.


    Just the idea of having to deal with the shit storm that runed weapons would bring made him already want to puke his guts out.


    Though he was a 3rd-tier nearing the stage of the 4th-tier, one of the powerhouses of the whole city of Nercana with incrediblebat capabilities and stamina, even he was starting to get tired from all this overwork.


    `If I knew that after epting the position of a branch manager only to be shackled with those things called work, I would never have epted the job in the first ce!¡ä


    Shaking his head in bitterness, he took another sip of his wine and looked at the ceiling.


    "Sigh...I guess it¡äs time to search for a recement." Hannes said, trying to forget the work awaiting him in his office.


    ****


    A weekter in Nercana, in the morning...


    The door of the church that Danzel had purchased opened slowly, with three small figures with brown cloaks looking slightly worn out came out.


    With each of them having a small bag multiple runed contracts.


    "Alright guys, this will be our first job starting from now. Act normally without attracting unnecessary attention, you got that Marcus?" Kayn said to Marcus beside him.


    "Huh? Why are you pointing at me!? What about Anna!?" Marcus said, offended by his brother''sck of trust.


    Shrugging her shoulders, Anna walked in front of them.


    "It¡äs becausepared to you, I ain¡ät yelling early in the morning and attracting all the attention to us."


    "Wha-!"Marcus closed his mouth as he realized that he had just proven her statement


    Although he wanted to prove her wrong, he would just be embarrassing himself.


    Grumbly to himself, he followed after Anna.


    Kayn who was watching them walk forward turned to look at the church suddenly.


    `Is what we are doing really worth it...¡ä


    "Hey, Kayn! We will leave you behind~"


    "Hurry up!"


    Hearing Annas and Marcus he shook his head out of such thoughts.


    "Comming!"


    `It will be found, we just need to carry some things back here without anyone following us¡ä.


    Following Anna and Marcus, they made their way towards Honor¡äs store.

 Chapter 140 - Why Are Those Guys So Mature

    "Hey Kayn, is this the ce?" Marcus asked.


    "Mhmm, it should be it." Kayn said as he looked at a map in his hands.


    "So? How do we proceed?"Anna asked with a quiet voice.


    "What do you mean by that? Don''t we just need to pick some items for that guy?"


    "Marcus, please think before you talk." Anna rolled her eyes at him.


    ''If it were that easy, he wouldn''t have given us such a valuable item to us.''


    Staring at the ring that Kayn had on his finger, she knew that their job wasn''t supposed to be easy.


    An item that many consider an artifact, a ring of spatial storage.


    Although the resources required to craft such a ring weren''t that highpared to the effect it did, cause of his nature of being forbidden, the one who holds possession would bebeled as criminals that the mages of various academies would dly ept them with open arms on theirbs.


    "Standing here wouldn''t do us much either..." Kayn said as he hid his hands deeper into his cloaks.


    "See? Even Kayn agrees with me."


    "Alright..."


    Walking inside the shop, many various items came into their sight.


    "Wow..." Anna and Marcus gasped in amazement.


    They never thought that they who were called monsters and ves would ever enter such a grand shop.


    They were items that they only saw those rich mages carrying and others that they haven''t seen before to begin with.


    Compared to the dirty bakery that they went to buy the leftovers of a day ago, this ce was like a pce in their eyes.


    "Huh!? For such a small stone they want a whole 30 gold coins? Isn''t that a rip off" Marcusined upon seeing the price tag put in a mana crystal.


    "If you got anyints about my items, you are free to leave Si-"


    Walking to them, a man with a mustache and a big belly said to the trio.


    "Huh? What is a bunch of brats doing inside here? This isn''t a yground! I don¡ät have the time to amuses brats such as you! Go away!" Honor waved his hand as he was chasing a bunch of dogs away.


    Staring at Honor, Kayn pulled a piece of paper out of the ring of storage that Danzel had given him and showed it at him.


    "Excuse us if we are wrong, but do you by any chance know something about this?"


    "You guys are still here? I already told yo-" Mind sentence, Honor eyes widen up in shock.


    Looking at all the simr patterns on the paper he couldn¡ät help but look at the brat in front of him.


    `It can¡ät be that those guys are...¡ä


    "Who gave you this item?" Honor asked with a serious face.


    A week has passed already when he sold those contracts to the union.


    Since the union served as the middle man between him and the customers, he had no idea who knew about the runed contracts.


    Although today¡äs date was supposed for Danzel to send someone to collect and resupply him with runed contracts, it was still somewhat hard for him to believe that those kinds were it.


    If he by any chance were to spill the beans without even realizing it, he would be done for in more than one way.


    `There is no way that despisable guy sends a bunch of children to do such an important job! Those guys must be spies sent by someone else!¡ä


    "I ask you again, who gave you that..."


    Looking at each other, the trio was confused as to why the man in front of them was so stressed out looking.


    "Mister, you should know who gave us this, right?" Anna said tilting her head.


    "Yes, we were told that you should know the one who made this paper! Don¡ät lie to us!" Marcus said as he pointed his finger at him.


    `So they really are spies! I knew this day wille, but to think it will be so soon!¡ä Sweat formed though his forehead, while his eyes darted left and right trying to see if someone else was watching.


    "Oh, right a forgot..." Kayn put his hand into his cloak seeming to try to find something.


    `Is he trying to pull out a dagger? Are they going to threaten me!?¡ä Honor though horrified.


    Preparing himself mentally to face such danger, he walked a step to the front.


    `They are just a bunch of brats, they shouldn¡ät be that difficult to handle!¡ä


    "Here Mister, he told us to give that."


    "Hmmm?" Seeing the simr handwriting of his, Honor suddenly halted.


    "Isn¡ät this the list that I wrote...?" Mumbling to himself, he nkly looked at the kids.


    "Why didn¡ät you show me that instead of that thing, for damn''s sake. Follow behind me, I got the stuff there." Honor said, trying to sound refined to hide the embarrassing few seconds a moment ago.


    Following behind Honor, the trio arrived in the room where Danzel and Merrick talked things out with Honor.


    Butpared to the other time, the room was filled with boxes of various weapon and armor pieces.


    "Seat wherever you find, that was the only ce I could store that huge order of this man..."


    Nodding their head, they seated together with Kayn in the middle.


    "Are those all the things that we got to bring back?" Kayn said with a frown


    Seeing the amount of stuff with some weapons being even taller than Anna, Kayn severely doubted that they were fit for the job.


    And Honor was the same opinion.


    "I am not sure if I am supposed to ask that, but how are you guys nning to carry all this stuff back to the knight? I haven¡ät seen you guysing from carriage either." Honor said.


    At that time when he asked how they will transport the goods, Danzel just told him not to worry about it and that he has a way.


    At that time though him being stressed out from having to host a murderer in his store, he just agreed without giving it much thought at all.


    Why should he care if the other party said it¡äs fine? Even if it end up not working out, he wasn¡ät the one to be med.


    But even he got curious of how Danzel would bring all those items without a soul knowing.


    Since he was already receiving customers who he suspected to be spies aiming to find the gold mine that was the rune contracts, bringing out such quantity of goods would never go unnoticed by the watchful eyes aiming for a clue.


    Shaking his head, Kayn pulled his sleeve and showed the ring that Danzel gave him.


    "We will use this."


    "Hmm, the ring? What do you mean by..."


    Without exining any further, Kayn stood up and went for one of the crates of weapons.


    `It¡äs faster if I show him¡ä Kayn thought as he touched the crates with his palm.


    And the next moment, the whole crate vanished into thin air without creating the smallest sound.


    Honor who saw that stood up with opened mouth, staring in shock.


    `It can¡ät be! The item that this Danzel stole from the Berums army wasn¡ät his equipment! But a whole damn [Ring of Spatial Storage]¡ä Honor thought in shock.


    Giving someone who wasn¡ät a part of the army or of the nobles ss such an item, meant either that the man was either a powerhouse on his own or someone the kingdom valued.


    Thinking about Danzel''s upation, he could somewhat guess why the army had given him the ring.


    But he was damn sure that they didn¡ät expect him running with it.


    While Honor was daydreaming of what he has just seen, Kayn continued gathering the crates before nothing else was left to pick up.


    Seeing the clear room and then back at the ring, Kayn had a surprised look.


    "To think such a small object could hold so much stuff in it without any difference of the wight..."


    Putting his hand under his sleeve he looked at Honor who was still trying to proceed with what just happend.


    "Is there anything else for us to bring to him?" Kayn asked.


    As if just woken up, Honor shook his head with a bitter smile on his face.


    "No, that¡äs everything that this guy requested me." Honor said while zing at them with a serious expression.


    "Enough of that, you guys got the supplies?"


    Nodding their head, the trio opened their bags and let the runed contracts fall to the table messily.


    "That¡äs what he told us to give you."


    After confirming that those were the right stuff, Honor stored them into a luxurious box before he guided the trio back to the storefront.


    "Alright, since people might be watching we will pretend that I will be throwing you out alright? Act like...well, kids." Honor scratches his head as he just realized that all this time he was speaking with a bunch of brats.


    `Aren¡ät children supposed to be more carefree? Why are those three so mature?¡ä Honor thought before shaking his head of such thoughts.


    After `throwing¡ä the trio out of his store and them `giggling¡ä as if they did something mischievous.


    Kayn, Marcus and Anna made their way back while carrying a whole armory worth of equipment into their fingertips.

 Chapter 141 - Rune Grade Improvemend

    [Read Author¡äs note]


    In the basement of the church.


    Through the darkness of the room, only a small green light lighten the entire room with hundreds of weapons and armor pieces lying around.


    Each of those had many kinds of characters engraved on the metal.


    While some had the same characters, if one were to look carefully around he would notice that they were at least 15 different recognizablebinations to see.


    Of course, without any kind of dark vision such difference could be easily be passed by without even noticing them.


    But if you were one of the few like the one undead seating in the middle of the room carving in silence more of those characters possessing dark vision, that would be a whole another thing.


    [Common Rune Ser sessfully engraved, Rating: Well-done]


    [You received 3000 XP]


    "Finally...."


    De-activating his [Rune Vision], he raised the sword to the air and stared at it for minutes to pass.


    "To think that I made such mistakes all this time along." Danzel said as pushed himself up.


    "Stonewall." Raising his hand while casting, a small three-meter wall of stone was raised from the ground.


    Swinging the newly made runed sword, the wall was cut in half at one go clean.


    "It¡äs indeed much better than before, if I were to remove the Veren runes from the Veren sword then this sword might be better..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Although he was happy that he finally managed to make rune of the higher grade, the process he went to do it made him shake his head.


    Although the [Good] and the [Well-done] grades were working just fine, in the end, they were fakes of the real deal and he knew it.


    Comparing the two grades to each other, he saw many mistakes on the [Good]. By fixing such mistakes and trying to better himself overall, he managed to create a [Well-done] rune.


    But what did this mean to Danzel?


    It means that the [Well-done] grade, although superior, also had mistakes that Danzel couldn¡ät wrap his head around.


    It was simr to how one would answer a question on a test full of confidence, but in the end, you forgot to mention a small detail that would had given you the full points.


    Although most of it was correct, it wasn¡ät the perfect answer.


    And Danzel knew that.


    Putting the sword to the side, he pulled Veren out of his sheath and looked at it.


    "Neither this rune is perfect..." he mumbled to himself.


    Though the recently simply that the kids above brought for him, he could finally continue to practice his runesmithing once again in a quiet ce.


    Although he had to give those annoying kids his [Ring of Spatial Storage], it was only temporary.


    And with him practically holding the other kids in the church as a hostage, he didn¡ät doubt that they will run with it.


    Nevertheless, with the huge supply of stuff to engrave runes with, he started to buymon runes in frenzy.


    Since he started to realize that the closer he went in understanding some runes, the hard it was getting to progress.


    For that, he decided to learn othermon runes and try his luck on them.


    Hoping that they will be able to help him move forward.


    And in the end, they did make him have a greater understanding of the runes generally.


    Although his current goal was to replicate the Veren runes that by his guess we''re on the umon level,mon runes did help him.


    Some of those runes made keeping poison in des much easier, making your armor pieces waterproof with many other ones increasing the resistances of magic and weapons generally.


    Since he had lots of XP stored, affording so manymon runes wasn¡ät a problem for him.


    But those runes whereof the umon quality...


    "This ce starts to feel much crowded with all these items around... I got to tell that guy Honor to start selling those." Danzel said as he stared at a particr sword that had a simr length to Veren.


    That was his first attempt to create the Veren rune.


    But in the end, it turned into a rune called [Rune of Varon] which would suck one''s blood out and turn the blood into mana that would wrap his sword around.


    "I have the blood converting method, I just miss the repair part and I should be able to make a simr rune that of Veren, but..." Frustrated, he threw the sword to the ground.


    Although it was his best attempt at Veren, in the end, the rune just wrapped the sword in mana with some extra steps.


    He himself could wrap a sword with his own mana, why would he need a sword that needs blood just to do the same thing?


    He didn¡ät even have the capabilities to use the mana in the first ce, so what was the point?


    "I got to find a way to make mana rece the steel, but how..." Pondering, he went to one of the crates to pick another sword to practice his runesmithing.


    "Huh? Don¡ät tell me that I already used everything to carve runes..." Cursing internally, he pulled out his [Sun Timer].


    "Ugh...The other supplies wille in three days in time if I am right. What should I do now?"


    Sitting in front of the stone table, he pulled all kinds of different things out of his ring of storage.


    "Should I train-No, I have already done that for a whole week. Maybe finish those books that I have gotten not long ago, but..."


    As he was thinking on what to do next, one his ethereal eyes he spotted the badge of the mercenary association of him being a B-ranked mercenary.


    "Mhmm, I should change my routine." Picking the badge, he made his way towards the association building after exining to the kid Kayn where he will be going.


    Making his way towards the association building, not sort after he arrived at their front door.


    "This ce hasn¡ät much chanced thest time I was here..." Walking to the board where all kinds of missions were, he looked at them one by one.


    "Bodyguard duty, Helping training one''s kid with swordsmanship..." Danzel read as he shook his head in disappointment.


    They were many missions that either took way too long to finish or weren¡ät just for his taste.


    As he read thest quest in disappointment and was about to leave, he heard a simr voice from behind him.


    "Hey, Danzel! I haven''t seen you for ages, how are you doing?" The bulgy giant Hannes came and patted Danzel''s shoulder with a smile on his face.


    Looking at the familiar face, Danzel nodded in response.


    "Well, I been trying to find a quest to do to just pass some time, but nothing here meets my criteria..." Danzel said solemnly, not sure how to handle the huge muscles of positive energy.


    "Hmm? Do you want to take a job? Are you sure you haven¡ät looked at every single one? What are you searching for?"


    "Well, something that can be finished max at three days and that isn¡ät looking after someone..."


    "Hahaha! So you basically are searching for a quick fight huh? Let me see..." Hannesughs before focusing on the board.


    "Hmm, my friend. It seems there truly is nothing for you here..."


    Hearing that, Danzel shrugged his shoulders and prepared to go back to the dark ce he came from.


    "But worry no more, as I have the best solution for you!" Hannes quickly said.


    "Hmm, and that is?" Danzel asked in curiosity.


    "You see, me and Serran together with some other guys are nning to go hunt a beast in the forest that has been creating problems for certain people. Using a carriage to go there and back here will only take one day in total!"


    "To the forest huh...what kind of monster is it?" Danzel asked as he didn¡ät want to blindly ept to face a enemy he didn¡ät know.


    "Ehm...I am not sure what they are called. For as long as I remember it¡äs just a big turtle. You can ask Serran for details if you want."


    Looking at Danzel with shining eyes, Hannes said.


    "So, will you join us at the hunt? Having a reliable person like you would really help." Hannes said.


    `Should I ept...` Danzelined if he should join them or not.


    Although he quite disliked hanging out with the living, humans mostly.


    Going out to blow up some steam wouldn¡ät be so bad.


    As the magic caster, Serran and Hannes were at least tolerable. He nodded his head.


    "Alright, as long as we are in three days back here, I don¡ät mind joining you guys."


    Hearing that, Hannesughs out loud before showing Danzel the way.


    And the moment that Hannes left with Danzel the building, from upstairs came to a group that instead of wearing the mercenary badge, wore the adventurer back.


    "Sigh...are you sure that he is in this down short feet?" A girl holding stuff said to a guy wearing small daggers around his clothe armor.


    "Don¡ät start ming me, that guy managed to leave Bernes without anyone knowing where he went. If that was as easy as waving that wooden stick of yours, we would already found him."The short man said.


    "You!"


    "Enough with you Pickering, let¡äs go eat something, I am starving over here." A man with a huge shield said to the duo.


    Grumbling to each other, they seated at a random table in the building.

 Chapter 142 - Party

    "Hannes...what¡äs this?" Serran pointed at Danzel with a frown on his face.


    "Hmm? Do you mean Danzel? I brought him here for the quest. Didn¡ät you tell me to see if someone is interested in joining us on the hunt?" Hannes said.


    "I didn¡ät mean-why-sigh, whatever." Serran said facepalming himself.


    `What did I think by sending this dork to do a single job right.¡ä He thought as he observed Danzel with one eye.


    It wasn¡ät that he didn¡ät acknowledge Danzel¡äs strength.


    Since he hunted down the Alpha of the infamous golden hound pack all alone, that alone proved that he was capable.


    Although their rtionship by thest meeting became much better, Serran was still very ufortable around him.


    If he had to exin it, he would say that Danzel was looking at them with a slight disgust my time to time.


    Like every time he tried to speak with him, he would always stay for a few seconds silent and then talk.


    Shaking his head, he turned his back at them "Anyway, follow me."


    "...Alright" Nodding his head, Hannes and Danzel followed along."


    After 5 minutes long of walking, they arrived at a stall with many carriages.


    Though it was so early in the morning, there weren¡ät many people to see.


    Except for a group of people.


    "This is our group." Serran mentions Danzel.


    Nodding his head, he stared at the three people in front of him.


    `A spear, sword, and a bow?¡ä Danzel thought as he observed them.


    "Hey, Serran! Where have you been? We were thinking about leaving without you!" A girl with a bow in her back and nice curves said.


    "Didn¡ät I already tell you that I will bring someone else for the quest?" Serran replied with a solemn face.


    "Hmm? Is that guy behind that muscle head the one that you are talking about? I thought you will bring a magic caster, not a knight" The girl said, giving Danzel a disdainful look.


    `What¡äs her problem?¡ä Danzel imminently decided not to interact with that girl.


    "Don¡ät worry, the guy I brought would be much better than any magic caster you will find interested in that quest." Serran passed right through her and threw his bag inside the carriege.


    "Let¡äs go already, waiting anymore will put us back to the schedule..."


    "Huh? You didn¡ät even tell us who that random guy is!" The girl made her presence known with herints.


    "Serran is right, we just came formed a group based on the quest requirements. What¡äs the point of knowing each other. Just looking at his sword you can guess he is a swordsman just like me." The man with the sword on his waist said as he joined Serran along.


    "You..!"


    Shrugging his shoulders the swordman disappeared in the carriage.


    The one holding the spear just gave Danzel and Hannes a side look before joining those two.


    "Sorry, Danzel. I forgot to mention this snake here..." Hannes whisper to Danzel just loud enough for the girl to hear.


    "What did you just say!?"


    Ignoring her temper, he passed through her with Danzel following close by.


    With her face getting red from embarrassment, she pointed her finger at Danzel aggressively.


    "You! Who are you anyway!? Don¡ät you see that none is liking your presence here!"


    Halting for a second, he stared at her with a cold look.


    "Maybe a look in your reflection might be of some help." He said as he joined the carriage along.


    Stomping her feet to the ground, she shortly joined them after while cursing to herself quietly.


    ***


    After hours of traveling with the carriage, the party finally arrived in front of the forest.


    "Finally, we arrived..." Hannes said as he stretches his hand out of the carriage.


    Shortly after the group followed along.


    `I should even stay inside instead..." Danzel cursed internally.


    Not only did he waste hours sitting in this carriage, but he was forced to hear the girl with the swordman Pickering through all the journey.


    At first most of them ignored her, but the moment the swordsman had enough it turned into an eternal loop of curses andints.


    It was to the point that he was getting mentally tired from them.


    I hoped the whole time that the others will join and stop this endless torture.


    But I was too naive!


    With Hannes sleeping like a log and Serran driving the carriage, he could only put his hopes on the spear guy. But to his ignorance, the guy was also weird and only stared in my direction with a frown on his face.


    In a hopeless situation, he could only try to appease that hy?ne with his social skills. WhIch in the turn only added fuel into the fire...


    At some point, he was about to use his [Rune Vision] to get some peace in his mind.


    s, he decided against it as he didn¡ät want to leave himself vulnerable with some strangers around him.


    "Hey, Serran. Where can we find that huge turtle that Hannes mention" He asked, despairingly trying to stop the two beside him from talking.


    "Hmm? Turtle?" Looking confused for a second, he eximed with understanding.


    "I guess Hannes didn¡ät exactly tell you what we are hunting. Here..." Pulling a map from his cloak, it gathered everyone''s attention, including the fighting duo.


    Giving Serran a thumps up secretly, he listens along.


    "What we are going to fight is called a [Earth Lizard], that looks simr to a [Earth Dragon] but is by whole lot weaker. It can be found around this area and his looks could be practically described as a giant turtle."


    "It¡äs one of the lowest 3rd-tier beasts that is famed for his sturdiness. Although it¡äs extremely slow to the point 2nd-tier can kill one, his limps can crush someone to death if hit."


    "Any question?"


    "No."


    "I got the gist of it."


    Seeing everyone shaking their head, he put away his map.


    "Although we joined hands for money, I believe it¡äs best if we introduce ourselves." Serran said.


    "Didn¡ät you say that we don¡ät need to..." The girl said with a frown on his face.


    "I said that because you would evenin about the guy we brought, which would waste everyone''s time..." Serran shook his head bitterly.


    "I...!"


    "I agree." The guy with the spear said, cutting the girl mid-sentence.


    Going with the flow, the others agreed shortly after.


    "Since I suggested it, I guess I should start."


    Tapping his staff to the ground and straightening his back, Serran said.


    "You may call me Serran and as you can see I am a magic caster who is well versed on earth and light magic. If you have any injuries feel free to give me a heads up"


    `Light magic...¡ä Danzel looked meaningfully at Serran before the next introduced himself.


    "As his buddy, I should be going next! As you all probably know I am Hannes. I mainly use this spear to prate my enemies or my fist if the situation calls for them! You may leave the heavy work for me to handle."


    Stepping forward, the guy with the spear tapped his spear to the ground while looking at Hannes in disdain.


    "My name is Marrick andpared to that guy I am ancer. I specialize to fast closebat."


    "That¡äs it?" The man with the sword shook his head as he stepped forward.


    "You guys can calm me, Nn, like you guys, might be able to see. I am a swordsman, so my specialty is like that guy¡äs in close quarters. I am capable of some mana and life force to enchant my body so you don¡ät have to worry for my capabilities."


    Looking to his side, he snorted.


    "And what can you do?"


    "Hmpf!" The girl scoffed at him.


    "If guys aren¡ät blind, then you can see that I am an archer. I am confident of my aim and detection awareness. I also can use some life force to reinforce my attacks, so feel free to depend on having me as your backline support!" She said with a straightened back that put her two melons in disy and a look full of confidence.


    `Isn¡ät that like dering that you will just watch us from behind...¡ä Danzelined internally.


    If one thing he knew was that small wounds wouldn¡ät be enough based on Serran¡äs description.


    The Alpha alone that was high-end 2nd-tier was capable to receive a de through his eye and recover shortly after.


    What could do some small arrows do at a beast that specializes in defense?


    `Isn¡ät she just a useless archer?¡ä


    "I guess it¡äs my turn..." Danzel mumbled as he noticed the gazesnding on him.


    "You guys can call me Danzel. simr to Nn I use the sword with the use of some spells to fight my enemies. I am confident in my speed even with that armor on me."


    Looking at them with a cold gaze, he said with a small grin.


    "Let¡äs have a nice cooperation with each other."

 Chapter 143 - Earth Lizard

    "Like I said! You should just sit back and watch! Having you watching our back would just make me worried about receiving an arrow through my head."


    "Hmpf! I bet you can''t even cut a de of grass with that big knife of yours! I would rmend changing your carreer to that of a cook!"


    "What did you say!?"


    "You got a problem with saying the truth!?"


    ''Obnoxious people'' Cursing under his helmet, Danzel focused on the path upfront instead of those two.


    Right after they introduced themselves to each other, they followed Serran who was guiding them with the map.


    Danzel put him among the most dangerous people around him.


    Though he wasn''t exactly sure, he was confident to say that he was the strongest among them, if he were to consider their meleepatibility alone.


    But even then, he wasn''t too sure about Serran.


    Although he could somewhat grasp how strong they physically were, that didn''t help him much with a magic caster who relied on their mind and spells.


    Him knowing that he could also use light magic, one that went against dead mana made him obviously wary of him.


    If it wasn''t for the fact that Serran had already told him that he is a 2nd-tier magic caster by their travel some weeks ago, he might have reconsidered of joining them.


    ''As long I don''t let my ground everything should be fine'' Danzel thought as he turned his head slightly to the left.


    ''There is also this guy who gives those weird nces from time to time.


    Compared to Hannes who was walking upfront like a free spirit, Serran who was guiding them by Hannes''s side, and those two idiots who loved to talk no stop.


    The guy named Merrick was the most suspicious of them all.


    Usually, he would shrug it off as his charm being too good for his own good, but that guy definitely didn''t give those looks!


    ''Crap!'' Noticing my gaze, Merrick came closer to his side.


    "Hey...you said that your name was Danzel, right?" Merrick whispers to him.


    "Yes...that''s my name. "


    Nodding his head, he gazed in front in silence.


    ''That''s it? Didn''t you juste here to make things more awkward?'' Comining internally, he yed along.


    After several minutester, Merrick spoke while still looking upfront.


    "You know, I know what you did."


    "I done many things till now, being so vague doesn''t help much of understanding what you exactly mean." Danzel scoffed at him


    "..." Merrick looked at him with a frown on his face.


    "...What I meant is that I know that you killed the hammerheads not long ago."


    ''!!!''


    His ethereal eyes darted in an instant towards Merrick''s face.


    Looking at him intensely, many thoughts run through his mind.


    ''How does he know? Did those guys that I killed inform him before going to raid my ce? Or is the guy who the kids of the church this one?''


    As his mind into chaos, a sudden realization made him calm again.


    Without halting the steps, Danzel replied.


    "Hammer heads? Do you by any chance mean those guys who that everyone has been talking about recently?"


    "...Do you think that you can y dumb with me?" Merrick said with his frown grown for the worst.


    "I apologize if I am ruining you delusional''s, but I haven''t killed much of anyone in my time in Nercana." Danzel said with a confident tone as if he was simply stating facts.


    But while he was lying through his teeth, his mind overworked in the meantime.


    `Calm down Danzel, that guy shouldn:''t be able to know that. As long as I am aware I killed every one of the Hammerhead in my church and even those guys informed him, they are no longer evidence there.''


    ''And the chances of the person that the kids meant being him is close to zero. As is he knew that by the kids, he would never approach me as he should have a grasp of my abilities.


    That, or he was just suicidal.


    With all those facts, there were only two things.


    ''He either guessed or doesn''t know for sure that I did it.''


    Merrick on the side who expected some kind of reaction from Danzel was surprised to see him continue walking calmly.


    ''Was I wrong?'' Merrick thought as he started at Danzel.


    "You know, I had some connection with the hammer heads. Or more specifically a group of three idiots."


    "..."


    "...You see, those three idiots owned me quite some gold. Although those idiots would always use that gold for either woman or alcohol, they always returned it with a bit of interest back."


    "..."


    "Hey, if I remember right you had a fight with those three idiots a day before the whole group of hammer heads disappeared."


    "And I know, that though those guys were the lowest of the low, those guys would never forgive the one who messes with them."


    Walking a bit ahead of Danzel, Merrick stopped right in front of him.


    "Now let me ask you, if the vengeful hammer heads were to disappear after messing with someone and that someone standing in front of me. Who would you think that killed those guys?" Merrick said with a grin on his face.


    Starting at him coldly, he pushed his shoulder and continued walking after Serran.


    "You can find someone else to fool. Because the guy owning you gold died, doesn''t mean that you can used others as the killers just that they pay you the owned gold instead."


    "Nheless, I heard that many people hated those guys. It isn''t a surprise of them dying from an enemy or a hero of justices."


    "You...!" With his face shing up red, Merrick stared at Danzel with hate.


    ''I thought you already had fled Nercana after you killed those bastards, but knowing now that you stayed. Hehe, just you wait until we go back and report you to the association! I will enjoy your look being dragged into one of those academies.'' Merrick thought as he continued walking behind Danzel.


    ''That guy knows too much...'' Danzel thought while rubbing the handle of his sword.


    As he was thinking of how to dispose of that guy without anyone noticing, he stopped in his tracks and looked at the ground confused.


    "Hmm?"


    "Guys! Something from our right ising directly at us! And it''s pretty big" the girl with the bow yelled as she kneeled to the ground while pointing toward the right.


    "Huh, what are you talking ab-"


    *Booh Booh!


    As Nn got confused by her remark, a sudden vibration appeared on the ground.


    "Huh, what''s happening? Did an earthquake suddenly begin?" Hannes asked as he looked left and right.


    Looking at the direction that the girls were pointing, Serran browns frown.


    "Everyone! Prepare for battle! Our target ising!"


    Hearing Serran''smand, everyone stared in the direction with their weapons already in ready.


    "Finally, and here I was getting bored of searching." Hannes said with a smirk, with an expression of wanting to just charge in.


    "Everyone listen up! Sarah, you go to the left and I go to the right giving support from the back."


    "Merrick and Hannes will nk the [Earth Lizards] from the back while Nn and Danzel stay in the front and his sides!"


    Starting at everyone with a sole expression Serran asks.


    "Is everyone fine with that?"


    Nodding their head, everyone went to their position without muchint.


    Even though my and Nn''s cement was the riskiest one.


    As long as the beast is as Serran had described it, then it wouldn''t be hard to deal with.


    With Serah already drawn her bow and Serran preparing his spells.


    Everyone waited for the beast toe.


    *Boohm! Boohm!


    With the vibration from the ground growing stronger, a sudden screeching voice echoed through the forest.


    "Wgaaaaaaaah!"


    Running towards their direction, a 6-meter tall lizard with rocks on his body, making it look like scales came running at them with bloodshot eyes while pushing the huge trees to the side.


    As everyone saw this creature, they frown (except for Danzel).


    "H-Hey! Isn''t that thing way bigger than you described it to me!" Nn''s face paled.


    "His speed also doesn''t match that of a [Earth Lizard]!" Sarah yelled out loud.


    "Is that really a [Earth Lizard]?]" Merrick said with a frown.


    Observing the oing giant, Serrans eyes widen up.


    "Oh no! This guy isn''t just a [Earth Lizard]! It''s a beast anomaly dammit!"


    Hearing that cold sweat run through their backs.


    Danzel inparison stared at the giant lizard with a grin on his face.


    "Perfect" Danzel whisper to himself.


    ''This guy should be of some help in cleaning things up.'' Danzel thought as he started at Merrick''s pale face.


    ''I bet none will question me if Merrick dies in the middle of the chaos.''


    Arriving in front of them, the earth lizard jumped and let out a loud growl through the whole area.


    "Groooowl!"


    "Everyone! Concentrate on the fight ahead of us!"

 Chapter 144 - Earth Lizard (2)

    "Growl!"


    "Ugh, dammit! Are we really going to do this!?" Nn cried out while drawing his sword out of his sheath.


    Ignoring hisint, Danzel dashed towards the earth lizard shortly after followed by Hannes and Merrick.


    "Dammit!" Grinding his teeth, Nn followed along frustrated.


    Grasping a glimpse with his bloodshot eyes at them, the earth lizard raised his feet and smashed it downwards to where Danzel was.


    `Serran was right...¡ä Sidestepping the foot, he shed with his sword to the other foot, leaving a big gabbing wound.


    "Gwaaagh!" The earth lizard screamed with his tongue out and kicked the ground where Danzel was.


    "It¡äs indeed though..." Jumping back, he secretly shook his head. Although he was able to cut quite a lot, half of the wound was cleanly cut while the other half was like it was torn with pure force.


    Observing the wound closer, Danzel couldn¡ät help but curse out loud.


    "That thing can also regenerate!?"


    Seeing the wound closing slowly, Danzel opened the earth lizard status, only to see many skills and talents that either made it tougher or help it heal more effectively.


    The one that brought most of his attention was the [Mana Forced Adaptation] which raised all his stats and continuous evolved his body.


    Although he wasn¡ät much worried about himself as this things Agility was of 100 and his 189. This earth lizard''s original agility was 76.


    Together with his big and fat body, it was quite slow.


    But his stats were probably what Serran was referring to and not his current strength.


    And based on what he could see, the only guy who seemed to have a bit higher agility was thencer Merrick.


    Starring at the almost closed wound and his sword, Danzel went and continue shing the earth lizard.


    `With them being here, using [Cursed de] might get recognized as a death ability by Serran or the others. Although continuing shing his body doesn¡ät seem to do much, for now, let¡äs observe the situation...¡ä


    "Gwaagh!" Screening with his tongue out, the earth lizard felt extremely annoyed.


    With those four being so close and his big body, it could only trash around with his feet and long tail awkwardly. But even his attempt to swallow their body with his mouth was a failer as they either disturbed him or were too fast.


    "Take that you big loud full lizard!" Holding his spear with both hands, Hannes thrust his spear to the side with life force ring to the tip of the spear.


    "Haaah!" The ground under Hannes''s feet cracked as if an explosive was ignited. A huge force came out of Hannes spear, pushing the earth lizard''s body slightly to the right.


    "How is that-!"


    "You idiot! Say something if you are going to throw it to me!" Merrick cursed at Hannes as he did a quick session of thrusting, making tons of small holes yet deep wounds.


    "Gwaagh!" Angered, the earth lizard jumped with his two front legs and raised his front body section higher up. Once his whole body came down, a huge shock wave pushed the others together with rocks away.


    Standing in the middle of the crater, it raised his head a screeched with his head up high in pride.


    "Gwaaagh!


    *Fsee


    As it was showcasing his power, a small sound of string could be slightly heard.


    With the sound recing an arrow cutting through the wind, the arrow pierced directly at the earth lizard''s eye. making it scream with pure rage through the surroundings.


    "GWAAAGH!"


    Experiencing the pain of having his eye be pierced together with losing half of his vision, with bloodshot eyes the earth lizard searched from where that attack until it meet a slim figure to the distance.


    Realizing that it was that figure''s fault that he was experiencing such pain, it disregarded the others who once again began to wound him and rushed like a bull with his tongue out, his bloodshot eyes fixed at Sarah.


    "Ah crap!" with a paniced expression, Sarah turned around and made a run for it as soon as she saw the earth lizard having the hots for her.


    But with the momentum the earth lizard was building, she was doomed to be caught.


    Seeing that, Serran clicked his tongue and mmed his staff to the ground.


    With mana traveling through the ground, a wall made of stone rose up, blocking the path between the charging earth lizard and Serah.


    "It won¡ät hold..." Danzel mutter to himself.


    He clearly recognized the spell that Serran used as his [Stone Wall] spell.


    Although it was a better version of his, it was nowhere enough to stop the earth lizard.


    Raising his hand, after some hesitation he started casting another stone wall directly in front of Serran¡äs wall.


    Although he would very much like to have that obnoxious girl killed, her aim impressed him quite a bit, which in turn made her good support.


    Nheless, he concluded that even if she struck him with an arrow she would be of no threat. Unless she manage to hit his head, with his skeletor body, the damage would be nonexistent.


    "What the, he can use earth magic?" Serran said, surprised by the sudden wall that was cast by Danzel.


    "Gwaagh!" With his whole force that is built up, the earth lizard came crushing to the ovepped stone walls.


    *Booough!


    With the walls crumbling down, the earth lizard came to a sudden halt as his momentum disappeared.


    As it was about to begin his charge once again, the hard earth under his feet started to soften up to be something simr to a liquid form.


    "I won''t let you!" Serran yelled as his mana changed the earth under the earth lizard into the mud.


    "Gwaagh!?" His two front legs slowly sinking to the ground, the earth lizard looked confused as it tried to free itself.


    Seeing that chance, Nn''s eyes brighten up.


    "My chance!" Nn said as he dashed with life force enchanting his body and mana engulfing his sword.


    Jumping in the earth lizard''s tail, he runs on top of his body towards the head.


    Although the earth lizard noticed that, it could only helplessly wriggle his body in hopes to throw Nn off his body.


    "Nn! Get away from it! My spell is about to fade!" Serran screamed with a panicked voice.


    Ignoring Serran¡äs warning, he continues running towards the head.


    "Hmpf, if you want to get the job done, you got to aim for the head!" With the mana increasing the sharpness of his de, he swung at the earth lizard forehead with ease.


    With blood oozing out of the clean-cut wound, the earth lizard screamed out of pain.


    "Gwaaaagh!"


    "Ha! How you like that-" As Nn was about to swing once again, the mud began to harden, which made the earth lizard have footing once again.


    "Gwaaaagh!" Rising his body from his previous position together with his head that was down, the moment it stopped rising Nn was thrown up to the air without even being able to react.


    "What the hell!?" Suprised in the air, he prepared himself to meet the impact of his fall.


    But shortly after he noticed the earth lizard hastily turned his back at him.


    "Wait! It can¡ät be!" A sudden realization came to his mind which made his face pale. Turning his head toward the ground with a crazed expression, he started to repeat the same thing.


    "Come one,e one! Fall faster!" Staring at the ground with a crazed longing, he came to a sudden halt as the earth lizard stopped spinning.


    Having turned his huge body with all of his strength, the earth lizard tail was swung through the air with such force that the air was making sounds of it being pushed.


    *Fsooooh!


    "Nooo!" Seeing the huge tail being swung at him with such force, Nn screamed out of despair as he put his arms up to guard against it.


    s, like hitting a fly with your hand.


    The huge tail sends Nn flying through the air.


    Rolling through the air with his arms and legs already broken, half of his body crashed at one of the trees with such force that his head was pulled out and all remaining bones of his chest broke.


    Falling headless to a nearby bush with a messed up body, only the loud screech of the earth lizard could be heard through the surroundings.


    "Gwaaaagh!"


    "Oh god..." Serah shook as she stared at what had just happend.


    Not even 5 minutes have passed to where she and Nn wereining at each other. But with just a strike, the annoying man who was pissing her off died.


    `If that were to hit me...¡ä She though.


    And she wasn¡ät alone thinking of that.


    Serran and Merrick also had tense expressions on their face.


    Only two were fearless.


    Danzel, who was confident of his strength.


    And Hannes.


    "You beast! I will show you what you get for killing Nn!" Yelling, Hannes runs directly in front of the earth lizard.


    Although the earth lizard couldn¡ät understand what it was saying, it knew when to recognize a challenge.


    Having seeded with his tail attack once, the earth lizard turned and swung his tail towards Hannes side.

 Chapter 145 - Traitor

    *Swooooosh!


    "ORAAAGHHH!" Hannes runs at top speed straight towards the earth lizard.


    "That damned fool! Didn¡ät he just see what happend to Nn!" Cursing out loud, Serran hastily guided his mana to the ground.


    As the earth lizards came swiping towards Hannes''s side with terrifying strength, just before the tail managed to ram at Hannes, a huge burst of lifeforce came out of Hannes''s body which made his muscles bulge to the next level.


    Jumping right as the tail came to his position, he pierced his spear to the earth lizard''s tail like a heavy anchor in the ground, making the whole tail halt for a moment.


    "Gwaaagh!"


    "How you like that you bastard!?" Hannes said as he pushed his spear much deeper to the ground.


    But as soon as the earth lizard had turned once again to his original position, the spear shook continuously while making creaking sounds.


    "Oh, crap..."


    "You huge idiot! Get away from it!" Serran yelled while finishing his spell.


    "[Earth Spikes]!"


    With the mana gathering below the ground of the earth lizard tail, one by one, four earth spikes prated through the tail itself.


    "Gwaaaagh!" Screaming with his tongue out, it tried to pull his tailback, but with not much sess.


    *Crack~


    "Huff~Huff, getaway..." Serran said with heavy breathing while being on his knees.


    Hearing him, Hannes quickly moved away after taking ast look at his spear.


    "Dammit! I even liked that spear!"


    "Then you shouldn¡ät have done that fancy move of yours in the first ce..." Danzel mutter to himself, as he too finished one of his spells.


    Below the struggling earth lizard, a sudden stone wall rose and hit the earth lizard jaws.


    Pushing his jaw forcibly upwards, made the earth lizard bit his own tongue and fall to the ground, which resulted in a defining scream of pain.


    "GWAAAAAAAGHHH!"


    *Crack~Crack!


    With it iling around in pain, cracks in the earth spikes together with the spear started to appear, they looked like they couldn¡ät hold the beast for much longer.


    Seeing that the earth lizard lost his mind, Merrick turned to Danzel with a disdainful look.


    "Hey, you! Continuing this any further with that things regeneration would only spell our doom!" Pointed at the earth lizard with this finger, or rather this eye, Merrick started to dash.


    "It''s eyes though don¡ät regenerate as fast! I will use whatever I have left to get the eye while you finish itter!"


    "..." Nodding his head, Danzel raised this hand and looked nkly ahead.


    `Alright, with this I only gotto finish the deed and get out of here!¡ä Merrick though he used a variant of abilities to enchant his spear simr to Nn and his body.


    Merrick who was closing in the raging earth lizard but all this hesitation away.


    His decision didn''te from nowhere.


    Although as much as he hated doing this job, he concluded that this was the only way.


    As he consider the earth lizard''s notorious regeneration and top of it being an anomaly, he heavily doubted that they will be capable of actually finishing it off before they exhausted themself.


    Not only was one of them dead, their backlinepletely crumbled with their magic caster seemingly exhausted his mana, but their archer also seemed to be in a state of panic.


    `That muscle head with now his spear lost would be of no help, which makes me and that murderer the only capable to fight.'' Although he looks stronger and faster than I, with his armor...¡ä


    Merrick, who by diligence alone was capable of ascent to the middle tier of the 2nd-tier without possessing any kind of talent, knew that ignorance would be his demise.


    Just by a nce of the speed and strength that Danzel showcased, it was enough for him to get a grasp of his strength, even if only a little.


    `Probably in the high end of the 2nd-tier, at best the lowest of a 3rd-tier...¡ä


    If he managed topletely blind the beast and let Danzel fight that thing to the death, he was confident that he could escape from here.


    Consider that the heavy armor would Danzel off and the three others being bait, leaving this ce would be a piece of cake.


    "But first I got give that guy some hope against that thing..." Tightening his grip on his spear, he closed in on the earth lizard.


    Grasping a glimpse from the side of his eye, the earth lizard in his rage swung his leg while sweeping the ground together at Merrick.


    "I ain¡ät like that idiot!" Making a huge jump back, the swinging leg went past him.


    Using that opening, he jumped at the leg of the raging earth lizard, and using this leg as his own footing, he pushed himself closer to the earth lizard face.


    "Take that!" Holding his spear, on one hand, he pushed the whole spear deeply into the earth lizard''s eye.


    "GWAAAAAGHGH!"


    "That¡äs my take-off," Merrick said as he quickly pulled the spear out and pushed himself away with his leg on the earth lizard''s nose.


    *Baagh!


    With the extreme pain going through his body, the earth lizard forcibly pulled his tail out of the spear while destroying the earth''s spikes.


    `Although if given the time I could probably push the spear much deeper to his bastard''s head, just blinding it is fine. Staying anymore and I could be joining that annoying brick, Nn.¡ä Merrick thought in relief, although the earth lizard''s huge mouth tried to bite him, he felt rxed.


    Since he pushed himself in advantage he would be of no further danger. Once he step to the ground and created some distance he could make a run of it after he made sure that Danzel would battle it.


    Though his n was overall risky and dangerous, he would make it out alive.


    "It¡äs now you turn Danz-" As he tried to call his scapegoat out to take his ce, he came to a sudden halt.


    Literally.


    "Huh?" Feeling something pressing his leg, he looked down only for his eyes to widen up.


    "Wha-!"


    Seeing the blue glow mesmerizing his eyes, he stared in shock at the two blue hands holding his leg.


    `Mana Arms!?¡ä


    Seeing the simr color and form of what was in front of his eyes, he immediately recognized that spell from the time he was in the academy long in the past.


    One of the spells that were known as the most useless and basic to learn to the point by just learning in would receive the mocking of having wasted his time learning such spell.


    And currently, right in front of him, he was witnessing this very spell stopping his momentum and even slowly pulling him towards the mount of the earth lizard!


    "Let me go!"


    Forcibly using his mana to make his arm swing faster with his spear on the hands, with just a hit both the mana arms shattered with the blue mana fading in the air.


    Unfortunately for Merrick, the damage was already done.


    With a shadow befalling on top of him, he stared at the huge mouth that was closing up to him with dread.


    As the mouth was close to devouring him, the world seemed toe to a halt while images of his life were shing in front of him.


    From being a bastard''s son of a great mage with high hopes to learn magic in the academy to impress his father,ter to find out how he wasn¡ät talented and soon after to bepletely abandoned by his own father. Unable to ept his fate, he worked hard to be stronger for one day to prove the people that looked down on him wrong.


    But after turning at the age of 34, he finally epts this fate of being one of the masses, an extra. Upon that realization, he dealt with many bad figures, with the hammerheads being one of them.


    He didn¡ät understand why he deserved such a life.


    And as soon as the images came into the blue mana arms holding him down, he forgot of anything else and turned to see who the culprit was behind the spell.


    The first person he looked at was Serran who was their magic caster, but seeing his condition he crossed him out of the list.


    Shortly after his sightnded on Serah and Hannes where one was panicking and the other going to get his destroyed spear.


    Once he nced at Danzel though, his eyes froze.


    Unlike where the others focused on other things, Danzel inparison had his eyes locked with his own.


    Although one hand was grabbing the helmet as if he had a headache and the helmet itself covering his eyes.


    He knew that he was looking at him.


    As he remember how Danzel used a spell before, his eyes were filled with rage and hatred.


    "You traito-!"


    Closing up the mouth, the earth lizard raised his head into the sky.


    *Gulp


    Seeing the earth lizard shallowing the annoyance down to his stomach, Danzel had a big grin on his face.


    "Deadman tell no tales...."

 Chapter 146 - Bad Match

    "Kiaagh!"


    "Dammit! what was Merrick thinking by jumping up ahead right into the mouth of that thing! Serah, calm down! You two! We got to get away while it¡äs still blinded! If we run away now we will still have the chance of surviving!" Serran said as he struggled to stand straight up even with his staff supporting him.


    "What!? Do you actually want to run away after seeing what this thing had done to Merrick and Nn! Are you telling me to run Serran!?" Hannes yelled, showing his firmly his disagreement.


    "Idiot! That¡äs because we are running away in the first ce. If we are killed, the death of those two would even be for nothing! It¡äs better to report this quest as a failure and run off with our lives while we still can!" Serran scolded Hannes before turning his head to Danzel.


    "Hey, Danzel! We are getting out of here! With this thing blinded we ca-"


    "It¡äs not..." Danzel quickly stopped him from speaking any further.


    "Huh?"


    "Look" Pointing his finger at the earth lizard, more specifically his eye with an arrow in it was staring in their direction.


    Realizing what Danzel meant, Serrans''s face turned pale.


    "I-Impossible, it can still see us!? With that arrow!?" Serran said with a hint of fear in his voice.


    "If I had to guess, it can only see us barely, the important part is that it can vaguely guess our position...¡ä


    Hearing that Serran became much calmer than before, but the frown on his face remained.


    "Then...."


    Without letting him finish, Danzel quickly stopped him.


    "You tw-No, you three go and run away from his ce. I will stay and..." Pointing his sword at the screaming earth lizard, he said with a tone cold.


    "...And kill that lizard."


    "What!? You crazy!? You want to fight this thing too!? Didn¡ät you see what happend to Merrick just now!?"


    "..."


    Seeing Danzel not responding, Serran was surprised that he was serious.


    `Does he actually want to buy us time to let us leave while he stays and sacrifices himself?¡ä Serran doubted but based on their situation he couldn¡ät interpret what Danzel said other than buying them time for them to escape.


    `Is it because he is confident to take on that earth lizard or because he wants to y the bait...¡ä Looking at Danzel that wasn¡ät showing any chance, he beat his lips before saying with a grave tone.


    "If that¡äs the case we will help you, since we all epted the job, we-"


    "You can¡ät, or rather you guys will just get in my way..." Danzel said ice-cold to his face.


    Serran wanted to object, but his word wouldn¡ät get out of his throat after seeing the earth lizard and the tall Danzel looking down on him.


    "I didn¡ät think you were such kind of guy..." Serran mumbled to himself as he turned around while hitting Hannes with his staff lightly.


    "You dork! We getting out of here!"


    "But-"


    "Now!"


    Running with Serah and Hannes towards the patch they came from, Serran took ast nced at Danzel while ncing at his staff tightly.


    `Sorry...¡ä


    Danzel who looked back at the leaving group nodded to himself.


    `Yeah, get out of here! With you guys here I can¡ät even use my other spells on that thing!¡ä


    Just by staring at the earth lizard, he felt disgusted by his regeneration.


    Not only did the holes of the spikes already heal together with all other smaller wounds that they made in the start, but this thing also didn¡ät even look tired at all!


    Compared to the alpha wolf that he had fought, this guy''s regeneration was disgustingly good.


    Confirming that that guy had already left him alone, his grin grew much bigger.


    "Finally some time alone...."


    "Gwaaagh!" Screeching with blood spilling out of his mouth, the earth lizard made his charge at Danzel.


    "Sadly, you met a bad match you big lizard..." Releasing his dead mana out of his body, his sword got engulfed with the dead mana while dark green mana was rushing to his hand.


    "Feel the decay-" Casting his spell, a dark green mist flew in haste towards the earth lizard and entered his body.


    Ignoring the weird mist together with the weird feeling that he was getting from his body, it raised his leg and smashed it down to Danzel, aiming to smash him into bits.


    "Hmm, I expected a bigger reaction..." Mumbling to himself, the mana in his body made him lighter and faster than ever before.


    *Baahm!


    With the leg falling down and creating a small crater, so did two of his toes fell to the ground, separated from his leg.


    "Gwaaaagh!" Screaming from pain it turned his body and swiped all around him as he lost sight of Danzel.


    Throwing his sword and pulling Veren out, he channeled his mana and cut through the air, releasing a sharp green wind towards the tail.


    With the impact of the wind cutting some of the tail and pushing it back, instead of running away from the tail''s radius, Danzel dashed directly at where his [Gale Mana de] hit.


    Swinging his cold sword towards the already injured tail with both hands, he separated the tail by itself with the dead mana flowing through his de elerating the decay of the wound.


    "Ugh~the headache..." Grabbing his head again he created some distance while deactivating his [Cursed de] and [Swift Movements].


    With him receiving the bacsh of upgrading his [Mana Arms] to level 9 and using so many spells and abilities at such a short amount of time, even though he had enough mana left, those things demanded quite a lot of his mental prowess.


    "Gaaawgh!"


    "This thing sure can¡ät be any louder huh?" Danzel looked at the earth lizard in annoyance.


    Observing the wound of his toes and tail, Danzel felt satisfied upon seeing no hints of regeneration.


    "Hmmm, usually ts should start turning his flesh into a necrotic, but..." Noticing that the wounds he did not show the expected effect of the [Cursed de], he sighed internally.


    `As the [Cursed de] disables his regeneration, the regeneration disables the damaging properties of the effect of the skill...¡ä


    "It¡äs good enough for a level 1 skill..." With the crimson light of the Veren runes devouring the remaining blood on his de, he started guiding his mana into his body once again.


    "I guess it¡äs time to finish this farce..."


    Making up his mind, Danzel started to walk slowly towards the earth lizard.


    That¡äs right, although he was much superior based on his agility stats and [Swift Movements], that thing''s strength was nothing to joke about.


    Although he could probably survive one attack, he doubted if he could survive a second one.


    This is why he chose to walk instead of rushing in just now.


    With it having a lost trace of him and probably being blinded by the pain, he decided to use [Silent Steps] to get closer.


    For him, he found working smarter to be better than working harder.


    Reaching 5 meters away from the earth lizard, Danzel looked around while thinking of how to kill such a huge thing.


    `With how fat this guy, killing it by destroying his heart doesn¡ät seem doable, if anything I got to aim somewhere around his head.¡ä


    Gazing at the earth lizard head in wonder, his sight fell upon the earth lizard''s neck.


    `There...¡ä


    Finding his target, he dashed and leaped to the air with the help of the [Leap] skill while gathering his dark green mana around Veren.


    "Gwooogh?" As the earth lizard bloodied sight noticed a green light behind him, it was toote.


    *Fsheeeeen!


    With the air de cutting through the wind, it cut a big part of the earth lizard neck, which made it raise its head up high from the sudden pain.


    "Gwaaaaaaagh!"


    Landing at the earth lizard''s back, Danzel held himself on the open wound while raising Veren with the other sword.


    Swinging Veren with all his strength, he cut through the flesh and the spinal cord, inflicting extreme pain on the earth lizard.


    "GWAAAAGHHH!"


    A shriek echoing through the whole forest came from the earth lizard.


    And like a puppet who had all his strings cut off, the earth lizard fell to the groundpletely paralyzed, only capable to move his face a bit.


    After the smoke cleared in the air, Danzel stared at the lizard in surprise.


    "That thing is still alive?"


    After saying that, a huge amount of life force flowed through the lizard''s neck wound, slowly pushing the spine back together and the flesh itself closing.


    Danzel who was staring at that without hesitation pierced Veren at the spine with his dead mana burning the life force.


    "Gwaaagh-!"


    "Be quiet already, you aren¡ät getting out of his alive..." Piercing Veren deeper through the wound, he kept open the with his remaining arm that was already draining the life force with a dark green light.


    "Let¡äs see how tenacious you really are." Saying that with a deep tone.


    Veren¡äs runes lighten up in crimson light, closely followed by the cries of the earth lizard.


    "Gaaaawgh!"

 Chapter 147 - War Progress

    "Gwaaeeegh..."


    With hisst cry, the earth lizard draw hisst breath before his vision was filled with pure darkness.


    [You received 50 000 XP]


    "Finally some quiet..." Danzel said as he aimlessly stared at the sky.


    `Why did I even leave the church in the first ce?¡ä Danzel asked himself.


    Not only was he made to wait in that slow carriage for hours long, but he had to hear those two bbermouths at that too.


    He originally wanted to just have a chance of page after all this sitting around and working at home. Just to shake those undead bones of his.


    "How the hell did I end up killing that huge a*s lizard in the middle of the forest?" ncing at the earth lizard dead body, he shook internally his head.


    `Right, it was because I went to that association building...¡ä


    He purely wanted to get some kind of excuse to go out and hunt something in the forest by request of one of the quests so that he wouldn¡ät feel bad about wasting his time like this.


    Once Hannes appeared and awaken his curiosity about this earth lizard though, he already fell in the dump hole that he walked in.


    "I should avoid going to that association building anymore, or better yet staying at the church. At least there I would have some quiet..."


    *Crack


    "Mhhm?" Turning his head towards the sound, Danzel cursed internally.


    `Ugh...did it really have to be now?¡ä


    Staring around the beast that appeared from his surroundings with saliva in their mouth, the death mana in his body red up, making the blood quickly turn ck until not a hint of blood remained in his armor.


    "They must have smelled that fat a*s over here..."


    `Sigh, I should even stay at the church...¡ä


    Jumping off the earth lizard neck, his killing intent was felt by every beast around him.


    While the wised recognized the danger that Danzel possessed, the stupid ones recognize it as a challenge!


    "Woof!"


    "Keeegh!"


    Different kinds of beasts simr to wolves and bears came rushing towards Danzel.


    ****


    Three dayster in the capital of Arcana kingdom.


    In a ce with no windows to see and only artificial light.


    There was a huge circr room that had three different tforms at different heights.


    The lowest tform had close to a hundred small pools of water on the floor while the second-highest floor had only around 20 pots of water that although simr to the ones of the lower floor, their quality was one above those below.


    And in the third and highest tforms, they were four golden pools crystal with clear water to the left and right side.


    And right in the middle of those 4 golden pools, was a magic circle drawn in the silver ground.


    Suddenly in the room, almost every single pools water of from the lowest to middle started to bubble continuously as the glow of blue mana lighten the water up.


    Like a whirlwind made out of the water, the water in the pools started rising into the shape of people with by each second more details being added in.


    In less than five seconds, hundred of different images of people appeared in the room.


    As everyone one of them looked around them in silence, in the highest tform, a magic circle in the middle lighten up.


    Appearing out of nowhere was a man with deep blue robes and two gauntlets.


    Once he appeared in the room, a massive amount of mana flooded through the room, though the people showing in the images weren¡ät physically in the room.


    Their mystical sense was able to perceive the pure yet terrifying strong mana.


    As if everyone agreed before hands, the simtions gazed to the ground and aimed.


    "We wee the almighty Magus of the Tower!"


    Gazing down on the people, a staff appeared on his hand and hit the ground.


    *Tiink~


    Waiting for the echoes to end, the man with the robes said.


    "By the name of Arcane, I dere the begin of this conference among fellow seekers of magic!"


    Making his staff once again disappear, a silver liquid came out of the ground and turned into a silver throne with a sigil of a tower with an orb in the middle.


    Sitting on the throne, hezily looked at the lowest floor.


    "The great mages of the "lowest floor" shall tell their cases, right after with the Archmages."


    Many of the people hearing the word "lowest" showed their frowns for others clearly to see.


    As the elites of the whole arcana kingdom, being called the "lowest" was a heavy insult.


    One had to know that, unlike normal great mages that served as soldiers, every single one in here was an important figure.


    From family heads to principals of famous magic academies and talented people.


    Used on being the ones in power and not the other receiving end.


    For some of them, insulting their pride would be considered the greatest sin


    s, noneined of this remark.


    Since right above their heads were beings that far surpass them, they could only suck their toes in the grievance.


    With one starting to take the lead, the others follow along with heated topics revolving around their kingdom and the current war with the Berum Kingdom.


    Most of them being reports and asking for assistance in something, the man with the drop blue robes stopped them and allowed middle ones to speak.


    On the middle floor was an old man raising up his staff, mentioning if he can start.


    With none objecting,he looked at the man with the deep blue robes.


    "Excuse me, Oh~Magus of the Tower. But I would like to ask where the presence of the other four Magus are..." The old man, Archmage Nevvan said.


    "...The other four haven''t found any time to attend this meeting."


    "I see..."


    Continuing the meeting, one of the archmages wearing a mix of armor and cloth said with a heavy tone.


    "I believe it''s finally time to engage the offensive, great Magus. Reports of our spies say that the saintness of the Berums church to have finally passed away. With a being of the 5th-tier less, if we it was all 5 images together with our army. Our chances of winning are high!"


    "I disagree, with that statement of yours. I believe it would be wiser to remain in our territory and if possible...end the war."


    "What!?"


    "What do you mean by ending the war?"


    "We can''t just-"


    "After all those sacrifices we can''t just-"


    Murmurs of disagreement echo through the room, with some looking at Nevvan with hate.


    "Silence." The deep blue-robed man said loud enough for everyone to hear.


    Like pressing the stop button, silence befell the room


    Looking.at Nevvan with his eyes, he asked.


    "I believe that Nevvan has his reasoning that he would like to say something like this"


    "Indeed I have... My reason for wanting to put an end to the war isn''t to end the suffering that war brings."


    "But about some things that we recently got aware of. Not long ago an undead Anomaly appeared in the Berum kingdom, an extremely rare existence."


    "The reason is why I am telling everyone here that is that three days ago, another anomaly appeared."


    "Wait, you can''t mean-"


    "Anomaly''s can only be born with a huge amount of mana mutating their being. And the current anomaly that was found was in a forest with not so dense mana."


    Looking straight at the Magus he continued.


    "That making me believe that another of " those" disasters will soon be affecting ournds too. If that were to happen in the middle of the war, then-"


    "Stop," he Magus of the tower said with his hand raised.


    ""That" disaster that you are talking about is predicted toe in year''ster. It has to be confident that two appeared out of nowhere."


    Shutting down Nevvan''s further request of his topic, the conference continued...


    ***


    Present...


    "Finally done..." Danzel said as he sheathed Veren back to his sheath.


    Killed every beast that came rushing at him, although annoying.


    In Daniel''s ethereal eyes, they looked like some kind of XP bags running at him by their own will.


    "Sigh...at least it was worth the trip. Not only did I get rid of an annoyance, but also received more XP than I already thought I would gain.


    "Mhm, I guess I should upgrade the runesmith ss one more. As the progress of the Veren rune would be taking so much on. I got enough XP for it anyway. "


    "I also would need resources to practice, so selling the tuned weapons doesn''t sound such a bad idea.


    As he walked the path that they came from, he soon spotted Sennan, Hannes, and Serah seemingly talking to another person.


    ''I guess they are giving their report to that guy.''


    Walking towards them, he gestures at the shocked Serran.

 Chapter 148 - Runed Weapons

    At the end of the conference, the water that was creating the images fell down back to the pool.


    "Spouting lies in front of the Magus itself... ridiculous." The man with a mix of armor and a robe said as he leaned back to his couch.


    "That damned mercenary presence shouldn¡ät even be allowed in the conference room inside the tower in the first ce! Wanting to end the war of just because some monsters appeared, such a disgrace of the Archmage title!"


    Taking the pile of papers that lied on the table in front of him, his frown soon disappeared.


    "Right, the union should bring me the crystal that I ordered. With it, I should be able to try some of my new enchantments too..."


    *Knock~Knock


    "Master, you guest have arrived."


    "Mhhm, right in time." Raising his staff in front of him, a blue sphere appeared before showing images of a man with two ck gauntlets and his ck hair pulled back.


    "Guide them to my room!" the man yelled at the attended behind the door.


    After a short while, the room was opened, with the man with his ck gauntlets walking inside.


    "We from the Union, greet the respected Archmage..." The man, Hanson bowed slightly his head towards the man in front of him.


    "I wee you to my domain, Hanson of the Union. Please, take a seat."


    Nodding his head, Hanson seated down.


    "I take it that you being here should mean that you got what I ordered from that union of yours." The man with the mixed armor said directly to Hanson.


    Usually, Hanson would frown upon his customer being so direct, but as he was already used to his man behavior, he pulled out a big box together with a smile on his face.


    "As you ordered, Master Anwir, a crimson crystal second to the highest grade of crystal."


    "Mhhm, let me take a look first." Taking the crystal in his hand, a blue glow flows inside his eyes.


    "Mhhm, the union sure is impressive to get their hands in such a treasure. I recognize the item as the one in the order I had put, thus here is the payment that we agreed beforehand" The archmage Anwir said with a monotone, with his eyes glued on the crimson crystal.


    Giving a spatial ring of storage to the table and Hansonment that it was the correct payment, Anwir almost stood up, wanting to experiment with the new toy that he got.


    "Excuse me Master Anwir, but would it be possible to present you some items that I think will be for your taste?" Hanson hurriedly said, with his smile twitching a bit.


    `Those damned magic casters, all they can think is of magic and crazy staff. They can¡ät appreciate the spirit of a merchant...¡ä Hanson thought bitterly to his heart.


    "Mhhm? I mean... since it¡äs you I might as well take a look on those" Anwir said, with his smile cracking, making it obvious for Hanson to see that he was annoyed.


    As one tasked in the research of finding new ways to increase their militarybat be it for spells, items, and other forms of modification, the archmage Anwircked no wealth to say the less.


    But getting his hands on resources by throwing just his wealth around wasn¡ät visible.


    With ack of resources and his recent research showing no good progress, the merchant Union did indeed help him a lot in bringing him quality resources, even if they were more pricer than their cost.


    Though for now, he would be busy ying with his crystal around, doing Hanson a favor by buying what he got for him wasn¡ät all that bad.


    Showing a wry smile, Hanson pulled out a small crystal together with a sword, not items covered in fancy cloth.


    "Hmmm?" Anwir upon seeing these two items tilted his head in confusion.


    "Let me introduce you to those items in front of you master Anwir!" With enthusiasm in his voice, he pulled the cover off, showing a sword that had runed letters in them.


    "A sword and a crystal containing working runes."


    Upon hearing that, it took Anwir a couple of seconds to process what Hanson said.


    Once he did, his eyes widen up in surprise.


    "What!? You telling me that those runes?" He said while pointing at the runed letters.


    "Indeed they are..." Hanson said as he grabbed the sword.


    "This sword that you are witnessing has runes that increase the sharpness of its edge by an incredible amount."


    Putting the sword back on the table, he picked the crystal and showed the small runes at it.


    "ording to the runesmith, although that rune is a prototype, it increases the amount that the crystal can handle."


    Putting the crystal down, he meaningful looked at Anwir''s shocked expression.


    "I also hold in possession of different runes of armor and weapons. But for crystal, there is only the mana increasing type for now." Finishing his speaks, Hanson stared silently at Anwir, waiting for his response.


    Anwir shocksted for a short before his face turned a cold and calcting one.


    "Those items are indeed very attractive, Hanson. I believe that you mention of the runesmith himself, could it be..."


    Understanding what he wanted to ask, Hanson quickly interrupted him.


    "I apologize master Anwir, although we hold rtionships with the runesmith. It''s more of a one, the union, being the middle man between his items."


    Frowning, Anwir nodded his head slowly.


    "I see...I take it he was the one that came from Berum after he caused some kind of trouble, what was his name again..."


    Smiling bitterly, Handon nodded.


    "The one behind his item is supposedly called Rue Danzel."


    "Ah, yeah. That was his name..."


    After a short silence between these two, Anwir''s focusnded on both the items with a frown.


    "Hanson, although I am impressed by the crystal, I can''t say the same with the sword. Though the runes are useful, on such an iron sword it wouldn''tst long between a fight among 3rd-tier ones. If it was a better sword with enchantments put together with the rune I would be much more worth."


    "Sadly that goes to the crystal too...it''s fairly a low-level crystal, quite small at that too."


    Looking at Hanson with a cold expression and greed, he said.


    "Would it be possible for " that" Danzel to engrave the runes into higher value items?"


    ''That guy...''


    "That, Master Anwir is still under discussion. As his skills aren''t in a match against the Berums runesmith..."


    "Mhmmm...alright. I will get everything that is rtable to runes that you got." Anwir said, while his eyes focused on the runed crystal.


    ''If that Danzel were to upgrade my crystals then the possibilities that will open would be...''


    Negotiating about the price and showing every rune and their abilities, Hanson and Anwir shook their hands before Hanson stopped right at the door.


    Turning his head behind, he looked at Anwir with a serious face.


    "I believe that I don''t need to say it, but please refrain from doing something that will upset the runesmith. Otherwise, the risk of him leaving the Arcana kingdom is high, based on the reports from Berum."


    "Mhhm... I will keep that in mind, please show Hanson the way outside." Anwir said to the servant outside.


    As he observed Hanson leaving the building, he put a huge grin on his face.


    "It seems like a huge treasure chest is hiding inside the kingdom.


    Pulling out amunication device, Anwir started to make many different calls.


    ***


    "Hey Danzel, are you really alright? Serran asked with a concert look on his face.


    Coming out of the associations building with the reward in our hands, I shook my head


    "I told you that I am fine..."


    "Seriously, tell me if you are hurt. Light magic you see is my forte. Be it pain or regenerating deep wounds. Making them disappear would be a piece of cake!" Serran dered proudly.


    ''Hearing that makes me worry more that put me at ease


    Though he hadn''t experienced a confrontation between light magic, Danzel didn''t risk him getting hurt by Serran.


    "Killing that lizard wasn''t that hard honestly...it was fairly slow like you said. Though it took some time to finish it off. Further injures I have not."


    "Sigh...if you say so." Serran nodded somewhat hesitant.


    "I am in believe either Hannes or that..Serah are in need of some care and not I."


    Turning towards the road that lead him to the church, saying their farewell Danzel was walking towards the church.


    "I still got two days, sigh. I guess I should use all those XP somewhere before they go past their expire rate or something..."


    His eyesnded on his sub-ss, his grin grew for a bit


    ''I guess it''s time to see what the higher-level runes look like...'' Danzel though, as he saw the all-out of the big church far away.

 Chapter 149 - Rune Mastery

    Underground the church.


    Dashing forward, Danzel cut through the stone wall in front of him before going to the next wall.


    With both his body and sword being surrounded by mana, he moved so fast through the room, that normal people would have difficulties properly taking a look at him. Once they thought he stopped moving, he disappeared right next after.


    Und such a feat was Danzel doing while casting new stone walls to rise, only to be fated to crumble a moment after.


    Though such intense training helped him to get more used to his fairly new skills, [Swift Movements] and [Cursed de], the main reason why he was training as such was for a single reason.


    [You received 5000 XP]


    "Finally hit the mark... I guess that¡äs it for today." Danzel said as he looked at the mess that he created.


    `Let¡äs just put the stones in the corner of the room and pretend they weren¡ät there in the first ce¡ä Danzel thought as he seated to the ground where his stone table was.


    "Status..."


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 40


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10]


    Health: 8910/8910


    Mana: 1419/1419


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength:192 Agility: 189 Intelligence: 129 Endurance: 161


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Swift Movement Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Prate Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.9] [Vanguards Defense Lv.5] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1] [Cursed de Lv.1] [Death Influence Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead that recently became a Wight. Although hecks knowledge about Death Magic. His Strength alone makes him much stronger than your usually 3rd-tier Undead.]


    [XP: 865 025]


    "Hmmm... I gathered quite enough with that beast in the forest. But would it be enough I wonder..."


    Tapping with his finger on [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.10] another window showed up in front of him.


    [Runesmith of Undeath]: 20 000 XP + 1000 XP per upgrade


    "Let¡äs hope it gets maxed at the 30 levels..."


    Pressing on the upgrade window, multiple images appeared one by one in front of him.


    [Runesmith of Undeath level has increased from Lv.10 to Lv.11]


    [Runesmith of Undeath level has increased-]


    ...


    [Runesmith of Undeath level has increased from Lv.29 to Lv.30]


    [Inteligence increased by 60 and Agility increased 40]


    [You gained 40 Attribute points]


    [You reached the maximum level of Runesmith of Undeath ss]


    [To advance into a higher tier ss a mission has been assigned]


    [Mission]: Create a functional rune using purely your knowledge.


    [Mission Completed!]


    "I am starting to think that those missions are just for effect there..." Danzel thought to himself.


    It wasn¡ät like he wasining about the mission being so easy. Why would he even?


    If he could spare the extra work that those missions were willing to put up on his te, he obviously would.


    "My mind also feels like it got more clear with those 60 points in Intelligence...I guess the more expensive something is the better it gets" Before he was able to get used to the changes, the messages were stilling.


    [Please choose your mastery as a Runesmith of Undeath]


    [Choose 2 out of 5 talents to permanently gain]


    [Mastery of Himself]


    [Past Rune Mastery]


    [Rune Learning Mastery]


    [Pure Mana Carving Mastery]


    [Affinity Carving Mastery]


    "As expected, I get to choose one more talent that before" Nodding to himself, he right away went ahead in reading them.


    [Mastery of Himself]: Though the belief of learning what you are good at. Your understanding of runes using your Affinity had increased, thus improving their overall effectiveness. The chances to get runes of your affinity increase by 10%, together with the rune''s performance.


    [Past Rune Mastery]: Perfecting the art that you already surpassed, the understanding of runes from a lower grade than you are capable to learn increases together with their effectiveness. The increase in understanding and rune performance is 20%.


    [Rune Learning Mastery]: Knowledge is power, thus the one who possesses more should be the more powerful. The cost of all runes is reduced by 10%.


    [Pure Mana Carving Mastery]: Since carving a rune require any type of mana. Learning how to turn your mana purer, the effectiveness on every rune goes by 5%.


    [Affinity Carving Mastery]: Through the study of your own mana, you learned how to carve with the mana that is most suited for your body. The effectiveness of runes using your affinity goes by 15%.


    Reading through the presented talents, Danzel grumbled to himself as the familiar feeling hit him.


    "Couldn¡ät it make it easier to choose for me?" He thought bitterly as he read carefully on each one of them.


    "Though It¡äs the most practical out of all of them, I got to scratch [Rune Learning Mastery] out of the list. Though it would save me quite some XP, as undead I got enough time to gather the XP. It¡äs better to maximize the effect of the runes than to get more..."


    As such, he also crossed the [Past Rune Mastery].


    He found it kinda pointless using runes of lower grades. Though currently, he was using mostly runes of lower grade, he already experienced the effects of a rune that is a grade higher up them.


    [Common] Runes were generally only passive ones, but the [Umon] ones showed signs that they were active effects, for example being [Rune of Uzal] and [Rune of Eniv].


    "I guess those two should be the best choice..."


    Having made his choice already, he gained two new talents.


    [You acquired the talent [Affinity Carving Mastery]!]


    [You acquired the talent [Mastery of Himself]!]


    [Your talent [Dead Rune Knowledge] has been upgraded!]


    Showing up in his status window, he suddenly realized a bit more of the undead runes that he had and some mistakes that he done by carving them.


    "It¡äs better this way..." Mumbling to himself, he opened the status window in front of him.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 40


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.30]


    Health: 8910/8910


    Mana: 2079/2079


    Attribute points: 40


    Attributes: Strength:192 Agility: 229 Intelligence: 189 Endurance: 161


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Swift Movement Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Prate Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.9] [Vanguards Defense Lv.5] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1] [Cursed de Lv.1] [Death Influence Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead that recently became a Wight. Although hecks knowledge about Death Magic. His Strength alone makes him much stronger than your usually 3rd-tier Undead.]


    "Gaining so many stats at once still feels weird..." After punching the air a few times, he opened his [Dead Rune Knowledge] and took a look at the new options being[Rare].


    "So that how the new grade is called..."


    Pressing on the [Rare] option, a number that made him freeze appeared in front of him.


    "Seriously..."


    [Rare]: Cost 300 000 XP to learn a Random Rune


    Seeing that the cost has increased by a whole of six times from the [Umon] rune, he felt really surprised.


    It was as if the number was saying to go out and kill another six earth lizards or work your a*s off for days worth of time.


    He originally had thought that it would go to the 100 000 cost range, but he never had expected that it wille to be 3 times the expected amount!


    "And here I wanted to see an undead rune of the [Rare] grade..."


    By far, his best runes are undead ones, and him already picking the [Undead Carver] talent. Made him decide to go ahead and get the set talents that mostly affect the undead runes.


    Since the increase that [Pure Mana Carving Mastery] was giving was too low for his taste, he went for the much higher increase for runes that were better suited for an undead to wield.


    "Such a bit... I was pretty excited to try the better grade rune too." Shaking his head in disappointment, he closed his status and looked at the ceiling.


    "Right, I am supposed to deliver all the runed items to Honor today..." Clearing his ring of storage, he caster [Mana Arms] to help him gather the items that he was going to send.


    "Convenient as always, after taking a nce on the [Rare] graded rune I should start increasing my skills..."


    Having put everything that he is going to send to Honor in front of him, he pulled out his [Mana Pen] and started to write the following effects of each rune, so that Honor can recognize what item does what.


    "That should be good enough..." As he stood up to go to the stairs, he nced at the mana crystal that he once draw a rune and decided to put it inside his ring too.


    "Let¡äs hope that Honor is capable to sell this useless mana crystal somewhere..."


    Having finished packing up, he walked towards the stairs.

 Chapter 150 - Eyes Everywhere

    "Do we really have to do this again, Kayn?" Marcusined quietly.


    "What choice do we have? Since we epted the gold already, unless we n to leave the church, we got hold of our end of the deal" Kayn said with a bitter tone.


    "But..."


    "No buts Marcus, unless you are confident on winning against that knight Danzel." Anna said with a small grin on her face.


    "Like anyone could win against this guy..." Marcus rolled his eyes at Anna¡äsment.


    `I will probably be cut into pieces before I even throw a punch of my...¡ä


    Closing the door of the church, the three made their way towards Honor¡äs store.


    Having already received the storage from Danzel, they just had to bring it to Honor, but the closer they got to their destination, Kayn in particr had a weird feeling.


    `Something is wrong...¡ä


    Staring to his surroundings, his eyebrows knitted together.


    At first, he thought it was him imaging things, but once they arrived at Honor¡äs store he realized what was wrong.


    `They weren¡ät so many people before...¡ä


    Compared to other times where they were here, although they were around five to six people in the street doing their business, that number had by now increased by three times that amount.


    Usually, he would consider that the store suddenly be popr for some kind of reason.


    But once he realized that many of these people were stealing nces at him and the other two he knew something was wrong.


    "Marcus, Anna, we are being watched, don¡ät react~."


    Hearing that, Anna frowned slightly before her face turned back to of a smiling little girl that she was.


    Marcus inparison turned his face 90 degrees left and looked at Kayn with surprise and an opened mouth.


    If it weren¡ät for Kayn looking like when he was punching him mercilessly in their training, Marcus would even turn his face and make eye contact with those people watching them.


    `I shouldn¡ät have mentioned it in the first ce..." Sighting to himself from Marcus'' behavior, he stared in front of him without showing much emotion.


    One of the people who noticed Marcus behavior a moment ago blocked the door of Honor¡äs store.


    "Hey brats, what the hell are you doing in this shop, huh!? Did your guys by any chance lose you, mama and papa?" A man with an intimidating look said as he moved closer to Kayn, Marcus and Anna.


    "Huh? What di-" Before Marcus had the chance to get angry, he received a swift yet deadly hit from Anna¡äs elbow to his ribs.


    `Gwaagh!¡ä


    "We aren¡ät lost! We are here get grandma healing herbs!" Anna said with a cute voice.


    In contrast to Marcus habit of brute force this way through problems and Kayn''s overwhelming talent inbat, she prided herself on her memory.


    Though she mostly found such a talent of hers uselesspared to the boy''sbat ability, at times such as this she felt grateful for having a great memory.


    The moment Kayn warned them about the man watching them, a flow of information flowed through her mind in hopes to find the reason for it.


    And with a little strain on her mind, she soon realized or rather saw a scenario as to why the man in front of them was questioning them.


    For her, it felt like a thousand-piece puzzle to finallye together, though piecing every single piece together was tiresome, in the end, she was rewarded with an image.


    `That knight and his contract, the merchant who traded with him...¡ä


    At first, when she saw the concept of the contract able to see through lies, she was quite amazed, but the cause of herck of knowledge of magic and the world itself, she subconsciously put the contract as a convenient item made from magic.


    Something that everyone could get his hands on if they wanted.


    That knight used a bunch of those on some brats like them as it was nothing.


    Such a mistake wasmon to everyone.


    Even with her memory, if she were tobel something to be right at first nce to in actuality being false without even trying to question it, she would end up gaslighting herself.


    Turning the lie into the truth.


    Unlike others who would stick to the lie even when given the truth, she was different.


    Picturing that this lie detector contract was extremely rare and precise, she could easily think of it making a big profit with others wanting to monopolize the source.


    `If my suspicion is right, then that guy isn¡ät asking us because he is concerted about us or being purely pissed of. He must be someone who wants to find the source of these contracts...in other words us¡ä Anna thought to internally.


    Since she had to find a reasonable cause to justify that a bunch of brats with rags covering their body enter the store, she remembers how Honor sold a few herbs that improve the condition of some everyday illnesses.


    Thusing up with the idea of buying medicine


    The man hearing that showed a frown on his face before softening back.


    "Oh yeah, the report also mention that he was selling such stuff..." Covering his mouth with one hand, the man mumbled to himself.


    "Can we pass, please~?" Anna said with her cute voice.


    "Hmm? Yeah, whatever. Just be quick with picking does leaves or something!"


    `Idiot¡ä With a bright smile on her face, Anna and the others walked inside the store.


    Honor who was writing something on a piece of paper, raised his head to look at his new customers.


    "So you are here again..." Honor said with a nervous tone.


    Kayn who noticed that noticing his distress was suddenly pulled by his sleeve by Anna.


    "Hey Kayn, go pick some of those herbs from over there and give him the ring together with them."


    Realizing what Anna wanted him to do, he quickly picked up some random herbs and went towards the receptionist''s table.


    "We would like to buy these good sir..." Kayn said as he quickly hid the ring in the herbs and handed some coins.


    Honor who was at first considerably confused was surprised to see what those brats were doing.


    "It seems like you guys learned your lesson that stuff is not for free...but it seems like those herbs were mixed with some bad ones too, give me a second to bring some new ones for you."


    Taking the herbs together with the ring to the other room, Honor shortly came back with some new herbs in where the ring of spatial storage was hidden together with a small piece of paper.


    "Thanks for the herbs..."Hiding the ring into his sleeves, Kayn picked up the herb and left the store with Marcus and Anna.


    The moment they left the store, everyone who was standing around the area looked at them for a moment.


    "Tch, they really went in for some stupid herbs..." The man of before grumbled to himself.


    Distancing themselves with each second, Marcus soon turned to Anna and Kayn with a confused look.


    "Since when did the grandma from the bakery be ill and why doesn¡ät I know of anything of it?" Marcus asked cornered.


    "Idiot."


    "Idiot"


    "Huh? Why are you guys suddenly calling me that..."


    "We will tell you once we reached the chu-" Before Danzel was able to finish, from the corner leading to a dark passageway came a cold voice.


    "Hey you guys"


    "!!!"


    Suprised from the voice, they made a step back and looked in the direction of the passage with wary.


    The man as if blending with the shadows of the dark passageway and only the silhouette could be seen asked with a softer tone.


    "Ah, please. There is nothing to be warry about. I just heard about your guy''s ill grandma and couldn¡ät help but feel concerned."


    Looking at the kids who were staring in his direction ready for a fight a small smile formed in his mouth.


    "I really mean it, seeing you guys with rags on and medicine by itself being expensive. I thought I could pay for your medicine, even if you already got it..."


    "...Why would you want to help us?" Kayn said with a harsh voice.


    Kayn imminently doubted the man''s goodwill without a second thought.


    "Well...consider it a donati- or rather the goodwill of someone who got more wealth than he could spend on. If you don¡ät trust me I can just give you the coins right now, just tell me the side effects that your grandma is having and I will provide you with enough coins to get the best possible medicine by yourselves..."


    Kayn who was about to refuse his offer saw the look in Annas'' eyes that mentioned epting.


    `Right, if that man is like the other one watching us, then for kids like us refusing free money would look just more suspicious.


    "Our grandma recently got some high fever..." Kayn said loud enough for the man to hear.


    "Hmm...fever you say? That¡äs too bad to hear. Here, catch that..."


    Throwing a shining gold coin towards Kayn, the man said.


    "With that, you guys can probably buy whatever you want, be it medicine or whatever you want..."


    Catching the gold coin, Kayn looked at the dark passageway with a frown before him and the other two took another way towards the church.


    Seeing the trio left, the man hiding in the shadows with two dark gauntlets scoffed.


    "Since when do herbs used to help with diarrhea cure fever..."


    Cleaning the blood that stained his dark gauntlets the man disappeared into the shadows.

 Chapter 151 - Familiar Faces

    *Tap, Tap~


    Sitting in the broken statue, Danzel stared silently at the door while tapping his foot to the stages.


    Looking at the four small bottles with a piece of paper inside, he caressed the hilt of Veren.


    "They arete..."


    Knowing how long the distance between of Honor store and the church, he considered that those guys should evene back ten minutes ago.


    That was him counting the fact that they would talk with Honor and their shorter legs.


    If it weren¡ät for the contracts of Honor and the trio being in front of him, he would already consider that something went wrong.


    "It can¡ät be that they found a loophole in the contract..." As Danzel was getting more impatient and worried, the sound of the door opening could be heard.


    Seeing that the nearby kids went running towards Kayn and the other two, Danzel shook his head before jumping off the stage.


    "You guys are way toote." Danzel said as he reached out his hand in front of Kayn.


    Understanding what Danzel meant with his hand, Kayn quickly gave him the ring together with the piece of paper that Honor gave them.


    "What is this?"


    "We don¡ät know, Honor gave it for you to read..."


    Staring at Kayn¡äs face for a second, Danzel turned around without saying a word and went down the trapdoor.


    "Humpf, he didn¡ät even thank us for our work" Marcusined


    "Let him be, you wouldn¡ät want him to anger him." Kayn said with a hint of pity in his tone.


    "Kayn is right, can¡ät you remember how he threw Kayn to the air? And that is Kayn that we are talking about." Anna said as she shook her head overly exaggeratedly.


    "Anyway, we got everyone a piece of that sweet bread from the bakery for everyon-" As Anna revealed the many loaves of bread that she had hidden in her bag, the trapdoor that Danzel went in opened once again.


    Danzel who went out of the trapdoor looked at all the kids gathered together, with soon his gaze falling towards the sweet bread.


    "..."


    "..."


    "..."


    Shaking his head, Danzel opened up the church door and left quietly without even saying anything towards the kids who were frozen.


    `So that¡äs why they camete...¡ä


    *Baang


    "At least they have done their job well..." Danzel said as he cut the message of Honor into tiny pieces.


    "To think that he would write something like this..." He shook his head as he remembered the content of the message.


    `Rue Danzel, I am well aware that we made a deal together with that runed contract. But it seems the situation in the shop has turned for the worse. Although for the moment, it¡äs still doable, the outside of my store lurks people trying to figure out the creator of the contracts. In other words you! I am currently trying to establish a connection with one of the higher-ups of the merchant Union. But until the preparations are done, I would have to ask you to stay low profile. From Honor~¡ä


    "Asking me to hide..."


    It wasn¡ät like Danzel didn¡ät already foresee something like this happening as he found an inevitable thing to happen.


    But even he didn¡ät expect people to seek his funny bone already.


    As the run weapons are going to bring forth another wave of people seeking him, Honor''s reasoning did make sense.


    "I don¡ät like it..." Danzel mumbled to himself as he clenched his hand.


    The current situation that Honor described, although still them being on the clear, he really didn¡ät like the current situation that things were going.


    Not only were people already seeking his traces, but Honor also mentioned revealing their partnership that he knew a little about.


    Though keeping his identity secret was a lost cause, since one noble named Raphael and him were the only ones known to runesmith.


    With that guy being in Begum, figuring who was making the contracts wouldn¡ät even take an idiot to figure out.


    Only his looks were unknown to others.


    And this fact alone was the only good thing ording to this situation.


    `Seeing that Honor¡äs contract hasn¡ät burned out already should mean that I am still on the safe side. But just in case I should follow Honor¡äs advice on keeping a low profile...¡ä


    "Maybe burying myself to the ground just like I have done back then for a few weeks would make the situation calm down." Shaking his head from his own terrible joke, he made his way towards the market to purchase some paper to use on his contracts.


    Walking for a few minutes, he reached the shop that he once bought his contract supplies there.


    "Hello, I would like to buy a stack of..."


    "Right away~" The shopkeeper took the stack of paper and started to wrap it together with some string.


    `That guy sure is slow...¡ä Danzelined internally.


    Bored, he turned his head towards the window to pass some time.


    But once he did he froze entirely, nkly staring at a certain group of people.


    Walking to the street, a group of three-man followed closely by two girls holding a staff in their hand.


    One person, in particr, stood out among this group to Danzel.


    The bright red hair together with a sword to his side.


    `Huhhh!? Why are those guys here!?¡ä


    Hiding behind the shelves, Danzel stared at the group with warry.


    "It must be a confidence, they can¡ät havee to find-" Whispering to himself, Danzel''s ethereal eyesnded on a piece of paper that the group was showing to the people.


    With the help of the recent increase in his agility stat, not only could he see further away but also much sharper to when he was first woken up from the cursedke.


    Reading the words of that paper, Danzel''s eyes red for a moment with killing intent.


    "They are here for me..."


    Three words of the paper got Danzel most of his attention.


    Those were...


    Bounty


    And his name.


    Rue Danzel.


    ****


    At the same time in the main building of Durendal Association main building.


    Sitting in a luxurious office, an elderly man wearing a robe sighted to himself.


    "This bastard Anwir...making trouble to our association when tomorrow the conference is about to begin. Forcing me to oversee such mere paperwork." The elderly who was in fact an Archmage named Nevvan pushed the remaining paper to the said, he looked at a certain luxurious box that he had gotten a certain group of merchants.


    "Now what should I do about this..." Having already received a short exnation of what this item is, he was as surprised as he was annoyed.


    "A contract that burns when it¡äs broken, without any enchantments at that too..."


    As a veteran on the ways of magic, he knew that such an item was impossible to create with the use of magic or at least magic on his level.


    He thought of a variety of ways of how to recreate such an item, but all his solutions weren¡ät viable.


    The item in his eyes worked simr to a ritual that put a curse on someone.


    But if that were the fact then he himself could easily re-create it, even with his little knowledge of curse magic.


    The hard part was that the curse didn¡ät attach to either of the two people who signed, but to the contract itself.


    Using the mana and the blood of the people, the cursed could form an invisible link to the two people, that if severed would activate the cursed and burn the contract.


    That alone made Nevvan impressed with the one who developed such an item.


    "Even if it is a rune, creating such aplex item with nothing to exploit...the guy who created is as terrified as he is a genius."


    Although he couldn¡ät understand why a rune had to have such a letter engraved or how the effect was put on an item as simple as paper.


    By a nce alone he knew how much thought and work had to have gone into making the rune.


    "Such a genius should be capable of even more runes if I were to recruit him into the association..." Grinning to himself, he picked up themunication crystal from the side of the table.


    "Hey, call Merrick to my office."


    Shortly after, Merrick with an anxious face came inside Nevvans office after closing at the door.


    "Master Nevvan, how could I be on your service..."


    Turning the box around, Nevvan mentions with his finger at the box.


    "Tell me anything that we know about this item."


    Merrick who got a nce at the all so simr contract, froze while his eyes shook.


    "This, Master Nevvan is... supplied to the Union by a merchant named Honor, which is also a member of the union. He recently started selling those run contracts. As for who is his supplier, we still haven¡ät...be able to find." Merrick said with his voice growing weaker at the end.


    "Hmm, so we don¡ät know. If I remember right, the runesmith should havee from Berum, what was this name again... Wasn¡ät Rue Danzel?"


    With cold sweating from his back, Merrick nodded at Nevvan, unable to answer that self-evident question.


    If he did, he would break the contract.


    Nevvan who noticed that he didn¡ät get a reply looked at Merrick with a frown.


    `His body temperature started to raise...¡ä


    Nevvan though, as he who specializes in ice magic was easily able to notice such a chance of one''s body.


    "Now that I am thinking about it, wasn¡ät the guy who I asked you to tail also named Danzel? Tell me, how did your investigation go?" Nevvan said with his frown turning for the worse as he noticed Merrick stressed behavior."


    "Master, I...."

 Chapter 152 - Target Found

    "Master, I..." With sweat starting to appear on his forehead, Merrick had a distressed look on his face.


    Merrick knew very well of his current situation.


    Having already learned of that cursed contract¡äs poprity, he knew that this century-old magic caster would do everything he could to get his hand on Danzel when he learn that he can put runes on weapons just like the one he wielded.


    Although he was safe for the moment, the cards that he was dealt with in this situation seemed grim.


    If he were to reveal Danzel to Nevvan right now, he could confidently say that Danzel would run away without a second thought.


    If that were to happen and Danzel managed to vanish, even if he told the truth on Nevvan.


    He wasn''t confident to say that Nevvan wouldn¡ät kill him from his rage alone, as he would be practically the one who notified Danzel to run away.


    Thus,ing into the current dilemma.


    `Should I tell him or not...¡ä Merrick thought over and over again, without founding a solution in hand.


    `I have to make the master Nevvan figure out my situation without him killing me here or breaking the contract...¡ä


    Gulping his saliva down, he nervously said.


    "I found that he is staying around the area where poor life..."


    Looking at Merrick''s eyes, Nevvam frowned.


    "Why are you so vague about it? Tell me the details already."


    "I...got nothing else to report, master Nevvan." Merrick said with his head looking at the floor.


    "You..."


    The room temperature rapidly decreased, making Merrick shaken uncontrobly from fear.


    "So you are telling me that you found nothing about him? Even when that person has supposedly killed an anomaly?"


    "Yes...please forgive me master Nevvan." Merrick went down to his knees with his head still down, not daring to meet the archmages gaze.


    Nevvan simply looked at Merrick with a cold gaze.


    Having been in charge of the whole Nercana for years, he knew the staff that was working for him quite well, that included Merrick.


    A formerly mercenarybatant that became a member of the association 5 years ago.


    Although he was a mere 2nd-tier, Merrick proved himself of his information gathering skills.


    Although his ability limited him to take over the easier and the so not important jobs, till yet he never failed to dissatisfied Nevvan as he did now.


    Nevvan knew that humans were animals that reached the top with the failure of others and that failure could not be avoided.


    But when Nevvan was starting at Merrick, he didn''t see such failure, but something different.


    As failure is the product of an action, Merrick who didn''t state the reason for his failure made Nevvan think that he was lying to him.


    And the fact he was lying to obviously made it all the more suspicious.


    ''Right, he became nervous when I mention that guy Danzel...''


    Closing his eyes, Nevvan thought for a moment before looking at the contract that was bought to him by the union.


    ''Someone of the lowest stage of the 3rd level shouldn''t be possessing a ring of spatial storage, to begin with.''


    ''Unless he is a highly esteemed noble or a great mage with the potential of reaching the archmage level. Getting your hand on one of those would have been done by stealing...''


    Havinge to a sudden realization, he put a small grin on his face.


    "So that''s how it is..."


    Standing up from his seat, Navvan gaveerrick a look before going with this staff towards the door.


    "I will deal with youter, but as for now you are prohibited to leave this building before I say so"


    Closing the door of his office, mana spread to his surroundings.


    "To think that I would go out of my way to find someone" mumbling to himself, he disappeared from the spot, leaving no trace behind of him being there.


    ****


    At the same time, outside the shop where Danzel was.


    "Sigh...no luck this time either" the man with the red hair put the bounty back.


    "Hey Serras, we have been looking for days long, shouldn¡ät we just give up at this point? Our funds also getting rather short." The girl with short blond hair wearing robes and holding a wooden staff said from his side.


    "We can¡ät just give up like this, Naomi. That bastard has to be hiding here just like he did in Bernes. If we were to catch him then the gold that we will receive would be enough for us to get better equipment and live in luxury for a few years." Serras said slightly annoyed.


    "Naomi has a point, Serras." The girl beside Naomi said.


    Compared to Naomi, she had dark violet long hair with a much mature look and a developed body in the chest area.


    "Ugh..not you too, Sumire..."


    Seeking help from his side, he stared with a pleading look at the tall man who had a mace to his back.


    "Bernard, hel-"


    "No, I don¡ät want t to involve in that conversation." Bernard imminently cut Serras''s mind sentence, knowing too well that he will regret it if he helped Serras in the conversation with the girls.


    `Tch, traitor¡ä


    "Hey, Jack! Didn¡ät you tell us that he will be here?" Serras said as he pointed his finger at the short guy with many knives around his clothing.


    "..."


    Jack didn¡ät even spare a nce at Serras and simply stayed frozen.


    `Like I would let you ignore me!¡ä


    Reaching his hand to touch his shoulder, Jack moved to the side and looked at a particr shop that was opposite to them.


    `This feeling...¡ä


    "Look, even Jack doesn¡ät want to agre-"


    "Let¡äs move to that store over there." Jack said, disregarding Naomi speaking.


    "Huh?"


    Seeing him move towards another shop, everyone looked at each other before following along.


    "Hey, Jack! Why would do you suddenly want to go in here? I don¡ät see anything interesting inside there." Naomiined from the side


    Ignoring her, Jack looked around the shop without seeing anyone except the shopkeeper.


    `Was it my imagination?¡ä


    As he was about to turn back and leave, out of the other side of the shelves came to a tall figure wearing a ck cloak around his body.


    At first, he didn¡ät pay that figure any need, but as such as the figure walked past him a feeling of danger together with a simr feeling of being watched came behind him.


    `This guy!¡ä


    Turning hastily, he gripped the upper limp of the cloaked figure''s right arm.


    "Hey, could I ask you somethi-" As Jack turned the man to the side, he broke into cold sweat upon seeing a long de being held from the man''s left arm and pointed at his throat.


    "Let me go..." A cold voice came behind the man''s helmed.


    With wide-open eyes, Jack let the man''s arm go and took a step back.


    "I-I apologize, I seem to have mistaken you for someone else..."


    The man holding the sword stared for a second into Jack¡äs eyes before sheathing the de back to this sheath, he turned back to leave the store.


    As things happen too fast, only Sumire and Bernard noticed the man''s actions.


    "This bastard, pointing a sword at someone else is, give me a second to teach him a lesson-" Bernard said who was shortly stopped by Sumire.


    "Why are you stopping me, Sumire? Didn¡ät you see what this bastard has done to Jack?"


    "Hmm, did we miss something?" Serras and Naomi turned around, looking confused at those two.


    Shaking her head, Sumire turned and looked at Jack cold stare.


    "Hey Jack, was this person by any chance..."


    Nodding his head, Jack said in a solemn tone.


    "Yes, that guy was it. He is our target..."


    "Huh? What do you mean by that Jack? what target?" Serras said in a serious tone.


    "Pointing at the door that the cloaked figure had already left, Jack replied.


    "That guy who just passed us is probably, No. He is definitely the man we are searching for."


    "Wait, you don¡ät mean!" Shocked, Serras stared at Jack.


    "He was Rue Danzel, the man in the bounty."


    Hearing that, Serras put a big grin on his face, his eyes burning with fighting spirit.


    "Why didn¡ät you tell us then! If we wait here any longer he will get away!"


    Seeing that Serras was about to run after Danzel, Jack blocked his path.


    "What are you-"


    "Serras! Calm down. I can understand how you will but running after he would lead only to trouble."


    Looking at the confused Serras, Jack sighed to himself.


    "Though you might not know, that guy already sold an incredible item to the outside. And like us, they are way more people searching for that man. If we were to reveal his identity to them without doubt, those people wille flocking like how birds would do if you drop pieces of bread to the ground."


    "If that were to happen, even if we were to catch him, others will shortly after stealing him from us..."


    Hearing Jack''s exnation,Serras ground his teeth to each other out of frustration.


    "Then what should we do!? We can¡ät let him just go away!"


    "There is only one thing we can do..." Showing a big grin on his face, Jack replied with an amused tone.


    "We just got to tail him until he is isted from others. When that momentes, we will strike. After all, he must have a base somewhere in Nercana."


    Saying that everyone put a serious face before tailing the cloaked figure.


    But among those serious faces, one face, in particr, showed a hint of worry.

 Chapter 153 - Chase Him Or Not?

    "So they recognized me..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Although he was cursing internally, he still found the situation to be under control.


    Thanks to the rune in my helmet, it allowed me to see things as if I haven''t had a helmet at all.


    That alone allowed me to when I turned my head slightly to see the short guy with the many knives tailing him.


    This fact made him feel much more reassured.


    If those guys were to choose toe headstrong at him right here in the city, he dreaded the consequences that would arrive shortly after.


    ording to Serran, the mercenary association rules the whole city.


    If they were to be a fight inside the city he could very well imagine how an army of mercenaries, if not that monster like grandpa.


    Adding that he was basically being chased by people he knew nothing about for his runed contracts.


    Even if he were to kill those bounty hunters aiming for his skull, he would end up being surrounded and be the price of the others.


    That was the worst possible scenario that could ur.


    "At least they got someone smart within their group if they had decided to trail me..."


    It wasn''t difficult for Danzel to guess why they decided to trail him.


    Since they wanted me to get the reward from the bounty, they wouldn''t want to possibly risk me getting on someone else hands.


    This way of thinking is the reason why he was so confident of his situation.


    ''Continue thinking that way, if you guys want me all alone, then I will be grateful to set up that stage of yours...''


    Knowing their purpose, even if vaguely, Danzel will use that information to the fullest.


    ¡äEven if they got the number advantages, as long I got to that ce their defeat will be sealed...¡ä


    Changing his path, he soon arrived at a ce where many carriages were being held with people doing their business.


    Seeing the same carriage where Serran once rented for them for the earth lizard quest, he walked towards the person waiting beside him.


    The person who waszing looking around for customers noticed a shadow that came at him.


    "Hmm?" Looking to the side, a tall figure wearing a cloak stared down at him.


    Though the tall figure looked ominous at first, once he noticed the helmed that was hidden from the hood, he eximed in surprise.


    "Oh, aren¡ät you one of those fellows who recently rented my carriage to hunt an earth lizard?"


    "That¡äs correct..." Danzel said with a deep voice.


    "Oh~ it¡äs indeed you. Could I help you with anything then?"


    Pointed at the carriage and him, Danzel said.


    "I would like you to bring me to the forest."


    "Huh? Do you want me to bring you there? Don¡ät you want to rent the carriage?" The man said with a small frown on his face.


    Seeing that Danzel confirmed his question by a nod, he was about to reject the offer before a heavy bag fell to the side of the carriage.


    "Before you reject me, please take a look at what I offer."


    "What do yo-oof!"


    Taking a look at the bag, the man sucked up his breath and looked at the bag with astonishment.


    `S-So many gold coins...¡ä


    With his breath quicking, he stared at Danzel with greed in his eyes.


    "I just need to bring you to the forest right? If I were to bring you to the forest you will be giving me the bag, right? You aren¡ät lying to me are you now, right?"


    `Disgusting...¡ä Putting his hand on his cloak, Danzel pulled another small bag and pushed it in front of the man''s chest.


    "You just need to bring me there, after you bring me to the forest you might leave, together with those bags..."


    Frozen for his current situation, once he realized what was happening the man put swiftly hidden the bags to his shirt while going in the carriage.


    "We got a deal! I will bring you to the forest no matter the cost dear customer! Just make yourselffortable while I prepare the horses."


    Shaking his head internally, he jumped in the carriage while staring outside.


    Though he looked like he was aimlessly looking at the sky at the way where his helmet was facing, his ethereal eyes were glued on a person specifically.


    `Now what will you do? Will youe after me or let me get away? Whatever your choice, I will be fine with.¡ä


    Although he didn¡ät know much of their abilities, to say the least, Danzel was very well confident to win if it were in the forest.


    But even if they didn¡ät chase him, he will be fine with too.


    Although he found it quite a pity that he didn¡ät pick all his possession from the church, if they really didn¡ät chase him then he would simply run away to some other down or something.


    Where he would go, he didn¡ät care as of now.


    As the situation was going out of his control, his survival was the biggest priority.


    "We will begin moving, dear customer!"


    "Hmm alright..."


    Losing sight of the short man tailing him, he seated to one of the seats of the carriage whileining internally.


    "Carriages are truly slow..."


    With the carriage leaving Nercana, Danzel made his way towards the forest where he once slew the earth lizard.


    ***


    At the same time...


    "Hey Jack, did you really just say that this bastard left Nercana just now!?"


    Nodding his head at Serras question, Jack seated to a barrel.


    "That¡äs indeed the case, I saw it with my own eyes."


    "What!? Then we got to chase after him before he escapes!" Serras said with an angered tone.


    "Calm down, Serras." The magic caster, Sumire said while looking at Jack.


    "Do you know where he is going, Jack?"


    "Mhmm, as far as I heard he is going towards the forest."


    "You ability sure is helpful for stuff like this, Jack. To be able to enchant you hearing sure sounds useful..." Bernard said with an envious look on his face.


    "What¡äs so good about that useless ability, when instead you can turn someone into a crisp with a fireball of my" Naomi said with a prideful tone while raising her staff.


    "Such a simpleton wouldn¡ät understand..." Bernard mumbled to himself just loud enough for Naomi to hear.


    "Huh? Who are you calling a simple-"


    "Are you guys really going to start fighting while our target is running away?" Jack solemnly said to the two of them.


    "Jack is indeed right, we don¡ät have the time to joke around. We need to decide if we are going to chase him or not..." Sumire said from the side.


    "What¡äs to decide? Of course, we will chase him! We already spend days searching for him and if we were to just give up now, then all our efforts would be for nothing!" Serras replied as if he was scoffing at Sumire''s use of words.


    "Serras is right. If Serras and that guy Danzel really had met, with the red hair that Serras has there is no way that he didn¡ät recognize him back at the shop. If we don¡ät grab that opportunity now to catch him, we can kiss the bounty reward goodbye." Bernard said with a frown on his face in which Naomi nodded in agreement.


    "Guys..."


    ncing her staff much harder, Sumire had a troubled face.


    As she wanted to say something, Jack beat her at that.


    "I believe that we should give up on chasing him."


    "Huh?"


    All exined in surprise.


    With a frown appearing on his face, Serras looked at Jack with anger.


    "Why? Weren¡ät you the one most excited had about the bounty? Why did you change your opinion out of the blue?"


    Sighting out loud, Jack looked directly into Serras eyes.


    "Sigh...it¡äs because that the information on the bounty was wrong. While I was the one trailing him, I felt an unconfirmable feeling of being watched. Not only that, the way that guy pulled that sword and put it in front of my neck was way too fast. Rather than him being a 2nd-tier like a bounty says, he felt much more powerful-"


    As Sumire was about to put her agreement on Jack''s statement, he jumped off the barrel.


    "But seeing that the majority is for chasing him though, I won¡ät go against the party''s wishes."


    He nced at Sumire for a second before turning his back towards the road where many men were offering their carriages.


    "Let¡äs quickly rent a carriage. If we go now we will be able to catch up. Even if he is a little stronger that is. We should be able to handle him somehow."


    "Alright! Let¡äs go pick up our ticket to the riches!"


    Running past Jack, the group slowly moved to rent a carriage.


    As Sumire was following along with a troubled face, Jack patted her shoulder.


    "I know how you feel, but we will be counting on you, Sumire" Whispering to her, he quickly moved towards Serras who was talking to a coachman.

 Chapter 154 - Hunter And Hunted

    "Dear customer! We arrived at our destination, would here be a good ce to stop?" The man in the front seat of the carriage yelled.


    "It¡äs alright here, you can stop the carriage." A cold voice came from inside the carriage.


    With the horses no longer pulling, the carriage stopped.


    Jumping out of the carriage, appeared a dark armored figure with two swords to his side.


    "Hmm, the sun still has to set..."


    "Dear customer, is it alright for me to leave? Although you told me that bringing you here is just enough, after all, what you gave me I wouldn¡ät mind waiting for your business to be done..." The man said while scratching the back of his neck.


    ¡äIn no way in hell am I going to sit in that slow think, running would have been hundreds of times faster...¡ä


    "No, you have done your job well, you can leave at any time..." Danzel replied in azy tone.


    "Hehe, If that¡äs what you wish dear customer then I shall apply to your wishes."


    Although the man tried to suppress it, Danzel had long noticed the small grin that was showing on his face.


    Scanning his surroundings, Danzel noticed quite a lot of people wearing the same uniform with saws and axes in their hands.


    "Hey, before you go back, can you tell me what those guys are doing here?"


    Hearing that, for a split second the man frowned in annoyance before turning back into a radiant smile.


    "Oh, those guys are..."


    ording to what the coachman said, those guys were the lumberjacks that came up back to continue their work. Since the recent dangers that were terrorizing this part of the forest, that the anomaly earth lizard was, their work has been for safety reasons been stopped.


    But since Danzel and his party had removed the threat that was the earth lizard, they had finally been able to go back to their job.


    "There is even a rumor that the earth lizard that you guys had killed also exterminated the nearby hostile beast, making the lumberjacks able to go for much better quality trees that are deeper inside the forest. If you guys haven¡ät left in such haste I say that those guys would even throw you banquets for the gratitude they have on you guys."


    "..."


    Motioning the coachman that he can leave, Danzel was standing and cursing from the inside.


    Without him even realizing he did those guys quite the big favor.


    Although they were essentially hired to kill that earth lizard, in the end, they, or rather he, for the most part, not only killed a much stronger version of that earth lizard but also exterminated those beasts that came to have a snack of the fat lizard.


    If he knew that killing those XP bags back then would give them an extra reward then he would have reported it back then.


    Of course, the reward that he would have gotten would be seen as insignificantpared to his current wealth.


    Originally what he had thought was to wait for he pursues toe and have a go in this ce, but now with so many people around him, he had to change his ns.


    "I guess I would need to go deeper to the forest..."


    Staring at the few carriages that wereing and going in the distance, he switches his gaze towards a tree to his side.


    "I guess I have to leave a hint behind."


    Clenching his hand into a fist, he turned to the side and punched the tree.


    *Breaagh!


    Hearing the loud sound of wood breaking, everyone got startled and looked at the dark armored knight who left a fist imprint into the wood itself.


    "What was that noise?"


    "A beast?"


    "Did that guy just punch the tree?"


    "Uwah...look at the tree."


    Ignoring their pointing fingers, Danzel walked much deeper in the forest with heavy steps.


    `Let¡äs hope they aren¡ätpletely fools...¡ä


    ***


    In a short whileter among the many carriages, a group of five people stepped out.


    "Let¡äs hope we didn¡ät miss him..." Serras said as he looked at his surroundings.


    "Don¡ät worry. We already checked the carriage and the coachman that brought him here. So him being here is not the problem. The problem is..." Having her hand on her chin as Sumire was in deep thoughts, she was shortly cut off by Jack who was beside her.


    "That he might actually n to run away. If that were the chase then he recognized Serras in Nercana."


    "Huh, Doesn¡ät that sound extremely bad?" Naomi said, with a worried expression.


    "Don¡ät worry just yet, ording to the coachman, that guy must have arrived where we are." Jack said as he walked towards one of the people working nearby.


    "Hey, Jack. Where are you going? We got find him before-


    Shrugging his shoulders at Serras, he tapped the shoulder of one of the lumbers Jacks.


    After saying some words he shortly came back.


    "Since that guy was here, those people working here must have seen him. The one I asked told me that he went towards that direction." Jack said as he pointed at a damaged tree.


    "Hmm, if that¡äs the case what are we waiting for? Let''s go!"


    Nodding to each other they made their way towards the given direction.


    Jack, who specialize in sneaks attack and has good experience in trailing others imminently notice the footprints in the ground.


    Although the others felt delighted to find those trails, Jack thought the exact opposite.


    ''Something feels off about all this. It''s way too easy for a guy who evaded Berne''s military and even made it this far in another kingdom...''


    That wasn''t the only reason why he felt so. When he asked the lumberjack before, his answer puzzles him.


    ''Hmm? Ah, you mean the dark armored guy of before? Yeah, he was here. You see that tree over there? The guy that you talking about did that with a single hit of his fist! A single hit I am telling you!''


    Ever since then, the question of why the guy they were chasing hit the tree remained in his mind.


    But no matter what came into his mind made no sense to him.


    "Why would he do that... The tree, the footprints..." Jack mumbled to himself.


    A short momentter, the familiar feeling of being gazed upon came back at him.


    Stating at the directions where he felt the gaze, Jack froze.


    "Guys look! He is over there!" Serras said while drawing his sword out and pointing at the dark armored figure.


    "Prepare forbat everyone! Don''t forget, we need him aliv-"


    "Hehehe"


    A deep and yet coldugh echoed around the area.


    "To think that you would truly follow me" the figure said as they throw one of his swords that he had to the side to the ground.


    The dark armored figure pulled out hisremains long sword with runes in it, with ominous mana surrounding the de.


    "How didn''t I realize it sooner..." Jack draw out of his many knives a par on each of his hands while clicking his lips in frustration.


    "Oh, mana! Bless they my allies for me and bestow the gift of the matchless body with strength!" Casting from the side, Sumire who had her stuff raised pointed at the ground towards the other four of her party members


    With five of the same circle appearing on everyone''s foot, a yellow light surrounded their bounty before it got absorbed in their body.


    Naomi who saw that raised her staff too and started casting.


    "It seems I was right...let''s do that just in case."Whispering something to himself, dead mana started and surrounded Danzel''s body.


    With the armor that Danzel wore, a small part of the dead mana was seeping out of his armor simr to trapped smoke.


    "Alright, guys! We do it just like we always-" with life force enchanting his legs, Serras dashed forward with a big grin on his smile.


    -Do!"


    Seeing that, Jack imminently panicked!


    "Wait, Serras! This guy wasn''t running! He was-" before Jack could finish what he could say, a dark green mist shot out Danzel''s palm and engulfed Serra''s body with extreme speed before the most entered Serras body.


    "That magic!?" Sumire who looked by their side had her eyes open wide.


    "Tch, Bernard! Let''s go and support Serras!" Dashing forward, sweat formed in Jacks''s forehead.


    He felt regret as soon as he felt the aura that this guy was generating in front of him.


    It was as if a long forgotten fear of his has reawakened.


    ''This guy wasn''t running away from us! He nned to hunt us from the very start!''


    The fear that as a hunter to suddenly be the hunted instead.


    ***


    At the same time in Honors store.


    An old man wearing robes while holding a staff in his hand stepped inside the store...


    Behind him are several ice sculptures of people.


    Unmoving without a hint of life to be seen on them.

 Chapter 155 - Five Vs One, There Is Only A Way To Do This

    Seeing that nothing happend, he ignored the mist that just entered his body and Serras used his life force to force his legs to move at a much higher speed.


    Like a pushed-together string that gets suddenly released and flies with high speed.


    Serras arrived shortly after in front of Danzel with his sword surrounded by mes created by life force.


    "You finished!" Swinging his sword aiming for Danzel''s shoulder, the grin that he had the whole time stiffed by what happend next.


    With much faster movement, Danzel shed swords with such strength that blew the Serras mes away.


    "Such power..." Serras whisper in disbelieve as his sword was slowly being pushed back.


    "Dammit!"


    Taking his sword back from the sh, Serras was about to try another swing with forcing his limps to move faster.


    But as soon he realized that his opponent was right about swinging he pushed his sword forward, receiving the heavy strike of Veren.


    "Ugh...how could this be...after Sumire enchanted us!" Cursing out loud, he attempted to disengage as soon he realized the difference in strength.


    Danzel of course, wouldn''t let that happen though.


    "Where do you think you are going?" Saying with his deep cold voice, Danzel movement forward into a frontal assault.


    Holding Veren in both hands, he swung from the top of his head and then from his side, shing with Serras sword non-stop.


    *Thiingh!


    *Thiingh!


    *Thiingh!


    With his hands feeling numb from Danzel''s powerful swings, Serras clicked his tongue before swinging horizontally with mes running through his sword.


    This time, Serras managed to push Danzel and his sword to the side, creating a window for him to escape.


    "Huh?"


    Or so it seemed from Serras perspective.


    ''Why does he hold the sword with one hand...''


    "Hmpf, idiot" Scoffing at Serras stupidly, Danzel''s free hand lightens up with dark green light.


    That''s right, Danzel who noticed early the immense life force being gathered in the de, noticed early that Serras was going for a big move.


    And with the behavior, or rather fear that Serras showed him in their fight, he knew that he had only one thing in mind.


    And that was to create some distance with him.


    Pushing his hand forward, the dark green light together with the seeping dead mana was about to grasp Serras skull.


    Seeing the hand about to touch his face right in front of him, his eyes were shaking with only a wording into his mind.


    Death.


    *Fseeee!


    But right before Danzel was about to touch Serras head, he looked to the side and cursed internally.


    ''Almost had him...''


    Reinforcing his gauntlet with his [Armor Mana ting], he moved his free hand towards the wind-cutting sound.


    Seeing three daggers flying towards him, although fast, not fast enough to hit Danzel.


    Punching the first dagger from his side, Danzel punched shortly after the second and then the third one.


    "Mere tricks..."


    "What are you doing Serras! Get out of there!" Jack yelled from the aide as he drew out more daggers.


    With Danzel distracted, Serras jumped back.


    "T-Thanks."


    Seeing that, Danzel was about to chase right after Serras, but Bernard with his made and huge shield came running at him like an iing training, his shield surrounded with mana.


    "This is..."


    Recognizing the skill that the man was using, Danzel pulled out his own shield from the storage ring and guided his mana around his shield.


    ''[Shield Charge]''


    Being pushed forward, the two metal shields met together, creating an echoing sound.


    Although Danzel recognized that the man''s technique of the skill [Shield Charge] was much better, that wasn''t the same with his strength.


    "Ughh..."


    Being pushed back, the man almost fell.


    Being in a crouching position and his shield not covering the top side of his body.


    Danzel raised Veren up high, with dark green mana surrounding the de.


    "One less"


    Swinging down Veren simr to a falling guillotine, Danzel grinned to himself.


    However, before Veren was to reach down on the man''s neck, a sudden appearance of mana came below the ground where Danzel was standing.


    With a small circle appearing for a splitting second, the ground where Danzel was standing rotates to the left.


    Making Danzel who was about to cut the man''s head to swing down to the ground, releasing a dark green wind de cutting the ground.


    *Fsheeeeen!


    "What just happens-"


    Bernard who saw Danzel confused, rotate his body and swung his mace at Danzel''s side with mana around it.


    "Dammit-"


    Being too close to avoid it, the made hit Danzel right towards his stomach area.


    The mana that was being held in the mace was released, creating a small yet strong enough shock wave to break one of Danzel''s ribs and even bent his armor to the inside.


    *Crack


    That though, even if Danzel was pushed for 5 Meters away, he still managed to catch himself from falling.


    Since he felt no pain and his skill together with the engraved absorbed most of the impact, that was an easy feat.


    Of course, from an outsider''s perspective, him standing after such a hit would be surprising.


    "Seriously..." Bernard said in disbelief.


    "You really had done it now-"


    Wanting to take revenge for the blow he received, he was interrupted by a bright,rge ball of me that suddenly appeared from Naomi''s staff.


    "[Fireball]!"


    ''That thing is much bigger than the one that the shaman had used...with this, using [Mana Arms] just like I did with the [Magic Missiles] wouldn''t work. I got to raise a wall.''


    Without hesitation, he started putting his mana to the ground and casting his spell.


    Sumire seeing that frowned her eyebrows before tapping the ground with her staff.


    Finish the spell, Danzel awaited for the wall shortly to rise.


    But before that, the ground that he was standing at moved him a few steps forward in almost an instant.


    "What!?"


    Worse for Danzel, the [Stone Wall] that he cast tied the next moment right behind his back.


    Soon after, a bright light came closer from his side, in a form of a massive ball of fire.


    "DAMMIT!" Cursing out loud, he pushed his shield forward before the fireball came crashing to him and the stone wall behind him.


    *Brooough!


    With the stone wall crumbling, mes with ck smoke surrounded the area of impact.


    Starting at that scene, Serras asked a hesitant asked with a hesitant voice.


    "You know we need him alive...right?"


    "Like you are one to speak when you. Got almost defeat if not killed by that guy." Naomi replied.


    "Do you guys think that he is still alive?"


    As soon as Jack said that, in the middle of ck smoke, a dark green most flew out of the smoke towards Bernard''s direction.


    Being so sudden, the dark green mist entered the surprised Bernards''s body.


    "Isn''t that-"


    "I never had luck with fire it seems..." A cold voice sounded, grabbing everyone''s attention.


    Coming out of the smoke, Danzel with armor that had some of this body part melted and mes dancing around his armor appeared.


    "I am telling you guys now, that-"


    Before he was able to finish, appearing from the if side, camouged with the remaining smoke Jack dashed forward with his dagger trying to stab him.


    "-you aren''t getting here alive."


    *Thiing!


    With the dagger brushing to his chest ting and creating sparks, he swung Danzel towards Jack, aiming to cut him in half.


    "Huff!"


    Bending his body down, he dodge Danzel seeing by hairs breathe and jumped backward while throwing some of his knives at Danzel, who were easily blocked by his shield.


    "That again?"


    Raising his palm at him, dark mist formed in his hand before shooting out in Jack''s direction.


    Raising her staff, Sumire quickly cast a blue barrier around Jack.


    As soon as the moste at Jack, the most were blocked for a short second by the barrier before entering it as if it wasn''t there, to begin with.


    ''So a barrier won''t work either...'' Sumire cursed internally.


    Seeing that Sumire went as far as to cast a barrier on him, Jack yelled out loud.


    "Sumire! What''s this mist!?"


    Before she had the chance to respond, Danzel responded for her.


    "It''s a curse."


    "Huh?"


    Hearing that, the three of them who were hit exined with a confused look.


    "The red hair over there should even have realized it by now what kind of curse it is."


    Danzel said as he pointed at Serras who had a frown on his face.


    "The curse that I cast on you is called [Curse of Decay]. All it does, taking for thename, is to burn your vitality until you guys be a pile of some dead skin and bones."


    Danzel said as he shook his head.


    "Actually, I never nned to face you guys like this. I mean, even if I am superior in one on one fights. I found fighting the five of you with how you work together with a too big of a threat, really."


    ring his mana in his body, he nced at the two magic casters from the back.


    "You guys still haven''t realized it didn''t you? As of why I came so deep in the forest."


    "From the very beginning, although it didn''t go as nned. I face you guys here together for a single and only reason, just so that I can kill you guys here."


    Using [Swift Movements], Danzel dashed towards the opposite way where they were.


    "It was only to curse and kill you guys like the hunting dogs that you are!"


    Seeing Danzel run away, they, especially the trio that for cursed had a sudden realization.


    Like how a sudden timer would appear in your exams or a bomb that is about to explode.


    In Serras, Bernard and Jack''s mind.


    Such an invisible timer that was telling them how long they got to live appeared.


    That just now!


    Started ticking!


    *Tick


    "Bastard!"


    "Bastard!"


    "Bastard!"


    Without a second thought, the three of them chased after Danzel.

 Chapter 156 - Vanishing Hope

    Baffled by their target who fought so fierce a moment ago to turn his back and run away.


    What surprised them more, or rather terrified them was what that man said.


    The fact that the curse was eating up their vitality with each passing second.


    ''This isn''t anymore for the bounty reward!'' Serras cursed inside his head as he, Bernard, and Jack went after Danzel.


    As he already started to feel the effect of the curse, although slightly, he knew that if things kept going like that, him ending up dying and bing a dried-up corpse would be his only future.


    The other two had simr thoughts as him.


    The twody''s who were watching them chasing Danzel also had a surprised look.


    Naomi looked beside Sumire looking for what to do, only to see Sumire shaken face.


    She too didn''t know what to do in this situation, but one thing she was certain of.


    "Guys! Don''t chase after him! If you do-" Sumire yelled but they were too far to hear her.


    ''Those idiots!''


    "Naomi! Let''s quickly go after them! If we hurry it might not be toote."


    "R-Right"


    ***


    "So they decided to chase after me, huh..." Danzel mumbled to himself as he continued running deeper in the forest.


    "Well, of course, they would. It isn''t like I gave them much of a choice..." He snickered under his helmet.


    It was as if telling them to either chase him or die a horrible death of being sucked dry your vitality.


    Although he originally nned to cast all five of them the [Curse of Decay], achieving that was much harder done in reality.


    Not only were the two magic caster a bit far away, but it turned out that they could be much more dangerous.


    ''That woman especially was troublesome with her earth magic...''


    *Fseeeee!


    "Again?"


    Turning his body slightly around, he blocked the flying daggers with his shield before resuming running once again.


    "If only they knew...''


    ''If only they knew that the curse would slowly disappear after a certain distance had been created.''


    Indeed, Ignorance was the privilege of fools.


    Altough the curse wouldst some amount of time if the target had gone out of his range, as long Danzel was at the minimum range then the rune couldst indefinitely.


    Like a timer who gets reset back to the beginning the moment you near.


    "Now...how should I deal with them..."


    Taking peeks at the three chasings him, he put a grin on his face.


    "I even decided-"


    Guiding his mana towards the de of Veren, he halted for a moment and swung his sword towards a tree to his side, releasing meanwhile his [Gale Mana de]


    "-to how I will deal with!"


    Kicking the tree after it was cut, the tree started to fall in the path between him and the ones chasing him.


    "That crazy bastard! He actually cut a tree!" Serras cursed upon seeing that.


    Enchanting their body with various techniques, Jack and Serras managed to pass through before the tree managed to block their path, but that wasn¡ät the case with Bernard who carried a heavy shield and knew little of movement abilities.


    "Seriously!? Guys! Wait for me-"


    Seeing that Danzel once again started to run away, Jack and Serras paid Bernard no need and chased after Danzel.


    "Dammit, Dammit, DAMMIT! Jack! Do something!" Serras yelled as a slight pain appeared all over his body suddenly.


    "Ugh..." Drawing more daggers out, he threw them at Danzel that with the use of mana flew much faster.


    Danzel though either dodged them or right of the bat blocked them without having any difficulties


    `We can¡ät get near! At this rate, we will rot to death!¡ä Jack cursed as he pushed his body to move faster.


    As the two were chasing him, they noticed a big amount of mana traveling to Danzel''s de while halting to a tree.


    "This lunatic! He is nning to cut another tree!?" Both of them cursed as they hasten their steps to the limit.


    Butpared to what they thought, Danzel had other ns.


    "Yeah,e much closer-"


    Changing his stance, he faced the duo, and instead of swinging at the tree-like he did before, he swung towards the direction of the two, releasing a dark green de of wind traveling towards them.


    Seeing that, both Jack and Serras paled as they tried to stop themself from running towards the cutter.


    "This guy!"


    Having no other choice, they jumped above the wind de.


    But as soon as they did that, Danzel who wasn¡ät far away was only a few meters away from them.


    Using both [Swift Movements] and [Shield Charge], he came crushing at Jack with his shield.


    Although he managed to push his hand together, Jack was still thrown to the with his remaining air in his lungsing out of once.


    "Baaagwhh!"


    "Jac-"


    Relentlessly, Danzel moved at Serras while their des shed.


    "So...where have been before?" Danze said in a sinister tone.


    "You-"


    Using seer power, Danzel pushed Serras back and swung once again.


    "Dammit!"


    Without even being able to rest, Serras continuously received the heavy swings from Danzel without even being able to counterattack.


    And even when he did, the shield was shortly there to mock his attempt.


    "Dammit! Jack! Help me out!" Serras yelled as the fatigue started to take effect from receiving such heavy strikes.


    Jack who was groaning to the ground while touching his chest from pain, gridded his teeth and pulled three daggers with one hand, and infused them with mana.


    Throwing them with everything he got, they traveled aiming for Danzels back.


    `Now what will you do bastard! If you turn around to block them Serras must have an opportunity to finish a monster like you!¡ä Jack though,pletely forgetting about the bounty in the first ce.


    Serras didn¡ät miss the chance, he used his mana to create mes that boosted his sword forward and managed to push Danzel''s de for a second away while taking the stance to push his sword into Danzel''s heart, no longer caring for any defense.


    He knew that if he missed the chance, both of them would die a fool''s death.


    With death creeping above their head like a timer, pushing their bodies to the limit to face an overwhelming opponent when the situation looked for the worse they still managed to find a chance among this despairing situation.


    Among the darkness before them, a small little spark of light cracked through that darkness, managing to spark a small me of hope in their eyes.


    That would have been the case if it wasn¡ät for a miss calction on their part.


    Turning the light of hope into a mere illusion.


    *Fseeeeen!


    All three daggers that cut through the wind pierced Danzels back sessfully.


    Without halting his movements, Serras that abounded all defense was shortly pierced by Danzel Veren through the heart, making the part that was pierced decay rapidly.


    "H-How?" Dropping his sword, Serras stared at the de that pierced his chest in disbelieve as strength quickly faded from his body.


    "You have no need to know" Danzel said as he pulled Veren out of Serras chest.


    "I-Impossible..." Taking hisst few steps back, Serras fell to the ground with no spark of hope or life remaining in his eyes.


    Without paying any need for him, Danzel made his way slowly towards Jack who was crawling away with sweat showing on his forehead.


    "Even if you run, the curse will slowly kill you," Danzel said as he kicked Jack to the stomach and pierced his thigh with Veren.


    "Gaaawgh!"


    Crying with pain, Jack starred at Danzel his three daggers at his back with disbelieve.


    "Both your lungs and heart should already be pierced! How!? How can you still move!?" Jack said with a hoarse voice.


    Looking at the man solemnly, Danzel raised his foot and in a quick movement crushed the man''s skull.


    Activating the runes of Veren, Jacks''s blood was sucked in and repaired Veren from the damage it received from his fight with Serras.


    After he was done with it, he turned around only to see a shaken man looking at him and two corpses in fear.


    "You sure took your sweet timeing here." Danzel said as he run towards Bernard, who in turn began to run away from the way he came from.


    "Where are you going-"


    Closing the distance in a mere few seconds, he swung Veren with one hand.


    "Ugh!"


    Turning around in thest second, He barely blocked the heavy de with his huge shield.


    Seeing his posture is all over the ce, Danzel sends out a kick to his legs, making Bernard to fall the ground.


    "-when your friends are waiting for you to join them?"


    Swing his mace in Danzel''s leg in hopes to cripple him, Danzel swung Veren at the hand holding the mace and cutting it off.


    "Aggghghgh!"


    "So noise..."


    Pushing the de in the man''s throat, a new notification of XP came, which he ignored like the other ones.


    "Now only the two magic casters remained..."


    Removing his de, he stared in front of him, only to be stunned for a second.


    Seeing the two magic casters who stared at the corpse with disgust and teary eyes, Danzel was surprised to see them not running away.


    "So you two decided to help those three guys from dying huh?"


    Directing Veren at them, he said with a cold tone.


    "Too bad, you guys are toote."

 Chapter 157 - Vanishing Hope (2)

    Staring at the dark knight in front of her, Naomi''s eyes flickered.


    "I-It can¡ät be, Sumire, tell me! Tell me that I am the only one seeing that.


    She yelled as she pointed her staff towards the corpse that had his skull crushed, one that had his hand and neck sliced up, andstly at a corpse that had his chest withered up.


    "Tell me that those aren¡ät Jack, Bernard, and Serras!"


    "...Naomi, focus. Now it isn¡ät the time to-"


    "Focus!? You telling me to focus when I am seeing this!?"


    Biting her lips with her eyebrows bending down, Sumire stared in front of the dark knight with mana ring in her eyes.


    "Keep it together Naomi! We first got to deal with the one that did this."


    Staring at them solemnly, Danzel tilted his head to the side.


    "By any chance, did you guys really not think that such a situation could ur?"


    "Shut up!"


    Without paying a need of the blonde-haired girl, Danzel continued.


    "Although you guysing to help those guys from a fate that has already been decided could be considered brave, in my eyes you guys are fools. Idiots who were blinded by greed."


    "What-!"


    "You guys witnessed my power and what I was capable of and yet you two still decided toe after me."


    "I admit that facing the five of you together would probably lead me to my defeat. But the moment your front line and backline have separated, the result should have been obvious by now, right?" Danzel said as the mana that he guided while talking surrounded his body.


    Dashing forward, he released his killing intent.


    Seeing that he wasing at, the two raised their staff and were about to cast their magic.


    ''First the weaker one...'' Raising his palm, mana traveled through the ground towards Naomi''s location.


    Sumire who sensed the man widens her eyes.


    ''This guy..!''


    mming her staff to the ground, she moved the ground between her and Naomi''s to the opposite side.


    "Sumire! What are you-"


    Suddenly, a wall made of stone raised up sideways in the exact location where Naomi stood.


    Seeing that Naomi halted what she was about to say and imagined what would have happend if she was in her previous location.


    ''This bastard, how does hee up with stuff like that!? Using a defense spell like that!''


    "He is too dangerous..." Sumire said, but when she saw in the direction he has a heading and the wall separating her and Naomi, her eyes widen even more in shock.


    ''His aim from the beginning was Naomi!''


    "Naomi! He this targeting you!"


    Guiding her mana towards the ground, she pointed her staff at Danzel.


    Danzel who was waiting for the moment where a slight shift of the ground happens used his skill [Leap] and jumped forwards.


    As soon as his feet left the ground, the ground itself was pulled back and the shift only stopped at the 20 meters range.


    Of course, that didn''t affect Danzel at all as he was in mid-air.


    "I have already seen this trick!"


    nting his feet to the ground once again, one charged at the magic caster who started to gather mes around her staff.


    "Tch, that damned wall!" Sumire cursed as the stone wall was blocking her sight.


    ''I got to help Naomi!'' She thought as she sprinted in the back end of the wall.


    Meanwhile, on the other side of the wall, Danzel stared at the fireball that turned almost as big as the other one he received.


    ''I am too far...''


    As he thought of how to interrupt her from casting, an idea came into his mind.


    Casting internally the spell while running, two ethereal blue arms made of mana appeared in front of the magic caster.


    Observing how she was holding her staff, Danzel internallymanded the two arms to push at each end of the staff.


    Naomi who had her entire focus on casting as fast as she could felt a sudden pull from her staff.


    With her hand twisting around while the two arms were pulling, she let her staff fall to the ground.


    "No-!"


    Seeing her spell going out of control without the support of her staff, in desperation she pushed her two hands near the ball of mes and continued casting.


    "Mhmmmh!"


    With burn marks appearing in her delicate skin, she pushed through the pain as she knew that if stopped her spell she would be as good as dead.


    ''Although a bit dyed, It''s finished!'' Naomi celebrate internally as she saw Danzel still being 8 meters far away.


    "Burn into crisp, you bastard!" Pushing her fireball forward ready to release it upon Danzel, her ears picked a wind-cutting sound that she was too familiar with.


    *Fseeeeeen!


    ''This sound-''


    The next moment, the fireball that she had in front of her appeared in her eye to be expanding towards her face.


    Without being able to make a sense of that sudden change, out of the mes, a dagger appeared flying directly towards her face.


    *Crack!


    "Why do you have...Jacks... Dagger...?"


    With a dagger prating her face, she fell to the ground before releasing her fireball above Danzel''s head and managing to hit the corner of the stone wall.


    Seeing her now dead lying to the ground, Danzel wanted to pet himself to the shoulder for managing to actually hit her.


    ''Good thing that I didn''t throw those daggers from my back before.''


    Honestly, when he saw her putting her arms on the mes he got shbacks at his fight versus the goblin shaman.


    Though he has gotten much stronger and tougher than before, if he were toface that fireball once against at his range made, even he wouldn''te unscathed.


    Or in his case intact.


    Coming around the corner of the stone wall, Sumire stared in shock at him and the now-dead Naomi.


    "You!"


    With anger boiling inside of her, she started casting with only one intent.


    And that was to kill him.


    Like an rm warning him inside his head, Danzel moved to the side, avoiding a spike that would have impaled him.


    "Too slow..." Without letting that stop him, he rushed forwards aiming for the kill.


    "Die!"


    With multiple earth piles floating around her, they soon turned in a form of a needle and we''re short forwards at Danzel.


    Activation his skill [Vanguards Defense], he blocked the flying needles with only one scratching his helmet before he arrived in front of Sumire.


    ''Got you!''


    Swinging Veren sideways,the de was about to cut through Sumire''s body.


    But unexpectedly, Sumire bent her body back and fell to the ground, managing to avoid Danzel''s swing with only a small cut to be made in her cor bone.


    Breathing heavily, she invited her mana to the ground and shifted her and Danzel to the opposite sides.


    "Huff, Huff, you monster..."


    Danzel, instead of reacting to the fact that he targeted him moved away, he stared intensely at the magic caster in front of him.


    ''Did she dodge my swing by intentionally or was it luck...?''


    Although Danzel hasn''t met many magic casters before. The few that he did had amon thing.


    They were physically weak.


    Although they were special cases like that arsonist Rapha who used both sword and magic.


    The magic caster currently in front of him was clearly only using magic.


    ''No, it wasn''t by luck. Since she began her spell mind fall, she must have nned this.''


    Growing more warry of her,he raised his pal and castes the curse of decay upon her.


    But as he was about to finish his cast, he stepped to the side to side the spike, while interrupting his cast.


    "You despicable guy, are you thinking of running away after you cursed me!"


    Staying silent for the moment, open his status and looked at his remaining mana.


    ''Only a bit more of 400 mana left...''


    Although it was quite enough, Danzel didn''t decide to risk it.


    With her spells being able to create distance between him while attacking him at the same time.


    He became worried that a statement would ur, in which he in the end would be out of mana while she was not.


    Though cursing her and just standing far away would guarantee her death.


    If she used her time to run back and warn the people working in the forest about him.


    Although he could probably kill most of the ''made witness''.


    He still had to calcte people with carriage and other mercenaries or soldiers nearby.


    ''If I let her go warn the others I can already say goodbye to Nercana and I will be forced to move somewhere else.''


    ''But if I were to kill her here I can continue staying in Nercana have the resupply from Honor.''


    Though he came here determined to already leave Nercana.


    Since none of the bounty hunters except for that mag caster in front of him are now dead.


    The hope of still staying in Nercana was there.


    Although his safety was the biggest priority, he didn''t want to needlessly was his time building a new ce to stay and figure out a supply for his runesmithing.


    ''If I haven''t killed her after the use of 300 mana then I will just curse her and get out of here.


    Stepping forward, he made his choice.

 Chapter 158 - Vanishing Hope (3)

    Taking his first step forward, pounds of earth floated from the ground into the air, shaping into thin yet long needles.


    Upon witnessing that, Danzel dashed forward only to the halting cause of the iing barrage of earth needles.


    "That again?" Holding his shield forward, he cast [Vanguards Defence] and quickly blocked the earth needles in front of him.


    But that was it.


    Without Danzel realizing it.


    From behind his left side, a needle of earth started to form from the earth and flew towards Danzel!


    As the needle was aiming for the side of his stomach, his skill [Greater Sense Danger] didn''t activate to notify Danzel.


    *Tweeegh


    "Huh?" Blocking thest needle, he looked down to his armor, only to see a needle prating him.


    Turning his head towards the magic casters, his eyes red up with dark green light even more.


    Raising his hand, the dead mana whirled around his hand and shot out in the form of a dark green mist.


    Knowing that blocking the mist was impossible, Sumire focused her attention on her spell.


    Entering her body, Danzel looked at the distance he had to cross.


    He was 19 meters away from her.


    Though it could be seen as a short distance, Sumire wasn''t going to stand there and let Danzele any closer.


    Raising her staff a small wall, or rather a wave of 3 meters high and 5 wide with multiple spikes formed from the ground and came rushing towards Danzel.


    Although the wall looked rather intimidating, Danzel didn''t falter.


    He knew that if he moved to the side, precision time will be lost.


    With mana engulfing Veren, he raised his sword like a wave and swung done like one!


    *Fsheeeeen!


    A dark green wind cut through the ground and air.


    When the spiked wave came into contact with the air de, it cut the wall in half and continued flying towards the magic caster, while making the wall crumble.


    As the de was too far from her, Sumire stepped a few steps to the side, letting the air de pass beside her.


    14 meter.


    Holding her staff from the side where the wind de passed, the dirt the was thrown from the dark green wind de came to a halt and became a needle almost instantly.


    Swinging her staff forward, the needles flew loose at Danzel.


    dauntless, without showing a hint of fear, Danzel moved his shield forward, while crouching his back a bit.


    Making his shield protect most of his upper body without losing much momentum.


    But that came at the cost of some needles piercing his armor and one leg armor part.


    Of course, that alone wasn''t enough for Danzel to stop him from moving forward.


    10 meter.


    Surprised by the ineffectiveness of her needles, Sumire tapped her staff to the ground, sending her mana to the ground


    Danzel who was marching forward suddenly felt the ground change.


    But unlike how he felt the ground shifting and moving, the feeling was different.


    Like a puddle of mud, the ground soften, making the foot of Danzel go into the soft ground that hardened the next second.


    Since only one of his legs where trapped though, Danzel didn''t trip himself.


    The moment he was about to pull out his leg though, his skill [Greater Sense Danger] warned that danger ising from the ground.


    Not a secondter, the same spike that interrupted his spell a few moments ago rise once again, this time aiming for his heart.


    Unfortunately for Sumire, the spike simr to needles.


    Although hardened, earth in the end was still earth.


    Swinging his shield at the rising earth spike, before it was even able to pierce Danzel it was crushed into pieces.


    "So annoying..." Pulling his foot out of the earth, Danzel cursed internally as to how he couldn''t take his sight off her without getting prated.


    He much preferred facing someone with the sword than one of magic.


    Since the former only was more straightforward than a magic caster spells.


    That was one of the reasons why he hasn''t used [Sin of Wrath] already.


    If he were to be blinded by rage, he could miss some small changes like the ground changing.


    That, and he found that he didn''t need to use it.


    8 meter.


    Seeing him too close for her ownfort, Sumire started casting her spell.


    ''I need to create distance''


    Guiding her mana to the ground, she started shifting the ground she was standing at back another 20 meters.


    What she didn''t know though was that Danzel was waiting for this exact moment!


    Guiding his own mana to the ground, he cast [Stone Wall] 5 meters away from the magic caster.


    With the ground pushing her backward, Sumire noticed the foreign mana into the ground, making her look in shock.


    "Oh no!"


    Bring toote to cancel her earth-moving spell, she was dragged back, directly to the wall that was starting to rise!


    ''I will crash!''


    Realizing the situation that she was in, she quickly started to cast her spell in haste.


    Finishing her spell on time, a barrier formed around her right before she met the wall.


    "Kyaaagh!"


    Although the barrier saved her from receiving the impact, she barely managed to catch herself from falling from the ground pushing her legs to the wall.


    And when the moment when she looked up, her eyes froze.


    The dark knight, Danzel was on the 5-meter range and right about to end the 4 meters.


    Biting her lips hard enough to bleed, she directed her staff towards Danzel.


    ''I will have to use my trump card...''


    4 meter.


    Raising Veren a bit higher, Danzel prepared to sh her head off.


    Yet, before he could he noticed a change.


    In the staff that she was pointing at him, the blue mana crystal in her staff showed some sparks.


    And in the next moment, before he knew it, a burst of light illuminated the whole area for an instant.


    *Tschhhhh!


    "Huh?"


    Looking down on his body, his armor front and back was orange-red from the heat.


    "To think that I will have to use the enchantment in my crystal..." Sumire bubbles to herself as she lower her staff after seeing the dark knight slowly to the ground.


    ''It''s over...'' Sighting from relief, all the umted stress and fatigue hit her body at once.


    *Pfuuu


    But her relief didn''t for long as he saw the man in front of her still standing and releasing mana around his body.


    "3 Meter~"


    With killing intent ring outside, he swung his dead mana-infested de at her head.


    "How!?" Forcing every nerve of her body to do anything to get out of the path of the de, she barely manages to save her dear life for the cost of her eye being shed and corpses with dead mana.


    "Ahhhhhh!" Screaming in pain, she wasn''t willing for things to end like this.


    Touching the ground, she despairingly guided her mana to shift the ground underneath the dreadfull knight further away.


    Unfortunately for her though, Danzel was determined to end things now.


    Gripping her hand tightly, the ground moved him back.


    But unlike he who had a good footing on the ground, Sumire was mercilessly dragged to the ground 20 meters distance in total.


    "Agghhh!"


    With the spell halting, Danzel swung her to the side and threw her at a nearby tree.


    Right before Sumire was sent flying, she swung her staff at Danzel''s head in hopes to make in the unconscious.


    But the only thing she managed to do was remove the helmet of Danzel''s head.


    Showing his skeleton face with two managing ethereal eyes that looked like two dark green mes.


    Sumire, of course, didn''t take notice of that as her one hand was dislocated for being thrown away and multiple wounds were in her body, including the wound in her eye.


    Seeing her state, Danzel knew she couldn''t fight anymore.


    Walking slowly to her, he put her staff in his storage ring, before looking down on her.


    The moment Sumire shifted her remaining eye at Danzel, she felt fear like never before in her life.


    But with fear came also a downing realization.


    "So that''s why they didn''t work..."


    "Naomi''s fireball...Jack''s daggers..even the needles and the lighting..."


    "You were a cursed undead from the very start! Hahaha...it can''t be..."


    "Ending up chasing an undead, a Wight at that..."


    "Hooh, you know what I am huh?" Danzel said, slightly surprised.


    "Haha...this got to be a dream-" Seeing the undead with his ominous two eyes raising his long sword above her head, she put on a smile that was covered in tears.


    "-Right?"


    With a quick swing, her head fell to the ground.


    Shaking his head, Danzel turned around to pick his helmet up.


    "Sigh...my armor is a mess."


    Seeing how the lighting distorted the armor and heavily damaged it, Danzel sighed in regret.


    Looking around his possession that he was carrying, he noticed some other stuff missing


    "Dammit, they broke the contract bottles...was it the fireball? Or that lighting? It seems like I got to make some new contracts for Honor and that guy Merrick then." Danzel said as he raised his helmet to put it back on.


    But before he could do it, he heard a low voice echoing in the area.


    "I am sorry, but that wouldn''t be possible."

 Chapter 159 - Death

    Without being able to respond, the helmet that was in Danzel''s hands was pierced from something so fast that Danzel couldn''t take a good look at it.


    "Baaahm!


    "Huh?"


    Turning his head around, what he saw stunned him.


    ''Ice?''


    The ice that he was speaking of had created arge while in a tree.


    The ice after seemed to have stopped inside a tree which looked like cloth that was ripped with a dull knife.


    If it weren''t for the fact of the small bits of metal lying near the ice spear, Danzel would have questioned it if that thing took his helmet away from him.


    But to Danzel, his helmet wasn''t important now.


    Rather, the one who cast it was the real threat.


    ''It can''t be...'' Danzel thought, hoping that the person behind him wasn''t the one he was thinking of.


    Unfortunately for Danzel,that was indeed the case.


    "Why..." Taking a step back, Danzel looked shocked.


    ''Why is he here!?''


    "It seems that we meet again, wasn''t thest time when you did the test of you rang?"


    An elderly man with a long white beard wearing a robe and a staff in his hand appeared out of seemingly nowhere not far from Danzel.


    Usually, when people faced an undead being head one, various negative emotions would surface in their face.


    Be it fear, dread, distress or disgust alone.


    There would be always such a feeling there.


    That was usually the case.


    The elderly Archmage instead, looked at Danzel and shook his head in disappointment.


    Like how a child opens eagerly arge presence at Christmas, only toter find out that the present was some clothes that didn''t even fit him.


    "Right, Lerum Danzel?" With his face hiding him of disappointment, his eyes darted to the sword that Danzel was now holding.


    "Or would you rather be called, Rue Danzel, the runesmith from Berum?"


    "..."


    Danzel in response stayed still, his mind working at his limit to find the reason why this man was in front of him.


    In conclusion, only two names appeared in his head.


    "Merrick and Honor..." Danzel mumbled as he cursed internally.


    ''Did they find a loophole in the contract?''


    ''No, that shouldn''t be the case. If they ever had mentioned or wanted reveal who and where he is, the contract would have imminently litten up''


    ''But that doesn''t make sense, the bottles that we''re keeping the contract not long that 10 minutes ago by that fireball of that one magic caster. I didn''t even reveal my location to either of those two.''


    Danzel heavily doubted that this old man was capable of finding him in a matter of 10 minutes in an unknown location.


    Truth was, he was both right and wrong.


    Finding someone in a mature of 10 minutes while being in the forest was indeed impossible.


    Where he was wrong though was that there was indeed a loophole in the contract.


    Or rather two loopholes.


    "Mhmm, if you thinking how I found you then you guessed right. It''s indeed with the help of my subordinate and that merchant. Who thetter is dead."


    "Thus, as I said. Making a contract with him would be impossible." The Archmage, Nevvan said with a calm tone.


    Hearing that, Danzel realized something.


    The deceased can''t break or fulfill the contract.


    But Danzel was still confused, as something wasn''t adding up.


    The information.


    "But then ho-"


    "How did I know where you are? Naive, you are truly naive. Did you really make those runes for the contract by yourself?"


    Nevvan wrinkles got even worse as he frowned in doubt.


    Walking slowly towards Danzel, he answered.


    "I made a contract, with the merchant I mean..."


    Like gears fitting each other, Danzel opened his mouth wide open.


    As he realized what he did.


    The second loophole in the contract was the loophole itself!


    The contract or rather the [Rune of Uzal] wasn''t omnipotent.


    In the case of the contract that Danzel made for Honor, he did make sure to put on the details.


    Some being that writing, hinting, saying anything about him and his location would make the contract break.


    Making the one signing the contract impossible to reveal anything in any kind of form.


    However, if something existed that was able to indirectly reveal the lies of someone without making him break the contract.


    Then the contract wouldn''t activate.


    Realizing what must have happend, Danzel was filled with regret.


    "Dammit..."


    ''I should even write that making another contract would activate the runes!''


    "Mhm, it seems like you acknowledged your mistake."


    Nodding his head, Nevvan looked at Danzel while touching his white beard with a though full expression.


    "Now, although I originally came here to recruit you, sadly, that doesn''t look possible anymore."


    With the temperature rapidly decreasing, a surge of mana came out of the magic caster body.


    "!!!!"


    "Now, before I destroy that insult of magic that your body is, let me ask-"


    Without letting him finish, Danzel own mana surged through his body.


    Turning around, he kicked the ground and run as fast as he could away from the magic caster.


    ''If I don''t escape I..!'' Danzel thought.


    The moment he saw the sole mana amount that this magic caster released, he knew that he had no chance of winning.


    "Mhmm, to think you were as stupid as to put such a useless struggle."


    Raising his staff a bit, the ground around him turned in an instant into ice and traveled with immense speed towards Danzel.


    With his [Great Sense Danger] activating, he felt immense dangering towards his legs.


    Before he knew it, the ice that was traveling started to raise into a thin ice de.


    Danzel attempted to jump, but sadly he was only fast enough to raise this one leg high.


    His other leg was cut in an extremely fine cut, to the point it was scary.


    But that didn''t let Danzel hinder him.


    Bringing out the staff that the previous magic caster had, he used it to support himself while he hopped awkwardly further away.


    But it was useless.


    The magic caster who was 30 meters away appeared 5 meters behind him in an instant.


    "Rather despaired aren''t you?"


    This time,pared to a second ago, the danger wasn''t felt to his remaining leg, but his chest.


    Knowing full well that lodging was useless, he turned around while engulfing Veren with mana.


    What he saw next was an ice spear like the one before flying at him.


    Swing Veren at the iing ice spear.


    The next moment he knee, his whole body was catapulted towards a tree.


    "Seriously..."


    Pinned down with a massive ice spear in a tree. Danzel grid his teeth in anger as he looked at this own body.


    The side of his five waspletely destroyed, but what made him suffer the most was upon witnessing Veren''s state.


    "Dammit..!" Cursing out loud, he got out of the ice spear that was pinning him in the tree and fell to the ground right in front of Veren cause of theck of a leg.


    "T-The rune is destroyed..."


    The longsword that Veren was, that he was using ever since he defeated one of his kind.


    Was now, broken in half with only the hilt with a small part of the de still intact.


    Though it pained him to see Veren now ruined, that''didn''t make him forget of the situation he was in.


    "I need to get away..."


    As he stands up while supporting himself by the tree.


    The archmage was right behind me.


    "Give up"


    Swinging his staff at Danzel''s side, hitting like a hammer, Danzel was sent rolling to the ground.


    "You neither run nor win against me. Give up" the archmage said as he looked down on Danzel.


    "Now, before I kill you. Answer me. Are you a part of the council?"


    "..."


    Hearing a foreign name, Danzel stayed still for a moment.


    But before he could answer,the archmage added in.


    "Well, it doesn''t matter really. Although killing a runesmith is a shame, but the fact that you are undead makes you too dangerous."


    "Hahaha..."


    ''How stupid was I..."


    "What''s so funny?"


    "You wanted to know if I am from the council, right?" Danzel said.


    ''For something like this to awaken bits of hope in me...''


    Gripping a pile of earth with his hand, he turned around and throws it at the magic caster''s face before turning around aiming for his throat with what remained left from Veren.


    "Naive..."


    The earth that he had thrown was blocked by a transparent barrier of shorts.


    Looking at the undead charging at him, he lightly tapped his staff to the ground.


    The next moment, a cold wind came out, turning Danzel into a block of ice.


    "A third-rated undead daring to face the likes of me..." Saying so with disgust.


    The magic was about to raise his staff until he notice something weird.


    *Crack


    "Hmmm?" Sharing the sound, Nevvan looked ahead only seeing a small crack appearing in the ice.


    But what happend next surprised him even more.


    "Such bloodthirst..."


    His ice that was supposed to stop all movement and made it all the more difficult to move mana had now a slight glow of dark green mana together with killing going towards the magic caster.


    Though the cracks were small, they were free in size by each second.


    The most confusing part that it was for Nevvan was that the dark green mana was looking like an image of the wight ovepping with his body and only going out for a moment.


    "Let''s finish it..."


    Tapping his staff to the ice block,rge cracks start to form in the ice,breaking the ice as the body of the undead.


    Once that happend, a wave of killing intent came upon Nevvan that was made him surprised.


    As the cracks reached the climax, an echoing voice full of hatred was released.


    "I WILL NEVER FORGET! YOU! MAGIC CASTER!"


    The ice was below away, destroying the Wights body, with his dark green self-image vanishing at the same time.


    Only a small ring with a small part of Verens de remained.


    "Hateful as ever, that is that filthy undead."


    Bending to his knees, he collected the ring and looked back at where the undead died before shaking his head from the undead''sst words.


    In the next moment, he disappeared from the scene.


    Failing to see the dead mana that still remained in some small pieces.

 Chapter 160 - Continues Misfortune

    In an unknown ce at an unknown time.


    A world that had his light robed away, only pitch-ck darkness was to see.


    At least that was the case of a certain someone.


    Like matching lighting up the room, an ominous dark green light appeared out of nowhere, having the form of a skeleton at that too.


    Once his empty eyes sockets red up, the skeleton figure started to move.


    "Huh?"


    As if he just regained back his senses, Danzel looked confused at his surroundings.


    "Where is it-"


    Asking himself where he was, he found the darkness around sort of...familiar.


    Though he didn''t know why he remembered a certain memory.


    "That''s right! I have been here before! Before I awaken from the cursedke I was here!"


    Danzel eximed.


    Although he remember though, he couldn''t remember as to why he was here before and for how long.


    Wherever he tried to remember nothing came in his mind as if it was nk.


    A single thing he remembered though.


    That before he awaken from theke, he was for a long time inhabiting this ce.


    How long it was he didn''t know.


    He only knew it was for a long time.


    "That damned magic caster! Is it because of him that I am here!?" Danzel said in anger.


    As he looked around him to see what to do now, he suddenly felt something touching his leg.


    "Huh?"


    Looking at his leg, Danzel saw the same darkness as before.


    ''Something is there...''


    Feeling another touch much higher to his leg, Danzel was finally able to make a silhouette.


    The silhouettes arms looked like they were thrown in a ck substance that looked like pitch-ck water.


    Though in the darkness around him for him to see something extremely weird, he indeed saw it.


    Before he could make a sense of what this thing was, another set of arms started to touch his body, with the ck water slowly wrapping around him.


    "What!?"


    Feeling the immediate danger, Danzel punched the silhouette to his face.


    Suprincly, the figure let of his body as his whole head was blown away.


    Before he could celebrate, dozen of new figures surrounded him and reaches out of his body.


    "Those things! They want to turn me into what they are!"


    Unwilling to be bound by them, Danzel shook the nearby dark sellouts and resisted their touch.


    But the next moment, he was grasped from his jaw by a simr silhouette that was only much stronger than the other.


    "D-Dammit! Don''t you dare think that I will allow myself to be defeated like this!"


    So Danzel said, but any attempt he made to free himself of that silhouette was fruitless.


    As the other weaker sellouts started to flock at him and cover his body with some dark fluid.


    Danzel felt multiple emotions.


    The hatred of the magic caster.


    The fear of the unknown.


    But among all these emotions one surfaces in Danzel the most.


    That was, the unwillingness to give up on his life.


    The more he was covered with the ck fluid, the more his senses were fading away.


    And once he started to feel his own will to be affected.


    Danzel, his own will refused.


    "My will, shall not be bound, EVER!!!"


    As the ck fluid was about to cover his head, atst, Danzel voices echoed through the seeming infinity space.


    Before the next moment for his body to disappear from that pitch-ck ce.


    ****


    10 secondster, in the forest.


    Where crows were chewing the flesh of five adventures, not far away from where pieces of bones were lying to the ground.


    Something astonishment yet sinister was taking ce.


    The bones in the ground started to slowly flow in the air while releasing dead mana.


    And like a whirlwind, the bones with the mana turned into a storm.


    The greenery around this asion started to wither and lose the little vitality that it had.


    Soon the dead mana started creatingrge bones at surprising speed.


    If someone were to search this scene from the sides, they would have thought that an ancient evil or a devil was being summoned to the material world.


    But that wasn''t correct.


    Creating thest set of bones, a two-meter tall skeleton made his appearance, an undead who hated the living.


    Taking his steps down, the undead at first stayed unmoving as it was hollow of a will.


    But that soon changed as a dark green silhouette merged with the undead body.


    With the undead sockets ring up, the crows who had their meal flew away from horror.


    "..."


    Starting at his surroundings in silence, Danzel who was silent the whole time broke into franticughter.


    "Hahahahahahah! It activated! The talent [Undying] went into effect! Hahaha!"


    Currently, Danzel was beyond happy.


    He knew that he would die from that magic caster.


    Since resistance was useless, he had to rely on the talent to somehow get out of his situation alive.


    That n though required the magic caster to have left before his talent take ce.


    Otherwise, he would be killed not long after his resurrection.


    So seeing him that he left, Danzel was released.


    "I got to pat myself for picking [Undying] that the resistance..." Danzel said.


    Honestly, he was quite tempted to pick either the physical or magic resistance. But since he found 10% not being that much, he went for the talent that guaranteed him to survive at least 1 attack.


    "Still, I didn''t think that using [Undying] would be so dangerous...I probably shouldn''t rely on it anymore." Danzel mumbled as he remember his experience in that dark space.


    ''Going there every time I use the skill is kinda...'' Shaking his head, he started looking around him, only to see nothing of his possession being left intact.


    "He took even the ring..."


    Going into his knees, he picked up the fragments of the Veren de with a grievance.


    "Sigh...I shouldn''t even have dealt with humans, to begin with. Being a hermit, earning experience for a decade or two would probably be the best idea now. After all, are creating the Veren rune Is impossible..."


    Looking towards the adventurers that he killed before, he found the one that was supposedly called Bernard and... He started to strip him naked for his armor.


    "Hmmm, no one of them has a helmet with them..."


    As his head turned towards the magic caster that drilled him with earth needles and her river, he but a grin on his face.


    Ripping off the hoody that the robes had, he whirl it around his head and poke two holes in the hood in where his ethereal eyes were.


    "That should suffice for now..."


    Danzel said as he didn''t care about how weird he might look to others.


    "Now where should I go?" Danzel scratches his skull as the map that he had was taken away.


    "Ugh..who cares. All I need to do is to get as much faraway from this kingdom. If that magic caster learns that I am still alive he might teleport me to...finish...me"


    Danzel said as hee to a halt.


    As if he remembers something, Danzel who was originally running away from Nercana went into a full sprint there, or more specifically the church.


    "Dammit!" Cursing out loud, Danzel remembers something.


    That was the contracts of the kids!


    He left them to the church!


    Though the magic caster found him, Danzel guessed or rather hoped he didn''t know where his base was.


    Although he could ask around in search with the help of the association, finding his base with just the contract seemed unimaginable to Danzel.


    But the cause of the existence of Merrick the church was bound to be found.


    Him being still alive proofed that they didn''t find it, or at least the magic caster hasn''t.


    As if he were dead, the contracts wouldn''t activate.


    But if the contracts were being found to be working and that magic caster takes a sniff of it, Danzel days would be numbered.


    ''I got to destroy the evidence. After that, I will be free to start a new or collect XP for a few years...''


    Those thoughts were for the future though.


    Although his body felt stiff and somewhat weak, that didn''t stop Danzel from running non:-stop at Nercana.


    Arriving there, his steps hasten towards the church.


    Once he made that none was there, he walked in the front door and punched around the keyhole, making the luck break open.


    Naturally, Kayn and the other kids got imminently rmed by this.


    "Who are you!?" Kayn said, to the unknown figure before him.


    "Tch, I will deal with you guyster."Danzel said as he ignored their stunned expression.


    Recognizing the voice, Kayn looked only at him before he left for his work area.


    " I got to hurry..."


    Removing the damaged armor and hoody, Danzel equipped himself with some unturned gear and took the small magic mask as he gave every helmet to Honor.


    As he continued packing his staffing in a hurry, the contract behind the stone table started to lighten up and explode in the bottle that they were one by one.


    "What the.,"


    Seeing that scene, Danzel marched upstairs with a long sword in his hand.


    ''Let''s hope he isn''t who I think it is....''

 Chapter 161 - Continues Misfortune (2)

    At the same time when Danzel entered the church.


    From a run-down building beside the church, a certain person was watching.


    In the shadow that the ruined building was casting.


    Simr to how Kerres the assassin traveled through shadows but also different.


    A whirlwind made out of shadows wasing out of the shadow, slowly forming into that of a figure with dark gauntlets and sharp eyes.


    "He must be it..." The man, Hanson who was wearing tight clothing that showcased his muscles and a light armor protecting his chest made out of special dark metal came walking out of the shadows while looking at the church in front of him.


    Ever since he met Kayns grouping out of Honor¡äs store, his curiosity got awakened.


    Or rather his suspicion on them.


    His goal of being here was to meet the runesmith that supplied Honor with his items.


    Rue Danzel.


    Till yet, although he had many duties to take care of in the union. He decided to take the matter in himself to find the runesmith.


    So important were to Danzel to Hanson.


    Even if his work was slowly pilling up on his desk... finding the man who was capable to create the runed contracts was essential for the union and his ns.


    Knowing that someone would have to supply Honor with the items, Hanson bind his time while stalking Honor through the shadows.


    As interacting with Honor risked him breaking the contract that he had with the runesmith.


    And by far what he read by the report from Berum, that he got from his connections.


    Rue Danzel was a man who wanted to remain hidden.


    At least that''s what Hanson got out of this report.


    The very fact that this sort of guy made such an invisible contract was in Hanson''s mind another proof of his reasoning.


    s, the times he spends stalking Honor we''re finally rewarded by meeting the three kids.


    Which to his surprise directly lead him to where he wanted to be!


    And that was unexpected to abandon church out of all ces.


    The moment he saw a figure wearing dark armor leaving the building, with the same ring that those kids were carrying at that too.


    He knew that this man was the man he was searching for.


    The ring that he recognized as a [Ring of Spatial storage] was what made hime to this conclusion.


    But since he saw the runesmith going somewhere else, he decided to wait for him toe back.


    Although he could confront him now, he was afraid that he would appear too hostile to him.


    And after hours of wait, he came back!


    "Let''s hope nothing goes wrong..."


    Walking with his hands on the back, he halted for a moment before seeing the destroyed lock.


    Pushing the door to the side, he walked inside the dark lightened church.


    "Huh?"


    "Huh?"


    Hanson and the kids inside looked at each other in confusion.


    An awkward silence between them appeared.


    The kids looked warily at Hanson while he looked somewhat surprised.


    He knew that inside there would be the kids he had followed, but for him to see so many kids here surprised him.


    As Hanson scanned the building, he put a frown on his face.


    ''He isn''t here?''


    "Hey, didn''t a man wearing some armor and a hoode in just now? He should be called Rue Danzel, so were he?" Hanson asked with amand-like voice.


    Hearing that together his face looking cold. The kids went hidding between the different seats.


    Before Hanson could make up for what they were doing, his ears picked up a wind-cutting sound from his side.


    Swinging his hand in that direction, he caught a poorly made arrow with little difficulty.


    "That..." Staring at the arrow with a frown, the kid that he talked with before came dashing in front of him.


    But what happend after surprised him.


    The kid elerated and threw a punch at him while starting to shed block tears.


    "You are..."


    Stoping the punch with ease, Kayn started pulling his dagger out and swung amateurish at Hanson who was simply dodging by moving to the side or fending it off with his gauntlets.


    Seeing him making no progress, Kayn threw the dagger at Hanson''s face and tried to kick him to his side.


    Unfortunately for Kayn, the one he was facing wasn''t his match.


    Catching the dagger, Hansom simply pushed Kayn with one hand to the chest.


    Through this simple movement, Kayn was sent crashing to of the seats with groans of pain escaping his mouth.


    "For a brat, you are quite good, but sadly youck the technique and skill for such power. Even if you control that powers of you."


    Grabbing him by his arm, he raised Kayn to the air with a nk look on his face.


    "I didn''te here to fight. I am just looking for the man who just came in here a few moments ago." Hanson said with a cold voice.


    With a bitter smile on his face, Kayn shook his head.


    "We can''t tell..."


    ''Could it be...'' With his frown growing much worse, his voice got colder.


    "I see, you also signed the man''s contract..."


    Seeing Kayn and the other kids who couldn''t control their surprise made Hansom confirm his suspicion.


    ''Since I already found him, breaking their contract wouldn''t matter much...''


    "Then so will it go, is you don''t tell me where that man is, I will kill everyone inside here, starting by you first."


    "Ahhh..."


    However cold it sounded, what Hanson said proved to be effective.


    "T-The bad man is down in the basement!"


    "He is under that trapdoor!"


    "He is in the statue there!"


    Hearing what the kids said, looked at the statue with a frown on his face.


    "Mhmm, good." Letting Kayn go from his grip, he started at Kayn''s legs with surprise.


    ''So he really can control it...''


    "Kayn! Are you alright!?" Marcus who was to the side came rushing in and helped Kayn move away from Hanson.


    Although he wanted to join in the fight, he was forced by Kayn to stand back as his side effects started to appear.


    Hanson stared for a brief moment at the duo before going to the stages.


    As he wanted to go there though, the trap door was suddenly pushed up.


    Coming out of the trap door, an armored two-meter tall figure wearing a weird mask and a sword on his hand was to see.


    Once he stepped out, a wave of thin killing intent covered the church.


    ***


    Danzel POV


    Seeing a man with two dark gauntlets and Kayns pained expression, he roughly figure what was going on.


    "Are you by any chance the runesmith, Rue Danzel?"


    ''Another one came from me...'' Danzel cursed to himself.


    His body felt extremely stiff to move and overall weak.


    He guessed it was the side effect of having so little dead mana in his body currently.


    Not only that, his actual mana barely recover.


    Which for the current situation was extremely bad.


    "What if I am?" Danzel said with a cold voice.


    "You see,I wanted to discuss with you-"


    "There is nothing to discuss between us..." Stepping down the stage, Danzel''s aura turned much grimmer.


    "Since I will be leaving his ce..."


    Hearing that, Hanson''s face looked like he swallowed a bad pill.


    "That-"


    Without letting him finish, Danzel replied as he gather hisst bits of mana to activate [Swift Movements].


    "And I won''t allow anyone to get in my way!"


    Dashing forward, He swung one of the long swords that he had at the figure.


    *Twiich!


    Metal shing with metal.


    "I didn''te here-"


    With [Sin of Wrath] activating, Danzel turned a deaf ear to what the man in front of him said and continued to swing forward.


    Sparks flew left and right, as the two-man shed many times with each other.


    The wind was bring pushed back by each blow that they made.


    Although it looked like Hanson was at disadvantage.


    That wasn''t the case.


    Every swing was blocked without much effort.


    "Aghhhh!" Frustrated, he raised his de up and swung down at Hanson with all his strength.


    "Sloppy"


    *Booogh!


    The whole church shook with just falling down.


    Hanson, who was holding the de with his two arms.


    The ground under his seemed to cave in like a crater.


    Yet even though the swing was strong, Hanson caught it by ease.


    Being in a standstill, before Danzel could react,ing out of Hanson''s hands came another set of hands looking like living shadows.


    Reaching for his chest te, the two shadow arms pushed with their palm at him with enormous strength behind them.


    The next moment he knew, Danzel was sent flying towards the half-broken statue.


    *Baaahm!


    With bits of the statue falling on top of him, Danzel looks at his saved chest te.


    Many of his ribs got broken and soon turned into dust.


    That attack made him realize.


    That he was weaker than this man.


    That thought alone made his [Sin of Wrath] deactivate.


    It wasn''t that he was giving up.


    ''[Mana arms]''


    With a half-broken mana arm appearing, it dragged the weird that he let go toe back at him.


    Standing up from the statues rumble, he looked up ahead.


    Once he did, he was swiftly grabbed by his neck and bind towards the wall.


    If that was someone else of one of the living. His injuries and being grabbed by the next could have been fatal.


    But for Danzel, one of the undead.


    He knew no pain.


    Raising his sword by grabbing it by the de itself, he wanted to pierce the man''s throat.


    However, it didn''t work.


    The shadow-like arms appeared and held both of his arms.


    Raising his free hand, Hanson pulled the mask out of Danzel''s head.


    "I suspected it....the sensation was different as usual when I hit you. For hitting something so hollow could truly only be one of the undead."


    "Kgh...bastard!" Danzel struggled to get free, s with no sess.


    Kayn, Marcus, Anna and the other kids who saw were speechless to see that the man they lived with was one of the undead.


    Hanson stared for a few moments silent, before starting at Danzel ring ethereal eyes.


    "Are you from the council?"


    Grinding his teeth, Danzel answered.


    "First that magic caster then you...I got no idea what that council is!"


    Staying silent once again, the shadow arms took Danzel''s sword away and Hanson let him fall to the ground.


    Confused Danzel didn''t dare move.


    His mind was racing as to find the reason why he was let go suddenly.


    "Undead...No, Rue Danzel. I came here to make a deal with you."


    Hearing that Danzel froze, with a grin appearing on his face.


    Though since he hadn''t a face, in Hanson''s perspective it looked to him grinding his teeth.


    ''I can survive.''


    That single word remained in Danzel though.


    "What kind of deal?" He said with a cold voice.


    "It''s simple, I want you to make runed items for me. You will also be forced to be under supervision. In return...as far as it is in my capabilities, I will supply you with the items that you are in need."


    Hearing that, Danzel scoffed at him.


    "Heh, isn''t that me bing you ve?"


    Shrugging his shoulders Hanson replied.


    "You should know that making a deal with an undead puts me at high risk. Nheless...don''t you think it''s better than getting destroyed here?"


    ''I shouldn''t have ever gone to the home of humans...''


    No matter how he sweet tones it, Danzel could only see that as a ve''s contract.


    But as the man said, dying here was much worse.


    ''This could also be an opportunity...''


    If what that man said was true, Danzel could slowly improve himself in time to the point where he could escape.


    ''It''s not like I got a choice...''


    Shaking his head internally, he nodded.


    "Alright...it''s a deal then. But only If I leave Nercana."


    "Why?" Hanson tilted his head.


    "I... an old magic caster using ice magic from the mercenary association know who I am. Staying here would endanger me...If you agree to that then the deal is done..."


    "Nevvan..." Hearing that Hanson face distorted before sighting


    "Alright, it shall be done."


    Having his safety guaranteed for the moment, Danzel looked at the side.


    "What about them."


    Looking at the kids who were frozen in fear, Hanson put a thoughtful expression as he saw a dark-haired boy.


    "Let me deal with them...."

 Chapter 162 - New Place

    Having exined the situation that he was in with that old magic caster, the man who introduced himself as Hanson seemed to think of that very seriously.


    Of course, he told him that he somehow had managed to escape him by sheer luck and determination alone.


    Although he seemed to doubt his words.


    By fair right at that too as they were pure nonsense.


    Danzel wasn¡ät stupid enough to reveal his ability to revive himself.


    The talent [Undying] in his eyes was the ultimate trump card that he had.


    Power-wise, the talent did nothing.


    But the fact alone that it gave him the element of surprise or better, made him y the true definition of `ying dead¡ä.


    The tricky situation that seemed impossible to get away with was possible with the talent!


    He had to admit though, facing such a situation only luck and the ignorance of his enemy would allow him to survive.


    That¡äs why keeping such an ability hidden was a must.


    Otherwise, him reviving and dying a secondter was a situation that he could very well imagine...


    Another liability of the talent was him going to that dark space.


    Though he didn¡ät how much time exactly had passed, he knew it wasn¡ät short.


    `Maybe [Undying] activated on the 7 or 8-second mark. If not the 10 seconds.¡ä He thought to himself.


    That was another liability of the talent.


    `Who would have thought thating back to life would actually be this hard, right?¡ä


    That¡äs right, activating the talent itself was an outside factor.


    It wasn¡ät like pushing a button and calling a day, not by a long shot. Though he wasn¡ät as sure how to activate it after going in that dark space. His best guess was either by his sheer willpower or his none-existed guts...


    `I could probably kill myself and practiceing back to life every day, but that¡äs...¡ä


    In more than one way wrong.


    To die without managing toe back wouldn¡ät even be a joke anymore.


    If that really were to happen then he would for the real die and be the same as those things in that space.


    Sitting on a carriage, he stared nkly at the many people doing their own thing.


    "Why do I even think of stuff like that?" Danzel cursed internally as he currently was bored out of his mind.


    "Hey, when will we be reaching our destination?" He asked with his cold voice.


    "We will be there soon." The coachman replied.


    Grumbling inside Danzel continued starting at the unfamiliar ce that he was.


    As for where he was, it definitely wasn''t Nercana.


    The day that they made the deal,Hanson didn''t waste any time into holdings his part of the deal.


    It took him less than a few hours to arrange a carriage together with guards who he guessed were his form of supervision on him.


    Where he went was supposed to be in the capital of the arcana kingdom. Which by Hanson''s words were where his new base was going to be.


    At first, when he heard of all that, it didn''t seem that bad.


    But once he learned how long his journey is going to take, his mood was ruined almost instantly.


    Without having any say in this though, he left Nercana.


    That was two whole months ago...


    He was forced to stay in the small space of the carriage without being able to do anything else than wait for night toe for him to practice his contract-making rune, otherwise known as [Rune of Uzaal].


    Since the carriage wasn''t stable and the only thing he had to work with was paper, making runes inside the carriage was the next thing to impossible.


    At some point, even the thought of running away.


    But as soon as he releases that the guys around him were around his physical strength, he quickly scratched that idea.


    Only in the night could he ever hope to gain a small margin of XP into his pure wallet.


    "Sigh...how I miss the church." Danzel mumbled dejectedly.


    A ce for only him to rx and practice without any interference, where the air was filled with dead mana andfortable to overall staying there.


    That''s what he lost in a single day...


    Although he felt gloomy about it, Danzel saw some positives at that too.


    ''At least I don''t have to worry about those brats too.''


    Remembering how Hanson took them away who knows where he felt much better.


    Simr to how a huge headache that troubled him for months had suddenly faded.


    He felt relieved.


    "Sir, we arrived."


    "Finally..."


    Opening the door of the carriage, wearing his armor at top of a ck robe while hiding his face with the small magic mask and a hood to hide his featurepletely.


    He stepped out of the carriage looking at the tall building in front of him.


    He had expected to go to a more low-profile building to have his base. But staying at the building that was in the middle where merchants sold their goods with a lot of people to pass by.


    "Is that the ce..?" He asked uncertainly.


    "Yes, please follow us." One of his ''guards'' who was named Edward said with a serious voice.


    Following along,Edward who was taking the lead opened the door and let everyone in.


    Looking around Danzel could only describe this ce as empty...


    It looked like a lobby with furniture of leverage quality based on what his status said and a staircase going up.


    "The room is on the second floor." Edward said.


    Going up the stairs and opening the door, Danzel got a nche at his future workce.


    Or rather a temporary one.


    The room itself was very simple.


    It was purely arge t room with boxes filled with supplies that he would need for his runesmithing and threerge desks that he could use as a station for his work with a bed and a few seats.


    Other than that the room was basically cleared with much space to fill out.


    Although he didn''t like the fact that he was on the second floor, making summoning stone walls impossible, he also thought that he oils train here, the wooded ground would eventually break.


    But those things weren''t what Danzel noticed at first.


    The first thing that he noticed was the man who was at fault for being here to the very ce.


    Having his hair pushed back and his signature two ck gauntlets, the man who was seated in the middle of the room waved his hand at me.


    "So you arrived."


    "So it seems..."


    ''You bastard..''


    Danzel cursed internally.


    He clearly remembers how Hanso stayed behind to apparently finish some kind of work.


    So finding him being here faster than him, who used the carriage made him feel like he wanted to cave in his face.


    ''If you had a faster way of travel then why did you make me take the carriage, to begin with!?''


    Nodding his head, Hanson walked towards Danzel.


    "Don''t worry, I just came to give you my regards for today and also find out what you might need for your...craft. Tomorrow will we talk about what I need for you."


    Missing solemnly, he put his hand on the mask chin while he thought deeply of what he might need.


    ''Hmm...let''s see."


    Opening his status through the use of a mentalmand, he nodded his head and closed the status


    "If that''s the case, other than the supplies for making runes, I would have to like a [Ring of Spatial Storage], if possible a more sturdy armor and a longsword..."


    Hesitating for a moment, Danzel added in.


    "And if possible I would have liked two corpses with minimal damage..."


    Hearing that, Hanson frowns a bit.


    "Hmmm, I can prepare you the armor and the ring, but why corpses? Do you need it for your runesmithimg?"


    Shakininf his head, Danzel shook his head.


    "The corpses are more of a personal research..."


    Hanson stared for a good long minute at Danzel were mask eyes balls.


    "Alright..."


    Nodding his head, Hanson passed beside Danzel and whispered at Edward who was guarding the door.


    "Don''t underestimate him. If he was to make any suspicious moves then make sure to either stop him or...kill him." Patting the Edwards''s shoulder he soon took off.


    With only the four guards including Edward and Danzel being in the room.


    He gave them a brief nce before seating to one of the seats while opening his status.


    ''I got a little bit of 560 00 XP left, I guess trying the new rank of the runes now isn''t that bad..." Danzel said as he without any hesitation pressed the purchase button.


    The next moment, a total of 300 00 XP vanished in his wallet.


    All for the awaiting rare-rated rune.


    ''Please be it an undead one...''


    In front of his eyes, a new notification came before him.


    [You acquired an-]

 Chapter 163 - Youths With Potential

    [You acquired a Normal Rune of Force]


    Staring at the notification, Danzel soon turned disappointed.


    "It isn¡ät the one I wanted..." He grumbled to himself.


    Not only did it feel rather bitter his chance to get an undead rune was technically 35% better though the help of two talents of his, the [Master of Himself] and [Undead Carver]. But the fact that such runes could perform better than the normal runes was also a big downer.


    s, luck as ofte wasn¡ät on his side.


    "Sigh~whatever...if it¡äs at the rare quality then it¡äs bound to be good." Mumbling so to himself, he tapped at the window to read through the runes description.


    Reading through it, he nced to the side where the boxes with various equipment lied there.


    "Hmm, an armor-type rune, huh? Has been a while since I draw one of those..."


    Processing the information in his head, he quickly cast [Mana Arms] to bring him a chest te to the table.


    `Mhhm, let¡äs try it out first¡ä


    As he was about to head right into carving the rune, he suddenly remember something.


    Turning around, he nced at the four people looking at him with a hollow gaze.


    "What are you guys doing here..?"


    With a frown showing on their faces, Edward, representing the four guys replied.


    "We were ordered to be your guards and supervise you in case something happens..." Edward said with a tone that would make others think that there was nothing else to disguise.


    But Danzel wasn¡ät having that.


    "Sounds great, but I simply don¡ät care. You can very well guard me outside the door of all I care. One thing is for sure, I ain¡ät going to work any time soon with eyes behind my neck."


    "Sir, we were ordered to-"


    "I don¡ät care of what that guy Hanson or whatever told you bunch, but my statement isn¡ät a choice, but an ultimatum. Now leave."


    As if what Danzel said stuck a nerve on one of the guards, he scoffed at Danzel.


    "Hey, don¡ät start getting too cocky, you-" Before the guard could continue, he suddenly came to a halt.


    Putting his mask away, Danzel standed up with his hand holding the scarab to his side.


    Showing them the height difference that he had and also his skull face with eerie dark green mes like eyes.


    "You should know by now, what my true nature is. Just seeing your four faces makes me want to slice your throats at the spot. You who are bound by the frailty of flesh wouldn''t understand how such thoughts would one distract from doing one''s work, and a delicate one that is runesmithing."


    Drawing his sword out, the four of them instinctively put their hand in their own weapon.


    "It wasn¡ät a request of me, but a warning to avoid needless bloodshed."


    Hearing his words, the four of them stared at each other with a frown on their face.


    Moving his hand away from the hilt of his sword, Edward bowed slightly.


    "I...we apologize. As you wish, we will stand behind the door."


    The three other guards wanted to express their disagreement, especially the one that talked back to Danzel.


    But after seeing Edward seriously looking at them they could only suck their opinions back to their throats as they made their way outside.


    Seeing the door closing, Danze shooking his head around while activating [Rune Vision].


    ***


    In certain training grounds under a building.


    Where in the middle was a t arena and everywhere else were training equipment for all kinds of training one''s body.


    Sitting nearby the equipment was a small girl having her hair tied in a ponytail style that stared in the arena with a bitter smile on her face.


    In the directions where she was starting was a tall man with two dark gauntlets around his back.


    Standing tall on his ground, Hanson had an amused smile on his face as he started at two boys charging at him.


    One of the boys threw a punch while the other moved on his back and tried to kick Hanson''s leg.


    "You two movements are too predictable." Commending at the boy''s effort, with only minimal movement Hanson grabbed the boy who threw a punch at him at his arm and pushed it at the other kid.


    Making those two crash with each other.


    "Ugh...Marcus, you are on top of me..."


    "Sorry, Kayn..."


    Moving to the side, the two boys, Kayn and Marcus stared at the ceiling, trying to catch their breath from all the training that had be their daily routine around two weeks ago.


    Where they met their mentor and an undead.


    The three of them, Kayn and Anna in particr remember the fight between those two figures, both with amazement and fear.


    The sheer speed that those two shes with each other could be barely be seen by Kayns eyes.


    While Kayned fear came from their throwing aura.


    Anna feared the aftermath of this all.


    As she barely heard the context of those two and their deal, she feared that she and her family will be silenced.


    When she was thinking of ways to escape with her family, the unexpected happend.


    ''I see potential in you three. If you were to work for me I promise you the safety of you all''


    Having no other choice, they epted Hanson''s proposal.


    They expected the days of experimenting on their body will once again repeat themselves.


    Only toter to know that they will experience something much worse.


    ''Well, more like the boys''


    Flipping the next page of the book that she was holding, she hummed on her own while her brothers were sweating buckets on the ground.


    "I guess that''s will be it for today. I got some affairs to take part in, so you two take a bath and eat your lunch to restore your lost nutrients. I will be back in around an hour or two. Once I am back we will continue your training."


    "Ugh..."


    "I feel like dying..."


    Hearing the grows out of the two, Hanson shook his head while going out of the training grounds.


    Seeing a young maiden greet his view, he subconsciously put up a smile.


    "What is it Amatha?"


    "Sir, the items that you requested have been prepared ording to your orders, here"


    Opening a small box with a ring in it, Hanson took it by his hands while nodding in approval.


    "You did we''ll Amatha, you should be expecting a bonus this month.


    Hearing that, a surprised look appeared on her face.


    "Thank you very much!"


    Waving her off with a smile, Hanson walked through a wall without any hint of him remaining.


    To be more precise, he went in the shadows of the wall and is traveling at immense speed through the shadows.


    Arriving at the area where many merchants traded with each other, Hanson went into a certain building.


    ''Tch, those guys aren''t taking it seriously...'' Passing through the four guards guarding the building unnoticed in the shadows.


    Entering the door that the guards were guarding, he looked at certain undead starting at a broken de.


    ''What is he doing?'' Hanson thought as he observed the broken de.


    Trying to get nearer to get a better look, he halted in surprise.


    As the undead had turned around to face him!


    ''...''


    Sighing internally, Hanson stepped out of the shadows.


    "How did you know that I was there?"


    Shrugging his shoulders, Danzel got up.


    "Gut feeling."


    ''You don''t even have guts..'' Comining internally, Hanson throws a small ring at Danzel.


    "Here, what you asked."


    "Mhmm..."


    Putting the ring in his finger, Danzel grinned to himself.


    "With that done... Have you managed to make any new runed contracts from the weeks?"


    "Contracts? Ah, yeah there are over there. You can pick them up." Pointing at a box near the table, Danzel focused on the ring that he just got,pletely ignoring Hanson.


    Not minding his attitude, he went to pick the contracts.


    Only to notice some runes in the chest tes lying there too.


    "Hey, what are the runes in those armors?"


    "Those? Well...you could say that they are a prototype of more advanced runes."


    Intrigued by ''more progress'' Hanson inspected the armor closer.


    "What are they capable of?"


    "The runes effect are-"


    ...


    Exining the rune''s effect, Hanson''s eyes widen up in surprise.


    "Is what you said really true?" Hanson asked, unable to believe what he just heard.


    "Is there any point for me to lie? You can easily find out if what I said is true or not by just testing it."


    "Just don''t forget that''s a prototype and not the real thing. Turning it as good as I said would take...some amount of time."


    Nodding solely, Hanson stared at Danzel.


    "How much time will you need?"


    "Ehm...if you supply me with more chesttes then I might manage it in around two to three weeks."


    Putting the chest tes into his own storage ring, Hanson was slowly going into the shadows.


    "Consider the supply to be done and focus on making as many of those runes as possible in the next two weeks.

 Chapter 164 - Humanoid Monsters

    Meanwhile two weekster, in a far of ce.


    A raging battlefield was going for days.


    Spells fell into each opposite side, while man shed and shed their own blood for a single purpose.


    To hold control over the once fallen city of Seranan.


    Once under the control of the Arcana kingdom, the city where it had the most resources with various mines for mana crystals and even dungeon where the mana mutated fire smanders deep down the earth. Had now be the shield for their long-time enemy, the kingdom of Berum.


    Although the Berum kingdom had a muchrger quote of life force users, they still had the few magic casters. So the magical resources that the city of Seranan was offering were quite useful, but what Berum had his eyes at most were the fire smanders, where their hide could circr better life force and magic of fire.


    As the fire attribute was the most renowned attribute to have in Berum, a hide enchanting that attribute is being sought after by many different people in Berum.


    With demand, people seek a supply.


    In which ce was better to supply your own people than your enemy''s resources?


    Even though that was one of the many conflicts that those two kingdoms had with each other through all the years.


    The city of Seranan couldn¡ät escape the grasp of the oing war.


    And currently, the city''s walls were giving the army of Berum advantages against the Arcana kingdom.


    Using the high ground that the wall was giving them, the mages of the Berum kingdom run down their bombardment down to the enemy''s shoulders.


    Since also Begum had more soldiers using life force, they had much better physical power than their enemies.


    Making a wall that the Arcana kingdom couldn¡ät surpass after weeks of fighting.


    And one of the head officers who was observing the situation felt currently much frustrated.


    "So, that¡äs the battlefield that you had trouble with?" A man wearing a mix of armor and robe said with a staff in his hand said towards an elderly beside him.


    "Mhmm, that¡äs indeed the case, Master Anwir. I was told that you might be of some help here."


    Pondering for a bit, Anwir nodded.


    "Indeed, If I wanted to I could annihte the enemy''s army in just a few minutes."


    "Oh~! That¡äs Master Anwir for you. A true archmage! If you could then please d-" Before the elderly could continue, Anwir quickly shot him down.


    "But I won¡ät"


    "Huh?"


    "I heard that ou son is taking part of this mess in front me and how you must worry as a father. But as you shall know General, If I were to appear to the battlefield, others big shots are bound toe and face me..." Staring at the elderly man with disdain hidden in his eyes, Anwir said with a harsh voice.


    "Don¡ät bring your personal matters in the arcane will"


    "I very well know that, Master Anwir..." The elderly stared far ahead as if he was looking at something with a frown.


    "Not to sound disrespectful to you, but I heard that you will provide us with support."


    ''If you aren''t going to help then why are you even here!'' Were the elder''s true thoughts.


    Anwir noticed the hidden meaning behind his words, but he chose to ignore them.


    As the elder wasn''t wrong.


    He was going to give them support.


    What kind of support though was...


    "Hey, bring them here." Saying so through amunication spell, the two looked ahead before in no longer than 2 minutes cartridges carryingrge boxes came and stopped at the two.


    "Master Anwir, those boxes are..."


    "That is your support."


    With the door of the boxes dropping, a terrifying scene appears in the elder''s eyes.


    Chained humanoid with dark chiseled muscles on their and fingers resembling a small scythe was to see.


    Their eyes were covered with a tight bound together with cloth and the mouths came devoured and had spike-like teeth.


    Although every single one of those humanoid figures we''re looking all different on a small scale


    But one thing had they inmon.


    The chest te with the arcana sigil in the middle.


    "S-Sir...what are does?" The man asked terrified from inside.


    No longer carrying about the elder, Anwir stares far ahead with mana ring his eyes.


    With his enchanted vision, he managed to find a group of mages on top of the wall.


    ''They will be a good test subject''.


    With pping his finger, the chained fell to the ground.


    Them being free, their bestial started to take over.


    Before they could enjoy their freedom, their nightmares have soon be to rearrangement


    A strong burning sensation appeared behind their backs, bringingsting pain.


    "KGGGH!"


    Having seen enough of their suffer, Anwirmanded through a spell simr to telepathy.


    ''Kill those on the wall and does who stop you.''


    Like puppets who have bound with their string again, they started up and red in the direction of the wall.


    The next moment, an echoing scream was heard through the battlefield.


    "Kghhh!"


    "Kghhhh!"


    Without even waiting for further orders, the 50 or so dark figures dashed madly, pushing or right to kill everyone who was standing away.


    "Kghhhhaaaah!" In the middle of the fight, multiple auras of 3rd-tier entities appeared on the battlefield, all screaming.


    One of the soldiers of Berum who was also a 3rd-tier and noticed the change.


    He quickly finish his opponent and met with a being that he didn''t know what it was.


    "What the-"


    "Khaaaaaah!"


    Dashing forward, the dark figure swings his scythe-like finger just how a beast at an incurable attack rate.


    The soldier at first tried to cut that thing arms off, but once he noticed the arms to be as hard as metal or worse.


    ''If the arms don''t work then how about the stomach you monster!''


    "Die!!!"


    Pushing the best hands to the side, he swung towards the abdomen, aiming to cut him in half.


    But suddenly, his sword came a halt in the air, as if something was blocking his sword


    The dark humanoid put a grazed smile on his face and pushed his arm in the soldier''s chest and crushing the heart of the poor man.


    "H-How...."


    "Khahahahha!"


    Ignoring the dead man in front of him, he and the other dark figure went into a big enough massacre to be noticed by the mages.


    "Sir! Our elites can''t deal with those...beast! If this keeps up they are found to breach with ourck of elite! What shall we do?"


    The head mage managing the mages on the wall looked with a frown on the bloodthirst monster to the ground, he put up a wry smile.


    "Use fire magic...we will burn them!"


    "What!? But sir! Then we will hit our own man!"


    "Follow the orders! We can''t allow those things to live."


    With ground teeth, the mages began their own spells.


    Sensing the sudden mana in the wall, all the dark humanoids remembered their orders and dashed forward.


    "Kghaaaa!"


    Gathering together, the monster bulldozed through the troops with east as they grew closer at the wall.


    "Mere beast..." Seeing that the head mage scoffed as he released his spell.


    "Fire!"


    ''Go ahead and die all together!''


    The mes covered their view, the monster together with the soldiers around them made contact with the explosive spells.


    *Booom!!!!


    Smoke rose in the impacts zone, covering the tragic fate that those that met the whole focus of a dozen mages.


    Unfortunately for them, they didn''t know.


    Coming out of the smoke, the unscathed dark humanoids jumped to the wall with their feet and leg digging in.


    What was also important to tell was that a circr barrier began fading around the dark humanoid figure.


    "Q-Quick! Cast another-"


    "Kghhhhaaaa!"


    "Kghaaaaa!"


    "Kgha-!


    After a few steps and jumps in the wall, the mages remained with 49 dark humanoid figures alone.


    "N-Nooo!!!!"


    The result was a massacre of the mages.


    "There aren''t any spellsing our way! Now is our chance!"


    Realizing that, the soldiers and mages of the Arcana kingdom pushed forward.


    Staring from afar, the elder had his mouth a gap.


    Anwir stared at his creation, or rather. Certain equipment of them nodded in satisfaction.


    "Getting these runed armors was indeed the right choice. I will have to ask for that merchant for more of those."


    Although heined slightly about the prices. He couldn''tin of their effectiveness.


    ''To think that ''those'' runes will activate by themselves...It sure suits that creation of my, hehehe.''


    ***


    On the same day, a few hours before in Danzel workshop.


    Putting hisst chest te to the side chest where other alike chest tes were, he sighed internally.


    "Damn, those take a much longer time to create..."


    Pulling the new armor from his ring to the table, he continued carving runes.


    ''Well, at least the effect of the rune is good....what is a little time to an undead anyway.''

 Chapter 165 - Dead, Rise Once More

    "Finally is done..." Putting the armor on the side, Danzel nodded satisfied.


    [You received 8 000 XP]


    "So the rare runes give 8000 XP huh..."


    Standing up, he unequipped the armor that he had borrowed from Hanson. He picked up the new armor and hid away his thick bones.


    "Hmmm, it''s rather on the lighter side. Maybe I should have some weights or something..." Daniel said slightly dejected.


    The before heavy armor that he has turned into tiny pieces cause of that old magic caster.


    "Pity, at least this one has better runes in it, also the new..."


    Looking at the armor, or rather his chest te part, he was still surprised to get something like this...awkward.


    [Rune of Force]: A rune created by someone who was once known as "architect", a genius mage who specializes in the creation of artificial life in the form of golems. Topensate for theck of will in his creation, the rune is a self-activation rune that activates a barrier in case of sensing danger. Sadly, the time it requires for the rune to charge with mana takes around 4-5 hours, as it was made in his early years.


    Although it was good, he felt awkward having that rune.


    To this credit, the barrier did manage to block his swings when he tested it, but the activation of the barrier was rather vague.


    For example, if the earth needles were counted as sensing danger, then the barrier would be useless.


    Sure, the spikes prating him could be a small annoyance, unless it was his head of course.


    Otherwise, he was unlucky, the needles will just pierce his armor and pass right through his bones.


    So the fatal wound that would have been for a mortal is for him, an undead with pure bones not so much fatal.


    But contrary to umon runes, this rune had a much bigger effect, which was nice to see.


    And he couldn''t muchin of having an extra shield keeping his dear life.


    What heined though was about his new sword.


    "Sigh...how I miss feeling of holding Veren in my hands..."


    If he were topare Veren and his nameless sword for just the quality, then the nameless sword would be much better.


    Be it channeling mana, the sharpness, and the toughness alone, it was a ss above.


    With runes recing the Veren runes, he could proudly say that it was indeed nice to have.


    But the huge disadvantage that he wasn''t used to was that he had to take care not to break it.


    No longer could he simply pierce his stone wall to do his catapult maneuver without worrying about breaking the de.


    Remembering that, Danzel shook his head dejected.


    "I got to get my mind out of Verens bitter end..."


    Tapping on his status, he looked around for quite some while before deciding what to do.


    "Right, since I saw thatst time, it wouldn''t hurt trying now."


    [Lower ss Death Magic]


    [Lesser Raise Undead]


    [Reconstruct Body]


    Of course, he meant of the remaining undead skills.


    He hasn''t bought them yet because they didn''t seem that practicalpared to the [Curse of Decay]


    In a sense, he saw them as mere support skills.


    Being self-exnatory, [Lesser Raise Undead] allowed him to make a dead body into an undead.


    That spell couldn''tpare to the Draugr skill which he fought to get Veren.


    Since the skill, raised them and not created them. The ways that it could be used were very limited.


    Why should he waste time in casting when he can just hack at his opponent.


    As for the [Reconstruct Body], it was a spell made to go hand in hand with the [Lesser Raise Undead].


    As the only thing that it did was basically restore the body of a dead.


    And by restoring the body, it meant only the bones...


    The worst part of it was that the skill didn¡ät work on the undead.


    At first, when he read the skill, he was pretty excited to see a spell that could regenerate his body and not wait for hours long for a part of him to grow back with the help of dead mana.


    Heck, his only healing ability as of now would only work if he died!


    So when he read the limits of the skill he was naturally disappointed.


    And as of now, he was hesitant to get any more skill on his name.


    Though the first and second upgrades were fine and could be gathered by a week.


    What came after would really open up a hole in his wallet.


    If that''s so, the question as to why he gets those spellses into mind.


    And for that, there is a simple and only reason.


    ...


    He got bored.


    [You acquired Lesser Raised Undead]


    [You acquired Reconstruct Body]


    Gripping his skull in pain, information flew through his mind and slowly imprinted in his mind.


    "Ugh...I almost forgot about that being a thing..." Shaking his head, he moved away from the desk.


    "Alright, this should be enough..." Crouching down, two pale corpses appeared out of thin air with eyes closed.


    "..."


    After starting at the two unfortunate fellows, Danzel took a few steps back and started his cast to defile their bodies.


    "Dead, Rise once more~"


    Casting as the spell was imprinted in his mind after a thin dark green mist flew out of his hand and inside the two corpses.


    Starting with a slight twist, the once deceased shot their eyes wide open while their emotionless face became pure ferocious.


    "Gaaaagh~"


    Stumbling on their feet, they soon raised up and stared at their master emotionless.


    "Hmm...so that''s the spell huh?" Mumbling to himself, he gave their firstmand.


    "Move to the right..."


    "Gaaahh~"


    Dragging their feet to the ground, they continued walking until they continue hitting the wall.


    "It seems like they are quite stupid..."


    Commanding them to return where they were before, he pulled his long sword and damaged both with just a scratch.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Zombie (Undead)


    Level: 1


    ss: ----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 247/250


    Mana: 10/10


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 7 Agility: 1 Intelligence: 1 Endurance: 4


    Talent: [Undead]


    Skills: ----


    [Remark]: A undead who was created with the use of magic. A mere puppet drove solely by his instincts and his master orders.


    Reading through the description, Danzel would even frown if he could.


    "Mere puppets, huh?"


    For Danzel it felt weird.


    Staring at someone who looked like a living person and not feeling any kind of disturbed thates with his undead trait to hate the living.


    `That¡äs undead for you..."


    With a swift yet strong movement, he prated both of their skulls in an instant.


    Seeing them fall down, Danzel raised his hand and started casting.


    "Sorry..."


    `[Reconstrukt Body]¡ä


    Seeping out of his body, dead mana entered the two undead bodies and slowly repaired their skull.


    `One more time...¡ä


    "Dead, Rise once more~"


    As the dark green mist entered their body, the unexpected happend.


    Instead of the undead raising just like they did a few seconds ago, this time they stayed still with only further decay to show on their body.


    "Yeah...I should guess that would happen." Shaking his head, he went and seated to the chair where he was working thosest two weeks.


    "Well, that end fast..."


    Noting the discovery of that experiment, he put the page into his storage ring while staying staring at the status window.


    "That¡äs 10 000 XP for you... and I didn¡ät even learn how to upgrade the talent [Lower ss Death Magic] from it in the end. Does it upgrade after I upgrade the spells or how can I do it...?"


    He thought of many scenarios, but as the talent didn¡ät point at a clear path that he could take, everything, in the end, was pure spection.


    In the first ce, he just decided to get those two spells after two weeks of continuous work and thinking of solutions for the [Rune of Force] to be at least giving him XP. He honestly was mentally exhausted.


    It also didn¡ät help with the rune by itself being harder to understand.


    If it weren¡ät for the experience that he gained from continuously carving runes, then finishing this rune would probably have taken him a month.


    *Knock~


    "Ugh...should I practice with my new sword while I earn my keep? But I ain¡ät really in the mood-"


    *Knock, Knock~


    "Excuse me, I aming in!"


    mming the door open, the guard Edward came walking in with an angry expression.


    "Hey, why didn¡ät you op-huh?"


    Looking dumbfounded in the ground, Edward saw two corpses with blood spilling out of their body and an undead holding a sword with blood in it staring at him.


    "Why did youe in?" Danzel said with his cold voice before realizing why the man was so shocked.


    `Right, I forgot to clean up...¡ä


    "You-I mean...I already knocked but heard no reply after waiting for longer than 10 minutes..."


    Shifting his head to the side, Danzel asked in a deadly serious voice.


    "You knocked?"


    "...."

 Chapter 166 - Magic Tool

    Deciding to end the awkward silence in the room, Edward coughed a few times to clear his throat.


    "Could you move those...corpses away?" Edward said, his eyes glued on the two corpses.


    Although he didn''t have the cleanest


    work out there with many kill counts under his belt.


    Seeing two slightly dried corpses with blood leaking out of their head and widen eyes of the rage of members of his race.


    Him showing no reaction would have been all the weirder.


    But Danzel who was pissed of at him entering like that had nothing of that.


    "No"


    "Huh"


    Both stared at each other eyes in silence, for Edwar only to slowly be scrapped out of his hollow gaze.


    "Hey, if you got something to tell me, then split it out or get out of here already..."


    Cursing at Danzels''s rude behavior, Edward started exining with a frown on his face.


    "I have gotten new orders from master Hanson...that I got to install a magic item inside your room. I am here to do exactly that."


    Edward said as he pulled a small box from the bag he was holding.


    "This is the magic item?" Danzel asked curiosity.


    "Yes...now where would you like me to install it in?"


    "Hmm...what does it even do? I would like to take a first look at this before I answer that question." Walking towards Edward with his ethereal eyes locked on the box, Edward flinched for a sec.


    "S-Sir Danzel, this item is..."


    As Edward openness the small chest, Danzel saw a few blue crystals in there.


    ''It will be faster this way...''


    Without letting Edward exin, Danzel yanked one of the crystals and read this description with a sole expression.


    [Fragment Crystal]: A part of a muchrger crystal, some of these parts are so enchanted that once the enchant isplete,pletemunication is viable.


    ''So that''s what it was.''


    "Hey! Be gentle with it! If you were to break the enchant I will be beaten to death!


    "... "


    "..."


    Silence fell in the room.


    ...


    "You damn..." Edward cursed under his breath.


    ''That guy, or damned undead, probably doesn''t even care if I drop dead or not.''


    And to his credit, he was right.


    "Is it big? Can you ce it somewhere around my workstation?" Danzel pointed at his back.


    Hearing that, Edward looked to the side where he pointed and nodded with a sole expression.


    "Yes...it should be possible..." Nodding in confirmation, Edward stared wrongly at Danzel before he went ahead and started to use the magic tool upon the curious gaze of the undead behind him.


    After a few minutes, Edward was done.


    "I have finished..." Closing the empty box, he hastens towards the door.


    Before he could celebrate leaving, he was stopped by Danzel.


    "Hey, where are you going? You didn''t even exin to me how to use this thing."


    Trying his best to hide his displeasure, he turned around with a stiff smile.


    "There isn''t a need to do anything...it has been enchanted in advantage so that it can only receive a signal of master Hanson magic tool. When you see the middle top shard light up, then it will activate on its own..."


    "I see...that''s no fun," Danzel said as he stared at the magic tool.


    "...Now if you don''t have any question left, could I be allowed my leave?" Edward pleaded nicely when it actually was cursing internally.


    "Mhmm, go ahead if you are done."


    Seeing Edward closing the door, Danzel went closer to the magic tool in front of him.


    The magic tool in question didn''t seem like a tool, it was of 6 shard crystals making up marquise shape more of anything, which by a first look could be mistaken as a nice decoration on the wall.


    It didn''t really scream as a magic tool.


    One could only recognize it as such if they notice the glow on the crystal together with the headed enchanted trapped inside.


    Which thetter could practically do the mages or those with rich magical knowledge.


    And Danzel who was starting at the shards was none of those above mentioned.


    "Hmm...I can''t see them. If I remember the description right, then enchantment is an internal thingpared to runes who were external. Since they sounded so simr I thought it would be easier to see them. but I can''t I was wrong..."


    Shaking his head, he summoned his status and started browsing to pass some time.


    Until momentster the shard light grew stronger, making Danzel take notice.


    "Is it activating?"


    The blue mana trapped in the shard crystal was released into a thinyer.


    The next moment, theyer started to change colors and create a barely noticeable figure of a person who Danzel knew well.


    "It seems the installment has been don- what are you doing?" Hanson who appeared in theyer simr to a screen frown his eyes browns when he saw Danzel''s behavior.


    Putting his finger in and out of theyer, Danzel ignored Hanson as he continued doing other tests like guiding his mana in his hand or other mana crystal in between.


    "Are you done..." Hanson asked in a cold voice.


    "Mhmm, I was simply curious of it."


    Removing his hand from the image, Danzel seated to his seat and looked at Hanson.


    "Now, why did you tell this guy... How was he called again? Edman? Enward? Or was it E-"


    "It''s Edward..."


    "Right, right, that was his name. So why did you tell me to bring me this thing here? It''s not like I can use it or anything." Danzel said.


    "Sigh...the tool is more for me to use, tomunicate with you. It''s not like I have the time to go and look for you when need to."


    Looking at Danzel with a serious expression, Hanson continued.


    "At least that''s part of the reason. The truth is more to protect. The client who I sell you runed items is extremely satisfied with the new runes you provided. He and others like him trying to find you is nothing surprising."


    ''Damn I am popr.'' Danzel thought bitterly.


    "I see your point. But is that really why you contact me? If not go ahead and close that thing. I was in the middle of something if I may inform you"


    ''In the middle of doing nothing that is...''


    "Is that so? Then I will be quick. I need more of those runed armors that can establish a shield. And as quick as possible at that."


    Starting at the image of Hanson with his ethereal eyes. He shook his head with hands crossed.


    "Impossible"


    "May I ask the reason why that:s the case?" Hanson asked, unwilling to give up.


    ''Although undead can''t tire, that shouldn''t mean that we can put into working 24/7!'' Danzel though.


    The real reason as to why he refused though was because those particr runes were just too inefficient in XP gain.


    Since [Rune of Force] practically took 2 times the time that required for him to carve an umon rune. Drawing them would make him now feel like wasting time.


    Since the novelty of a new ranked rune has now fully gone, it would be much better to get better on other runes.


    But as he couldn''t exin those reasons to Hanson, Danzel was forced toe up with something on the spot.


    ''What should I tell him...''


    Thinking of Hanson as him being his sponsor, Danzel thought of an excuse.


    "Since I worked and finished the rune under two weeks. I would like to try other ideas of runes that I have...If I were to continue making them it will stall my...research by a big amount." Danzel told his nonsense.


    He knew that if he stayed and did nothing, Hanson would force him or go right off to kill him. But if he were to sell him the idea of `a new product'' that could be as good as the preview''s big hit, that would be another story.


    And as Danzel predicted, Hanson swallowed the bait like a big fish.


    "A new rune you say...Alright, you can do that. But after you make another patch of those chest tes for another two weeks. I already told the client to deliver another patch in two weeks, so canceling that order will put me in a difficult position. Once the two weeks had passed, you could go on your research..."


    `Dammit!`


    "Are you really telling me to continue doing the same thing for another two weeks when I could be making better runes? At least give me something to motivate those bone hands of my."


    As Danzel realized that he could not avoid his fate anymore, he turned into looking for rewards.


    "Hmm, fine. What would you like to get for yourself? As long as it¡äs in my power and not too unreasonable I will get it for you." Hanson said after he thought about it.


    Keeping his only supplier happy in his mind was more worth than a few hundred coins.


    "If that¡äs the case, then I would like you to get some books for me."


    "What types of books?" Hanson tilted his head in confusion.


    "After staying silent for a moment Danzel answer.


    "Books about magic."

 Chapter 167 - Union Head

    Currently in Hanson office.


    As the conversation between Hanson and Danzel came soon to an end.


    Hanson de-activated the magic tool, he sighted out loud with a sigh right after.


    "Sigh...why does he have to make such a difficult request?" Hanson shook his head in defeat.


    At first, when he heard that he wanted to get some books about magic, he didn''t think much of it.


    Since out of all the younger kingdoms, the Arcana kingdom could be very well said to have the most advantage magical knowledge with more than one mage of the highest tier.


    The so-called kings of magic.


    Magus.


    With such beings controlling the nation with dozen more archmages.


    The topic of magic has been an advantage to an incredible level.


    Considering that fact, finding books with the topics of magic was although rather expensive for the everyday Joe, it wasn''t that of a rarity.


    Of course, the price went based on the topic in the book.


    With themonly known basic elements being on the cheaper side and the more rare ones such as dark, light or even dimension magic were way more than simply twice the price.


    But in the end, you just needed enough gold coins and connections to acquire such things.


    Daniel had enough of both of those.


    What made it difficult to follow that request though was the type of book that Danzel wanted.


    "How am I supposed to find something like this?" Hanson cursed to himself remembering what Danzel asked for him.


    One of the forbidden magic schools, a book containing information about Death magic.


    A Necronomicon.


    "It was already bad forming a partnership with an undead..." Hansonined internally.


    Though he didn''t regret his decision.


    His receiving more support and getting out of that rat hole he consider Nercana to be, couldn''t have been possible be achieving without Danzel.


    "I got to find a solution for thi-"


    As Hanson was making up ns for the future, hismunication device showed for a moment, taking him by surprise.


    "Who could it be? A client?"


    Taking the device to his hand, the next moment the voice of a manes out of the device.


    "Am I speaking with sir Hanson?" The man asked.


    "Yes, who might be asking?"


    One of the problems with the smallmunication enchantment in the crystal was that although it could receive multiple signals from different devices. Knowing who suddenly was calling you was a mystery to the receiver.


    "Excuse for calling so suddenly sir Hanson. I am under the orders of the Union Head order call your presence on the Headquarters in the Arcana Kingdoms capital. The Union head specifically said to drop all your current work and meet him as fast as possible in his office. That will be all."


    Right as the man stopped talking, the glow in the crystals faded, taking Hanson in surprise.


    "Wha- Did he really just hang up on me? By this voice, he must be the one attending the Union Head..."


    As he just swallowed a bitter pill down, Hanson grumbled to himself.


    `If the Union Head really called for me, then refusing might as well call my doom...¡ä


    With a huge pressure to be put on his shoulders, he removed all his ns of today including that of Danzels and grabbed hismunication crystal.


    "Hey Amatha, cancel all my previews ns of today, including the training of the kids. Something urgent happend."


    "Huh? Sir Hanson? What might you b-"


    Closing the device mid-Amatha sentence, the dark mana around went through his shadow and made them the next moment they appear toe in life.


    "Let¡äs hope it isn¡ät anything important..." Sinking slowly through the shadows, Hanson went out of the building where his office was and traveled in high speed through the shadows to a certain location.


    Going through the very shadows pass the people, those who saw the shadow thought that a bird flew above them, casting the shadow. Unbeknownst to them that someone capable to kill them with a blink of an eye was under their feet.


    Reaching a huge building owned by the Merchant Union, Hanson dodged all the guards without them realizing and passed through a hidden path by the small gaps that it had.


    With his shadow going down the stairs, Hanson''s shadow stopped right in front of a luxurious yet sturdy door that had many enchantments.


    Having his shadows rise up and form Hanson''s body, he went through one knee, staring to the ground.


    "Hanson Tenshikage, response to the Union''s head call..." Hanson said out loud with his gaze still staring at the ground.


    Only to receive silence in return.


    Yet Hanson still stayed in that position as he knew that the person behind the door must have heard him.


    Although he was someone who was about to reach the higher realm of power that was the 4th-tier who passed through the security that the headquarters of the union had offered, he knew his limits.


    Soon after, the door was opponent by an aged man wearing a butler uniform.


    Both the man and Hanson exchanged nces for a split second before Hanson went into the room.


    Once he did, a huge pressure befell on top of him by the sheer presence of the man in front of him.


    But that didn¡ät surprise Hanson, what surprised him was another weaker yet more malicious aura that wasing from another person who robes.


    "Thanks for responding to my call, Hanson. You mighte in." The man excluding the huge pressure said to Hanson who thetter followed.


    The Union Head, in other words, the one holding the most authority between hundreds of merchants who sold from everyday items to treasurers all around the world, except the abandonednds.


    Such a person would one expect to be more of a businessman wearing a fancy suit and fancy looks.


    But that couldn¡ät be more wrong.


    Instead, he was a man with a body that seemed to be sculpted after the god of war, refined muscles that seemed and were harder than most metals. The upper part of his body was fully exposed with few essories such as a ne with the highest tier of enchantment.


    Having sandy blonde hair, the man who was master of the huge merchant Union lowered his aura so that Hanson wouldn¡ät feel pressured.


    Hanson secretly thanked the Union head, as the closer he went, the more powerful the pressure was bing.


    Going beside the man with the brown-ck cloak, he was for a moment surprised by the man''s appearance.


    Hiding in the hoodie of the cloak, was an aged man''s face with brown skin.


    His bald head was covered with tattoos while his mouth was covered with ragged brown bandages. But the most eye-catching part was the man''s white pupils in his eyes, which was simrly seen by blind people.


    But his were crystal clear with and by what Hanson noticed, very well able to see. Although not sure how well.


    Seeing Hanson''s curiosity or wariness, the Union Head exined.


    "Hanson, this man here is a member of the `that¡ä council. As he did a favor of mine, I would like to hear his request. It¡äs about the guy that you found not long ago."


    Hearing that, Hanson got cold sweat running through his back.


    He observed the aged man from the bottom till his head while cursing internally.


    Not showing his distress, he turned around and looked at the one wearing a robe.


    "And what would that request be? As I already informed the Union Head of my situation, any information considering the identities of the runesmiths can¡ät be said...Unless the Union Head so wishes so, of course."


    Shaking his head, the man with the white eyes turned and shook his hand.


    "I ain¡ät interested into learning who made those runes. In the first ce, I don¡ät represent the council. I merely halted with my party here to resupply. That¡äs when I heard a rumor of a runesmith able to increase the total mana amount of a crystal. So my visit here is more to ask to put such a rune in that crystal."


    Appearing out of nowhere, a huge dark crystalrge enough to be of an adult''s head.


    "Would it be possible on this crystal?"


    Staring at the sheer size and quality of the crystal, Hanson gulped without realizing.


    "I...don¡ät know. I got to ask the runesmith first to confirm. And although he indeed knows how to make such a rune. He said that hecks practice of it, making the addition mana..pared to the size of this crystal seem nothing. After hearing that...do you still wish to ask him to put the runes?"


    "Yeah, as long as it¡äs finished this week and the rune is as the rumor goes. I don¡ät care how small the effect is."


    Hanson stared for a moment at the Union Head before taking the huge crystal.


    "Then...I would deliver as fast as possible..."


    Feeling a huge amount of mana inside the crystal, Hanson frowned.


    `This mana...¡ä


    After staying there to discuss the details with the Union Head and the cloaked figure.


    In the blink of an eye, two weeks of carving runes into chest tes had passed.

 Chapter 168 - Past Mistakes

    In a room where not a spark of light was to seen except the ominous dark green mana.


    Sitting in front of a bench, was an undead who movent his finger with an extreme focus on the top of the chest te in a way that almost seemed like a machine.


    Almost, that is.


    "..."


    Raising the chest te in front of him, Danzel nodded to himself.


    "That shall do..."


    [You received 8000 XP]


    cing the chest te to the side, Danzel summoned his status.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 40


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.30]


    Health: 8910/8910


    Mana: 2079/2079


    Attribute points: 40


    Attributes: Strength:192 Agility: 229 Intelligence: 189 Endurance: 161


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Swift Movement Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Prate Lv.1] [Mana Arms Lv.9] [Vanguards Defense Lv.5] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1] [Cursed de Lv.1] [Death Influence Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1] [Curse of Decay Lv.1] [Lesser Raise Undead Lv.1] [Reconstruct Body Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead that recently became a Wight. Although hecks knowledge about Death Magic. His Strength alone makes him much stronger than your usually 3rd-tier Undead and shows the behavior of a Lich. ]


    [XP: 985 025]


    "Almost one million..." Danzel said with a tired tone.


    Not only was he practically forced to make over 80 runes that were quite demanding on his focus, but he even failed to receive out of 10 runes his XP reward, as it didn¡ät fit the standard.


    That by itself was quite annoying as it made him feel like his efforts have been wasted.


    Of course, he wasn¡ät capable to get physically tired as he was one of the undead. But even he would get tired of constant failure and repeat the same thing.


    It practically took him two weeks to learn how to carve the rune correctly and two other weeks to continue the supply that Hanson wanted.


    In other words, he continues carved for almost a whole month with little to no breaks.


    And those breaks were mostly him doing nothing in the room!


    The only interesting thing that he has done was carve a rune into a huge crystal that Hanson sent him.


    Once he read what this crystal was, Danzel would have to lie if he didn¡ät consider taking it for himself. But he knew his limits.


    Although sad, it was a nice change of pace for him.


    His only regret was carving such an inferior rune on that crystal. To him, it felt like a child painting at top of a famous painting.


    He actually wanted to first raise the quality of the [Rune of Mana] that he could make before carving the rune of that big crystal.


    But as he was given a week of time, he could only carve the rune and continue the grind of the chest tes.


    Having done with those now, he focused on his status as currently, it was his only hope to get him out of here.


    "So expensive..."


    Staring at [Swift Movements] cost, Danzel had a bad predicament.


    For a single upgrade of it, it cost a total of 500 000 XP!


    Let alone the rising cost per upgrade, such a cost rise was terrifying huge!


    The worst of it all, Danzel knew that his other skill such as [Gale Mana de] would cost way morepared to this once it receives the third upgrade!


    Just imagining it makes him have a headache.


    He had realized long ago that his skillscked quite a bit, but the fight between those bounty hunters opened his eyes!


    Well, metaphorically speaking that is.


    The damage that his armor received back then would even be fatal to other none undead warriors.


    Saying that he brute-forced his way through the win against the bounty hunters.


    At least against the earth magic caster wouldn¡ät be really wrong.


    As he got sever all-time prated by earth needles...


    "How long will it take me to upgrade everything four times?" Daniel asked himself.


    With onlying up with that it will be a ton lot.


    "As of now a yea- No, maybe year''s..."


    His way of getting XP, although consistent for now.


    It was rather slow to say the less.


    s, unless he went into a genocide, then his fate wasn''t going to change any time soon.


    ''I don''tck time'' Standing up from his seat he made his way towards the door.


    Though he hated being shackled here making runes, he knew that he had to bide his time.


    ''Let''s forget about everything for now. If I remember right today is that day.''


    He let all his nning of upgrades and work that had to do behind and wore his small magic mask.


    Opening the door, the guards got startled for a moment before ncing at Danzel with wary.


    Edward who was one of the guards asked with a frown on his face.


    "...Is something wrong, Sir Danzel?"


    Without even bothering to give him a nce, Danzel walked right past the guards.


    "I will be going out for shorts, don''t follow me."


    The moment those words came out of the masked figure, the guards got suddenly dense.


    "Sir...we can''t. Our order-"


    "Stop." Danzel stopped Edward word a deep voice.


    "I told you once already. Don''t make me repeat myself." Walking down the stairs, Danzel continued.


    "You see...I hate those making the same mistake. If I was trying to escape, Hanson would have known by now from the contact."


    The guards wanted to chase after him, but the feeling of Danzel killing intent made them halt.


    Fighting him here would only bring attention to the building.


    Seeing Danzel slowly going out of the building, Edward grabbed hismunication device.


    "Yea?"


    "S-Sir Hanson, we got a situation..."


    ***


    Walking towards the streets of the capital, Danzel scanned the area, noticing that it was way different from the time he came here.


    Streets were bustling with merchants selling rare and exotic food while dancers using magic were giving performances to the people.


    What surprised him the most were the small children that wearing a simr, but a way more shabby mask than him.


    ''So annoying''


    Feeling the gazes upon him, he hastened his steps.


    He chose a path where it didn''t have many people and had some long stairs going up.


    Following the stairs, he found himself somewhere where he could see most of the houses and a statue of a man wearing robes there.


    "Much better here..." Sighing in relief of theck of people, Danzel observer the city from above.


    "Hmm...that''s the Fire Festival, huh?" He said to himself.


    Personally, he knew only that they celebrated theing of the new year.


    Why it had the name Fire Festival he did not know.


    "Taking a break outside might have been a bad idea with so many...people," Danzel said as he started at the city.


    It was currently nighttime, so the sight of many lights illuminating the whole capital was sure a nice sight for Danzel to see.


    But what surprises him the most was what happens next.


    Flying to the air, blue and red light flew in the sky.


    *Booom!


    *Booom!


    With the lights exploding like fireworks, the sky was illuminated by those lights.


    "Those have to be spell." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Though he didn''t the reason as to why they ended such a spell simr to the fireball that once roasted his pure bones.


    Danzel couldn''t help but admit.


    "It''s just like back then..."


    shbacks of how he once left the dark cave and to be engulfed by the sunlight for the first time aftering out of the cursedke.


    The sight before him was as beautiful as back then.


    ''I should even cut all connections with the humans once I left Berum.'' As Danzel thought that.


    His shadow that was being cast by the lights in the air seemed to be alive.


    No, they were alive.


    As if multiple eyes were watching Danzel from the shadows.


    In the middle of the shadow, a figure wearing ck gauntlets was formed by the shadows themselves.


    Turning his head at the growing Hanson, Danzel grumbled to himself.


    ''To think that I would do the same mistake twice.''


    "I just wanted to see the culture of you people, but I had enough of his sight, I will being back" Turning his back from the lights, Danzel followed where Hanson was going.


    ''Just wait. It''s just a matter of time. Unbeknownst to you, that powerless undead will soon....''

 Chapter 169 - Long Time No See

    In an underground training area...


    The room that was supposed to be litten up well from small mana crystals of the wall was now instead filled with living shadows dancing around and shing to each other like a whirlwind.


    At first nce, that sight will look like some dark mist.


    But if one were to look closer in, they would be able to recognize that this mist was taking the form of a humanoid figure.


    To be more precise, there were two groups of shadows with one having a smaller build than the bigger ones.


    Discussing them otherwise with theirck of feature would be almost impossible.


    Almost, that is.


    The strong would imminently realize a feature that themon people couldn¡ät even hope to notice.


    That was that the bigger shadows were a level above the smaller shadows.


    And the one controlling the smaller shadows had already noticed his disadvantage.


    With a hole opening from the living shadows, a figure wearing ck gauntlets together with a metal mask on his face dived to the shadows that weren¡ät his.


    The figure''s legs also were covered with simr dark boots covering till his knees, with the rest of his body to be a tight yet light armor with the color of dark and silver, allowing him to freely move without hindering his movements.


    That made the figure look quite intimidating to look at as even if they tried to look at his eyes, the opposite party would feel like they were staring at the abyss and being stared back at.


    That was because they were.


    The shadows that were about to pouch at him were swiftly recalled under the true shadow of a tall figure with simr gauntlets.


    *Thagh! Thagh! Thagh!


    Sounds of the metal gauntlets shing echoed through the whole training grounds!


    Each punch of the smaller figure was closely followed by either another punch aiming for vital parts or a hand of shadow appeared once in a while to put on the pressure on the taller figure.


    But even though all that, each and every strike was blocked with a solemn look of the other party without showing much difficulty.


    "Tch..."


    As the sh continued, a hand of a shadow appeared under the taller man''s feet.


    *Wseeen!


    Activating some sort of mechanism on the gauntlets, the extracted de came out.


    As if copying him, the shadow also pulled out an extracted de from the gauntlets.


    Both him the shadow pushed their des forward intending to kill their opponent.


    Yet...


    "Too slow."


    With a half-turn of his body, he devasted the shadow with a kick while grabbing the extracted de and pulling him forward.


    With a swift movement, he put his palm on the short figure''s shoulder and pushed lightly.


    *Crack!


    "Tch!"


    Having his one arm dislocated, he called multiple shadows to jump at the tall man.


    "Wasteful movements..." Saying that he made a quick work of those shadows with just his gauntlets alone.


    However fast he finished the shadows though, it was just enough for an iron masked figure to retreat and fix his arm.


    Seeing that, the tall man was about to charge forward before he halted to his steps.


    Looking above him, four transparent balls glowing with purple light of the size of a football came falling down right at his location!


    "Mhmm, well times, but..." Jumping back, he dodges the purple balls a few seconds before they fall.


    Once the balls met the ground, a small crater appear, as if gravity itself got heavier for a second.


    Unbeknownst to him though, the magic caster responsible for the purple balls nned the man to take this action.


    As the tall man got his footing back, a bright red light appeared behind him.


    "Take that!!!!"


    With red scales covering his hand, another figure brought out raging mes on his fist.


    And like a cannon, the mes shoot direct to the tall man, who actually was Hanson.


    "If you n to ambush me, then don''t tell out loud. Haven''t I already taught you that?" Hanson said as he dodge the mes.


    *Boom!


    Sadly, as the mes were shot out and Hanson dodge them instead of blocking them.


    Some of the equipment turned to melt.


    ''Sigh...those were expensive.'' Sighing internally, Hanson put an end to their training.


    Gathering the iron mask who was Kayn, the magic caster Anna and Marcus who shoot the mes together, Hanson nodded satisfied.


    "Well done today. You guys improved."


    Pointing one of the time, he started to lecture them.


    "Kayn, your talent and battle sense are what many would like to have. Your hard work also impresses me. But your w is that you put too much on top of your shoulders, not realizing that without help, failure wille to stop to advantage."


    "Anna, I am impressed of you capable to wield such magic and forming a n around it. What is keeping your ns to not working though is that you ept the very best of everyone."


    "And now you Marcus..." Staring at Marcus, Handon sighted.


    "You got to work ongoing for the kills instead of a shy big move. Doing that would make you as much of an enemy as your enemies. And don''t forget to no yell when you ambush someone..."


    pping his hand, Hanson dered the end of their training.


    "Hey, Kayn. Are your arm alright?" Anna asked with concern.


    Taking off the iron mask, Kayns eyes turned back to normal.


    "It''s alright...the pain has already faded away." Kayn said.


    "Seriously? When I heard that crack I got gossips through my body." Marcus said.


    Having finished their schedule of today, the trio went towards the door to take their leave like they were used to.


    "Wait, who told you guys to leave? I still got something to tell you guys." Hanson said with a frown on his face.


    Turning around with confused looks Kayn asked.


    "What is it?"


    Staying silent for a minute and serving them, Hanson crossed his arms together.


    "I decided to put you guys into work for now on..."


    Hearing that, they all froze.


    Work? Not training?


    "By work you mean..."


    "Exactly what it sounds like. Your training shall be continued so don''t worry. It''s also to gain experience with tough...partners."


    Saying no more, Hanson pulled a book cover in a cloth highly together and gave them to Kayn.


    "From now on, you guys will guard a certain person in that address. As for this book give it to the man that you got t guard. I already informed the other staff so don''t worry and gain some...experience.


    Taking and starting at the book nkly, they nodded their heads.


    "As you say, Master Hanson" bowing their head, the three quickly left the build and walked in the roads.


    "Work, huh? Doesn''t sound fun at all." Marcusined to himself.


    "Don''t be like that, after what Master Hanson had done to us. Rejecting will be disrespectful." Kayn said.


    With Anna using the map, the trio soon found their destination.


    "So is this the ce? Many asked as he stared at the building.


    " Let''s go in and ask."


    Walking to the receptionist, Kayn asked if they were in the right ce.


    "Oh~you guys look much younger than I had expected. Don''t worry. You can go ahead and give " him" the item he seeks.


    The first confused at first, but after 15 minutes they managed to walk on the stairs without the other guard''s lunch any attacks on them.


    "So you guys are ones..." Edward said with a tired voice.


    "May we please enter the room? That item that I am holding is ordered by Master Hanson to give it to the behind that door."


    "Sigh...what was Hanson thinking in sending you guys..." Mumbling to himself, Edward opponent up the door, leading to a bad light-up space.


    The three of them stared curiosity around as their mutation was giving them better eyesight in dark ces.


    The room was quite vast by itself, filled with books and various weapons on the side.


    Even weird chains folded on a small ball that was mostly metal and had small parts of ss.


    But the very first that all three notices upon entering were an ominous kind of mana.


    "This is...dead mana, right Anna?" Kayn said with a frown, being inside here felt as if you were short in air.


    It was uncountable


    "What happens here?


    Entering the room, they wanted to look on the crafting branch and see if they might find something.


    But before they could even realize it, Anna who was holding the book was suddenly surprised by a shadow casting on top of her and... A sword right about to cut her throat.


    " I believe that''s my..." A deep voice sounded, triggering some sort of PTSD on Kayn.


    Turning around to see if his ears were ying tricks on them.


    When he saw the figure, he was shocked.


    Danzel rook the book away stared at the trio intensely.


    "Hmm, you guys are the new guards that I¡äve heard of..."


    Putting the sword away from her neck, Danzel revealed a grin.


    "Long time no see... You three.."


    ''It''s him!'' The three thought at the same time.


    With shock still remaining in their eyes, Danzel was surprised that they were still alive somehow.


    With his grin getting bigger and bigger, Danzel asked them.


    "How longhas it been...?" Walking past them and putting the book to his working table, Danzel said as if he suddenly remembered.


    "Right....Around 2 years, if I am recalling right"

 Chapter 170 - Efforts Of Two Years

    Flipping the book cover and reading a few lines, Danzel nodded satisfied.


    "That should keep me busy for a while..."


    Closing the book, Danzel nced with his hollow eyes on the frozen trio.


    "So what are you three waiting for? Get out already." Danzel said to the three.


    Thetter ignored him and looked at him with a frown on their face.


    "That voice..." Kayn mumbled to himself.


    He clearly knew that very voice.


    The voice that kept repeating in his nightmare both scared him and gave him confidence.


    The responsibility that he had on other lives and how he should ept being what he was.


    Remember the tall figure that confidently said those things and literally threw him like a rag a few meters away.


    That alone shook Kayn¡äs mentality, who was currently only a 17 years old teenager.


    But the most rememberable thing about that figure was the fact that he was undead.


    Not only was the idea of living with your family at the same ce where an undead who were famous to hate the living was. The sole idea that he thought of himself as a monster and the undead, Danzel as a person made him change his mind if only a little bit.


    But his opinion of one thing didn¡ät change.


    He, Anna and Marcus found him terrifying.


    Though in their training they were a few times where they fought some skeletons so that they know how to fight them a Skeletor type undead.


    `This ispletely differentpared to our fight.¡ä Anna thought to herself.


    The seer pressure that gave out a feeling of dread that Danzel was giving waspletely differentpared to the skeleton''s unending hate of life.


    To her defense, the feeling of danger that she was feeling was amplified from the dead mana in the room.


    Undead generally were very territory by nature alone and were rarely found living among the living


    With the dead mana being in a way infections to the living that could potentially harm them.


    Being inside a room full of dead mana would make one''s body subconsciously send warning signals.


    That, and simply because they were standing before a much superior entity.


    Soon though their fear disappeared.


    `Right, we don¡ät have to be scared of him. We trained tirelessly through the 2 years and have increased our strength enough to face Master Hanson. Facing against must be much easierpared to our master!¡ä


    The three thought at the same time.


    But such though were quickly swept away by their purposes of being here in the first ce.


    That was, to be guards for that Undead in front of them.


    Unfortunately for Kayn and Anna, Marcus wasn¡ät the same opinion.


    "Why-"


    Before he even had the chance to finish his sentence, two dark green hands appeared behind his back.


    As it was so sudden, Marcus couldn''t stop the hand gripping his armor.


    The next moment, he was dragged towards the door.


    Even with the resistance that Marcus had tried to give, he was helplessly thrown headfirst out of the room.


    "I didn''t ask for you guys'' opinion..."


    Edward who saw this by side put a wet smile on his face.


    Taking that as an offensive action, both Kayn and Anna went readied to fight.


    But Danzel wasn''t having that.


    Commanding the dark green arms to fly at the magic caster, Anna was unsure what to do with the two arms flying directly at her.


    As every spell that she learn that could possibly serve best would take too long, she began doing what any other caster would do if forced into closebat.


    That was swinging her staff!


    "Take that!"


    Swinging her staff at one of the arms, it hit!


    s, the staff was brushed off like it was nothing and continued flying at her.


    As she was too close with Marcus, Kayns shadows tried to reach out and destroy the hand but were toote.


    Gripping Annas cloak, the dark green arms threw her like a sack of potatoes outside just like Marcus.


    "Kyaagh!"


    Kayn sighed in relief seeing the two just being thrown outwithout any harm if you were to ignore Anna sitting on Marcus'' back.


    Soon after, the hands began to move in his direction, but Kayn gave them a cold nce.


    Once they got close he struck the two hands with a smooth movement without batting sweat.


    Danzel who saw that didn¡ät show much of a reaction.


    "So? What are you waiting for? Get out."


    Hearing that Kayn contemted if he should do as he said or try to fight him.


    Having fought with Hanson who he heard was the peak of a 3rd-tier person and able to exchange blows, Kayn was really curious about how strong his fear really was.


    Seeing the determination in Kayn¡äs eyes building up, Danzel scoffed.


    "So dump..." Danzel said as he walked towards Kayn.


    Kayn''s body bleed dark mana which fell to the ground and created two shadows of his.


    But as soon as they formed their form Danzel dashed as fast as he was capable, making him seem like he appeared in an instant to Kayn.


    With wide-open eyes, hemanded his shadows to attack Danzel but saw no sess as they got destroyed with a punch from Danzel.


    "!!!"


    Feeling the danger ahead, Kayn draw his extracted de out went to prate Danzel''s head.


    "I see..." Moving to the side, Danzel gripped Kayns throat with the speed that Kayn couldn¡ät follow.


    "You guy¡äs haven¡ät learned your lesson after two whole years"


    Raising him to the air, Kayn struggled to remove the hand that was grabbing his throat firmly.


    "Let go...!"


    "You guys are quite lucky, if it weren¡ät for Hanson annoying me about his students of his, then I would have killed you on the spot."


    Throwing him to the door beside the struggling Marcus, he summoned his Dark green mana hands that began closing slowly the door.


    "I got to say though, you guys really are lucky to be saved by the same man."


    "Anyway, next time any of youe in without my consent, expect to say goodbye to that life of yours."


    *Baahm!


    Holding his throat to lessen the pain, Kayn nced at the door somewhat depressed.


    `We weren¡ät able to do anything...¡ä Kaynmmed internally.


    Unbeknownst to him and the other two, they misunderstood something.


    Compared to Hanson who was holding back for the sake of training them and Danzel who was going full out the moment he wanted something to be done.


    They never stood a chance.


    ***


    Having the trash that consistent of overconfident teenagers out of his room, Danzel went back to his table and looked at the book that he had ordered for a long time ago.


    The first time he asked for it was around 6 months ago. But only now did Hanson allow for it toe to him.


    Sitting down in his seat, Danzel opened the book with a grin on his face.


    "Hehehe~This is it!" Danzelughed, making a rather intimidating picture of an undeadughing.


    Such a picture could bepared to how magic casters finally break through their research.


    It was neither a grimoire holding ancient spells nor a forbidden one.


    It was simple, a book containing most of the map of the world!


    Be it the new kingdoms like the Begum Kingdom and the Arcana Kingdom or the still remaining old kingdoms, they were detailed drawn for Danzel to see!


    Even the parts where the map had unidentified parts drawn in it, there were still the outlines out there to see!


    "Though it wasn¡ät that bad...I endured long enough."


    He had been stuck here with limited freedom for two whole years, carving runes for Hanson for that long. Although he learned a few new skills and received much more experience in handling the runes to the point where creating [Well-done] runes wasn¡ät as rare as it was back then and the resources to continuously farm XP was nice.


    Danzel strived for freedom.


    Although the dead mana in the air made his stay much morefortable.


    Being inside the room made him remember how he was in the cave while at times hearing whispers of someone or something.


    If it weren¡ät for the fact that he turned reading books into his hobby, then him going mad would very well be possible.


    "Finally, I can n out getting out of his ce..." Danzel said as he stared at his status.


    So that he doesn¡ät alert Hanson in some sort of way, he only leveled himself a few times together with some of the skills and runes that he needed to make for Hanson.


    Leading him to hoard most of his XP to his storage.


    In a way, he was loaded.


    "I can finally spend all my efforts of those two years of my effort." Staring at the very bottom of his status, Danzel couldn¡ät help but get excited.


    [XP: 90 880 425]


    "Now, with what should I start with...."

 Chapter 171 - Soul Skill

    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 45


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.30]


    Health: 10010/10010


    Mana: 2200/200


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 225 Agility: 300 Intelligence: 200 Endurance: 181


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery]


    Skills: [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv.9] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Swift Movement Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Prate Lv.9] [Hand of Mana Affinity Lv.9] [Vanguards Defense Lv.5] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1] [Cursed de Lv.1] [Death Influence Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1] [Curse of Decay Lv.1] [Raise Undead Lv.8] [Reconstruct Body Lv.1] [Sense of the Damned Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Undead that recently became a Wight. Although hecks knowledge about Death Magic. His Strength alone makes him much stronger than your usually 3rd-tier Undead and shows the behavior of a Lich. ]


    [XP: 90 880 425]


    "Yes, let¡äs do it as nned..."


    Though the two years, although he restrained his spending quite a lot, that didn¡ät mean he didn¡ät upgrade himself at all or didn¡ät learn anything at all.


    One example is the passive skill [Sense of the Damned Lv.1] that he learned from a few books that Hanso gave him about Magic.


    Even though the skill sounded quite intimidating, the overall effect could be seen as rathercking. As all it did was able to sense if someone was dead or not. With undead included too.


    The range of the skill was sitting at the pitiful range of 5 meters.


    From a two years state point, learning a single spell would be seen as quite pitiful from a magic caster perspective.


    The reason for that was simple Danzel, at the end of all, had little of an actual foundation built on his knowledge of magic.


    And unlike magic scrolls that had the entire spell made for any caster to cast by following the instruction, the magic books he got were more theory-based and how the spell is supposed to be shaped by your mana and so on.


    Although Danzel was quite depressed about it, he found it as a chance to finally build his knowledge of it.


    But midway through his research, he quickly found out that...


    He didn¡ät understand a single thing.


    At one point he even asked Hanson for advice.


    And Hanson''s answers were as obvious as it could be...


    Hecked the foundation.


    As he described it, he was a self-taught magic caster.


    Without any guidance from another magic caster, learning even the basic spells would be difficult.


    And with his current situation...


    That suggestion was shot down.


    `It¡äs much easier spending XP`


    Although he didn¡ät like the idea of being to relying on using XP as a spell.


    The effectiveness of doing so was apparent.


    And currently, he knew where to spend it.


    [Prate Lv.9]: 50 000 XP


    It is one of the few skills he levels up between the years for this moment.


    And the sole reason for doing so was...


    Yes, that was to sacrifice it


    [Prate level has increased from Lv. 9 to 10]


    [The skill Prate has reached the modification stage!]


    [Chooce 2 of the given option for the skill to focus on]


    [Overall improveme-]


    ...


    Danzel ignored all the given options and went for two particr ones.


    [Soul Affinity]


    [Dead Mana Affinity]


    Although he liked it to call it a sacrifice.


    It was more of an experiment.


    Although the skill [Prate] was quite good on delivering of power.


    Danzel swordy was more in the line of shing than piercing, which made the skill awkward for him to use.


    And as it was of his few activation skills, using it as an ingredient to see what skill woulde out was quite attractive.


    As of why he wanted to use those 2binations were...


    For the upgrade cost of course.


    [The modification for the skill Prate has been choosen]


    [Prate Lv. 10 bes Mortal Reminder Lv. 1]


    "Hmm, let¡äs see if I ruined the skill or not..."


    Pressing at his new skill icon, the description...surprised him.


    [Mortal Reminder]: Make being life though a piercing reminder of their mortality. Each wound you create with the use of a weapon leaves a mark that can be activated to summon an illusion of your being, piercing the enemy with the same weapon on the mark. Depending on mental strength it can be lethal.


    Reading the description of the skill, Danzel could hardly understand what it does.


    But as he already learned the skill, the knowledge in printed in his mind make things made sense.


    "Quite interesting..."


    It was indeed interesting how the spell worked.


    The dead mana left a mark that worked like a curse as a tracker for that illusion of short to find his target.


    ''It isn''t that bad...I think.'' Danzel through uncertainty.


    Putting that aside, he went out to upgrade another of his skills.


    [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery level has increased from Lv. 9 to 10]


    [The skill Intermediate Weapon Mastery has reached the modification stage!]


    ...


    [Overall improvement]


    [User Weapon Focus]


    [Dead Mana Affinity]


    [Soul Affinity]


    Taking a look at the option, Danzel couldn''t he wasn¡ät confused.


    He could somewhat imagine what the first and second were. But the affinity option didn¡ät make any sense in Danzels''s mind.


    After all the skill was about how to use one''s weapon.


    While the overall [Overall improvement] would make him gain better knowledge of how to handle weapons and [User Weapon Focus] would probably improve the weapons that he mainly used far better than the [Overall improvement], those being his shield and longsword.


    But what knowledge would the affinity give him?


    He didn¡ät know, but he sure was willing to try.


    "As I am undead, taking that affinity shouldn¡ät be that bad."


    Choosing [User Weapon Focus] and [Dead Mana Affinity], new windows started to pop.


    [The modification for the skill Intermediate Weapon Mastery has been choosen]


    [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery Lv. 10 bes Death Guarding Swordsmanship Lv. 1]


    [Death Guarding Swordmanship]: Your ways of using a shield and a sword have been severely improved. Influenced by your affinity, you managed to mix dead mana into your swordsmanship too. Your skill that both use dead mana or a shield/sword will have their effectiveness by 10% improved.


    Once that notification appeared in front of him so did the knowledge flow inside his mind and improve the knowledge that he had for the sword and shield together of how he should passive channel dead mana on those two without wasting his mana.


    If he had to describe it it was like making his shield and sword a part of his own body, capable to hold the dead mana.


    Just for that, he was satisfied with the oue of the skill.


    Although he wouldn¡ät be able to use other weapons as efficiently as before, for him the sword and the shield were all that he needed.


    An upgrade costing only 9400 XP. it was well worth it.


    For a skill that he generally used in his fights, it was long pushed back on his priority list.


    Mostly because his opponents were not much better than him with handling the weapons, except for Hanson who could easily see past his attacks.


    Theck of his stats also yed a big role in losing on the few spars that he requested from Hanson.


    Another skill he wanted to upgrade but was hesitant about was his [Undeath Corruption Lv.1].


    The reason he was so hesitant is that he was unsure if he would gain another talent or not.


    The skill reduction cost was a must if he was going to the road of only death affinity skills. The free attribute points and the free stats that it gave were just nice to have.


    But the talent [Superior Undead] was among his talents, one of the best, as it was always active.


    Another reason he didn¡ät want to upgrade it was because he would begin to release more dead mana to the air.


    Although he could control it for better when he upgraded, that was only temporary.


    It was like having the timer of a bomb and a nuke.


    Although the nuke would go out muchter in time than the bomb, the damage that it will release to his surroundings was anything but pretty.


    At least for the living that is.


    With that in mind, Danzel only nned to increase it only after he got away or was in a difficult spot in case it gives him another broken talent.


    His n currently was to upgrade his skills that still sitting on without any upgrades into at least the second evolution of said skill.


    As they there price was generally low, it would really be cheap for him if he didn¡ät do at least that much.


    But his remaining XP was reserved for his Level.


    He really needed to increase his attributes if he wanted to have any hopes to get out of here.


    Escaping meant escaping Hanson, who was many times stronger than him.


    Fancy skills and spells could only do that much.


    Against absolute power, only strength simr to said power could have any hope to win or at least escape.


    And as the level upgrade was really expensive, wasting XP was a big no-no.


    The few skills that he had still at level one were the following...


    [Leap Lv.1] [Silent Steps Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1] [Curse of Decay Lv.1] [Reconstruct Body Lv.1] [Sense of the Damned Lv.1] [Death Influence Lv.1].


    Some of those were clearly better than others by arge amount.


    Compared to his [Curse of Decay], the others looked rather...bad.


    The other was more situational.


    And honestly, Danzel needed only three for his escape.


    Them being...


    [Leap Lv.1]: 2500 XP + 300 per upgrade.


    [Silent Steps Lv.1]: 2500 XP + 300 per upgrade.


    [Curse of Decay Lv.1]: 10 000 XP + 1000 per Upgrade.


    Although the other skills were didn¡ät cost much to upgrade, Danzel was still unwilling to waste his XP on them as cheap as this sounds.


    The first two skills made only sense to Danzel if he wanted to escape.


    As for the curse, the effect was too strong to pass out.


    Tapping on the upgrade option, several notifications started appearing with the simr pain of knowledge being printed inside his mind.


    "Ugh..."


    ...


    [Leap level has increased from Lv. 9 to 10]


    [Silent Steps level has increased from Lv. 9 to 10]


    [Curse of Decay Lv. 9 to 10]


    [The skill Leap level reached the maximum level!]


    [The skill Leap-]


    [The skill Silent Steps-]


    [The skill Curse of Decay-]


    Ignoring the ongoing notification, Danzel nced at the end result.


    The skill [Leap] turned into the skill [High jump] which generally only improved the effectiveness of his previous form.


    [Silent Steps] became [Presentless steps], lowering his presence of being and his steps to be silent if he is so willed.


    They were nice and all, but the one skill he was most satisfied with was the [Curse of Decay].


    Or rather...


    [Curse of Scourge]: A vicious curse. Upon cast into a living being, the target experiences exaggerated decay with their nerves too simplified to receive more than usual pain. Even if the part of the enemy''s body has fully decayed, the curse will make it so that the target will still feel the pain in his decayed nerves.


    "Truly vicious..." Danzelmended himself.


    Forcing his enemies to still feel the pain of their decayed bodies...


    It could only be described as a vicious thing to do.


    Danzel though wasn¡ät going to avoid using that curse just because it¡äs got much more gruesome than before.


    If the pain of his enemies helped him win against them, then he very well would use it.


    "Now with those things finished."


    With his remaining 90 722 025 XP remaining and all his core skills upgraded, only one thing remained for him to upgrade


    [Level]: 500 000 XP + 50 000 per upgrade


    "I hate it even after looking at it again..."


    The cost was stupidly high that Danzel at first didn¡ät want to invest in.


    But as this was his only way to increase his attributes efficiently.


    The XP that he stored through out the two years, started to dwindle at a fast pace...


    [Level has increased from Lv. 45 to 46]


    [Level has increased-]


    As the notification started toe one after the other.


    Danzel power started rising into one that of a peaks strength of a 3rd-tier.

 Chapter 172 - Danzel′s Present

    Danzel currently was in a state of nostalgia.


    `When was thest time that I felt like this?¡ä He asked himself.


    Thinking back again, they were few instances where he could think of such a simr feeling overwhelming him.


    But this time the feeling was two times- No, maybe three times greater from back then.


    It was to the point that it brought forth the euphoria-like feeling of evolution.


    But this feeling didn¡äte from reaching the point of evolving into a higher being.


    It came from receiving overwhelming power.


    [Level has been increasing from 94 to 95]


    [Strength Increased by 4, Agility Increased by 4, Intelligence Increased by 2, Endurance Increased by 4]


    [You gained 3 Attribute points]


    After leveling for a whole of 50 levels, Danzel stored XP was in a matter of minutes, just like that spend.


    "Haha~Those two damned years...have been all worth it!" Danzel said out loud whileughing at his newfound power.


    His mind became all that much clearer while his body felt light a feather that could crash iron with just his hand.


    He somewhat expected it, but theorizingpared to feeling the actual effect was a different thing.


    Even if he tried he couldn¡ät exin how something like that felt.


    The feeling of suddenly gaining almost double your power was after all, unimaginable.


    "Status!" Danzel said, disregarding however loud he was.


    If he didn¡ät see it, he would think that all this was a lie.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 95


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.30]


    Health: 21010/21010


    Mana: 3300/300


    Attribute points: 150


    Attributes: Strength: 425 Agility: 500 Intelligence: 300 Endurance: 381


    ...


    [Remark: A Young Wight who almost reaches his peak of power! Worthy to be called a freak among his fellow undead. It has little experience with Death Magic, but still enough for others to recognize you as a Wight. But because of your past, being mistaken as a Lesser Lich isn¡ät impossible.]


    "It¡äs really almost double the amount..." Danzel said, realizing that he just yelled.


    `If I were to evenly distribute my attribute points, then I would even gain more than twice my original strength.¡ä Danzel thought as he just noticed the remaining attribute points.


    What finally turned him down from his excitement was him reading the remark.


    At first, he praised him and then started to insult him...


    `I am distracting myself


    Seeing that it wasn¡ät time to waste time like this, he imminently went and spend the remaining attribute points to where it would help him most.


    And that attribute would be...


    [Agility Increased by 150]


    Feeling his body bing so light, made Danzel feel weird.


    Usually, his attributes would be bnced except his intelligence which was obvious why.


    Now though, that was no more.


    He pulled his longsword out and swung a few times at speeds that he wasn¡ät ustomed to.


    "It¡äs indeed weird...but not to that it can¡ät be controlled." Danzel said as he sheathed his longsword to his sheath.


    There wasn¡ät anything to control actually.


    It was his body after all.


    The only thing he needed was time to practice and get used to his speed.


    And he had to do that fast.


    "I only got so much time before my n goes to action...until then I got to run away." Danzel said.


    Although he called it a n though, it was more like him running away from the Arcana Kingdom, out of the grasp of the Merchants Union.


    Of course, he wasn¡ät going just going to burst the door open with just his newfound power.


    From those remaining years, he didn¡ät sit there and do anything other than carving runes.


    He supplied himself with many toys that would make breaking out of his building easier.


    Those toys were considered as his research supplies, which were being delivered by Hanson to him.


    And Danzel was sure, that him using those supplies as he nned to, would really surprise the guards and Hanson.


    But out of all those things, the biggest time invest wasn¡ät for the toys he prepared.


    No.


    It was for a special present that he prepared to give Hanson.


    Summoning dozens of armors by his now improved spatial ring of storage, he put a grin to his face.


    "If I remember right, my next delivery should be in three days. And based on what Edward told me, those armors would be used in the fifth day."


    Taking a look at the armor, Danzel picked another armor without any runes engraved in it and started to carve a rare rune that he got through the two years.


    At first, when he got that rune, he cursed as to how useless it was.


    Now though, he carved that very rune in every one of those armors.


    Those chest tes were supposed to have the [Rune of Force] carved in them, which bestowed a one-time use self-activating barrier.


    That was the order that Hanson ced on Danzel.


    `This will be my present to you, Hanson.¡ä


    ***


    The war between the kingdoms of Berum and Arcana had been for years being a stalemate.


    Even if there were times when one of them conquer a part of thend of the other kingdom. The other party would soon reim it back or take anothernd of their opponent.


    That was the norm of the current war.


    The reason why such a back and forth didn''t change was that both kingdoms didn''t go all out.


    In such fights mostly soldiers of the 3rd-tier or below were able to participate.


    Any higher would break the unwritten rule that those parties decide to.


    Although that rule was being broken from now and then by beings of a higher tier.


    An actual death of such a being hasn''t happened for years.


    As nurturing a 4th-tier was miles harder than making an elite soldier of the 3rd-tier.


    Wasting such trump cards for a bit ofnd wasn''t worth it.


    Making that both armies were generally even with the kingdom of Berum being slightly stronger than Arcana cause of their Life Force being more popr in the public with priests of the holy element taking care of the surviving soldiers.


    But that advantage was shaken two recent years.


    A personal of the 5th-tier, the Saintess was removed and called a heretic instead by the pope, splitting the church in two and creating confusion on the ranks of the church.


    Not only that, their enemy created an inhumane weapon that neither feared nor felt pain.


    At least that''s how they saw it, in the current battlefield that was taking ce.


    "K-Kghhhh!"


    Their arms were ckened with fingers of the form of a scythe''s torn the flesh of the Berum soldiers together with the armor apart with a rageful expression.


    Although they asionally they also killed a few of the arcana soldiers.


    Those monsters didn''t care.


    That fact alone builder a terrifying image on the Berum soldier''s head.


    Making their morale fall apart once that monstrosity came at them.


    The most terrifying was that they weren''t small in numbers.


    Around 100 such beings holding the power of a 3rd-tier ravaged through the battlefield.


    And another annoying part of those monsters that the generals of the Berum found most annoying was the equipment that those beings had.


    Armors that had a barrier!


    t first when they learned of that, they thought that arcana was carelessly throwing their resources to create such enchantments.


    But once they inspect the corpse of such a monster, they soon realized they were wrong.


    Those weren''t enchantments!


    Those were runes!


    Meaning that those monsters gained a free life at no further cost of the Arcana kingdom!


    For that reason alone, it made facing those monsters incredibly annoying and not worth dealing with.


    But letting them kill their groups wasn''t eptable either.


    "Dammit! Another wave of those Arcanic Mutants is dimming our wave" Themander responsible for this battlefield on the Berum side cursed out loud.


    Though the recent year''s he faced many of those arcanic mutants.


    And he knew how annoying it was to deal wi them.


    "Quick! Prepare artillery magic on those things! We can''t let them go any further!" They generallymanded with a hoarse voice.


    "But Commander..! Our man will be hit!" The mage responsible for delivering orders said in protest.


    "Doesn''t matter! If those things don''t do, we will lose many more men than we will kill ourselves! Ry the message! That''d an order!"


    Clenching his hand as hard as he could, the mage rid the mage with a heavy voice.


    Soon after, numerous spells flew through the air.


    Soon after, the spell fell on the Berum soldiers alongside the Arcanic Mutants.


    Cries of grief and pain together with the sounds of explosion filled the battlefield.


    Making everyone who wasn''t hit get a hold sweat.


    "It isn''t over! Send another valley of spells on the same spot! They aren-"


    As the general of the Berum was about to finish hismand, he was stunned at what he saw.


    "They...died?"


    Starting at the corpse of the Arcanic mutants, he was confused.


    Were they not supposed to survive with their barrier?


    Both generally of the Arcana and Berum though.


    But the Arcana got quickly over it andmanded his units to charge, noticing the confusion on their enemy.


    As the soldiers of Arcana were approaching the enemy army with the arcanic mutants lying ahead.


    A sudden change happend.


    The armor that the corpses Arcanic Mutants wore brightened with an ominous dark light.


    The dark light formed a circle in the middle of the chest te and the next moment the dark light.


    No.


    The dead mana formed a spike in the middle of the circle outwards.


    Going down, the dead mana spike pierced the corpse of the arcanic mutant through their chest until it was fully absorbed in their body.


    But as the soldiers of both noticed that anomaly taking ce.


    It was toote.


    Standing back from the dead, the hundred or so arcanic mutant screamed with hate and rage much stronger when there we were alive.


    And now, the former known arcanic mutants became undead who only saw hate for the living.


    They became ghouls.


    "GWAAAAGH!


    "GWEEEEGH!


    "GHEEAHH!

 Chapter 173 - Escape

    Sitting in the chair where he spend two whole years working there, Danzel stared intensely at the Sun Timer.


    Once he saw the image fall into the new hour, Danzel stood up.


    "It¡äs time..."


    Pulling his long sword out of his sheath, he nced around the ce in case he forgot something.


    He tried preparing as best as he could those five remaining days, but even then, he wasn¡ät confident in his n.


    He observed and gather knowledge of the dealings that Hanson made with the army.


    So he knew that his presence would only be reported at the very least at the night.


    How he learned that was when he intentionally was giving Hanson runed items that didn¡ät work.


    By doing that he would receiveints of Hanson.


    Although he was getting fewer resources for some amount of time by doing that, Danzel found it well worth it.


    The time when the mistake was realized and reported was between 6 to 8 hours in time.


    Since it was quite early in the morning, the changes armies of both kingdoms colliding were bottom low.


    But the risk of that not being the case, although low, it was still there.


    Danzel though decided to still go for it.


    As stubborn as it sounded, Danzel couldn¡ät just run away knowing that Hanson received many privileges in the Union.


    He didn¡ät know much of what he received, but the talk of him being promoted was currently being talked for four months straight.


    And his way of dragging him back down was to break a taboo.


    That was the practice of necromancy.


    One of the few reasons why Berum was at war with Arcana was because of such taboo.


    As a kingdom that focuses on improving its magical knowledge.


    Magic casters of great power and wisdom were bound to be born.


    But.


    Where there is light, there must be shadow.


    As magic is an endless path towards knowledge and power.


    Many people would do anything to reach the end of this path.


    And among those people, many would even forsake their humanity and seek how to be immortal beings.


    A Lich.


    Making the arcana kingdom, in a way.


    The birthce of many Liches who brought forth many terrible events throughout history.


    Being a gue or a legion of undead.


    There were many such cases.


    And the Berum kingdom followed the teaching of the Sacred Cross and adored the immortal bird that was once their king.


    A being who is made out of pure life force.


    The phoenix.


    For those reasons, the Berum kingdom sought to eliminate to what wherein their eyes, the spawn of evils.


    But such ims were of course refused by the Arcana Kingdom.


    And that those Liches were just madmen who are their enemy too.


    Such ims made Berum''s justification to bring a full-out war against the Arcana kingdom, to be invalid.


    `I wonder what will happen.¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    Although vaguely, he knew Arcanas situation, so he was curious how it will appear to the Berum if their soldiers rose from the dead and became enraged ghouls who would kill every living thing once they got their eyes to them.


    "I ain¡ät going to be here anyway..." He shook his head just thinking of that situation.


    What if doing that made the war between those two kingdoms escte to a full-out war?


    Danzel didn¡ät care.


    He was trapped here for two whole years and even once killed by one of the powerhouses of this very kingdom.


    Nheless, the idea of many of them dying didn¡ät make him feel bad at all.


    "Now..."


    Seeing that he got everything ready, Danzel brought a small circr metal container that had small chains. In the middle of the container, was a ss.


    Past the ss was to what looked dark green smoke.


    He locked the chains tightly to his ribs, making the container look like a core of sorts.


    Equipping his chest te once more, he started to bring out the things he prepared through the two years.


    Bring it out of his other storage ring, big containers of the form of barrels were ced near the door, holding a simr dark green smoke in them.


    Though it wasn¡ät clear to see, the smoke was so tightly packed inside the barrels that if any crack happend to the ss, the smoke could explode out.


    "Let¡äs hope that those things work just like the book said..."


    The smoke that they contained was no mere smoke.


    In fact, it was poisonous gas mixed with dead mana.


    The magic books that had information about death magic, in particr, contained many more things than magic.


    That poisonous gas was made by Danzel with some rathermonly found fungus that he had to feed with dead mana for a whole week. And after the week, he had to trap those fungi in such containers and then drown them with dead mana until they begin to disappear and be that poisonous smoke.


    The gas ording to the book was supposed to be used to make dead bodies better receive dead mana, so that they have a better chance to be natural undead.


    But Danzel didn¡ät need that.


    The book also mentions that the gas was poisonous to the living.


    "Although it isn¡ät supposed to be lethal, I will use what I have..."


    Currently outside his door were fours guards that held the strength of a 3rd-tier, with the strongest being Edward and the others being simr levels to when he was five days ago.


    Although his guards were supposed to be seven with those church kids.


    The time he chose now was when they went to train with Hanson.


    Making him only to get rid of the four guards and the three employees that we''re normal people.


    The only thing he worried about was the contract that he made with Hanson.


    Danzel didn¡ät know if Hanson carried it in training or not with Kayns group.


    That was the variable to his n.


    The moment he attacks them outside, the contract that he created will snitch on him.


    `Quite ironic to have my creation be something that would hold me back at times like this...¡ä Danzel thought as he shook his head.


    Having finished putting thest barrel facing the door, brought thest of his toys from the storage ring.


    Appearing from thin air and falling the next second to the ground.


    More the 30 corpses of both men and women were left to the ground, wearing both gauntlets and a chest te with the remaining just being casual clothing.


    "It has been a while when I havest done that..." Danzel said as he stared down at the pale corpses.


    With his dead mana going around his body, Danzel started his spell.


    "Be made to serve~" Saying his cast, the dead mana shot out to the 10 corpses.


    Absorbing the dead mana, the corpses that had their eyes close were shot wide up the next moment while their bodies started to rise.


    Staring at the zombies for a moment, Danzel cast [Raise Undead] two times more.


    Making the rest of the corpses be zombies.


    "Let¡äs hope that they will be useful..." Danzel said uncertainly.


    Although by raising his spell from [Lesser Raise Undead] to [Raise Undead] the casting got much shorter and the zombies had higher stats.


    They were still a zombie.


    A tier 1 undead!


    Expecting them to win against a 3rd-tier opponent was nothing more of a joke.


    They wouldn¡ät even count as cannon founders!


    That is if it weren¡ät for Danzel''s runic equipment.


    Walking to each of the zombies one by one.


    Danzel activated the gauntlets that the zombies had, resulting in them glowing in a dark green light.


    Those were runes that had the [Rune of Eniv], the rune that sucked out the vitality of both the users and the target.


    And the chest te that those zombies wore, had the same runes that bestowed a self-activating barrier that could block attacks of the 3rd-tier for a short amount of time.


    `They wouldn¡ät able to kill them instantly and each touch of them would be a pain to deal with.¡ä Danzel though.


    Danzel hoped to simply overwhelm them and finish them off before they notify Hanson.


    `You all, go to those containers and break them when I say so.¡ä Danzel transmitted hismand internally to the zombies who thetter followed them.


    The internal transmission was one of the benefits of upgrading the skill [Lesser Raise Undead] to [Raise Undead].


    Seeing them in position, Danzel channeled his mana into his long sword.


    `You over there, go and open the door when I tell you.¡ä


    The zombie who was instructed to go held the door while staring dumbly to the ground.


    Taking his stance, Danzel clenched his sword as hard as he could.


    "You should have killed me when you had the chance, Hanson..." Danzel mumbled to himself as the mana in his sword reached his peak.


    `Now!¡ä


    The zombie holding the door including the other zombies on each barrel upon themand of their liege.


    Began to fulfill his instruction.


    *Ttsss!


    *Ttsss!


    With the door opening and poisonous gas bursting out, Danzel released the wind-piercing de together with a deafening sound.


    ***


    A few seconds before the door opens...


    Clueless about what is about to happend the guards tasked to look after Danzel were bored.


    They were two to the left and two to the right.


    With the two-guard closer to the door rambling out of boredom.


    "Hey, Edward. How about a drink after our swift is over and seeing some pretty girls while we are it?"


    Hearing that, Edward put a wry smile on his face.


    "Mikel, we are currently at our job. So I hope we keep such talk after our shift is done."


    "Ohe on Edward! For use elites looking after a fossil is boring as hell! If it weren''t for the good pay that Hanson is offering us, then I wouldn''t waste my time here." Mikel said.


    Hearing that, Edward shook his head.


    ''I got to report to Hanson to rece this guy with someone else...'' Edward though.


    As Edward was about to answer Mikels previous question, the sound of the door opening could be heard.


    ''What the..!'' Sensing the manaing out of the door, Edward who worked as a guard for those two years knew that something was off and got wary.


    The other three guards though didn''t though.


    Once the door was opened, the air cutting sound together with Edwards''s warning shouted out.


    "Dodge!"


    *Fsheeeeeen!


    A dark green wind cut horizontal through the walls, closing in the guards.


    Realizing what was happening, the guards tried to guard against the reaping de of wind.


    But it was toote.


    The wind de cut a deep wound in their chest and pushed the two guards forcefully to the side so that the wind de could continue flying at the other two.


    Edward who realized early the imminent danger dodged in time while the guard opposite to managed to block the wind de, which resulted in him being pushed to the side.


    "Arghhh!"


    "Dammit! It hurts!"


    Both the guards yelled in pain and rage.


    If their body weren''t that of a 3rd-tier, then they would have split in half!


    But what happend next stained them.


    "Cough~Cough, smoke?"


    "N-No! Is poison! Don''t breath it-"


    The dark green gas came like a wave, filling the whole path.


    And currently, in that poisonous gas, a shadow was to be seen.


    Passing the two guards, a cry run out!


    "Arghh..."


    Hearing the cry of the guard opposite to him, Edward saw a massive shadowing at him!


    "You Undead!" Knowing too well who this figure was, Edward swung his sword with one hand at the shadow.


    Maybe it was because of how fast things were progressing.


    That Edward forgot who he was dealing with.


    As the sword was about to hit the shadow behind the most, a barrier appeared that blocked Edwards''s attack.


    "Ah..." Seeing his mistake, Edward quickly trapped hismunication device to report to Hanson.


    "Toote..."


    With the speed that Edward could barely see, Danzel cut Edwards''s head clean off.


    ''Kill them'' transmitting his thoughts on the zombies, they dashed towards the two wounded men.


    "What the-!"


    "Zombies!?"


    The two-man who didn''t yet see Edward and the other guards swift dead eximed in surprise before scoffing from inside.


    You think that mere undead will stop us!?


    Grinding their teeth, the guards swung their swords, realizing a wind de simr to Danzels.


    But...


    The barrier of the zombies who were in charge activated and fully blocked the attack.


    "Hu-?"


    Before having the chance to understand what happend, the 30 zombies with glowing gauntlets rushed at them!


    They managed to kill the first four of those, but once new zombies with the barrier were in front of them, all zombies crashes at the two, pushing them to the ground


    "Aghhh! Some were zombies..."


    "I can''t do like this..!"


    As the wound that Danzel did was a fatal one, the two didn''t have the strength to push away 24 meat backs with a barrier protecting them.


    Seeing that, Danzel went down the stairs.


    ''At least they were in some use'' danzel thought as he saw he stared at the stunned employee who looked at him in horror.


    One who was able to realize the current situation went to grab themunication device.


    "No, you don''t"


    Casting his spell internally, a dark green hand appeared in front of that man and dashed out to grab his wrist.


    "Ahhhh!"


    Dragging the employee to him, Danzel swung his sword at the man.


    Granting him a swift death.


    "Kyagghh-"


    Seeing the death of their senior, the two couldn''t help but panic.


    "Now be quiet..."


    Sending an internalmand, the dark green hands grabbed the two employees at their throats and pushed them at the wall up high.


    "Gh-I can''- breat-"


    "Please- spare us-"


    Pulling a robe out of his storage ring.


    Danzel wore it and pulled the hoodie to hide his mask.


    Walking towards the exit of the door casually, he turned around the choking man.


    "No"


    With that, Danzel walked out of the building with the choking sounds in the backgrounding to an end.

 Chapter 174 - Escape (2)

    Few minutes after Danzel left the building, in front of the path of the door.


    Blooding out of the corpses of a headless man and another who hadrge cuts going through his chest and head filled the floor that was currently in the process of drying.


    Usually, such an amount of blood would take approximately 60 minutes to harden up.


    But because of the poisonous gas that was fused with dead mana beforehand, it spend up such processes.


    The most terrifying sight though was the legering of more than twenty corpses halfway.


    Worst off, among the pile of the corpses. A disfigured figure with blood covering him from top to bottom crawled to the ground. That figure held a clear resemnce among all the other corpses lying unmoving to the ground.


    The only way to disguise that figure with the others was through the fact that Life Force was running through his body, if only slightly.


    That man wasn¡ät one of the dead.


    "D-Dammit...it hurts..." Gnashing his teeth while tears run through his face.


    "I-I didn¡ät sign up for this!" Mikel screamed as he crawled out of the pile of the corpse.


    Not much time had passed where he and the others were talking about picking up some nice girls. But not long after they were surprised by the powerful undead that he was assigned to look after and protect.


    That¡äs right, Mikel applied to this job thinking that they had to make sure that none harms that undead or him escaping.


    He never thought that he would be attacked by the undead, less with a horde of zombies behind him!


    If it weren¡ät for the technique he learned of how to utilize his life force to regenerate his vitality, he would end up like the other guard thrown in the pile of corpses.


    s, that technique only recovered his vitality and not his actually wounds.


    It was more of a skill to recover one''s stamina and hunger.


    A useless skill that was mainly supposed to be used to be able to train for a prolonged time.


    So the bite marks with multiple ces that his body showed signs of necrosis didn¡ät recover.


    Making the current pain he was feeling simple immeasurable for a normal man to handle.


    Only a person like Mikel who was a 3rd-tier being could manage to kill all those zombies while critically wounded by the undead air de.


    "Cough~Cough!" Coughing blood out of his mouth, a wave of weakness befall him.


    But while amid despair, his eyesnded on themunication crystal that Edward had dropped a few meters away from him and the feeling of hope started to appear in his heart.


    "I-I got to report it..!"


    "To Hanson...!"


    "A-And call help...!"


    As a trail of blood was being made to where he crawled and his tears running no stop, Mikel trapped and activated themunication crystal.


    "Cough~Cough, Please...!"


    The waiting for Hanson to pick up his own crystal was for Mikel torturous.


    Each second felt like an eternity to him.


    "Please...!"


    And as if his prayers were heard, a voice came out of the crystal.


    "Yes? Who am I speaking to?"


    "S-Sir! The undead! He killed everyone! Only I! Only I survived! I beg you, Sir! I can''t feel my legs anymore and I am heavily bleeding. I need help otherwise I-!"


    Without being able to finish his plea, themunication crystal light faded, hinting that the other party broke off the connection.


    "W-What!? No! It can''t be! You can''t do this!"


    Mikel saw that as his death sentence.


    Different feelings flew through him.


    Anger.


    Despair.


    But the strongest among those feelings was grieve.


    "Cough~Cough! Please...someone...."


    With the poisonous gas doing his job, Mikel could only stay there with tears on his face.


    Waiting slowly for his death.


    ***


    At the same time in the training grounds.


    "-The undead! He killed everyone! Only-" hearing those words alone, Hanson who imminently understood the situation.


    ''So he finally decided to run...and here I thought he ept his fate.''


    Although Hanson was looking calm from the outside. That wasn''t the same on his inside.


    *Crack.


    Clenching the crystal to uncontrobly cause his anger, themunication between his subordinates closed.


    "You three! The training of today is canceled!"


    "But-" As Kayn wanted to ask why a surge of mana came out of Hanson


    ''Don''t think you can escape me so easily.''


    Merging with the shadows, the shadows speed up with incurable speed out of the building.


    Traveling among the highest building that there was nearby, Hanson looked down on the city with his sharp eyes.


    "Go..."


    The next moment, tens if not hundreds of different shadows spread through the capital towards every corner that there was.


    From market ces to inside the shops.


    For Hanson.


    The eyes of the shadows were no different than his own.


    And not shorter than a minute, Hanson frowned.


    "He isn''t inside....did he already leave."


    Commanding a few of his shadows to scale the walls of the capital and the other still looking around.


    A particr shadow that was on top of the wall halted as it stares far through the distance.


    Among people, from normal to the 3rd-tier.


    Staring in the same direction was nothing to see.


    But the shadow.


    No.


    Hanson who was starting there could see a small figure with a familiar armor running at incredible speeds.


    "Found you..."


    Recalling all the shadows back at him, he himself became a shadow and chased after that figure he just saw through the distance.


    ***


    "I am should be closing in the forest if I remember right"


    Running a tops speed, Danzel was holding his grin back.


    ''To think it was so easy...''


    Although he somewhat expected to demolish the guards on his own.


    He had to say that his early [Gale Mana de] was an extreme sess!


    He expected the guards to either dodge it or at least block the wind de.


    But them getting hit by it was never written in his n!


    "Maybe I gave them too much credit..."


    Thanks to that, he managed to save valuable seconds by letting his zombie finish off the two critically wounded.


    ''Now I understand why the [Rune of Force] was so popr among Hanson''s clients... That thing is crazy good!''


    Entering the forest, Danzel wanted almost to pat himself on the shoulder.


    This went really well!


    "Good thing that I didn''t use the [Rune of Skal''Spear] to turn the corpses into ghouls. Although they are much stronger and would only target the living. The fact that I can''t control them would have messed up the surprise attack"


    Opening the door and breaking the ss of the poison-filled gas contained couldn''t be done by the ghouls.


    Danzel relying on [Raise Undead] was the correct choice.


    ''Maybe I should even try the n much sooner instead of waiting for so long.


    Although he wouldn''t have so many stats and not even the map.


    Danzel guessed he could do his escape much sooner.


    ''I don''t regret it. It''s better being safe than sorry.''


    "After I get out of this forest I can continue going much further away, beyond those two kingdoms reaches.


    Although he was quite deep into the Arcana kingdom territory.


    With his speed and unlimited stamina, getting out of here wouldn''t take him long.


    "As what I do after that..." Danzel said uncertainly.


    As all his time his mind was focused on escaping the Unions, grasp. Other than the n alone he didn''t think much of his future.


    ''I got enough time anyway...taking it slow shouldn''t be that bad.''


    Thinking of what bright future was awaiting him while running.


    As he run past one of the trees, a shadowy hand reached out to grab him.


    Nevertheless, although Danzel was making ns for the future.


    The wariness of his surroundings was never lost.


    Drawing his sword out of his sheath, he cut the hand together with the body of this shadow I to three pieces.


    "Hanson..." Danzel said with his cold voice.


    The shadow who was cut into pieces looked at Danzels mask.


    "Weird..."


    Falling apart, many more shadows started appearing from left and right, dashing towards Danzel.


    "I should even know that it wasn''t going to be that easy..."


    Branding his sword at the shadows, he started taking at the shadows.


    "You... Are much faster..." Echoes of the same voice came from the shadows.


    Although the shadows had created numbers, Danzel knew.


    The more the less powerful they are.


    "And you are much slower, Hanson," Danzel said with his cold voice.


    ''I got get out of the forest...fighting here brings me only in disadvantage''


    With the trees casting shadows to the ground, even if the shadows were weak.


    Their number together with their unpredictable nature ofing out of the shadows was even for Danzel annoying to deal with.


    Without hesitating, Danzel brought out a sharp dagger from his storage ring.


    And the next moment, he pierced his own chest te In the middle.


    "What are you-"


    The next moment, an explosion of poisonous gas came out of Danzels armor, creating a practical deadly smoke screen.


    Using [Swift Movements], Danzel run out of the smokescreen and went outside the forest.


    Sooner after, the shadows merged to the ground and followed him after.


    Just before the shadow could reach him, Danzel managed to go out of the forest.


    Taking a few steps more outside of the forest, Danzel turned around and brought out his shield while taking a stance facing the forest.


    "..."


    And then there was silence.


    With only wildlife to be heard if one paid attention.


    But what Danzel was paying his attention to was a maning out of the shadows of the forest.


    "Got to apud you, with the t ground where you are. Concealing my shadows in wouldn''t be possible.." Hanson who wore his dark gauntlets said yo Danzel.

 Chapter 175 - Danzel Vs Hanson

    Looking down on the shadows that the trees were casting, Hanson looked at Danzel.


    "But if you really expected that such a minor detail would actually bring you an advantage...then I got to say that your escape n was rathercking to say the less." Hanson said.


    In return though, he only received silence.


    "..."


    "..."


    Though he found it rude to be so bluntly ignored, Hanson wasn¡ät angry the less.


    `What happend to him?¡ä Hanson couldn¡ät help but as himself.


    In fact, he was taking Danzel as seriously as he would against opponents with simr strength as him, if not greater.


    The reason for it was because currently, Hanson was fighting something unknown.


    `Can undead really change so much after a month?¡ä


    It hasn¡ät been a month or so where he and Danzel had their spar.


    In the years he did notice Danzel getting slightly stronger and his swordsmanship more refined.


    Butpared to the undead of a month ago and the current undead who was facing him, it was like day and night.


    From his strength to his speed and the way he was holding the sword with the shield.


    In Hanson''s eyes, Danzel''s improved tremendously.


    Which confused him and made him wary.


    But that alone didn¡ät scare him.


    He faced much scarier beings thoughts his whole carrier.


    "Although your idea of staying there is pretty good, did you even think if the possibility of me just waiting for the night toe? What will you do then?" Hanson said in a mocking tone.


    Although his shadows could travel without any pre-cast shadows on the ground.


    Having the pre-cast shadows already there not only made his dark mana travel much faster but also passively strengthed it. Which in turn strengthens his living shadows.


    If he were to follow behind Danzel until nightes to engulf the day in darkness. Then he will be at his strongest.


    Und Danzel who already saw Hanson [status], well know that this came from a talent of Hanson called [One with Shadows].


    Just thinking of that happening...


    Danzel felt amusement.


    "Hahaha~"


    "What are you-?"


    As Hanson got confused by him startedughing out of nowhere.


    Danzel voice turned much more sinister.


    "Do you actually believe that you got the privilege to wait for so long~"


    Both his original dark green mana got mixed with his dead mana and wrapped around his longsword in a form of a mist.


    Pointing his sword at Hanson, Danzel grinned sinisterly behind his mask.


    `[Curse of Scourge]¡ä


    The next second, the dark green mist elerated and went straight at where Hanson was.


    "This..."


    With a frown on his face, a shadow rose from the ground and rushed directly at the mist in an attempt to activate the spell early.


    But to Hanson''s surprise, the dark mist simply ignored his shadow existences and passed right through it.


    "Maybe wind? Or..."


    Brining out a dagger without a handle from his own storage ring, Hanson put his own mana into the dagger to enchant his strength and threw the dagger at the iing dark green mist.


    Simr to his shadow though, the dark green mist didn¡ät even flinch by the dagger and continued at Hanson which was less than 5 meters away from him.


    "Tch"


    Stepping to the side, Hanson dodge the mist that passed beside him.


    But to his surprise, like a homing missile, the dark green mist turned and flew in his direction.


    Hanson who saw this stopped his attempts and stayed his ground, as he finally came upon the realization of the mist identity.


    "I see..."


    Not a secondter, the mist engulfed his whole body and entered his body.


    Feeling an odd sensation while observing his body, Hanson turned and looked at Danzel with disgust.


    "A curse that eats at my vitality, huh? Was that in the books that I gave you?"


    "Who knows, but where there is one, there is a second..."


    As Hanson''s pathetic attempts to stop his first curse lost him quite a lot of time, Danzel shamelessly threw his next curse that was [Curse of Exhaustion].


    Knowing full well that trying to block that mist was useless, Hanson simply epts his fate to be hit by another curse.


    "Now, are you still nning to wait until night?" Danzel said with his cold yet mocking tone.


    "You..."


    Releasing his dark mana together with his killing intent, Hanson''s muscles were tensed.


    "After I break both your legs and hand, I will force you to work for the Union for all the eternity that you undead have the privilege."


    Tapping his gauntlet''s wrist with his arms, his gauntlets extended until elbow while the enchantments in the gauntlet released dark mana.


    His finger end became like ws, sharp enough to cut through metal with ease while the enchantment would send the dark mana to every one of his blows like aftershocks.


    Seeing that Danzel went back to his stance.


    "If before numbers didn¡ät cut it..."


    The next moment that Hanso said this, two arms made out shadows came out of his body.


    One arm grabbed Hanson''s shoulder while the other grabbed his head directly. The shadow after pushed itself out without actually making Hanson feel the touch of his own shadow.


    Seeing that, Danzel imminently understood that this shadow was much stronger than the other scrubs that he made into pieces. Even if thetter and the former looked the same in appearance.


    "Then quality it shall be!"


    Kicking the ground, Hanson and his shadow rushed at Danzel walking Zick-zack between each other.


    Seeing that, Danzel released his own killing intent.


    `Tricks won¡ät work on him¡ä Danzel knew that as fact though their spars.


    He had to get serious.


    "Because of you-"


    He had made himself remember thosest two years.


    "And that damned Magic caster-"


    Of how he once died and got to experience that dark ce.


    Danzel forced himself to remember those events.


    "I won¡ät forgive you-!"


    Like a releasing flood, his bloodlust increased to a terrifying level even for an undead who hated the living.


    Among that blood loss and rage.


    Power followed soon enough through him.


    [Sin of Wrath]: Activated.


    Forgetting all about his stance, Danzel raised his long sword above his head while mana was being guided in it.


    Like an execution cutting the rope of gluten.


    Danzel de was swung down towards the ground and released a dark green wind de towards Danzel.


    Because Danzel hit the ground itself though, the wing de pulled the smoke and small stone with it together.


    "That feeling..." Mumbling to himself, Hanson and his shadow dodged to the side and hidden in the smoke that was made.


    *Baaahm!


    As if someone pressed the pause button, Danzel didn¡ät move a single bit.


    Although halfway consumed by his rage, Danzel still held the conscious to remain wary of his surroundings.


    And once Danzel felt a presence among the smokescreen, all that conscious that he had faded with him swing towards that direction.


    *Thikkkk!


    The ground cracked while the longsword shed with Hanson gauntlets.


    But even with the increase that attributes that [Sin of Wrath] gave, Hanson although pressured, didn¡ät feel much threatened.


    "That aura, that bloodlust...it¡äs the same as two years." Mumbling to himself, Hanson pushed the sword to the way while releasing one of his punches at Danzel.


    Only to be blocked with Danzel''s shield and having the de to chase after Hanson''s neck.


    Exchange after exchange, they both shed on equal grounds.


    When Hanson finally managed to find an opening to Danzel''s attacks, thetter would spend his mana on his shield and block his strikes.


    Making a vicious cycle where both lost.


    One spends his mana while the other spends his vitality.


    But soon enough, that cycle was broken with the interference of Hanson''s shadows.


    Running at the right moment, the shadow jumped and attempted to kick at Danzels''s mask.


    Knowing full well that against Skeletor type undead, hitting them anywhere else was a waste of time.


    Unbeknownst to Hanson though, that very undead had a very kin sense for danger.


    Turning his body, Hanson activate his [Vanguards Defence] and blocked the attack sessfully. Leaving him wide open for Hanson to hit him directly at the side of his ribs.


    With the sheer power supported by his gauntlets, Danzel was thrown to the side while his armor was pushed inside.


    *Crack


    Though it did manage to crack two of Danzel''s ribs, that was what Hanson''s attack did.


    Guiding the mana in his body to the longsword, he released a wind de in their direction, blowing the smokescreen that he created a minute ago away.


    "Tch, that armors of yous..." Hanson who dodged the wind de with ease cursed to himself.


    He was unsatisfied with his attack.


    Bus since he was more of the speed type and Danzel armor having runes of the [Well-done] quality that medicate blunt damage, not to forget his sturdy bones added with his [Armor Mana ting]


    Such amount of damage was expected.


    "This will take much longer than expected."


    Running together with his shadow, Hanson decided to switch his fighting style to one that he dislike the most.


    Head on fights.


    As cheap attacks like the previous did almost to nothing damage, teaming with his shadow to overwhelmed him.


    "Gwhehh-!" Grinding his teeth, Danzel realized.


    But found himself in a pinch.


    Once Hanson attacked, his shadow would soon after the following suite.


    Making Danzel go in the defense, which while influenced by rage was quite hard to not make mistakes.


    He would so often try to swing his sword in an attempt to hurt either Hanson or the shadow.


    Only to be rewarded by a quick jab by either two of them.


    And once Danzel''s patience run out, he pushed his shield forward while guiding his mana all over his body.


    Activating his [Shield Charge] together with [Swift Movements], he rammed at Hanson with his shield and swung his longsword at the much slower target which was the shadow.


    "Fool." Hanson muttered to himself.


    While he was blocking the shield with both of his arms, another shadow wasing out of his body and circling around Danzel¡äs shield.


    The newly created shadow, without any hesitation, formed his hand straight as it was a de, and pierced Danzel¡äs armor where his ribs were.


    What surprised Danzel though was that this shadow wasn¡ät done yet!


    The hand that was still inside of Danzel, as creepy as it sounded.


    Grabbed his ribs directly and dragged him to the side making him stumble.


    "You lost..."


    With mana helping him flex his muscles, Hanson let out a punch directly at Danzels''s mask with a much faster speed than his usual attacks.


    *Crack!


    Breaking the mask and feeling that he broke Danzel''s skulls altogether, he sighed internally.


    `Though I wanted to still keep him, he became too dangerous to keep him anymore.¡ä


    "He served his purpose..." Sensing the intimating and hateful aura goes away, Hanson didn¡ät grieve much of the undead that served him for two whole years stabilizing his position in the Union.


    As Hanson wanted to recall his shadow though, the undead who was supposed to fall to the ground managed to stay standing with the longsword swinging in his direction.


    With widen eyes, Hanson reacted quickly and take a few steps back while his dark mana turned him as part of the shadow, which made his escape that much quicker.


    "Huff...you sure are sturdy. I was sure that I blew your skull up with the attack of my." Hanson said, with sweat running on his cheek.


    `If I was even a second toote to react I would have been done for.¡ä Hanson thought as he observed the small cut through his chest.


    It wasn¡ät of arrogance that he dismissed Danzel as dead.


    He knew quite much about the nature of many undead and how to kill them.


    And for Skeletor type Undead, with the only exception being the Lich.


    Breaking the skull would always kill, or rather grand the undead in question a true death.


    Seeing the undead who was staring at him with two ethereal dark green eyes though but his knowledge in question.


    `Did I misjudge the mask as the skull? Maybe I got too soft with training those kids...¡ä


    As Hanson was in his mind, the next action that Danzel did made him frown.


    "What are you doing?"


    Danzel, who threw his shield to the ground, held his longsword with both arms in an offensive stance while the [Cursed de] skill was active.


    "I will finish this with the next attack..." Danzel, who regained his sanity said to Hanson.


    "I see..."


    Flexing the muscle in his leg while changing with mana to fulfill an action much faster.


    Hanson the ground and rushed towards Danzel.


    "I am not sure what you did, but it''s time for you to perish!"


    As he got closer at around 4 meters.


    Hanson was about to summon his shadow to continue his previews assault.


    Danzel who saw this grinned ominously.


    And at the next moment, it happend.


    It was sudden.


    Undetectable.


    And extremely painful.


    Out of the blue without Hanson knowing, a de simr to the one Danzel was holding with a faint dark green glow pierced his heart from behind.


    "Gah!" Throwing up blood from his mouth to his hands, Hanson looked confused at his chest.


    "I-Impossible..."


    Turning his head slowly around, what he saw shocked him.


    Holding that very de that was thrust to his chest.


    Was a second Danzel who look ethereal with a faint dark green glow.


    Once Hanson made eye contact with the ''second'' undead, it startedughing frantically.


    <strong>"Gahahaha!!!"</strong>

 Chapter 176 - The Worth Of Luxury

    Staring at theughing skeleton who held the sword that was piercing his heart, Hanson was in disbelief.


    `How are there two of them!?¡ä


    "Dammit!" Cursing out loud, out of his own shadow, multiple shadows came cramped together and jumped at the second undead.


    But once the shadows came out and were about to reach out at theughing undead, as if it didn¡ät exist in the first ce.


    The second undead disappeared without any trace to be left.


    `Huh?¡ä


    Seeing that, Hanson was bbergasted.


    `How did it disappear? I didn¡ät take my eyes away for him even for a second, but...¡ä


    Unfortunately for Hanson, his racing thoughts were interrupted by Danzel''s cold voice.


    "Look over here..."


    Remembering the situation he was in, Hanson hastily turned back around and raised his hand to block the iing sword.


    That was when he saw that didn¡ät match up.


    `Where did the blood in my hand go?¡ä As he realized that, he also found the hole that was made by that second undead to now be gone.


    Those thoughts of his were shortly pushed back in his mind, as he was forced to face the crisis in front of him.


    Although Hanson reacted extremely quickly on the second undead piercing his heart, to which reacting at all is impressive enough.


    He to process that his heart was pierced, recognizing the enemy and even responding against it by the span of a second.


    Even for a battle-harder veteran who faced death every day could be hard to achieve.


    Mostly the reason why he was so calm was that Hanson practices a very special art of using dark mana.


    To themon man, it was just known as shadow magic, which although isn¡ät wrong.


    It was arge understatement for how Hanson used that shadow magic.


    The original technique was called [Shadow Ascension] or other refereed as bing one with the shadows.


    Unlike the usual summoning magic that calls upon an elemental to appear that can follow simple orders.


    The Shadows of Hansons weren¡ät in fact categorized as summoning itself.


    In fact, it was him manipting the dark mana to his will, while sharing his senses with them.


    That requires him to train his mind to extreme levels so that his shadows act as if it was him.


    Just controlling one or two shadows at the same time would put the average user of dark mana into a mind overload.


    Und Hanson who was still at the 3rd-level was capable to control 100 shadows while sharing his senses.


    That alone should speak of how mental fortitude one''s mind to be in hopes to achieve such a feat while still being in the 3rd-tier.


    Because of that, when he found out that Kayn had actually talent for such a rare praxis, he of course was happy and thus became fond of him as the other two that were simrly talented, even if not on his own art.


    But even with extreme senses and reflexes to react in less than a second.


    Keeping up with his mind, the current body of him could.


    Knowing that full well, as how frustrating as it was.


    Hanson knew that the ominous dark de could not be dodged unscarred.


    Seeing the deing diagonally at him, aim to cut his body half.


    Knowing that he couldn¡ät get away, he did everything in his power to reduce the damage.


    Pushing his gauntlet up in his head, the ominous de of the undeading for his neck was blocked, but the de did not stop.


    Sliding at the Hansons gauntlets with sparksing out, the de passed Hanson''s hand and went slightly to his right lung.


    Covering the part that was about to be hit with shadow arms, Hanson gritted his teeth and prepare himself for the pain that was about toe.


    And the pain indeed found its way towards him.


    Slicing the hands that were protecting Hanson''s body, the longsword that Danzel held dug through his flesh while leaving the dead man to do his job.


    "Agh...!"


    Arge amount of blood sshed out as if the blood itself was dragged out and thrown into the ground. The main reason for that happening was of Danzel''s improved original rune that he carved in the sword inspired most of his old de Veren.


    The dead mana stuck to Hansons cut part and burned his vitality by the second while also decreasing his natural regeneration. Having two courses at that too, Hanson currently felt horrible.


    Danzel though wasn¡ät going to stop there when his enemy was vulnerable!


    But as he tried to raise his de to hack at Hanson once more.


    Hanson didn¡ät hold the same opinion thoughts.


    With dark mana whirlwind around his body, Hanson''s body turned in shadows and exploded the next second.


    The shadow-like cloud moved around Danzels, making one think that Hansons could appear at any moment and at each angle.


    But Danzel didn¡ät buy it.


    Gathering the mana in his body into his sword, he released a wind de and cut through that cloud.


    "Once cursed by me, you got to thinking of something else if you n to run away..." Danzelmented as he watched Hanson on the edge of the forest holding the wound with his hand.


    "That thing of before... It wasn''t an illusion was it!" Hanson yelled at the undead.


    "..."


    "And I am certain that I had crushed that skulls of yours. But here you are standing there...are you really a Wight as you said?"


    "..."


    There was a moment of silence between those two.


    Hanson who by now realized he wasn''t getting any answers was slowly sinking to the grounds shadows.


    "Fighting you more isn''t worth it anymore..." Hanson said frustrated.


    But that little frustration wasn''t going to let cloud his mind.


    "Though I hate to say it, I lost. Risking my life to bring someone who is unwilling to work for me will bring both parties losses. The runes that you made those years helped me already achieve my goals. You are no longer needed..."


    Although he knew that once he got back he would receive a punishment from the Union Head for losing a runesmith.


    His position in the capital was granted and already rooted there.


    Having the undead runesmith was a luxury as it was a ticking bomb.


    Once that fact was revealed, the Council was bound to make trouble for him.


    ''I even got some apprentice waiting for me...''


    Seeing no profits to be gained without any risk, Hanson gives up on bringing Danzel back.


    "Although I would much prefer to have you killed..." Mumbling to himself, Hanson stared at the undead.


    "Rue Danzel, the undead abomination that you are. Although I am leaving things being, don''t think that you will escape the grasp of the Union! No matter where you go, sooner orter you will pay for what you have done today." With Hanson''s voice turning that of deep echoes, he disappeared into the shadows.


    "He left..." Danzel said.


    Unable to sense his curses anymore, Danzel knew for a fact that he left.


    "Sigh, I was forced to use it..." Danzel sighed as he pulled out a helmet from his storage ring.


    Putting the helmet on, Danzel imminently started dashing in the forest towards the direction he originally nned to go.


    That is out of this kingdom.


    ''Although I won...it doesn''t feel like it'' Danzel thought bitterly.


    Even if in the end he had not a single crack in his bones and he critically wounded Hanson.


    His dying once and being forced to activate his [Undying] talent didn''t count as a victory for him.


    After all, who wins by dying?


    His win also revolved around managing to wound him after getting back from that dark ce.


    If he hadn''t managed to wound him and leave back his mark so that the new skill [Mortal Reminder] could activate.


    He was 90% percent sure that he would have been overwhelmed by Hanson and his shadow and end up dying for real.


    Against an opponent like Hanson, Danzel knew that making mistakes would be his downfall.


    But as he was too weak to face Hanson, he also needed to use [Sin of Wrath] to be able to keep up with him.


    That thought influenced his mind to be more reckless and more rxing on his undead instincts.


    He founded it ironically.


    Bing stronger to be able to face him would make him do mistakes.


    While without bing stronger, he could avoid making mistakes and be beaten by Hanson who was stronger.


    For that reason alone Danzel tried his best to make his n so that he would avoid fighting Hanson at all costs.


    But here he was, having done the exact opposite.


    "I got lucky this time..." Danzel acknowledges it.


    He wasn''t his match.


    Only the element of surprise was barely enough to make it somehow alive.


    But for Danzel, that was good enough.


    As long as he managed to make it out alive, everything else was a luxury.


    "Although I worry for thest thing that Hanson said...Now getting out of here takes priority.." Danzel said, as he slowly disappeared deeper into the forest.

 Chapter 177 - Tavern

    Currently near the borders of the Arcana kingdom, in a small city near the mountains.


    The darkness of the night and the depressing rain had filled the sky.


    With barely any light that was being made with thenterns that had the simplest of enchantments ced in.


    Usually, such an envirment would make someone subconsciously get wary and look out for potential scetzy people who would take any opportunity to find trouble with you.


    It was a time when no person would have willingly gone out.


    But currently, though such a night was a tall figure wearing a dark cloak that was almost blending in the night itself with the hoodypletely shadowing his face from others people''s sight.


    Anybody who was that figure would undoubtedly feel that something is off about him.


    The figure in question who was continued walking stopped in a particr tavern that by just standing outside could one hear the voices of the cheering mood inside.


    Nevertheless, the figure didn¡ät stop to see if it was worth entering the tavern or not. Instead, he stared at the wall of the taverns build.


    More specifically, at a piece of paper that was glued on the wall.


    While staring at the wall motionless.


    A sudden thunder roared through the sky, illuminating the night for a split second.


    *Twighhhh!


    In that split second, the paper that the figure shows together with the figure''s face under the hood.


    ----------------


    [Wanted]


    Rue Danzel.


    Dead or alive.


    Reward10 000 gold coins


    ...


    ----------------


    The wanted poster withholds information about the height, the weapon, and that the wanted person always wore armor.


    Such details matched exactly the figure who was staring at the poster.


    "Such a useless thing to do..." The figure, the man himself described in the wanted poster said to himself.


    Rather than a man though, Rue Danzel was an undead.


    While Danzel was on his mind, he noticed two men with horses not far away from the tavern stopping with uniforms that Danzel very well recognized.


    "Sigh..."


    Grabbing the wanted poster, he tore it apart stored the remains in his storage ring, and made his way towards the tavern as he noticed the two men wearing the uniform of the merchant unioning his way.


    *Gweeegh.


    With a screeching of the door, Danzel who stepped inside unwillingly was greeted by bright lights and the sight of many people having their fun their way.


    Menpetingamong themselves who could drink the most.


    Another bet among each other hoping thatdy luck would spread her legs for them.


    Some tried to start a conversation with thedies hoping to get in their pants only to be rejected right from the start or ending with a punch from the delicate hand from the verydy''s that was strong enough to send a normal person K.O.


    Those were the few of the many.


    The unique tables that Danzel found were three in particr.


    One of the far back was a man sitting all alone with a cloak hiding his face and cheap liquor taking a few sips from time to time.


    Though he wasn''t able to exin why that man was letting out a depressing aura that would make everyone want to avoid him.


    He looked like someone who would suddenly start telling his depressing past and how life sucked when you just passed by.


    The other that brought Danzel''s attention were two-man arm wrestling while using their mana.


    What brought most of his attention though was the table beside those two men.


    On the table beside, them were a duo with strange clothing that Danzel haven''t seen before.


    The one of them that was wearing a wight robe with long sleeves with an additional cloak that was hiding her face guessed Danzel that it was a kid based on his height ( she wears something simr to Chinese traditional clothing with a cloak over her should covering her face. Danzel doesn''t know how those clothes are called)


    Opposite to her was a man who surprisingly was about 2 meters tall.


    He wore a shirt-like bottom while the top also had long sleeves.


    Danzel could see leather armor behind his clothing.


    That man was simr to the kid also hiding his face with a silver half mask covering his mouth and a weird dark hat that was circr ( think of samurai-like clothing with a jingasa on top of his head.)


    Beside the man''s chairs rested a sheath hiding arge de that was simr in high to Danzel''s long sword.


    Of course, such a sight was quite exotic, but the thing that made him pay so much attention to them was the fact that they had over 10 tes stacked up to each other while continuing eating as if those guys are starving.


    ''Did you guys starve for a month or what?''


    While Danzel was in his thoughts.


    A beautiful young maiden came before.


    "Wee dear customer. Would you like something to eat or to drink?"


    Seeing her speaking with him, Danzel was confused for a second.


    ''Can I do neither of those two?'' Danzel thought bitterly.


    How could he, an undead do those things?


    Nevertheless, Danzel knew that he would appear weird if not suspicious if he truly said his thoughts out loud.


    "I...would like something to eat."


    Showing a glowing smile on the undead who killed hundreds of living beings. The young maiden looked around for a second before pointing at a particr table.


    "Sir, as we are somewhat full this night, would she mind if you sit behind the table to where that small girl and man is?"


    Seeing that she was pointing at the exotic duo, he nodded solemnly.


    "It''s fine by me."


    Escorting him to the table, the young maiden brought out a wooden tablet while holding a piece of coal wrapped around some cloth as the pen.


    "What would she like to have?"


    "I...will go with what your rmendation."


    Finishing his order, Danzel cursed to himself.


    ''Damn, just being among those guys brings me to want to bash their heads. At the dead mana less air also sucks''


    Though he learned to control his urges of wanting to kill those before him.


    Resisting them at all was by itself quite tired some of his mentality.


    It had been a total month since his fight with Hanson.


    At that time he used to move around the areas that weren''t as much popted ording to the map and by taking a long way, he finally managed to reach the borders of the Arcana Kingdom.


    In other words, one step away to get out of that unlucky kingdom.


    But once he tried crossing them, he noticed several armed people looking around the boards.


    Making him forced to halt on his path.


    The reason why it was so highly guarded was that the war between the kingdoms spiked and that a battle was brought around the corners.


    Nevertheless, the current situation wasn''t optimal.


    "I could circle around the border, but the time that it will take is-"


    *Baahm!


    Throwing out of his thought, he nced at the table opposite to him.


    "Hahaha! Won! Now spill it out! What was the news that you been talking about?" The man who won the arm wrestleughed in triumph while flexing his muscles.


    "Tch, fine. Not long ago, I met a guard who apparently run away from his duty of protecting a merchant when some bandits attack them. And apparently, that merchant was the son of a rich merchant. Meaning that those Bandits must have struck gold!"


    Hearing that the man looked slightly disappointed.


    "Huh? I thought you said that the information would make us rich. If what you said is true, wouldn''t the merchant Union handle the spoils of the bandits?"


    "Tch, tch, that''s the good part. The merchant wasn''t associated with the union. Meaning that if we go raid that ce in the mountains, we will be rich!"


    "Ohhh!"


    While the two were thinking about the idea of looting the bandits.


    There was loud conversation borough attention to few people.


    Mainly a person who walked to their table and Danzel with the man having a half mask covering his face.


    "You two better forget about it is you hold dear to your life. I heard the boss of the bandits is of the 3rd-tier. With many 2nd-tier people on his proposal. With your two pitifully strength you will die without even taking a nce on the fortune." The man who came in their table said as he chucked down his liquor.


    "Huh!? Are you mocking us!?"


    "Are you looking for trouble you bastard!?"


    The two said enraged.


    Danzel who was watching my side was having his own thoughts.


    ''The strongest is a 3rd-tier, with many 2nd-tier people. if their leader doesn''t have the same strength as Hanson then is doable.'' Danzel though.


    The idea that he was having was although possible dangerous.


    Could very well be an opportunity.


    Being so close to level 100 where he thought was his next evolution. Danzel desperately wanted to earn the required XP to be a 4th-tier undead.


    Although he needed to max his ss and his subss level together with the other skills such as [Undeath Corruption]


    But seeing he was so close to reaching level 100, that was by high changes the next evolution.


    Being once and done with it was much to his preference.


    And surely it wasn''t because of the addictive feelings that came with the process of evolution.


    Although training would slowly but surely gain the required XP.


    Killing some XP bags called bandits didn''t sound too bad.


    While he was on his own thoughts, the fight that was about to break out a few meters away from him was shortly interrupted by two men with a uniform of the Union entering the tavern.


    "Those guys are..."


    "From the union right?"


    "Pss, they will hear you..."


    While everyone around was getting quieter in the tavern, the two of the Union looked around and raised a piece of paper in the air.


    "Anyone! Have you seen someone with such feature-"


    Seeing the all-familiar poster, Danzel cursed internally.


    ''It seems it''s to go...''


    Before he could step up though, a young maiden with arge grilled fish came and deliver it to Danzel''s table.


    "Here sir, have a nice meal."


    "..."


    Starting at the dead fish with his hollow eyes, Danzel felt troubled.


    The union people who had finished what they asked looked around with their eyesnding on a man looking extremely scetzy in a corner alone.


    Pointing their finger at him, they made their way towards him.


    Resulting in the loud atmosphere of before to resume.


    ''Change''


    Dropping a gold coin to the table, Danzel standard up and parted ways with a fellow dead being that was the fish.


    As he is standing up, he subconsciously looked at the table in front of him where the girl had finished devouring her te and started looking at the grams with pleasing eyes.


    As he suddenly noticed something, he got quite surprised.


    ''Those are...''


    Shaking his head, he passed through him while mention with his finger at his food.


    "I lost my appetite, feel free to take me. I already paid."


    The gramps gave him a sharp judging look as he was trying to read what he wanted for them.


    Danzel in turn noticed that didn''t care and simply walked towards the door to leave.


    Before he could leave though, the young maiden of before yelled as he waves at him.


    "Sir! That''s way too much! I haven''t given you change."


    The two members of the merchant union who heard that turned their heads towards the door to see what themunion was about.


    On they saw a tall cloaked figure, their frowned.


    ''Dammit...'' Cursing of the girl''s good nature, Danzel left as he noticed the two moving towards him.


    Seeing that suspicious movement, the two hasten their steps to catch up with Danzel.


    Looking from the side, the small girl looked at the fish that Danzel left and then at the elderly.


    "Grandpa, can I have the fish from that man."


    Showing a bitter smile under his mask, the grandpa in question looked under the table at a small pouch that had few coins.


    ''We got to restock...'' Taking his eyes away from the pouch.


    He picked Danzel fish and gave her to the little girl in front of her.


    "Since that man gifted it to us, it would be a waste to let it be thrown away."


    "Yaayh!" Taking her small fork, the small girl started devouring the dead fish with no hints of mercy.


    The elderly who smiled by seeing that took a nche at the second that was resting beside him.


    ''The bandits should be a nice target....''

 Chapter 178 - Bandids Of The Mountain

    Outside of the tavern...


    "Hey, you! Wait!" One of the men wearing the union uniform yelled at the suspicious cloaked figure, who thetter tantly ignored hismand.


    "This bastard, hey! We are chasing after him! He seems suspicious!"


    Nodding to his partner, they began running after the cloaked figure.


    The cloaked figure nced at them before moving into an alleyway to the left.


    But to their surprise, once they turned left to the alleyway, the cloaked figure that they were chasing had disappeared without any signs to see.


    "Where did he go..."


    "Ugh! Dammit, he might have been our leader for the bounty!"


    "He might have run through the alleyway. Should we chase after him?"


    "Idiot, we were just a few meters apart with him. If that guy is someone so fast we two wouldn¡ät even stand a chance."


    "But if we do that-"


    While the two were arguing with each other. they failed to notice the figure who was stalking them from above the buildings.


    Blending in the night, the figure jumped behind the duo.


    Once his feet touched the ground, the sound of himnding to the ground never appeared, making the two who arguedpletely miss the figure who was a head taller than them.


    Stepping a step forward, the figure wrapped his hands around their shoulders as if they were old friends.


    The two who got startled by that wanted to fight back against the unknown cloaked figures'' apperance.


    But it was sadly toote.


    The figure cold gauntlets were pressed at the two mounts with such strength that the two felt their jaws breaking.


    "Mhmm!"


    "Mhmm!"


    "You two are an annoyance." The figure who was Danzel said with a chilling voice to the two,


    Making them subconsciously tremble out of fear.


    "You better off death..."


    Hearing Danzel''s ultimatum, that being the deration of their death. They forced their legs that has became jelly to stand firmly and to withdraw their swords to fight back.


    Though the two were too focused staring at Danzel, they failed to notice the dark green glow at the end of the alleywaying their way.


    Once they noticed because of the sudden brightness, it was toote.


    "Mhhhhm!"


    "Mhhmm!"


    As the screams were being suppressed by Danzel, the two looked at their chest in confusion and horror.


    With blood staining their uniform, a short dagger was pierced through their heart that was being held by some dark green hands.


    As weakness overwhelmed their entire body, the men gave up resisting.


    [You received 8000 XP]


    [You received 7500 XP]


    "Thanks for saving me some trouble." Danzel said stored the two dead bodies together with the daggers that his [Hand of Mana Affinity] were holding.


    "Well done you two." Giving both of those hands a high five, he made them dissipate.


    "Killing is indeed the faster way to increase my strength. Too bad that doing that would bring too much trouble..." Shaking his head out of the bloody nature of the status. He rested his back on the wall of the building while staring at his wallet.


    [XP: 4 102 725]


    "Sigh...on the past I would have thought that I was rich. But now I feel like I am the poorest undead that there is..."


    For reference, the current upgrade for his next level was on 3 000 000 XP in total!


    For him to achieve level 100 in the first ce, he needed a total of12 750 000!


    If it wasn¡ät for the fact that he hoped to reach his next evolution, he would even have gone and spent his XP on the sses that he had or some of the skills.


    Working towards the required XP would take him many months of work.


    Which Danzel currently didn¡ät have the luxury to waste on training his swordsmanship. Even if he hadn¡ät got much used on the [Death Guarding Swordmanship], the knowledge printed in his mind was for him good enough for the time being.


    "I don¡ät know how long the tighter security in the borders will be lifted, but I might have to circle around..."


    Moving towards under the roof of a building, Danzel looked at the map that he got from Hanson in deep thoughts.


    "Hmm...? This river is..."


    Staring at arge river that was sorge that went out of the borders of Arcana a few km away opposite to the mountain, Danzel was struck with an idea.


    "Yeah...depending on how deep the river is, I could just walk under the river. It''s better than hoping for those two kingdoms to finally take a breather. While I am at it, I might as well go look for those supposed bandits in the mountain."


    Putting the map on his storage ring, he started to walk in the rain towards arge mountain.


    "Has been about two whole years thest time I did some public service for amunity..."


    Thest time he could remember was when he had killed some kind of a group called bold heads or something.


    It was such an insignificant part of his almost three years after he rose from the cursedke that he couldn¡ät remember those guys that sought death at him.


    In his eyes, they were just a bunch of fools that were no different than XP bags walking towards his own wallet.


    `I am sure that someone wouldin if I were to make those bandits the essence of raising my strength even further beyond my current self.¡ä


    "First I got to find them though..." Danzel mumbled to himself as he slowly disappeared through the distance.


    ****


    Early morning the next day in the mountains.


    Danzel who was searching like a predator would for prey in the mountains was running all around the mountain that was a par forest.


    Since he was an undead that didn¡ät tire at all, running at top speeds significantly increased the area that he covered in his search.


    He was so fast in fact that the beast who would im with pride to be predators to be scared and hiding in small holes so that then cross path with Danzel.


    Fortunately for those predators, a small echo gained Danzel''s attention.


    "Hehe, Found you...!" Dashing towards where the echoes came, Danzel soon found out a small cave that was surrounded by people with rough faces and to what Danzel would consider quite dirty.


    Hiding around a tree and some bushes while using [Presentless Steps] to hide better


    "Hey, Hey! Come one! Don¡ät you dare fall on me!"


    "If you fall I will cut those legs of yours!"


    The people in question seemed like they formed a half ring around a duo of people. One of them only had some rags covering his private areas and looking heavily malnourished while the other with bulging muscles was beating the living daylight out of him.


    Each punch that the man with the muscles gave made the blood of the othere out.


    The man who had many bruises and was hit once again by the man in front of him couldn¡ät take it any longer and fell to the ground with his whole body shaking from the pain.


    "Dammit!"


    "That¡äs our number two after our boss! He sends that rag doll a whole 5 meters away with a single punch!"


    "Hey you over there, you lost your bet. Now hand those coins to me already!"


    "Never!


    "What-"


    ...


    Looking at that sight, Danzel stared solemnly at those guys.


    Currently, he was observing in cases if they were any dangers or not.


    As for the poor man who was shaking to the ground, Danzel didn¡ät give him much of a nce as he didn¡ät care about what would happend to him.


    As much of how cruel this sounded.


    "Hmm...that guy should be near the end of the 2nd-tier. If what that guy said was true, then expect their boss who is supposedly a 3rd-tier. That guy should be the strongest." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    After staring for a few seconds more to see if there is something that could be a variable, he guided the mana in his body towards his body.


    "Alright..." Drawing his longsword out, Danzel dashed out from his hiding ce at incredible speeds.


    "Hmm?" One of the bandits who was staring at the forest absconded-minded got started when he saw a cloaked figure dashing at speeds that made him first believe he saw an illusion.


    But once Danzel run to the first of the bandits and cut his head off, the bandits realized that this wasn¡ät an illusion.


    "Enemy!" The bandits screamed to their fullest.


    Unfortunately, when every bandit noticed that there was an enemy, six people had already died.


    "Who is that bastard!"


    "Doesn¡ät matter! Kill him!"


    Picking their weapons up, the bandits dashed towards Danzel with the intent to kill.


    Only to shortly realize that they were being killed before they had the chance to throw a single swing at Danzel.


    "Bastard! I will kill you!"


    As the bandits were about to run out of fear of death, the man with the bulgy muscles dashed towards Danzel with mana surroundings his fist.


    "Hahaha! Gerkan went serious!"


    "That guy is now dead!


    But as soon as Gerkan, the strongest of them all second to the boss throw his punch on the cloaked figure.


    The cloaked figure moved slightly to the left, dodging Gerkans fist who was known to break the stone itself in pieces and had pierced with his longsword through the heart of Gerkan.


    "Ugh..." with a pained groan, Gerkan fell to the ground without showing any signs of moving.


    The whole fight between Gerkan and Danzel took less than 2 seconds.


    And that alone terrified those bandits.


    "Run!"


    "He is a monster! We can¡ät win!"


    "Call the boss!"


    Dropping their weapons to the ground, the bandits dashed towards the cave as if it was their only hope.


    "Where are you guys going? I haven¡ät finished with you all quite yet." Said the chilling voice and the originator of their current fear.


    With his mana traveling through the ground, a stone wall blocked the entrance of the cave, together with the bandit''sst hope.


    "Magic!?"


    "Break the wall! Quick!"


    "Dammit! We shouldn¡ät have thrown our weapons."


    Well, even if they had their weapons, breaking through the stone wall before the being behind them get them to meet their death was from them, the biggest dream in their whole life.


    "Aghhh!"


    "Spare me!"


    "Please!"


    No longer than a few minutes, the bandits who were cheering and having jokes with each other were now dead to the floor.


    "Mm, not bad." Danzelmented on his work.


    Using the rune on his sword to make the stained blood marks on his sword be more of a liquid form and swung to the air, making his sword now clean from any blood.


    "Sigh...Veren was much better." Grumbling to himself, Danzel heard a small groaning from behind him.


    "Ugh..." The malnourished man groaned while staring aimlessly at the sky.


    Walking towards him, he stared at him in silence.


    "You will soon die." Danzel said solemnly at the man.


    "I know." The man answered with a bitter smile.


    The man''s wounds were too severe to survive.


    And Danzel wasn¡ät going to let him live anyway.


    "I see..." Danzel answered slightly confused, not too sure if the man was referring to the former or thetter.


    Pointing the longsword towards the man''s heart, Danzel looked at the man who looked at him with a bitter smile


    Unsure if he was thinking of ending his misery or that his life was about to end.


    "Don¡ät worry, I will have you receive your revenge." Danzel said as he pierced the man''s chest with his sword.


    "T-Thank you..." The man said towards Danzel, with tears on his face.


    Those were the man''sst words.


    "..."


    Standing in front of the man''s corpse in silence for a few seconds, he pierced his sword to the ground while raising his hands to the air.


    The next moment, dead mana came out of Danzel''s body and shot towards the nearby corpses.


    "Be made to serve~"

 Chapter 179 - Necromancer

    At the same time when Danzel mastered the Bandits in their hideout entrance.


    A small girl was walking beside a tall grandpa who was holding arge curved sheath with a de resting there.


    Both those two were wearing some quite unique and weird clothing based on the cultural standpoint of the Arcana and the Berum Kingdom.


    And the fact that both of them were hiding their body feature didn¡ät make it much easier for someone to guess where those two hade from.


    That duo though could be easily mistaken for a grandpa taking her dear grandaughter for a walk through the forest.


    One would never expect that those two were currently going to begin a massacre.


    "Grandpa, when will we be there? My feet are starting to hurt." The small girl said with a cute voice at her grandpa.


    Looking at the small girl, the elderly felt quite troubled.


    "Shiro, forgive this useless grandpa of yours for making you suffer through this. We will shortly arrive at our destination." The elderly holding the sheath said with a gentle voice as he looked at the small girl.


    The small girl that was called Shiro shook her head when she heard her grandpa apologizing.


    "Mhhm, I know that grandpa is the greatest! And I know what we are doing is for my sake! I, Shiro, can still go on!" She dered proudly.


    Though he wore a mask that was covering his mouth, the elder''s eyes betrayed the proud smile that he had hidden in his mask.


    "Bear it a little more Shiro, the kind guys in that tavern said that the entrance of the bad guys should be around here."


    A few minutester, the duo walked to a cave with stationed bandits taking the role of guards.


    There were around 5 in total.


    "Grandpa, are those the bad guys?" Shapiro asked the grandpa who was staring at the guards with a frown on his face.


    ''There are signs of blood in their clothing, worse of all their stench of blood is quite strong. There is no doubt...those guys are the bandits.'' The elderly thought as he turned around to Shiro with his face softened up.


    "Shiro, those 5 people are bad guys. Let grandpa deal with them while little Shiro stays here, alright?"


    "But Grandpa! I want to fight too!"


    "No, but, you stay here and protect yourself. Got it?" The elderly said with a tone that wouldn''t take no as an answer.


    "...Alright, Shiro will stay here." Shapiro said slightly disappointed.


    "Good girl." The elderly said with a soft voice while he put his hand in her head.


    Turning around,the elderly took a deep breath in and then exhaled.


    Pulling the sword out of his sheath, the elderly took small steps towards the 5 guards.


    "Hmm? Hey guys! Look over there! Someone ising!" One of the bandits pointed with his hand at the elderly.


    "This guy...he drawer his sword out!"


    "Intruder? Should we call for support?"


    "And be ridiculed for calling support against one single guy?"


    "Let''s just kill him, the clothing together with that weird sword should fetch quite some coin."


    Pulling their weapons out, two of them started walking towards the elderly while the other 3 three stayed behind.


    "Hey you, what are you doing here? Are you perhaps seeking death here?" One of the bandits who walked forward said.


    "..."


    The elderly didn''t reply and only looked at them with a frozen look.


    "You! What are you starting at-"


    Before the man could finish, the elderly wielding a de with a length that was bigger than the average handle together with a long curved de that resembled a scythe sword disappeared from the spot and appeared behind the two who were confused about where he was gone.


    Once they realized that he was behind them, the two of them were cut in half.


    "Wha-!?"


    Witnessing that multiple rm clocks started ringing in the bandit''s heads.


    Doing the worst job that was in this Bandits group, they were assigned to look after and guard the secret entrance in cases of emergency.


    With only 5 people here without being given any ves to waste their time.


    Their job consisted of just ying guards with the others or standing leaving the boredom that was their life.


    The only merit here was that it was quite safe as it was hidden on top of the mountain.


    The 5, or rather 3 now would have never expected to fall in such a situation in where a monster was going to appear.


    One of them who was quicker in his mind recognize the danger and started dashing inside the gave for his dear life.


    Unfortunately for him though, although he handled the correct way, his running alone made him the target of the elderly scythe sword.


    Like a sh, the elderly dashed with incredible speed towards the man running away.


    Reaching him in less than a second of time.


    With some swift yet urate Swings, the man was cut into three pieces.


    While the two were terrified that this old man passed beside them without them noticing, their attention was shortly caught by a cute cheering voice.


    "Wow! Grandpa is the best!"


    As if their brains went to overload with every single brain cell working at their best.


    The two-man who saw that small girl had the same idea.


    ''If that girl is the grandchild of that devil, then...''


    Dashing at the same time, the two-run with a crazy expression towards the girl.


    ''If we get that girl as hostage we will survive!'' That is what both bandit though.


    The eyes of the elderly who saw the turned bloodshot with an intense bloodlust spilling out of him.


    But thatst for a split second before he got back to normal and walked his way up to Shiro.


    One would think of why the Grandpa wasn''t in a rush to save his dear grandchild.


    The answer to that was because there wasn''t a need to.


    Seeing the two bad guys approaching her, Shiro raised her hand, two white pale little hands.


    What she also reveal was the encroaching mana gathering around her hands.


    Mumbling to himself something a change happend.


    The vast mana that was in her arms soon started to turn into sparks and soon after into multiple lighting that was sent in front of where the bandits were.


    *Twighhh! Twighhh!


    The bandits in question who didn''t see thating had nowrge holes through their bodies. Making them fall to the ground with a shocked expression frozen in their face before their death.


    "Grandpa! You saw that!? I defeated the bad guys!" Shapiro said in triumph before her Grandpa.


    "Yeah...I saw it, my dear." Saying that with a bitter smile on his face,the elderly looked at the gave and then at Shiro.


    "Let''s go defeat more bad guys Shiro, make sure to stay behind me."


    "Yes~"


    Saying that the two made their way deeper towards the bandit''s hideout.


    ***


    Deeper inside the cave.


    In a room with many luxury items and arge bed.


    A giant of a man with many scars in his body standard up from the bed that was shared by a girl who had a pair of lifeless eyes, her face was that of a model, but the clear tear marks in her face ruined the booty that she once had.


    "Tch, another one broken. I guess it''s time to throw her away to the other guys." The man said as he started at his corner who had some other chained girls with only rags covering their bodies.


    "Now...who should I pick"


    As the giant of a man got closer to the group of girls with a malicious smile on his face, the door of his room was busted open.


    "Boss! There is an emergency!" One of the bandits with sweat running thoughts his forehead yelled out loud.


    "What is it!? What is so important to disturb me in my room" the giant man said in anger, as this mood got just ruined.


    "Boss! We are being attacked!"


    "Huh? By who? The merchant Union? Or the soldiers of the kingdom?"


    "Neither Boss! We are being attacked by the undead!"


    "Huh? Undead?" The giant of a man, otherwise known as Boss asked in confusion.


    Thest thing he expected to face was those immortal beings called undead.


    "Yes! And the one controlling them is way too strong for us to handle! We need you, boss!"


    Showing a frozen on his face, the Boss walked towards a table picked up two war axes, and followed his subordinate.


    And soon after he arrived at the scene, he was shocked.


    Running like a beast pretending to be human, his former subordinates that now became zombies were running at others with madness, fully driven by their instinct to cut the throat of others.


    His subordinates were trying to defend themselves. But as the moves of the zombies were difficult to guess, their attack ended up falling towards the zombie''s chest and arms instead of the head which was their weakness.


    Worst of all, if they missed their seeing they would be jumped at and soon found to be devoured.


    The most surprising part of that all was that alone robe figure winding a sword had suddenly surrounded himself with ominous mana.


    And the aura that hit the corpses that died not long ago would start to rise and join the ranks of that Necromancer.

 Chapter 180 - Sword Wielding Necromancer

    "Gwaagh~"


    "Gweegh!"


    The corpses of the bandit''s formerrade before the hooded rose as one of the dead while screeching to the living.


    And for the few remaining Bandits who saw that were terrified.


    The idea that they will be ravaged and eaten alive was bad enough for them.


    But to be turned as an undead was something from their nightmares.


    For all they knew was that their soul will experience entless torment under the servitude of the Necromancer in front of them.


    That, and the idea of being eaten alive made their morale sink rock bottom with some given in the fear.


    And the boss of those desperate bandits showed a frown upon that scene.


    "They were really undead..." He said with a solemn voice.


    One of the zombies who had finished biting someone''s neck turned his head and stared at the man who held two war axes.


    Following the instinct of his undead nature, the zombie growled with the intense hatred of the living.


    It took him only a few moments to reach the man and have his teeth sunk in the man''s muscles.


    "Hmpf, stupid." The man scoffed.


    Raising his axe, he cleaved through the zombie''s torso with much to no resistance.


    "Gwaagh!" The zombie growled back while it growled towards the man''s feet.


    "Annoying." The man said as he raised his foot and stomped at the zombie''s head. Making the undead''s head explode as if throwing a melon to the ground.


    The result of it was a bloody mess.


    Taking arge breath in, the man yelled out loud.


    "You Bastards! What are you guys doing!? Those things are weaker and much more dumper than you! You just have to bash their hands and be done with it! Since when did I allow weaklings to be a part of my group!"


    The Bandits who heard all the familiar voices that before would make them scared. In that voice now though they saw hope.


    Their boss was here!


    The bandits imminently turned their backs on the undead and dashed towards their boss as if he was thest hope that they had.


    Of course, such action made the few who reacted too slowly be overwhelmed by the nearby zombies that previously were being fended off by the other bandits.


    "Aghh! No! Don¡ät leave!"


    "Help me!"


    Seeing that, the man holding the war axes wanted almost to facepalm himself while bashing the heads of the group who was running towards him.


    `Those dumpa*ses...¡ä


    As the bandits generally were much faster than the limping undead, the fewst bandits came with heavy breaths.


    "Hah~Hah...Boss Farris! We got to use the secret passageway! They are too much for us-" Before the man could even finish his sentence, he froze upon the sight of the de of the war axeing down his head.


    *Crack!


    "Huh?"


    Pulling the war axe out of the man''s head, the others had to watch how theirrade fell to the ground with arge cut through his head.


    The bandits couldn¡ät help but suck in their breath as they stared at the corpse in fear and then back at the one responsible for killing.


    The giant of the man, the boss of the bandit''s group in this mountain, Farris ignored the stares of the others.


    "You fear blinded fools! Are you telling me to leave behind all the umted treasures and run away! That undead that you are facing only of the first tier! The lowest of them all! Some mere zombies!" Farris pointed with his war axe on the zombies who were closing closer in a line that was being led by the Necromancer.


    Pointing next to the Necromancer, Farris scolded the others with rage written on his face.


    "And the Necromancer who uses such meter soldiers shouldn¡ät be much stronger!"


    Controlling his life force inside his body, the muscles that could be considered first-ss from that of a bodybuilder expanded.


    "Someone who uses such mere tricks as making others his puppets stand no chance against me! Farris! So don¡ät fear! Pick up your weapons and fight! Once I killed that Necromancer I will allow the remaining of you to y with the stored goods inside my room!"


    Putting a little strength towards his legs, the ground that he was standing on cracked under the pressure.


    "Now, Fight! Those who do will receive heaven''s pleasure, while those who don¡ät will get my axe!"


    Hearing the confidence of their leader together with his threat and promised reward. The moral that was rock bottom fell was now no more!


    `We can do it! With Boss here, we will survive¡ä They thought.


    Unfortunately, the man who motivated them wasn¡ät much the same opinion.


    `All my 2nd-tier people died and only the weaklings remained. Facing against that undead is probably too much.¡ä Farris cursed internally.


    The idea of having his whole bandits group destroyed that he painstakingly built among this whole year was ruined by passing by Necromancer.


    He didn¡ät know the reason why such an ominous figure was here.


    But one thing he knew.


    And that was, he didn¡ät care as to why.


    He fought against many spellcasters through his years.


    Be it those who used a sword or a staff, he always emerged victoriously.


    He wasn¡ät scared of a spell caster who used some forbidden arts.


    "Here I aming!"


    With his feet sinking in the ground himself, Farris dashed forward with each stepped cracking the ground itself!


    The Necromancer who saw this raised his hand and guided his mana to the ground.


    The next moment the ground started to raise in front of where Farris was running.


    Effectively blocking the two parties with a stone wall.


    `So he is buying time huh?¡ä Farris scoffed at such a poor attempt to stop him.


    "You will need something better to stop me!"


    Like a charging bull, Farris rammed the wall with his shoulders as he was a battering ram himself.


    But once Farris passed through the wall he was surprised to see the Necromancer himself next to the wall.


    `Why is a spellcast-¡ä Amid his confusion, Farris''s eyesnded on the sword that the Necromancer was holding.


    "This guy!" Having back his footing after ramming at the wall. Farris hastily raised his war axe on his right arm and swung it down at the Necromancer.


    But before the axe couldnd on his target, the Necromancer''s other hand was raised with a shield appearing out of nowhere.


    *Twiik!


    The war axe shed with his shield while creating sparks.


    Holding the longsword with an ominous mana dancing between the de, Danzel shed the man''s chest while drawing forcefully lots of his blood out.


    "Argh!" Pushing the pain through his chest away, he swung with his other hand at the Necromancer.


    Seeing the iing attack, Danzel jumped back and dodged the swing that raised the dust from the ground.


    `This guy is strong...maybe stronger than Hanson.¡ä Danzelmended internally as he looked at his shield that had a cut mark in.


    "...Bastard! You aren¡ät a spellcaster! That pain...I will return it tenfold!" Farris said as the muscles in his chest started to shake.


    `What the heck!?¡ä Danzel thought surprised at the sight in front of him.


    Therge wound that he made through his chest while the effects of [Cursed de] started to show, was slowly being closed! What surprised him though was that this wasn¡ät regeneration!


    It was the man controlling his muscles to move them between the wound, essential covering the wound with his muscles!


    "Returning the pain to me, you say. I ain¡ät too sure if that will work out." Danzel said as he took his stance towards him.


    "Cocky bastard..." Enraged, the man dashed forward while letting a battle cry out.


    "Oraaaahhhh!"


    Taking a lost look towards hid undead, Danzel sent them a mentalmand.


    `Imand you all, kill those in the far back. Let none survive!¡ä


    As if they were waiting for this.


    The zombies let out a massive screech and dashed in at the same time towards their target.


    "Gwaagh!"


    "Gwaagh!"


    "Gweegh!"


    Farris who was prepared to face the horde of the undead was surprised to see that they all ignored him and that they went for his subordinates.


    The fact that the sword-wielding necromancer discarded his minions relieved him as it angered him.


    To him, it was no different from tantly saying that he was underestimating him.


    "Your death wouldn¡ät be easy!" Farris said as he swung his sword at the necromancer, which in turn was blocked by said necromancer''s sword.


    Feeling the pressure of his swing, Danzel was forced to take a step back and cancel their engagement.


    `He is indeed stronger, fight head one would bring me in disadvantage.¡ä


    Blocking the bandits swing with his shield next, Danzel wasn¡ät much of panic even if his opponent was physically stronger.


    `Though he is stronger,pared to Hanson''s skills and speed. That guy is just a brute..¡ä Danzel thought as he already nned how to kill that brute in front of him.

 Chapter 181 - Unexpected Meeting

    Echoes of metal shing with each other could be heard through all the cave.


    The few bandits who were trying their best to survive the horde of hungry zombies and got a glimpse of the battle ying not far away from them became awed and terrified.


    Of course, those who saw the cloaked figure and their boss fight were shortly after one step closer to being devoured by the zombies.


    That though was one of many minor details.


    But if one were to watch the two fightings and able to follow their fast movements, it would have seen that the cloaked figure who was Danzel had the advantage.


    Once every sh Danzel would either take a step back to avoid the brute in front of him or block with his shield while managing to scratch the man''s muscles with his sword.


    Although they were just scratches that didn¡ät even were deeper than two centimeters deep. The mana running through his de was no normal mana.


    Instead, it made undead what they are.


    Immortals who denied the concept of death and fully embraced it!


    Such mana in a mortal''s body without any techniques or body modification to keep it check would start eating up the vitality of ones by itself.


    So the small wounds that were practically nothing to someone were now begging to show ck spots, clear signs that necrosis started to take effect at such parts. And with so many wounds adding up in one''s body, it wouldn¡ät be strange to feel intense pain to the point of copsing or being tired.


    At least that was how it was supposed to be.


    `What the hell is with this guy!? Does he have muscles for brains!¡ä Danzel cursed as he was forced to block the iing axe with his shield.


    The axe in question was engulfed with the lifeforce together with the arm holding it. Making the strike of the shield feel like Danzel was hit by a train or something simr.


    Instead of the man feeling any pain from his wounds to Danzel it seemed more like the wounds or the pain from them fulled the man''s eagerness to bash his head.


    He had to say that he vastly underestimated the man''s stupidness.


    Danzel would have bet that this man didn¡ät have the word defense in his dictionary.


    Instead of avoiding the small cuts, Farris instead pushed forwarded to have one if not both of his war axes dig through his body. He simply swung the two axes left and right with monstrous strength that Danzel could barely handle.


    In a sense, those two war axes were the perfect weapons for a man named Farris.


    They are small enough to utilize with a single hand, and instead of some dagger, the full impact of one swing will be fully kept on the axes. Making them an extremely deadly weapon if it struct someone.


    But though the natures of the war axe, defending one''s attack with them is extremely awkward to do, as the handle could suddenly be cut if one blocked.


    For Farris short of fighting style was perfect.


    Equipped with two of such deadly weapons, Farris was extremely dangerous even for Danzel who was able to see every one of his movements.


    His being on the defense didn¡ät help either.


    He also calcted that even if he were to use [Sin of Wrath], contesting against him with pure strength was a wide dream for the current him.


    "Oraaaah!" Flexing his muscles, the axe that stuck in Danzel''s shield was starting to push forward, slowly making Danzel himself be pushed away.


    `His strength is ridiculous...¡ä Take arge step back and let the axe be swung in the air. The two of them stared at each other.


    "You damned bastard! How long are you nning of running away! You don¡ät actually believe that those mere puppets of yours will be of any use once they are done with my subordinates, right!?"


    "..."


    "Or are your belief that such small wounds would actually make me fall!?" Farris said with an angered voice.


    To him, it seemed as if the sword-wielding necromancer was ying with him! Something such insulting as him being poked and then running away from the grasp of his axe.


    If it weren¡ät for the fact that his enemy had the potential to harm him, he would already have gone berserk.


    Danzel silence also didn¡ät fair well with Farris either.


    With his patience all burn down, Farris was about to charge ahead when he noticed a dark green glow in Danzel''s sword.


    Swinging his sword to the air, a dark green wind de was shot out towards where Farris was.


    "Heh! Do you believe that a mere wind de could do anything at me!" Raising his war ax, he was about to swing at the air de, when suddenly a crippling pain felt through his chest.


    A simr sword that of the necromancer in front of him had pierced through his heart.


    Farris''s mind went nk for a second, trying to process what was happening.


    But before he could reason as to why a de was pierced through his heart, he in sticky re-directed his swing to his back to kill whoever pierced his chest.


    Swinging his hand to his back, he got a small glimpse of a hooded figure that disappeared the next second, leaving a confused Farris.


    But amidst his confusion, he didn¡ät forget that the air de was closing dangerously near him.


    "Punny tricks!" Farris yelled as he used his life force to enchant both his axe and hand.


    With a swing at the side of the air de,pletely destroying it one-sidely. Farris realized that he underwent some sort of spell that made him illusioned him getting his heart pierced.


    Although it wasn¡ät an illusion in a sense, hiscking education in magic made him think that it was one.


    Usually, even amidst one illusion, pain and other gruesome images could be replicated to make someone feel as if they were real. Once the illusion was done, everything would go back to normal, with the pain to be forgotten.


    As if someone was having put into an illusion to have his limps cut off while feeling the pain, once it ended. The target''s pain of having his limbs cut off would no longer be there. At least the physical pain that is.


    But to Danzel [Mortal Reminder], the pain inflicted although a lie.


    An ethereal pain would still linger for a short amount of time at the target.


    Making the [Mortal Reminder] effect feel semi-real.


    Making it, if one didn¡ät had the knowledge of it, to be extremely surprised and confused.


    After all, who wouldn¡ät when arge sword would pierce your heart while you feel the pain out of the blue?


    s, the effect onlysted a few seconds.


    And for Danzel who dashed in front of Farris, not have enough time to end his attack.


    Learned from his previous attacks, instead of shing Farris''s body, Danzel now aimed for the man''s heart!


    Farris got managed to get his grips together from his confusion, saw the situation that he was in, and reacted to it.


    Letting one of his war axes fall to the ground, he blocked the iing sword that wanted to pierce his chest with his hand.


    Grinding his teeth from the pain, the de that went through his palm was shortly stopped a few centimeters away from his muscle as he was able to catch the de in time.


    "I got you now you bastard!" Farris shouted with a malicious smile on his face.


    He ignored all the pain of his hand and raised the other axe that he hand on the other hand high up like an executioner who was about to do the deed.


    Unfortunately for him, as he now held his enemy in ce and also withstood his attacks, it brought him a sense that was nothing else toe.


    Making him miss the dark green light that wasing behind his back.


    Before he was able to swing his war axe down, a familiar pain was felt through his chest, making him halt for a second.


    Looking down on his chest, was a sword piercing his heart.


    Witnessing that, Farris wanted almost tough at the Necromancer using the same trick on him.


    But as soon as he tried, instead of augh a mouthful of blood came out of his mouth,


    He wanted to swing his war axe and destroy the necromancer''s head off, but him suddenly feeling dizzy made him unable to.


    Waiting for the illusion to stop as it did before, Farris felt worse by the second.


    Finally noticing a sword, that was different from the illusion before was still pierced through his heart.


    "W-What!?" With a hint of horror in his eyes, he tried to turn his head to his back.


    Seeing him distract and weaken, Danzel wastes no time drawing his longsword out of Farris''s grip.


    And with a smooth movement, he cut the throat of the confused man.


    With blooding out of his throat and having the dead mana burn the vitality around the area. Farris let go of his remaining war axe and grabbed his throat in hopes to stop the bleeding.


    Falling to his knees, he stared at the Necromancer''s feet with fear as he felt weaker and weaker.


    The sword that was pierced in this heart was suddenly drawn out.


    Amidst hisst moments, Farris forced his head to look at the sword only to see dark green arms holding the sword in the air.


    "Although I originally nned to trade blows with you and thene back to life... I guess that works too."


    Farris who heard that didn¡ät understand what the necromancer was.


    Where it for the content not making sense for him or seeing his whole world turning into ck water who engulf him.


    Danzel didn¡ät care.


    The only thing he cared about as of now was the floating window in front of him.


    [You received 70 000 XP]


    "Although my shield is a bit damaged...it was worth the trouble."


    Dragging the corpse of Farris through the ground, Danzel inspected the work of his undead.


    "Hmm...it seems they finally finished too." Danzel said as he saw thest of the bandits crying out to be saved from the surrounded zombies who were eating him alive.


    As the undead he created would transfer the XP to him, Danzel didn¡ät much care who would kill those guys. He was just d that he didn¡ät have to waste his time chasing after those punches.


    `Although I found them eating disgusting...¡ä Danzel thought as he walked and inspected the corpses.


    As he was about to look deeper inside the cave for any survivors, he heard a loud yell from a different tunnel.


    "Kyaaah!"


    Turning his head towards the voice, he saw three of his zombies who were influenced by hismand to rush towards a duo of a small girl and an elderly wielding a curved sword.


    Danzel at first was just going to let the zombies kill those two.


    But what he saw next surprised him.


    The elderly who raised his sword a little, and with incredible speed, he turned the three undead into pieces.

 Chapter 182 - Threats And Negotiation

    It was in an instance.


    Danzel only managed to take a small glimpse, but the three zombies that he raised were eliminated in an instance.


    Sure, they were beyond weakpared to his standards.


    In fact, if someone were to fight with a clear mind against them even if he had the same stats as the zombies. That, someone, could probably take 2 to 3 zombies head-on, if not more.


    After all, except for how scary they look and all. The zombies were only driven by instinct.


    And their actual intelligence was rock bottom.


    He once had tried tomand them to hold and use weapons, but that didn¡ät work that well.


    Overall, the zombies he raised were weak.


    So finding them being decimated by someone else wasn¡ät much to his surprise. The surprising part was the one who did it.


    It was so fast that even Danzel who effectively had 550 agility wasn¡ät able to see. All that he managed to see were some after-images from the elderly curved sword cleaving his undead.


    That alone brought many concerns upon him.


    As someone far stronger was before him.


    "Grandpa! What¡äs wrong with those people? Are they sick?" The small girl asked while pulling his pants a bit. Though her face was hidden from the cloak on top of her clothes, by voice alone could one deduct that she was close to crying.


    Looking at her grandaughter, the elderly showed a soft gaze for a split second before turning to that of serious, sharp eyes.


    "Shiro, stay behind me. I will deal with this." Hiding the small girl behind him, the elderly eyes turned and gazed directly at Danzel.


    Feeling his gaze, Danzel cursed to himself.


    `All of you, form a line and don¡ät engage.¡ä Danzel sent amand onthe remaining undead which by now number more than 30.


    Following their liege''smand, the zombie who was aimlessly gazing somewhere turned their heads simultaneously towards the direction of the two living while forming a line in front of their liege.


    The image of so many undead showing their hostility was one of the finest nightmares that one could find.


    The elderly who saw that frowned his eyebrows as he stayed silent.


    "..."


    "..."


    With both parties staying silent, Danzel felt extremely awkward and didn¡ät know what to do. He could only try to look like the friendly undead next door and hope that he wouldn¡ät have to fight that guy.


    Of course, the blood that stained his armor together with the 30 or so undead didn¡ät help him much with that.


    The elderly who was observing silently, raised his curved sword slightly.


    That small thing though made Danzel have no existing nerve to react as fast as he could.


    Raising his sword and shield in front of him, he took his stance. It took him only a second to get in his stance.


    He still remembered the day when he had his whole body destroyed by the magic caster two years ago. The desperation of being unable to do anything and beingpletely helpless towards someone else.


    He never wanted to feel like that and go back to that dark ce.


    And currently, looking at the elderly in front of him. It brought him the same vibes as back then.


    Staring at the undead horde in front of him, the elderly took a small step forward while looking coldly at Danzel.


    `No good, that guy means business!¡ä Recognizing the man''s look like a clear sight of hostility, Danzel''s mind raced through various ideas of how to get out of the current situation he was in.


    While he was starting to get more anxious about his current situation, his eyesnded on the small girl in the far back.


    `That¡äs it!¡ä


    As the elderly seemed about to dash forward, Danzel raised his deep voice.


    "Take another step and I will curse that child over there!" Danzel said as he revealed his dead manaing out of his armor and sword.


    Hearing that, the elderly halted his steps and looked at him with his frown turning for the worse.


    "What did you just say?" The elder said with a threatening voice.


    Hearing that Danzel celebrated internally.


    ''So he cares for the girl...''


    Between the few actions that he had, Danzel only managed to think of two.


    Those were negotiation and treating him.


    The reason why he chose thetter was that negotiations were only then possible if both parties had the same standing.


    He knew that the elderly had nothing to gain by letting me go, neither would he lose something.


    By his guess, that guy could annihte both him and his undead without breaking a sweat.


    With the reputation of the undead counted at that too, the chance of being let go we''re extremely slim.


    Making his choice to treat him.


    Effectively making him receive a loss if he chooses to fight him.


    ''I need information...'' Danzel thought as he answered the elderly question.


    "It''s exactly as I said, if you were to step any closer I will cast a curse upon that child that eats up her vitality and bring severe pain."


    "..."


    Seeing him starring daggers at him, he sighed in relief internally.


    ''He is hesitating''


    "If I may ask...for what reason have youe in this bandit hole? Depending on the reason, we might not even need to fight...or forcing my hand to harm that little miss over there." Danzel said.


    "You threatened me...do you think that you can win against me," The elder said with an angered voice.


    "I would call it more of a self-preservation act than anything...I admit I get defeated..."


    "But! I am fully confident that I can take that little miss to the grave with me." Danzel said with his cold voice.


    Though he was putting a thought act, he was extremely worried.


    Though using both of his curses on that little girl could maybe kill her.


    That was all about it.


    Once she dies, he would die shortly after.


    And that was thest thing that he wanted to happend.


    Both parties stayed silent for a few good seconds.


    Only the growls of the zombies could be heard inside the cave.


    The elderly turned around and nced at the small girl, Shiro, his granddaughter.


    Turning his gaze back at Danzel, the elder said.


    "We came to kill the bandits and...loot their belongings. What about you?"


    Hearing that Danzel grinned to himself.


    "I see... I only came to kill those bandits as I...was of the need of some materials for my craft as you see." Danzel said whilemotioning on his undead as he bullish*tted his eat though.


    He was only passing by and getting some quick XP from those guys. So technically he didn''t lie.


    "Sorry for beating you guys on that, but I have no need of their loot. You can have their loot..."


    While showing a face that said ''I don''t believe you'' Danzel felt conflicted when suddenly the small girl looked at Danzel.


    "Grandpa, isn''t this guy the one who gave us the fish yesterday?" She asked innocently.


    "Hmm?"


    "Hmm?"


    Both he and the elder looked at the girl confused before they started at each other.


    "You are..."


    "Oh...you guys are the ones of the tavern..." Danzel said finally recognizing the two pair of yesterday night.


    Although their clothes were unique, the two didn''t strike a strong enough image for Danzel to remember them.


    With the situation growing a bit better, Danzel decided to strike while the iron was hot.


    "We really don''t have to fight... I will just go and you get the loot of those guys. Doing that everyone will be happy, right?"


    Showing back his frozen, the elder pointed at the lineup of the undead.


    "And what will you do with that undead of yours then?"


    Starting at the zombies that he was pointing at, Danzel said in a solemn tone.


    "I...willmand them to stay guard on the exit in case you don''t hold your word. Other than that I have no use for them."


    The elderly stared a good few seconds directly into Danzel''s eyes.


    "Are you saying that we aren''t going to hold our word?" the elder said with a serious voice.


    To which Danzel wanted to scoff at, but decided against it as it wouldn:''t bring him much of any gain.


    "Please understand my situation..."


    With that guy being possible of the 4th-tier, someone who was still at the 3rd-tier was like a peasant in front of a dragon!


    Taking chances against such being when it wasn''t necessary would be beyond stupid.


    He knew his limit, at that old man was way more than he could handle.


    "I understand... We will do it as such. But once you have gone, we will eliminate that undead of yours, we got a deal?''


    Nodding his head, Danzel walked slowly towards the tunnel as he had his ethereal eyes glued on the two.


    When he was far enough, he began moving his man to the ground and raising a stone wall that blocked the whole entrance.


    ''Stay here and fight until your end!'' Giving his undead theirst orders, Danzel used his [Swift Movements] skill to surround himself with mana and make him faster.


    Dashing towards the exit like a maniac, he celebrates internally.


    ''I did it! I actually managed to talk my way out from this monster of an old man!''


    Though he only saw him kill three zombies, the speed he killed them was enough for him to avoid him.


    If he couldn''t follow the enemy''s movement, how was he supposed to win in the first ce?


    The answer was he couldn''t!


    There were only so few tricks he had, but against absolute power, he knew that all these tricks would be utterly useless.


    "I had enough of this kingdom.. It''s time to go."

 Chapter 183 - Next Destination

    Inside the mountains cave...


    The wall that Danzel had raised was soon destroyed and cut into small pieces.


    With the wall crumbling down, the zombies that waited from the other side howled upon taking a glimpse from one of the living.


    Abiding by their liegesmand and their own instincts.


    The first zombie to take the lead of a malnourished zombie with all the other zombies following closely behind him.


    The man responsible for cutting down the wall stared solemnly at the horde that was about to run him down.


    "So he said the truth, huh..." As he finished his words, a small glow was to see in the elderly legs.


    And the next moment, the zombie''s target had vanished from his original spot.


    Before the zombies knew, the body of the horde was split into several pieces. Creating a scene out of a horror movie.


    The worst was that although many of the undead had died, the few zombies who had their heads stillunhurt were still able to move...in what little they had of their bodies.


    "Sigh, that undead are really handful ones..." The elder said as he finished the remaining crippled zombies by destroying their heads.


    As destroying the body without the head would kill an undead.


    Weaken them, yes.


    As destroying their body essential removes arge amount of dead mana from the undead.


    Cleaning his sword with a cloth that he kept on his clothing, he walked away from that gruesome scene and went towards a small girl with a group of women wearing rags.


    "Grandpa! Have you finished your job?" The small girl Shiro said as he run towards her grandpa.


    The elderly showed up with a warm yet bitter smile that was hidden behind his mask.


    `I made her see something she shouldn¡ät have...¡ä


    Going on his knees, he gave the small girl a hug, which made the girl confused.


    "Grandpa?"


    Touching her shoulders lightly to not hurt her identally, he made her stare into his eyes.


    "Shiro, forgive this Grandpa of yours for showing such a sight. Your mother would probably never forgive me for showing such sights..."


    Shiro who was staring at her grandpa bing serious suddenly went quiet and stared at him with silence.


    "You know, Shiro? I know that you are a genius and I know that you don¡ät like seeing such sights...but because of your condition you have to- No, you have to try to get used to such sights from now on." The elder said to the small girl as he could see the littered blood on the floor and corpses on the ground.


    It pained him to say such words.


    He tried to prevent her condition, but as she was the daughter of his daughter. Shiro had it much worse.


    And as she grew bigger, such grew her condition for the worse.


    As it was more of a racial trait from being one of `them¡ä, he could only try to earn the few silver coins from side jobs, while hiding who they were.


    And now, the elderly finally wasn¡ät able to provide for her condition.


    Forcing him to fall as low as going to steal from some mere bandits.


    `I guess I have to meet that person once more...¡ä He thought to himself.


    Seeing Shiro''s thoughtful expression the elderly gripped her and raised her to the air.


    "Ahhh, Grandpa! Let me to the ground!" Shiro yelled surprised with giggles escaping her mouth from time.


    "Hahaha~Now Shiro, How about Grandpa Agares takes you to eat another one of those fishes that you like so much yesterday?"


    "Really!?"


    "Would your grandpa ever lie to you?"


    "Yay!" Shiro raised her hands in celebration while her grandpa, Agares put her down.


    "Mhmm, let¡äs get that nicedy back to the city and have our Shiro have her feast. After all, we will be leaving towards a faraway ce tomorrow." Agares said, mentioning the girls to follow him and Shiro.


    "New ce? Where are we going, Grandpa?" Shiro asked while walking down the mountain.


    "It¡äs a faraway ce, much further to wherever we had gone before. Where only sand was to see with the sun looking down. We are going to meet an old friend of mine that I owe him my everything..." Agares said as he put his hand at top of Shiro''s hood.


    "Grandpa! I can¡ät see~"


    "Hahahaha~"


    While the duo wasughing heartily followed by the group of women not far behind, Agares stared at Shiro with a determined look.


    `To think that a time wille where I would go out of my way to ept the `mans¡ä offer after all those years...¡ä Agares though aggravated, but staring at her loveable granddaughter, his determination burned once more stronger.


    `For the sake of Shiro...my daughters...and my everything that I swore to protect.¡ä


    "Now, let¡äs go get that fish of yours, Shiro."


    ***


    Few hours after Danzel left the cave.


    Having already passed the Mountain, Danzel sprinting through the forest was to be seen with incredible speed.


    While most beasts of the forest who saw such a maniac running towards them would turn tail and find a hole to hide their heads in.


    Out of the few of them, was it because of ignorance, confidence, or right of stupidly had decided to try their chances to gnash their teeth at Danzel.


    Once they decided that choice their fate was sealed.


    "Wooof!"


    From the same species as the wolf that he once killed their Alpha, a pair of three such wolves decided to jump at him.


    "I don¡ät have time for you guys." Danzel said as he swung his de to one of the wolf''s heads, effectively splitting him in two.


    The other one fell by having his skull crushed by bashing his shield on their head and the remaining one just beheaded with his sword.


    [You received 5000 XP]


    [You received 5000 XP]


    [You received 5000 XP]


    Ignoring their bodies, Danzel continued dashing forward towards his destination.


    Though he guessed that those wolfs were being mind-controlled by an Alpha like the ones he had fought, Danzel wasn¡ät interested in hunting the Alpha who send him those XP bags.


    As the current, he was in a rush.


    All that was in his mind was to leave this damn kingdom that continuously brought him bad luck.


    From being threatened by Kayns group to reveal his identity toter be killed by a damn Archmage from the woods, only to survive by sheer luck, be ced to work for two whole damn years by Hanson and his merchant Union.


    Heck, this time he found another guy who could potentially cut him in pieces in a damn cave!


    He just wanted to earn some XP by killing guys who wouldn¡ät be missed by anyone!


    If it wasn¡ät for that small girl being there, then this end could very well be on that cave.


    Now he was just relieved that the old man wasn¡ät going after him and just let him go.


    Maybe he lost him and he was still looking for him or he alerted those annoying guys from the Union.


    Nevertheless, Danzel wasn¡ät going to push his n of getting out of the kingdom back anymore.


    "I should be pretty close by now..." Danzel said as in the distance he could see how there were fewer trees to see.


    Coming out of the woods, the sun illuminated the vast river.


    "Finally arrived," Danzel said as he looked ahead.


    "That¡äs bigger than I had expected..." Danzel said, surprised that he could barely see the other side of the river.


    "Hmm, let¡äs take a look." Pulling his map from his ring storage out, he went into deep thoughts.


    "Let¡äs see, If I were to cross the river the borders of Arcana and Berum would no longer be there. But except for the big ck spot in the map, I can either head towards northwest closer back to Berum, but there isn¡ät anything else except that one old kingdom that I heard Hanson talking about..."


    `No...ording to what Hanson said then that ce is thest ce that I would want to go.¡äShaking his head, he stared at his two remaining options.


    "I either got to move forward where the unknown part of the map is or in that direction." Pointing his finger at the northeast side from here, was a part of the map that was with yellow color-marked.


    "Then I will have to get in that desert..."


    After thinking about his choices for a bit he made up his mind.


    "Dessert it is then" Danzel dered out loud as he put his map away.


    With left having only trouble and the middle is unknown. Danzel preferred the dessert that the former two.


    As he had the map of the desert, not as much detailed as the two kingdoms.


    He still had bits of information about some cities there.


    "It isn''t like I lose anything anyway, I got enough time to waste."


    Walking closer to the river, he stared at it before looking at his armor.


    ''I guess I should put them out first'' Danzel thought, not very much liking the idea of having his main equipment to rust or something.


    Putting all his staff inside his storage ring, he brought out some armor and sword that he had to carve before.


    "Mm, good."


    With decently packed weight to those bones of mine, I walked towards the river until I was fully submerged.

 Chapter 184 - Deserts Of Azu′rah

    In the deserts of Azu¡ärah.


    Where the sun was scorching the sand and those who dared toe.


    Maybe it was because of the unfriendly environment that didn¡ät allow us to strive or at the sheer size of the desert.


    The deserts of Azu¡ärah were one of the manynds that were worth being called of unknown origin. The reason for that wasn¡ät because it wasn¡ät mapped or anything the like.


    As of thest hundreds of years, explorers started that before were afraid had to take it by their hands to explore the desert of Azu¡ärah.


    After many people who had gone missing and others that had been found dead, the few who managed to get out of the desert managed byparing the work of fellow explorers and theirs to finally creating the addition of the desert of Azu¡ärah in all the other maps.


    But till this day the title of unknown origin still stayed on this desert.


    In the first ce, the thing that draw the explorers to risk their lives to explore through the dangerous deserts was for a single reason.


    Ancient Artifacts.


    Once upon a time, there was a crazy magic caster who put himself to explore through the deserts of the unknown who was supposedly was searching the ways of immortality.


    That man was a famous archmage back on one of the most renowned academies of the arcana kingdom. Maybe it is because he reaching thest days of his life and getting mad about it.


    The reason why he was called mad was lost due to the nature of time.


    But one thing was remembered after the archmages return.


    It was the artifact that he brought back with incredible strength that made his legacy be a taint through history, making the explores with either greed or curiosity to seek what the Desert had to offer.


    Even when the archmage in question had shortly vanished from history together of what the artifact did.


    The sole potential treasure hunt in the desert was enough to make people seek the desert of Azu¡ärah.


    Ores and material that had never been sighted were discovered.


    Ancient Ruins of destroyed cities and monument buildings alike were found, some containing ancient knowledge or artifacts.


    But till this day, the reason why this dessert was called Azu¡ärah was still unexined.


    Only one thing was universally known of those who dared to step in the desert of Azu¡ärah.


    That was where that vicious beast inhabited the whole desert that sought nothing else than to kill.


    And rumors were saying, that in those very deserts.


    Champions of earth-shaking power and could-level armies were there to find.


    As Ancient Devils were to find there.


    ***


    Currently in the deserts of Azu¡ärah.


    Though the vast and far desert, a silhouette was too seen.


    Without carrying any water or food at his side.


    With only a sheath carrying a longsword and wearing heavy armor under a cloak.


    The armor of his that reflected the sun above had gone into dangerous heat levels that could easily leave a burn mark on a normal person.


    One would question how the man survived walking on this desert under such circumstances and be still standing on his two feet.


    As such a feat was only able to replicate by either a higher tierbated.


    Or a being that neither hungered nor tired.


    More specifically, an undead.


    And that particr undead was none other than a wight going by Rue Danzel.


    Staring at the piece of paper in his hand, Danzel cursed internally.


    "Sigh, where am I..." Danzel said as he stared in front of him, only to see the same thing wherever he looked.


    Sand.


    One could say, that Danzel, f*cked himself a big-time this time around.


    After he submerges in the river and walked in the deeps of it until he reached the other side, making him leave the borders of the Arcana Kingdom.


    The journey from here to where he was currently was a rather uneventful month to say the less.


    He walked through the forest and beast-infestednds without halting his march towards his goal. The desert.


    Originally, walking from the river until the desert by foot only was from another perspective an insane act to do.


    While the others had to sleep, find provision, fight through the weather, and fatigue.


    Danzel had to do nothing of such things.


    Fatigue and harsh weather? He felt nothing.


    Need of food? He couldn''t eat even if he wanted to.


    Sleep? That was for losers!


    With such features that had his undead body, walking 24/7 was nothing hard for him.


    Except for the few times he checked his status window, he hadn''t stopped making his way to the desert.


    But once he arrived at the edge of the desert and he decided to head his way towards one of the cities.


    Danzel, lost his way while going towards the city.


    Rather, there wasn''t even a path to guide him there.


    Since, well, there was only sand to see.


    Usually, Danzel would check his surroundings first before he was able to confirm his position on the map.


    In the desert''s case though, they weren''t,t much of any details to take from to confirm his potion, as everywhere was just sand to see.


    Without having apass or like the magic item that serves a simr purpose.


    Orienting yourself in such a ce was close to impossible.


    Even if they were ways to see which direction was where.


    At least for Danzel, he knew no such method.


    In other words...


    He was lost.


    "How many hours has it been since I came to this ce?" Danzel said as he continued walking forward.


    Taking a look at his Sun timer, he shook his head bitterly.


    ''Already 4 hours, huh?'' Putting his sun timer away, he noticed something ahead of him.


    ''Ah, crap''


    Out of the far distance, there were waves of sound flying through the air, swallowing everything to be never seen again inside the cloud of sand.


    It was a sand storm.


    "Next thing after next..." Sighing to himself, he braced himself forward and entered the raging sand storm.


    Danzel did feel a slight resistance all around him, but nothing strong enough for him to be pushed away.


    Although he could now barely see while his armor was filling with sand, he continued moving forward.


    Danzel didn''t know how many hours he spend in that sand storm. As he was too afraid of losing the sun timer if pulled out.


    Seeing the end of the sound storm, he pushed himself out of the harsh winds.


    Once he did, he froze upon the sight in front of him.


    "Are those the..." Danzel said as he observed his surroundings.


    With grumbled buildings that had clear signs of decay that could tell many history''s based on the signs of carvings of each building.


    The most noticeable one was one of the very centers.


    To Danzel it looked like arge tower that overseen the much smaller buildings.


    "So those are the small spots drawn in the map. Here I thought they were some vige of shorts, but to think that they were just some ruins of the past." Daniel said.


    With nowhere else to go, he walked towards the crumbled buildings, only to find an old road that was made there.


    "Finally some steady ground..." Danzel said as he shook the sand out of his armor.


    Finishing doing that, he walked towards the crumbled buildings with disappointment.


    "There is nothing left, huh?"


    ''It wasn''t like I was expecting something'' He shook his head as he continued searching the houses.


    With how old the building was, he knew that there will be nothing left.


    Although some houses had a sword, they began usably;


    Jest forbat.


    Having checked 10 houses in total, his patience run down as he gazed at therge tower.


    ''Maybe that ce has something interesting for me to see, as it looks all important and so.''


    Having made his mind, he wandered towards the tower, only to halt his steps.


    "..."


    Sensing their presence, he drew his sword out while checking the surroundings.


    "Gweaaagh~!"


    Turning his head towards the sound, he was surprised to see what made it.


    Staring at in front of him, three of the three-and-a-half-meter-long beast that had the form of a wolf and a tiger.


    The faces of those things were almost skeletal-like.


    Their body was long like a tiger with finely defined muscles.


    By a nce at their eyes, one could tell that those guys seemingly lost all sanity.


    "Seriously...desert wolves," Danzel said surprised


    As Danzel was about to go forward and finish all those three.


    There was a sudden change.


    The two front legs of those wolves moved as if their bone structure had changed.


    The legs be much stronger than before, making their form perfect to leap their opponent. Next, their mouth opened wide enough for them to swallow a kid at a whole.


    For the moment ago, those wolves looked like some different beast with only their prey on sight.


    "Gweeeh!


    " Geaaaagh!


    Seeing them dashing forward, Danzel raised his de.

 Chapter 185 - A Helping Hand

    Pushing their ws in the road, the skull-revealing wolves kicked the ground while baring their teeth at Danzel.


    `Fast¡ä


    Seeing the speed of that beast, Danzel would have frowned if he could.


    Taking arge step to the side, thergemouth of the skull wolve closed in like an instant, making a *ck* sound. One couldpare it to the bite force of a snapping turtle, but much stronger.


    Danzel managed to throw a swing at the side of the beast, leaving arge cut that had signs of decay taking ce.


    "It¡äs tough too..." Danzelmented as he stared at the howling skulled wolf.


    "Gweeeegh!"


    *ck, ck, ck, ck*


    Staring at the one who inflicted such pain in him, the skull wolve together with the other two started opening and closing their mouths, creating a continuous sound with them.


    Though their face revealed their skull, it was simr to the exoskeleton.


    They weren''t undead or something alike.


    One would have noticed that by the pair of hateful eyes of the skull wolves.


    As if they have finished theirmunication, all three stopped moving their mouth in an instant, while taking a simr stance that the one that just got injured.


    "Gweeeegh!"


    "Gweeeegh!"


    "Gweeeegh!"


    `Since you failed alone, now you want to try with all three of you¡ä Danzel scoffed at the sight that those beasts disyed.


    Opening their mouth wide to the point where the flesh around the mouth was starting to tear, all three of the skull wolves leaped at Danzel with theirrge mouths


    "Alright, bring it on! I will make you realize your own weakness." Danzel dered as his mana surged out of his body.


    One would say that Danzel was taking his current situation lightly or that he got arrogant through all the fights against powerhouses such as Hanson.


    And in the past, where he first awaken in the cursedke. Those ones may have been right.


    But the current him was not.


    As he knew his limits and capabilities.


    Not waiting to be pincer attacked from all his sides, Danzel kicked the ground and dashed towards the wounded.


    Making the two unwounded skull wolves chase after him.


    "Gweeegh!" But that wasn¡ät the case in the wounded one.


    Seeing his prey running by his own free will towards his mouth, the wolf''s eyes circled in moon shape, waiting for the free meal toe.


    As it was about to close his mouth though, it felt an instance of the insane amount of pain before everything went ck.


    "Gwe-eggh..."


    It felt confused.


    Scared of the endless darkness that was filling his vision with a much darker liquid.


    It tried to close his mouth out of reflex, but once it did he felt something off.


    As if...something was inside his mouth.


    "As stupid as predictable..." Danzel said as he was holding a spear with one of his hands.


    Seeing the spear inside the skull wolves mouth which went out of the beast''s skulls, the skull wolve could only shake and nothing else.


    [You received 20 000 XP]


    "Not bad."


    Letting go of the spear that he pulled out of his storage ring, Danzel nced at the other two closing in.


    "In that Necronomicon that I read, I quite like one phrase that it had"


    Swinging his long sword to the air, the gathered mana from the de was sent out, creating a sharp de of wind towards one of the skull wolves that jumped at him.


    Being in the air, the skull wolve had to fully withness his fate by his very two eyes.


    That being him having the wind de cut him from him in half.


    "That, in pursuit of magic, doing the same over and over again, is the definition of insanity." Though in the context of the book, it meant it more than limiting yourself on the none taboo magic alone and not all magic, including necromancy. Is a sin on all those who pursue the path of magic.


    At least that was the author''s opinion.


    Danzel, by a single exchange already knew how those beasts are fighting.


    With theirrge mouths and muscr legs, their dashing power was really impressive.


    Putting their biting force at that too, they were extremely dangerous.


    They had both power and speed.


    With apparently a tough body for his sword to not fully dig through their flesh.


    But that¡äs all they had.


    With them practically being built to leap and get a piece out of you, they were only so few ways for them to attack.


    It didn¡ät take much to figure out.


    If they were to run straight at you, why not hit them harder back instead or before theye close to you?


    Well, it was easier said than done, as either a magic caster or one weapon with longer reach.


    [You received 23 000 XP]


    Witnessing the death of his kind, the skull solve didn''t falter a bit once it was before Danzel.


    Being in range and seeing that something was in his mouth, like a metal gate closing.


    Thergemouth closed at bit Danzel''s whole left arm off.


    Feeling the cold metal that it was used to eating from other explores that had armor, the skull wolve wanted to burst outughing menacingly.


    After two of his kind died against that prey, he finally had the chance to taste that delicious meat that they all so favor.


    But while he was chewing, he notices something weird.


    Isn''t too nd?


    Before it could realize what it was eating, a long sword was pushed to his head.


    [You received 25 000 XP]


    Huh?


    *Baahm.


    With his massive body falling to the ground, Danzel looked at the ce where his left arm was supposed to be.


    "Sigh...I should have even cast a stone wall or something. Now there goes my armor.", Danzel said with regret.


    Losing his arm didn''t pain him at all, both figuratively and literally.


    What pained his none existed heart was the loss of his armor left-hand part!


    "If it weren''t for that sand storm, I would still have the barrier from the [Runes of Force]. I guess luck isn''t on my side." Shaking his regrets away, he stared at the dead body and raised his palm towards them.


    ''[Reconstruct Undead]''


    With dead mana sipping out of his body, he went one by one of the corpses and repaired their skulls.


    Though because the skill was still lv.1, it took him quite a while to finish all three that were much stronger than the average human.


    "I guess that''s good enough..."


    Putting the corpses in his storage ring, he thought for a second about what to do for his missing arm.


    ''Leaving it as is should be alright, but...'' Danzel though.


    He wasn''t much fond to stare as his dead mana wasing out of his ''wound''.


    "It should take a few days to recover with all the HP that I have."


    Hiding his missing arm with arge cloak, he created his longsword back to his sheath while continuing exploring the ce where he was.


    In among the endless silence, Danzel caught a small sound through the distance.


    *Tinnk~


    "This sound is..." Recognizing the sound all so well, he used [High Jump] to go to the roofs and follow the directions of the sounds.


    And before long, he confirmed what those sounds were.


    "Kaaaa!


    "Brace yourselves! They areing!"


    ''Human...'' Danzel thought as soon as he saw them.


    They numbered in 5 people in total. At least that was now the case.


    Starting around the ce, he saw many fresh corpses withrge bite marks.


    And seeing the skulled wolves that he faced not a few minutes ago,was now making life difficult for those people, Danzel went inside a crumble-up building so that he can stalk them better.


    Seeing the fight in that group, Danzel was secretly impressed.


    Each of them yed a role and each of them looked after their back.


    Once their frontier that wielded a great sword missed his target or make a mistake, the other would try and think of a way to save the.


    By watching their showcase in power, Danzel could vaguely guess that every one of them was on the lower side of the 3rd-tier.


    And by what things looked like, those guys seemed to have the advantage of the situation.


    One by one, the number of skilled wolves number dwindle slowly yet surely.


    By now there were over 20 bodies of such wolves lying dead to the ground.


    And the few that remained were 7 in total who were looking for an opportunity to strike their exhausted prey.


    Those being the human party.


    Although they looked exhausted, Danzel knew that they still had some juice left to finish the remaining skull wolves, if not only barely.


    ''Now..what should I do..." Danzel thought as he looked at the fierce fight of the two parties from the window of the crumpled building.


    "Those guys would surely make up for some good and fast XP since they would be tired and all, but..." Danzel mumbled as he stared at his missing arm.


    ''Fighting them head one with my current situation sounds risky too.''


    As he knew nothing of this enemy''s, diving in now while missing an arm would be stupid.


    Nheless, he couldn''t guarantee that these skull heads would ignore him.


    But, as if being struck by lighting.


    A sinister idea came to his mind.


    ''Who said that I need to go myself there?''


    Raising his hand to steak out of the buildings, Danzel grinned to himself.


    "A guess a helping hand would be much appreciated."


    Concentrating on his spell, the dead mana flew through the ground and entered the body of the dead skull wolves.


    "Be made to serve~"


    As the group fighting for life noticed something dark entering the body of the dead.


    They eximed in surprise.


    "What!?"


    Standing up from their deaths, the newly formed undead received their very firstmand by their liege.


    ''Kill the humans.''


    "Gweeegh!"


    "Gweeegh!"


    ....

 Chapter 186 - Explorers

    Few minutes before Danzel arrived at the ruins...


    The deserts of Azu¡ärah.


    A ce with an environment unfitting for any living being.


    Be it either food or water, the few cities or rather viges that made their ground in the desertscked both of them.


    With the heat of the sun being enough to make one feel as he were inside a furnace and a creeping cold at the night.


    One would have questioned why would such people seek to find their refuge in such a ce.


    The answer of that would be because of the mercenariesing here.


    Better known as the explorers around the desert.


    Since there was no government in such viges, they were fully able to monopolize the ie of the explores, as they were the only known trade routes for merchants to go.


    As no supplies in this weather spelled death in the deserts of Azu¡ärah.


    But other than that, why would explorers seek to challenge the environment of Azu¡ärah?


    Reasons for it were too many.


    Gold.


    Fame.


    Ancient knowledge and Artifacts.


    Finding never seen or recorded monster in any books from far and wide.


    And some even seek the very thing that mortals couldn¡ät ever have.


    Immortality.


    Those were the few out of the many reasons as to why explorers seeked the deserts of Azu¡ärah.


    But danger lurked everywhere, wherever one went.


    After all, not even a considerable amount of 100 years of time were enough to explore the whole desert of Azu¡ärah till this day.


    As for the reason why that was the case, many didn¡ät know.


    But those who knew would shake in fear just by imaging of a certain monstrosity.


    And a particr group of 20 explorers was in the middle of talking about that particr being.


    Resting a great sword up to his shoulder, a man with rough futures looks at his fellow explorer beside him with a frown on his face.


    "Sean, I would very much appreciate it if you don¡ät talk about such things while we are on a march...It will bring bad luck upon us."


    "Hmm? What do you mean by that, Isamu?" The explorer wielding a short sword paired with a shield named Sean asked while tilting his headin confusion.


    The explorer that rested his greatsword, named Isamu looked at his friend with improvement look.


    "You know what I am talking about..."


    "I don¡ät know what you are talking about~" Sean said with a yful tone.


    Staring daggers at Sean, Isamu said with a heavy tone.


    "I am talking about the Ancient Devil of Azu¡ärah"


    Hearing what Isamu said with a serious voice at that, Sean couldn¡ät help but burst out ofughter.


    "Pfff~Hahahaha! Did you really believe what I told you about finding a devil in our destination? Everyone knows that this thing is just made up by someone with a poor taste! It¡äs the same as a fairytale that those wannabe bards singing all day long." Sean said.


    "No! That Ancient Devil of Azu¡ärah does exist, I witnessed it with my two own eyes!"Isamu said.


    "Yeah, right? I heard that joke from you before. A faceless being engulfed with mes surfing above the skies with the size of a dragon was it? Maybe you can fool our archer over there, but me you can not. If such a being really existed the whole desert would have long realized it!" Sean said, not realizing the danger that was about to befall on his head.


    "Hey Sean, behind-" Before Isamu could warn his friend, it was toote.


    Walking behind him, a slender girl with nice curves and brown long hair with a bow in her back raised her hand.


    And before Sean could react, he received a hit to his head.


    Not strong enough to leave any damage, but strong enough for him to grow in agony.


    "Aghhh! You b*tch! What do you think you are doing, Sylva!"


    "Hmpf, that¡äs what you get from calling me a fool." The beauty worthy to be called a babe walked past the two while ignoring Sean¡äs curses.


    Seeing that, Sean wanted to go and give her a lesson with the same medicine, but the only thing that stopped him from doing that was that mesmerizing a*s that swung left and right.


    "Man, you almost drilling..." Isamu said, shaking his head in disgust at Sean¡äs behavior.


    So he thought at least before his eyes subconsciouslynded on the same spot where Sean sight was.


    `Wow¡ä


    While both had their priorities straight, a sigh from a girl was heard from behind them.


    "You know, instead of ring at you fellow explores body parts, I think it¡äs time to stop fooling around." A blonde girl wearing white robes with a staff in her hand.


    With the star having a shape of a cross in the end,


    "Hmm? What are you talking about, Priestess?" Isamu turned his head and asked. But once he did his eyes widen up.


    "Sigh, we are already here." The girl with the white robes said, otherwise referred to as Priestess.


    Witnessing the crumpled-up buildings, Isamu wasn¡ät surprised.


    He was part of any investigation of old ruins of city or underground tombs in this desert.


    But never before had he seen a tower like that in front of him


    "It¡äs so huge..." Isuma said in awed, his excitement of exploring a mage tower was already starting to kick.


    "They are indeed are." Sean nodded in confirmation, both their gazes being in different ces.


    Moving towards the roads of the ruins, a man with heavy armor raised his hand moved to stop their march.


    "Everyone! We arrived at our destination! We will head towards that tower and take a break there! And tomorrow early we will investigate the tower! I don¡ät want to see any ckers!"


    Hearing their leader''s orders, they all sighed in annoyance. Asking them to continue walking after that long march put people in a bad mood, but not enough to cause trouble.


    "Ugh...I know that guy knows what he is doing, but can¡ät we take a break right here where we are?" Sean said as he wiped his sweat from his forehead.


    "Stopining already, the tower isn¡ät that much far away. Since we will have to walk anyway, we might as well do it now that tomorrow." Isamu said while ring at their leader with respect.


    "Our leader isn¡ät doing that to annoy us. He knows how dangerous those magic towers are since he was born in the arcana kingdom. If we were to walk to the tower tomorrow, our morale is bound to fall, if only slightly."


    "Is that so?" Sean asked with doubt.


    "Yeah, it is so. I knew our leader for years by now, so I can tell that he is looking after us."


    "Not only is he strong, but the way he gives instruction is like that of amander. Once when we were in a pinch against some monster, he thought out a strategy that made us barely get out alive."


    "I see..."


    "And-" while Isamu was continuing telling the tails that he and their leader suffered together to Sean who looked dead bored.


    Isamu caught by the side of his eye something.


    A bit further where their leader was, he noticed the side of the road that was filled with sand moving.


    ''Huh?''


    At first, he thought it was the wind blowing the sand away.


    But once he noticed the sand rising, his eyes went wide open.


    "Leader!"


    As soon as he screamed the sand of the ground exploded.


    Revealing arge beast with the form of a three-meter long tiger-wolf hybrid body construed.


    The most noticeable point of that beast where his face is that of a skull and how the huge mouth was opened with the leader of the explores being in the middle.


    "Dam-" The leader tried to step back, but it was already toote.


    *nk!


    Like an instant, the mouth of the skull old closed and devoured the upper body of their leader.


    Leaving only the legs for the others to see.


    Finishing eating their leader, the skull wolf let out a call.


    "Gweaaaohh!"


    Compared to the wolf''s call, there we''re must rougher in nature.


    Although different though, they both served as a signal.


    For this case, it was a signal of reinforcement.


    Jumping out of the sands near the road, many more appeared from all sides of the explores.


    "Gweeegh!"


    "Gwaagghh!"


    While they were realizing killing intent to all the explores.


    Thetter stared confused and warry of the monster nearby.


    They never expect that their leader would just die so suddenly. Making them unsure of what to do.


    Unfortunately, for them. The skull wolves weren''t going to wait for them.


    Seeing the dire situation, Isamu stepped forward on the frontlines. And shouted at them.


    "You bastard! What are you spacing out! They are merely some overgrown dogs. Operate as usual!"


    Taking the role of a leader, meant to take responsibility.


    But leading themself, he must show them that he was confident in his decision.


    Dashing forward, he swung his greatsword and cut off the skull wolf''s neck the moment it just dashed at him head one.


    As the others started to join in and he observed while fighting too.


    He figures do guys'' nature.


    "Everybody! Those guys know only to leap! Take advantage of that!"


    "You right!"


    "Thanks!"


    Too bad, knowing information and how to use it are two different things.


    Few who tried turned out to be the next meal of the skull wolves.


    Making their numbers fall as quickly as their enemy''s.


    Maybe it was because of all of them being exhausted from the hour of walk in the warm sun.


    But such losses pained Isamu greatly as he knew most of the people.


    "Gweeegh!"


    Opening his mouth, the skull wolve dashed forward to devour him like their Leader.


    ''Dammit!'' Isamu cursed internally of him losing attention on going a battle.


    When he thought it was his end, a sharp wind-cutting noise passed through him.


    *Crack.


    With his skull pierced, Sylva pulled another arrow and aimed at another one.


    "Don''t space out"


    "I known!" Dashing forward, he moved where Sean was facing a skull wolve.


    Overwhelmed by the two, the two covered the side of the other while helping the other if need be.


    Shortly after though after many deaths, they were still 7 of the best in


    Heck, they were only 5 with the exhausted body.


    "Hah~Hah~, just those more and we will be done."


    Without the support of the priestess and Sylva with the remaining guy protecting them, fighting a few more seemed feasible.


    Then, it happend.


    Ominous mana growled through the floor at an increasing beast.


    They imminently went vary and started to look for a magic caster.


    But upon seeing the most entering their body, Isamu and the other shortly after realized what was going on.


    With tens of such skull wolves having the most enter inside of them, a change urred.


    Coming back from the dead with extreme hate put together."


    "What!?"


    The color drained from their body upon witnessing that.


    "Be careful! There is a necromancer in the facility!"


    Raising her staff high, a gold glow appeared out of the corpse?


    "May light serve you all!

 Chapter 187 - Holy Magic

    With the dead mana traveling to the corpses, the skull wolves rose up to the surprise of the explorers and the living skull wolves.


    As the body was lying to the ground around them from their fight. Once they have risen, they surrounded the explorers.


    "Gweegh!"


    Howling at their hatefull enemy, they imminently jumped into action.


    Although they were now in the bottom of the 2nd-tier as being merely a zombie through the core. Compared to a human''s body that Danzel was used to animate, those skull wolves had a much better body, making them reach the second tier in strength without evolving into an undead who was of the second tier.


    With their jaws still as deadly, even if they were a lot slower than the living ones.


    They had the numbers.


    The two other explorers who were at the front together with Sean and Isamu who killed lots of the skull wolves found themselves regretting killing so many and not moving ces.


    As both were near each other, the corpses who they let rot before were no charging beside one living one!


    "What the hell!?"


    "You can¡ät be serious!"


    The moment they stepped to the side to dodge the leap of the living one, they imminently pushed their des inside his body. Killing it with a swift movement.


    But before they were even able to draw their des, 8 of Danzel undead were having their mouths open to bite a piece of them.


    They discarded their weapon and tried to realize against the untiring undead, but unfortunately were overwhelmed.


    Once one of the undead skull wolves tackled one of them and made him fall, the other soon jumped in for a meal.


    With hisrade looking his back now dead, the other one soon enough fell into the same fate.


    "Aghhh!


    "H-Help!"


    His desperate plea for help was ignored by his fellow explorers as they still had to fend off the attacks of the undead.


    "Dammit! Sean! Theying!" Isamu jelled as he got rid of another of the living ones while sweeping his greatsword and releasing a wall of wind, pushing the undead who were rushing at him a bit back.


    `If this continued we will be wiped out¡ä Isamu cursed as he saw Sean struggle of holding his own against the undead.


    It was only him, Sean their guardian in the front. With Sylva and the priestess giving support from the back protected from another explorer that they weren¡ät acquainted with.


    Although the undead was much weaker, their bites were lethal.


    Not to mention, they had only Sylva give support fire while their priestess was preparing her magic.


    Not to mention, that undead is being controlled by a necromancer hiding somewhere around them.


    Having to be wary of a magic caster throwing a spell at you while you were such difficult put a lot of stress on both him and Sean.


    `Those damned beasts...they didn¡ät even realize that those things are undead!¡ä Isamu cursed internally.


    The most frustrating thing for him though was that the living skull wolves hadn¡ät even realized that their kin became monsters who hated the living!


    "Priestess! How much longer!" Isamu jelled as he cut another undead, shortly to be reced with another one.


    The priestess in question, who had her eyes closed raised her staff and channeled.


    "Oh Goddess of the endless light, please grant the pitiful souls that we are with your guiding! [Holy Light]!"


    Opening her eyes, a golden glow appeared out of her staff, until it illuminated 20 meters around her.


    While herrades felt a warm feeling counting around their bodies, the undead skull wolves had a more extreme reaction.


    "Gweaaagh!"


    "Gwaaaaagh!"


    "Gweeagh!"


    Screeches that a living thing couldn¡ät even hope to make came out of every undead who were inside the warm and tortures light.


    It was as if the pain of the living came back at them and having been put into a stake to be burned in a fire.


    Although it was looked like any other light that you will find.


    For the undead, it was their bane.


    Holy Magic.


    Magic that rejected dead mana itself and was granted by a holy Deity.


    Reminded once again by their mortal pain, the skull wolves dragged themself to the ground and left the light radius.


    ring at the Priestess with enough killing intent to drow someone.


    "Fooh, finally a break-" Sean said, regretting even spouting those words out.


    The remaining living skull wolves who weren¡ät affected by the warm light at all were still in to get a part if not ahead in their mouth.


    Staring at Sean struggling, he wanted to help but shortly stopped himself as he saw another one rushing towards him.


    "Tch, Sylva! The necromancer! Find him!" Isamu said as he jumped to the said, now facing a skull wolve.


    "Mhmm." Nodding her head, her eyes turned into green light.


    With now not worrying about herrade dying and herself, she finally had time to look around her for any hints telling there was a necromancer nearby.


    Shortly after, her eyesnded on a building that had arge crack around his window.


    Noticing a small movement in the shadows, her eyes turned sharp.


    ''Found you''


    Pulling an arrow from the quiver, she pulled the string of her now with an arrow with it and channels her mana into it.


    Clear blue mana surrounded her arrow.


    Letting the strings go, a loud wind-cutting voice was released.


    Flying through the air while surrounded with mana at incredible speed.


    *Fsoooou!


    It went towards the house who she saw a movement in.


    *Grbaaah!


    Making contact with the wall, the wall itself exploded, raising a dust screen through the air.


    "Sylva what was that!? Did you find him! Or rather, did you hit him!" Isamu asked as he couldn''t see because he was focused on his fight.


    "..."


    Instead of answering, Sylva stared in the direction of the dust screen intensely.


    A few seconds passed with only the fight of the two with the skull wolves to be heard.


    Until that silence was broken by Sylva.


    Seeing the dust screen clearing, a tall shadow was to be seen.


    "No! I didn''t get him! He is still alive." Sylvia yelled as she draw another arrow to shoot at the necromancer.


    But to her surprise, the necromancer moved to the side, letting the arrow fly past him.


    "Huh!?"


    The necromancer in question ignored her disbelief and raised his palm high simr to a stop motion.


    Confusing those who saw him to that.


    While Isamu was fighting the skull solve though, as if his senses slowed down, his eyes moved to the ground with a grown building in his face.


    ''Why is mana going through the ground? Is it the magic casters?'' Isamu thought as he got warry of it.


    But once he notice the mana to continue moving to the ground towards a sorted person, his eyes were wide open.


    "This guy!"


    Guiding his life force through his body, he forced it to increase his strength and speed to a whole new level.


    "Die! You ugly beast!"


    As the will was able to swallow him whole, the skull solve was cut into pieces.


    Without any time to celebrate, he turned around while shouting at Sean.


    "Sean! Fall back! Now!"


    Although confused, Sean wounded one of the skulls wolves he was facing and run away without a second thought.


    Even if those two fighters most of the time with each other, they did trust each other.


    But the other three didn''t.


    "What are you-" the explorer who was protecting the two was about to say before he was interrupted by Isamu.


    "Move back!"


    "Huh?"


    Dashing forward,she jumped into the priestess who was channeling the [Holy Light] spell, dragging her and him to the ground.


    Stunned by what had just happened, she yelled at Isamu.


    "No! Without me continuing the spell, the undead will-"


    Before she could finish her sentence, a wide stone wall was beginning rising in the exact position where she was channeling the spell a moment ago.


    "If I didn''t do it, now you would have a damn wall raising between your legs." Isamu said at the silent priestess who recognized the spell in front of her.


    ''Using a defensive spell such as [Stone Wall] to actually attack someone...''


    If Isamu didn''t move her away, she could very well get injured by the fall or fall to the other side of the wall,pletely isting her and the party.


    ''Huh, wait second'' realizing that something was wrong, she scanned her surroundings before turning her head at Isamu who helped her get up.


    "I see Sean and Sylva, but where is the one of before?" She asked Isamu.


    Not a secondter, her question of before was answered.


    "No! Stay away! Aghhhh!" With screamsing from the other side of the wall,the four of them who were on the safe side with no undead to see felt bad for him.


    Isamu tried to warn him, but even he didn''t expect a whole stone wall to appear.


    As he wasn''t very knowable of magic, his imagination wasn''t that created.


    He expected a spike of earth to appear under their priestess, not a wall separating the streets all tougher together with theirrade.


    "Everyone...we got to run, though we could probably manage the skull wolves...facing a necromancer after that is beyond dangerous.* Isamu said with a depressed look.


    Not only were they exhausted of the journey already, but facing such an amount of unknown beast with q necromancer on the loose.


    Everyone shortly agreed and started running away from the ruins that are this city.


    ''I will have toin to the informant for this one.. For all, I know that necromancer could be a Lich or something if he were to live here.''

 Chapter 188 - Small Army Of The Dead

    [You received 40 000 XP]


    [You received 42 000 XP]


    [You received 65 000 XP]


    Seeing the notification in front of him, Danzel wasn¡ät happy at all.


    "I failed...I even let them escape..." He said as he stared at the stone wall he raised.


    Jumping off the building, he turned his head and looked at the big hole in the building.


    "To think that an arrow did that, that¡äs a first." Danzel mumbled to himself, noting to himself to be careful around archers.


    He was pretty confident that he hid pretty well, but the archer proved him wrong.


    Shaking his head, he walked towards where his undead was devouring the man whose path was blocked by the stone wall.


    "First was that earth magic caster and now that swordsman...If it weren¡ät for him I would even manage to kill them off by now." Danzel cursed under his helmet.


    He regretted not reading through the magic caster information more clearly.


    Having his mana being seen made his [Stone Wall] lose much of his effectiveness of using it offensively.


    Not only would he had probably severely injured their priestess by growing a massive wall under her legs, but it would also have cut off the escape path of the three meleebatants, effectively isting them with their archer.


    Although the archer could choose to run away, Danzel was fairly confident that he could chase her down or at least throw his curses at her.


    "Maybe I should step up personally..." Danzel said.


    But watching his missing arm he quickly shook his head.


    Although he recognize that those guys were slower than him, it wasn¡ät by a lot.


    Even if he had his minions to support him, that holy magic that their priestess used took him really off guard.


    Not only that, but he doubted that he could go against that great swordsman without his arm left. Of course, he couldn¡ät judge the strength difference between him and that guy.


    Danzel guesses by the weapon choice alone for that man to hold great strength. As he invested all his attribute points on his agility, he quitecked in the strength department.


    So he wasn¡ät that confident to block the great sword without his shield.


    As much as he hated to admit it.


    "At least those guys saved me quite some time." Nodding at the increase of his XP in his status, he looked ahead to his undead.


    And the two still living skull wolves.


    "I totally forgot about those guys..." Danzel said slightly confused.


    The fact that they were standing beside his undead and even showed hostility towards him the moment they managed to lock their eyes on his body. Danzel found it very strange.


    `So they are stupid enough to not even recognize their brethren to have turned undead.


    "Whatever..."


    Pointing his finger towards the two, Danzel sends out hismand.


    `Kill those two¡ä


    Not a secondter, the two skull wolves who were groaning towards Danzel were jumped by the undead skull wolves.


    Confused about what was happening, the teeth of the undead dug in their flesh, making them cry out of pain.


    Without being able to react, they soon find their gruesome death.


    [You received 30 000 XP]


    [You received 28 000 XP]


    "Ah...I should even have told them to be more gentle with them." Danzel said as he looked at the two pitiful-looking corpses.


    "With them like that, I can¡ät raise them as undead..." Danzel said, Scratching the back of his helmet.


    After taking a better look at his surroundings, he noticed that this wasn¡ät the only case.


    Though he raised all the undead skull wolves as undead, this wasn¡ät the case for the humans as he reached his limit of how many he could raise from that range.


    Even if he could if they could be raised or not as undead was put in question.


    All he could say was that those skull wolves were way miles away from being gentle with bitting those people to their death.


    Every corpse that he could see was at least cut once into pieces.


    Be it an arm or leg missing, or heck even their head.


    Those were the less damaged out of all the corpses of the humans.


    The worst one that he could see was once that had his half missing and only his legs remaining.


    `If I were to cast [Raise Undead], would he raise as a pair of legs?¡ä He joked internally.


    But the idea was quickly shot down by his knowledge of the undead that was in his Necronomicon and of course his own experience.


    "Without their heads, that wouldn¡ät work."


    As he essentially would die instantly from having his head crushed, if his spell didn¡ät work he wouldn¡ät be surprised.


    "Now what should I do...letting all those corpses rot here would be such a waste..." Danzel thought to himself.


    Not muchter, an idea came to him.


    "Right, I still have that."


    `Gather all the corpses in a straight line in front of me. Make sure not to damage the body any further.¡ä


    Obeying to their liege''smand, the undead skull wolves carefully dragged the human corpses.


    Some of them would gently bite the leg of the corpse, while others would gently kick the course to make it roll towards him.


    Every undead tried their best to uphold their liegesmand, each in a different way.


    Danzel who was looking at that couldn¡ät help but think of how cruel...and somewhat cute way of following hismand.


    If one could describe the scene would be like a puppy bringing back the stick to their master. But in that case, the stick was a corpse that had some of his limbs missing.


    Not a sight that many couldfort to look at.


    "Maybe I should even do that myself..." Danzel said as he looked at the corpse who were lined in front of him with weird poses.


    "Whatever..." Not caring anymore, he went towards the first corpse and raised his palm in its direction.


    "[Reconstruct Body]" Danzel cast.


    With his dead mana leaving his body and entering the body of the corpse, Danzel was...


    Disappointed.


    "The damage is too great, huh?" He mumbled to himself.


    Thinking about what to do, he raised his hand and summoned his status window.


    "I guess spending a few XP on those shouldn¡ät be that bad."


    Staring at the [Reconstruct Body] skill, he pressed on it to upgrade it.


    Watching his XP to be drained, several notifications appeared before him


    [Reconstruct Body level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv.2]


    ...


    [Reconstruct Body level has increased from Lv.9 to Lv.10]


    [The skill Reconstruct Body has reached this maximum level]


    [Reconstruct Body Lv.10 turns into Undead Reconstruction Lv.1]


    [Undead Reconstruction]: Through the use of dead mana and your knowledge you managed to find a way topletely repair the bones of a corpse within a short amount of time.


    With the information flowing into his mind, he realized how crude and inefficient his previews method was.


    "I see...I could probably figure it out myself if I had put my mind into it." Shaking his head, he decided not to dwell on this any further.


    His XP was already gone, with the knowledge remaining in his head.


    Only the deed to be done was missing.


    "Although the flesh won''t be repaired, I should be able to raise them." Danzel thought out loud while the dead mana was swarming to his remaining hand.


    Casting the spell, the dead mana went and engulfed the corpse.


    Not muchter, signs of the bones regenerating were to be seen.


    After the spell was done, Danzel looked at the fully ''repaired'' corpse before going into the next one.


    Corpse after corpse, not muchter he has finished the repairs of the corpses.


    "Hmm...maybe I should remove their flesh instead of having them half zombies, half skeletons." Putting that aside though.


    Daniel raised his hand and cast his spell.


    "Be made to serve~"


    With his dead mana entering the body of the human corpses, they all soon started to tech before long the first corpses started to rise.


    As one of the Undead.


    "It worked after all." Danzel nodded his head as he looked at the small army that he raised from the dead.


    "Although there is nothing put some pushover that can only serve as meat shields. Their numbers alone should be useful. The skull wolves could even be used inbat"


    Overall, except for letting four guys escape his grip, he was satisfied with how things turned out.


    "Maybe I should probably check the whole ruins to see if they are any more of those skull wolves there. Not only would they make for some good undead, but their XP will surely help me a lot."


    ''But let''s put that aside.'' Danzel thought as he turned around.


    Starting at the huge tower ahead of him, Danzel stepped forward.


    "I guess I should secure my base before doing that."


    Stepping forward, Danzel gave out amand to his undead.


    ''Follow me, fellow undead.''


    Hearing theirs piecesmand.


    Danzel personal army of the dead started to follow behind his steps.

 Chapter 189 - Into The Tower

    Walking down the roads of these deserted ruins.


    A small army of the dead was being guided by a hooded ominous figure.


    Dozen of undead, some being mere skeletons ( with still flesh sticking in their body) of humans while others being zombies of skull wolves that each was a bitrger than three meters tall and long.


    Including the still fresh blood that wasing oozing out of their body. It created a nice picture for all kinds of nightmare purposes.


    And the master of that undead was looking at the new contraption that he got his hands to.


    Apass.


    "Now I won''t have to worry about getting lost in the desert...As if it would be so easy." Danzel sighed to himself as he put his newly acquiredpass into his storage ring.


    Among the items that weren¡ät devoured orying in the stomach of his undead in who knows what condition.


    Other than the weapons humans and stuff that they had in the bag, there wasn¡ät anything worth mentioning. At first, when he saw those guys being fairly strong, he ced his hopes to find something simr to the staff that let out lighting.


    So with his hopes raised by quite a bit, the disappointment was to say the less quite bitter.


    Except for the few maps that ovepped with the map that he received from the Union, thepass was the other thing that he got his hands on.


    At first, he was fairly excited as of now he could orient himself with the man and not walk aimlessly through the desert.


    s, such though were quickly dismissed as he, in fact, still had not the sightless clue of where he was currently was on the map!


    If he were to follow the direction of thepass towards a destination, he neither would know if the destination is now behind him nor how long it would take him to reach it.


    `I could brute force itand just go back if it was the former, but the time I would have wasted doing that is...¡ä Danzel thought as he put hispass away.


    Sure, he was an undead who never tired or hungered.


    But that didn¡ät mean that he liked walking aimlessly for hours if not days just so that in the end it turns out that it was all for nothing.


    The days he would waste would be of not acquiring the necessary XP for his goals.


    Although he wasn¡ät feeling under pressure to earn them or anything.


    Danzel for a while felt quite uneasy.


    Be it losing his one arm, letting the remaining humans escape, or even the hunting dogs of either Berum or the Arcana kingdom.


    He just couldn¡ät brush the feeling that something was going to go wrong no matter how much he assured himself that he did everything so that the worse won¡ät happen.


    The environment was to his advantage, unfitting for the living to strive.


    He created a small force of undead that although rather weakpared to him, could be deadly if underestimated, especially his skull wolves.


    Both Berum and Arcana as far as his knowledge went, didn¡ät have a base of operation here. Meaning that the chances of him being hunted down by Hanson hunting dogs or the army of the Berum were bottom tier low.


    The only thing that remained in his eyes were those humans that escaped him.


    `They shouldn¡ät be much a threat though...¡ä Danzel though.


    Even if they came back with more people, Danzel was confident that he could escape.


    Be it one way or another, he always found a way.


    But that alone was the reason that he was feeling uneasy.


    The fact that he had to escape so many times.


    Time and time again, something happend that put him in a bad situation.


    To when in actuality he purely wanted toy low and carve runes somewhere alone as they were the best way to earn XP.


    But Danzel gave up on the idea.


    The idea of carving runes to earn XP was no more.


    Having tried it twice by now.


    Trying it once more would be signs of insanity.


    So in the end, Danzel thought of himself as unlucky.


    Be it through the result of his actions or meredy luck hitting him on his face.


    He feared that that damned luck of his is going to bring him into a tough situation.


    But staring ahead of him, he reassured himself.


    "I should be able to earn the required XP in peace in this ce." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Ahead of him, there was arge radius where there weren¡ät any buildings in sight. And in the center of that ce was arge tower casting arge shadow under him and his undead.


    Danzel couldn¡ät help but mutter to himself upon staring at his new base.


    "Rather grand, huh?"


    He did hear that the king of the arcana kingdom was living in a magic tower back when he was working for Hanson.


    Although he personally didn¡ät manage to witness the so famous tower, if he had to imagine how it would look like, then it would be the exact tower in front of him.


    But if he had anyints, then it would be...


    The door.


    Staring at the huge door made out of some sturdy wood reinforced by some sort of metal that had a huge hole in the center, Danzel sighted to himself.


    "Couldn¡ät the one who broke it just use that door?" Danzelined internally.


    Moving along with his undead beside him, with the skull wolves in front and the human undead following lovingly behind, Danzel neared the door.


    Once he walked closer to the door, he halted his steps while drawing his sword out of his sheath.


    "Those presences..."


    With his skill [Sense of the Damned] sensing living beings not far from him, Danzel sent amand to undead skull wolves that we''re beside him.


    ''Kill those hiding under the sand!''


    Having his intent also as hismand being heard by the undead, they imminently understood what their liege wanted to do.


    Taking a fast step forward while biting towards the sand, a shrieking voice of pain came out of the sands.


    "Gweeegh!"


    "Gweaagh!"


    Coming of the sands, two muchrger than the average skull solve emerged.


    The truth of his undead could only dig deep into the flesh without being able to bite the flesh off with their current strength.


    Danzel immediately recognized that those two were much stronger than the others.


    But even if they were, that didn''t matter.


    Swinging his sword in the air, the mana on the de flew onwards in the form of a de.


    "Gwaaagh!"


    With the de shing one of the skull wolves necks, Danzel dashed to the next, where he personally finished the job by a swing.


    [You received 35 000 XP]


    [You received 36 000 XP]


    Commanding his undead to stop biting the now dead skull wolves, he sheath his sword back in the sheath.


    "So those guys can give under the sand, huh? If I were to consider their leaps being so fast together with the element of surprise, then those guys are much more dangerous than I thought." Danzel said before turning them shortly as undead.


    ''Push the door open Danzelmanded to his newly made undead, who in turn did as ordered.


    "Hmm, now I can see why others see consider necromancy as some evil magic"Danzel joked to himself


    Being able to turn your enemies who wanted to kill and even eat you into a harmless puppy was indeed evil.


    ''Though most likely my race should the main reason''


    As undead who hated the living, the reason should be obvious as the necromancy school isn''t practiced in the open.


    Although Danzel could understand their reasoning, he also found necromancy damn convenient to use.


    As Danzel was on his own thoughts, the creaking sound of the door stopped.


    The two newly created undead skull wolves having done their job, turned around and walked in front of Danzel.


    To Danzel, they looked as if they came back to get a reward after doing a good job.


    ''That''s shouldn''t be the case though'' Danzel thought as he entered the tower.


    He knew full well that those guys were essentially mindless.


    Beings drove by their instinct.


    "Hmm..." Gazing at the insides of the tower,Danzel could only describe it as a mess.


    It looked like some won''t of a lobby, but with every piece of furniture destroyed and thrown to the ground aimlessly.


    He could see a few bones here and there with some rags for clothing.


    He tried restoring those bones intoplete skeletons so that he can raise them but found sadly no sess as the bones shortly after turned into dust.


    "I guess too much time has passed, huh?" Shaking his head, he looked some more before he found a staircase going to the next floor.


    "Hmm, it''s going be a pain bringing all the undead with him. They might even copse the staircase seeing how old this ce is."


    Having decided, he gave hismands.


    ''You two, the new ones will follow me. All of you wolves will go outside and hide under the sand, kill any living being thates near the tower!''


    ''And you guys, just stand on this floor until otherwise said so!''


    Finished had he had to say, the undead started to follow hismand.


    The undead skull wolves went out and clumsily tried to go in the sands. Although they looked ridiculous by that, in the end, they managed to do it.


    As for the human undead...they aimlessly walked on the floor with some just staying still as if they were frozen in the spot.


    "Hmm...I guess that''s good enough for now"


    Turning his way towards the staircase.


    He walked forward with the tworger undead skull wolves following behind him as his bodyguards.


    Going up the second floor, they were simr to the first-floor bones lying on the ground.


    At for what the floor was for Danzel didn''t know.


    They were three separatedrge rooms with rows of stairs.


    Finding nothing important, Danzel together with his bodyguards went to the next floor.


    "I wonder what this floor will be for."


    Going up to the next floor, Danzel halted his steps as he looked surprised in front of him.


    At least as much as a skeleton could look surprised.


    The third floor was by far thergest among the other two.


    The walls seemed like they had some poles sticking out with the side being broken up dummies of some kind. Danzel couldn''t say for sure what they exactly were as of how decayed they were.


    But the most noticeable thing that was on the floor was the double as big skull solves on the middle resting.


    His feet had ws simr to that of iron and sharp as a scythe, while his muscles were much more well builtpared to his newly made undead.


    His jaw as his skull generally had a much pure white color of that of a bonepared to the other.


    Another noticeable feature was that the left eye socket of the skull had cracks, making one subconsciously focus on the eye of the beast.


    It reminds Danzel of that Alpha wolf that he had killed years ago, but the aura that this thing was letting out is much stronger.


    Worst of all, the beast that was supposed to be resting imminently woke up as soon as it felt the presence of those three.


    Raising his huge body and standing on his four legs.


    The eyes of the beast turned bloodshot as it let out a reading howl towards Danzel.


    "GEAAAAAAAAGH!!!"


    Creating a small shock wave by his voice alone, Danzel drew his sword once again.


    "I see..."


    Stealing a nce at the two undead of his, Danzel realized something.


    ''So those two were the guards, huh?''


    Seeing the giant skull wolve about to dash forward, he guided his mana on his body while cursing internally.


    ''Me and my damn luck.''

 Chapter 190 - Hard To Kill Undead

    "GEAAAAAAAGH!!!"


    With the sheer howl alone, the bones themselves of him and his undead skull wolves started to vibrate while the dust was falling from the stones that made the tower.


    The metal-like ws dug slightly through the ground.


    Staring at the three intruders with pure rage in his eyes, it dashed forward with incredible speed towards the ones who interrupted his sleep!


    Seeing that, Danzel gave an internalmand towards the two bodyguards of his in a cold tone.


    `Go!¡ä


    "Gwhaaahl!"


    "Gwhaaahl!"


    Following the orders of their liege, the tworge undead skull wolves dashed forward with their mouths wide open. Their determination to uphold the wishes of their liege and releasing of killing intent is one impressive to withness and shiver at.


    Too bad that those things weren¡ät much use against the huge skull wolve.


    Not taking further than two steps ahead, the huge skull wolve towered the two undead. For a second there was some rity showing in the huge skull wolve eyes as it stared at the two former guards of his temporary home.


    The eyes that looked as they were filled with rage showed a sign of intelligence.


    How high or low his intelligence was unknown.


    It just was high enough to recognize his former subordinates turned their own fangs against him!


    Treason!


    It though.


    Without showing any hint of mercy, the huge skull wolve twisted his neck slightly and bitten the stomach of the traitor of the left with a fierce bite, a spring of blood with sounds of breakingbones from ribs could be heard.


    It had such a big strength that it managed to lift the whole body of the skull wolve up to the air.


    It looked like a cat picking up a kitten to drag it to safety by his neck. But in their case, the brutality level rose up to 100 as blood was oozing out of the stomach of the skull wolve.


    "Gwaaagh!"


    Turning his eyes towards his right, where the second traitor was, the muscles of his leg started to move in an abnormal way. Turning the leg was was for running and dashing to his target more suited to flexible swing it to his left and right.


    Swinging his metal-like ws towards his right, he swept the second traitor to the side while the ws prated the lungs of the traitor.


    Like someone hitting a fly, the skull wolve was thrown to the side of the walls of the tower and fell to the ground with an increadible amount of blooding out of his body.


    Seeing that, one could see by the eyes of the huge skull wolve that it was having fun of the pain that the traitors felt.


    But that blissful of his was shortly cut off by an intense paining from his chest.


    As if a wave of wind passed through him, arge cut was to be seen in front of his chest.


    Taking notice of the pain, they turned his eyes down to the ground.


    Only to see a hooded ck armored figure holding a longsword by a single hand alone, while his other arm was hidden between arge ck cloak.


    It was Danzel.


    Stepping forward, he swung his sword at the chest of the huge skull wolve. Not once but twice in a row.


    With the use of his original rune that he carved on his de, not only did it suck the blood out, but the [Cursed de] skill also corrupted the wound with dead mana, slowly but surely starting to decay the parts that were cut.


    The eyes of the huge skull wolve sharpen into a dangerous degree out of the anger alone.


    How dare this insect to harm my body!


    Raising the same leg that pushed one of the skull wolves to the wolve above Danzel''s head, the ws came soon into a drop.


    Of course, Danzel wasn¡ät going to just stand there and let himself be crushed.


    Using [Swift Movements] to increase his speed, he dashed under the belly of the huge skull wolve, swinging at this belly for thest time before making arge jump to create distance.


    "..."


    Staring silently at the wounds of the huge skull wolve, Danzel felt annoyed.


    `That thing is tough...¡ä


    Of course, his longsword did manage to fully sh somerge wounds on the beast, being howrge the beast that he was facing, those wounds were although painful, was not fatal.


    "Although getting a hit on arger target is much easier, bringing them down is all the more annoying." Danzel mumbled to himself as he swung the blood off his sword.


    The runes of the de made it quite easy to liquid the blood so that a simple swing could remove the blood taints.


    Those actions of his thought made the huge skull wolve to stare at him with a much more intense re of hatred while in his mouth was still the skull wolve.


    Seeing that, Danzel couldn''t help but grin.


    Raising his sword as if he were challenging the huge skull wolve, Danzel said in an amusement tone.


    "I think that you got something mistaken." Danzel said, unsure if the beast was able to understand him or not.


    "You see...we are undead."


    "Dead beings who neither hunger none tire." Danzel said as he guided his mana on his de.


    "Though I doubt you can understand me, do you believe that losing an arm would affect an undead?" He said with his grin behind his helmet turning all the more sinister.


    "Would you think that destroyed lungs or rips of one''s body would bring the death of an undead?"


    "Or rather...made us stop moving?"


    As Danzel had finished talking, the huge skull solve with his higher senses was able to hear a small sounding from the right.


    It turned his head to see what it was, and what it saw surprised him.


    The traitorous skull wolve that he swept over and had his lungs pierced started to rise up to his own feet while blood was stilling out of therge wounds.


    Did he survive?


    It though in surprise.


    Unfortunately for it, distracted at his former subordinates standing up after such a fatal blow, it failed to notice the small movement of the ''corpse'' that he had on his mouth.


    And once it noticed it was toote.


    Straightening his body up, the skull wolve who was being bitten on open his mouth with sharp teeth and dug them in the back of the huge skull wolve deep in.


    Resulting in a painfully muffled scream from the huge skull wolve.


    "Gwghhhh!"


    His eyes darting at the one responsible for biting his back, his previews confusion and anger grew much more.


    Anger of the traitor inflicting wounds on his body and confusion as to how the traitor still had the strength after his strong bite.


    It strengthen his bite to dug much further into the traitor''s flesh, but to no avail as those teeth wouldn''t let go of his back.


    Seeing no sess, it decided to solve it by force.


    By pulling the traitor with his mouth.


    Although his strength was sufficient, the result of doing that wasn''t that good.


    Pulling forcefully the traitor from his body, arge piece of his flesh came out that was on the traitor''s mouth.


    With his angered screams mixed with his pain, he swung his head to the side while letting go of the traitor.


    The strength of how it did it was so great that the skull wolve was raised more than 7 meters up higher and crashed at the tower left walls at incredible speed.


    Unable to protect itself, the undead skill wolve came crashing to the wall shortly after falling to the ground and breaking numerous bones at the same time.


    But dead was it not.


    At least not truly dead.


    With his skull showing only some small cracks, the undead still stared at how toplete his mission even if it couldn''t move at all.


    "Gweaaagh!"


    Screaming to make his presence aware of, the second skull solve came dashing in to take upon the task of fulfilling their livesmand.


    Moving his gaze off the one responsible for hurting his back, it stared at the slow-moving traitor that had his mouth wide open.


    Sneering to itself, it opens its muchrgemouth and bites the neck of the charging traitor as if wanting to eat the head.


    Once it borough down his fangs, the taste of blood overwhelmed his mouth.


    Withrge a mouth of it being the traitor''s ones, and a smaller amount being of his own.


    "Geeaaagh!" Feeling pain inside his mouth, it directly spotted the traitor only to see that it had a piece of his own fleshing from his mouth.


    Out of anger so great that made him lose his sanity and purely wanting to go berserk, It swung his ws into the traitor''s body, cutting it into three pieces and pushing back like some rags.


    Lucky for it, the skull was still intact, thus the undead still being ''alive'' even if only barely.


    It wanted to furthermore go and thrash thosetraitors for the reason of harming it.


    Meanwhile forgetting a small detail.


    Or rather a small figure.


    Having hidden his presence and quicken his steps with his skills, Danzel was able to go near the huge skull that wolve unnoticed as it was currently being blinded by rage.


    "Forget something?" Danzel said as he swung his sword to one of the back legs.


    *Fseeeeen!


    Supported by his skill, it was all the easier for Danzel to chop the muscr leg of that huge beast.


    *Ting


    "Gwaaaaaghhhhh!!!"


    Experiencing the pain of losing one limp, the huge skull wolve lost his bnce and fell together with his screams.


    s, though the sess of delivering such blue, Danzel sighed as he looked at the ground.


    "Sigh, that''s the limit I guess?" Danzel said dejectedly.


    Staring at his prized de that had enchantments and his own runes carved in the ground now snapped in two.


    Danzel felt at a loss.


    "I should have taken better care of it..." Danzel mumbled as he picked up and put the remains of the sword into his storage ring.


    ''Maybe Ipared it too much with Veren.'' Danzel couldn''t help but think to himself.


    Shaking his head, he gazed at the frailing huge skull wolve.


    Not only was it severely bleeding from numerous ces, the blood loss together with the decay made him feel weaker and weaker by each passing second.


    And yet it still tried to growl weakly towards Danzel with pure killing intent.


    ncing solemnly at it, Danzel simply raised his palm towards it and started casting.


    ''[Curse of Exhaustion]''


    ''[Curse of Scourge]''


    Two dark green most flew out of his hand and entered the huge skull wolf''s body.


    Thetter was confused about what had just happend.


    "Now be good andy where you are." Danzel said while turning his back towards the staircase.


    "Gwaaaaaggh!?"


    You running you coward!?


    It tried to yell out to the hooded figure.


    But s was ignored.


    While it was still trying to growl towards Danzel, thetter who by now was in the staircase said in a solemn tone.


    "Don''t worry-"


    Dissapierkng from the huge skull wolves'' blurry sight only Danzels''s echoing voice could be heard.


    "-we will know each other soon enough."

 Chapter 191 - Skeletons And Skull Claw

    Leaving the huge skull wolve to his sealed fate.


    Going towards back to the first floor to check on his undead, he shortly sat down as he realized that they were aimlessly wandering left and right.


    "Sigh...now what should I do?" He said as he sat down the stairs.


    Bringing all kinds of different weapons out of his storage ring one after the other, Danzel felt somewhat lost.


    From short sword to longsword and even maces. Danzel brought every weapon that he had in possession out and lined them neatly in front of him.


    Be it the weapons that he still had from when he worked for Hanson not long ago or the human remains of those in the desert.


    Danzel had many choices as to what his next weapon would be.


    But even among that options, he still chose to try out the few longswords that he still had left.


    And when he said few, he only meant that he only had three of them.


    And one could barely be called a longsword.


    To Danzel it looked somewhat like a bastard''s oversized sword.


    s, that was the first one that he put away.


    He much preferred a much longer de that was on the heavier side that was still able to hold it in one hand. If it weren¡ät for his shield and instead he had picked [Undead High de] as his original ss, then wielding a greatsword just like the one that escaped wouldn¡ät have been that bad of an idea.


    But still, he found his currentbination of shield and a longsword the best.


    Great defense with wide and powerful attacks.


    Although such a battle style had its own shorings.


    Which didn¡ät?


    While with a spear you can kill your opponents in an advantaged reach, once the enemy gets near you, the situation will turn for the worse.


    An axe packs great strength after each swing, but other than that it sucks at defending against attacks.


    A dagger although fast and flexible to kill your opponent was,cked the needed range for ahead onebat.


    Needless to say, every type and weapon had its own set of advantages and disadvantages.


    The point was which of them all will make yourself yours.


    For Danzel''s case, it was the shield and longsword.


    So with the two remaining longswords left, he chose the one that meets his criteria while being the less damaged.


    As for why he brought all his other weapons out was something total else.


    But before he could use those other weapons for that purpose, he had something much more important thing to do.


    cing the new longsword on hismps and the sheath beside him, the two pairs of ethereal eyes of his glowed slightly stronger.


    "[Rune Vision]"


    With his world turning into a gray and soundless one. Danzel stared at the green spots that his de was showing.


    Without any hesitation, his finger let out a small ze of mana that soon touched the de and moved it into different shapes without his finger flinching for even a second.


    One could tell that Danzel was experienced with that.


    In carving runes, controlling your mana and your hand was critical on runesmithing. A slightly wrong input on the mana could be decided where the end product would be a failure or a sess.


    The quality of the item itself was also an important fact.


    As the more damaged it was, the less room one had to draw the rune and the chance of making a mistake by your mana flow increased.


    Still, for Danzel who did that tireless though more than two years, he had some true skill.


    Even if he wasn''t able to carve a perfect rune at the end of the day.


    Standing up from the ground, he did some test swings in the air.


    After a few swings, he stopped to look at his new sword before shaking his head bitterly.


    "I got too used on the other one...and how long this sword willst is also questionable."


    Putting the sword back on his sheath, Danzel couldn''t help but remember his old de.


    ''If only I had Veren, things would have been much easier.''


    Although Veren itself was by his core a poorer quality than his current one, he dearly missed the self-repair effect.


    "Well, nothing to be done for it I guess..." Shaking his head, he put himself to think of something else.


    "Right, now about those..." Staring at the weapons on the ground, he switched his gaze upon his undead.


    ''You all, gather''


    Hearing their livesmand, all half skeleton zombies turned towards Danzel and moved to where he was.


    ''Stand in a line and remove your equipment


    As soon as Danzel gave hismand, he immediately regret it.


    Misunderstanding what he meant, the undead tried to rip off their armor and clothing in a frenzy as if those were a ticking bomb or something.


    "Wha-you idiots!"


    ''Stop!''


    Following themand, they stopped as if they were some statues who groaned from time to time.


    "Ugh...I should have seen thating." Danzel groaned out of annoyance.


    Hismands worked with his will and own intent.


    Since he wanted to continue to search the tower, his intent was recognized as him being in a rush.


    This is the reason why they reacted as such.


    ''Stand in a line and raise your hands high, I will do it myself...''


    With them following his instruction, Danzel went one by one undressing his undeadpletely, leaving them standingpletely naked.


    Even when some of the pale corpses were that of women, Danzel didn''t feel anything particr gazed at them.


    Just indifferences.


    Mere corpses, or rather puppets.


    Drawing his longsword out of his sheath, his dead mana danced on the de.


    Without a hint of hesitating, he pushed his sword at one of the zombies through the chest, while making sure he didn''t hit any bones at doing that.


    Not longeth that 5 minutes, the flesh of the undead decayed to the point where it turned into dust, leaving only someskeleton standing in front of him.


    "It worked, huh?" Nodding to himself, he went through the row and did the same thing.


    Turning the half skeletons half zombies into aplete skeleton.


    Doing that of course affected their status, with losing some strength for agility to gain some.


    Usually what Danzel did wouldn''t work into aplete zombie.


    But since his zombies had their parts of bones exposed, the transmission of the two undead races was as possible.


    "Now for the important part..." Danzel mumbled as he pointed in a certain direction.


    The direction we''re the weaponsy.


    ''Go and choose a weapon of your choice.'' Danzel said as he looked at his skeletons roaming and nkly staring at the weapons.


    Worried at first, he was relieved to see the skeletons starting to pick a weapon.


    The reason for that experiment of his was of certain old memories of his.


    Back when he freshly came out of the cursedke, he remembered the undead who he named "Fellow" and swung his sword towards the goblins.


    As he knew zombies wouldn''t wield a weapon, what about skeletons then?


    And the answer to that was as expected, they could!


    Although they just grabbed them and dragged them to their feet.


    He was sure that skeletons were much more of a threat than unarmed zombies.


    ''Train with your weapons, get used to the.'' Danzel transmitted to them.


    As he walks upstairs, a sudden thought came to his mind.


    ''And don''t break anything. Especially your weapons''


    "Just to be sure..." Danzel whispered to himself, clearly no longer underestimating their stupidity.


    Walking upstairs to the second and then third floor, the huge skull wolvey down dead, clearly trying to move as of how the trail of blood suggested.


    What surprised him though we''re something else.


    "Those two managed to survive? Danzel though.


    Starting at the terrible damaged skull wolves'' bodies that he took as bodyguards, Danzel let them rest, or rather let them restore their own damaged body by slowly gathering dead mana.


    Letting them do their own thing, Danzel walked towards the now dead huge skull wolve.


    Opening his status window, he was surprised to see how much it gave him


    [You received 110 500 XP]


    "it left me quite the fortunate behind his death..."


    Raising his palm towards him, Danzel said.


    "Now what kind of gentleman would I be if I weren''t going to personally thank him for it."


    Dead mana runs through his hand and towards his palm. Firstly fixing his body, mainly the missing leg.


    And as second, like in an instant, it shot out and entered the huge beast''s dead body.


    "Be made to serve~"


    Starting off with some of his muscles twisting, the huge skull wolf started to rise awkwardly in front of Danzel, effectively towering.


    "Hmm... It''s quite big." Danzel said as he send out his firstmand.


    ''Bow''


    Lowering his head, the huge skull wolve waited patiently at his life''s nextmand.


    "Much better..."


    As Danzel was starting it down at it, or rather his back, Danzel put up a wry smile.


    "I even decided."


    "From here on forth, you will be called skull w." Danzel dered.


    With his ws being like that of a metal and his race''s characteristic skull faces the name should be obvious enough as to why he chose it.


    Having the big one called ''huge skull wolve'' or ''Boss skull wolves and didn''t feel quite right to Danzel.


    As for why he was grinning so sinister, it was because a certain thought run in his mind.


    ''Although learning to ride isn''t that much of a need, with such great mount ahead in front of me, It surely will be a waste not to learn as of how to ride'' Danzel though.


    He definitely did not want to ride on top of Skull w just so that he could have some fun riding on top of him.

 Chapter 192 - Last Floor

    Touching the forehead of Skull w, a status window appeared.


    Looking at it for a few seconds, he nodded to himself as if he confirmed something.


    "It is indeed stronger than the other two, but the power that it lost way too much..." Danzelment for hiscking ability in turning them as far stronger undead.


    With how things were off now, the Skull w that dominated his other two skull bodyguards had now turned into a slightly better version of them. Barely surpassing the former with 30 stats at each attribute except the intelligence.


    If it weren¡ät for his bigger size and metal-like ws, Danzel would have even forgotten that this thing was 3rd-tier being.


    "Even if I were to ride it, I wouldn¡ät even be able to use my weapon as of howrge it is. Maybe it would work if I were to use a spear together with the smaller skull wolves..." Danzel though it stared at Skull w, who practically looked like an oversized dog of death.


    "At the very least it gave me quite the amount of XP, even the less. Having more undead under my control isn¡ät that bad." Danzel said to himself as he went past it.


    `Follow me.¡ä


    Seeing his liege walking towards the next floor, Skull w rise his huge body and walked steadily behind his master.


    The two bodyguards tried to apply themand too, but their body was too messed up for them to move.


    It was a miracle that those two didn¡ät get annihted.


    Nheless, as much as they wanted to follow him, they were shut down by their master of death.


    `You two stay here and recover.¡ä


    "..."


    "..."


    Freezing up from hismand, they rested their heads on the ground in silence while their liege moved on.


    Though those two looked like they wanted to whip at hismand.


    Danzel knew that this wasn¡ät the case.


    "Created undead have neither will nor intelligence, huh? I guess the Necronomicon was right..." Danzel mumbled as he was taking some nces at the Skull w.


    At first nce, the undead he created would look much smarter than a random undeading back from his grave.


    But Danzel would disagree.


    Those guys were nothing more than puppets of his will.


    Taking thetter away, they would be nothing more than stringless puppets.


    Compared to "Fellow" and the undead under the cursedke, they were a clear difference there.


    That was that they had a will...


    Or at least looked like they had.


    As it was three whole years by now, Danzel couldn¡ät exactly remember his days back in the cave. Even when his intelligence helped him memorize and calcte.


    "They just are puppets..." Danzel said out loud.


    Moving to the fourth floor and finding nothing else except some bones and broken tables. The two moved on without much of a dy.


    After almost some endless staircases wide enough to fit three of Skull w, they arrived at a much tougher door than all the other ones of before, even the gate of the very tower was of less quality.


    Fortunately for Danzel, that door that would have been a heck of an annoying task to break was already pushed open, in what Danzel recognized by the use of force.


    Pushing the door to make the gab bigger for him and Skull w to enter, a much different sight came before him.


    Entering the room, he was as amazed and disappointed when he realized what this room was.


    "A library..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Circled by paravent bookshelves that went till the roof of this floor.


    If he had to bet on something, Danzel would bet on the fact that this room could hold more than a thousand books.


    As of the exact number, Danzel couldn¡ät be sure of it.


    As in this library...there were no books.


    "So unfortunate...it¡äs truly unfortunate to see such a thing in front of me." Danzel said with a sad tone as he picked a stack of put-together papers from the ground, which once was a book with a cover.


    Once he tried to gently pat the dust away so that he could read the content, the stacks of paper were turned like a wall of stone crumbling away and turning into dust.


    "The nature of time can sometimes really be terrifying..." Danzel said, bitterly.


    `At least I don¡ät have to worry about such a thing.¡ä He thought as he searched to find something that was at least readable.


    But even after searching the whole library, there was nothing to find, not even bones like the other floors.


    "If my guess is right, I should be almost at the top. There shouldn''t be that many floors left."


    Walking towards anotherrge door simr to the one before, Danzel pushed it open with ease.


    Opening the door, instead of there being some staircase to the side as the other floors. The door opponent into arge floor that was purely lightened with blue color from the mana crystal of the side.


    The room that took up the whole floor was made out purely of a single staircase that wane through the walls up.


    "Who thought of putting so many stairs here? Such a waste of space" Danzel thought as he observed the stairs closely.


    Even from the bottom, he could seerge holes in the stairs with several cracks clearly to be seen.


    Not only that, they were to what looked parts of broken statues in the bottom of where he was and the stairs with different kinds of weaponsying on the ground.


    "Will the stairs support Skull ws weight?


    Danzel asked himself.


    Staring at the Skull w that he signed of decayed in his body, Danzel found it still too big to step on those stairs without breaking them.


    " I guess that''s it..." Danzel said as he pointed at Skull w.


    ''Stay here and guard the door.''


    Danzelmanded Skull w as he went on to scale the staircase.


    From time to time, he could see somerge holes that had been shaved off the wall so that something twice his size could fit.


    At first, he didn''t think much of it but as he saw several parts of the statue being held in those holes, his best guess was that they were formerly being kept there.


    "Did an earthquake happen or who threw those things in front of a damn staircase!" Danzel cursed as he jumped atop a hole.


    Continuing moving forwards, he felt a sudden presence in the room.


    Or rather, that of multiple ones.


    As he moved a bit further up, he saw them.


    With eyes glowing in golden light and body seemingly seem made out of poor sand.


    Hiding behind the holes of the statues, ghastly figures wearing scarfs to hide their face except their eyes appeared while flying to the air around him.


    With suchso simr eyes.


    "Undead?" Danzel mumbled as he sen see no hate towards them.


    "Khaaaa~"


    "Khawaah~"


    The ghostly undead growled at the one stepping into the tower.


    Danzel inparison just looked at them solemnly.


    "If I am right, then those guys are..." Without letting him finish, one of the undead flew forward with his hand right about to reach his chest with a screening howl.


    But as it arrived in front of him, the undead felt a sensation that it long ago had forgotten.


    Which made his current situation look all the more confusing to it.


    His own body that long ago was forced into bing a spirit of the death, the wraith, once more felt the touch.


    Gripping the manifested soul that uses mana as his vessel by his hand, Danzel was unsure of what to do with him.


    His capability to touch him in the first ce was just because of the runes being there.


    Seeing how weak it was, Danzel just tossed it aside while having his dead manae out of his body.


    The wraith who stabilized itself together with the others looked at Danzel for a few more moments before leaving back to what Danzel would consider their hiding spot in the holes.


    "To think that they were other undead like me..." Danzel said as he continues going up the stairs.


    Be it that he intimidated them or they saw him as a fellow undead, Danzel soon went uninterrupted to the end of those stairs.


    Once he stepped on the top, a gash of wind mixed with sand and a small light greeted him in the face.


    Seeing what was on the top, he halted.


    "What the..."


    A giant door of unknown metal tougher than a tree itself that he doubted if he could push forward by himself was in front of him.


    And that very door was pushed tougher and beating it while massive marks of scratches deep enough for two arms to fit it were to be seen.


    ''What could have possibly have done this?''Danzel asked himself as he imagined what kind of creature could do such a thing.


    While he was thinking of what it could be, his eyes wandered around the middle of the floor.


    Kneeling to the ground in a defeat-like position, he notices how many lines were sharply drawn through the ground. One of such lines ends in the direction of that body.


    Moving in front of the figure, he saw how pieces of metal were prating his heart with a mana crystal staff that managed to block a single attack.


    Though he recognized his clothing as being of high quality, by now after all those years. All that they had be we''re some dirty rags.


    The most surprising part of everything though, was that this seemingly unimportant corpse had dead mana running through their body dead mana.


    "That guy should'' even had enough dead mana to be an undead, and yet here there is..." Danzel said as he looked at the door.


    "Hmm, let''s first see what this tower has to offer. Then think of what to do with him..."


    Danzel said as he moved towards to broken-up door.


    Reaching thest floor of the tower.

 Chapter 193 - Story Of Tower

    Walking through the gap of the gate.


    The first thing that greeted him was the bright sunlight together with a gorgeous room.


    "The tower doesn¡ät have a roof? No wonder there is all this sand and light in this room." Danzel said as he stared at the gaping hole through the roof.


    He guessed that the piles of sand in the floor came from the opened-up roof.


    Another detail was that they were numerous bones to see hidden well in the piles of sands, most of the bones being destroyed into small pieces.


    "What the hell were the people doing inside this tower?" Danzel asked himself as he saw huge bones hold his size, and that was when one it was broken seemingly in half.


    `From what kind of being did that bonee from?¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    Unable to resist his curiosity, he touched the bone and saw this status.


    [Bone of an Ancient Hydra (Damaged beyond repair)]: A bone of the might sub-species of Dragons, an Ancient Hydra. Back in his life, the Hydra regeneration abilities were enough to grant him the title of "Immortal Being". After living through thousands of years, his wisdom granted it the title "Ancient" that was capable to use every head to cast devastating magic. Unfortunately for it, it meets a much fiercer flow, making it meet his fate early.


    "The heck did I just read..." Danzel said, unsure if should be surprised or not.


    Though he didn¡ät know what a hydra was, he knew what a dragon was from the books that he read, as most authors of such books liked topare the power of a spell to a dragon. Like the one time, he read that a fireball could potentially be as strong as a dragon''s breath.


    They were just too many references and illustrations of those fearsome Dragons.


    As Danzel understood them, they were just overgrown lizards who have wings and can shoot fire from their mouth. With some books saying that they can cast magic.


    But once he pressed to see the details of a [Ancient Hydra], he found them way scarier than Dragons.


    Endless-like regeneration with multiple heads reaching a number of 10 at best.


    With every one of those heads being capable to cast magic.


    He already had trouble facing magic casters as they were, but having one counting as 10 was way too scary to imagine.


    `I don¡ät even want to imagine what the other bones are...¡ä Danzel shook his head away from the other bones.


    In the first ce, he could neither fix them nor use them.


    Instead of going through useless information of various bones, Danzel decided to look at what was in front of him.


    To be more precise, the walls of the tower itself.


    Although he took notice of the throne that had a part of the back broken and was seemingly made out of gold, as except sand, there was not a single piece of rust in the throne.


    What take his intention attention instead was the carving of the wall that built a masterpiece of a picture, which almost looked lifelike to Danzel.


    `How much time would one take to carve such things on a wall?¡ä Danzel thought honestly as he skimmed through the variety of pictures to find a start.


    Not short after, Danzel noticed something on those carvings.


    "It''s...a story?" Danzel thought as he saw how one carving developed the meaning of the other one beside it.


    `If it¡äs a story...then it should also have a start.¡ä Danzel thought as he searched was the start of the story that those carving were pointing at.


    A few secondster, he found a picture that had the number one in a form simr to the Roman number, just a bit more curved.


    "Let¡äs see..."


    The first picture.


    In the carvings of a sandhill, there was a man wielding simple pants and a robe turned seemingly to shreds, making the robe only cover his both arms and bits of his chest.


    Together with it, the man carried a staff that resembles that of a spear that was purely made.


    It was so carved that even though the man looked like a begar, he had by far the most details in the picture itself, from his firm muscles to his spear, he was the main focus.


    And in the picture, that man stared through the distance in the direction leading to the next carving.


    In the second picture, he seemed to like people worshiping that men who controlled the sand to drag down various beasts he did not know of. The man appeared as he was flying in the air and being the light of those people that Danzel guessed he saved.


    The sand that he controlled went through the next picture where he could see it was split into three different parts.


    In the bottom part, the man was teaching other people with knowledge, while the building of the tower could be seen to have started.


    The middle part carving was of the man saving furthermore people and guiding them in the tower where it has grown much bigger yet different from how it looks now.


    The third part was of a man teaching others to what he saw could be interpreted as magic, in that picture the top of the tower was finished and looked very much the same as of now, but less decayed by time.


    The end of the tower was turned into sand which was used for the next picture to show a massive city standing on said sand, while the tower was in the middle of them all.


    The sand that continued ''flowing'' led further to the next part of the story.


    There was the man from the first picture which much more refined clothing and weapon. But in the essence wearing the same style.


    The man was holding the spear in front of him when the huge wave of sand turned into soldiers.


    There was a mix of both human and inhumane soldiers, them being golems that we were covered in sand.


    And among those soldiers, a woman with long hair was to be seen closest to the man of the spear.


    The soldiers in the picture mixed together in form of sand that lead to by far thergest picture.


    Danzel who saw it immediately noticed what this picture was.


    "It''s the map..." Danzel mumbled as he brought out his own map I confirm.


    ''They are a resemnce there...'' Danzel though.


    Holding one of the maps of the people that he died by the skull wolves, the ces where was written as old ruins and such, we''re in the carving a former city or viges of some kind.


    "This actually might be a more urate map..." Danzel said as he started marking all the unknown parts from his own map.


    The map''s edges of the carving were guided to turn into another picture, it being the man of before together with the woman soldier, that now held three baby''s in her embrace while showing a gentle smile.


    The top of the picture soon guided into what Danzel thought were the adult forms of the previews kids, kneeling before the man with the staff that sat on a throne.


    The three of them had different looks.


    One hiring his face with a hood while caring for staff.


    One muchrger than the other two wielded a sword.


    With thest one, who Danzel recognized imminently.


    "Wait...this staff...isn''t that guy who kneels in the door? Daniel thought as he looked at the door.


    ''I will confirm itter.'' He thought as he didn''t want to stop looking at the story that was being told by those beautiful carvings.


    With the throne end extending, it lead to the next carving which confused Danzel.


    The man who he recognize as King stepped out of his throne and walked leisurely at different ces, it being more hinted at that as in his handheld a with a miniature him walking the small.


    "Hmm. Did he step away from the throne and let his kids take responsibility?" Danzel thought.


    But as he looked at the next picture that wasn''t being led by something, he was stunned for a second.


    Compared to the other carvings that were seemingly made as one painting to create a story.


    Till yet the story shows how a man built a whole kingdom with the help of his magic and finally rued to what would many consider a perfect life.


    But the next carving was different.


    It was carved as if someone was in a rush or just didn''t care more about the previous style of the carvings. It was rough and detailed.


    Yet the most intriguing from them all as yet.


    Thest carving, the king who set out to this world with a carefree attitude was now kneeling to the ground while gnashing his teeth in front of a giant hole in the sky, which in the middle was a small spark of light that bleed something on top of the kneeling king.


    Confused, Danzel turns to see the next picture to make sense of what he just saw, but Danzel looking at it was still confused.


    As the few more looked around, he noticed that the carvings that he still hasn''t been read had now been destroyed.


    Tracks of huge ws simr to the one he saw of the gates.


    Looking up through the roof, they were many such scratches in the left and right, making him wonder what could possibly go up there to scratch the walls.


    "Hm...So I basically stay in a pce of some kind, huh?" Danzel muttered to himself as he turned around the door.


    Going outside the door, Danzel stared at the kneeling dead man who held a staff in his hands.


    "Hmm...he looks really simr to that of the story." Danzel said, recognizing him from one of the kids that wielded magic.


    Though he didn''t know the reason for his death, he also didn''t care.


    Danzel was for only one thing there...


    The crystal.


    Taking the staff of the dead man, he pulled the piece of metal that was in the crystal.


    *Fwuuu~


    *Tiik


    Throwing the metal away, Danzel stared at the gray mana crystal in front of him, with a grin on his face.


    "After two years I got to see another one of those."


    [Mana Essense Crystal (Damaged)]: A extremely rare crystal that had all its impurities removed, making it turn into an Essence Crystal. Making the mana inside the crystal be much purer mana and capable to hold mana.. It bes heavily damaged in which it lost its nature, turning into just a mass crystal of pure mana.

 Chapter 194 - Settling In The Tower

    "Mhhm...as the crystal has the status of being damaged, then there should be a way to repair the crystal. Somehow at least..." Danzel said as he inspected the crystal in his hand.


    Looking at the `wound¡ä, he quickly noticed that mana was leaking to the air and gathering small amounts of mana at the same time, as their nature of being mana crystals.


    It was simr to how a gas canister was continuously being filled with said gas, only for it to escape to the outside because of a small hole.


    And the fact that there was more mana leaking than it naturally gathered, made the crystals, which was of the highest quality he ever saw, to be essentially useless.


    It did disappoint him, but not enough to discourage the thought of finding a great treasure.


    "Just the fact that it didn¡ät break when I removed the piece of metal is already a win. It being useful is just a luxury at this point. I even got enough time to figure out how to fix it, with me being an immortal." Danzel said as he went back to the throne room with the crystal in his hand.


    `Well, even if it wasn¡ät damaged, I got no clue how to practically use that thing.¡ä Danzel thought to himself bitterly.


    Although he had sort of an idea of how the equipment was made and how enchantments yed a huge role in using crystals.


    Danzel wasn¡ät much for learning how to make such enchantment for several reasons.


    Onepared to runesmithing, enchantments apparently required a bunch of materials. Which as an undead without the help of one associated wasn¡ät fishable to get a steady supply.


    But the biggest reason why he didn¡ät decide to jump in on that suspect was because of theck of XP.


    Since runes were getting quite expensive, having something simr draining his XP piles was a big no-no for him.


    "Maybe in a few hundred years I could go in the subject of enchanting, but for now runes are much better," Danzel said aimlessly as he stopped in front of the golden throne.


    Staring at it for a moment, he put the crystal to one of the arms of the throne before dusting the sand away from the throne.


    When he finished, he stared at the throne and then back at the carving of the King kneeling to the ground a massive hole being in the sky, which a light let out something that fell on the former possessor of this throne.


    The carvings on the wall seemed to be done without looking after details like the other carvings.


    Even though Danzel didn¡ät get what the carving was trying to say.


    He could somewhat understand what the one that carved the pictured felt about thanks to his experience of carving himself runes.


    Although not the same as those masterpieces, the required detail could be simr when carving.


    `It¡äs as if the one who carved this seemed to be in a hurry- No, maybe desperate?-¡ä


    But among those guesses, one of them seemed to fit the best.


    "Maybe he went mad..." Danzel said as his eyes were focused on the giant hole of the sky in the carving.


    "Though I ain¡ät sure if you ept it or not..." Danzel said as he carefully seated me and rested his back on the throne.


    "But I will be taking your tower as my residence from here on."


    The sun looked down to the opening of the tower, casting this sunlight that illuminated the wholest floor together with the sand that was being carried by the wind into the tower.


    Pulling his hood back while removing the helmet from his face, the undead who was seated on a golden throne looked up to the sky in silence.


    "..."


    With his ethereal dark green ring eyes, he opponent his mouth and muttered to himself.


    "I need to continue..."


    Standing up the throne and drawing his sword out of his sheath, Danzel walked away from the throne.


    `There are still many things that have to be done. I can¡ät waste my time on this temporary peaceful moment.¡ä Danzel thought as he was about to start his sword training.


    "Ah right, the [Sun Timer]..."


    Bringing out the device that disyed the time of the day, he ced it on the opposite arm of the throne that was the crystal.


    "Mhmm, now I will know how much time would pass..." Danzel said in a solemn tone.


    But instead of starting his training, he still looked at the [Sun Timer] in silence.


    Not muchter, he sighted internally while bringing the device back into his storage ring.


    "I don¡ät need it..." Danzel said while starting training with pure the longsword, as he didn¡ät have an arm to carry the shield too.


    With millions on XP to be gained and nothing else to read nor to carve runes ( he doesn¡ät want to carve the weapons of his skeletons).


    He could only train on his swordsmanship to gain a reliable XP.


    Ignoring the temporary peace that he found after all those years.


    He decided not to get distracted by it and focus on his task.


    Be it hours, days, or even months.


    Danzel continued to swing his sword as fast and urately as possible without showing any signs of rust.


    As he needed none.


    While his sense of time is slowly drowned by the endless training.


    He failed to realize how much he had changed from his past self.


    The Danzel that worked hard and took breaks for a change of page was nowhere to be seen.


    Only an undead remained that tirelessly swung his sword.


    It was a small change.


    Maybe even an insignificant one.


    The fact was, that such change wasn''t discovered by the said undead.


    ***


    In the vast among desert, where life was a scarcely under the watch full eyes of the sun.


    But scarcely didn''t mean extinct.


    The proof of that was a vige though the distance that we''re able to be seen.


    Although it was a vige, the people walking in the streets while others were trading and shouting to catch their customers attention


    A group of two women and two guys came into the town, their expression being tired looking from the bangs under their eyes.


    "Finally here..." An explorer with a sword in a sheath and a shield on his arm exined in relief.


    "Hey, don''t fall to the ground already. Who do you think will carry youter huh, Sean?" Isamu kicked Sean''s tired a*s while sighting to himself.


    ''Although we finally arrived...everyone else died.''


    Losing more than 10 people that he knew was no easy thing to shallow done. More of it is the case if from such people you owned your life multiple times.


    Though what happened was terrible, he saw enough death for him to not linger on what was already done.


    "So you two, what will you be doing right now? I and Sean wanted to grab something to eat in the tavern. We don''t mind if you guyse." Isamu said to the beautiful girls behind him.


    "As I was nning to eat something anyway, I might as well join you." The babe Sylva said.


    Having walked days of ice-cold and heat melting temperature.


    Having Sylvas agreement, he looked on their priests, who only nodded as her reply.


    Sean by the side who saw that interaction between these two gave thumps up on Isamu.


    "You..." Without having the strength to deal with Sean''s behavior, he sighed out loud.


    "Sigh...let''s just go eat something and call it a day."


    With a silent agreement of everyone, they entered the closed tavern.


    Finding soon a table that allowed them all to sit down, they all began ordering a huge portion of food together with some liquor to go with it.


    As soon as their order came, marching from the door were several hooded figures walking inside with each having a different high size.


    One of them so tall that it would heart once neck to see.


    Many murmurs started to appear, with some being wary of them while others'' spection was happening.


    "Hmm, who are those freaks? Wearing a cloak and all. Don''t you agree Isamu?" Sean asked Isamu, only for no response toe back.


    Swallowing the piece of meat in his mouth, Sean turned to Isamu.


    "Hey, why aren''t you responding-, is something wrong Isamu?" Sean asked confused by the angered face that Isamu was showing.


    Before he could ask the reason for it, he started up and headed towards the cloaked figures.


    Pulling his map out of his pockets, he mmed the paper on their table


    "You! You tricked us!" Isamu yelled towards the cloaked figure in the middle.


    "Hey, you limp down there! You got anything against us!? If you leave now I might spare you" a female voice said while ncing at Isamus''s direction with killing intent high enough to make him sweat.


    ''This feeling...''


    As Isamu was repacking himself of seeking trouble from that group, the man that he meant answered him.


    "Aren''t you of the group that purchased a map of time not long ago from me? Without a doubt, there was a tower as I said. So if I may ask, how did I trick you?


    Gritting his teeth, he pointed at his finger on the much older voice.


    "Though you told us there will be a monster, you didn''t tell us of the necromancer residing in those ruins! Because of him, we had to retreat with some of us dying even!" Isamu yelled, knowing full well that he was in the wrong.


    It was their leaders and his decision to buy the map of those cloaked groups.


    It was well known that ruins would contain never before seen monsters or deadly traps which were very likely for the ones to die meeting them.


    Exploring new ces even by the risk of danger.


    Those were explorers.


    After sending on the group for a while, he quickly apologized and left some coins as an excuse.


    Seeing the man who suddenly came to their table today something interesting, the cloaked figure who had a female voice bent closer into the table.


    "Hey boss, might you know that necromancer that this guy mentioned?" She asked.


    Shaking his head, he replied simply.


    "No"


    Starting sharply under his cloaks, the man brought a map out and spread it open for the group to see.


    Pointing at a certain


    "Forget about that necromancer, we got much bigger targets to chase after."


    Looking at every party member of his, the man said while his finger was still on the map.


    "As we are only here to target the much bigger fish."


    In the map that this was holding, there were multiple crossed red circles in the pages around.


    And out of all the crossed circles.


    There was one particr name written on top of those circles.


    And that was...


    Devil.

 Chapter 195 - Recruiting

    Walking back to his tabled frustrated, Isamu cursed to himself.


    "Dammit!"


    Sitting back to his table, he gave the wooden cups of liquor nces before drinking it on one go. Making his cheeks appear slightly red.


    He was frustrated with his weakness for several reasons.


    Be it for letting many of hisrades die or being unable to realize against the truly powerful.


    He despised his own weakness.


    Even if his strength level was considered amazing enough for those of the lower tiers.


    From the side of the table, the others who saw the usually calm Isamu drinking the liquor as it was water, cast a worried look at him.


    "Hey Isamu, I understand how you are feeling. But it isn¡ät your fault for what happend. We all took the march to find that tower too lightly. Even if that necromancer didn¡ät appear, most of us died against that ambush of those damned hiding dogs. Although it wasn¡ät supposed to happend... such sort of things is what makes us explorers." Sean said as he gulped together with Isamu the next cup.


    "Although I hate to admit it, Sean is right, it wasn¡ät your fault." Sylva said while piercing one of the sausages with her fork and putting it in her mouth. Biting it, a satisfying crack sound appeared from the skin of the sausage.


    That action alone didn¡ät go unnoticed by Sean''s watchful pair of eyes.


    "That¡äs right! T be rewarded with treasures and girls is a good enough reason for risking our lives! Even If I were to die. Dying while watching those..." Getting closer to Isamu shoulder with shoulder, he mentioned to Isamu to stare at Sylva.


    "Isn¡ät too ba- Aghhh! What are you doing!" Sean yelled in pain while touching his leg to lessen the pain that came under the table.


    "Hmpf! Guys. Don¡ät let yourself ever be corrupted by that beast, priestess." Sylva told the priestess beside her while giving Sean a look of pure disgust.


    Unknowing to her though...


    He was into that.


    While the two looked like they would start fighting any minute, the quiet priestess with golden blond hair moved her gaze towards Isamu.


    "Isamu, failure is how we humans progressed through hundreds of years. And with each failure, we can correct our ways and improve. Although failing isn¡ät a good thing, as long as we can learn from our mistake and improve ourselves, there will be always a next time." The priestess said with closed eyes together with her sweet voice like a luby.


    "But as you and we know, once you died everything is over. Once we died, we can¡ät improve nor try again. But as long as we are alive there will be always a next time."


    Processing what the priestess told him, his mind got slightly clearer.


    "Are you by any chance implying that we... try to go back to that ce where ourrades died?" Isamu tried to say quietly but ended up voicing it much louder than he expected.


    But what he didn¡ät expect was that the sweet priestess of their party would actually nod her head to his question.


    "Yes, as a member of the Sacred Cross church, and a believer of the goddess of light, I can¡ät tolerate someone who uses the arts of defiling the dead and forcing them to his will." She said with a serious voice and her eyes half-opened.


    Him and the other two who were bittering among themself a moment ago turned and looked surprised at the priestess in silence.


    The first one to break the silence was none other than Sean.


    "To think a person like you had be an explorer. If they were more people like you, maybe us being called graverobbers will be no more!"


    "Yeah, I remember meeting her and praying to every monster that we killed though all those years and-"


    While Sylva was bringing the dark past of her early years of being explorers to her party, the serious aura that she was letting go of was soon reced with a bright red one.


    "Ahhhh! Sylva! You told me that you aren¡ät ever going to mention that!"


    "Mhmm..."


    Taking a gulp of her own drink she put her hand on the cheeks while tilting her head.


    "Did I say that?"


    "Ahhhhhh! Sylva~!"


    With the previous gloomy mood disappearing as if there wasn''t any, to begin with, Isamu stared from the sidelines at how his remaining friends were joking with each other and having a nice time.


    "Hahahahaha!" Laughing out loud, he grabbed another cup and drowned it down.


    "Fooooh~Thanks guys. I lost myself there for a moment. As long as we are alive we can try again. Sylva, Sean, will you being to take revenge with that priestess of us together? I would understand if you refuse to go to that ce again" Isamu said.


    "Sigh...of course, I will being," Sylva said while piecing another sausage with her fork.


    "We are friends after all"


    Isamu nodded before looking at Sean, waiting for his answer.


    "Man, you really can''t read the mood, can you? I obviouslying too. Losing a beauty to look at and her holy magic would hurt that fragile heart of mine." Ignoring the gaze of Sylva, he patted the shield that he had on the side.


    "You can trust that shield to be at your service"


    "Thank you," Isamu said sincerely.


    "But four of us isn''t going to cut it." Sylvia said after swallowing the sausage.


    "That ce is lurking with beasts of the 3rd-tier. None the less that Necromancer..."


    "She is right. The Necromancer was capable to make undead of the 2nd-tier. At worst we can expect him to be a 3rd-tierbatant. If he was any higher we wouldn''t be here drinking as that" Sean said.


    "We can''t forget that he only used two spells of his. Someone capable of controlling death should also be able to have other spells into his arsenal." Priestess mentioned from the side.


    Hearing the back and for opinions of his party, Isamu came to a single conclusion.


    "Weck the numbers."


    Knowing that they will be facing a necromancer together with his army of undead at the very least, four people were indeed a small number.


    Grumbling to themselves about how to proceed with that problem, a sudden voice came behind them.


    "Yo, I heard your discussion and I can''t help but say that you got gotten my interest." Arge man with armor came at their table with a big grin on his face.


    "If I did hear right...you talked about a necromancer and a tower right?" The man asked while sitting beside Isamu.


    "That sounds like a ce much to earn, my friend. Since you guys need some people, let me and my group join the fun too."


    ***


    On thest floor of the tower.


    Where the hole of the roof lets the sunlight inside and illuminate the whole room.


    An undead Wight was swinging his weird through the air.


    Each swing raised the sand in the air.


    Though to someone it would have looked like the undead was aimlessly swinging their sword through the air. It couldn''t be further from the truth.


    With both power and bnce, the de was cutting through the air countless times. Doing such a feat for countless hours without seeing a sign ofck of quality of his swings.


    But soon that circle was shortly stopped by a notification that appeared in front of the undead.


    [You received 5000 XP]


    "..." Pushing the floating window to the side, Danzel was about to start his training once more until he released that his missing arm had finally recoveredpletely.


    "That took quite a while..." He said while clenching his hand.


    His first thought after having his hand back was to go back into the training.


    But as he was about to continue, a sudden thought came to his mind.


    "Right...it has been quite a while since I checked does undead of my."


    Summoning a pair of dark green hands, he walked towards the gate whilemanding the hands to bring his helmet to him.


    "Same as always, huh" Danzel said as he stared at the kneeling corpse that was supposed to be the King''s child based on the carvings.


    Taking his helmet from the hands, he put it into his head while going down the stairs.


    Though he still watched the wraiths staring at him, none of them did attack him.


    ''Are those guys actually smart? I got to use status on them once Ie back.''


    Going to the next floors, he collected Skull w and his two bodyguards that fully managed to recover by now to thest floor which was his fee skeletons simr to him swinging their weapon to the air.


    "1st-tier is really slow..." Danzel mumbled as he moved past that undead.


    Though he had them, where he was nning to use them wouldn''t fit their power level.


    Going outside of their tower, he gave out his internalmand.


    ''Rise''


    Hearing their liegesmand, the few skull wolve came out of the sand and started at Danzel.


    "Mhmm... Maybe it''s time to see what else hides in these ruins."


    Looking behind him, he started at the Skull w.


    "Let''s see..." Putting some strength in his legs, he jumped up high towards the back of the Skull w.


    ''You all! Follow behind me!''


    Asmanded, the undead skull wolves follow behind Skull w and their master in his back.


    "There should be some still left out there..." Danzel said as he imagined the XP that was to gain from the skull wolves remaining in the city.


    "I guess recruiting a few more of those shouldn''t be too bad.." Danzel said to himself as he started riding with Skull w and all his other undead skull wolves around the city that there was supposed to be in the past.

 Chapter 196 - Recruiting (2)

    Currently in the towers city that now we''re mere ruins.


    Vast amounts of blood were mixed through the sand.


    "Gweaaggh!"


    Stepping down on the blooded sand, various skull wolves were running while howling in desperation.


    And the 3 particr skull wolves that were with their tails behind, didn¡ät understand what was happening.


    To them, it was the same day that they were experiencing their whole lives.


    Waking up from the buried sand, they would usually roam freely around the ruins in search of food while the evesting sun was burning their body.


    But those things were normal to them.


    Experiencing months of starvation and the harsh sunlight was something that they learned to handle by their birth.


    Sometimes, some of the two-legged creatures woulde into their territory which would make a fine meal from them.


    Where do creaturese from was unknown to them.


    But what they did know was the pleasure of eating fresh meat that had lots of red juice in it.


    Not only those who eat that two-legged creature would sate their hunger and thirst, but would also be much stronger.


    Be it having stronger ws or arger build, they would gain great strength by eating those creatures.


    But even though those creatures came rarely, they still had to give their spoils if they have any to `Strongest¡ä as tribute.


    If they did not, the `Strongest¡ä residing in therge stone mass woulde and make a meal of them. Further strengthing the `Strongest¡ä.


    And by the end of the day, they will go back into the sands and sleep to hide from the cold.


    Such was the life of them, the skull wolves.


    But that circle was soon broken by a terrifying enemy riding `Strongest¡ä who hunted them done.


    At first, they thought that the `Strongest¡ä was angry and that she will just eat one or two of their group and as usual go sleep in the stone mass.


    Followed by a group of their injured kin, the `Strongest¡ä started to ughter their group without any signs of stopping together with her kin. What confused them more was that they didn¡ät eat them, but simply tore their kin without even trying to eat them.


    Recognizing the situation, they made haste to escape to avoid their death.


    But that was also a fruitless effort.


    Huge stone walls would rise and cut their escape paths only to be ughtered by being cut into pieces by the mouth of the many injured of their kin.


    By that many of them died, but few survived.


    But even those who survived were soon killed by a howling sound that they didn¡ät understand was.


    And what they didn¡ät understand made it fear it ever so much.


    As they knew, once the sound appeared...


    One of them would die.


    And those three remaining skull wolves who were pathing...heard soon after that certain sound.


    *Fsheeeeen!


    With a wind-cutting sound making this presence known, a glitch of dark green wind took shape of a moon de and flew towards one of the running skull wolves.


    Without being able to respond in any sort of way as the streets were small enough with them three runnings, the one in the middle soon got to experience mass amounts of pain.


    The air de soon reached the middle skull wolve and cleanly cut through one of his legs, making it fall to the ground while screaming in pain.


    "Gwaaaagh!" Yelling out of pain, the skull wolve turned his head back to see what was awaiting him.


    And what it saw terrified him.


    Jumping above him, he saw it.


    The `Strongest¡ä together with the creature that was on top of her.


    It thought that it will meat his end through therge fangs of the `Strongest¡ä.


    What surprised it though was that the `Strongest¡ä just left him to the ground.


    Making it believe that it was somehow spared.


    `Kill him¡ä


    Then there it was.


    Amand that the living skull wolve couldn¡ät hear.


    But those who heard it, went instantly to finish themand given by their liege.


    Jumping in theying down skull wolve, a wave of undead opened theirrge mouths and started to devour the skull wolve, who in turn was screaming from the tormenting pain.


    The liege of said undead who looked at this shook his head bitterly before looking ahead on the two remaining skull wolves.


    "I should even tell them to be more gentle with him since I got to raise himter on," He said as he guided his mana to the ground.


    "But first those two take priority..."


    Raising his palm, he cast his spell.


    `[Stone Wall]¡ä


    With a small grumble through the ground, a stone wall rose up and blocked the path of the remaining two.


    "Gweaaagh!?"


    "Gweaaagh!?"


    `Stop¡ä


    Commanding Skull w to stop at his cracks, Danzel jumped off her and looked at the two exhausted Skull wolves.


    "You are thest ones remaining. But don¡ät worry...you soon shall the ranks of my army." Danzel said as he dashed forward towards the two.


    Seeing the speed that the hooded two-legged creature was running at them, they imminently forgot how to escape and put all their effort into crushing the fool into underestimating them.


    Rushing towards Danzel, the first one to arrive rises his mouth and shallow Danzel whole simr to how it did to all other two-legged creatures.


    "Too simple..." Danzel muttered as he jumped to the side and dodged the skull wolf''s bite.


    Not only did he know how those beasts fought, but his [Greater Sense Danger] also warned him.


    Swinging his sword to the skull wolve body, he cut through a big chunk of flesh. But he wasn¡ät done yet.


    Ignoring the othering to him, he activate [Mortal Reminder] which made the injured skull wolve feel like someone else pierced through his heart. Though the small window of it being distracted, he swiftly cut his neck and ended his life.


    [You received 25 000 XP]


    "Five hours worth..." Danzel said as he stared at the iing skull wolve.


    Guiding his dead mana to his hand, he jumped back to create distance between the other skull wolve.


    Although he was stronger than them, he knew that being careless would make him armless once more.


    "Gweaggh!" the skull wolve yelled, as it saw its enemy and pray running away.


    "Be made to serve~"


    As soon as the creature muttered those unknown words while raising his hand towards him, hisrade that fought against the enemy a few seconds ago rise from the ground and bit at him with much ferocity.


    "Gweaaaagh!?"


    What are you doing!?


    It tried to say.


    But sadly, it was no more hisrade, but a loyal minion of their enemy.


    An undead.


    "You forgot about me?" Danzel spoke with a whisper-like voice.


    Swinging his longsword, he directly decapitated the remaining skull wolve.


    [You received 21 000 XP]


    "Sigh, now I done it." Shaking his head, he repaired both the two skulls solve body and made them into his own minion.


    ''Skull w,e over here''


    Applied ing to hismand, Danzel jumped on top of Skull w before starting at the bunch of undead that he gathered through around the ruins of the city.


    He spend more than 6 hours going around together with his undead to find if there were any more skull wolves to find.


    Although 6 hours were about 30 000 XP worth of time, he was d that he made the decision.


    Just those two skull wolves alone made the whole thing worth this time.


    And that was not talking about all the other skull wolves that he found in the ruins.


    Though he had lost a few undead in the process, he gained many more to turn as undead.


    Since he lost around 10 and gained 30 more.


    He had a little bit more than 40 undead skulls wolve into hismand.


    Or to be more urate, he now had 26 undead skull wolves while the remaining ones were still corpses that were being carried by his undead.


    Though he had lots of mana that he could use to fight without worrying about mana.


    Fighting multiple fights and creating undead was way too taxing for Danzel.


    Maybe he went with the magic caster root, he would have enough mana now.


    But as this wasn''t the case, he could only use the corpses forter when his mana recovered.


    "I only have 56 mana left... I guess that should do it for today. I am pretty sure I got every single of them, and if not that''s also fine. " Danzel said while looking through his status.


    Seeing on the bottom, he sighed internally.


    "6 780 425 XP, huh? Quite the improvement from thest time I checked. I guess do bandits and skull wolves were quite the XP bags. But just thinking of the required XP though makes the progress that I made seem not that impressive."


    Making the status window fade away, he and his undead arrive back on the tower.


    ''Let the corpse inside the tower. And don''t throw them atop of each other! ce them in a line!'' Danzel send out hismand. While observing the bunch.


    He would bet if he didn''t make hismand so direct, then they would just throw them like some carriage bags atop of each other.


    Seeing them finishing their job, he thought for a moment before sending hismand out.


    ''Except you two and Skull w, everyone one of you bury yourself in the sands. If there is someone were to enter the tower or try to attack you, kill them.''


    The reason for giving them such a specific order to attack was because do guys were dumped.


    If he didn''t, then does guys would just reveal themselves upon the look of a living being.


    As for how he knows that is because that already happens today as he tried to bait the skull wolves into a trap but didn''t work out because of that reason.


    "You all too, follow me" Danzel ordered the skeletons.


    Letting their training with their weapon was, although somehow expected...useless.


    So instant of letting them swing their weapons aimlessly, he decided to put them somewhere much more fitting in the tower.


    Moving up the floors, he let the two undead skull wolves that were the bodyguards of him once together with the Skull w into the library floor to guard.


    Guiding the skeleton of his into the staircase room, he halted and looked around as if searching for something.


    "There they are..."


    Putting his mind into it, two dark green hands appeared in the air.


    "Go"


    Flying through the air and into the holes of the wall, they trapped one of the hiding wraiths and brought them out by force.


    "Khaaaa!"


    Raising his hand and activating the runes of his gauntlets, he dragged the wraith towards him and grabbed into the undead neck.


    Angry of that, the wraith was about to attack Danzel before it noticed the overwhelming dead mana flowing from his body.


    "Wraith''s...a 2nd-tier undead who near-invincible by physical damage and a weakness to magic.As long as I am aware you guys should hold some intelligence. Don''t you?"


    The wraith who heard that looked directly into Danzel''s eyes, before yelling at him.


    "Leave! Leave this tower!"


    Though thenguage was different from what Danzel was used to hearing, for some reason he was able to understand it.


    "So that counts my question as yes."


    Without any hesitation, he there the wraith towards the tower''s wall, making it explode with his sand body.


    Soon after though, the sand started to merge once more and create the wraith''s body.


    "Khaaaa" the wraith screamed at Danzel, angry at what he has done to him.


    "Though I ain''t nning to stay here forever, for now, I won''t be leaving any time soon. If you don''t like that I don''t mind erasing a fellow undead."


    Seeing the wraith leave, Danzel stared at his skeletons.


    ''You guys spread through the staircases and make sure not to fall. This floor will be under your protection.''


    Having finished his arrangements, he went to the throne room before greeting the child of the towers king.


    Since that guy gave him such a nice treasure, he started greeting him for the fun of it.


    "I guess the rest XP I would have to farm by training...." Shaking his head, he started once again doing his swordsmanship training together with his shield

 Chapter 197 - Devil Of Azurah

    At the same time when Danzel walked back.


    Isamu together with his group finished their preparations for their revenge.


    From equipped to necessary rations, they were now prepared.


    Together with their new allies.


    Waiting outside the town, the four of them soon enough saw a group of Explorers being led by a most familiar face.


    "Yo, did we make you guys wait?" The man who wore full body armor said with an all simr grin that when they first meet in the tavern.


    "It¡äs fine, we just arrive like you..." Isamu said while making a handshake with the man before tilting his head slightly to see the impressive numbers that this guy brought together with him.


    "Are those your people?" Isamu couldn¡ät help but ask.


    "Hahaha! Didn¡ät I tell you that I know some people? Do you take me for a year?"


    Taking a step back, the man pointed at all the people behind him.


    "Though I originally nned to bring some more. Because of the distance of that tower is, I only managed to bring22 warriors and 3 magic casters."


    Hearing that, Sean who was heard by the side rise his eyes wide from surprise.


    "Wait, you actually got some magic caster to join us too?"


    Hearing that from the side, one of the magic casters who wore sses and had a fairly young look stepped up.


    "Magic caster from the Arcana kingdom if I may correct you. Sigh, under normal circumstances we wouldn¡ät join the likes of you, but the request of facing a necromancer did appeal to us. So be grateful for having us in your presence" The young man said with a hint of arrogance in his voice.


    "Huh!?" Taking a step towards the young man, Sean looked at him extremely pissed at him.


    "What did you just say you pri-"


    As he was about to spill the bins, Isamu quickly covered his mouth before looking at the magic caster.


    "We are grateful for helping us." Isamu said with a friendly tone.


    "Hmpf, lowlives." The young man scoffed and turned to his other magic caster colleges.


    "Hey, Isamu! Are you just going to-"


    "Sean, I know how you feel. But we need those guys if we are going to face another magic caster that we know little about." Isamu whispered to Sean.


    Although he had his own kind of pride in himself and was confident that he could win against those youngsters. He knew how to focus on his priorities.


    Not only was magic caster great at giving the necessary support in time of bench, but their sense of mana was much greater than a warrior as himself.


    If back them the necromancer guided his mana a few meters away from his position, he wouldn¡ät be able to save their priestess.


    Sean together with the other explorerand would have been trapped facing the onught of the undead and a magic caster supporting them from the back.


    Only Sylva would have remained untouched, but he doubted she would survive it either if the necromancer were to raise hisrades and him as undead to chase after her.


    With her limited arrows and stamina, sooner orter she would have died.


    Having someone who is more associated with mana in their group would lessen the chances of such a reality toe if he were to be able to sense the mana in the ground.


    Seeing the interactions between the young man and Isamu, the man with the armor scratches the back of his head.


    "Sorry for that, though they aren¡ät as experienced as the others, they graduated from one of the academies in the arcana kingdom, so they have the skill, is just..."


    "There personality, huh?" Sylva finished the sentences for the man.


    "And a really bad one at that." Sean added from the side.


    "Sean!" Isamu said as he gave him a look, who in response only shook his shoulders.


    "Sigh...I hope you forgive my guys too, Herald. Let¡äs have a nice cooperation with each other."


    Nodding to each other, the armored man, Herald turned around his group.


    "Mhm...I guess we should start going then..." He mutters to himself.


    "Everyone! Pack your stuff together! We march towards the Towe-"


    As Herald with his loud voice was about to finish his sentence, from the other side of the town, 5 beams of blue light shot out of the ground while making thundering sounds echo through the whole pace.


    *TRWIIITCH!!!


    *TRWIIITCH!!!


    *TRWIIITCH!!!


    *TRWIIITCH!!!


    *TRWIIITCH!!!


    Soon the beams of light together with the deafening sound disappeared through the sky.


    It came so suddenly as it had gone away, leaving no traces of the light remaining.


    To some, it would like some divine punishment had gone wrong and came reversed from the ground instead of the heaves.


    But to those who were familiar in the deserts of Azur¡ärah, such a sight wasn¡ät that rare to see.


    "What the hell was that!?" The young magic caster yelled and looked together with the other two dumbfounded towards where the light was.


    But for those who weren¡ät, such a sight was a once of per lifetime event.


    "Look at them going at it again... They sure don¡ät like to give up, huh?" Herald said aimlessly as he stared at the shocked young man.


    "Everyone we set out! That includes you, kids, too!e to your senses already or we are going to leave you behind!"


    Hearing that, the young man turned his head 90 degrees at Herald, with a face simr to one of someone insulting the god of a priest.


    "How can you all stay calm like this!? Didn¡ät you the light! Do you have any idea what that was!? This was-"


    Gulping his own saliva down the throat, the young man pointed his finger in the direction of the lights.


    "Teleportation magic!"


    Seeing the young man making a big deal of it, Herald sighted as he responded with a solemn look.


    "Yeah, we know. They are those guys who arrive around 1 year ago with their leader using that spell to travel through the desert. An annoying bunch to say the less, using such a damn loud spell. And before you get any ideas, don¡ät involve yourself with them." Patting the back of the young man, Herald gave him a bag and headed out with the others out.


    "Now move one! We got their of a necromancer to im!"


    ***


    Few minutes before they head out, in the deserts of Azu¡ärah.


    One of the most developed towns named Hershamal¡ärah was on the far east side of the desert.


    The town was on the tracks of bing a fully developed city.


    More than a hundred people were walking to the streets doing their usual business to bring some bread to the table for either their family or themselves.


    Others in wooden boats caught fish from the sea and brought them to sell them into the bazaar.


    Though the life of the desert was harsh to the point living there was torturing yourself.


    In Hershamal''rah, living there was bearable.


    Thanks to the nearby sea, the surroundings of the town were much cooler than any other ce in the desert.


    Some even though maybe in a few hundred years, the town that is now Hershamal''rah would be a prosperous kingdom no less worry that the two new kingdoms.


    "Haaah~ to believe I would see such a sight in does dreadful deserts." An old man resting outside his shop said while ncing at the people around him.


    It was indeed peaceful.


    "Hey mama, what is this?" A small boy pulled at his mother''s skirt.


    "Hmm? What is it, sweety? What is over there?" The mother of the boy said with a sweet voice as she nced where her kid was pointing at.


    "Huh? Is there a sandstorming?" She muttered confused.


    She and the boy wasn''t the only one who saw this sight.


    "Ah,mon! Did a sandstorm really have to appear today?"


    "Hurry and gather the fish! A sandstorm ising!"


    While everyone else was preparing for the iing sandstorm, the old man sitting outside his shop had his eyes glued at the sandstorm.


    And not long ago, he noticed something.


    "That sandstorm...it looks to being at quite fast."


    He first doubted his eyes, but the longer he stared, the closer the massive sandstorm was closing in.


    And as soon as it got closer, he saw a massive shadow hiding in that sandstorm.


    "I-Impossible!!!" Shooting out from his seat, seemingly forgetting his fragile body, he began shouting like a madman.


    "Everyone! Run! This isn''t a sandstorm! It''s the-"


    Before being able to warn all the others, like a tsunami hitting the town.


    The sandstorm covered the whole town is like an instant with so much sand in the air that one couldn''t see any longer than 1meter in front of him and neither speak without having a mouth full of sand down their throats.


    The people tried fast to move into their house, but before they could, everyone in the town heard a deep pitching voice that brought fear into their hearts.


    "Feast!!!"


    Before the people understand what was going on, the buildings were swept to the side together with the people trying to run away.


    Others died from being dragged high into the air before they were able to be seen again, while others were being cut into pieces by the sand itself that some of hardened in shapes of des.


    "Ahhhhhh!"


    "Help!!!!!!"


    "Dear!"


    The cries of help and pain we''re endless.


    None knew what was happening.


    Except for an old man who wasying in front of the massive shadow responsibly of this.


    At first, he thought it was a dragon.


    But taking a better look at it, the backside of his legs was reced by a huge tail from a leviathan that moved left and right though the buildings.


    Sweeping everything that went his way away.


    Simr to a dragon though, it had his two front legs and a pair ofrge wings.


    The most blizzard the old man was to observe was the head or rather heads.


    In the middle of his body, the being had some slender and tall necks, taking simrity of that of a Hydra.


    But the most terrifying of it all was that the head themselves were messing.


    Instead of them, the two necks had tworge lizard-like hands fused with their neck itself, with the mouth being in the middle of the hands.


    Those hand mouths were gripping the people and directly eating them while still having them in the arm.


    An alchemist who was to witness such a beast would put it in the categorize of chimera going wrong.


    But that couldn''t be further than the truth.


    As he identify was only one.


    "The Devil of Azu''rah" The old man muttered before being trumpeted to death.


    "Feast!!! Not enough! Feast!!! not enough!" The devil two ''heads'' we''re continuously changing, one of each saying the other did ''t.


    While the devil of Azu''rah was blooding the streets with blood and dead bodies.


    A sudden light appeared not far in front of him, pushing away the dust itself.


    With the light fading away, 5 cloaked figures appeared.


    "Enemy! Feast." The devils ''heads'' screamed out of poot rage.


    Without letting it continue, the leader of the cloaked figure raised his staff and prepared his spell.


    The other four of them instead rushed towards the devil at a speed that Danzel could never achieve as of how he was now.


    "Mere food! You will pay!" Raising up into the sky with his massive wings.. the town of Hershamal''rah was no more.

 Chapter 198 - Dungeon Ruins

    Walking through the ursed deserts, a group of 30 people was to be seen on the edge of the ruins of the tower.


    "Finally here!"


    "Hah~and here I was starting regrettinging here."


    "We should even get a beast to carry us! One of those massive lizards would have been enough."


    Many of those people in the group startedining as soon as they stopped to take a breather.


    "Idiot! Do you even got any idea how much it would cost us to borrow one of that beast!? We came here to make a profit. Not open holes in our own pockets." Herald said while punching the guy who suggested the idea of getting a ride.


    "Everyone! We will take a break here before we are going to spoil our winnings!"


    "Huh? Can¡ät we just take a break into those ruins? We could use the buildings to hide from the sun." One suggests.


    "We can¡ät do that." Isamu answered the man''s question before Herald even had the chance to.


    "I ain¡ät sure if you have forgotten, but that ce is filled with monsters of the 3rd-tier. Not only that, with them hiding in the sand. You will be dead before you even realize it." Isamu said before going silent for a moment to continue


    "At least that¡äs how our leader got eaten..."


    "..."


    Sighing internally, he walked beside Herald.


    "So? When do you think that we can go in the tower?" Isamu asked with a look saying that he couldn¡ät wait to go in there and fight.


    Shaking his head, Herald motioned his head towards the group resting.


    "Don¡ät haste, my friend. Although I understand how you feel, those guys have been walking for two whole weeks through the desert. Even though except those arcana guys everyone else is a veteran explorer. The toll in their body had been building up. They need rest." Herald said as he screened Isamu from top to bottom.


    "You need to rest..."


    In reply, Isamu shook his head bitterly.


    "I am still fine. More importantly, is to be on the lookout. Sylva is already looking and I am sure an extra of two eyes wouldn¡ät hurt."


    Seeing him walking away, Herald sighed as he went to take his own break.


    As he too was exhausted


    "Hmm, she should be around here, ah."


    Noticing the beauty with brown hair and a bow on her back. He was about to greet her before he noticed another person beside her.


    "What is he doing here?" With a frown on their face, Isamu walked towards the two.


    "Any movements from the ruins, Sylva?"


    "No, nothing." She responded with a cold tone without even looking at him.


    Which made him a bit upset, but not enough to voice it out.


    Taking his eyes away from the beauty, he started at the guy who was looking up to the sky.


    "What are you doing here?" Isamu asked.


    Without removing his gaze from the sky, the young magic caster pointed his staff towards the tower.


    "Hey, tell me. Can you see that?"


    "Huh? What are you talking about? Do you mean the tower?"


    "Tch, I ain''t talking about the tower! I am talking what is above it!" The young magic caster said annoyed.


    "Ehm...Do you mean the sky?" Isamu said as he scratched his head to make sense of the young man''s question.


    "You blockhead! I am talking about the mana! The mana above the tower!"


    Growing his eye browns, he pushed his face forward.


    Only to see the tower and the sky.


    "Sorry, us warriors aren''t that well versed in seeing mana. We more like utilize it to enchant our battle powers."


    "In other words, you guys are just muscle heads."


    With a vein in his forehead twitching, Isamu asked with a fake smile.


    "If the great magic caster could enlighten me, then I would be most grateful."


    Ignoring the secret sarcasm hidden in Isamus''s word, he started exining.


    "Before that...let me ask you something. Do you have any idea what dungeons are?"


    Tilting his head and stroking his chin, Isamu answered.


    "You are talking about those monster-infested areas where many rare beasts are residing, right? I myself have been in some myself, as they are fairlymon in the desert. Why do you ask?"


    "Is because you don''t seem to know what a dungeon is. What you told me is just the side effects of being in one."


    "Dungeon in every sense is a ce where mana is ''loved'' or where it constantly flows for an indefinite amount of time."


    "Right~ So why are you exin-" Isamu halted mid-sentence as something crossed his mind.


    "Wait, you aren''t telling us that this tower is a dungeon, right?" Sylva asked.


    "No." The young magic caster shook his head.


    "The whole ruins-No, this whole ruined city has essentially be a dungeon."


    "Huh!? Do you mean that this huge city had be a dungeon? I thought dungeon can only be sorge..." Isamu said while looking at the city ruins in disbelief.


    He knew of dungeons that were massive tombs andbyrinths with monsters roaming in there worthy to be feared.


    But a whole city to be a dungeon was to him unheard of.


    "Hey, are you sure that''s the case?" Isamu asked with doubt in his voice.


    Surprisingly, the young magic caster didn''t mind him being doubted and just shook his head in response, which made Isamu and Sylva who were listing from the side confused.


    "I am simply telling you what I learned in my academy. While supporting my eyes with mana, I am capable to see mana somewhat. And what I am currently seeing is simr to that of some dungeons. But also not the same."


    "Alright, you lost me there. Can you exin in easier terms for use none magic caster to understand?"


    "


    Well... Imagine a dungeon being a flow of water going through an endless circle with water being the mana. That''s a dungeon. But in this case, is more like...it''s more like Vortex. Like a hole that was made in a pond. The mana on the surroundings is being guided into a single point and then released." The young magic caster said while lowering his staff to the tower.


    "And the point where the mana is gathered, the hole in the pond is directly above that tower over there..."


    "Mhmm, I see." Isamu nodded his head while trying to hide his confusion.


    "Do you why that''s the case?" Sylvia asked, receiving secretly a dumps up from Isamu.


    "No, that''s the first time that I am seeing such a dungeon. No book in the academy had any records of it." He said while turning his head to them.


    "You guys said that you faced a necromancer, right?"


    "Yes" both replied at the same time.


    "Then...by any case. Did you manage to see his face?"


    "His face?"


    "I...only managed to get a glimpse of him. All I saw was his dark armor while hiding his face with a hood and a helmet."


    Hearing that, the young magic caster went silent.


    "That''s just me specting, but...was that necromancer an undead? A lesser lich?"


    By that, both Sylva and Isamu went quiet.


    "What makes you think that? And a lich from all of that. " Isamu said with a frown.


    "Well, many things. First the environment of the desert himself. I can''t imagine someone surviving in those ruins without any food. Other than that, the road of a necromancer is that of turning into a lesser lich or any other of the types of undead."


    "And don''t confuse a lesser lich with a lich itself. Does two existence are inpletely different levels of power. With thetter being the stronger one of course."


    "I see..."


    With an awkward silence between those three, Isamu scratches the back of his neck.


    "I got to apologize, I have taken you as an arrogant prick, but you are much smarter than I thought..."


    "Hmpf! Compared to you illiterates. I spend years of study the moment I turned it 5 years old!" Pointing aggressively his staff towards the warrior''s head. He said.


    "If that ce really has a lesser lich in it, not only would it be much dangerous for us. But the chance of finding much more value increases. And I tell you now that if there is a magical artifact in there, my group will take it, got it!?" Without waiting for a response, he walked past Sylva and Isamu and went towards the others.


    Shaking his head towards the young man''s character, he turned to look for Sylva, I only to see that she was long going by now.


    Making him sigh bitterly.


    "Sigh...not leaving me a chance, huh?"


    As soon as he said that, Sean who was together with some other Explorers waved at Isamu through the distance.


    "Hey! Isamu! Come over here! I am telling those guys when we to-"


    Seeing that, Isamu could only smile bitterly to himself.


    "I aming!" Telling at the group, he hastens his steps while thinking of what the young magic caster of before said.


    ''A lesser Lich, huh? I got to tell Herald about it.''

 Chapter 199 - Skull Of The Sands

    "Beat your highest alert! The enemy could be hiding under your very feet!" Herald yelled to all other Explorers, while especially looking at those who were taking this lightly.


    Though he knew that those people could handle themselves, Herald somewhat regret bringing those few that walked like they owned the ce.


    "Does who aren¡ät yet aware, the enemy that we could be facing wolves two times your size in every way! Not only that, we would be facing a magic caster using dark arts! The taboo magic that is necromancy!"


    "Once you killed something, make sure to kill it twice before those you slew get up to bite your damnzy a*ses!"


    Those few who heard him and were indeedzing around clenched their weapons harder while looking for any possible danger.


    Sadly though, those few were the minority.


    Most of them just brushed Herald''s words as the usual friendly warning.


    Though most of them were in the near 2nd-tier, with some being 3rd-tierbatants.


    They weren¡ät soldiers.


    Taught advantage tactics how one should maximize thebat potential of a group overall instead of a soldier.


    They instead were Explorers.


    People abandoned homes after hearing tales of great fortune and powerying in the ancient tombs and ruins in this huge desert.


    Most of those people were self-taught with the mindset of everyone is up for himself on ton battlefield.


    Or rather, exactly such people had to have such a mindset to survive being an Explorer.


    The difference between the young and desperate people searching for a quick way to find fortune and glory and those veterans.


    Were umted mistakes that they had.


    Though the many challenges that the desert offered, they survived yet.


    Thus making them gain the title of a veteran.


    Even though their journey they were newbies that we were far more powerful than them, in the end, they survived.


    Because of that, Herald found it very unfortunate for such people to have been blinded by the light called pride.


    It was human nature for being proud of someone for recognizing one''s aplishment.


    Sighing internally, he walked in the front.


    "Let''s go! Our destination is the tower!"


    Packing up their stuff from their break, they all entered the ruins of the city.


    With the priestess and the three magic casters as the core. Herald¡äs group surrounded them while the remaining group of Isamus stayed at the front with Sylva taking the role as their scout.


    Though not a single one of them were trained as a soldier, that didn¡ät mean that they were stupid enough to disrespect the role of their support. Those are the magic casters in the middle.


    Moving in the front, Herald walked beside Isamu who was with Sean.


    "Hey Isamu, what you told me before...are you serious?" Herald whispered to Isamu.


    Turning his head to face Herald, he nodded in confirmation.


    "Yes... though that¡äs the young¡äs magic caster guess. What he made sense..."


    "If the necromancer that we told you about hasn¡ät yet left this ce, then the possibility of him being an undead is quite high."


    Hearing that, Herald cursed under his breath.


    "If that is the case, then it will be much harder than I originally expected. But is still doable. The problem is if there isn¡ät a magic caster at all."


    "What do you mean...?" Isamu said with a frown.


    "Yo, don¡ät stare at me like that. If the magic caster has run away, do you believe that he would leave any loot for any of us? Heh, if it was me, I would take everything that I could before I run away." Herald exined while letting out a dryugh.


    Though it might have sounded like a joke to others, Isamu understood the hidden meaning behind Herald''s words.


    Though his group had their priestess and the revenge of their pastrades in the past. Herald''s sole reason foring here was to get a profit.


    Back a few weeks ago they negotiated that his group will only be the bare minimum profit out of this expedition so that they could cover for their supplies. All other stuff from ancient relics or mass of gold would go to Herald and his group.


    It was such an outrageous deal that the past him would, without doubt, reject it. But Isamu knew better now.


    With their priestess being dead set to go, all she had to do was to leave their already destroyed party and join Herald''s group.


    Though he knew that she wouldn''t do that to join a bunch of randoms, his inner doubt wasn''t.


    Losing her from his party would be a hefty loss for them.


    Caster practicing holy magic was already rare enough in the whole world. And finding one in the desert was all the more so.


    Being able to cast the spell or miracle that they so liked to call [Heal Wounds], was extremely valuable after all.


    So for revenge on his past friend and future, Isamu didn''t mind much of losing potential profit.


    Herald though couldn''t do the same.


    He brought more than 20 people with him, who all expected to get pieces of the awaiting treasure.


    While those two continued talking about what to expect in the tower with Sean joining the conversation from time to time.


    They soon found themselves in front of the enormous Tower.


    "Heh, so that''s the tower. It looked impressive from the distance, but upfront it''s something else..." Isamu muttered to himself.


    "It seems old...what do you two think about this tower?" Sean asked the Priestess and Sylva.


    "I don''t like it here. I feel something strange upon staring at that tower." Priestess said unsure as to why that was the case.


    "It''s...huge," Sylva said the first thing that came up in her mind upon watching the tower.


    "Hehe, which one do you mean? The tower in front of you or the one beside you." Sean said with a grin on his face.


    "Ugh, men." Showing a face of disgust, she move away from the trio and stared hard at the gate of the tower.


    "Alright, everyone! The treasure is just ahead of us! Be it we face a necromancer or monster! They are no match for us! Now let''s march-" before Herald had even the chance to finish his motivation speech, he was shortly interrupted by a cold serious voice.


    "Wait!"


    Turning his head like everyone else, they started at Sylva in confusion.


    Ignoring that she just had ruined the whole mood, she slowly pulled an arrow out of her quiver while raising her bow.


    "It isn¡ät the time to get allpatible while does things are under the sands..." She said as she pulled the string of her bow together with the arrow while aiming up to the air.


    "Huh? What do you mean-"


    Focusing her mana into her arrow, she whispered a cast and then released the string of the bow.


    "Everyone! Prepare for battle!" She yelled as she stared at her arrow.


    The arrow that was slightly glowing in light started showing cracks to be gradually spreading through the arrow.


    Upon everyone''s stare being focused on the arrow, everyone except her group got surprised that the arrow suddenly burst into tiny pieces in the air.


    `[One of Hundred Arrows]¡ä


    The small remaining pieces of the arrow suddenly as gravity had lost its meaning started levitating in the air. The mana that each piece of the broken parts had soon started to grow bigger into a shape of thin spike up to the air.


    The next moment, once the spikes in the air took up a simr form started to fall directly in front of the gate.


    Like a pouring rain hitting the ground, the sand where each spike fell raised the sand while they went much deeper inside the sand.


    When every single one of the spikes fell, they were a moment of silence in front of the tower.


    "Hey, archer. What was that all about-" Before one of the explorers could even continue to question her. Soon the ground started to shake slightly.


    Drawing the next arrow in her bow, Sylva responded. "Don¡ät underestimate your scout''s sense."


    As if mines in the ground simtion had been activated, the sand started to exploded upwards to the air, together with the howls of the unresting undead.


    "Gwaaaagh!"


    "Geeeeawah!"


    "Gwaaasagh!"


    "Gwweaa-!"


    ...


    In a blink of an eye, 20 or undead wolves started to rise from the ground up, showing their terrific skulls full of killing intent to the killing.


    ncing at the living, they wasted no second to release their instinct and to follow their master''s orders.


    Kill those who attacked you!


    "What the- Everyone! Prepare for battle." Herald yelled out loud.


    "Everyone! Those things are of the 2nd-tier! They weaklings!" Isamu added to Harald¡äs yell as he realized how everyone was momentarily shocked to see so many undead pops up from the ground.


    The first undead to fall was pierced through his skull by Sylva who prepared herself beforehand.


    Some who saw that got their confidence back while all others just had to do what they could.


    Luckily for them, warm light farms gentler than the scorching light of the sun appeared behind them.


    "[Holy Light]" The priestess from the back yelled while raising her staff high.


    In front of the light, the undead who were about to crash to everyone else started to halt their steps as intense pain that they shouldn¡ät feel started to appear.


    "Gwaaagh!"


    "Good job, O priestess! Everyone! Kill those bone skulls!"


    Rushing towards the undead, they quickly destroyed them with very much resistance.


    "Haha, that was a piece of cake!"


    "Those things were nothing!"


    "I could fight another 10 of those!"


    Seeing the now terrifying undead now destroyed to the ground, some of those explorers kicked their skulls as they felt embarrassed to fear those weak things.


    "Heh, if those guys were the guards of the so-called necromancer, then this wouldn¡ät even be that hard." One of the explorers said while he went towards the gate of the tower.


    Taking a step inside the tower, simr to before, the sand exploded up high, revealing another bunch of the undead skull wolves.


    Without the man having the chance to run away, 3 of the undead pounced at them and turned him into shreds. Each of that undead takes a part of the man for themselves.


    "There is more! Priestess! Use the light!" Herald yelled as he faced the undead in front of him,


    Compared to before, they now had no light behind their back as they thought there was only 20 undead.


    As for why the wolves came separately, that was behind the order of their liege.


    That it was...


    `-If someone were to enter the tower or try to attack you, kill them¡ä


    As the second wave wasn¡ät attacked.


    The undead responded to the first part of themand.


    ****


    Currently up into the tower


    Danzel who was entirely swinging his sword around halted upon seeing a status window appearing in front of his face.


    [You received 20 000 XP]


    "I see...someone came into the tower.


    Sheathing his sword in his scabbard, he walked outside thest floor.

 Chapter 200 - Necromancers Tower

    "Die already! You monster!" One of the Explorers wielding a sword yelled as he dug his de into the skull of the undead.


    "G-Geaaah~"


    Seeing thest of the undead falling motionlessly to the ground, he showed his sword to his side while falling to his knees to take a breath.


    Such a sight was everywhere to be seen in the tower front gate.


    Together with the corpses of the skull wolves who either had their heads cut off or their skulls ndly destroyedpletely in the ground. There were Explorers who sat tired to the ground to catch their breath while all the others looked vignt at their surroundings.


    So that if they were any more undead to pop up from the ground, they will be ready to react unlike how they were a moment ago.


    Herald who was the same, yelled at one of the Explorers toe to him.


    "What is it, Herald?" The one asked.


    "Tell me... How many of us died?"


    Frowning for a second, the man sighed before taking a good look around him.


    Though doing such a thing was annoying for him, the man was used in such a request.


    "It seems Herald that... 6 of us had died on the undead assault, with some receiving minor injuries. If it wasn''t for the priestess''s light then we would even suffer much more.


    Hearing that, Herald cursed internally.


    "To think that 6 of us would actually die from that mere undead. We even knew that those things will be hiding into the ground and yet we still received casualties."


    Though the 6 casualties were those of the 2nd-tier, it still pissed him off that the so-called veterans of the desert died from a mere undead such as those.


    They foolishly rushed at their target head-on so that they could dig their fangs into their flesh. Not only did they make themselves predictable, but they also let them use their weakness against them, which were the skulls.


    Though the many undead hats they were, a veryrge amount of them had a so-called core that if it wasn''t destroyed, the undead wouldn''t perish. They were some exceptions to that rule, for example being purifying an undead from his dead mana.


    For undead skeletons and zombies, destroying their skulls would do the trick of stopping them from moving.


    But even though all their enemy''s mistakes, they still received casualties.


    Mostly becausepare to humans, does undead skull wolves were just much bigger than them.


    And with a wall of 20 or so undead skull wolves rushing towards you, it was fairly difficult to stop them.


    Without being able to move left and right as there would be more mouths to get a piece of you waiting. The Explorers could only face that undead head-on.


    Most of them managed to overwhelm them with their pure strength simply being higher than the undead.


    But the 6 of them who weren''t getting caught up with the ending in the undead mouths.


    If there really wasn''t the priestess [Holy Light] spell making the undead hesitate to move forward, they would indeed be more casualties.


    "Pathetic" Herald mumbles to himself.


    "Hey! What are you all standing here for! What we fought were just the mere minions of the mastermind! If there is anyone scared to go with us after fighting those weaklings, then go! If you do though don''t expect any treasures of the necromancer''s tower!"


    Looking at each other, the explorers firmed the grip of their weapons.


    "Ha! As if we let you take the treasure for himself, Herald!"


    "Do you believe that we are fools!?"


    "Hahaha! Those who got stomach ache by the appetizer before the dessert then leave! Leave the true man handle this."


    Seeing the mood getting better, Herald nodded in confirmation.


    "And here I thought I was staring at a bunch of little girls! Everyone! By the end of the day, we will call those towers ours!"


    Having finished taking care of the wounded and equipment, they moved forward and went inside the tower.


    But once inside there were surprised to find not a single undead inside and only a weakly lighten room.


    "Hey, bring out the torches!"


    Upon Herald''smand, the ones in the front started igniting their torches.


    "Hmm...this seems like a lobby of some sort." One of the magic casters said while scanning the surroundings.


    "As long as we don¡ät see any undead, we don¡ät care what this room is about. We move towards the next floor."


    After making sure that they truly weren¡ät any undead hiding around or any treasures to find, they moved towards the next floor which without the light that came from the gate became much darker.


    "Hey Sylva, can hear any of the undead?" Sean whispered to the beauty, this time with a serious tone.


    "No, nothing that I catch on..."


    "Priestess, can you give us some light?" Herald asked while staying wary.


    "Mhmm, I can, but I got to remind you that I have a limited amount of mana to offer to the goddess."


    Halting for a second, Herald nodded.


    "Do it."


    Raising her staff, she released the light thatfort the living.


    "[Holy Light]"


    With light illuminating the whole room, the explorers got relieved to see no undead waiting for them in the dark.


    "Huh? This room is...simr." The young magic caster said to himself.


    Catching on that, Isamu asked about it.


    "What do you mean? What¡äs simr?"


    "Well, this room slightly reminded me of our ss back in the academy where they taught us the basics of magic." He said while talking to his fellow magic caster about it.


    Going through the next floor, before the priestess was about to cast [Holy Light] once more, the magic caster stopped her.


    "You already wasted enough of your mana. Let me handle this."


    Raising his staff with a bright red crystal in it, he started casting.


    "O mes, burn-in pierce my enemies in front of me!"


    With mes gathering above his staff and forming a me in a form of ance, he shot it out in front of the group. Although only lighting the room for a split second of where the me spear went, it was just enough for the group to see if they were any enemies or not.


    "Quite the magic you got there, my friend." Herald said, while mentally noting to make connections with this magic caster.


    While the other Explorers moved forward with nothing to worry about as they weren¡ät any enemies on this floor either.


    The two magic caster frowned.


    "Hey, isn¡ät this like the training grounds for the seniors?"


    "This seems like to be the case..."


    "But why would there be a ssroom together with training grounds inside this tower?"


    "I thought it was a magic tower by the first look, but now I getting the feeling that it¡äs more of a...academy?"


    "Huh? What are you talking about? Aren¡ät those massive towers in your kingdom the academy?" Sean asked,


    "Do you really believe that hundreds of students could learn inside a tower?" The young magic caster scoffed at Sean.


    Ignoring him, Sean looked at the other magic caster.


    "Well, when you refer to a magic tower. They are considered the absolute domain of a magic caster. A ce where the owner of the magic tower is at their strongest. But this tower could have been an academy in the past. After all, why would let people in inside your stronghold?"


    "I see. Thanks for the info, Magic guy." Sean said, totally ignoring the other magic caster.


    Making him annoying because of it.


    Going up the next floor and finding a ce where the magic caster was recognized as the alchemist grounds, the group of explorers soon arrived in the closed-up door that looked much stronger than the other one.


    "Hmm, this door seems like it barely survived the test of time, huh? At least it isn¡ät closedpletely." Herald said while pointing to two explorers to his side.


    "Hey you two, go and open that door, it will take too long if we go one by one."


    Grumbling to each other they walked towards the door.


    Pushing the door, the two frowned as the door seemed to be only to go that far in.


    "Is it broken?" The one asked the other.


    "Hmmm... doesn¡ät seem like it. I think something is blocking the door from the other side."


    "Dammit...I should evenin of being chosen."


    With every one of their party staring at them, they felt somewhat pressured to hurry.


    Going through the door, with one of their hands holding the torch. Once the two came to the other side and lighten the area around the other side of the door, they found what was blocking it.


    "Swords? Why are there swords pierced through the door?"


    Though they both were confused about it, they didn¡ät think much of it and went out to reach the swords.


    But before they were able, they heard a growling sounding behind their back.


    "What the-!" Freaking out, they pushed their torches towards the direction of the sound.


    At first, the light of the torch didn¡ät illuminate in what was inside the darkness.


    But not muchter, in where the light was, there was a much bigger w together with two skulls of wolves releasing their killing intent to be seen.


    "Gweaaagh!"


    "Gweagggh!"


    "Shit! This floor has those things too!"


    Turning around to go to the other side, their eyes halted on a massive mouth being opened up above them, with them being in the middle of it.


    "Huh?"


    They were only able to see a glimpse of it.


    An undead skull wolve twice the size of the other undead that they fought. Using his metal-like ws to stay stuck in the wall of the tower directly above the door.


    Maybe they got too used not to see any undead on the past floors or maybe the torch''s light wasn¡ät enough to lighten above their head.


    "Wha-!?"


    "No-!


    Nheless, they could only stare as the massive mouth closed and cut their bodies in half!

 Chapter 201 - Trap

    "No-!"


    Hearing the cries of their fellow explores, everyone got suddenly dense up.


    Before they could question them from the other side of the door, a snapping sound was heard. After the sound, the two explorers had gone silent.


    "Hey! What is going on!?"


    "Is the enemy there!?"


    "Respond!"


    Many cried their question to the duo who went past the door. Since the door opening was only capable to fit one person, they couldn¡ät get a good look at what happend.


    At least everyone except Herald who was in front of the opening couldn¡ät see what happend.


    Herald though saw every single second of them.


    The face of those who he personally sends out to turn that into horror and panic.


    The desperation in their eyes.


    That was thest thing that Herald could see before a huge mouth bites half of their body.


    Even now, he saw how the mouth slowly dragged itself upward with blooding out of the mouth. The blood of those two explorers.


    "You!"


    With his life force rushing in his hand, he dashed towards the door.


    Going through the small gap of the door, he raised his torch into the wall. Making him see the culprit of the one who eats the two explorers.


    An undead skull wolve that was twice as big as the one he fought outside the door with ws seemingly out of metal. Keeping itself up the wall of the tower while staring him those hollow eyes.


    Instead of getting surprised by the undead size, Herald let out his torch fell to the ground while ncing his fist.


    "It was you bastard!"


    With finding nearby wind gathering to his fist by the use of life force. He sends out a punch in the air towards the direction of the undead.


    In the next instance, the wind that was gathering was pushed out like a cannonball with the life force enchanting the wind itself.


    The undead who was raising his body felt a sudden wind pushing his body back. And without even realizing a huge see-through twisted hole was made in the undead chest.


    If the undead hadn¡ät raised his body in the instance where the armorer man came from the door, her now skull would have that huge hole and end up reaping her out of her undead state.


    That wouldn¡ät have been in any way eptable as she still had a mission to follow.


    A hole through their chest big enough to fit a small child was to her of now problem.


    Why?


    Because she was an undead!


    "Gweaaaaagh!"


    Howling towards the living, she raised her w and swung it towards the directions of Herald.


    "Tch, that thing moved." Without showing and spread of panic, he gathered wind through his legs, and once he did, with the support of the wind he epted to the side to avoid the huge metal wing to turn him into pieces.


    *Grrhhhh!


    Carving the ground using her ws, Skull w smashed the ce where Herald was standing not long ago.


    "This thing-Hey! How long are you guys waiting outside already! They are is only one-!" Being interrupted mind sentence by two additional growls not far by him, Herald frowned.


    `Did that Necromancer hide his best undead on this floor? If they are two more of that thing, then it would be troublesome.¡ä


    "Hey! Move you a*ses already! Where are you!?" Herald yelled as he stared at the door.


    But once his eyesnded on the door, he froze like a statue.


    The door that was once slightly opened, was now closed with a slight glow surrounding the door.


    "Hey- It can¡ät be..." As Herald thought of something terrible, Skull w came down from the walls and showed her entire body at Herald while standing beside the now-closed door.


    The wall''s light seemed to show ripples from time to time, but the door itself showed no shaking at all.


    "Grweaaaah~"


    "Grweaaaah~"


    "Grweaaaah~"


    With three growls now echoing in the entire floor, Herald cursed under his breath.


    "To think that this would a trap..." Gathering the wind around him, he knew what to do.


    That was to crush that three undead around him.


    But before he could let another wind attack of his, he noticed how the big one stopped his advantage right in front of the torch that he had dropped.


    Noticing the undead staring at the torch, Herald''s face paled up in an instance. As a huge problem surfaced.


    "Wait! Don¡ät tell me-!"


    Skull w instead of staring at the living had his howl eyes focused on the torch in the ground.


    Raising her leg, the supposedly mindless undead stomped at the torch, thus removing the only light source of the whole floor.


    "Grwe-grew-grew~"


    With augh-like growl, she nced at the living with pure killing intent.


    That re of the undead was thest thing he saw before the whole floor was engulfed in darkness.


    ***


    Going back around the times when Danzel received the XP notification, Danzel who was on thest floor didn¡ät stay waiting for his enemies toe.


    Walking down the stairs, shortly after he received multiple notifications.


    [You received 34 000 XP]


    [You received 35 000 XP]


    [You received 28 000 XP]


    ...


    ncing at them, he made the windows disappear.


    "It seems like they are still fighting the skull wolves outside. It¡äs too bad that I can¡ät spectate their fight..."


    Though he quite liked that he received the XP, as it would save him hours of training. The fact that he received up to 6 notifications was something that made him uneasy.


    He clearly remembered how many people he let getaway when he arrived at those ruins. And the numbers were definitely not 6.


    He would very much like to believe that his undead killed all the intruders that came into the tower. But thinking of the possibility that his undead have been already dealt with and more enemies were ascending the tower. Danzel didn¡ät mind sparing some time of his training for preparing for the possible guest.


    While ignoring the wraiths doing their wraith stuff, which were flying around him and being generally annoying. He went towards the library floor is where he let the Skull w and the two bodyguards skull wolves there.


    Entering the room, he found the two bodyguards wolves just standing there and looking aimlessly at the roof while the Skull w was resting simrly to how he first found her.


    "If those guys guarding the tower have already been subjugated by the enemy, then I can only use those three on this floor." Danzel mumbled to himself as he stared at the three muchrge skull wolves.


    Since he very much doubted that the stairs could support those three or even use theirrge bodies for their advantages, they could only be used on this floor, or rather, there wasn¡ät a point moving them to the lower floors.


    "The question is how I use them to the fullest..." Danzel asked himself.


    With only so many resources there to use, Danzel had to use whatever was there to use.


    "Hmm...maybe the door?" Danzel mumbled as he looked at the door.


    "If I were to block the door with something and let the opening allow only one person to go through, maybe the three of them could finish the enemy one by one..."


    Though it sounded like a good idea, Danzel quickly shook his head.


    Even if the door let one person at a timee in, one second was probably enough to pass through the door. Not only that, with the enemy''s powers being unknown, the speed at where those three killed the enemy was also unknown.


    "Ugh... Ick information."


    Thinking of what to do, there was only the idea of using the door to his advantage.


    "Even though I could kill everyone inside the tower if I were to use `this¡ä spell. That will be myst resort. For now, let¡äs see how things go..."


    Walking towards the door, he inspected the sides in hopes that he could close it somehow.


    But after searching for a while, he was puzzled not to find a lock or anything the like.


    "Hmm, are those things really doors?"


    Confused at the door, he opened their status to see if there were any hints of how to close it.


    And what he read surprised him.


    [Gate of Azu¡ärah Knowledge (Damaged)]: A gate crafted by master craftsmen and enchanters. Putting all their effort to create the gate guarding leading through the library of Azu¡ärah. Though the door had many enchants written in the gate. Because of a certain event, the crystals fueling the enchantments had been damaged. Though the gate has mana to support the enchantments, there is no way to regenerate the mana. Once there is no mana in the gate, both self-locking and protection enchantments will be no more.


    Reading through the description, Danzel couldn¡ät help but stare at the door in surprise.


    "You...aren¡ät you actually amazing?" He praised the door.


    Knowing now that the door will lock by itself if closed and protected at that, many more ideas came into his mind.


    "If my guess is right, the event that the description is talking about has something to do with the carved pictures in the throne."


    Bringing out two swords from his storage ring, he pierced them through the ground to make the door not open more.


    "Well, it isn¡ät like it matter if I know what this event was. The past doesn¡ät matter."


    Staring at the Skull wyingzily around, he specifically gave her amand.


    `Skull w, try and hold yourself up the gate.¡ä


    Standing up, she walked slowly to her master and followed through hismand.


    Because of themand involving his will too, she knew exactly what to do.


    Doing what she was asked, she stared down at him.


    `Alright, wait until someone goes through the door and kills them. After you have done so close that gate below you.¡ä


    `Let¡äs hope that this will achieve something...¡ä Danzel thought as he walked back into thest floor.


    "What matters is the current present."

 Chapter 202 - Herald Vs Undead Skull Wolves

    "Dammit!" Cursing out loud, Herald jumped to the air to create arge distance between the skull wolves'' location.


    `I can¡ät see!¡ä Herald though while trying to see through the darkness, obviously with no sess.


    The only thing he could do was try to predict the skull wolves'' steps and their growls.


    Even if he could vaguely sense danger, that was only for nearby attacks. Although helpful, it wasn¡ät enough for him to counterattack or even defend himself against attacks.


    Worse of all, Herald realized that those undead were capable to see through the dark.


    Meaning that he was blind while his enemies were not.


    "I shouldn¡ät have rushed like an idiot-!" Herald cursed stupidly while raising his life force.


    `I will have to work at what I have! Otherwise, I will die like a dog!¡ä


    Raising his hands, he pped them to each other and created a small fire that appeared through the use of life force.


    Unfortunately, the fire appeared as quickly as it disappeared, making Herald only too briefly see the three terrifying undead rushing to get a bite out of him.


    "Ugh! I should even practice more on my fire technique-!" Herald cursed


    Creating such a small spark of mes at the 3rd-tier was no doubt a bit embarrassing to see. Since he mainly focused on enchanting his body with the earth attribute and using the wind element as his primary attack method. Herald didn¡ät put any type to all the other elements.


    Everything he learned of the fire element was simple so that he could light up a campfire. As he was much better on the other two elements, that¡äs where the path of using life force arts for fire ended.


    Essentially making him have only a brief moment where he could uncover that darkness around him.


    Gathering the wind around him, he send another one of those wind cannons towards the location where he saw one of the undead. Specifically, the one undead who killed the two explorers.


    The target who was Skull w who saw this, moved a bit to the side, making the pressured wind only cut a small chunk of her back.


    Making it that she neither would receive fatal damage nor slow down her rush towards the so hateful living.


    Noticing that there was not any difference in the steps that the undead was making, Herald realized that his attack wasn¡ät fatal.


    "Tch, did I miss!?"


    pping his hands together, another spark of mes appeared that illuminated the surroundings for just an instance.


    "Gweaaagh!


    "Gweaaagh!


    Out of the illuminating darkness, the first thing that Herald managed to see was how two of the undead were just a few meters away from him. With the two having their mouths wide open, it was a picture that made even Herald quite surprised.


    "What the-!" Yelling in surprise with wide-up eyes, Herald used his life force to gather both the earth and wind elements.


    Stomping his foot forward to the ground, the wind that was gathering around him moved forward like a huge wave towards the left undead.


    Though the wind-wave didn¡ät put as much of a punch as the wind cannon of his, it was strong enough to push the much bigger undead skull wolve to the side and make it fall to his steps.


    "One down-!" Herald yelled as he pped his hands to light a spark once again.


    And what appeared through the darkness was a huge mouth who only 2 meters away from biting and shallowing him whole.


    Using his life force, the earth elements run through his hands, turning them slightly pale in the process as the earth element made his two arms more fortified and much stronger.


    Grabbing the jaw of the undead with one hand, Herald raised his other arm above him and caught the mouth that closed down.


    Though most people would be directly shallowed whole by doing that or being crushed and bitten down to death.


    Herald wasn¡ät one of them.


    By holding the jaw of the undead, he stopped it from moving any further.


    And the other hand stopped it from eating him alive by doing that.


    Effectively holding the undead in his ce while it struggled to close his mouth and fulfill their liegesmand.


    "Gweaahhhhh-!"


    While hearing the growls of the huge undead in front of him, Herald flexes both muscles on his legs and arms. The next moment Herald faced the other direction and forcibly dragged the undead he was holding to the side by his shire strength alone.


    "-and that¡äs the second down!" Herald yelled as he threw the undead to the side.


    "Ha~Ha~Ha, dammit, there is still the other left."


    pping his hands together, he once more illuminated the surroundings.


    His eyes darted all over his surroundings, but he got confused as there weren¡ät any signs of the biggest undead in front of him.


    As confusion was about to hit him, he felt a terrible sensation of danger from behind him.


    Turning his head slightly behind, the very moment the fire had gone out.


    He saw the biggest undead raising his metal-like w.


    "Gweaaagh~"


    Reinforcing his body to make with the earth element, he raised up his guard on where the sensation of danger wasing.


    And the moment he raised his guards, he felt the metal-like ws sweeping through the side.


    "This-" Not even able to let out his cursee out,


    He saw send flying by the much bigger w than his.


    Even if he essentially were stronger than her, Skull w was much bigger than him. Making him unable to keep his feet to the ground.


    Flying through the air without being able to stop himself, Herald crashed to the walls of towers.


    *Brgogh!


    Falling to his knees while the sand of the walls came falling to him, Herald groaned.


    "Ugh...to think that such weaklings could do so much to me...this can¡ät go on."


    Standing up from the ground, he rested his back to the falls while gazing towards the endless darkness where his enemies were.


    Hearing the steps of the undead near him, Herald ground his teeth.


    "If it weren¡ät for this darkness I would already grind their bones into dust."


    As he was about to p his hands once more to create some light, Herald came up with another idea.


    "Dammit, to think I would do such a stupid thing!" Herald yelled as he let a burst of life force out of his body.


    Raising his hands, he put his whole concentration into creating mes.


    With mes appearing in his hands, Herald forced himself to keep them up while creating the mes into his hands.


    "Argggh!" Screaming out of pain, he looked at his hands who started to burn his flesh and armor.


    `I just need to fuel the mes myself! Even if the fuel is my own flesh!¡ä


    Having sessfully ignited both his arms in mes, Herald was now able to see the three iing undead rushing towards him.


    "Now I can see you, bastards!" Herald yelled while the nearby wind came around him.


    `Dammit! this feels like hell! But once I got rid of those undead bastards I can ask the priestess to heal those wounds!¡ä


    Having gathered the wind around him, he stepped forward and realized the wind together with the mes of one of his hands.


    "[Wind of Swarm]!"Yelling out loud, the pressured wind flew towards their target.


    But unlike the wind cannon he used, this attack although weaker, the wind itself split into many parts simr to a shotgun rounds.


    Knowing that he just needed to crush their skulls, Herald consider this attack much more suited.


    Skull w who was running between the two bodyguards'' undead skull wolves, instead of leading the charge slowed his charge and let the two undead overtake his spot while he was running behind those two.


    Thus letting the two bodyguard skull wolves receive the whole attack from the wind.


    Each hit of the wind opened a small hole through their decayed flesh, but not big enough to see through. The closer they went the more hits they received.


    And with the wind hitting their skulls atst and destroying thempletely, both the bodyguards fell to the ground without showing a sign of moving.


    The duty that they have been granted in their lives, has been fulfilled.


    Stepping at the now corpses of the bodyguards, Skull w rushed towards her target.


    "To think it would use hisrades as a meat shield!"


    Gathering another bunch of wind from his surroundings using life force, using his remaining burning had, he send out a burst of wind, essential the wind cannon of his.


    Though the mes went away, the moment he has done as such and letting the darkness once more set in this room. Herald who a secondter heard a bone-cracking sound sighted internally in relief.


    "Finally..."


    Supporting his body to the tower walls, the gate that was separating his group with him burst open, with the faint glow havingpletely disappeared.


    "Dammit...right when I dealt with everything theye bursting in." Herald mumbled annoyed at theserades'' timing.


    Coming out of the door, was Sean holding his sword to the side while his shield was in front of him. Beside him was a girl with golden hair while holding a staff with both arms.


    Raising her staff high, a warm light surrounded the whole floor.


    "[Holy Light]!"


    Frowning for the blinding light, Herald froze as he stared in front of him.


    "Huh!?"


    Seeing the biggest undead he heard bone-cracking sound mid-airing in front of him with a destroyed jaw and a big hole through her neck. Herald''s eyes widen up.


    `It isn¡ät dead!?¡ä


    Frecking out, he gathered reinforced his body with the earth element while gathering the wind to finish the leaping undead in front of him.


    `Without a jaw, it will probably sweep these ws once more at me! Once it does I will send another of my wind cannons and then-¡ä While Heralds though were racing to the extreme to respond to this surprise, he soon widened his eyes as he saw Skull w who stepped the ground to jump directly at him!


    "W-Wait! You can¡ät be meaning-!"


    With a terrible thoughting to his mind, Herald tried to jump to the side and dodge but was unfortunately toote.


    Ramming directly Herald, the wall of the tower cracked before itpletely crumbled and created a hole to the outside. But Skull w didn¡ät stop there.


    Instead of stopping there, she continued pushing her body forward and dragged herself free fall together with Herald into the air from the fifth floor.


    "Noooo! What have you done!?"


    Screaming desperately, Herald looked how he was getting further and further from the hole in the tower.


    "I can¡ät die like this!"


    And the next moment he knew, all lights of the world had disappeared with thest sound he heard being a *Ssh.

 Chapter 203 - Those Who Want To Loot

    With the sand blowing through the wind in the ruins.


    Currentlyying in front of the towers was anything but a nice sight to see.


    "How could this be...to think that this bastard Herald would even die like this..." One of the Explorers mumbled to himself as he moved away from the newly made hole of the towers.


    Standing now next to the hole was the priestess kneeling to the ground and taking a praying position, while Isamu and Sean were looking at that ugly sight.


    Although them being so high up made them unable to see the...details.


    The fresh red blood together with the undead much dark blood with both of them having their limbs broken in unnatural ways.


    One could describe such a sight as a cupcake with a strawberry filling that exploded.


    But to Sean and Isamu, Heralds death wasn''t their main concern.


    "So, what will we do now Isamu? Turn back?" Sean asked while he gazed at how the sand was slowly covering Herald''s dead body.


    "No...we can''t back now with how far we even came. The expense would be huge without having a reward topensate us. That, and the pride of others would also make them disagree." Isamu said as he shook his head while having a troubled face.


    Things didn''t look good for them.


    It wasn''t just that one of their strongestbatants had died off.


    But the leading figure of this party died, leaving none other else to lead.


    "Are you really suggesting to continue Isamu? You should know that those guys will start to fight any moment to gain the leadership role." Sean said with concern.


    If they were in their previous group where everyone had created a longsting party, such a thing of who to take the leadership wouldn''t have been a problem.


    But their group wasn''t one as such.


    They were just people but together by the use of either Herald''s favor or promised reward. Worse of all, the 4 of them were in a way outsiders with the others.


    Be it to leave or to stay was unclear.


    And the one who would be the leader will automatically have the most control of where the loot goes.


    Having experienced the greed of humans before, Isamu''s current concern wasn''t the possible Lesser Lich that could be hiding in the tower, but his actual treasure.


    ''If it is something irresistible, then the first ones to die would be us the outsiders.''


    Though the chance of that happening was low, it wasn''t unheard of an Explorer pushing his team to a death trap to get the goodies for himself.


    "I understand your concerns Sean, but we have to continue," Isamu said.


    That''s right, they had to continue.


    Though they were at risk of staying and fighting the necromancer, in the end, there would be a reward.


    Running away with their tails behind though would only bring them losses.


    "We can''t stop here, not when we lost 9 people already..."


    Seeing that Isamu had already decided, Sean could only sigh out loud.


    "Sigh~I guess we have to do it."


    Tapping his sword to his shield, Sean grinned to himself.


    "Who knows, maybe if I get that necromancer''s head, my reputation to the girls will raise."


    Hearing that, the kneeling priestess flinched for a second before standing up and walking towards Sylva, while only giving those two a brief cold re.


    "Anyway, I still find Heralds death strange. I mean, even he fell for the trap, counting the one undead who fell together with him and the two in this floor, they were only enemies of the second tier."


    Walking back to their group, Isamu simply shook his shoulders.


    "It¡äs unfortunate, but even if that undead were essentially weak. Their size makes them already a threat. Considering that Herald was probably fighting in the dark too, I believe it¡äs quite impressive he managed to get all three of that undead, even if he died in the process..." Isamu said.


    "Well, you got a point. Fighting in the dark sounds bad. What I don¡ät understand is why didn¡ät he just bring light in the room?"


    "And how is he supposed to do that? Don¡ät you remember that this guy sucked at using life force to create fire? We evenughed at him not long ago when he tried to light the campfire. He wasn¡ät like our priestess who can blind us at any time."


    "I mean...why didn¡ät he just open a hole through the tower? If he did as such there would be light just like now, right?"


    "..."


    By hearing that, Isamu went silent while he gazed at Sean with a solemn look.


    "Ehm...he probably didn¡ät think of that? He was probably focused on hearing his surroundings to find the enemy''s vague position. At least that¡äs what I would have done. The idea though is indeed quite good..."


    "Right?"


    "..."


    With an awkward silence resurfacing between those two, they stopped talking about Herald.


    "Hey! I am telling you guys that this ce isn¡ät safe anymore! 9 of us died by simply the minions of the one controlling them! Even Herald died for simple 3 of that undead!" One of the Explorers yelled as he pointed at the two bodyguard skull wolves.


    "You bastard! Are you saying that you want Heralds death to be for nothing!?"


    "If we go now, not only will all our reputation be reduced into dust, we will neither receive any spoils of this tower! We need to stay and fight!


    "No! We go to leave! Our lives are much more important than mere coins."


    "You saying that because you got yourself covered in those coins, don¡ät you!"


    Witnessing the arguing around him, Isamu felt speechless of


    `Fighting with themselves in the enemy territory Isamu frowned as he walked towards the duo of explorers who were about to get more personal.


    "You! Are you looking for a fight!?"


    "So what if I am, Huh? If you got the balls the-huh? Why are you look at me like that you little-" Before being able to finish his sentence.


    Isamu gave him a quick punch in his face and making fly backward a few meters.


    The other one who saw this was stunned for a moment.


    Standing tall with his chest pushed forward and his great sword on his shoulder, Isamu inhaled for a moment.


    "You idiots! What the hell are you doing! Don¡ät you guys where you are!?" With his loud voice echoing through the floor, everyone got their attention on him.


    "Did you guys forget where we are!? We are in a dungeon with potentially the master of that undead being directly above our heads! We don¡ät have the privilege to fight among each other!"


    Staring silently at Isamu, they looked at each other with some whispering to each other.


    "Who does he think he is..."


    "ying leader already, what a prick..."


    Hearing their whispers, Isamu walked to the two who said that while raising his fist.


    "Do you think that I want to be a leader of fools who want to run away!?"


    "Huh!?"


    "What did you just say!?


    "You heard me loud enough! We lost 9 peopleing up this high while most of us using most of our resourcesing into this ce! If you want to leave, Leave! But if you forget about getting anything from our spoils!" Isamu said in a confident tone, but to his inside, he was quite anxious.


    If 1 or two left, it wouldn¡ät be a problem.


    But if more than half left, then he would have to go back to his words and abandon fighting the necromancer as it would be too dangerous.


    `Is there anything else that I can tell them to stay?¡ä Isamu tried to think of anything to make them stay but to no sess.


    While the few who wanted to leave were creating groups to leave, the young magic caster who was watching from the said stepped up.


    "To think that there would be idiots who want to leave!" He said in an arrogant tone, making them who want to leave frown.


    "Though you illiterate might not know, we are currently in a dungeon with a necromancer residing in it! Do you know what this means?" The young man said while pointing his staff to one who wanted to leave.


    "What should it mean? It¡äs obvious that a crazy magic caster is there waiting for us!"


    "Tch, tch, idiot. To think I would be breathing the same air as you." The young magic caster shook his head with an expression of self-pity.


    "You-!" As the explorers wanted to curses at him, the young magic caster stomped his staff to the ground.


    "I will tell you that this means you fool! Where a necromancer resides, such do high-quality artifacts reside! And I ain¡ät talking about that garbage that you explorers like to call artifacts. I am talking about the real artifacts!"


    "Be it a grimoire holding the secrets of immortality or high-quality increasing for enchanting, a necromancer base could be considered the treasure of a dragon! Each piece of equipment sells for thousands of gold! Any fool who wants to miss that can walk away. We won¡ät need you anyway. You will making me a favor if you do." The young magic caster said as he turned around at patted Isamu''s shoulder.


    "Now, shall we im our treasure for our own?"


    Speechless for the young magic caster''s interference, he nodded while looking back at the people who wanted to leave.


    "I won¡ät stop you if you want to leave." Turning his back at them, he walked towards the next floor door together with the others who wanted to get a piece of the cake.


    The group who wanted to leave swiftly realized that some of them were changing sides, making only 6 of them look at the backs of the 15 fellows explores walkings as if they already had the treasure in their hands.


    "Dammit..." Biting his lips lightly, the one who was pointed at moved forward while gripping his sword tightly.


    "As if I will let you take all the treasure for yourselves!" Saying that, the other who wanted to leave followed the other group.


    Pushing the door of the next floor.


    They arrived on a floor with stairs all around.

 Chapter 204 - The Towers Master

    Holding their torches up high, the group of Explorers walked inside the next floor.


    Instead of seeing a small path of countless stairs leading to the other floor.


    The stairs this time seemed to be the floor itself.


    There was a small peak of sunlighting from the top with some sand falling down, which made those who unconsciously looked up rub their eyes to remove the sand.


    Unfortunately for them, the lighting from the top was so little that it didn''t brighten the whole stairs.


    The seemingly endless darkness in those stairs although creepy, did highlight the little sunlight from the very top.


    But such sight was quickly brushed off as one of the Explorers stepped forward and moved his torch forward.


    "Hey, I found the beginning of those stairs." He said while turning his head to the others.


    Who in turn moved their heads to the man wielding a great sword and the magic caster.


    But most of them looked towards the great sword wielder for answers.


    Maybe it was because those two were the loudest of them all. Or because they convinced everyone to push forward and challenge the dungeon.


    Putting away their greed and worries, every one of them knew that someone had to take the role to lead. Otherwise, the danger of multiple people calling out orders and confusing everybody would ur.


    Thus, everyone unconsciously thought of the great sword wielder Isamu and the young magic caster as their leaders.


    But since only one leader was able to exist, they decided on Isamu more than the young magic caster.


    Although magic casters were said to hold wisdom and many truths of the world.


    The people here would rather pick Isamu that the arrogant young magic caster who didn''t even consider himself as an Explorer-like them.


    Having realized that, Isamu sighted in relief internally.


    ''Things look good so far.'' Breathing in, he raised his greatsword with one hand and pointed at the beginning of the stairs.


    "Those who use their shield and wear heavy armor will walk in the front of the stairs, with the others follow by behind."


    "I am sure that I don''t need to tell you guys, but our enemy is using traps! So make sure to look at your steps and-"


    Groaning from the side of the group, one of the explorers heard Isamu''s lecture in the basics.


    Turning his head up the stairs to find something interesting to sate his boredom.


    While looking around through the same darkness, his eyes stopped at the very top.


    "Huh?"


    Frowning his eyes, he stared at a small silhouette.


    ''Am I seeing this?''


    Running his eyes and taking a look back, what he saw were some green light nearing him.


    "Hey~" his voice was like that of a whisper.


    But the longer he looked the bigger the two lights wereing their way.


    Realizing what do lights were, his expression turned pale.


    "Hey! Everyone-!" He screamed out loud, his tone turning more desperate.


    "-Enemy attack!"


    Surprised at theirrade''s sudden yell, they looked at him confused as they didn''t process what the man said.


    *Fsheeeeeeen!


    Hearing the wind cutting noise, they raised their heads to see where it wasing from.


    Those who saw therge wind de approaching them now finally understood what the man said.


    ''An Attack''


    But unfortunately, as they draw their weapons to defend themselves, the wind de nearest their ranks was about to make an impact with the unlucky victim.


    Isamu who too was toote to react traced the path of the 2 wind des to see who will be unfortunate to get hit.


    "No-!" Isamu yelled as loud as he could seeing who it was.


    ''They are going for our support!'' He thought with a pale expression.


    More specific in the term support were one of the magic casters who still haven''t even taken notice of the danger.


    And the priestess.


    Being toote to react, he could only watch how the wind de was nearing the shocked priestess.


    Fortunately though, among everyone here.


    One of them was able to react in time.


    *Fsheeeeeeen.


    Just as the wind de was about to kill the priestess. She was pushed by the side by a man with a wield in his hand.


    *Tiiiickshh


    Collidinggng with the shield, the wind de struggled to move.


    Although at first difficult, the longer he held the dark green wind de, the weaker it was getting.


    "Ahh!"


    Pushing his shield forward to the side, the wind de got destroyed, with no traces to be seen.


    "Are you alright?" The man with the shield, Sean, asked qt the priestess who looked at him from the ground.


    Perhaps it was because of the lighting from the top, but to her, he looked like a knight in shining armor.


    "I-I am alright," she said with a small blush.


    Raising from the ground, she suddenly heard the sound of *Booh.


    Looking at where the sound came from, she froze as her eyes turned into horror.


    The magic caster neither had the time to cast any spells nor a knight to protect him from those sharp winds.


    Was now cut in half andying to the ground lifeless.


    "A-Andrew!" The young magic caster called his dead colleague.


    But the magic casterying to the ground, that once few knew, was Andrew.


    "No" as she was to cry out loud, Isamu yelled at her.


    "Priestess! Use your light!"


    Surprised by him, she remember that there was still an enemy.


    "R-Right!"


    Concentrating to herself she swiftly heard another of those wind-cutting noises.


    Making her hands go a little stiff.


    "Don''t worry about it! Start the spell!"


    Swinging his great sword at the next wind de, Isamu managed to destroy it with little effort.


    Trusting in Isamus''s words, she raised her staff high.


    "[Holy Light]!"


    A warm light came from her staff, the staircase floor was soon fully illuminated.


    And as result,undying screams echoed through the floor.


    "Kweeeah!"


    "Kwaaah!"


    "Kwae-!"


    ...


    Revealing from the dark, tens of skeletons with each holding a so familiar weapon in their hand were to see.


    Seeing that Isamu frowned.


    ''Guys...''


    Seeing his oldrades now in this state, Isamu grieved and cursed at the being who did this to them


    ''I will make you pay...''


    Turning his gaze towards the one silhouette at the top, he knew that this was the one who did this to them.


    "The master of the tower..."


    As he waited for more of those wind attacks toe their way, the necromancer which he presume left.


    "Huh? Why is he?"


    Though he didn''t know why the enemy left, he didn''t wait for long before he made his move.


    "Everyone! We will be charging to the top! Be careful at your steps!" Isamu yelled as he was the first to run off.


    "Dammit, wait Isamu!" Sean yelled as he looked at the priestess who ended her spell.


    "Come, you are one of the most important people here." Sean said with a solemn face.


    Though she was happy to bear that, she knew what she had to do now.


    "I known..." She said while gripping her staff tightly.


    Hasting their steps to catch up with Isamu, the other explorers followed behind them, with some overtaking the priestess.


    "There are only some mere skeletons ahead! There is nothing to fear!" One yelled as he obliterated a skeleton with just a swing of his.


    The difference between a 3rd-tier and a 1st-tier skeleton was way off inbat power for the skeletons to even have a chance to fight back.


    Step by strep, they climb the stairs while destroying the few skeletons that were there to supposedly be a challenge to them.


    Being halfway through the stairs, the explorers got their confidence back from the previous fights.


    "Haha, it was the right decision to stay!" He said whileughing after destroying a skeleton.


    As he passed a wall that had a hole to the side.


    His vision changed to that from the stairs and the bottom of the floor that they first came in.


    "Huh!?"


    For a second he couldn''t understand what happend.


    As rxation hit him, he wanted to yell.


    Right as he was about to do so though, he felt terrible paying in his stomach area.


    Looking at his size, he was stunned to see a skull face wearing a robe that was made out of pure sand.


    "What the-!"


    Seeing the sand move, and grin sinister at him, his eyes were wide open.


    The next moment he felt himself falling and the sand figure floating in the air and looking at him with a grin.


    "Ahhhhh!" The explored scream out of horror.


    Fortunately, or rather unfortunately for him, he wasn''t the only one who was falling.


    "Ahhhhhh!


    "Help!!!!!"


    Their screams were desperate.


    But even those screams who were heard by everyone inside the tower came soon to an end with a sound of *ssh.


    One watched stunned by the sudden appearance of those sand figures.


    "Kaaabhhhh!"


    "Kaaaaaagh!"


    "Kaaah!"


    And terrified by their undying howls.


    "What are those!?" Sean screams as he shed off the sand figure, but seemingly with no damage showing.


    And the one who answered his question was none other than the priestess behind him.


    "Wraith''s...."

 Chapter 205 - The Towers Master (2)

    Swinging his sword while mana was channeled in, Sean swiftly cut the wraith of before once more.


    "Kwaah!"


    Having the bottom half of his body cut, the wraith screamed loudly before creating some distance from the human who hurt it.


    Seeing that, Sean was about smirk to himself.


    What stop him though was as he saw the wraith''s body slowly regenerating.


    The sand that was the wraith''s vessel slowly moved back to the half it lost a moment ago. And before long the wraith seemed exactly as it did a moment ago.


    "Hey! You know what does things are don''t you? How do you get rid of them?" Sean asked the priestess while he looked at how the others did.


    ''This isn''t good,the others have simr problems dealing with those things as I have. At this rate, we will be wiped.''


    Gazing at the floating undead, Priestess exined with a frown on her face.


    "They are undead of the second tier known as a wraith. Of the rarer types of undead that Sacred Cross is knowledgeable of, they are evil spirits that use mana to manifest their existence. Anything other than attacks with mana or life force would be useless against them! Magic is more effective against them!"


    Hearing her exnation, Sean''s expression didn''t turn for the better.


    "Use magic! Use magic against them! If you can''t use mana then your life force!" Sean yelled to all the others.


    As the others were lost on what to do, Sean''s voice borough some rity back to their sense.


    But even after using attacks that contained mana or life force, the actual damage was neglectful against those wraiths.


    But even if the wraith''s sand body had been cut or crushed, they started to soon regenerate back to their full form.


    "It isn''t effective enough..." He mumbled while looking at the priestess.


    "You holy magic should be effective against them, right? Or you light?"


    "The Holy light miracle should be, but I only have an offensive miracle, which doesn''t work on flying enemies..."


    "Doesn''t matter, use your light..." Sean said as he fend off a wraith hiring under the stairs.


    Nodding her head, she stopped at the chairs while she began casting.


    Raising her staff high,the warm light filled the floor.


    "[Holy Light]!"


    The next moment when the light hit the wraiths, they screamed undying howls as they put their arms in front of them to fend off the light from hitting their faces.


    "Khaaaaa!"


    "Kheetah!"


    ...


    Watching the wraith''s screaming of pain as if they were burned alive, everyone sighs in relief.


    Unbeknownst to them though, the scourging light that bought them immense pain to that undead. Also reminded them of an event in the past.


    The next second, the sand in their body moved forward and created a shield that protected them from the light.


    The priestess who saw that got surprised.


    After the duration of the [Holy Light] finished, the wraiths were still there.


    And without the light keeping the undead from moving, they soon would go and start their rampage on her group.


    Preparing to cast [Holy Light] once more, she was quickly stopped by Sean.


    "Stop, there is no use. Instead of wasting your mana, save it."


    "But-"


    Catch up with Isamu who now was protecting Sylva and the young magic caster from the nearby wraiths.


    Sean caught hp and helped him fend the undead off.


    "Isamu! We got to do something!" Sean said.


    "I know..." Isamu said with a frown on his face.


    Though he said that, he honestly didn''t know what to do now.


    Only two people out of all there''s could potential fatal wound does undead. Them we''re being the magic casters.


    Worse of all, the wraiths started to act much more clear-headed than the undead was known of. Making it a losing battle for them.


    "How about we kill the necromancer then?"


    Unexpectedly, the one who voices out an idea was the young magic caster.


    Hearing that makes the others nce at him confused before focusing back on the stairs and enemies.


    Noticing the confusion, he borated.


    "Though I ain''t certain. It depends on the magic caster''s ability, but if the summoner dies, so do their summons though."


    "Are you sure about that" Sylva voiced her doubt imminently after.


    In response, the young magic caster shook his head.


    "No, I am not. I have no sort of knowledge such as the school of necromancy. What I am telling you is based on just boo of how to fight the undead."


    Breathing heavily from hisck of stamina, he looked at Sylva.


    "Does it even matter if I am right or wrong?


    Only me and my colleagues have the ability to get rid of the undead in one go,pared to you who need multiple hits! If by killing the master of those things means stopping does things- aghhh- I can''t breath!"


    Shaking her head from the exhausted young magic caster, she looked at Isamu.


    "What do you think Isamu? Should we try what he said?"


    "..."


    There was a moment of silence.


    Isamu took a look at his party and considered if they should do it or not.


    ''5 of us against the necromancer...is it possible?''


    Though it was a decision that was difficult to choose from. He didn''t linger muching to a decision.


    "We will do it. Us 5 will kill that Necromancer."


    It was either staying helping the others fend off against the undead or them killing the brain of that undead, it being what they considered the necromancer.


    Hearing his decision, the group of five-speed ascends to the next floor.


    "Everyone! We will kill the necromancer! Until then keep the undead busy!" Isamu yelled to all the other explorers.


    Some thought that they were being abandoned and used as bait while others tighten their grip on their weapon and epted their reality.


    "You aren''t allowed here!" One of the wraiths yelled as he rushed to kill Isamu.


    Noticing the undead, Isamu prepares his greatsword to fend off the undead.


    But before he could do that, a massive me flew through the air.


    The me directly hit the wraith''s, which resulted in it screaming.


    "Master Azur-!"


    Its screams became once hearable, became just a scream.


    And with the mes dissipating, the wraiths that were hit were nowhere to be seen.


    "Go! While we keep those undead busy, go and finish their boss!" The one magic caster who was responsible for casting the me said.


    Ignoring the fact that all wraiths halted their actions and stare at the spot where the one wraith died, Isamu tossed his head and went with the four others up the stairs to the very top.


    "We got to finish this fast," Sean mentioned while looking at the huge broken-up gate.


    "Yeah...but be careful, we don''t know what that Necromancer had cooked for us..."


    "Mhmm..."


    Nodding their head, the first thing that got their attention except the huge gate was a skeleton who was kneeling to the ground in front of the gate.


    "Priestess, is it an undead?" Sylvia said while aiming her bow at the kneeling skeleton.


    Frowning her eyes for a second, she shook her head.


    "No, it isn''t an undead...yet. If I purify it then-"


    "Don''t bother" Isamu said with a harsh tone.


    Walking forwards, he kicked theying skeleton to the side and looked forwards towards the gate.


    "That can waitter after we finished all undead. For now, save you mana."


    "..."


    As a priestess of the Sacred Cross, such treatment of corpses wasn''t eptable. But thinking of their situation she has to say that Isamu was right.


    "Alright, let''s go in..."


    With Sean and him in front and the other three in the rear, they walked through the broken gate.


    Greeting them was a wave of sunlighting from the top of the roof together with the warmth that it brought.


    The light that fell on this floor highlighted the beautifully carved pictures in the wall where each of them had a connection with each other.


    "Wow..."


    "Beautiful..."


    Sylvia and the young magic caster were in awe of those pictures.


    Sean and Isamu inparison only had a solemn look on their face.


    And the priestess''s focus onlyy in a picture that was messy carved and that had a person kneeling in defeat.


    "Quite the nerve you have appreciating my home." A cold and deep voice called out.


    Surprised by the sudden voice, they all became wary as they looked in the directions of where the voice came from.


    "Ah..." The young magic caster subconsciously let his voice out as he started at the bring who sat on a golden throne.


    "Wee, to my tower..." The cold voice said.


    Hearing that, they all frowned.


    Stepping forward, Isamu raised his greatsword to his shoulders while pointing with the other at the seating armored figure.


    "Are you the Necromance!?"


    "..."


    An awkward silence surfaced through thest floor.


    As they were about to attack the eating figure, the seating figureugh.


    "Hahahahaha~"


    Rising from his throne, the 2-meter tall figure said with a cold tone.


    "Do think that you considered me as a necromancer from just those mere undead."


    Gripping the sword that rested beside the golden throne and sheathing it out.


    The armored figured to let his killing intent flood the whole floor.


    "Foolish...."

 Chapter 206 - Towers Guardians

    While currently Isamu and the others faced an overwhelming killing intent on thest floor.


    The other explorer''s situation went from worse to terrible.


    Upon the one wraiths, death brought forth by ance made out of pure mes. All the other wraiths who were fighting with their hands with sharp fingers flew through the air while gazing at the living with a rage.


    The explorers who finally got a breath from those floating nightmares sighed in relief.


    "Magic caster! Do another one while they are standing still!" One of the explorers yelled.


    "You don¡ät need to tell me that!" He yelled as he gather his mana and slowly turned into mes.


    As everyone was looking at the wraiths anxiously, wondering when they were to strike, something unexpected happend.


    The wraith in the middle among all the others wraiths started talking with a quiet yet echoing voice.


    "To be freed from your eternal duty..."


    "Brings disgraces in the name of Azur¡ärah!"


    And then almost simultaneously, every single of the wraiths pped their hands together.


    Doing that, the sand gathered near their hands, be it from the tower''s walls of their own body.


    "O mes, burn-in pierce my enemies in front of me!"


    R


    Aiming his staff towards the talking wraith, the gathered mes took the shape of ance.


    "[ring Lance]!" Finishing his casting the spell, thence made out of mes travel through the air not any slower than the wind de that killed the colleague of his before.


    ''ring Lance, a spell in close resemnce with the Fireball. Although itcks the destruction power, it''s much faster and thanks to its shape, the mes can pierce one body and inflict internal wounds. The wraith is finished.'' The magic caster thought with a smug smile on his face.


    Watching thence made out of mes reach the wraith, he was right about to start gathering his mana to cast another spell when he watched something absurd happening in front of him.


    The mence that was about to engulf the wraith in mes, had in an instant been cut in half. With the remaining mes going past the wraith''s left and right.


    "What!?"


    Stunned, he watched the wraith who was holding a spear-axe-like weapon that he saw before.


    Soon after, the remaining wraiths started creating a simr weapon as that wraith.


    Pushing their hands from the palms that were before, the sand slowly formed into a long stick, and in the end, a de appeared.


    What amazed the explorers more was that those weird weapons that we''re made with sand, started now bing that of a metal.


    With their weapons now finished, the wraiths grabbed the newly made voulge.


    Pointing the voulge towards the magic caster, the wraith that talked announced now together with all the others wraiths loudly.


    "We are the guardians of Ged''uruk''s tower! The remaining disciplines of the great Azur''rah!"


    Flying with their newly made voulge in hand towards the magic caster, they all said with their voice mixed with killing intent.


    "And all living shall die from stepping inside our''s master sacred ce!"


    "P-Protect the magic caster!"


    "If they get him we are also done!"


    "Dammit! I didn¡ät sign up for this!"


    The explorers cried out loud.


    Some felt desperate and tried to run away, others stayed their ground and decided to fight to the bitter end.


    "No! Don¡ät run! If You run-" Before the magic caster could finish, he saw how the wraith shed the ones that run away in their back. Leaving a massive wound and falling to the ground only to die shortly after.


    "Forget them! Focus on your spell!" The explorer who yelled to protect him said.


    Seeing a wraithing from the side of his eyes, he shed with the undead.


    "Haaah!" Using his life force to reinforce the muscles in his hands, he directly cut the voulge and the wraiths stomach area.


    "How is that!?" The man yelled with a grin on his face.


    But sadly that grin didn¡ätst that long


    "Hehehehe~"


    Simr to before, the body of the wraith regenerates together with the weapon he cut.


    "Hey! That cheati-" Without being able to finish, another wraith came and shed with the man. Counting the now recovered wraith, the man was fighting 2 wraiths that both skillfully wielded the voulge.


    The other explorers who were trying to protect the magic caster were in a simr situation.


    "Tch, O mes! Burn and swing your mes like the immortal phoenix! [me Wave]!"


    Swinging his staff, a wave of four mes flew above the explorers protecting him.


    That made the wraiths who were fighting while floating step to the ground like the explorers. That brief chance of their footing was all that the explorers needed to inflict a finishing blow to the wraiths.


    "Take that!" Swinging his sword, he cut a wraith diagonally from its neck in half.


    And he wasn¡ät the only one who managed to do this.


    Although the mes that came above them felt extremely hot, they all managed to either sh or crash the wraiths in front of them.


    At least that¡äs how it looked for them.


    The sand that was falling down from the destroyed body of the wraiths suddenly halted mid-air and instead of regenerating from the spot flew past the explorers.


    "Huh!?" Of course, the explorers who thought they finished the undead were shocked to see them still able to regenerate.


    But the one man who was first to say to protect the magic caster widen his eyes as he rted where the sand was going.


    "No! Stop!"


    Ignoring what the man said, the wraiths started to rebuild their body while holding their voulge.


    The magic caster who saw more than 8 wraithsing his way from both front and behind him flinched from the fear.


    "Dammit! O mes! Burn and swing you mes like the immo-"


    *Fseeeen


    Right when he was about to finish casting his spell, one of the wraiths raised his hand and threw the voulge like a spear and hitting the magic caster right towards his chest.


    Feeling the impact and arge cut through his chest, the magic caster couldn¡ät help but interrupt his spell.


    "Agghh!" He screamed while holding the freshly made wound with one hand while continuing his spells.


    If it weren¡ät for the fact that a voulge wasn¡ät suited for piercing and throwing like a javelin, he would have died wearing only a robe protecting his body.


    "immortal phoni-"


    Of course, the short time that the wraith managed to buy was enough of the other of his kind to get in their range.


    One of the wraiths swung his voulge to the side of the magic caster''s stomach.


    And without letting the magic caster scream in pain, four other wraiths swung their weapons and cut his body off him.


    "Agh...."


    Feeling his strength leaving his body, he let go of the staff and fell to the ground. Thest thing the magic caster saw was the explorers rushing towards him and dark waters slowly emerging from the surroundings.


    "You bastards!" The explorer of before yelled as he swung his sword at the same wraith he cut before.


    Taking notice of that, the wraith raised his voulge and blocked the sword with its shaft that was made out of metal.


    *Tinkkk!


    Colliding with each other, the explorer was surprised to see that he couldn¡ät cut the wraith''s weapon as he did a moment ago.


    "Huh-Ah~" The man who inspected the wraith''s weapons finally noticed what happend.


    `The metal is much thicker than before!¡ä


    And as soon as he realized that, a wraith that was hiding under the stairs reviewed itself and swung his volume at the mana side.


    "Die." The wraith said as he pushed the man back.


    Without being able to defend himself from the push, he could only watch as the undead swung his volume diagonally just as he had done.


    Falling to the ground as a lifeless corpse, the wraiths moved to their next target.


    The more people fell by the des of that voulge, the quicker the explorers started to die.


    Although they were few who were on the 3rd-tier and were able to heavily wound the wraiths, or rather make them use their mana to regenerate their body. They too were fated to die as the people keeping them from overwhelming them were now dead.


    Not long after, were those who stayed behind or run away.


    Everyone died.


    Some bodies werepletely crashed from falling down the stairs, while others died fighting in the stairs.


    Their difference in how they died didn¡ät much matter to the wraiths who stared below at the corpses.


    What mattered to them was the intruder were finally.


    Or rather, the fact that the living died matters to them.


    Which one of it more important was the wraiths unknown.


    But one thing was certain.


    To them, both of those things were important.


    Going closer to the corpses of the explorers, dead mana came out of their bodies.


    The next second, their sand bodies crumpled to the ground with the dead mana entering the course''s bodies.


    And the next moment, the lifeless corpses started to raise from the ground one by one.


    "We need to uphold our duty..." The possessed corpse said as it grabbed the voulge from the ground (stairs).


    A simr scene was happening all around the corpses.


    Raising from the ground and gripping the voulges from the ground (stairs).


    The wraiths inside the explorer''s bodies started to ascent towards thest floor.


    "The remaining disciplines of the great Azur''rah..." The wraiths muttered in unison.


    "All the living shall die!" They said with a sinister smile on their face.

 Chapter 207 - Necromancer Danzel Vs Explorers

    At the same time where the wraiths summoned their voulges, on the throne floor.


    "Foolish..."


    Danzel said with a cold voice.


    Standing in front of the golden throne while pointing his sword at the group of humans, he released an intense killing intent.


    Taking a step forward, Isamu dashed forward with Sean following behind him.


    "Don¡ät let him cast! Isamu!" Sean yelled,cking any movement techniquespared to Isamu.


    Danzel watching that released his dark green mana around his body.


    His eyes glowing brightly behind his helmet.


    With the floor showing cracks on where he stood, Danzel dashed towards Isamu who was doing the same.


    "Huh?"


    Using only two steps, both him and the necromancer were only 3 meters apart from each other. Which made Isamu confused.


    Seeing a magic caster who went into close range volunteer was a rather weird thing to see.


    But amidst his confusion, he didn¡ät forget what he had to do.


    Raising his greatsword, he swung it down towards the necromancer.


    `Now, show me what you can do with that sword of you.¡ä Isamu though.


    He could already imagine how his enemy will block his greatsword and fall through his knees by the sear weight of the great sword.


    Unexpectedly though, instead of raising the longsword, the necromancer raised his other hand.


    "Hah! A spell?" Isamu said in a mocking tone.


    `To think that so many people died from such a weakling...¡ä Isamu though, already considering his enemy''s death.


    But just before the de was about to cut Danzel in half, a small light appeared in the hand he extent out.


    Not taking a second long, a shield appeared in Danzel''s hand.


    *Tinkkkkkkkk~!


    Using his shield, Danzel instead of fully blocking the attack, lets the great sword slide through his shield, making the great sword instead of going to his body, to go and hit the floor.


    "What!"


    Without letting Isamu rest, Danzel swiftly swung his sword to stab the man''s face and finish him off.


    Using his mana, Isamu forcefully made his body move to the side.


    Taking arge step back, he felt a burning pain in his cheeks.


    Without letting him, Danzel swiftly appeared in front of him with a sword engulfed in dead mana.


    Raising his greatsword, Isamu tried to fend off the attacks, s he quickly noticed that he was getting overwhelmed by the quick session of swings.


    "This guy! He isn¡ät a spell caster!" Isamu yelled.


    Using his mana to enchant his arms, he pushed the longsword of Danzel and raised his greatsword to swing it down.


    "I will crush you!" Isamu yelled.


    Isamu knew that by their exchange, he physically was stronger than his opponent. But that wasn¡ät the same for the two speeds.


    Raising the shield that had mana in a swift movement, the great sword came crashing down.


    *Tuunk!


    *Brgggh!


    With the floor cracking from the impact, Isamu expected his opponent to falter from the impact. Unlike his expectation though, the longsword was swung towards his chest.


    Reacting quickly, he stepped back and saved his dear life from being cut in two. Unfortunately, that wasn¡ät without a price.


    Blood pouring out of arge wound of Isamu¡äs chest, he groaned in pain.


    "What the hell-!"


    Seeing that the wound was turning slowly ck, Isamu freaked out.


    "Weak."


    Stepping forward to finish what he started, he was shortly stopped a few meters away from Isamu by a man with a shield and a sword.


    *Tinnnk!


    "Isamu! Go back! Get yourself treated! I will handle him!" Sean said as their swords collided with each other.


    Nodding his head bitterly, Isamu moved away.


    The priestess standing from the back quickly acted.


    Raising her staff, a golden light befalls Isamus''s location.


    Danzel who briefly nced at the light was surprised to see the wound that he just made to start regenerating. But thanks to his [Cursed de], the regeneration process was much slower and less effective.


    `I need to kill her¡ä Danzel thought.


    Having a magic caster capable of holy magic against him being undead was quite threatening.


    `But first I got to get rid of him.¡ä


    ncing at the one with the shield, he canceled their engagement.


    "You said that you will handle me, huh?" Danzel said with his cold voice.


    "Did I do something wrong?" Sean replied with a grin on his face.


    Pushing his shield forward, he used both [Swift Movements] together with [Shield Charge] to elerate forward.


    Simr to him, Sean raised his shield and the same skill [Shield Charge] towards the Necromancer.


    *Tinkkkk!


    Ramming their shield with each other, both of them put every inch of their strength to push the other.


    "Aghh~!"


    "..."


    Neither of their swords was involved, just their shield and the strength that they possessed. But even after a whole two seconds, they swiftly realized that they both had a simr amount of strength.


    Using the time, Danzel started casting one of his spells at point-nk range.


    "[Curse of Scourge]" Danzel whispers to himself.


    Though a chant wasn¡ät needed for that curse, Danzel still chanted the name of the spell.


    Not a momentter, the dead man in the hand that was holding the shield flew like an explosion at Sean''s face and blocked his vision.


    "What the-!?" Losing his cool for a second, Danzel managed to push Sean back from the short distraction that he created.


    Though the spell [Cursed of Scourge] didn¡ät have any imminent effect of any sort, the visual effect was just enough to catch someone off guard when a dark green mist appears in front of your face and enters your body.


    As the dark green mist could basically enter one''s body from literally anywhere, Sean was surprised to see the mist going in his mouth. Making him believe that the mist was some sort of a dangerous substance.


    But being a veteran explorer famous for being a guardian with excellence reflex, he managed to get himself from being thrown away to the ground from Danzel''s push. Making him only take a single step back.


    Even though his managing to do that was quite impressive, that alone wasn¡ät going to stop the longsword froming for his head.


    Winding his eyes, he watched how slowly the de with dead mana on it was closing its distance from his neck.


    `Is this it?¡ä Sean thought as he tried his best to move the shield of his to block the sword.


    Knowing full well that he wasn¡ät going to make it in time.


    As the longsword was about to take his mortality away, it halted mid-air for an unbeknownst reason.


    `Ah, is this is what they say when you are about to die, your life shes before your eyes?¡ä Sean though.


    "You idiot! Move!" Sylva yelled.


    Hearing Sylva¡äs voice and sensing a simr danger that he felt all so often. Sean¡äs face paled as he jumped back.


    Ignoring Sean getting away, Danzel''s focus was on the arrow that was flying towards his way.


    "Hmm?"


    With his [Greater Sense Danger] activating by this lone arrow, Danzel was quite confused.


    Although the arrow was fast, it wasn¡ät any threat big enough to activate [Greater Sense Danger].


    `Something is wrong with this arrow!¡ä


    Unable to ignore the dangering from the arrow, he turned around and face the arrow.


    The arrow shortly after showed small cracks building thoughtfully around.


    Exploding apart, the pieces of the arrow that contained mana started to berge needles in the air and flew towards Danzel.


    "That was an arrow?" Danzel said stupefied by the sight of 1 arrow bing more than he could count.


    Seeing how the mana needles weren¡ät much faster than how a normal arrow is being released by someone of the 1st-tier, Danzel didn¡ät panic.


    Raising his sword, he directly destroyed the needle using his sword alone.


    Without even using his shield, not a single needle managed to hit his body until now.


    "Using that one arrow that you had used before would even be much better instead of relying on number alone." Danzel said as he gathered his mana to use [Swift Movements].


    Ignoring Sean who was a few meters away from him, Danzel switched targets and dashed towards the archer.


    As she had toe forward from my side to attack me, now she basically was defenseless with neither the warriors blocking his path.


    Unlike before where he couldn¡ät reach their backline, their backline couldn¡ät give their warriors support either from the risk of friendly fire being there.


    "Tch!" biting her tongue from annoyance, she started sprinting back to the backline.


    She expected that her attack would be able to take the dark armored necromancer by surprise and wound him. Thus creating an opportunity for Sean.


    She didn¡ät expect having be chased by someone who was fully capable to win over Isamu and Sean.


    "Isamu should even recover by now... if he and Sean work together with all of us we should be able-" As she turned her head to look at the necromancer, her eyes widen up as how he closed the distance between them in such a short amount of time.


    "Fast..."


    Bing suddenly nervous, Sylva draws her bow, uncertain if she should turn back and shoot him in hopes to gain some time.


    `At this rate, he will catch up!¡ä She thought as she started to feel the pressure.


    Before she was able to decide though, Danzel who was chasing her stopped at jumped back.


    *Shwoooooh!


    With an air-cutting sound, arge spear made out of the light came crashing to the location where Danzel was about to run into.


    "This is..."


    Turning his head slightly, he saw another of those 2 spears made out of lighting his way.


    Reacting quickly, he maneuvered left and right,pletely dodging the spears of light.


    "-Light Magic?" Danzel grumbled under his helm, as he stared at a young magic caster feeling extremely annoyed.


    "First I will get her..." Raising his longsword, his dark green mana engulfs his sword. He prepared to use [Gale Mana de] at the archer.


    "No, you will not!" Yelling out loud, the priestess raised her staff, letting out a warm light from her staff.


    `Get blended by the goddess graceful light!¡ä


    Unbeknownst to her though where she just wanted to blind him for a moment to let Sylva getaway.


    Danzel imminently canceled his skill and raised his shield to block the light froming to his face.


    `First a holy, then light magic?¡ä Danzel thought as he started to regreting to reside in this tower.


    Feeling the slight burn around his body, his body unconsciously let a bit of dead mana leak out of his armor.


    Making the priestess who saw Danzel''s reaction and dead mana frown.


    As a thought crossed her mind, she widen her eyes in shock.


    "We were right! That necromancer is an undead!"

 Chapter 208 - Necromancer Danzel Vs Explorers (2)

    Seeing how the necromancer acted and the immense dead mana around his body, both the priestess and the young magic caster came to the conclusion that the necromancer that they were facing, most probably wasn¡ät one of the living.


    "I knew that something was weird when he didn¡ät even falter by my swing." Isamu said with a frown on his face.


    "What undead is it?" Sean yelled at the two behind him while ring at the necromancer that almost got his head.


    "I don¡ät know." the priestess shook her head and nced at Sean with a worried look.


    "How are you feeling? Did that mist do anything to you?"


    "...It¡äs a curse." Sean said with a bitter tone.


    "Huh!? A curse? Are you alright!?" Isamu said stunned.


    Staring at the necromancer, everyone''s face turned all so much more serious than before.


    "Don¡ät worry, it¡äs nothing serious, at least for now..." Sean said as he moved his gaze towards the young magic caster.


    "Do you have any idea of what undead this guy is?"


    Much to everyone''s disappointment, he too shook his head.


    "Sadly, neither I know what he is. They are many other different 3rd-tier undead out there. But one thing I can be certain of. That thing isn¡ät a lesser lich."


    "We can already see that." Sylva rolled her eyes at him.


    If a lesser lich, a magic caster was so strong physically that was both faster than Isamu and her, then it definitely wasn¡ät a magic caster.


    "Are you people really able to afford and talk while I am in front of you?" The cold voice reminded them back of the threat in front of them.


    "At that thing is also highly intelligent. So usually tactics against undead wouldn¡ät work at him" The young magic caster said in a bitter tone. Knowing full well that an undead holding his thoughts was anything from normal.


    "Hey, Isamu. This time-"


    "I know."


    Walking both forward, Sean and Isamu stood side by side.


    "This time we will face him together."


    Seeing the two mortals walking towards him, Danzel scoffed at them.


    "Foolish."


    As his words are the trigger, both Isamu and Sean run towards the necromancer.


    Of course, the others behind them didn¡ät stand there and do nothing.


    "[Holy Light]!" The priestess said while having her staff raised up.


    The warm light hit the back of both Isamu and Sean.


    The necromancer who was facing those two was thus unable to hide from the light.


    Using the chance created by the light, Sylva quickly draw her bow and injected the arrow with her mana.


    Unlike before though, the mana was much tenser concentrated in the arrowhead and the string of the bow.


    Letting the bowstring, the arrow flew with incredible speed towards the necromancer''s head.


    Unfortunately for her, the necromancer simply took a step to the side and let the arrow pass him.


    Making an air-piercing sound, the arrow found his target in the walls of the tower.


    *Brooogh!


    Staring at the newly made hole that revealed the sandstorm outside the tower from the side of his ethereal glowing eyes, he turned back and dashed towards the two warriors.


    "Such mere light isn¡ät enough to stop me." He said while ignoring the burning feeling.


    "Undead aren¡ät capable to get blinded." The young magic caster said to Sylva.


    Sylva hearing that showed a face of displeasure on her face.


    She drew another arrow and stretcher her bow and was ready to shoot again. But seeing that Isamu and Sean were blocking the way, she decided to lower her bow.


    `If I shot now I might hit either of those two...¡ä


    She wanted to earn a hit on the necromancer while he was blinded by the light.


    Too bad for her, the fact that the undead wasn¡ät able to get blinded wasn¡ät known by many. While the fact that the undead had night vision wasmon knowledge to everyone who fought one before. Them being unable to get blinded was not.


    Reaching a rtively close distance with the necromancer, Isamu using his mana, enchanted his body together with his great sword to be sharper and release a much greater impact.


    "Take that!"


    Swinging his great sword at where the necromancer was, thetter jumped back in the right moment, making the great sword only hit the air before making an impact with the floor.


    *Braaahh!


    Creating a small crater and sending a shock wave to the floor itself. It let a pretty big scar through the floor.


    `Dammit, for just being just bones or rotting flesh, that thing is pretty fast.¡ä Isamu cursed as he saw the necromancer about to jump at him.


    Coming from his side though, Sean came with his shield using mana for the skill [Shield Charge] that the necromancer was all too familiar with.


    *Tuuunk!


    Both shields collided and created a loud sound.


    Unlike before instead of just being a test of strength, Sean quickly removed the sh with their shield and swung instead his sword at the necromancer.


    *Tiiink!


    Of course, the necromancer being Danzel responded with his longsword too.


    Having both simr strengths, their sh seemed evenly matched as both used much more defensive swordsmanship arts with their shield to save them from the enemy''s attack.


    Even though that was the case, it didn¡ät take long to realize who was holding the advantages between those two.


    Both of them swung their des tens of times to each other''s shield and sword. A feat that the 1st-tierbatants couldn¡ät achieve in such a short amount of time.


    The 3rd-tierbatant''s speed leagues beyond the first-tier ones.


    And the current one who was faster among those two was the Necromancer Danzel.


    "Ugh..." Sean groaned as he was starting to feel the pressure.


    "Go back to your grave you filth!" Charging towards Seans and the necromancer''s sword exchange. Isamu came from the side and swung his greatsword from the side.


    "..."


    Danzel who already saw Isamu¡äs advantage had already guided the mana in his body.


    Using [Swift Movements], he took arge step back and barely got out of the great swords way.


    But to his surprise though, three spears made out of light were flying towards his very direction.


    "..." Staring at the light spears, he continued using [Swift Movements] to takerge steps back to avoid the collision with the light spears.


    If his movement skill were one evolution lower and not his [Swift Movements], using the skill multiple times would even be hard. But as [Swift Movements] was suited for being active for more than just an instance, dodging the light spearsing from that far wasn¡ät that difficult for him.


    Catching up to him, Isamu and Sean moved closer to him.


    "You are finished, you filthy undead. Against us five and you, the oue of this battle is clear.


    "..."


    Infusing his mana with his greatsword, Isamu said with a serious face.


    "For those who you all killed and turning them into undead, we will be the ones taking their revenge."


    "Isamu, focus until we smash the skull of his. The longer we take, the more will die against that undead." Sean reminded.


    "I known"


    As the two were about to charge forward, to their surprise, the necromancer lower his longsword.


    "Are you guys really fine being so far away from your backline?" Danzel said with his cold voice showing no hint of worry.


    "Hmm...?" Both Sean and Isamu frowned from hearing that.


    ncing briefly at the three in the back, they saw nothing that could potentially harm them.


    "Just by looking at you two, it¡äs clear that you haven¡ät noticed that you have been following my n all along." Danzel said as he pointed his longsword at them.


    "Leading you two away from the other three was my goal all along."


    "What are you talking about-"


    Before he could finish, Danzel''s dead mana raised up from his body.


    "Be made to serve~"


    With the dead mana flying towards into the pile of sands and ancient bones.


    The sand exploded and from both left and right pile came two undead skull wolves that were newly raised from their death to serve their creator.


    Alongside them, two dark greens hands who have been hiding from the very beginning flew towards the young magic caster with each having a dagger.


    `Kill both magic caster at any cost!¡ä Danzel sends hismand on the undead.


    Who in turn didn¡ät even think twice about obeying their liegesmand.


    Seeing that, every one of Isamu¡äs party got surprised.


    "Isamu..."


    "Go already, I won¡ät die that easily..."


    Nodding his head, Sead turned around and dashed back.


    Though he didn¡ät much worry from the undead that made their appearance, but rather at the two flying dark green hands holding the dagger.


    Although to him they seemed slow, for a magic caster who was their target. They were anything but slow.


    And with the priestess preparing her spell and Sylva being too busy to finish the undead from her side, the young magic caster had either to focus on getting rid of the undead or use a spell to interrupt the flying hands.


    Sean knew that the young man couldn¡ät do both.


    `Hold on, Isamu.¡ä Sean thought as he rushed at the young magic caster''s side.


    ...


    "Not much of a grand n if I have to say so myself. Dealing with those things wouldn¡ät take that long." Isamu said while being warry of the necromancer.


    `All that I have to do is to buy time for Sean toe back. Once he does our victory is as good as sealed.¡ä


    Danzel of course, saw clearly what the man in front of him wanted to do.


    "Fool." Danzel said with his cold voice.


    And the next instant, his very presence was starting to grow.


    Or rather his killing intent.


    "Sigh...Now I can stop holding back."


    As Danzel didn¡ät need to concentrate on keeping the [Hand of Mana Affinity] active, he could finally activate one of his strongest abilities


    [Sin of Wrath]: Activated


    With strength running through his entire body, Danzel with much greater speed dashed straight towards his target.


    While having a sinister grin behind his helmet.

 Chapter 209 - Necromancer Danzel Vs Explorers (3)

    With the ground itself cracking under Danzel''s feet, he dashed towards his target.


    Noticing the necromancer''s sudden change of speed and raise of killing the undead, Isamu widens his eyes in surprise. But that alone wasn¡ät going to stop him from acting.


    "I will crush you!"


    Raising his greatsword, he swung diagonally towards Danzel who was running straight towards the de.


    Although swinging his greatsword from above his head would bring out a much stronger impact, Isamu went for a diagonally sh.


    As he already saw that the necromancer could block his great sword with a shield if you swung like that, he decided to go with a different solution.


    One that would either push the necromancer back or make him unable to attack him after his swing.


    `I won¡ät make the same mistake again!¡ä Isamu thought as he watched how his great sword neared the necromancer.


    But instead of the necromancer already raising his shield to block the swing, he instead runs straight forward towards the edge of the great sword.


    `Huh?¡ä


    Though confused by the necromancer''s reckless action, Isamu saw it as an opportunity.


    "Die!" Isamu screamed while putting every little strength into this one swing.


    As he watched in slow motion how his great sword not even being half a meter away from the necromancer''s body, he noticed a chance that was rapidly taking.


    The dark armor that the necromancer wore glowed with light and that very light started to expand into forming a barrier around his body.


    And like hitting a metal wall, the great sword hit the newly created barrier and bounced back.


    "An enchanted armor?" Isamu said stupefied by his wrong realization.


    As he didn¡ät notice the necromancer gathering his mana or casting any spells together with the armor''s glow, Isamu could only associate that barrier as equipment.


    As for how he was wrong, it was because he thought that this effect came from an enchantment.


    "Dammit-!" with his eyes being locked at the dead mana engulfed de, Isamu was reminded of the pain that he felt a few moments ago.


    `I will die!¡ä He thought as he tried to pull his great sword back to defend himself.


    Unlike his expectation though, the necromancer hadn¡ät such sorts of ns.


    "You willeter." The cold voice said.


    Without being given the chance toprehend the owner of this cold voice.


    The shield that he blocked his greatsword a few moments ago was pushed with incredible speed and power towards Isamu''s chest.


    "Baah!"


    Falling down to his knees from the impact while all air in his lungs left his body, one could say that Isamu felt terrible.


    Even in this condition, he didn¡ät let his grip on the great sword.


    And as he was about to stand up and defend himself from whatever wasing his way, he saw froze on what he saw.


    The necromancer who could use what was once in front of him was now starting to run away.


    Or rather, towards the direction where their priestess was.


    Realizing his intention, cold sweat fell down his back.


    "Shit! Run Priestess!" Isamu yelled in urgency.


    Hearing Isamu¡äs cry, everyone including the priestess herself noticed who the necromancer was aiming for.


    With Sean who fended of the mana arms and the magic caster destroying the two undead of their side and Sylva who was drawing her bow to kill thest undead skull wolve with the help of the [Holy Light] spell.


    The priestess was forced to stop her spell as she now was to herself to deal with the iing necromancer.


    "Oh, Goddess of the endless light-"


    While she was preparing her spell.


    Danzel dashed with a terrifying speed towards the first of his target. The priestess that could use the bane of every undead out there, holy magic.


    Though the instincts of the undead added together with his [Sin of Wraith] and her being use such sort of magic.


    His killing intent became suffocating while his vision turned into a tunnel vision with the pair of ethereal eyes being locked on the mortal in front of her.


    `I will kill you!¡ä


    "I will kill you!"


    His conviction and determination of this single task were unbreakable.


    As he reached not further than 7 meters though, a golden magic circle appeared under his feet.


    "-I beseech you to guide the evil of this pure soul away with you unending light!" The priestess cast her spell.


    As if responding to her voice, the magic circle under Danzel''s feet lighten up with golden light.


    "[Holy Smite]!"


    In the next moment, the magic circle was engulfed with an endless amount of light.


    "KYAAAAAGHHH!!!!"


    Together with the appearance of the light, a howling scream came from the middle of the magic circle.


    And the one who was screaming in pain was none other than Danzel itself who felt as if he was being boiled alive.


    The pain was so intense that he couldn¡ät muster any strength to move out of the light.


    Each passing second his ethereal dark green eyes flickered, looking as if they could disappear any moment.


    The pain was strong that it even cleared his mind from the effect of [Sin of Wrath].


    Having his full rtionality back though, made his experience in the endless light much worse.


    "KYAAAG-Kyah-ghhh!!!"


    Though it was many times more painfully like that, it allowed Danzel to handle that dire situation.


    Wrapping his armor with the mana tings to reduce the pain even so slightly, he started guiding his dead mana around his body to activate a skill he never used before.


    Gritting his teeth from pain, the skill activated.


    `[Coating Miasma]¡ä


    The next moment he activated the skill.


    The dead man in his body red up from his body with his armor leaking some of the dead mana constantly.


    Reducing the damage and the pain from the holy spell, Danzel was finally able to push himself out from the light.


    "Haah~" Getting out of the light, couldn¡ät help but sigh in relief.


    That moment though onlysted for a brief second as his killing intent raised to the extremest without the help of [Sin of Wrath].


    "You!"


    Using [Swift Movements] to appear in front of the priestess, he raised his de up high.


    "DIE!!!" Danzel yelled as he swung the de towards her.


    Hearing the enraged cold voice together with his killing intent, the priestess froze as she stared in front of what to her seemed like a colossus swinging his sword to get her neck.


    "Ah..."


    Without even being able to voice out her thoughts.


    She watched how the de wasing down for her neck.


    But before the de coulde down for her neck, a wind-piercing sound made its presence clear.


    *Fshooooh!


    Taking notice of the sound, Danzel stared at theing arrow with mana flying towards him.


    Recognizing it as the arrow that could destroy the walls from a building, Danzel cursed internally.


    `As if I am going a mere arrow stop me!¡ä


    Without having any choice left, he re-directed his swing towards the arrow itself.


    The arrow soon met with Danzel''s de.


    If it was a normal arrow without any techniques put into practice, Danzel could easily fend it off.


    But without being the case, it wasn¡ät going to be so easy.


    The grip in the handle of his sword shook so slightly as he was trying to brush the arrow away.


    s, he couldn¡ät.


    *Crack.


    With cracks appearing in his sword, the next moment his whole sword cracked and exploded into pieces as the arrow was pushed to the floor on his right.


    "Dammit." Danzel cursed from losing his weapon.


    As taking another weapon from his storage ring and swinging at the priestess would take precious seconds in which Sean who was already on his way would stop him. Danzel guided his mana towards his shield.


    `[Shield Charge]¡ä


    Hitting her with a shield simr to how Danzel did on Isamu, the priestess was sent flying a few meters above the air.


    Compared to the much stronger body and figure that Isamu, the priestess could be considered quite skinny. It was easy for Danzel to send her up into the air.


    Not a secondter he sent her flying, Danzel turned around and blocked the sword from Sean.


    *Tinnk!


    "You!!"


    Ignoring the infuriated man in front of him, Danzel''s eyes were still focused on the priestess.


    Putting his mind to work, he cast [Hand of Mana Affinity] to appear near where the priestess in the air was.


    Gripping her foot, the dark green mana hands dragged her and changed the directions on where she was flying.


    As she stands in the middle of the room where the broken-up gate was, instead of flying in the gates the dark green arms dragged her outside the throne room.


    And when she was about to hit the floor again, the mana arms let off her leg go, essentially throwing towards the beginning of the stairs.


    "Aggh!"


    Hitting her head to the floor, she was unable to stop herself and rolled back the stairs back.


    Rolling the stairs unable to stop herself, once she stopped she felt a huge amount of pain running on her whole body.


    With her head bleeding and covering her eye, she felt as she was beaten up by someone for an hour through the end.


    "I-I need to return...the others need me."


    Struggling to stand up, she searched blindly around her for the staff that was granted to her by the church, symbolizing being a sessful priestess of the Sacred Cross church.


    "Where is-ah!" Eximing in surprise, she saw a pair of feet stopping in front of her.


    Recognizing them to be from humans'' feet, she sighed in relief.


    `It seems that there is still holding on against the wraiths¡ä


    "Excuse me, could you hand me, my staff? It should be around here. My body is too wounded so I need to cast a miracle to heal." The priestess said only the necessary word needed.


    Although she wanted to know the situation down here and see how she could help, healing her body and going back to kill the necromancer was the priority that her party decided.


    After waiting for a few seconds without the person in front of her reying she raised her head.


    "Did you hear me? I need my st-staff?"


    Upon raising her head, she stared confused at the man holding a voulge up high. Looking as he was about to swing it towards her.


    "Huh?"


    Unable to process what was currently happening, a cold voice spoke to her.


    "Death to all the living."


    And with a swift motion, her head went rolling to the ground

 Chapter 210 - Necromancer Danzel Vs Explorers (4)

    Staring at the priestess falling down the stairs, Danzel although he was relieved to no longer have to worry for the holy magic, the fact that he didn¡ät see any notification troubled him a bit.


    "You!"


    `Right, I should finish those first.¡ä Danzel thought as he gazed at the frontman while putting his worries aside.


    Bringing out the bastard''s sword that he had in his storage ring, he pushed the sword off the man and swung at him with his new sword.


    *Tiink!


    "Don¡ät worry, you guys will be next." Danzel said with his cold voice.


    Though Sean was well aware of the storage ring, it was still surprising to see a sword appear out of nowhere.


    Blocking the swing of the necromancer, before having the chance to go in the offense there was another swinging from his side.


    `Dammit,¡ä Sean cursed as it was getting harder to block the swings.


    Danzel who was putting pressure on the man didn¡ät forget to keep a watch on the archer behind him.


    Where he saw her drawing her bow and putting mana in her arrows, he would move behind Sean to make him serve as his cover. Making her unable to shoot at him without risking hitting her ally.


    As for the magic caster, although he paid some attention to him as his attacks were by far the most destructive, it wasn¡ät on the same level as the archer. By a clear look, he recognized that the spell caster was hesitating on casting a single spell.


    Unlike the archer who was like a patient hunter who looked a mistake that she could use. The young man had already considered it as a fact that using any of his spells is impossible in the current situation.


    `Although the fact that I don¡ät know his spell is troubling, it can be dealt withter.¡ä


    Even though he wasn¡ät much used on the bastard''s sword length, the overall shape of a longsword and a bastard''s sword wasn¡ät that different from each other. Making his swordsmanship just a tiny bit worse than him being on his peak.


    s, that small disadvantage didn¡ät matter as Danzel soon realized that the curse ced on the man was now showing its true colors.


    `His movements are getting stiff.¡ä Danzel thought as he sped up his attacks by a bit more.


    "It¡äs about time..." Danzel said solemnly as he saw the man with a great sword running towards him.


    "Sean! I aming!" Isamu yelled as he was running with the great sword on his shoulders.


    Using mana on his legs to force them to move a certain way, Isamu spends up.


    Once he was 2 meters apart from Sean and the necromancer, he raised his greatsword, ready to split the undead hiding under the armor and hood in two.


    But before he could swing his sword down, the necromancer scoffed at him


    "Fool."


    After those words came out of the necromancer''s mouth, it happend.


    Out of nowhere, Isamu felt a heart-piercing pain in slow motions.


    Literally.


    At first, he thought he was imagining it, but after gazing down his chest he froze.


    Feeling the cold edge of iron on the spot where a de was piercing his chest in his heart, for a millisecond everything in this world went nk.


    He couldn¡ät make sense of what was happening.


    "Isam-"


    Turning his head slightly to see where the de wasing, he saw an exact clone of the necromancer holding the sword that was piercing his chest with the only difference being that it didn¡ät wear the helmet.


    <strong>"Guhahaha!"</strong>


    "How?" Before having the chance to understand what was happening, the undead together disappeared as he heard someone calling him.


    "Isamu!!!"


    "Sean-"


    As soon as he regained the rity in his eyes, he remember what he was supposed to do.


    But it was toote.


    As Danzel pushed Sean back with his shield, he turned around in a full circle and cut Isamu''s throat in a swift and clean movement.


    Circling once more, Danzel was standing back to back to Isamu who was starting to bleed heavily."


    "That¡äs one"


    Falling to his knees, Isamu let his greatsword go and clenched his throat in the hope to stop the bleeding.


    "Gaah!"


    s, it was useless.


    "Isamu!"


    Feeling the burning payinging from the dead and together with the massive bleeding that didn¡ät allow him to breathe, he soon fell to the ground.


    Everyone was stunned as to how fast it happend.


    Sean was thinking of what to do next with now Isamu dying to the floor.


    Unfortunately, Danzel wasn¡ät going to leave him time to think.


    Dashing forward, Danzel runs straight towards the archer.


    "What- Sylva!" Realizing his target, Sean''s expression went pale.


    Running after the necromancer, he soon realized that he was much slower than him.


    "Use your magic! Now!" He yelled at the young magic caster, who flinched in response.


    "R-Right." Raising his staff, he started casting.


    Compare to him who wasn¡ät prepared for the sudden change of events, Sylva had already finished preparing.


    Letting the bowstring go, the arrow that was sent flying started to crack and explode.


    The remaining parts soon turned into long needles from mana and continued flying at the iing necromancer.


    Danzel who saw that scoffed internally.


    `Such things aren¡ät going to buy you any time.¡ä


    Raising his shield and activating [Vanguards Defense] he blocked every needle that wasing to him effortlessly.


    "Tch..." Biting her tongue, Sylva started to run to the left with the use of mana. But unlike Isamu¡äs and Danzel''s version of movement skill, her technique was much better suited in the speed quote.


    "As if I am going to let you go..." Danzel said to himself as he spread his mana into his bastard sword.


    Having finished his skill, a dark green wind de flew towards the direction a bit ahead on where the archer was heading, essential cutting her escape.


    Forced to stop her steps, she decides to draw her bow and shoot at the necromancer once more.


    But as soon as she finished drawing her bow and turning around, she saw the necromancer in front of her with a raised-up de.


    "!!!" Taking a step back in a moment of urgency, she was about to let the arrow go, but her bow was unfortunately caughtby the necromancer''s swing.


    *Crack!


    Having her bow destroyed she went to pull a dagger that she had.


    But the necromancer Danzel wasn¡ät going to let her.


    Making his shield disappear, he used now his free hand to grab the archer by the neck tightly.


    "Agggh!"


    Raising to the air, Danzel watched how her face was getting paler by the second.


    "I shall put your annoyance to an end." Danzel said with a sinister tone before his gauntlets that were holding her lighten up in a dark green light.


    "Aghhhhh!" Sylva the archer cried in pain as she felt the pain of having one''s vitality drained up.


    Seeing her suffer, Danzel for a split second had a grin of satisfaction.


    But that quickly disappeared.


    "I shall send you to the other side."


    Throwing her a little up to the air, he mercilessly pierced her heart with the bastard sword.


    "Ahhh~"


    Like a puppet that lost all its strings, she slid down the bastard''s sword and fell unmoving to Danzel''s shoulder.


    "That¡äs two."


    Throwingthe body like a rag to the ground he stared at the light spears that formed above the young magic caster.


    "Hmpf." Scoffing at such a sight. The light spears flew towards him.


    `If it didn¡ät work once or twice, it won¡ät work a third time.


    Although the light spears were fairly fast and destructive, if the caster and the target were so far apart, it wasn¡ät even a threat to Danzel.


    Speeding up towards Sean while moving Zick zack to dodge the destructive spears of light, he arrived in front of Sean and swung his bastard''s sword towards him.


    *Tiink.


    "Y-You bastard!" Sean yelled, hoping that his rage from the death of hisrades would give him some unfound strength.


    s, he found himself struggling to keep the bastard sword in check.


    "Now only you and that boy over there remaining. I wonder how long you willst." Danzel said as brought out his shield and used [Shield Charge] to collide with Sean''s shield. Making to take a step back.


    `Dammit! that bastard is right! If this continues we will be wiped!¡ä Gritting his teeth, Sean yelled at the young magic caster.


    "Hey, you! Use any kind of spell! Don¡ät worry about hitting me! Just do-"


    Without being able to finish, Danzel swung his bastard sword from above, making Sean grit his teeth from the strength that the swing packed. What he didn¡ät realize was that the pain and corrosion that was happening in his body were starting to make him stiffer and bits by bits weaker.


    "Hmm, it would be troublesome if that boy starts acting." Danzel said as he pushed with his shield once more.


    Though it was quite exhausting from having been pushed back, Sean much appreciated the fact that a de wasn¡ät going for his neck.


    But as soon as he saw the necromancer''s ominous mana going through his hand, his expression stiffed.


    "Be made on serve~"


    Shooting the dead mana from his body towards the two corpses of Isamu and Sylva.


    They stand up as newly created undead.


    "H-How dare you! How dare you defile my friend''s bodies even in death!" Sean screamed furiously.


    Danzel of course simply ignored the man''s fury.


    `Go and attack the shield one¡ä Danzelmanded, in which the two undead rushed with killing intent to Sean.


    That very sight was one of the reasons why necromancy was forbidden magic.


    Making you once allies to raise up and to fight for the cause of the one who killed them as an emotionless undead.


    The young magic caster who was looking at that trembled in fear.


    Though Sean told him to shoot, he couldn¡ät possibly do that.


    He knew his spells best so the chance of hitting Sean was extremely high.


    And having watched how the undead was moving, he was sure that it would certainly dodge his attack.


    Worse of all, all his spells were offensive except one that was able to create a barrier around himself and not the others.


    "W-What should I do..." He said with a shaken voice.


    Unlike before where he could crash multiple undead skull wolves with his magic as of howrge they were and their movement patterns being almost mindless.


    The undead in front of him was a bit taller than Sean and highly intelligent, knowing full well what was going around him.


    If there were another magic caster there, they might have thought of a solution for the current situation, but for the young magic caster who just graduated from the academy together with a big ambition of learning the secrets from the world.


    He was far too inexperienced.


    Making him brainstorm for any ideas to witness how Sean got jumped by the two undead.


    Though he just brushed them off as they were nothing, the master of the undead used the opportunity to swing his bastard sword at Sean''s head.


    *Touch.


    With the head rolling to the ground, Danzel ignored the man''s body and slowly walked towards the magic caster.


    "You are the only one left." He said with a cold voice.


    Seeing him getting closer, the young man raised his staff and started casting.


    But before he could do that, two dargs green hands appeared and stole the staff from his hand.


    "N-NO!"


    Reaching to take the staff back, the necromancer arrived in front of him and pushed him to the floor with his shield.


    "Ah~"


    Without being able to voice out his thoughts, he watched how the undead necromancer was staring down on him.


    While his mind was trying to think of what to do, he heard the sound of some stepsing from the gate.


    Turning his head, his terrified expression turned to one that hope.


    "G-Guys! Help me out!" He cried out for help on the explorers who came walking inside the throne room with a voulge in their hand.


    While their eyes were glowing in a golden ominous light.


    "Hmm, it seems that the wraith¡äs finished before me," Danzel said as he saw that the people who came were no more one of the living.


    "Huh? Wraith¡äs?" The young magic caster voiced his confusion.


    Raising his bastard sword up high, Danzel solemnly said to the magic caster.


    "Don¡ät worry, you soon will be one of us."


    Saying that Danzel was about to swing his bastard sword down.


    But before he could, the whole tower itself started to shake, making his swing miss right beside the boy''s head.


    "What happend..." Confused at what just happend, a huge shadow fell upon the whole floor.


    Raising his head, Danzel was stunned

 Chapter 211 - The Devils Tower

    The once benevolent city of Ged¡äuruk, which now has fallen to ruin and became the dungeon that it is today from an event of the past.


    A sand storm covering miles through the end was ravaging the outside.


    If one were to look at what was in front of him, they would write the sandstorm as a natural disaster that just happend to take ce at a time and space.


    One of the many unfortunate events that life woulde to experience in the deserts of Azu¡ärah.


    But if one were capable to sense nearby active mana or see the outside of the sand storm from far and high away, they would immensely recognize that this sand storm was in no way natural.


    Like a sphere that turned in circles and covered most if not all sight together with other magical senses.


    A barrier.


    And the one currently responsible for it was a monstrosity that came back to its birthce.


    The tower of Ged¡äuruk was once ruled by the great Azu¡ärah.


    ****


    Currently on thest floor...


    As Danzel was about to swing his bastard sword at the young magic caster in the ground, a sudden shake as if an earthquake was taking ce happend through the whole tower, making him barely miss the young man.


    Seeing a massive shadow being cast on the floor, Danzel froze like a statue as he raised his head to see where the shadow wasing from.


    Hanging into the top of the roof with its massive dragon-like leg and two massive wings covering the sunlight from falling down the floor. A massive being covered with freshly made wounds that made the blooding out from them fall down the floor which Danzel was.


    The most eye-catching thing of it though was the two massive necks that instead of a head there, two hands that looked as if they were molted down and fused with the neck itself in which in there middle of their palm hand a lipless mouth, showing to everyone the sharp teeth that it had.


    Though Danzel and the others couldn¡ät see the other half of its body, if they could they would be able to see the massive blood that wasing from the ce where its legs were supposed to be.


    It would have looked as if it was cut in half.


    "What the hell is that..." Danzel whispered to himself as he suddenly heard a metal sound falling to the ground.


    Turning his head, he saw how the wraith¡äs possessed bodies had fallen to their knees andid the voulges to the ground.


    `Why did those guys fall to the ground?¡ä Danzel thought to himself puzzled.


    Noticing the necromancer¡äs confusion, the young magic caster saw its opportunity.


    Raising his palm, his mana came outside and turned into mes.


    "[Firebolt]!" The young magic caster cast, letting a small ball of me fly towards the necromancer while he moved a few meters back.


    Noticing the sudden chanceing from behind him, Danzel turned around a bit toote to either dodge or block the small of mes.


    *Brough!


    Receiving the impact, Danzel took a step back as some mes remained in his armor.


    "..."


    Watching the boy running towards the gate, Danzel paid him no mind.


    Although he was annoyed by the spell that he cast on him, Danzel''s current concern was of no way that magic caster.


    His focusy towards the huge abomination that was on the roof.


    Noticing that the two neck-arms with mouths were pointing their direction down to where they were, Danzel cursed internally.


    `That thing heard that!¡ä


    A secondter, he noticed a sudden change happening in that abomination''s body.


    Between the two neck-arms that it had, its muscles started to vibrate and move weirdly, with them not long after starting to grow.


    "Wait, they aren¡ät growing but..."


    Observing how the muscles started to get a top of each other and fuse together, Danzel recognize what the mass of muscles started to form was the top part of a man.


    At first, the torso grew followed by two overly long hands thatpared to the torso was skinless.


    "It¡äs building...a person?" Danzel questioned himself as he stared at how a human head started to form from the mass of muscles.


    s, when he expected to see a normal head, what came out was the head of a man who had its eyelids melted with its flesh, essentially making the figure blind.


    Or so would had been the case if there wasn¡ät a vertical bloodshot eye in its forehead.


    The most disturbing fact of this figure was in Danzel''s opinion how the man cried tears of blood out its already closed eyes that had melted with his face.


    As soon as the creation of this half-human body was created, it turned its head down the floor and used its vertical bloodshot eye to dart left and right to see what was below him.


    It firstid its eye towards the kneeling corpses that it recognize as the wraiths that took residents in its territory.


    Switching its gaze towards the small human running away, a creepy smile started to form as its hunger started to awaken.


    Turning its gaze towards thest person present under him, its previous smile vanished.


    Staring down at the ck armored figure with a hood, the focus on its vertical eyey towards the right hand that was holding the bastard sword.


    Specifically towards the ck armored figure fingers.


    The longer it stare down at that location the more furry was building up, which at one point turned into pure killing intent.


    Danzel who was recognized how the eye stared at him with rage and sensing the killing intent.


    He knew he was in huge trouble.


    `Dammit! That thing wille for my head!¡ä Danzel thought as he was about to turn around and run.


    But before he could, that abomination let a loud cry out of both its neck-arms and the crying man¡äs mouth. It was so loud that it generated a shock wave going through all the tower.


    "KYAAAAAAAAAGH!!!"


    "KYAAAAAAAAAGH!!!"


    "KYAAAAAAAAAGH!!!"


    The shock was so strong that it traveled through the first floor and the ground itself outside the tower, raising simultaneously the sand of ruined city.


    The sand that was raised though didn¡ät fall back to the ground though.


    Instead, it started to gather like a reversed vortex in the air above the abomination, resulting in at the same time revealing many more buildings that were before covered in sands.


    Luckily for Danzel and the wraiths, they were unaffected by the deafening roar of the abomination.


    s, the same couldn¡ät be said for the young magic caster.


    "Aghh~"


    Falling to the ground with both his ears and eyes bleeding, the young magic caster fell to the ground like a puppet that had its strings cut off.


    The abomination soon gripped the walls of the tower with its neck-hand and dragged itself down the floor itself.


    "GIVE IT BACK!!!" The crying man roared with an ovepping voice of a different being.


    "Dammit! Here is the home of this damned thing!" Danzel cursed out loud as he dashed towards the gate at full speed.


    The moment the abomination started to drag itself into the walls and carve huge scars simr to the ones he saw in the pictures. He recognize that they were the same.


    Ignoring the wraiths who were still kneeling to the ground, Danzel imminently made his escape from the falling down monstrosity and the wave of sand that was following behind it.


    Once he reached the outside of the gate, the ground shook greatly.


    Turning his head slightly, he saw how the monster reached the ground already and sent one of its neck-hands towards his direction.


    "GIVE IT BACK!!!"


    Ignoring the crying¡äs man words, Danzel cursed internally as he guided his mana into the bastard sword.


    `Dammit!¡ä


    Swinging his bastard''s sword to the air, a dark green wind de flew towards the neck-hand.


    *Fsheeeeeen!


    Slicing bits of flesh from the hand, it only halted for no longer than a second before it continued its way towards Danzel.


    `It will catch me!¡ä


    Seeing that attacking this beast was useless and it was about to catch up to him in just a few seconds. Danzel gazed to the ground as an idea crossed his mind.


    "Do I seriously have to do this!" Heined out loud as he guided his mana into the bastard''s sword.


    Knowing that there is no other way, he gritted his teeth while swinging the de to the ground.


    *Tiiink!


    Ignoring the fact that his bastard''s sword broke apart from using all his strength to sh the floor, he achieved what he wanted to do.


    Showing cracks at first, the floor underneath Danzel grumbled.


    Making Danzel free fall to the staircase floor just about when the neck-hands were about to grab him.


    "Status!" Yelling out loud, a status window appeared in front of him.


    [Status]


    Name: Kenuza¡ärah / Vhig¡änorrus¡äengoruz


    Level: ??


    Race: Devil


    ss: [Ancient Evil Lv. 4]


    Sub-ss: [Grandswordman Lv. 53]


    Health: 20 764/??????


    Mana: 5058/?????


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: ??? Agility: ??? Intelligence: ??? Endurance: ???


    Talents: [Other Dimensional Being] [Devil] [Dragon] [Hydra] [Human] [Leviathan] [Corrupted Mind] [Talented One] [Way of the Sword] [Magic of the Sand] [...] [...] [...]...


    Skills: [Hyper Regeneration Lv.1] [Dragon Breath Lv. 5] [Greater Sand Control Lv. 9] [Master Water Movement Lv. 1] [Corruption of Mind Lv. 9] [...] [...] [...] ...


    [Remark: A being from another dimension merged with other powerful beings. Because of a certain event of the past, it managed to reach this dimension. It shouldn¡ät be existing.


    Ignoring the hundreds of different skills and talents that this thing had Danzel finally got a grasp of what this monster was.


    A devil.


    "Dammit! From what kind of hole did that thing manage toe from!?" Danzel screamed in disbelieve as he watched the Devil breaking the floor and chasing after him.


    Looking at the ground he was falling to, he braced himself for the impact as he decided to go for the n that he made in case things don¡ät go that well.


    *Boough!


    *Crack.


    With his legs cracking, but not breaking apart thanks to the runes that lessen the fall of such height.


    Danzel channeled his mana into the walls of the tower.


    "To think that I will be forced to do this!" Danzel cursed out loud as the tower walls started extending to block the Devil, which thetter broke with no effort.


    "GIVE IT BACK!!!"


    But as a result of Danzel''s action, the material that created the wall came from the tower itself.


    And by taking the remaining stone that was supporting the tower from the top...


    The tower started to grumble.


    "Fall!" Danzel yelled as the tower started to grumble from the top all way through the bottom and burying the wraiths together with him and the Devil with the whole damn tower itself

 Chapter 212 - The Realm Of The Dead

    Currently in an unknown ce at an unknown time.


    Where endless darkness was the only thing to see.


    There was only one single light source of a dark green skeleton standing there lost in his thoughts.


    Staring at his hand, the skeleton who was Danzel would even have smiled bitterly if he had any skin.


    "I am back into this ce, huh?" Danzel muttered to himself as he looked around him, only to see nothing but pure darkness.


    "To the realm of the dead..."


    At least that¡äs what Danzel called the ce that he was currently at.


    With the only way to enter this ce being through his actual death, he found the name quite fitting.


    "I wonder what face those fanatics will make after learning that after death, the only ce that awaits them isn¡ät beside that goddess that they believe but a void of endless darkness," Danzel said to himself, still remembering the burning feeling of that priestess.


    He wasn¡ät very interested in that religion that those guys were following, but rather at the holy magic that those what he considered fanatics could unleash.


    That is the bane of all undead, holy magic which he experienced firsthand how effective it is against the undead.


    `At least everyone from the tower should end up here...¡ä Danzel thought as he tried to remember what happend.


    "Mhm...was I eaten by that devil or buried alive by the copsing tower? I can¡ät remember..."


    Hisst memories were of how he copsed the tower''sst two floors using [Stone Wall] in the walls of the tower itself. He remembered how the copsing stones grumbled the ground that he was standing at and the devil that was falling together with him.


    "Let¡äs hope it¡äs thetter..." Danzel thought as just the imagination of being inside the devil''s stomach made his mood much worse than it was already.


    "Well, no point thinking about it. As soon as I can go out of the realm of the dead I will find out." Just as he finished saying that, by the corner of his eye he saw a figure covered in ck waters slowly revealing itself.


    "Ah, that¡äs right." Moving his hand swiftly and gripping the figures to what he considered the head, Danzel said.


    "You guys appear wherever I stay here too long..."


    Since the figure struggle to get itself free from Danzel''s grip, Danzel started to raise his dead mana,


    "Since time works here differently, I can¡ät tell when you guys appear."


    Without hesitating, Danzel released his dead mana into the figure covered in ck waters.


    "[Curse of Scourge]" Danzel mumbled as the darg green mist went inside the figure he was holding.


    "!!!"


    As soon as the mist went inside, Danzel could only see how the figure opened his mouth as if it was screaming. Since the figure wasn¡ät making any audible sound, Danzel considered it that it was screaming as he considered the effect of the curse.


    Throwing the now cursed figure away, it disappeared as if it merged with the endless darkness.


    "I see..."


    Danzel was in no way a sadist being doing that, at least he didn¡ät consider himself as one.


    Cursing the figure which could potentially be a soul of all he knew sounded terrible considering what type of curse it was.


    The reason why he did that is for the sake of finding answers.


    "I can sense the figure being not much further away for me but not see it, huh?" Danzel said in understanding.


    It was as if he cast a curse at someone invisible and standing in front of him.


    He could sense him, but not see him.


    Being in his own thoughts, more of those figures covered in dark waters started appearing and trying to reach out to him.


    "Here theye..." Danzel said solemnly.


    His gaze though wasn¡ät focused on them, but on another one that he recognized immediately.


    "Is this the third time that it shows up¡äs?" Danzel questioned as he gazed at another silhouette covered in ck waters.


    Although the ck waters made every one of them look practically the same. In every each of them there was a small difference to be found.


    Be it how tall they were or their body structure, there were small changes to be found.


    When he died for the second time by the hands of Hanson, among the ck water-covered silhouettes, he could only recognize the one much stronger one that grabbed his jaw from the first time he came into his ce.


    Ever since then he always appeared when he came to the realm of the dead.


    "Here I thought the second time you appeared was a fluke, but seeing you for the third time..."


    Watching how that silhouette was reaching out to grab him, Danzel could only sigh internally.


    `It isn¡ät pleasant.¡ä


    Since by now he learned how to return to his physical body, he didn¡ät worry much about does ck watered silhouettes. As long he could sense the connection with his body he could escape the realm of the dead.


    "Since the connection is still strong...putting a fight wouldn¡ät hurt, right?" Danzel mumbled as he started casting a curse towards the being in front of him.


    But before he could do that, he felt a simr strong grippared to the silhouette that was following him on his shoulder.


    `Another strong one appeared?¡ä


    Turning his head slightly, Danzel froze as he stared at the one holding him.


    "What the-"


    The silhouette holding him was in no other way differentpared to the other silhouettes trying to grab into him.


    But that silhouette in question had something that all other ones hadn¡ät.


    That was one ethereal golden light simr to his who was glowing dark green in his eyes sockets.


    And it was staring directly into his eyes.


    `This thing! It¡äs time to leave!¡ä


    Not knowing how dangerous the golden eye silhouette was, Danzel imminently forgot about him experimenting on the realm of the dead.


    In the next moment, following the connection where his physical body was, he disappeared from the realm of the dead.


    The weaker ck water-covered silhouettes having lost track of Danzel merged back into the darkness.


    Only the golden-eyed stared together with the other stronger silhouette to where Danzel once was. With thetter merging into the darkness too after some while.


    But the golden-eyed silhouetted remained there staring.


    And before long in this realm where time flowed differently, the golden-eyed disappeared simr as to how Danzel did.


    ****


    In the middle of the tower of the ruined city, where now only masses of blood and the remains of the towery.


    In those very grumbled stones came an immense wave of dead mana under the rumbles. The dead mana continued to flow for some sort of time before it dissipatedpletely.


    But once it did, the remains of the tower started to shake.


    Pushing some stones to the side, a skeleton arm appeared dragging itself out of the stones.


    Once the remains of the tower were pushed back, a figure with destroyed ck armor came out and looked to his surroundings confused.


    "So I wasn¡ät eaten." Danzel said in relief.


    Looking at his armor though, he cursed to himself.


    "Sigh, and here I was getting quite used on that piece of armor. At least itsted me quite a while."


    Observing his surroundings, his gaze soon meet arge spot that was covered in stones together with a river of the blood being in the ground.


    "That should be the Devil..." Danzel said as he equipped another sword from his storage ring.


    `Thankfully the ring wasn¡ät destroyed.¡ä He thought in relief.


    If it was indeed destroyed by something he cause, that would have been bad.


    Though Danzel instead of going to check if it was dead or not, the first thing he did was to open up his status screen.


    And what he saw made him relieved in many ways.


    "I am so d!" Danzel yelled out loud.


    Looking at his XP Storage having increased by a whopping amount of 2 000 000 XP, he saw sure that it came from the Devil.


    `There shouldn¡ät be anything else capable of giving me such a big amount of XP in that tower, nothing except the Devil!¡ä


    Though their meeting was short, Danzel was relieved that their meeting was as short as their farewell.


    "Compared to what else I met, this by far reaches the top of the list that I don¡ät ever want to meet again."


    Standing up from where he was seating, he moved down the remains of the towers. And once he did he saw many of the wraith¡äs sand bodies floating and aimlessly staring down the ground.


    "So those guys survived, huh? That¡äs undead for you." Danzel mumbled to himself as he went closer to the ce where the devil''s corpse was.


    `If I remember right, that thing was pretty injured when I saw its status window. Otherwise, I would even doubt that it actually died...¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    He doubted that a being that he wasn¡ät able to see the attributes of and its size could have lower max HP than himself.


    "Haha...I guess I have to thank the one who injured you." Danzel said as he imagined the future of this being actually surviving the fall of the tower.


    "Hmm... now that I think about it, didn¡ät that thing say something to give it back? What did this thing mean by that?"


    Remembering the way the devil looked at him and yelled at him in furry, Danzel found it pretty bizarre.


    "I don¡ät remember taking something from him though...maybe it¡äs because I took residents in the tower? Or was it just screaming at- wait, there is something!"


    Remembering how he actually took something from the tower and had it in his storage ring, Danzel brought it out to his hand.


    "Did it want this [Mana Essence Crystal]? It¡äs the only thing that I can think about..." Danzel mumbled as he stared at the crystal confused.


    While he was thinking of another item that the Devil could possibly want from him, he sensed a strong surge of dead manaing out of the remains of the tower.


    `Dead Mana?¡ä


    Jumping the remains with a certain distance on where the dead man wasing out from, Danzel stared cautiously in that direction.


    Soon after, a smoke made out of dead mana was being leaked from the rumbles.


    And the smoke soon moved together to start forming a body of dead mana.


    "A wraith?" Danzel said as he stared at the newly made being made out of dead mana that looked simr to a wraith but also different.


    The wraith looked as it was wearing some kind of armor mixed with a robe together with a scarf to his face made out of dead mana simr to his whole body and armor.


    Turning his head towards Danzel.


    Danzel ethereal dark green eyes meet with the other''s undead ethereal golden eyes.

 Chapter 213 - Death Spirit

    Staring at the golden eyes of the floating undead in front of him, Danzel couldn¡ät help but remember the eyes that were in the death realm.


    `Did it follow me back to the physical world?¡ä Danzel thought as he was holding his sword in front of him.


    The silence between those two didn¡ät long as the golden-eyed undead opened his jaw.


    "What is an undead doing here?" the golden-eyed undead said with a hint of confusion as he stared at Danzel.


    `Huh? What is he talking about?¡ä Danzel got confused by the undead¡äs question. But after thinking a bit Danzel had a weird suspicion of the undead in front of him.


    "Don¡ät you find that question as a fellow undead a bit weird?"


    Hearing Danzel''s words, the golden eyes lighten up strongly for just a moment before going back to normal.


    "...Fellow?" The golden-eyed said in a confused tone.


    Turning to look at his arms, the golden-eyed inspected his body in silence.


    "I see... it seems like it turned out to be like this..." The golden-eyed undead said solemnly without any sort of emotion hidden in his words.


    "Are you the one responsible for raising me as an undead?"


    Hearing that Danzel shook his head.


    "No, that isn¡ät my kind of work. I ain¡ät capable of raising an undead this...intelligent." Danzel said as he got the gist of the situation that the undead was in.


    `That guy is confused.¡ä


    The golden-eyed undead stared for a bit longer after Danzel''s words before looking around him.


    "Where is this ce...?"


    Danzel in response just shrugged his shoulders at that.


    "That question is a difficult one to answer...as I don¡ät know what exactly this ce is. All I can say that where we standing, or in your case where you floating was a tower that I copsed not long ago."


    Hearing Danzel answer, the golden-eyed undead stared at Danzel intensely.


    "Why did you copse the tower?" The undead said with a much heavier tone.


    `He is angry?" Danzel thought as he sensed how the golden-eyed became much more serious than before.


    "It was necessary to kill that Devil that is lying dead over there." Danzel said in a solemn tone.


    "Devil?"


    The golden-eyed asked in a confused tone.


    Turning to look at where Danzel was pointing at, he saw a river of blood building up under the stones where a huge corpsey there.


    Flying towards that spot while ignoring Danzel, the golden-eyed stayed silent staring at the corpse.


    Danzel who was watching by the side tightened his grip on the sword.


    `If I attack now while it¡äs distracted...¡ä


    Not only did this undead seem immersed in the corpse, but it also showed his back on him.


    As he didn¡ät know how strong that undead was if a fight were to break out then the first one to strike would hold the advantage. And how things currently were, attacking now would be the best way to start his first attack.


    s, Danzel decided against it.


    As far as he knew, that undead that looked like a wraith could be of the same tier as him considering the intelligence that it showed. Another reason he find was that there wasn¡ät a need for a fight to break off between the two.


    Aside from the XP gain, he will get by killing him, there wasn¡ät much of any reason to fight a fellow undead.


    At least that¡äs what he thought.


    `Fighting him with only my remaining mana should at best be avoided...¡ä Danzel thought as he waited for the golden-eyed to do something else.


    As why he was low in mana is because of using the [Undying] Talent to restore his body.


    Minutes passed by with the golden-eyed undead watching the corpse of the Devil before turning to face Danzel.


    "You have my thanks for killing him..." The golden-eyed said as it stared at his body that suddenly started to show cracks building up.


    Which of course seeing that confused Danzel.


    "It seems like I can¡ät stay in this state for much longer..." The golden-eyed undead solemnly.


    As he finished his sentences, from nearby the wraiths that were frozen in a ce surrounded those two.


    "..."


    Danzel who saw that got wary by counting the numbers of those wraiths.


    `If they alle at me, things will get annoying fast.¡ä


    The wraith¡äs to his fortunate only nced at Danzel before locking their simr golden eyes that had a mix of gray towards the intelligent golden eye, bowed their backs while floating in the air and holding the voulge with both hands in front of their head.


    Watching that Danzel couldn¡ät help but think of it as a salute.


    "It seems even you guys turned into an undead..." The golden-eyed said while turning his head towards Danzel and pointed with his hand at the crystal that Danzel was holding.


    "That crystal that you are holding is under my ownership."


    As soon as the golden-eyed said that, Danzel was surprised as he figured out the identity of the undead figure.


    `This guy is the one iplete undead who was kneeling in front of the gate of thest floor?¡ä Danzel though.


    As what his response was, it was quite obvious.


    "I don¡ät mind giving that crystal back..." Danzel said to the undead in front of him.


    Although he felt bitter about losing that huge crystal, it couldn¡ät be helped.


    Not only was he surrounded with many wraiths and a 3rd-tier undead in front of him, but he was also out of mana to actually put up a fight.


    Counting that the crystal was also damaged and repairing will take him to find the necessary knowledge and possible resources.


    If by giving a possible treasure that is useless in the current present to avoid a fight that could very well cost his immortality for good.


    Then he didn¡ät mind.


    The golden-eyed undead though shook his head by Danzel''s answer.


    "No, I don¡ät want that crystal back. In a matter of fact, I want you to hold onto the crystal. If you do that, I will do a favor for you..."


    "Huh?"


    Danzel who heard that not only got confused, but the other undead words rmed him somewhat.


    "What kind of favor are we talking about?" Danzel asked in a suspicious tone.


    The golden-eyed undead who saw how Danzel was suspicious of him, raised his hand and showed the cracks that were building.


    "Favor might not be the right word, but rather a deal."


    "As you can see my body is slowly falling apart. As for the reason as of why I am unclear... So here is the deal..."


    "I will take residents inside that crystal and stay inside there as long as I find a suiting vessel to transfer to. Since I will be unable to move I will need you to carry the crystal around. If you do that I will guide you into a treasury where many artifacts are being kept..." The golden-eyed undead said as he eyed Danzel''s armor and sword.


    Danzel who understood what he meant was obviously interested in the treasury part.


    But the whole other half sounded as appealing as the food of goblins.


    `How the hell did I end up being in this situation?¡ä Danzel cursed internally.


    "Just out of curiosity...what happens if I refuse?"


    With his golden eyes ring once more, the undead answered.


    "If you were to refuse then I and others will be forced to fight. Leading to a result of us both dying.


    "..."


    `I shouldn''t even have asked...¡äDanzel thought bitterly.


    Considering the undead situation, if he were in the same position as his them I too would have done the same. If words didn¡ät work, then force would end up being yourst option.


    "Dammit..." Cursing under his broken-up helmet, Danzel brought a paper out of his storage ring and imminently started carving in the air.


    "What are you doing?"


    Of course, the golden-eyed undead who saw that got confused by Danzel''s actions.


    Taking no longer than 2 whole minutes, Danzel was finished carving into the paper and started writing into the paper extremely fast thanks to his attributes.


    "Here, catch," Danzel said as he throws the rolled-up paper towards the golden-eyed undead.


    Catching the paper, the golden eye looked at Danzel confused.


    "Input your mana down on the paper. If what you said holds any lies or breaks the requirements of the contract then the paper will be aze. Resulting in us fighting. If nothing happens then we got a deal..." Danzel exined to the undead who nkly stared at him.


    Danzel simply modified the contract runes instead of using blood and mana. Only the usage of mana was allowed. Making it in a sense an undead-friendly product.


    Starting to read the contract, the golden-eyed eyes red up as he looked at Danzel in surprise.


    "You...are capable to carve runes?"


    "..."


    Taking his silence and the contract as evidence, the golden eye inputted his mana into the contract.


    Seeing the contract not burning up, Danzel sighted internally.


    "With it, we have a deal."


    Nodding his head, the golden-eyed undead looked up in the sky and let out a loud screech.


    "KYAAAAAAAAH!"


    Spreading his dead mana around, the wraiths that were nearby soon started to move towards the golden-eyed to enter his body.


    It looked as if some dark mist that was the wraith''s dead body started to go sucked in the golden-eyed undead.


    With all the wraiths sucked in, the screeching also stopped.


    "What are you name...runesmith?" The golden-eyed asked.


    After staying silent for a bit, Danzel opened his jaw.


    "...It¡äs Rue Danzel."


    Nodding his head, the golden eye robe part of his armor turned longer as if the body of the undead was turning into a mist which in the next moment flew at an incredible speed towards the crystal.


    Touching the crystal, a dark light was starting to shine in the crystal that Danzel was holding.


    With the light fading away together with the golden-eyed undead, Danzel heard a whisper.


    "As of I am Nersan¡ärah."


    "..."


    Shaking his head from the situation that he got himself into, Danzel started to move away from the remains of the tower.


    But as he was walking he noticed from not far of the sand shaking.


    "Did I miss a skull wolve?" Danzel said as he moved in the direction.


    As soon as he got close though the sand exploded with a towering figure raising him.


    As Danzel was about to dash forward to kill the skull wolve in front of him, he halted as he realized who that figure was.


    Of the biggest and strongest skull wolves that he had faced into the tower.


    His strongest undead till yet, skull w appeared in front of him.


    "How the heck did you survive?" Danzel said as he stared at the skull w weirdly.


    `His Jaws and his rips case is destroyed¡ä


    The longer Danzel stared at the skull w the more he was surprised how that undead managed to even able to stand in front of him. The undead body looked like a mess except for the four legs who only had some cracks.


    `Did it fall with his belly or something? If so how did he survive the rocks of the tower.¡ä


    Shaking his head from such thoughts, Danzel jumped into skull ws back.


    `Go¡ä


    Even though themand was cruel if one considered skull ws state of body, the undead still followed his lieges orders.


    Seeing that skull w could follow the order, Danzel stared at the crystal in his hand.


    "Now, Nersan¡ärah.. Where is that treasury that you mentioned."

 Chapter 214 - Death Spirit (2)

    Leaving the ruins on top of Skull wback and holding a crystal that contained a powerful undead named Nersan¡ärah. The three moved through the sandstorm to reach their next destination.


    By the time they got away from the sandstorm range and were unable to see it from far.


    The sandstorm that in fact was being subconsciously controlled by the Devil started to weaken as the Devil has now been killed. And after hours after its death, the sandstorm that its true identityy in being a barrier has fully vanished.


    The Devil of Azu¡ärah, that terrorized the desert of Azu¡ärah for years of the end has finally perished in the rumbles of the tower, the ce that this being was born.


    Or rather manifested.


    The lives that it took were countless.


    The city and viges that were starting to flourish perished and were drowned by waves of sands.


    Many challenged the supposedly Devil of Azu¡ärah, but their fate was no different than the ones that it buried in the sands.


    Be it for fame or bing a hero, challenging themself against that otherwordly beast and seeking the secrets that made the Devil of what it currently was.


    Out of all those, only 4 people survived.


    And currently in the ruined city that was once named Ged¡äuruk, 4 blinding blue lights came from the sky above and down in the remains of the tower.


    Such a sight could one describe as if heaves send out divine punishment to the mortal world.


    s, they would be wrong.


    With the blue lighting slowly disappearing, four figures wearing brown cloaks and hiding their body appeared out of the lighting.


    "So where is it? Where is the big mass of meat this time!?" The first of the cloaked figure that moved put her hands together and cracked her fingers.


    Her voice was that of a female one holding lots of confidence and eagerness. Though their body was hidden by the cloak, one could estimate that she was a whopping 1.84 meters tall. If one were to observe her feet for some unfound reason, they would notice that she was walking bare-footed and that her skin was more of the brown skin color.


    Behind her, a cloaked figure reached the height of 3.5 meters that had a massive halberd resting in his shoulders looked around the remains of the tower. Gazing towards a certain ce where lots of dark blood were spilled, he figures pointed at that ce with his slightly blue finger.


    "Over there, Death Caller." The tall figure said with a rough and loud voice.


    The one holding a ck staff with a huge dark crystal in the front end of the staff turned him towards where the huge figure was pointing.


    Seeing the ck blood together with the corpse that was oozing such blood, the magic caster was surprised.


    "This is..."


    Turning to the direction where everyone staring, the four robed figures said what everyone had in mind.


    "Isn¡ät this the Devil?" The robed figure with a man''s voice said in a surprised tone.


    "Ehhhh!? No way!" Shocked, the hooded girl leaped towards the corpses with one single jump and started tossing rocks all around the ce.


    "That idiot, what if it¡äs alive." The man whose weapon was hidden under his cloak shook his head as he followed behind her.


    After clearing a bunch of rocks with no seeming effort, the neck hands were revealed for others to see.


    Well, at least their remains.


    "Boss! It¡äs really dead! What should we do now!?"


    The man holding the ck staff walked beside her and looked to the ground, his expression hidden from others thanks to the cloak.


    Looking at a particrly neck-hand, the one holding staff senses some mana that he knew wasn¡ät from the Devil itself.


    `Someone fought against this thing. Did it also copse the tower on top of it and managed to kill it?¡ä That was the conclusion that he came at.


    Knowing that this sort of mana wasn¡ät from the Devil, the one who fought the Devil probably either defeated it alone or just copsed the whole tower on the Devil.


    `If that¡äs so then he should also be buried alive.¡ä


    While he was in his own world.


    The girl was pissed.


    "Ahhh! Come on! We chased this little bastard for a whole year and even lost Verengan not long ago! I can¡ät ept that this thing died like this!"


    Shaking his head, the one holding the staff touched the corpse of the Devil.


    "No, it doesn¡ät matter who killed this thing. All that matters is that it¡äs finally dead."


    In the next moment, therge corpse of the Devil disappeared into the thin air while the blood that has already fallen started floating into a ball shape.


    "Though it was an annoying endeavor, we can finally move on." Bringing out arge jar of special ss, the one holding the staff guided the mass of blood towards the jar.


    Collecting all the blood of the Devils, the jar disappeared simr to how the Devil¡äs corpse did.


    "Though it¡äs a pity that we lost Verengan and all the others early, Their deaths weren¡ät wasted."


    Rolling her eyes on the staff holder, the girl replied in an annoyed tone.


    "Boss! Your jokes aren¡ät funny!"


    "She is right, Death Caller."


    "Mhhm..."


    With all the others nodding in agreement, the staff holder put a wry smile on his face.


    "Have I been figured out?"


    Raising his staff, a magic circle started to form slowly.


    "So boss? Now that we have finished this, what will be our next job?"


    While the staff holder continued concentrating on his spell, he replied.


    "We will join the war between the Arcana and Berum kingdom."


    "Huh?"


    The three who heard that looked at him surprised and confused.


    "But wouldn¡ät your magic bring problems?" The man in the hood asked.


    "The situation has changed for the arcana kingdom, ording to the information that I received, it should be fine. Nheless, the job will pay well." The staff holder replied while his whispering casting never ended.


    "Did the informatione from the same group?" The man asked with a frown on his face.


    "Indeed, it came from the Council." With the staff holder replying, the magic circle started to shine in blue light.


    "But before we go there, we need to resupply, in both items and personal."


    The moment those words escaped his mouth, the magic circle activate and engulfed the four in the light which flew to the airand disappeared to a destination unknown to others that the staff holder.


    *****


    In the middle of the deserts of Azu¡ärah


    Days after the fall of the Tower and the death of the Devil, Danzel on top of Skull w was staring aimlessly in front of him.


    What he was actually doing though was reading.


    [Status]


    Name: Nersan¡ärah


    Level: 92


    Race: Death Spirit


    ss: [Greater Magic Caster of the Sands Lv. 60]


    Sub-ss: [Necromancer Lv.1]


    Health: 12040/12040


    Mana: 12000/ 12000


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 230 Agility: 400 Intelligence: 800Endurance: 300


    [Talent]: [Superior Undead] [Talented One] [Magic of the Sand] [Amptitude in Magic] [Greater Magic Caster] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Ethearal Body Possesion]


    [Skills]: [...] [...] [...] [...]


    [Remark: A Death Spirit who with a somewhat cursed miracle was able to manifest when it¡äs lost his vessel. Though his past was a great magic caster with immense talent. A terrifying undead to face in thend of the sands.]


    `A Death Spirit, huh?¡ä


    Making the status window disappear in front of him, Danzel looked at the crystal he was holding.


    "Sigh...it would have been much easier if I could just put you in my storage ring" Danzel mumbled to himself.


    "...Neither living nor beings with a conscious tied within them are capable to go inside a dimensional type item." Nersan¡ärah who heard Danzel said in a solemn tone.


    "I know that already, you don¡ät need to tell me twice." Danzel replied annoyed.


    Having to travel for days with a talking stone in the middle of the desert with nothing else to see except the same old same did annoy him.


    "Anyways, are you sure that we are traveling in the right direction? It can¡ät be that this treasury that you are talking about is buried in the sands or anything right?" Danzel asked.


    "I would have noticed if we have passed it. As long as your maps are correct then it shouldn¡ät be a problem, as a matter of fact...we should be near." Nersan¡ärah said inside the crystal.


    "I hope so..."


    Not muchter, after the Skull w walked up a hill of sand, through the distance arge building came in sight, with tents and people to be seen there.


    Seeing that, Danzel asked in a cold tone.


    "Is this the ce?"


    After a moment of silenceing from the crystal, Nersan¡ärah replied


    "...Yes, though it looks a bit different as of how I remember it, this should be the ce."


    Nodding his head, Danzel draws his sword out of his sheath.


    "If I remember right, you needed a living vessel, right?"


    Without waiting for Nersan¡ärah answer, Danzelmanded Skull w to move towards the building.


    "Might as well find you one and be done with it...."

 Chapter 215 - Sashia Village

    "Sasha! Can you help us out here?" A shirtless full of sweat man called out as he and his colleagues struggled to raise a rock in the building that they were building.


    Hearing her name, the girl wearing a pure white robe with golden strands and holding a staff with a light blue crystal rushed towards the two men.


    "Coming!"


    Hasting her steps, her golden hair that was tied as a ponytail together with eyes of the same color as the crystal looked mesmerizing to the onlookers.


    "How can I help you two?" She asked the man with a calm voice and refine voice which made her look more mature.


    "Ehm...is it possible to raise this rock there for us?" The man asked while scratching his head in embarrassment.


    Looking at the rock and the ce where it needed to go, she nodded towards those two.


    "Yeah, give me a second." Saying that she put forward her staff and started casting.


    A few secondster, the sands from the ground rose and elevated the rock towards where it needed to go.


    With the sand carrying the rock going back to the ground, Sasha looked towards the two-man.


    "Is it fine like that?" Sasha asked in a calm tone.


    Frozen in amazement from what just happened, when the two of them heard her voice, they came back to their senses.


    "Ah, yes, yes. You are a lifesaver, Sasha. Without you, I couldn''t imagine how this vige would still be standing on its own."


    "Haha~you have overestimated me." Laughing with an awkward smile, she bit the two farewell as she moved on.


    Not long after she heard her name being called once more for seeking her help.


    "I aming!"


    Running towards to help out with her sand magic, she couldn''t help but think of how this vige was progressing at such a fast pace.


    Having finished helping another group, she stared at the huge building looking like an ancient temple or tomb that worked as this vigendmark.


    `Well, calling it a vige is a bit much, but...¡ä


    Seeing everyone working together with no conflict to be seen was bringing her some hope in this forsaken desert that everyone lived in.


    This ce back in the day was named the hollow dungeon by explorers as they were no treasures or monsters to be found. Considering that the mana around the ce was barely enough to call it a dungeon, the name hollow dungeon was quite suited for it.


    But now that hollow ce was slowly turning into a vige capable of flourishing.


    "Chief Sasha! We might need your guidance for this part here!" Another woman called out for her assistance.


    "You don¡ät need me to call me like that!" Sasha said with her cheeks getting slightly red.


    And the name of that vige was none other than `Sashia Vige¡ä, at least that''s what everyone decided to name it as such, as they considered Sasha as their vige chief.


    Even though she personally didn¡ät like to have such a grand title.


    Everyone still called her that way.


    As she was the mostbined for that title.


    With her being a 3rd-tier magic caster capable of light magic to heal wounds and for what she was most famous of, her sand magic. Her skills were crucial for everyone''s day-to-day lives.


    Nheless, she managed to convenient a merchant froming here to trade his goods with them, making the vige grow without showing any signs of stopping.


    "Sigh, I am tired..." Sasha sighed as she stared at the sun going down to let the darkness of the night takes his ce.


    Sitting on top of one of the boxes resting, a fairly thin man with a tall build and ck hair walked towards her.


    "Hello, Ms. Sasha, may I sit beside you?"


    "Or would you rather be called chief Sasha?" The man said with a wry smile on his face.


    "Stop calling me like that, Marco. I already heard that from everyone else..." Sasha replied with a growth in the end.


    "Hahaha, sorry, I couldn¡ät help it since I''ve been hearing everyone praising you and all."


    "For a merchant, you seem to have quite the free time if you can hear such useless stuff." Sasha rolled her eyes on him.


    "I-"


    "You know, I never actually nned for this ce to be so big. Originally I came here with some other Explorers because my grandma told me about this ce when I was a small girl learning magic. She told me that this ce is special that holds relics of the past."


    "But as you might know, the ce was hollow, neither relics nor something special as my grandma told me. Worst of all, we got caught up with a month-long sandstorm. If it weren¡ät for that huge building over there keeping us safe, then this vige wouldn¡ät have existed."


    Hearing that, Marco nodded his head.


    "You''re right, with the sandstorm being fairlymon, creating a vige without the people getting swept away is impossible. Wherever the vige is created or the people are burried alive, fate decides it. But with this huge building already in ce and the area being around other viges not far away, us merchants and explorers don¡ät have to y with the dice of fate."


    "And for that, I thank you for creating this ce Sasha, without you, many people would have died," Marco said while lowering his head slightly.


    "Sigh, stop it, I just kept this ce together with the help of my magic. That¡äs it." Sasha said with a sigh.


    "And that¡äs already good enough. Who knows what this ce would have be if bandits took control of it. I wouldn¡ät be able to sleep soundly knowing that every trip lies the danger of some bandits chasing my goods and looks." Marco said with an execrated face.


    "I mean, with you sand magic, none one dares to make a move and everyone behaves."


    Hearing her magic being praised, the boring look that Sasha had vanished.


    "If you have to thank anyone then, that would be my grandma. As she was my teacher on the ways of magic."


    "Even the sand magic that you use?" Marco asked interested.


    "Yeah, she was a great woman and a much greater magic caster than I am. You could say that she was my role model. Everything that I know about magices from her. I still remember when she raised giants made out of the sand, where I in turn am only capable of this..."


    Pointing her staff to the ground, the sands shifted and started raising into the form of a humanoid sand soldier.


    Marco from the side, even though he had already seen those things before, he was still amazed by the sight of the sand soldier wearing armor and a voulge made out of the sand.


    "Compared to the giant that is 20 times the size of this, I still am quitecking," Sasha said with a bitter smile on her face.


    `No, Sasha. You are wrong. For the age of 20, a magic caster such as yourselfes only once every few centuries, if not at all. It¡äs just that your grandma is a monster of different scales.¡ä Marco thought but not said out loud, knowing that it was quite rude calling someone''s grandma a monster.


    Even if it¡äs the truth.


    "Your grandma must have been impressive then." Marco decided to say instead.


    "I bet though that you will be able to reach her level in no time. After all, you are quite youngpared to your grandma. I wouldn¡ät mind betting a bag of gold coins in you suppressing her in the future." Marco said joyfully.


    "Hmpf, just a bag of gold coins? Isn¡ät that you not having confidence in me? At least bet you whole carrier while being at it."


    "That¡äs it..."


    Seeing his awkward face, Sasha couldn¡ät help butugh at him.


    `Though the work around the vige is quite tired some. Times like this aren¡ät too bad.¡ä She thought while looking at Marco¡äs face.


    While those two were enjoying there chatting with each other, a man who was walking not far away from them looked through the distance and noticed something.


    A dark golden light lightens up as fast as it disappeared through the distance.


    The man who saw rubbed his eyes and looked towards that direction, only to see no such light.


    "Did I push myself to the point that I am seeing stuff?" The man asked himself.


    But as he was to turn his head to the other side, he saw a massive sandstorm like a waveing directlying towards them, the Sashia Vige from the same direction where the light appeared.


    After ncing at the far-away sandstorm for a few seconds to make sure he wasn¡ät seeing things, his face paled as he noticed that the sandstorm was real.


    "Everyone! A Sandstorm ising! Go thendmark!" The man yelled before running away.


    Hearing that, many looked around and noticed the sandstorming their way.


    "Dammit, I heard that a sandstorm passed through his area, but to think that it wille here too! Sasha! We need to move away!" Marco called out to Sasha.


    Nodding her head, she standing up to leave.


    But the longer she stared at the sandstorm, the bigger her frown turned.


    "This isn¡ät a normal sandstorm...." Sasha mumbled as he followed Marco with her staff in her hand.

 Chapter 216 - Undead Raid

    Sometime back when Danzel discovered the Sashia vige.


    Jumping off Skull w, he pierced his sword in the sand and wrapped the crystal, Nersan¡äran¡äs vessel in a cloth and hang it on his sword hilt.


    Sitting on the sand, Danzel brought out one of the few books that he had and started writing.


    "What are you doing...?" Nersan¡ärah asked, confused by Danzel''s actions.


    "Isn¡ät it obvious? I am writing." Danzel answered without giving the crystal which Nersan¡ärah in a second look.


    "I can already see that, I am asking as to why now when our destination is just right in front of us."


    Closing the book, Danzel stared at the crystal.


    "For a mere rock, you sure talk a lot don¡ät you?"


    "..."


    After an awkward silence between those two, Danzel ced the book beside him.


    "Sigh...Look Nersan, they-"


    "It¡äs Nersan¡ärah..."


    "Right...Nersan¡ärah. There is no reason to rush the whole thing. From this far away I could already count more than 20 people there. With a ce this big, it should at least be double that amount. Against such numbers, we might as well use one of our traits as an undead." Danzel said in a bored-like tone.


    "What are you talking about?" Nersan¡ärah was of course confused by Danzel¡äs answer.


    "I am talking about our night vision. While the living relies on light to see things around them, we undead do not. As of that, we might as well wait until the sun goes down. I don¡ät need to exin the reason as of why right?"


    "I see...attacking with the help of the night. Simple yet effective. I wouldn¡ät have expected this from someone who copsed a whole damn tower..."


    "I thought you weren¡ät holding a grudge for it." Danzel said, receiving only silence in response.


    Looking at Skull w who was still standing, he send out amand.


    `Lay down for the time being.¡ä


    Following hismand, Skull w went ahead and seated so that his belly was for Danzel to rest his back at simr to a billow.


    Resting his back subconsciously on Skull w''s belly, Danzel looked in the clear sky.


    "You could say I have some...experience in raiding a vige simr this size. Back then I simply rushed without much of a n the moment I learned that my enemies were weaker than me."


    "At first it went well, but before I knew I was surrounded and was forced to fend off against multiple people. Even though I was much weaker back then, against those people, I was the stronger one. Since if I weren¡ät I wouldn¡ät have been here in the first ce."


    "Back then I let someone escape. Whether it was on purpose or not, I should have killed him to prevent information from spreading. I regret not doing so. Though in the end, I killed everyone, since I was stronger. It could have gone better"


    Looking back at the vessel of Nersan¡ärah, Danzel spoke with a cold tone.


    "But let me ask you now, if I weren¡ät stronger back then if there were someone far more powerful or numbers that even I could not handle, what would had happen?"


    "So what you are trying to say is that you want to maximize your chance against that potential more powerful enemy?" Nersan¡ärah said, somewhat impressed.


    "No, you are wrong." Danzel mercilessly denied his im.


    "Huh? What did you mean then."


    Grinning behind his helm, Danzel pointed at him and then at himself.


    "It isn¡ät my chances but rather our chances, as you are going to help me."


    "..."


    "..."


    As the awkward silence resurfaced, Danzel picked back his book and started writing.


    "...What are you writing?" Nersan¡ärah asked in a solemn tone.


    "I am writing down notes about that Devil and all other stuff that I got to learn in the desert."


    "..."


    "..."


    ...


    And like that, the night came soon to rece the sun.


    *Boo


    Closing the book and putting it back into his storage ring, he started up.


    "It''s time"


    Drawing his sword out of the sand into his sheath, he nced at the cloth that had the crystal.


    "It''s been long enough..." Nersan''rah mumbled from his crystal vessel.


    "Hmm? Not satisfied in being a mere rock?" Danzel said as he made Skull w stand up.


    "...why aren''t you trying to be an immobile crystal?" Nersan''rah replied, annoyed by Danzel''s attitude.


    "Right, sorry."


    Moving on top of the hill riding Skull w, the sight of torches starting to lighten the vige was to see.


    "Before we head, do you have any preference in the type of body that you want?"


    "...if a body catches my interest then I will notify you." Nersan''rah said with a cold voice.


    "Sure...but don''t forget that if you don''t tell me early enough, the body that you want to rece your crystal vessel with might be killed by me." Danzel said with a simr cold voice.


    "I know"


    Making sure that they were on the same page, Danzel raised Nersan''rah''s crystal high up.


    "Now do your part, Magic Caster Nersan''rah" Danzel said.


    Without replying to Danzel, the vessel of Nersan''rah that was his crystal started to shine in a dark golden light.


    "[Deserts Wrath]" Nersan''rah whispered his cast through the end.


    The next moment, as if a strong wind started to move forward.


    The sand from the ground rose up and flew towards the vige of the living in the form of a sandstorm.


    "Good." Nodding satisfied, Danzel was about to draw his sword out of his sheath when she saw some sanding together to concentrate.


    "This is..."


    Staring before him, the sand before him started to turn into that of metal, forming a veryrge and intimidating type of voulge that had skulls carved in the de.


    Compared to the other voulges, not only was it a half longer than those wraiths had used, but the de itself was a whole meter big.


    "Use that, your sword wouldn''t be much of a use on top of that sand walker." Nersan''rah said.


    "Thanks?" Reaching out to grasp the floating voulge confused, the moment he grabbed it he imminently felt the weight of this thing.


    ''To think that such a heavy weapon can float in the air...'' Danzel though secretly amazed by Nersan''rah magic.


    He very much doubted that his mana hands could lift this beast.


    But for him, himself, carrying such a thing was a piece of cake.


    Swinging the voulge a few times with only one hand, Danzel rested it on his shoulders.


    ''Skull w, move forwards at top speed.'' Daniel sends out an internalmand on Skull w.


    Following his pieces order, Skull w dashed inside the sandstorm towards the vige.


    ...


    The vigers who were workingte in the outskirts of the vige were the first to notice the sudden appearance of the sandstorm.


    "Ugh! Did a sandstorm really have to appear in the middle of the night?" One manined about who was gathering his stuff in his bag.


    The man knew that if he were to leave his stuff behind, by the time the sandstorm ends, his stuff would be by long go.


    "Matt! Move you a*s already, the sandstorm ising closer!" One of his colleagues called out.


    "I know dammit!" Matt cursed as he picked his bag.


    Looking back at the building that they were about to finish and then back on the sandstorm, Matt couldn''t help but feel annoyed by the fact that a bunch of material will be swept away and potentially harm the building.


    The building although unfinished was built with the idea of withstanding sandstorm, but the raw resources needed to finish the building wereying down near the house.


    With no time to gather the resources, they were forced to leave them at the mercy of the sandstorm.


    "ursed sandstorm! If you had a body that I could beat up, I would already beat you countless times!"


    Turning around he cursed at the sandstorm once more.


    But before he could a very his eyes, he saw arge shadow in the middle of the sandstorm thanks to the torches who were already in the sandstorm.


    ''Huh? What is that shadow?''


    Before he could question it any further, he felt a firm grip on his shoulder.


    "Matt! Move you a*s already!"


    "H-Hey, I think a saw something inside the sandstorm." Matt said in a shutter.


    "What are you talking about!? There is nothing there! Nowe!" His colleague said as he pointed at the sandstorm, nothing there to be seen with the torch that was there already put down.


    Looking back at the sandstorm and seeing nothing, Matt considered it as an illusion that came from his current stress.


    "Right, let''s go!"


    Starting to run with his colleague, one of his tools suddenly fell out of his bag.


    "Tch, now in all times!"


    Bending to pick up his tool from the ground, the moment he raised his head he saw a massive deing his way.


    ''Eh?''


    Before he could make a sense of what happened, he and his colleague''s half cleave body was catapulted through the air together with the building that they almost finished today.


    *Brouuugh!


    Thest thing that he saw was how an armored figure riding on top of a massive undead cleaved through the building with ease using a massive voulge that had skulls carvings.

 Chapter 217 - Undead Raid (2)

    "Ahhh! Run!" one yelled in fear.


    *Booughm!


    With a nearby house being swept as if it exploded, bodies started to fly through the air, only to fall to the ground as lifeless corpses.


    At first, the vigers started running from the danger that the sandstorm was, but now they were running from an unknown being that was inside the sandstorm.


    Observing the shadows of the beast was enough to determine howrge the being was. At least those who managed to see it and made it out alive that is.


    One of them described what he saw as someone riding a huge beast and wielding a huge weapon. Though others would have questioned that, everyone did in fact believe this one guy.


    The reason was that every time a building was destroyed, a huge wind-cutting sound was to be heard with a faint growl in the background.


    While a group of workers was running in the center of the vige, they soon started to hear some steps nearing their position.


    *Vrghhhhhh~!


    As one of them turned to look behind on the sound, his face paled to the extreme.


    "W-What the hell is that!?"


    Approaching them, was Skull w with Danzel dragging therge voulge through the sand.


    Because of the sandstorm and theck of light, the man could only see a massive skull face of a wolve and chillout riding and dragging a massive weapon that had skulls carved too.


    Not to say the less, the bloodlust oozing out of those two figures was too terrifying.


    "T-They are going to catch up!"


    "Run faster!"


    "Run if you value your lives!"


    Putting everything they got into moving forward, one of the men who was breathing heavily started to slow down.


    "Ha~ha~ha~, e-everyone! wait for me!" The man falling behind the other cried out.


    "Don¡ät stop Jame! We got to move-" Trying to motivate the man falling behind named James to keep going, he turned to look at how far he was.


    But once he took a look, his mind went nk as he saw a huge mouth open behind James.


    "E-Everyone! Wai-"


    Before poor James could finish his sentence, thergemouth that could swallow every one of them with one bite closed.


    But instead of devouring James whole orbiting him to death, Skull w threw James'' body through the air with such force that broke multiple of his bones.


    "!!!"


    Before the man was able to see James'' pained expression, the huge weapon was shot up from the ground and cleaved James in half with a swift move.


    Turning their heads behind the air-cutting sound, before they were able to see the blood from James falling down, the huge voulge was swung down.


    Crashing the man in the middle of this group.


    Everything happend so fast that the people couldn¡ät even react to the fact of two of their colleagues dying in such a manner.


    "Ahhhhhh~!" As their spirit was being crashed down with the sight of the huge weapon raising once more, they cried in despair.


    "A monster!"


    "Help!"


    "It¡äs the Devil of Azu¡ärah!"


    Unfortunately for them, their cries of help didn¡ät manage to bring them out of their situation.


    One by one, Danzel started cutting them and creating a blood path wherever he passed by.


    The majority of the people facing him were just some mere workers of the 1st-tier with only two of them being of the 2nd-tier. And yet they too perished.


    Their massacre though came soon to an end.


    "[Ice Shards]!"


    Hearing some sort of yell, Danzel turned around only to see many small ice desing flying towards him and Skull w.


    Danzel raised the huge voulge in front of him and blocked the ice des using the de while Skull w just right of tanked it using his sole body.


    "Ice magic, huh?" Danzel said, seeing the spots where Skull wolve was hit to freezing.


    Turning his head to look in the direction where the spell came from, Danzel saw a group of 5 protecting someone with a staff in his hand.


    `So they had gathered themself.¡ä Danzel thought as he looked at them.


    "You! Don¡ät you move or that beast of yours! Drop your weapon and identify yourself!" The man holding the staff said to Danzel.


    Ignoring him, Danzel looked down at the crystal he was holding.


    "Is that guy suited for your taste? He is a magic caster"


    "No, every one of those is some useless nobodies. They couldn¡ät hope to put much of a fight against me...or you."


    "I see..."


    "Hey! What are you mumbling to yourself! Didn¡ät I already tell you to drop your weapon!" The man yelled while gathering his mana into the staff he was holding.


    ncing at the man, Danzel raised the crystal up high.


    "Don¡ät kill them, Nersan¡ärah."


    With a dark golden glowing out of the crystal, the group of six got rmed.


    The magic caster who cast his ice magic before was about to release another one of his spells when suddenly he and the others got entangled from the sandpletely except their head,


    `[Sand Prison]¡ä Nersan¡ärah finished his spell that controlled the sand and hardened it when it covered someone. Though the was originally meant to cover the whole person and suffocate them to death, Nersan¡ärah although a bit perplexed, considered Danzel''s words.


    Nodding in satisfaction, Danzel stapped the huge voulge into the ground and jumped using his skill behind the group who were trying to free themselves.


    "You were right, to be incapable to escape some mere sands. They truly weak." Danzelmended as he sheathed his sword out and cut the magic caster''s throat.


    Turning around and stabbing through the man that was imprisoned in the sands, Danzel pierced his heart and turned in front of the remaining 4 people struggling for their lives.


    Danzel though wasn¡ät as generous as to wait for them to break free.


    Cutting their throats one by one while ignoring the XP notification, he was about to swing at thest one.


    But before he did, the man managed to break free and sh his weapon with Danzel''s sword at thest moment.


    "Ughh..." The man who held his weapon with both hands struggled from the pressure that Danzel''s sword was giving, who in fact was holding it with one hand as usual.


    "..." Daznel who saw this though wasn¡ät much impressed by him.


    Throwing the crystal that was Nersan¡ärah¡äs vessel up to the air, he punched the man with his now free hand in the center of his chest. Making all the air in his lungs together with salivaing out of his mouth.


    "Guagh!"


    Catching Nersan¡ärah¡äs vessel, Danzel cut the man''s throat without much hesitation.


    "Don¡ät start throwing my body around..." Nersan¡ärahined to Danzel for having his body being treated as such.


    "Right, sorry. Is just holding you while fighting is quite troublesome."


    "I see...but then why did you tell me not to kill them? And the way you killed those guys was quite slow, no?" Nersan''rah said, annoyed to be called troublesome.


    "I tried killing them with the less amount of damage possible in their body. Now they are in a perfect condition to be possessed by your wraith" Danzel exined.


    ''Also if you killed them I would even lose the free XP.''He thought to himself.


    Another reason as to why he did that was also to observe the wraith''s state.


    While he read through Nersan''rah''s status, he did find a skill rted to storing ethereal undead.


    But about their state, he didn''t know.


    Though he knew that Nersan''rah could only possess courses or living beings and not actually undead, he wasn''t worried about being possessed by him.


    He even checks him with a contract of his.


    His being wary was just because his contract of his failed once in the past.


    So if the case were to happen that he was forced to fight Nersan''rah, he wanted to know the state of the wraiths too.


    ''Though if possible I would like to avoid that of happening.''


    As he thought that, some dark most shot out of the crystal and entered the bodies of the deceased ones.


    Twitching a bit, the body of the group started to rise once more with newly created voulges in hand.


    "Mhmm, follow me," Danzel said to the bunch.


    "Now let''s finish the remaining ones," Danzel said followed by 6 undead holding voulges and giant skull wolve.


    ****


    At the same time, the huge building serves as thendmark of Sashia Vige.


    Running inside was a young woman wearing a pure white robe with golden strands and a staff in her hand together with a fairly thin man who was breathing heavily out of exhaustion.


    The vige who were already on edge from the loud sounds of buildings copsing had their face brighten up as soon as they saw Sashaing in.


    "Sasha!"


    "Chief!"


    Seeing people rushing towards her, she imminently looked around concerned.


    "Is everyone ok?"


    "Yeah, everyone here is safe, but some of us are missing. And the group who went to search for others hasn''t turned back yet. There are also those loud sounds outside..."


    Staying silent for a moment, Sasha looked at everyone.


    "I am in believe this sandstorm is...artificial."


    Hearing that the vigers got confused, while the warriors and a few magic casters frown in response.


    "What do you mean artificial? Like someone used magic or?"


    Nodding her head, she replied with a serious tone.


    "Yeah, most probably the sandstorm is the work from an enemy."

 Chapter 218 - Dark Flames

    As Danzel on the other undead moved forward the treasury, the more humans they found running towards the same direction.


    For Danzel and Nersan¡ärah was quite fortuned to have more bodies to put wraiths to possess over.


    As for the people who had their bodies defiled even in death, not so much.


    So in total, they were 14 wraiths together with Skull w following behind their own master.


    Though Danzel felt somewhat bitter for letting the wraiths kill the others, essentially stealing his XP. He decided to not think much of it.


    Knowing that the living would by now gathered around with unknown numbers, he wanted to go there prepared.


    Since his undead¡äs woulde out just as peak 1st-tier strength with a human body. Letting the wraiths who were somewhat able to use magic and how to handle their weapons, which was for all a voulge.


    The choice was obvious the wraiths.


    Though they would have rtively the same physical strength as his undead, the above mention traits would make their strength that of a 2nd-tierbatant.


    Of course, there was also the option to turn the corpses into ghouls which would effectively make them much stronger than the wraith¡äs possessed body. That choice was crossed out as he only had a few pairs of the runed armor and theck of control that he had on them.


    Though he doubted that they would attack him as a fellow undead, he much more preferred the controlled undead than the rogue ones.


    Not muchter after walking for a few minutes, a towering building came in sight.


    The many steps of the building leading to the entrance together with the material that it was built out of made it look like a sacred tomb.


    Though his night vision thanks to being undead, was Danzel able to appreciate the detailed carvings in the walls.


    But that onlysted a moment as his attention was won over by some sand humanoid figures.


    They looked very much like the wraith''s sand bodies that he saw them with.


    From the top of where the entrance was, a group of people stared at Danzel and the wraiths with a frown.


    Sasha who was among this group couldn''t help by be shocked when she saw the people behind the leading figure.


    The moment she saw bloodstains in their throats and chest area together with their golden eyes.


    Though it was her first time seeing such a thing, she imminently realized the state of the people she knew were in.


    "Undead..."


    Hearing that, the Explorers who were staying in the Sashia vige together with the vigers who only had bows and a tool to fight against had their frowns grow much worse.


    Particr thetter if the group.


    Instead of staying behind like the majority of the vigers, they with their 1st-tierbat power decided to fight too.


    But after seeing the armored figure leading a bunch of undead, they immediately regret their decision.


    "Shit! Is it a necromancer!?"


    "Even Merrick the magic caster died together with the others..."


    "Can we win?"


    With most showing their concern out loud, Sasha was about to speak up when one of the Explorers stepped up instead.


    "Don''t worry, with Sasha and me as magic casters and the help with the others. We don''t have to worry about a mere necromancer and his minions."


    The magic caster wearing a mix of a robe and armor holding a staff pointed at the sand humanoids spread around the steps.


    "After all, we also have those guys around."


    Seeing the sand soldiers created by Sasha and the explorers, the viger gulped back their anxiety.


    Having the number advantage together with veteran fighters, courage started to grow in their chest.


    ''That''s the former leader for you.'' Sarah thought to herself.


    The magic caster named Valdenz, a 3rd-tiered magic caster and previous leader of the explorer party that Serah was in didn''t disappoint in people management.


    During the mana from her body to her staff, the sand that umted in the treasury entrance started to raise up.


    Danzel who saw that imminently charge forward with the fellow undead following behind him.


    The sand soldiers on standby turned to face Danzel with their spears.


    Thrusting his spear towards Danzel''s chest, Danzel pushes his de against the spear.


    Having greater strength and speed, he pushed the spear away while swinging at the sand soldier''s neck.


    Cleaving the mass of sand in one clean swing, the sand soldier fell to the ground without any signs of recovery.


    Before being able to rx, the vigers let loose of the bowstrings.


    ''Slow'' Danzel thought as he raised his sword and started blocking the arrow as if they were nothing.


    Compared to the archer that he fought back then in the tower, the speed and amount of arrows were toocking.


    The wraiths who were shot at simply raised their hands and formed a shield of sand in front of them while running towards their target.


    "[Sand Missiles]" casting her spell, simr to the spell [Magic Missiles]. 5 mana missile with the sand increasing the impact of the spell flew towards Danzel.


    As Danzel was about to think of what to do against those, Nersan''rah''s crystal shone a dark golden light for a moment.


    Manipting the sands nearby Danzel, the sand shot up in the air like a huge tentacle and pped the iing missiles with little to no difficulty.


    ''That''s magic for you'' Danzel said internally at the casting speed and power of Nersan''rah''s spell.


    With the help of the wraith''s stopping the sand soldiers, Danzel rushed forward with little to no interference.


    "Buy me some time..." Valdez said to the explorers.


    He didn''t expect that the infamous sand soldiers would start falling so quickly.


    Though theycked the numbers, the wraiths and Danzel could easily storm through the sand soldier as they were more powerful, with Danzel being an unstoppable force that the sand soldiers couldn''t handle.


    "Create more soldiers, Sasha. I will deal with him."


    Nodding her head, she started summoning more sand soldiers.


    The explorers who joined into the mix quickly started to push the wraiths away. Which made their confidence recover.


    They didn''t know that those undead were just mere puppets who were hiding inside.


    Wraith would have such a hard time if they weren''t inside the corpses.


    But as those who decided to face the tying thread, the sword-wielding necromancer soon came to regret their decision.


    As Danzel made quick work on the two who arrived in front of him, the sand tentacles pped the remaining 3 to death.


    "What the hell is this guy!? He is both at magic and physically stronger!" One of the Explorers who watched from the side cursed at the sight of the 5 dying so fast.


    Before they were to get discouraged in fighting the necromancer though, a sinister light came behind them.


    "Move back," Valdenz said as he raised his staff.


    From the endpoint of his staff, a dark me as back as the night appeared with a sight of grey light indicating light.


    ''What me is this?'' Danzel questions internally and the sight of the me.


    Without letting him think any further, Valdenz let his me lose.


    "[Chaos Core]"


    *Wruagh!


    "Danzel, dodge that," Nersan''rah said in a whisper-like tone to Danzel.


    Following Nersan''rah''s advice, Danzel moved to the side, away from the dark grey mes path.


    But seeing the me chance his path Danzel cursed under his helmet.


    "A homing type..."


    As soon as the me got closer, the sand tentacles shot up to face the me.


    But to Danzel and Nersan''rah''s surprise, the me pushed through the sand and continued headstrong towards Danzel.


    Sensing his sense of danger skill activating, Danzel knew he had to avoid the me.


    Jumping back a few steps, he grasped a wraith''s shoulder and threw it at the dark grey me.


    *Wraaauagh!


    With the far grey mes exploding, the wraith manipting a corpse was engulfed in such mes.


    "Kuagggh!"


    A scream came out of the burning body.


    Before long, a dark mist was shot out of the mouth of the corpse, directly towards the crystal of Nersan''rah.


    "You..."


    "It was an emergency," Danzel said with a cold tone. His ethereal eyes glued on the magic caster responsible for the dark grey mes.


    ''Though the wraith survived, that guy itself is a problem.'' Danzel though.


    "Nersan, can you block one of those mes?" Danzel said loud enough for only Nersan''rah to hear.


    "Yeah...but I will have to put all my focus into it, meaning that I can''t support you." Nersan''rah said in a cold tone.


    Nodding his head, Danzel raised his sword up.


    Channeling his mana into his sword he let loose 2 dark green wind des towards the location of the magic caster.


    Which were shortly blocked with two sand walls.


    "I see...one defense while the other attacks'' " Danzel said quite annoyed.


    ''If I don''t finish this quick I would be forced to make Nersan release all the wraith''s true bodies.


    Something that Nersan''rah didn''t want to do if it wasn''t necessary.


    Since even though he used the crystal as a vessel, his body still slowly started to break a bit, even if it was at a snail''s pace.


    As a Death Spirit, he would weaken if the dead it collected were to leave his body.

 Chapter 219 - Sands Emperors Shield Vs Dark Flames

    `First I got to get close.¡ä


    With that thought in mind, Danzel dashed towards the two magic casters.


    "Don¡ät let him get close! Stop him!" Valdenz yelled to everyone present.


    ncing towards the rushing sword-wielding necromancer, the explorers gritted their teeth and forced themself to face him while all the vigers aimed their bows at him.


    Danzel didn¡ät think much of thetter of the group, but the second group of 2nd-tier warriors was a nuisance to him.


    The first to arrive was one wielding a short sword pared with a shield.


    He was the first to fall from the people rushing towards him.


    Although the man used his life force to strengthen his shield, just a swing at his shield made the man almost fall to the ground from the strength of the swing, even leaving a small dent in the shield.


    Unfortunately for him, he wasn¡ät able to stop the fast de from cutting his throat.


    "Aghh-!"


    Leaving the man bleed to death, Danzel moved towards the next who was trying to get in his way.


    The strength difference between 2nd-tier and a peak 3rd-tier was way too high for the men to even have a chance against Danzel.


    Not only was his swing strong, but they were also terrifying fast.


    Since Danzel invested lots of attribute points into his agility stat to escape Hanson. Though his strength was quitecking, his speed was at a level where the mortals in front of him couldn¡ät evenpare against.


    Worst of all, every time Danzel killed one of them, a dark mist would escape the crystal which he was holding and enter the fallen one''s body.


    Once the mist entered the body, they would soon find their former allies rise up to join in the pursuit of making them join their ranks.


    That sight alone made them turn tails and make a run from the current situation. Doing that though would be no better than escaping their grim reality and they knew it.


    If they run back inside and let the others die, they would only dy their death. Pushing through the undead and leaving the vige was also a no-go with the raging sandstorm still there. Not even counting theck of supplies of both food and water, they would either freeze in the night or died covered in sand.


    Considering all their options, the only way for them to survive was to kill the necromancer.


    But...


    "I-it-s Impossible..." One of the explorers shuttered as he watched his colleague bing undead and solely increasing their enemy''s numbers.


    The sand soldiers although great and all weren¡ät much different than the explorers in the matter of strength.


    And their help was further restricted by the growing number of wraiths.


    "Everyone, well done." Valdenz said.


    Hearing his words was like a ray of golden light reviving their spirits and hope.


    "This time I will kill him."


    Valdenz using his mana created simr dark grey mes to appear."


    "Begone, one who insults the wonders of magic, [Chaos Core]."


    Putting his own will behind the spell, the dark grey mes grew much stronger than the ones of before.


    *Wruuuagh!


    Releasing the spell, the dark grey mes flew in Danzel''s direction.


    Moving away from the sword-wielding necromancer so that they don¡ät get caught up in the aftermath of Valdenz''s spell, Danzel stood his ground and waited to face the dark mes.


    Danzel at first tried to input his mana into the ground to cast [Stone Wall] in front of him, but was unable to, or rather the mana went with extreme difficulty inside the steps which made the process of casting the spell impossible to finish before the ck grey mes reached him.


    "Nersan! Do it!" Danzel said as he pointed the crystal in front of him.


    The next moment the crystal shone in a dark golden light.


    "[Sand¡äs Emperors Shield]" An ominous voice echoed as a vast amount of dark golden mana went out of the crystal and mixed with the sand.


    The sands glowing in a faint dark golden light started shifting and flying towards the crystal at immense speed.


    The sand at first formed a ring and shortly after the rings started increasing and stopping at 3 rings. Filling the rings with the ck golden sands and making them at least 0,5 meters thick each, the appearance of three sand shields floating in the air that were almost stacked up with each other had been formed almost imminently.


    Not long after the forming of those 3 shields, the ck-grey mes reached the first shield.


    *Wruuuagh!!


    The sound of mes increased while the grey light shone much stronger the moment the ck mes made contact with the first shield.


    *Brough!


    Breaking the first sand shield apart like a spear prating a shield, the dark grey mes reached the second sand shield.


    "Wruuuugh!


    Simr to the first wall, there was a short moment where the wall and the ck-grey mes fought with each other in who was fated to fall first.


    Unfortunately, though, the mes were too strong for the shield to hold on.


    *Brough!


    Passing through the falling sand of the shield, the dark grey mes reached thest of the three shields.


    *Wruagh!


    Upon making contact with thest sand shield, the mes form changed.


    If before it was like a spear that sought to prate the shield, now instead it tried to engulf the whole shield at once.


    The mes spread through the shield to the point where Danzel from the other side could see a glimpse of those very mes burning in the grey light.


    "Well done." Danzel said without showing any signs of concern.


    As he said that the sand shield started to show signs of cracking.


    *Brhh.


    Through the cracks, Danzel could see the grey light from the other side.


    When the cracks started to grow, they reached the point where the shield could no longer hold on.


    Bursting apart, the sand started to fall to the ground.


    Fortunately for Danzel, the mes also reached his limits.


    Without having any more strength to push forward,the dark grey mes that we''re mixed with the sand started to fall to the ground, reducing to only bits of the me continuing to burn on.


    Danzel of course fourteen such development as his greater sense danger skill hadn''t been activated.


    "Finish it now." Nersan said in a whisper-like tone.


    "Of course."


    Guiding his mana around his body, Danzel dashed forward.


    The people who looked at the sword-wielding necromancer elerating toward the top were surprised.


    They thought that the spell of Valdenz would finish Danzel.


    Since they run to the sides to avoid the ck mes, now there was none to halt Danzel even if they wanted to.


    Those who tries to rush back were left behind as they were slower than him.


    And the only 2 sand soldiers who tried to stop him were destroyed to bits by Danzel.


    Leaving none behind except the vigers to guard the most important people, the spell casters.


    s, the moment the vige people saw the sword-wielding necromancer rushing at them, most of them run back to the sacred top, leaving only a handful of people to guard Valdenz und Sasha.


    "Those guys..! Sasha! Use the wave!" Valdez''s anger quickly faded as he had to worry for his life.


    "What!? If I do that, everyone will..." Sasha said hesitantly to listen to Valdenz''s order.


    "Sasha! Do it!"


    Hearing his desperate voice and the marching sword-wielding necromancer, she released their situation.


    "Forgive me." Biting her lips, she raised her staff.


    Like a gathering storm, a vast amount of sand started to gather around her staff.


    Sensing out mana in the air where the sand was, she brought down her staff to the ground


    *Tick


    With the blue crystal in her staff growing up, the vast amount of sand was pushed forward.


    "[Sand Wave]!


    As the spells name suggests, a wave made out of sand rose and fell towards the steps wide enough to cover the whole steps.


    The explorers who saw that paled as the sudden realization that the wave was alsoing towards them.


    "Sasha! Why!?"


    "Run down!"


    "We can''t! The undead is blocking our way."


    With a wave of sand threatening to bury them alive in front of them, while behind them the undead was waiting to slice them apart, their fate looked grim.


    "Push through! If we all run down, some of us might survive!" One of the explorers yelled.


    With no further option left, they all turned left to face the undead.


    Danzel though didn''t do that.


    While running at top speed towards the iing sand wave, he guided his mana into the sword that he held.


    Glowing in a dark green light, he swung at the iing wave twice in the same direction


    *Fsheeeeen!


    *Fsheeeeen!


    Releasing two dark green wind des, the part where it hit the sand wave, although cut arge amount of sand by both wind des.


    It wasn''t quite enough to create a path.


    And yet Danzel still didn''t halt his steps, instead, he elerated.


    "Something like this..." Before being able to finish his sentence, he mmed in the wave and disappeared in it.


    While on the other side.


    "I...killed th-"


    "Sasha! If you are going to me someone, me me, I told you to do it." Valdenz said with a heavy yet firm tone as if he was suppressiong his guilty within him.


    "Moreover, while it might have washed up that necromancer, the undead should still have survived. Until then let-"


    *Baaaagm!


    Without any notice, the wave of sand exploded.


    And in the middle of this explosion a dark armored figure wielding a sword and holding a crystal in hand appeared.


    "-Isn''t going to stop me.." Danzel said with a sinister tone as he reached the top of the treasury.

 Chapter 220 - Gate

    *Tuck


    The moment Danzel''s feet touched the ground, to everyone it seemed like time has stopped.


    The terrifying sword-wielding necromancer that ughtered everyone in his path like weed managed to stand at the top amongst the living.


    Seconds would have felt like hours if it weren''t for the fact that their enemy didn''t even give them a second to think.


    While using [Swift Movements] on his body, Danzel kicked the ground and dashed towards the male magic caster.


    Valdenz who realized the current situation light his eyes with mana, a trait that only 3rd-tier magic casters were capable of to enchant their senses to be capable to keep up with the speed of physically strong enemies.


    Though he was capable to see things faster and everything else.


    That didn''t mean that his body could react to what he was seeing.


    Because of it, Valdenz could only stare shocked at the iing sword-wielding necromancer.


    While his staff ignited with dark grey mes, Danzel had already raised his de and swung it at him diagonally.


    Though Valdenz managed to take a step back, he still couldn''t avoid the de of Danzel.


    Cutting him to in his shoulder till his hips, arge amount of blood gushed out of the magic caster''s body.


    "Valdenz!" Sasha yelled as she activated her mana vision too.


    Seeing herrade falling slowly to the ground she instinct wanted to rush towards him and use her light magic on him.


    But her rationality did the opposite of it as she watched how the sword-wielding necromancer turned around and ran towards her.


    Using every little mental power that she had, she finished her spell just as Danzel reached before her.


    Her casting time was extraordinary fast without wasting any of her mana.


    The sand shifted and created 3 sand soldiers in front of her to face the necromancer.


    s, with sand magic considered as ancient in the current present, the people who also learned such magic could potentially be counted by two hands.


    The talent of Sasha and the affinity of her spells were top-notch. Sadly, with her mentor dying before being able to pass her whole knowledge to the disciple, the spell itself was too weak to face Danzel.


    Swinging his sword at an extremely fast pace, the newly creates sand soldiers break in the mass of sand to the ground.


    Essentially saving Sasha a mere 2 seconds.


    After her master passed away, she was essentially left with none other choice but to create her spells by herself, with most being immigration or the few spells that she learn from her grandma.


    She didn''t have any time either to cast another spell before Danzel swung down his sword at her.


    ''So that''s is where I will die?'' She thought bitterly.


    Dying and turned as one of the immortal undead, forever serving the one who took her life from her. Such fate awaited her.


    Without being able to see the city of Sashia flourish.


    Not achieving a higher realm of mastery in the path of magic.


    And nheless, not advancing her rtionship with merchant Marco.


    Even though she had so much to live for,her life was about to be stolen at any moment.


    Though some miracle though, the de that was about to reach her neck stopped a few edges away from decapitating her.


    The swings wind pushed her hair back, leaving her stunned looking at Danzel.


    "Huh?" She said in a whisper.


    Danzel who stopped his de before her neck would even frown if he had a face upon hearing Nersan''s words.


    "Don''t kill her."


    Having instinctively stopped at Nersan''s words, he was simrly confused as Sarah, but for a whole different reason.


    ''Hey, it can''t be...''


    As he was thinking of what to do, he noticed small parts of his sword covered in dark grey mes.


    As he swiftly remembers something, his [Greater Sense Danger] activates.


    "Run Sasha!"


    Hearing her name, she reimed her sense and acted ording to a simr voice.


    Covering her feet with sand until her hip, she swiftly moved away from Danzel.


    Instead of chasing her though, he dashed to the side.


    Doing that he managed to dodge the spray of dark grey mesing from begins him.


    ''He can still cast?'' Danzel thought as he got far enough so that the dark grey mes won''t reach him.


    The one responsible for such me was none other than Valdenz.


    Holding his hand on the chest in the area where a huge wound was to be seen, the dark grey mes were continuously burning his clothes.


    The spell that he cast was called [ Chaos Embrace] that shot out simr dark grey mes like a methrower, the downside being that its range and concentrated power were much less than the [Chaos Core].


    Lowering his staff, the shooting-out mes stopped.


    Looking at the sword-wielding necromancer with a pale face, he turned his head toward Sasha.


    "Sasha...take everyone inside and close the gates. I will be facing him."


    Hearing his intention Danzel guided his mana into his sword and looked at the vigers.


    "I won''t let you!" Valdenz yelled, looking through Danzel''s intentions.


    Pointing his staff in Danzel''s direction a small ball of dark grey mes was shot out of his staff.


    "..." Changing the direction where he was looking towards the dark grey ball of fireing at him, Danzel swung his sword in the air towards the same direction where the mes wereing from.


    *Fsheeeen!


    With the dark green wind de traveling towards the ball of mes, they soon collided.


    *Wruagh!


    The ball of dark grey mes exploded and vanished in less than a second upon hitting the wind de, unfortunately, the wind de was also destroyed by that.


    `That small me is enough to destroy my wind de...¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    Their casting time one the [Gale Mana de] and Valdenz''s small dark grey fireball was around the same but Valdenz''s spell was much faster and more powerfulpared to Danzel.


    Which showed the powers of a magic caster and their spells.


    For Danzel whose attributes were focused more in closebat, a magic caster was most of the time the pure opposite.


    *Crack.


    Hearing a small cracking sound, Danzel stared at his sword, slowly falling apart until it became totally useless from the ck grey mes.


    `Such powerful mes...¡ä Danzel thought internally as he let go of the hilt of the sword.


    *Tick.


    "Nersan..." Danzel said with a cold tone as he opened his hand.


    "..." Nersan¡ärah crystal lighten up in dark golden light.


    Not short after, the sand that was used for the sand soldiers shot up through the air and started gathering themself above Danzel''s hand.


    And simr to how the huge voulge was created, the sand started to getpressed and slowly turned into metal until it became a longsword.


    Witnessing such a sight more closely, Valdenz eyes looked at the crystal that Danzel was holding with a frown.


    "An Ancient Relic..."


    "Wrong."


    Swinging the new sword in front of him to test how it was, he looked towards the magic caster.


    "Though ancient...this is no mere relic." Danzel said with a cold tone.


    Guiding his mana around his body, Danzel''s ethereal dark green eyes lit up for a moment as killing intent was being spread around.


    "I thought you wouldn¡ät be able to put up a fight with such a serious wound. But it seems that those mes in your chest protected you."


    Stapping forward, Danzel said with a sinister tone.


    "This time though I will make sure of it, your death has already been decided."


    Dashing forward, Valdenz imminently went to work and prepare his spell.


    "Darkness deep hiding within truth,e out an-" As Valdenz was casting his spell though, he suddenly felt an immense pain going through his chest.


    Spouting blood from his mouth, he looked down only to see how a dark green glowing de was driven through his chest and heart.


    "H-How..."


    Reaching his hand, he grabbed the de as if he was questing if it was real or not.


    But the moment he did and felt the cold edge of iron, he was stunned.


    Without know-how though, the de disappeared before his sight.


    And soon a new de was pierced in his heart, a de much colder than before.


    "Ahh..." Looking ahead of himself, he found the necromancer pushing his de deeper into his chest.


    "Gaah!" Spouting a mouth full of blood he felt an overwhelming weakness upon his body.


    "Fall and be one us." Danzel said as he draw his de out of the magic caster.


    [...]


    Ignoring the message, Danzel swiftly turned around and chased after the others.


    The moment he turned around though he saw through the distance a gate closing.


    "Those guys!"


    Running at top speed he looked towards how the gate was closing.


    "Dammit!" Heading his mana on his de, he raised it and set out a wind de.


    And as about the wind de was about to hit, the gate closed.


    *Buuaah!

 Chapter 221 - Bad Blood

    Standing in front of the tall gate, Danzel raised his sword up high and swung against the gate.


    *Tinnnk!


    Hitting the gate that was seemingly made out of stone, the sword that Nersan created for him broke into two pieces, with the de falling to the ground.


    "Ugh! What is this made from!?" Danzel said frustrated.


    Reaching out his hand and touching the gate, a floating window appeared in front of him.


    [Entrance Gate of the Sacred Treasury of Azur¡ärah]: Out of the few ces out in the desert, the sacred treasury was one of the few where it didn¡ät get affected by the event of the past. The gate array that survived enchants the gate to be near indestructible as long as mana is being input.


    "An array? So there is a barrier in this whole building?" Danzel said as he checked the floor and walls only to see simr descriptions.


    "I am surprised that you noticed the arrays..." Nersan¡ärah said with an indifferent voice.


    "...even if I did figure why this ce is so sturdy, I got no clue how to get past it." Danzel said.


    He didn¡ät bother exining that the only way he found out about the arrays was thanks to the status descriptions that he had ess to.


    "You don¡ät have to worry about that, I can open the gate. But not right now."


    "Why not? Does it require some sort of preparations?"


    "Well, it¡äs because of you. The gate is so made that once attacked, for some sort of time it will go into a lockdown state. Making except the master of this ce to open the door. As long as this lockdown state is active, we can¡ät get in."


    "...Seriously?"


    "Yes."


    Turning to look back at the gate, he cursed at the gate.


    Walking back, Danzel looked at the half of the sword.


    "Can you repair or create another one of those?" Danzel asked.


    The next moment, the nearby sand floated in the air and flew towards the broken sword and fixing it to his original.


    Nodding in satisfaction of the wonders of Nersan¡äs magic, Danzel reached where he could see all the stairs who by now were engulfed with a bunch of sand.


    "..."


    Staring for a bit, Danzel sends out amand.


    `Skull w, rise up.¡ä


    The moment themand finished, the piles of sand shook and then the next moment exploded in the air.


    Appearing from the sands came the appearance of Skull w looking towards his liege.


    Shaking her body like how a wet dog would do, she threw the piled-up sand away from her body and walked towards her liege.


    "It seems like I will soon have to remove that flesh from you..." Danzel muttered to himself as he saw the part where she was hit with the ice magic falling to the ground.


    Though Undead could regenerate their body, that wasn¡ät the case for zombies that Skull w essentially was.


    She was capable to regenerate her bones just like any other skeleton with the usage of dead mana, but such a rule didn¡ät apply to the flesh.


    Though he didn¡ät know the exact reason for that, he guessed that the flesh didn¡ät align with the dead mana itself with a zombies stage.


    Since he had experimented with the rune that turned a corpse into a ghoul, he obviously checked the ghoul¡äs status.


    And among one of its abilities was [Cannibalize], which essentially allowed them to regenerate their decayed flesh by eating the flesh of a living that hadn¡ät died long ago.


    `That can wait forter though.¡ä Danzel thought as he watched how the wraith-possessed body started to rise while holding the body of the explores of before.


    "Did every one of them die?" Danzel said with a hint of pity hidden in his voice.


    Walking towards the top, the wraiths threw the bodies of the explorers in front of him and kneeled with their voulges in front of him.


    Only in the fact that they were kneeling towards their true master who was Nersan¡ärah.


    "Hmm...if those guys together with the magic caster were the strongest, then I don¡ät think it¡äs necessary to put wraiths within them." Danzel said as looked in the crystal.


    "I agree," Nersan said which after his crystal let out dead mana fly towards the few corpses.


    Seeing that, Danzel imminently figured out what Nersan¡ärah tried to do.


    "Lesser Raise Undead, huh?" Danzelmented as he saw the corpses stand up and make small growl sounds.


    "Lesser? What do you mean by that?" Nersan of course didn¡ät like much of Danzel dering his spell as `Lesser¡ä.


    Danzel in response simply shrugged his shoulders.


    "Yes, lesser. As this is the true raise undead." Danzel said indifferently as he shot his dead mana in the remaining explorers.


    "Be made to serve~"


    With the dead opening their eyes, the newly created zombies looked at Danzel.


    "Though simr, my version makes the zombies a bit stronger and holds better understanding in your¡äs orders intent."


    "...I see." Nersan¡ärah said after a long moment of silence.


    "It seems like you guide you will into the dead mana as there are in the middle of transforming into an undead and then..."


    Ignoring the whispers from the crystal in his hand, Danzel walked towards the only one person who they didn¡ät turn as undead.


    "Honestly, I thought you would choose him as your vessel that the other magic caster."


    The manying in the ground dead was the most powerful magic caster sharing his tier he faced till yet.


    He honestly found the man quite strong.


    His fast casting spells were as strong as his [Gale Mana de] which he cast much faster than his wind de. If they were to fight only in long-range, then he of no doubt would have lost, for obvious reasons.


    But even if they were to fight on equal terms, without Nersan it would have been very difficult to avoid the spell [Chaos Core].


    The only way to fight back against that was to cast [Stone Wall] under the guy''s feet to stop his casting but in a ce such as this where he wasn¡ät capable to move his mana through the ground that option was scratched away.


    "Wasn¡ät he powerful enough to use as a vessel?"


    "Powerful might he has been, but he was one with bad blood." Nersan¡ärah said with a cold voice.


    `Blood?¡ä


    Looking at the blood of the magic caster, Danzel didn¡ät understand Nersan¡ärah¡äs meaning of `bad`.


    Raising his hand to guide his dead mana towards the outside, Nersan¡ärah interrupted him.


    "Wait, don¡ät turn him into an undead yet, though one with bad blood, his body has much better usage than bing a part of...those." Nersan said as he looked at the zombies in disgust.


    Though he hadn¡ät a face to see his expression, just by his speech Danzel saw the hints of disgust.


    "..."


    Storing the corpse of the magic caster into his storage ring, he seated in front of the gate waiting.


    ***


    After several hours inside the sacred treasury, on the other side of the wall...


    "Are you telling us that we suck here like some trapped rats!" One of the vigers said as he pointed at therge gate in outrage.


    "Yes..." Sasha believed the cruel truth of their situations towards the vigers.


    Together with her and the people who managed to escape Danzels manughter, they exined the situations outside and we''re for evident reasons stressed out.


    Learning that most fighters died fighting a bunch of undead with a sword-wielding necromancer leading them was quite too much for a few people to keep calm and look at the bigger picture.


    "Are we supposed to starve here to death!? We only have for a few weeks'' worths of food in here!"


    They say that in face of death, people show their true colors.


    And that couldn''t be more true at the viges who would usually joke among themselves to start cursing at each other.


    "S-Sasha dear, would those sand puppets really be able to break through?" A woman said with concern.


    "Yes...I am sure of it. Don''t worry." Sarah said in a calm tone tofort the scared woman.


    Starting at the 40 or more sand soldiers that she created she felt tired.


    ''With those numbers, we might be able to do it.'' She thought to herself.


    Though the past hour, she was creating sand soldiers and recovering her mana to make more of them.


    But soon she was reaching her limit.


    "Everyone please stay calm! I will handle the necromancer and the undead! Just like I had done!" Saying so, everyone calmed down and whisper to themselves.


    They all knew Valdenz as a strong magic caster, but if they all had to decide which one is stronger then they would had decided for Sarah.


    With her being literary a one-man-army with her sand soldiers, she fended off countless bandits and beasts out of their vige.


    "Yeah...that''s Sasha we are talking about-"


    "She can definitely defeat the evil magic caster-"


    "The goddess is watching over us-"


    While others tried tofort themselves and others prayed to a goddess.


    Therge gate that was supposed to be only capable to open from their side, started to open.


    "Ah! The gate!" One of the purples said as he pointed at the gate.


    And with the gate opening, the undead and their lives walked inside.

 Chapter 222 - Beginning Of Possession

    *Grrkkk~


    The continuous sound of the gate caught everyone''s attention.


    The small bits of sands that were stuck between feel above the walking undead, who were being led by their eventual lieges.


    "Everyone prepare!" Sasha yelled to the stunned and scared people.


    Looking at Marco who was trying to bring the people under control and then back at the sword-wielding necromancer, she clenched her staff much harder than before.


    "I won¡ät let you hurt anyone!" She yelled at Danzel.


    Looking at her, Danzel raised and pointed his sand-created weapon to them.


    "Go."


    "Gweaaagh!"


    "Gweagh!"


    "Gwea-"


    ...


    Skull w and the remaining of his own undead imminently rushed towards the living with oozing killing intent.


    Even though the wraiths didn¡ät obey his orders, they too rushed upon Nersan¡ärah¡äsmand.


    Sarah who saw didn¡ät wait much longer tomand her own sand soldiers to face the undead while the few vigers picked up a weapon and started to prepare to fight for their life. Among them, the few who run away were the fastest to reach with their bows.


    Releasing their bowstring and letting tens of arrows fly loose, the vigers wanted almost to celebrate when they saw that they hit one of the zombies. Unfortunately, the undead who were hit by the bows didn¡ät slow them in the slightest.


    Instead in the eyes of the vigers, they looked like they were going faster upon hitting them.


    That undead though the first to fall from the spears of the sand soldiers piercing their skulls. The only exception was Skull w who simply eat the sand soldiers whole. As for her species being able to open their mouth extremely wide and Skull w being a much bigger size than her species, the Sand walkers, which were called Skull wolves by Danzel.


    Since they had lots of time to talk those past days, Nersan¡ärah told what kind of beast Skull w was.


    `A beast brought from the outside of the desert and then evolved itself to best suit the desert¡ä Danzel thought as he watched Skull w destroying and getting hit by the sand soldiers.


    Nersan¡ärah exined that their undead-like appearance with their skulls expose was a forced evolution step point made by his father so that the sand walkers don¡ät get hurt from the sand that might have gone in their eyes and cause an infection or worse of all make the sand walker blind.


    "I better move before we lose too many of them..." Danzel mumbled as he guided his mana into his body.


    Kicking the ground, using the skill [Swift Movements] he moved extremely fast towards the sand soldiers and kept destroying them with ease.


    Thanks to the [Swift Movements] skill being one with high duration time, Danzel could move at top speed for arge amount of time before he abused his mana.


    Though some of the wraiths were getting destroyed and flying back into Nersan¡ärah¡äs crystal because of the number difference, the rate that Danzel destroyed the sand soldiers was much faster than the undead fell.


    Though in his opinion it would have been much easier to just rush the magic caster controlling them, that decision wouldpromise with what he had to do.


    "So annoying..." Danzel said as he crashed another sand soldier.


    Remembering the strategy that Nersan told him, it was quite annoying.


    `Listen Danzel, that girl is much inferior in magicpared to me. I guess that she would try to beat us with numbers, so all you have to do is..."


    "Deblete her mana, huh?" Danzel mumbled as he watched at the magic caster''s heavy breathing.


    Since magic casters were only useful when they had the mana to cast their spell, once they are out they were practically helpless.


    And Sasha who stared at her sand soldiers getting destroyed realized what the sword-wielding necromancer was trying to do.


    Raising her staff, multiple missiles made out of sand flew towards Danzel, who was simrly destroyed by the sand flying like a whip or a tentacle.


    "If this continues one, then everyone..."


    Although she knew what the necromancer was trying to do, she could only follow the man''s attention and continuously summon sand soldier after sand soldier to deprive him of all of his undead.


    `As long as my manast until the undead minions are destroyed, then I can overwhelm him with numbers.¡ä She thought to herself.


    But sadly for her, she didn¡ät know that she was fighting against two 3rd-tiered undead.


    "What!?" Sarah yelled in surprise as she watched something that deprived her of all hopes she had on her n working out.


    With the crystal glowing in a dark golden light, the sands of the destroyed sand soldiers soon reformed into a simr and yet different sand humanoid.


    Muchrger and way more detail in their armor that she would have difficulty creating.


    The said sand soldiers holden voulges and had their faces covered in a hood made out of the sand. The amount of those soldiers was only 15.


    Although a jokepared to the sand soldiers of Sasha¡äs, their power was much stronger.


    Joining forces with the undead, the tides of the battle turned against the living.


    "Haah~Haah~Haah~"


    Falling into one of her knees, Sasha couldn¡ät control her breathing while sweat wasing all over her body from the abuse of her mana.


    The sweat was mostly of the heat of the abuse of mana together with the pain that it bough upon her body.


    Though they were only about 5 wraiths and 2 sand soldiers together with Skull w and their respective lieges.


    Seeing the magic casters state, Danzel switches his target.


    "Now..."


    Dashing towards her, the vigers tried to shoot him, but the arrows simply bounced against his armor that was ted with his mana.


    "Sasha! Stand up! We must go away!" Marco said as he rushed and looked at Sasha with worry.


    "Haah~Marco...run away." Sasha managed to say as she pointed her staff towards Danzel.


    The sand¡äs shifted and started to create a humanoid figure in front of her.


    The man used of creating that sand soldiers though was much greater than the others from before.


    "[Sand Arbiter]." She said as sand soldiers twice the size of Nersan¡ärah sand soldiers appeared with parts of his armor and spear being that of metal.


    "Hmm?" Looking at the sand soldiers who hadn¡ät legs and were essentially rooted in ce, Danzel was as surprised by this thing piercing his spear at him with incredible speed and power as he was disappointed by it.


    "You might have been a challenge if you could even create such soldiers." Danzel mumbled as he dodge the second piercing attack of the Sand Arbiter.


    Moving into his range, Danzel swiftly cut through the sand arbiter''s hand twice before swinging his sword diagonally to his face.


    *Fssuuuh~


    The huge sand arbiter fell to the ground as a mass of sand.


    "N-no way, it was a 3rd-tiered one..." Sasha said in between her breathings in shock.


    The [Sand Arbiter] was indeed a summon of the 3rd-tier, but it being in an iplete state-led it to only have the strength of someone who just joined the 3rd-tier rank.


    For Danzel who was near peak the 3rd-tier, the [Sand Arbiter] didn¡ät have much of a chance. Making herst line of defense keeping Danzel away from her to crumple into the floor.


    Dashing forward, Danzel soon reached in front of her.


    "Sasha!" The man who was by her side quickly stepped forward and pushed his dagger towards the necromancer.


    "..."


    And before Sarah¡äs sight, she saw how the necromancer cut Marcos''s head with a swift swing.


    From the swing, some amount of blood flowed towards her shocked face, as she couldn¡ät process what was happening.


    When she did though, she scream out of grief.


    "Nooooo! Marco!"


    She quickly moved and gripped Marcos falling body into her hands.


    Seeing no reaction of the body, tears flow and mixed with the blood of Marcos.


    Grasping her staff in anger, she wanted to imminently use all her remaining mana to kill the one who killed Marco, but upon raising her head, she only saw masses of sands gripping her body and forming a wicked cross like a prison that to her surprise started to suck her remaining mana out of her.


    "I will go finish the rest." The sword-wielding Necromancer said something that she didn¡ät understand what he meant.


    But she soon did.


    Before her eyes, the crystal that he was holding the whole time started to float and gather sand to form a humanoid figure.


    But unlike any other sand soldier, the humanoid figure had actually colors in the sand itself which made it lifelike. Only using the lifelike word would be wrong as the sand figure had a skull as his face.


    "Do that, I will begin the body possession." Nersan¡ärah said as his ethereal dark golden glowed much bright for a second.


    Serah who was confused and exhausted, finally understand what he meant.


    "No! Don¡ät kill them!"


    With her vails as background music, Danzel went around and killed the vigers mercilessly.


    "Nooo!"


    "Help!"


    "I-I will do anything! let me live- Ahhh!"


    While that was happening, Sasha felt a strong headacheing in her head as a skeletar sand figure touched her face.


    "Let me bring out your body''s true potential."


    As pain and whispers of the dead started to ring in her head, minutes passed.


    And though the countless ethereal pain.


    She felt an ancient being trying to steal her body for itself.


    Though all that pain, she struggled to keep her sanity.


    Which of course you lead the pain to forever one continue.


    "Ahhhhh!"

 Chapter 223 - Nersan′rah New Body

    Time passed like fleeting sand, simr to how the screams of despair and pain did in the Sacred Treasury.


    While the remaining undead fought against the sand soldiers and prevented them to get any closer to Nersan¡ärah and the girl. Danzel went around and swiftly killed the vigers at a scary pace.


    Every time the air-cutting noise was being made from his sword, the blood of the living would taint either his armor or sword.


    Few tried to fight against the Wight in order to save their dear lives.


    And yet those few were the first to receive their deathpared to the ones who hid and pushed others. Though cowardly, it did bring them a few seconds longer to live.


    Yes, seconds.


    As Danzel saw others betray each other, the one who pushed the other party would be targeted next by Danzel''s de.


    The people could only see how death was closing in without being able to do anything.


    Literally.


    The arrows that hit his armor bounced off as if they were nothing, while neither de could reach him before his holder would be mercilessly cut down by Danzel.


    They realized that they couldn¡ät escape death and the only thing they could do was how death wasing closer to im them alike.


    Just like staring at an hourss timer, sooner orter, every bit of sand will fall.


    ...


    "It¡äs barely enough for a day¡äs worth of work..." Danzel said as he whipped the blood from his sword.


    As the people here didn¡ät wear any heavy armor or something out of metal to protect their bodies, counting that their bodies themselves were much less durable than the ones of a higher tier, cutting them down was to Danzel simr to how he cut butter.


    Though not entirely like butter, it did save him the trouble of switching among other weapons.


    `Too bad that those guys were just of the first tier. If it weren¡ät for the few 2nd-tier people, then I would even gain a day¡äs worth of XP¡ä he thought to himself.


    Ignoring all the XP notifications, he looked around to see how the 2 remaining wraiths together with Skull w managed to defeat all the remaining sand soldiers.


    Though the wraiths were one thing, from the very beginning he didn¡ät worry about losing Skull w. One reason was that he was essential toorge for the sand soldiers to strike her skull, essential her core to end her servitude.


    `She is pretty damaged though...I guess the removing of the flesh now is a must.¡ä Danzel thought as he looked at the ck blood falling from Skull w and bits of her own flesh being smashed through the ground, probably stomped by herself.


    Putting all such thoughts to the side, Danzel looked towards the most interesting ongoing events.


    The possession.


    When he turned his head and looked at the sand prison he frowned mentally.


    `It¡äs still isn¡ät over?¡ä Danzel thought as he looked how Nersan was still touching the girl''s head, thetter letting small groans of pain.


    Moving closer to them and waiting a few seconds to see if there is any change, even after waiting for a few minutes he turned to Nersan.


    "Hey, Nersan, how does it look? You need more time or?" Danzel asked.


    After a short silence between them, Nersan removed his hand and answered without removing his gaze from the girl.


    "Don¡ät call me like that." Saying so with a cold tone, he raised and clenched the mouth of Sarah and forced her to look into his ethereal golden eyes.


    Sarah whose eyesight was emotionlessly regained her light and stared at Nersan¡ärah with anger and unwillingness.


    "That wench...her continuous is much stronger than I had expected that it would be. Or is it rather spirit? No matter what, she isn¡ät letting me possess her." Nersan said with anger suited for the undead.


    "So you can¡ät do it?" Danzel asked.


    Those words hit Nersan¡ärah unfound nerve to the point he replied with spite.


    "Of course, I can possess her! If I do it though I will have to forcefully break her mind, which isn¡ät ideal as it could damage her brain. Since I will be using that body, I wanted to avoid doing as such.


    "But it seems I will have none another choice if things continue as such." Nersan¡ärah said with a cold tone who terrified Sarah.


    Though her hate of having everyone dying together with the fear of losing her body kept her resisting against the undead in front of her. The physical pain together with the mental one was starting to make her crazy.


    `Please! No more! Kill me already you monsters!¡ä She wanted to scream but her voice has long been lost with her screams of pain.


    "Mhmm...If it¡äs that then I might be able to help


    To both their surprise, they looked at the sword-wielding necromancer in surprise and hope.


    From which party was which was unknown, but Nersan¡ärah stared at him with doubt.


    "You? What do you want to do?"


    "Wait and see." Danzel said as he moved in front of Sarah who looked at Danzel as if seeing her next torturer.


    "Please~just kill me~" She said with tears falling down her head.


    "..."


    Looking at her in silence, Danzel stared at Nersan¡ärah and whisper something that Sarah wasn¡ät able to hear.


    Nersan¡ärah at first looked at him with suspicion before nodding in confirmation.


    Seeing that, Danzel raised his de up high and ced it a few centimeters away from her chest.


    "You will feel it just for a second." Danzel cold words sounded very sinister, but to Sarah, it was a sign of ending her torture.


    Pushing his de forward, she closed her eyes and prepared to feel intense pain in her chest.


    But all she felt was pain simr to how one would feel after cutting their cut in paper.


    Opening her eyes to see what was happening, all she saw was the de slightly cutting her at the sternal notch.


    Putting his de away, a few centimeters long cut was to be seen.


    "H-Huh?" She stared dumbfounded and confused at the necromancer, not sure what to make of this cut.


    Ignoring her gaze, Danzel stared at Nersan¡ärah.


    "Do it."


    The moment those words escaped Danzel''s mouth, Sarah felt an immense pain going through her chest.


    Her head was shot up and looked dazed from the pain.


    The feeling of cold metal and the blood that she coughed felt so real that for a moment.


    She forgot how she was supposed to keep her guard against a certain undead.


    As the feeling of cold metal and blood tasted in her mouth, her vision darkened as she felt her body going limp.


    When she thought she finally died though, a new voice inside her head was there to tell her how reality was cruel.


    "Don¡ät worry, I will use your body with care."


    The moment she realized what had just happend, it was toote.


    With Nersan¡ärah¡äs sand body falling apart, a dark golden glow escaped the body of the girl as the sand prison exploded and the mana around her increased and raged through the surroundings like a vortex.


    Danzel who saw that cached the falling crystal that was Nersan¡ärah past vessel and looked at the girl impressed.


    `Such a huge amount of mana.¡ä


    As the vortex of mana rage started to die on, the floating body of the girl fell to the ground.


    Or rather Nersan¡ärah¡äs new body fell to the ground.


    "Hahaha, I once more have mortal flesh..." Nersan¡ärah said with a much deeper voice than Sarah¡äs, yet still simr enough to realize it was Sarah''s voice.


    Gripping the staff that she used, Nersan¡ärah looked at it before shaking his head disappointedly.


    "Sigh...so primitive. Has this era equipped digressed as time went on? I guess I will have to use it till I reach the treasury..."


    "Are you done?" Danzel said with an ice-cold voice.


    Turning around to face Danzel, Nersan¡ärah nodded his head.


    "Yeah, the possession has now been fullypleted. I am the master of this body."


    Looking at the girls named Sarah¡äs body and Nersan being the one speaking made him feel weird.


    "Anyway, why did you choose this body and not the other magic caster ones? Though you said he was bad blood and all...Aren¡ät you mentally a male? Wouldn¡ät a male bodysuit you best?"


    Standing silent for a moment, Nersan¡ärah opened his mouth.


    "Indeed, mentally I am a male. But I have chosen this body for the very fact of its blood. You see, this girl is a descendence of one of my...past people. Though not royalty itself, she is the bare minimum of a body that I require.


    "I see..." Saying so without much interest, Danzel looked around as if searching for something.


    "So? Where is the treasury that you talked about?"


    "The path is right in front of you."


    Walking towards the walls, Nersan¡ärah reached out and input his dark golden mana into the wall itself.


    Danzel looked confused as he knew that doing so wouldn¡ät do much as the ce didn¡ät allow any mana to move at all (almost). But to his surprise, the seeming wall opened up simr to the gate and opened up a path.


    "There was such a thing?"


    Walking slightly ahead of Nersan¡ärah, they both went towards the secret path.


    As they were walking, Nersan¡ärah observed how his body felt much different than the one that he once had when he was one of the living.


    "It¡äs so different..." Mumbling to himself, Nersan¡ärah looked down and touched his left breast.


    `So that¡äs how they felt....¡ä He thought to himself as he soon found out slowly found out how the body worked.

 Chapter 224 - Sacred Treasury

    Walking down the secret path together with Nersan''rah, they shortly arrived in a fairlyrge room that had all sorts of magical items, from essories to weapons, few were in disy.


    Too few to be exact.


    "Is this the treasury that you bosted all about? If yes I am severely disappointed" Danzel said while reading the description of the few items.


    Most of them worked like keeping a spell inside of them that could be re-charged simr to his [Rune of Force], but most of them weren''t that useful.


    Some either created clean water by consuming ones or just shifted the sands to create a shape.


    The most useful of them all was a ring that could keep the sand floating to create a shield simr to how the wraiths had done.


    They were a nice item, but nothing impressive.


    "Of course not, this is merely the lobby of it." Nersan''rah said with a scoff before moving towards a wall that had a centimeter big hole.


    Creating sand out of nothing, Nersan''rah guided the sand inside the whole and started to shape it in a certain form.


    Injecting his mana too, a few *Click* sounds started toe out of the wall.


    *Click~Click~Click~


    After a few seconds of that sound continuing on, in the middle of the room the floor started with a staircase.


    "A secret room inside a secret room?" Danzel said with a dry towards Nersan who simply shrugged his shoulder on him, making his ponytail swing around.


    Taking a step towards the staircase, once he was about to reach the staircase, space seemed to move by contact with his feet.


    It seemed like a transparent fluid got disrupted by Danzel''s movement.


    "!!!"


    Fricking out, Danzel jumped a few meters back while pointing his sword towards the opened-up path from reflex.


    "Stop overreacting already, it¡äs just a dimension shift and nothing more." Nersan¡ärah said as he walked towards the staircase.


    Once his body seemed to go inside the transparent fluid, something weird happend.


    Staring him from the other side, Danzel saw how Nersan¡ärah seemed as if he was space ahead that he was supposed to be.


    `What the hell?¡ä


    Standing still like a statue, Danzel was ring at Nersan in confusion.


    Lowering his sword, he walked towards the staircase and slowly submerged just like Nersan did.


    "..."


    Fully inside, he looked behind him only to see a distorted look of the room he was in before.


    "You said something about dimension shift, right? What is- wow!"


    Looking towards Nersan¡ärah, or more precisely what was behind him, he was stunned.


    A wide area where the light was of a dark blue light that brought the illusion that there was a dark blue mist constantly in the air, following where the staircase was just a long pathway wherein ended in a circr tform.


    Looking down though was what truly shocked him.


    Countless floating pathwaysbined with staircases were floating through the air at a constant altitude whererge statues were to be seen. Not only was this whole ce magical, but the level of detail on the pathways that looked as if they were made out of pure gold was one of a master level.


    "You don¡ät know what a dimension shift is?" Nersan¡ärah said, making Danzel re-focus on him that the sight before him.


    "Dimension shift...rather the term of a pocket dimension would make it easier for you to understand? Anyway, we went through the entrance, space and time inside here changed to that of the current reality. Not only has the space being expanded upon allowing it to be as big as you see, but the flow of time also is much slower inside here than the actual reality." Nersan¡ärah said while walking down the stairs with Danzel following closely behind him.


    "Space and time you say...."


    It took Danzel some amount of time to work his mind around those two subjects.


    "So it¡äs simr to a spatial storage ring? This ce I mean?" Danzel said while being lost staring around.


    "What? of course not, you can¡ät evenpare a dimension shift to such an item. In fact, justparing them is insulting the former."


    "Compared to an item that expanded space and making it freeze with no flow of time where no living things can enter in. A dimensional shift is at a muchrger scale where everyone and anything can move. The fact that it''s also slow time means that it breaks thews of the world itself."


    As Nersan''rah finished speaking, an awkward silence surfaces with only their steps to echo in thisrge ce, mainly Danzel ones.


    "Who would even build such a thing...?" Danzel said the only thing that was in his mind.


    He did somewhat expect the treasury to be quiterge with any wonders to see, but never in his immortality would he see that the treasury was in a ce where it broke thews of the world.


    Danzel didn''t wait to get Nersan to answer, and yet he still got one.


    "The one responsible for building this ce was my father," Nersan''rah said, bringing in some interesting news for Danzel''s non-existent ears to hear.


    "You father you said? Built this whole ce!?"


    Nodding his head in confirmation, she stepped with Danzel on the circr tform at the end of the pathway.


    "My father was an exceptional magic caster, one that could bring natural disasters on wimps and create miracles worthy to be called work of a God. He was a great father, but..."


    *Wrough~


    A sudden shake happend to the circr tform where Danzel and Nersan''rah were standing.


    "..."


    Seeing Nersan not freak out imminently, Danzel observed his surroundings, only to find out that the tform that they were standing has begun to go down slowly.


    Seeing the huge gem in the middle of the tform bright up, Danzel realized that the tform itself was a magic item or rather a magical construct.


    ''Do mana crystalse in such sizes?'' Danzel thoughts were shortly interrupted by Nersan continuing his speech.


    "-But my father in the end was a magic caster just like me and my brother. Makings his mission to discover the secrets of magic."


    *Wrought!


    As the tform stopped moving, the two walked towards a simr path where this time had 4 total huge statues.


    At least that''s what Danzel thought they were before taking a better look at them.


    "Those are..."


    Standing tall at the high of 15 meters, the ''statues'' had the mouth of a brown wild while the rest of their head was ripped with bandages around that the only thing that they didn''t cover was a closed up eye.


    While those parts were that of flesh, the rest of their body was made out of the same magick stone as the whole building was.


    What made those ''statues'' more intimidating than the purebination of flesh and stone was the fact that every 6 of them had arge voulge burning with an immense amount of mana.


    If it weren''t for the crystal that was I racked and fused with the weapon, then the weapon would have exploded the instance the crystal was removed.


    What surprised Danzel was the fact that those ''statues'' had the aura of that of an undead simr to himself and Nersan''rah.


    Before Danzel could the many questions that were going through his head, Nersan''rah continued.


    "And those secrets didn''ty in only a profession of his, but also on the ones that he was less focused on. That includes forbidden magic such as necromancy."


    Turning towards the stunned Danzel, Nersan gave him the most lovely smile that he could.


    Doing that with him possessing Sasha''s made him look gorgeous to the opposite sex.


    Well, most of the human race it is.


    Seeing the ''statues'' starting to move and not look like some random statues anymore, Danzel cursed.


    "Such as the flesh golems that you are seeing right now~"


    "Dammit! Tell me that sooner you useless spirit!"


    Raising his sword in front of him, the 15-meter flesh golems turned their head towards the two of them.


    "Gaah~"


    Their breathing let the smoke out of their mouth simr to when molten magma meets with a block of ice.


    Each step they made held the strength to destroy a builder their size with ease.


    As the dust cover from years of end fell to the ground.


    The creation''s of Azur''rah moved to eliminate the intruders.

 Chapter 225 - Flesh Golems

    "Groowl!"


    "Greagh"


    Gnashing their teeth and making growls, the flesh golem let loose a constant eerie aura of that of the undead.


    Woken up from their slumber to fulfill their tortures mission that they were designed after, the flesh golems marched towards Danzel and Nersan¡ärah with hate and duty guiding their every action.


    "GROOWWLS!!!"


    Echoes of deafening growls filled the massive sacred treasury as every single flesh golem started to activate on the lowered floating pathways.


    "Though they are strength is incredible thanks to their size, that also is their disadvantage as they are as slow as they seem." Nersan¡ärah said while his staff crystal brighten up with mana.


    While he prepared his spell though, a massive hand made out of the same material as the flesh golem¡äs touched the corner of the pathway.


    Having jumped from a lower pathway towards the one where Danzel und Nersan¡ärah was, a flesh golem was hanging with one hand on the pathway.


    Raising his up to the tform, the newly arrived flesh golem turned his head towards the two without opening its only eye and position his other hand holding the massive voulge¡äs towards them.


    `This guy! he can¡ät be!¡äHe thought as he turned to Nersan¡ärah who didn¡ät notice the newly arrived flesh golem from behind them


    Putting the question of how does undead were capable to see in the first ce, Danzel knew when to recognize danger when he sees one.


    "Move!"


    Cursing internally, he swiped his towards Nersan¡ärah¡äs stomach with a swift and yet gentle motion, but once his hand made contact with Nersan''s belly, he inputted his whole strength and send Nersan¡ärah flying up.


    "Ough~!" Nersan¡ärah growled as he looked at Danzel in confusion and anger.


    Although it was much better than punching Nersan¡ärah into the air, which would probably result in inflicting internal organ damage on his newfound body, Nersan¡ärah still felt like he just got gut-punched.


    `This bastard! What does he think he is doing-!¡ä Nersan wanted to say as saw a massive voulge being pushed to where they were from a flesh golem hanging in the edge of the pathway.


    Realizing that he couldn¡ät jump away in time, Danzel changed his poster and readied himself for the iing voulge.


    *nk!


    Upon making contact with the voulge, Danzel felt as if his de met with a train going at top speed.


    *cchhh!


    Though Danzel didn¡ät fall or get crushed by the huge voulge, he couldn¡ät do anything but be pushed away by the sheer difference of strength.


    Holding his ground, he was pushed back while creating sparks in the ground from his armor legs. And once he reached the edge of the tform, Danzel was pushed to fall out of the tform they were.


    "Danzel!" Nersan¡ärah yelled as he quickly shifted the sands towards Danzel''s side.


    "Grweegh~"


    While growling, the flesh golem taking the lead of the other 3 flesh golems opened its bloodshot eye and looked towards Nersan¡ärah.


    As the eye glowed for a split second, the mana that Nersan¡ärah gathered for his spells was disturbed and went out of control, making the spell itself fall apart and the mana flee through the air.


    "What!?" Nersan¡ärah yelled in surprise as the sand that was about to catch Danzel from falling lost his influence and became fleeting sand.


    Seeing Danzel fall, he cursed the genius that was his father from cing such things as those flesh golems.


    `Dammit! Father never exined to any of us three brothers what does damn flesh golems were capable of! Back then I thought that they were only some physically strong puppets who were created out of necromancy and father¡äs knowledge, but to think that he would give some mere puppets a skill worthy to be called the bane of all mages of the 3rd-tier and below as a magic caster himself!¡ä


    The skill that Nersan¡ärah was talking about was of [Disrupt Magic], a skill capable to make a magic casterpletely useless if used correctly.


    Just as the spell is called, [Disrupt Magic] sends a wave of mana to disturbed the mana in a specific ce and time. Which if used correctly could make a spell¡äs mana bent, making it cancel the spell.


    As impressive as it sounded though and that it was, it wasn¡ät an all-mighty skill to go against every magic caster. It needed to be cast the moment the magic caster finished his casting.


    For that one is required to observe one enemy and determine when to cast it so that it cancels the enemy''s magic caster spells.


    Simply put, one needed to be extremely precise on the enemy moved, mana, and even casting.


    Things that Azur¡ärah knew.


    In the first ce, he designed the flesh golems to embody and master this very skill.


    And for achieving that, necromancy was needed.


    Nersan¡ärah remembered asking his father why he didn¡ät use the usual golems in the tower and used those flesh golems instead.


    `Though my golems would have been much stronger than those flesh golem¡äs, there is a limit in enchanting the strength of a golem which also would require resources that can be used to raise other disciplines in the tower. Son, I know you don¡ät like the art of necromancy but out of the other schools of magic. It¡äs one of the strongest types of magic-¡ä


    "I hate it when he is right..." Nersan¡ärah mumbled to himself as mana around his body was raised, lifting his robe and ponytail as if a gentle wind passed his side.


    Never in his life had he found the arts of necromancy necessarypared to his brother.


    Where he needed soldiers, sand magic could make many reliable minions that some undead, while any other spell could bring the same devastation that as a necromancy one.


    At least that''s what he thought back then. now, that wasn''t the case.


    Having experienced death once and being raised as an undead, effectively granting him a second shot in life with additional powers at that.


    He did lose most of his old body''s strength and mana, yes. But with the gift of immortality and using the dead to strengthen himself directly, his opinion of necromancy changed.


    Releasing his dead mana andbining it in one of his spells, Nersan created a new spell called [Dead Scythes].


    Raising the sand around him, he ended multiple sharp des that contained enough dead mana to detoured a normal rock to be dust.


    The Flesh golems of course used their eyes to make the few sharp des crumble and disappear in the air, with only small pieces of dead mana remaining.


    It was a spell that relied on numbers while not losing on its destructive power.


    Sadly the spell being made up just now not only consumed huge amounts of Nersan''rah''s body but also had a fatal weakness that the flesh golems possessed.


    Seeing that they weren''t capable to stop the flying sands of death, they all pushed their voulges forward and activated the enchantment that was in the weapon.


    With the crystal lighting up, the very same light spread and formed an ethereal shield that by first look didn''t look all that impressive.


    But once the flying scythes met the shield, they imminently exploded like water balloons meeting a brick wall.


    "..."


    Seeing that Nersan''rah was lost in words.


    Seeing their every single voulge creating such a shield.


    ''Not only did father put brains capable to cast something such as [Disrupt Magic]but also gave those mere puppets each an artifact capable to generate a damn shield used for magic! And he told us that he doesn''t want to waste any resource on them!''


    Grumbling internally, he was about to try another spell when by the side of his eye he saw the flesh golem that thrown Danzel away to have finally started up into his own feet while holding the huge voulge in his hand.


    Looking left and right, Nersan''rah was surrounded by the 5 flesh golems whose eyes opened and stared at him.


    ''Dammit, magic doesn''t work on those guys'' he cursed internally as he conjured a set of armor and transformed his staff into that of an I voulge that held the same effect as that of a staff that was capable to enchant and move mana more freely.


    Knowing that magic wouldn''t work in the current situation, he enchant his body to lessen the gap between his and their physical strength.


    "Gaaah!"


    As the flesh golem behind him swung his voulge at him.


    Creating sand through the ground, helped Nersan''rah catapult himself out of the range of the swing.


    Pointing his voulge that served as a staff above the flesh golem, sand shot out with incredible speed to pierce its eye.


    But before the spell could make contact with the target, the other flesh golems interrupted the spell.


    Nersan''rah of course aimed for that.


    With the sand is no more controlled by Nersan''rah, it inly fell to the ground and more importantly toward the certain flesh golems eyes.


    "Gaaaah!"


    As if screaming out of pain, theyopened his eyes wider and started looking towards Nersan with killing intent.


    Nersan''rah aimed to see if it can get blind, but seeing its condition to be still able to see, Nersan''rah started to tack his mind while dodging and the flesh golem''s attacks

 Chapter 226 - Flesh Golem′s (2)

    `Gh~! This power!¡ä Cursing internally, Danzel used his whole strength to stop the voulge, sadly with no sess.


    Leaving sparks and marks in the ground, Danzel found himself being pushed off the tform.


    `Dammit!¡ä


    Watching how the sand controlled by Nersan came towards him, he was about to praise his quick reaction.


    However, the moment he saw the sand slowing down and falling to the ground, he continued falling down.


    "If you have to do something right, you got to do it yourself in the end!" Danzel cursed as he scened his surroundings.


    "There!" Danzel rejoiced as he looked at a tform that was near the previous one.


    `This f*cker must have jumped from there to us¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    And he was indeed right with the flesh golem jumping from that tform, the only problem was that the tform had simr flesh golem¡äs walking there. Worse of all, if Danzel continued to fall as he was, he would just miss the tform and fall with the next tform looking to be 100 meters further away.


    Position himself better mid-flight, Danzel send out his mana below him and started to form two hands out of dark green mana.


    As soon as the mana hands were formed, Danzel stepped with his one foot on top of one hand while his free handheld the remaining mana hand to keep himself stable while the one mana hand that he was stepping on was slowing his fall.


    Commanding his mana hands to rise in the air, Danzel''s fall slowed each second more.


    But unexpectedly, he felt some sort of force making keeping his mana hands active.


    "What is going on..." Danzel mumbled as he concentrated on keeping the hands active.


    Usually [Hand of Mana Affinity] required a very low concentration from himself, essentially making them as some second limps, but Danzel now found himself each passing second that keeping mana hands was starting to require his whole focus.


    Without knowing why such a thing was happening, Danzel imminently went to abandon the ship that was his mana hands simr to a sailor who spotted dozen of holes under it.


    Realizing his focus on the mana hand he was holding, he strengthen the one below him while he guided his own mana into his legs.


    Using a skill he hadn¡ät used for a while, Danzel used [Leap] to jump off the fading mana hand towards the tform.


    *Tuck!


    Reaching the tform, Danzel rolled to the ground.


    But before he could rx, he sensed an imminent danger falling upon him.


    Literally.


    Trusting his instincts, he jumped to the side shortly after a massive foot made out of stone stomped the position he was previously at.


    Jumping back, Danzel recovered his poster while studying the enemy in front of him.


    "So it¡äs one of those guys..." Danzel said with a cold tone.


    Watching how they walked and movements were rtively slow in the scope of a 3rd-tierbated, Danzel knew not to underestimate them.


    `Confronting them with my strength would be mere suicide even for me who has to live.¡ä He thought as he already nned how to deal with them.


    The flesh golem who saw the intruder be still alive growled with his god mouth and raised the massive voulge to swing it at Danzel.


    Sweeping it so that it takes the whole pathway sideways, the air-cutting sounding from the voulge came closer to cleave Danzel in two.


    Having long realized the flesh golem¡äs invited to sweep him like a fly off the tform, he wasn¡ät stupid enough to stand and receive it.


    Just about the voulge was to cleave him two, Danzel using both [Leap] and [Swift Movements] jumped over the voulge.


    Pacing his feet to the floor, Danzel kicked the ground and dashed towards the hands of the flesh golem.


    Noticing that the intruder dodged his well-calcted attack, it wanted to stop and try once more to tten him.


    s, Danzel wasn¡ät going to let that of happening.


    "Slow!"


    Raising his sword up high, he swung at the stone hands holding the voulge a total of three times in a short amount of time.


    *Brough!


    The hands of the flesh golem soon crumbled and fell to the ground.


    If one were to look closer at the stones that fell of the flesh golem, one could see signs of blood. Danzel though didn¡ät pay much of any need of that and put his sole focus on eliminating the undead hybrid in front of him.


    The flesh golem that considered his hands useless now, raised his foot and went to stomp at Danzel.


    `There size is as much as their own weakness.¡ä Danzel thought to himself as he jumped back away from the flesh golem¡äs stomp.


    Thanks to their size, not only made the other flesh golem¡äs unable to help each other without risking friendly fire but also made their movements slow.


    And at that, Danzel was right.


    The fact that their size and materiel that they were built with made them both heavy and had more resistance with the air, making them slower.


    That was a fact.


    Swinging his sword towards the ankle area of the flesh golem, cutting arge part of it, the flesh golem fell to one of its knees and supported itself with the voulge like a stick.


    The flesh golem swung its arm back to where Danzel was to throw him off the tform but was way too slow.


    Being forced to jump back a few steps, Danzel dashed and cut the other ankle of the flesh golems, making it fall to both his knee and bending his back.


    And as Danzel predicted, the flesh golems without their legs were a sitting duck in front of him, waiting to be finished off.


    Jumping and running on top of its back, he went for the kill.


    Recognizing the intruder running on his back, the flesh golem head twisted slowly with blooding out of its throat until it did almost a 180-degree turn.


    When it finished Danzel was in front of its snout.


    "Yeah!"


    Opening its mouth to swallow the intruder whole to fulfill his duty and undying hunger.


    "So the mouth is from a skull wolve, huh?" Danzel mumbled as he swung his sword to the side of the flesh golems mouth and moved past its ferocious bite.


    Holding his sword with both hands, being now behind its head he swung mercilessly and left a massive cut that was as deep as half of the flesh golem''s head.


    "Yeah!"


    Screaming in pain, the flesh golem wanted to move his hands to hit the intruder, unbeknownst to it that it no longer had control over his body.


    *Bough!


    Junping off before the fall of the flesh golem motionless state, Danzel stared at the notification in front of him in satisfaction.


    [You received 100 000 XP]


    "For how annoying and time-consuming they are to kill, they give quite the amount..." Danzel said as he made the notification vanish.


    Hearing the howls of the lower floors and the other flesh golems walking towards his, his grip on the sword tightened.


    `I might actually gather enough.¡ä He though as he gathers the mana from his body towards his sword.


    But simr to when he used the mana arms, he felt some kind of force disturbing the mana in his sword.


    Shortly after, the gathered mana breaks away from Danzel''s influence and mixes with the air, making Danzel waste his mana.


    "Something is wrong with this ce, or maybe..."


    Gazing at the flesh golems making their way towards him, he walked towards them with each passing second bing faster.


    "-They are responsible for it?"


    One of the flesh golems swung his voulge down toward¡äs Danzel only to be dodged by thetter. Before he had the chance of realizing just like he did with the other flesh golem, the one that swung at him moved his leg away and left enough ce for another flesh golem to send a kick, taking him by surprise.


    "Those things-!"


    Pushing his sword forward and putting mana tings in his armor, he felt the full force of the kicking like an iing train which sent him flying and rolling through the pathway.


    He felt some of his ribs cracking, and yet Danzel raised up once more and nced at the now destroyed sword that Nersan created for him with annoyances.


    "Shit..." Cursing under his helmet, he threw the handle of the sword to the ground, he pulled a spear out of his storage ring while gazing towards the slowly moving flesh golems.


    When in fact was staring in the status window of the flesh golem that kicked him.


    "So that exins it..." Danzel said in understanding.


    Not only did that undead have some nasty Talents such as [Tortured One], [Abomination], and so on, but some of them multiplied his already high strength of 545 by 1.2 by the cost of his agility multiplier being 0,8.


    Making them extremely slow and slow.


    What interested him the most where one skill called [Disturb Magic] which seemed like the cause of the disturbance that he felt a moment ago.


    `That¡äs bad.¡ä


    Danzel though as he felt the focus on his mana ting to be disturbed and forcefully cancel the effect of his skill.


    For him such a skill, although annoying, it wasn¡ät that he couldn¡ät fight because of it.


    Since [Swift Movements] and [Leap] were ones that happend inside his body, they weren¡ät able to be disturbed, it didn¡ät affect him much.


    But he knew full well that this wouldn¡ät be the same for Nersan¡ärah.


    `Skilled as he might be, he is screwed against those things.¡ä Danzel though.


    Looking at the tform where he fell and then back at the flesh golems, he tightened his grip on the spear and walked towards them.

 Chapter 227 - Flesh Golems (3)

    `Though I could take my time to finish those giants, I doubt that Nersan could still be in one piece. And for my goal, I would need his help.¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    The treasury did interest him quite a bit, but to his ethereal eyes had a secondary of importance. Something like a side quest.


    Although it would be nice to get a new weapon and armor of better quality, it wasn¡ät necessary.


    First of all, he came and make his home the tower to farm the remaining XP for his remaining 5 missing levels that hopefully would unlock the evolution process.


    `I nned to earn them slowly by minding my business alone in the tower, but I guess that¡äs no longer an option.


    Having some giants bags of XP in front of him that were basically worth 20 hours each. Danzel of course didn¡ät want to miss any of them.


    The only problem he currently found was theck of weapons that he had for destroying those giant undead hybrids.


    "I should even collect the other weapons from the fallen before following Nersan..." Danzel mumbled annoyed as he guided the mana in his body.


    Using [Swift Movements] to elerate towards the flesh golems, the moment he saw them raise their voulge up high Danzel switched his grip on the spear and took a throwing pose.


    "Take that!~" Using his whole strength, he threw the spear towards the eye of the nearest flesh golem.


    *Fsoooh~!


    Although he wasn¡ät very much used to throwing his spear like a javelin, he still had the knowledge of the [Intermendiate Weapon Mastery] which by now turned into his current swordsmanship, [Death Guarding Swordmanship].


    Essential giving the necessary knowledge of how to throw a spear and use all other weapons decently.


    s, practice makes perfect.


    And Danzel had none of it, making the spear fly towards the neck instead of the eye.


    But that didn¡ät pain Danzel much as his throw achieved what it was supposed to do.


    Distracting the giant flesh golem.


    The flesh golem in question felt threatened by the spear and raised its hand to catch the spear.


    *Brough~


    With the spear prating the palm of the flesh golem¡äs midway, some cracks appeared, but that was it.


    The flesh golem but its hand away and looked at where the indurated was supposed to be with a growl, but to its surprise, he found nothing there.


    That was because he already reached near its feet.


    The other Flesh golem though didn¡ätmiss Danzel nearing the fellow tortured one.


    Before it wanted to sweep its giant voulge and send the intruder flying off the pathway or cut him in half and be done with it, but now it changed its mind.


    Moving a step back, it pushed the spear voulge blunt end between its fellow tortured one in where the intruder was in order to crush him.


    "That makes thing¡äs easier..." Danzel mumbled as he used the skill [Leap]to jump up high to dodge the iing voulge.


    *Brough!


    A loud sound of the blunt end of the voulge meeting with the floor of the pathway was made, but the floor didn¡ät show any signs of damage which impressed Danzel who now was standing in the voulge shaft.


    The moment the flesh golem saw the intruder standing in his weapon, it dragged it back with one hand while the other palm was pushed towards Danzel to p him as one would do with an annoying fly.


    Gathering his mana once more, he used [Leap] once more while ignoring the heat that came from the abuse of mana and moved away from the danger of being pped away.


    Jumping towards the back of the still confused flesh golem, he brought another spear out of his storage ring and pierced it to its back to use it as a footing for himself.


    Realizing that something hit its back, the flesh golem reached out to touch the spot and pull out something that was stuck in its body.


    Bring it forward and looking at what it was, the flesh golem growled in confusion at the sight of the spear.


    "Growll~?"


    All that without realizing that Danzel was mid-air in where its neck was.


    Bringing out an axe that he had from the storage ring, he swung at the flesh golems neck and cut arge portion of it, effectively cutting the area where the brain sends outmands towards the rest of its stone body.


    "Gwaaah~!"


    Just like before, a loud scream sounded like a mix of a dog and a human being in extrusion pain.


    Even when Danzel receive the notification that he had killed the flesh golem, it didn¡ät stop howling while the remaining stone body started to fall.


    `I got to hurry before it falls...¡ä Danzel though as he moved swiftly towards the top of the flesh golem head while ignoring the pain that it was suffering.


    Time was in essence and he couldn¡ät care less of his enemy''s pain.


    Looking at the tform he fell from, Danzel gathered his mana in his legs.


    "You will have to wait forter." Danzel said towards the remaining flesh golem before jumping as high as he could towards the tform.


    Though he had the axe as a shing weapon, because of the weapon''s nature it was more suited for powerful hits that makingrge cuts with swords.


    Observing the status of the flesh golem, he did notice that the damage expert their head was extremely minimally in where their head was the sweet spot in damaging the.


    Simr to how his body worked and yet different.


    In his case, he could only be fully destroyed or dir if his skull, which was holding his consciousness was destroyed, but destroying other parts of his body would make him feel weaker from the lost dead mana in his body.


    For the flesh golem as far as he noticed, the head was where the whole undead and its consciousnessy, and the body itself was a tool that didn''t affect the main body which is the head.


    Getting off point, Danzel needed weapons that he could use to effectively destroy their head.


    He had the axe now, but he didn''t fancy him much.


    So reaching to Nersan who could make weapons and guide him to the Treasury was a must.


    But even after using the flesh giant to get a higher footing, using [Leap] to jump higher and [Swift Movements] to make himself lighter,Danzel was only a meter away from reaching the tform he fell off even after reaching his hand out.


    One had to say that below him was nothing else but a fall to the meter is the end.


    Before he was pushed with the voulge, making him reach the tform he was before, but now that wasn''t the case.


    If he fell, he will probably die.


    That though didn''t his mind though.


    Maybe it was because he somewhat expected it or that because of his talent [Undying] he felt much less fear of death.


    That didn''t mean that he was going to let himself fall off through hundreds of meters.


    Using his mind, he cast two mana arms in front of him, the one holding the tform while the other one holding the end of the other hand, essentially making a chain of arms long enough for Danzel to reach.


    Letting the axe fall, he gripped the ha da swiftly and dragged himself high enough to let its other arm grab the tform before he started to feel the disturbance of mana.


    ring below him, Danzel felt annoyed at the remaining flesh golem starting at him with its bloodshot eye.


    "Peeking bastard, just wait until I finish my dept on those here." Danzel cursed as he dragged himself on the tform.


    Looking ahead of him, he saw Nersan tobe now dressed up in armor and wielding a spear.


    Nersan used to create sand under his fret to jump around in the air to escape the grasp and voulges looking to cut hi newly rued body.


    Daniel just seeing that was impressive because not only was Nersan physically strong but was also using magic in such an effective way if one were to consider the circumstances of the flesh golem disturbing the spells of him.


    Looking from far away, he looked fine and slowly but surely damaged the flesh of golems stone body even if only a little bit.


    But Danzel knew that wasn''t the case.


    Though he had some absurd amounts of mana, there was a limit.


    ''That''s probably also the case on his body.'' Daniel thought as he looked at the Nersan.


    Though his true body was of the never-tiring undead, his current body was of a living girl, who probably didn''t have much stamina or endurance in her stats.


    ''I guess I should start moving.''


    With [Swift Movements] still being activated in his body, he grabbed thest axe that had and rushed towards one of the flesh golems.


    Nersan''rah who was observing the whole field quickly took notice of Danzel and was surprised to see him up here when he actually fell from the tform.


    Seeing him running at the flesh golems though, he wanted to shout out how strong they were.


    But before he could say something Danzel swept his axe on the ankle of the flesh golem,pletely destroying it and making the flesh golem fall to one of his knees.


    Seeing this inflict such strength, Nersan sucked the words that he want to say back to his throat.


    ''He is indeed strong....'' He thought as he dodged much easier with a flesh golem out of his way.

 Chapter 228 - Swordman And Magic Caster Of Equal Power

    Turning to see what destroyed a part of its body, the flesh golem eye locked towards a small figure with dark cracked armor and helmet, wielding an axe in one hand.


    "Gwaaagh!" Growling and sending saliva out of its mouth, it swung its hand to p the small figure.


    *Fhooosh~


    Dragging the air with it, the flesh golem¡äs palm came like a raging wave to sweep Danzel away.


    Sneering at the flesh golem¡äs attempt, Danzel instead of running away like he did the whole time decided to stand his ground and raise his axe.


    "You are just a pile of old stones..." Danzel said as he swung his axe packing all of his strength towards the palm of the flesh golem.


    *Bough!


    The flesh golem who expected to get rid of the intruder, looked now his hand that was now fully destroyed in confusion.


    Though their minds were already broken centuries ago, because of Azur¡ärah¡äs necromancy, he made it so that those tortured ones would forcibly keep their brain to work towards the given roll at maximum efficiency.


    It was cruel, but because of that the flesh golem quickly understand what happend.


    Looking at the small figure that was the intruder, he growled and notified the other flesh golems to put Danzel at the same level of danger that Nersan¡ärah, if not a level higher because he was capable of damaging them.


    "Useless..." Danzel cursed under his helmet as he stared at the crumbling of his axe.


    `I didn¡ät even swing it all that much too...¡ä Danzel though as he just realized the other flesh golems turning towards him except for one focusing on Nersan¡ärah.


    "Heh, it seems I am quite popr." He said as he channeled the mana in his body to use [Swift Movements].


    `Not even I am stupid enough to fight against 5 of those things.¡ä


    "Gwaagh!"


    "Gwaagh!"


    "Gwaag~!"


    ...


    The flesh golem¡äs raised up their voulge¡äs and swung them down like a thunderp on the location of Danzel.


    *Vchuuuoh~!


    The pathway floor lighten up in faint golden light and like a rimple traveled the whole pathway before disappearing.


    With the strength that the flesh golem¡äs had, even the magic cast in the pathway that kept it from being damaged and floating in a fixed location was put through strain.


    s, the enchantment held and stabilized the next second.


    Danzel who jumped back and avoided that pulled one of the few remaining spears from his storage ring and took a throwing pose.


    Before the flesh golems could raise their voulge¡äs once more, Danzel threw the spear with all of his strength.


    `Please hit!¡ä


    *Fshooooh~!


    One of the flesh golem¡äs who saw the spearing near him raised its hand up high and protected his head, mainly the eye of his from the iing spear.


    But once it did, the flesh golem noticed the spear flying past his head,pletely missing him.


    "Gwahah~!" It growled in a way that resembledughter.


    Danzel who noticed that said in a cold voice.


    "I wasn¡ät aiming for you."


    Though he didn¡ät know if those things could understand what he was saying, even if they did it was already toote.


    The spear that flew as fast as a ballista''s boat was heading towards the one flesh golem that had its back turned to face Nersan¡ärah.


    Without seeing iting, by some miracle the spear that Danzel threw hit the flesh golem head with such force that pushed the whole head of the flesh golem down by the seer impact.


    That alone though didn¡ät make the flesh golem die,


    Danzel was fine with that, he didn¡ät even n to kill the flesh golem in the first ce.


    As if they had nned this days ago, Nersan¡ärah didn¡ät waste a single second of the distracted flesh golem that kept him from using his powerful spells.


    "Impaling sands-"


    "Impaling sands-"


    "Impaling sands-"


    Casting his spell, three ovepping voices of Nersan¡ärah could be heard that brought to however who heard it shiver though there back. At least that would have been the case if Nersan¡ärah didn¡ät have the voice of girls.


    Unbound by anything, Nersan¡ärah created sand using his mana to use as material. The sand shot out and started to form into thick swordnces that had many small spikes and a secondter turned the formed sand into sharp metal.


    In a matter of seconds, Nersan¡ärah created over 30 of thoserge swordnces.


    With its eyes glowing in a dark golden light, Nersan¡ärah pointed towards the flesh golems location.


    "[Dessert¡äs Dread]!"


    "[Dessert¡äs Dread]!"


    "[Dessert¡äs Dread]!"


    With three ovepping voices, the swordnces elerated like rockets and flew towards the flesh golems.


    Gripping the spear stuck in his head and pulling it out, the flesh golem raised its head the exact moment where tens of swordnces came towards him.


    "Gwaagh!"


    Piercing its chest, destroying two of his joints, and opening a hole in the half of his head, the flesh golem screamed in agony as it started to fall.


    "Gwagh! Gwagh!" The one who had its ankle destroyed and was forced to look forwards sent out a signal to the others and raised with his remaining good hand the voulge and created a barrier thanks to the enchantments of the voulge.


    The barrier was strong enough to hold even against a spell from a 4th-tiered magic caster and wasrge enough to cover the whole front of a flesh golem.


    Making it protect itself from the few swordnces and let the other remaining ones fly towards his fellow tortured ones.


    Unfortunately for them though, except for one who managed to turn early and activate his barrier, the others found themself halfway through their turn to be impaled by multiple of those sword spears and leaving huge holes in their body, including their head.


    While the cries of the fellow tortured ones sounded through the sacred treasury, the two remaining flesh golems didn¡ät waste any time to stare at Nersan¡ärah with hate and activate their mana disturbance skill on him.


    "Tch, two remain..." Nersan¡ärah clicked his tongue as he was starting to think of ways to destroy the remaining two.


    But before he could, he heard Danzel calling him.


    "Nersan¡ärah! Sword!" Danzel yelled as he kicked the ground and passed the standing flesh golem.


    Seeing where he was heading and its request, Nersan¡ärah managed to control the sand from the ground that came from his previous spells tonch towards Danzel''s arm and form a sword out of metal.


    Though it was difficult for him to turn the sand into metal, shifting the sands by his will was nothing difficult for him.


    Gripping the sword, Danzel imminently guided his mana into the de.


    That was only possible because the flesh golems had their focus on Nersan¡ärah and disturbing his mana.


    "Fall." Danzel said with a sinister tone as he became so fast that he disappeared from his spot for a split second and appeared in front of the kneeling leg of the flesh golem he previously damaged.


    Letting his sword scream out loud and dere what was toe, the air itself screamed from an air-cutting noise.


    *Fsheeeeen!


    With the help of the flying mana de and his own strength, he cleanly cut the whole leg of the kneeling flesh golem in half and appeared in front of it.


    The flesh golem who relied on its leg happend to suddenly fell forward by the sudden loss of one of his limbs.


    Falling face forward it saw the small ck armored figure in front of his fall.


    Raising its mouth to swallow him whole, Danzel used [High Jumb] and cut through half of the flesh golems bandaged head. Leaving it to fall followed by a massive flow of blood and screams of the wolve mouth part.


    [You received 100 000 XP]


    Standing on the still screaming course, Danzel couldn¡ät avoid the dark blood from the flesh golem tarnishing his armor.


    But Danzel didn¡ät pay much of any need for his armor.


    Turning his head towards the remaining flesh golem, he guided his mana into the de he held.


    Not a secondter, the flesh golem looked at Danzel and activated his mana disturbance skill on him, making the mana that was being guided in his sword go of waste.


    "Are you sure that you want to look towards me?" Danzel said with a cold yet sinister tone.


    Using that time, Nersan¡ärah using the sand to walk through the air, went behind the flesh golem and raised up his mana to cast a spell at any given time.


    Realizing what was going on, the flesh golem pointed its voulge towards Nersan¡ärah, activating the barrier while still looking at Danzel and continuing disturbing his mana.


    The flesh golem that both of that intruder who killed his fellow tortured ones held an equal amount of danger. It considers the ck-armored one to have less firepower, but being both strong and fast enough to endanger him to damage, while the female intruder was much easier to handle, but if let alone had a destructive power that wiped almost every one of the fellow tortured ones.


    In its mind, as long as it kept itself with the barrier safe from the female''s spell and fight the ck-armored intruder with its strength, the chance of winning was at its highest.


    It was the only logical decision to follow against a swordsman and a magic caster of equal power.


    Danzel und Nersan¡ärah though scoffed at the disy that the flesh golem showed though.


    "Let¡äs see how long youst.." Two cold voices said in unison.

 Chapter 229 - Treasuries Vault

    At the same time where Danzel and Nersan¡ärah went ahead to fight the flesh golem.


    A particr duo arrived in the run-down vige that had neither a name nor a good reputation.


    One of the duos wore some long-sleeved clothing that to the other who saw the 2-meter tall figure almost got a heatstroke by imagining how the man wearing a weird hat and a silver mask covering his mouth would feel with such clothing.


    But what got their attention first was the big sheath that the man carried.


    `Is this guy an idiot?¡ä


    `Can he even pull out his de with its length?¡ä


    Such things were being whispered about the outsider among the ones in the vige.


    With the man taking the spotlight though, they failed to miss the guy¡äs partner being a small girl wearing a white robe which also hid her face and her skin from all others'' sight.


    Seeing her height and how she was walking with full confidence, it would be pretty obvious that she was a kid.


    As their clothing was so unique and the fact that they were outsiders brought lots of attention to them.


    Even unwanted ones.


    "Grandpa...why is everyone looking at us?" The small asked, her previous confidences going away as lots of strangers were looking at her.


    Noticing her distress, the elderly with the weird hat and silver mask didn¡ät even have to scan his surroundings in recognizing the gaze of those guys.


    `Here too...¡ä The elderly called Agares frown.


    "Let¡äs go, Shiro, I heard that there is a good restaurant in the other part of this ce. I bet you are hungry, right? Grandpa will be taking you there."


    "Really! Yay!" The small girl yelled with a glim of happiness on her face.


    Not even showing a shadow of a doubt that her almighty and goodwill Grandpa would ever lie to her.


    With those twoing for the first time in this ce, it didn¡ät take a genius to see the elderly lie.


    Gripping softly her hand, Agares together with Shiro turned into another street to avoid the gazes, but to his surprise, the ones that showed the most hostility in their eyes started to follow the duo.


    Seeing that, his eyes turned cold.


    Taking another route towards an alley with two walls of buildings to the left and right side.


    But before long, Agares halted his steps.


    "Reveal yourself¡äs"


    His voice came out like a whisper that was spoken next through your ear, making the people hidinge out and block both sides of the road.


    "Hehehe~Look at him guys, another big fish swept up right into us." One man carrying a bastard''s sword in his shoulder said to the others behind him.


    By the seer aura that he was releasing, Agares who could see one''s aura was able to determine the man in the middle as their leader, as he was the strongest among them.


    What else he could observe was the equipment that they were carrying was way above someone of their strength.


    "Who send you here?" Agares said with a stone-cold voice towards them.


    The answer that he got through felt...stupid.


    "Send us here? Ha! You believing that you are a big shot or anything!? Let me tell you, the owner of those guys were simr bricks like you believing to be something special. Guy¡äs like you came right into our palms with that crazy magic caster¡ästest recruitment post. Seriously, whoever that Death call or whatever his name has excited the explorers." The man with the bastard said arrogantly as he raised his bastard¡äs high to reveal its worth.


    "Since such guys aren¡ät going to pass the recruitment anyway, we might as well harvest the loose ends, don¡ät a agree?" He said with a sinister smile on his face.


    As the kept bloodlust was continuously increasing by the second, Agares felt his sleeves be dragged lightly.


    "Grandpa..." Shiro said with a cute yet worried voice.


    Seeing his granddaughter, all the bloodlust was reced with a radiant smile of a loving grandpa.


    "Don¡ät worry, Shiro. Grandpa would take care of those bad guys." Agares said while rubbing her head, carefully not to put away her hood.


    "Heheh~" Shiro giggled from the gentle and caring touch of her grandpa.


    "Now Shiro, close your eyes for grandpa, please. The next time you open them we will be in front of the restaurant I told you about."


    "Mhhm!" Nodding her head, Shiro covers her eyes with two small pale white hands.


    `Good...¡ä Agares nodded as he grimaced the moment he stared away from her granddaughter towards the ones responsible for their current situation.


    Reaching out his hilt, the man with the face of the man holding a bastard sword got serious.


    "Ha! You want to fight us!? We might have spared you and the girl if you have just given us your item, but-"


    "Silence."


    Agaresmanded quietly, but his voice oozed out so much pressure and killing intent that the face of the people around them quickly started to turn to one of shock.


    "You-!"


    Before being able to finish what the man with the bastard sword was about to say.


    Agares draw his curved sword out.


    *Shhhhh~


    It was as everything was ying in slow motion in the view of the thieves. And yet in just a split instant.


    They lost track of the old man''s sword.


    That¡äs when they noticed that they couldn''t feel any parts of their body at all, even their vision seemed to turn if not being split.


    "Huh?"


    Agares''s sword was so fast that for a split second it broke the sound barrier and cut multiple times all around him, leaving only the air being cut and leaving the space where it was swung with a void that waster filled with the nearby air.


    Even the strongest of them who had his gaze towards Agares was only capable to see multiple white clones cutting his subordinates at such speed that even he wasn¡ät spared being cut into multiple pieces.


    Only the sound of the falling body parts could be heard in the small alley.


    Putting his curved sword back into his sheath.


    `Mere fools.¡ä Agares scoffed internally as hugged Shiro and made her face his chest.


    Although he showed things that he shouldn¡ät at Shiro at such a young age, he still tried his best to spare her of such gruesome sight that was the result of his action.


    "Let¡äs go, Shiro." Agares said as disappeared from his location.


    Thest thought that he had was of something that the leader of those thieves said.


    `It seems I finally find your traits.¡ä


    *****


    After a few hours, in the Sacred Treasury...


    Danzel was channeling his mana into his palm.


    "Now all you have to do is use your mana like how I exined you to activate the enchantment." Nersan¡ärah said from the side with his hands crossed.


    "Mhmm...I think I got it now." Danzel said.


    Inputting his mana into the circr floor, the gem in the floor lighten up, and the circr floor that they both were standing at started to shake before slowly descending lower.


    Seeing it work, Danzel stood up and nodded in himself as he looked at the cracked sword beside him.


    "Hey, Nersan, can you make me another one?"


    "..." Looking at the cracked sword, Nersan¡ärah raised his hand to control and create sand around the sword.


    Not muchter, the sand went around his sword and repaired it to its peak performance that was a few hours ago.


    The sole survivor of the flesh golem¡äs that first appeared, although it fought by its best of abilities. It ended in a devastating defeat from his side as he and Nersan¡ärah practically broke and cut him into pieces with a little effort.


    With Nersan¡ärah supporting him from the side, practically creating a distraction, and him himself being a bit of a nuisance who needed constant attention because of his firepower, Danzel found it easy to finish a sole Flesh Golem in this situation.


    After finishing that sole golem, they had easily a few more dozen to finish off in the lower tform that was practically built like a maze thanks to the nature of the circr tform (Elevator).


    Of course, Both his and Nersan¡ärah decided to be cleaver this time around from finishing those hybrids between a golem and an undead.


    Instead of going into closebat, instead went around into finishing the flesh golem using a range instead of close quarterbat from the higher pathways. At he had to say that it worked like a charm.


    With the tform blocking the [Disturbing Magic] Nersan¡ärah was capable to finish them slowly but surely.


    Well, almost finish them off as Danzel told Nersan¡ärah t leave them half alive.


    Nersan¡ärah didn¡ät like much that suggestion as it would waste more of their time, he did agree in the end as time was on their side.


    It wasn¡ät like there was some sort of timer for them to rush. And with Nersan¡ärah having a body, his true body stopped breaking apart.


    The reason why Danzel wanted to leave them half alive was obvious...


    `I got enough¡ä Danzel thought internally as he watched his XP having already reached the required amount to get to Lv.100.


    That was only possible because he was the one who killed almost every flesh golem till itsst floor that they were descending at.


    On his way here he also learned how to operate the circr tforms and make them float either back or down, effectively connecting them into a pathway. He simply had to ask for Nersan¡ärah to exin to him how it works and after a few...tens of tries he got the hang of it.


    As for the reason why he learn how to use them, he had his reasons.


    Before long, the circr tform came into a sudden halt, but this time not in a tform.


    "Wee~"


    But on the bottom of the floor itself.


    "To the Treasuries Vault," Nersan''rah said.

 Chapter 230 The True Nature Of The Sacred Treasury

    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 95


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.30]


    Health: 21010/21010


    Mana: 2650/3300


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 425 Agility: 500 Intelligence: 300 Endurance: 381


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery]


    Skills: Death Guarding Swordmanship Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [High Jump Lv.1] [Presentless Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Swift Movements Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Mortal Reminder Lv. 1] [Hand of Mana Affinity Lv.9] [Vanguards Defense Lv.5] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1] [Cursed de Lv.1] [Death Influence Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1] [Curse of Scourge Lv.1] [Raise Undead Lv.8] [Undead Reconstruction Lv.1] [Sense of the Damned Lv.1]


    [Remark: A Young Wight who almost reaches his peak of power! Worthy to be called a freak among his fellow undead. It has little experience with Death Magic, but still good enough for others to recognize you as a Wight. But because of your past, being mistaken as a Lesser Lich isn¡ät impossible.]


    [XP: 14 600 725]


    "Wee to the Treasuries Vault." Nersan¡ärah said with a prideful tone, making Danzel focus on the front of him and not his status.


    `Now isn¡ät the time...¡ä Danzel thought bitterly as he made the floating window in front of him disappear


    Though he had the XP to get thest 5 levels to reach 100 and have even some to spare, he wasn¡ät dumped enough to use them now with the presence of Nersan¡ärah.


    Although they fought together and even spend some time learning about each other''s personalities, Danzel couldn¡ät bring himself to trust Nersan¡ärahpletely.


    So if he really were to trigger his evolution by reaching level 100, then if Nersan¡ärah were to backstab him or something that sort he would be screwed.


    He didn¡ät know what would happen if he were to be attacked mid the evolution process and he wasn¡ät either willing to know.


    For now, he decided on the wait-and-see approach.


    As he himself was interested in the promised items inside the vault.


    "Hmm, so on the other side should the treasures be, right?" Danzel asked as he stared in front of him.


    The vault in question was a huge gold circr half where that had a high of over 20 meters.


    The vault had three main blue mana crystals with many smaller ones supporting the enchantments that were in it. The golden-like metal used for it made the vault look extremely extraordinary.


    Though it was a beautiful piece of craftsmanship, Danzel asked the important question.


    "Can you open it?"


    Upon hearing that, Nersan''rah scoffed and made his way towards the vault.


    "I can already imagine what you are thinking, but don¡ät worry-"


    Raising the staff spear up high, the mana crystal glowed and spread his mana around the gathered sand that was nearby.


    Like a building-up storm of sand above him, Nersan¡ärah guided the storm towards the vault.


    "I will keep my word..."


    The sand traveled through the air and mmed directly to the vault.


    At least that''s how it seemed at first.


    Upon taking a closer look, the sand was slowly going inside some tiny holes that could be easily overseen by one''s in sight.


    When every piece of sand has gone inside the vault, a glow showed inside the three main mana crystals.


    Twisting his staff spear, Nersan¡ärah started to control the sand inside the vault with his mana in a particr way that make the glow of the mana crystal soon turn in the shape of some writings.


    Danzel who saw those writings would have frowned if he had a face.


    `Those letters...they look simr to runes, but not quite right.¡ä


    As Danzel had quite some experience in handling runes, he could recognize a rune when he saw one. And what he was seeing right of now was definitely not a rune.


    "Done"


    Saying that the rune-like letters glowed the brightest, making it activate all the smaller crystals.


    A massive ray of light came out of the vault itself by the mere activation of the vault enchantment, indicating that the vault was opening.


    *Grrrhh~<sub> </sub>


    Taking a big breath, Nersan¡ärah raised his shoulders and his chest up as he were an emperor who came back to his pce.


    "Follow me." Nersan¡ärah said towards Danzel.


    "..."


    *Tap~Tap~Tap~


    With only Nersan¡ärah staff spear hitting the ground and Danzel''s steps to be echoing around, the two stepped inside the treasury.


    "Wasn¡ät you father that this build this ce?" Danzel asked as he watched his surroundings in amazement.


    "Yeah, why you asking?" Nersan¡ärah said.


    `It¡äs the same..." Danzel thought to himself as he stared at the treasury that held a sky clear resemnces with the towers library floor, but much grander than the one that he saw before.


    Not only were there many books to see but on top of the bookshelves wereying different kinds of items, being resources such as mana crystals of higher quality or artifacts.


    They were there.


    The top part was where the magical itemsy waiting such as nes, rings, swords, and armors while the top was filled with books that were protected with what he saw as a barrier.


    Seeing all that, Danzel couldn¡ät help but say...


    "Didn¡ät he go overboard with all this?"


    Though he had no idea how barriers and other kinds of enchantments were being made, he knew something.


    And that was that enchantments were expensive to make.


    Be it the mana crystal themselves or the natural resources that were needed for the enchantment.


    It was naturally expensive.


    As of how he knows that?


    Well, that was the excuse that Hanson used to him, wherever he asked for a high-quality enchantment sword or armor.


    His current armor did have an enchantment that made it tougher and more durable, but the enchantment was from a lower grade.


    Although he found it really cheap for Hanson to give him the bare minimum of armor with enchantments back then, now he was sure d that he had at least one.


    Without the enchantments and the runes on them, it would have long ago been broken from all the shi*t he had to go through.


    Nersan¡ärah hearing that simple shrugged his shoulders and pointed in a certain direction.


    "Though this ce was called a treasury, the true identity of this ce is that it was the workce of my father. That simr vault over there leads to my father''sboratory while we''re we are is simple his storage area."


    Touching the other closed vault door with his hand Nersan''rah said with a bitter voice.


    "And a magic casters storage of the level oft father isparable to that of hundreds of treasures."


    Hearing the flesh golems there made much more sense than before.


    The flesh golems weren''t there to pose a challenge on the said intruder. As he and Nersan''rah alone managed to clear every single of them by using their range.


    But they were there to help the master of this treasury fight off other magic casters!


    The more he thought of it, it more it made sense.


    Since a warrior focusing more on physical strength than of magical knowledge wouldn''t be a threat to the treasury because he wouldn''t able to break through the vault in the first ce.


    Only a magic caster could open the vault, and that''s only if they knew how exactly.


    Seeing the magic caster''s we''re the only treat, a bunch of flesh golems disturbing and having a shield against magic was the killerbination for magic casters.


    And that''s alone with the flesh golems.


    If the master of this ce were to join in the fight without having to deal with the flesh golems, the one with an advantage was clear to see.


    "Now as promised, I will allow you to take some of the artifacts from these ces..." Nersan''rah said as he guided the sands towards the area where the swordsy."


    As if they were working like some second limps of Nersan''rah, the sand picked up a longsword of the pile of weapons together with an armor set.


    "...here" Taking ast look at them, Nersan''rah ces those in front of Danzel.


    "Don''t mind me..." Danzel said as he touched every piece of equipment and revealed their status descriptions of every single one.


    [Long Sword of the Sand Emperors de]: A de crafted by the Emperor of the sands as a gift towards one of his beloved sons'' Kenuza''rah. The enchantments make the mana to be spread much faster and with less effort, even I promise the effectiveness of the mana itself, making it enchant everyone attack using mana. Additionally, I ones will, they are capable to control the sands around him by their sheer willpower. Sadly the de would nevery in the hands that they were intended to go.


    [Armor of the Sand Emperors de]: A armor crafted by the Emperor of the sands as a gift of his beloved son. Is capable to create sand and turn them into the metal to te one''s armor. Additionally, both toughness and durability have been vastly increased. Sadly the armor will never be able to be won''t and protect the one that was intended to.


    Starting at them in silence and amazement, Nersan''rah had a smirk on his face.


    "Now as I kept my part of our deal, how about we talk about business. Rue Danzel."

 Chapter 231 Mistrustful Thoughs

    *Tuck!


    Throwing the current armor that I had to the ground together with the sword, making them both crack and get destroyed, I equipped the new armor that was given to me as promised.


    Seeing the enchantments on both the equipment, he did regardless of leaving himself wide open in case of Nersan¡ärah attacked him.


    Flexing his body, Danzel nodded in satisfaction at the new armor and sword that he had.


    The longsword was of a simr style as the one that Nersan¡ärah made for him constantly with his sand magic, making him think that Nersan¡ärah nned to give him this sword.


    A sword that could very well have been for his brother to use.


    The armor that he wore inparison to the ck one was now a grayish-blue color made, from a metal that the description didn¡ät say much about, to his surprise.


    Although it wasn¡ät as high as his ones before, he could feel how the armor that he had now was much tougher and more durable.


    Considering how strong they would be after he carves a few runes into them, he couldn¡ät help but grin to himself.


    Raising his sword up high, he swung through the air with all his strength, resulting in a gush of wind to push the nearbyying sand away.


    The sand that was flying away though came suddenly to a halt.


    Soon after, the sand started to fly back towards where Danzel was. With the gathered sand, he raised his hand with the palm open and made the sand levitate above his palm in a ball shape which was rotating slowly.


    A feat that wasn¡ät possible, was thanks to his new longsword possible.


    He was able to control the sand simr to how Nersan¡ärah did.


    "Now as I kept my part of our deal, how about we talk about business. Rue Danzel." Nersan¡ärah said.


    ncing towards him, his expression before turned stone cold.


    Removing his will towards the floating ball of sand, the fell through his fingers and sshed to the ground.


    While he was letting the little remaining sand fall of his hand, Danzel pointed his de towards Nersan¡ärah.


    "That fact that you are making, Nersan¡ärah. I can recognize it." He said with a cold and ne tone. Simr to how he wouldment about something obvious.


    Of course, Nersan¡ärah couldn¡ät understand what Danzel meant by that.


    "My face...? What do you mean by that?" Nersan¡ärah said as he touched his face which had a frown.


    "..."


    Maybe it was because Nersan¡ärah was in a mortal body that he recognize the way Nersan¡ärah looked at him was no different than the way Gerak, the dwarf cksmith, and Hanson, the shadow merchant.


    Or rather to be more specific, Gerak, the dwarf cksmith found his runecrafting awe-worthy and something he wanted to have into his work, while Hanson, the shadow merchant looked at him like a tool.


    Though those two different waypoints were totally different.


    To Danzel it could be one and the same.


    And how Nersan¡ärah was looking at him was a mixture of those two.


    That¡äs why Danzel imminently understands what Nersan¡ärah meant with "business".


    While still keeping his arm up high and the other pointing the de at Nersan¡ärah, Danzel looked at him with his ethereal dark green eyes.


    "Although we might have known each other for some amount of time, the craft of runesmithing doesn¡äte out cheap." Danzel said with a cold voice.


    With his face turning serious, Nersan¡ärah¡äs glowing dark golden eyes stared directly at Danzel''s ethereal eyes even with the fact that he wore a helmet.


    "So I have already been figured out, huh..."


    "..."


    Seeing the unresponsive Danzel, Nersan¡ärah sighted internally.


    "It¡äs indeed true that I have been meaning to ask you to carve some runes to some equipment from this treasury. With runesmithing being categorized as lost knowledge, even I wasn¡ät capable to replicate their nature. Considering those things, I would have been a fool to not request this as a magic caster who seeks secrets of magic..."


    Hearing Nersan¡ärah¡äs exnation, he didn¡ät think much of it.


    Based on his voice, Nersan¡ärah sounded genuine in his words.


    s, that didn¡ät change the fact of how Danzel¡äs statement.


    "What are you willing to offer me to uphold your request." Danzel said with a hint of arrogance intentionally in order to see how Nersan¡ärah would react.


    Seeing how Nersan¡ärah was tightening his grip on his staff while his face remained the same, Danzel knew he struck a nerve of the death spirit.


    "...As long as you carve runes into some of the equipment, I am willing to repair and give you the mana crystal that I was using as my vessel."<sub> </sub>


    Hearing that, Danzel''s interest was spiked up.


    The former vessel that Nersan¡ärah was talking about was none other than the [Mana Essence Crystal], one of the highest quality mana crystals that Danzel was aware of.


    Though he didn''t know how to put them to use, he knew what they were for.


    Being a natural mana generator, one could connect it to be it enchantments or what he theorized was runes.


    Although runes work indefinitely as the mana had been bonded into an object tost forever, they were a few exceptions like the [Rune of Force] that needed to absorb the nearby mana to recharge his barrier or ghoul making rune that had a simr rule.


    Both those runes required some external output to recover and be recharged. So the idea ofbining crystal with runes to recharge them if not enchant the rune''s effect has been bugging his mind.


    He tried a few variations but every single one failed, either because the runes themselves sucked or that the mana crystal was bad.


    So having an offer to gain such crystal tempted Danzel.


    Lowering his hand and sword, Danzel nodded at Nersan''rah.


    "We have a deal. But don''t push your luck and demand me to carve runes in every single item in here."


    Unbeknownst to Nersan''rah, the reason Danzel was holding the hand up wasn''t to see how the sand fell to the ground but to be ready to use his [Status].


    If something really happened that made him and Nersan''rah start a fight, Danzel was already prepared to press down on the upgrade button of either his ss or subss level to use all his remaining XP in order to raise his attribute to the limits of his XP.


    Although if that were to happend, all his efforts of gaining such arge amount of XP would have been lost. XP could be regained.


    Danzel vaguely knew what Nersan¡ärah was capable of.


    Considering the bunch of wraiths that he had locked inside of his true body, if they were going to fight then Danzel would have gone all out.


    Seeing Danzel ept his offer, he raised his staff and shifted the sands to carry various equipment and crystals with a cold expression on his face.


    "Since the mana crystal is extremely rare and needs some time to be repaired, I will be waiting for every one of those items to have a rune in them. As of what kind of rune I will be leaving it to you...as long as it isn¡ät anything destructive and you write down what you did, the mana crystal shall be yours..." Nersan¡ärah said with a cold expression on his face.


    Touching the equipment and putting them into his storage ring, Danzel turned around the circr tform and started to activate it.


    "It shall be done in around a day or two of time...till then don¡ät disturb me. I will be outside the treasury." Danzel said while hinting at the words `disturb me¡ä.


    Making Nersan¡ärah believe that Danzel didn¡ät want to give him the chance of learning how runesmithing worked.


    And that was only partially true.


    In fact, Danzel doubted that could replicate his runes by just watching from the side.


    Although the shape of the rune could be easily learned, the input of mana was much more difficult to get understand, not to forget that some runes required to use his very own will into his mana like the rune that turned the dead into ghouls.


    After several minutes of going up with all the different circr tforms, Danzel reached the very top where they first came from.


    Walking through the opening of the dimensional shift, the space was like the water that was suddenly disturbed.


    Walking through the secret passage out to where Nersan¡ärah got his female body and where the bodies of the vigersy. Danzel raised his hand.


    "It should be alright here..."


    Making his status window appear, he suddenly got reminded of something.


    Looking to the side where Skull w was resting, he send out amand.


    `Go and watch that path until I say otherwise.¡ä


    "..."


    Standing up from his sitting potion, Skull w moved towards the secreted passage looking as if he was dragging his feet unwilling, making one think that Skull w was unwilling to uphold his liegemand.


    Danzel didn¡ät think much of it as he knew that Skull w was a mindless undead who couldn''t resist his orders.


    "Now, let¡äs begin," Danzel whispered to himself she pressed done on the upgrade button of his current level.


    [Level has increased from Lv.95 to 96]


    [Level has increased from Lv.96-]


    [...]


    [Level has increased from Lv.99 to 100]


    [You reached the Maximum Level of the Wight race]


    [Evolution option has been unlocked]

 Chapter 232 Upper Tier Undead Choice

    [Please choose the race you want to evolve to]


    The moment the choice option appeared, the dead mana inside his body shot out and drowned the whole room with the dead mana.


    Although if he were to do that, Danzel''s mana would be quickly drained, this time it wasn¡ät the case. It was as if the spent dead mana that was being released was going back into his body only to continue the circle.


    Making the scene look like Danzel bathing in a beacon of dead mana, with him being in the center.


    While Danzel watching what was happening to his mana, he noticed a part of mana being dark green, suggesting that this mana was from his affinity itself and not the dead mana.


    He quickly took notice of that because the dark green mana was raising in front of him and started to take a form right in front of him.


    What was much weirder was that the mana that was supposed toe out of him, felt foreign to some extent. He could feel that it was his mana, but for a reason unknown to him, the mana felt much purer and stronger, yetcking something that his weaker mana had.


    Before he could make head and tails out of this phenomenon, fourrge status screens ovepped with his foreign mana.


    "This is..." Seeing the status screen appear in front of him, he imminently realized what it was based on the picture that there was to be seen.


    There was a total of four different pictures, each having a description and the name of the picture.


    Staring at the left picture, Danzel recognized the name of this character being mentioned in the Necronomicon that he had.


    It read.


    [Duhan]


    A 4th-tier undead that ording to the Necronomicon was supposed to be a headless undead who held its head and route stead that bought death to all.


    And based on the picture, Danzel could say that it was really urately depicted.


    In the picture where the moonlight was present, standing on top of a hill was an armored skeleton horse which had his armor and heels stained with the blood of the corpses below the hill. Those below who were still alive run with a terrifying expressions on their face.


    Even though the skeleton horse would be considered scary, Danzel guessed that the terrifying expression of those mortals wasn¡ät from the horse itself, but the being that rode on it.


    The being in question wore a dark ted armor simr to Danzel''s past armor, the only difference was that the ce where its head was supposed to be was nothing but space. The headless humanoid figure had an ominous de that was chipped up heavily in one hand, his other hand was raised up and holding the missing head.


    The crimson ethereal eyes of the Duhan¡äs head blighted the moonlight into red and made it seem like a blood moon, while its scream brought out an eternal fear into the hearts of the mortals who were unlucky enough to cross paths with this Duhan.


    At least that¡äs how it looked to Danzel.


    Lowering his gaze towards the description, he began reading it.


    [Duhan]: A Warrior who defied death itself and manifested himself after losing his head. Out of the many undead, a Duhan is of the few ones that can¡ät be artificially be created by the use of Necromancy. Only those with the strongest will to enact their vengeance towards those who cut their head can turn into Duhan¡äs, making each and every single one of them into an immortalized walking disaster upon the living.


    Turning his head after finishing the one description, he looked to the one beside it.


    This picture was taken ce in a graveyard filled with bones and opened up graves at the night.


    And among one of those very graves was a huge hugged back skeleton whose chest had other skeletons'' skulls fused together.


    Another surprising fact was that this undead had another set of arms directly to its back, each holding arge sword.


    Its other hands were collecting other parts of skeletons.


    [Gravekeeper]: a rare type of Undead who infused its body with the fallen undead to increase its dead mana. Each collected body has a chance of enabling the skill for the Gravekeeper to use. They are known for being masters of weapons with terrifying strength that have as many lives as they have skulls in their chests. Although their absorption of dead mana makes them stronger, that brings them to lose arge part of their mana senses from their own mana, making them unable to castplicated spells.


    "Uwagh..." Danzel muttered upon finishing reading the description of [Gravekeeper]


    Because of the pressure that was given to him during his evolution, he first decided to read them all before thinking of which one is the best to not waste any time.


    But upon reading that description, he was amazed at how good it sounded.


    Shaking his head, Danzel put those thoughts to the side for now and went to read the next one.


    Compared to the [Duhan] and [Gravekeeper] pictures where they had an ominous feeling.


    The other could only be described as overwhelming.


    In the picture, there were hundreds if not thousands of hundred of different undead fully equipped with items that could be simrly ranked as his new sword.


    From Skeleton to zombies, Draugr to Wights, and much more other undead that Danzel didn''t recognize we''re staring at a Skeletor figure sitting on a throne made out of bones and metal of unknown origin.


    With a golden crown, imputed with a purple mana crystal and robes filled with enchantments of the highest rank.<sub> </sub>


    The skeleton figure was staring down at the undead army, while inside its chest was a crystal-shaped box glowing with ominous mana.


    Danzel didn''t need to read the title more description of this undead to realize what it was.


    [Lich]:Magic caster''s who either cast their mortality away by crafting the so-called phctery and putting their soul in or Lesser Liches. They are considered the kings of the dead with their mastery of magic, especially those of the Dark Arts such as Necromancy.


    Seeing the option of bing a Lich surprised Danzel.


    He long had thought that the option of bing a magic caster type undead had been removed from the moment he chose to be a Wight. But seeing the option of a Lich, the most infamous of all the undead as the option was quite interesting.


    ''That option is a no-go...I invested way too much in my physical attributes and skills. Bing a Lich now would make those 3 years meaningless. But...''


    He was undead.


    What were 3 mere years to an immortal being?


    Though his current options power-wise were incredible, as of now his choice was more into bing a Lich.


    The reason for it was because the other choice had a much more different body than he currently had.


    The [Duhan] description had everything that he wanted but one thing.


    The fact of being headless.


    Maybe because using the talent [Undying], Danzel guessed he looked at the evolution option of bing a [Duhan].


    Through his past years under the watch of Hanson, he figured out that the skills that he could buy directly were influenced by his knowledge and status information such as sses and his race.


    How exactly it worked he didn''t know, he just knew that it was somehow rted to the option he would unlock.


    So maybe because he came back from the dead after having his skull destroyed together with his physical strength.


    As to why he got the option to be a [Gravekeeper] he had absolutely no clue.


    Not only was this undead twice, if not thrice his current size.


    But the fusion part sounded was as strong as it was creepy.


    Maybe he gained it because he used different weapons, making his status give him another set of arms.


    His hugged back and size though was enough for Danzel to cross him out of the options.


    The Lich was much easier to guess as to why he got it, as he himself was capable of some amount of magic.


    So if he didn''t want to carry his head around or be an overly big skeleton with a meases body structure, Lich was the only option that he had left.


    "No, there is still one..." Danzel muttered as he gazed at the final picture.


    The picture was taking ce on a battlefield filled with a red sky.


    And as red, as the sky was, it couldn''t bepared to the earth below.


    Crimson blood stained the ground so much that the former pond.


    Based on the crimson color that oozed from the corpses that were the source of such blood, one could guess that those corpses were in recently.


    And the corpses weren''t a few to say the less.


    One could count thousands of mortalsying dead on the ground.


    And on top of those corpses, a figure wearing a dark ted armor and releasing an aura of death to his surroundings.


    From his helmet, the two ethereal eyes looked through the surroundings, as if it was searching for another prey.


    If one were to look closely towards the face of the sword-wielding figure, one could clearly see a skull gnashing his teeth with hate faithfully to the one of every undead.


    Lowering his gaze Danzel read the character¡äs name.


    And it stated.


    [Death Knight]

 Chapter 233 Vision Of A Man

    "A [Death knight], huh?" Danzel mumbled to himself as he took a better look at the undead standing on top of corpses.


    Except for the fact that he was a bit taller than he, they had the same body build.


    Neither need to carry ahead nor have another set of arms.


    Simr to the [Lich], a [Death Knight] looked much simr to a skeleton.


    Lowering his gaze towards the description, Danzel started reading it.


    [Death Knight]: Beings that wield death itself in their very hands. In every single existence of such an undeadys the blood of ten thousand who lost their life. Out of the few heroes who achieved such a feat are capable to turn into beings known as Death Knights. They have one of the purest dead mana out of the undead, making their body registered to otherwordly influence and also allowing them to dwell deeper in the arts of Necromancy. Those who fell at the hands of a death knight will never be able to experience a peaceful death.


    After finishing reading the description, Danzel stared back at the [Death Knight] in the picture.


    He found this description simr to that of the [Duhan] and yet different.


    The [Death Knight] option had many smaller details that were rather vague, such as their resistance against some kind of influence or their pure dead mana. But overall, Danzel found the description satisfying.


    Not only would the evolution of a [Death Knight] be an improvement of his current race, but he will also keep his head in the same ce where it belonged.


    `There isn¡ät much of a choice, huh.¡ä Danzel thought as he briefly gazed towards the [Lich] option before turning his head towards the [Death Knight].


    Raising his hand and pointing at the picture of the [Death Knight], a small window appeared in front of him.


    [Will you turn into a Death Knight?]


    [Yes]


    [No]


    [Your choice can¡ät be reversed]


    Without much of any hesitation, Danzel tapped at the [Yes] option.


    As soon as he was confirmed his choice, the dead mana that was being released spiked up like some raging mes and started to go inside Danzel¡äs body.


    Danzel wasn¡ät surprised by the dead mana returning to him, but he was surprised by what was happening towards the four pictures of the different undead.


    While the three pictures of the [Duhan], [Gravekeeper], and [Lich] started to show signs of cracking and breaking apart.


    The pictures started to be alive.


    The [Duhan] who had its head risen up, looking towards the terrified mortals suddenly started to move and turn his attention towards Danzel.


    Raising his sword, a huge wave of dark mist gusted out between his skeleton horse. The dark mist that traveled towards Danzel seemed like it could go out of the picture any second, but before it did the picture cracked and the dark green mana spread to the surrounding dead mana.


    Simr to the [Duhan] picture, the [Gravekeeper] who was picking pieces of bones from the ground suddenly raised its head and looked towards Danzel with the two swords being engulfed in mana.


    With his ethereal eyes being revealed on every single skull that was fused in his chest, it ran towards the "outside" of the picture.


    s, the picture broke apart and fused with the dead mana.


    The [Lich] inparison to the two, just had his head turned, silently staring at Danzel with its ethereal eyes till his picture also grumbled.


    Thest picture that remained glowed in an ominous dark green light and was the only one that didn¡äte to life.


    And instead of crumbling apart, the [Death Knight] option turned into a dark green mist and flowed inside of Danzel¡äs body together with the nearby dead mana at an extremely fast pace.


    Danzel who awaited for the euphoria-like feeling that evolution brought every time felt this time an intense pain in his mind.


    "Aggggh!"


    Grabbing his helmet, Danzel screamed from the intense pain that he was constantly assaulted with.


    "W-What is going on!" Danzel yelled as he threw his new helmet to the ground and grabbed his skull in hopes to lessen the pain.


    The dead mana that he released and was now getting back inside his body made his view pitch ck, making him believe that he found himself inside the realm of the dead. The only way he knew that this wasn¡ät the case was because he could feel his equipment still being on his body.


    Gripping the hilt of his sword, Danzel swung to the air and released a dark green wind de in hopes to cut through the dead mana.


    s, it was useless.


    While his bones were gettingrge, Danzel could hear countless unintelligible voices yelling inside his head, which made him almost want to bang his head towards the floor.


    It was such an intense pain that one wouldn¡ät be surprised that one would go insane from it. Danzel though wasn¡ät one of those who would go insane. While he was in constant pain, he didn¡ät stop thinking of ways out of his situation.


    What is happening?


    Did something go wrong?


    How can I stop this pain?


    Did the evolution fail?


    Have I wasted too much time on my choice?


    Is this part of the process?


    Having such thoughts in mind and his vision being overwhelmed by the dead mana, Danzel wasn¡ät able to notice that a dark green illusion-like copy was ovepping with his current body and fading away only for it to appear once more.


    While his scream was seemingly endless, the dead mana that was in the room started to turn the corpses of the vigers into natural-born undead zombies.


    Raising up their chest, the dead screamed alongside Danzel.<sub> </sub>


    "Arghhh!"


    "Graghhh!


    "Greagh!"


    And before Danzel knew it, his vision that was pitch ck started to form into different surroundings that Danzel saw before.


    ***


    With the presence of the pain no more, the darkness that gued Danzel''s view was removed, but to his surprise, he no longer found himself in the sacred treasury that he was a moment ago.


    In fact, he was currently moving without him knowing.


    `What is going on?¡ä Danzel though.


    Once he tried to look around, he found himself he couldn¡ät.


    Taking a better look at his surroundings and seeing the hands of a man moving as he was running, Danzel felt confused.


    It was as if he was sharing a first-person view with the man who was running in a hallway.


    `He is quite slow, at best he might be a peak 1st-tier. But that doesn¡ät matter, I got to find out what is going on.¡ä Danzel thought as he tried to control his mana that he always passed.


    Unfortunately simr to the rest of his body, he could only be a bystander and watch how the man was running in the hallway.


    Soon after the man stopped right in front of a door.


    As the man brought some keys out of his pocket, he suddenly put one of his hands on his mouth.


    A second after he did, the man spitted blood out of his mouth, although his hand caught most of the blood, some did go towards the door.


    "Dammit..." The man muttered in a voice that was for some reason extremely familiar to Danzel.


    `Who is this guy? Is he one of the illusions that keep appearing before me?¡ä Danzel thoughts didn¡ät interrupt the man from opening the door and mming it close.


    Although the room didn¡ät have much light, Danzel was capable to see his surroundings thanks to being undead, while the man moved as if he knew this ce.


    Hasting his steps, the man walked towards a cab with a set of mirrors.


    But before his face was about to reveal, the bloodied hand of the man touched the mirrors and open them up.


    The inside cab was many different things that Danzel didn¡ät recognize. The item that got most of his attention was the one that the man grabbed in his hand.


    It was some kind of cylinder ss container that had some kind of liquid inside.


    As soon as the man touched the cylinder container though, a knocking sound came from the door that he closed.


    Turning his head around, the room that they were supposed to be suddenly changed into arge room that seemed like a huge theater that had it''s seeling opened for the people who were sitting inside to stare at the sky.


    `Huh? What just happend?¡ä Danzel confusion further continued as the man who once held the cylinder contained now held a violin bow instead.


    "Why..." The man muttered to himself as the violing bow suddenly started to crack, the cracks showing a bright red light.


    Before Danzel could make sense of what happend, the light engulfed his whole vision and the man was thrown back as if an explosion had just urred.


    The people who were in the opened-up theater became some dark mist that turned the surroundings into a simr dark mist till everything into a pitch-ck that Danzel recognized imminently.


    "The surroundings changed into the realm of the dead?" Danzel wondered, finding himself still in the first-person view.


    And suddenly, he felt an immense dangering from the unending darkness.


    He wanted to realize, but he couldn¡ät


    Out of the darkness, a massive hand grabbed the man.


    "A fortunate unexpectantly, for a soul like you." A cold voice sounded through the darkness.


    *Crack!


    Danzel heard a sound simr to a ss breaking, his focus though was on the terrific figure that was before him


    "What the hel-"


    Before he could finish, the cold voice appeared once more.


    "Very well, your wish has been acknowledged"


    Amid his confusion, the surroundings changed in an instant in the ce where Danzel was originally from.


    In the Sacred Treasury.


    Looking at his surroundings, Danzel was found himself copsed to the ground.


    "What was that?" Danzel said with a cold voice as he stood up.


    The moment he raised his hand though, not only did he see all the zombies walking aimlessly around.


    But he also found a floating window in front of him.


    The content of the floating window shocked him.

 Chapter 234 False Expectation

    [You acquired O Fearful Death]


    [Strength Increased by 50, Agility Increased by 40, Intelligence Increased by 30, Endurance Increased by 60]


    Danzel who saw the top part of the window was pleasantly surprised by the sudden increase in his attributes and acquired a new talent.


    And yet he couldn¡ät get happy as he continue reading the text below.


    "W-What?" Danzel stuttered as he got closer to the window, wondering if he read wrong.


    If Danzel had skin, it would already have been pale by now.


    [You failed to meet the requirements to be a Death Knight]


    [After finishing the requirements, the evolution will take ce]


    [Click Here to see the requirements]


    Danzel stood there frozen like a statue, unable to understand what the message implied.


    You didn¡ät meet the requirements.


    You failed.


    Those words echoed through his mind like a broken radio that wouldn¡ät stop repeating the same crappy song.


    Danzel didn¡ät have the strength to see the requirements to be a Death Knight.


    Or rather, he never felt as strong as he was now.


    As he gained a whooping of 50 Strength and 60 Endurance and the fact that he couldn¡ät control his strength, he felt like he could actually damage the sacred treasury walls if he tried with his sword.


    His rationality though stopped him from doing just that, as he knew that doing that would probably break his sword. If the Flesh golems didn¡ät manage to leave a scratch on this material, then Danzel¡äs mere 495 strength would do nothing.


    Even if one counted his stats multiplier.


    s, Danzel was too shocked as he never expected to see such a thing.


    Although he would have expected it if it were one of his sses since they always gave him dump missions, a requirement for him toplete.


    An evolution till now never gave him any kind of requirement that was needed to be done.


    So the sudden appearance of one took him off guard, and not in a good way.


    "It¡äs alright, the status window says that as long as I meet the requirements, I will be able to finish my evolution. It¡äs good enough that nothing bad happend."


    `If I weren¡ät counting the enormous pain that I receive that is...¡ä Danzel grumbled to himself.


    Raising his hand and pressing on the window to see the requirements, once he did, he couldn¡ät help butugh helplessly.


    "Haha~, are you kidding me?" Danzel asked the status.


    He knew that no reply woulde as always and also knew that to others he would seem like he was talking in the air.


    But he couldn¡ät help it as the requirement in front of him was too absurd.


    "I should have known with the nature of the statu- or rather with the description of the evolution options." Danzel said as he read the two given requirements.


    [Requirement: Raise you [Undeath Corruption] into the fourth stage.]


    [Requirement: Kill over 10 000 of the living by your own hand.]


    [Currently achieved: 386/10 000]


    As if he was just hit by a sledgehammer in his skull, Danzel didn¡ät know what to think of such requirements.


    He found the first requirement quite easy to achieve.


    As it needed only the use of XP to finish it, Danzel could easily farm the required XP in just a few months. Heck, if he went out of his way and iste himself as he originally nned to do in the devil¡äs tower, then it would be much faster.


    It was just a matter of time before hepleted the first requirement.


    But he couldn¡ät say the same for the second requirement.


    Kill 10 000 people.


    Or rather 10 000 of the living.


    Seeing the counter of 386, Danzel was sure that he didn¡ät kill as many people as the counter said. Although the majoritywere people, quite some amount was from beasts such as goblins, Ravenous Eyes Hounds, and even a Devil that wasn¡ät from this dimension.


    Although he only mentioned those, they were a few more of the normal beast such as normal wolves and deers, but they were just a few of the many.<sub> </sub>


    Most of his kill count was from him working for the shadow merchant Hanson. Since Hanson knew that he was learning the arts of necromancy, he mostly request living `experiment material¡ä. He still remembers how Hanson''s face grumbled when he asked this request.


    If only he knew that all the trouble that Hanson had to take to bring living `material¡ä to Danzel would not be for actual experimentation on the dark arts, but to fill Danzel XP wallet a tiny bit more.


    Although it was petty for him, Danzel saw that as a small victory against Hanson through those 2 years of essential imprisonment.


    And even after emerging from the cursedke 3 years ago.


    He only killed 386 of the living from the required amount of 10 000.


    A number that could easily win him the title of a mass murderer.


    Yet the status told him to kill more than 10 times the amount of his already kill count.


    Absurd.


    "Sigh...I should have known." Danzel said in self-loathing.


    "The description of the other undead weren¡ät there for nothing."


    The [Duhan] description had said that for a Duhan to be created, he has his head cut off and have a strong resentment against the one who did it.


    The [Death Knight] said that only those who killed more than 10 000 people can be a [Death Knight].


    And the biggest hint that he missed was the Lich option.


    He felt incredibly stupid considering how he ignored an essential detail that hecked.


    Hecked a Phctery.


    He long knew that the undead called Lich needed a Phctery which they could bind their souls into and essentially grant them immortality.


    So if Danzel had chosen to be a Lich...


    What about the Phctery that hecked?


    It wasn¡ät like a Phctery was something easy to make or an object you could choose to make to be your Phctery.


    He couldn¡ät just bind his soul on his sword or a mere.


    A Phctery was supposedly a magic item of the highest regard ording to his Necronomicon. An item that all Necromancers desired to know its secrets.


    "Good thing that I didn¡ät choose to be a Lich... Although the amount of people that I need to kill is absurd. I can see the goal out of the long path. Compared to learning how to craft a phctery it¡äs much easier..." Danzel said to himself in selffort.


    He didn¡ät mind killing any of the living to say the less, but he couldn¡ät imagine the consequences that it would bring of doing as such.


    "..."


    After staying silent for quite some time, thinking of any solution to that requirement, Danzel sighted to himself.


    "That problem can wait forter..." Danzel said as he looked at the zombies around him.


    "Imand you, gather in front of me." Danzel said with a deep voice.


    His body had a vastly of increase death aura around his body traveled together with his voice through the whole room, making the zombies turn to look towards Danzel.


    Seeing their not follow hismand, Danzel shook his head.


    "Even though I was the source of their waking, they don¡ät seem to follow my orders." Danzel said as he disappeared from his current ce and reappeared in front of one of the zombies with his sword raised up high.


    Without much hesitation, Danzel cut the zombie into pieces with ease. Ignoring the XP notification, he went left and right and killed every single zombie that was present.


    As the zombies didn¡ät consider him as an enemy for being a fellow undead, the zombies waited there without going to stop his rampage against Danzel.


    Well, even if they all rushed at Danzel, they wouldn¡ät manage to do much.


    "Now that I have finished with those, let¡äs see a new talent..." Danzel said as he opened his status and pressed on his new talent [O Fearful Death]


    [O Fearful Death]: From a being that surrounds his body with the element of death, the ones that start to fear for their life in front of you have their mind more attuned towards that fear. Being affected by this will decrease their mental stability by 20% and make you appear like the fear they envision as such inside their mind. Because of that, a small part of dead mana is surrounding your body constantly.


    "Not abat-oriented talent, huh? I guess better than nothing." Danzel said, not particrly excited about his new Talent.


    As far as he knew he only had one ability that affected one''s mentality directly. But even then, the talent by itself wasn''t particrly exciting.


    Compared to what he envisioned from getting his evolution done, this was nothing.


    "Right, I almost forgot about Nersan''rah''s items..." Being suddenly reminded and wants to distract himself from the failed evolution.


    Danzel went ahead and started carving runes into various items.

 Chapter 235 Nersan′Rah′S Offer

    Exactly as Danzel said, he finished carving the runes on all the items that Nersan¡äsan gave him in about two days.


    Although at first, he expected to finish them in a day, because of his sudden growth in his attribute, the agility increased his overall speed and intelligence increased how efficient his mind could process information, making his overall carving speed faster.


    The reality was much crueler.


    As he didn¡ät yet get used to the changes in his body, he needed to be extra careful when he carved runes.


    As carving runes was all about precise work of hand movement and controlling one''s mana, even the slightest mistake could lower the grade of the rune by a whole grade.


    Even though the items he carved runes weren¡ät going to be of his use, he still went out of his way and make them as best as his abilities allowed him.


    As of currently, Danzel was using his [Rune Vision] and was carving thest rune into a huge mana crystal. Its size was much bigger than the mana crystal that he was promised to get, but better was it not.


    Using his [Status] to see through the description of the given items, Danzel could easily see through the fat piece of mana crystal being of an inferior gradepared to the other one.


    With Danzel''s mana seeping out of his finger that was touching the crystal, Danzel cancels his talent, making the world take color once more and giving his hearing once more.


    Danzel raised the crystal up with his hand and observed it for a few moments before making it disappear inside his ring storage.


    Standing up from his crossed leg position, Danzel bough out a piece of paper and a pen, before writing something.


    "I guess I should go meet Nersan¡ärah about now..." Danzel said as he made the paper disappear simrly to the crystal.


    Making his way towards the secret path, Danzel saw Skull wying down, looking like she was about to die out of boredom.


    `Right, I told it to guard that ce...¡ä Danzel thought as he paused beside her without giving Skull w a second look.


    Skull w who saw him pass beside her as if got rejuvenated back to her living state. She jumped up straight and brought out her decaying tongue that was about to fall off at any moment.


    But upon realizing that her¡äs Liege just crossed the weird-looking barrier, she fell to the ground looking aimlessly forward and upheld the orders she was given to her.


    Going through the dimensional Shift and walking towards the circr tform, Danzel activated the enchantment just as Nersan¡ärah thought him how, making the circr tform descend to lower levels of the Sacred Treasury.


    While doing so Danzel open up his status.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 100 [Max]


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.30]


    Health: 25 410/25 410


    Mana: 3738/3740


    Attribute points: 15


    Attributes: Strength: 495 Agility: 560 Intelligence: 340 Endurance: 461


    Talents: [O Fearful Death] [...] [...]


    Skills: [...]


    [Remark: A Wight that managed to see the higher realm mastery over death, but not fully enters it and ims it as his own. Such a case has never been heard before without a second party involved. Many would recognize you as a true anomaly and a truly born undead with high potential. Only time would tell what such an anomaly would turn into. Too bad that his knowledge about death is toocking for such great potential.]


    [XP: 4 635 725]


    "Tch, can¡ät be nice for once, huh?" Danzel scoffed under his helmet upon seeing the Remark.


    Supposedly he grows has been recognized to be one if not the fastest among his fellow Wight out there. But such a fast growth also let him leave all his skills behind to rot in the lower stages of their evolution. Which made him feel bitter to think about as it essentially proved the annoying remark right.


    Though he was physically now strong, his techniques and spells weren''t capable to bring most of his strength to any use.


    In the past, it was fine since his mana amount wasn''t all that high and he had to be careful to not waste any.


    But now his current amount of mana will take quite some time to empty even if he used his most mana expensive spell.


    That could be an advantage in a prolonged fight, however, if the battle was close, then all that pills up mana inside of him would only sit there and do nothing.


    "I even have some skills that I didn''t even touch and some that can be bought directly to learn, but my current skills are more important." Danzel mumbled to himself as he reached the floor of the treasury.


    Stepping out of the circr tform, Danzel moved towards the already opened up vault.


    Walking inside though and seeing what was in front of him, made him freeze for a split second.


    The previous messy collection of armor and weapons were now sorted, but that wasn''t what surprised him.


    The thing that surprised him was the beings that floated in the air near the bookshelves.


    Over 30 beings emitting a dark aura under their gold-like armor and two pares of dark golden ethereal eyes were to be seen behind the scarf that hid their skeleton faces.<sub> </sub>


    Beings are otherwise known as Wraiths.


    Each of them traveled carrying a book and sorting it on another bookshelf, while the few of them brought some of the books to the crossed leg sitting figure that was in front of the Lab door.


    Seeing that, Danzel started walking toward the figure.


    The figure was none other than Nersan''rah in the body of the female magic caster.


    Compared to when he saw Nersan''rah two days, ago. Now he looked much different.


    While his golden hair and ponytail make him look enchanting to the opposite sex, the Nersan''rah in front of him looked like he had taken the top part of his rob fall and hanging to his legs and bonded his chest by some kind of bandages which made the two lumps of meat almost t.


    Almost that is.


    What caught most of Danzel''s attention though was the nearby dead mana that was surrounding and being controlled by Nersan''rah.


    Something could only watch in awe of such fine control of mana.


    "So you even came." Nersan''rah replied as soon as he noticed Nersan''ran''s soundless steps.


    "You thought that I would run away?" Danzel scoffed at Nersan''rah.


    "Of course no-" Before Nersan''rah could finish his sentence, the moment he standard up and looked towards Danzel, his expression became stiff.


    ''What happend to him'' Nersan''rah questioned his very own eyes.


    The Danzel in front of him was totally different from the Danzel of two days ago.


    Not only was he a bit taller, but the deathly aura that he was emitting put some sort of mental pressure on Nersan''rah.


    He clearly remembers this exact feeling when he was alive.


    A pressure that only one person managed to inflict on Nersan''rah.


    And that person was none other than his father, Azur''rah.


    A being that his existence itself was above his.


    Though the level of the pressure was quite lower than that of his father, he felt the pressure of a higher being towards Danzel.


    Even though he once reached the 4th-tier.


    His body now was only one of the 3rd-tier.


    Though thosest two days managed to increase his body strength,pared to Danzel it was nothing.


    While being on his own thoughts, Danzel pulled out all the runes items that were given by Nersan''rah and even threw the list that had written what every rune does.


    "Here, my part of the deal is done. You finished yours?" Daniel said, in which Nersan''rah sighted internally.


    "Yeah...It''s finished."


    A momentter, one of the wraiths came down carrying a crystal and handing it with a bow to Danzel.


    Touching the crystal and confirming it was the real deal, he nodded in satisfaction.


    "I guess with that done, it''s time to cross our ways, Nersan''rah."


    Without waiting for his answer, Danzel moved toward the circr tform.


    Seeing him leave, Nersan''rah panicked.


    "Wait, Danzel!" He called out, Danzel red at him with his ethereal eyes burning with seriousness.


    One of his hands was resting on the hilt of the sword.


    "What is it?" Daniel said with a cold voice.


    After eyeing Danzel for a second, Nersan''s grip on his staff became much stronger.


    The atmosphere inside there was quite heavy, one wouldn''t be surprised if those two had a go with each other.


    Neither of those two knew who would win if they were to fight now.


    Nersan¡ärah was an exception mage that had already reached the level of an Archmage when he was alive. Even though he had the body of 3rd-tier, the 30 or so wraiths together with his knowledge were enoughpensation for his inferior body.


    But if one considered individual strength alone, then Danzel was superior.


    So instead of going with his original n, Nersan¡ärah raised his arm and open it for Danzel to see.


    Danzel who saw that gesture stayed silent.


    "You and I, Danzel, how about we two join hands to achieve something much greater." Nersan¡ärah offered with a serious voice.


    "...What?"

 Chapter 236 Nersanrahs Goal And Danzels Decision

    "...What?"


    Hearing what Nersan¡ärah just said, Danzel tightened his grip on the hilt as he reminisced about the past.


    "Yes, if we-"


    "I refuse." Danzel said, without giving Nersan¡ärah any room for negotiation.


    Stunned by Danzel''s words, Nersan¡ärah flinched as he saw Danzel turning his back on him and heading towards the circr tform.


    "Rue Danzel!" Nersan¡ärah yelled as stomped his staff towards the floor and released a flood of mana. Forcible gaining Danzel''s attention once more.


    "Danzel, before you reject my request, hear me out." Nersan¡ärah said with both his eyes glowing in a dark golden light.


    The massive wave of mana that Danzel expected to be attacked of some kind seemed to travel towards the bookshelves, making somewhat relieved and yet caution against Nersan¡ärah.


    Pointing his finger towards Danzel, Nersan¡ärah said.


    "I am going to be honest with you, Danzel. The moment that I learned that you are a runesmith, I wanted you to join my ranks at any cost possible." Nersan¡ärah said with a cold voice.


    "And I will have to apologize to you, for seeing you for just being a runesmith."


    "..."


    To Danzel, although he couldn¡ät be sure, he felt that Nersan¡ärah¡äs words were sincere.


    "I failed to miss how you are someone much greater than I had anticipated. You Danzel have a much greater potential than you might be in belief."


    The surrounding mana controlling the sands on the bookshelves suddenly engrossed all books and opened them all at the same time while the pages were rabidly turning one by one.


    Opening his hands as he was showcasing the entire room, Nersan¡ärah continued.


    "Though I ain¡ät skilled with the ways of the sword-like my brother was, out of my brothers I was the greatest magic caster of them all! I might be in the 3rd-tier now, but I know how to break through the bottleneck and reach the 4th-tier! And that I can share that with you."


    "I saw how you are capable of magic and I have to say, for someone as strong as you with the sword, your knowledge of magic iscking. But if you join me! My Knowledge! I promise to teach you everything and make you a magic caster that even my past self couldn¡ät be!" Nersan¡ärah said without a hint of hesitation.


    One had to know that every magic caster treasured their knowledge, their very own legacy that represents their life works to the point that they were willing to die to share such knowledge with anyone.


    And Danzel knew that.


    Through the years, he tried many ways to get ess with some kind of magic scrolls, but s with no sess. Not only were they rare, but they were also heavily guarded information as it essentially had how a spell worked into the finest of details.


    As long as a magic caster had the necessary knowledge to understand the theory of magic, depending on the knowledge, the magic caster could easily learn the spell by just spending some time understanding the magic scroll.


    Which was nothing else than sharing one work, one''s legacy towards some random person.


    Making the creation of magic scrolls to be an unwritten taboo among the magic caster society.


    So what Nersan¡ärah offered him was no different than sharing his legacy and making him his discipline.


    "So you are willing to share your knowledge if I were to serve under you?" Danzel asked in his cold voice.


    "No, I never mentioned you serving me." Nersan¡ärah shook his head in disapproval as if he got offended by those words.


    "What I want is joining my cause, Danzel."


    "You cause, you say? Can you borate on that?" Danzel said.


    Clenching his hands, Nersan''rah withdraw his mana and made the books close back.


    "My goal is none other than to revive and rebuild the legacy that was left from Azur''rah, my father. To create a new empire that once ruled over the desert! That''s my goal." Nersan''rah said.


    A secondter, the wraiths that were previously floating in the air, suddenly received amand from their master.


    Flying towards Nersan''rah, they all bent with one known to the ground and their head looking at the floor right behind Him in a straight row.


    "That''s why Danzel, I want you to be one of the pirs of the new empire that will be created. Given enough time, we two can reach a level that others wouldn''t be able to go against us."


    "..."


    Stating silent, Danzel couldn''t make up if Nersan''rah was joking or not.


    Actually, he knew he was serious.


    Making him der if rejecting such a deal was a good or a bad idea.


    In all honestly, the deal was filled with advantages andcked very many disadvantages. Making him think that there was a catch somewhere that he couldn''t see.


    What he didn''t know though, was that although Nersan''rah offerings his knowledge of a 4th-tier magic caster was too much, all other rewards weremonly offered to recruit a 4th-tierbatant.


    As they were a step below the known peak strength that were the people from the 5th-tier, their value is enough to grant them a noble title.


    As Danzel wasn''t aware of that, such an offer gave him the wrong vibes, making him warier of a loophole.


    The offer seemed too good to be true.


    But...<sub> </sub>


    "Even after what you offered, Nersan''rah. I will have to reject such an offer."


    Not expecting such an answer, Nersan''rah was shocked.


    He never had thought that someone would reject an offer in sharing a 4th-tier magic caster''s knowledge.


    "Can I ask as to why you made such a decision? Was it not enough?" Nersan''ran asked as he couldn''t ept Danzel''s answer.


    Danzel in response shrugged his shoulders.


    "It isn''t about if what you offer is enough or not, but more of that I never nned to form a party with you."


    "Nothing more, nothing else. I have some business to fulfill, so I can''t stay here. Maybe when I finished and have nothing else to do, I might consider your offer. But now it''s a clear no."


    "I see..." Nersan''rah said in a whisper-like tone.


    Seeing his expression, Danzel could see how he was frustrated.


    Sighting out loud, Nersan''rah raised his hand towards the direction of the bookshelves and ended his mana there.


    Simr to before, controlling his mana to use the sands, he pulled out a book and grabbed it by his hand.


    After taking a good look at the book, Danzel looked back at Danzel and threw that book toward him.


    Seeing that it didn''t have mana in it, Danzel determine that it was safe to touch.


    Looking at the book, Danzel looked at Nersan with confusion.


    "What''s..?"


    "A present, if you will. Although I would have liked you to join me...I ain''t going to force you if you don''t want to."


    Putting the book away into his storage ring, Danzel looked at Nersan for a few seconds before opening his mouth.


    "Although I don''t have anything else toparator you with as of now for the book,let me give you advice as a fellow undead," Danzel said.


    "Advice, you say?"


    "Yes, although you might already know this, I will still tell it. Every undead has a weakness, be it me or a Death Spirit, they do have a weakness.


    While Danzel was speaking with Nersan, two illusion-like figures appear behind her, making his mood to get worsen. Though their faces couldn''t be seen as if they were hidden behind a thigh spot.


    "And that is of losing their sanity. So whatever you do, stay sane." Saying that Danzel walked towards the circr tform.


    Looking where Nersan was standing, the two figures had disappeared, nowhere to be seen.


    "If you hear my warning or not, is you to decide."


    As the circr tform was epting, Danzel mumbled to himself.


    ''"It wasn''t that bad..."


    Out of those 3 years, Nersan''ran was the first person he found to befortable talkking about.


    Not because of his character, but because of his nature of being undead.


    The unresting hate that was ever-present on the living made his interaction more annoying as talking to someone who you wanted his head to be ahead wasn''t that particr you full.


    He almost sumbed to Nersan''s offer.


    But upon thinking about it, wasn''t worth the risk.


    That''s right, risk.


    They were multiplreasonsss such as being overpowered in the future.


    Other we''re in the form of him just not wanting to end up with experience simr situation to that of Hanson.


    And his recently absurd quest.


    The number 1 reason why he didn''t join hands with Nersan was for a simple reason.


    And that was him being a [Death Spirit].


    Using his status, he could see all the small details.


    And simr to the [Gravekeeper], a [Death Spirit] could simrly take the souls of the dead and either nurture them or co troll them based I the type of undead.


    The more a [Death Spirit] eat or collected, the less of their sanity will lose.


    Thest thing he wanted was to have his soul trapped and be at his mercy after losing his sanity.


    As the circr tform reached a pathway at the top, Danzel moved towards the next circr tform and made his way towards the exit.

 Chapter 237 An Undeads Goal

    After rejecting taking part in Nersan¡ärah¡äs quest to revive and build anew the kingdom of his father as one of the pirs. Danzel made his way out of the Sashia vige together with his sole remaining undead, Skull w.


    Frankly speaking, Danzel didn¡ät have to take Skull w with him. Since he was much faster than Skull w, taking her with him would mean that he would have to wait for her to catch up.


    Well, that is if Danzel were to travel at his top speed, which for an undead it wasn¡ät that hard to do 24/7.


    And yet he still chooses to take her together and use Skull w as his mount.


    Not that he was just toozy to walk or anything, but he found that there wasn¡ät a need to rush things.


    Nheless, as of now, he was studying the book that Nersan¡ärah gave him.


    Even when a full week had passed since he separated from Nersan¡ärah, he found it difficult to understand the content of the book. Most of the content seemed to be straight-up gibberish even though he could read every single word in the book.


    But after staring at the book for days, Danzel was able to grasp at least what the book was for.


    "I see...that¡äs a really great gift that Nersan¡ärah gave me." Danzel muttered while he was riding at Skull w¡äs back.


    Bringing out the mana crystal Nersan¡ärah has given him per their trade from his storage ring, the crack that was before had now fully closed without any hint of damage to see.


    The reason why he brought the crystal out was that the book contained information as to how to improve the crystal itself by making the user¡äs mana interact with the mana crystal at a better rate, that of course with the cost of other kinds of mana to be less effective.


    That brought many disadvantages as it brought advantages in that kind of technique.


    Naturally, since the input of your mana would be much better, the enchantments would be much stronger than usual, and that effect gets strengthened if the enchantment in question has the same affinity with some sort of element.


    If for example, the crystal had an enchantment that would shoot a fireball, then the power of the fireball would increase tremendously, if the user input his mana and had an affinity for the fire element.


    So if that mana crystal were to be used on any of his equipment, the effect of said equipment would increase by a lot, essentially making equipment only for him to use.


    As for the disadvantages...


    Since the user¡äs mana would work better than any other mana, that will make the mana crystal recover much slower naturally. And other than sharing an item that has such an effect on the mana crystal, they weren¡ät any other downsides.


    "Maybe I was too hasty in rejecting Nersan¡ärah¡äs offer..." Danzel grumbled to himself as he shook his head and put the book together with the mana crystal in his ring storage.


    The knowledge that such a book contained was to say the less, amazing.


    But the problems with it were as clear as day.


    Danzel couldn¡ät use it.


    Not only did he never once try enchanting, but he also couldn¡ät understand the knowledge that the book contained.


    Because of that, Danzel felt extremely bitter about having such treasure that he couldn¡ät use it.


    `Maybe that was Nersan¡ärah¡äs aim for giving such a book.¡ä Danzel sighted internally.


    It was like having a treasure chest that only Nersan¡ärah could open.


    No matter how fancy and all the cool treasures were inside the chest, one could only dream of them.


    Doubt started to fill his mind, thinking it was the wrong decision of leaving Nersan¡ärah¡äs side.


    Not only was Nersan¡ärah capable of enchanting on his own, but he probably also knew how to put the information from this book into use. Otherwise, he wouldn¡ät give it to Danzel so easily.


    And remembering all the books that still were in that treasury, Danzel couldn¡ät begin to imagine what kind of other amazing knowledgey there to be learned.


    The temptation of being taught such knowledge and even Nersan¡ärah magic was huge to say the less.


    s, the moment such doubt¡äs formed inside his mind, they imminently vanished right after.


    Yes, he could learn all those things and be a magic caster that he could never dream of ever achieving.


    s, the risk contained in Nersan¡ärah¡äs offer was too big for Danzel''s liking.


    Maybe if he had chosen the [Lich] option, his temptation would have bested him and made him join on Nersan¡ärah kingdom building.


    But as he hadn¡ät and chose to be a [Death Knight], he could resist the temptation.


    It wasn¡ät like he found Nersan¡ärah to be a primordial evil or something that he had refused his offer.


    It was because of one of the talents that a [Death Spirit] had, that he decided to part ways with Nersan¡ärah.


    And that was the one called [Yielding Death Detaining].


    The talent that was responsible for taking over the wraith¡äs inside his body and making them follow Nersan¡ärah¡äs orders.


    Not only was the talent capable to capture the soul of both the undead and the living to make them serve his cause, but it would also increase Nersan¡ärah¡äs power by the quality and the amount of the prisoned souls inside his body.


    Although the living that had their souls captured would straight up be mindless undead that followed every order, for undead it was different.


    Instead of bing mindless, they would straight up retain their memories and knowledge even after losing their physical body. Nersan¡äran could either then feed on that soul and make himself stronger or guide the prisoned souls back into their physical bodies while still having control over their souls.<sub> </sub>


    Of course, the downside to that was that Nersan¡ärah would start losing his sanity the more he uses this talent.


    That was the reason why he gave Nersan¡ärah a warning to not lose his sanity. Even though it wasn¡ät a long time that they have spend, he found himself and Nersan¡ärah forming a good synergy with each other, be it fighting or conversing with each other.


    But his fear of being enved and possibly dying by Nersan¡ärah made him unable to bear the risk of associating with Nersan¡ärah.


    It was ironic.


    For an undead to fear death that is.


    While Danzel was in his own mind, Skull w walked over a sand heel.


    And over through the distance, they were some small buildings to be seen.


    Seeing that, Danzel pushed all his useless though to the side and focused on what was in front of him.


    Bringing out the map that he had inside his storage ring and briefly looking at it, Danzel nodded to himself.


    "So I finally arrived...I guess luck is on my side." Danzel said to himself.


    Having been though by Nersan¡ärah how to navigate through the desert by using the shadows to figure out where is where Danzel reached his next destination.


    It was the same method that they used to find the sacred treasury in the first ce.


    Even though he wasn¡ät that good at it and it was rather vague, it was better than nothing.


    "I guess next time I meet Nersan I will have to give him a gift or something." Danzel mumbled to himself as he draw his new long sword out of his sheath.


    Opening his [Status] window, Danzel looked at the quest progress.


    [Currently achieved: 442/10 000]


    Raising his sword up high, the sand from the ground rose slowly. Because he didn¡ät start making the sand take aplicated shape or making it tougher by pressing it together, he was quite capable to raise enough sand from a small wave of sand that if looked at from the distance, could be easily mistaken as a sand storm.


    Pointing his de toward the building through the distance.


    Opening his mandible, a cold voice bearing hismand sounded through the distance.


    "Heed my call~"


    Hearing hismand, a total of 56 figures were trenched with bloodied clothes and bearing the weapons that once the living had wielded.


    Their ethereal eyes indicated that they weren¡ät some lowly Skeletons.


    "My Undead~!"


    Danzel voice echoed through the surroundings as the aura of death was leaking from his armor.


    The sand that had risen up through the air slowly pushed itself forward and started to go pash though and hiding the Skeletor figures for only their dark green ethereal eyes to remain to be seen.


    Receiving his will, the undead every single one of them was a [Draugr] that was created by the spell [Greater Raise Undead].


    One of the skills that Danzel decided to upgrade with his remaining XP from his before the state was the [Raise Undead].


    The spell that previously only managed to make either skeletons or zombies was now capable to turn corpses into 2th-tier undead.


    The corpses that came from a vige that he raided this week were now going to be used to raid and massacre the vige that was in the distance.


    One might call him a cruel and a terrible monster for doing such a thing.


    He, though, was one of the dead.


    An undead.


    "Go forth and kill everyone~!"


    "Gawwh!"


    "Gweah!"


    Danzel''smand was the trigger that made all the Draugr sprint towards with their unholy howls. The wave of sand now covers the march of the unliving towards the vige.


    With Skull w taking his first towards the vige, the cold voice of her raider sounded through the distance.


    "Rather, leave them to the very edge of their death~!"


    And for his goal.


    "As I shall be the deliver of their death!"


    He would do everything to achieve it.

 Chapter 238 The Few Remaining

    In a certain vige through the desert, where tragedy and disasters could pop out of nowhere were amon urrence.


    The nameless vige had met its worst disaster yet.


    ****


    *Tap~Tap~Tap~


    Walking on the very road that the vigers had built with much difficulty and sleepless nights, an over 2-meter tall figure wearing a full ted armor, released an aura that was unfitting for the living.


    Looking around the buildings, the figure saw bloodstains all over the ce, with a rare corpse or two still oozing fresh blood out of their body, and beside it was a skeleton that had his skull broken in half.


    "It seems some didn¡ät make it." The ted figure said as he looked around the ce where he saw a few more of the skeletons that the figure had created.


    Of course, those were none other than Danzel draugr¡äsying down on the ground.


    And he didn¡ät like that to say the list.


    The weirdest thing was his draugr shouldn¡ät have disobeyed his orders and kill a person. To Danzel it was fine if they brought someone half dead in front of him, and most of the draugr who stormed through the vige did exactly that before leaving to catch another prey for their liege.


    But seeing a dead person with a sh wound beside one of his draugr who happend to wield a sword, it didn¡ät take a genius to guess what had happend.


    His undead disobeyed his orders.


    `It shouldn¡ät have been from his choice...something must have happend here.¡ä


    Considering that his reanimation spell has evolved once more, not only did it make him capable of rising much more powerful undead, but it also improved how his will and solicited his control over them.


    In theory, they shouldn¡ät have been capable to go against his will.


    `Something must have happ-¡ä Before Danzel could finish his thoughts, a vibration on his hand together with a muffling sound stopped him


    "Mhhm! Mhmmm!"


    Lowering his gaze to his hand, he saw a hand holding a man that had a pale blue expression on his face simr to that of a corpse.


    The tears on his face together with the terror inside his eyes of the man clearly hinted that the man was terrified beyond belief.


    "Ah...right. I forgot about you." Danzel said in his cold voice in order to hide his embarrassment.


    The finding of his undead disobeying his orders made him forget of the man he was dragging to the floor.


    Raising the pale man up to his eye level, since Danzel got taller by him experiencing a partial evolution of a Death Knight, the man was essentially not touching the ground.


    Making his already agonizing experience all that much worse.


    "Mhhm!Mhhm!"


    "Stop making those sounds..." Danzel said as he let go of his grip.


    As it happend, the adrenaline rushed through his body and his survival instincts took over the man action.


    "HEL-!!!"


    Before the man could even finish his despaired cry for help, Danzel gripped the man at his neck tightly.


    "Didn¡ät I already tell you to shut that mouth of yours? If you are in believe that anyone is going to help you, then I am sorry, but you are delusional." Danzel said with his cold voice at the terrified man.


    Raising his one hand towards the corpse that was between the dead Draugr, dead mana surrounded his hand and swiftly traveled towards the corpse.


    Not a secondter, the corpse that was infected with Danzel''s dead mana rose to its two feet and took the sword of the one that was responsible for his death in his hand.


    "Guah~" The newly created Draugr that still had the flesh of the man he was before, bent his back and bowed towards Danzel as a sign of loyalty.


    "Good." Danzel mumbled just loud enough for the man in his hand to hear.


    "M-Max? W-What-happe- Agh!" The man screamed by Danzel tightening his grip.


    Unbeknownst to him, he had put just a little bit more strength on his grip, he would even have broken the man''s neck.


    "Now then...if you don¡ät want to turn like him and serve as undead for eternity, answer my questions. If you do I will grant you a swift death."


    Cold sweat runs through the man''s back upon hearing Danzel''s words.


    Max, a person he saw every day and even had a few drinks with him to celebrate his wending with a beautiful maiden, people knew him for being an honest and strong guy who always lifted to mood wherever he was in a group.


    Seeing the current Max though, there was nothing of that left but a being who oozed killing intent and showed an expression full of hate.<sub> </sub>


    `I-I am going to be turned like him? Into such a being?¡ä


    The man clearly feared death, simr to how most of the living did.


    But the thought of being enved for all eternity and bing undead was all that more terrifying.


    Death could be swift, but bing undead is for eternity.


    "I-I will do- I will do it! Please...just don¡ät make me into...that thing!" The man said with a broken voice.


    Hearing his desperate answer, Danzel grinned sinisterly.


    "Alright then, tell me if there is anyone who is capable to destroy that skeleton over there...For your information, those guys are off the 2th-tier."


    The man showed a moment of confusion on this question, but suddenly with the hand tightening around his neck, he remembered something.


    "Yes! There are! Some mercenary or explorers! They-Guh! They should be the ones who done this!"


    Feeling the grip of his neck lessening, he took a big breath to relieve himself.


    "I see...you know their actual numbers?" Danzel asked.


    "I-I don¡ät- No! There should be around 8, yes they should be 8!" The man said in desperation.


    His unconfident answer didn¡ät manage to go unnoticed by Danzel though.


    Without a hint of hesitation, Danzel''s gauntlets started to glow in dark green light and started sucking the vitality of the man. Resulting in pain that the man never felt ever before.


    "Ahhh! W-Why! I did as I! You told me!"


    Ignoring the man''s thoughts, the color around his neck started to darken and his skin shrink to the point that the mana looked like a mummy.


    [You received 1200 XP]


    Letting the course of the man fall to the ground, Danzel''s dead mana escaped his hand and entered the man''s body, turning him in a matter of few seconds into a Draugr.


    "Delusional until the end." Danzel mocked the man.


    Although he could uphold his deal with him, Danzel didn¡ät feel any need to do that.


    Not only would it be a huge waste to leave a course ready to be one of his soldiers, but the pain he inflicted on the man also satisfied his undead urges.


    Most of the time Danzel found the urge of undead, the hate towards the living to be as convenient as annoying.


    p Killing any of the living would refresh his mind and bring him satisfaction unique to the undead race while annoying when he had to suppress his instincts.</anda>


    And for some reason that he wasn¡ät aware of, his hate towards the human race was much strongerpared to the other mortal races'' beings.


    "Now, the guy said about 8 people, but based on how he spoke, there might as well be many more. If they also have multiple 3rd-tierbatants, then me alone wouldn''t be enough... I need more numbers" Danzel said as he looked through the distance and concentrate.


    Another feature that came with the [Greater Raise Undead] was that he now could perceive the locations of every of his undead in a limited area.


    If he had to describe it, then it worked very simrly to when he ced a curse upon someone and was able to track them down.


    ''My Undead..e back at my location'' Danzel send out amand through every undead that was in the range hm.


    A few minutester, undead Draugr dragging other humans through the ground while still being heavily injured came to Danzel''s view.


    Few carried their prey in there while others didn''t have any spoils at all.


    Nodding in satisfaction, Danzel drew his sword out of his sheath while the undead presented the half-dead humans in front of Danzel.


    "Now with those done..."


    Swinging his sword to the people, Danzel made quick work with them and ended their life in a swift.


    Though he could enjoy it to the fullest by torturing them, Danzel didn''t was to of any of that and decided to go right into business.


    With the dead mana raising up, it flew towards all the corpses.


    At first, there was no reaction, but momentster the corpses started to raise up from their death to serve their lodge.


    "Only a few remain..." Danzel said as he and his undead behind him walked deeper into the vige.

 Chapter 239 Group Of 6

    In the center of the unnamed vige, in one of the many houses, sounds of someone fighting 66could be heard.


    *Fhhii!


    With the sound of a whip piercing through the air, a sudden cracking sound was heard inside the house.


    *Crack.


    "Guah..." with a weak voice, one of the draugr having a spear as his weapon, fell to his knees and then to the ground unmoving.


    Arge hole going through the draugrs skull was to be seen.


    Such cases of draugrs falling down to their defeat were simrly to be seen around inside the house.


    Moving with an amazing speed, a woman wearing though seeing clothing except her private''s areas was to be seen, dodging two of the undead who tried to keep up with her speed with their hateful ethereal dark green eyes.


    Having a pair of weapons looking like some sort of extension of her finger and a ck cloth mask hiding her mouth, she moved like the wind and dodged the attacks of both undead with little to no effort.


    Dodging both hateful des that the draugs had, the woman raised her hand, and in the split of a second, her hands disappeared and reappeared.


    "Gauuh!"


    "Guuah!"


    Screams mixed with the hate of the living and their own unwillingness were to be heard from the two draugr.


    They tried to turn around, but before doing so, several cuts made their appearance over their body.


    *Crack! Crack!


    As if they exploded, the two undead fell to the ground cut into hundreds of pieces.


    "Mhhm~! That one felt good." The woman said seductively as she stretched her body.


    "Hey, you guys! Have you already finished!" The woman said as he turned to look behind the other 5 people behind her.


    And the many undead that they were facing.


    Another girl wielding a whip seemingly made out of some sort of metal swung her whip like a venomous snake and let out devastating attacks that were enough to destroy the bones of the draugrs.


    Even if the draugrs touched any of her attacks, the whip moved back like it had its own free will and pierced their skulls.


    While her fighting style looked vicious, one of the men wielding a double-headed axe was much more savage.


    Pushing through and even ignoring the des of the undead, he allowed himself to be cut through the stomach for the trade to crushing the draugrs in a full swoop.


    While the draugr fell down with their skulls destroyed, the man only had some small red marks on his stomach but no rtive open wound to be seen.


    "Hahaha! Weaklings, is that all that they can do?" The manughed with a mocking tone as he scanned his surroundings to find his next prey.


    s, the 5 remaining draugrs were in midst ofbat against two other men wearing what seemed like a knight''s armor.


    Their armors looked almost identical and only by their different colored des.


    One held a weapon seemingly made out of silver and the other one a dark de.


    Though at times the Draugr seemed to hold an advantage against one of them, the moment one of them stepped up to support the other, their auras seemed to have increased by a notch together with their swordsmanship being unmatched, without a single w to be seen.


    The moment one lets a little spot open, the other would jump in and cover for him. Added with their attacks releasing dark and silver-like mana with each their attack, the draugrs were helpless against the duo.


    Thest one of the draugrs who were fighting against the duo suddenly halted his movement before turning his back and running towards the door at full speed.


    But as soon as it arrived at the door, a missile made out of poor mana was shot so fast that the draugr could only look behind to see its demise.


    *Crack!


    *Tud


    Falling to the ground, the man with the axe stared at where the stairs were with an annoyed look. By now he was holding the axe, one could guess that he was about to throw his axe towards the escaping draugr.


    "Hey! That was my kill!"<sub> </sub>


    Walking down the stairs, with a staff in his staff, a man looking over his 70 years looked at the brute and shook his head.


    "It isn¡ät the time to argue about such things. Nheless with the little time that we have."


    Hearing what the old man said, everyone in the room frowned at the words `little time¡ä. Suggesting that wasting their time now would bring them into danger.


    "Huh!? What do you mean by that-!


    "Are you just clueless or just inly studying? Undead don¡ät just appear out of nowhere like that." The old magic caster said as he crashed a half-destroyed skull with his staff.


    "What did you just say you senile-"


    "Are you saying that someone must be responsible for the appearance of those undead?" The silver-ded knight interrupted the man and said as he sheathed his de back into his scabbard.


    The old mage in turn simply shook his head, making the others confused for a moment.


    "No, it isn¡ät a must, but is. That is definitely the work of a necromancer. That much should have been obvious if you guys fought against that undead." The old mage said.


    "Mhmm, now that you point it out, that undead had an identical strength." The woman with the whip said with a cold tone.


    What she said, made others except for the mage and the two knights realize that this alone was not normal.


    Though the undead was the same race, they should have different kinds of strength based on how long they lived or their general talent. The lowest of the Draugr was no different than some mere skeletons with just an additional strength, while draugr of the near the peak of the 3rd-tier could even cast spells and even use necromancy to resurrect the dead to their minions.


    When you thought you were fighting an honorable duel against such an undead, you shouldn¡ät be surprised to see the duel turn into an overwhelming number difference against you.


    And for every undead to be the former, it wasn¡ät hard to guess that they were all created instead of born naturally.


    "Ehhhh....doesn¡ät that mean that there is a necromancer responsible for this? How troublesome" The girl with the ws said with an annoyed tone.


    While the others stayed silent to digest that information, one particr of those 6 didn¡ät do as such.


    "And what if there is a necromancer? Looking at how he created those weak skeletons tells how weak that guy is! As long as I get close and personal with that my partner of my, I would be able to cleave his magic caster a*s without much trouble." The man said as he stroked his partner, who was his axe that he was willing to throw away without any hesitation.


    Of course, the old mage didn¡ät miss how those words also target him indirectly.


    "His undead might have been weak to say the less, but considering their number, then those things are probably the weakest of what the necromancer has."


    "Nheless, by now all the people here would already have been turned and makeup ann army of the dead. It''s better to run than stay here."


    "Even if there are 100 of them, I can-"


    "Nah, I agree with that grandpa over there." The girl with the ws said as he walked towards two corpsesying on the ground.


    Sending out a kick, one of the corpses was thrown to the side.


    "Even if they are weaklings, they still got 2 guy''s who were self-proimed 3rd-tierbatants." The girl said with a scoff.


    "Though those guys were trash, their strength was that of a 3rd-tier."


    Hearing what she said, the eyes of the other went towards the two corpses.


    The man wielding the dark de put his hand on his chin before saying what was in his mind.


    "Hey...could this maybe be a test of sorts? The Deathcaller is supposedly to be capable of making such sort of undead. Maybe the words gone out of we want to join him went out and making him a test-"


    "No, I doubt that being the case." The old mage shook his head at the man.


    "I doubt that he would kill a whole vige for the sake of a test. Don''t operate you actually worth,pared to that monster, we are nothing" The old magic caster said with a bit of frustration with his words.


    While that group of people was discussing what their next move was, they were ignorant of the army that Danzel was guiding towards them.


    Not only has Danzel resurrected the fallen and increased his soldier number, but he also fully exploited the new feature that the [Greater Raise Undead ] brought at him.


    With the spell working part like a cure now, if Danzel we''re in range and one of his undead were to die.


    Like a candle going out through the night, Danzel would have known long as one of his draugs died.


    Not muchter, Danzel could already see the sellout of the house together with many draugs and their weapons.

 Chapter 240 Necromancer Vs Mercenaries

    Walking to the destination where Danzel felt one of his undead presence fading away, he and more than 50 draugrs halted no far away from a certain building.


    "Hmm...I guess that¡äs the ce." Danzel mumbled as he stared at the house not far away from him.


    Even if it weren¡ät for losing his connection with a few of his undead, he would still be capable to guess that this is the house of the people who destroyed his undead.


    As the crumpled skeleton corpses around the house were a pretty obvious indicator that many of his undead got killed here.


    "No wonder so few of my draugr came back to me, they must have noticed those guys here, but ended up dying, making them unable to fulfill their orders..."


    Turning his back slightly, he gazed at the many Draugr equipped with various weapons that he plundered in his time in the desert.


    Most of the weapons came from the people that he and Nersan¡ärah killed in that secreted treasury, some others came from the people her and even few were of his own pocket...that he also blundered from some poor souls that have found their end because of him.


    Compared to the equipment though, getting bodies to use for his necromancy spell wasn¡ät that easy.


    The storage ring of his might be able to store corpses, but the space that it would take would be too much for Danzel''s liking.


    Making him realize the limitation of necromancy.


    Or rather, the limitation of his spell.


    Looking at his hand, Danzel was reminded that he didn¡ät know much about necromancy, to begin with.


    He still remembered the blue-eyed draugr that he had fought back when he was still a skeleton. Compared to his [Greater Raise Undead], the draugrs [Low-Undead Creation] could create undead just by using his dead mana and without the need of a catalyst such as a corpse.


    Of course, his spell was much superior that the draugr¡äs one, as he could summon 2nd-tier undead. But considering that Danzel was at the peak of a 3rd-tier, his skillspared to other wights were embarrassingly poor.


    Danzel decided to put such thoughts away and focus on the current situation at hand.


    `Have they already left or are they still inside.¡ä Danzelined as he stared at the house.


    It had been a few minutes since the connection with his undead has been cut. Those few minutes were enough if those guys decided to run away.


    He could go and open the door or straight up send a few of his undead to see if there was anyone in or not.


    The former though was rejected as it could pose him in danger while the second would destroy the undead he send in case of an ambush of some sort.


    If there really was an ambush there, then both options would had bring him some sort of a loss.


    Since those guys managed to destroy most of his undead, Danzel wasn¡ät willing to underestimate their power.


    And while he was thinking of a solution, an idea popped into his head.


    "Yeah, that should work..." Danzel mumbled to himself as he made his status appear in front of him.


    Searching for a certain skill, Danzel raised his hand and pressed the upgrade button a certain skill of his.


    [Sense of the Damned has Increased from Lv.1 to Lv.2]


    [Sense of the Damned has Increased from Lv.2-]


    ...


    After spending a few thousand XP on his first self-taught skill, the [Sense of the Damned] reached the maximum level.


    [The skill Sense of the Damned Lv.10 thismaximum level]


    [Sense of the Damned Lv.10 turns into Eyes of the Damned Lv.1]


    Being frozen in ce from all the information that was entering his mind, Danzel was capable to grasp his wits together and understanding the improved version of [Sense of the Damned]


    Much as he hoped and expected, the range of the skill increased by a whole lot, while the affected showed the livings figure much more clearly.


    Before where he stared at the house and saw just a building, he now was seeing some humanoid figure made out of faint dark green light.


    To be more specific he saw 6 figures inside the house.


    "Hehehe~so they were inside." Danzel snickered ominously to himself.


    Knowing now that they were people inside, he knew how to lure the rats out of their holes. That was necessary as he held the number advantage, and fighting into a small house was nothing but limiting himself and his undead.


    Looking at one of his draugr holding a spear, he sends out amand toe to him.


    "Hand me your spear." Danzel said as he had his hand opened in front of the draugr.


    Presenting his spear while bowing his head, the draugr upholds his liegemand.


    "Good."


    Brining out a piece of paper and wrapping it around the spear, Danzel held the spear in front of the draugrs face.


    "Inject your mana inside the paper..."


    Doing as he was told, the Draugr injected his mana into the piece of paper, which the moment it did so, the paper was engulfed in some fierce dark green mes.


    As the dark green mes devoured the paper, they further spread towards the spear and started to slowly devour the wood of the spear.


    Doing as such, the dark green mes, though continuously burning fiercely, the dark green color was disappearing and being reced by the same color as the usual mes that one would see normally.


    "You four, press your spear at each other spear." Danzelmanded another 4 Draugr holding a spear.


    Fulfilling their lieges orders, Danzel pushed the burning spear towards where all the other 4 spears were meeting, resulting in them starting burning simr to the spear he was holding.


    Giving the spear back to the draugr, Danzel''s cold voice sounded inside their head.


    `Ignite that building in mes.¡ä


    Nodding their head toward him, the Draugr started dashing and when they were close enough, they shot their spears like a javelin toward the building.


    At first, nothing happend, but as soon as the mes started to spread, Danzel grinned to himself.


    `Now all that I have to do is for the rats toe running outside theirfort zone.¡ä


    True to his prediction, as soon as the whole building was caught in mes, the door of the building was pushed open with such force that it broke.


    The one responsible for it yelled with clear anger in his voice.


    "You bastards! How dare you try to burn us ali-" Before the man with the double-headed axe could finish what he had to say. All words were pushed back at his throat at the sight of more than 50 undead with dark green ethereal eyes.


    The one who caught this attention the most though, was the leading figure of that undead who was releasing an aura of danger that he never felt once before.


    "This guy-"


    "So that¡äs our dear necromancer, huh?" A feminine voice sounded behind his back.<sub> </sub>


    Coming out of the house, a group of people stared at the sight in front of them.


    "They are quite a lot of them." One wielding a dark sword said with a frown on his face.


    "Indeed so, but there seem to be the same as the one of before." The one wielding a silver sword said.


    "Don¡ät get cocky because you killed those small flies, the one in the is no joke." The girl with a whip in her hand said with a cold voice.


    "That¡äs indeed the case." The old mage behind them said as he raised his staff and released the spell that he had prepared.


    Shooting out his mana in the form of multiple missiles, Danzel who saw that raised his sword in front of him.


    The next second, a wall made out of stone was raised from the ground directly in front of the mana missiles.


    *Bragh! Bragh! Bragh!


    Colliding with the stone wall,rges pieces of the wall fell down until the wall itself grumbledpletely as thest missile hit the wall.


    "The spell of the stone wall...so he must be the one who raised that undead." The old mage muttered to himself.


    Looking indifferently toward the group of people, Danzel''s cold voice echoed through the surroundings.


    "Kill them."


    Hearing hismand, the Draugr dark green ethereal eyes red up with great ferocity as they dashed towards the living.


    That though wasn¡ät the onlymand that Danzel had given them.


    He gave them a calcted n on how many should focus on which person.


    The group who saw this imminently raised their weapon and prepared themselves for the iing undead rushing them.


    And surprisingly, one of them decided to go into the offense that hold their ground.


    The one was the girl with the pair of ws that were in her fingers.


    "Hey! Come back! We don¡ät-" The old mage cried out seeing the girl leaving.


    "Ha~! Don¡ät underestimate me! I will finish this in an instant." The girl said as she guided her lifeforce to enchant her body to move at an incredible speed.


    ''Is she an idiot?'' Daniel thought honestly at her private.


    But as soon as reached near his Draugr, the girl disappeared and appeared behind the few draugrs, which a secondter were cut into several pieces.


    The draugrs couldn''t even follow her movement with her speed, but Danzel could and was honestly surprised to see how quick she was.


    She easily moved through the ranks of his undead and either dodged or right of cut his undead into pieces.


    As Danzel was about to dash forward to sh with her, unexpectedly to him, he saw that girl dashing toward him.


    ''She is aiming for me...'' Daniel thought and decided to stay put and wait for her toe toward him.


    The more distance she made with the other 5 the better he thought.


    Soon after a few seconds, the girl reached 10 meters away from Danzel.


    But instead ofing towards him, she halted and kicked the sand.


    With her strength and momentum, a wave of sand blocking his vision appeared.


    "..."


    Standing his ground, the moment he saw something pushing the wave of sand towards his side on the right, he turned right on purpose.


    As the sand cleared out, what seemed to have pushed the sand before seemed to be a small rock that was from his stone wall together with a cloth.


    The next moment directly from the left moved at a speed that looked like teleportation, the woman with her finger ws appear o Danzel left side with one of her hands risen up and ready to swing it down.


    The lifeforce inside was pushed outside towards her ws, extending them and even making them sharper than ever before.


    "Die!"


    Swing her hand at an amazing speed aiming for Danzel''s head, the girl saw her victory sh in front of her eyes.


    s, blue mana came out of Danzel''s armor and formed around him a barrier that blocked the attack of the girl.


    With her attack being so powerful though, her five fingers prate the barrier and almost managed to scratch his armor.


    But that was all of it.


    Naturally, the girl who was the sudden barrier was shocked.


    "How-"


    Turning Danzel his head, the girl managed to see a glimpse of Danzel''s ethereal eyes behind the small opening of his helmet. Making her body shake for a moment.


    "Die like a fool." Daniel said as he swung his sword and cut through her hip and right elbow through her body.


    "Ah~!!"


    With a scream of pain, her two halves fell to the ground.


    [You received 87 000 XP]


    Looking at her body, he scoffed at it.


    He deliberately let himself wide open for such an exact situation to happen.


    He of course pretended to have been yed and not being able to react.


    Since he had the rune of force engraved on his chest te, he baited her to go for the kill when he was protected by the rune.


    Turning his attention towards the shocked faces of the 5 people, Danzel''s voice sounded almost inside their heads.


    "Don''t worry, you will be next." As he said that, he activate the enchant from his armor and starter to cover him in the sand.


    Secondster the sand harden till it became an additionalyer of his armor.


    Maybe because of his injected dead mana, the metal of the extrayer turned into a ck color.


    Making him appear like a dark knight whomanded the dead to do his bidding

 Chapter 241 Necromancer Vs Mercenaries (2)

    With the sand turning into ck metal through the influence of his dead mana and his aura releasing out of his body, the 5 people frowned.


    As the ck metal covered his helmet and left no spot open, making one question how he was able to see.


    Danzel cold voice filled with bloodlust came out.


    "I will kill you, every single one of you!"


    In the next second where he guided his mana into his body, Danzel kicked the ground and elerated at immense speed toward the living.


    The sand was pushed back as if an explosion took ce on where he was standing and he already caught up with the draugr who were in the front.


    `Fast!¡ä The 5 of them thought at the same time.


    Moving on the front, the man wielding a double-headed axe and the two knights took up the front, while the old mage and the girl holding a whip were behind those three.


    Though those guys haven¡ät fought in the same group except the two knights, they were experienced enough to recognize the danger in front of them.


    Seeing one of them being cleaved in half was enough to see the iing Necromancer as someone posing danger to their lives.


    Of course, Danzel wasn¡ät stupid enough to fight 5 people of the 3rd-tier head-on while they already have built their own formation.


    `Divide and Conquer it is!¡ä Danzel thought as he swung his sword in the air, releasing a diagonal dark green air de towards the 5 of them, their expression turned into a frown.


    Not wanting to face the unknown face of the dark green air de, instead of facing it, frontal everyone decided to dodge it instead.


    The old mage using his magic to levitate slightly above the ground moved to the left together with the two knights while the man with the axe together with the girl holding the whip moved arge step to the right.


    At the same time as he did that, Danzel guided his mana under the ground, something that the old mage took quick notice of.


    Seeing through his n, the old mage cast his spell and yelled out loud.


    "You two! Come back to our side! His n is-" Before he could finish his words, arge wall made out of stone blocked the path between the two on the right.


    Of course, that wasn¡ät before the old mage released multiple balls made out of electricity and shot them towards Danzel.


    Gazing at the spell, instead of dodging it, Danzelmanded his draugrs beside him to dash directly towards the ball of electricity.


    Upon contact with the old mage''s spell, the draugrs let out a cry of pain as the lighting slowly was destroying their skull to the point itpletely made their body explode and release them once more into the realm of the dead.


    "What!?" The old mage of course was surprised to see this. He didn¡ät expect the dark knight to use his undead as meat shields.


    `Dammit! I should even though of that possibility!¡ä The old mage stared at Danzel fiercely as he concentrated on releasing another of his spells.


    Danzel who was glitching at the old mage elerated his speed and moved towards the right, a way of the old mage''s vision and the two knights.


    `Wait till I finish with those two.¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    The old mage seeing that he no longer could attack the dark knight aimed his staff towards the earth wall.


    But before he could even finish his spell, the knight wielding the dark sword reminded the old mage of the danger in front of them.


    "Save that spell to save your own skin, with what we are facing, we aren¡ät going to be able to protect you..."


    Hearing his words, the old mage checked what was in front of them, and understood imminently what the knight with the dark sword meant.


    "Draugh!


    "Grrh!"


    "Gaaah!"


    Hoarse screams of the unliving came ever closer to the three of them.


    The one responsible was none other than over 40 of draugrs full of killing intent towards those 3.


    `Dammit, he is right! I can¡ät afford to look after those two.¡ä The old mage cursed as he directed his spell towards the draugrs in front of him.


    Even he, a magic caster of the 3rd-tier couldn¡ät be careless in front of the undead in front of him considering his body being far inferior to that draugrs.


    He could see the movement of the draugr almost in slow motion if he injected his mana into his eyes and use his mana eyes. But seeing it and reacting to it weren¡ät the same.


    Although he knew that they were ying by the palms of the dark knight, they had no other choice.


    ***


    Moving towards the direction of the man wielding an axe and the girl holding a whip, Danzel elerated his speed and left his 10 draugr¡äs that followed him behind.


    Getting close enough, Danzel cast his [Cursed de] on his longsword in an instant. Thanks to his [Death Guarding Swordmanship], not only was it a breeze to engulf his sword with the dead mana that brought decay upon his enemies but the effect also greatly increased by it.


    Raising his longsword while holding it with both of his hands, Danzel swung it down towards the man, aiming to get his head off in a clean swipe.


    Of course, the man feeling the danger didn¡ät allow that to happend.


    Swinging his axe, he stopped his sword of Danzel.


    The floor that the viges had created cracked and showed the sands beneath it, making those two at a standstill, one unable to push the other away and im their life.


    "Heh~It seems my luck is on my side. I thought I would be facing a magic caster thin as bones, but seeing how strong you are, I guess our fight will be fun. Hehe~" The man with the axe said.


    Though his words were full of confidence and one would be intimidated by the man''s vicious face. The man wasn¡ät confident in himself to win against that dark knight in front of him.<sub> </sub>


    He was a maning from a tribe made out of barbarians, they were hunters by birth and fighting was their second nature. Making their instinct and body to be much greater than their peers.


    s, even the barbarian wasn¡ät confident to face the dark knight, that swung so fast that he could barely see a trace of its sword. Nheless, the height that the barbarians were so famous for was also inferiorpares to the dark knight.


    `It¡äs like fighting a starved beast that looks towards his meal. One wrong move and that ominous sword would im my head.¡ä The barbarian thought to himself.


    As for Danzel, he wasn¡ät intimated one bit by the barbarian''s words.


    If he were he would have been ashamed of himself.


    From peopleing back from the dead, a magic caster that could freeze one''s body in an instant, and a monstrous being with over a hundred of skills that weren¡ät from this dimension itself.


    An overconfident fool''s words were nothingpared to them.


    The moment he shed with the barbarian, Danzel understood the strength differences.


    In physical strength alone, they were equal if only the barbarian was only slightly stronger by a few points of strength, although that was the case, Danzel crowned over the barbarian based on their speed.


    `That guy is simr to that one bandit that I killed back then, it will take a while to finish him off.¡ä


    Giving the woman that was far behind the barbarian, Danzel decided what to do.


    "I will deal with you muscleheadter." Danzel cold voice came out of his mouth.


    Before the barbarian could understand the meaning behind Danzel''s words, Danzel pushed their weapons away and took arge step back using [Swift Movements].


    "Wha-" Before the man could finish his words, Danzel gave the draugrs who were a few steps behind him hismand.


    "Kill him."


    Hearing their liegesmand, the 10 draugrs passed through Danzel and went towards the barbarian with clear intent.


    "ording to our master will!" The draugrs said with their ice-cold voice in unison.


    Releasing what was happening, the barbarian got enraged.


    "You!!! How dare you run away!" The barbarian said as he dodged the thrust of a Draugr wielding a spear. Before the draugr could pull back his spear, he found himself with the axe of the barbarian destroying his skulls.


    Scoffing at the barbarian''s words, Danzel left his undead to deal with the barbarian and he went straight towards the woman with the whip.


    `Before my undead ends up getting destroyed by this musclehead, I got to finish her off!¡ä Danzel thought internally as his killing intent reached the woman with the whip.


    `Shit! That bastard is aiming for me!¡ä She thought to herself as she extended her whip and whipped towards the dark knight in front of her.


    She originally wanted to run away towards the other side where the two knights and the old mage were by using the barbarian to buy her time.


    She didn¡ät expect that the dark knight would let his undead deal with the muscle head and face her directly.


    Having no other choice, she gritted her teeth and injected her life force into her whip.


    "Don¡ät underestimate me you wannabe necromancer!"


    *Fsssiiih!


    Seeing the whip traveling towards him, Danzel raised his de with one hand and swung down, exactly down the middle where he expected the whip to hit him.


    Doing something like that as aiming to cut a whip traveling at such speed would have been impossible for him, but for the current him such a feat was now possible.


    In the moments when his longsword was about to cut the whip in half, he senses some sort of dangering from the whip.


    As the sword was about to cut the whip, the whip itself seemed to move of its own free will and change direction and going towards his left just below his ribs.


    Having already sensed the danger though, he was able to put tes of armor around his armor.


    s, the blow of the whip was no joke.


    *Crack!


    Being pushed back a few feet, Danzel felt one of his ribs crack, but not broke thanks to his quick reaction.


    Looking down at his armor, he saw no actual damage to his armor, but arge portion of the ck metal cracked and fell to the ground.


    `It changed directions at thest minute...¡ä Danzel thought as he looked at the woman''s whip with annoyance.


    `If I had carved more runes into my armor, I wouldn¡ät have received damage from something like that.¡ä


    Except his sword having his first self-made rune that draws the blood of others out of their body, his helmet that had the [Rune of Vis], allowing him to see as if didn¡ät have a helmet at all, and the [Rune of Force] capable to put a barrier around his body on his chest te. There weren¡ät any other runes.


    Even though he could fill his armor with multiple runes, with his armor being of higher quality, he wanted to carve higher quality runes than the lower ones.


    But if his armor got actually damaged because he didn¡ät carve any runes, he would have felt devasted.


    "Such an annoying weapon..." Danzel mumbled, as his armor created sand to turn into the ck metal to fill the gaps of the armor.


    Hearing the dark knight''s annoying voice, the woman put up a warm smile on her face and whipped the ground.


    "Thanks for thepliment, it took me quite a while to master."


    "Out of courtesy, allow me to show you more of my skill using your body as a target!." She yelled as she whipped once more toward Danzel

 Chapter 242 Troublesome Opponents

    *Fssiiih! Fssiiih! Fssiiih!


    Sounds like thunder piercing through the air could be heard.


    Sometimes that sound came as thunder hitting a boulder and destroying it into tinny pieces.


    The source of all those sounds was none other than the woman wielding the whip.


    When she swung her whip, her whole body would move ordingly to increase both speed and impact of the whip.


    Using her mastery of the whip and her life force to control the whip ording to her will, the whip was swung dozens of times at Danzel.


    The mere touch of the whip on the ground left a carved marking.


    Forcing Danzel to the instant of advantaging forward, to stay in that distance and keep dodging the whip.


    The moment you tried to take a step forward, he would have been forced to pull it back so that the whip doesn¡ät hit his leg.


    Making a situation that was extremely frustrating for Danzel.


    Although one hit wasn¡ät capable to pass through his armor, the impact alone was strong enough to crack, if not possibly break the bones behind his armor.


    `Dammit, this can¡ät go on.¡ä Danzel thought as he gave his draugr a quick nce.


    The draugrs that were originally 10, had now been reduced into 5 in total. His draugr fought relentlessly with everything they had, butpared to a 3rd-tierbated who was physically strong, there was little that they could.


    That was obvious since those draugrs were off the starting 2nd-tier.


    Against an opponent much faster and stronger than them, not to forget with a body that they could barely damage, their downfall woulde much faster than Danzel originally had thought.


    `That annoying wench and her annoying whip! If that muscleheades to help her I will be forced to give up on killing those guys.¡ä


    Making up his mind, Danzel guided his mana into his longsword.


    Dodging the whip that came after his head just barely, Danzel raised his sword and shed through the air, releasing the dark green mana that turned into a sharp air de diagonally. Right after, he dashed full speed using [Swift Movements] towards her.


    "Hmpf, I already saw that one." The woman with the whip said.


    The moment the dark green wind de reached her, with her flexible body, she jumped towards the side of the air de just barely enough to not get cut.


    But even after doing such an acrobatic move, she didn¡ät forget that the dark knight wasing for her head. Without even having touched the ground, she swung her whip with one of her hands with such speed that it almost came beside Danzel in an instant.


    Looking to his side, Danzel gritted his teeth and swung his swords towards the whip.


    s, instead of being cut as it should, the whip held on thanks to the woman''s life force. Originally if Danzel left the whip being, he would have been hit to his chest, but now thanks to him swinging his sword towards the whip, instead of stopping the whip circled around his head, and with the whips users will, it struck Danzel head like a sledgehammer.


    *Crack!


    "!!!"


    Feeling his whole skull vibrating, Danzel seemed like he had lost control of his body and started falling.


    Seeing that, a vicious smile appeared on the woman that was responsible for that.


    "Hahaha! Take that sucker! Go back to the grave where you summoned those lot-" The woman''s words halted before her eyes became wide open.


    "You-!


    Before she could swing her whip once more, Danzel who was about to fall-nted one of his legs forward and dashed towards the woman with the whip at such speed that before she could swing her whip, he arrived in front of her.


    Seeing the ominous dark green glowing sword ready to swing at her, she was forced to abandon her attempt to attack him and instead dodge his iing death of her.


    Bending her back, Danzel''s sword barely passed her.


    Flipping using her hands that touched the ground, she created a 5-meter distance between her and the dark knight in an instant. But as soon as she was in front of her, her face became pale.


    Danzel instead of following her and stopping by his first swing, swung once more towards the air, releasing a dark green air de right in front of the woman.


    And with the air de being so close, she could do nothing but face the air de face on.


    Spreading her life force around her body, she tried to harden her body, allowing her to not be cleaved in half.


    "Aaaah!" with arge cut on her clothes and a muchrge wound that let a massive amount of blood flow out of her body, weakness started to overtake her body.


    "You bastard! I will kill you!" Ignoring the lethal wound and screaming at top of her lungs, she raised her whip to hit the dark knight once more before her iing death.


    And yet Danzel didn¡ät even allow that.


    Grabbing the hand holding the whip and twisting, Danzel pushed his long sword directly toward her.


    "Ahh~"


    Driving the de even deeper, the dark manaing from the [Cursed Spell] decayed her already pierced heart at an extremely fast rate while the runes drained her blood and forced it out.


    [You received82 000 XP]


    Letting off her hand and drawing his sword out, the woman fell to the ground motionlessly.


    "To think that I was forced to use that tactic once more." Danzel said in anger as the ck metal on his metal repaired itself.


    `It pisses me off.¡ä


    Simr to what he did against the shadow merchant Hanson, he intentionally used himself as bait to get closer to his enemy.


    Though against Hanson his skull got destroyed and effectively killed him, the woman''s attack only managed to crack his skull, which was better than dying but also not.


    Having his skull cracked, would make let him more open to his instincts of undead and clouding his reasoning. Which wasn¡ät that optimal as of now.


    Turning away from the corpse of the woman, not even bothering to raise her as one of his undead, Danzel dashed towards the barbarian.


    `Move back!¡ä Danzelmanded the 2 remaining draugrs.


    Hearing their liegesmand, they instantly took a step back and confused the barbarian for a short moment.


    Noticing the iing Danzel though, he swung his axe towards him, and once more found themself to sh with each other.


    "Delivered as promised...now it¡äs your turn." Danzel said in his cold voice.<sub> </sub>


    "Heh...took you long enough." The barbarian said as he pushed the sword away and swung with all his strength towards Danzel''s head.


    Who thetter blocked effortlessly.


    `Dammit, that useless woman. She couldn¡ät even keep a man in check for longer than five minutes.¡ä The barbarian cursed internally as they exchanged swings with their rtive weapons.


    In the few excites that they did, the barbarian found himself being pushed back from Danzel''s assault. As his speed was much greater than him, the barbarian couldn''t ever realize properly without risking being cut by the ominous de.


    Even when he used his life force to forcefully move his body in a certain way to increase his strength and speed, there was only a moment where the assault stopped before continuing once more.


    In a mere few seconds, the barbarian found himself cornered a few meters away from the stone wall that Danzel had created.


    `This is taking too long.¡ä Danzel thought as he felt the presence of his draugr decreasing by more than half on the other side of the wall.


    If he had more time, he would simply cast both his curses on the man and slowly widdle him down with his endless stamina.


    `You two, attack the man''s joints at the same time.¡ä Danzelmanded his 2 remaining draugrs that were on this site.


    Hearing themand of their liege inside their mind, the 2 draugrs dashed and aimed their swords towards the barbarian legs, where his joints were.


    "You underhanded bastard!" The man cursed as he pushed Danzel''s sword away with his life force and then dodged the attacks of the draugrs.


    Even though his body could receive the damage, his joints were a much weaker part of his body that could potentially be damaged by the attacks of the 2 draugr, or the pain being strong enough to give the dark knight in front of him the advantage he needed to cut his head.


    Having taken a step back, the man cleaved one of the draugrs in half while elbowing the other rushing Draugr to its face, making his skull crumple and ending the draugrs immortality.


    But even with that 2 annoyence, the barbarian didn¡ät forget about the ominous sword of the dark knight. Having too little time though, he managed to push the sword away together with his axe.


    *Tiick!


    As the sound of metal shing with each other was ringing in his ears, the barbarian realized that the dark knight swung his sword with only one of his arms instead of both.


    Grinning behind his helmet, Danzel brought a leather shield out of his storage ring and guided his mana towards the shield.


    The shield pushed Danzel forward and together with him dashing forward, he directly rammed the leather shield on the barbarian''s chest with enough force that would resemble a train.


    "Gah!" Yelling out of pain from a few of his ribs breaking and a mouthful of blooding out of his mouth, the barbarian was catapulted towards the stone wall like a missile.


    Coming in contact with the stone wall itself, the man felt another intense paining from his back, but before he could even scream out of pain the whole stone wall broke apart and buried the man with stones.


    "Not quite enough, huh?" Danzel mumbled as he didn¡ät receive any sort of notification of XP from the barbarian.


    Throwing his leather shield to the ground, as it didn¡ät survive the impact with the barbarian''s body, Danzel stared at the flickering light that was under the rumble of the stone wall. That weak light was what represented the barbarian''s life.


    But right as Danzel was about to go and finish what he began, the blue light in front of him took his attention away.


    Looking ahead of himself, what he saw stunned him.


    In an instant, a prison made out of lighting halted the movements of 6 draugrs. The lighting prison not only kept them from moving for a reason unknown to Danzel but also electrocuted them lightly.


    "What the...¡ä


    Scanning his surroundings, Danzel''s ethereal eyesnded on the old mage and released a huge amount of mana out of his staff. Hinting that he was the one responsible for imprisoning his draugrs.


    Shortly after, the blue glow in his staff came in the form of lighting.


    Once the old mage pointed his staff up high, the lighting was released towards one of the lighting prisons and interfacing the power of the prison, being strong enough to make his undead break apart in a matter of seconds.


    To Danzel''s surprise, that wasn¡ät the end of it.


    The lighting that was on the lighting prison split in two and connected with the other prisons until the lighting connected to every prison and destroyed the draugrs.


    In a matter of a few seconds, 6 out of the remaining 18 draugrs got destroyed in an instant.


    "Crap, this muscle head can wait forter, I got to get rid of the mage." Danzel mumbled as he left the barbarian under the rumble and dashed towards the mage at full speed.


    In a matter of few steps thanks to his [Swift Movements], Danzel arrived beside the old mage with his sword risen up and ready to im the remaining of his old man''s life.


    But before the ominous de could reach the old mage, a sudden barrier in the form of a bubble made out of mana, filled with electricity appeared around the old mage.


    Upon contact with the barrier, his sword couldn¡ät move to pass the wall.


    Worse of all, the electricity that was around the barrier instantly traveled toward Danzel.


    "!!!"


    Even though his whole body was glowing in such strong lighting, the old mage turned his head towards the one that attacked his barrier.


    "Hmpf, if you thought you are getting a fast one with me, think twice."


    Taking a step back and taking a stance, he pushed his staff like a spear and hit the dark knight''s chest te.


    The thrust itself didn¡ät hold much power, but the mana that was discharged in the form of lighting was no less weak that a natural lighting bolt.


    That lighting that was released from the tip of the staff prated Danzel''s armor and reached the backside of it.


    Seeing that though, the old mage showed a frown on his face.


    Uses his magic to levitate slightly above the ground and create distance between the dark knight.


    "You...you aren¡ät a human."


    Danzel whose armor was still releasing smoke from his armor red at the old mage with killing intent.


    "Well done figuring that out." Danzel said with his cold voice, filled with sarcasm.


    Even if their armor of his blocked most of the damage, if he were a human, his inside would already have been burned to a crisp.


    With his skeletor body though, the damage wasn¡ät any significant.


    Dashing forward, his intention was clear as day.


    He was going to kill the mage.

 Chapter 243 Troublesome Opponents (2)

    As both were standing a few meters apart from each other. The moment Danzel noticed the smallest spark of manaing out of the old mage staff, he dashed forward.


    Not willing to let the dark knight any closer, his mana split into the air and turned into balls of lighting and were shot towards the dark knight.


    Halting his advantage, he put his mind on casting two dark green hands made out of mana while at the same time activating the enchantment of his sword to raise the sand like a wall.


    Unfortunately for Danzel, the 5 balls of lighting passed right through the sand wall without detonating as he had hoped so.


    "Not strong enough..."


    Taking a step back, he moved the two mana hands to collide with 2 lighting balls and in the end detonated them.


    Having 3 remaining balls of lighting to deal with, Danzel was forced to move to the side and dodge them. With some quick maneuver and his speed, he was able to dodge 2 out of the three.


    As those lighting balls had the nature to follow their target, Danzel found himself in front of the remaining lighting ball.


    Without any other choice, he swung his sword and cut the lightning ball in half, which didn¡ät help much as the electricity of the lightning ball was fully received anyways.


    *Chiii!


    Gritting his teeth, Danzel ignored the lighting dancing around his body and continued he pursue the old mage heads.


    Seeing that, the old mage was dumbfounded.


    "You damn monster if the lighting isn''t enough, then how about some mes?"


    Tapping his staff to the ground, arge magic circle appeared under Danzel''s feet.


    As soon as the magic circle glowed in red color, a pir of mes engulfed the dark knight whole.


    If one were to look from afar, the pir of fire would like the wrath of heaves that were being unleashed towards the mortal realm.


    Seeing such a sight, the old mage felt proud of himself.


    Even though he specialized more in lightning-based spells, the pir of fire was one of his best spells.


    The spell didn¡ät only spawn mes and shoot them up high, but it manipted the mes themself with gravities magic to make the mes denser and drag them up high without making the me themself any weaker.


    He also used the wind to twist the flow of the mes at the same time to make his enemies be burned by all sides in equal amounts.


    The old mage was confident that not even one possessing a body of a 4th-tier warrior could survive his spell.


    "Hehe~ that¡äs what you get from trying to burn us alive." The old mage snickers to himself as if he just heard the best joke in his life.


    But his snicker soon stops as he felt a threatening aura full of maliceing out of the pir of mes.


    "This guy! It can¡ät be-!" The old mage levitated back and started to cast his next spell.


    The next moment, the one responsible for the threatening aura came out of the pir of mes, still engulfed in mes.


    The dead mana around his body was clear for the naked eye to see, while the killing intent could be felt by everyone present except the undead.


    Kicking the ground, Danzel arrived in front of the old mage with newfound speed and bloodlust.


    "DIE!!!" Yelling out loud, Danzel swung his sword at an incredible speed.


    But before the sword could make contact with the old mage, it halted in the air as a prison made out of lighting came around Danzel.


    The lighting that was channeling to his sword kept him from moving, while the lighting around his body was negated from his armor.


    The mes that were still on his body were soon overtaken by the ck metal that his armor created.


    The old mage who was staring at Danzel''s de not even being a meter far away almost made him lose his cool. But before he could even rx, he stared at how the sword with its dead mana was slowly creeping ever closer to the outside of the prison, making the old mage curse out loud.


    "Dammit! What kind of strength does this guy have!?"


    Inputting more of his mana into the lighting prison, Danzel''s de finally halted into its ce. But as soon as the old mage removed his input on mana, the sword would slowly move forward together with his wieldier.


    Worse of all for the old mage, the terrifying bloodlust that the dark knight was leaking out made him scared.


    By this long life where he fought many experts of the 3rd-tier and even met a few of the 4th-tier, it was his first time feeling such a scary auraing out of a person.


    He felt like a petite child holding on to a damaged chain that kept the door of a starved lion closed. He could only watch how the lion was trying to break through the door and see the chain he was holding also be breaking slowly but surely.


    Gritting his teeth, the old mage yelled towards the 2 knights that were still busy with the draugrs.<sub> </sub>


    "Hey! What are you doing! Come and help me get the necromancer!"


    The knights who heard the plea of the old man only nced at him before focusing back on destroying all the remaining draugrs.


    `Those guys!¡ä


    Understanding that he was abandoned by the 2 knights, the old mage gritted his teeth and put all his focus on creating a ball of lighting on his other hand while still keeping the lighting prison in check.


    Moving away and pushing the ball of lighting towards Danzel, the prison keeping Danzel back broke, but through the contact of the lighting bolt, he was slightly pushed back.


    Using that opportunity, the old mage thanks to his levitation spell jumped up high andnded on one of the roofs with little input from his muscles.


    When the old mage thought he could finally take a breather, he noticed two dark green wind desing towards his way.


    "Tch!" Clicking his tongue, the old mage jumped to the side and dodge the first wind de while using his barrier to block the second projectile.


    ncing towards the dark knight that was releasing such a high amount of killing intent, the old mage''s face darken.


    `Forget it, this fight is no more worth the risk.¡ä


    Wising up, the old mage instead of staying and fighting to the death against an opponent that survived all his best spells, decided to run away.


    Turning his back, he jumped towards another''s house roof as he was weightless.


    The moment he touched the next roof, the previous spot where he was one was devasted as if an explosion ord.


    Jumping to the next roof, the old mage nced in surprise behind him.


    Swinging his sword in the air, all the dust that Danzel raised from ripping the roof was pushed to the side. Staring at the old mage directly into his eyes.


    Right as he was about to chase after, the moment he took a step forward, he forced himself to regain his rity back and stop [Sin of Wrath] from further influencing his mind.


    Seeing how the distance was bing bigger by the second, Danzel''s grip on his sword tightened.


    "I will give you that, magic caster...Today isn¡ät going to be your end." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Raising his hand and pointing it towards the escaping magic caster, Danzel''s voice turned into a vicious one.


    "But don¡ät think that you can leave just like that. You see, I am quite vengeful."


    The moment he finished, the dark green mana that he was channeling was shot out in the form of a mist.


    The dark green mist traveled at immense speed, at a speed that caught up to the magic caster not long before the curse was cast.


    Seeing the misting for him, the old mage turned around and cast his barrier around his body, but as soon as the dark green mist made contact with the barrier, it entered as if it weren¡ät there in the first ce.


    Not even the lighting dancing around the barrier stopped the mist from entering the old mage''s body.


    "What-!" Yelling in surprise from the mist bypassing his barrier, his face soon turned pale as he understood what the dark green mist was.


    "That despicable bastard! To think he knows how to cast curses...at least it isn¡ät of the permanent kind."


    Although the old mage felt bitter from the curse in his body, he nevertheless made his escape while ignoring the pain that he started feeling in his body.


    `Such pity.¡ä Danzel though internally


    Watching such a big sack of XP that inflicted damage on him leaving did make him feel bitter, but he managed topromise with himself.


    "Two fish are better than one..." Danzel mumbled as he turned his head over his shoulder.


    The knight with the silver sword swung his sword and cut the final draugr.


    The moment the draugr fell to the ground, the two knights turned the focus towards the destroyed roof.


    Or rather, towards the master of all those undead that they ined.


    Walking off the building edge, Danzelnded on the ground.


    "Now only you two remain." Danzel said with his de pointed at those two.


    Seeing that, both of the knights to their stance.


    Looking at them, his dark green mana came out of his hand.

 Chapter 244 Necromancer′S Curiosity.

    "Haah~ Haah~"


    *Tinkk!


    Cutting the haggard breath, Danzel''s long sword shed with the silver sword of the knight.


    There was only a moment where the two swords were equal to each other, but that moment was short-lived as Danzel''s sword was pushing forward.


    "Haah~You monster~!" Using his life force to strengthen his body, he pushed the dark knight''s sword away and took arge step back to create some distance from each other.


    The silver knight''s sweat was clearly to be seen on his face and his breathing indicated that the man was heavily exhausted.


    "You...are an undead aren¡ät you?" The silver knight said frustrated.


    Walking closer to the silver knight, Danzel''s armor seemed to have some scratches, but soon those scratches were covered by the dark metal from his armor.


    Behind himy the corpse of the knight that wielded the dark sword.


    The knight''s corpse had his neck sliced, leaving a puddle full of blood near the corpse, but the most noticeable thing was how his skin dried up and looked like that of a mummy.


    "Took you long to notice." Danzel said as he held a grin on his face.


    If one were to see him, it would look as if he was opening his mouth a bit, but Danzel was currently in quite a nice mood.


    Not only did he fight for a whole 30 minutes against those 2 knights, but his armor also got damaged, albeit only slightly.


    At first, he thought that with his superior stats, he would be able to make quick work out of those 2 two knights, but he couldn¡ät be more wrong.


    His stats themself were far superior, while he was on the peak of the 3th-tier, those 2 were around the middle, if not a bit lower.


    Nevertheless, even with the individual strength difference, the swordsmanship of the duo far surpassed their actual strength.


    Fighting those two felt as if he were fighting someone wielding 4 swords respectively. Not a single-blind spot to make use of and relentless attacks that never allowed him to drop his guard for a second.


    The many scratches on his armor were of the attacks he barely managed to dodge.


    Finding himself in such a situation, Danzel used his nature as an undead to his advantage.


    A battle of endurance.


    Not only did he cast both his curses towards both the knights, but with the endless stamina of one of the undead, Danzel waited till one of them hit the bucket.


    And after the whole 30 minutes, the knight wielding a dark sword had soon hit the limit, making him take a mistake that cost his life. Being inflicted with curses that brought exhaustion and pain, he fell victim to Danzel''s long sword.


    Thus, bringing them to the current present.


    Of course, the silver knight has the same curses inflicted upon his mortal body.


    "Anyone with half a brain would and experience would have noticed." The silver knight said with a fake smile.


    Through their fight, the silver knight noticed that he couldn¡ät hear a single breathing from the undead in front of him even after fighting for over 30 minutes.


    People with a body of a 3rd-tier could well easilyst hours if they wanted, but to not let a single breath out was in the realm of impossible for someone of the living.


    Just thinking about the current situation and his dead brotherying cold on the ground filled the silver knight in anger and frustration.


    "Haha~, to think I wanted to join that necromancer¡äs mercenary group...I bet that necromancer would be disappointed in his undead using such cowardly methods."


    Hearing his words, Danzel frowned internally, as the word necromancer got his attention.


    `Well, I can ask that after I am done with him...¡ä Danzel thought as he open his mouth.


    "...You call me a coward when I faced you two alone? Maybe if that magic caster had stayed, you two might have the chance to beat me."


    `Although at that point I would have run away.¡ä Danzel added mentally in the end.


    He knew his limits, or at least he thought he did.


    And fighting those 2 knights while having support from that old magic caster was a big no for him.


    Though he wanted the XP and his mission to finish faster, he valued his life even more than some mere numbers.


    Dashing forward, he shed done with his long sword aiming for the knight''s head.


    *Tiink!<sub> </sub>


    Their swords held each other from splitting more blood, but the difference was that the knight was holding his sword with both hands and Danzel with one.


    Pushing forward, he sent out a punch straight to the man''s guts.


    *Gaaah!


    Not having much strength to react fast enough, the punch connected and let his saliva fly out of his mouth.


    The only thing preventing his fist from going inside the man''s stomach was the little life force he used to protect himself. But even with life force, the man found himself kneeling with no further strength to fight back.


    "Ugh...me and my brother will be awaiting you on the other side, you monster."


    What were thest words of the knight wielding the silver sword before he got decapitated by one swift swing.


    [You received 80 000 XP]


    Watching the body fall off, Danzel scoffed out loud.


    "Hmpf, talking about the other side when you don¡ät even know what it looks like. Hope your wish doesn¡ät turn true." Danzel said as he cleaned his sword from the blood using the rune in his sword.


    With his sword now clean, Danzel removed his helmet by putting it in the storage ring so that he sees his reflection from his sword.


    "It seems Ick the countermeasuresagainst a magic caster. To think he would damage me to such extent..."


    Staring at a small hole that his skull had with multiple cracks and around his eye socket that it melted to some extent, he cursed internally.


    `Dammit, more than half of my HP has been reduced by a sole spell, which shouldn¡ät affect me as much.¡ä


    Even when he was under the effect of [Sin of Wrath], he still couldn¡ät do much against the old magic caster and that pissed him off big time.


    Attacking him with the sword would result in getting electrocuted, in range he would get harassed by other spells and if he let his guard done as he did under [Sin of Wrath], he would have to take a bath of mes.


    All options he had were awful.


    It was only through sheer strength that allowed him to scare the old magic caster.


    "I would need to increase my skills and hopefully find abination that is good against magic casters. Although curses seem quite good, the time they take to do a meaningful difference is too long."


    Letting the ck metal of his armor fall off from his current armor, he also gazed bitterly at the scratches of his armor.


    "Though I said that...maybe carving some runes to the armor would be wiser. Since I only got one armor, I might as well go for the best and aim for the next grade runes."


    Danzel felt conflicted, although he had arge amount of XP in his storage, he knew too well that all his XP could disappear in a matter of a few seconds of getting carried away.


    "Baah! I will decideter, I better go collect theying stuff before I forget." Danzel said as he walked towards the rumbles.


    Walking on top of the rumbles, he sends out a kick and pushed arge amount of stone away, revealing arge hand reaching out to Danzel with ill intent.


    "Useless." Danzel said as he swung his sword towards the hand and cut it with ease.


    "Ahhhhhh!" A loud scream came out of the man whose hand cut off.


    The man who was screaming from extrusion amount of pain was none other than the barbarian himself.


    Before his scream could be over, Danzel stomped his chest, making him unable to move.


    "Now then...since I killed everyone and thest guy got my curiosity in the end. Why won¡ät you be the one who answers my question.


    The man send out a hated re towards the dark knight, but the moment he saw the skull with its dark green ethereal eyes staring back at him, his face paled even more.


    "U-Undead!?" the barbarian screamed in horror.


    `I guess the silver knight was right.¡ä Danzel thought as he made a stack of papers appear in his hand.


    "Now before answering my question, do know thatying to me would be useless." Danzel said in a sinister tone.


    Those pieces of papers were none other than a bunch of contracts that didn¡ät have the details written in.


    As the barbarian was giving him a hand and offering his blood, making a contract with him was nothing difficult.


    "Now with my first question...is there another necromancer beside me?"

 Chapter 245 Curiosity Over Disregard Of Life

    On top of some stone rumbles, a piece of paper was thrown into the air before it was ignited in dark green mes.


    If one were to look carefully, quite many simr pieces of paper were lying around which weren¡ät burned at all.


    "Sigh~, again? Even though I told you that it¡äs useless, you still pursue the wrong path." Danzel said as a small dagger in his hand approached the barbarians hip.


    "N-No! No more of it! I won¡ät do it again! It was a mistake! I didn¡ät mean- AGH!!"


    Driving the dagger into his flesh, the barbarian''s scream was heard through the distance.


    Pulling the dagger out, Danzel stared coldly at the mentally and physically scarred barbarian who acted quite arrogantly an hour ago.


    With the help of his runed contracts, he was able to find out the answer to his question, as if he lied he would know imminently with the contract getting ignited in mes. In the times when the barbarian refused to speak in the first ce, he resorted to a more...forceful manner.


    In the form of torture that is.


    Hearing the man''s screams and the expression that the barbarian made every time he stabbed him, made him remember how convenient being an undead truly was.


    Walking a few steps back and sitting on top of thergest rock, Danzel threw the dagger away and thought back on the information he gained.


    `There is another necromancer in the desert¡ä


    That was the first thing that he managed to confirm from the barbarian.


    Which got him quite interested for several reasons.


    As if he didn¡ät count Nersan¡ärah, he himself didn¡ät meet a necromancer ever.


    Of course, Danzel didn¡ät consider the goblin shaman as one necromancer.


    After all, the shaman was pathetically weak now that he looks back at it.


    He doubted that even if it had used his whole mana, he wouldn''t manage to kill him with his current body.


    Nevertheless, ording to the barbarian, the necromancer is supposed to be quite powerful.


    And supposedly, he is the leader of a mercenary group that he and the others of his group wanted to join.


    That made him think of an idea.


    Since he was currently stuck with [Lower ss Death Magic] and he had no idea how to improve it, he thought that asking advice from that necromancer could solve his problem.


    After fighting with the old magic caster, he realized howcking his attacking options were.


    In fact, he always knew that this problem existed, it was just that other stuff held much bigger importance.


    Making it is pushed back in his side thoughts.


    If he were to find the reason or at least a hint of how to upgrade his talent, then he will have many other options.


    ''I guess meeting him under the pretext of joining his group should make it possible for me to meet that necromancer peacefully.''


    "At least I hope so..." Danzel said as he shook his head.


    Of course, he could continue massacring whatever came into his sight and use the XP he would gain to make his current abilities better, but this choice would only improve his current him without giving him any new options that he desperatelycked.


    `Even if I do that, with that damned magic caster that escaped, sooner orter routers about me will travel which will make others wary of me and thus much harder to kill them.¡ä


    He still cursed internally or allow the magic caster to run away.


    Although if he continued his massacre on the desert, there was bound to be news about him, now with the magic caster knowing his existence he expected that such information would be spread much faster than they originally anticipated.


    "Ugh...what a mess." Danzel touched his skull as his n became a mess.


    The moment he touched his skull, he was reminded of his still damaged skull.


    "I even got that against that old fossil... the cracks should heal but the other stuff..."


    When he was wondering about his deformed skull, a sudden idea struck his mind.


    "Oh right! Why didn¡ät think of thatter!"


    Getting off the rock he was sitting on, he made two ethereal dark green hands appear which shot out and gripped the silver and dark sword of the two knights.


    "Might as well use those instead of my weapon." Danzel mumbled to himself as he held the silver sword with his left and the dark sword with his right.


    Walking and looking down on the shivering barbarian who seemingly lost enough blood to kill three people.


    `That¡äs the vitality of a 3rd-tier I guess. No matter how much they let out, the stuff stilles out.¡ä


    Oblivious of the undead¡äs though, the barbarian eyes shook in fear as he saw him holding the two swords of the knights.<sub> </sub>


    Although the torture he received was enough to make him wish to die already, he still held a slimmer of hope to get out of his situation.


    s, the undead had other ns for him.


    "That look in your eyes, I''ve seen those before. And I am sorry to disappoint you that your hope is unfounded."


    Raising the dark sword just an inch away from the barbarian''s neck, Danzel raised the silver sword to the side of his skull.


    "If my experiment goes right, we will soon meet on the other side."


    Without leaving his words to sink in, Danzel pushed down the dark de in the neck of the barbarian.


    A mouthfeel of blood came, which made him cough his own blood and drown in his at the same time.


    As his life was passing through his eyes, thest moment in his life was filled full of confusion.


    Before his body was overtaken by a dark fluid that resembled the void, he saw how the undead drove the silver sword through his skull.


    *Crack!!


    With the undead skull destroyed, he fell to his knees before falling through the ground emotionlessly.


    ***


    In a time and space filled with darkness, a dark green light appeared out of nowhere.


    The dark green light was in the form of a skeleton.


    Turning his eyes around, the figure was Danzel spotted another faint light through the distance.


    The light in question however disappeared right after heid his ethereal eyes on it.


    Even though he was only able to get a nce at the light, he was able to confirm the source of that light.


    "So it seems that I was right with Nersan''rah. This ce is really the realm of the dead...the destination of everyone who experiences death itself." Danzel nodded to himself.


    As the faint light was a small piece of the face of the barbarian before being engulfed in the darkness, he felt confident in the identity of this ce.


    Even if he were wrong, he managed to confirm a small piece of this ce.


    "I guess that will be enough for this time around."


    Having confirmed what he wanted, Danzel was about to go back to the physical world before he stopped and turned his back to look into the darkness.


    More specifically though, he looked at a small outline of a figure which he could identify as the one that always followed him in this darkness.


    ''You still at it, huh?''


    Shaking his head, Danzel disappeared from the darkness as his curiosity was filled.


    ***


    Not long after Danzel copsed to the ground, the dead man in his body exploded and spread far before turning into a vortex that flew in his direction.


    The dead mana started to fix the cracks and the missing ribs at an incredible speed before the head that was in pieces, the broken pieces themselves moved and started to form a new skull without any damage to be seen.


    As a result of that, the nearby dead risen once more in the form of zombies, while Danzel''s dark green ethereal eyes lighten once more inside his eye sockets.


    Standing from his feet, the first thing that caught his notice was the massive Skull w that looked towards.


    "Right, I forgot you weren''t of the newer undead and that you can" t receive long-distancemands." Danzel said to himself as he stored the two swords in his storage room.


    Though those swords weren''t as good as his, it didn''t hurt from taking them in his ring storage.


    "So you didn''t manage to bring someone to me, huh?" Danzel questioned Skull w, who in response lowered her head.


    "It doesn''t matter." Danzel said as he finished the zombies in a mere few seconds.


    Cheating his sword, Danzel looked at his destroyed draugrs bitterly.


    "Every single one of them got destroyed."


    Shaking his head, he jumped in skull ws back.


    Taking his Necronomicon out to study it even further, he gave Skull w in the direction that the barbarian told him about.


    Towards the where the Necromancer was recruiting to build up a party.


    At least ording to the barbarian''s words.

 Chapter 246 Arcsarah

    Currently near the borders from the deserts of Azu¡ärah.


    On the Northwest side was one of the closed viges which could potentially be called a city in a few years.


    Since on the spot of the vige, they had fewer frequent disasters such as sandstorms or monsters making their presence known to the people of Arcsarah.


    That allowed the Arcsarah vige to have a nice foundation which not only allowed buildings to be made of more durable materials but was also a hot stop for all merchants of the like to gather.


    Every singlepensated merchant knew the ce of Arcsarah as it was a vital point for such merchants to resupply before they go back and sell it for profit in the vast desert where people were desperate for either food or water.


    Bread that could be sold for the petty price of a few copper coins, could suddenly turn into a few silver coins instead.


    For such reasons, people flocked to Arcsarah.


    Be it merchants, explorers, magic casters, or warriors, they were there.


    And among those people, a merchant wasn¡ät having the best day...


    "What do you mean by that!" One man yelled as he hit the table full of wares.


    "S-Sir...I already exined that any lower will be"


    "Is that how you talk to one of your customers, huh!? Are you taking us for fools!? Is that it!? Maybe getting a little rough would change your mind!"


    Of course, Arcsarah wasn¡ät a perfect ce.


    As no leading figure was there to uphold some sort ofw, the rule of the strong rule the weak was still present there.


    Most wouldn¡ät go for such methods to deal with people as it would sour the connection of the merchant and make the people look negatively at you.


    But the merchant holding his shop in the streets had sadly met a group of 3 bad apples, that didn¡ät care about the oue of their actions.


    `Curse those fools! I knew I should have gone deeper to the center instead of out of the vige. If I had done so I wouldn¡ät have to deal with those fools¡ä The merchant scolded himself for his bad decision-making.


    He thought he could make some coin if he wait for new arrivers.


    But instead of new arrivers, he found himself dealing with some unreasonable people who threaten him instead.


    "Haha~it seems like my joke went too far sir, its actual cost is only 14 copper coins." The merchant with a smile that was only for the look.


    Internally he grimaced as if he eat 5 whole lemons at once.


    `Though I won¡ät make a profit if I sell it that low, as long as those guys leave everything will be fine.¡ä


    Unfortunately for his expectations, the next thing he heart made his heart freeze.


    "Huh!? 14! Don¡ät you see that all 3 need one!? At least make it half of its price!" The man in the middle said with an evil grin on his face and eyes of the crescent moon.


    "!!!"


    "Hahah! That¡äs right, right!"


    "As expected of our brother, as generous as always."


    Seeing how the two other men yed along with the nt bullsh*t of the middle man, the merchant nced at his hand so much that it started bleeding.


    While the three men wereughing as if they heard the best joke of their life, a sudden shadow eclipsed them, followed by a cold voice.


    "You, are you a merchant?" The cold voice said, taking the notice of the three men and merchant.


    "Hah!? Don¡ät you see that we-" Before the man in the middle could finish his sentence, once he turned his back, his whole body froze.


    Having gathered the attention of everyone nearby and being the one responsible for casting the shadow of the three-man, was an over 5-meter beast who had its body covered by a piece of cloth. Not only was it big, but the ws showing out of the cloth seemed like that of metal while its head was that of a skull without a hint of flesh to see.


    Most who saw that beast became scared thinking that a monster found its ce inside the vige, but by the few words of the nearby who knew of its race and saw that it had a poorly made bridle tight around his fang, they calmed down in the belief of being the amount of someone.


    Though unusual, many types of mounts resembled that of monsters, such as big lizards.


    What made the man truly freeze though was the giant of a man that was behind him.


    Since he was wearing a cloak he couldn¡ät see much of his face, but based on his height and build, he unconsciously let an oppressive feeling out.


    One that made others feel that he was dangerous.


    "Hey, I asked you a question." The cloaked figure said as he turned in the merchant''s direction.


    Realizing that the suspicious figure was talking to him, the merchant nodded his head.


    "Y-Yeah, I am indeed a merchant. What could I do for you, dear sir?"


    "Good, you see, I wanted to ask-"<sub> </sub>


    Being in the middle of the cloaked figures and the merchants that were their target, the fact that those three were ignored didn¡ät sit too well on their nerves.


    And the middle man who was taking the part of their leader walked one step toward the cloaked figure with a knife in his hand.


    "Bastard...are you blind or something!? We were first here! If you care for your life then piss off!" The man said as he pressed the dagger gently on the figure''s cloak.


    The two other men who saw this grinned with malice and pulled their respective daggers out.


    The merchant who saw this started to sweat bullets out of his back.


    The cloaked figure in response didn¡ät even look at the man pointing the dagger in his chest or behaved to be scared.


    If of anything, behind that cloaked the figure was simple.


    Annoyed.


    "Piss off."


    As soon as his cold words ended, his hand moved at such speed that the people nearby could be mistaken that it disappeared and then reappeared like teleportation.


    Only when the sound of the hand hitting something could the others see where the hand moved.


    "BUAAAGH!"


    Being the middle man''s face that the hand hit directly on his jaws, the man was catapulted like a piece of rag through the air, his whole body circling mid-air until it hit a nearby house.


    *Boogh!


    Seeing what happened to their brother, the two men had their jaws dropped in shock while they became pale.


    It all happened without even being able to see what happened, in a matter of a few seconds.


    The man who received the hit didn¡ät show any kind of response, making the atmosphere around the street much worse than before.


    "That man is just unconscious." The cloaked figure said to everyone present.


    Hearing those words, many turned a blind eye to the man who was hit. As most didn¡ät want to get involved with the cloaked figure or the three other men, they all decided to believe the cloaked figure.


    "So? What were you nning to do with those daggers?" The cloaked figure said towards the two men.


    Hearing that, the men''s faces immediately became pale in horror.


    "Hiiiegh!!"


    Dropping their daggers to the ground, the two started to make a run of it, while leaving their supposed brother behind.


    Leaving those two escape, the cloaked figure turned his gazing eyes towards the merchant who was slowly also moving away.


    "..."


    The next second he saw that he disappeared from his ce and reappeared in front of the merchant by his seer speed.


    "Where are you going." The cloaked figure said while blocking the merchant''s path and revealing a hilt of a sword hidden in his cloak.


    *Gulp.


    Forcing his saliva back in his throat, the merchant cursed to himself for finding a much more troublesome guy that those 3bined.


    "I remember that I have an important date with someone, so..." The merchant said while trying to make his best fake smilee out. Which he failed as his fear of the cloaked figure made him too restless.


    "Don¡ät worry, I won¡ät be holding you for long. I am just seeking information about...this ce. Nothing more."


    Without letting his words sink into the merchant, 2 big bags were dragged by two dark green hands from the back of the huge beast.


    "As for the payment...you can have that stuff for yourself."


    Seeing the bags and then turning to look at the cloaked figure, the merchants made a frowned while a small interest grew inside of him.


    Opening the bags to see what was inside, they were various useless stuff while some like the tools and weapons got him interested.


    "As long it¡äs something I know, I will answer any of your questions." The merchant said.


    Hearing those words, the cloaked figure lower his hood which revealed a helmet made out of ck metal which the merchant didn¡ät recognize where it was from.


    "You see, I heard that there is a group that is being led by a Necromancer in this vige..." The figure, who was none other than Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "I wanted to ask where I can find them," Danzel said.


    While ignoring the XP notification that appeared moments ago.

 Chapter 247 First Test

    On the outside of the Arcsarah vige, where it was as deserted as the rest of the whole desert, people gathered there.


    "Hey, is it true that they will do it again this time around?" One man asked the one beside him from curiosity.


    Noticing that he was talking to him, the man nodded in confirmation.


    "Mhm, so I have heard. And if the rumors are true, then this will be thest time we see such an event, if not ever."


    "Seriously? If that¡äs the case, wouldn¡ät the bets be at the highest?" The one who first talked to his neighbor said.


    Nodding his head once again, the other man gazed in front of the gathered people.


    "That¡äs right. If you want to get rich, today is the day."


    Of course, those two guys were referring to none other than the biggest entertainment that was to be found in the Arcsarah vige.


    Livebat.


    Since it was old news that a powerful party of mercenaries was recruiting members to join their cause in Arcsarah. The merchants were unwilling to waste such opportunities to make a profit.


    One of the tests to join their group was though fighting others who had the same goal.


    And with most people willing to join the party was respectively 3rd-tierbated, it was extremely exciting for themon men to see such people fight with each other.


    Unlike the 1st and 2nd tier, the 3rd-tier was considered the strength of a monster. It was in the level where magic casters could destroy a whole house with a single spell and a swordmaster to cut through metal with ease.


    It was natural for the weak to be drawn with such strength, making it for the merchants all the easier to set their scheme.


    Which was none other than betting.


    They managed to quickly put up a spot where people could observe the fight of such 3rd-tierbatants and let them bet on the winner.


    A simple yet effective way to make a profit.


    Though it was frustrating to give the winner of the bet some of their earned coins, they still made a profit by the sheer amount of others losing their money by betting on the wrongbated


    And ording to the rumors that surfaced in Arcsarah, the party of mercenaries will take their leave this week.


    Meaning, that this event was thest of its kind.


    In other words, the winner of today''s bets wille out rich with how many people are here.


    "So, which one will you be betting on?" The man asked his neighbor.


    "I am going for that guy." He pointed at one who was waiting to the side.


    The man in question was shirtless, allowing others to see his defining muscles. No weapon was to be seen on top of him except if one considered his fist that had bandages.


    "He is quite the famous in the desert, he is being called the unseen fist. A martial artist who is of the 3rd-tier. He will be my golden goose for today." The man said with a smile on his face as if he could already see the gold coins in front of his eyes.


    Shaking his head for the guys wasting his money, the other scanned all thebatants with not much interest.


    Compared to the other man who was here to bet his money, he was only for the show here.


    ? `Well, though they look strong, I doubt any one of them would beat the second test.¡ä


    While he was scanning thebatants, he caught a glimpse of someoneing through the distance which he didn¡ät recognize.


    It was a cloaked figure riding on top of a huge beast that very well resembles an undead wolve.


    His size was over 5 meters, which brought the attention of the others to its rider.


    Though he didn''t know why just starting at the rider of such a beast made him ufortable.


    He didn''t know why, but he felt that he was radiating an aura that was much different than the other people gathering here to fight.


    It was a certain coldness that made the man look at the few coins in his hand.


    "I will be betting my coins on this guy" the man answered the other guy.


    Originally he didn''t n to do such a useless thing as to waste his coins on such a gambling show.


    But since those coins were his leftover, he decided to follow his guts and bet on the new guy.


    ***


    Currently in one of the big tents that have been built near the arena where the bets were.


    A cloaked figure came out.


    "Mhhm~, is it already time?" The cloaked figure said with a female voice, indicating that she was a woman.


    Stretching her hands, revealing a brown skin color, she looked at the participants that came with azy expression which thanks to her hood was unseen by prying eyes.


    "Hey, take it seriously. One of those guys could be anotherpanion of ours.


    Followed by another cloaked figure with a male voice, he called her from her behavior.


    In response rolled her eyes at him.


    "Yeah~yeah, I heard that joke already."


    Turning her head towards the many people with weapons in their hands, she scoffed.


    "After all, they don''t see much different than the other failed bunch."


    Hearing that, the cloaked man grimaced u set his hood.<sub> </sub>


    Though he said that to her, he held the same opinion of her.


    The ones that came to join their group didn''t look much different than the ones that came before.


    ''Though another helping hand would have been useful, there is nothing to be done by it.''


    Even though every single of them wanting to join their group could be considered the elite of an army.


    Their group was searching for someone much greater to join their group.


    "Sigh...even if you are right, it''s still your turn to do it." The cloaked man said.


    "Ugh~you don''t have to tell me. I know already!"


    Turning her back to him, she moved to the middle of the arena where everyone was able to see her.


    Taking a big breath, her loud voice echoed through the surroundings.


    "Everyone who came to join us, step forward!"


    Sensing the oppressive aura and hearing her voice, those who held the strength of a 3rd-tier stepped forward.


    "Our group only seems the strongest to join our ranks! Therefore we will begin with cutting the weed out of the real worth that will receive our test!"


    "Separate yourself so that you can duel each other! Thest remaining shall take the test! That''s it!"


    Hearing her words, everyone taking part in the test scanned their opponents to try to see who was the weakest of them all.


    Seeing the war of res between them, the cloaked woman sat cross-legged on top of a box.


    "And I believe I don''t have to mention it, but don''t expect us to save you a lot! You can kill each other for all I care. And if you interfere with each other duels, then be prepared to fight me."


    Most of the people hear grimaced by that as they were joining a fight in which they could potentially die.


    Separating and building duos with each other, they soon all found a partner to duel.


    Most people here didn''t feel worried as they fought enough battles to grant them the title of veterans.


    After all, someone who is of the 3rd-tier and focuses on their physical body and their weapon couldn''t reach that level without muchbat.


    They immediately went serious and took their opponents seriously.


    Only a few were full of confidence.


    And among them, was a shirtless man who had a smug smile on his face.


    "Heh, it seems that I got the new face to fight." The man with the title of unseen fist said as he cracked his knocks together.


    His oppose t who was wearing a cloak stared silently in response.


    "..."


    "Not much of a talked I see?" As soon as he said that, his life was forced to travel through his legs.


    Putting pressure on his legs, the ground cracked as he dashed forward with a grin on his face.


    "Let me give you a hand then!"


    The vigers who were watching the start of all fights started cheering at the moment they were waiting for.


    Reaching the cloaked figure, he sends out a punch toward his jaw.


    Without much of any movement though, the cloaked figure moved his head to the side andpletely Dodge the punch by a hairs breath.


    As the punch dragged the hood, the top part of his cloak got ripped off. Revealing the owner of dark armor.


    Before he could understand that his enemy had dodged, he felt a massive force hitting his jaw, which made his vision shake.


    ''Huh? What happens.''


    Having not understood that he was punched by the armored figure in his jaw, the other hand of the dark armored figure draw the long sword out of its sheath.


    Once drawn at a speed of less than a second, he held the de up high and set it down.


    Cutting the shirtless guy in half from his left shoulder to his pelvis.


    The duel didn''t even take a total of 5 seconds.


    While the others just engaged and we were fighting with their weapons on sequel grounds, the moment the ground was trained by the blood of someone and his body cut in such an anxious way.


    It was as if someone pressed the pause button on every one.


    Ignoring their re, he swung his weird too soon most of the blood to the ground turned his head towards his nearest person without even hiding his killing intent.


    Most were shocked that one actually died, as there was already an unwritten rule between them all not to kill each other.


    But not only did the ck-armored guy ignore that rule, but he also openly showed his hostility toward all the others.


    It was as if he was saying "you all will be the next''


    "Hoh?"


    Of course, such action got the interest of 2 certain people.

 Chapter 248 Threatening Dominance

    Upon the death of the man that was known as unseen fist, the audion was in shock. They rarely have seen someone dying in this event, not even considering the brutality of how he died.


    The weak-minded had their breakfast and make their way towards their throat to withness freedom once more. Which lead to some turning around to puke, with some guy receiving the whole service on top of his cloth.


    Such reaction was natural from seeing the organs of another maning out for everyone to see.


    Of course, such a reaction was the minority.


    The others only felt an instance of disgust before they gave their focus on the other people who fought with strength that they would never achieve in their lives.


    At the very least that¡äs what they decided to believe.


    Such intense fights allowed them to fill the childhood of many men by bing powerhouses and doing such battles where spells reigned the skies and people with the speed of gods fought back.


    But even that unfilling desires there soon hit the cruel reality.


    Moving to his next opponent, not even a few minutes into the fight, the dark armored figure who has Danzel simrly executed his opponents to his past prey.


    The blood that stained his armor and sword together with his cold aura around him send chills through their spines.


    Just the imagination of fighting an opponent like the dark armored figure and dying in his hand made the dreams of the audion fade away.


    Of course, the people who were in the arena and kept watch on him felt a sense of a real threat.


    It has to be said that some hoped that the martial artist and the dark knight had a bad rtionship or their fight was too intense which forced the winner to kill their opponent.


    But once the second victim has made his appearance, everyone understood that the dark knight wasn¡ät just looking to pass the first test.


    He also aimed to kill everyone else present in the arena!


    Once the dark knight moved to his third opponent who just finished his fight, the poor guy felt a bad proportion and a hint of fearing from his heart.


    Raising his swords, the man gulped as he stared at the bloodied knight.


    "Hey man, though I don¡ät know why killed those two guys. Let¡äs keep our match like a spar, alright? There is no reason to make this personal, no?" The man tried to sound confident and indirectly put a threat in his suggestion, s his voice betrayed the fact that he was nervous.


    Unfortanently, it wasn¡ät much effective.


    Pointing his sword towards him, Danzel''s cold voice made the man flinch.


    "Cross swords with me and you shall end like those two guys over there. Don¡ät expect mercy from me."


    `He is crazy.¡ä The man cursed himself for finding such an opponent. His gaze moved around the arena to find another opponent till the cloaked woman yelled for everyone to hear.


    "I forgot to mention! Anyone who refuses to deal with the opponent in front of you, will by default fail our recruitment.


    Danzel opponent opened his mouth in surprise by hearing that. Turning his head towards the cloaked figure and seeing her staring in their direction, he realized that this rule was aimed at him!


    `This bitch!¡ä


    He originally nned to change his target to someone else instead of facing the psychopath in front of him.


    Now though he only had two choices.


    Retire and lose the opportunity to make connections with the mercenaries group or fight.


    If he had to choose thetter, he knew that it will be a fight to the death with only oneing out of it alive.


    Gritting his teeth, he opened his mouth to ept the challenge, but once he started toward the dark knight, the words in his throat couldn¡äte out.


    "I-I concede..." Lowering his gaze to the ground, he hastens his steps to move away from the arena.


    The cloaked woman who saw this sighted in disappointed as much as Danzel did.


    While she felt disappointed for having another idiot jumping to his death, Danzel was for the fact that a big juice source of XP was walking away.


    His disappointment though was short-lived as the next opponent decided to fight instead of running away like the other guy.


    Not even 5 minutester, his corpse found itself on the ground.


    Seeing the five digging numbers in the notification made him grin.


    `Hours of work made just in mere minutes.¡ä Danzel thought as he calmed down his excitement to go and collect the other crops waiting to be harvested by him.


    Watching the massacre happening from the sidelines, the guy who decided to not fight Danzel shivered abnormally.


    Knowing that he just escaped the grips of death, the man disappeared from the scene.


    ****


    Currently, in the arena, a man with a shield and a mace stomped the ground, making the sand nearby rise through the air.


    "Haah!"


    Swinging his mace down to the air followed by his battle cry, a huge knight made out of light holding a mace appeared behind him and copied the man''s action.


    Moving back and dodging the huge mace made out of light, Danzel crumpled to himself.


    `This one is annoying.¡ä Danzel thought as he send out two dark green wind des at his opponent.


    And as expected, the giant knight of light other arm materialized a shield from the same light,pletely blocking his wind des.<sub> </sub>


    Being the only ones left in the arena, the two of them had all the space for themself to use, which made things much easier for Danzel.


    Many conceded once they came across him and his current kill count was that of 6 headcounts.


    p Even though he was superior to all other people, some with weird skills who also decided to fight him, made him take much longer with a mage taking most of his time to defeat.</anda>


    But that was about it.


    In all his fights, he heldplete dominance over his opponents.


    The man in front of him though was different.


    Using light magic that undead was naturally weak was already a treat on its own.


    Though the moment the giant knight appeared, Danzel couldn''t close the distance without putting himself in harm.


    "I guess it can''t be helped." Danzel said.


    Seeing no other solution, Danzel changed his path and dashed in a straight line to the man.


    A surprised look was to be seen on the man''s face as he couldn''t understand the dark knight''s sudden behavior.


    That though didn''t stop him from swinging his mace from high up, down to the ground to crush his opponent with the help of his giant.


    "That''s vengeance for the others!"


    Once the mace made out of light closed into Danzel, a sudden shock wave made the surrounding sand be pushed away, making it for the others looking from the side not to see clearly.


    "He did it!"


    "The holy avatar won over the dark knight!"


    The crowd exploded in cheers as they watched the knight made out of light disappear.


    Everyone witnessed the destructive power of its swings and they knew that even the dark knight couldn''t survive such a direct hit.


    While some mourn for losing their bets ced on the dark knight, others celebrated the fact they won big time.


    Since the winning chance of the man with the mace was lower than that of the dark knights, the people who bet on him received a big sum of gold coins.


    At least that would have been the case if it wasn''t for the fact of the dark knight having his sword pierced in the man''s throat.


    "H-How...." That was thest words of the man nicknamed holy avatar.


    Going a few seconds back in time...


    The moment the light mace was upon Danzel''s head, a bubble light barrier appeared and blocked the mace from crushing him on the spot.


    The strike was so strong that the barrier showed cracks.


    As the barrier absorbed the whole impact, Danzel was able to close the distance to the man.


    Knowing he was in danger, the man put his shield forward and blocked the first swing.


    The man was ready to retaliate by seeing on his mace to the dark knight''s head.


    The less he would have expected was the appearance of another sword in his other hand.


    Taken by surprise, Danzel pierced the man''s heart with a dark de.


    The moment he did so, another de pierced him through his heart once more from behind.


    Feelings his mental and physical strength rapidly decreasing, he couldn''t avoid Danzel thrusting his sword through his neck.


    Making his dark sword disappear in his storage ring and the sword that was pierced from behind disappear too.


    They were now in the present.


    Where Danzel looked in front at the notification if front of him.


    [You received 89 000 XP]


    Making the notification disappear, he gazed at the corpse in front of him.


    Or rather, in the shield that it had equipped.


    "I wanted to save this barrier forter use, but oh well..."


    Crouching down and removing the shield of the corpse Danzel nodded satisfied.


    "That should be enoughpensation for now..."


    As he equipped the shield, a sound of tching hands appeared behind him.


    "Well done, with you being the only one remaining. You will be moving to the second test.


    Having almost forgotten for the reason of being here in the first ce, Danzel looked at the cloaked woman and nodded in response.

 Chapter 249 Whittled Crimson Spear

    Walking past the corpse that he was very much responsible for, he walked towards the two cloaked figures.


    But before doing that, he first wanted to check the spoils from his massacre.


    [Shield of Daylight]: A shield that bathed in the morning daylight while it¡äs making. Inspired by that daylight, the cksmith ced enchantments that amplify light magic and even slightly that of holy magic. Because of that, the shield is much more resilient against death and dark magic.


    `Ugh, I can¡ät even use that.¡ä Danzelined internally to himself.


    The shield by itself was never to doubt a great item that many would kill to get their hands on, but it wasn¡ät made for Danzel.


    Even when he tried to guide his mana to the shield, he felt a slight resistance from the shield. Although the resistance was almost none existent, it was there. Making Danzelin about his luck.


    His [Death Guarding Swordmanship] was in the very sense, a sword art that used both a sword and a shield.


    Although he found some shields that he could use which were now inside his storage ring, they were generally of poor quality, mosting from the massacres that he did in this desert.


    `At least this shield shouldn¡ät break too easily...¡ä


    Putting those thoughts away, he stopped once he reached 5 meters in front of the two cloaked figures.


    "So? What about this second test?" Danzel asked as he turned towards the cloaked woman.


    Even though he was towering over her with how tall he had be, in reality, Danzel felt an intense aura leaking from her.


    An aura that made even him hesitant to fight against her.


    The male with a simr cloak beside her caught his attention too, but not at the same level as the cloaked woman. Though he gave off some kind of cold aura, that was all about it.


    Ignorant of his thoughts, the woman walked and brought her arm around the cloaked man''s shoulder.


    "It¡äs nothingplicated, you will fight with him. If we determine you worthy, you pass. Simple as that."


    Hearing that, the cloaked man turned his head towards the woman in surprise.


    "What!? Didn¡ät we agree that it¡äs your turn?"


    Ignoring what he had to say, the cloaked woman turned her head towards Danzel who was at the moment frozen in ce.


    Noticing him standing like a statue, she put up a warm smile that was hidden for the public to see.


    "Don¡ät worry, we just want to see your skills to the fullest. I will be one the side watching as the judge, so...have fun! I will be cheering for you!"


    As soon as she finished speaking, she turned around in an attempt to get out of the arena, s the man with the cloak wasn¡ät that happy with her decision.


    "Hey, where are you going! I Didn¡ät agree to the- Hey!" Running after her, he caught up and started arguing with her while Danzel was questioning his decision oning here.


    Even though Danzel arrived at Arcsarah today and knew nothing from the hidden rules and agendas of that merchant and participants alike, he wasn¡ät totally clueless.


    Based on what the merchant that he "saved" said, the necromancer was the leader of that mercenary group and he and his group were all of the 4th-tier.


    That fact alone made him want to avoid confrontation with the cloaked man at all cost.


    He knew what the strength difference between a 3rd-tier and someone of the 4th-tier was.


    Sure, he was confident in fighting someone on the same tier as him, but he wasn¡ät suicidal to face someone of the 4th-tier.


    The memories of being frozen and turned into hundreds of pieces were very much clear in his mind.


    After a long debate between those two cloaked figures, the man with the cloak sighted out loud before turning to face Danzel. His face was still hidden under the hood.


    He didn¡ät know what those two talked about and he also didn¡ät care much.


    Be it the man he faced or the woman, Danzel knew what the result would be.


    Before opening his mouth to tell them that gives up on the second text, the cloaked man was a second faster than him.


    "Since my sister wouldn¡ät be able to hold back her punches, I will be facing you. Though it would be more of a spar. So you don¡ät have to worry for your life" the cloaked man said.


    "..."


    Staring at each other, an awkward silence rued between those two. Though the silencested only a few seconds, for the onlookers it felt like hours.


    The two were 15 meters away from each other and yet the people were anxious about missing the engaging with the murderous knight and that of a 4th-tier.


    Danzel debated if he should trust the man''s words or not.


    Though one could point out him as hypocritical for fighting and expecting the other party to show mercy.


    The people that he killed today were most likely expecting toe out of the fight alive even after they lose and yet he still cut their livers without hesitation.


    He very much held dear his life and he wasn¡ät willing to let go of his life no matter the cost.<sub> </sub>


    `I still have [Undying] to use. Even if I identally die... it should be fine.¡ä


    Convincing himself that it was fine, Danzel strengthen his grip on his sword.


    Seeing both ready, the cloaked woman raised her hand with three-finger showing in her dark skin.


    "Once I count down to three, you may start! 3..."


    Danzel pushed all sides though to the side and put his entire focus on the man in front of him while barely keeping track of the counting.


    His ethereal eyes red up with an ominous dark green light behind his helm, while he guided his mana around his body.


    "3-2-1-Begin!!!"


    Once the moment that the final finger was down, Danzel kicked the ground and dashed forward with all his killing intent leaking out of his body.


    *Brough!


    Leaving a sand cloud behind from where he was standing, he moved a total of 5 meters in an instant. The people watching from the side didn¡ät even process what just happend expected the participants survived.


    Looking at Danzel''s charge, the man with the cloak swung his sleeve to the air with an indifferent expression on his face, which was hidden by his hood.


    Coming out of his sleeve were 3 red projectiles which were as fast if not faster than a bullet.


    Seeing the iing projectiles, Danzel continued moving forward while dodging the 2 with some quick maneuvers and blocking thest red projectile.


    He could had avoid thest shot, but that would have required him to stop and lose his momentum.


    s, once the projectile met his shield, he couldn¡ät help but halt for a second.


    *Thuad!


    A loud metal sound was heard.


    If Danzel wasn¡ät undead and wore no helmet, he would have a face of disbelief.


    "..."


    Staring at the spot where his shield was hit by the projectile, smoke was to be seen with a small yet deep scratch together with some red liquid sshed around that spot.


    The impact that this projectile had could bepared to that of a truck driving at full speed at the very least.


    Danzel body had already reached the level where he could hold his own against such force, but thinking of what would have happend if those three projectiles had hit him was especially scary to him.


    `Was that magic!? I didn¡ät notice any kind of mana and nheless, it was too fast to be magic!¡ä Danzel though.


    Unfortunately, he was wrong.


    It was indeed magic. The reason why he couldn¡ät tell for sure was that the cloaked man could cast this fast and hide the mana in his spell to an almost impossible kind of level.


    Out of his own curiosity, he touched the red spot in his shield and brought out the description. And the description of the red liquid made him even more confused.


    [Defiled Blood]: Blood of a wielder holding the talent [Defiled One].


    "...Blood?"


    "You noticed, huh" The man with the cloak said as he raised his hand.


    The next moment, a crimson light escaped from his cloak, and a pile of crimson clear blood circled around his arm.


    For the name of [Defiled Blood], one would expect the blood to be dark and show lots of impurities, but that wasn¡ät the case with this blood.


    The crimson blood soon started to circte around his arm and turn into a spear that was whittled. The defiled blood that was in a liquid form hardened to the point that the blood looked no different from that of a crimson metal.


    If he had to guess, that whittled spear wasn¡ät any inferior to his own sword be it its sharpness or durability. Also, the red veins that flowed inside that metal were also quite the sight to see.


    `Are you telling me that this thing is made out of blood?¡ä


    As he finished those thoughts, a faint red light escaped from the man''s cloak before disappearing and to his surprise, the man dashed right towards him!


    Gritting his teeth, Danzel forced himself to meet the whittled crimson spear.


    He didn¡ät know if it was just a piece of sturdy metal created by magic simr to how Nersan¡ärah made the weapons out of sand or if it had something special to it, he was left with no other choice but to engage in closebat.


    From the man''s previous demonstration, it was clear that sooner orter he would kick the bucket if they started with rangedbat.


    Forced upon him, his sword met the whittled crimson spear.


    *Thuank!

 Chapter 250 Blood Spikes

    Watching from the side, the people had an astonished look carved on their faces.


    *Gulp~


    Forcing his saliva back to his throat, a man looked at his neighbor and pointed at the scene in front of me.


    "H-Hey, am I seeing things?"


    His neighbor being too stunned to react wasn¡ät even able to hear the man''s words as he was trying to make sense of what he was staring at.


    Seeing the two figures in the arena, one wearing a cloak that hid his body and another one with a dark armor both were engaged in flurries of attacks at such speed which left after-images in their eyes.


    Mixed with the sound of metal shing, the fight seemed like it would end any second if one of either party makes a mistake.


    That though couldn¡ät be further from the truth.


    Using his shield to block the whittled crimson spear with the support of his [Vanguard Defense] skill, he would send out a swing using his whole strength. Only for it to either be avoided by some quick maneuver or blocked by the whittled crimson spear.


    The whole situation was for Danzel frustrating.


    He might have endless stamina as a trait of being undead, but the durability of his shield wasn''t finite and would sooner orter break apart.


    For now, they were only a few scratches that were deep caused by the thrust of the man''s whittled crimson spear.


    Not only that, but he also felt that something was amiss in the whole situation.


    He didn''t feel anything from his [Greater Sense Danger].


    After a few seconds of pondering about the cause of it and seeing that things didn¡ät improve, he decided to go more into the offense.


    As soon as he blocked the thrust of the little crimson spear, he imminently guided his mana into his shield and making him elerate for a split moment forward. As he did that he prepared to thrust right crashing into his opponent.


    Unfortunately for Danzel, as his opponent had already seen iting, the man stepped slightly to his sight while thrusting his wittled crimson spear directly at his face!


    Forced to cancel his advantage, Danzel moved slightly to the left.


    *Fooosh


    Having barely avoided the wittled crimson spear making a hole through his skull, Danzel took arge step back to create some distance between.


    Instead of the cloaked figure following him as he expected, the man pointed the wittled crimson spear towards his direction, while small bits of blood were gathering in the holes of the crimson spear.


    "!!!"


    Receiving some bad vibes from such urrence of the crimson spear, he raised his shield in front of him.


    Not a second after, the gathered blood shot out with an incredible speed right toward Danzel.


    *Tuck! Tuck! Tuck~!


    As he nted himself on the ground, Danzel held his ground while under the attack of the blood projectiles.


    Seeing none other of those attacksing towards him, Danzel looked at the shield which let out the smoke of where the projectiles made an impact.


    He didn¡ät feel dishearted from having his newly acquired shield much more damaged. The shield was only there to shield his life and prevent damage.


    What he felt more annoyed about was something that he realized.


    `This guy...he isn¡ät even taking this fight seriously.¡ä


    Although he knew from the beginning that he was much more inferior than this man who reached the 4th-tier, he still held a slimmer of hope that their strength wasn¡ät that far apart from each other.


    Seeing the man''s strength and speed also reinforced those though, as he was essential on equal terms.


    But he was wrong.


    Once he dodge the wittled crimson spear from piercing his skull, he knew that this couldn¡ät be the case as the [Greater Sense Danger] didn¡ät activate.


    A skill that always was supposed to warn him from life-threatening danger.


    The fact that it didn¡ät activate meant that he wasn¡ät in danger in the first ce.


    In other words...the whole sh was a facade.


    `I will force you to take this seriously.¡ä Danzel though with newfound determination.


    Since the whole spar is supposed to showcase his abilities. If he ends up showing `this¡ä much strength, he doubted that he will pass.


    Though passing the teat and meeting the necromancer to possibly sate his curiosity about necromancy has be a minor priority now.


    The fact that he gets to learn first-handed the strength of a 4th-tier is useful on his own for future reference.


    Other than that...the people he killed gave him tons of XP.


    ''I will force you to show me'' Danzel thought full of determination.


    Opening his status, he quickly went ahead and increased the level of his sub-ss.


    In the next second, a surge of power started to be one with his body.


    And that all unbeknownst to everyone present.


    The moment he put some strength in his legs, he disappeared from his current post and appeared right in front of the man with the cloak.


    Surprised, the man blocked his sword just about it was to cut through his chest.


    For a moment, the cloaked man seemed to struggle, but as soon as a faint crimson light escape his cloak, the situation started to slowly drag back to where it was from the beginning.


    Knowing that he had to react now before his opponent stabilized the flow of their fight, Danzel imminently dumped all his free attribute points that he still had left into his agility stat.<sub> </sub>


    Feeling the change instantly, though still in an awkward way.


    He swung his sword right after blocking the crimson spear at a speed that took the man by surprise.


    With the de nearing the sideways aiming to cut the man in half from his chest area, dead mana engulfed his sword.


    Using his shield to make it awkward to move the crimson spear, the swing would be fatal.


    *Tuck!


    A metal-like sound appeared in the surroundings.


    The sword that was going the man in half has now revealed his other hand which was also the one holding his sword from moving.


    Simr to the wittled crimson spear material, the man''s hand was covered in a crystal red metal, making holding the edge and resisting the decay effect possible.


    "Nice tr-" Before ending hispliment, the cloaked man frowned behind the hood as he felt a slight bit of paining from his hand before opening his eyes wide open upon the realization of what just happened.


    ''The control upon my blood has been dominated''


    Raising his foot, showing simr crimson armor leggings, the man sends out a kick towards Danzel''s chest, who thetter blocked with his shield.


    The impact of it was so strong, that he was pushed back a few meters.


    Looking at his shield slightly caved in, he cursed internally before looking at the drips of blood that were dropping off the man''s palm.


    Though the wound was none existed and killed in less than a few seconds, the damage alone borough him a sense of achievement.


    ''I only have one chance''


    Taking a stance that held his shield forward and cing the sword on top of his shield, he prepared to dash forward.


    Using the rune of his sword to move away the blood of the man''s weapon or armor was indeed effective.


    He expected that since the rune from quite a low grade. He doubted it would work twice if one prepare for it.


    Having injured him now, Danzel could start his n.


    Letting himself be influenced by the hatred of the living being around him and looking at him as if he was ab rat.


    He achieved a state in which his sanity and rage coexist with one another.


    Letting [Sin of Wrath] activate and spread his killing intent to all others.


    ***


    A minuteter Danzel [Sin of Wrath] activation.


    "That''s quite the aura," the female loaded figure said as she whistled upon such killing Intent.


    Coming from another tent, was a much taller cloaked figure that had a halberd resting on his shoulder.


    "Vanessa, who is that?" The figure had a harsh and loud voice of a man.


    Looking at the giant behind her, she shrugged her shoulders.


    "Who knows, he might be the next member." As soon as she said that, she felt an incredible amount of killing intent that she was too familiar with her.


    "That idiot! What did I tell him!"


    Once she turned around to see the fight, it was already over...


    ***


    Present...


    Guiding his mana around his body and shield, Danzel used both his movement skills to increase his charge as much as possible.


    With the additional stat increase from the talent [Sin of Wrath] Danzel, his speed reached the next level to the point that other participants had their eyes wide open in surprise.


    The few who surrendered against Danzel felt like they just escaped death''s scythe.


    The cloaked figure inparison had an indifferent look on his face that was hidden.


    Taking his own stance to prepare to confront the dark knight.


    Once they were 4 meters apart and he was about to thrust, he felt his chest be cold before a piercing pain reced the coldness.


    To his surprise, a sword glowing slightly with a dark green light moved even further through his chest, in the same position where his heart was supposed to be.


    ''!!!''


    rmed, his crimson-colored eyes light up like two bloody suns as an immense killing intent spread to the surroundings.


    Before Danzel''s swing reached his head, the cloak hiring his body suddenly expanded before it got ripped off by a mass of blood.


    The mass of blood was pushed out words while hardening just like he did with his wittled crimson spear.


    Resulting in creating an area of spikes as long as 10 meters around him.


    In the middle of the spikes, was now a rather young looking man with gray hair, paired with two crimson eyes who glowed currently like two bloody suns, skin being that of a dark gray with two pointy ears.


    Touching his chest to find the sword that pierced his heart, the man frowned upon finding nothing.


    "An illusion?" He mumbled as he stared at the dark knight whose barrier and dark armor got pierced by the blood spears.


    "Ah..."

 Chapter 251 Meeting

    "I was careless..."


    The dark knight hanging in the air cursed himselffor his naivety.


    `Everything happend in an instance...if it weren¡ät for my preparations, I might have be what the humans call a meat skewer.¡ä


    *Crack~


    As he tried to move, the barrier surrounding him showed more cracks from the prated spot of the blood spikes, while his dark ting created by the armors enchantment fell off. But to his luck, the blood spikes didn¡ät prate his armor itself.


    ? His barrier that till this day managed to block any attack now looked like a ball of cracked ss from the 6 blood spikes that appeared from the man''s body.


    What made Danzel speechless was the amount of spikes present.


    Like a halo, dozen of blood spears were surrounding the man who was in the middle.


    Danzel didn¡ät even want to imagine what would have happend if all those blood spikes were concentrated on him.


    If that were to happend, he would even be a true horror among those that had trypophobia.


    He was lucky enough that those spikes were only touching his armor and leaving small scratches. If it wasn¡ät for the [Greater Sense Danger] bringing him back to his sense, those scratches couldn¡ät have been much worse.


    He praised himself for reacting as fast as he did.


    His mana ting around his armor had indeed saved him...even though it pierced just like his barrier.


    The top part of him was thanks to his new shield still fine, but Danzel felt a headacheing as he was watching the dark ting falling to the ground.


    The ting itself didn¡ät bother him as such, as producing it was extremely simple though his armor enchantment.


    What was the real issue was the runes that were destroyed!


    After separating from Nersan¡ärah and deciding to carve the runes to his armor, the first thing he tried was to see if he could abuse the enchantment to his interest.


    After a few trials and failures, he found out that he could carve runes to the dark ting on top of his armor without affecting the runes of his original armor.


    When he learned of that fact, he was proud ofing up with such an ingenious idea.


    Of course, he was well aware that the dark armor ting wasn¡ät sturdy enough to hold attacks of the 2nd-tier, so any runes that reinforced the dark tings themselves weren¡ät that efficient.


    But that wasn¡ät the case for the [Rune of Force], which conquered the barrier.


    Once he found out about this interaction, he had imminently carved those set of rules and put a rather thinyer of dark ting on top of the runes in order to mask the runes from the sight of other people.


    Essentially creating two barriers that were constantly active if the runes were already charged.


    So losing these runed tings meant that he had to go through the whole process of making a new set of runes.


    "Ugh...as long as I live, anything else is secondary." As soon as he finished his mumbling, the blood spikes started to shrink slowly and the blood it gathering to the man responsible for those spikes.


    Seeing that, Danzel gripped the tip of a blood spike and pushed himself away, freeing him and breaking his barrier at the same time.


    *Pouf~


    Raising a small sand cloud from his fall, he touched the ground while standing straight. Falling at such height was nothing to him by now.


    Staring as the blood was slowly being sucked under the man''s clothes, he was unsure what to do.


    Understanding how ignorant he was about the strength difference and that there was no hope of winning, he found it pointless of fighting.


    Heck, even if that guy were only able to summon those blood spikes around him, he wouldn¡ät know how to get past them in the first ce.


    Something so fast that covered such arge area was for him impossible to ovee.


    While thinking of a solution, a voice stopped him from his brainstorming.


    "How did you do it?" The man with the dark gray skin and pointy ears said with a frown on his face.


    Being taken out from his thoughts, Danzel had finally noticed the man''s race which looked simr to a race that he met one his first year ofing out of the cursedke.


    "...Dark elve?" He subconsciously said out loud, making the frown of the man in front of him grow much worse.


    "You-"


    Before he could finish his sentence though, he was hugged by the shoulder from behind him.


    "Hey! What did I tell you of holding back against him!? If that guy didn¡ät react, he would even be dead!" Pulling her hood from her face, her beauty stunned the most lookers.


    With a pair of deep violet eyes and long silver hairbined with her dark brown skin. Her beauty was extroverted and unique. If one were to describe how she looked based on her face alone, the words cool and mature woulde out rather than cute.


    Being aware of the beauty in front of them, their inner desire of them couldn¡ät help but screen her body. Even though her body was still hidden by the cloak, it couldn¡ät hide all her curves.


    Looking at the woman beside him, the light in his crimson eyes died out while his face sorted up.


    "Sis, it was an ident. I didn''t n on going so hard at him. He just surprised me in the end and without thinking I..."


    Nodding her head several times, she let her brother go and looked at Danzel.


    Seeing him frozen in ce, she walked towards him.


    "Don''t worry, what you showed us is enough for you to pass our test."<sub> </sub>


    Hearing that put Danzel at ease.


    If they made him continue taking the test, then he would even have been surrounded.


    Sheathing his sword to the scabbard, he activated the enchantment of his armor to fix his dark tings. Though the runes were no more, it was better than nothing.


    "Is there anything else or can I meet the necromancer."


    Hearing him, the woman who looked much more of a dark blue than her brother chuckled in response.


    "Yes, you can. In truth, thest test was supposed to be epted by our leader into our group."


    "The first test was supposed to cut the wheat from the chaff, while the second one seeing if you meet the minimum requirements."


    "But in the end, our leader decides if you join us or not. So you would even meet him even if you didn''t want to."


    "I see..."


    "Come, I will show you where our leader is."


    Nodding his head, Danzel followed suit while trying his best to ignore the piercing gaze of the dark gray elve.


    As he was walking with her, his gazended on a huge figure who was simr to the woman wearing a cloak to hide his body.


    Noticing his gaze, the man said.


    "See youter." The huge figure said as he went back to his tent.


    Not sure what to make out of the words of the figure, he decided to focus on following the dark elve girl.


    "This isn''t the first time you see a dark elve, is it?" The dark elve said, surprising Danzel in return.


    "How did you know?" Danzel asked, puzzled as to how she knew.


    "I am right? Well, usually people who see dark elves stand to gaze more at us, so I kinda figured out that you might have met a member of my race."


    Before the discussion could be continued, the two arrived in arge tent.


    Signaling Danzel to stop, the dark elve pointed to the tent.


    "Wait here for a bit, I will notify him."


    "I can wait." Danzel said with indifference.


    Disappearing inside the tent, after a few minutes the dark elve came out.


    "He will shortly pick you up in a few minutes. So you will have to wait for a bit longer." She said in an apologetic tone.


    "It''s fine, I don''t mind."


    "Mhm, alright then. If you manage to join us let''s introduced ourselves." She said as he patted him on the shoulder, which looked kinda awkward with how tall he was.


    Seeing her leaving, Danzel refocused on the tent in front of him.


    Using [Eyes of the Damned], he was able to perceive 2 members of the living inside the tent.


    ''So he isn''t alone?''


    After a while of waiting outside, Danzel felt the people inside the tent moving.


    Not a secondter, the tent opened up.


    "!!!"


    Upon seeing the one who came out of the tent, Danzel was surprised.


    The man had dark brown skin and a cloak which was a much darker brown. If one didn''t look carefully, the cloak could be seen as pure ck.


    With a bald head covered in tattoos and some ragged bandages covering his mouth, the most noticeable trait of him was his eyes which were resembling that of a blind person.


    The figure itself was surrounded by a sinister aura.


    But his appearance and aura weren''t the reason why Danzel was surprised.


    It was because one of his traits as undead didn''t activate upon being in front of the man.


    And that trait was none other than the hate of living.


    "You..."


    The necromancer in response also frowned upon realizing what the other party''s identity was.


    But before any of them could say something, behind the necromancer a little girl together an old man came out. The two, in particr, had some unique clothing.


    The little girl who noticed Danzel, had her eyes opened.


    "Ahhh! It''s the baddy who gave us the fish!" She yelled in surprise while pointing her finger toward him.

 Chapter 252 A Monstrous Group

    Completely forgetting of undead in front of him, Danzel''s eyes red up in surprise.


    `Those guys!¡ä


    Recognizing the duo in front of him and the murderous look of the old man behind the small girl, he swiftly grabbed his sword and draw it so fast that it created sparks on his scabbard.


    But before he could even fully draw his sword out, a clear air-cutting echo appeared.


    With his skill [Greater Sense Danger] sending a warning signal to its fullest, Danzel could only stare in slow motion at how the opposite curved sword was closing towards his neck.


    As soon as the sword touched his dark ting and was slowly moving deeper in his armor, a deep yet low voice appeared inside their head.


    "Stop."


    As if following hismand, the old man''s sword stopped in an instant while Danzel was frozen mid drawing his sword.


    *Fsouh!


    While those two were frozen like statues, the wind inparison was violently pushed to the side.


    "..." Staring at the sword in his neck, Danzel was in shock at the speed of that old man.


    He even increased his agility not long ago, but even then the de was too fast to follow or react to.


    It was so shocking that he forgot the sudden appearance of a voice inside his head.


    The undead hiding inside living flesh stared at the two of them, before sighting out loud.


    "Agares, put your sword away from this one. Since you three know each other, might as well introduce me inside the tent." Saying such words with a hint of coldness behind his voice, the undead turned his back and entered the tent followed by the small girl.


    Seeing her granddaughter leaving, the old man named Agares put a frown on his face before staring back at Danzel.


    "..."


    "..."


    Staring at each other in silence for as long as two seconds, Agares moved his sword away and tapped the bottom part of Danzel''s hilt with such strength that made him break his hand away from his sword, resulting in the sword going back to its scabbard while Danzel sword shook from the force.


    Opening his mouth like that of a fish, Danzel was dumbfounded at what just happend. But he didn¡ät let it show.


    Stabilizing the shaking of his hand, Danzel followed the elder called Agares back to the tent with a warry look on his face.


    Entering the tent, he came across a next surprise.


    The undead holding now an ominous staff with arge dark crystal on the top and a glowing tattoo of a skull with an opened up mouth in the middle of the crystal.


    Though the staff by itself was impressive, Danzel was more astonished at the magic happening in front of him.


    Created out of seemingly nothingness, the earth started to form from the ground and rise until it created a stair that looked more like a throne with beautiful carvings, which those details alone would take a master carved with years of experience to replicate.


    Danzel wasn¡ät as surprised by the beauty of the throne as he was by how the earth appeared in the first ce.


    He send out his mana inside the ground to see if there was any earth in the ground but found nothing.


    Leaving him to believe that the undead in front of him created the earth out of nothing.


    As if reading him though, the undead chuckled at Danzel''s response.


    "Feel free to take a seat, you others too." The undead said as he seated in his own crown.


    The old man Agares took the small girl in his arms and seated her on the much small throne beside his own.


    Being the only one standing now, he looked at the undead in front of him and lowered his head slightly.


    "Then I will take up on your offer..."


    Seating on the throne, Danzel briefly gazed at Agares who had his focus stolen by the little girl before gazing back at the necromancer, unsure what to do or say.


    Seeing Danzel not willing to start the conversation, the necromancer tapped his staff to the ground, making it disappear after turning into ck smoke.


    `How the heck did he do that?¡ä


    His question was unanswered inside his mind, and the necromancer leaned back on his throne which looked much better than the other three.


    "Now Agares, why don¡ät you tell me the rtionship between you and this one?"


    Hearing his name being called, he reluctantly moved his focus away from his granddaughter and stared back at the necromancer.


    "Well, calling it a rtionship isn''t quite right. We just met exterminating some mountain bandits."


    Tells the necromancer how he and his granddaughter met Danzel and how he threatened to harm his granddaughter.


    Danzel couldn''t help but stop the old man''s world.


    "It was out of self-defense...I knew full well that I wasn''t a match for you. The undead I ordered was only there to buy me some time to get away..." Danzel said to justify his action.


    He didn''t lie or anything of that sort.


    The old man''s ability that he showed a moment ago only further proved that his decision was the correct one.


    And the necromancer nodded internally at him making such a decision.


    If he were in Danzel''s situation, he would probably have done the same.


    Knowing that it was going to be a losing fight, might as well run away.


    "Mhm, I can understand your both''s reaction, but why did youe here? Why do you want to join us? And what would you like to gain from joining us?" The necromancer said with his cold voice while looking at Danzel.<sub> </sub>


    Daniel at first didn''t know how to answer those questions.


    ''Why am I even here?''


    ''Wasing here the right choice?''


    Such questions and many more floated in his mind.


    After a few seconds of long silence, Danzel opened his mouth.


    "If I had to say, then is probably my curiosity and...finding a ce to fight to improve my skills." Danzel said after thinking carefully of his words.


    He indeed wanted to meet a true necromancer as they wielded the magic that created the undead while his other reason was more in line with his need to be a death knight.


    "Curiosity you say? What do you describe of such desire in more detail?"


    Nodding his head, Danzel started to exin.


    "As you might have realized by now with...the old man''s story. I also study the arts of necromancy. Though they aren''t anything special."


    Nodding his head, the necromancer started asking other questions which he answered to the best of his ability.


    But one question, in particr, caught Danzel off guard.


    "Are you the one called Rue Danzel? The Runesmith that appeared not long ago?"


    As soon as the necromancer''s words ended, several rms inside his mind were activated.


    He was shocked of his true identity was being found out.


    Before he could dispute his ims, the necromancer made his staff appear once more.


    Making the dark crystal glow, a few sets of runes had appeared out-think air.


    Taking a closer look at those runes, he manages to recognize them as his work.


    "If you want to hide your identity, then you will have to cloak the runes of your armor better. Those of my level can see through your equipment with ease."


    ''So that''s why...'' Danzel thought bitterly.


    He already had an alias nned and a somewhat believed backstory to go with it while joining this group.


    But now with the cat out of the bag, his preparation was pointless.


    "It''s indeed as you say. I am the runesmith, called Rue Danzel."


    Agares who heard that had a look of understanding while the little girl behind him had a face of confusion.


    Pulling at his clothes with her little hands, she asked with an innocent voice.


    "Grandpa, what is a runesmith?"


    Smiling at his grandaughter, Agares patties her in the hair.


    "Little Shiro doesn''t need to know." He said, only receiving a cute route from her.


    Ignoring those two, the necromancer heard Danzel rise up from his seat.


    "That changes everything then."


    Walking towards him, or rather to the outside of the tent, the necromancer mentions the three to follow suit.


    "You have been officially epted to our group. But before talking about your payment and such, we got to relocate because of your previous appearance.


    Walking out of the tent with those three, the necromancer watched through the distance of the crowd that was forming


    "So annoying~". The necromancer mumbled to himself as he send an internal message to the other three members.


    Them being the two dark elves and the giant of a man.


    "Are we doing that, Deathcaller?" The huge man said with his halberd resting on his shoulder.


    Nodding his head, the necromancer raised his staff and created a huge magic circle around them.


    "What the-"


    Before understanding what was happening, he felt a huge amount of mana surrounding him.


    And before he knew it, the cheers of before became silent, while the location he was supposed to be disappeared and filled instead with an endless sea of sands.


    Understanding what just happened, he couldn:''t help but be amazed at the necromancer''s skill.


    ''To think that he can teleport...''


    While he was on his own mind, the necromancer walked beside Danzel and patted his shoulder.


    "Let me introduce you all to our new member, Rue Danzel."


    As soon as his words came out, everyone stared at Danzel.


    ''Hmm?''


    Taking a closer look at the people around him,


    He finally notice that out of everyone here, none was of the human race.

 Chapter 253 Deathfull Skulls

    Hearing what their leader just said, out of the three members, only one showed a hint of excitement. And that one was no one but the dark elf named Vanessa.


    It was as if her eyes sparkled while the other two showed no reaction.


    Seeing no one speaking in, the necromancer continues while gazing at the small girl and elder duo.


    "As for those two, they will continue to apany us and help us with our work, so treat them well."


    Just as Danzel thought that he was going to introduce the others, the necromancer grabbed his shoulder.


    "You will have more time to know each otherter, we still haven''t finished our talk." The necromancer said while raising his staff.


    With a faint glow escaping from the crystal, out of thin air, walls made out of stone came out of the ground.


    Simr to the stone thrones, the materiel itself came not from the ground that was only sand.


    In less than a few seconds, multiple small simple houses were created.


    Walking towards one of the houses, Danzel followed the necromancer into the house that had only a table and two thrones.


    "Take a seat." The necromancer said with a cold voice.


    Following the necromancer''s instructions.


    Still standing, the necromancer tapped his staff to the ground, making a magic circle to expand under their feet around the whole house before disappearing.


    Nodding his head with satisfaction, the necromancer was seated on his throne.


    "Don¡ät worry, these are only measurements in case someone unwanted guest tries to peek at us. " He said, noticing Danzel''s distress behind his helmet. As a magic caster, he knew how one felt when someone who he barely knew started casting a spell in front of him.


    "So with that out of the way, let¡äs go direct to business."


    As soon as those words came out, a sudden ominous pressure came out of the necromancer''s body with leaks of dead mana in the mix.


    "I am the leader of the Deathfull Skulls, named Velkir Veleron Verres. And as you might have realized, I am one of the undead." Velkir said with his eyes glowing in gray color.


    "A Lich."


    As soon as his words faded away, Danzel had to bring out his whole willpower to continue staring at the Lich''s face. He felt like his body got several tons heavier out of nowhere. If it weren¡ät for the fact that he was seating on the throne, he would even fall to his knees.


    `This feeling! Is just like back then!¡ä


    What Danzel was feeling was simr to the [Undead Domination] that he once felt against the draugr.


    Just thousands of times stronger.


    But even with that much stronger urge to obey hismand, Danzel still managed to keep his will for his own.


    "I am Rue Danzel, a Runesmith for the better or the worse. Also one of the undead that is known as Wight..." Danzel said while gazing directly into Velkir¡äs eyes.


    There was a short pause between the two.


    When the Lich Velkir raised his hand, his aura was reduced to a lesser degree, but never once vanishedpletely.


    "Now with our introduction finished, I will have to ask you a question before we start with our deal." The Lich Velkir said with a cold voice that came from being of the undead.


    But if one was perceiving enough, they could notice a hint of relief in his voice.


    `A deal?¡ä Danzel didn¡ät miss those words before nodding in the Lich to continue.


    "As long as it¡äs in my power to answer the question."


    "Don¡ät worry, I ain¡ät going to ask something difficult. I more or else know the answer. I just want to hear it from you directly to put one of my unending worries at ease."


    "My question is...are you part of the council. And if not, have you ever associated yourself with them.


    `Council?¡ä


    Upon hearing the question, Danzel felt confused and if he had any skin he would even frown.


    He remembers how the shadow merchant Hanson asked him a simr question and now a Lich of all things was asking him the same question.


    Back then he consider the council to be some random group, but now that the Lich Velkir also mention it, Danzel''s curiosity was piqued.


    "I am no member of the so-called "council" that you mentioned. I once had a... forced partnership with a merchant of the merchant Union. But other than that, I didn¡ät associate myself with anyone that is from that "council". As far as am I aware of at least."


    "Mhm, a forced partnership. Hehe" Velkir chuckled for reasons unknown to Danzel.


    "Your answer is satisfactory."


    "Putting my unending worries aside. Rue Danzel, what would like to gain by joining our group?" Velkir said with a serious tone.


    "Gain..."


    Hearing those words, Danzel fell into silence.


    Heck, because of the intimating aura he forgot that the group of Velkir was that of a mercenary one.


    Hired killers in short.


    Though it was beneficial for him to kill those of the living, it didn¡ät mean that he would go out of his way to do the dirty job of someone else without getting some other kind of benefit except the ones of his status.


    Doing something that could mean the end of him without getting something in return was a big no.


    `What do I actually want to gain...¡ä


    Once such a thought formed in his mind, he suddenly felt empty from the inside.


    His current set goals were ones that were directly associated with him gaining strength and finishing the mission given by the status.


    But looking over those points, he couldn¡ät see anything else.


    `I can attain strength wherever I want as long as I train myself and finishing the mission could be done in a much easier and safer way. There is no rush, I have enough time. I am undead after all.¡ä<sub> </sub>


    Unbeknownst to himself, Danzel touched his helmet with one of his hands while gazing at Velkir unfocused.


    `For what reason did I leave the cursedke again?¡ä


    The Lich Velkir who till now had an expression face frowned his eyes upon staring at Danzel''s state.


    `This guy, don¡ät tell me...¡ä


    "Cough, what I want from you by joining us isn¡ät only yourbat capabilities but also your talent as a runesmith. Making your request more valuable than the other 5 inparison." Velkir said slightly embarrassed for coughing as one of the undead couldn¡ät cough.


    But by doing that he managed to catch Danzel''s attention.


    "The others here reached out to me for a different reason. Be it knowledge, equipment, strengthing one''s body or even shelter."


    "Taking for example Agares deal with me. I promised to provide for them and teach his granddaughter magic, in return, I asked him to wield his sword for me..."


    As if clicking something in Danzel''s mind, the fog inside his mind faded away.


    "Then, in exchange for my runed items andbat capabilities, I would also like to also be taught magic. Be it necromancy or another kind of magic school. And since you said that my request is more valuable, I would also like to have some enchantment items. Since equipment doesn¡ätst long in bloodshed." Danzel said while showing his shield which still had some blood on it.


    Hearing his request, Velkir smiled behind the bandages.


    `Quite a greedy one, aren¡ät you?¡ä The Lich thought to himself.


    "Fine, but since you requested quite a lot of me. I will be able to request 5 runed items even after you leave the Deathfull Skulls. Of course, if it¡äs reasonable and convinced for both of us."


    `Well, if it¡äs just 5 runes.¡ä Danzel thought about thest condition and found nothing wrong with it, he nodded his head in confirmation.


    Standing up, both of them gave each other a handshake.


    What Danzel didn¡ät know at that time was that this deal was more in favor of Velkir than for Danzel himself.


    But the Lich also didn¡ät know that the moment the two touched hands, a part of his information got leaked to Danzel.


    [Status]


    Name: Velkir Veleron Verres


    Level: ??


    Race: Lich


    ss: [????]


    Sub-ss: [Grand Savant of Death Lv.99]


    Health: 40 350/????


    Mana: ?????/?????


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 411 Agility: ??? Intelligence: ??? Endurance: ???


    Talents:[Exaled Undead] [Death King] [...] [...]...


    Skills: [Flesh bodyCreation] [...] ...


    [Remark: A natural-born undead who turned himself into an all-powerful Lich many decades ago. Many referrer such undead as kings of the death and this one is not excused. This one, in particr, is close to breaking through the next tier]


    `Ugh, the information shown is simr to that of the devil.¡ä Danzel thought internally.


    "Alright then, we will start our lesson by tomorrow as still I have the stuff to do. In the meantime, you can introduce yourself to the other members."


    Nodding his head, Danzel turned around to leave but stopped himself as he just remember something he has forgotten all this time.


    ''Right! Skull w!''


    Though Danzel considered his mindless undead as mere puppets for his use.


    He had to say to himself that he was quite fond of the big amount of his.


    Not only was it his strongest undead, buttely he found that it wasn''t as mindless as he originally thought it was.


    The reason for it, Danzel didn''t know.


    But he sure was interested if his hypothesis was correct or not.


    Considering that Velkir would be his teacher, he could get the answer he wanted for the Skull ws case and the many other questions that he had about magic.


    Turning around and exining to Velkir the situation, the Lich didn''t seem to the mind teleporting back to get the big amount of his.


    "Thanks again, Velkir." Danzel said in gratitude.


    Guiding him out of the house, Velkir gazes directly at Danzel''s ethereal eyes even though it was behind his helmet.


    "Starting tomorrow, you will be calling me master."


    "..."


    Seeing the Lich going back to the house, Danzel patted the nose of Skull w who in question lowered his whole body pitifully as if it was an abandoned puppy who found its owner.


    ''Drama queen''


    As Danzel was checking on her equipment, he heard a voiceing behind him.


    "Hey, new guy. I want to talk with you."


    Turning his head around, Danzel saw no one other than the dark gray elve with the pair of two crimson eyes and gray hair.

 Chapter 254 Azrael Darkwood

    "...Dark elve?" Danzel said uncertain.


    The dark elves he knew, which weren¡ät many to say the less had a brown skin colorpared to the guy in front of him. Though he had the two pointing ears set on him, he didn¡ät know if his dark gray skin counted as a dark elve or not.


    `Is he from a sub-species of the elve race? That could exin it...¡ä


    Such a question though didn¡ät make Danzel forget to get on his guard against the dark gray elve that almost killed him by tearing holes through all his armor and body.


    Though he still had [Undying] to save him from the death realm once, that couldn¡ät be said for the same of his armor.


    Danzel turned his body more to the right of where Skull w was resting so that his shield would hide his other hand gripping the hilt of his sword.


    The dark elve with the crimson eyes frowned upon seeing that.


    "Call me Azrael, not a dark elve. And there is no need to be warry of me. If I wanted to kill you, I would even finish you on our spar instead of waiting till now and since Velkir epted you as one of our own, we can be considered allies, if not colleagues." Azrael said.


    `Colleagues, huh?¡ä


    Knowing that the crimson eyes elve Azrael was saying the truth, Danzel lowered his guard but by no hand did he stop being warry of the elve named Azrael.


    "So? What can I do for you...Azrael." Danzel said awkwardly.


    Looking around his surroundings as if he were wary of something or someone, the crimson eyes elve Azrael turned around and pointed at a house made out of stone.


    "Follow, we will talk in my house."


    "..."


    Hesitant, Danzel decided to follow Azrael to the house.


    Having made a deal with Velkir the Lich, Danzel doubted that the elve would try to kill him.


    Danzel didn¡ät like to rely on his fate at the hands of others, but time and time again it is shown that it is the case.


    Mostly the reason is that hecked the strength to reinforce the fate of his own will. After all, if he were stronger two years ago and managed to defeat the shadow merchant Hanson, he doubted that he would even go to the desert, to begin with.


    `I will need to get stronger faster so that I can decide my own fate.¡ä Danzel thought with burning determination.


    Unbeknownst to Danzel''s thoughts, Azrael pushed the door curtain and entered the house, closely followed by Danzel.


    Upon entering, Danzel felt a weird sensation passing through his body.


    `This feeling is simr to the entrance of the treasury.¡ä Danzel thought as he stared at the door.


    As if reading his mind, Azrael soon confirmed his suspicion.


    "You felt it? Anyway, don¡ät worry about it. Is just a barrier that I have ced."


    "I see..."


    Taking his eyes away from the door, Danzel was stunned to see the inside of the house.


    Compared to the Lich''s house which was just a table and the two thrones, this one had multiple decorations on the wall and the table which was made out of wood was filled with paper that had weird magic circles and messy handwriting. Heck, Danzel guessed that the ink used for writing could be blood or at least something simr based on its crimson color.


    He didn¡ät even want to consider what all the other alchemy tools and potions were or the possible usage of those.


    `That Azrael guy must even have something simr to my storage ring. There is no other exnation as to where all this stuff came from.¡ä


    At least that was Danzel''s best guess.


    Why the room was so messy when it should have been ced not long ago was a mystery that Danzel didn¡ät want to take part in.


    "I hope you don¡ät mind this mess. Anyway, you can seat wherever you-oh, never mind..." Azrael said while looking at the chairs he had and Danzel''srge body.


    "I wanted to talk about a few things that I noticed between our spar. Mainly of that illusion or whatever it was that you cast on me. How did you do it and was it an illusion in the first ce?"


    `Is he talking about [Mortal Reminder]?¡ä


    Being his only soul-based skill, Danzel was very hesitant to reveal the exact content of one of his trump cards. Since the skill was that ofbination with his soul affinity, one didn¡ät have to be a genius to figure out that the illusion wasn¡ät as simple as it is shown to be.


    After all, its effects take ce in one''s soul, which was a concept that Danzel was very unfamiliar with.


    He knew that saying that it was just an illusion wouldn¡ät cut it as Azrael''s way of speech suggested that he himself was unsure if it was an illusion or not.<sub> </sub>


    So he decided to mix the truth with lies instead of revealing his trump card.


    "It was indeed an illusion. The same moment my sword harmed you, a mark was also ced to inflict the illusion that you suffered. I can activate the mark wherever I want, but it also disappears when activated. Nothing more, nothing less."


    Hearing Danzel answer made Azrael have a look of understanding before turning into a frown the next second.


    Without saying anything, crimson blood escaped from his body and traveled around his hand.


    Seeing that Danzel went ahead to draw his swords but was shortly interrupted by Azrael¡äs words.


    "There was another thing that confused me." Azrael said as his arm was now covered with the hardened crimson blood like a gauntlet.


    "I don¡ät mean to insult you, but with your strength alone, you shouldn¡ät even be able to pierce my armor, to begin with. And yet you still managed to scratch my palm and inflicted that...cursed mark. How did you do it"


    The pair of crimson eyes looked at Danzel, leaving no room for negotiation for Danzel.


    Grumbling from the inside, Danzel raised his sword and showed the carving of his runes. Hiding his identity from this group was now pointless with his name revealed.


    "The reason why I managed to hurt you was that the material that your armor was made of was blood. Those runes that you can see are able to suck the blood of others and control it. Although the control part isn¡ät perfect, it was enough to push away a small part of the blood to inflictyou a scratch."


    Staring at the runes on his sword with fascination, Azrael made a sk filled with some red content appear from thin air, confirming Danzel''s suspicion about him having a storage ring.


    "Can you show me how those runes work?" Azrael said as he gave him the sk.


    "This sk contains some of my blood, feel free to use it."


    "..."


    Taking the sk in hand, he bathed his sword with the content of the sk.


    Falling on top of the sword and descending to the ground, the blood suddenly halted mid-air before starting to circle around Danzel''s sword like several snakes going up and forth, creating a loop of blood.


    Lowering his sword, Danzel let the bloodstream fall to the ground.


    "Hmm, interesting." Azrael nodded to himself as he gather the spilled blood and ced it in a new sk.


    "Say, your name was Danzel, Rue Danzel was it not?"


    "Yeah, that''s indeed for what I go by with." Danzel nodded.


    "Mhm, I am Azrael Darkwood. I know our start wasn''t the best, but I hope that we can cooperate in the future. That rune you showed me, in particr, brought my interest you see..." Azrael said without even trying to hide his ulterior motives.


    "As long it benefits us both..."


    Shaking each other hands, Danzel left the dark elve to dwell on his own work.


    He didn''t what he could gain out of the cooperation between the dark elve as of yet, but making connections with him wouldn''t hurt.


    At least he believed so.


    The dark elve showed a straightforward personality and didn''t seem to like hiding his intention. Making in Danzel''s opinion easier to deal with than Velkir the Lich.


    Right as he was about to leave, Azrael stopped him in his tracks.


    "Ah, I forgot to mention. My sister has quite a difficult personality, butpared to me...she is a nice person. So give her a chance when you meet her."


    "I will keep that in mind..."


    Leaving Azrael''s house, Danzel went back to Skull w and jumped on her back.


    "Sigh, what a day..."


    Looking at the sun already setting, Danzel gazed at all the houses and activated the skill [Eyes of the Damned].


    ''Hmm, that one in the right is where that old fossil and the little girl are... On the opposite side is probably this guy''s sister based on how she glows and in thest house was probably the big guy.''


    He was curious as to what races the big guy with the halberd and the exotic duo were, but not so much to go out of his way to find out.


    Though there was an empty house in the distance that he guessed was for him, he didn''t n on staying as of yet.


    Instead, he opened up his status to see where to spend the XP that he gathered through all the time.

 Chapter 255 Great Rune

    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 100 [Max]


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.72]


    Health: 18 230/25 410


    Mana: 4836/6050


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 495 Agility: 812 Intelligence: 550 Endurance: 461


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery]


    Skills: [Death Guarding Swordsmanship Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [High Jump Lv.1] [Presentless Steps Lv.1][Undeath Corruption Lv.1] [Swift Movements Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Gale Mana de Lv.3] [Greater Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Mortal Reminder Lv. 1] [Hand of Mana Affinity Lv.9] [Vanguards Defense Lv.5] [Armor Mana ting Lv.1] [Cursed de Lv.1] [Death Influence Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1] [Curse of Scourge Lv.1] [Greater Raise Undead Lv.1] [Undead Reconstruction Lv.1] [Eyes of the Damned Lv.1]


    [Remark: A wight who is capable to see the higher realm of death. Considering his age, it¡äs a true anomaly. If it weren¡ät for theck of knowledge that he has inside his empty skull, one could even call him a soon-toe cmity.]


    [XP: 3 670 700]


    "Crap, it seems like my intelligence surpassed my strength. So much of being a sword wielder." Danzel chuckled at seeing his attributes.


    `Maybe If I increased my ss itself, such a thing wouldn¡ät had happen.¡ä He thought before shaking his head.


    Since his subss [Runesmith of Undeath] cost much less to upgrade than his [ck Guard] ss, it was only logical that he would upgrade the ones that would bring the most out of the situation that he was in.


    Which resulted in bringing his Agility up to 812 in total!


    If it weren¡ät for having been used for his body strength and speed to change on short notice, he would even fall headfirst to the ground for being unable to control his speed.


    Though he found it awkward having such speed with so much strength, it wasn¡ät something tommed about.


    He could just make up for it in the future.


    What troubled instead was how the dark elve was able to match his speed instead.


    "I wonder what the base attributes are for someone of the 4th-tier..." Danzel mumbled as he silently cursed his status for leaving most of the important information as [???].


    It was frustrating, but since he could nothing about it, he just decided to cast such thoughts aside and turned his attention toward his subss.


    "If I remember right, this one was upgraded once I upgraded it 20 times, bringing it to level 72. If my guess is right, the next stage should be either on level 80 or 100. If it¡äs the former, I might see something interesting before the day ends, but if it¡äs thetter...that would be depressing." Danzel said to himself as he did a quick calction as to how much he needed to spend.


    The calctionsted less than a second thanks to his intelligence increasing, making his mind much more efficient and more resistant to foreign sources that affected one''s mind.


    "Ugh~a total of 2 660 000 XP for a mere 8 levels. At this point, I don¡ät know if I am just poor or that the prices are ridiculously high." He grumbled to himself.


    Forcing himself to grit his teeth, Danzel pressed the upgrade button with a hint of unwillingness to be noticed by his trembling finger.


    [Runesmith of Undeath level Increased from Lv.72 to Lv.73]


    [Runesmith of Undeath level Increased from Lv.73 to-]


    ...


    [Runesmith of Undeath level Increased from Lv.79 to Lv.80]


    [Inteligence increased by 40 and Agility increased by 24]


    [You gained 24 attribute points]


    After painfully watching his XP getting drained in mere seconds, the next notification that appeared in front of him made his ethereal dark green eyes re-up.


    [You reached the maximum level of Runesmith of Undeath ss]


    [To advantage into a higher tier ss a mission has been assigned]


    [Mission]1/3: Being capable to carve a [Rare] rune with a [Well-done] grade.


    2/3: Have more than 600 worth of base intelligence points.


    3/3: Have more than 850 worth of base agility points.


    [Mission Completed!]


    If Danzel could sweat, he would even fill buckets worth of his sweat by now.


    He barely meets the requirements of all those three missions!


    If it weren¡ät for his [Superior Undead] increasing all his attributes by 10%, he would have to put the current mission on hold for a long time.


    Generally, the mission he received were eitherpleted already as of how easy they were or stupidly difficult to meet.


    Not even counting his current mission to be a [Death Knight], he once had to fight someone who was supposed to be much stronger than him.


    Back then killing the arsonist Rapha wasn¡ät over beyond difficult as a magic caster of the 2th-tier wasn¡ät that dangerous. But now if the mission requires him to fight someone of the 4th-tier and win...


    He might as well crack his own skull with his own hands rather than trying the impossible.


    As for him being able to make [Rare] runes of the [Well-done] grade was only achieved in the recent time.


    With his Intelligence increasing over time, he was able to spot much faster his own mistakes, while the additional agility helped him to do more precise work.


    This leads him now to have three options considering his future as a runesmith.


    [Please choose which path to open as a Runesmith of Undeath]


    [Choose 1 out of 3 [Great Rune Talent] to permanently gain]


    [Great Rune of Existence]


    [Great Rune of Stronghold]


    [Great Rune of Truth]


    [Great Rune of Existence]: The knowledge of runes that affects one''s existence as a whole, a path of runesmithing that only a few dared to seek and learn the techniques. As it allows the runesmith to carve runes itself to one existent. Be it their body or soul.


    [Great Rune of Stronghold]: The knowledge of runes that affects the state of a material thing. It¡äs an art of runesmithing that can change the very basic rules of something that doesn¡ät hold either a soul or consciousness of its own, although thetter part can be worked around, the runes are mostly used to enchant buildings.]


    [Great Rune of Truth]: The knowledge of runes that affect magic arts in all sorts of ways. A runesmithing art ismonly chosen by a magic caster who tries to find the truth through the means of runesmithing. Such runes can have the effects of magic or enchant if not mutated the type of magic.


    After finishing reading the three options given to him, Danzel didn¡ät know what to make of them.


    First of all, the fact that those options weren¡ät called [Talents], but [Great Rune Talent] itself was something he didn¡ät know of.


    He tried to see the description of the [Great Rune Talent] itself, but sadly nothing informative was shown for him to make head and tails of the so-called [Great Rune Talent].


    Giving up on what they were, Danzel focused his attention on his option.


    If he had to summarize them, it would be that [Great Rune of Existence] were runes that could be carved in body and supposedly the soul.<sub> </sub>


    The [Great Rune of Stronghold] of buildings and items itself and the [Great Rune of Truth] focused on magic.


    What he found weird of those was that he was already given the option to learn a part of such things. For example, being runes that could be used as magic.


    Back then he rejected learning them as they were too slow for his battle style and he was willing to do it again.


    As for [Great Rune of Stronghold], most of the runes he was able to learn was of his equipment such as weapons and armor with the exception of his runed contract.


    He still didn¡ät find a rune that could enchant the capabilities of a building of some sort, but he guessed if he picked this one he would be able to learn them.


    s, Danzel had already decided which one to pick the moment he read it.


    And that was the [Great Rune of Existence].


    As it provided the current him with more options that were much more interesting than the other two Great runes.


    Picking the [Great Rune of Existence], he felt something in his body happening.


    Or to be more precise to his very own soul!


    It was neither a feeling of pain nor euphoria.


    He was feeling as if something faint was inside his spine and ribs but at the same time also not.


    This feeling though disappeared the next moment and the faint feeling turned to be more noticeable as of how heavy it has gotten.


    At first, it wasn¡ät as bad, but the more itsted the worse this feeling got. It reached the point where Danzel was gritting his teeth and scratching his breastte as if he wanted to get rip something off himself.


    "Grghhhh~"


    [You acquired the [Great Rune Talent], [Great Rune of Existence]]


    [Your talent [Dead Rune Knowledge] has been upgraded!]


    [The change of learning runes of your affinity has risen up to 15%]


    [The change of learning [Great Runes] based on your [Great Rune Talent] of Existence] has been added at fix 10% +0,5% per 200 intelligence (The chance of learning [Great Runes] can¡ät go beyond 20% with this effect)]


    Danzel who was too busy in his own suffering to read any of those floating windows heard an echo of something cracking inside his mind.


    If he were to see his current soul now by his own two ethereal eyes, he would see that some cracks were to be seen in his ribs and spine.


    But instead of an increase in suffering, he actually felt the pain go away.


    He even started to feel much better.


    As his mind has cleared from all the suffering he experienced in that short amount of time, he was able to see a new window appearing in front of him.


    [Though some abnormality, you [Great Rune of Existence] turned into [Great Rune of Undeath Existence]]


    "It changed? Rather than that, what was that feeling just now?"


    He was even more confused when he checked his body for any cracks or anything of the sort but found none.


    Opening the description of his new [Great Rune of Undeath Existence], the text itself didn¡ät change instead in the end where it was added that [Great Runes] will be of undead preference.


    Other than his status itself changing a bit, below his attributes, the line of [Great Rune Talent]:[Great Rune of Undeath Existence] appears.


    "Grhh."


    Waking up from his confusion was Skull w that growled quietly with her head turned to look towards him.


    "...What¡äs done is done. I will have to figure out what this feeling was forter. For now, let¡äs see the new option." Danzel said as he petted Skull ws back and clicked in his [Dead Rune Knowledge].


    Seeing that another box has been unlocked, he raised his finger and pressed it.


    Only to open his mouth in disbelief.


    [Epic]: Cost 1 000 000 to learn a Random Rune or a Great Rune.


    `Such a scam.¡ä Was Danzel first thought upon since the price of the better runes.


    To his misery though, he couldn¡ät suppress his curiosity over the new runes.


    Even though he had a mountain amount of stuff to spend his XP though, he still decided to go for the new runes.


    [You acquired a Soul Rune of -]


    To Danzel''s surprise, before the window was about to tell the rune''s name, it stopped and instead showed a window that Danzel had never seen before.


    [...]


    `What the hell...?¡ä


    But before he could think of the reason for such urrence, the window of before appeared with the full name of the rune.


    [You acquired a Soul Rune of Harvest]


    "Something is wrong, but..."


    His mumbling only stopped at the but.


    From the previous pain to the current weird message, Danzel felt that something was wrong but was unsure of what it was.


    Not sure what to make of all those things even after thinking about them, Danzel sighted and pressed to see the effect of the [Rune of Harvest]


    "What the-!!!"


    And once he read the description, his ethereal dark green eyes red upped intensely in surprise.


    He read the runes description multiple times and yet he still couldn¡ät believe its effect.


    Though it wasn¡ät a [Great Rune] and only a [Epic] grade rune, the effect alone made him grin maliciously.


    `This will solve everything!¡ä


    ****


    At the same time, in the realm of the dead.


    Floating through the endless darkness was a sole silhouette where its features couldn¡ät be seen.


    If one were able to see through such darkness, one could only see how that silhouette was wearing some kind of ragged cloak. The color of its color couldn¡ät be seen even if one was able to bypass the darkness.


    "Such unexpectantly is too soon to happen." The silhouette cold voice echoed through the darkness.


    Raising his hand, the silhouette continued.


    "I didn¡ät want to interfere with such soul, but..." The silhouette said as some kind of ck aura escaped through his hand for a short moment.


    The moment the ck aura disappeared, multiple chains appeared around the silhouette''s body and tightening him up.


    "Such soul can¡ät die. At least not yet." The silhouette said as it disappeared from his location while still bound by the chains.

 Chapter 256 First Lesson Of Basics

    After acquiring the new rune, [Rune of Harvest], Danzel immediately went out and brought out all the mediocre weapons that he collected to practice carving the rune.


    The few weapons with the rune came out as a failure, but that didn¡ät disappoint Danzel at all. Since he received the information inside his head and his intelligence was more than 600, he was quick to adjust and improve the rune.


    s, it was revealed that [Epic] runes are much moreplicated than the [Rare]. Of course, Danzel expected that and didn¡ät feel bad for such failures. Knowing the effect of the rune brought it enough motivation to try and bring the [Rune of Harvest] to the [Beyond Perfection] grade. Although he still hasn¡ät managed to create a rune out of the [Perfect] quality as of yet.


    The motivation was still there.


    By now he was confident that he could make a [Perfect] quality rune if it was of the [Common] runes. But with better stuff out there, he found such achievementcking to take pride in.


    Instead of learning old stuff to perfection, he might as well go ahead and learn the new stuff which was miles better than its predecessor.


    Not only that but he was also excited to try his luck and improve his blood sucking rune with the knowledge he gained from the [Rune of Harvest]. Heck, he could even try otherbinations and create his own abomination of a rune with his new knowledge.


    Nevertheless, all those things had to wait till he is able to carve the rune to the very least [Good] quality.


    His other dreams and n had to wait till he finished with that task.


    To Danzel''s disappointment, such a task though wasn¡ät going to be finished overnight.


    Without even realizing it, the whole day passed and the sun rose to greet both living and dead.


    In fact, If Danzel didn¡ät hear his name being called, he wouldn¡ät even notice that it was morning.


    "Rue!!!! Rue Danzel!!! Good morning!" A loud feminine voice called, to Danzel''s annoyment.


    Turning his head, Danzel saw the dark elve girl walking towards him while waving her hand towards him. Right behind her, was the giant of a guy who rested a halberd worthy of his body size.


    `If I remember right, that is the sister of that Azrael guy.¡ä Danzel thought to himself, but deep down he was having doubts, as those two didn¡ät look the slightest simr to each other.


    Knowing that such a remark could be seen as rude, he was smart enough to not voice out his though.


    "What is it...Vanessa was it right?" Danzel said as he turned his head towards the big guy. Not sure what to call him.


    "The big boss told me to tell you to go to him. So you better get going."


    Moving past him and Skull w, the two made their way towards the deserted.


    "We are going to have a short spar over there. So don¡ät worry if you hear something."


    "???"


    Ignorant of what she meant, he watched them leaving through the distance before jumping off Skull w.


    As he walked towards where Velkir''s house was, he saw Skull w right after following his tracks.


    Turning his head, Danzelmented about bringing Skull w or not.


    "Hmm, I can ask him as to why this one became so strongpared to the other ones."


    Giving her permission to follow him, Skull w''s steps became more yful.


    Ignoring her behavior, Danzel soon reached the house of the Lich and entered cautiously.


    "He isn¡ät here? Did that woman lie to me?" Danzel thought with doubt.


    The next moment though, he heard a cold voice ringing inside his mind.


    `Come behind the house.¡ä


    Recognizing the Lich¡äs voice, Danzel followed the instruction as he was told, but found nothing to see behind the house.


    "Did he mean this house?" Danzel mumbled to himself as he kept walking behind the house.


    To his surprise, he meet a barrier which made his hand disappear without him noticing it!


    Pulling his arm back, he found his missing arm still attached in the ce where it was supposed to be.


    "..."


    Watching closely in front of him, he notices faint traces of mana.


    "A barrier of sorts?" Danzel said out loud.


    Trusting his none existent guts, he stepped forward and entered the barrier.


    Once entered, he found the two exotic people and the Lich appearing from tin air.


    Guessing Danzel''s confusion, the Lich''s decided to enlighten him.


    "Don¡ät fret, it¡äs a simple illusion to keep the gaze of others away. Nothing much." Velkir the Lich said in a cold voice worthy of an undead.


    `You call that simple!?¡ä Danzel cursed internally at the Lich.


    If such an illusion was something simple, he couldn¡ät even imagine what was the criteria for amazing.


    Of course, Danzel refrained from saying such things and instead bowed slightly to the Lich who would be from today on his teacher.


    "I have I arrived, Master."


    "Seeing you remembering our conversation of yesterday, I can see your potential." Velkir the Lich said with a satisfying tone.


    Noticing his new discipline and looking toward the other two, he quickly put his worries away.


    "As I mention yesterday, I will be teaching you and Shiro magic. Agares over there will be just observing us. Treat him as isn¡ät here in the first ce."


    Hearing that, the little girl that was named Shiro turned her head and stared at Danzel.


    "Are you here to learn magic too, baddy fish?"


    "..."


    For a short instance, Danzel froze in ce when he heard what the little girl called him.<sub> </sub>


    It was a first to be called with such a silly name.


    Knowing not to argue with a child though, Danzel decided to ignore her as well.


    Which resulted in the little girl pouting her cheeks.


    "Hey! Don¡ät ignore me! I will fry you with my magic if you ignore me!" She said in a childish manner.


    The Lich who was watching by the side shook his head and sighed before turning to Shiro.


    "Shiro, you can go ahead and take a break for now. We will continue our lessonter."


    "Yay!"


    As if hearing her favorite two words, the little girl jumped with joy and imminently rushed with her little legs towards her Grandpa.


    Seeing that, Agares showed a warm smile, but Danzel who was warry of that old man saw for just an instance how their eyes met with each other.


    `What have I done to receive his grudge!?¡ä Danzel cursed internally before focusing on the Lich.


    "Alright, before I start teaching you. I would need to know what you are capable of and if you got some questions, feel free to let me know. I will answer them without any doubt." Velkir said with confidence.


    "Well, most of my spells require a body to perform." Danzel said awkwardly.


    Without wasting any time, Velkir made a corpse appear and fall like a dead fish to the ground.


    "There you go."


    Nodding his head, Danzel gathers his dead mana and sends it out towards the corpse on the floor.


    Watching the spectacle in front of him, Velkir frowned.


    "This is [Greater Rise Undead] and as you can see I can only use it on corpses. I hoped to learn how I can create simr undead without any corpses." Danzel said.


    "Hey, can you tell me where you learned this spell?" Velkir asked with a frown.


    Noticing the Liches expression, Danzel knew something was wrong.


    "Why? Did I do something wrong?"


    Velkir shook his head in response.


    "No, I just found it odd how you cast your spell. If I had to exin it to you, it was like reading a book exnation. They are way too many unnecessary things going on in the spell. Be it how the mana enters the body, or how it activates the corpse to turn into an undead. Even the envement part is quite a mess. If you undead were to gain consciousness and break off the envement cast upon them, you might find yourself facing your own creation."


    Hearing Velkir¡äs exnation, Danzel felt like someone who had a bucket of old water thrown over his head.


    He was impressed how the Lich was able to see that many ws with a simple look.


    Hearing that his undead could break through their envement instead made him unconsciously look towards Skull w in doubt.


    Just imagining his legion of undead turning on him made him have a headache just thinking about it.


    "Show me your other spells too." Velkir said with a much cold voice.


    Following Lich¡äs instructions, Danzel cast all the spells that he knew.


    Once done, only the heavy sigh of the Lich was to be heard.


    "Sigh, tell me. Can you replicate this?"


    Raising his hand, a ball made out of dead mana appeared floating on top of his palm.


    Copying Velkir¡äs actions, Danzel raised his hand and tried to wrap his dead mana in the form of a ball.


    Though he seeded after a few seconds, it was clear that by how it was shaking, the ball was both unstable and not as dense as the Velkir ball.


    Without saying anything, Velkir pointed his staff to the distance and created a small target made out of stone.


    "Watch."


    Without moving his arm at all, the dark ball flew towards the stone target with a speed simr to a crossbow bolt.


    *Brough!


    Crashing into the target like a ball of water, the stone seemed like it melted like ice until the dead mana lingering on the target disappeared.


    Trying to achieve the same feat, Danzel sends out his own dark ball.


    Once he did, the sight was truly sad to see.


    Compared to the speed of Velkirs dark ball, he traveled like that of a fly facing hisst moments before joining death.


    The saddest part was how the ball disappeared before even reaching its target.


    "It seems like we have to start with the basics, hub?" Velkir said somewhat awkward.


    "Do you know how you can heal your body using your mana?" Velkir asked with an empty tone.


    "No..."


    "How did you even manage to learn [Greater Raise Undead] if you don''t even know that?" Velkir said in confusion.


    Not sure how to exin to him using the status to gain such knowledge. Danzel said the first things that came to his mind.


    "By feeling it..."


    "...We will start with the basics."


    As Velkir raised up a stone wall to use a ckboard.


    Danzel for the first time after three years ofing out of the cursedke started to learn necromancy the correct way.

 Chapter 257 True Monster And True Genius

    "Shiro, continue holdings those in ce till I say otherwise." Velkir the Lich said with a cold tone.


    Far from getting distracted by the sudden cold words, the small girl that eat 3 whole adult meals with ease not long ago had her hands opened and on top of them were each a different ball of some elements.


    The elements which were that of water and electricity circled constantly in a form of a ball. And if one looked closely at those balls of either element, they would quickly notice that both were unstable and ready to go rampage.


    Not only that, but the balls were only half a meter away from Shiro''s small pale hands. Though the top half of her face was hidden with the hood, looking at her clenching teeth and a few drops of sweat, one could guess that the little girl didn¡ät have it easy controlling the two balls of dense elemental mana.


    Compare to the ball of dead mana which was one of the lowest graded necromantic spells that the Lich showed Danzel, the two balls of elemental mana were different.


    Be it their density and amount of mana, not to forget the much greater technique, it was closer to a spell that 3rd-tier mages would use.


    And managing to hold not one but two of such spells at the same time while keeping them at full power was something only geniuses or those with true talent could achieve,


    Though with enough practice, anyonepetent mage could achieve such results. Doing as such was considered extremely dangerous for those who barely kept the two spells stable.


    Only a small misstep or a loss of concentration could result in the spell blowing in their face.


    Knowing this exact fact, Agares was staring at his granddaughter with intense focus. Reading himself to jump and save Shiro at the first notice of trouble.


    The Lich inparison stood only a few meters away and watched her perform without any worry showing in his tattoed bald face.


    `To be able to be a 3rd-tier magic caster at such young age. If one looked outside of her childish side, that kid is extremely smart and learns from me like a dried-up sponge. I would even make that child my true discipline if she were an undead. Too bad.¡ä


    Noticing the elemental going away, Velkir snapped his finger and made the two raging balls of elemental mana fade away without any sort of violent energy being released.


    "For your first time trying to control two different spells of a different attribute, it wasn¡ät bad. But don¡ät get cocky as of yet. If I weren¡ät there to cease your mess, your left arm would have been exposed from the water pressure while your right arm releasing the lighting ball would have fried you alive. If you were lucky, the pressured water would have hit your skull and granted you a quick death." Velkir said mercilessly to the little girl who fell on her knees to the ground out of exhaustion.


    As she wasn¡ät used to hearing such harsh words, her eyes showed signs of tears building up but none of them fell actually to the ground.


    "Yeah, Vel teacher. I will try my best next time." Shiro said with her childish voice.


    Agares who saw that put an awkward smile behind his silver mask before ring at Velkir in anger for making his granddaughter sad.


    The Lich who noticed Agares staring at him scoffed internally before ignoring himpletely.


    He simply stated the truth of Shiro''s actions.


    Her being sad for not being able to ept the truth was something that Velkir didn¡ät put an inch of care about.


    "Shiro my dear, what the old man Velkir is trying to say is that you did well. He is just too shy to say it out loud." Agares patted gently her head.


    "*Sniff, did Shiro do well?" She said as he turned her head and looked at a certain figure.


    "Compared to bad fish, Shiro iscking...he does the same but much better than me. Am I doing something wrong?" She asked, gentile confused if she was doing something wrong or justcked the talent for it.


    Before Agares could reassure his granddaughter, the Lich Velkir was a second faster.


    "No, you have the talent for it, and as I already said, for your first time you done well. Danzel over there is just practicing a tier 1 spell."


    Hearing that, Shiro felt much more confident and Agares didn''t miss the chance to spoil her granddaughter with praises.


    Because of that, Agares didn''t realize the significance of Velkir''s word.


    Turning his head, Velkirs blind-like eyesnded on Danzel''s figure with a solemn yet solemn face.


    ''Though tier 1 spells have their own uses, the fact that they require the less amount of strain in mind and mana to use makes them easy to use, yet that also reflects on the spell strength.''


    "But..."


    *Brough!


    Starting at the distance where Danzel was with his hands open up, the dead man that was flowing through his body flowed towards his hands before rising from his hand.


    And in just a few seconds, two balls made out of dead mana materializes.


    Pointing his hand towards some stone targets, the two balls of dead mana flew towards their target.


    And soon enough, they made contact.<sub> </sub>


    *Brough! Brough!


    The result was simr to Velkir''s own demonstration except for the fact that the dead mana balls were much slower andsted much less on top of their target.


    Although their spell was the same, the difference in power was like heaven and earth.


    The problem was that Velkir taught this spell just a few hours ago!


    ''I would even understand how a magic caster of the same level as I could learn a mere tier 1 spell in such a short amount of time. But for someone who doesn''t have the basics done...it''s too fast.'' Velkir thought to himself.


    By teaching him, Velkir became quickly aware of Danzel''sck of knowledge in magic.


    What he was most confused about was how he knew of some more advantage stuff while stillcking the basics in him.


    Simr to a cloth filled with holes.


    It was still usable but the missing parts were apparent.


    ''Based on his dead mana...he should even recentlye to bring. Maybe he has risen a decade or two ago. Considering that I would sort him among the genius, but learning two spells is something that only a true monster can achieve.''


    "Maybe if he achieves the next stage, I could even..." Velkir''s mumbling never was put to an end and his stare on Danzel change ever so slightly.


    ***


    Danzel POV.


    `This spell isn¡ät that bad` Danzel thought to himself.


    Pointing his hand towards one of the stone targets, his dead mana formed a ball.


    `[Death st]¡ä Casting the spell silently, the ball of dead mana was shot out and crashed on its target, resulting in a simr result as all his other tries of his spells.


    `The mana cost is insignificant, though itcks speed, both casting speed, and mental effort are quite low. For being level 1, it¡äs alright.¡ä


    At first, when Danzel started the lesson with Velkir the Lich, many holes that were building up in his knowledge of magic were showcased and closed up. It felt like getting the answers to a question that was bugging you for months of end.


    But even he, who had over 600 worth of intelligence wasn¡ät capable to replicate the spell that Velkir showed him.


    After all, putting what you learned into practice was easier said than done.


    He was able to make his dead mana ball denser with more corrosive powers andst longer, but it wasn¡ät enough to be called a spell, specifically called [Death st].


    It was enough though to unlock the option to learn the spell [Death st] by using XP!


    Some may call this cheating, while all other magic caster¡äs who spend their entire whole life learning the arts of magic might right off start cursing him to die in a hole or something.


    Danzel of course would evenugh at all suchints.


    Why cripple himself when he can achieve the same results much faster?


    s, even his method had some limitations.


    The more obvious one was that he needed XP to buy such knowledge from his status. If he was broke, then even he had to surrender himself to learning the traditional way. Though he didn¡ät dislike such a method, it would be stupid for him not to use the more convenient option.


    The second problem was learning enough of that knowledge for it to be unlocked as a skill option to be learned. And the bar for such an option to appear was quite strict.


    Nevertheless, thanks to the spells that Velkir taught him being of the 1 tier, they weren¡ät that hard to learn and they didn¡ät cost that much XP.


    With his remaining 10 700 XP, he managed to learn both spells that Velkir taught him in a matter of 5 hours.


    One being the ball of dead mana, [Death st]. Costs a total of 3000 XP and the other is [Restore Death] which cost 5000 XP in total.


    Though he didn¡ät have the chance to use [Restore Death], it basically repaired his body from receiving damage.


    `Maybe I should break a rib or two and test it out?¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    s, before he could put such thought into practice, he felt a small tremoring from the ground. The next moment through the distance, the sand rose as if a huge explosion rued.

 Chapter 258 Deal With The Blood Mage

    "What was that?" Danzel mumbled as he stopped casting spells.


    Agares and Shiro also noticed the sudden explosion in the distance and were like Danzel curious and wary of it. Agares in particr moved his hand closer to the hilt of his scythe sword.


    Seeing his ss losing focus, Velkir mumbled some curses that could be hardly understood. Making his staff appear, the Lich tapped the ground once and made the barrier surrounding them disappear.


    "That¡äs it for today. I got some important business to attend to, so if you got questions save them for tomorrow. Agares, if your child wants to continue the practice, make sure to supervise her so that she doesn¡ät kill herself. As for you Danzel, I don¡ät care. You are free to do what you wish."


    The Lich didn¡ät even wait for their response and teleported to who knows where.


    Danzel felt regret from seeing his living spell vending machine leaving and not managing to get at least another spell unlocked.


    Shiro inparison reacted like an excited child that just heard the bells of school and escaped the lesson. Although she liked magic by nature, it was still too much for 6 hours of constant training.


    Seeing no point in staying here anymore, Danzel made his way back to Skull w before turning his head to see the old man named Agares staring daggers at him.


    `What the hell is with this guy? Is he still seeking to cut my neck or what.¡ä Danzel thought as he hurried his steps to get away from that scary grandpa.


    The memories of the sword reaching his neck were still fresh in his mind and he wasn¡ät willing to make another such memory any time sort.


    "Skull w, stopzing around already." Danzel said as he jumped on her back while she was stillying on the ground.


    Standing up and doing a stretching motion, she and her master moved away from the Liches house.


    Danzel wondered as to why Skull w stretched herself just now as undead didn¡ät had a need for it, but in the end, he decided to keep silent.


    `Skull w can¡ät speak anyway...¡ä


    While Danzel was thinking as to how to spend his remaining day, his ethereal eyes noticed a huge cloaked figure who had the dark elve tied up on his halberd and carried her like some kind of package on a stick.


    The dark elve looked unconscious as far as he could tell by this distance and honestly quite beaten up to plumb.


    If it wasn¡ät for the fact that the huge figure was missing a whole arm and the blood was flowing like a waterfall from his wound. As Danzel on top of Skull w moved closer to the duo, Danzel noticed how a trait of blood was made through the distance.


    `What the hell happend...¡ä Danzel thought internally.


    And it just happens that someone else blurts out his exact thoughts in disbelief.


    "What the hell happend!?"


    Hearing the familiar voice, Danzel imminently knew who it was.


    Running towards them was none other than the dark gray elve with his pair of glowing crimson eyes. The anger in his voice was clearly for others to notice.


    After all of them gathered together in a spot, the huge figure said his first words.


    "We had a spar, long ears. I and her couldn¡ät control our strength." The huge figure said in his harsh voice.


    "Dammit, you two! Let¡äs go to my ce. I will begin the treatment there." Azrael said and before he turned to go back to his house, he quickly noticed Danzel who was making his escape from the trio.


    "Wait Danzel. If you got nothing important to do, follow me. I got something to show you." Azrael said while turning his back.


    Shrugging his shoulder, Danzel followed the trio suit.


    It wasn¡ät like he had any other ns other than earning some XP through training and practicing the [Rune of Harvest].


    After a few seconds of walking, the trio arrived at Azrael''s house.


    "You can put her done." Azrael said with a harsh tone.


    Nodding his head, the huge figure struck his halberd into the ground and pulled the cloth that had the dark elve tied up, and then gently gave her to the dark gray elve.


    "Then I will be leaving." The huge figure said with a hoarse tone as he turned around and left to Danzel''s surprise.


    Without answering the big guy, Azrael carries his sister inside the house in a princess carry. With a swipe of his hand, all the papers on the table that Danzel considered to be important were thrown to the side with a small wave of blood that came from the dark gray¡äs elve arm.


    cing his sister on the same table where important documents were a second ago, Azrael made a red potion appear from thin air.


    Opening the small bottle, Azrael manipted the red content of the potion to float in the air and directly pierce Vanessa¡äs veins. By manually spreading the medicine, the bruises started to disappear and the light showing in [Eyes of the Damned] brighten up by a little.


    Danzel who was watching by the side though was left confused.


    "Ehm, though your sister is beaten up quite badly, she doesn¡ät look in any danger. In fact, shouldn¡ät you use that red liquid on the guy who lost his arm?" Danzel voiced out his confusion, butpared to his thought, what he received was Azrael staring at him like he was the biggest idiot out there.


    "Why should I waste something so precise on that guy? It would be a total waste of him. My sister needs it more." Azrael said as checked his sister''s condition.


    Danzel in turn was left even more confused than before.<sub> </sub>


    `Compared to her bruises, that guy lost a whole damn arm!¡ä


    He didn''t say such thoughts out loud, but Danzel knew that something was either with Azrael or him wrong.


    He reminded himself of not provoking the dark gray level using his sister.


    "Alright, now let me show you one of my creations." Azrael said as he brought a long cloth out of his storage.


    Unwrapping the cloth, Danzel saw a whittled white spear which looked like an exact copy of the whittled crimson spear that Azrael had created in their spar.


    "Why are you showing me this?" Danzel said with an inch of suspicion in his tone.


    And as he expected, the exact words that he thought that we''ve would say came out.


    "Can you carve me the blood-sucking rune on this?"


    "..." A deadly silence appeared on those two.


    Even after Danzel expected it, he didn''t think that Azrael would ask him so early.


    "As I even told you, as long both benefit from the transaction, I don''t mind carving some runes."


    "Right."


    "If you know already, then instead of showing me my work, show me my reward."


    For a second Azrael was in a state of trans before remembering being on the material ne.


    "Reward you say. Hmm...is there anything in particr that you have in mind?"


    Having expected such an answer, Danzel started listing what looked like his charisma gifts.


    "First of all, I would like a constant supply both with weapons as I need them to practice my runesmithing with them. Although the weapons could be of low quality, there should at the very least have no damage on them. Other than that...what can you offer me specifically?"


    Upon hearing that the dark elve face grimaced.


    "The weapons part is doable. I can simply craft some with my alchemy and magic. At worst we can loot the weapons of our enemies and put them in our space storage. But this isn''t enough for our deal..."


    "I could make various alchemy potions and other handy tools and also enchant some of your item . But since my focus on that profession is quite...unique. I ain''t sure if they suit someone like you." Azrael said awkwardly.


    Usually, he would never offer so much stuff to anyone but his sister.


    Potions and enchantments of someone of the 4th-tier were incredibly valued. Even if the enchantment itself doesn''t suit the user, the fact that is a 4th-tier enchantment is enough to fight over.


    s, Azrael wasn''t an idiot.


    He knew the worth of runesmiths and that they were capable to put another set of enchantments in the form of runes.


    If it weren''t for the fact that he saw a rune that was capable of manipting his own blood, he might even ignore Danzel. But since that wasn''t the case, he might as well build connections with Danzel.


    And Danzel was very well aware of the exact thoughts that Azrael had in his mind.


    After all, he even had himself worked to the bone by a dwarf and a merchant.


    If he didn''t learn how to recognize such people by now, then he truly wasted his three years here.


    ''[Rune Vision]''


    With the world losing color and all sounds dying out, he moved his gaze towards the whittled white spear.


    What he saw was multiple yellow spots every we''re around the whittled spear except for the tip which showed a green color.


    "Although I ain''t that interested in potion...for now, let''s make a temporal contract."


    "The rewards are as you state and I will carve runes in that spear. When I am done with it and you like it as much as I like the reward, we can continue the contract."


    Though at first confused, after exining how the runed contract works, they went ahead and finished the contract with mana and blood.


    Taking the whittled spear in the storage ring, Danzel turned towards Azrael.


    "Since its shape, it would be quite awkward I carve so it might take a while to finish the end product.


    " it''s alright...as long as you don''t run with it."


    Saying both their goodbyes, Danzel went ahead with a huge grin on his face being the helmet as he found his first target on carving the [Rune of Harvest].

 Chapter 259 Old Man With Hidden Intention′S

    Having said their goodbyes, Danzel made his way out of the house with a few weapons that Azrael was generous to donate to him.


    ording to him, those weapons were mostly failed products of his alchemist. He didn¡ät know how he made such weapons with the use of alchemy and ording to Azrael, such weapons were more fragilepared to weapons that were made by a smith with the same level of smithing that Azrael had for alchemy.


    The weapons he got were slightly worse than the swords of the ck and silver knight that he killed not long ago.


    In short, better than average.


    Upon Azrael''s ignorance though, Danzel found such alchemic weapons to have a much reacher color when he used his [Rune Vision] on them.


    Whereas in a normal sword, [Rune Vision] showed a green color. An alchemic sword color had a much brighter green, which meant that the runes were more easily carved into that spot.


    Making the whole rune carving process much easier for him to achieve a higher quality of a rune.


    Well, that difference wasn¡ät that great, but it was something.


    And after trying his luck multiple times to carve the [Rune of Harvest], he failed miserably and came out the same grade as before.


    [Poor].


    Slowly but surely he did improve in making the [Rune of Harvest] whenpared to when he first started out. But the fact that he improved but still showed the same grade made him beyond frustrated.


    It made him feel like he didn¡ät progress at all and that he was just wasting his time as he didn¡ät get a single point of XP by carving all those runes.


    Taking a look at how many swords he got, Danzel was unsure if he was able to reach the next quality rank after going through all the swords.


    "Ugh, it was fine when I went around and looted the weapons of my enemies. But here I don¡ät have any supply of weapons except Azrael..." Danzel said as he put the newly failed runed weapon to the side.


    "I guess there is no other choice. I will have to get that skill..." Danzel said with a sigh before opening his status window and pressing the [Skills].


    What next appeared was a long list of skills that he could learn.


    Most of those skills revolved around weapons and how to enchant them.


    For example, there were the skills of [Throw uracy] or [Heavy Strike].


    ? As its name suggests, [Throw uracy] passively increased his uracy on thrown weapons, while [Heavy Strike] increase the force behind your weapons attack, albeit only slightly.


    Thetter was better than the former, but Danzel decided to ignore those skills for now as he dimmed them unnecessarily.


    If he managed to evolve [Heavy Strike] three times, then maybe that skill would be quite reliable to use. But until it went there, it wouldn¡ät be much of a difference.


    Also, the fear that he would further spread his resources by buying mediocre skills was there.


    He already had enough skills on his te to the point where he was embarrassed that some of his most important skills were low-level.


    Some examples were [Greater Sense Danger] and [Armor Mana ting].


    Unfortunately, Danzel was forced topromise and get another skill that he unlocked way back then when he was in the service of the shadow merchant Hanson


    [Rune Erasure]: 10 000 XP required.


    As its name suggests, it would allow him to erase runes that he himself carved.


    Though it sounded really convenient, there was a catch on the skill.


    Erasing the runes, not only will damaged the weapon itself but also worsen the foundation for rune crafting. Meaning that rune carving will be much more difficult and the damage to the weapon will increase.


    It was a skill that wasn¡ät supposed to be used on your main equipment.


    And since Danzel had a continuous supply of weapons back then and had alreadyrge stock of weapons though out his journey to the desert, there wasn¡ät a need to get the skill.


    But with that not being the case anymore, his hand was forced to get it.


    "Sigh~ The starting price is also quite big. So upgrading it will cost me a fortune in theter evolutions." Danzel sighed as he jumped off Skull w back.


    Out of habit, he got used to working on Skull ws'' back as he used to work on her back while still being on the move.


    That resulted in his journey in the desert being slower, but as he used that lost time to work on his skills, it wasn¡ät that bad.


    "Stay here, for now, I willeter." Danzel said in amanding tone.


    Brining his shield out of his ring storage, Danzel unsheathed his sword and walked through the distance so that he would disrupt none of his training.


    After walking for a few minutes and making sure that he distances himself from the houses that the other residents, Danzel started to swing his sword.


    Since he was using his whole strength on every movement, every time he swung his sword, the sand would be pushed away while his steps would raise clouds of sand.


    Once he charged like a bull with his shield, the raised clouds of sand would follow suit with a devastating swinging right after.


    Each action of his changed his surroundings and if it weren¡ät for the fact that the desert looked all the same, the results might have shocked someone.


    Once the few minutes passed, an hour came to its close before several hours started passing.


    In the blink of an eye, night arrived without Danzel realizing it together with arge amount of XP in his storage.


    This emotionless training though was suddenly interrupted by a faint presence though the distance behind him.<sub> </sub>


    "!!!"


    Without thinking of who or what the presence he felt was, Danzel guided his mana into his sword and turned around to swing at the presence.


    With a dark green wind escaping his de and splitting the sand from the ground, it wasn¡ät over for Danzel.


    Putting his mind to work, Danzel cast two sets [Death st]¡äs in his other hand which held the shield. Swinging his hand, Danzel sends out the two balls of dead mana into his target, while taking the stance with the shield in front of him.


    The [Death st]¡äs soon disappeared through the risen sand clouds for them to never be seen again.


    `[Eyes of the Damned]¡ä Activating his skill, Danzel was able to see through the identity of the presence.


    Looking at the body size of the presence and doing a process of elimination, Danzel''s grip on his sword was tightened.


    "Why have youe here!"


    Once those words came out of his mouth, the sand cloud was pushed away and expanded till there it was clear to see the figure that followed him.


    "Do not freat, I havee with no ill intent in mind."


    Wearing a weird hat on his head together with a silver mask covering only his mouth and carrying a long scythe sword, the figure was none other than the elderly named Agares.


    Seeing Danzel still holding his stance against him, it was clear to Agares that he didn¡ät convince him a bit.


    "I have been hearing the sounds of a de cutting through the wind for quite some time. My curiosity brought me here." Agares said with indifference while gazing at the ground near Danzel.


    Even though it was night, Agares was quick to recognize that Danzel was training.


    And how he reacted once he released his presence ever so slightly also confirmed his evaluation.


    "I apologize if I interrupted your training." Agares said.


    He knew how annoying it was to be interrupted while being absorbed in training.


    So he didn¡ät find Danzel''s reaction weird.


    And he wasn¡ät wrong.


    The current Danzel was beyond annoyed and frustrated by the old guy''s appearance. As he needed only a few more minutes to get his training reward, but as he interrupted him, he had to start anew.


    Not only that, but he didn¡ät believe a single word of what this old man said.


    Not only had he specifically walked away from the resting spot of the group to avoid this exact interaction with someone, but for him to be still heard after being so far away?


    Yeah, even with that guy being of the 4th-tier, he didn¡ät believe that he heard him from so far away.


    This leads him to the conclusion that the old man followed him here.


    "You can¡ät fool me with such a mere excuse. Tell me your intention!" He yelled as he realized his killing intent on the old man.


    But the truth was that Danzel was merely putting a tough front. His ethereal eyes scanned the surroundings for a way to escape.


    If they truly fought, Danzel knew that he was doomed to lose.


    Agares who saw his reaction put up an awkward smile on his face.


    As Danzel suspected, Agares did indeed follow him with hidden intention.


    `It¡äs for the future of that child¡ä Agares thought to himself.


    He recalled the conversation that he had today telepathically with the Lich Velkir when he was teaching Danzel.


    `Agares, as a friend of your father and the future of that child. I would rmend you to build a connection with him.¡ä


    `He has an immense talent of magic with the body of a fighter. I can guarantee you that he will be a powerhouse in the few years toe. Not to forget that he is also a runesmith, making his potential value as high as the sky. Combining those facts, Rue Danzel will make for an incredible ally as much as he would as an enemy.¡ä


    `Don¡ät be blinded by your mortal emotions. Don¡ät forget that you carry that child''s life behind your back. Last, of all, don¡ät make new enemies. For the sake of the nearing future.¡ä


    Remembering his words, Agares could only agree with what the Lich said.


    Neither he nor his granddaughter needed any more enemies. But they needed allies to rely on.


    With his daughter and her husband long passed away, he now was Shiro¡äs family and guardian.


    Making him responsible for building a favorable future for his granddaughter.


    Ignoring Danzel''s question, Agares stared at Danzel doing his best to not show any hostility.


    "That I came with no ill intent is the truth. Is just that I haven¡ät swung my sword for a long time and I felt a little bit stiff on the shoulder. So I came to swing at the wind and forget about this old body''s age." Agares said as he raised his scythe sword upon the sky.


    "Hahaha, I ain¡ät going to lie and say that I didn¡ät follow you here. I originally had something to discuss with you. But after watching you swinging your sword, you awaken this old man''s spirit."


    Lowering the sword and pointing at the sky towards Danzel, Agares said with a wry smile on his face.


    "So how about it? Would you mind sparing with this old man for a bit?"

 Chapter 260 Danzel And Agares Spar

    Hearing what this old man said, Danzel felt his none existence guts turning upside down and twisting around.


    He had already experienced Agare''s speed and strength the moment he met him together with Velkir.


    If it weren''t for Velkir stopping that old man, his neck would beying on the ground.


    If they were to fight, it wouldn''t even be a spar!


    The strength difference was just that big.


    s, Danzel decided to agree on the spar.


    "Very well..." Danzel answered with a cold voice.


    Not only did he not have any other choice, but Danzel doubted that Agares would kill him.


    The sole reason for this doesn''t was the fact that he was still standing with his head attached to where it was supposed to be.


    If Agares had the intention to kill him, he wouldn''t have wasted his time talking that he came in peace.


    Even if it was to lower his guard, Danzel believed that there wasn¡ät a need to lower his guard, to begin with. If the old man wanted, he could kill him regardless of his intentions.


    `So a fight is unavoidable...¡ä Danzel thought as he cursed his luck.


    He scanned the distance between the two and where the other house was and he concluded that running away was also pointless.


    It would take him only a few seconds to run back, at worse it would take him 10 seconds at his best.


    Though it was fast, he doubted he could make it if the old man aimed to kill him here.


    `As long as I manage to injure him...as long as I activate [Mortal Reminder], I might be able to escape!¡ä


    Danzel doubted that either Velkir or Azrael would let him die and lose the chance to get some runed items from him. Although he wasn¡ät too sure about Azrael, he believed that the Lich would save him after makings a deal with him


    "You said you wanted a spar, right? Fine! Then I will give it to you!"


    As soon as his words came out, though out his body his dark green mana started to surround him with his hand and sword being engulfed with arge amount of dead mana.


    Raising his now cursed sword, he didn¡ät stop there.


    The dead mana channeled by his sword escaped through the air and started to form balls of dead mana that were much stronger than before thanks to his sword art.


    One the first [Death st] appeared, the next appeared closely followed by a third. Making three balls of dead mana floating above him.


    For a moment, the dead mana channeled in his sword went out to make another [Death st], but mid-forming the spell copsed.


    "Ugh, that¡äs the limit?" Danzel mumbled to himself before raising his feet and stepping forward with all his strength.


    *Bouf~


    The nearby sand was pushed to the side and Agares felt a slight tremor under his feet. But even after watching Danzel preparing spells, he shows any signs of moving.


    `I just need one opening!¡ä With that in mind, Danzel sends out the three [Death st]¡äs towards his target. But he himself didn¡ät stay idle to his spot.


    Activating [Swift Movements] and [Shield Charge], he dashed forward with incredible speed, he was so fast that he overtaken his own three [Death st]¡äs.


    It took him a mere second to close the distance and be only 6 meters away from Agares. Even after emitting an intense killing intent, Agares had the same indifferent expression on his face. He simply gripped the handle of his scythe sword with both hands.


    "A frontal charge?" Agares said with a slightly amused tone.


    Danzel knew that this won¡ät be enough, but he still had something up his sleeve.


    Using the enchantment of his sand emperors de, the sand under Agares feet shifted away like quicksand and the nearby sand jumped around his feet in the attempt to drag him done.


    For a split second, Agares was surprised to find the sand itself trying to bury him alive. But he scoffed at the attempt itself and a wave of his mana generated a big burst of wind, making the nearby sand on his feet to be blown away.


    "You will need something much stronger to hold me down." Agaresments with an amused tone before his and Danzel''s sword meet with each other.


    *Thinnnk!


    A loud sound of metals echoed around the desert with sparks appearing under the night.


    If one looked from the distance, one would assume that those two were equal, but that couldn¡ät be more wrong.


    Once their swords met, Danzel felt like swinging at an understructure wall of metal.


    All his build-up momentum disappeared and he was left without being able to affect Agares''s sword at all.


    Opening his status window, using the hand holding his shield, he spends the remaining 24 attribute points in his strength.


    But even after feeling his strength increasing, it was a hopeless attempt.


    Agares didn¡ät miss the sudden chance of strength, butpared to his strength, it was just a drop of water inside the sea.


    "Unlike your looks suggest, you are quite fast for your level, but the same doesn¡ät go for your strength." Agaresmend, before gazing at the three-ball of dead mana closing towards him.


    Pushing Danzel''s de away and swinging once more while he took a step back, Agares made Danzel block his strike while creating enough distance between those two.


    The [Death st]¡äs had already passed Danzel and were only a few meters away from crushing Agares.


    Taking the same position that looked simr to a Te Ura Gasumi stance, an almost invisible light was going through the scythe sword.


    Facing the three [Death st]¡äs from right, left, and in front of him, Agares gazed turned ice cold.


    "Sword Art-" Mumbling something behind his mask, the light became more noticeable.


    And under Danzel''s gaze, his connection towards his [Death st]¡äs was severed and the three balls of dead mana were cut in half before exploding like balloons. The mana making the spell work faded in the air.


    Looking dumbfounded at what just happend, Danzel would even gulp his saliva if he had any.


    Everything happend in an instant.


    What he found most disturbing about this was that all three of his [Death st]¡äs were destroyed simultaneously.


    He couldn¡ät say for sure, but for a single moment he could swear that out of Agares''s sword, another three came out and split his [Death st]¡äs.


    He couldn¡ät say for sure because of how fast it was, but the three swords didn¡ät look like the scythe sword of that old man, instead, they looked like usual curved swords with the same length (Imagine a Nodachi with less handle and more de).


    While he was trying to process what happend, Agares''s voice brought him out of his thoughts.


    "Your use of spells isn¡ät that bad, but it seems you waste too many movements with your sword."


    Danzel thought out his confusion and the monologue of the possible senile old man had already a [Gale Mana de] preparing the whole time.


    Swinging his sword, the dark green wind de towards Agares while splitting the ground. As he did that he speed up right behind the wind de.<sub> </sub>


    Staring at that, Agares pointed hisrge scythe sword towards the dark green wind de with one hand before the simrly faint glow appeared on the scythe sword.


    Simr to before, the light brightens up for a split second.


    What happend next was the dark wind de crumpling from its center.


    Feeling the sudden dangering towards him, Danzel halted his steps and pushed his shield towards where the danger wasing with the assistance of his [Vanguards Defense] skill.


    The next second, he felt a massive blow hitting his shield, so strong that he was being pushed back a few meters and almost falling to the ground.


    "What the..." Dumbfounded, he stared at his shield, only to find no projectile or anything the like.


    He felt as if he got hit by a bolt by a ballista at point-nk range.


    And that was understating the power behind that sudden attack.


    "Mhm, it seems like you got some nice reflexes under you. Your judgment of danger isn¡ät half bad." Agares said as he slowly walked towards Danzel.


    In the next moment, upon Danzel''s watchful gaze, Agares disappeared from his location and appeared in front of him without realizing it.


    "!!!"


    Surprised, he swung his de at him, only to be blocked by Agares scythe sword.


    Pushing Danzel''s sword away, Agares swung once more with incredible speed towards Danzel, the speed of Agares was just enough for Danzel to raise his shield with the help of [Vanguards Defense] and block the swing.


    The swing was so heavy that he thought that his arm bone will get dislocated.


    Staring at Danzel indifferently, Agares stepped back and pulled his sword back from his shield.


    With his scythe sword tip being reversed curved, he directly pulled Danzel''s shield towards him, which resulted in him being pulled too.


    It was such an unexpected move from such an unorthodox weapon that Danzel didn¡ät see iting.


    With his footing lost and his chest wide open, Agares raised his leg and kicked him directly at his chest te so fast that Danzel didn¡ät even have the chance to use his [Armor Mana ting] skill.


    The kick was so strong that Danzel was sent flying several meters before meeting and rolling to the ground like a rag doll.


    "Dammit..." Cursing at one of his broken ribs, Danzel stabbed his sword into the sand and rose up.


    Before he could rx though, he felt an intense feeling of dangering toward him.


    To his surprise, without making any sound Agares was in front of him with his sword held up in the air with both hands.


    Feeling the gtin aiming at his head, Danzel swiftly raised his shield.


    ? *Think!


    Feeling the overwhelming pressure from his shield, he gritted his teeth and thrust his sword toward Agares''s stomach.


    Agares in turn only step slightly to the side while raising his sword and swinging once more at a speed that was barely for Danzel to respond to.


    Soon out of the few swings and shes, several minutes passed with Danzel trying to fend off Agares swing with everything he had while trying to fight back, but regardless of any of his attacks, the old man either dodged them using only the necessary movement or just blocking them with his scythe sword.


    Upon the hellish sh of the two, the 5 minutes soon turned into 10 before even those turned into 30 minutes.


    Then it happend.


    [You received 5000 XP]


    "!!??"


    With Danzel using all his focus to fend off Agares, the moment the XP notification appeared, Danzel for a split second lost his focus.


    Once he remembers the intense feeling of danger, Agares scythe sword hit his sword near the handle with enough strength to drop it off his hand,


    With sparks reigniting, Danzel''s sword flew through the air and stapped the ground several feet away from him.


    With no weapon in his hand, Agares instantly swung his scythe sword towards his neck, but albeit stopping inched away before decapitating him.


    Once his scythe sword stopped, the wind generated by Agare''s swing pushed the nearby sand away.


    "Why did you lose focus? If I didn¡ät stop my sword, your head wouldn¡ät have been in ce." Agares said with a harsh tone, simr to a teacher watching his student fail his exam because of a stupid mistake.


    "..." Danzel in response was dead silent.


    Staring at the de in his neck and then at the notification that made him lose his focus, he felt both confused and bitter.


    Bitter because though all this time, Agares was merely toying with him and that he could kill him any time he wanted.


    And confused about the appearance of notification.


    `Why did I gain the same XP I gain when I train? It hasn¡ät even been an hour yet.¡ä


    While trying to think for a reason, a sudden thought appeared in his mind.


    `Did I receive my training reward faster because I fought with Agares?¡ä


    The fight was so intense that it paled inparison to when he trained alone so he thought that maybe that was the reason for the sudden XP notification.


    `Does that mean if I train with someone else, I will gain faster XP?¡ä


    Once that thought crossed his mind, Danzel''s gaze towards Agares changed.


    Walking a few steps back away from the sword on his neck, Danzel made [Hand of Mana Affinity] appear and pick his sword for him.


    Agares in response silently stared at what he was doing.


    Having his sword back in his hand, it was Danzel this time that pointed his de toward Agares.


    "I might even make a mistake, but that won¡ät happend the next time."


    "Let¡äs continue our spar, after all...the night is still young."


    Saying that Danzel charge at Agares who had a wry smile behind his silver mask.


    *Thinnk!


    The two who had hidden intentions in mind shed with their sword once more.


    And the echoes of their sh went until the day of tomorrow.

 Chapter 261 Fading Enmity

    With the morning light greeting the sands of Azu¡ärah, the continuous echoes of shing metal have finallye to a stop.


    *Thinnnk!


    Having his sword thrown from his hand, Danzel stared frustrated at the scythe sword pointing towards his throat once more and slightly cutting through his dark ting of his.


    "I guess now it¡äs a good time to finish our little spar." Agares said as he withdraw his sword.


    Seeing that, Danzel went out to pick up his dropped sword while walking on top of all the umted ck metal that has been chipped off his armor.


    The armor itself was barely scratched and the destroyed ck metal could be generated again.


    Pulling his sword from the sands, Danzel activated the enchantment of his armor. Taking only a few moments for the ck sand to cover up all the missing parts of his ck ting, after the sand hardened, Danzel looked as good as new.


    "What we did can¡ät even be called a spar...it was simple you toying with me." Danzel said as looked at his own reflection in his sword.


    Although his mood had increased as soon as he learned the rewards of such spar, he generally felt quite bitter from losing so much.


    Followed by Agare''s silence, it was pretty clear that Danzel stood no chance against that old man.


    Agares who thought he had hurt Danzel''s pride, wanted to say something but was shortly after interrupted by Danzel.


    "Tell me, was the reason why you followed me because you were after my runesmithing skills?" Danzel said in a cold voice yet tired voice.


    It was natural for Danzel to have such doubts after thinking about it for many hours.


    Although he had to bring out his entire focus against Agares scythe sword, every time Agares made him drop his sword, Danzel had a small amount of time to wonder about Agare''s true intent.


    The thought of Agares trying to kill him had been removed after their first engagement. Danzel doubted that Agares yed with him just to kill him in the end.


    Thinking about what else he had to offer for that old man to seek him out in the middle of the night, only one thing came to his mind.


    His ability to make runes.


    Agares silence also indirectly confirmed Danzel''s evaluation.


    "The sole reason that I came to meet you was to resolve the enmity between us two." Agares said with his eyes closed and a frown on his face.


    Remembering back then in the cave of the bandits, Agares still remembers how Danzel threatened him to use curse magic on his granddaughter, he felt immeasurable anger arise from inside of him.


    `I can understand why that guy acted in such a way, but considering Shiro¡äs condition, she might have died.¡ä Agares thought to himself.


    He understood Danzel''s thread was out of his self-preservation.


    The chance of Danzel mistaking them for bandits were also there, so Agares understood where Danzel wasing from.


    But the very thought of the child of his daughtering to harm was unbearable to him.


    `But if my hatred prevents the future growth of her...¡ä Agares though with resolve to put away his hate towards Danzel for the future sake of his remaining family.


    "I would be lying though if your skills didn¡ät interest me though."


    "I only have this old body and my sword skills to offer. Both those things reached the so-called 4th-tier that you like to call. I noticed lots of wasted movements in our spar and your sword art is rough and filled with holes. If you are willing to make runes for my granddaughter, Shiro. I could teach you how to better yourself as a swordman.


    "..."


    There was a moment of silence between those two.


    Danzelughed bitterly internally as the man who was asking for his service called his swordsmanship "rough and filled with holes".


    It sounded like he was insulting him, but Danzel knew for the better that Agares was right. Not because he lost the spar countless times, but of the skill [Death Guarding Swordsmanship] being at level 1.


    Considering the times it evolved, [Death Guarding Swordsmanship] was a 3rd-tier skill, which of his tier was fine. But it being at the lowest level, someone like Agares who he guessed wielded a 4th-tier skill would see his swordsmanship to be frankly, really bad.


    `He said he would teach me his skills, I doubt the option to learn such skills could be unlocked as easy as magic. And improving my [Death Guarding Swordsmanship] can be done with the use of XP. All that I would be gaining from epting such a request would be receiving potently knowledge to unlock a skill and faster XP gain through the use of spar¡äs...¡ä


    Summarizing what he could gain from Agares, he didn¡ät find it all that tempting.


    For someone who is pursuing the path of the sword, to be trained by a 4th-tier expert might be a dreaming true.


    But for Danzel?


    It wasn¡ät.<sub> </sub>


    Not only did he have to learn how to improve his runes and try somebinations that he still hadn¡ät tried out, he still had to review what he learned from Velkir''s lessons, but additionally he still had his Necronomicon and the book that Nersan¡ärah left to finish understanding.


    In other words, he had arge load of stuff to do which required time.


    Adding the swordsmanship lesson on top of this mountain would only make the mountain higher than it was already.


    Nheless, even after such a reason, Danzel still epted the old man''s offer.


    "That offer of yours...In exchange for my runes, I would like to have such spar and your advice." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Although for him such a deal wasn¡ät as valuable for his runes, Danzel found it still worth it to ept the old man''s offer based only on the fact that he was on the same party as him.


    As long as he knew, they were going to be fighting together since they were a mercenary group. So making the enmity between someone who would potentially watch his back go away wasn¡ät too bad.


    Other than that, Danzel didn¡ät want to make an enemy out of a 4th-tier expert just because he rejected such a request.


    "Alright then, you can call me wherever you want to start. Other than the time that my granddaughter takes a lesson of magic and needs me, free feel to call me." Agares said with a relieved tone.


    Turning his back, he walked back to the houses where the other remained.


    Danzel who was staring at his back shook his head before taking ast look at his sword.


    More specifically, he gazed towards the carved runes.


    "A runesmith, huh? Such an upation feels more like a curse with benefits at this point." Danzel said with a bitter tone.


    Till now, all the events that brought him here were for the sole reason of him being a runesmith.


    Danzel wonders what would have happend if chosen to be an enchanter instead of a runesmith back then.


    Although he gained much and the runes themself were extremely valuable, the dangers he had gone through were as simr to the rewards of his choice.


    `Maybe I would still be at the capital of Berum, hiding somewhere and slowly umting my strength.¡ä Danzel thought to himself, but shortly after shook his head from such thoughts.


    "Sigh~I don¡ät regret it. If I wanted to hole myself somewhere and slowly increase my strength, I wouldn¡ät have left the cursedke, to begin with."


    Sheathing his sword back into his scabbard, Danzel went to meet up with Skull w and go for his magic lesson.


    Once Skull w saw him through the distance, she raised up and run towards him like a lost puppy who found his owner once more.


    Danzel who saw that would have frowned if he had a face.


    `Skull w broke through mymand...It seems that Velkir was right.¡ä


    Jumping on her back, he orders her to go to where Velkir''s house was.


    Reaching the house and going where the barrier was, he and Skull w found themself with Velkir teaching Shiro magic with Agares sitting in the distance cross-legged with his eyes closed.


    "You arete." Velkir said with his cold voice without turning towards Danzel.


    "Sorry Mast-"


    "Instead of apologizing,e here and start listening. Today I will be teaching you how to umte much purer mana. As the topic will be for both of your usefull, you will be taking the lesson together."


    "Whaaat~! I don¡ät want to learn with the bad fish!" Shiro said in an exaggerated manner.


    "..." Dumbfounded, Danzel stared at the girl and then back at Agares from the distance. Although one would guess that this old was sleeping, Danzel noticed a small twitch in his eye brown.


    "May I ask the reason as of why, Master Velkir?" Danzel said while walking near the Lich and the small brat who kept calling him bad fish.


    "It¡äs for the simple reason that we will soon be departing for our next job, making that peaceful lesson all that more valuable for you two. You Danzel have already part way used the technique by your air de that you showed, but as far as I am aware, you can¡ät use that technique on your other spells."


    Upon hearing that, Danzel fell silent as he wasn¡ät even aware that he did something special with his [Gale Mana de].


    "You Shiro need to learn it from the ground up. So today''s lesson will be about this topic."


    Without waiting for any protest to rise, Velkir went out of his way to start his lesson.


    Being what it is, Danzel could only stand there beside Shiro and listen to his Lich master lesson.

 Chapter 262 Immortal

    At first, Danzel thought that the lesson wouldn¡ät be hard to understand thanks to his previous experience of learning two spells in a row.


    But when the lesson began, Danzel knew how wrong he was.


    He vaguely understood 20% of what Velkir the Lich tried to exin to him, with the rest of it being just question marks inside his head.


    Sometimes the stuff that the Lich mentioned would sound simr to what he was doing when he was using his [Gale Mana de], but s Danzel had to continuously stop the Lich and ask for a more detailed exnation.


    Though that helped him understand the topic a bit more, the gaze that Velkir was casting on him was extremely terrifying! The light in his eyes would faintly glow in an ominous gray light where Danzel stopped him from his lesson.


    The worst part of it was that the little girl who kept calling him "bad fish" seemed to understand much better than him!


    That fact alone made him feel bitter from inside.


    Andpared to his first lesson, that lesson didn¡ät stop on the first day but continued on for days.


    At this point, he learned the practical uses of such a technique and how important it was to increase the efficiency and power of one''s spells, but he still didn¡ät know how to use it.


    At best, he only managed to increase slightly the power of his [Gale Mana de] ording to Velkir. But the increase was so pathetic that it wasn¡ät even worth mentioning.


    He knew that it was important to learn such stuff, butpared to learning new spells, it was less rewarding.


    The knowledge itself was interesting, so it didn¡ät bore him to death.


    Nheless, he felt awkward about seeking the little girl Shiro progressing much faster than him.


    It wasn¡ät that bad on the first day, but after a whole week of learning together, he felt that hecked the talent of magic, to begin with.


    "Sigh, even if I don¡ät have any talent for it, at the very least I have something that no one has." Danzel said as he deactivated his [Rune Vision] and raised the now runed wittled white spear.


    Because many runes were carved around the metal, Danzel had a hard time carving the runes, but after careful nning, he finished the rune that Azrael had requested him.


    Which was none other than his original blood-sucking rune.


    But Danzel didn¡ät have the slightest urge to return the now finished product to his client.


    `Now only the [Rune of Harvest] needs to be carved on the tip of the weird spear and the deed would be done, hehe.¡ä Danzel thought internally as he put the spear away in his storage ring.


    "But that would take some time..." Danzel said as he stared at one of the alchemic weapons.


    It was a usual spear with an unusual tip, which the tip in question had the [Rune of Harvest] carved at the [Bad] rating.


    "Although it improved from [Poor] to [Bad], the fact that the rune is still inefficient is a problem. I guess I still have a long time before I can get any XP from [Epic] runes."


    Bringing another alchemic weapon out from his storage ring, Danzel was about to start practicing carving runes but a sudden voice inside made the mana in his finger disappear.


    `Danzel, bring all your stuff together with you undead to my house as fast as possible, something urgent happend.¡ä


    Hearing his master¡äs voice, Danzel put the weapon away and followed the instructions.


    "Skull w, go to master Velkir¡äs house. The usual house where we stop every day." Danzel said with amanding tone.


    Raising up from her feet, Skull w dug his metal-like ws in the sand and dashed as fast as possible to the location where her master willed.


    Arriving shortly after at the house of the Lich, Danzel found all the other members of Deathfull Skulls waiting there.


    The "dark" elve siblings, Azrael and Vanessa standing.


    The elderly and the small girl with the exotic cloth¡äs, Agares and Shiro.


    And to his surprise, the 3,5 meter giant with his halberd resting on his shoulder and cloak hiding his body feature. The reason why Danzel was surprised was that the arm that was supposed to be missing had now regrown anew.


    Danzel knew both from the man''s height and his nature of hating the living, specifically humans the most for some unknown reason, that this man was like the others, not human. But what exactly he was he didn¡ät know.


    Lastly, the leader of this group was none other than the Lich Velkir.


    In his hand, Velkir was holding a mana crystal which Danzel guessed was amunication device.


    "It seems like everyone is here. As the situation of our employer is urgent, the schedule was pushed forward. So anything you left behind stays also here." Velkir said with his cold voice while he raised his staff to the air and realized a massive amount of mana.


    Soon after, a massive magic circle appeared under their feet.


    `Teleportation magic?¡ä Danzel thought as he remember the first time he teleported.


    The magic took less than 10 seconds to finish before the magic circle lightens up.


    mming his staff to the ground, the group of 7 was engulfed with light before disappearing from their current location and being reced with bolts of lightning piercing through the sky.


    ****


    With7 lighting bolts shooting down from the heaves into the earth, the respective spot where the lightning bolts hit were 7 figures to be found.


    "Where is this?" Danzel mumbled as he looked at the forest around them.


    "It''s the forest of Gartera, a territory where war is waged between the new kingdoms." Azrael said as he looked around the forest.


    Looking nkly at Azrael, Danzel turned towards Velkir.


    "So? Whatexactly is our mission?"


    Turning to look at Danzel, Velkir stayed silent for a moment before answering.


    "We are to take part in the war and assist a soon-to-be kingdom to turn into a full-fledged one."


    Raising his staff, a blue lighted surrounded the Lich. Soon after Velkir started to float in the air.


    "I will tell you the detailster. All you need to know is that our employer got ambushed and we are to eliminate the enemy party."


    Seeing that everyone got the rough idea, Velkir elerated further in the forest with incredible speed in flight.


    "Dragonspeed everyone, our pray is waiting for us."


    Without further ado, everyone else started following after the Lich.


    Agares picked up little Shiro into his arm and was able to match the Velkir speed together with the giant with the halberd.


    Right behind them was he together with the "dark" elve siblingsstly followed by Skull w who couldn''t keep up.


    In fact, Danzel had to use [Swift Movements] to catch up with everyone.


    ''They are fast...'' While he was impressed by everyone''s speed except Skull ws one. A sudden voice pulled him out of his tough.


    "Hey! Rue Danzel! How have you been? I heard that the old man was teaching you magic though the resend days."


    Turning to see who was talking, it was none other than Vanessa.


    "That''s indeed the case..." Danzel answered.


    "Hmm, that must be hard I imagine, no? You know, my brother is a great magic caster. Butpared to him, I like using that two beautiful pieces of work." Vanessa said while showcasing her two first.


    While the two started an awkward talk, with Danzel answering Vanessa''s question, Velkir suddenly spoke out.


    "Sartan, go finish the job."


    Responding to Velkirs words, the giant with the halberd flexed his legs before dashing forward at three times the current speed they were going at.


    The ground itself left marks of his footmarks.


    Soon after, the giant named Sartan disappeared through the distance.<sub> </sub>


    "So his name was Sartan, huh?" Danzel mumbled to himself just loud enough for Vanessa to hear.


    "Didn''t you know? Here I thought you were ignoring me the past days, but you are quite the introvert aren''t you?"


    "..."


    After a few seconds of awkward silence, a loud roar shook the forest as if an earthquake was happening.


    "He already started huh?" Vanessament.


    Ignorant of what she meant, their group shortly after arrived in front of two different armies Danzel recognize one of them to be from the Arcana kingdom.


    "Such chaos..."


    While the other army had around 200 men, the soldier of arcana had at the very least double that number.


    And Danzel recognized most of those soldiers to be of the 2nd-tier with some 3rd-tier.


    Danzel imagine trying to fight that group but concluded that it would be a hard fight to survive with such numbers.


    "The arcana group is the enemy right?" Danzel asked as his mana spread around his body.


    "Yes, but there is no need to join" Azrael this time said while watching without much concern.


    "What do you mean~"


    Before Danzel could finish his sentence, loud screams were heard through the surroundings.


    "Kiaaaghh!!!"


    Turning his head, Danzel was astonished at what he was seeing.


    The giant Sartan who left the moment ago was swinging his halberd in a frenzy-like manner while being in the middle of the arcana army.


    Each swing of his halberd cleaved several people in half to despise their mana shield while others were thrown to the air from the wind that was created from a single swing of his.


    The lucky enough who were able to escape the cleaving halberd and managed tond a hit with their sword on the giant were dumbfounded to see their swords breaking apart without even leaving a single scratch on Sartan''s body.


    Seeing the giant who was making a quick work of his soldiers, the armymand of the Arcana kingdom gritted his teeth before sending the next orders to all the 3rd-tier magic casters.


    "Concentrated fire on the cloaked big figure! Kill him whatever the cost!!!"


    Hearing themander''s orders, the magic caster raised their staffs and let out a volley of ice spears to fly at an incredible speed towards Sartan.


    Sensing the increase of mana, Sartan looked toward the magic caster with a huge grin behind his hood.


    "Hahaha!!!" Laughing in a crazy manner, Sartan ignored all the people around him and dashed directly towards the magic casters while framing the few soldiers who were in his way.


    "This beast...! Fire!!!" Giving out themand, all the 3rs-tier magic casters let the valley of ice spears travel towards the giant with the halberd.


    Compared to others'' expectations, Sartan didn''t even try to dosage the valley of ice spears and run straight through them only protecting his head with one arm.


    A few secondster, multiple ice spears pierced through Sartan''s body like a skewer.


    But even after this, his speed didn''t decrease a single bit.


    In fact, he became even faster.


    Reaching where the magic casters were, Sartan made a quick work of them and the nearby bodyguards of such magic casters.


    Seeing what happens to his elite unite, the armymander gritted his teeth and raised his staff.


    A few secondster a massive ice spear appeared above him With two magic circles in front of the spear.


    Being able to use three spells at the same time, it was clear that the armymander was much more talented than all the other magic casters in his unit.


    "Die Monster!!!" Jelling out loud, the ice spear entered the magic circle.


    In the next instance the ice spear. Catapulted right towards Sartan at an immense speed where Danzel himself didn''t know if he could dodge it.


    And simr to before, Sartan didn''t Dodge.


    Therge ice spear pierced his chest whileing on the other side of his body.


    The ice spear packet was such a strong force that pushed Sartan off his one fit.


    He seemed like one that would fall over if pushed even if a little.


    When everyone thought he died, the veins in his foot still on the ground flexed abnormally.


    Using only one foot to jump forward,Sartan as unorthodox as it might seem, flew towards the armymander at extreme speed.


    The armymander had barely time to create a barrier around him, but unfortunately for him. A single kick of Sartan destroyed the barrier like a piece of ss and send him towards one of the trees, which made his body explode like a pasta once it made contact with the tree.


    Now in the spot where their armymander was standing, was a 3,5-meter tall figure with arge ice spike piercing his chest and letting loads of blood spill out.


    "That monster! He got the armymander!"


    "Kill that bastard!"


    "Everyone! Use fire magic together!"


    As one shouted out, every other magic caster on the arcana kingdom side raised their followed magic amplifier weapon and shot out all kinds of fire magic.


    And in a matter of a few seconds, spells of the fire elemental rain down on Sartan, resulting in multiple explosions urring.


    s, it wasn''t enough.


    With a heavy aura being released, the remaining fire was pushed away and disappeared almost instantly.


    "H-How..."


    "Impossible..."


    "How is he still alive!?"


    Amidst everyone''s amazement or terror.


    The giant was having a huge hole through his chest regenerating at an astonishing speed.


    With his cloak now burned down, the giant with the light blue skin and two tusksing from his mouth was now only wearing a piece of cloth that was hiding his private parts. Although the cloth looked old and wasn''t in a good condition, it was nevertheless an enchanted item.


    "Roaaaaarrr!!!"


    Roaring at top of his lungs, a huge shock wave was sent out around him.


    With his eyes burning within madness, Sartan charged through the arcana army.


    Any wound that he had, be it fatal or not had recovered at an astonishing speed.


    ''If I had to put it into words...that guy seems like a-''


    "Immortal" Vanessa said while watching the sight all not so impressed.


    "Immortal Juggernaut is what people call him. At the very least does who know us."


    "He is one if not thest remaining High Troll that exists."

 Chapter 263 Nonsense Of A Lich

    Standing tall in the middle of over more than a hundred corpses like a war god, Sartan the High Troll was thest standing.


    Broken des and spears were stuck though out his body with every wound from magic having long disappeared.


    In front of him was a lone soldier pointing his sword towards Sartan with a shaken grip. Even though the soldier had the aura of a 3rd-tier that could rival Danzel, the man was in the midst of despair.


    "Y-You monster!!!" Yelling out loud to bring out thest courage that he had, the man raised his hand to swing his sword filled with mana towards Sartan.


    "Weak." Saying so with a rough voice, the halberd that was resting on his shoulder was raised up and brought down with such speed that the soldier couldn¡ät react too.


    "Aggggh!!" Yelling out of pain, the man watched how his hand that held the sword was cut by the massive halberd.


    But being one of the elites of the Arcana kingdom that received special training and guidance in the arcana, he bypassed the pain and started chanting a spell with his remaining hand.


    In a mere two seconds, the mana in his hand transformed into three lightings that imminently reached Sartan¡äs body.


    Sertan instead of stopping the man decided to watch it all happening.


    The lighting that hit his body traveled around his body, trying to fry himpletely. s after a few seconds of the lighting trying its best, the man couldn¡ät keep the spell up any longer.


    "You done, weakling?"


    With a swift movement, Sartan gripped the man''s remaining hand and brought him high enough for their eyes to meet.


    "L-Let me go! You Monst- Argghh!"


    *Crack.


    Increasing the strength in his grip, the mans remaining hand broke.


    Other than his head and two legs, the man became like a broken doll.


    "A-Argh..! Why..! We didn¡ät hear..! It was wrong..! The info-Agh!"


    Watching the man in front of him speak nonsense, Sartan decided to put an end to the man''s misery.


    "H-Hey! Why are you opening your mouth!? Don¡äte close! Sto-!"


    *Crunch! Crunch!


    Watching from the distance, Agares who was carrying little Shiro, covered her eyes from the horrible sight.


    The dark elve siblings who saw didn¡ät even pat an eye as they got used to such sight.


    Danzel in turn was surprised to see someone with simr strength as him meet his fate in such fashion.


    `I should refrain from challenging others from a higher tier...'' Danzel thought internally.


    Meanwhile,pared to their lukewarm reaction to seeing his head eaten, the soldiers of the other army looked as terrified as the arcana army was.


    Not only did the ambush of the arcana army put them on the edge, but having a monster show up suddenly and begin a massacre was enough to make them wary to the extreme.


    When Sartan nce at the other army, they all raised their weapons against him even though they knew that the same would befall them if that High Troll decided to make them his dessert.


    Ignoring such gaze, Sartan brought back his bloodlust and walked toward his group back.


    "I finished, Death Caller" Sartan referred to Velkir.


    Agares gave him a harsh look for not even cleaning his mouth from the blood, but the High troll ignored him and instead stayed silent behind Velkir.


    Finally noticing the group of neers, the other army soldier began to have cold sweat behind their back.


    "Danzel,e over here." Velkir suddenlymanded.


    Looking at the Lich confused, he applied to his request.


    Velkir in turn pointed his staff to Danzel and started casting.


    "[Item Concealment], [Hide Hidden Weapon]"


    With a faint light surrounding Danzel, the Lich turned around and walked towards the wary army.


    "I am the leader of the mercenary group, Deathfull Skulls! We are allies!" He said with a cold voice.


    Although the wipe that Velkir was sending was totally from a wigged magic caster, the soldier rxed for just an inch before calling their superiors.


    After waiting for a few moments, an aged man with a white mustache and hair came forward.


    "O Great Archmage, I give my gratitude for answering our urged call. How about we go to a more private ce to talk that staying here."


    Nodding his head, Velkir motioned the others to follow after the aged man.


    The soldiers who saw that gulped upon realizing that Sartan was one of them. Even though they were allies, some people couldn''t help but move away from the High Troll.<sub> </sub>


    Arriving in a tent where it was guarded by two spear-wielding soldiers, Danzel had to make Skull w wait outside for convenient reasons.


    The moment they went in, the first thing that the aged man did was bow his head towards them.


    "Once again, I can¡ät thank you enough for answering our call. If it weren¡ät for your group. my soldiers and I would have been wiped out by the enemy Arcana."


    "No, there is no need to give us any gratitude or what so ever. Though the call forced me to mid-way stop a project of mine, it is but our obligation to answer the call of our employer." Velkir said with his cold voice.


    If Danzel''s face wasn¡ät just that of a skull, he would have a funny expression on his face.


    `It seems like Velkir can be pretty petty, huh?¡ä


    Although Velkir''s words were that of a model employe of the month, to Danzel it sounded different.


    It sounded like `You made me waste my precious time just toe and finish some of those insects? If you don¡ät pay us extra, then forget about our deal¡ä


    Danzel wasn¡ät the only one who noticed that, Azrael and Agares as much as the aged man had a simr expression, with thetter being more of a frown than a funny face.


    It was as if one made an order to a friend and hasten the delivery within short notice and your friendes and ask you to pay more for the trouble it created for him.


    "That can¡ät go, Great Archmage. Our Kingdom will be sure topensate you for your troubles." The aged man said with a smile on his face, but the clenching of his fist betrayed his true emotions.


    "If that¡äs the case, it would be undoubtedly rude for me to reject such gratitude." Velkir said with his cold voice.


    `Uwah...¡ä Azrael, Agares, and Danzel thought internally about the shamelessness of Velkir.


    "I will notify my superiors so that the arrangement of your reward can be done as soon as possible...But Great Archmage, I was notified only that 4 of you will being to our assistance, but the number of your group is..." The aged man said while gazing at the new members, Danzel, Agares, and Shiro.


    The man''s gaze showed only suspicion towards them, especially the grandpa and small girl duo.


    With their clothing but nothing but usual, it screamed of being an outsider.


    Danzel dark armor also attracted his attention, but the clothes of the other two by far surpassed the exotic factor.


    Though Velkir didn¡ät show any reactions to the aged man''s gaze, the gray light behind his eyes turned slightly darker than usual.


    "It seems you have noticed. Since the job this time is quite big, I decided to recruit some more hands. The one with the weird sword is Agares and the new member of our group. I can confirm his strength to be no less that of Sartan over here."


    Gazing at the old man with a silver mask on his mouth and then towards the High Troll that singles handily defeated a small army, the aged man couldn¡ät help but shed cold sweat from his back.


    But remembering that they were two other unknown people, hisplexion turned into fear and excitement. Fear of turning this group into enemies and excitement to have them as allies.


    "Then those two are also-" Before the aged man could continue, Velkir shortly after interrupted him.


    "Those two aren¡ät part of our group."


    Once those words came out of the Lich, Danzel stared at Velkir as if asking if he heard wrong or not.


    "???"


    The aged man also seemed confused by Velkir''s s answer.


    "Then..."


    "Those two, in particr, are different than the other members. The two of them are instead my apprentices."


    Hearing what the Great Archmage just said, the aged man''s eyes widen to the extreme.


    `I need to report this to the higher up! Especially that girl over there!¡ä


    Ignorant, or at least pretending to, Velkir continue the introduction of his two apprentices.


    "The little one there is called Shiro, while the one with the dark armor is Abdiel. Both hold the power of a 3rd-tier with thetter being at the peak of his tier. I brought them here to gain more practical experience. You know, raising the next generation before the old-aged hits the mark, haha."


    `You are a damn Lich, you damn liar! Old age my ass! You are an undead and immortal being! Und don¡ät go out there and decide the name of others!¡ä Danzel cry to Velkir¡äs nonsense was only inside his mind. He knew what Velkir was going for and secretly he was amazed at his nonsense.


    As if biting the bait, the aged manughed with Velkir together and nodded his head while saying "There you are right, the age of our old bones is bound to reach the limit¡ä. Unknown that the Velkir¡äs bones were most probably a few centuries old for all that Danzel knew.


    "I see, I see~ the more hands the better I dare to say. I wee the two if they are willing to assist us in the war. I will arrange you a ce to stay-"


    "There would be no need to trouble you at such difficult times, I can use this opportunity to show my two apprentices how to build their own ce to stay. I hope this is alright, no?"


    The aged man''s face frowned for a split second before showing back his fake smile.


    "Of course, suit yourselves in our ranks."


    Nodding his head, Velkir voice echoed through everyone''s minds.


    `Let¡äs go.¡ä


    Following their leader''smand, all of the Deathfull Skulls went out of the tent, leaving the aged man who was ring at Danzel and Shiro with an ice-cold expression.

 Chapter 264 Dynasty And Mission

    Having left the tent of the aged man tent, they distanced themselves from the army before Velkir started to create their own "tent" with the use of magic.


    Rather than a tent though, it could be described as a small house in the middle of the forest. Though itcked color, the design of the walls made it look quite oppressive to anyone that saw the house.


    Entering the house which was big enough to host every 7 of them, which takes into ount the height of Sartan, the inside was quite spacious.


    Of course, Skull w could also fit inside it if she squished through the door, but Danzel decided to let her stay as a guard outside.


    Much to Skull w¡äs dissatisfaction and whining, after giving her a directmand, she seated on the ground while staring aimlessly through the distance.


    Compared to the detailed work of the outside walls, the inside was inly empty except for some stone blocks going around in a circle.


    "Everyone take a seat." Velkir said as he went into the middle of that circle.


    Raising his staff, a bright yet short-lived purple light appeared. The mana that Danzel could barely detect spread around the house before creating a barrier of some sort.


    While the Lich continued casting magic of unknown effect, the others took a seat on the stone blocks.


    "..."


    Waiting in silence for their leader to finish, there was an awkward silence between them. But that soon changed when Velkir lowered his staff.


    "Although some know why we are here, for those who don¡ät I can answer your question." Velkir said as he gazed at Agares and Danzel in particr.


    Staying silent, for a moment Agares asked the same question that Danzel had in mind.


    "How trustworthy are our...clients?"


    "Those guys aren''t trustworthy in the slightest. When we fight alongside them don''t trust you back with them. They are the kind of guys that will backstab a magic caster like me to get my secrets." Velkir said with a cold tone.


    Leaving Agares in surprise, Danzel stepped in.


    "If that''s the case, then why are we helping them?"


    Briefly gazing at Danzel, Velkir shook his head.


    "Sadly, things aren''t as simple as they look. To achieve my goal, we have to participate in the war with those bootlickers."


    "..."


    This time the one to ask questions was neither Agares nor Danzel, but the High Troll Sartan.


    "When will our next fight be, Death Caller." Sartan said with a harsh voice.


    Nodding towards Sartan, Velkir stepped back of the middle and started moving his mana towards the ground.


    In the next instance, the t stone floor started to shift and raise up until it created something simr to a map with multiple spheres in specific ces.


    "It will be today, Sartan." Snaping his finger, tennis size balls of dead mana appeared on top of all except one single sphere.


    "The one without your mana is our location, no?" Azrael asked as he observed the map on the floor.


    "As expected of you, Azrael. That this map represents the forest is correct." Velkir said while pointing his staff to one of the spheres with his mana.


    "Those spheres, in particr, will be our target, they are retreating troops of the Arcana Kingdom who heard of our appearance." Velkir said while shaking his head.


    "Since a snake of those dynasty bastards revealed our existences, we will have to deal with the remaining running insects." Velkir voice was filled with hate.


    "Anyway, the retreating troops hold their nned supplies, be it their nutrition, weapons, spoils of war, and their troops, our single job is to eliminate them."


    As soon as Velkir finished his sentence, an aura of bloodlust was spread in the house.


    "Hahaha~! Good! I still haven¡ät had enough for those guys anyway." Sartan said while standing up and being the one who released the bloodthirsty aura.


    Shiro who was in Agares embrace tighten her grip on her grandpa''s cloth out of anxiety because of the High Trolls aura. But the imposing feeling soon disappeared with a gentle aura wrapping around her.


    "Draw back your aura." Agares said while giving the High Troll a threatening re.


    Seeing that, Sartan scoffed before ignoring the grandpa and focusing back on Velkir.


    "Tell me where I need to go Death Caller!"


    "Sartan, you will take that sphere over there. They are a part of the retreating army so you might find some minor resistance."


    "No need to say more! I will go ughter them all!" Sartan said while walking out of the house with his already blood-stained halberd.


    "By the way, which location will the Dynasty take care of?" Azrael said with a frown on his face.


    "None, at least they won¡ät take part in this whole operation today. Their higher are still deciding where to ce us in their army. Some of those idiots are under the impression that their army will be invisible as long as we are there. But once the Arcana troops go out of the forest, then even we will be put at risk."


    As if something did not align with what Velkir just said, Azrael looked away from the map and stared with his crimson eyes at the Lich.


    "If that¡äs the case...where did you get a hold of this information?" Azrael said with a frown on his face.


    "I just happend to hear the information from somewhere nearby." Velkir said with his eyes smiling like an innocent grandpa selling his bountiful harvest in the fields


    Danzel who heard Velkir¡äs answer was dumbfounded.


    `This guy! He stole his ally''s secret information while giving such a shameless expression! Velkir doesn¡ät trust Dynasty guys a single bit!¡ä Danzel yelled internally.


    Azrael had also a dumbfounded expression on his face, showing that he wasn¡ät the only one that believe that Velkir was talking a load of bullsh*t.


    "I see, them if that¡äs the case...I will be taking those two spots, while my sister will take that one." Azrael pointed at three particrly close spheres.<sub> </sub>


    "Hey! Don¡ät go and decide what others will do without their opinion! Boss! I will also take two care of two spots!" Vanessa said with an unyielding tone.


    "No, don¡ät hear my sister¡äs nonsense, Master Velkir. We two will take care of those three spots." Azrael said while his crimson eyes were dyed with his mana, turning them into a pair of two crimson suns.


    "Come sister! Let¡äs talk outside, I don¡ät want Master Velkir to withness your stubbornness."


    "What! Hey! Come back! Azrael! Come back~" Vanessa tried to object to her¡äs brother ims but seeing him leave she gritted her teeth before chasing after him with frustration.


    Seeing all the family drama going on, Agares who was holding little Shiro rose from his seat before pointing at 2 spheres on the floor map.


    "Per our agreement, I will take care of those 2 spots..."


    Without waiting for an answer from Velkir, everyone else left except the two undead.


    Staring at the map, Danzel wasn¡ät sure what sphere to pick.


    Although he was strong, he wasn¡ät strong enough to face an army like Sartan.


    `Although I might be able to deal with an army of 2nd-tierbatants...if they are some of the 3rd-tier in the mix, then even I...¡ä


    Staring silently at Danzel, Velkir secretly nodded his head.


    `At least he knows his limits.¡ä


    "Don¡ät worry, I got quite the fitting job for you" Velkir said while pointing at a sphere.


    "This is...?" Danzel stared nkly towards the sphere on the ground.


    "Out of all the retreating troops, I already informed myself on this one in particr. They are holding a part of the spoils of war with them. Be it numbers, individual strength, and weapons, those on in particr are the weakest." Velkir said while making the map on the floor disappear.


    "But they have over 25 of the 3rd-tierbatants and around 150 of the 1st-tier with a mix on 2nd-tier. Against those numbers, you don¡ät stand a chance." Velkir said with an ice-cold tone.


    "If that¡äs the case, then..." Before Danzel could object to Velkir¡äs absurd request, he stopped him.


    "Follow me outside Danzel."


    "..."


    Following him, he saw Velkir stand beside Skull w with a lookof interest.


    "Hmm, you are quite lucky to have raised such an undead. Sadly it¡äs too weak for any practical use. Maybe after some modifications she could..."


    Seeing that Danzel followed him, Velkir started exining.


    "If I am not:t wrong Danzel, you once helped the arcana kingdom to supply them runed weapons armor, no?"


    "That''s indeed the case, but it wasn''t out of my free will. I was practically forced to make them runed items." Danzel said while shrugging his shoulders.


    He wasn''t really surprised for Velkir to know such information.


    "Then you must know about the mutants of Arcana, right?" Velour asked while still inspecting Skull w''s body.


    ''The mutants of arcana?'' Danzel thought confused.


    Although he knew that the armors that he carved runes back then were a bit bigger than the average human, he didn''t suspect much of it.


    "No, that''s the first time hearing about...those mutants. I generally was locked up and had only interaction with the items I had to carve. For example, I didn''t know that back the crystal that I carved runes on to would belong to you."


    "So they let you stay ignorant, huh?" Velour said while shaking his head.


    "Well, in short, does mutants can bepared to a chimera in some sense. But unlike recing parts of a being and putting them together to another being like it''s done to a chimera, the mutant''s body itself changes."


    "It can bepared to fusing two races to create a new one. For something that a mortal though, it''s not bad."


    "But, for such research to progress, there is a need to be as many samples as possible."


    Turning to look at Danzel, Velkir raises his staff up high.


    In the next moment, the skull that was in the dark crystal lightened up in a dark light.


    "The spot that I will be tasking you out to take out is one that holds a part of the spoils of war against the Dynast."


    Soon after, the ground around them seemed like it turned into a dark most that almost seemed alive.


    "The spoils of war in particr though, are neither weapons nor armor of fallen soldier. Instead, they are those who got caught and made into prisoners who are nned to be sent as test subjects or to be their future mutant soldier."


    The dark most from the ground suddenly rose, before several figures wearing dark ted armor with a helmet covering a hollow skull. Carrying in their hands was a long sword of simr length to Danzel''s sword.


    "To prevent that from happening, I will be giving you some of my undead to yourmand. How you use them is for you to decide."


    Starting at the 50 skeletons that were giving a weak aura of a 3rd-tier, Danzel gripped his sword much tighter.


    "Your mission will be to save those prisoners-!" As Velkir started speaking, all the 50 newly made undead had simultaneously their hollow eyes filled with a gray ethereal me full of hatred of the living.


    "-if saving them is impossible, then kill them all! Leave none to survive!"


    Danzel ethereal dark green eyes red much brighter than any of that 50 undead. While his dead mana escaped through around his body, creating a much threatening aura from all the other newly made undead.


    "It shall be done." He said with a cold voice.

 Chapter 265 Approaching Death.

    Currently, somewhere in the forest Gartera, over 100 hundred soldiers wearing armor with the symbol of the arcana Kingdom were escorting multiple wagons with a cloth on top.


    If one were near those wagons, a terrible smell would greet the one, together with cries of pain. Whoever was inside those, definitely didn¡ät have a great time.


    One of the arcana soldiers who driven the wagon in question grumbled out loud.


    "Ugh...why do we even have to carry those guys when we are going to execute them back home anyway? Getting rid of that dead weight will increase our speed at the very least by half."


    "You know that we can¡ät do that, soldier."


    "Hii~! Who is there!?"


    Looking up where the voice came from, the soldier''s eyes widen up when he saw a man wearing robes sitting on top of the wagon.


    "S-Sir Great Mage! Forgive this one for raising his voice at you." The soldier said in quick session.


    For the lower-ranked soldiers, such reaction was natural when interacting with one who was allowed to wear robes instead of armor.


    The robe itself had also parts of tough leather from the magical beast, which made their protection and flexibility much better than the armor given to normal foot soldiers.


    The reason why the soldier was so anxious about the presence of the robed figure, was simply because of their status difference.


    The first and second tiers of strength can be said that they are reachable for everyone if one works hard enough, but that wasn''t the case in the 3rd-tier.


    The title Great Mage itself is granted only to those who achieve such strength and be of the elites wherever they go or if their overall contribution to the kingdom is high enough to grant the title.


    While the former meant that the person is one of the elites who are possibly sponsored by the academy they had finished, thetter could only be achieved by those who were of noble blood.


    Even though the arcana kingdom values magic more than any other kingdom, the hierarchy of aristocrats is still somewhat present.


    In other words, the people holding the Great Mage title could make the life of a soldier a living hell.


    "Rx soldier, I didn''te here to pick on you." The Great Mage assured the soldier before jumping off the top andnding beside the soldier.


    ''He must be an elite considering his attitude.'' The soldier thought internally, before nodding his head.


    "You see, although those attention seekers of the Dynasty are indeed a burden, one of the Archmages of our kingdom found a way to make even such hopeless people useful for our cause. You know what am I talking about, no?" The Great Mage said before turning his head and gazing towards the soldier.


    "After all, instead of using disobeying soldiers or criminals to make mutants out of them, those people behind you can take the ce of such a bunch. Don¡ät you agree"


    *Gulp~


    Forcing his saliva down his throat, the soldier shudders in fear when he imagines himself being turned into such an abomination.


    Though he didn¡ät see those mutants in action, the rumors of them being skinless monsters with body parts of beasts that lost all sense of reason. Some even said that even after their death, those monsters would turn into a cursed undead known as ghouls.


    As a soldier who fought for his kingdom, he hated the people of the Dynasty who suddenly got the balls to join in the war between the Arcana and Berum, but even he still pitied the people imprisoned inside the wagon.


    "You are indeed right sir! In fact, they should feel honored for finding their use in our kingdom!" The soldier said despised all his thoughts.


    His pity was indeed true, butpared to saving his own skin, it was nothing.


    "Well, said the soldier." The Great Mage said.


    "If it wasn¡ät for the Dynasty breaking one of the unspoken rules of war, we wouldn¡ät have to run behind our tail and we would even have closed the territory of this forest for good... To think they would even call a bunch of monsters to aid them."


    "Sir Great Mage, do you by chance mean that they brought someone of the-"


    "Of the 4th-tier? They indeed did. More than one in fact. But don¡ät worry, by the speed of our march, we will be out of the forest tomorrow morning. As long as the information is right, the Dynasty didn¡ät yet send out those monsters to chase us."


    "Once we are out of the forest, we can call for reinforcement to deal with those guys, but till then stopining and do your job. Compared to others, I am willing to ignore your words of before."


    "T-Thank you very much, sir! I will do my best!" The soldier said to the Great Mage who jumped off the wagon.


    Staring at the wagon that bypassed him, the Great Mage in question shook his head before gazing at the clear moon above him


    "Sigh~, here we are running with our tails behind"


    Using his magic, he made himself weightless so that he can jump to the top of another wagon.


    `At the very least there is a beautiful night to lose myself in.¡ä He thought beforeying on the wagon full of prisoners under him.


    While he was in his own world though, the Great Mage failed to notice the gazeing from a cliff Not too far away from them.<sub> </sub>


    ****


    At the same time as the conversation between the Great Mage and the soldier took ce...


    On a cliff in the distance, dark armored figures were gazing down towards the light and many soldiers escorting multiple wagons.


    "Location confirmed." The dark armored figure said with his cold voice, before making the map in his hand disappear from thin air.


    Walking on the edge of the cliff, the dark armored figure turned his head slightly to the left.


    "Follow me."


    Once the figure said those words, he stepped off the cliff and started falling from over 20 meters high.


    *Boohm~


    With his legs meeting the ground, the nearby earth was pushed away.


    The figure equipped with a shield in his left hand and a long sword in the right received no damage from such a fall.


    The figure had long surpassed the level of getting injured by some mere 20 meters of height


    The next moment though, right behind him, dozen of figures with simr armor fell from the cliff. Simr to him, they fall didn¡ät do much of them.


    Every single figure of those figures was releasing a threatening aura of death unconsciously. Behind their helmets was a faint gray me that continuously burned inside their skull.


    The reason for that was that they were undead.


    "Use your magic." The figure in front said with the same coldness as before.


    Without doubting his words, dead mana slipped through the armor and weapons of all those undead.


    The only one that didn¡ät use such a method was the leading figure, which used dark green mana to cover his body.


    Once the figure finished, he dashed forward.


    Like an unspoken agreement, the 50 undead that wielded long swords run right behind him with incredible speed.


    s, not as incredible as the one that leads them.


    `This has to be a test from Master Velkir'' The figure thought to himself.


    Though he was impressed by seeing the undead of the 3rd-tiering out of nowhere, the figure doubted that the undead was his master''s best unit.


    He who focused more on closebat and was capable of turning the dead into undead had only managed to make them at the 2nd-tier.


    For his Master, who was a Lich, he of course would doubt that summoning undead that barely achieved the 3rd-tier was his best. After all, he was a magic caster much greater than himself.


    `Though even that bunch would be too much for me.¡ä The figure thought bitterly.


    Compared to the undead who followed him, he was much stronger than them. But not to the point where he could face 50 of them at the same time.


    `Individually though, I am the strongest undead out of all of them.¡ä


    "We should be reaching our target, prepare forbat." The figure informed his followers with his cold voice.


    As if reacting to this piece of information, the gray mes inside their skulls, lighten up much brighter than before.


    `If we were to speak from individual strength, then we have the advantage, but considering their number, we severelycking.¡ä The figure though.


    `They have more than a hundrend people, while we are only 51, I can¡ät let the fight prolong otherwise we will be surrounded. If I knew the strength of their 3rd-tierbatants, it would have been much easier. If we want to win we need chaos.¡ä


    A swift strike that would cripple the enemy before they even realize what is going on and bring the cause to all of them.


    "I will turn this into a dogfight." The figure said while closing in towards the distant light.


    `And passionate their best soldiers.¡ä


    "Once those all are dead, the rest will be easy." The figure said as the dark green mana was guided to his long sword.


    The dark green mana was from none other than Danzel the Wight.

 Chapter 266 Danzel Vs Great Mage

    Shortly after his long sword was engulfed with his mana, Danzel managed to see the outline of some people holding torches.


    The people who were in fact the soldiers of arcana were imminently drawn in by the dark green lighting towards them.


    "Hmm?"


    It took them only two seconds to recognize a figureing straight at them with incredible speed. If it weren¡ät for the dark green light, the two soldiers wouldn¡ät even be able to notice Danzel.


    "Enem-!"


    Without even finishing his warning shout, Danzel appeared in front of them with his sword raised in the air.


    "Die"


    Swinging his sword, he cut the two men with a clean swing, killing them immediately.


    Those nearby who noticed what was going on were met with an iing dark green wind that cleaved whoever dared to stand in its way.


    "Agghh!


    The air des being two didn¡ät stop after cutting through one of them, but continued to travel and consume the lives of those behind the first victims.


    Those who tried to cut the air de itself with the use of their mana enchanting the weapons and their bodies only managed to split a wind de into two smaller ones.


    Although it greatly reduced the power of the air de right afterward, death still came for such people.


    The oue, in the end, was 12 soldiers dying.


    For a single move, it wasn¡ät that bad.


    `Butpared to their numbers, it¡äs nothing.¡ä


    "Enemy raid! Everyone prepare~"


    Seeing that the soldiers of arcana getting back to their senses, Danzel knew he didn¡ät have much time.


    "You all! Use tier 2 magic!" Danzel yelled as he dashed forward and cast his spell.


    While the magic caster was preparing their own spells to deal with the charging dark knight, another 50 shadows appeared from the same ce where Danzel came from.


    Noticing them only having a skull with a pair of gray mes for eyes, a magic caster of the 2nd-tier who was nearby eximed with widened eyes.


    "Undead!"


    Each of that undead aura brought fear upon the soldiers.


    They imagine inside their heads the charge of that undead with their long sword cleaving them in two, but that didn¡ät happend.


    The undead instead of charging forward, took a throwing position simr to when one threw a javelin.


    <o>,m Obeying Danzel''smand, each and every one of them started casting the same spell.</o>


    "Grant O swift death~"


    Being in perfectly Syncro, the spell otherwise known as [Death Spear] started manifesting in the hands of the undead.


    Just as the name suggested, the dead mana gathered around the hands of the undead and took the form of a spear before hardening and turning into physical form.


    Unlike other spells like [Death st] where it shot itself to the target, [Death Spear] was meant to be thrown physically.


    For a magic caster point of few, such a spell wouldn¡ät be good at all since most of themck the physical strength, but to the undead who were mainly a warrior type, it was an advantage.


    Not only that, but discarding the homing and flying effect of the spell, required less mental strength to keep it active and the spell itself will be much stronger than the usual spell with those two effects.


    So, although it was considered a tier 2 spell, its effect rivaled those of the tier 3 spells.


    Once the [Death Spear] fully manifested in their hands, the undead threw the spell like a javelin to their respective target.


    Those who weren¡ät able to react got instantly impaled with one of the [Death Spear], granting them a swift death just like the undead said a moment ago.


    The ones who raised their shield met a simr fate and those who only got scratched found the wound area turning ck and lost all senses in that area.


    The only ones who managed to survive were those lucky enough to stand beside a Great Mage. The barrier that they created managed to stop the spears from finding their target, but at the same time the barrier itself got prated.


    In grand total, another 36 died with 3 being injured by the decay effect of the spear.


    The few mages who stubbornly continued their attacks spells and weren¡ät hit at all wanted to aim towards the 50 undead for revenge, but before that, a Great Mage who watched Danzel closing in with a speed that even he had difficulty following, issued hastily the new orders.


    "Forget about the ones behind! Kill the one charging in!"


    Following their instructor''s orders, various [Fireball]¡äs and [Earth Shot]¡äs were directly aimed at Danzel.


    Danzel who saw that, instead of stopping to dodge, raised his shield and became even faster than before.


    Soon after the boulders of stone were stone directly at Danzel while the fireballs exploded to where he was.


    *Boouggh! Baahm!


    "Take that, you bastard!


    "Aim towards the other ones! Quick."


    All the mages responsible for those attacks shifted their focus on the other undead, but a particr Great Mage who was standing on top of a wagon sensed foreign manaing under him.


    Following where the mana wasing from, he shouted his findings.


    "He isn¡ät dead! Shoot another one on the charging one." The Great Mage yelled before jumping off the wagon.


    A secondter, the earth under the wagon full of prison was raised up and directly destroyed right through the middle


    Seeing that the Great Mage was shocked, he pushed away his shock before focusing in front of him.


    What he saw terrified him.


    An intense bloodlust spread through the area making the weak-minded ones shake in fear. The one releasing such aura was single handily ughtering the same mages who cast the spells against him.


    The soldiers equipped with swords or spears tried to protect their magic caster, but it was a hopeless attempt that didn¡ät even save the magic caster a second.


    The Great Mages noticing Danzel killing their allies as if they were wheat, imminently sprang to action to stop that mindless ughter.


    But they weren¡ät the only ones to make their move.


    The undead also charged right behind Danzel.


    Once they sensed someone of the 3rd-tier, they immediately sprang towards them and startedbat. The magic caster who was far away from them managed to shoot their respective tier 3 magic that even managed to destroy few undead.


    But once they came near them, the Great Mages had to use more utility-based magic to get out of the melee range of the undead. Some created barriers, some levitate in the air and used the soldiers of the lower tier as meat shields.


    Even though the undead was barely in the 3rd-tier, their strength and durability weren¡ät to be messed around with.


    The few magic casters of the 2nd-tier who managed to with the undead with their spells were but a minor inconvenience.


    After all, the undead who were of the skeleton-type was practically immortal as long as their head remained intact.


    Ice spears that pierced through their armor were ignored and were let inside their armor, not even bothering to take the ice spears out of their body and broken ribs.


    The Great mages didn¡ät find it difficult to deal with the undead, but the time it took them to kill one was too long and the people who died from the undead were starting to pile up.


    With the way the undead spread, it was total chaos where strategy found nowhere its way in.<sub> </sub>


    The Great Mages thought that it was a matter of time before they would win.


    But a Great mage, in particr, didn¡ät have the same thoughts.


    `That undead aren¡ät the problem! It¡äs this one that we will have to deal with.¡ä


    The Great Mage, in particr, was the one that was facing Danzel.


    His staff had in the tip mana leaking out and that mana, in particr, turned into a mana de that could easily cut through iron with ease.


    "Haaah!" Yelling out loud, the Great Mage swung his staff like a spear in quick session through the air, each time he swung, a small beam of mana was shot out directly at Danzel.


    Danzel though wasn¡ät fazed by such a sight.


    Dashing forward while using [Vanguards Defense], he quickly managed to block every beam with ease while closing in the Great Mage.


    Once he was close enough, Danzel thrust his sword, aiming for the melee magic caster''s heart.


    Not letting that happend, the Great Mage held his staff in front of him and cast a round barrier that went from both tips of his staff.


    Danzel sword pierced the barrier, s it came to a stop.


    Putting more strength in his grip, Danzel managed to slowly push his sword further into the barrier.


    Seeing the sword with dead manaing closer to his body, the Great Mage started immediately casting another of his spells.


    Once he finished, the Great Mage disappeared from his spot and reappeared 10 meters behind Danzel.


    Being now behind his enemy, the Great Mage didn¡ät let go of this chance and charged arge amount of his mana into a spot.


    Once he thrust his staff forward, a much bigger and faster beam appeared traveling to Danzel.


    Knowing from the beginning that the magic caster was behind him through the use of [Eyes of the Damned], he turned around with his shield facing the beam.


    Once the shield and the mana beam made contact, the force was enough for Danzel to be pushed back a few meters.


    "..." Staring at the smokeing out of his shield, Danzel''s ethereal eyes red up behind his mask.


    "Stop him!"


    "Don¡ät let him near the Great Mage!"


    "Kill him!"


    Soldiers who tried to block Danzel''s way were soon met with his cursed sword without even being able to stop his charge toward the magic caster.


    The Great Mage would have very much liked to stop the fools running towards their death, but he didn¡ät have the time to care for them.


    Time was of the essence, he knew that he was outmatched but he still had to try.


    `The previous attacks seemed to work, but that damn shield is on the way. If this continues, sooner orter I will end up like those 3 idiots. If I want to kill him, it has to be this...¡ä


    As he did before, he gather his mana into the tip of the mana de and waited for Danzel to get closer to him.


    `As long as I reduce the range and increase the firepower, maybe an opening will appear.¡ä The Great Mage though.


    He has already done a simtion in his head.


    His attack may be blocked by that shield, but considering the power behind his attack, he would then use his short-distance teleportation spell to create some distance between him.


    As long as he kept this up, either his allies woulde to help him or the annoying shield of the dark knight would give out.


    "Hitting two birds with a stone~" The Great Mage mumbled as he watched Danzel closing in.


    If it weren¡ät for enchanting his eyes with magic, he wouldn¡ät even be able to respond if he was attacked at such speed.


    Once Danzel reached the 5 meters, the Great Mage released the charged-up mana and let it explode in a concentrated spot that seemed like his mana de extending.


    Butpared to his expectation, Danzel didn¡ät raise his shield but instead made it disappear into his storage ring.


    `What is the-¡ä The Great Mage got confused for a split second before having a dumbfounded expression.


    "Compared to Azrael, this attack is nothing." The Dark Knight said with a cold voice.


    The barrier that surrounded him, though cracked, managed to fully negate the Great Mage attack.


    "Shit!"


    Cursing out loud, he raised his staff and generated a barrier in hurry.


    Luckily for him, it was just fast enough to prevent the cursed sword from entering his body.


    `I need to create distance.¡ä


    While he was casting, Danzel left hand that no longer had the shield pushed at the pommel of his cursed sword, further pushing in the barrier.


    The sudden push made the barrier crack even more and let the sword pierce the needle magic caster''s chest. Activating the rune in his sword, blood quickly was sucked out of his body


    "Ugh~Dammit!" Gritting his teeth, the Great Mage finished his spell and teleported 10 meters away.


    Looking at the hole in his robe, the Great mage cursed as he watched the elerating decay happening.


    The wound itself was somewhat shallow, but the decay was fetal as it was near his heart.


    "I need to cast recovery magic~! You everyone! Hold this bastard done while I heal." The Great Mage shouted at the nearby soldiers and mages who flinched.


    Wasting no time, he started casting his recovery magic as fast as he could.


    But before he could even finish, a wind-cutting sound came behind him.


    Too focused on his spell, his reaction was slow.


    *Krish!


    "H-Huh?"


    Looking down his chest, all he could see was a spear made out of dead mana piercing directly into his heart.


    "Y-You bastards...!" As he felt his body weaken he nced behind him, only to see one of the undead that had a finished throwing poster staring directly at him. It was clear to the Great Mage that this undead was responsible for the spear going through his chest.


    While he was slowly watching his life passing through his eyes, how a noble recruited him after finding his talent, being one of the elites in the academy and one of the few who managed to be a Great Mage at the age of 26.


    He believed that he had a great future ahead.


    s, the reality was cruel.


    The only future that awaited him now was the dark green wind de that soon cut him in half.


    Seeing the body fall to the ground and the XP notification appears in front of him.


    Danzel felt relieved.


    `Here I thought that he stole my kill.¡ä


    Swinging his sword to the air, to let the blood of the former Great Mage fall to the ground, Danzel went out to see his next prey.

 Chapter 267 Demonstration

    "That damned undead!"


    *Swoush!


    One of the Great Mages said while flying in the air, in an attempt to lose his pursuer.


    ncing to his right, they were 3 undead following him and actually keeping up with his speed. In fact, they were slowly but surely closing in on the Great Mage.


    "Take that! [Dual Magic Missiles]" Aiming his palm towards the undead, a blue magic circle appeared which released multiple balls of mana right towards the undead.


    One by oneing out of the magic circle, the 12 balls of mana chased their target.


    The undead who saw that, moved left and right but upon such a barrage of attacks, one unfortunate undead was hit, and once hit by 1, all the more followed.


    His undeadpanions though didn¡ät show a shred of emotion upon his death.


    Seeing that, the Great Mage cursed internally.


    `Those heartless monsters! I will get you with the next one!¡ä


    As he just began creating the magic circle, with his enchanted hearing through magic he was able to hear a wind-cutting sounding closer from his left.


    Abandoning his previous spell, he hastily created a barrier around him.


    Once he finished, a spear made out of dead mana pierced the barrier and almost hit him too. Which made forced him to halt for a split second.


    But that was his greatest mistake.


    Before he could fly away from his spot, multiple spears of dead mana impaled his body.


    "Ah~!


    Like a fly reaching its life expectancy, the Great Mage flight magic gave out and made him fall.


    *Boeuf


    The Great Mage''s body twitched continuously as he felt a great amount of pain from the sudden decay happening in his body.


    Unable to see such sight, an undead, in particr, pierced the Great Mage''s head and killed him instantly, ending the poor man''s misery.


    Pulling his sword out of the Great Mage''s head, Danzel shook his head while ncing towards Velkir¡äs undead.


    `Seeing those guys attempting to steal my XP time and time again is unbearable.¡ä Danzel joked to himself before going to find his next prey together with the 2 undead before and another 5 who joined him.


    Wherever he looked, corpses and grates of the various spell were to be seen on the ground.


    But Danzel didn¡ät think much about it, what was only in his mind currently was eliminating the remaining soldier.


    And shortly after an explosion happened in the distance, he and the other 7 undead traveled towards the explosion with incredible speed.


    Arriving there, Danzel saw a few undead already destroyed on the ground while 6 were facing 5 Great Mages grouping together.


    `So they decided to group, huh?¡ä Danzel though amused.


    Taking notice of the undead reinforcement, one of the Great Mages who recognized Danzel as being the leader of the undead, cursed out loud.


    "Another 7 of that undead areing our way together with their leader!"


    With every Great Mage frowning at such news, they started preparing a set of spells to greet the neers, but Danzel and his undead grew were a step faster than them.


    The 7 undead quickly started casting their [Death Spear] and throwing it like a javelin toward the magic caster together with Danzel [Gale Mana de]


    Against such force, 4 out of 5 Great Mages gave up their spells and instant started making barriers with the remaining magic caster creating a magic circle in the air which shoot a project made out of light towards one of the 6 undead who was closed to them.


    The undead tried to dodge the project, but with him being so near the magic caster, he ultimately failed and had half of his skull destroyed.


    Compared to the attack of Danzel and the other undead, their attack proved to be useless as it barely touched the 4 barriers.


    Seeing that, Danzel looked at the 5 undead and gave hismand.


    "Move back and surround them, you other too."


    Nodding their head, the undead followed Danzel''s order and spread around the Great Mages with twice the distance of what the 5 undead had before.


    Although the Great Mages saw that they were surrounded, one of them couldn¡ät help but scoff at such a tactic.


    `This idiot, he gave up the distance between us and those undead just to surround us who is a magic caster. With us all together, we can finish more than half of those monsters before they are able to gain that distance!¡ä


    "Don¡ät freat everyone! Compared to us, that undead are mere weaklings! They are only 12 of them! Once we finished them, we can finish that bastard who controls those monsters!"


    Although the morale of the other 4 Great Mages didn¡ät particrly increase for their colleague''s speech, they also felt that this was the case.<sub> </sub>


    They all saw the terrifying ability that Danzel had, butpared to him, they found the other undead to be quitecking.


    They were confident of winning by using the tactic of using barriers to block the attacks and one or two of them casting offensive magic inside the safety of the barriers.


    The dozen of destroyed undead on the ground spoke of the results of their tactic.


    Danzel who could imagine what was going on in their head wanted almost tough out loud.


    `So stupid¡ä He mocked internally.


    "You guys are wrong." He said with a cold voice.


    The Great Mages who heard that frowned.


    "For magic casters who im to be elites, I got to say that you are quite pathetic, if not in out stupid." Danzel said with his cold voice filled with ridicule.


    "Y-You...what did you just say-!"


    "You idiot! He is provoking you! Ignore him and go to casting!" One of his colleagues said to the man who felt offended, but he himself was offended by the undead''s remark.


    The undead who saw the magic casters preparing their magic went out and started casting their [Death Spear] spell.


    Inparison, Danzel only slowly raised his sword up in the air.


    "You guys must have never fought against an undead like me." Once his words finished, a surge of dead mana came out of his body.


    The undead who felt such an immense of dead mana had their gray ethereal eyes re up with excitement.


    Inparison frown in the Great Mages much more and 4 prepared to cast their barrier to block the potential heavy attack of Danzel¡äs.


    Seeing the barriers manifest around the 5 magic casters, Danzel couldn¡ät hold it out anymore.


    "Hahaha! Let me demonstrate to you what it means to fight one of the undead!" Danzel said whileughing maliciously.


    Unlike the expectations of the Great Mages, the dead mana of Danzel shoots out not towards the magic caster, but the very soldiers that he and his undead already slew.


    Seeing that, the faces of the Great Mages turned deadly pale upon realizing what the dark knight was nning to do.


    "Stop him!!!"


    But before they could even start casting their magic, the undead who waited for this very moment threw the [Death Spear]¡äs towards the barrier, forcing 4 magic casters to focus on the barrier instead of the attack.


    The magic caster that previously cast the project made out of light tried to finish the dark knight off just like he did with the undead of before.


    But with the distance between them being too far, Danzel only took a step to the side to dodge the iing light magic.


    "Awaken! And be reborn into immortality" Danzel said while being influenced by the undead¡äs nature. Since he used [Sin of Wraith] and fought with humans quite a lot, the current him wasn¡ät in the perfect state of mind.


    As if answering his call, the once in soldiers of the Arcana Kingdom picked up their weapons from the ground and stood up Draugrs


    Of the hundred or so corpses, only 20 turned undead.


    `Go and kill those 5¡ä Danzel send out a mentalmand towards the newly made Draugrs.


    Doing asmanded, the 20 2th-tier undead sprinted towards the 5 magic casters who cursed out loud.


    One Great Mage, cast his a spell which made a wave of stone spikes appear towards the iing draugr.


    The spell got rid of 15 of those draugrs with ease, while the 5 remaining were lucky enough to not get hit and survive.


    "Hmpf!" Scoffing at the weaker undead, a Great Mage generated 5 small balls that were the size of tennis balls and shoot them out towards the surviving undead.


    Once contact was made with the skull and the tennis ball-sized mana balls, the skull of those undead scattered into pieces.


    But right after the destruction of those Draugr, the undead created by Velkir threw their [Death Spear]¡äs which forced the Great Mages to go all out into the defense.


    But what awaited them after was twice the amount of Draugr who slowly walked towards them from all sizes.


    "How..."


    Danzel who was walking around and raising up undead could only grin at the situation that the magic casters were facing.


    "Let¡äs see how long youst against our number advantage." Danzel said while raising up another patch of Draugr.


    "Don¡ätin, you once held the number advantage. It¡äs only fair that now it¡äs my turn." Danzel said towards the despairing Great Mages.


    With a horde of undead charging towards them and 12 [Death Spear]¡äs being thrown at them, once Danzel finished turning the remaining corpse into his undead and joined the fray, the tides soon turned and the Great Mages that were reverence as the elite force of the Arcana Kingdom find themself among the ranks of Danzel undead.


    While this whole fight was taking ce, someone, in particr, peered from the beginning to the end at the oue of Danzel''s ughter

 Chapter 268 Abandoned

    "It has been done." Danzel mumbled as he put his shield in his storage ring.


    Turning his head, thest 5 Great Mages were standing in front of him as one of his Draugr¡äs.


    The 5 of them did manage to kill quite a lot of his undead, but in the end, they too fell in defeat.


    While the 12 undead of Velkir sends continuously their [Death Spear]¡äs, once Danzel finished raising the dead and joined the fray with his Draugr¡äs, the Great Mages were simply overwhelmed.


    They simply couldn¡ät do anything.


    With the Draugr serving as Danzel''s meat shield, Danzel managed to close the distance without much difficulty. Making him a threat that needed to be exterminated for them to survive, as his strength was capable to damage their barriers more than they werefortable with.


    s, if they didn¡ät take care of the Draugr, they would have been shallowed since the barriers would even get destroyed with so many undead attacks.


    And to deal with those 2 threats, they were only 2 magic casters that had the freedom to use offensive magic, since the other 3 were focused on not getting everyone impaled by the [Death Spear]¡äs.


    In fact, the biggest threat wasn¡ät Danzel nor his numerous undead, but the undead that Velkir had created that kept forcing the three of those magic casters to cast their protection magic.


    Not only that but with the distances that Danzel ordered them to stay, every single one of them could react in time and dodge the various spells that the Great Mages shot at them.


    The Great Mages that thought that they had the advantage by further away from them learned soon enough that it was the exact opposite in fact.


    Once the first of them was in by Danzel, they were forced to run away, but with them surrounded they soon found their way towards undeath with Danzel''s assistance.


    Looking at 40 or so undead watching him and awaiting his orders, Danzel sends amand to his own undead.


    `Half of you go and scout the nearby area in case they are reinforcement from those guys, while the other half go and gather all the weapons that areying around. Make sure to order them based on their quality.¡ä


    As soon as the Draugr¡äs heard Danzel''s voice inside their head, all of them bowed slightly their head and went to do their given task after saying "We follow our Lieges will".


    Seeing them go, Danzel shook his head.


    `Although I doubt that reinforcement will being, it never hurts being extra careful.¡ä


    Nheless, Danzel wanted to give all those Draugr¡äs a task to do to keep them standing like some statues.


    By now, Danzel understood that the undead he created weren¡ät in out mindless and did in fact hold a shred of self-awareness.


    Skull w was the best example of that,


    "Wait, does that make me a father in some sort of way?" Danzel though perplexed.


    *Tick


    Taking notice of the sound beside him, Danzel stared at the 12 undead that Velkir had given him for this mission.


    "Hmm, I originally wanted to keep more of you guys intact...I wonder if Master Velkir gets angry for losing so many." Danzel mumbled to himself, and the undead in response looked at each other without a shred of emotion.


    Leaving regrets and weird thoughts behind, Danzel looked around the battlefield that they were responsible for and saw multiple wagons.


    Using his [Eyes of the Damned] he could see that inside there were the supposed prisoners. Of course, Danzel didn¡ät need to use his skill as he was previously informed by Velkir of such information.


    The fact that he himself destroyed one of such wagons and killed some of the prisoners was also a reason why he knew.


    "You guys wait here while I check on the prisoners. If something happens while I am gone,e notify me." Danzel said coldly as he went towards one of the wagons.


    In total, they were 10 wagons but through the crossfire from the fight, only 8 remained.


    Getting on one of the wagons from behind, Danzel pushed the cloth away, allowing himself to see what it was inside.


    Inside a cage, men and women wearing rags while their hands were chained together with the metal bar of the cage were to be seen. Their feet had also chains but weren¡ät connected to the cage itself.


    They were multiple bruises to see and small cuts to see on those prisoners, but for better or worse, the woman had a more noticeable amount of such wounds.


    Danzel could sort of guess what happend to that woman, but decided to push such thoughts away.


    "Let¡äs see..."


    Gripping the bar of the cage with all his strength, Danzel started to slowly bend the bar of metal.


    "Huh..?"


    "Who is he...?"


    Seeing such a feat, the prisoners were amazed, but after thinking of their position, their expressions soon turned grim.


    After bending another metal bar enough for him to fit inside, Danzel stood awkwardly in the middle of them all.


    The ones who were near him growled as far as possible with their chains.


    Their fear was reasonable with what they experienced as prisoners. The fact that Danzel''s armor and the sword were stained with blood didn¡ät help much with easing their worries.


    If the dark knight in front of them decided to raise his long sword and take their lives, no one could stop him.


    Such thought was reasonable as Danzel himself was questioning himself if he should kill them all or spare them.


    `Velkir mentioned that I can kill them if the option of saving them isn¡ät there. But now that I killed the soldiers of arcana kingdom I would be expected to let them live...¡ä


    Just the thought of doing that made Danzel frown, at least as far as the skull could frown.<sub> </sub>


    Counting the people in the wagon, they were 18 in total. Considering that they were 8 wagons in total, that would mean that they are 144 prisoners who were supposed soldiers.


    Killing them wouldn¡ät just bring him closer to his goal of bing a [Death Knight], but the number of hours that he would save would be tremendous since each of them should be a couple of thousands of XP.


    If it weren¡ät for the fact of having that sliver of doubt that Velkir was testing him for some sort of reason, he would already have acted and killed all the prisoners by now.


    `Maybe that isn¡ät the case at all and I am just paranoid. Letting them live will leave a good impression on the client, but ording to Velkir, what we are doing right now is charity work for them. Killing the enemy would be good enough, but if I were to bring them back, they might think of Velkir being a pushover that his group is willing to do free work.¡ä


    Danzel learned quite early the meaning of what mercenaries are.


    Hired killers.


    Those who do the dirty work for some coin.


    At least that¡äs what two mercenaries with quite enough bloodlines had exined to him.


    Saving the prisoners whether morality good it was or not. It had the potential to harm his group.


    At least that¡äs what he told himself.


    "I will need a second opinion..." Danzel mumbled as he went outside the wagon while ignoring the confused and scared gazes of the people.


    Looking at his Draugr¡äs having finished picking up all the weapons, Danzel sends out hismand to his and Velkir¡äs undead.


    "Gather all prisoners from the wagons and bring them outside. You 12 make sure to break the chains connected to the cage, if they resist you may use force, but don¡ät kill them."


    With all the undead going to work, Danzel brought out a device that Velkir had given him a few days ago.


    It was amunication device.


    "Hmm, the design is different to the one I used with Hanson, but if I remember right I need to inject my mana and then find-"


    After trying sometimes, themunication devices lighten up shortly after a cold voicees out of it.


    "For you to call me, it seems like you finished your mission, am I right?"


    "Yes, Master Velkir. I killed all the enemies and secured the prisoners."


    "If that¡äs the case, what¡äs the call for?"


    "You see, I wanted to ask something about the prisoners-"


    Danzel started asking about his previous worries and the current situation while emphasizing the cons rather than the pros of keeping them alive.


    Danzel might be a heartless mass murderer, but he hadn¡ät lost all reason to start a future problem just because of his current grid. In the past, a careless mistake of his leads him into a whole chain of misfortunate events that lead him to almost dying for real.


    Once he was done with his exnation, Velkir stayed silent for a moment before answering.


    "Your reasoning does indeed hold bits of truth in it and it might be an opportunity for us. Our client should have already realized what we are up to. Knowing them, they most likely would try to ignore our work and say that it was our own decision just that they don¡ät pay us."


    "But with the prisoners in y, we can either ask them to acknowledge our work and pay our worth in full or abandon their soldiers and suck their pride just that they don¡ät pay."


    `Velkir is indeed shameless for the first thing that hees up with is how to rob his allies.¡ä Danzel thought internally.


    Though it might seem like he disrespects the powerful Lich, in truth, Danzel secretly admired Lich''s intelligence.


    "It will take me at most 15 minutes to see if such trade is possible, till then...can you hold on?" Velkir said with a cold voice.


    "There is no need to worry, I already send my undead to patrol for potential reinforcement from the enemies side. So if there is a case of such thing happening, I would be able to execute the prisoners." Danzel said with an ice-cold stone.


    The prisoners who were for a long while gathered behind him flinched by mentioning their execution as if it was no big deal.


    "Well though, Danzel. Wait till I finish the things on my side. If I haven¡ät called in the next 15 minutes, you know what to do."


    "Yes, Master."


    Shutting down themunication device, Danzel stared at the hundred or so prisoners that had an anxious expressions.


    Though the people couldn¡ät see Danzel''s face, all of them couldn¡ät help but think that he was grinning maliciously behind his helmet.


    ...


    After 15 minutes of passing, the promised call of Velkir did indeede.


    The eyes of the prisoners shed with hope.


    Danzel who picked up themunication device and heard Velkirs order nodded his head and put the device back in his storage ring.


    Turning towards the prisoners, Danzel had only one thing to say.


    "Sadly, your very own kingdom has abandoned you."


    As soon as his words were processed by the prisoners, cries of disbelief and despair were soon covered by the cries of pain resulting from Danzel''s sword.


    In no longer than a minute, another hundred more notifications appeared in front of Danzel.

 Chapter 269 A More Complete Soul?

    Staring at the cold corpses of the prisoners that Danzel was responsible for, he felt an extreme disgust towards the higher-ups of the so-called Dynasty and relief.


    Though he benefitted immensely from their decision of abandoning their soldiers and he felt no shred of remorse towards the prisoners, he still felt the decision the human behind such decision quite disturbing.


    He didn¡ät know how much Velkir asked for them, but for them to throw away their lives as if they were tools.


    Although he sort of expected their decision to end up like this from Velkir''s exnation, he thought that Velkir was just exaggerating things.


    `But it seems like he spoke the truth.¡ä Danzel thought internally.


    One could call him a hypocrite since he treated his undead as a tool, but Danzel only recently started to think that his undead was more than his creation.


    They were his creation that was loyal and almost mindless so he judged that it was alright for him to use them, but the people of Dynasty held the fate of others and decided upon their own interests or goal, even if it meant sacrificing them for their goal.


    That action couldn¡ät help but make him remember that one kid named Kayn that risked the lives of the others without their consent.


    He hated not being in control of his own life.


    That¡äs why he hated seeing such a thing happend in front of him.


    If one were to ask his impression of the so-called Dynasty by using points, he would already give them negative points.


    Just like Velkir said, they weren¡ät to be trusted.


    "It isn¡ät my business anyway. Considering that they needed to call mercenaries for their war, their situation might be bad."


    `And considering the strength that 4th-tier beings have, they must be quite expensive.¡ä Danzel thought internally.


    Putting such forter, Danzel focused on his given options.


    `I even gather quite a lot to increase some of my skills. Although I am curious about what the [Great Rune] is all about, I already got my hands full with the [Rune of Harvest]. Learning another rune while I still haven¡ät learned this one would be stupid of me.¡ä Danzel thought as he gazed at his status.


    Ignoring the skills that he could buy, Danzel had a total of 24 skills including his newest being [Rune Erasure]. His current goal was to increase his most important skills into the fourth tier, or at the very least to the third tier.


    He could go and further increase the level of his [ss] and [Sub-ss] to increase his attributes, but he ultimately decided against them after witnessing some of the abilities that the Deathfull Skull group had.


    The undead standing beside him was living proof that skills couldn''t be neglected.


    Maybe if he increased [Greater Raise Undead], he could create 3rd-tier undead.


    s, his XP was limited, which forced him to put priority on what to upgrade first.


    So after thinking of what was of most importance Danzel was stuck on which of those 5 skills to decide.


    Them being:


    [Death Guarding Swordsmanship]


    [Swift Movements]


    [Gale Mana de]


    [Greater Sense Danger]


    [Mortal Reminder]


    ...


    Each of those skills was Danzel''s main weapon and life-saving skill.


    They were other important skills such as all his curses, but those made Danzel truly dangerous.


    If possible he wanted to increase all of them, s him being poor as usual, he forced himself to press the upgrade button.


    And out of those 5 skills he carefully thought of upgrading, he went ahead and instead upgrade a skill he hasn''t touched for years.


    [Undeath Corruption turned from Lv.1 to 10]


    [Skill Undeath Corruption reached the modification stage!]


    [Choose 2 of the given options for the skill to focus on!]


    [Skill Reduction]


    [Grow]


    [Soul Affinity]


    [Dead Mana Affinity]


    [Overall Improvement]


    [Corruption]


    ''Vague as always, huh?'' Danzel thought to himself.


    He could sort of guess what each option would result in except the usual affinity.


    The first 2 that he decided to write off were the [Corruption] and [Overall Improvement] choices.


    Although he didn¡ät have it happend yet, the corruption part was more of a downside. Sure, if the location where he was filled with dead mana, it would be much morefortable for him, but other than that, it brought no further advantages.


    Improving the skill overall did sound good, but Danzel this skill to be more focused on a certain thing.


    The question was which point he should focus on.


    The [Skill Reduction] would be the most practical as it would save him arge amount of XP, while the [Grow] option would give him more attributes in certain years. At least that¡äs what he guessed of it.


    And the big question marks of it all were the two affinities.


    He could sort of guess that [Soul Affinity] would make the skill discount to be shared with such skill that uses that affinity, but he couldn¡ät say for sure about [Dead Mana Affinity].


    Wasn¡ät this skill of that affinity in the first ce?


    What will the skill turn into by choosing an option that the skill already had?<sub> </sub>


    And out of curiosity, Danzel decided to go for both [Soul Affinity] and [Dead Mana Affinity].


    Till now, his sole skill [Mortal Reminder] was one of his best trump cards, and considering the newest soul rune, [Rune of Harvest], Danzel decided to go more in-depth in the path of soul type abilities.


    And choosing the [Dead Mana Affinity] was just out of curiosity, but also out of caution. By now he had tons of death spells and skills that benefitted from the skill reduction. If there was a chance that by choosing [Soul Affinity] and recing the effect range only from death-focused skills to only soul abilities, Danzel would be in trouble.


    His picking [Dead Mana Affinity] was just a precision for that.


    `If only the changes would be more detail...¡ä Danzel thought as he shook his head.


    With such thought in his mind, Danzel chose the two affinities and watched the new description of his skill together with an otherworld feeling spreading around his body.


    [The modification for the Undeath Corruption has been chosen]


    [Undeath Corruption Lv. 10 bes Soul of Death Essense Lv.1]


    [Soul of Death Essense]: A very rare case of undead making his soul more ustomed to dead mana itself. Resulting effectiveness skills and talents that hold the attribute of either Death or Soul to increase by 10%. s, such a soul would never again be able to be hosted in a body that hasn¡ät been created or born by dead mana.


    All attributes Increase by 25.


    Lowers the cost of Dark, Curse, Death, and Soul-based skills by 25%


    Every 4 years, 10 attribute points is being granted.


    ...


    After finishing reading the description, Danzel looked around his in curiosity. Ignoring the fact that he became stronger from the stat increase, he suddenly felt morefortable.


    It was simr to gaining a second sense but also not at the same time.


    He stillcked the basic sense of undead, but something else was added that Danzel was too sure as of how to exin.


    If he had to describe it, it would be like someone removing a tight suit and recing them withfortable clothing.


    He felt that he had more freedom.


    In a way... he felt moreplete than before.


    `It seems that it was the right choice after all. The 10% increase in all Death and Soul skills is always wee. Although I would like to gain another title from it...for now that¡äs good enough. Now all I got to worry about is finishing the kill count to evolve.¡ä


    He was also d that the corruption part was removed, or rather, reced with something else. Though he didn¡ät know the disadvantages of his soul-changing in nature, for now, he didn¡ät see anything to be worried about.


    `Hmm, I still have some XP left to use. I wonder where I should put the rest in.¡ä


    While Danzel was currently contemting what to upgrade, the 12 undead who were standing around him moved simultaneously and bowed down with one knee to the ground.


    Surprised by the sudden change of movement, Danzel became wary of his surroundings to the point where he felt a faint presence behind him.


    His ethereal dark green eyes red up to the extreme.


    With a swift movement, he turned around and swung with all his strength towards the certain figure behind him.


    He didn¡ät even wait to identify the one who was behind him.


    A moment of hesitation could be the deciding factor of dying or not if the presence was an enemy.


    *Thuad!


    His sword seemed to sh with something that was as though as his sword.


    "I am d that your reaction isn¡ät half bad, but to raise your sword against your master..." Velkir who appeared out of nowhere said with an ice-cold tone.


    Seeing who it was, Danzel immediately withdraw his sword and sheathed it back into the scabbard.


    "My apologies, Master Velkir...I thought that it was an enemy, so without thinking I-"


    "It¡äs alright, I understood where youing from. I am also partly responsible for hiding my presence from you." Velkir dismissed Danzel''s worries.


    Looking towards the 12 remaining of his undead and the Draugr¡äs that Danzel made, Velkir turned back to Danzel.


    "Well done, that¡äs it for today."


    Raising his staff, the skull on the big dark crystal lightens up.


    The next second, the ground beneath the 12 undead was filled with darkness which slowly shallowed those 12 to somewhere unknown to Danzel.


    "Hmm, what are you nning on doing with that undead?" Velkir asked while looking at the Draugr.


    Danzel in response only shrugged his shoulder.


    "Honestly I ain¡ät too sure, I thought of either destroying them or letting them loose around the forest. I doubt those of Dynasty would let them stay at our camp anyway."


    "You are right, the kingdoms of the living can¡ät ept our existence. Though it¡äs a pity, there is no other choice. Call all of your undead here."


    Doing asmanded, Danzel sent amand through all the Draugr who was on scout duty to return back.


    Once they came back, Velkir¡äs raised his staff a cast a spell which made all of his [Draugr]¡äs fall like dolls who had their strings cut.


    Danzel felt an overwhelming force trying to cut his connection with that undead and he could try and resist it, s he let Velkir''s spell take his course and dispose of the undead that he created.


    Like how Velkir said, it was indeed a pity, but there was nothing to be done about it.


    Since the forest was a battlefield where the Dynasty was taking part, it would be quite annoying if his very own undead attacked the Dynasty.


    With that done, Velkir turned his back and walked towards the distance.


    "Come, we are going back."


    Nodding his head, Danzel walked behind Velkir.


    `I guess I would use the remaining XP when I have some free time.¡ä


    While both those two undead had something different in mind, they left the crime scene behind.

 Chapter 270 Item Material And Interest?

    After walking away from the crime scene, Velkir and Danzel went towards the base, which was near the tents of the Dynasty soldiers.


    What awaited them there was the aged man with two guards on each side of his. The man''s face seemed expressionless at first, but after taking a better look, Danzel noticed that his expression was a facade to hide the anger within him.


    "Master Archmage, about the request of yours, we found the decision to have been made in haste so we from the "Great" Dynasty would like-"


    "There is no need to discuss this anymore, you people had died together with the enemy. Unless you want to reward us with doing your work, there is nothing else to talk about." Velkir said with an ice-cold tone while passing the three humans and walking towards the stone base.


    The aged man who heard such news had his eyes wide open in surprise, while the guards beside him turned towards the two in anger.


    "You! How dare-"


    "Stop!" The aged man yelled to the two idiotic guards.


    Although he understood that they were doing what they were taught about, offending an Archmage that was a necromancer on top of that, was much worse than seeking death.


    `I shouldn¡ät have brought those two idiots with him¡ä The aged man thought as he made eye contact with his guards.


    Understanding what they have even done, they bowed and apologized, but Velkir treated them as if they weren¡ät there and continued to walk towards the base. Danzel who was following his steps, had his head slightly turned and observed the two guards with a cold aura.


    "Master Archmage, for the war effort and following our contract, we ask you to give us a detailed report for your group''s "own volition" of decision." The aged man said with the same expressionless face.


    Hearing about the contract, the Lich halted his steps and looked toward the three humans.


    "My discipline here eliminated the group of enemy soldiers by turning the prisoners into undead. Even in their death, the captured soldiers of the "Great Dynasty" showed their loyalty until the very end by taking their enemy with them."


    "If you epted our request of paying for our "own effort", I would have ordered my discipline to risk his life to save you people, but after denying my request, I put my discipline''s life in priority," Velkir said with a cold and amused tone towards the shocked trio.


    Knowing that their friends and colleagues had been imprisoned and potentially tortured was already bad enough, but hearing that the man with the dark armor killed them and turned them into his undead minions, the guards gripped the hilt of their sword, but that was about it.


    They didn¡ät dare to raise their swords against either the Archmage or his discipline.


    "Master Archmage...I am in believe that such a decision was met too hastily and the way your discipline resolved the matter is inappropriate. To turn our soldiers into undead is-"


    "Is exactly right with the contract that I signed with the Dynasty. The use of necromancy was allowed, be it ally or foe. In fact, calling the magic that I taught my discipline inappropriately is like insulting me. It seems like I would have to make some words of advice for Dynasty for people like you." Velkir said with a cold tone.


    "I-I didn¡ät mean it that way, oh Great Archmage. Please forgive this old fool, with age catching up to me, I said something that I didn¡ät mean. I hope you can forgive me." The aged man said while bowing slightly.


    If it weren¡ät for his hand clenching to the point where veins started showing up, one could easily believe that he was just the neighborhood grandpa selling groceries.


    Of course, both Danzel and Velkir with much superior senses could see through the old snake''s act.


    "If it weren¡ät for the fact that we are allies, I would even have put those old bones of yours into a much greater use." Velkir said while turning his back.


    "I will give you tomorrow a detailed report, till then, don¡ät bother us unless it¡äs an emergency."


    Entering the stone base, the first that Danzel noticed was that the stone base grew and created different rooms, but the middle had still cube-like seats.


    "Follow me." Velkir said towards Danzel.


    Nodding at the Lich, he followed the stairs that went underground till they reached another room which Danzel guessed was Velkir¡äs one.


    "I observed you fight with those humans, and for someone of your skill, I was quite impressed." Velkir said.


    "So you were indeed testing me, huh." Danzel said, not surprised by Velkir¡äs revtion.


    The fact alone that the Lich came to pick him up after finishing his ughter made it pretty obvious that Velkir was nearby.


    "Oh, so you knew?" Velkir said unimpressed.


    "Anyway, for your performance being satisfactory, I decided to give you a reward." Velkir said while bringing out two small wooden boxes and giving them to Danzel.


    "Open them."


    Nodding at him, Danzel opened the two boxes which both contained tworge gems.


    "Mana Crystals?" Danzel burned out while staring at the Lich in confusion.


    It was as if he was asking `What I am supposed to do with those?¡ä


    "Indeed, those two are some high-quality mana crystals, but they themselves aren¡ät my gift. I am giving them to you so that you can engrave your runes on them. After you finished, I will craft you a magic ring that would be useful in hiding your runes from other people''s gazes."


    "...Thanks, Master Velkir." Danzel said with a cold tone.


    Secretly he was cursing for his shamelessness.<sub> </sub>


    Of course, he was happy for getting such a valuable item from someone of the 4th-tier, but one had to read through the lines of the Lich and the content that he provided.


    There were 2 mana crystals and one item which he will get.


    Unless Lich uses both of those mana crystals for his item, Velkir was telling him to make carve one rune for my item and one rune for him to use.


    Whatever the case might be, Danzel decided to stay silent about his thoughts.


    Putting the two wooden boxes that contain the mana crystals into his storage ring, Danzel left Velkir¡äs room and went outside the stone base to see Skull w.


    Laying on the ground in a manner that suggests that Skull w was dejected, once the undead saw the sight of his liege returning, she imminently rose up and walked towards him with excited steps.


    If she still had any flesh on her, Danzel guessed that her tongue would be out of the excitement. But since that¡äs no longer the case, she was only opening and closing her mouth as if she tried imitating be excitement.


    "Are you a dog or what?" Danzel mumbled as he touched the skull of Skull w.


    "Hmm, Master Velkir did mention that he will make you stronger, maybe then I can bring you to my fights." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    He almost went ahead to jump on Skull w back to start carving runes, but once when he remembered where he was, Danzel abandoned the idea.


    `Although Velkir caster a barrier of some sorts, that doesn¡ät mean that they aren¡ät spies looking for our information.¡ä


    It wasn¡ät that he was paranoid, but the fact that the Dynasty learned what they did, it was either Velkir revealing such information or someone else finding it out.


    "It seems like you will have to stay the night alone this time around, Skull w." Danzel said.


    Hearing his lieges words, Skull w turned her head with her mouth wide open.


    She looked toward Danzel as if she had done a great sin and is now being punished.


    Danzel was speechless by such behavior and even wondered howe such an undead developed such a personality.


    "I wonder if Master Velkir made a room for me, if not I will have to sit somewhere inside."


    While Danzel was mumbling to himself and was preparing to leave inside, a feminine voice came from behind him.


    "Hey, how is that cutie called again."


    Having long sensed the presence behind him and recognized the voice of the figure, Danzel answered.


    "This one is called Skull w."


    "Huh? That¡äs a really weird name you know? I mean, I get it with such ws and the big skull face, but couldn¡ät you be more creative when naming your pet?"


    "First, Skull w isn¡ät my pet. Second, what are you doing here Vanessa?" Danzel said with an annoyed tone.


    "Ehhh~Why are you so cold to me? Just so that you know, if it weren¡ät for me, you wouldn¡ät even have joined our group! Show some gratitude towards me, you bastard!"


    "Did you reallye to me toin..?" Danzel said with azy and cold tone.


    He already sends hismand to Skull w to go back to being a "guard".


    Seeing that, the dark elve Vannesa got more frustrated.


    "Ugh! You are no fun you know?"


    "If that¡äs the case, I will go back inside. I have some work to do." Danzel said while walking away.


    "Alright, alright! I came here for a reason!" Vannesa said while dragging Danzel''s arms towards her soft parts with incredible strength.


    Knowing that he was no match for her, Danzel looked at her dejectedly.


    "Then what is it..? Compared to you I am busy." Danzel said with a cold voice.


    Some might have been delighted in being in his situation, but for him, she was in out annoying.


    Vannesa who saw such a cold reaction, smiled while gazing directly at Danzel.


    "Hey Rue~, might you be interested in my body~" She said with a soft voice almost to a whisper and pushed her soft parts more towards his arm.


    "..."

 Chapter 271 Fourth Illusion?

    Being grabbed by Vanessa, Danzel was forced to halt his steps.


    He couldn¡ät move.


    It was as if several ankers were bound around his arm and keeping him in ce.


    By reflex he tried to brush her off, but even with using his whole strength, there was no sign of his arm escaping.


    Feeling annoyed by the woman, Danzel turned around his head towards her.


    "I ain¡ät intere-"


    While mid-sentences, Danzel''s dark green ring eyes lighten up.


    If one were to rate Vannesa based on how she looked, she would be ssified as a killer babe or an otherwordly beauty. Her pair of violet eyes could make one get lost in them, while the bloodline of the elve races tunned her to be a natural beauty. Even if she might be a sub-species of the elve race, a dark elve was still an elve.


    But her beauty wasn¡ät why the current Danzel was so shocked.


    His shock came from the figure standing right beside Vanessa.


    The figure had long ck hair which matched her clothing.


    It was some sort of clothing that Danzel never had seen in his 3 years after awaking from the cursedke.


    In a time long past, the current "Danzel" might have recognized those clothes as suits that businessmen or women would use. s, the current couldn¡ät.


    There was a small dark green light escaping from the tip of the newly appeared woman. Making Danzel believe that the appeared figure was another kind of illusion that he kept seeing from time to time.


    Seeing that Vanessa wasn¡ät reacting to the woman¡äs appearance, proved that further.


    Most of the time, there would be only 3 different figures appearing.


    One was a female who kept telling him that he could even do better.


    Another was a male that continued ming him for something that Danzel wasn¡ät aware of.


    Those two, in particr, he learned to ignore, but thest one was one of the most annoying ones.


    Thest was another male figure thatpared to the other two, didn¡ät repeat the same thing over and over again, but kept mocking him for all his decisions.


    And the current female figure standing behind Vanessa was a new illusion guing his mind.


    Once he carefully nced at the face of the new illusion, simr to the other ones, he couldn¡ät quite right see her face.


    It was as if a fog was preventing him from doing so.


    The only noticeable part of her was her golden eyes behind the fog.


    Just looking at those eyes made Danzel feel frustrated and angry for a reason unknown to him.


    Recognized that his mind was being influenced by something which he guessed was the newly appeared illusion, Danzel raised his free hand and pulled a long sword out of his storage ring.


    His dark green mana seeped out of his body and entered his sword.


    "Huh?" Blurting out in surprise at Danzel''s reaction, Vanessa immediately lets go of him as he senses a genuine bloodlust inside his sword.


    Disappearing from her position, Danzel cleaved the female figure while the dark green de that was released cut through the ground till it hit a tree in the distance.


    At least that¡äs what he believed, as the figure that he thought cut in half, was nowhere to be seen.


    `So it was another illusion...¡ä Danzel thought while looking at the cut ground.


    "Bastard! Is that really your way of telling a maiden like me a simple no!?" Vanessa stomped the ground and pointed her finger at Danzel.


    Coming back, in reality, Danzel turned to look at the Dark elve and then back at the arm that she was holding.


    *Ting


    His dark ting that was enough to brush off an attack of a 2nd-tierbated around the middle level had several cracks to be seen, with some of the tings falling to the ground.


    "As far as I am aware, maiden''s don¡ät have the strength to destroy my armor tings..." Danzel said bitterly.


    By putting some mana in the enchantments, dark sand covered the cracks and missing parts of the ting before hardening.


    Vanessa who saw what she did was slightly embarrassed, but it wasn''t all her fault for damaging Danzel''s ting.


    Through his sudden outburst, Vanessa had for a split moment forgotten to keep her strength in check.


    "Still! Swinging your sword at me is too much! If I weren''t careful, I would even st your head away without thinking!"


    Although Danzel wanted to tell her otherwise, he couldn¡ät.


    Although he didn¡ät see how Vanessa fought, as far as he knew, she often sparred against Sartan and injured him heavily. Heck, she even managed to cut a hand of Sartan.


    "Sigh~why did you want to talk about me? Or did you juste to see if I am interested in your body or not?" Danzel said in a cold yet tired voice.


    As an undead, he couldn¡ät get physically tired, but mental exhaustion was still possible.


    Sometimes he couldn¡ät help but feel helpless around the whole group of 4th-tier. Just the idea that a single p from them would send him directly on a journey on the realm of death made him feel exhausted.


    "Ugh~it isn¡ät like that! It¡äs don¡ät go and do it with just any guy! I just heard something from my brother and wanted to see if you are willing to do a trade with me..."


    Connecting the gears inside his head, Danzel understood why Vanessa came to him.


    `Again...¡ä Hemmed internally.


    "So you came for my runes...but still, why offer your body to me?" Danzel asked slightly half confused and half understanding.


    He understood that his runes had an incredible value, but offering one''s body to an undead...


    Sure, she didn¡ät know that he was undead, or at least he believed that to be the case.


    But still.


    Hearing Danzel''s words, made Vanessa frustrated for several reasons.


    "Ugh! It¡äs becausepared to my brother and the boss, who are both magic casters, I got nothing else to offer! Andpared to them, I only want one item to have your runes. Doing it once with you is a cheap price! At worse, I will consider it as some light exercise." Vanessa said while opening her cloak for Danzel to see her fine-structure body.


    Her body was almost like that of a sculpture, with fine muscles that made her figure appear more appealing to the eye. If it weren¡ät for her pointy ears, one might have used her of being a subus with such a hot body.<sub> </sub>


    Together with the cloak, the only thing he wore that hid her private ces was a sturdy ck colored bandage which looked though enough to be a metal of some sort. Not only that, but seeing the button ck bandages which resembled short pants, he could tell that those bandages were extremely thin.


    s, as one of the undead, hecked the senses and the mindset to feel any sort of lust inside him.


    "Sorry, but I ain¡ät interested. Although it isn¡ät a big deal to carve some runes for you, I would need some sort of minimal payment for my skills. As long it¡äs information, items or anything else that you might think would bring some sort of value to me, then I might ept."


    "Till then, I would have to refuse your offer. Sorry, but as of now I am quite busy so..." Danzel said while turning his back towards Vanessa.


    Behind him was Vanessa biting her thump nail in frustration while shifting her gaze to Danzel continuously.


    Her brother, Azrael had told her the significants of runes.


    By Azrael''s exnation, runes were another set of enchantments that can be put in an item that already has reached the limit on its enchantment.


    She that possessed an artifact of the highest tier, couldn¡ät help but get excited at improving her artifact which Velkir himself said reached the limit.


    `I have to find something to convince him to do it, otherwise, my brother will...¡ä


    In her desperate attempt to think something up, a sudden idea came to her.


    "Wait! Rue Danzel! I got something to that I can trade."


    Halting his steps, Danzel turned around and stared at her, implying for her to continue.


    "Though it isn¡ät much, how about my knowledge? I know no magic but I been in ces that you might have not. I... I can also talk about our group''s capabilities! Since you are someone of the 3rd-tier, I doubt you''ve seen or experienced any fights. Wouldn¡ät that be a nice reference for the future?" Vanessa said in quick session.


    At this point, she was saying whatever came to her mind, wherever it was useful or not.


    Danzel who also notice her somewhat desperate reaction sighed inside his mind.


    "Alright, I will do it." Danzel said while walking back to where Vanessa was.


    "Realy!?"


    Hearing what he just said, Vanessa''s eyes sparkled and she almost jumped in joy, only a shred ofmon sense kept her from doing such. She thought that her offer wouldn¡ät be attractive to Danzel.


    And honestly, she wasn¡ät that far off.


    Although it did interest him a bit, what Danzel aimed for was to have a chance to carve a rune on an item of her.


    `I originally had thought that she would ask Azrael for runed items. Although the info shouldn¡ät be of much use, it¡äs still something.¡ä


    "Mhm, since it¡äs sote, how about you tell me about everyone in our group? You can tell me the rest wherever there is time. And as for me carving the rune, I would have to see the item and discuss what you mind want for the runes effect to be. How does that sound?"


    "Y-Yeah! We will do as you just say!" Vanessa said slightly uncertain.


    "So introducing our group huh... except that miser grandpa and the cute Shiro, I can tell you about the others. As I myself don¡ät know them too well."


    "It¡äs alright, just tell me what you know." Danzel nodded in understanding.


    Her not knowing the new members of the Deathfull Skulls group wasn¡ät a surprise.


    "Where should I start...hmm, you haven¡ät seen what I specialize in right?" Vannesa asked, and in response, Danzel shook his head.


    "Let¡äs start with that then, me and Sartan are the melee fighters of the group. My specialization is that of a Pugilist. My main weapon is my whole body itself, but most of the time I use my fist to crash my enemies."


    "Though I hate to say it, out of all except little Shiro and you, I am the weakest of the group. But thanks to an artifact of my, which I want you to carve runes on allows me to reach the very peak of the 4th-tier."


    "Next is Sartan, his species are known as high trolls, which allows them to use regenerated at high speed. In fact, his regeneration is so absurd that cutting his head off wouldn¡ät kill him."


    "Out of all of us, he got the highest brute strength. He is so strong that he can hold on against someone of the 5th-tier and possibly inflict a fatal wound on them. He sometimes loses himself in battle and bes berserk, so wherever you see him be like that, you should better run. Also-"


    While letting her continue speaking about the High Troll Sartan, Danzel couldn¡ät help but doubt her words.


    `His regeneration is indeed incredible, but he can survive without his head!?¡ä


    Unbeknownst to Danzel''s dumbfoundedness, Vanessa continued with the next member.


    "Next one is my brother Azrael, as you might know, he uses something called blood magic which has regenerative properties and physical ones. Depending on the situation, he is weaker than Sartan, but once he is on a battlefield, he surpasses the 4th-tier. If the situation is thetter, my brother is the strongest one out of our group." Vanessa said with a hide of bitterness and a mix of being proud.


    "As for the Boss, he holds the most war potential out of any of use with the use of his necromancy. I''ve seen him summon armies of undead, but I honestly don¡ät know the limits of his. I heard that out of the people that "reside in the center of the world", he is the strongest out of his current tier. I ain¡ät much knowledge about it, but supposedly he holds a high ranking position among the-"


    "Vanessa!" A voice yelled behind her, cutting her mid-sentence.


    Recognizing the voice, Vanessa looked towards the door of the stone base.


    "Azrael? I thought you will be busy with an experiment of your-"


    "Vanessa, don¡ät say anything else." Azrael said while moving beside the confused Danzel.


    "Vanessa...Master Velkir doesn¡ät want Danzel to know about the ones that "reside in the center of the world". Didn¡ät he tell you?" Azrael said with a harsh tone, which made Vanessa lower her head slightly.


    "I sorr-..."


    "There is no need to apologize, I know why you did that, but let me help you with your request."


    "Azrael! I don¡ät need your help! I-!"


    "Vanessa. I am you brother?" Azrael said with an emotionless face.


    Compared to his usual affection towards his sister, Azrael''s eyes could resemble the ones of the undead.


    Hearing such a question, Vanessa became speechless and walked inside the base.


    "Of course, you are" Those were thest whispers of her, before leaving Azrael and Danzel standing there.


    "...Now Danzel, how is the progress with the item that I requested again?"


    ***


    At the same time, in the tent of the aged general.


    Bringing amunication device out of his pocket and inserting it into arge table, the aged general activated the device.


    As the mana crystal lighten up, the aged general opened his mouth.


    "Your royal majesty, I have some news to share with the Great Dynasty."

 Chapter 272 Dynasty Of Ioratal

    In a ce far away from the Gartara forest, where several people seating around amunication device.


    Each of those people wore clothing befitting their nobility and status. Each of them represented the higher-ups of the Dynasty of Ioratal.


    Otherwise, known as the Great Dynasty.


    s, they weren¡ät considered as either one of the new kingdoms or the old kingdoms. If one were to look at their history alone, the length of their history is simr to the Arcana Kingdom and the Berum Kingdom, which were considered the new kingdoms.


    But the Ioratal kingdom wasn¡ät considered a kingdom by the outsiders because of theirck of territories that they held under control. If it weren¡ät for the few people of the Ioratal Dynasty rising to the 5th-tier and their control of several mineral mines, they would even be conquered by their neighbors, the Berum kingdom.


    For years they were suppressed by the two other kingdoms and held no hope of expanding their own territories.


    But the people inside the room gathered here to discuss how to change the frustrating situation that their Dynasty was facing.


    And among the nobles there, was also the one who held the throne, his majesty.


    "Your royal majesty, I have some news to share with the Great Dynasty." A voice came out of themunication device inserted in the middle of the table.


    Seating in the middle of the table was a man that looked around his 70 with long gray hair and a crown on top of his head.


    Right beside him was a man fully d in ted armor and holding a spear where its tip was of dark gold metal.


    The man was releasing a pressure that was worthy of the 5th-tier, while his spear brought forth an ominous feeling on the nobles seating around the table.


    "You are allowed to share your findings, General Lennes Lenoir" The one who wore the crown said.


    The aged general, whose name was Lennes Lenoir started telling the recent oue of Velkir¡äs deal.


    "Sadly, our people who were imprisoned were killed together with the enemies by one of the disciplines of the Archmage."


    Once his words fell into the room, the atmosphere inside became much colder.


    "This is bad..." of the nobles said with a frown on his face.


    "Indeed, among those prisoners were some kin of the lower ss nobles. If theye and learn that we could save them, things will be annoying."


    "Is that even our fault? That damn necromancer is at fault! He told us that he can save them, but decided not to! He might even kill our men out of spite! Isn¡ät his actions breaking the contract we had!?"


    "You right, if he waited for our decision, we might even have saved them."


    "We need to-"


    Watching the nobles battling with each other to see who to throw the me on, the king who had an emotionless face would even like to hit those nobles for their foolishness.


    `It¡äs because of you guys that my father failed to raise the Dynasty into a fully developed kingdom. If you didn¡ät hesitate to ept Velkir¡äs condition, such a thing wouldn¡ät have happend.¡ä


    Turning his head towards the armored spearman, thetter nodded his head and tapped his spear to the ground, creating an echo for everyone to hear.


    "Stop showing you disgrace in front of his royal majesty!" His voice was loud and overpowering, making the nobles closer their mouths under such pressure.


    But their eyes were staring daggers towards the spearman.


    Shaking his head internally, the one who wore the crown turned his attention towards themunication device and asked a question that was in his mind.


    "General Lennes Lenoir, you said that it was the discipline that killed the enemy and our soldiers. Can you share with us the details of how he did so?"


    Hearing the king''s question, the other nobles frowned as they noticed something weird about what General Lennes said.


    ording to their information, the new members of the Deathfull Skulls were a swordman of the 4th-tier and two disciplines that were of the 3rd-tier.


    If what Lennes said was the truth, then it means that one of the 3rd-tier disciplines killed hundreds of people that had several of 3rd-tier in.


    Under logical reasoning, such a feat was impossible.


    "...ording to Archmage''s words, that seems to be the case. He told me that the dark armored disciplines used our people to turn into his undead soldiers to ughter the soldiers of the Arcana. I should get the details of the battle by tomorrow, but for now, that¡äs what I know."


    Hearing such news, made the king close his eyes.<sub> </sub>


    "What!? He defiled our people! That¡äs uneptable!"


    "Are you telling us that he killed our people and then forced them as his undead to kill his enemy?"


    The king knew that suchments would fill the room soon after those words.


    He acknowledged those who stayed silent and looked at the other nobles as if they were fools. As they saw what truly was in front of them.


    "Though the news of losing our people is regrettable, the knowledge that we gained has much greater value." The king said with a cold tone.


    Some of the nobles looked at the king confused, while the others were quite nodding in approvement.


    But among those silent ones, one particr noble had a small grin on his face.


    `That human is indeed cleft.¡ä The noble with the green thought to himself.


    "The Necromancy school is considered taboo for a reason. And that¡äs it¡äs his terrifying war potential and destruction that such magic school holds. Wherever an enemy is felled, a necromancer can turn him into an undead ally. Making them essential a one-man army magic caster."


    "The Archmage Velkir, who we managed to contract is such a being, who can increase our army and re-use our brave soldiers. With how the conflict with the Berum and Arcana developed, his necromancy skills are essential."


    "But, now that he brought his disciple here, there should be two additional necromancers among our ranks. Though I resent such magic, we can¡ät ignore their war potential. As long as we manage and use those disciplines effectively, our chances of making our Dynasty raises." The king said.


    Hearing their king''s reasoning, the other nobles started discussing among themselves how to use those two and who to me.


    From the front, the king had an emotionless face but on the other side, he scoffed at those nobles who didn¡ät realize the situation.


    `Those idiots, if we were to me anyone of the Deathfull Skull group, we might lose their favorite and abandon us. With our resources being strained to the limit, we can¡ät risk them leaving and joining another of the two kingdoms.¡ä


    The Dynasty of Ioratal with their mineral mines could be considered a rich country with rare resources, but what theycked was the manpower to use their wealth effectively.


    The service of the Deathfull Skulls was stupidly expensive, which made all the other nobles have a bitter feeling about sharing such precious resources with outsiders. s, spending so many resources onplete 4th-tierbatants that could all be considered man army was well worth it.


    With them finally gaining a chance after hundred of years of suppression, it wasn¡ät the time to cheap about their ways.


    Watching those noble fighting who is to get the biggest piece of bread instead of searching for the keys of the chains that bind them frustrated the king the most.


    "What about the swordman, General Lennes?" One of the noblest asked.


    "Though it''s early to say, he undoubtedly singles handily finished the arcana soldiers while apanied by the discipline of the master Archmage." Said Lennes over themunication device before continuing after hesitating for a bit.


    "Though this might be my personal guess, the little girl, the discipline of the Necromancer might be rted with the swordsman."


    "Mhm...there is too little information about those three." The king mumbled under his breath before refocusing at what he had to say.


    "Good work, General Lennes, continue keeping a eye towards the new three mercenaries. As of now, we don¡ät have enough information to effectively use those 3." The king said.


    "Yes! I would do my best to follow his royal Majesty''smand!"


    "Alright, with this our current meeting hase to an end"


    Standing up from his seat, the king walked towards the door, closely followed by the spearman.


    *Closing the door, the spearman turned to look at his king.


    "Your majesty...will it be alright to leave the nobles so much time? You saw what happens with the prisoners if a decision wasn''t met."


    While continuing walking, the king answered.


    "It was necessary, most of them are still savoring the false peach. They can''t handle change. I am giving them time to see who among them would be worthy to look after." He said while his guard, the spearman, and he disappeared through a long halfway.


    ***


    In a matter of a blink of an eye, a whole week passed.

 Chapter 273 [Rune Of Thirst] And Mana Aptitude

    Currently, in the stone base that Velkir has created, sitting with his back on the wall in a room that had many other weaponsying around, Danzel was holding a whittled spear and pressing his finger towards the tip of the spear.


    Removing the mana on his finger, Danzel deactivated his talent [Rune Vision] and sighted in relief.


    "After all this work...I finally managed to bring the [Rune of Harvest] to the [Average] rating." Danzel said while looking at the runes of the wittled spear.


    They were only a rune to be seen and that was on the tip of the spear, which was none other than the [Rune of Harvest].


    But if one were to look carefully, they were three runes in total, whereas the two other ones were behind the many opening of the spear.


    Although doing so proved to be much more difficult than he expected, it came out fine.


    It was a mere attempt to naturally hide the runes for other eyes. Though the [Rune of Harvest] couldn¡ät be hidden as it was one the tip of the wittled spear, one could artistically see the carving.


    The carving resembled several lines that formed like a vortex or a ck hole of some kind, in those lines were extremely small rune letters that made out the lines. And in the middle of a said ck hole was a mouth, or rather the teeth.


    It looked as if something was sucking everything, which wasn¡ät wrong if one considered the two other runes that he managed to carve.


    One of them being the upgraded version of his original rune, which he decided to call, [Rune of Thirst]. It was a sessfulbination with an aspect of another mon] and the previous rune of his.


    Themon rune was called [Rune of Trist], which upon the usage of mana could gather wind around the user in arge area.


    The aspect he used tobine his original rune is therge area part.


    Since he got to the point, where reaching the [Well-done] to [Perfect] rate with [Common] runes, it wasn¡ät particrly hard to mix in anotherponent in his original rune.


    What he aimed was to increase the range of the blood-sucking part, which when sessful, made the [Rune of Thirst] be born.


    He would be lying to say that he wasn¡ät proud of his creation.


    [Rune of Thirst]: A rune made by a particrly strong weight. A vicious rune that allows one object to naturally draw blood and to some extent to control the movements of drawn blood. Upon minimal usage of mana, the range of the rune''s blood drawing ability is greatly extended. The range is increased the more mana is spent by the users. As the name suggests, the object with this rune will thirst for blood.


    `Though I was unable to make the effectpletely passive since it was easier by putting mana cost, it shouldn¡ät be impossible to fix in the future.¡ä Danzel thought while looking at the third rune.


    That rune was a in [Common] rune, called [Rune of Peain], the rune did nothing else than enchanting the mana attacks to inflict more pain on one target.


    Mana attacks generally being his [Gale Mana de] or [Cursed de].


    The rune by itself wasn¡ät that great as it would spend arge amount of space where other runes could be carved in the weapon which would be more useful.


    The sole reason why Danzel carve this rune at all was mainly for the theme of the spear and thebination with his [Rune of Thirst].


    Since one could increase the range of the rune by putting one''s mana in, it was considered a mana attack, which in turn made the [Rune of Peain] activate constantly.


    A viciousbination if he had to say the truth.


    And as the spear would be used by Azrael who was a blood mage, he thought the rune was suitable.


    "Hmm, my sword does have some remaining space for a rune, but to put the [Rune of Thirst], I would have to remove my previous one by using the skill [Rune Erasure]. Maybe if I increase its level, the damaging part will disappear, but that also requires XP..." Danzel mumbled as he put the spear in his storage ring.


    Leaving his room, Danzel went out towards Velkir¡äs room as they nned to have a lecture again.


    He decided to hand the wittled spear after taking the lecture.


    `Though Azrael wouldn¡ät let me hear the end of it if he knew that I finished it. Receiving a few hourster should be fine.¡ä Danzel thought with a faint grin under his helmet.


    Walking down the stairs, Danzel arrived in Velkir''s room with two other people beside Velkir waiting there.


    Those two were none other than Shiro and the overprotective Agares.


    "I see you finally came," Velkir said in his cold voice.


    Reaching out his head Velkir put one wooden box on the table.


    "Here."


    Nodding my head, I reached out and put the wooden box in the storage ring.


    ''I will have to see its effectter.'' Danzel thought while ignoring the intense gaze of the small girl behind Agares.<sub> </sub>


    He couldn''t really see her face with the hood and his height difference, but he could tell that she was jealous.


    "Since we are pressed against time, today we will be discussing one mana aptitude." Velkir dered as brought out two of the same books from what Danzel guessed was his storage ring.


    "Those books consider the basics and how to build one''s aptitude and other information which you might find useful. After we are done with our lecture, you should read it."


    Nodding their head, Agares picked up the book for Shiro''s case while Danzel put it in his storage ring.


    "Then let''s start, with one of you having already an aptitude it will be easier to exin." Velkir said while turning his head towards Danzel.


    "Danzel, could you please release your mana for everyone to see?"


    Nodding my head, I released my dark green mana from my hand.


    "Shiro, can you tell me what color the natural mana has and what defines the color change of mana." Velkir said towards the little girl.


    "Mhm, natural mana has a blue color." She said while raising her pale white arms to show her own mana.


    "Depending on the element that the mana holds, the different color it turns!" She said while transforming the mana in her hands into all kinds of colors.


    The fire element showed as a bright red.


    The water element is light blue.


    Earth is brown.


    Darkness as ck.


    And many others.


    Motioning to stop, Velkir said.


    "Correct, the color of mana tells the element that resides on our spells. Of course, such color can be tempered with but among the arts I mana, there are some exceptions."


    "And those are one''s Mana Aptitude." Velkir said while looking at his disciples who waited for him to continue.


    "Simple put, it''s the mana that is the most efficient for thematic caster body to use. Everyone has one, but wherever one awakens it to use for his own unique magic is a whole other case." Velkir said while pointing his staff towards Danzel''s dark green mana.


    "The usual requirement to awaken your aptitude is to be a magic caster of the 4th-tier, with some rare cases of 3rd-tier casters managing to awake it."


    "But there is an exception to this rule, this being that one is being " born" with his mana aptitude right of the start. "


    Understanding what Velkir, Shiro raised her hand to receive Velkir attention.


    "Teacher, does Shiro have a mana aptitude." She asked with a glow of expectations in her eyes, but the answer she received was like pouring cold water on top of her.


    "You do have one, but sadly you will have to awaken yours." Velkir said as he turned towards Danzel.


    "You in turn Danzel have already awaken yours, and as far as I can tell, it holds the attributes of death and life."


    Hearing that, Danzel finally understood what the Lich meant with mana aptitude.


    ''He means my [Soul Affinity]?'' Danzel though and his interest in the topic spiked.


    "What does having an aptitude for death and life mean."


    "Imagine it likebining two elements to turn into one. For example, the fire element with the earth elemental mixing together would result in the use of magic with molten earth much easier."


    "But the samebination doesn''t mean the same result. Azrael as much as I hold an aptitude of death and life, our final mana aptitude is fundamentally different."


    "The blood magic is the result of Azrael''s unique mana, as for yours, I ain''t too sure about it. I have never seen such mana as yours, Danzel." Velkir said as he shook his head.


    "Finding how to use your unique mana is your job, but do not let yourself be lost on such a narrow way of magic. Studying magic that you are only good at isn''t the way of a magic caster. Though specializing yourself with spells of your mana aptitude is strong, most of the time, there would be weaknesses."


    "Learning the correcting spells and knowledge to fight off such weaknesses is the deciding point of a good magic caster and a bad one." Velkir said with his cold voice.

 Chapter 274 Cursed Spear

    After several hours had passed, Danzel walked out of Velkir¡äs room with the newly uired knowledge.


    The mixed mana aptitude or affinity seemed to be of huge importance for those who mainly use mana instead of life force.


    ording to Velkir¡äs words, everyone possesses some sort of attribute. One might even have more than two or three if they were born lucky enough.


    But what really matter was if one had his attribute mixed and unlocked apletely new path of one ability, which most of the time was unique to the person.


    For example, both he and Azrael had a mixed affinity for life and death, but the affinity itself came outpletely different.


    Danzel being his [Soul Affinity] and Azrael his [Blood affinty].


    What he found the most confusing part of this was the fact that he didn¡ät have anything like a life affinity or something the like.


    Velkir''s answer to that was that one''s race ys a part in contributing to one natural attribute.


    Which taking to ount what races he and Azrael were, such abination did make sense.


    Undead were beings born after death, which gave them a natural attribute of death. And ording to his Necronomicon, the undead is more likely to be naturally born if they have a strong desire to live., thus giving them a life attribute.


    Or at least thetter part was mostly his guess.


    As for Azrael, all he knew was that dark elves had a particr talent towards dark arts, where necromancy is a part of said arts.


    In other words, their mana is extremely special which could make unique spells that others might not know about.


    Of course, someone could replicate thebination and build his own spell with it, but such feat for the more difficult attribute such as [Spatial], [Death], [Life], and many more.


    There were only so manybinations that resulted in twobinations. Examples are the fire attribute and earth attribute.


    That mix for the most case was focused more on explosive firepower or the creation of some sort of metal. They were other usages such as extracting the impurities on oars, but thebination had some clear limits.


    The most important point of it all was, that spells of one mana aptitude are much stronger than other spells, as one has a natural talent for that.


    Making Danzel ponder his future decisions ording to his skills evolutions.


    Taking also to ount [Soul of Death Essence] that increased the effectiveness of his death and soul skills, it would be more logical to aim towards evolution paths that have either one of those elements.


    But taking to ount his [Superior Unique Concioness] talent that further increased the strength of soul skills, Danzel thought that it would be much wiser to make all his skills soul affinity focused.


    `No, there are some skills which might not suit such attribute, but making my main skill into [Soul Affinity] doesn¡ät that bad. At least [Mortal Reminder] hasn¡ät disappointed me yet.¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    Originally he wanted to test the waters by evolving his more useless skills towards having a [Soul Affinity], s now he thought otherwise.


    "I do have some XP left to use for a skill, but for now it could wait for tomorrow after our new mission arrives."


    While immersed in his though, he arrived at his original destination.


    Azrael room.


    Entering the room, the first thing that Danzel saw was Azrael stabbing his own arm with a bloodied dagger.


    "Did youe for resupply of weapons, Danzel?" Azrael said with a nk tone without even looking at him. He talked as if the dagger piercing his arm wasn¡ät even there.


    "...No, I didn¡äte for that. I cam-wait, what are you even doing in the first ce?" Danzel asked in genuine confusion.


    Raising a small bottle with a crimson liquid inside and purring it on top of the dagger that was piercing his arm, as if the crimson liquid had a mind on his own it moved straight towards the wound and into Azrael¡äs arm.


    Once that happend, Azrael¡äs arm started twitching abnormally.


    "Mhm, in simple terms, I am currently trying to improve the quality of my blood. But..."


    Watching his veins start swelling at an rming rate, Azrael took a piece of paper with his free hand and started writing using his finger.


    "Another failure..." He mumbled as he ced the paper into another pile of papers.


    Drawing the dagger out, Azrael draws the foreign blood out of his arm and regenerates his arm in ways unknown to Danzel.


    "So? Why did youe here? Just to watch me?" Azrael said while closing and opening the fist on the arm that was injured a second ago.


    `Is every one of the 4th-tier capable of such absurd regeneration?¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    Not letting his thoughts out, Danzel brought out the whittled spear that Azrael entrusted to him.


    "I just came to deliver the finished product."


    <o>,m Hearing those words, Azrael''s eyes widen up and focused on the white whittled spear.</o>


    "I see...what kind of runes did you carve on it? Looking at the symbol...you carved two runes?" Azrael said while walking closer to Danzel, his crimson eyes were inspecting all the symbols which weren¡ät there before.<sub> </sub>


    "...Quite the observation. You are right, I managed to put 2 different runes. Or more precisely, 1 rune is made up frombining 2 runes." Danzel lied through his teeth.


    "Oh? May I take a look at it?" Azrael asked.


    "It¡äs yours now." Danzel in return shrugged his shoulder at him.


    Even if he kept the wittled spear, it was such a strange weapon design that he couldn¡ät make good use of.


    Taking the white wittled spear in his hand and equipping it, Azrael swung it around a few times.


    "What can the runes do?" Azrael asked while his eyes were glued on the white whittled spear on his arm.


    "As you request, I carved the blood-sucking rune into the white spear while doing a slight modifying it with another rune. Not only did the nature of passively sucking blood by own will remain, but the range of that ability can be increased by the use of mana."


    "Hmm, an activation and passive effect in one rune..." Azrael muttered while looking towards the wall of his room.


    Swinging his free arm, blood was shot out and sshed towards the wall with limited force.


    Raising the white whittled spear, for a second nothing happend.


    But after that second, the inside part of the white whittled spear lightens up in a faint crimson light, resulting in the blood on the wall being sucked towards the spear.


    "The mana cost is really low for being able to suck the blood at such distance. I will have to test the limits of it and see up at what it isn¡ät efficient anymore."


    Once again, Azrael started muttering his thoughts out,pletely forgetting that Danzel was there watching him.


    "Ah, right. What does the other rune do?" Azrael asked, ignorant of the fact that he was muttering to himself for 5 minutes straight.


    "...Cause of theck of spaces that I had to work with, I had to carve a lesser rune on it. The effect itself inflicts more pain from any attacks that use mana. Of course, the mana has to go through the spear for the rune to work." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Hearing Danzel''s exnation halfway though, Azrael brown frowned before finally turning to face Danzel.


    "Wait second, does this effect get activated by the effect of the other rune?"


    "Correct, I carved that certain rune for the sole purpose of thisbination. Though it doesn¡ät damage one''s opponent, I believe that a certain amount of pain could make them lose focus." Danzel said with a stone-cold voice.


    Azrael in response was quite speechless about it.


    "That some vicious weapon that you created." Azrael said while ncing at the white whittled spear.


    "Do you not like it?" Danzel asked


    "No, I love it." Azrael answered while staring at the whittled spear.


    `For such a weapon to have such effects without any enchantments at all. Just the idea of putting my own enchantments on it makes me excited.¡äAzrael thought to himself.


    "As I will be using this as my weapon from now on...I guess a name is called for. You got any ideas, Danzel?"


    "Why do you even ask me..?" Danzel said in annoyance. Having finished his business with the dark elve, he wanted to go and continue his work before going to the next mission.


    "Well, it¡äs the truth that I crafted the spear itself, but since you were the one who carved the runes, I believe that your opinion of the name of this weapon is well earned."


    Wanting to go back to work, Danzel answered with the first name that came up in his mind when he thought about the white whittled spear.


    "Just call it Cursed Blood Spear or Spear of Thirst for all I care. I will be going now."


    Seeing Danzel leaving his room, Azrael put the white whittled spear on the table and brought out all kinds of tools and materials for enchanting purposes.


    "Tch...he couldn¡ät pick a more average name for a weapon that will be of the highest tier." Azrael muttered to himself, before cing a crimson barrier around his room.


    As his pair of eyes burned like two crimson suns, Azrael began the enchanting process.


    ¡äThough you probably weren¡ät serious about naming this spear, I will respect your choice. But since I will be using this spear, allow me to butcher those two names of yours.¡ä


    With his crimson mana entering the white whittled spear, Azrael muttered to himself.


    "I even decided, I will bestow you the name of [Cursed Spear of Bloodthirster] and you shall be the spear that will bath beneath a river blood, just like I, you master Azrael has done."


    Azrael''s will seeped through his crimson mana and entered the white whittled spear.


    The more mana entered the spear, the more a wicked aura was starting to appear around the spear.


    And hidden beneath that aura, a dormant consciousness was born and resided inside the spear.


    Once the enchanting finished, the [Cursed Spear of Bloodthirster] was born.

 Chapter 275 Azrael Blood Mage

    The day of the mission had arrived and the Deathfull Skulls mercenaries group had gathered themselves in their base.


    "I am deploying my magic." Their leader, Velkir the Lich said with his cold voice.


    With a magic huge magic circle appearing under their feet, the 7 of them disappeared to their next destination.


    The walls of the stone base were reced by tall trees.


    If one paid attention, they could hear some faint soundsing all around the forest.


    "You know what to do, spread and finish your mission." Velkir said with his cold voice.


    Nodding with each other, everyone split into 3 different groups.


    One was Velkir and Sartan, who were about to use teleportation magic to disappear.


    ording to Velkir, the kingdoms of Berum and Arcana were currently in a fierce fight near the borders of the Dynasty of Ioratal. It reached a point where evenbatants of the 4th-tier had appeared.


    Velkir¡äs and Sartan''s job was to reinforce so that they prevent the fight from passing the borders of Ioratal.


    As beings of 4th-tier were practically cmities if they fought seriously, those two, in particr, were the most suited for the job.


    With Velkir being an incredible magic caster who could summon an army by his will or devastate an army with his magic, his sole presence there would put pressure on the other two kingdoms.


    And ording to the Dynasty''s wishes, Sartan was there to act as Velkir¡äs bodyguard with his immortal-like vitality.


    Though Velkir found it a waste of manpower, he didn¡ät say anything as he knew what was on the mind of lesser beings.


    The other group consisted of Danzel, Agares, and Shiro who were supposed to escort the supplies of a particrrge mine that was owned by the Dynasty.


    If those supplies were actually of some of the ore, then transporting them would even be easy.


    Just dumping all the mana crystal inside a spatial storage device or two and using teleportation magic would even finish the job.


    But those supplies weren¡ät the mana crystals, but the miners themself.


    Harvesting mana crystals was a dangerous job, which depending on the attribute of the crystal, could kill a person.


    Breaking a mana crystal that wasn¡ät processed was incredibly unstable, where one single small crack could let the whole mana explode outwards, resulting in an explosion of that depending attribute.


    Worse of all, this could result in a domino effect if the explosion damaged a nearby mana crystal, who in turn did the same.


    As such, miners capable of harvesting mana crystals were quite valuable.


    "Danzel, stand still for a brief moment." Velkir said as he pointed his staff towards Danzel who had his sword drawn out.


    "[Greater Being Undead]~[Ue Death Protection]~[Greater Shadow Haste]."


    A dark mist escaped from Velkir¡äs staff before the mist entered Danzel''s body through the result of three different spells.


    Feeling his whole body bing morefortable and lighter than ever, Danzel nodded towards Velkir out of appreciation, while hiding the fact of his disbelief of Velkir''s current feat.


    Just like he did once before, Velkir¡äs voice ovepped with his own and cast respectively three different spells at the same time.


    It was a feat that even he couldn¡ät do.


    He could activate multiple skills at the same time, but skills that are considered spells were a whole new case.


    He barely was capable of multi-cast [Hand of Mana Affinity] and another spell and that was because the former used more of his will than delicate guiding one mana.


    `I will have to ask him how to do thatter.¡ä Danzel thought internally as he dashed off with Agares holding Shiro in a hug.


    Using his teleportation magic and the other three running to the mine, only the dark elve siblings remained.


    "Well, then brother! Make sure not to die. I will be ahead of you" Vanessa said before kicking the ground and leaving a small crater from the spot where she now disappeared.


    "Sigh...be careful, sister." Azrael said with a tired voice.


    Of course, Vanessa didn¡ät manage to hear his words.


    `We were supposed to work as a group.¡ä


    Although knowing that fact, Azrael didn¡ät decide to run after her sister.


    The reason being was because he knew that he couldn¡ät catch up if she really made her mind up to go full out. Also, he gave her several artifacts just in case something happened to her.


    He wasn¡ät worried because he thought that she was weak he thought that she was incredibly strong.


    His worries came from knowing her personality.


    "I should be going, [Greater Haste]."


    Using the same spell that he used against Danzel back on the test, Azrael followed after his sister.


    Or rather, he went towards the true destination instead of the decoy of where his sister went.


    Because of his overprotective side over his sister, Azrael asked Velkir to give his sister a false goal to keep her busy till he finished the true mission.


    Currently, Vanessa was heading towards a group of Berum soldiers who had arge amount of 3rd-tierbatants, while he was heading to eliminate a potential threat to the Dynasty.


    And that was someone of the 4th-tier.


    Dashing forward, his movement would even be blurred by the sheer speed he was moving. Only those of peak 3rd-tier could keep their eyes on him while those of the lower state could only faintly see a ck and crimson cloaked figure with a massive spike attached to his right arm.


    After a few minutes of running with incredible speed, he felt his body passing through something material.


    "Tch...barrier?" Azrael thought as he tightened his grip on his [Cursed Spear of Bloodthirster] and his awareness spread around him and identified three presences that weren¡ät there before.


    Being mid-air, three robes figures surrounded Azrael by the use of teleportation.


    "Kill him!"


    Having already prepared their spells beforehand, three devastating balls of mes were shot directly at Azrael.


    Once those three balls of me were in range, they exploded in a massive explosion, before inside the explosions several more balls of me appeared that resulted in the same.


    It was a spell called [Tripled Fire Discharge], a spell which created arge fireball with another 3 inside the same fireball.


    And considering that three were shot at Azrael, they were 12 whole explosions that took the ce.


    "Was he the one who activated our rm barrier?"


    "He must be, but don¡ät take your guard off! There might be others who came with him!"


    "Re-activate the barrier, I will go and report about the intruder''s death-" Thest of the robed figures were swiftly interrupted by an emotionless voice.


    "Something like that isn¡ät capable of harming me."


    "!!!"


    "This guy-!!!"


    "Cast another [Trip-"<sub> </sub>


    Distancing themself from the center of the smoke, all three went out and guided their spells in their gauntlets.


    s...


    Three des made out of blood cut through the smoke and severed the three magic casters in half. Their protective artifacts that did activate also failed to protect their owner''s life.


    Ignoring the three corpses, Azrael continues dashing to his original destination.


    And shortly after, he saw several soldiers already had their swords drawn while the magic caster their spells were prepared.


    "Enemy!"


    "Fire magic!"


    "Kill him!"


    Be it bolts of crossbows or any kind of spell, just like the previous spell of the 3rd-tier magic caster, [Tripled Fire Discharge], it was blocked by a circling barrier made out of the blood.


    "Is he hiding?" Azrael thought to himself as he scanned for his target.


    `But first I will have to deal with those annoying small flies.¡ä


    "Human ignorance, learn to know your ce." Azrael said with an emotionless tone as he started casting his spell.


    "[Sanguine Bath]."


    Coming out of his feet was Azrael¡äs defiled blood that formed a small pool around the ground.


    Every step he took, the pool of blood moved together with him, simr to one''s shadow.


    The soldiers who figured out that crossbows were now useless, dashed with their weapons in hand and charged toward Azrael.


    With over 100 soldiers surrounding the intruder while being buffed from behind by the magic caster, the soldier previous fear turned into confidence.


    `We can do it!¡ä They thought.


    s, the reality was cruel.


    "[Bloodening Mirror] Activate." Azrael muttered with a low voice.


    The blood barrier that was protecting a second ago suddenly started ckening and expanding at a fast pace.


    And before the soldiers could react or get away, the blood barrier expanded and turned into hundreds of small des that cut through the armor of the 100 soldiers and dug into their bodies.


    "What the-!"


    "Agggh!


    In a matter of a second, the shouts of courage turned into pain.


    Out of the 100 soldiers, 87 died instantly with the tiny des, while the others who survived were barely hanging on their life after even using the others as shields.


    The magic caster and the remaining soldiers who saw that imminently lost all will to fight, even those of the 3rd-tier didn¡ät dare to step up.


    "Impossible-! What kind of spell was that!?"


    "He is a monster!"


    "We can¡ät deal with that!"


    In the mids of despair, a voice simr to salvation was heard.


    "Those under 3rd-tier, step back! This isn¡ät your fight." A man said while appearing in front of all those soldiers.


    Just like the magic casters of before, the man wore a simr robe, but only with an additional chest te with many enchants.


    In his hand was a long curve sword which one could say was abination of a long sword and a katana.


    The one wielding this de had immense pressure releasing unconditionally, making it pretty clear that he was of the 4th-tier.


    "Hmm, you must be the blood mage of that mercenary that the Dynasty brought, huh? Do think that such magic as yours still exist in this world, heh." The manughed before his face turned serious.


    "You killed the people that I was entrusted to. For that, let me have the honor of erasing such taboo magic!" The man shout before dark mana red up out of his body.


    "[cken de]!" Tracing one hand on his de, ck mes of chaos surrounded his sword.


    "[Hellfire Armor]!" His chest te was lightened up with chaotic mes simr to his sword, but the man felt neither pained nor hurt.


    "[Chaos me Steps]! His time, a par of circle appears on each leg, giving his foot to leave sark me froming out.


    Azrael who was watching the man buff himself got suddenly a idea.


    " I can teat it here..." He mumbles before easing the white spear of his.


    Once risen, a crimson light escapes from the spear.


    Suddenly, as if a vortex has taken ce, the moans of the pain of the 13 people and suffering could be heard thanks to Danzel rune.


    The corpses in turn had all their blood sucked off.


    [Blood Transmission]


    With the blood getting used in and going towards the pool of blood.


    What really stupefied them was what happened next.


    The previous dried-up corpses started to throw in blood.


    From their mouths, blood came out and slowly spread around the body of the corpse.


    Once it was done, the now 100 fallen soldiers rose up as a pile of blood puppets and started to form ording to how Azrael looked.


    However, they only had the outline of Azrael''s body structure while being faceless. In their hand, they wielded a copy of the [Cursed Spear of Bloodthirst] with only its look.


    "The pseudo mind does seem to work, but seeing that they can''t replicate mepletely means it''s too young" Azrael mumbled to himself.


    The man who looked at all the blood monstrosity gripped the hilt tighter.


    "You damn defiler of corpses! Here will be your grave." The 4th-tier man said before he cut several of those blood puppets.


    But after they were cut, they instantly turned back to their form.


    Luckily for him, his chaos me prevented them from regenerating or at the very least slowed down the incredible amount.


    The more time passed, the more injuries the man umted.


    Azrael who draining the blood of the man failed to notice an ethereal far green smoke going towards him before entering the tip of his spear.


    But rather than failing to notice, it was more the case that Azrael couldn''t see it in the first ce

 Chapter 276 Buffed Danzel

    With Azrael being busy fighting the swordman of cken me and Vanessa devastating the people whom she was sent to.


    Danzel party with Agares and Shiro were soon enough able to hear distances noises of shing metal.


    Exchanging nces with Agares, Danzel nodded and dashed ahead of Agares.


    It wasn¡ät because Danzel was faster or anything, if one were topare their speed, then Agares would one-sidedly beat him.


    Although their rtionship was somewhat awkward, Danzel was aware of Agare''s overprotective nature of his granddaughter.


    Though she had a much greater talent of magic than even himself, right now Shiro was a mere inconvenience to Agares.


    Using [Swift Movements] Danzel was already fast enough, but with the additional buffs that he receive from Velkir, his speed reached an absurd level.


    The Spell [Greater Being Undead] respectively increased all his stats except his intelligence by a whole of 200 points!


    Making his agility reach over 1000 attribute points!


    His [Superior Undead] Talent multiyer also helped Danzel reach a state of power that made him almost feel that he set a foot on the gates of the 4th-tier.


    The most amazing fact of this spell was that the strength came so naturally to him, that there wasn¡ät a need to get used to his new strength.


    The other buff called [Greater Shadow Haste] also increased his agility by another 100 attributes, but that was only the side effect of that spell.


    The true nature of the spell was to surround his body with dark mana of some kind to hide his presence and all noises that he would make. From the outside it looked as if his armor was mixed with a mist of darkness, making it difficult for others to recognize that his armor was made out of some sort of metal.


    As for the third spell, he wasn¡ät too sure by the description alone that was disyed on his status screen.


    It only mentioned that it was a protectiveyer of some kind.


    Nevertheless, Danzel found the two previous buffs to be good enough.


    No, they were so good that Danzel was disturbed by them.


    Though it might be a small glimpse of Velkir¡äs power, that alone was enough of a reminder of Velkir¡äs power.


    `I will pay more attention to Velkir¡äs lesson next time...¡ä Danzel swore to himself.


    While he was admiring his newfound power, he soon picked up several presences with the use of [Eyes of the Damned]


    Once he reached his destination, Danzel saw several corpses of the Dynast soldier, with only a few remaining trying their best to block the entrance of a cave.


    They were 3 people in total, two of them being of the 3rd-tier while the one in the middle was giving the aura the pressure of a 4th-tier. All three of them were severely wounded.


    Taking the other party into ount, there was a clear number advantage.


    With over 30 of the 2nd-tier and 10 of the 3rd-tier, they were also respectively 2 that gave the same aura as the man of Dynasty.


    `They have 4th-tiers...¡ä Danzel all previous confidences vanished as if they never existed before.


    He was fairly confident that with his attributes now increased, he could have found a way to deal with all the 2nd-tier and 3rd-tiers, albeit risky.


    Sure it would have been close, but if he thought of his agility and the fact that he had his trump card, [Sin of Wrath] still to use. Victory couldn¡ät be far of if he resurrected all the nearby corpses to win him some time.


    But not even Danzel was suicidal enough to dare and challenge either of that 4th-tier.


    Against them, there was an invisible wall that one couldn¡ät pass if they didn¡ät reach the same tier of strength.


    And to his luck, the two 4th-tiers had their focus towards the soldier of Dynasty, who in question held a sword and a shield respectively.


    The moment the 4th-tier of the Dynasty raised his sword and gave a shout, a warm yet at the same time, disturbing light fell upon the soldiers of the Dynasty.


    Watching all the wounds close and the color on their faces returning, Danzel knew why he felt so disturbed from watching the light.


    `Holy Magic...¡ä


    Though he felt annoyed seeing it, Danzel was actually relieved for his "ally" to be the one capable to use that.


    As the more, they shined, the more attention they bought to themself.


    Knowing the fact that Agares will shortlye, Danzel used the fact that his presence was that of a ghost to deal with a surprise attack.


    With Velkir¡äs buff and his [Presentless Steps], the soldiers of Arcana only then noticed his presence when their throats were cut.


    Of course, that was only the case for the 2nd-tier soldiers.


    "Enemy reinforcements!" One of the 3rd-tier mages shouted as he channel his mana into the air and formed an elemental of air to face Danzel.


    Slightly surprised by the entity in front of him, Danzel swung his sword and cut the elemental in half, but a second after ended up forming/regenerating (?) once more and giving out a punch to Danzel.


    But Danzel reacted ordingly.


    Knowing that this was an entity made out of mana, Danzel directly aim to cut the mana of the entity by itself with the use of his dark green air des.


    Resulting in the air elemental being cut like butter to the magic caster''s surprise.


    He prepared to summon his next elemental but found the dark knight right in front of him.


    Without being able to cast any sort of barrier, the magic caster was cut and contributed by turning into XP.


    Danzel though wasn¡ät done.


    The 3rd-tiers who recognize the threat that he possessed, imminently gave up their support on the two 4th-tiers and instead went aiming for Danzel.


    The 2nd-tier soldiers didn¡ät sit there idly but also moved to surround Danzel.


    Once they were halfway done so, a mist-filled with dead mana spread around Danzel. The mist in question entered the corpses of the previously fallen soldier and risen up once more as one of the undead, wielding their des towards their former allies for their new master.


    Instead of using the surprise to push forward, Danzel decided to retreat back, while silently preparing his next [Greater Raise Undead].


    The 3rd-tiers of Arcana who saw the undead made a swift decision to chase after the necromancer instead of his minions, even if many of the 2nd-tier died from them.


    They knew what a necromancer was capable of with still so many corpses being around.


    Danzel understood what was going through the mind of the 9 who were after his head. And because of that reason alone, he couldn¡ät help but grin to himself.


    `They fell for it


    If Danzel were to go full out right here, he would have a chance, but against 9 of the 3rd-tier with no further support of his undead, it would be a hard-fought battle where he might die.<sub> </sub>


    Afraid of that result, Danzel went out and chose the easiest way to deal with them.


    And that was not dealt with at all.


    Appearing from the distance, was an elderly wearing a silver mask covering only his mouth and a weird-looking hat (Jingasa) while carrying a child with one of his hands.


    But most noticeably was therge sword that was reversed curved.


    Noticing that grandpa, Danzel who was previously letting the other 9 catch up had to the surprise of the soldiers of Arcana speed up.


    "There are all yours." Danzel whispered to Agares before passive him.


    Agares in return frowned at Danzel''s words but didn¡ät say anything.


    "Little Shiro, hold tight at this grandpa of yours." Agares said while raising his scythe sword.


    His scythe sword emitted a feint gray smoke simr together with his body tougher.


    The soldiers of Arcana who noticed the old man''s strength, cursed out aloud and turned their backs and ran away.


    "It was a trap!"


    "Run! We need to tell the General about him!" one of them said while bringing hismunication device.


    They didn¡ät know that the moment they turned their backs to Agares, their fate was already sealed.


    Disappearing from his ce, Agares moved faster than the speed of sound and appeared in front of all the 3rd-tier soldiers.


    Without having any other choice, the soldiers send their strongest attacks at Agares in hopes of revealing a chance for them to run away.


    But once Agares swung his sword in the air with a speed that even Danzel couldn¡ät keep up, the mist spread like lethal des and cut through all their techniques and spell before the mist found its ce at the soldiers.


    It was too fast.


    Without even being able to process what just happend, the soldiers found themself dead on the ground cleaved into two parts.


    Holding his regret from losing all the XP from those guys, Danzel walked towards Agares.


    "Those were all the 3rd-tier, 2 of the 4th-tier with a mix of 2nd-tier soldiers should be remaining. On the Dynasty side, there is another 4th-tier. Though he might die at any moment."


    "Can you deal with them or should we abandon the mission?" Danzel said with his cold and serious voice.


    He knew that Agares held incredible power, but he wasn¡ät sure if it was enough to face 2 of the same rank as him.


    Even with him and Shiro, he wasn¡ät sure if they were of any use against the guys of Arcana. Considering also the fact that Shiro could be used against him, things could go ugly really fast.


    He expected Agares to understand his point of view and give up on saving the miners. But once he heard his decision, Danzel was surprised.


    "We aren¡ät going to abandon the mission. Or rather, first we will see how strong the enemy is and then decide. I might not look like it, but I am confident of facing multiple of my ne or what you call tiers."


    Nodding his head, Danzel went back with the other two to a given location, the only thing now to be seen were undead fighting the living and the 4th-tiers exciting shes with another.


    Each of the arcane 4th-tier was using swords techniques that used mana to generate various spells that affected their battle style.


    The Dynasty''s 4th-tier had a hard time dealing with those two.


    The other two of the 3rd-tier had passed away, with him being the only one remaining left thanks to his holy magic.


    Danzelimminentlyy turned the nearby corpses into undead, making the 2nd-tier who had already had a hard time with the first patch despair at the impossible task in hand.


    "How is it? Can you do it?" Danzel asked Agares who looked at the 4th-tier of the Arcane kingdom.


    "Yes, don¡ät worry." A


    Dashing forth, Agares appeared in front of one of the sword mages and swung his scythe sword, aiming for his head.


    Suprised by the neer''s appearance, the sword mage blocked Agares''s sword and jumped back to create some distance.


    Raising his palm, spears made out of ice were created in almost an instant and were respectively shot at Agares.


    Shiro who was being carried, stretched her pale white arm and generated a barrier made out of mes and stopped the ice spears with the barrier barely keeping itself from breaking.


    Danzel was surprised by her being able to block an attack of a 4th-tier, but after seeing her hand shaking and the mana that the barrier held, he knew that she used overtaxed herself and her hand was probably heating up from the inside.


    The one of the Dynasty, who Danzel called a pdin was a relief for the appearance of allies just like the report of not long ago said.


    He frowned towards the necromancer that was Danzel, but looking at how his undead was massacring the enemy of his kingdom, he let it slide.


    But remembering the reason why he and the mercenaries were here, the pdin shouted at Agares in urgency.


    "Go to the cave! I let some small flies slip inside! I can hold out against those two for 20- No, at best 15 minutes! Before I reach my own limit you have to save the miners!" The pdin said as he pushed the sword of the sword mage with his shield away.


    Growing at those words, Agares remembered why they were here for. But considering the value of a 4th-tier and the miners, Agares thought that the Dynasty would more likely have someone of the 4th-tier than some miners.


    Which brought Agares into a dilemma, if he were to leave and go save the miners, the pdin might die before he even saves the miners.


    He didn¡ät know the insides of a mine, and as far as he was aware, taking a wrong turn might cost him a huge amount of time. Worst case scenario, he would be toote to save the miners and to return back to the pdin, resulting in his death.


    With only one option being the most reasonable, Agares shouted towards the only avablebatant that was currently free...


    "Abdiel! Go to the cave!"


    Hearing this name being called, Danzel needed a good second to process who was Abdiel in the first ce. Once he remembered Abdiel was the name that Velkir had given to him, he gave the remaining soldiers who were fighting and dying by his undead a look of regret before dashing towards the cave.


    The two particr sword mages wanted to stop him from entering, but respectively Agares and the pdin stopped them from advancing, with Agares almost taking the life of one of them.


    Danzel in turn who entered the cave, run at an incredible speed in the dark cave.


    Being one of the undead, he could see without any light.


    "Let¡äs see where do guys are..." Danzel mumbled to himself before activating [Eyes of the Damned]


    Staring left and right for a few seconds, he finally noticed several presences spread all around the passages of the cave.


    Choosing the path with the most presence, Danzel dashed toward them

 Chapter 277 Wight Vs Mutants

    In the pathway of the mine, where Danzel saw many presences.


    One of the presences was pushed with incredible force towards the wall.


    The pickaxe that he held in his hand broke, and the man holding it threw blood out of his mouth.


    Falling to his knees, the miner''s entire body was shaking and his eyesight was turning hazy.


    "M-Monster..." That were hisst words before his body gave out.


    "Thomas!"


    Calling the dead man''s name, people with simr clothing and pickaxes like him surrounded him and red at the one responsible for doing this with hate.


    "There wasn¡ät a need to kill him!" One female miner said while her eyes were filling with tears.


    The man responsible for this scoffed at the group.


    "If you don¡ät want to end up like him, then stay put. Act ignorant like that idiot and I won¡ät show mercy on any of you." A man with blond hair wearing a uniform that symbolist his status as a Great Mage and amander in the Arcana Kingdom.


    "Just so that you all know, my mission was to kill all you bunch. But as your skills are attractive, I spoke for you to take you as prisoners that kill you all here. And yet that fool tried to fight back even after being so generous to you all! He got what he deserved." The blond Great Mage said as he swung his staff to the air, letting most of the blood of the man be thrown at the wall.


    Understanding that they got no hopes to go against this man, the miners distance themself in the corner while forcing the ones wanting revenge to not act on their emotions.


    The Great Mage shook his head in annoyance just by looking at them.


    `If it wasn¡ät for earning Master Anwir favor, I would even kill those lowlymoners of that backwater ce. For a noble that graduated with one of the highest scores at the academy like me to pick up trash like them is a disgrace of my title¡ä The blond Great Mage thought to himself.


    He even brought two associates of his family that held the rank of 4th-tier for this mission. And he was d that he has done so.


    He never thought that the Dynasty of Ioratal would bring a holy knight of the 4th-tier to defend such a lowly ce filled withmoners.


    But now that he was brought to Sword Mages of the 4th-tier, the mission was bound to seed, and earning the favor of the Archmage Anwir was guaranteed.


    Recently the Berum kingdom attacked the Archmages Anwir territory, more urate to where his personal mines were.


    With the news that Archmage Anwir was seeking an apprentice and his family being close with him, the blond Great Mage sought to earn this position.


    `Master Anwir gave me his "things"...as long as I seed here, only my bright future awaits ahead of me.¡ä The blond Great Mage though.


    After several minutes of passing, the man''s face changed to a slight frown.


    "Have they still not killed that holy knight? What¡äs taking them so long to report?"


    As he was about to bring out hismunication device, he suddenly felt an ominous auraing far through the distance.


    rmed, he guided his mana toward his eyes and looked at where the ominous aura wasing from.


    Once he turned his head, what he saw made him curse out loud.


    "Those fools!" The blond mage cursed out loud watching a dark knight with mist escaping from his bodying straight towards him.


    And the speed that he wasing towards him made the blond man get cold sweat behind his back.


    `Howe that those two let someone this fast get inside the mine! He isn¡ät of the 4th-tier, but his speed is abnormally high!¡ä


    Analyzing the current situation at hand, the blond Great Mage calmed down once he figured that the enemy was with the same tier as he.


    "You speed means nothing in front of my magic!" The Blond Great Mage yelled as he pointed his staff towards the iing dark knight.


    And in an instant, lighting started circling around the blond Great Mage and raising his hair slightly.


    Guiding the lighting in front of his staff, his spell of his manifested.


    With the lighting taking the form of a ball with a 1-meter radius, the ball emitted several other lightings that were striking the walls of the cave constantly, creating a made out of lighting that covered the whole pathway.


    The stone of the wall itself started melting by the seer temperature of the several lightings.


    "Die! [Thunder Seeker]!"


    Activating his spells, the whole and the ball of the lighting were shot in front of him.


    *Chigh! Chigh! Chigh!


    Be it the wall or the floor, everywhere the lighting touched melted.


    And in front of such a strong...


    Danzel runs straight towards the spell.


    In the next second, the spell [Thunder Seeker] made contact with Danzel, all the electricity was guided to Danzel''s body, making him a light source that lightens up the whole cave.


    The blond Great Mage wanted tough at the fool who run straight to his death, but what stopped him from doing so was that his lighting wasn¡ät touching the dark knight but a sphere.


    As soon as he realized what was happening, Danzel continue running at full speed unhindered by the powerful spell. The barrier that was around him slowly started to grumble and fade into nothingness.


    "A barrier!? But I didn¡ät detect any mana!" The blond Great Mage was clearly rmed.


    He wanted to cast another of his spells but found that his enemy was too near toplete his spell.


    "Dammit!" Creating a barrier around him, he started double-cast his next spell on his free hand.


    Seeing the barrier, Danzel mercilessly swung his long sword at the barrier with all his strength, destroying the barrier but at the same time pushing his sword away.


    The blond Great Mage didn¡ät expect that his barrier could be torn into shreds by a single attack, but that didn¡ät make him give up on his next spell.<sub> </sub>


    Making a spear of lighting appear on his hand, he grabbed at it to pierce it on the dark knight¡äs head now that his sword was back.


    Sadly for him, there was an overwhelming amount of speed difference between those two.


    Once Danzel passed through him and had already swung at him, the Great Mage found himself throwing the lighting spear into the empty pathway.


    The lighting spear itself flew with an incredible speed towards the wall of the cave and prated the wall several meters deep.


    If the barrier held and the blond Great Mage suggested throwing the lighting spear, Danzel wouldn¡ät have been able to dodge at such a close distance.


    s, that wasn¡ät the case and instead, a huge amount of blood came out of the wound on his chest, and the hand that threw the spear was severed. In both ces where Danzel swung were dead mana destroying the Great Mages cells.


    "Ahgghhhhh!!!" Screaming at top of his lungs, the blond Great Mage let go of his staff and fell to the ground while gripping the spot where his former hand was to activate healing magic.


    Green light emitted around his palm, but recovery didn¡ät seem to take ce. Noticing this fact even while suffering, the blond Great Mage said out loud in horror.


    "Why doesn¡ät it work!? DAMMIT!!!"


    Maybe he would even realize that he was infested with dead mana, but with his current state of mind, he couldn¡ät think straight with all this pain.


    Danzel who was watching the man suffering, couldn¡ät help but be reminded of the vitality of someone in the 3rd-tier.


    `I nned to cut him in half, but his robe was much tougher than I expected.¡ä Danzel thought as he slowly walked towards the magic caster to deliver the finishing blow.


    Feeling the dark knight''s intent, the Great Mage hurridly brought out hismunication device and activated it.


    "Imand you all!! Come this instant towards m-"


    Before he could finish his sentence, Danzel pierced his longsword towards his brain.


    [You received 350 000 XP]


    Pulling his sword out of the magic caster''s brain, Danzel turned to face the terrified miners.


    "I even came for you all." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Maybe they understood what he said wrong, but all the miners had their faces turn deathly pale with some picking their pickaxes and pointing them at him.


    Seeing that he made a mistake, Danzel corrected himself.


    "I am the reinforcements of the Dynasty. I and my allies came to pick you up..." Danzel said with a tone of annoyance in his cold voice.


    Upon hearing this, all the miners celebrated without even taking the consideration that Danzel might be lying.


    The woman who was holding the corpse of Thomas with tears on her face, raised her head towards their savior to give him her gratitude.


    But once she did, the first thing that she noticed was a ck silhouette in the pathway closing in their direction at an incredible speed towards them!


    If it weren¡ät for the fact that she was a veteran miner for mana crystals that built up a slight night vision, she wouldn¡ät have noticed.


    At first, she thought she was seeing things, but the closer the figure came, her face turned once more into horror.


    Moving by jumping to different sides of the walls with his scythe-like fingers and ckened body, she yelled towards her savior.


    "Behind you!" She yelled, but once she finished her shout, the monstrosity had alreadye behind her savior and swung his scythe-like finger at the dark knight.


    She closed her eyes and expected the dark knight to have his head blown away by the monstrosity.


    But that didn¡ät happend.


    "I know." Danzel said, fully aware of the figure behind him.


    Once the monstrosities hand came close to Danzel, suddenly a barrier surrounded Danzel and stopped the ck hand in his ce.


    "KGHAH!?"


    Being mid-air, Danzel brought out his shield from his storage ring and turned around while swinging his shield with a huge force.


    Hitting the chest of the figure with his chest, it was thrown towards the wall right beside Danzel.


    "KGah!" Spewing out dark blood from his mouth, the figure wanted to try once more to kill the enemy in front of him.


    As if Danzel would let that happend.


    Swinging his long sword, Danzel cut the monstrosities hand and head in a clean swing while also carving the wall behind.


    *Thud.


    [You received 50 000 XP]


    With the monstrosity corpse falling to the ground and leaving a pool of dark blood to the ground, the miners stepped back in horror.


    "What the hell is that!?"


    "They are mutants of the Arcane Kingdom." Danzel answered while turning his back on the miners.


    Looking in front of him, Danzel raised his shield in front of him.


    "And it wasn¡ät thest one of them."


    Watching with his night vision, Danzel could clearly see.


    That many more wereing towards him.

 Chapter 278 Wight Vs Mutants (2)

    Watching the humanoid figures with cken skin walking toward him, Danzel frowned as much as a skeleton could.


    He was only able to guess those things'' identity only by putting together Hanson''s description of where his runed chest tes were going.


    Though some of them had differences between them, they all had one thing inmon. A ck veined body where their hands werepletely ck and hard as some metal. Others had ws for hands with their throat filled with red hair.


    If Danzel had to describe them with one word, then that would be abominations. Beings simr to chimeras but in the form of a humanoid body.


    It didn¡ät take a genius to figure out what the main increase in those things was.


    Danzel felt relieved that those mutants didn¡ät have any of his runed armors.


    Upon the first contact with the first one, Danzel could determine that they were of the 3rd-tier. Checking their status window, Danzel figured out that their race was called [Semi-Homonculi Varient] and had little to no skills.


    What they did have were several talents of different races simr to the Devil of Azu¡ärah. With [Human] being one of them.


    He didn¡ät have time to read what every single talent was capable of with the enemy in front of him, but the talents such as the races and the [Failed Specimen], [Crazed], [Tortured One] were enough of a hint of what they experienced.


    But Danzel wasn¡ät one that would pitty his enemies. He also wasn¡ät afraid of them.


    Killing all of them would take some time, but the job would eventually be done. What he was most worried about was the object of his mission.


    Turning slightly his head to the right, he saw the 20 or so prisoners shaking in fear.


    "Raise up and pick up you pickaxes...though I can deal with those things, I can¡ät guarantee your survival." Danzel said with his cold tone.


    Hearing that, their previous pale faces turned even paler.


    `We can¡ät even keep up with their movement! What are we supposed to do with our pickaxes!?` They thought internally.


    They wanted to voice out their thoughts but were too scared of the dark knight who saved them. Something about his overall aura and voice made them fear him.


    The first one out of all those miners ti pick up their pickaxe was surprisingly the woman who was the first to cry. Her hands and legs were shaking like a drenched cat, but her will alone made the others act like her.


    Looking at that, Danzel directed his gaze towards the Arcane mutants in the pathway, he raised his shield and guided his mana towards his longsword.


    Seeing his mana, the mutants reacted imminently with a sprint towards him. Their killing intent is clearly for all to see.


    `I guess it¡äs time to act like a real [ck Guard]¡ä He thought amused before swinging his in the air.


    Releasing two dark green wind des at the mutants, Danzel prepared for his next move.


    The 9 mutants were running frantically towards him. Jumped above the wind des with incredible dexterity at both the wind des without even losing much of their momentum and were ready to continue their dash forward.


    What expected the mutant to take the lead though, was a shielding at the speed of a train.


    "Kgwahh!" Spewing out the blood of his mouth, the mutant was thrown several meters back with his chest caved in. Even after surely breaking some of the mutant''s ribs, it stood up without even yelling once out of pain.


    Danzel would very much hope to go after him to deliver the finishing blow, but with the other onesing, he had to leave him with that.


    Having used the same move as he did versus Agares, three [Death st] cathed up from behind him and aimed towards the 3 nearest mutants.


    2 out of 3 mutants let the ball of dead mana hit their faces and let the decay take ce whereas thest one simply swiped his hand and cut the ball of dead mana directly.


    Of course, Danzel didn¡ät count on his mere tier 1 spell to inflict any fatal damage. He used it only because it was around his mental capabilities and it will disturb his enemies.


    And sure enough, it work better than he expected.


    Though those guys didn¡ät seem to feel any pain, the decay that was happening towards their eyes was enough of a distraction for Danzel to act.


    He cut the one blinded by him with one of his swings while sending one of his wind des toward the other, leaving arge wound in each of them.


    Seeing no XP notification, Danzel knew that they were alive. And with the other mutant that blocked his [Death st] with his handing, Danzel had to raise his shield to block against the scythe-like fingers.


    *Thinkk!


    The sh generated sparks and left a small scratch on his shield. The blow was strong, but not strong enough for Danzel to be pushed back.


    Stretching his hand, Danzel pierced the mutant''s chest right through the heart.


    "Kgwah!" With a yell of anger, the mutant wanted to once attack Danzel, but his whole body came to a sudden halt.


    Danzel who activated his [Mortal Reminder], pulled his sword back.<sub> </sub>


    Using [Swift Movements] and [Shield Charge], he dashed to the side and rammed another mutant towards the wall with his shield.


    With the mutant''s arm broken and pimped to the wall, Danzel managed to decapitate the mutant with a lighting speed swing.


    [You received 45 000 XP]


    With 1 dead and another 3 soon to follow, Danzel cursed instead of celebrating.


    `Dammit! I let some though!¡ä


    Watching 2 of the mutants aiming for the miners and the other 3 surrounding him, Danzel knew that the fate of the miners would soon be grim.


    He soon received another XP notification from the one that had his heart pierced, but the other 2 heavily wounded didn¡ät seem to have given up on wasting his time.


    He thought of using [Stone Wall] to barricade the miners, but after thinking that he was inside of a cave, he gave up on that option.


    After all, the chance of burying everyone here alive was extremely high. In the worst-case scenario, he would identally break a mana crystal and result in the whole mine exploding.


    Maybe he would survive the former result, but thetter would definitely be the end of him.


    All he could do was kill does 5 as fast as possible and then go eliminate the other two.


    Releasing his bloodlust on the surroundings, Danzel moved much faster with each of his swings being heavier than the one before.


    Soon enough, the group of 5 mutants started to be cut down without even being able to realize against him. Their fearless nature made the mutants extremely aggressive, mostly relying on exchanging blows with their opponent no matter the case.


    It was a ruthless fighting style where they performed a lethal suicide attack on their opponent.


    Against such an opponent who was willing to trade their life for yours required utmost caution.


    At least that should have been the case if it weren¡ät for the difference of strength between the two parties.


    With Danzel using [Sin of Wrath], his attributes reached a new peak. A peak that the mutants could never hope to achieve.


    Each swing fatally wounded them if not right off killed them while Danzel''s shield together with his skill [Vanguards Defense ] blocked each attack with ease.


    With 5 other XP notifications appearing in front of him, Danzel canceled his [Sin of Wrath] and imminently dashed towards the remaining 2 mutants who were ughtering the miners.


    As to why he canceled [Sin of Wrath], it was because he was worried that his hate towards the living would be too much for him to fight against the influence of this talent.


    But even after shutting down his talent, his arrival was only a second toote without it.


    Once he appeared, Danzel made quick work out of those mutants.


    The mutants imminently changed their target towards him the moment he came close, making the miner who was about to be impaled by the sharp finger sigh in relief.


    They were indeed of the 3rd-tier those mutants.


    Not only were their reflexes much better than those who were around the same level as them, but their body itself was a weapon.


    Their ws were though enough to not be cut from one of his swings and sharp enough to scratch his shield.


    s, once one saw through their weakness of disregarding their lives, a strong blow was the end of them. They also didn¡ät have any mid-long ranged attacks which made the whole fight much easier for Danzel.


    Swinging his sword to throw most of the ck blood to the wall, Danzel put two of the corpses of the mutants inside his storage ring before turning to see the miserable state that the miners were in.


    Out of the 20 miners that were previously alive, only 8 remained with severe cuts on their bodies. Some even bleed worrying about some amount of blood from their back.


    He also found the woman who was the first to pick the pickaxe dead to the ground on top of the corpse she was holding previously.


    Danzel did everything that he could to fulfill his mission.


    Or at least that¡äs what he made himself believe.


    In truth, if he forced himself out of 5 mutants and went straight towards the 2 that slipped by and fought there, he could possibly save more of the miners.


    Of course, that would have resulted in him getting possibly damaged by doing that and even facing those mutants as 1 versus 7.


    Because of that and the hate that felt towards the miners from him being undead, he decided on the safest method.


    The only nce that he spare to give towards the miners who were grieving at their now-deadrades was one of indifference.

 Chapter 279 Bountiful Harvest

    Naturally, for the sake of his mission Danzel wasn¡ät shy about sharing some clean cloth with the injured miners.


    At first, the miners were surprised at possessing a spatial storage ring even though he already used it to bring out his shield.


    And they were right to be surprised.


    As the spatial storage item were most of the time, illegal items that none other than those of the higher society could possess. And even they were limited to having their names written down in a list of all who possess such an item.


    Such items were the optimal tools for smuggling out resources after all.


    In the case where rare resources were to be found such as the highest quality mana crystal, it would end up as a disaster if it were to be stolen and brought to another kingdom.


    Of course, Danzel and all the other members of the Deathfull Skulls group had gained their authorization to use them in the Dynasty.


    Nevertheless, ignoring the stares from the miners, Danzel decided to move inside the mine to check all the other presences that he saw.


    The miners didin to him about leaving them alone while enemies could still lurk inside the mine.


    To theirints, Danzel decided topromise by giving them a minimal amount of safety.


    And that was by turning the dead miners and mutants into undead.


    Of course, he had to fix some of the corpses by using [Undead Reconstruction], but that took only a bit of his mana.


    The miners weren¡ät very happy with him, raising their colleagues as undead and turning the mutants into top-ss nightmare material.


    But what else could he do for those miners?


    He even found it funny how they cursed at him and prayed to be smitten by a goddess or something. Here he wants to go and potentially save your colleagues while providing them with some insurance.


    He didn¡ät even bother to argue with those people and left to find other mine.


    His undead was instructed to protect the miners and not to kill them. But he didn¡äty any orders that his undead was restricted on beating them halfway to dead.


    Of course, his thoughts were filled with his will, so the undead understand that they should show restraint.


    So if anyone was beaten up to that state, they had themself to me.


    Running across all the different pathways of the mines, Danzel managed to see many presences thanks to his [Eyes of the Damned] skill.


    And what he met there was as he expected, survivors.


    They were 5 dead miners on the ground withrge scratch wounds were 3 others were alive. The 3 of them were at first intimidated and scared of the dark knight who came, but after exining the situation they were relieved.


    That relief though didn¡ätst long as they saw the 5 miners turn into undead.


    They felt like those kids that asked if there was a monster under their bed and the mother would return to them that there wasn¡ät a monster under their bed. But as soon as their mother leaves their room and they check under their bed, expecting to find nothing.


    Theye to see a monster with several jaws staring at them back!


    To make it worse, the mother knew all along that there was something under the bed!


    Annoyed by those overreacting, he gave them a sort of exnation to follow the undead before going to find other survivors.


    And in a matter of 10 minutes, the whole mine was filled with echoes of miners screaming out of horror.


    s, Danzel managed to gather all the survivors into a single spot.


    If it wasn¡ät for him having to exin the situation to each group, he would even take half the time to find everyone.


    And the fact that he managed to find every surviving miner was thanks to his [Eyes of the Damned] to thanks.


    He was so satisfied with this skill, that he even decided to push the priority a step up.


    On the miner''s side, they were d to see other surviving miners meet up again. But at the same time, the new survivors brought another wave of sadness with the undead they were escorted by.


    Danzel though wasn¡ät there to see that scene.


    As he currently was standing near the mine entrance and observing the fight of the 4th-tier by using [Eyes of the Damned].


    Observing isn¡ät even the right term as he couldn¡ät probably observe what was happening. The lights that represented the presence of the 4th-tier were hazy and too fast for the skill to properly pick up their exact location.


    So all that Danzel could observe was wherever one party lost or not.


    After all, he didn¡ät want to go out and end up as a target for the 4th-tier!


    Sure, he was at the peak of 3rd-tiers.


    But after observing Agares cleaving several 3rd-tiers with a move he knew his ce on the food chain.


    Though in the early tiers the strength difference wasn¡ät as overwhelming. But the higher one went, the bigger the gap there will be between each tier.


    And the difference between a 3rd-tier and a 4th-tier was enormous.


    It was to a level where the former couldn¡ät hope to beat thetter.


    For that reason alone he waited till the two lights were extinguished.


    And soon enough, two lights disappeared with only two remaining.


    Going out of the mine, Danzel sighed mentally as he watched Agares with Shiro being the victorious ones. The pdin was also there, but he didn¡ät though much of him surviving.<sub> </sub>


    "Have you finished?" He said towards Agares.


    Once the pdin heard his voice, he turned around and stared daggers at Danzel.


    "Yeah, how about your side?" Agares said while putting Shiro down and rubbing her hood.


    Seeing Shiro giggling to her grandpa''s touch and not even a single wound on Agares himself, Danzel didn¡ät know if those 4th-tier they fought were too weak or Agares was too strong.


    "I have gathered all survivors and had my undead guard them for now. Sadly, some died by the enemy."


    Turning towards the pdin who was showing a hint of killing intent, Danzel pointed at the cave entrance.


    "You might want to go and treat some of the miners inside. Some might die from bloodlust any moment." Danzel said in an apathetic tone.


    Gritting his teeth, the pdin sheathed his sword to his scabbard.


    "I will remember you, Necromancer." The pdin said before dashing towards the mine.


    `I would rather not for you to remember me.¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    By his tone, it didn¡ät take a genius to figure out that the pdin deciphered him. As for the reason, Danzel''s guess was because of his necromancy.


    For him who uses holy magic, necromancy is probably an unforgivable sin. He also guessed that some of the corpses that he raised were probably his soldiers.


    `Even if he hates me, he shouldn¡ät be able to do anything about it.¡ä


    With him being a discipline of the Archmage who was helping in the war, if the Dynasty were to touch him they will risk losing Velkir, a powerful Archmage.


    `At least that should be the case...¡ä Danzel thought unsurely.


    Were Velkir would react or not was a mystery to him.


    And since he didn¡ät want to let his fate on other people, he had to think of the worst possible scenario.


    But considering the value of being a runesmith, Velkir wouldn¡ät want to lose him by something that could have been easily avoided, such as the hate of a lone, 4th-tier pdin.


    `Nevertheless, I will have to deal with it when ites in my way, there is something more important to check.¡ä He thought as he brought out his status window.


    `Status¡ä


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 100 [Max]


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.80]


    Health: 32 680/39 960


    Mana: 3500/6050


    Attribute points: 24


    Attributes: Strength: 729 (200) Agility: 1146(+300) Intelligence: 600 Endurance: 671 (200)


    Great Rune: [Great Rune of Undeath Existence]


    [...]


    [...]


    [XP: 8 300 300]


    Imminently after checking his status, Danzel couldn¡ät help but grin to himself.


    Staring at his current XP in the storage Danzel couldn¡ät help butugh quietly to himself.


    Unbeknownst to him, Agares and Shiro were staring at him as if he was a weirdo.


    But even if he knew, he wouldn¡ät care at all!


    Originally he only had a few hundred thousand in his storage.


    Even though the mutants and the magic caster gave him lots of XP for him to reach 1 000 000 XP.


    As of the other 7 300 300 XP that wasying on the bank, weren¡ät done by himself at all!


    `Now I can finally upgrade a good amount of my skill!¡ä He thought in joy


    Thinking of who the culprit for the sudden appearance of the XP was, he couldn¡ät help but be thankful for this person.


    `O Azrael, I knew that you will bring a bountiful harvest!`


    Without even realizing it, Danzel''s ethereal eyes gazed at Agares''s scythe sword and the corpses of the 4th-tier that Agares killed.

 Chapter 280 Spending Harvest

    Having killed their enemies and sessfully saved the miners, all they had to do was to wait for the Dynasty reinforcement to pick up the miners and transported them back.


    With their mission being to escort those miners together with the soldiers of the Dynasty, Danzel and Agares were forced to babysit the Dynasty soldiers till they reached safety.


    Those few hours were pure misery for Danzel.


    Having finally gained arge amount of XP, he couldn¡ät wait to hole up in his room and start upgrading all his skills. Though he could do it while walking, he feared the severe headache that is bound to beat mentally out of him.


    Not only that but the gaze that the pdin was giving him was more than an annoyance. If looks could kill someone, then Danzel would even be obliterated by now.


    Though the pdin couldn¡ät know of him being an undead thanks to the ring that Velkir gave him, he knew that the pdin despised him to his core.


    It wasn¡ät only because he was ring at him with intense killing intent, but once that man went to heal the miners, the first thing that he noticed was that his undead that was guarding the miners had been exterminated in almost an instant.


    Though he finds it a pity for his undead to end up like that, he didn¡ät go out of his way toin.


    Mostly because the pdin that killed his undead was of the 4th-tier.


    So for the rest of their mission, Danzel decided to stay quiet.


    Once they arrived at the base of the Dynasty, all that Danzel, Agares, and Shiro had to do were to wait for Velkir to pick them up.


    The second party to arrive here is the two dark elve siblings, with Vanessa ring at her brother Azrael as if he stole her pocket money.


    He didn¡ät know what happend between those two, but guessing based on their looks, Azrael had done something.


    As to what it was exactly he wasn¡ät interested enough to ask.


    As for Vanessa, once Shiro came to her, for a moment she forgotpletely of the fact that her brother deceiving her.


    Azrael of course, as a 4th-tier magic caster, saw through the moments of weakness of his sister and acted ordingly by walking to Danzel to start discussing the performance of the [Cursed Spear of Bloodthirster].


    A name that Danzel found a bit too excessive for a spear. Though he didn¡ät say that to Azrael.


    And with everyone discussing among themself, except Agares who was observing his granddaughter conversing with the dark elve.


    Several hours passed before Velkir and Sartan appeared to them.


    With everyone finishing their own mission, Velkir used his shy teleportation magic and transported them back to their base.


    As soon as Velkir teleported there, he vanished as quickly, saying that he will go experiment together with Azrael.


    Danzel briefly went to see Skull w, before going back to his room.


    Once there, he imminently brought out his status and looked at his total XP once more.


    [XP: 8 300 300]


    Once he saw the absurd amount of XP Danzel couldn¡ät help but get excited again and...feel regret.


    Bringing out one of the alchemic weapons with the [Rune of Harvest] and reading the description, he sighed.


    [Rune of Harvest: Average]: A imperfect version of a rune that was invented by a librarian who noted the purpose of the cursed items inside the said library. Because of his personality, the members of his race and one of the outsiders didn¡ät put any trust in him and put him to oversee the library''s items. Being the only one that took his work seriously and felt imprisoned by the ipetence of his "colleagues". One day though, when invasion struck his nation, he stepped up and annihted everyone by bringing a disaster that till this day ravenous a world. The oue of his action resulted in him bing his true self and oveing the threshold of mortality. The runes carved by the tool which he uses to reap the living steal their very own [Soul Essence] and give it to the runesmith itself to be transformed into [?#?#?: Experience Points] for the sole purpose to strengthen the runesmith. Those who had their own [Soul Essence] stolen in death are more likely to stay forever in the [?#?#?: Realm of the Dead]. The current efficiency of the rune is 70%.


    Danzel sigh of regret came from the fact of the rune being 70% efficient and not actually 100%.


    If the rune were 100% instead of 70%, then most likely the 7 000 000 XP that he earned would have been 10 000 000 XP!


    Just thinking of what his potential had lost made him extremely sad.


    s, he decided not toin as the XP was practically free given to him.


    Instead decided to put his focus on more pressing matters.


    And those were his skills!<sub> </sub>


    Without putting much thought into it, he went out and upgrade [Gale Mana de], [Armor Mana ting],[Vanguards Defense], and [Greater Sense Danger] into the 3rd-tier, or rather modification phase.


    Those options were the most obvious ones as they were still on the 2nd-tier skills and were rtively cheap considering his total XP amount.


    All 4 skills represented his fighting skills and out of all of them, [Gale Mana de] was his strongest tool against mid-long ranged enemies. He somewhat felt bad letting such skill rot in the 2nd-tier.


    `You four can finally receive your promotion and reach a new height¡ä He thought as several options appeared.


    First of all, he decided to choose the, [Dead Mana Affinity] together with [Soul Affinity] for the [Greater Sense Danger] skill to see if the route of those two skills continues to give good skills such as [Mortal Reminder].


    The result of thebination was the skill called [Existential Sense Danger].


    Not only did it improve slightly the previous effect that it had, but the skill would also warn him from unnatural dangers concerning his very existence, be it his body or soul.


    Overall, Danzel was satisfied with it even if the new effect was rather vague to say the less.


    Next to his list was the [Vanguards Defense].


    When the modification option came, Danzel decided to test the other option instead of the two affinities as he die a moment ago.


    And the end result was choosing [Dead Mana Affinity] and [Absorbtion].


    [Vanguards Defense] is a skill that let his arm move faster with a shield on his hand and absorbs the kic energy of the enemy''s blow just to send out a small amount of it back.


    For the sake of the skill of having an affinity, Danzel chose the [Dead Mana Affinity] as dead mana affected the material worldpared to [Soul Affinity].


    He could have chosen the [Overall Improvement] as his second choice, but in the end, he went out and picked [Absorbtion].


    What came out of those twobinations was a skill called [Undying Guard], which surprisingly changed the effect quite a bit.


    The main effect of improving one''s reflex and speed remained, but what changed was the second part of the skill. It now turned that the kic that was absorbed into one shield will in turn into dead mana to either heal an undead or recover one mana. The thorn-like effect waspletely removed and instead, a new way of healing appeared!


    It mentioned that the mana recovery effect was 5 times less effective that the healing effect.


    Overall, the skill turned out great.


    Since the absorption amount has increased, that also meant that his shield would get less damaged in the long run. And for him who most of the timecked a shield to pare with his long sword, that skill was a life saver.


    "Damn, I should even upgrade my skills much earlier..." Danzel scolded himself for holding himself down on gaining such amazing skills.


    But he didn¡ät regret it.


    Most of the time hecked pure strength that techniques.


    ? He knew that he would never be safe with him being a runesmith.


    Though now he was suffering from severe headaches from the newfound knowledge beating itself to his mind, he didn¡ät regret his choice.


    Taking a break for 5 minutes to recover from the pain of the headache, Danzel went out and saw the options for the [Armor Mana ting].


    For it, he also decided to go the same route as before for the same reason.


    He chose [Dead Mana Affinity] as it affects the material world more. For his second option, he chose the [Mana Resistance].


    The second choice, in particr, found Danzel extremely difficult to choose from as to how many great options they were to pick from.


    Be it choosing to make the mana tings [Tougher] or the interesting option of [Barrier] which he was most tempted to choose, Danzel had topromise with himself and choose the one that made the most sense.


    And that was none other than the [Mana Resistance] option.


    With mid-long distance being his overall weakness and having already experienced getting shot by spells more than he wanted to admit, Danzel wanted to fix one of his weaknesses with this choice.

 Chapter 281 Spending Harvest (2)

    What came out of thebination of [Armor Mana ting] was the skill [Armor of Vengeances].


    The main effect of the skill stayed as it is, butpared to wrapping his mana around the armor in the form of tings, it now used dead mana to do the exact same thing, which resulted in the mana armor being more resident against Death, Holy and Light magic.


    Other than Death magic, the other two were the natural weakness of all undead. It also improved the general effect by just a tiny bit.


    But the main difference came from the secondary effect of the skill. And the effect was where the armor could absorb a part of the enemy''s magical attack and then discharge around him in a shock wave that had a decay effect built-in.


    The [Mana Resistence] option did what Danzel hoped so. By absorbing a part of the magical attack, it meant that the spell that would hit him would contain much less power with an additional option to counterattack with the shock wave.


    Overall, he was satisfied.


    He thought that it would have been better for the absorption part to be much stronger than the shock wave itself, but the oue didn¡ät displease him at all.


    `I will have to try the shock wave to see before I judge the skill. But for now, I will give it the benefit of doubt.¡ä Danzel thought internally as he went to thest skill on his must-upgrade list.


    Raising his hand and upgrading [Gale Mana de] to its max level, the modification option showed up in front of him.


    For this skill, in particr, Danzel already knew which options he would pick.


    Like the other skills, they were some tempting options such as [Faster Travel], [Sharpness], [Multiple Waves] that would improve the skill power by a lot. But the ones that Danzel chose were [Dead Mana Affinity] and [Soul Affinity].


    Considering that the skill [Gale Mana de] was his main weapon against ranged enemies, Danzel aware of the danger that thisbination could potentially ruin his most reliable skill. And yet he still chose to pick thebination for the seer potential for doing that.


    As far as he knew, [Soul Affinity] dealt with ethereal effects that the material world couldn¡ät dare to fight against it. [Mortal Reminder] was a good example.


    Though he had to mark someone first for the effect to activate, once the effect activated, no matter who it was, the one unfortunate enough will suffer.


    Of course, the stronger ones were, the more resistant it would be against it, butpletely immune to the pain wasn¡ät possible. It didn¡ät even matter if one had a strong pain resistance, as [Mortal Reminder] attacked something other than one''s physical body.


    Danzel hoped for thebination to create an impossible-to-block attack!


    s, the more one hopes, the more disappointed one was fated to be.


    [Soul Reaping Wind]: shing through the wind, one soul shall be reaped. Using a shing weapon, one could cut down the wind and send out a sharp de that contains the attribute of death itself. The one hit by it will experience a part of their very own [Soul Essence] to be cut. Additionally, the wound created by such wind would bring forth a short yet strong decay in one''s body.


    "Sigh...I asked too much." Danzel sighed to himself as he read the effect of the skill.


    His wish of having an impossible-to-defend attack didn¡äte to being and what he got instead was the skill [Soul Reaping Wind. Which Danzel didn¡ät find too bad at all.


    Now whoever is misfortune enough to get hit by this, Danzel was sure that he wouldn¡ät like it. The decay part is inflicting more damage on an enemy while the [Soul Essence] cutting part also sounded quite painful.


    He didn¡ät know what it would feel like having one [Soul Essence] cut away, but considering the after-effects of the [Rune of Harvest], it was bound to be nasty for his enemies.


    "I guess I have another skill to experiment with." Danzel to himself as he opened his status to see his remaining XP.


    ...


    [XP: 4 760 300]


    "I knew that those 4 skills were on the more expensive side, but to think that I lost more than 3 000 000 XP." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    One had to remember that previously [Gale Mana de] was at Lv.3 and [Vanguards Defense] at Lv.5 respectively. So watching such an amount of XP disappearing in a matter of 10 minutes brought him more headaches than he needed.


    Just like before, he was forced to take a break so that he can calm down his mind before considering what he would do with the rest of his XP.<sub> </sub>


    "At the very least those 4 new skills will for now on being discounted, making my spending much more efficient. But considering that the higher the tier, the higher the cost of the skill...then I would need a mounted worth of XP to increase them at the 4th-tier..." Danzel thought in misery.


    `I am lucky to have the [Rune of Harvest] to bring me the XP. Otherwise gaining all the XP would either need my decades of work or mass genocide.¡äDanzel thought to himself.


    Shaking his head to forget about his future expenses, Danzel looked right ahead towards his status window and considered his avable option.


    And those weren¡ät that many.


    He obviously didn¡ät n to increase the level of his sub-ss as he didn¡ät even manage to bring a [Epic] rune in the [Good] grade. Heck, he didn¡ät even start learning the new [Great Rune]¡äs.


    By now he was released that runesmithing wasn¡ät supposed to be rushed. It was an art that required one pacient and unwilling will to give in the chase for a better rune grade. He also considered that he might have rushed his way towards the [Epic] runes.


    Though practice makes perfect to some extent, the lower rating runes such though him the basics of rune carving. He also considered buying more [Rare] runes to expand his knowledge before going to the harder runes.


    But considering the power of [Epic] runes and the still unknown effect of [Great Rune]¡äs, it wasn¡ät very tempting.


    His next option on where to spend his XP was his main ss, [ck Guard] which finds itself at level 1.


    Deciding to upgrade his ss would have obvious effects, those mainly being his attribute increasing by a whole lot. And since it was at Lv. 1, the first levels would be quite cheap so it wouldn¡ät be a bad choice at all.


    There was also the possibility of unlocking another patch of new skills to learn, which could have an incredible effect.


    The option was tempting, but in the end, Danzel decided to push the level increasing of his ss in the oing future.


    Such a decision had several reasons, but the main reason for it was because he was already considered at the very peak of the 3rd-tierbatants.


    As far as he knew, they were only a very small amount of people who could actually face him equally and have the same tier as him. So increasing his attribute anymore would be overkill.


    Not to forget that currently, he didn¡ät know his body''s current limit.


    If he were to increase his sses to the point where his body will reach the limit of strength, then Danzel was afraid that he would self-destruct himself wherever he used [Sin of Wrath].


    Though that was only considering the worst possible scenario and that it was unlikely to ever happen.


    But the fact that it was overkill still stayed valid.


    He had also once asked Velkir if it was possible for him to reach the 4th-tier while still remaining as a Wight. And his answer was that it was impossible.


    At best he would reach the lowest of the low of 4th-tierbatants.


    An amazing feat, but nheless, Danzel knew that obtaining the true strength of a 4th-tier required him to evolve into a [Death Knight].


    So where he decided to spend his remaining XP was on his remaining skills.


    Following his very own priority list, the list he chose were [Cursed de], [Death st], [Death Influnce] and [Restore Death], and [Rune Erasure] and he chose to respectively level them up to level 9 instead to the max to reach the modification stage.


    The sole reason for doing such was because those 4 skills were still of the 1st-tier.


    If he were to upgrade them to reach the 2nd-tier, then Danzel thought it would be better to first see the advantages of the new skills before going into the modification.


    He was afraid that if he hasted his decision, he wouldn¡ät be able to see the full potential of the skill and because of hisck of knowledge, choice the wrongbination for the respective skills.


    With those though in his mind, Danzel went right ahead and upgraded the 5 skills to the 2nd-tier.

 Chapter 282 Spending Harvest (3)

    Lucky for him, 4 out of 5 skills he chose were of the death attribute, making his purchase much cheaper than it was originally supposed to cost.


    That alone made the gruesome headache in his mind much less painful for him.


    Putting his back on the wall of his room, Danzel nced aimlessly at the ceiling slightly mentally exhausted from the bunch of information that he received the following past half hour.


    And as an undead, such a feeling was somewhat alien to him, making the experience all the worse.


    Except for his sense of touch, hearing, and being capable to see, the undead who were of a skeleton body type couldn¡ät feel anything else. Even his sense of touch was only limited to judging the weight of something.


    He could feel no warmth nor cold after all. Neither feel physical pain nor get sick.


    In fact, Danzel to this day didn¡ät fully understand the feeling of cold even after being literally frozen entirely. As for warmth, he knew how it felt and that was only because his mana, which kept his body from moving was used in a way that extended his own limitations.


    Nevertheless, his feeling sick from the headache was something that he couldn¡ät quite get used to.


    "Ugh~ it seems Azrael harvest onlysted me so long, huh?" Danzel mumbled to himself before gazing at all the new skills.


    [Cursed de] ------> [Cursed Wounds de]


    [Death st] ------> [Greater Death st]


    [Death Influnce] ------>[One with Death]


    [Restore Death] ------>[Restore Undying Body]


    [Rune Erasure] ------>[Rune Removal]


    Going around and reading each one of the descriptions, Danzel wasn¡ät really amazed.


    The improvement of the skills was in simple terms, an upgrade of their previous version.


    [Cursed Wounds de] just like the previous version, engulfed his sword in a constant wave of dead mana, and whoever got cut by his sword while the dead mana was on, the wound will start to decay and made healing the wound all the more difficult. The upgrade improved the spreading effect of the decay, the eleration of the effect taking ce, and made the effect of weakening healing much stronger.


    This case was also for the [Greater Death st] as it only improved the previous effect except for the part where the spell had also got an acid sort of effect.


    Previously it will only decay one''s body, now it could melt even flesh.


    Though Danzel found it still kinda weak based on the firepower alone, he wasn¡ätpletely dissatisfied by the spell.


    But the same couldn¡ät be said for the now [One with Death] passive skill.


    Previously his lesser version of the skill [Death Influnce] improved natural regeneration by 25% and the guidance and quality of his dead mana improved by a total of 5%.


    Which was no different than improving all his death-natured skills by a small bit. Considering that the skill was the most expensive out of them all, the skill only improved his dead mana mastery by another 5%, making it of total 10% while improving the natural regeneration to 75%.


    Additionally, the skill improved his mana regeneration by a total of 20%,


    What Danzel liked most about this skill was obviously the 10% of dead mastery.


    Previously he liked the natural regeneration of the skill, but since he already has a spell that he can heal himself with, he saw the 50% improvement as nothing special.


    Considering how many death skills he now had, an additional 10% was considered quite good in his book.


    As for the 20% mana regeneration, it was quite handy to have but wasn¡ät in his opinion an impressive addition to the skill.


    Just the fact that his other skills improved by upgrading this one was enough for Danzel.


    As for the other two skills, there wasn¡ät much of a change in them.


    [Restore Undying Body] healing effect on the undead had improved by a lot and additionally, he could now cast this spell by distance, potentially healing one of his undead if he wished to do so.


    [Rune Removal] was the one with the less amount of change as it only showed an overall improvement.


    If he now wished to remove a rune without damaging the item that the rune was carved to, he now could do such if the rune was carved in a green area, where it represented the easiest spot.


    Not particrly useful as of now, but Danzel guessed that if he pushed this skill at the 4th-tier, he could then maybe perfectly remove a rune from an item.


    "Still, upgrading a skill towards the 4th-tier that isn¡ätbat-oriented might be a waste, considering how many runes I have that are worthy enough to be put in items." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Sure, he would very much hope to remove the current rune in his sword and rece it with his newest rune.


    He knew that this skill was a must to have if he wanted to upgrade his equipment with high-quality runes.


    His current armor and sword were of incredible quality, there was no doubt about it.


    The fact that his armor stillsted this long and his long sword were as sharp as when he got it, but Danzel still doubted that this willst in the future when he had to y thousands.<sub> </sub>


    "If only the [Rune of Harvest] was of a better grade, I would even be able to continue my spending spree, but it seems like I exhausted my XP." Danzel sighed as he opened his status window.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 100 [Max]


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 1]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.80]


    Health: 25 410/25 410


    Mana: 5350/6050


    Attribute points: 24


    Attributes: Strength: 529 Agility: 846 Intelligence: 600 Endurance: 471


    Great Rune: [Great Rune of Undeath Existence]


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Concioness] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery]


    Skills: [Death Guarding Swordsmanship Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [High Jump Lv.1] [Presentless Steps Lv.1][Soul of Death Essence Lv.1] [Swift Movements Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Soul Reaping Wind Lv.1] [Existential Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Mortal Reminder Lv. 1] [Hand of Mana Affinity Lv.9] [Undying Guard Lv.1] [Armor of Vengeances Lv.1] [Cursed Wounds de Lv.9] [One with Death Lv.9] [Coating Miasma Lv.1] [Curse of Scourge Lv.1] [Greater Raise Undead Lv.1] [Undead Reconstruction Lv.1] [Eyes of the Damned Lv.1] [Greater Death st Lv.9] [Restore Undying Body Lv.9] [Rune Removal Lv.9]


    ...


    [XP: 40 300]


    "Mhm, it isn¡ät bad at all. Though some less important skills are still in need of an upgrade, for the most part, I improved my main abilities by a lot." Danzel said while standing up and crossing his hands while looking at his remaining attributes points.


    Without putting much thought, Danzel imminently invested them at his strength, turning the 529 to 553.


    Internally Danzel found it funny how as a [ck Guard] who specializes in necromancy and being a vanguard, his highest stat was his agility instead of either strength or endurance.


    Of course, the reason for his absurd amount of agilityy in him upgrading his sub-ss and not his main ss.


    With his new skills, Danzel thought of investing some attribute points towards endurance in the future, instead of either strength or agility.


    As he now had many recovery options, he put this thought into consideration for the future.


    His main goal was to have both agility and strength at an equal amount while having enough endurance.


    He waspletely written off for improving his intelligence.


    Although improving one''s mind efficiency was tempting, Danzel constantly overflowed with mana. Making it seem like a waste to increase his mana pool when in the first ce he couldn¡ät even get spend all of his mana, to begin with.


    "Mhm, maybe I should increase my [ck Guard] level just to be on the safer side, but then again they are still the curses to upgrade, and [Hand of Mana Affinity] are just 1 level away from reaching the 3rd-tier. I haven¡ät used it as muchtely, but the fact that it¡äs an incredible skill remains." Danzel said as he stared at his XP storage, wishing for it to be filled once more.


    s, a undead doesn¡ät get to have everything that they wish for.


    Closing his status window, the first thing he did was test all his new skills.


    Drawing his sword out and guiding his mana towards the sword in a way that his affinity remains on the sword, it looked dark green, and the almost etherael-like aura was escaping from his sword.


    He would have hoped to swing his sword to test the [Soul Reaping Wind] skill, but doing that would result in damaging the room so he refrained from doing as such.


    Next, he tests both [Undying Guard] and [Armor of Vengeances]. While his armor was surrounded with dead mana like a secondyer, his shield had a simr visual effect.


    He couldn¡ät exactly test his [Existential Sense Danger] as it was a passive effect, so he let it slide before continuing with the other skills.


    With a single thought, his sword was engulfed with fierce dead mana that was seeking to bring forth decay upon the living.


    With only a remaining skill to test, Danzel started concentrating on his spell.


    Taking a few seconds, the spell [Greater Death st] was manifested in the form of three muchrger balls of dead mana. Now the three balls of dead mana looked as if it was a liquid that burned in dark mes.


    Of course, those dark mes weren¡ät chaos magic, but a visualparison by the dead mana wavering through the air like mes.


    Slightly surprised by his new spell, Danzel couldn¡ät help but grin to himself.


    "I wonder what Velkir would think from this."

 Chapter 283 Shield For Contracts

    As eager as Danzel was to test all his new skills and see how powerful each of them was, not a single opportunity came.


    His first thought was to ask Agares for a spar, but he quickly removed that thought from his mind.


    The reason for it was simple.


    Agares was just too strong.


    What he wanted to test were the effects of each skill on a person and not seeing all his skills being blocked.


    He wanted to observe how the decay of [Cursed Wounds de] was improvend. How the skill [Soul Reaping Wind] would affect one''s body and all his other skills.


    If he really sparred with Agares, at most he would see how [Undying Guard] and [Armor of Vengeances] work, but not actually the potential of the skill.


    It wasn¡ät like he could ask anyone in the group to let him injure them.


    He considered asking the high troll Sartan to be his sandbag, but that thought was quickly dismissed for several reasons.


    The most important ones were that he basically didn¡ät know Sartan well enough and that he wasn¡ät too sure how he would react to having a part of his [Soul Essence] cut.


    After considering his options, Danzel could only sigh internally and wait until the mission woulde for him to test his skills.


    Unfortunately though, after a day passing, no such news came to Danzel''s disappointment.


    Without having anything else to do, as usual, he buried himself in work for several days.


    Be it trying to improve the [Rune of Harvest] to the [Good] rating, going through the notes of his previous magic lesson with Velkir, or understanding the book of Nersan¡ärah. Danzel had enough stuff to keep himself busy.


    Wherever he got bored with one of those works, he would simply take a break and start with some other work till he also got bored of that so that the endless circle could continue.


    In a way, Danzel reached the peak of workaholism.


    If he weren¡ät doing something, he would subconsciously remember the times inside the cave of the cursedke. The ce where he first woke up.


    Before he even received his [Undead Warrior] ss and the option to gain XP from training was avable to him, Danzel had nothing to do 24/7 other that scavenging the trash of goblins and walking aimlessly in the cave to pass his time.


    Further outside the world, Danzel was forced to keep himself hidden and work.


    As he gained benefits from doing that, he found it quite rewarding and enjoyable, and in a way, with his work being his only pass time, it wasn¡ät a surprise for his work to be his hobby.


    Except for the few times he went out from his room to check on Skull w, Danzel for the past weak continued working.


    After the third day of having his skills upgraded, Velkir paid him a visit in his room and requested lots of runed contracts from him.


    Till this point Danzel was only further refining his own techniques, Danzel didn¡ät mind following Velkir¡äs request.


    Obviously, Danzel wasn¡ät a fool to just make the rune contracts for free. He and Velkir made a deal, after all, to bepensated for his work. Though the magic lesson was of incredible value to Danzel, it wasn¡ät that worth it if one considered the value of such contracts.


    For better or worse, they could be used to detect one''s lies.


    Velkir of course knew the value for the runed contracts too and he was quite lenient in hearing his request.


    As for what Danzel''s request was, there was only one thing that came to his mind.


    And that was a shield that enchants the effects of abilities that use dead mana.


    With currently being equipped with several death-natured skills, being equipped with practically a holy shield that was even damaged was quite foolish.


    At first, Danzel had requested the premium package of having his shield made of material that enchants death-natured abilities naturally and on top of that having a few enchantments that Velkir could offer.


    When Velkir heard his request, he couldn¡ät help butugh at the Wight¡äs shamelessness and rejected the offer.


    After a few backs and forths, the deal ended up being with Danzel providing Velkir over 150 rune contracts in return for a high-quality shield for his purposes, but without any of the enchantments, he requested.


    Here found theck of information extremely frustrating.


    Danzel knew that both mana crystals and enchantments were extremely expensive, but that was about it.


    He didn¡ät know the actual value of such enchantments or what materials they needed. So if Velkir decided to overexaggerate the value of the enchantments that he request, he wouldn¡ät be able to know.


    Gritting his teeth, Danzel epted Velkir¡äs offer with the idea that he would enchant his shield in future their future transaction.


    Velkir seemed to hesitate for a brief moment, but in the end, he still epted.


    And for the past two weeks, Danzel''s focusy on carving the [Rune of Uzal] in the piece of paper that Velkir provided for him.


    Thanks to already having a few of those runed contracts in his storage ring, he managed to finish them in those two weeks.


    ...


    "Finally finished..." Danzel sighed out loud before leaving his room.


    "It will be a while for now before I touch the [Rune of Uzal] again, though I gained some XP by doing this, I fell behind in my other studies." Danzel said as he headed towards Velkir room.


    `I wonder for what Velkir needs all those contracts for.¡ä


    Walking down the stairs, the first thing that he noticed was an almost silent grunting from Velkir''s room.


    `Is he going through an experiment?¡ä Danzel wondered.<sub> </sub>


    Entering Velkir''s room, the first thing that he took notice of was that Agares and Shiro were also in the room and they were gathered around the table.


    More specifically, Shiro was sitting on top of the table and had the top of her exotic clothing removed with a white bandage bound around her chest.


    As she was facing the other way, Danzel couldn¡ät see her face except for her white hair and pale white skin.


    But the most notable thing was the dark red veins that spread behind her back.


    Based on Agare''s bitter look towards his granddaughter, Danzel knew that he came in a bad time and decided to leave ande backter.


    But Velkir stopped him in his tracks.


    "Danzel, did youe to deliver the items that I asked you to make?"


    "...Yes, that¡äs indeed the case." He answered as he stayed at the door, not sure if he was supposed to leave or not.


    "Wait a second." Velkir said before touching the dark red veins in Shiro¡äs back.


    p "Agh...!"</anda>


    Ignoring Shiro¡äs grunt of pain, Velkir''s palm lighten up and surrounded their back of Shiro in blue light.


    The more the light was around Shiro¡äs back, the faster the dark red veins shrunk back until theypletely disappeared.


    "That should do it for now. Agares, you can dress up Shiro." Velkir said with his cold voice.


    With an aggravated face, Agares nodded and took Shiro into his arm before putting her to the ground and dressing her up.


    Ignoring those two, Velkir walked towards Danzel.


    Seeing that, Danzel brought out the over 150 runed contracts in two boxes.


    Taking a look at the boxes, with a wave of his hand, Velkir made the boxes float towards the table where Shiro was sitting before.


    "The shield that you requested will take a bit more time to be finished. If everything goes right, it would take me another 2 to 3 weeks for your requested item to finish. I hope you don¡ät mind."


    Danzel in response only shrugged his shoulders.


    Even if he were toin, nothing will change.


    "As long it arrives in my hands within a reasonable time, I don¡ät mind." Danzel said before turning around to go to his room as he had no further business with Velkir.


    "You two, tomorrow morning we will have another lesson here in my room, don¡ät forget it." Velkir said towards the three of them before putting his focus on the runed contracts.


    Danzel and Agares simply nodded before heading to their respective rooms.


    Taking a quick nce at the duo out of pure curiosity, Danzel noticed something different about Shiro who was carried by Agares.


    The first thing that he took notice of was that Shiro herself seemed a few inches taller and her nails had grown for 5cm more.


    `It has only been 2 weeks and she grew so much? I guess the fact that mortal children grow faster is true.¡ä Danzel thought to himself, before dismissing such thoughts from his mind.


    He had lots of stuff that needed to be done and much stuff to learn.


    ***


    At the same time in Velkir¡äs room.


    Seeing that the group of three left his room, Velkir took a nce at the runed contracts before putting them in his spatial ring.


    "A total of 156 contracts. One too many ording to our deal." Velkir mumbled to himself before tapping his staff to the ground.


    "[All Seeing Istion], [False Decoy], [Banshee Whisper], [Mana Cloud], [Illusive Mind Barrier], [Watcher of the Dead]."


    In a matter of just 2 seconds, Velkir cast a total of 6 spells topletely iste his room.


    Bringing amunication device out of his storage ring, Velkir gripped it and activated it.


    With a small glow escaping from the device, Velkir''s mouth behind the ragged bandages opened.


    "Enable the array. I aming" Velkir said in his cold voice.


    Waiting for a few seconds, Velkir felt an ethereal connection going through the amulets that he was wearing.


    Gripping the amulet in his hands, the ground beneath him gradually became a ck liquid, if Danzel saw the ck liquid, he would had know that it wasn¡ät the same as the liquid that the realm of the dead is filled with.


    Once the ck liquid was 2 meters wide, Velkir¡äs body started to sink in the liquid beforepletely disappearing from his room.


    The location where Velkir the Lich appeared was inside a particr mansion.


    In the room where Velkir came out, a man wearing the clothes of a noble was waiting for him on the couch.


    "Wee, Veleron."


    The noble greeting Velkir was one of the many nobles that represented the Dynasty of Ioratal.

 Chapter 284 For Their Sake...

    Staring at the noble who had a leisurely look on his face, Velkir walked towards the couch and brought out a whole box containing Danzel contracts to the table.


    "I don¡ät remember granting you permission to use my second name, your highness." Velkir said with his cold voice as he seated apposite to the noble.


    Reaching his hand, the noble took browsed through one contracts runes with interest.


    "Is that so? As far as I remember you told me to call you Veleron. Isn¡ät it just you that forgot it? After all, you are aware of what kind of condition the likes of us suffer."


    "..."


    With their silence of them resuming, the noble put the runed contract away and stared at Velkir in surprise.


    "Those are awesome, Veleron! I have heard some rumors of a runesmith appearing in the arcana kingdom, but since I was in Ioratal, I couldn¡ät confirm it. But to think that the famous "Forced Contract" does exist..." the noble said while ncing at Velkir as if waiting for an exnation.


    "You better put does into some good use, the merchants of the union seem like to no longer produce them. Even getting all of those was hard and most of all, expensive." Velkir said while hinting at the word expensive.


    Seeing through the hidden meaning of Velkir¡äs words, the noble looked away.


    "Tch-here you go." The noble said before throwing a small bag into the table.


    Though the bag seemed small, in actuality it was a spatial storage device that contained much more than its size presented.


    "For a second, I forgot how shameless you were behind that flesh mask of yours."


    Ignoring the noble''s words, Velkir took the small bag and put it away inside his robe.


    "How are the other 3 doing? Did any newse from the council?" Velkir said.


    "You should know that nothing changed. They are looking for opportunities, but the king is always on high alert with every noble to the point where he the spear of Ioratal to be his bodyguard 24/7."


    "As about the council...you should know best that except that one faction, the other two factions stay to themself. Of course, some of our guys will eventuallye out to refill their resources." The noble said with azy tone.


    "So no changes, huh?" Velkir said as he stood and turned his way towards the array where the dark liquid came out.


    "Huh? Are you already leaving? But you just came..."


    "If there is nothing else that you need my presence, then yes. I still have some stuff to prepare." Velkir said as he tapped his staff on the array, making it spew out the dark liquid and sink inside of it.


    "Nheless, I wouldn¡ät want to waste the precious time of your highness."


    Were Velkir''sst words before disappearing.


    Being left alone in his room, the noble stood up and made the box filled with runed contracts disappear.


    "Tch~, making fun of me when I got the short end of the stick. At leastpared to the other 3, Veleron seems more reliable." The noble said before going to leave his room.


    Reaching out to draw the handle, he halted his steps as he looked at his hand which was bleeding.


    "Oh...it seems that I got too worked up with the contracts." The noble said while looking at the cuts on his finger and the tip of his finger where his bones wereing out.


    In the next moment, his injured was engulfed with dead mana.


    Once the dead mana vanished, his hand was as good as new.


    "I put too much time and effort into improving the status as an illegitimate child of the king. Ruining my cover from a careless mistake of mine would undoubtfully be not funny."


    Once he opened the door and walked out with a maid following behind him, he suddenly halted his steps as he remember something.


    `Ah, I even forgot to ask Veleron about his two new apprentices.¡ä


    "My lord, is something bothering you?" The maid asked with a corned look on her face.


    Gazing at the maid for a brief moment with a cold look, the next moment he showed a bright smile.


    "No, I just remember something." The noble said before continuing walking.


    `I will just ask him the next time we meet.¡ä


    ****


    The next day, in Velkir room.


    Just like yesterday, the duo of Agares and Shiro were there together with the two undead of the whole group.


    Agares was observing from the side as always while Velkir was teaching them about magic theory with a book in one of his arms.<sub> </sub>


    Of course, the ones he taught were Shiro and Danzel.


    "That will be all for today." Velkir said while zing at Danzel,


    Remembering the magic that he showed him, he would be lying if he said that he wasn¡ät surprised.


    `I understand that he is of the 3rd-tier, but improving a 1st-tier spell that he was taught not long ago is a thing that only genius can do.¡ä Velkir thought internally.


    As a Lich that lived for centuries long, Velkir of course met without countless genius that had talent in magic.


    And it was because of that very reason why he was confused by Danzel''s quick progress. Because Velkir knew that Danzel was no genius nor a talent thates every 1000 years.


    If he had to describe Danzel purely out of his talent, then Velkir would rank it above average, but not to the level of genius.


    `Does his progresse from the inheritance of his old body? If that¡äs the case, then that could exin as he is a [Wight], but that seems unlikely...¡ä


    Velkir''s guess was that the corpse that became the now [Rue Danzel] was someone unordinary. As Undead who were naturally born from dead mana tent to inherit the skills of the corpse, they were before.


    If someone of the 4th-tier were to be cast in a dead mana-infested area for dozen years, the possibility of turning into undead with special skills was all the more likely.


    But considering that Danzel''s main weapon was a sword and not magic, Velkir was unsure if that was the case.


    An archmage is more likely to turn into a [Skeleton Mage] or a [Lesser Lich] than of a warrior after all.


    `Hmm...I will have to make sure.¡ä Velkir thought to himself.


    "Danzel, tomorrow at the same time we will have another lesson together with you undead dog. I will turn her into the next tier as I once said."


    Suprised by this announcement, Danzel slowly nodded his head as a certain thought appear in his mind.


    `Skull w should be able to pass through the door...right?¡ä


    Seeing him nod his head, Velkir''s attention went towards the excited Shiro.


    "Shiro, this time around you wouldn¡ät able to take part in tomorrow''s lesson. Study what I taught today and train under Agare''s supervision." Velkir said with his cold voice before putting the book on the table.


    Shiro in turn, her bright full expression of a second ago disappeared into thin air as if she was soken in ice-cold water.


    "Master Velkir! Why can this guy take your lesson and not Shiro!? This is unfair!" Shiro said as he pointed at Danzel.


    Without even ncing at Shiro, Velkir answered.


    "The reason why you won¡ät take part in tomorrow''s lesson is simple I will be teaching about the school of necromancy. It¡äs magic that defiles the living and raises the dead to the undead. If you are interested in learning this sort of magic, I don¡ät mind teaching you, but the one who you have to convince isn¡ät me but Agares."


    Hearing that, Shiro turned her head towards Agares as if she regained her vigor of before.


    "Grandpa, can I-"


    But before she could even finish, Agares''s harsch voice echoed through the room.


    "Velkir! Stop arousing my granddaughter''s curiosity about your vile magic!" Agares jelled as he turned his head towards Shiro.


    Shiro who saw her grandpa''s face froze for a split second.


    Her grandpa that always showed her a gentle and concerned full look at her was nowhere to be seen. What she saw was her Grandpa''s scary face that she had only shown her three times.


    Getting on his knees, Agares grabbed Shiro''s shoulders lightly and made sure that their eyes met each other.


    "Shiro, my dear, please cast the thought of learning such magic away." Agares said without leaving any room for negotiation.


    "I know better than anyone else of your love for magic Shiro. You can also be considered to be a genius in the subject of magic. But for this reason, alone I cannot allow you to learn such magic."


    "If you were to learn such magic, everyone will despise you. treat you as a monster that needs to be killed. But most importantly, such magic will change who you are for the worse."


    Hearing what her grandpa just said, Shiro couldn¡ät help but nce at Danzel and Velkir for a brief moment before turning and ncing at her grandpa.


    Unsure what to say or do with his serious look cast on her.


    "So...Shiro, please. Promise me, that you wouldn¡ät learn such magic ever. I...won¡ät like to see you such magic." Agares said before slightly increasing his grip on Shiro''s shoulder.


    "For the sake of your parents...please give up on learning necromancy."

 Chapter 285 Ritual

    Seeing how serious her grandfather was, Shiro couldn¡ät bring herself to go against his plea.


    "Alright, Shiro will do as grandpa says." She said while lowering her gaze to the ground.


    She knew that her grandpa was asking her to forget about necromancy for her own good based on how serious he was, but that was it.


    She did understand what necromancy was capable of as she still remembered the day when she and her grandpa met Danzel.


    The memory of the dark knightmanding corpses was still vivid in her mind. Though most of the time she didn¡ät treat Danzel seriously, she still remembered the bloodlust that he and his undead were letting out.


    To her necromancy was indeed scary, but the people she knew that wielded such much weren¡ät like her grandpa described.


    ording to her grandfather, Velkir was their savior which saved both her and her grandfather at the bricks of death. He was even willing to help her with her condition while also teaching her magic.


    As for Danzel, he took care of the thieves that they nned to take care of.


    Nheless, she still remembered the delicious fish that he gave her.


    To her, Velkir and Danzel were scary but weren¡ät necessarily bad people as her grandfather described as.


    So she was confused by her¡äs grandfathers words as they contradict what she believed.


    Of course, if either Danzel or Velkir would hear her thoughts, then they wouldn¡ät be able to keep theirughs to themselves.


    Shiro without a doubt had an excellent mind and talent for magic, but that doesn¡ät change the fact that in the end, she was nothing more than a naive child.


    It was a limit that was set for every living being that without enough time passing, was impossible to cross.


    In fact, she could be considered on the more mature sidepared to the children of her vige of the same age as hers.


    Being forced to leave their homnd, while escaping with her grandfather to the outside world and seeing many people dying by her¡äs grandfathers sword, she would naturally grow more mature.


    But there was a limit.


    Agares in turn who heard Shiro¡äs answer sighed out loud in relief, but from the inside, he was slightly worried for Shiro going on the wrong path.


    He could sort of guess what Shiro was thinking about and for that reason alone it worried him from the inside.


    Picking her in his arms and hugging her, he said.


    "You will understand in the future, Shiro. Till then, please focus on other schools of magic. I bet Velkir would be willing to teach you another school that you haven¡ät learned, right? Master Velkir." Agares said with the voice of the friendly grandpa next door.


    At the same time, his eyes red at Velkir with a murderous look while the iris of his eyes became sharper and vertical.


    Seeing that, Velkir frowned while ring directly at Agares eyes.


    "Tch~she cane the day after tomorrow to have a lesson. Now all of you scram!"


    Kicking the three out of his room, Danzel parted way with Agares and Shiro and went towards his room.


    ***


    On the next day...


    Tracing his finger on the runes in one of his alchemic swords, Danzel put the sword to the ground while looking at it.


    "Hmm, the skill [Rune Removal] does seem to work just fine. I also don¡ät see any further damage to the sword. Hmm~let''s call it a sess for now." Danzel mumbled as he put the sword into his storage ring and brought out a list.


    "Let''s see what I wrote here...I could trybining the poison sticking rune together with the liquid control part of [Rune of Thirst] to achieve that effect. But then again, I still have the [Rune of Harvest] to bring on the [Good] rating to see how much XP I gain. I could also try and learn the spell that Velkir~"


    Looking through his to-do list, Danzel wasn¡ät too sure what to start a project of his to start. He had countlessbinations that he had written and many other tasks that he wanted to progress. One of them being of course to achieve the [Good] rating on the [Rune of Harvest].


    While he was searching for what to do, on the side of his sight, he saw the time in the [Sun Timer] and sighted to himself.


    "Sigh~it seems like I will have to push all those things forter."


    Taking his magic pen and writing something on his list, Danzel couldn¡ät help but look at his worn-out magic pen.


    "Though the enchantment of it still works, I guess after 3 years, it is close to breaking." Danzel said as he shook his head.


    Putting the few magic items that he had back in his storage ring, he left his room and went outside the stone base.


    What he saw outside was Skull wying down to its belly (she no longer has flesh) and staring aimlessly through the distance.


    People who would see her will get the impression of the undead being always on high alert and looking at the surroundings. But all that Danzel saw was Skull w lookingzily around as if trying to find something to lift her from her boredom.


    "Skull w! I thought I told you to keep guard!" Danzel yelled seemingly angry, but in truth, he wasn¡ät.


    Skull w in turn turned a deaf ear (she doesn¡ät have ears) to his harsh words and instead rose up and walked towards Danzel with exciting steps to see her liege again.


    "Alright, calm down, I didn¡äte here to y with you today." Danzel said while rubbing the skull of Skull w.


    If Danzel had to describe the rtionship with Skull w, then it would be quiteplicated.<sub> </sub>


    In essence, he saw his own undead creation as nothing more than soldiers who will uphold and follow his everymand. But Skull w wasn¡ät only the undead who stayed by far the longest to his side, but Skull w gained a limited free well of some sort.


    Danzel could feel the connection there, with him being the master and Skull w being his obedient soldier, but something from her was different from all his other undead.


    For Danzel personally, Skull w was nothing more than a level below of pet position. Something interesting but not something that he was obsessed with.


    Of course, Skull w waspletely oblivious of her¡äs liege harsh thoughts and was also unsure of the reason for hers liege visit if it wasn¡ät for ying.


    "Gwuggh?" She turned her head as if asking what he meant.


    "Mhm, for now, follow me in the house and we will see if we can make you stronger." Danzel said before turning around and walking towards the house.


    Skull w who picked up the lines of her liege, she immediately became excited and walked behind Danzel.


    She had some difficulties entering the door, but after a few tries of squshing herself in, she managed for the first time when she arrived in the forest to enter the house!


    Danzel who watched Skull w opening and closing her mouth decided to ignore such behavior before walking down the stairs towards Velkir¡äs room.


    It didn¡ät even take them a minute for them to arrive at Velkir¡äs room.


    "Master Velkir, I came together with Skull w as you even told me." Danzel said before entering Velkir¡äs room.


    The first thing that Danzel noticed was that the table of yesterday had now disappeared and in its ce was a huge magic array on the ground.


    "Come on in together with you undead, Danzel." Velkir said while he was staring at one book with a tree cover.


    Following his instruction, Danzel brought Skull w in and walked closed to the magic array on the ground.


    *Boug~


    Closing his book, Velkir walked towards Danzel.


    "It seems that you even noticed the array. Though the correct term would be more of a ritual rather than an array." Velkir said while bringing out his staff and pointing it towards the three holes of the ritual.


    "The ritual that we will be using today has the aim to turn an undead into a higher tier undead without the current owner losing its subordinate towards the one who raised the undead."


    "In the middle is the ce where you undead has to stay, while we two have to stay on the much smaller circles." Velkir said while pointing at the respective circles.


    "Usually, the ritual only requires one undead and the master to activate the ritual. But in your case, you aren¡ät skilled enough to pull the ritual off. At least not yet." Velkir said while standing in his circle.


    Hearing Velkir''s exnation Danzel looked at his own circle confused.


    "If that¡äs the case, then what¡äs the point of me being in the circle? Are you simply going to transfer the subordinate after doing all the work?"


    "No, for the ritual to work, I will have to use your own mana to improve your¡äs undead. As using my mana would overwrite who the master is." Velkir said


    "Also a warning before we begin, in the case where your mana is inefficient or not enough for your undead to be of a higher tier, then the ritual will be deemed iplete and the subject that wasn¡ät able to evolve will perish. If you are fine with such risk, then we can start."


    Hearing this, Danzel silently stared at the ritual beneath him.


    Bending his knees and touching the ritual with his hand, Danzel brought out the description of the ritual.


    "..."


    Seeing that there was nothing wrong with the ritual and it wouldn¡ät bring him harm Danzel was relieved. But what he found in the description made him look at Velkir suspiciously.


    The ritual was called [Modified 24: Death Worth Servant Ritual] and the ritual did exactly as Velkir just said, except for letting this part.


    [Modified 24: Death Worth Servant Ritual]: ....If the subject isn¡ät capable of achieving an improvement, its mortal body perishes. The ones who were leading the ritual will be able to see thest moments of how the body of the second party died. The ritual works only if every party is an undead.


    Danzel didn¡ät know why Velkir hid the second part of the ritual and honestly, he wasn¡ät too interested in knowing as he didn¡ät remember a single bit of the living version of this body.


    Since he knew that he was a natural-born undead, he knew the living version disappeared and now he, Rue Danzel was inhibiting this body as someone else.


    With those thoughts in mind, Danzel nodded and looked toward Velkir.


    "In the case, it doesn''t work, that just means that Skull w wouldn''t have been able to keep up with me. With my current strength, I have little use for 2nd-tier undead." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Hearing that, Velkir activated the ritual.l


    Lighten up in gray light.


    Suddenly Danzel''s mana was drained out of his body and turned into a dark green mist that circled around Skull w and entered its body.


    Feeling the sudden change and heat going through its existence.


    Skull w''s eyes lighten up in dark green light and howled.


    "Gwaaaagh!!!"

 Chapter 286 Death Hound

    With Skull ws'' howl shaking the whole room, the dark green mist engulfed her, making it for neither Velkir nor Danzel to see what was going on through the mist.


    Watching from the side, Danzel looked at the dark mist that was being made from his own mana. The more he looked, the more concerned he became.


    "How long will itst..." Danzel mumbled before gazing to his side.


    It might have looked like he was staring at the wall, but in truth, Danzel was watching the status of his mana.


    [Status]


    ...


    Mana: 5635/6050


    ...


    Mana: 5282/6050


    ....


    Mana: 4592/6050


    ...


    At first, he didn¡ät think that he would becking mana for the ritual, as he rarely managed to lower his mana pool in a fight. But after seeing the drain rate of the ritual, he wasn¡ät too sure if his mana willst him enough for Skull ws'' evolution.


    `By the rate that my mana is being drained, I willst 3- No, at best 2 minutes with my mana. If by then Skull w hasn¡ät achieved his evolution, then...¡ä Danzel thought to himself as he watched the dark mist.


    And as he waited, the 1 minute passed with the second minute passing right after.


    His expected limit has reached and Danzel felt more of his remaining senses weakening with theck of mana.


    `This feeling...it¡äs the same when I was revived after being frozen by that Archmage.¡ä Danzel thought as he looked at his mana pool.


    ...


    Mana: 825/6050


    ...


    "Only a few more seconds'' worths of mana..." Danzel mumbled to himself as he stared at the mist.


    With the howls seeming never-ending and his mana being drained, reaching 300, Danzel opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something but nothing came out.


    After seeing that another 100 points of mana have been drained, Danzel''s ethereal eyes red up and he strengthen his connection with Skull w to give him amand.


    `Skull w, as your master, I have no use for weak soldiers.¡ä


    Hearing the echoing cold voice of her liege, Skull w which was being infused with his mana, froze for a split second.


    `You have two options, Skull w¡ä


    Yet her lieges voice didn¡ät stop there.


    `You can choose to join the dark solitude that death offers you and be free from my binds.¡ä


    Skull w who hearing that, even though she couldn¡ätpletely understand what her liege meant by his words, Danzel''s will was enough to allow her to picture a world made out of seeming less darkness and those that reside there were covered with the same darkness.


    Just that faint image in her head made her body tremble from fear.


    And before she knew it, her lieges second option echoed in her mind.


    `If you so wish to prevent such fate, then stay bound by my will and follow me! Ovee it! Ovee this trial and reach the required strength to stay as one of my soldiers! This is your second No, this is your only option that is left!¡ä


    Hearing the echoes that by each passing moment were bing ever so faint, just like Danzel¡äs, her ethereal dark green eyes res up.


    "Gwaaaouhhh!!"


    Her howls became stronger and her iron-like ws dug into the floor even deeper.


    After hearing her lieges words, she started to rapidly absorb the dark mist that continuously strengthen her body so much that her body itself was starting to break apart. But that by itself didn¡ät stop her from absorbing the mist.


    At this point, the mana that she previously absorbed the minutes before together with the current wave of mana that she now absorbed was the trigger for a change to happend!


    Her ws that were digging the floor were gradually bing muchrger and the cracks on them were being regenerated. The tips of her ws now had turned into a pitch-ck color while the other part of her legs became seemed more metallic, but in the end, stayed still as bones.


    From her spines, another set of ribs seemed to grow with the same metallic feature as the ws. With her spine extending, Skull w became much longer than she previously had and grew a bit in the height department, but thetter was so minimal that one wouldn¡ät be able to notice.


    The most noticeable change of it all though was the dead mana that was surrounding each of her bones eves so slightly.<sub> </sub>


    The only area where the dead man wasn¡ät present was only her new skull.


    Her new skull naturally grew to adjust with her new length and her teeth became much sharper. But the most instinctive feature of her skull was the new hole that opened between the middle of her two eye sockets.


    And in that very whole was just like her eyes, another ethereal dark green me appeared.


    Once the change stopped, the dark mist that was engulfing Skull w like a cacoon burst towards the outside and send a wave of dark green mist to the surrounding room.


    Danzel and Velkir felt the mist pushing them back, but since both of them were strong enough, they weren¡ät sent flying to the wall. Most of what the mist did was brush the dust from their clothing.


    But the most damage that the mist did was making a mess to Velkirs room, with the sk breaking apart and notes flying to the ground.


    And in the middle of the mist bursting out was none other than Skull w excluding an aura of a 3rd-tier undead.


    "Gwaaaghooooh!" Skull w howled in joy after feeling the new changes in his body.


    Ending her howl, she searched for her liege but once she found her liege, she turned her head to the side in confusion as her vision wasn¡ät the same as she was used to.


    Seeing her confused, Danzel stepped forward and touched her skull.


    "Well done, Skull w. Now you gained the strength to follow me and another eye on top of that." Danzel said, making the already confused Skull w more confused.


    s, Danzel wasn¡ät going to rify what he meant and instead went to see Skull ws [Status].


    [Status]


    Name: Skull w


    Race: Death Hound


    Level: 60


    ss: [Death Hunter Lv. 2]


    Sub-ss: [Undead Mount Lv. 10]


    Health: 8 530/22 055


    Mana: 357/2 211


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 420 Agility: 585 Intelligence: 200 Endurance: 400


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Wolve] [Alpha] [Wolve] [Third Eye][Far Sight] [Tracker] [Leader] [Tyrant] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Steel Body] [Undead Servant] [Unique Concioness] [Reinforced Body] [Body Maniption] [Mount of Dead Warrior] [Ambusher]


    Skills: [Dark Mist Robe] [Prating Bite] [Death Howl] [Undeath Corruption] [Temporarly Ethereal Body] [Dying Hunter¡äs Mark] [Chase] [Cursed ws] [Mount] [Soul Seeing Eye] [Dark Mist] [Burrow] [Leap]


    [Remark: A hound born from death. A rare undead species that is said that they will chase their prey till their death. This Death Hound in particr took upon a forced evolution of some traits of his master¡äs mana, unlocking abilities that not all Death Hounds might have. Beware of its w as even a scratch would leave the flesh of the living to decay rapidly. This Death Hound is a servant of the Wight named Rue Danzel.]


    ...


    Seeing Skull ws'' status, Danzel couldn¡ät help but remember the golden alpha wolf that he once fought some years ago. But what surprised him the most was that Skull w managed to take some traits of his mana and create a set of talents and skills.


    Those respectively speaking based on his guess were


    [Temporarly Ethereal Body] and [Soul Seeing Eye].


    The most powerful of those two was [Temporarly Ethereal Body].


    As it hints by its name alone, the skill allowed the user to turn a part of their body for a certain amount of time into an ethereal state, enabling them to ignore all physical and life force attacks.


    It was such a powerful skill that even Danzel was a bit jealous of it.


    Unfortunately, it did have its downsides such as the mana cost increasing the more parts you turn ethereal, which suggests that making your whole body ethereal would cost one enormous amount of mana. The other downside was that one became more vulnerable against magic by a whole 20%.


    The other skill, [Soul Seeing Eye] wasn¡ät particrly impressive as the previous skill. If Danzel had to exin it, then it would be a version of his [Eyes of the Damned] skill, just better in shorter ranger and worse at long range.


    It also had the effect to predict the actions of those who are afflicted with [Fear] to some certain.


    `Skull w also gained various weird skills and even a subss of being a mount. I guess the time of riding Skull w manifested in the form of the [Undead Mount] subss and some other talents and skills.¡ä Danzel thought as he browsed through all the skills and talents of Skull w.


    But before he even got half of them, Velkir''s cold voice made him lose focus.


    "I see, Danzel, you are...

 Chapter 287 Death Of Former Owner

    Going back to when Velkir began the ritual for transforming Skull w into a [Death Hound], it was at that moment when several images started to show up in his mind and form a vision.


    `Let¡äs see if your talentes from your mortal owner or the undead Rue Danzel.¡ä Velkir thought as he felt a part of his consciousness getting in the vision.


    ****


    With a spark of dark gray light appearing in the middle of a forest, the light suddenly expanded and formed into a dark-skinned figure wearing a brown robe with some ragged bandages covering his mouth with a tattoed bold head.


    Watched his surrounding with a pair of his eyes that werepletely white as if the man was suffering from monocr vision.


    "A forest, huh? Considering where Danzel first appeared as a runesmith...this ce must be on the territory of the Kingdom of Berum..." Velkir mumbled to himself.


    As he was trying to figure out where this ce was, Velkir''s attention was shortly after interrupted by the sound of metal shing.


    *Ting! Ting! Tign!


    Being drawn towards the noise, Velkir turned around, only to see a battle against men and a horde of skeletons.


    "Crush the undead!" Soldiers yelled their battle cries while destroying the Skeletons in front of them.


    "For the sake of our city and our kingdom! Don¡ät falter against the undead![FireBolt]!" Themander yelled on top of his horse while weaving his staff and setting the Skeletons aze.


    Watching over the whole fight as a spectator of this vision, Velkir quickly lost interest in the whole battle as none one showed great power. Except for the few 2nd-tier soldiers that barely reached that tier and themander casting his spell on a horse, all the others were of the 1st-tier.


    `So weak. Guessing by their armor design, this happend not long ago. Should be around 80 years or a century when the Arcana and Berum war escted. Based on their strength, the soldiers should be mid their training.¡ä Velkir thought as he looked at the skeletons with disdain.


    "It seems like they are going to subject a necromancer, a low-level one at that seeing only skeletons."


    Shaking his head, Velkir increased the power of the ritual so that he perceived who out of all those soldiers was the body of Danzel.


    In the next moment, Velkir¡äs surroundings started to shift until he can be behind a certain soldier with a shield and a sword in his respective hand.


    He wore the same armor and helmet as all the other soldiers, but that soldier was one of the few who barely reached the 2nd-tier.


    "So this is..." Before Velkir could finish, the yell of the soldier interrupted him.


    "Die! Undead!" He yelled as he brushed off the sword of the skeleton to the side while swinging his sword right towards its head.


    *Crack!


    "Kghha!" Yelling with its cold voice, the skeleton fell to the ground with half of its skull cracked open and slowly turning into dust.


    Right after the Skeleton, the next skeleton came toward the soldier full of bloodlust.


    It swung its sword to behead the soldier, but the soldier didn¡ät interrupt the skeleton''s swing with his sword.


    The two shed a few times before just like the undead before, the soldier found a way to defend with his shield and prate the skull of the Skeleton.


    "Haah~ how are the others doing?" The soldier said as he looked at his surroundings.


    His colleagues just like him were all trainees in a sense where they all received the minimum training to fight. They were others like him who were a bit more talented than others and progressed much faster, but the fact that they weren¡ät that great of fighters was the truth.


    For example, in the skeleton horde, although now destroyed, they were a few casualties here and there. One could say that Skeletons were among the weakest of undead that there was. Maybe if one didn¡ät count the slow-moving zombies, then such a title could be justified on the Skeletons.


    Albeit they were generally weak, unlike the others, they didn¡ät hesitate to go for the killing blow, and their scary appearance brought fear to the weak-minded people, resulting in the Skeletons killing some of his colleagues.


    "Haah~and we still have the necromancer to face..." The soldier with the shield was sighted.


    Before he could even take another breather, themander riding the horse yelled out loud.


    "Soldiers! We continue our march towards the dungeon! If we falter now, the undead we fought today might be one of our loved ones! Let¡äs teach the necromancer what the people of Nexvarres can do!"


    "Ohhhhhh~!


    Shouting out in unison, the soldiers strengthen their grip on their swords and spears and continued marching towards the dungeon that was once a mine for mana crystals.


    The skeletons they fought were none other than the miners of that mine and guards of that dungeon.


    Though rare, the cave they were heading in would create small children-sized monsters with green skin which were extremely cowardly and aggressive depending on the situation.


    They weren¡ät particrly strong, but guards were needed to protect the miners from those small, ugly creatures.


    With them around, the dungeon could be hardly described as dangerous.


    At least that was the case until a necromancer made his base in the dungeon.


    The reason why a necromancer appeared there and made the cave its base was unknown to them.


    Even if there was a reason behind the necromancer''s decision, that didn¡ät matter.


    As they were here to subject him.


    "Hear me! Soldiers of Nexvarres!" Themander yelled as he stepped down from his horse and pointed his staff towards the cave entrance.<sub> </sub>


    "Whatever abomination we see in there, we will not falter! We won¡ät falter against someone who ys with the dead! Brace yourself and follow me!" Themander yelled as he entered the cave with all the other soldiers following him right behind him.


    They expected to see another horde of Skeletons or simr undead, but all they saw were bonesying on the ground and walls stted with blood as if it was a painting.


    The soldier with the shield and sword who was the owner of Danzel''s body looked at this sight with a frown.


    "Something feels off, why would a magic caster waste his time in doing something like that..." He mumbled to himself.


    Velkir who was staring at the soldier, couldn¡ät help but chuckle to himself.


    "Heh, that guy is sharp. But that still doesn¡ät exin Danzel''s talent. Maybe I was wrong and he is..." Velkir said as he continued following right beside the soldier with the shield.


    They walked a few minutes seeing nothing more than boneying on the ground and blood sshed on the walls.


    But as they reached near the stairway that would guide them to the second floor, themander who was in the very front halted his steps.


    "Every soldier! Halt your step! The enemy in front of us!"


    The soldiers who heard that imminently became stiff and stared at the dark path in front of them, unable to see through the darkness.


    Previously, the undeveloped mana crystals would lighten up the dungeon enough for others to navigate without needing a light source.


    But now that all the mana crystals have been harvested, they had to use torches that didn¡ät provide that much light.


    Themander could use his mana in his eyes to some extent to see through the darkness, but the others couldn¡ät.


    "Tch- [Light re]!" Finishing his spells, a ball made out of light was shot to the ceiling of the room, illuminating the surroundings and enabling the soldiers to see the enemy in front of them.


    "Huh? Those are the enemies?" One nearby soldier asked while looking at the lone two figures standing far away from them.


    The other soldiers held a simr confusion, as it wasn¡ät what they expected.


    They expected to see several other skeleton hordes before meeting the necromancer.


    So seeing a figure wearing a dark robe that even covered his face who held a wooden staff with a ck mana crystal with a lone skeleton beside him wearing armor, they couldn¡ät help but doubt that this was the necromancer.


    His outfit screamed that he was an evil magic caster and the "undead knight" beside him also strengthened that idea.


    But the idea of those two figures facing them with all their numbers seemed ridiculous.


    Themander was also slightly confused by the enemy''s decision.


    "Evil magic caster! If you are surrounded now, I promise you a swift and painless death! If you don¡ät, then we from-"


    <strong>"Be quiet, Human."</strong>


    The Necromancer''s voice echoed through the surroundings in echoes.


    Watching from the sidelines, Velkir couldn¡ät help but grin to himself.


    "I see, so that was the cause of your death, huh?"


    While the soldiers and themander alike were stunned by the deep and cold echoing voice of the necromancer.


    The dark-robed figure raised his staff to the air and release a huge amount of dead mana to the ground.


    In the next moment, the hidden bones that were covered with dirt connected with it each other and started to form into skeletons that were a bit smaller than humans but bigger than goblins, wielding respectively a sword.


    Seeing that in a matter of a second, the enemy had created double their numbers, the soldiers couldn¡ät help but freak out.


    <strong>"[Mass Enchant Undead]"</strong>


    In another wave of dead mana being spread to all the undead, including the "undead knight", the aura of each undead changed together with their strength.


    As soon as he finished and tapped his staff to the ground, two pairs of purple ethereal mes lighten up from the necromancer''s face and showed his skull face.


    Seeing that, themander couldn¡ät help but take a step back and mumbled to himself terrified.


    "...3rd-tier Undead, Lesser Lich."


    The Lesser Lich in question with his pair of ethereal purple eyes looked at the humans disdainfully before turning towards the "undead knight" beside him.


    <strong>"Use those soldiers to defeat those humans. Achieve that and as I promised, I will bring you into the 3rd-tier."</strong>


    The "undead knight" nodded his head and pulled his sword slowly as he stepped in front of all the newly created undead.


    "As youmand."


    Pointing his sword towards the human soldiers, with the same cold voice as before he continued.


    "Magic caster." The "undead knight" said while revealing the pair of two ethereal blue eyes and shrouding his armor with dark mist.

 Chapter 288 Death Of Former Owner (2)

    ? Feeling the umted bloodlust from the undead horde in front of them, the soldiers couldn¡ät help but shudder in fear.


    But the one that was in the deepest of despairs was none other than themander himself who identified what the necromancer really was.


    But before he came up with what to do, the undead already made their move.


    "Follow me! Obey my call! Kill the living!" the blue-eyed "undead knight" yelled with his cold voice filled with killing intent and dashed towards the soldier with the undead horde shortly after following behind his steps.


    `Dammit!¡ä Themander cursed internally.


    "Don¡ät falter! Soldiers of Nexvarres! Shieldman is in the front! Does with spears and prepare for the impact! Create a defensive position! They are only some mere skeletons!"


    Having his voice enchanted by magic, the soldiers suddenly felt a bit calmer than before, enabling them to do as they were ordered.


    Those who had shields stepped in front and created a wall made out of shields. One of those soldiers in the front was also the former owner of Danzel''s body.


    Shortly after, those with spears came behind the shield man, prepared to skewer any undead that came in range.


    Nodding in approval towards his soldiers, themander looked at the charging "undead knight" and the numerous undead right behind him.


    `The one with the armor should most likely be a Draugr, a 2nd-tier undead. Though its equipment seems much better than even mine, it¡äs just a lone undead. It should be hard for those seedlings to take him out. My focus should be on wiping as many skeletons as I can before the Lesser Lich decides to join in the fray.¡ä Themander analyzed the situation and decided on his spell.


    Raising his staff in the air, the mana crystal on the tip of his staff was engulfed with mes.


    "[me Wave]!"


    Once themander''s spell was finished, the mes from his staff were shot out and covered arge amount of space as if its staff was a methrower.


    Upon the appearance of the mes, the skeletons didn¡ät even flinch and charged right toward the mes.


    Of course, the result was the skeletons being engulfed in the mes and destroying their body close to evaporation their whole body.


    Seeing theirmander destroying over 20 undead with ease, the soldiers regained some of their vigors.


    The blue eyes Draugr who saw that grinned sinisterly.


    Suddenly, his enchanted armor releases a surge of dead mana, further strengthening the Draugr.


    Seeing that, the former body''s owner widens his eyes.


    "Commander! This one is dangerous!" He yelled, s his warning was drowned among the noise of his peers and skeletons.


    Themander who was unaware of his soldier''s warning finished his next spell and destroyed another set of skeletons. He evenpletely had his focus on watching when the [Lesser Lich] would make his move and at the same time destroy as many undead before they made contact with them.


    At first, looking at that seemed the correct option as doing that raised the confidence of the soldiers, but the few who noticed the aura of the Draugr couldn¡ät think the same.


    And once the Draugr came near enough to the shield wall, the spearman thighed the grip on their spears.


    "Now!"


    Coordinating their timing, three of the spearman thrust their spear right through the Draugr¡äs body.


    While one of the spears prated his head, the second one his chest, and thest one the undead¡äs shoulder, the three spear man couldn¡ät help but scoff at the pathetic attempt of the undead.


    s, their celebration came too early.


    The spot where they prated Draugr seemed to shift and reveal that what they actually hit was nothing more than some dark smoke.


    Before they could even understand what happend with the Draugr, it was toote for them.


    Appearing from the side of the smoke, the Draugr swung his mana-imputed sword towards the neck of the shieldman with incredible strength.


    Killing them in an instant with soon the spearman to follow.


    Once the Draugr prated through their defense, a massacre began taking ce.


    Each of the Draugr''s hits was both fasts like the reaper''s scythe and heavy hitters, making the soldier unable to react or block.


    Even though the current Draugr in front of the original strength was of the lowest of 2nd-tier strength, the Draugr still managed to dominate thempletely.


    And the reason for it was because of his armor and the buff that he received from the Lesser Lich.


    With those two together, the Draugr was near the peak of his tier.


    And because of the two skills that the Draugr possessed, the soldiers couldn¡ät deal with them.


    The most annoying skill, [Dark Mist Robe] made it extremely hard for the soldiers to aim currently their swings. Making them hit nothing but the dark mist.


    His other skill, [Battle Sense] allowed the Draugr to be aware of his surroundings.


    Creating abination of skills, which made it almost impossible for the soldiers, who were of the 1st-tier to react.


    Worst of all, the undead horde didn¡ät wait for them to deal with the Draugr and joined right into the fight, forcing the soldiers to focus on the enemy in front of them instead of the Draugr inside their defense.


    Themander who saw this felt regret and anger in himself for letting something like this happen.


    The worst part of it was that he couldn¡ät do anything about it.


    He tried casting him [Firebolt] spell to quickly take care of the Draugr, but that resulted in nothing more but having one of his soldiers hit.


    Making him grind his teeth in anger.


    Though he was a magic caster, he mainly focused on the shy fire spells and other minor magic that helps in his leadership.


    Fire magic in his essence, especially on the lower tier spell, was mainly focused around power and area of effect.


    Making it extremely dangerous to use when your allies were near the enemies.


    So to avoid friendly fire, themander focused on ordering his should around the Draugr and cutting the number of the skeletons.


    At first, the fight looked despairingly against the humans, but Velkir that looked from the sidelines shook his head when he looked at the Draugr.


    "He doesn¡ät even see that he is being tested right now. His skills aren¡ät that bad but he failed to see his surroundings." Velkir said to himself as he looked towards the Lesser Lich in the distance.<sub> </sub>


    Velkir knew that the reason why the Lesser Lich wasn¡ät moving was that he was testing the Draugr for "that" reason.


    `Still, where have I seen that purple color again?¡ä Velkir thought to himself as he looked at the Lesser Lich in doubt.


    While Velkir was trying to remember something about the Lesser Lich, the situation that he predicted came into being.


    Because of themander''s fire magic, the numbers of the skeletons were quickly thinned enough for the soldiers to be able to push the undead back. Once they were more humans than skeletons, the Draugr found himself getting focused by all sides by much stronger soldiers.


    Forced the Draugr to go into the defensive and even back away from their defense and regroup with the remaining skeletons.


    Previously with their numbers, the skeleton managed to surround the soldiers, but now with that no longer being the case, the Draugr and the skeletons found themself on the entrance side while the humans were on the Lesser Lich side.


    Themander was in constant fear of the Lesser Lich joining in, as it required just a spell from him to raise all the fallen soldiers as undead.


    But after seeing that the Lesser Lich hasn¡ät moved at all, themander was both confused and d.


    `After dealing with the Draugr, we might have a chance if all of us rush towards the mastermind of those things.¡ä He thought to himself.


    Albeit foolish of showing his back on the enemy, that was the only option left for them.


    The Draugr inparison gritted his teeth while looking at all of the remaining skeletons.


    "Useless weaklings! Summon Undead!" Yelling out loud in his cold voice, the dead mana of his body separated and created beside him 3 skeletons that were as tall as him.


    "Charge! Kill those humans!" The Draugrmanded all skeletons to charge with him towards the soldiers.


    The humans who had some distance between the skeletons prepared to receive the skeletons and the former owner of the body was in the front, ready to receive the Draugr that ughter many of his colleagues and friends.


    Themander albeit low on mana was already gathering hisst bits of mana to set the Draugr aze.


    For both parties, everything felt as if the world was going in slow motion upon the final showdown between the undead and the living.


    Be it the battle cries of the humans or the undead screeching hatefully towards the living, they prepared themself to finish off the other party.


    But as if shattering such thoughts, an echoing cold voice appeared.


    <strong>"It seems like you failed me, Draugr."</strong>


    The Lich said as he tapped his staff to the ground, making a magic circle appear beneath the humans and the undead group.


    Seeing the magic circle, the Draugr ring blue eyes litten up.


    "You Magic caster! I still haven¡ät lost! Stop the spell-" The Draugr yelled, but the Lesser Lich didn¡ät seem to care.


    <strong>"Pay the price for betraying my expectation."</strong>


    In the next second, the magic circle activated, and the dark, grim purple light created several ripples of dead mana to run through the ground, sweeping at the same time both the human soldiers and the skeletons at the same time.


    In a matter of a second, each group lost more than half their numbers.


    But upon the next moment, the ripples that run through the ground were enough to copse the whole floor beneath the two groups'' feet, where the second-floorke was waiting for them.


    "Aggghh!!!"


    "Heeelp!!!"


    "Kgghhh!"


    Free falling towards theke with their heavy armor, the humans were hit with dizziness and pain all around their bodies from the fall.


    When they thought that they survive, what they didn¡ät expect was the falling rocks to crash on top of them, either killing them instantly or dragging them to the bottom of the floor of theke, trapping them to throw.


    The skeletons received the same kind of fate as them.


    The battle thatsted longer than 20 minutes has now ended in a matter of a few seconds with the use of a single spell.


    Walking towards the edge of therge hole that he was responsible for, the Lesser Lich stared at theke.


    <strong>"I overestimated the humans. If that¡äs their army standard, finishing their city is only a matter of time." The Lesser Lich said.</strong>


    <strong></strong>As he was about to leave the dungeon, a figure with a shield and a sword came crawling out of theke.


    That figure was none other than the former owner of Danzel''s body.


    <strong>"Seems like one survived..." The Lesser Lich mumbled while pointing his staff towards the human and gathering his dead mana.</strong>


    Before he ended his spell, another figure came out of theke.


    "MAGIC CASTER!!!!" The figure yelled in his cold and hateful voice.


    Looking above him, the figure with the ethereal blue eyes stared at the Lesser Lich in resentment.


    "You traitor! This wasn¡ät our deal!" The Draugr yelled as he pointed his sword towards the Lesser Lich on the top floor.


    "..."


    Seeing that, the Lesser Lich pulled back his staff and stared at the Draugr for a moment before making his way towards the outside.


    Seeing that, the Draugr started to panic and released a huge amount of bloodlust.


    "No! You promised me strength! The 3rd-tier! You can¡ät leave! I will swear my loyalty to you! Give me the strength and I will be your sword! Magic caster!!!"


    Yelling as if having lost his mind, the Draugr couldn¡ät ept the current state of events and amidst his madness, he noticed a human soldier with a shield and a sword in his hand.


    "You! It¡äs all you guys'' fault! If it weren¡ät for you!!!" The Draugr yelled before dashing towards the soldier.


    Thetter who saw this cursed under his breath and took his own stance.


    "Dammit!"

 Chapter 289 Death Of Former Owner (3)

    `I have to survive no matter the cost!¡ä The former owner thought to himself as he braced himself to face the Draugr.


    s, when the blue-eyed Draugr dashed towards him, the former owner couldn¡ät help but remember how hisrades died against that undead. The fear that run through his body was barely suppresed with his will to survive.


    But even by strengthening his will, one couldn¡ät surpass the physical difference between those two.


    In just a single moment, the Draugr that was shrouded in the dark mist raised his sword up high and shed at him.


    The former owner imminently recognize the mana that was in the undead sword as the [Heavy Strike] technique. A rathermon yet powerful skill that let¡äs one increase the power behind one''s attack.


    It was a technique that was taught to the soldiers who achieved the 2nd-tier and was a must learn skill for any swordsman. Unfortunately, he only started learning so he couldn¡ät perform it himself, but recognizing it wasn¡ät that hard.


    Knowing that he had bi hope of meeting the undead sword with his [Heavy Strike] technique and the difference in strength, he pushed forward his shield to block the Draugrs swing.


    *Tiing!!!


    Once the sword meets with the shield, unexpectedly to the former owner''s expectations, the sword of the Draugr cut through his shield and only then stopped at his hand armor.


    The sword needs only a few more inches to take the former owner''s hand.


    "Ugh! You all piece of bones!" The former owner cursed as he felt as if he was going to be buried in the ground.


    Grinding his teeth though, he pushed through the hardship and swung his sword, aiming for the Draugrs skull.


    And with a swift swing, it seemed like he achieved in cutting the Draugrs skull for a split second, but the former owner instead of celebrating cursed to himself.


    `I felt not contract! That must be the-¡ä


    Before he was even able to finish his thoughts, the part that he cut was nothing more than the dark mist, and the sword that was stuck in his shield was dragged back and once again swung towards him.


    Seeing that, he barely managed to push the shield forward and take a step back.


    *Ting!


    This time the sword managed to cut through his shield and as the swing came from the side, now the former owner had only the bottom half of his shield.


    He wanted to realize, but the next thing he knew, the Draugr sent out a kick towards his stomach.


    If it weren¡ät for putting the other half of his shield in the way, maybe his organs would even be crushed. But even though he blocked the undead''s kick, it was still powerful enough to bend the shield and make him fall to theke with his butt first.


    *Ssh!


    `I need to stand up and fight. Otherwise, I will die.` The former owner thought as he raise up as fast as he could.


    Once he raisen up from the shallow waters, he was surprised to see the Draugr looking at him instead of rushing to kill him.


    `Why did he stop?¡ä


    As he was confused at the undead actions, the Draugr opened his mouth.


    "Compare to the other humans, you are stronger. But at the end of it, you are just a human. A weakling" The Draugrs said with his cold voice.


    Hearing that, the former owner was slightly stunned before anger rose up in him.


    "You are right,pared to us humans, monsters like you have a much better start than us. Remember though,pared to that necromancer, you are nothing more than those skeletons that we fought! Compared to him! You are nothing!" He yelled before unequipping his shield and throwing it into theke.


    Right after his shield, he began taking off his armor and throwing it into theke upon the gaze of the undead.


    His helmet being thest piece of his armor, his wet ck hair that gone till his neck fell off his face. Once he pushed his hair to the side, he gripped the handle of his sword with both hands.


    "In fact, you are so weak that even I am confident that I have a chance against a mere skeleton."


    Being called weak and even seen as a skeleton made the Draugrs before strong bloodlust even stronger.


    "You mere human!" The Draugr yelled as he swung at the former owner.


    He of course swung towards the sword to block the fate of being cut in two.


    With the weight of having his armor removed, it was barely enough to push his sword against the undead one.


    *Ting!<sub> </sub>


    But of course, the whole impact traveled through his hand.


    `Heavy! Me and my stupid mouth. It was just a single swing and yet I feel like my arms are going to be torn away! How long can Ist against him.¡ä


    Even though the water hinder his movements and the Draugrs attack was more than he could handle, the former owner pushed through his limits and blocked the time and time again the Draugr¡äs sword.


    His sword had already begun losing his edge and if this continued, his sword would be nothing more than a metal club at best.


    Even though he knew that what he was doing was nothing more than preventing his inevitable death of his, he still had a linger of hope of the Draugr showing a mistake that he could use.


    And as if the gods were answering his hopes, the Draugrs aura weaken suddenly, lowering both his speed and strength at the same time.


    Noticing that, the former owner remembered the spell that the necromancer cast on all his undead, including the Draugr in front of him.


    `The duration of his enchantment wore off! I can do it! The Goddes must be looking over me!¡ä He thought in joy.


    Even though he was exhausted, he still pushed himself to attack the Draugr.


    But even with the Draugr losing the Lesser Lich buff, he still had his armor increasing his strength, making the two now have an equal footing.


    The one who held the disadvantage was the former owner as with the Draugr use of [Dark Mist Robe] he couldn¡ät get a single hit at all.


    Sooner orter he knew that his body would give up while the Draugr¡äs tireless undead body would im his life. Even though he knew that the fact that both of them were on equal footing made him push further towards the light of hope.


    *Ssh!


    But as if fate was pulling a cruel joke on him and putting out his light, suddenly a skeleton came out of theke and thrust his sword towards his abdomen and piercing his body.


    "Huh-?"


    Without even understanding what was happening, the Draugr used the former''s owner''s confusion and pierce his own sword towards the human''s chest.


    In the next moment, he threw arge amount of blood out of his throat.


    "Gaah! When did such a thi-gah!"


    He waspletely bewildered upon the appearance of the skeleton''s ambush. With his whole focus aimed at the Draugr, he never expected another enemy to appear.


    Losing the strength of his body at a rapid pace, the sword that now had dulled fell to his feet. And once both the undead draw their swords out of his body, he fell to his knees and stared at the dark waters of theke.


    Seeing that, the Draugr scoffed at him.


    "I am no mere skeleton, I am a Draugr! A being capable of dominating the likes of that mindless undead. Let your ignorance be the death of you." The Draugr said with his cold voice.


    The next moment, several other undead came out of theke with his [Undead Domination] talent. Looking at the Skeletons, the Draugr turned his back on the dying human and left theke while making the skeletons follow behind him.


    Being left alone in the coldke, now filled with dead mana from the Necromancer, the former owner closed his eyes with thest bits of his strength and feelpletely in theke.


    *Ssh!


    Even though he was only in the shallow parts of theke, his whole body waspletely submerged.


    Watching from the sidelines, Velkir looked down at the corpse of the former owner.


    "It seems like Danzel didn¡ät inherit his talent of magic from him. And for a corpse, this weak to be a natural-born Wight in just a mere decade shouldn¡ät be possible. It¡äs unnatural. Unless..."


    Suddenly, the whole vision that the ritual was creating started to break apart and Velkir¡äs small part of his consciousness started to be pulled back towards his main consciousness inside the stone base in the Gartera forest.


    Digesting the information that he gained, Velkir stared at Danzel that was rubbing Skull ws'' skull.


    `A Death Hound? That¡äs rare...¡ä Velkir thought for a moment before even forgeting about Skull w and changing his focus towards Danzel.


    "I see, Danzel, you are a natural-born undead anomaly. That exins it." Velkir said with his cold voice while nodding his head in understanding.


    Danzel inparison stared at the Lich confused.


    `What the hell are talking about?¡ä

 Chapter 290 Shiros Curiosity

    Danzel couldn¡ät help but stare at Velkir as if he ate something wrong for breakfast for him to say such a thing.


    `What did he see for him to think that I am an anomaly?¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    In fact, it wasn¡ät the first time that others mistook him for an anomaly. As far as he could remember, back when he was working with the shadow merchant Hanson, he did manage to hear some rumors of an undead anomaly appearing near the dungeon where he came out.


    Even the remarks that were shown on his status window hinted toward him being an anomaly.


    But as far as he was aware, he wasn¡ät something like an anomaly.


    ording to what he heard, anomalies were rare urrences where beasts mutated far beyond their own limit with the influence of mana. Making it possible for a finger-sized lizard to turn into dragons and a corpse of a farmer to be a Lesser Lich.


    Such cases were called anomalies as they rejectedmon sense and broke through their own bodies'' limits to achieve something much greater.


    He once met such an anomaly in the form of an earth lizard.


    ording to the mercenaries that he fought together such beast, the anomaly version of the earth lizard was much bigger and more ferocious than his normal form.


    And because of this trait of anomalies, he could confirm that he wasn¡ät one of those things.


    After, when he first went out of the cursedke, he was a mere skeleton, an existence of the 1st-tier! And expect of his talent [Sin of Wrath], he was just a normal skeleton!


    He could also confirm that when he first met another skeleton. The brave fellow who fell in battle against those goblins was still unforgettable for him.


    In any case, if someone asked him if he considered himself an anomaly, then Danzel would have said yes. But the difference between the anomaly would be different for him as for other people.


    His considering himself an anomaly was for the sole reason of the [Status] existence and not because he started with a much stronger body.


    As far as he is aware, only he had a simr power such as the [Status].


    If there was someone else with such power, then he was sure that it would be known by now. Maybe not the status itself, but the fact that the owner of this [Status] bes all the more powerful the more he kills.


    At least that was his guess and the other users of the [Status] were hiding somewhere though around this world.


    In fact, he didn¡ät even want to think of such a possibility.


    What he liked to believe was that someone or something gave him such power. For the [Status] himself he wasn¡ät too sure as to why and for what reason he gained it, but at least he was sure that some kind of being had his hand in giving the talent [Sin of Wrath].


    In the end, he decided not to mingle with such thoughts that only created questions and no further answers.


    "I don¡ät see myself as an anomaly, Master Velkir. In fact, isn¡ät what you are referring to my innate talent of my?" Danzel said without any shame praising himself.


    Hearing Danzel''s remark, Velkir who thought was right was now slightly confused.


    `I thought there would be a reaction, but this...¡ä


    Shaking his head, Velkir looked at Danzel and Skull w with his usual cold face.


    "With the ritual now sessful, you two can go. I will give you a book on how to re-create the ritual so that you won¡ät need my help. Albeit, first you will have to increase your body mana capacity if you wish for a sessful transformation, but that will have to wait forter. Today''s lesson is finished, you can go ahead and do your own thing, s not in my room." Velkir said with his cold voice, before using magic to fix the mess that the ritual has bough forth in his room.


    As if Danzel was an anomaly or a genius among the undead, Velkir decided not to think much about it.


    In his centuries of existence, it was natural to cross over many anomalies. The only reason why Velkir was interested if Danzel was one or not was because an anomaly that was undead was an extremely rare urrence, much greater than a beast anomaly.


    Having an undead being born naturally is rare enough, but him being an anomaly on top of that was as rare as seeing a flying pig.


    In the past century, there was only one case reported of an undead anomaly appearing if one ignored the Danzel case.


    Other than this one undead, there hasn¡ät been a report of an undead anomaly in the past 5 centuries!


    So his interest was only limited to his shallow curiosity of him. He had far more important things that he was curious about and never enough time to go through all of them.


    As ironic as it was, just like many other Liches who focused on the endless pursuit of magical knowledge...


    Velkir didn¡ät find enough time to focus his entire being on his studies even though he was an immortal undead.


    In Danzel''s case, he just made his way outside while pushing Skull w through the door.


    There were still many things he wanted to test with Skull w skills and their respective talents. And as he was thinking of taking Skull w along with his missions, the more he knew about Skull ws'' capabilities the better.<sub> </sub>


    But as if the seven heavens had decided to band together to interrupt his work, a soft and rather childish voice came from behind him.


    "Is that wolf undead too?"


    Cursing internally, Danzel turned his head and looked at the small figure hiding behind the door, but obviously failing at the hiding part as her whole head was to be seen.


    "What are you doing here? Where is Agares?" Danzel said with his cold voice before opening Skull ws'' status.


    "He is down to master Velkirs room. I answer your question, now answer mine. Did your magic make the wolf into an undead?" Shiro asked while looking at Skull w''s ferocious skull and his two ethereal dark green eyes.


    "You answering my question doesn¡ät contribute to answering yours." Danzel said before focusing his attention on the status screen that the brat behind him.


    Seeing him ignoring her, Shiro puffed her cheeks in frustration and pointed at Danzel as if wanting to cast a spell on him.


    Skull w who saw that immediately raisen from his sitting position and growled towards Shiro, killing intent burning in her eyes.


    One wouldn¡ät be surprised to see her jump at the small Shiro and jewing her to death.


    Shiro who saw and felt the killing intent in the air immediately became frightened and hid behind the frame of the door, with only one eye still poking out to see the Death Hound.


    `Calm down, Skull w.¡ä Danzel sends hismand towards Skull w.


    He didn¡ät dare seek out trouble with Agares''s beloved granddaughter.


    He still valued his life after all.


    "Undead hold initiate hate towards the living. The killing intent that you just felt was because of your presence here. If I didn¡ätmand Skull w to stay put, you might even be his snack by now. If you understand at least that much, go back to Agares and stop disturbing my work." Danzel said heartlessly.


    Compared to hoping that she would leave him alone already, what Shiro did was the exact opposite.


    "So you really turned that wolf into an undead. Tell me, what was your today''s lesson with master Velkir about?" Shiro asked while still hiding behind the door frame.


    Danzel who heard what she said suddenly stopped browsing through Skull ws [Status] and turned around to look at Shiro.


    "Didn¡ät Agares tell you to not pursue necromancy? Why are you asking me something like that? Aren¡ät you afraid that I will tell Agares?"


    Hearing that, Shiro''splexion quickly worsened upon the thought of her grandfather learning about her question.


    And yet after having an internal conflict with herself, she stopped hiding and came off her "hiding" ce.


    "Necromancy is just another type of magic! Why is such magic considered evil and the others not?" Shiro said out loud, which in turn surprised Danzel.


    "Such a stupid question." Danzel said what was in his mind, in turn angering Shiro.


    "What do you mean stupid! Answer me!" She yelled with her childish voice at him.


    ''She won''t leave me alone isn''t she?'' Danzel thought in annoyance.


    "You right in one thing, while fire magic can burn someone to death or ice magic freeze one to death. In the end, each magic can be used to kill. And for necromancy, it''s no exception."


    "Then-" before Shiro could say something Danzel continued.


    "But necromancy is in short Death magic. Using it means to abuse the death and if you are willing to learn such magic, then you also must prepare to bring forth death to others." Danzel said while looking at Shiro.


    Though Agares was reluctant to exin to Shiro the exact reason why necromancy was in its essence, taboo magic.


    Danzel went ahead and told her the reality of such magic with his cold voice.


    Shiro was slightly stunned and wanted to say something, but at that exact moment, a familiar hand pressed and patted her head from behind.


    "Shiro didn''t I tell you to wait for me? What are you doing here-?" The figure being Agares rubbed his granddaughter''s head before seeing who was with her.


    Once he saw Danzel and his Death Hound staring at them, his face showed a frown.


    "Shiro, what were you talking about with him." Agares said, no longer using his friendly neighbor''s grandpa''s voice.


    Danzel who was watching from the side cursed internally

 Chapter 291 Danzel, The Overly Generous

    Upon seeing Agares frown, Danzel could easily imagine what Agares was thinking based on how he looked at him alone.


    Because of that Danzel felt quite miserable.


    `It was your granddaughter that came to me! Why are you looking at me like a criminal!?¡ä He wanted to yell out, but in the end, kept such thoughts to himself.


    Spinning his mind toe up with an excuse, Danzel immediately came up with an idea once he looked at the panicking Shiro.


    "I was discussing with her about the deal that we made. Of what kind of "item" she would be interested and such." Danzel said casually with his cold voice to make it more convincing.


    He knew that mentioning the word necromancy and Shiro was bound to be andmine that was to be avoided.


    In Shiro''s case, her being a 3rd-tier magic caster wasn¡ät just for show and her intelligence managed to pick up Danzel''s lead.


    "Yes! I came to ask him about "that"!" She nodded while nodding her head over the top manner.


    In truth, she had no idea what exactly that item was!


    Agares who looked at the two suspicious nodded his head towards Danzel.


    "...I see, in that case, let¡äs go inside and discuss. As it¡äs appropriate d to talk about your abilities here outside."


    "Yes...." Danzel said.


    `No!!!¡ä is what he actually thought.


    All he wanted to do was spend his time with Skull w and see the change that came from bing a [Death Hound].


    Now though because of Shiro, he was forced to put that matter for ater.


    Walking back with the two in their room, Danzel couldn¡ät help but stare around him in curiosity.


    If one ruled out the High Troll, Sartan, then the room of Agares and Shiro was the only one that he hadn¡ät visited yet.


    Compared to the others, those two were the only two in the whole group that shared a room together so it was naturally bigger than his.


    There were two separate futons in the corner of the floor of different sizes and a small table in the middle of the room with different books, notes, and some drawings.


    Compared to his messy room where alchemic weapons wereying on the side, their room was quite clean.


    `Maybe I should sort out my roomter...¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    As for Shiro, she dashed inside the room and put the books and all paper to the side, at least she tried by carrying everything all at once, resulting in everything falling to the ground.


    "Ah!"


    As she went around and picked up what she dropped together with Agares, Danzel felt somewhat awkward just standing there and decided to help.


    After picking some notes on what he guessed were from Velkir¡äs lesson, he finally came across a messy drawing.


    In the drawing were several buildings with weird roofs in the background orange and red, as if a fire was happening taking ce.


    In the middle of the drawing was a man with a long reversed curved sword, to his side were also some hints of another character, but the drawing seemed unfinished.


    "Thank you." Agares said before taking the drawing from his hand and making it disappear, Danzel guess that the drawing went into a spatial storage item just like his ring.


    "Shiro, use put all your things in the ring that Velkir gave you." Agares said to Shiro who froze for a second before using her storage item.


    `How the heck did she even achieve the 3rd-tier...¡ä Danzel thought earnestly.


    After soon finishing up cleaning the table, Agares motioned Danzel to sit down.


    Sitting down opposite them, Agares asked the same question as before, but to him this time around.


    "What were you discussing with my granddaughter, Danzel?" Agares asked in a tone as if already criminalizing Danzel for something he didn¡ät do.<sub> </sub>


    Danzel of course, who had plenty of time to think of what to say together with his 600 Intelligence (660 effective INT] responded ordingly.


    "You see Agares, though I agreed to make some runed items for her, I noticed a certain problem with. If you aren¡ät aware yet, my runes are mostly carved in ted armor and various cold weapons. I also am capable of increasing the total amount of a mana crystal, but that¡äs about it." Danzel said while pointing towards Shiro.


    "But if we are talking about cloth and leather armor, for example, her robe, then the runes that I know are limited to the lowest tier. She also doesn¡ät wield a staff or something the like that would need mana crystal, no? So I was wondering what should be done."


    Hearing that, Agares couldn¡ät help but put a thoughtful look.


    He knew that Danzel''s concerns were to take into consideration.


    Although Agares mainly did the deal with Danzel for the mana-increasing rune, it wouldn¡ät hurt to fully equip her granddaughter with ruined items.


    "Hmm, Shiro, would you be interested in using magic with a staff?" Agares asked, making her head turn in confusion.


    "A staff? But Shiro can already use magic with her hands. Do I really need one?" Shiro asked in return, bringing Agares into a difficult situation.


    All he knew was that the magic caster used staff to strengthen their magic and sometimes put spells inside the mana crystal to use forter. As a swordsman, he wasn¡ät too sure what magic caster used and if a staff was necessary or not.


    Just like Danzel, he directed his own mana into his sword, So he wasn¡ät too sure what to say.


    Seeing that from the side, Danzel decided to speak up.


    "Though I myself ain¡ät that knowledgeable, I have heard that their other option for staff. I mainly heard of magic orbs and magic gauntlets to be an option for a magic caster weapon. As to what their advantages were or disadvantages, I think it¡äs better to ask master Velkir. If he epts on create either of them, then you can tell him that I will carve some runes." Danzel said.


    "How about it, Shiro?" Agares asked, where Shiro nodded with a smile.


    "You also mentioned something about the lower-tier runes, right Danzel? Could you roughly describe how strong the lowest tier is and how itpared to that barrier rune of yours?"


    Danzel of course wasn¡ät shy in revealing how most of the [Common] runes were not that extreme and were generally passive effects for the most part.


    "Honestly, I wouldn¡ät rmend them. Though they are better than nothing, it¡äs way more efficient in changing armor to suit the runes that carve some runes that might be irrelevant." Danzel said before turning his gaze towards Shiro.


    "If I ain¡ät wrong, she should be of the 3rd-tier. Even though magic casters are for the most part weak physically, shouldn¡ät she be able to wear a simple armor?" He said before turning his gaze towards Agares.


    "That goes to you too, with how long your sword is, I should be able to carve some beneficial runes into it, but with your clothing, it¡äs the same case as Shiro."


    Hearing Danzel talking about rune carving his own item, Agares was taken by surprise. Originally the deal was supposed to cover only Shiro¡äs items and not his own.


    When he made the deal, he thought that his skills as a 4th-tier and private training that he was offering him were worthy enough for Danzel''s services.


    s, such a deal was only worth it if only Danzel goes to train with him.


    After weeks of passing, Agares realized though that Danzel, who was mainly using the sword, was more interested in studying his own runes and Velkir magic than in swordsmanship.


    There were only so few times when Danzel requested to fight with him, but that was about it.


    So for Danzel keeping his part of the deal when he didn¡ät even use him for training was a pleasant surprise.


    "What you saying does make sense...I would hope for Shiro to at least have that rune that creates a barrier around her. I will also ask Velkir about the orb and gauntlet, as for my case...I believe I will pass in changing my clothes, but I would be grateful if you put some simple runes on my sword." Agares said, where Danzel nodded in agreement.


    One might see Danzel tempting those two in bing a member of the te armor group and over the generous soul for offering his services to him.


    But behind that facade lies a snake that was full of hidden intentions that looked for his own benefit!


    Danzel wasn¡ät stupid, he knew that he didn¡ät really use Agare''s services and that what he was doing was a win for the other party.


    But he was fine with that as in the end, he would be the one who would benefit the most out of it with the usages of the [Rune of Harvest]!


    "If that¡äs the case, those are the following rules that I have in mind for your sword..." Danzel said before starting to exin a few of the runes.


    Of course, the existence of the [Rune of Harvest] was kept in the dark.

 Chapter 292 Losing Track Of Time

    After discussing what kind of rune Agares and Shiro would like to receive in their items, Danzel didn¡ät immediately go out of his way to carve Agare''s sword and came up with an excuse of having to prepare beforehand.


    Although he wanted everyone to have the [Rune of Harvest] as soon as possible on their weapons, Danzel forced himself to hold his urges of carving that rune till he achieved the [Good] rating.


    "I will be left then, I still have lots of stuff to do and prepare for. I will notify you when I finished my preparations." Danzel said while standing up and leaving their room.


    `I guess I will have to rush the [Rune of Harvest] grade... It hasn¡ät even been that long since I made all those runed contracts, but now I have to focus once again on runesmithing dammit.¡ä


    Being already in a bad mood for the sudden change of schedule, once he arrived in his messy room someone else followed him.


    Seeing who it was, Danzel was confused.


    "What is it Agares? Do you still have something to discuss or..." Danzel asked genuinely confused by the elderly.


    It hasn¡ät even been 2 minutes that they talked with each other and yet here he was seeking him for something?


    "I indeed do have something to discuss with you. And it isn¡ät about the runes that we talked about." Agares said with a serious face.


    Danzel in response motioned for him to continue.


    "Danzel...previously the thing that you talked about with my granddaughter wasn¡ät really about runes was it?" Agares said while looking at Danzel with his sharp gaze.


    "..."


    For a moment Danzel tensed up and cursed internally.


    `So he didn¡ät buy it, huh? Well, that¡äs to be expected...¡ä


    He thought of what to say, but in the end, he decided toe clean with Agares.


    "It is indeed as you say, we didn¡ät discuss all the runesmithing stuff. Although what I discussed with you a moment ago was the truth, what I truly talked with your granddaughter was about my lesson of necromancy." Danzel said while going around and cleaning up his mess, trying his best to ignore Agare''s frown.


    "That kid, Shiro, you should even notice yourself that she loves magic"


    "..."


    Having taken Velkir lessons together, Danzel would even have been either oblivious or stupid to not notice Shiro''s over-enthusiastic about magic itself.


    Have Velkir introduced something that she didn¡ät know her eyes would spark while every time he would ask Velkir for clearance she would stare at him as if he were azy pig that wasn¡ät paying attention to the lesson.


    Though he learned to ignore the brat, he still felt annoyed sometimes by her.


    When Danzel with the help of [Hand of Mana Affinity] skill finished cleaning the room, Danzel looked directly into Agare''s fierce eyes.


    "s, that goes on all magic. Her curiosity about Death magic isn¡ät an exception to that."


    "Danzel, you... what have you told Shiro-"


    "She asked me if such magic can be good if it were used by a good person. And since she interrupted my work, I told her how wrong she was. That''s all about it. Nothing more nothing less."


    Hearing that, Agares closed his eyes as if he wished what he guess was wrong, but after hearing what Danzel said he knew that one of his fear came true.


    "Danzel, even though we made a deal...I will have you pay if you ever teach Shiro for such vile magic." Agares said with a serious tone.


    Danzel in response would even roll his eyes at him if he could as such absurdity.


    "Ha! As if I got time to teach a brat when I myself don¡ät have enough time. Though I were you, I would worry more of her curiosity than me teaching her." Danzel said with his usual cold voice.


    For a moment Agares stayed silent in his room, staring at Danzel, but in the end, turned around to leave.


    "Sorry for disturbing you."


    With him being the only one in his room, Danzel sighted out loud.


    "Sigh~Let¡äs hope that he was thest one to disturb me for today..."


    Without further ado, Danzel picked one of the alchemic weapons and went right into carving the [Rune of Harvest] with the aim of improving the rune into the [Good] rating.


    And in the passage of time, Danzel finally managed to finish improving the rune after working for a whole week 24/7.


    [Epic Rune of Harvest sessfully engraved, Rating Good]<sub> </sub>


    [You received 15 000 XP]


    "Finally...I finished this damned thing." Danzel said with a tired voice before letting the sessful sword with the rune in the ground and staring nkly at the ceiling.


    He felt as if he upgraded several skills at the same time and receive an information overload. His head felt like bursting open.


    Every time he thought that he fixed a problem with the rune, the fixed problem became apletely different problem that affects another aspect of the rune. Making the rune one hell of an experience to adjust and fix till it reached the [Good] rating.


    Though he couldn¡ät get physically tired, he was in dear need of some rest.


    Even though he carved less [Rune of Harvest] than his runed contracts, thetter was much easier for him as he already knew how the runes worked, which made the work in carving those just repetitive.


    But for the [Rune of Harvest] he had to continuously think about his mistakes and experiment to see what worked best.


    In a way, he found it funny.


    He already had the knowledge of how a [Perfect] [Rune of Havest] was supposed to be, but every time he tried to follow ording to his knowledge, it never came out the way he wanted.


    `At least now I can finally finish spreading the [Rune of Harvest] for good. Though a better grade of the rune would be better, for now, I am done with it.¡ä he thought while shaking his head to remove the headache before refocusing on the notification in front of him.


    "A total of 15 000, huh? Not a bad amount gave the time I spent with each one of them. But the space in my ring seems to reach its limit with all those weapons that I used. Azrael is probably also bound to ask me to make another rune of him with the amount I took. And then there is his sister to think about..."


    Suddenly after listing the few things that he had to do, another wave of headache started to rampage in his mind.


    `The shield that Velkir promised should also be arriving soon. And taking to ount that I don¡ät know when another mission is going to be assigned, I can¡ät even take a break to study Velkir lessons as I have to see after Agares sword. I should also forget about finishing anything of the runebinations that I had in my mind.¡ä


    "For now I should focus on carving Agares runes so that I can be done with that for good. Then getting in touch with Velkir to ask about the shield. I even forgot to check on Skull ws'' skills, as for the other stuff..."


    Shaking his head, Danzel went out of his room and walked towards Agares and Shiro''s room. But before he even managed to reach their room, a voice started to call him from behind him.


    "Hey! Danzel! Have you heard already!?" The owner of this voice was none other than Vanessa.


    "Hmm?"


    Turning around, he looked at the dark elve in confusion.


    "What are you talking about? Am I supposed to have heard something?" Danzel asked.


    "Oh, didn¡ät the boss inform you already? We all have been given another mission. And this time around I heard that it will be quite the long one while splitting the group. Didn¡ät you hear?"


    Hearing those words, Danzel froze still, his ethereal eyes going out.


    He felt like someone who was drenched with ice-cold water naked in the winter.


    `No, she still didn¡ät mention when our mission will be!¡ä Danzel thought ordingly before asking what was in his mind.


    "Hmm~so you really heard nothing, huh? That¡äs what happens if you stay locked in your room for a whole week." Vanessa said while shaking her head.


    "The mission starts tomorrow."


    "..."


    Seeing Danzel freezing up, Vanessa patted his shoulder before waving her goodbyes to him.


    `It¡äs still fine...I still have time to carve Agare''s sword, before the mission starts. That way I can suck u- I mean benefit from his efforts. Anything else can wait for another day!¡ä Danzel said while hasting his steps towards Agares and Shiro''s room.


    And once he reached the outside of the room, Agares who sensed himing towards them came out looking at Danzel with a confused look.


    "Why have youe Danzel?" Agares said with a frown.


    "I just came to pick up your sword to carve the runes I promised. I should be able to finish them before tomorrow''s mission."


    Hearing that, Agares looked at Danzel strangely.


    "I see...but why now? It¡äs alreadyte night you know?"


    p For a workaholic that hasn¡ät left his room for a whole week and additionally being a tireless undead with night vision. Danzel suffered from the same thing that many undead experiences after isting themself from the outside world.</anda>


    He lost track of time.

 Chapter 293 Bodyguard Deployment

    Upon Danzel''ste request, Agares decided to leave Shiro to sleep in their room while he went ahead to Danzel''s room to watch over the runesmithing process.


    Though it would be more convenient for him to simply give his sword to Danzel for the night, Agares went ahead and requested to watch from the side.


    As for the reason, Danzel wasn¡ät too sure but he still epted the old man''s request.


    His best guess was that either Agares didn¡ät trust him or that he treasured his sword too much to let othersy fingers on the scythe sword.


    As for having his runesmithing secrets found out, Danzel didn¡ät worry too much. Although one could mimic the movement of his hand and also the symbol of the rune, the secret that made the rune work was a delicate control over mana, in an extremely specific way.


    He was confident that one couldn¡ät see through it even if one stared at the processes more than one time. Albeit he would be much more hesitant if the one watching was someone like Velkir, a magic caster that probably lived more than a few centuries.


    So for someone like Agares who was a swordsman, he didn¡ät mind much.


    Once he reached his room, Danzel went right ahead and started carving while Agares watched him with curiosity and worry.


    They didn¡ät have to discuss what kind of rune Danzel was going to carve as they had already discussed it. And since the scythe sword had a much greater length than even his great sword, Danzel found room to carve a total of 4 runes!


    `It will be my first time carving 4 runes into a single item...¡ä Danzel thought slightly excited that making his previous headache go away.


    He would even be more enthusiastic if the runes that Agares wanted weren¡ät for the most part, of [Common] rarity except a [Umon] rune and the [Rune of Harvest]. Making the scythe sword in the end to have 2 [Common], 1 [Umon], andstly 1 [Epic] rune.


    The twomon runes were respectively one that enchanted the sharpness of the sword itself, while the other runes increased the sword toughness,


    Both of those runes turned out as the [Perfect] quality, improving the sword''s intended purpose to much greater heights.


    Such runes were enough to make a butter knife into a sharp and sturdy dagger that could easily pierce through leather armor. But that was about it.


    As the [Common] runes were mostly passive effects and rather normal, Danzel didn¡ät find them fitting to be carved in high-end equipment.


    But Danzel understood Agares decision.


    Both of those runes were nice and simple.


    Agares even said that he was fine with those two runes alone, but through Danzel''s suggestion, he gave in and let him carve the third rune, called [Rune of Bleedreach].


    Such rune was basically a much inferior version of his current [Cursed Wounds de]


    It essentially made any mana attacks that inflicted injuries to be harder to heal and that was about it.


    The runes inflicted neither elerated decay, pain nor bleeding. It just made the healing effects on others to be much harder to heal a wound.


    The rune was of the [Good] quality, which made the effect only so-so. Usually, he could make [Umon]runes of the [Well-done] quality, but since this was one rune that he hadn¡ät practiced much, it turned out of the [Good] quality.


    As for thest rune, it was obviously the [Rune of Harvest].


    And in the end, the scythe sword turned out to be a better version of itself and nothing more.


    Though he found it slightly disappointing, in the end, he didn¡ät care as long as the [Rune of Harvest] was engraved in the sword.


    By the time he finished the 4 runes, the sun had already risen.


    "Here you got your sword." Danzel said before giving Agares the sword back.


    Observing the newly engrave runes on his sword, Agares nodded toward Danzel.


    "You have my gratitude, Danzel."


    Hearing that, Danzel passed beside him.


    "If you are really that thankful, then you can write down some of your techniques for me to practice on a piece of paper or something the next time we meet. It¡äs more convinced that me seeking you in the night." Danzel said without waiting for Agare''s answer.


    Hearing that, Agares frowned for a split second, before going toward his room.


    Like many other people, writing their techniques was looked down as if such information was to spread, then someone that the owner didn¡ät deem worthy would be able to learn it if one of course had the talent to learn the technique, to begin with.


    Though such a thing was much moremon for those who practice a martial art or any sort of weapon art than for magic scrolls.


    Even the most greedy magic caster who didn¡ät care about such a thing found selling their spells quite disdainful. At the very best they would sell spells of the 2nd-tier to customers that were to be trusted.


    For Danzel, the value of magic scrolls and written techniques was much greater as he could learn them instantly


    `Let¡äs hope that he will at least write something.¡ä Danzel thought before going where they first once gathered.


    There he found Vanessa the dark elve seating in the stone cubes with her legs crossed together.


    "Hey! Rue Danzel! I thought you wouldn¡äte!" Vanessa yelled while waving her hand towards him.<sub> </sub>


    Seeing that, Danzel shook his head helplessly before seating in one of the seats.


    "Though it¡äs already here since master Velkir has a barrier, please don¡ät call me by my name outside...The others know me as Abdiel." Danzel said with a hint of worry.


    `Won¡ät this girl expose me the second she goes out?¡ä He thought to himself.


    "Baah! Do you take me for an idiot!? I know at least that much!" Vanessa said while turning her head and ignoring Danzel''s existence.


    Danzel didn¡ät mind that and waited for a few minutes before looking at Vanessa.


    "By the way, when will Velkire? And what mission will be going to? All I know is what you told me yesterday and nothing more."


    ncing at Danzel with a disdainful look, Vanessa said.


    "Velkir should being by any time soon, Abdal. As for what the mission is I also got no clue." She said before turning her head away.


    `It¡äs Abdiel, not Abdal...¡ä Danzel thought, feeling his worries increasing.


    At first, he expected Velkir to appear in a few minutes, but it was only after an hour that Velkir came to meet them.


    "It seems like Vanessa informed you about the mission. Follow me outside you two." Velkir said with his cold voice.


    Doing as Velkir said, the three went outside.


    Skull w who was as usual "guarding" the fort, immediately became excited upon seeing her liegeing outside.


    But once she saw the dark-skinned man was Velkir, she became less enthusiastic.


    "Hmm, Danzel, will you be taking this undead with you?" Velkir said as looked at the Death Hound.


    Danzel nced at Skull w for a moment before nodding his head.


    "If it¡äs possible with you, I will like for Skull w toe." Danzel said while waving Skull w toe at him.


    With hesitant steps, she went near her liege while keeping an eye on Velkir. With now having a total of three eyes, doing as such proved to be much easier for her.


    Velkir did notice Skull ws''s gaze, but he simply ignored it and made his staff appear.


    Within the next moment, a huge magic circle appeared around them.


    "Hear me well you two, this time around you, Danzel, will be deployed to protect someone while Vanessa will help with the situation that this person is facing. But your priority will be to protect this person''s life." Velkir said.


    "Protect you say..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    "Though I believe I am more suitable to fight that protect... who is that person that I need to protect?" Danzel asked.


    Though as a [ck Guard], he indeed had properties to protect someone, overall, he found himself more suited to fight than to protect.


    `I will also have to kill people if I want to ever achieve the mission of bing a [Death Knight]. Protecting someone would only make the progress of this mission so much slower.¡ä


    So being assigned to protect someone slightly displeased Danzel.


    Oblivious of Danzel though, Velkir answers his question.


    "He is the son and heir of a duke who practices arcane magic. Since he has reached the 3rd-tier and uses a special type of arcane magic, he will be targeted by the enemy army. You will also have to worry about traitors who might want to assassinate him in order to harm the duke. So you will have to worry for both allies and enemies while being there."


    "As for you Vanessa, you will be one of the main forces who will help them with the battle. You should focus on preventing strong opponents to reach the duke''s son."


    Once Velkir finished, the magic circle around them lighten up, engulfing the three in light that in the next moment pierced the sky and transported them to a different location.


    Once the light disappeared, Danzel and Vanessa found themself on the top of the castle walls, and in the distance, smoke covered the surroundings and echoes of battle cries could be heard.


    The soldier on top of the walls flinched when they saw the three figures together with a huge skeleton hound appear from the seemingly sky and they didn¡ät hesitate to point their spears at them.


    "Every soldier put down their weapons! They are allies!" A robed young man holding a huge blue orb yelled out loud.


    Seeing who was speaking, the soldiers put down their weapons.


    "He is the one you will need to protect." Velkir whispered to Danzel before handing him a ring in his hand.


    `Inside the ring is my part of our deal, with some additional supplies. But I will be expecting the ring back¡ä Velkir said telepathically to Danzel before ncing at the young man.


    "The mercenaries of the Deathfull Skulls have arrived to give support."

 Chapter 294 Arcanist With 2 Groups

    Scanning the faraway battlefield, the young man who held a blue orb had a frown on his face.


    `Will I really be safe if I go there?¡ä The young man thought in doubt.


    He was Wilhelm Ionarres, the second son of duke Ionarres. One of the founding families that were involved in the founding of the Great Dynasty of Ioratal with a rich history.


    Their family was controlled and supervised over the many magic academies spread though the whole Dynasty. They were responsible for creating loyal magic casters to serve the kingdom either by joining the military or the academy itself to study ways to create new magic items.


    Not only that, but their family also carried the blood of an Archmage, making the whole Ionarres household natural skilled mages except for some minor expectations.


    Nevertheless, Wilhelm was one of those talented magic casters who by the age of 24 even achieved the 3rd-tier.


    Not only was his talent outstanding, but he also went out of his way to learn arcane magic. A type of magic that is also nicked is named natural magic where only pure mana was being used to cast a spell.


    The higher-ups of the Dynasty even considered him as a future Archmage and would rather not have him die on the frontiers during the war between the two other kingdoms.


    s, even though he had such a future ahead of him, he still volunteered to join the war effort.


    The reason for that was neither love for the Dynasty nor wanting to be a hero.


    The only reason why he would risk his life was to increase his standing in the family and im his father''s position.


    His elder brother had long since secured the position of the heir by creating a web of connections with other nobles to pressure his father.


    Even though he had more qualifications to im the family head position, his father was forced to keep his elder brother as the current heir of the family head.


    By the time he became Archmage his elder brother would even im the family and most likely deprive him of the family resources.


    Amidst despair of being in such a situation, someone reached out a hand and gave an offer that he couldn¡ät refuse.


    "Participate in the war and I will make you the heir, huh?" Wilhelm mumbled the exact words of that man who was in a simr situation as him.


    Staring at the battle, the man couldn¡ät help but get anxious.


    Suddenly, from the sky 4 piercing lights fell down on the same wall that he and many others were standing at.


    `Those must be the guards that his highness has talked about.¡ä Wilhelm thought internally before going to meet the group.


    ...


    ***


    After discussing with the Archmage for a bit and entrusting him with a female dark elve and a knight d in dark armor followed by a huge undead hound.


    After going down the walls, Wilhelm couldn¡ät help but steal some nces at the mercenaries of the Deathfull Skulls.


    `I neven seen a dark elve but her beauty is worth the name of the elve race.¡ä Wilhelm thought with a frown.


    Though she was beautiful, he couldn¡ät manage how such a fragile figure could put up a fight. Even her cloak couldn¡ät hide the dark elves'' figure, making him believe that she is an assassin of some sort.


    The other two members inparison left a much deeper impression on him.


    In appearance the undead hound was much more intimidating, its three ethereal eyes burning with a fierce dark-green me. For someone like Wilhelm who had never seen undead before, such a sight was as new as it was scary.


    But the one that made him the most warry was the dark knight as his aura by itself was quite threatening.


    Soon afterward, the group went inside the castle where inside was another group of 3 people.


    Each of their aura is fierce.


    One was a tall half naked man with several tattoos on his chest and a ne made out of big teal-colored wooden pearls. His body was full of scars and yet he created some sort of aura around him that made others feel safe.


    The other one was a woman wearing leather armor with several knives a bow and a quiver on her back. She had long blond hair and looked in her early 20s, but her pointy ears revealed the fact that she was an elve, making her actual age questionable at best.


    Thest of the party of three was a man wearing a ck cloak while covering his mouth with some ck cloth. His presence there felt missing as if he wasn¡ät there in the first ce.<sub> </sub>


    The single thing that those three had inmon was the fact that they were 3rd-tier experts.


    It didn¡ät take them long for that group to notice the people behind their client.


    "Master Wilhelm, who may those people be-wait is that an undead?" The elve archers said frowning at the appearance of Skull w.


    The other two had the same reaction as her and they immediately raised their weapons ready to fight at any time.


    Seeing that Wilhelm couldn¡ät help but curse internally.


    "Wait! The undead and those two are allies! Lower your weapons!"


    Looking at each other, the group lowered their weapons, but still nced at the other party with hostility.


    Danzel who watched the group with the same hostility as theirs turned his head toward the one he was supposed to protect.


    "Sir, who may those people be? As long as I am aware, our side wasn¡ät aware of them." Danzel said with his ice cold voice.


    "It¡äs natural that you haven¡ät heard of them as I wasn¡ät aware of them till today. They are the Nature''s Dagger mercenaries sent by my father to work as my bodyguards just like you...three?" Wilhelm said somewhat unsure wherever he should count the undead as a part of their group or just a minion of theirs.


    Hearing such information now made neither party satisfied.


    "With all due respect, Master Wilhelm Ionarres, but having an undead and a ck elve, beings that are known for their evil natures will hinder both our work and endanger you!" The elve archers said while pointing her finger towards Vanessa, who in turn frowned at her.


    "What did you just say vermin?" Vanessa said, releasing her killing intent towards the petite elve that now shudder in fear at her aura.


    Seeing things about to escte, Wilhelm released his own 3rd-tier aura and yelled out loud.


    "Quite! You all have been paid ordingly by the Dynasty to fight the same battlefield! They even came at my expense! Compared to you three that were paid by my father, I can send you back right away!"


    Though his aura wasn''t particrly impressive to the group of the 3rd-tiers and Vanessa, his words were enough to shut them up before they create more trouble for him.


    `His highness went out of his way and called a 4th-tier expert to watch over me. I have to get on her good side for my survival¡ä He thought to himself.


    "We also don¡ät have time to discuss good and evil based on one''s race! While weze around here, soldiers of the Dynasty keep dying by the second. Introduce your specialty and we will go to join the other too!"


    He tried to be especially loud at saying that so that the nearby soldiers who were working saw him in a better light.


    Looking at each other, the tall half naked man stepped up.


    "I am the vanguard of the Nature''s Dagger group and I mainly fight with my fist, I know some druid and shapeshifting spells. Name is Borg."


    The other who stepped next was the elven archers.


    "I am the archer of the Nature''s Dagger group, my name is Sarah..." She said with a scoff in the end.


    "I am the scout and rogue of the Nature''s Dagger group. I go by the name of Kenn..."


    Right after they finished, it was Vanessa who stepped up to introduce herself.


    "My name is Vanessa! As you can see I am an evil dark elve of the 4th-tier, I am a pugilist from the Deathfull Skulls mercenaries." She said with a sneer at the end, clearly making it known that she looked down on the other group.


    Though the rogue Kenn and the druid Borg didn¡ät mind her hostility, Sarah inparison ground her teeth in hate towards Vanessa.


    With everyone but one person left, naturally, everyone''s focus turned towards Danzel, the dark armored knight.


    "...My name is Abdiel and just like her, I am from the Deathfull Skulls mercenaries group-" Danzel said while reaching out and touching Skull ws'' leg.


    "-and I am a swordsman as well as a necromancer. This here is Skull w, one of my undead." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "Let¡äs all have a nice cooperation." He said while grinning behind his helmet

 Chapter 295 [Arcane Heavens Spears]

    The war between the new Kingdoms of Arcana and Berum has continued for several decades and showed his spiked several times, but at the current time, the war started to reach its peak with the Berum kingdom, otherwise known as thend of the immortal phoenix being the one agitated the war to happen.


    The war justification for it was the fact that the king of Berum, is a matter of fact a phoenix who is considered to be a divine beast that believes in the goddess of the Sacred Cross. As a being that is made out of pure life force and the holy attribute, it was only natural for their Kingdom establishing itself with the interest of those two attributes.


    That was why the Berum was known for the citizen having stronger and healthier bodies.


    The Arcana Kingdom was different though.


    A kingdom build upon the idea of purchasing magic and nothing else, with the ones that reached the peak of magic called the title of Magus to rule over the kingdom.


    Creating a kingdom ruled by an oligarchy as reaching the 5th-tier was too rare for achievement for a man to reach.


    Compared to the usage of life force, magic itself quickly shows its flexibilitypared to the former.


    With enough resources, magic items were created that could fatal wounds and different kinds of magic were found, making life much easier.


    s wherever the sun shines, shadows will be cast.


    And in shorter than a decade, the dark arts of magic were founded by people. The most infamous of them all was Necromancy.


    Wherever the intention was of such magic to be born, it didn¡ät take long for someone with ill intention to master this sort of power and achieve immortality in the form of undeath.


    Making the Arcana kingdom nothing more of a spawn ce of powerful undead in the form of Liches.


    Turning the exact reason for the Berum kingdom to instigate holy war against the Arcana kingdom.


    Of course, the weakest of the new kingdoms, the Dynasty of Ioratal saw that as nothing more of an excuse for the Berum Kingdom to im more territory.


    And the reason why they were taking part in the war was to prevent neither party finishes as they knew the moment one of them falls, they were bound to be next.


    "Or at least that¡äs the exnation that my brother gave to me. Knowing him he probably hid something, but that''s the gist of it." Vanessa said with azy tone while following behind Wilhelm.


    Hearing her exnation, Danzel nodded before looking around at the 200 knights that were with them and the other group of mercenaries.


    `So Dynasty is simply keeping the others for strangling themselves while being in the background, huh?¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    Although he knew the situation of both Berum and the Arcana kingdom, he knew very little about the so-called Ioratal Dynasty. That¡äs why she asked Vanessa for the reason they were in a war against two giants.


    The answer he got though was more simple than he expected.


    The two kingdoms couldn¡ät effort to fight on two fronts since the moment they do they will be at a great disadvantage against the true threat.


    And if either party seeded in taking over the territory of the Dynasty, then they were bound to have more resources than the other party, increasing their chance of winning the war.


    `So this battlefield wouldn¡ät contain the main force of either kingdom, huh? If things are as I guessed, then it¡äs an opportunity worth being harvested.¡ä Danzel thought before turning his head towards Wilhelm.


    "Sir, when will we be arriving?" Danzel said with a cold voice, much different from when he was talking with Vanessa.


    The knights who were only of the 2nd-tier looked at him in disdain.


    The fact of being a necromancer with a huge undead under his control brought both fear and disdain. Those who were overly sensitive to one''s aura also felt kinda creeped out by him and his voice.


    Looking at the knights that he was assigned, Wilhelm felt troubled by the necromancer''s presence andck of respect towards a noble.


    `No, he is a mercenary send directly by his highness and a 3rd-tier too.¡ä Wilhelm shook his head before answering.


    "We almost there, it shouldn¡ät take us long..."


    "..."


    Danzel wanted toin but stopped himself from doing as such.


    They have been walking for an entire hour with all the 200 knights.


    Though their numbers did indeed pose some threat, Danzel thought that it would have been better on leaving them behind and run towards their destination with only the 3rd-tiers and leave the liability behind.


    s, he decided to keep his opinion to himself.


    `Having more meat shields and corpses should be safer anyways¡ä Such were his true thoughts.


    In the meanwhile Sarah who was waiting to create trouble scoffed at Danzel.


    "Hmpf, how ignorant can you be? Didn¡ät you guys look at any information beforeing and epting this job? Sigh~that¡äs why I hate third-rated mercenaries."


    Hearing that, Danzel didn¡ät even spend a nce at her and continued ignoring her. Vanessa inparison looked as if she was ready to kill her on the spot.


    Fortunately for Sarah, before that happend they even reached their destination.


    "Knights! Look through the surroundings for possible enemies! Mercenaries, follow me..." Wilhelm ordered.


    Each of them followed the instruction and respectively both Vanessa and Danzel were confused as to what they were doing here.


    He wanted to voice out his confusion, but the ones who beat him first were Vanessa.


    "Hey, I thought we will be going to a battlefield, what are we doing here?"


    Hearing her question, Wilhelm''s frown titched for a split second.


    `Did you guys realle here without knowing anything?¡ä


    He couldn¡ät help but remember the words that Sarah said a moment ago.<sub> </sub>


    "Miss Vanessa~" Talking with a respectful tone unlike of a noble, Wilhelm pulled out a map that he was carrying.


    He didn¡ät dare offend someone of the 4th-tier.


    "The current battlefield isn¡ät that far away. It¡äs around here." He pointed at the blue and red cross on the map.


    "And we are here~" He then pointed at a ck circle which was around 8 kilometers far away from the battlefield.


    "We aren¡ät the main force of that army, but instead we are their support you see. We will be stationed so that I can-" Before he could finish, Vanessa groaned out loud.


    "Then you should even have told me instead of wasting my time walking..."


    Without a second thought, she left them all standing there and walked towards the direction of the battlefield.


    Seeing that Wilhelm immediately started to panic.


    "Miss Vanessa! Where are you going!?"


    "Isn¡ät it obvious? I am going to fight." She said while starting stretching out of the blue.


    Everyone except Danzel looked at her confused.


    "But your job is to stay as my bodyguard! There is no need to take part in the battlefield!" He yelled in quick session.


    She was his biggest guarantee here that anything could happen. Losing her made him feel extremely threatened even though they were 8 kilometers far away from the battlefield.


    "Hmpf, that guy there is already enough to be your bodyguard. There is no need for me over here." Vanessa said while pointing at Danzel.


    "But-!!"


    "See ya!"


    In the next moment Vanessa put some of her strength in her legs, she leaped through the air, leaving only a small crater and dust behind them.


    Wilhelm looked shocked at what just happend.


    He couldn¡ät help but remember her word, making him turn his head towards the necromancer.


    Danzel simply shrugged his shoulders at him.


    Although he didn¡ät get many opportunities to talk with Vanessa, it was still obvious that she had a hot temper.


    Wilhelm wanted toin to Danzel, but the next moment he suddenly felt one of hismunication devices activating.


    Taking the device in his hand, Wilhelm activated the device.


    "Who is there?" He said with a serious tone before moving away from the mercenaries.


    A short momentter he put themunication back into his robe and walked back to the mercenaries.


    "...I will not start my spell, look after the surroundings." Wilhelm said in a serious tone.


    The four of them nodded ordingly and looked after the surroundings. Skull w was the only one who looked casually at the surroundings.


    In the next moment, Wilhelm closed his eyes and let go of the orb that he was holding in the air.


    Instead of falling to the ground as it should, the orb levitates in the air without moving an inch. As Wilhelm began his spell, both under his feet and in the middle of the orb appeared some magic circle that moved clockwise in a very slow motion.


    Such a scene continued for several more seconds and suddenly the magic circle in the middle of the orb started to show some red dots.


    Raising his hands above the red dots, a set of 5 other small magic circles appeared right under the red dots.


    And in an instant where Wilhelm opened his eyes and raised his hands above him.


    "[Arcane Heavens Spears]!" With another big magic circle appearing right above him, the magic circle gather his mana and shot what looked like a magic missile just 10 times bigger.


    *Wtish!~Wtish!~Wtish!~Wtish!~Wtish!


    Flying one by one, a total of 5 spears flew through the distance, at first they were not much faster than what were the normal [Magic Missiles], but the longer they flew, the faster and bigger the 5 [Arcane Heavens Spears] became.


    And the direction they were headed was the same direction where the battlefield was!


    It took the [Arcane Heavens Spears] only a whole minute to close the distance and fall right through the battlefield.


    The only thing that Danzel and the others saw was several huge explosions appearing in the distance.


    "Long distance magic..." Danzel thought slightly shocked at the spell.


    By far this was the most powerful spell that he has ever seen till yet.


    But after remembering the cast time and how invulnerable the caster was from performing such a spell, he shook his head.


    `If one were to waste so much time preparing a single spell, they were bound to die.¡ä He though.


    Wilhelm wasn¡ät done yet and started preparing another [Arcane Heavens Spears].


    But once he began his spells, several figures appeared flying through the sky in the spot where the explosion urred.


    And in the next moment, those figures started flying right towards their group!

 Chapter 296 Summoning Device

    It was hard to miss the over 20 people flying right towards their destination.


    The knights which were for the most part of the 2nd-tier couldn¡ät even tell if those figures were either birds or an illusion created in their minds.


    But that wasn¡ät the case for the mercenaries.


    Those who had their senses enchanted could clearly see that those figures were wearing blue robes with a white mask that had a horizontal blue line. One could wonder how those people were capable to see with a mask like that.


    The fact that they were capable of using flying magic hinted at them being magic casters. The only thing that was unusualpared to your normal magic caster was that instead of holding a staff in their hands, they instead carried metal spikes in their hands.


    Seeing theming, Danzel sheathed his sword while feeling awkward.


    `Although my long-ranged skills did improve by upgrading them and became faster than before, I doubt I will be able to threaten those magic casters guessing by their flight speed.¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    Even if he was a powerhouse that could usually dominate others of the same tier as him, at the end of it his main weakness was the fact that he was helpless against magic.


    Sure, he could tank some of the spells directly thanks to the barriers created by his 2 [Rune of Force] together with the new skills [Armor of Vengeances] and [Undying Guard].


    Though that was the case, he would rather not face spells head-on like a meatshield.


    While he was thinking about how to deal with the iing magic casters, he suddenly heard something beside him.


    *Krrgg~


    Turning to see the source of that sound, Danzel saw the elve archers drawing her bow and aiming at the iing enemies.


    `Don¡ät tell me she is going-¡ä Before he could even finish his thoughts, Sarah released the string of her bow and shot the arrow directly at the magic caster''s reaction.


    *Boooh!


    The nearby dust was raised and the arrow pierced and traveled at the speed of sound, if not faster.


    The arrow easily closed the distance of 7 kilometers and reached the front of the magic caster who tried to dodge the arrow but failed in the end.


    Seeing that, Sarah couldn¡ät help but show a proud grin on her face, it was as if she was saying "You see how good I am? Now praise me!".


    "See that? Feel free to praise my skills!" She was even shameless enough to say those exact words, making the druid and rogue cringe internally.


    The next moment though when she changed her gaze towards the iing mages, she expected one of them to be falling with an arrow pierced through his skull.


    What she saw though was a barrier surrounding the magic caster that was sstrong enough to stop the arrow.


    "Tch, a barrier spell." Sarah groaned before preparing the next shot.


    There she was gloating when in actual fact her enemy managed to block her arrow. That alone made her feel temperament and angry.


    Danzel knew better though immediately saw something wrong with the magic caster.


    The way the magic caster reacted and theck of mana around him indicated that the magic caster tried to dodge instead of casting his spells.


    And seeing how quickly the barrier manifested around the magic caster, Danzel understood what just happend.


    `Those guys seem to enjoy my products, huh?¡ä


    Of course, Danzel was talking about the products that he made in his time in the Arcana kingdom when he was working with the shadow merchant Hanson.


    Back then he mainly carved runes into various chest tes which Hanson traded into the army of the Arcana kingdom. Of course, he also supplied some other runes, but for the most part, the [Rune of Force] was the most popr one.


    When Danzel saw the barrier, he was almost certain that it was his runes effect.


    `They probably hide the armor under their robes...¡ä


    And as Danzel guessed, it was exactly as he thought.


    The magic caster flying towards them did indeed hide their runed chest tes under the robes


    Wherever Sarah destroyed one of the magic caster barriers, then the magic caster in question will move right behind someone who didn¡ät use his barrier yet. Making things extremely annoying for Sarah.


    Using this exact method, the magic caster didn¡ät take them long to arrive above them with not a single casualty.<sub> </sub>


    And being inplete Syncro, they all raised their palms towards them and created a magic circle.


    Observing their aura the others realized that the enemy was only of the 2nd-tier.


    And yet the threat was still there.


    In a split second, severalrge fireballs were shot at all the knights and mercenaries.


    Wilhelm in turn had enough time to finish one of his spells.


    "[Arcane dome of Protection]!" With the magic circle under his feet expanding and covering all the knights, the mana formed a huge barrier protecting everyone from their side.


    Once the fireballs hit the barrier, several explosions urate outside the barrier.


    Such a feat for a single man to aplice was worth enough praise, but s such a feat didn¡äte without a cost. Not only did the spell spend 60% of all his mana but also made the magic caster feel mentally strained as he forcibly expanded the spell to protect the knights under hismand.


    Once the barrier was down, Danzel didn¡ät stay idle for long.


    Casting a total of 3 [Greater Death st] and guiding his mana into the longsword. Danzel send a total of 3 [Soul Reaping Wind] and 3 balls of dead mana towards the magic casters.


    Sarah also reacted ordingly and aimed toward the ones that had already their barrier broken.


    Albeit some of them managed to dodge the iing attacks, some magic casters found themself either having arge hole through their chest from Sarah''s arrow or screaming in pain from having their flesh melt by the assault of the dead mana balls. Although for thetter there was only one unlucky guy who was hit but still managed to survive because of the spell''sck of power.


    The most lethal of such assaults were the dark green wind des.


    Even though the arrows were much faster, the length of the wind de was much greater and more lethal.


    The two who were hit by such wind had arge chunk of their body removed while a dark green. The weirdest thing about this was that for a split moment, the missing chunk of flesh appeared with a dark green light.


    Then the dark green light was pushed backward, out of the magic caster''s body before disappearing in an instant.


    The magic caster didn¡ät pay for such detail and considered their allies as dead men. A total of 6 men were eliminated by Danzel and Sarah before the magic caster started to prepare their next spell.


    Originally there were a total of 22 magic casters, but now only 16 remained.


    Half of them seemed too prepared for another assault of fire magic while the other half dived straight to the ground in a circle formation, but the dive wasn¡ät targeted towards them but several meters away from them.


    Seeing such a weird action, Danzel felt suspicious and dashed toward them.


    But before he could reach them, a barrier appeared in front of him, forcing him to halt his steps.


    Just like before, Wilhelm used a smaller version of [Arcane dome of Protection] around himself and some of the knights. With only 2 thirds of the fireballsing their way, most of the knights were protected, but since the fireballs were cast to cover the whole area, some knights found themself being engulfed in mes.


    `Wasting his mana for such a thing...¡ä Danzel thought before turning to see the other half of the magic caster who dived to the ground.


    Without being able to stop them fromnding, they eventually reached the ground and stabbed their metal spikes to the ground in a circle like their formation.


    In the next second the metal spikes were engulfed in lighting and chained with the other spikes. After that, the magic caster went to their knee and touched the ground with their palms and released their own mana.


    Once metal spikes received the nearby mana, they explode and the metal parts circled around in a loop in the spot where the spikes were pierced. Not short after the ground in the circle was filled with a dark blue liquid.


    "Summon!" The magic caster yelled.


    And as if responding to their call, several humanoid figures started to surfcasting from the dark liquid with some having overgrown limbs while others had fingers of metal.


    At first 10 appeared, then 20 and the number of them started to rise by the second.


    Seeing such an abomination, the knights felt as if a cold wind brushed their necks, but their training made them channel their fear into strengthening the grip of their swords.


    Among those monsters, there were people wearing the same clothes as the magic caster who summoned all those monsters.


    `To think they would bring forth those arcana mutants by using teleportation magic...¡ä Danzel analyzed what just happend and took a step forwards.


    `Skull w, show me how much you grew.¡ä Danzel said telepathically to the Death Hound.

 Chapter 297 Skull Claw And Danzels Power

    "KGaaooooh!" Howling to the sky as if responding to her liegesmand, Skull w¡äs body started to change.


    The bones in her legs started to grow together with the sharp metal-like ws and her ribs started to shrink and bend inwards while her teeth seemed to be much bigger.


    Her overall body seemed to be slimmer by using the [Body Maniption] talent, but at the same time, she turned to look more ferocious and deadly to others.


    Digging her ws into the ground a sudden dark mist exploded within her stomach, engulfing her whole body except her skull in the dark mist.


    In the next instance, she dashed with incredible speed towards one of the portals that her liegemanded towards.


    The new masked magic caster that appeared and saw Skull wing towards them didn¡ät sit idle and waited for the undead to close the distance.


    By theirmand, the Arcana Mutants started to rush towards the undead while the magic caster started preparing their various spells.


    The first toe in contract with Skull w were the mutants.


    Each of them had a different kind of body part.


    Some Sharp talons for their nails while others had ws of some kind of animal. Themon theme on all of them was that each of them was built to kill and held the power of the lowerer-ranked 3rd-tier experts.


    As they lost their minds by bing the monsters they were, they gained power that more than 90% of the whole world''s poption could achieve.


    s, this very fact was their biggest weakness that they had.


    Once one of the mutants came close enough to Skull w, the dark mist itself swept through him and showed him to the side like a broken toy.


    The mutant that was sent flying had tworge chunks of meat cut from his chest and even one of his legs was cut off.


    The Dead Mana shrouding around her w made the flesh around the wound of the mutants rot at speed clear to the naked eye.


    The mutant in question tried to stand up and continue marching toward his enemies, but after arge amount of ck blood escaped from his body, the mutant copsed to the ground motionless.


    The other mutants who threw themselves towards Skull w experienced a simr fate.


    The dark mist around her body hid her actual body, but once the mutants came close enough in the mist and saw her ws of her and swung their modified hands, all they experienced was hitting the dark mist.


    The reason for that was the twobinations of magic spells being [Dark Mist Robe] and [Dark Mist] itself.


    The [Dark Mist] covered arge amount of dark mist to the surroundings and by Skull ws'' control, the dark mist surrounded her body.


    Bybining this spell together with the [Dark Mist Robe], a skill that covered the user''s movements in a simr dark mist, it became a skill that made her seem like a phantom.


    These two very two skills were the reason why her species were called [Death Hound]. They will create an environment where it was already hard enough to see their original body with the [Dark Mist] spell while leaving after images of their body with [Dark Mist Robe].


    Suck kind of move created the image of [Death Hound]¡äs being undead simr to a wraith which had an ethereal kind of body. But in truth, it was all a deception.


    Skull ws case though was a bit more special.


    Since there was a huge number advantage on the side of the mutants, she was bound to get hit and suffer damage, that would have been the case if she was a normal [Death Hound]


    s, Skull w managed to gain the skill [Temporarly Ethereal Body] which allowed her to spend her own mana to let physical attacks pass through her body as if she were truly a phantom.


    Of course, the rate of her mana decreased at a rapid rate, but so were the numbers of the mutants.


    Thanks to her [Body Maniption] talent, she could move each of her limbs in an unorthodox way, allowing her to attack enemies from her side without turning her body around at all.


    She was strong, so strong that Skull w could kill several of the mutants, but there was a limit.


    The mutants showed incredible vitality and were unwillingless toy down even after a mortal wound. elerating the amount of mana spent on Skull w.


    And things turned for the worse when the magic casters finished their own spell and shot them towards Skul w, forcing her to receive a huge amount of damage.


    If things continue like this, Skull w''s demise was certain.


    And Danzel knew that this would happen if Skull w fought all those enemies alone.


    s, they weren¡ät alone.


    The remaining knights charge and went to help out Skull w with Borg the druid providing support by raising the roots from the ground and erging them to bind the mutants and possibly break their legs.


    Sarah the elve archer sniped down the flying magic caster in the air and couldn¡ät provide support.


    As for the rogue Kenn and a few other knights went to help Danzel with the second portal who was currently taking part in a ughter.<sub> </sub>


    ***


    Going back a few minutes back in time, where Danzel send hismand...


    `Skull w, show me how much you grew.¡ä


    Although Danzel said that to Skull w, he actually didn¡ät have the privilege to stand to the side and observe Skull w at all.


    Although Danzel didn¡ät know the strength of the other three mercenaries too well, Danzel figured out that he was the strongest in a close-up fight.


    And with the overwhelming numbers of enemies and the fact that more could be summoned from the portal, Danzel had to quickly cut down the numbers and disrupt the magic casters that were opening the portal.


    Raising his old shield in front of him, Danzel dashed with incredible speed thanks to [Swift Movements] and [Shield Charge].


    Each step of his left a mark on the ground as he fearlessly charge at the enemies.


    He was so fast that the newly appeared masked magic caster became shocked.


    `Who is this guy!? At this rate, he wille for our head!¡ä They thought in unison as theymanded the mutants to charge at him.


    They were magic casters directly tough by the disciplines of the "Magus of the Tower". An elite group of magic casters who have undergone harshbat training and are equipent with thetest magic items of the Arcana kingdom.


    The mask that each of them wore had the enchantment to grant one the ability to use flying magic at the cost of some of their mana and the metal spears that they used to create a teleportation portal were a direct creation of the "Magus of the Tower" himself.


    It was a one-use item that needed at least 4 men with the metal spike to create a portal for their troubles toe. After it was used it would self-destruct so that the enemy doesn¡ät get his hands to study the magic item.


    It would also self-destruct if the one using the mana wasn¡ät the one authorized.


    And just like the "Magus of the Tower", they had magic gauntlets that served as their staffs and robe that made it easier to perceive mana and control it.


    But even such an elite magic caster felt a sense of extreme dangering out of the dark knight charging toward them. After all, they were only of the 2nd-tier.


    Their seniors of theirs and other great mages went to participate in the war against Berum after all.


    Their colleagues who notice Danzel''s quick advantage also became worried and changed the target of their spell.


    Soon enough 4 the magic caster send out their huge fireballs toward Danzel''s path while the others targeted Sarah.


    They did so to give the newly arrived magic caster time to cast their own spells as no sane human would continue running even after knowing that a barrage of mes came at them.


    Danzel though was no human.


    Running straight at the portal, he was soon engulfed by the huge fireballs, surprising the onlookers.


    Even a 3rd-tier would had receive burns enough to kill them if, of course, they haven¡ät suffocated yet.


    In the next second though, the dark knight charges out of the mes as if they didn¡ät exist in the first ce.


    "Impossible!"


    "Idiot, prepare your spell!"


    "Arcanic Mutants! Kill him!"


    Following the orders of the masked magic casters, the mutants charge right toward the dark knight.


    But as soon as the first mutant came in range to hit the dark knight, he was directly rammed by the shield and sent back flying with his chest caved in.


    Having lost some of his momentum, the dark knight raised his sword and swung it in the air, releasing an ominous dark green wind de.


    The wind de being too fast and them too close at it, a total of 4 mutants were cleaved in half together with a dark green after image of them before disappearing.


    Usually, even if the mutants had their whole heads destroyed, they would still be able to move.


    But now the mutants that had the bottom part of their body cut, should in theory be able to still crawl for several minutes before dying.


    s, after getting hit by the ominous dark green wind de, they immediately became motionless.


    After that, Danzel continues pushing forward, leaving his own team in the back staring dumbfounded at his ughter.

 Chapter 298 Useless Teammates

    Every time Danzel swung his de, the mutants came one step closer to their death.


    Not a single one of them could react to each of his swings with their speed alone and their own vitality was continuously being decreased by the curse inflicted by Danzel''s sword.


    Even the few mutants who were specifically modified to increase their regeneration properties for the cost of some of their strength had been helpless against the necromancer''s cursed de.


    It was as if something was pushing back their regeneration properties and severely reducing the effect, making their wounds continuously bleed while their very flesh began to rot.


    Though the numbers of the mutants were rapidly decreasing by Danzel''s de, it turned out that the mutants were much more annoying to deal with.


    Even after cutting them down and making the XP notification appear, they still kept throwing themself towards Danzel for a good few seconds before falling dead for good.


    `If this continues there will be more summoned that I killed this far. Albeit they are weak, they are still at the 3rd-tier.¡ä Danzel analyzed the situation before suddenly noticing an attacking from his side.


    Surrounding the front of his shield with dead mana, he defended against an attack by one of the mutants.


    *Tink!


    His w wished to pierce through his enemy''s chest and rip his heart out. Danzel''s shield though ruined his ns by blocking the w with his shield with ease.


    Right after, the dead mana in his shield suddenly turned into mist and swiftly traveled to his arm and entered his body to regenerate a small amount of mana.


    Without a second thought, Danzel cleaved the mutant that contributed to regaining his mana before focusing on all the other mutants rushing him.


    He already had killed a total of 13 mutants in less than a minute with this one being the 14. The XP that he gained from all of them was also at a satisfactory level, but the fact that he was stuck troubled him a bit.


    "I will have to push myself..." Danzel thought before preparing a spell of his.


    It took him only a few seconds to unleash his spell.


    "Raise! My undead!" Danzel yelled in his cold voice.


    Out of the 14 dead mutants, only 8 were suitable to be resurrected as undead Draugr. Their numbers wereughable amountpared to the arcanic mutants that help the strength of the 3rd-tier while his undead was of the 2nd-tier.


    `But that is enough.¡ä


    He directlymanded his undead to tackle the enemies in front of him, buying him some time to push forward.


    He aimed to kill the masked magic caster who held the portal active.


    Seeing his intentions, the magic caster didn¡ät stay idle and instead decided to take flight.


    Around that time was when his allies, the knights together with the rogue came and shed with the mutants behind him.


    The magic caster though didn¡ät pay attention to them and instead aimed for the true threat which was the dark knight.


    Surrounding him while flying in the air, all of them raise their hands in his direction. In the next second each one of them created a magic circle in front of them.


    "[Dragon Lighting]!" The 6 masked magic caster said, activating the magic circle in front of them and summoning fierce lighting to fall upon Danzel''s body.


    Being too apanied by the nearby arcanic mutants wanting a piece of him, Danzel failed to dodge their spells even though he saw iting.


    *Chiiigh~!!!


    Seeing the dark knight being engulfed in lighting, they smirked behind their masks.


    Seeing that fire magic didn¡ät seem to work against that dark knight, they decided to use lighting magic. Which of the cost of range, was more powerful.


    But before being able to celebrate finishing the main threat, the dark knight jumped toward one of them at terrifying speed thanks to his [High Jump] skill.


    "He is unharmed!?"


    rmed and shocked by the iing dark knight, the one that was targeted quickly raised his altitude to escape the cursed de.


    Though he achieved his goal of creating enough distance to keep the cursed de from cutting him, Danzel had already anticipated it and had prepared a [Soul Reaping Wind]for him.


    shing in the direction of the magic caster, the dark green wind de traveled towards the masked magic caster.


    Relying on hisbat training and his equipment, he barely managed to move to the side and let the wind de cleave his left arm instead of half his body.


    "Aghhh!"


    The magic caster screamed at top of his lungs and fell to the ground while gripping the wound in the hope to reduce the bloodlust as much as the pain.


    `Why does it hurt so much!?¡ä He cursed internally while in the midst of his suffering.


    Of course, having one''s arm cut off dide with a huge amount of pain. But those magic casters were specifically trained to still be able to keep their mind straight after losing a limb or two.


    They didn¡ät receive training to withstand torture, but they were tough enough to keep fighting while still being in such pain.


    But the current magic caster showed to bepletely unable to keep clear and use his healing magic on himself.


    Even his colleagues looked at him with a confused look.<sub> </sub>


    "Hey, calm down! Let me use healing magic." One of his colleagues flew down to him and directed his palm towards his missing arm.


    "[Close Wounds], [Greater Pain Resistance]"


    After those two spells were done, the wound of the fallen magic caster closed and healed to some extent, but not enough to regenerate his whole arm.


    He also used another spell to reduce his colleague''s pain to calm him done and bring him back into the fight.


    As for the fallen magic caster, he showed a moment offort before his face frowned into pain once more.


    "Aghh~! Why!? Why hasn¡ät the pain go away!" He yelled as he dug his nails into the ce where he was healed.


    "Hey, calm down, I already healed you. You should be fine." His colleagues were of course confused by the fallen magic caster.


    `I even used a pain reduction spell on you and yet you still feel the pain? He should be fine by now.¡ä He thought to himself.


    Forgetting the imminent threat that was looming over their head.


    Literally.


    "More than his flesh has been cut from him." The cold voice sounded behind him.


    Without being able to react, Danzel swung his de at the heads of the magic caster.


    Swiftly ending their lives.


    `So that¡äs what happens after ones have his soul essence cut from him, huh? I would even like to open his status to see if something changed, but now I have other priorities...'' Danzel thought before casting 3 [Greater Death st] and shooting them all in the face of a mutant.


    Upon impact of all three balls of dead mana, it directly melted half of the mutant''s face.


    After that, it took him a single swing of his second to finish that mutant off for good.


    "I even used both of the barriers..." Danzel mumbled as he nced at his allies.


    The rogue moves were as efficient as they were deadly, the mutants didn''t have the slightest chance against him, butpared to Danzel, he was killing the mutants at a snail''s pace.


    The knights inparison were theplete opposite.


    Against the 3rd-tier mutants who didn:''t quiet after death, the 2nd-tier knights were being killed extremely fast.


    Fear had overwhelmed them and morale was always low.


    The performance of his allies was in one way or another pathetic.


    ''I can''t rely on that useless bunch. I will have to force it then.''


    Previously he yed it safe and kept either blocking or dodging the attacks of the mutants so that his remaining barrier stay intact.


    But as he already used hisst barrier against the 6 lighting spells, he changed tactics.


    Using both his movement skills to dash as he has just done at the start, he pushed full speed towards the portal.


    The mutants that came in his way were either shed by his cursed sword or smashed with his shield with enough force to break some of their bones.


    But that didn''te without a price.


    In the midst of racing forward, a mutant appeared from behind another mutant and went to swing his ws at his head.


    Reacting to the attack, with a shift swing by his cursed sword, he directly decapitated the mutant.


    The now headless mutant wasn''t finished though.


    Forcing his body to move, it still continued the attack with its ws, but as it has lost its sight, the attack went right to Danzel''s chest.


    The ws pierced directly into his main armor.


    Seeing that Danzel directly cut the mutant''s arm out off, making him loses a part of his momentum.


    The masked magic casters who were waiting for a chance flew in the air and unleashed another barrage of lighting at him.


    ''Dammit!''


    Spreading quickly his mana around his armor to prepare for the impact.


    *Chiigh!!!


    This time there was no barrier to protect Danzel, leaving the lighting to travel through his whole body.


    Danzel started rapidly losing his health upon being electrocuted.


    But thanks to one of his skills, a part of the damage was absorbed though his armor and it gathered in the form of a dark most inside his chest, waiting to be unleashed

 Chapter 299 Abdiel, The Knight That Brings Death

    With the lighting of the spell [Dragon Lighting] traveling through his whole body, even his newly aquired skill [Armor of Vengeances] wasn¡ät able to absorb all the damage, making small cracks appear all around his body.


    Maybe [Armor of Vengeances] would have been able to absorb 2, but for a total of 4 lighting spells the skill was only able to reduce the damage he received to a minimum.


    Resulting in a wave of angering at Danzel.


    "You!!!" Gnashing his teeth, he guided his mana into his sword and swung towards the location of one of the masked magic casters.


    Unfortunately, the magic caster had already realized his limitation in rangedbat. At this point, they would have been stupid if they didn¡ät notice how Danzel long ranged attacks were only the dark green wind de and the balls of dead mana.


    But knowing isn¡ät the same as doing it.


    The masked magic casters had spread right after finishing their spell, but the one who was targeted found the ominous wind de being much faster than his flying speed.


    Luckily for him, one of his colleagues reacted ordingly and cast the spell [Air Wave] on the one who was targeted.


    [Air Wave] was a 1st-tier spell that as its name suggested, send arge wave of air to the caster''s target location. In most cases, it wasn¡ät a lethal spell to say the less.


    The magic caster used this spell to push his colleagues a few meters to the side so that he can dodge the dark wind de, which for the most part he seeded.


    The target magic caster thanks to the save of his colleagues barely manage to avoid death for the cost of being cut on the neck.


    "Agh~[Close Wounds]!"


    The cut was a few centimeters deep and could have been lethal if left untreated. And for a magic caster who is capable of healing magic, such a thing wasn¡ät an issue.


    "Dammit, Agh~[Greater Pain Resistance]! Why does it still hurt?" He mumbled as the pain in his neck made him extremely ufortable.


    It wasn¡ät unbearable like the one who had his arm cut off, but the pain he felt was always there and didn¡ät lessen even after using a spell like [Greater Pain Resistance].


    "Everyone! That wind holds some kind of pain amplifying curse!" The magic caster who was cut shared the information among the others before going down out of Danzel''s vision.


    Danzel would have very much liked to chase after them, but having lost his momentum he soon found himself surrounded by the arcanic mutants.


    A total of 6 mutants charged at him at the same time.


    The one in front of him jumped at him with his ck ws trying to get a piece from him while another 2 were trying to do the same on both his left and right.


    Using skillful his shield with the support of [Undying Guard] Danzel was capable to hold the one in front of him together with the ones on his left side at bay and even mmed his shield directly at their face and heal the cracks in his body.


    The two others from his right side were the victims of his sword.


    ? Wherever they came close Danzel would swing his sword and cut their chest arge wound, while amplifying the curse of the [Cursed Wounds de] skill.


    Holding so many 3rd-tierbatants while inflicting them lethal damage was a feat worth mentioning, but in the end, there was a limit.


    Right after the two mutants in his right stopped moving, thest mutant that was sneaking from behind him moved at speed much faster than the other mutants.


    Something that Danzlel didn¡ät expect.


    Without being able to react, the mutant rammed his shoulder right through his back with enough force to crack his spine.


    This mutant body modification was specifically aimed toward his legs so that he can dash with explosive speed. Making it the reason why this one was faster than all other mutants.


    But since using such speed overheated the muscles on his legs, performing such a move wasn¡ät possible more than once in a short time.


    And having used her dash already, the mutant felt soon victim to Danzel''s cursed sword cutting his body from shoulder to his hip.


    The mutant in front of him saw this as an opportunity and moved to Danzel''s right side in the hope to push his w right through where the lungs were supposed to be.


    Danzel who didn¡ät miss such movement had his ethereal eyes re up much more.


    Sweeping his sword like the scythe of a reaper, he directly cut the mutant''s chest in one go without it being able to dodge.


    Danzel learned that as long as he killed them and cut their arms off, they would be essentially powerless even if they would be able to move


    Unfortunately, he once again underestimated the mutants will power to kill one''s opponent.


    The mutant who had his half torso cleaved though, used one of its remaining legs to jump right past Danzel while the other leg turned around and directly kicked Danzel''s head.


    *Crack!


    Destroying the dark tings, the kick''s power was enough to leave arge crack in the back of Danzel''s skull.


    The damage had been much greater if Danzel didn¡ät wear his helmet while using [Armor of Vengeances].


    With the skull being the weakness of most skeleton type undead, the damage that Danzel received was incredibly high. If he were to look at his status, that would even have been a total of more than 6000 HP.


    As an undead, he didn¡ät feel any sort of pain.


    But receiving such kind of damage to his skull engulfed him with an increadible amount of hatred and bloodlust to the point where a dark aura was seeping out of his armor.


    "Now!!!"


    The masked magic caster who saw that didn¡ät dare to leave this opportunity unused.


    They flew above Danzel and let a total of 4 [Dragon Lightings] louse towards Danzel, which soon met their target.


    *Chiigh~!!! Crack!


    Just like before, Danzel was engulfed with the lighting of the magic caster, further opening the cracks in his spine and skull while creating much smaller cracks all around his body.


    Of course, most of the damage was absorbed and turned into a dark mist that was umting inside his chest thanks to the skill of [Armor of Vengeances].


    At that time the other mutants who had him surrounded reced the spots of the previous 4 dead mutants. Charging to get a piece on the severely damaged dark knight.


    At that time Danzel''s bloodlust was raised to the next level and manifest like a dark aura seeping out of his armor, bringing immense pressure though around the whole area.


    "YOU MERE INFERIOR BEINGS!!!" Danzel cold and thunderous voice echoes through the whole area, carrying the bloodlust that made even his own allies tremble from fear.


    In the next second, that dark mist that has umted in his chest moved out of his armor and circled around him.


    Suddenly, the very dark mist that was circling around his armor exploded and spread through his surroundings.<sub> </sub>


    At first, it looked like some usual dark mist, but once the mutants came in contact with the mist, they were forcibly pushed back as if the mist was a wall.


    The mist traveled a total of 10 meters and send every mutant who came across its path flying.


    Since arge amount of them was gathered around Danzel, the mutants who were sent flying crashed into the mutants behind them.


    Those who came in direct contact with the dark mist found their bodies to quickly decay and have their very own flesh rot.


    Danzel being in the middle of where the dark mist came had his sword engulfed with his mana while casting one of his spells.


    "Repair this wronged vessel."


    In the next second, dead mana flowed through his body and repaired the cracks of his body, but not all of them.


    It was the 2 tier spell, [Restore Undying Body], which was of the few skills which he had to chant to use.


    Once he used it once, he dashed forward with a speed much greater than before.


    Being under the effect of [Sin of Wrath] while having his skull damaged and even facing the living. Danzel''s state of mind was filled with bloodlust.


    Leaving most of the mutants behind, the few who came to stop him were met with his [Soul of Death Essence], making thempletely unable to move even after their death. Since he could only use such skill three times at the same time, the rest of the mutants who tried to stop him were directly run over by him.


    He pushed them to the ground while letting them scratch his armor or cut them directly with his sword while continuing his march towards his target.


    He did all that while continuously casting [Restore Undying Body] and slowly repairing his body.


    ...


    Currently, the masked magic caster who was putting their all to activate the portal once more finally seeded after painstakingly focusing their entire minds on it.


    Though the metal spikes did most of the work, they were still responsible to keep the teleportation portal active and supply it with mana.


    If they wanted to activate the teleportation portal more than once, they had to carefully keep the portal stable while supplying it with mana. It was a mentally tiresome job, which had them put their entire focus on maintaining the portal.


    After all, they were mere 2nd-tier magic casters.


    Though they were from an elite unit that receive special training and magical knowledge, there was a limit that they couldn¡ät cross.


    But with the help of some magic items, even they were capable to cast magic of the 4th-tier!


    Suddenly, the pool of mana in the portal seemed to show an image of a more masked magic caster and mutants.


    `Just a bit more...¡ä One of the magic casters thought as he saw the portal almost ready to bring their reinforcements to them.


    But in the next moment, a huge shadow fall upon this magic caster before a cold filled with hate came from behind him.


    "Repair this wronged vessel," The cold said before driving his cursed sword to the magic caster''s head, thus ending his life without him even realizing it.


    With him gone, the portal started to go out of control, and the image that just appeared faded away shortly after.


    Seeing that, the 3 other magic casters were dumbfounded at what just happend.


    `What just happend?` They thought in unison before ncing at their colleagueying on the ground while a pool of blood was forming where his head was.


    Right after seeing him, they saw the appearance of the dark knight engulfed with a horrifying aura.


    "Move!" Upon the call of one of them, the others jumped to fly into the air.


    But Danzel wasn¡ät generous enough to let them go.


    Having already been moving after killing the first of them, Danzel directly killed two magic casters without them being able to take flight.


    The one who shout was the only one who managed to fly and escape from the dark knight.


    At least that''s what he thought.


    Before flying high enough, he felt something holding his leg.


    "Huh?" Looking down at his leg, all he saw were two dark green hands holding his leg before he was cut in half by a dark green wind de.


    The blood flew everywhere, including on top of Danzel''s armors, which by now was filled with scratches and small holes.


    Out of his armor flew some dark sand which started to fill those scars and holes and make his armor just as it was before.


    Having stopped more enemies beings summoned, Danzel turned toward the remaining mutants and the masked magic caster.


    "Now only you lot remain." He said while walking towards the whole group with killing intent.


    Wilhelm who observed Danzel''s performance couldn¡ät help but remember Vanessa¡äs words.


    `That guy there is already enough to be your bodyguard.¡ä


    At that time he doubted her words.


    But after seeing the strength that he showed and feeling his ominous aura, cold sweat run through his back.


    "Necromancer Abdiel...a knight that brings death upon others." He mumbled to himself.


    He knew that his brother could possibly send assassins after him to finish him off so that he can secure the heir position for good.


    That was why Wilhelm was always wary of the people around him.


    Being a 3rd-tier magic caster, he was confident in his strength and his ability to survive an assassination.


    But after seeing the necromancer known as Abdiel, he suddenly lost all his confidence.


    `No, it should be alright. His highness was the one who sent me Vanessa and Abdiel to guard me.¡ä He thought for a moment before focusing back on the battlefield.


    Though he had spent the majority of his mana, through time he managed to regain some amount of mana to perform some spells.

 Chapter 300 Turning The Useless To Useful

    Seeing still 32 mutants being present, 12 of them fighting the knights together with the rogue and the other 20ing his way, Danzel halted his steps before gazing at the 4 masked magic casters.


    <o>,m "I will have to get those f*ckers first..." Danzel mumbled to himself.</o>


    Having now repaired his skull, Danzel was once again able to keep a more rational mind, even though he was still being affected by the [Sin of Wrath].


    Thinking of how he should kill those magic casters, suddenly an idea down to him.


    Putting his shield back in the storage ring, Danzel started casting.


    The masked magic caster who saw became puzzled by the dark knight''s action. Till now the shield as of the tools that defended against numerous attacks of the mutants and what stopped them from using magic that had a physical form.


    Such kind of magic such as shooting out ice spears if not stone boulders could easily be blocked by the shield of someone that reached the peak of the 3rd-tier. They were also too slow to take him by surprise.


    Inparison to their lighting spell which was both fast and lethal or their fireball spell which covered arge area and was essential unblockable was a much better option


    Removing his shield was nothing else than increasing their options which were before very limited.


    They waited for the mutants to just like before create a chance to attack without endangering themselves.


    But what the dark knight did next was something that even they didn¡ät expect.


    With the ground trembling under the dark knight''s feet, a wall of stone started to rise.


    And not in front of the charging mutants, but actually behind the dark knight''s back.


    Using his now free hand to grab the top of the ascending wall, Danzel was dragged up high together with the stone wall.


    Using both [Swift Movements] and [High Jump], Danzel catapulted himself right towards one of the stunning masked magic casters. Doing so resulted in the stone wall breaking in the spot where he jumped.


    Seeing the ck figureing his way at a terrifying speed, he and the other magic caster spread in fear of being cut.


    The one who was being targeted by the dark knight sighed internally as he distance himself from his previous spot.


    `Idiot, unless you have flying magic, your de will never reach us!¡ä He thought before he and the others started preparing their own spells.


    Danzel of course couldn¡ät fly and couldn¡ät change direction from where he was going as he merely jumped at him and was mid-air with no footing.


    Danzel though had already anticipated this result.


    `If there is no footing, I just have to make my own!` He thought before making one dark green hand of mana appear on his feet.


    cing his feet right on top of [Hand of Mana Affinity], he exerted his strength on his leg and jumped once again with the same speed at the masked magic caster who widen his eyes.


    As he was too close, the masked magic caster couldn¡ät react at all.


    With a swift swing right through his stomach, the magic caster was half-cleaved through his stomach. The blood seemed as if it was being drawn by the dark knight''s de while his flesh began to rot.


    "One~" Danzel mumbled before turning around, his long sword glowing in dark green light.


    Recognizing the dark green lighting from the dark knight''s de, their faces behind the masks paled.


    "No good! Run!"


    *Fseeehn! Fseeehn! Fseeeehn!


    Swinging through the air a total of three times, the mana was was gathered in his sword was shot out in the form of dark green des.


    The magic caster that warned them soon enough found himself to be the target of all three ominous wind des.


    `Why me!?¡ä He yelled internally upon such injustice.


    One wind de was already hard enough for them to dodge, but now he was facing 3!?


    Trying his best to fly out of the path of the dark green wind des.


    The first de cut through one of his legs, and the second and the third respectively cut through his chest.


    The 2 remaining magic casters who saw this shudder in fear and distanced themself much further.


    Upon the constant watch of Danzel, he sighed internally.


    `They are out of my range.¡ä


    Having nothing to support himself in the air, he came falling to the ground.


    Looking down at him, Danzel saw a mutant looking at him with his hand raised up towards him. It looked as if the mutant just received a message from a deity or was preparing to hug him. But considering his ws, what the mutant actually wanted was to rip Danzel to shreds.


    "Hmpf!" Scoffing at it, Danzel fell right towards the mutant, his face directly pressing down on the mutant''s face, resulting in dragging the mutant down and crushing his head in one go.<sub> </sub>


    *Boohm!


    With his other leg having crashed the right shoulder of the mutant, Danzel brought a spear out of his storage ring and directly pierced it to the mutant''s left shoulder, making him unable to move.


    Turning to see behind him, he saw several corpses of the knights and some of the mutants.


    His aerial maneuver resulted in him being back where the knights and the mutants first shed. But seeing the mutants pushing the knights, they were now several meters behind him fighting while retreating.


    "I guess I should make some use out of those useless people..." Danzel mumbled before making his dead mana re up and leak out of his armor.


    In the next moment, the dead mana left his armor and moved towards the numerous corpses of the knights.


    With their corpses twitching for a second, the once fallen knights started to raise up and pick their weapons.


    "For our liege!" The now newly made undead yelled as they raisen their weapons to the air as if celebrating their bing undead.


    Not even giving them a nce, Danzel looked at his total mana pool in the status.


    ...


    Mana: 2057/6050


    ...


    `I only have a little more than 2000 mana left. To think that I spend two-thirds of my mana...¡ä Danzel thought, before putting the spear back in his storage ring after confirming the mutant under him was unable to move.


    "Should be enough to raise all the others..." Danzel mumbled before turning to look at the 2 remaining masked magic casters.


    The two magic casters in question who saw the dark knight''s brutality and him raising the dead, couldn¡ät help but imagine their selves being cut into pieces and then turned into undead.


    "Hey, this group is done for, let¡äs regroup with the others and protect the other portal, we can¡ät face this guy alone." One of them suggest before the other nodded.


    `Like hell, we will face this monster!¡ä They thought before flying towards the other group that had his portal still opened.


    But before being halfway there, a wind-piercing sound came towards them.


    And without one of them realizing, the other was swept though some unknown force and fell to the ground, with a huge hole right through his chest.


    "Huh?" One magic caster eximed at this sight.


    Turning to see in the direction where the unknown force came, he saw an elve archer pulling aiming her bow towards him!


    "Sh*t!! You can¡ät be serious!!" He yelled in outrage before rushing to the others while maneuvering up and done to mess with the archer''s aim.


    But it was hopeless for him.


    Once the string of the bow was released and the arrow was sent flying, he soon found himself being swept by the arrow, leaving a huge hole in his chest.


    "Hmpf, as if I would miss." The one responsible for that, Sarah scoffed at the magic caster''s pathetic attempt to dodge her arrow.


    Seeing their death, Danzel nodded before looking in front of him, where the mutants were rushing towards him.


    Spreading his dead mana into the corpses of the remaining mutants and knights with the spell [Greater Raise Undead], now a total of 40 undead stood behind him.


    `Though those draugrs are weaker than those mutants. With their number, I would no longer be fighting multiple of those things at the same time.¡ä He thought before sending amand to all of his undead.


    `Follow me, my undead!¡ä


    With his will and words being transferred in all the undead, their killing intent was shown to the world as they charged at the enemies of their liege.


    Keeping up with their charge, Danzel brought out his old shield which by now was severely damaged, but still usable.


    He could have brought out his new shield given by Velkir which was now in his new storage ring. But he decided that it wasn¡ät worth it.


    He still had to engrave runes in the shield and Velkir shouldn¡ät have enchanted it at all.


    Those were his pashing thoughts as he came in contact with the mutants in front of them.


    With his undead taking the attention of the other mutants and even inflicting some damage. Danzel only had to focus at most with 2 mutants at a time.


    Compared to before when he faced 6 mutants, 2 were nothing for him.


    He quickly ughtered the ones in front of him and went to the next nearest mutant. It didn¡ät take long for him with the help of his undead in finishing all the mutants in front of them.


    Using once again [Greater Raise Undead] to replenish his undead, he guided them to help the others.

 Chapter 301 Undead And Their Master

    When the magic caster went out and install the two teleportation portals, they were forced to split their force in order to deal with the appearance of the enemy reinforcement.


    Upon Wilhelm¡äsmand, 120 knights went towards the one portal with the druid Borg, while the remaining went to help the dark knight Abdiel and the rogue Kenn.


    In the second group were only 64 knights with some who received light burns from the previous bombard of the masked magic casters in the sky.


    Though they were essentially almost half the many as the other group, the second 3rd-tierbated was supposed to bnce off their number as a single 3rd-tier counted for dozens of 2nd-tier knights like them.


    But the reality in front of them was cruel.


    The dark knight left them in dust and prated the lines of the mutants while the rogue Kenn used them like meatshield to deliver the finishing blow on the mutants they were currently facing.


    Though they were outnumbering them, they soon realized the overwhelming strength of those arcanic mutants.


    Some of them had hands harder than any steel they had ever seen while their ws were sharper than their very own swords. Their body held an incredible amount of vitality that even the usual lethal attacks were nothing to them.


    Lastly, their behavior to kill them no matter the cost scared the knights,


    They were only of the 2nd-tier!


    They couldn¡ät face dozen of 3rd-tier monstrosities!


    Although they were able to manage to reduce their numbers to a total of 12, to achieve such a feat they even lost a total of 40 men.


    Most of the reason why they killed so many was from the rogue Kenn''s strength of a 3rd-tier and not their own. Resulting in them continuously retreating back.


    Even if doing so essential meant abandoning the idea of supporting the dark knight and letting the enemy continuously summon more reinforcements.


    Some of the knights were aware of that and yet they still decided to retreat so that they don¡ät end up like the others who died by the sharp ws of the arcanic mutants.


    Doing that though was nothing more than dying their inevitable deaths.


    Knights were still falling victim to those mutants and they could only do their best to prevent that from happening.


    And in that moment of their desperation, several footsteps were to be felt going through the ground. The next thing they knew, the mutants were cut down by those who they thought had reached the end of their lives.


    "For our liege!"


    Wearing the armor of the Ioratal Dynasty and wielding the same swords as them, the people they considered friends and saw them fall at the hands of those mutants came nking their killers from behind while yelling "For our liege!"


    "H-How?" One of the knights muttered with shaking libs as he this scene.


    The mutants reacted ording to their instinct andshed out at the new enemy with a fearless attitude.


    But unlike the knights who sought to live. The ones who they were facing now were knights neither tired nor hungered.


    And by themand of their liege, they would also never fear!


    They were the undead.


    Overwhelmed by their number, the mutants were fatally wounded and dying like flies.


    And the one who was leading them killed most of the mutants with a swift swing of his cursed longsword.


    Falling down without any sign of movement, the liege of the dead, the dark knight Abdiel raised his de high and spread his ominous mana inside the corpses of the mutants.


    Upon the horrified gaze of the knights, they could only stand there and watch how the monstrosities they were desperately fighting against risen once more with their eyes glowing in a dark green light.


    The dark knight in question turned his head and stared at the knights.


    Though they couldn¡ät see his expression, the knights felt that he looked at them with pure disdain.


    Turning next his head towards the rogue who looked at him with indifference, the dark knight spoke with a cold voice.


    "You seem to be the only one at the passable level, even if only barely at that."


    The rogue Kenn didn¡ät react the slightest, but the knights inparison felt a surge of anger as he essentially dered every one of them useless.


    "Hmpf, just seeing you all disgusting faces I can guess what you are thinking. It doesn¡ät matter if you follow me or not." That were hisst words before leaving the knights there and charging with his undead soldiers to help the other group.


    The only one who kept up with the undead was the rogue Kenn, who was delivering slowing down so that he can be at the very back of the undead charge.


    Only then did it hit the knights that their fallenrades became undead who followed the dark knight''smand..l


    Which resulted in amplifying their hate and fear towards Abdiel, the one who enved them by forbidden magic.<sub> </sub>


    Abdiel, or rather Danzel didn¡ät care about their thoughts at all.


    Upon hismand, the draugr under hismand charged through the side, giving the knights who were facing the mutants in a desperate battle a nice yet horrifying surprise.


    The draugr fought like taking one mutant down with them even if it meant their own destruction.


    Compared to the group that Danzel was in, this group had failed to interrupt the magic caster''s teleportation portal and allowed them to summon more reinforcements. Making the number of mutants the same as the current knights.


    The druid Borg support magic showed its strength in the fight the most.


    The roots that risen from the ground were able to take the mutants by surprise as their only focus was to kill the knights, while the minor wounds of the knights were healed by the second by his magic. Another spell he cast was of improving the nearby knight''s stamina with one of his spells.


    And once he jumped into the fray, his hands were covered in fur while his fingers became sharp ws, bing his natural weapons. In all of that, his chest was covered with a green light that resembled some sort of insect armor, increasing both his defense and offensive capabilities by a ton.


    But even then the number of wounds that he gained were numerous and he couldn¡ät really deal a killing blow in one go against those mutants.


    The other big yer in that group was Skull w the Death Hound. He held the most kills out of all of the knightsbined.


    But because of that, he was also the target of all the magic casters that appeared.


    Though Wilhelm was giving his all to kill the masked magic caster, it seemed like he wasn¡ät specialized in spells that target individual targets.


    Making things much harder for Skull w.


    In fact, when Danzel looked over Skull w, he was stunned at his half-broken skulls and he became much smaller than before.


    Rushing forward towards his only sole 3rd-tier undead, Danzel cut down the mutants in his path. Once he was close enough to him, Danzel cast [Restore Undying Body] on Skull w.


    "Repair this wronger vessel."


    Once the dead mana of the spell came in contact with Skull w, several bones started to regrow and cracks were disappearing by the second.


    It wasn¡ät enough to repair all the damage that she received, but it was enough for Skull w to sweep her w and send several mutants flying.


    "Kwaaagooh!" She howled in joy upon her liege once more.


    Though they were busy dealing with the nearby arcanic mutants, Danzel couldn¡ät help but notice the dark mist that surrounded Skull w''s body.


    `This is...it doesn¡ät look like [Dark Mist Robe] considering the amount of mist, meaning that it should be the other skill, [Dark Mist].¡ä


    Faintly remembering the skills description, Danzel came up with an idea.


    `Skull w, can you expand your dark mist?¡ä


    Hearing her lieges question, Skull w who had just bitten a mutant nodded her head while failing the mutant that was barely able to move his legs...


    Seeing the confirmation of Skull w, Danzel sends hismand telepathically. before jumping on top of her back.


    Once he was seated in Skull w back, he suddenly felt his remaining senses improving together with his bloodlust. But thetter seemed to only improve his previous killing intent instead of affecting his mind.


    "I should even read through her whole description..." Danzel mumbled before starting his spell.


    `Well, right after I finish with all this crap I will have enough time.¡ä Danzel thought before sending the signal for Skull w to begin the n.


    In the next moment, Skull w suddenly howled at the sky, and the dark mist that surrounded her body the entire time expanded and exploded into the surroundings, covering the area of 30 meters in an instant.


    Shrouded by the sudden mist made the knights were confused, making many of them die from the mutants they were facing. The undead inparison fought just like before against the mutants who fought whoever was in front of the (except other mutants).


    With chaos spreading among the knights, the druid Borg fell to the ground shaking for a split second.


    The magic casters who saw the dark mist didn¡ät know what to do. They couldn¡ät just shoot their spells with the risk of killing the mutants.


    So they just waited above the teleportation Portal, waiting for the mist to disappear.


    But it was at this moment when the dark mist seemed only to stay in ce to move towards their exact location at incredible speed.


    And before they could react, the dark mist that came out revealed to but the Death Hound opening his mouth wide open with his rider whose long sword glowed in a dark green light.


    Feeling the killing intent and the pressure that those two let out, the masked magic caster panicked and raised their hands to cast their spells.


    But it was toote.


    "Die" With those words echoing in their minds by a cold voice, all they saw was a dark green light engulfing them.

 Chapter 302 Vile Necromancer

    "To think that my mana pool that seemed almost infinite would have been spent in such a short amount of time." Danzel mumbled to himself as he gazed at his surroundings.


    Wherever he looked, they were either bloodied corpses of the knights or the mutants that were in. Among those corpses were also his undead that had fallen in battle.


    After jumping with Skull w together in the backlines, it didn¡ät take much effort to stop the magic caster from operating the teleportation portal.


    Once his [Soul Reaping Wind] met with the urate magic caster, they could only shout in pain before falling down dead to the ground.


    At that point those two begone their own ughter in the enemy''s back.


    The masked magic caster who flew in the air did prove to be of nuisance to both of them, but even they were shot down by Sarah the elven archers.


    And since her arrows were many times faster than their flying speed and their reaction alone, that brought them into an awkward situation.


    Below them was both a Death Hound which bit on the mutants together with its master that had an incredible scary aura leave his body. Both eying them like some starved hyenas who stared at some wagyu steak.


    Though their fear didn¡ät affect their performance in battle as they have trained against that, they would have been stupid to go in the range of those two.


    s, the archers in the far were killing them with each arrow that was shot, forcing them to go descended and hopefully use the mutants as meat shields.


    And one could clearly see by their corpses on the ground that this didn¡ät go as well as they had hoped.


    Walking towards the corpses of the masked magic caster, Danzel decided to store each body inside his storage ring for potential magic items.


    `Though I don¡ät have much hope for that.¡ä Danzel thought as to how Skull w bit one of them and he shed them. At this point, their robes should be rags.


    As for other items, if they truly were any, he would rather checkter than have any of the others im his spoils by the excuse of stealing the Dynasty war spoils.


    `You can guys can pick whoever weapons and armor you like the most.¡ä Danzel sends hismand to the Draugrs.


    Having raised some mid-fight, only 37 Draugrs remained, most of them being of the corpses of the knights that of mutants.


    Though Danzel would have liked to raise purely only mutants as undead since they had better bodies, he still went for the knights as the bodies of the mutants were heavily damaged and would affect the performance of the newly raised undead.


    If he had both the mana and the time, he wouldn¡ät have minded using [Restore Undying Body] on the corpses and then raising them as undead. s, that wasn¡ät the case.


    Moving past his undead, the knights moved to the side and stared at him with disdain and fear. But Danzel ignored all of them.


    Right behind his back was Skull w following after his steps and the Draugr followed behind her.


    Once Danzel stopped in front of Wilhelm, they also stopped.


    "Sir Wilhelm, the enemy has been exterminated. What will we do now? Will, we retreat or stay?" Danzel asked with his cold voice


    Wilhelm in question was woken up from his stubbornness, as he replied to the dark knight''s question.


    "We will stay here, Necromancer Abdiel. After a short break, I will start casting my spells once more. As I will be vulnerable when casting, I will rely on your protection..." Wilhelm said.


    Danzel in response only nodded his head at him before walking with his undead to the side.


    "You can sit down now." Danzel said to Skull w, who as result did as her master said.


    Seating to the ground, Danzel touched the cracks on Skull w''s ribs.


    "Unfortunately, you will have to deal with those alone for now." Danzel mumbled before sending his Draugr amand.


    `Spread in the surroundings and watch out for a potential ambush.¡ä


    Hearing their lieges will andmand, the Draugr nodded before spreading and watching vigntly at their surroundings.


    `Although sending them out wasn¡ät necessary, having them all gathered around me is quite awkward.¡ä Danzel thought secretly before putting his focus back on Skull w.


    To be more specific, he focused his gaze on her status screen.


    They were in total 3 things that he didn¡ät know about her status.


    And those were [Mount of Dead Warrior], [Death Howl], and [Dying Hunter¡äs Mark].


    When he started reading them one by one, he found out that [Mount of Dead Warrior] was the reason why his killing intent was increased the moment he mounted Skull w.


    It seemed to be a new talent that she gained upon her evolution. ording to the description, the master that was picked by the [Undead Servant] talent would have his killing intent amplified when the master mounts her by a total of 10%.<sub> </sub>


    Considering that it didn¡ät affect one''s mind and that Danzel had [Sin of Wrath], such an effect was quite nice to have as a passive.


    [Death Howl] inparison was a skill, but it was also a passive effect, which resulted in her howl strengthening her survival instincts and amplifying the effect of fear on her enemies. Though the former sounded like a buff, it wasn''t in some situations. If a group had its own survival in mind, it will disrupt teamwork. Where fear would lead them to panic, resulting in chaos amongst groups if the effect is activated fully.


    Considering how much she howled in the battle against the mutants, Danzel couldn¡ät help but grin bitterly at the fact that Skull w friendly fired the knights with her howls. Though since he wore a helmet and had a skull for a face, one couldn¡ät possibly see his bitter smile.


    Thest skill he read was the most interesting out of all of them in his opinion.


    As [Dying Hunter¡äs Mark] was actually his first ever seen permanent curse spell he saw.


    Wherever he searched for a book that had the topic of curses in it back when he was dealing with the shadow merchant Hanson, there was as good as no information except the fact that they were famous for being permanent.


    His [Curse of Scourge] and [Curse of Exhaustion] both had a limited range and a duration time.


    So seeing Skull w possessing such a spell, he felt somewhat jealous.


    In truth, [Dying Hunter¡äs Mark] was a buff that is put on one''s body. If an enemy was hit with that body part that the spell was put on, the curse will activate and put a permanent curse on the enemy which made the one who caster the curse always be able to track the cursed one.


    A particr annoying skill if one wanted to run away.


    `It seems that Skull w doesn¡ät have any long-ranged attacks after all. She is more focused on meleebat it seems.¡ä Danzel thought before drawing his hand off her ribs.


    "I guess it¡äs time to check my spoils..." Danzel mumbled to himself before opening his status window.


    With the blue floating window appearing in front of him, Danzel gazed at the very bottom where his spoils were.


    ...


    [XP: 4 865 300]


    Staring at the XP that he gained, Danzel had to take a second look just to confirm that what he was seeing wasn¡ät an illusion.


    `It shouldn¡ät be that high...¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    It wasn¡ät that he wasn¡ät happy with the amount of XP that he swooped in one go.


    On average the mutants were giving him around 40 000 to 50 000 XP.


    For killing someone of the 3rd-tier, this amount of XP wasn¡ät that great. But the XP was still quite a hefty amount for just a single skill.


    Considering that he had to train for a whole of 4 hours to receive 40 000 XP, it was nice saving so much XP by just killing those mutants.


    But even then, that didn¡ät exin why he had so much XP left.


    Counting the XP that gained from doing all the contracts and the ughter of those mutants, he should have around 900 000 XP less than now.


    Then it hit him.


    `[Rune of Harvest]...it has to be either Agares or Azrael that deliver such amount of XP.¡ä


    And as if proofing his suspicions, out of nowhere he just gained a total of 7 000 XP.


    "There must have been a ughter somewhere." Danzel though.


    `I gained such benefits by only having 2 harvesters. If they were more of them then how much XP would I gain?¡ä


    Just thinking of gaining hundreds of XP by doing literally nothing but a grin to himself.


    "I will have to see how to equip Vanessa and Sartan with it, but that can wait. For now, I should focus on those gains."


    Having once more such a great amount of XP in his hands, Danzel couldn¡ät help but get excited.


    Be it increasing his [ck Guard] level or bringing his new skills into the 3rd-tier, Danzel couldn¡ät help but already fantasy about what to spend his pocket money on.


    But before he could do such, the remaining group of knights came toward him with hostile faces.


    "You Vile Necromancer! Release ourrades from your reign! You have already abused their rest long enough with your magic!" The one who was leading the group of knights shouted while pointing at Danzel.


    Danzel who was in a good mood till now became frustrated at the knights who came seeking trouble. He was so annoyed in fact that for a split second, his bloodlust washed over all the knights.

 Chapter 303 Abdiel The Cruel

    `Why did it have to be now of all times...¡ä Danzel cursed internally as he walked towards the group of knights.


    "Krgggghh!" Skull w who felt her lieges aura, risen up and growled towards the knights while she started to be bigger.


    Seeing the three dark green mes staring at them, the knights pulled their swords and pointed them towards Skull w. But internally, they were quite afraid of her.


    "Skull w, it¡äs alright, I will deal with those "things"..." Danzel said with his cold voice.


    The leader among the knights who was also the oldest knight here couldn¡ät help but frown at them being referred to as "things".


    He was about toin at Necromancer''s use of words, but once Danzel stood in front of him it was as if a cat bit his tongue.


    Not only was Danzel letting out a terrifying aura, but together with his ck armor which made him look quite ominous, and the fact that Danzel was 2.53 meters high, he towered those guys!


    Most of the knights were on the taller side around 1.83 to 1.95 meters. But only now did they realize the height difference between them.


    "What did you mean by that?" Danzel asked with a voice that brought chills down the spins of the knights.


    The knights though didn¡ät refuse to give in to the pressure.


    "It¡äs exactly as I said! Mercenaries Abdiel! Not only did your undead bring forth many casualties among the Ioratal Dynasty, but you continue to use your vile magic to control ourrades even in death! Such an arrangement I can¡ät ept!" The leader of the knights yelled while ring back at Danzel.


    Hearing what they had to say, Danzel''s ethereal dark green eyes red up.


    `Are those guys such idiots?¡ä


    That was the first thing that came to Danzel''s mind.


    Of course, Danzel acknowledges that the knight had a point.


    If Danzel didn¡ät give Skull w themand to spread her mist to the battlefield, then there would have been fewer casualties than are now as the mist essentially blinded the knights and lead them to their doom against the arcanic mutants.


    Not only that, but Skull w was also using the skill [Death Howl] which affected the knight''s mental state.


    It could also be argued that the Draugr¡äs cement on the battlefield didn¡ät favor the knights at all. If hemanded his undead currently and had used them as meatshields for the knights, although more of his undead would die, there would be fewer casualties among the knights.


    But Danzel suspected that the knight leader was talking more about the first two points.


    The thought that puzzled him the most was how those guys got the nerve toe andin to him.


    He was the one responsible for killing the most enemies and shutting down the portals, hence stopping the enemy''s reinforcements froming.


    Not only that, but his undead yed a huge role in taking the mutant''s attention away from the knights.


    Essentially if he wasn¡ät there, everyone dying here was the most likely oue.


    What puzzled him the most though was how those guys got the balls to go against a 3rd-tier expert who reached the peak.


    `Isn¡ät he afraid of dying?¡ä Danzel thought for a moment before he noticed the look of the other mercenaries'' group.


    They looked at the knight dissatisfied and even the elven archers wereining out loud with the other three.


    "Just because we are mercenaries they think we are inferior to them! If it weren¡ät for the money I would even draw my bow and~"


    Though they were quite far away from them, Danzel was still able to hear Sarah¡äsints with the hearing of the 3rd-tier.


    That was when he understood where those knights'' confidence came from.


    `They look down on me because of my status...¡ä


    Once he figured that out, he truly found it...


    "Stupid." Danzel whispered to himself loud enough for the knight leader to hear.


    "W-What did you just say!?" The knighted asked backed with an angered tone.


    Ignoring the old knight, Danzel turned to look towards the one magic caster who was taking the role ofmander.


    The one who he was supposed to protect, was the son of the duke, Wilhelm Ionarres.


    Meeting each other''s gaze, it was obvious that the noble was aware of what was going on.


    `Aren¡ät you going to step in?¡ä Danzel thought internally as he gazed at Wilhelm.


    To his surprise, Wilhelm simply turned around and seemed to ignore the whole situation, as if telling him to deal with it.


    It seemed like he didn¡ät want to take any responsibility at all.


    From amander''s standpoint, something like this was foolish as letting such behavior continue would undoubtedly create internal conflict with his troops.


    But from a noble standpoint, it was the right choice.


    Helping Danzel, who was using Necromancy could be turned into a scandal that could be used against him.


    For someone who wanted to steal the heir position from his unworthy brother, he couldn¡ät effort being in part of such a scandal.


    And after seeing Danzel''s strength, he was sure that the knights could do nothing against him even if they wanted to.


    So he chose to let things go their natural course.


    `So you are going to be a bystander, huh?¡ä Danzel though.


    "Hey! Why aren¡ät you responding! I said-"


    "I heard you loud and clear," Danzel said with his cold voice while looking down at the old knight.


    "So? What do you want from me?"


    Pointing at the undead who patrolled the surroundings, the old knight said.<sub> </sub>


    "We want you to release ourrades from your spell and let them go back to their rest!"


    Looking at the undead that the old knight was pointing to, Danzel''s next words shocked him.


    "What if I tell you that I don¡ät want to?" Danzel said before faintly sensing someone familiar watching him.


    "H-Huh?"


    Hearing what he said, the old knight together with the others was slightly stunned at such a response.


    "If a mere mercenary doesn¡ät let our fallenrades who fought with bravery to final rest. Then I and the other knights would be forced to use force against you-"


    "Is that so?" Danzel didn¡ät let him finish his sentence.


    With a swift movement of his hand, Danzel draw his long sword out of its sheath and swung it with the speed that none of the knights could react.


    *Fsiiin!


    Before any of them realized what just happend, the old knight was decapitated in an instant! His flying head as much as his body began to let out his still warm blood.


    [You received 15 000 XP]


    Ignoring the notification, Danzel looked down on the other knights and let his killing intent suffocate them.


    "I am fine with fighting everyone here present." Danzel said with his ice-cold voice.


    Realizing what just happend, the knights yelled furiously.


    "You crazy!?"


    "Traitor of Ioratal!"


    "Damn mercenary!"


    Many of the knights cursed at him many and rushed at him with their weapons in hand.


    Danzel of course reacted in kind.


    Everyone who came close to him was immediately cut down by his long sword.


    The knights couldn¡ät even react and many didn¡ät know when they were cut down.


    Seeing the situation escting for the worse, both Wilhelm and the mercenaries were shocked.


    "What are you all doing!? Stop this farce immediately!" Wilhelm yelled with a pale face.


    `Dammit! How did things escte to this point!¡ä He cursed internally.


    The worse that he expected was that Abdiel would give a beating to all those knights so that they realize their ce. But he never expected him to raise his de and start to kill the knights as if they were vegetables!


    If he knew that such things will ur, he would even step in and stopped those knights!


    Who would have thought that Abdiel would have such a short temper!


    The knights who heard Wilhelmsmand created distance between the mad necromancer. Each had their weapons drawn and pointed to Danzel.


    The Nature Daggers mercenaries also walked close to the knights, them also being wary of the necromancer''s next move.


    But in the next moment, all undead that was sent to patrol the surroundings came back and walked behind Danzel.


    Their dark green mes look at the living with hostility.


    In the middle of this group were a total of 10 corpses of the knights.


    "Mercenaries Abdiel...what is all of this supposed to mean?" Wilhelm said with a heavy tone.


    The death of the knights could have been prevented.


    He didn¡ät care for their lives, but because their deaths could have been prevented, as themander of the knights, he would be put responsible.


    Considering that Abdieles from a mercenary group and that most members are of the 4th-tier and also that he was sent by his highness to be his bodyguard, he couldn¡ät just put the whole me on him.


    Though the easiest method would be in saying that he betrayed the Dynasty, that would risk having bad blood with the Deathfull Skulls group, a powerhouse that decided to side with the Dynasty.


    The deal with this group was extremely important to Dynasty whichcked the force to fight back against the two kingdoms. And if he was the reason why the deal went south, the chances of him bing the heir of his house, even with his highness''s support, would be impossible.


    While Wilhelm was thinking of hundreds of scenarios that could go wrong, the dark knight shrugged his shoulders.


    "As you should be aware of, you knights resorted to using force. For this reason, I was forced to defend myself." he said in his cold voice.


    Wilhelm was about to say something but was swiftly interrupted by the appearance of a beautiful dark skin woman.


    "I even return with spoils of war!" The figure being Vanessa, she yelled out loud before going towards the middle of the group. Her suppose spoils of war were a total of 3 heads of some well-known 3rd-tier magic caster that were on the battlefield.


    Looking at the corpse of the knights on the ground, she decided to throw the heads at them before walking to Danzel while patting her two hands together as if wanting to remove the none existent dust.


    "Damn, I was expecting to see you beating those guys. But I didn¡ät expect you to kill them. Hehe, how cruel of you Abdiel." Vanessa said while walking beside Danzel.


    "So the presence that I felt a moment ago was you, huh?" Danzel said while looking at Vanessa.


    Once he started talking with the knights before, he faintly sense a figure behind him watching, knowing that it was Vanessa.


    Since she was watching everything happening, he decided to be bold and kill those idiots.


    Wilhelm who released that Vanessa was a witness to what just happend, cursed internally.

 Chapter 304 Soul Of Death

    After Vanessa''s arrival and her being a witness to the whole situation, Wilhelm decided to me the knights for using force against their allies.


    That decision alone made the knights feel extremely bitter and angry at the noble.


    `He was the one who cut down our people! How are we getting med and not this outsider!?¡ä They thought in unison.


    Of course, such thoughts were only internally and not spoken out loud, especially in the presence of the Necromancer.


    To them and the army, finding trouble with mercenaries was prettymon. As usual, they held a higher status than some hired killers.


    Most of them followed their respectivemanders who were both experienced soldiers and of nobility, making a social circle around the military.


    Those 200 knights were actually being lent to Wilhelm for the sake of repairing a favor in the future towards themander they were following.


    In other words, messing with them could also be interpreted as messing with the higher-ups of the armymanders. Allowing them to abuse their none existent authority to look down on mercenaries.


    But they never expected that the necromancer Abdiel would resort to killing them! And not even get the me for this!


    Making the knights look at Wilhelm and Danzel in resentment without even trying to show their attitude towards them.


    Inparison, Danzel who was riding Skull w with his undead following beside her didn¡ät care the slightest about the looks that they were giving him.


    He was simply staring at his status, wondering what to upgrade with the newly acquired XP.


    But since he was being pestered by a certain dark elve, he couldn¡ät focus on what to choose.


    "Hey! Abdiel, why are you staring in front of you like that? Is something in front of us that I can¡ät see?"


    `So loud...." Danzel sighed internally, before closing his status.


    "...No, I was just thinking about some stuff."


    "Hmm, is that so? Anyway, do you think it was wise to seek trouble with those guys? In my experience humans can be pretty petty.." She said while jumping on top of Skull w and standing with her feet on her back.


    "Krgggh~!" Skull w of course growled in dissatisfaction, turning her head and showing her sharp fangs.


    Only after Danzel calmed Skull w down did he answer Vanessa.


    "It doesn¡ät matter, If theye to seek trouble again, I will simply turn them like those guys over there." Danzel said as he pointed at his Draugrs, most of them being turned from the corpses of the knights.


    "By the way, did Master Velkir tell you about my race?" Danzel said with a more serious and cold tone.


    Vanessa in turn shook her head.


    "Nah, I just made an assumption based on our group and you...well, physical appearance."


    "Our group, Deathfull Skulls only epted those who weren¡ät humans, at the very least that¡äs what the Boss said to us. As for your physical appearance, well...it is pretty obvious that you aren¡ät a human considering how big you are." Vanessa said before sitting behind Danzel, making him slightly uparable.


    Hearing her reasoning, Danzel couldn¡ät help but be reminded of his height.


    `Right, humans don¡ät grow so tall... I should think of another race to act as...¡ä Danzel thought while making a mental note for that.


    "Then what race do you think I am?" Danzel asked to gather information.


    He could use what she said as a reference for the future.


    "Well, Sartan told me that you don¡ät smell like an orc. Considering that you are wearing a helmet, you shouldn¡ät be a troll either. Mhm, you also know Agares and little Shiro, so my guess is that you are the same race as them? How is that, am I right?"


    <o>,m `Not useful at all¡ä Danzel sighed once more internally. Till now he still didn¡ät see the status window of both of those two and they didn¡ät tell him either what they were.</o>


    Agares looked like a human that was on the taller side while Shiro looked unusually pale human child.


    "Who knows..." Danzel answered.


    "Ehhh~tell me! Da-I mean Abdiel! You know my race, it¡äs only fair to give me yours too!"


    `Ugh...so loud.¡ä


    ****


    After hours of walking back into the castle, Danzel was guided to his resting room. Which was nothing more than a small room that only had a bed, a desk, and a small box made of straw. Supposedly to be for his loudly.


    Except for Skull w who was given his own room in a stale where they kept the horses, all his remaining undead were put on hold outside the walls of the castle for obvious reasons.


    Outside in the field, he could use the excuse of using the dead as temporary forces to secure their safety. But keeping the undead and creating a personal small army right in front of their doors was a big no-no in the army.


    Not only did it bring great displeasure to the soldiers, but it was also a countermeasure in case the necromanceres out to be a traitor andmanded a small army right in front of their doors.


    The fact that he resorted to violence toward the knights also didn¡ät help the situation.<sub> </sub>


    They did tell him that they will consider keeping the undead and that is currently discussed among the higher-ups, but Danzel saw it as nothing but a farce.


    The most likely oue would be them requesting in stopping his spell. In other words, kill his own undead.


    [Greater Raise Undead] wasn¡ät a spell that controlled corpses, but in truth, it was a spell that was born undead and brought the control of the one who raised them.


    If they wanted to get rid of them, he had to literallymand them to kill themself by breaking their skulls with their weapons. There wasn¡ät an off-and-on switch that made his undead simple be corpses once more.


    In fact, if Danzel abandoned an undead somewhere far away, his control over that one undead would disappear through the passage of time which took years if not decades.


    "Still, giving such order to them..."


    Thinking of that, Danzel''s mood worsens.


    Seating on the bead, he shook his head to remove such thoughts.


    "No matter, I should just focus on what should be done and nothing more." He said before opening his status screen.


    They were a total of 6 skills that he kept to test first and then upgrade. And does were the following.


    [Hand of Mana Affinity]


    [Restore Undying Body]


    [Cursed Wounds de]


    [Greater Death st]


    [One with Death]


    [Rune Removal]


    Every single one of those skills was of level 9 and since they were the 2nd-tier skills, the next upgrade would bring them to the modification stage, which to his experience, was the point where one skill rose in power significantly.


    Though they were expensive to upgrade, considering the amount of XP in his wallet, it wasn¡ät that expensive.


    He already had an idea in mind in which direction the skills should be modified.


    He decided that three of those skills, them being [Rune Removal] [One with Death] [Restore Undying Body]would simple need their power adjusted instead of reforming them to be something anew.


    [Rune Removal] simply needed to be a skill that removed his runes and nothing more, but for the sake of the several bonuses that he had, he decided that choose [Dead Mana Affinity] and [Overall Improvement].


    Instead of [Dead Mana Affinity], he could even choose to pick [Soul Affinity] as both of them would have worked increasing the effectiveness of the skill, but he chose thetter as it affects more physical in nature. As the [Overall Improvement] was a must for his aim.


    What came out was a skill with the name of [Death Rune Removal].


    By its description, he could probably erase runes that were carved in yellow shown areas of an item. As his choice, it was an overall improvement in his skill. But that wasn¡ät all, the runes that were categorized as [Undead Rune] would be much easier erased from an item than usual runes.


    Considering that he chose [Affinity Carving Mastery] and [Mastery of Himself] for talents way back then, such an effect was convenient.


    As for the next skill[One with Death], Danzel only wanted to improve the 10% improvement of the dead mana mastery part of the skill instead of the natural mana and health regeneration.


    He now had the means to recover his body and even if his mana regeneration increased, it wouldn¡ät be of much use in a fight.


    So he decided to choose the [Soul Affinity] option together with the [Power Improvement].


    The former was chosen as this skill was already a Death type skill and choosing [Dead Mana Affinity] could be somewhat of a waste. Instead giving him more control of his own mana affinity was much better.


    As for thetter, he chose it because the other option was too vague.


    They were options such as [Improve Regeneration], [Undead Effect Improvement], and so on. Nothing specific targets the mana affinity improvements. So Danzel chose [Power Improvent] as it sound the most likely of it being what he wanted.


    The oue of that two modifications was something that he didn¡ät expect


    The skill[One with Death] turns into [Corrupted Soul].


    [Though some anomaly you [Corrupted Soul] turned into [Soul of Death!]


    "This is..." Danzel was surprised to see this message appear.


    He remembered how this message appeared once back when he was in the cursedke. He didn¡ät expect to see it again now of all times.


    Opening the description of the newly acquired skill, Danzel started reading.


    [Soul of Death]: A Undead who managed to corrupt his own soul with death. Resulting in the host soul never again being able to use a living vessel to host his soul. Both dead mana affinity and soul affinity mastery will be increased by a total of 25%. Also, increase both vessel and soul mana and health regeneration by a total of 30%. This skill can only be owned by an undead being. Additionally, the soul will be able to keep its presence in [???].

 Chapter 305 You Will Be My First Cursed Blade!

    Reading the description, Danzel couldn¡ät help but have slightly suspicious that the skill [Soul of Death Essence] skill be involved in the appearance of the message.


    As far as he remembered, the skill said that it made his soul more ustomed to dead mana itself. But it didn¡ät mention that the soul was fully ustomed to dead mana.


    But now probably because of this skill, his soul should be fully ustomed to dead mana and soul affinity. Once the skill manifested, he felt more connected to himself, or rather his own mana.


    Considering the sudden increase of the mastery of dead mana affinity and his soul affinity, such a change wasn¡ät surprising.


    His own mana had always had a hint of soul affinity and dead mana in it.


    Because of being undead, he could turn his mana more easily into dead mana than other types of mana. That also goes for what he calls "Soul Mana" which came from his soul affinity.


    Thetter though he couldn¡ät use as much as the former as it was rather unknown to him. All he knew of how to use this mana was to activate [Mortal Reminder] and [Soul Reaping Wind]. Where he now probably raises an undead by just pouring his dead mana into a corpse.


    Though it wouldn¡ät turn as strong as when he used the spell [Greater Raise Undead], it was still something. He could also do some other stuff, but he considered them more of party tricks than of a genuine spell or technique.


    "I can hold a much firmer control now, but I still don¡ät know how to use it..." Danzel thought as he stared at his skeleton hand that was engulfed with dark green mana.


    Shaking his hand, he equipped his gauntlet once more and decided to leave it at that.


    "Other than that, I didn¡ät expect my natural regeneration to decrease by so much... Although now the effect covers my soul too. Also, thest sentence also has another [???] description. Considering the context, it should be a location such as...maybe the realm of the dead? There isn¡ät much information to say for sure..."


    Overall, he was happy with how the skill turned out.


    The mana mastery of both his affinity improved tremendously while his health regeneration decreased by a bit where his mana regeneration increased.


    He suspected that the [Power Improvement] would at the cost of decreasing a part of the skill, would in turn increase another skill much better.


    He concluded that more experimentation was needed to see if he was right.


    `In the future, I can test it by buying other useless skills anyway...¡ä Danzel thought before going to the next skill on his upgrade list.


    Which were the [Restore Undying Body]. A spell that repaired the damage of an undead.


    It wasn¡ät like the [Undead Reconstruction] which repaired corpses, but it healed the undead. He recently used the spell to repair his body in the fight between mutants and the masked magic casters.


    Though it has done its job by repairing his body, he had to use it multiple times to repair the damage to his body. Essentially using his mana and time that could have been used to use other spells.


    And for its modification, he decided to pick [Dead Mana Affinity] and [Overall Improvement].


    He could have chosen something else for the former option as it was a Death-type spell, he still chose thatbination as usually, the affinity option was simr to the [Overall Improvement] option.


    Rather than having fasting casting mediocre heal or a strong heal which required time to cast, he liked to have the best of both sides.


    And what came out was a skill named [Necromatic Restoraction].


    It essentially improved the casting time of the spell and its chant by the spell''s name and also improved the healing together with its range. Additionally, it also recovered a bit of mana on the target, but the amount of the mana restoration wasn¡ät to the point where one could infinitely restore one mana by this spell.


    Of course, this spell could only be used towards the undead.


    Danzel was also satisfied with how the skill came out.


    He wanted the spell to simply heal and nothing else. That also went for the other two skills, they just needed a simple increase of changing them into something else.


    But for the other 3 skills, he wanted to change them to some extent.


    For example [Greater Death st] wasn¡ät designed to have much firepower and instead focused on inflicting a decay effect on others.


    He liked to use it together with [Soul Reaping Wind] as it would send out a barrage of long ranged attacks. And since it was a spell and [Soul Reaping Wind] was more of a sword technique, he could use both at the same time.


    But since thetter was much faster and more deadly than the former, it was left out by its senior [Soul Reaping Wind].


    But choosing a second modification for such a spell was extremely hard to decide.


    The first modification was [Speed Improvement]. Such an option was essential in order to enable the spell to keep up with its senior.


    There were a total of 5 other options if one ignored the 2 affinities.


    [Power Improvement]


    [Decay Improvement]


    [Acidic Improvement]<sub> </sub>


    [Curse]


    [Overall Improvement]


    ...


    He is right of written about both [Overall Improvement] and [Power Improvement]. He wanted a specialized spell so the former was a no while thetter could potentially increase the impact force of the spell and decrease everything else for all he knew.


    He didn¡ät want to risk betting on thetter and ruin his spell.


    The question now was which of the other 3 to choose.


    Decay and acidic were pretty simr yet different.


    If the spell hit its target, the former would quickly start once the opponent has its flesh rot just like the [Cursed Wounds de] effect, but if he were to improve the acidic part, he would right off melt his opponent''s flesh and potentialy damage his enemies sword or armor.


    Both had their pro and cons, but in the end, that two modifications didn¡ät improve the fatal weakness of this spell. This one is that for damage to take ce, the spell needed to have physical contact with the spell.


    For that reason alone he chose to pick the [Curse] option.


    As curses were essentially one of the hardest types of spell to defend against.


    Any defense-type spell would be right off ignored in the face of curse spells. The only spell that specilized against curses could defend against them.


    "The spell isn¡ät lethal anyway...it should be much more annoying to face if the spell were to turn into a curse." Danzel said as he chose the two modifications.


    [The modification for the Greater Death st has been chosen]


    [Greater Death st Lv.10 bes Curse of Five Bindings] Lv.1 ]


    [Curse of Five Bindings]: Manifest one dead mana into a gathering of miasma to shoot out at one''s target. With the miasma holding a terrible curse, once an enemy is hit, they will receive a minor decay effect before the cursestch on the target''s body and drain them from their strength for a certain amount of time. Each hit of this spell will reduce the attributes of the target by a total of 1% and increase the decay effect. This effect stacks a total of 5 times andst 10 minutes per stack.


    ...


    "Hmm, a curse that reduced one''s strength, huh? Not exactly what I hoped to gain..." Danzel said in disappointment.


    In theory, the spell was incredible, but in practice hitting, one enemy with the same spell 5 times in total was extremely difficult. But since it was a curse, it was much easier to hit opponents that didn¡ät have a response.


    ? `Well, you win some, you lose some I guess.¡ä Danzel shrugged it off and went to the next one.


    Next in the line was [Cursed Wounds de].


    Here the questiony wherever he wanted to increase the healing reduction or the decayed part of the skill.


    But after considering it for a bit he decided to go for both affinity options this time around.


    Improving the skill alone was tempting, each wound by his de would be all the more lethal.


    Even the slightest scratch could prove to be quite harmful considering the decay.


    And since healing wouldn''t be as effective, he sure bet it would be a headache for his enemies.


    In the end, though he chose the two affinities.


    The reason for it was that he wanted his sword to directly inflict damage on one''s soul!


    If he could now grade the soul-damaging part into the skill andter on focus on improving it, his sword will be on many more levels lethal.


    At least that was his hope on this modification.


    Soon after the modification was done, the skill [Cursed Wounds de] turned into [Siphoning Soul de].


    Reading the description, Danzel''s ethereal eyes lighten up in shock.


    [Siphoning Soul de]: A curse put into a cruel de wielded by a cruel master. Each wound inflicted by the cursed de will ce a cursed mark on the wound. The cursed mark will periodically drain one''s vitality and soul essence and transfer them to the cursed sword. Once someone''s soul essence has been drained fully, the body of the victim will start to copse. The more the same cursed sword drains one, the more powerful this effect will be. There is a chance that this sword will be cursed and inflict the same effect on others other than its wielder.


    "This skill...has terrifying potential." Danzel said with a hint of excitement in his sword.


    Drawing his sword and looking at the de, Danzel shouted internally.


    ''You will be my first cursed de!''

 Chapter 306 Grasp Of The Undying

    Danzel determination to turn his [Long Sword of the Sand Emperors de] into a truly cursed de was pretty high.


    The potential that the skill [Siphoning Soul de] had was enormous as it could infinitely make the skill stronger even if he didn¡ät upgrade it at all.


    "Such a powerful skill is only on its 3rd-tier? I can¡ät even imagine how the skill will turn out after reaching the max level." Danzel though.


    `I wonder how much each upgrade costs...¡ä Danzel thought before opening the cost of [Siphoning Soul de] upgrade.


    [Siphoning Soul de]: Cost 700 000 XP (+50 000 per level)


    "..."


    Seeing the cost of the skill, if Danzel had a heart, by now he would be experiencing a heart attack. Most of the 3rd-tier skills generally cost around 350 000 to 500 000 XP in total. But this skill reached a total of 700 000 XP! The only other skill that cost so much was [Soul of Death Essence]


    Luckily though, thanks to his talent [Superior Unique Concioness] and the passive skill [Soul of Death Essence]. He gained a total of 45% discount on upgrading skills that had soul affinity. And that skill that was categorized as death skills was instead only at 25%.


    Sadly the talent [Superior Unique Concioness] didn¡ät cover for his death skills.


    So instead of paying 700 000 for the first level, he now only had to pay a total of 385 000 XP. Which almost was half the price.


    "It isn¡ät that bad now that I think about it..." Danzel thought as he finished calcting the cost.


    Thanks to his 660 intelligence, his mind was so efficient that making such calctions took him a mere second to finish.


    "I guess I should increase it at the very least at level 9 in the future, but now... the remaining is somewhere else needed." Danzel said before closing the [Siphoning Soul de] window.


    He had already decided on where all this XP would be used for now.


    "I guess thest remaining is [Hand of Mana Affinity]. It waited long enough to reach its 3rd-tier." Danzel mumbled to himself before pressing the upgrade window.


    [Hand of Mana Affinity level has increased from Lv.9 to Lv. 10]


    [The skill Hand of Mana Affinity has reached this maximum level]


    [The skill Hand of Mana Affinity reached the modification stage!]


    [Choose 2 of the given options for the skill to focus on!]


    [Dead Mana Affinity]


    [Soul Affinity]


    [Projecteles Increase]


    [Speed Improvement]


    [Durability]


    [Power Increase]


    Scanning the given option, other than [Projecteles Increase], the other option wasn¡ät that particrly exciting.


    He guessed if he picked [Projecteles Increase], he would be capable to summon more than 2 hands at the same time.


    Considering how the spell was mostly used by other magic casters, [Projecteles Increase] would probably be the best choice.


    The more hands one had, the more convinced it was after all.


    But since Danzel used the skill in a morebat-oriented way, he decided to ignore that option.


    He also went ahead and ruled out choice the [Speed Improvement] as it wasn¡ät as valuable as the other options.


    After stepping on the 3rd-tier, the usage that Hand of Mana Affinity had seen started to lessen, and for a good reason at that.


    They were fragile andcked the strength to stop those of the 3rd-tier. They were barely enough to disturb a 2nd-tier expert''s movements and that is if they were taken by surprise.


    But even then Danzel hesitated in choosing the [Durability] and [Power Increase] options as it would probably turn the skill to be barely usable against 3rd-tier experts.


    One had to remember that this was by level 9 of the skill.


    Even if 3rd-tier skills were much stronger than their 2nd-tier past form, that also went for people who became 3rd-tier.


    `If it just improves, then it isn¡ät going to be enough to use against those with a simr level as me. It will end up being used as just picking up my stuff from the ground.¡ä


    Wanting to avoid such a fate for a much-loved skill of his, Danzel decided to go to another room with [Hand of Mana Affinity].


    And it was by picking both [Dead Mana Affinity] and [Soul Affinity] in hopes to change the effect like how it was done with [Mortal Reminder].


    He hoped for thetter option to turn the skill into some form of ethereal form and fix the durability problem somehow, whereas the former option was simple to ce some sort of effect that would damage his opponents such as a decaying effect or a curse.


    Anything to solve the firepower of this skill would be a blessing at this point.


    That¡äs how hopeless of a situation Danzel found the [Hand of Mana Affinity] skill to be...


    `Even though it¡äs my favorite skill, I will have to risk it.¡ä Danzel thought slightly hesitant.


    Finding no other solution to the current problem, he went ahead and picked both affinities.


    [The modification for the skill Hand of Mana Affinity has been chosen]<sub> </sub>


    [Hand of Mana Affinity Lv.10 bes Grasp of the Undying Lv.1]


    [Grasp of the Undying]: The caressing touch of an undying being on one''s soul. The undying being forms an ethereal hand made out of [Soul Essence] to influence the physical world. If the hand starts to influence the physical world, then it bes visible. Additionally, if the object that the hand touches hold a soul, then one is capable to pull some of one''s vitality and [Soul Essence] while also dragging the part it touches in a certain direction in a short amount of time. The pulled away vitality and [Soul Essence] are then sent to the undying being to recover himself. The skill can always influence the physical world, but pulling once [Soul Essence] and vitality has a cooldown of 2 minutes.


    ...


    "Sigh...fortunately it went well." Danzel sighed out loud in relief.


    Bearing through the headache that he received from all the previous upgrades, Danzel followed the information given to him and manifested the [Grasp of the Undying] skill in front of him.


    Compared to the [Hand of Mana Affinity] where it looked like a floating gauntlet, [Grasp of the Undying] looked totally different.


    It looked like his dark green skeleton hand where the fingertips of the hand excluded a much intensive color, making the fingers look like sharp ws.


    Pulling his sword out of its sheath, Danzel gave it to the skeleton hand.


    Once it made contact with his sword, the skeleton hand seemed as if it became a much darker color, whereas when it wasn¡ät touching his sword it became a much lighter color.


    "So that¡äs how it works, huh? It should be invisible to others, but I guess since I am the caster, I am able to see it? Will have to test it tomorrow..."


    Taking his sword back, Danzel made the skeleton hand disappear, before looking at his total XP.


    [XP: 4 585 800]


    `It seemed like the harvesters brought some extra XP in the meantime...¡ä Danzel thought internally before focusing back on his status screen.


    More specifically, he focuses on his [ck Guard] ss.


    [ck Guard Lv.1]: 50 000 (+5 000 XP per level)


    "Mhm, that should be enough XP to level up my ss a couple of levels.


    Pressing the upgrade option on the window, Danzel watched how a wave of notifications appeared in front of him and how his XP was being drained at an rming rate.


    [ck Guard level has increased from Lv.1 to Lv.2]


    ...


    [ck Guard level has increased from Lv.12 to Lv.13]


    ...


    [ck Guard level has increased from Lv.30 to Lv.31]


    [Strength Increased by 120, Agility Increased by 90, Intelligence 120 Endurance 120]


    [You gained 90 Attribute Points]


    [A part of the ck Guard skills have been unlocked!]


    With the surge of power overwhelming his body, Danzel nced at his hand a few times before nodding in satisfaction. He was quickly able to adjust to the changes to his stats since he was used to being affected by [Sin of Wrath].


    Though he much more attributes now than when he was affected by the talent, it wasn¡ät to the point of being unable to control his strength.


    After all, he experienced such sort of thing more than one time.


    `Status.¡ä


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 100 [Max]


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 31]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.80]


    Health: 33 367/33 367


    Mana: 7908/7930


    Attribute points: 90


    Attributes: Strength: 673 Agility: 936 Intelligence: 720 Endurance: 591


    Great Rune: [Great Rune of Undeath Existence]


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Consciousness ] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery]


    Skills: [Death Guarding Swordsmanship Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.1] [High Jump Lv.1] [Presentless Steps Lv.1][Soul of Death Essence Lv.1] [Swift Movements Lv. 1] [Shield Charge Lv.1] [Soul Reaping Wind Lv.1] [Existential Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Exhaustion Lv.1] [Mortal Reminder Lv. 1] [Grasp of the Undying Lv.1] [Undying Guard Lv.1] [Armor of Vengeances Lv.1] [[Siphoning Soul de] Lv.1] [Soul of Death Lv.1] [Coating Miasma Lv.1] [Curse of Scourge Lv.1] [Greater Raise Undead Lv.1] [Undead Reconstruction Lv.1] [Eyes of the Damned Lv.1] [Curse of Five Bindings Lv.1] [NecromatiRestorationon Lv.1] [Death Rune Removal Lv.1]


    [Remark: A wight who is able to influence the soul of others. terrifying existence that witnesses the realm of the dead. If it weren¡ät for theck of knowledge that he has inside his empty skull, he would already be a cmity. At every cost, avoid confrontation against the undead named Rue Danzel.]


    [XP: 310 800]

 Chapter 307 Long Term Relationship

    Seeing his attributes, Danzel felt somewhat awkward.


    Considering how many attributes he gained for a level of his ss, The attribute that he gained the less amount of points, that was agility was actually his highest attribute.


    Where in fact his ss was built to focus on Strength, intelligence, and Endurance.


    He didn¡ät regret putting so many points into his agility as it helped him immensely in any situation. But watching his intelligence surpass the other two core attributes of his made him feel quite awkward.


    `I need to change that.¡ä Danzel thought to himself as he stared at the remaining free attribute points that waited to be distributed.


    But as much as he wanted to increase his strength, Danzel felt the need to start increasing his defense capabilities with all the new healing capabilities that he gained.


    As the mutants who barely were of the 3rd-tier were capable to inflict his damage even with his armor on.


    Sure, they had a strong body, but they generally couldn¡ät use any skills at all. When he checked some of the statuses of those mutants, most of their skills were passive ones with rarely some active skills.


    If his opponent were an expert of the 3rd-tier and managed tond a hit on his skull while using a skill, then Danzel would even make a trip on the realm of death beforeing back and killing that fellow.


    Never the case, Danzel was starting to think it was better in focusing his attribute somewhere else instead of agility.


    Instead of being a swift reaper, he was considering bing a tank with healing capabilities.


    Though both had their merits, Danzel found thetter to be much more disgusting to face.


    With such thought in mind, Danzel distributed the remaining attribute points.


    He put 27 points in strength, making his strength 700.


    Next, he put a total of 59 points into his endurance, making it 650 with thest 4 points going towards his agility for the sake of turning his agility at 940.


    If one considered the effect of [Superior Undead], Danzel would even gain +70 strength, +94 Agility, +72 intelligence, and + 65 endurance.


    That bonus would be doubled if he was further influenced by the talent [Sin of Wrath]. Bringing his already monstrous strength a step closer to the 4th-tier.


    `I wonder how close I will be after evolving my ss. Considering the attribute points I will gain, I should be able to fight against a 4th-tier expert...I think.¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    Though he didn¡ät want to arrogantly believe that he can win against a 4th-tier, he couldn¡ät help but think that he could have a slight change if he further upgrade his [ck Guard] ss.


    "No, it¡äs better not seek trouble with any 4th-tier any time soon when I am still a wight. Only when I be a death knight will I be able to face other 4th-tiers."


    "Seeing I also revealed myself to Velkir, he should still want to use my runes. He even sent Vanessa to simply guard a duke''s son with me. In other words, the mission is nothing more than to keep me busy whereas Vanessa is my bodyguard." Danzel mumbled out loud while seating on his bed.


    Activating the spatial ring of storage that Velkir had given him, Danzel found a total of 3rge books with the mentioned "supplies".


    Taking out the books and scanning them, he found out that they were books that contained the knowledge of magic.


    The first book titled [Learnings of wicked magic for beginners] held subjects that would interest someone that needed the basics and had information for the 1st and 2nd-tier.


    The second book is titled [Studiess of necromancy by Revivor Veleron]. This one was as much more advantage Necronomicon that he himself possessed and was 3 times higher than the first book. One could easily use it to smash one''s head with this thing.


    Thest book was titled [Elemental magic of Spell studies] which like the first book, contained information for beginners, but more focused on the element aspects.


    Once he opened that book, a letter dropped to the floor.


    Picking it and reading its content, Danzel was more sure of his theory than before.


    -


    My discipline Danzel,


    No, our rtionship is more of a transaction than that of a master and disciplined one. Though I can¡ät personally teach you as I have some unfinished business, the books I sent you should be enough to satisfy your hunger for knowledge. I also provided you a battlefield for you to improve your skills with living targets, though I forced you to ce yourself guarding that noble kid for the next couple of months.


    I realized that you want to keep our rtionship only to transactions wise and I wish to respect such conditions. Since we are a part of the same race, I am sure this will turn out into a long-term rtionship that benefits both of us.


    Burn this letter, Velkir.


    -


    "Long-term rtionship, huh?"Danzel mumbled before taking a runed contract out of his storage ring.<sub> </sub>


    Imputing his mana into the piece of paper, dark green mes engulfed the contracted.


    Throwing the letter into the burning contract, soon both pieces of paper were engulfed in fire and soon enough both pieces of paper turned into ashes.


    Though it was kinda wasteful on his part, Danzel didn¡ät mind too much spending his contracts.


    Velkir provided him with enough paper to make another couple hundred of them.


    Though Danzel was still somewhat skeptical of Velkir¡äs ns for him, making some rtionships with a 4th-tier Lich wasn¡ät that bad.


    He could provide him with runes and Velkir could provide him with several items and equipment. Though he still held the fear of being enved simr to when he was with Hanson, he couldn¡ät do much about it.


    When he went to join the mercenary group and meet the necromancer which was Velkir, he didn¡ät really expect to be found out to be the runesmith known as Rue Danzel.


    He could lie about his runed sword, but he couldn¡ät lie about the fact that every single item of his was a runed item.


    For the better or the worse, being found out gave him many benefits he couldn¡ät even hope to gain before.


    `As for the future consequences, I will let my future self-deal with them.¡ä Danzel thought to himself.


    It wasn¡ät like he could do anything other than enjoy the benefits in front of him.


    "With those 3 books, my total collection increased by a total of 5 magic books. Nersan¡ärahs book also needs to be studied. I could make the crystal that he gave me into some sort of orb, but..." Shaking his head, Danzely on the bed that was way too small for him


    It even started making cringing noise with the total weight of his bones and armor.


    "Will even a couple of months be enough to even finish a single one of those things?" Danzel mumbled to himself before starting to read the book of Nersan¡ärah.


    And without even realizing it, several hours passed and the next morning came.


    *Knock, Knock.


    "Hey, Da- I mean Abdael! Come out already! We need to go." Vanessa said while continuously knocking on his door.


    The door itself started shaking and it wouldn¡ät be a surprise if Vanessa punched a hole through the door.


    "Sigh is it so hard remembering one name..." Danzel cursed under his helmet before closing the book that he was reading.


    Putting all the books that he had in his storage ring, he stood up from his bed and opened the door.


    "Where do we need to go," Danzel asked while looking down at Vanessa the dark elve.


    Compared to her, he was massive in size, but if Vanessa really wanted to, she could probably send him to the realm of the dead without him being able to react.


    "That guy Will told me that we will be going somewhere much further away from this castle. Probably on another battlefield." She shrugged her shoulders.


    Nodding his head, Danzel followed behind Vanessa who was guided to where the others were.


    Once the knights saw him appear, many gave him looks of dissatisfaction and hatred at him for obvious reasons.


    After killing some of their own for what they considered unreasonable, many started talking behind his back, calling him Abdiel the cruel.


    The other three mercenaries only gave him a wary expression which was reasonable on their part.


    Compared to him, Vanessa''s reputation was much better, be it because of her beauty or the fact that she brought several heads of some of the elite units of the enemy forces. Also, the fact that she was a 4th-tier made the more ambitious people to looking for opportunities to lick her boots to gain her favor.


    In turn, Danzel looked at all those knights with total apathy.


    He considered all those knights nothing more than portable corpses that were avable for his use.


    The only that interested him was the window in front of him.


    [Requirement: Kill over 10 000 of the living with your own hands]


    [Currently achieved: 815/10 000]

 Chapter 308 Castle Raid

    Currently, in a mountain range near, a group of people stared at the distant castle that was once owned by the Dynasty.


    "This is our next target. If we fail to take over it by today, not only will reinforcemente from their side and we will be forced to retreat." A robed figure holding an orb said to the other group.


    "So if we fail all the walking that we done would be for nothing?" A cloaked figure said with annoyance. Her voice is clearly feminine.


    Among the whole group, she excluded a crushing pressure far superior to the whole group.


    "Alright then, you guys wait here and I will clear the whole-"


    "Do you know if the castle holds a 4th-tier expert?" A chilling voice interrupted the cloaked woman.


    Turning her head towards the knight who wore dark armor, she frowned slightly.


    "Do you want to do it?"


    Instead of answering her, the knight stared at the robed figure as if waiting for his answer.


    "...As far as our information goes, there should be a couple of 3rd-tier with several that reached the 2nd-tier. I also heard that among them were a few Phoenix warriors...but among them, there shouldn¡ät be a 4th-tier expert. I believe that miss Vanessa would be more suitable for"


    "No, I will go." The chilling voice said while looking at the cloaked woman which was the dark elve Vanessa.


    "Let me do it."


    Sighing to herself, she shrugged her shoulders at him.


    The other group of three people looked at their exchange with frowns.


    "Then it¡äs only right that I follow suit, Abdiel. I specialize in those sorts of missions." A dark cloaked man said who held daggers in his hands.


    "..."


    Silently agreeing with the rogue, the dark knight sends out a mentalmand.


    `You all, follow me.¡ä


    And right behind the group of those people, a dark mist started creeping near them, with many many footsteps to be heard.


    The dark mist hid the owners of all those footsteps, but one could clearly feel through the ground that they were more than a hundred people walking in the dark mist.


    The only thing visible through the mist was several dark green lights.


    The dark knight taking the lead had his sword shed with the same dark green light that brought an extremely ominous feeling by just looking at the de.


    But even those lights were soon engulfed by the dark mist and blended in the forest and drawing closer to the far away castle right under the dark knight.


    ***


    Currently in the walls of the same castle...


    The walls surrounding the castle were constantly being patrolled with soldiers looking at the surroundings for potential threats with vignce.


    They were specifically instructed not to take their jobs lightly and to be always on the lookout for enemies. But after several weeks of seeing only a few rabbitsing out of the forest, it was bound for a few of those soldiers to be less vignt.


    "I wonder how much longer we will be stationed here." A soldier said with a bored expression to his colleague.


    "Get a grip already, If one of the leaders catches wind of you cking, I will also be dragged into your mess."


    "Heh, as if theye out in the middle of the night. Wherever I look at the forest, is just the same. We also have several experts that reached the 3rd-tier in the castle. Who would even dare to attack us?"


    "...Still, stay on your guard. Thosest months they have been rumors that the Dynasty has been acting suspiciously near our territory."


    "Right, right. All the rumors about a necromancer or whatnot. As far as I see, where were are there is nothing but trees." The cking soldier said, before extending his spear to his colleague.


    "Hold this for me, nature calls to me and she is quite impatient." He said with a grin.


    "Sigh~if any of the leaderse, don¡ät expect me to side with you."


    "Yes~yes."


    Seeing him leaving, his colleague shook his head before focusing on watching the usual scenery.


    But today he noticed something different.


    Bits of dark mist seemed to appear for a split second before disappearing again.


    "Mist? But it hasn¡ät rained for days..."


    *Crack~


    Hearing suddenly a noise, the soldier immediately became alerted and bend to see where the noise came from.


    And what he saw there gave him almost a heart attack.


    There was a knight equipped with dark-ted armor, standing in a spear that pierced the wall itself.


    Once those two made eye contact, the soldier felt an overwhelming bloodlust crawling to his neck.


    With every part of his body screaming danger, the soldier raised up from his bent position and yelled out to rm the others.


    At least that''s what he hoped to do.


    The man suddenly felt an enormous pain going through his chest and before he knew it, he was dragged towards the edge of the wall, making him start falling.


    But rather than meeting the ground, he came to face with the dark knight who pierced his sword through his hurt while covering the man''s mouth.


    He wanted to yell, but he felt the grip of the dark knight close to crashing his jaw.


    Soon enough, he lost all his strength soon after drawing hisst breath.


    But that wasn¡ät the end of the dark knight''s ns.


    With an ominous aura seeping inside the corpse of the soldier, the man once again opened his eyes and started looking around the forest as if he was genuinely patrolling.


    Everything that just happend went unnoticed by the many patrols that were only a few ten meters away. Mainly because the dark knight''s presence was almost none existence.


    His steps seemed to blend in a dark mist and leaving none of any notice or his aura out for others to notice.


    Leaving the undead soldier to continue his "duty", the dark knight left like a phantom towards the location of a presence.<sub> </sub>


    If it weren''t for the dark mist hiding his presence and the sound of his armor, he would have already been found out by now.


    In his path, he assassinated another two of the patrolling soldier with terrifying speed. Once the remaining life has left its mortal body, it disappeared into the thin air.


    Once he arrived at the door where the presence was, that very presence opened the door.


    "Haah~, there is nothing better than taking a leak while cking in work. But with that serious fellow, I better go back before he reports me."


    "There is no need to go back." A chilling voice said.


    "Who is there!?"


    Of course, the only answer he got was being grabbed by the neck like a helpless chicken.


    The dark knight that was several meters away crossed the distance in an instant!


    He couldn''t react at all.


    "Agh-You-! Who are-agh?"


    "Dead men don''t need to know."


    Suddenly, the dark knight''s gauntlet started to glow in an ominous dark green light.


    The man''s eyes shrunk in horror as he felt his vitality being drained.


    "Stop~, please, spare-!"


    His pleas fell on deaf ears.


    His struggles became weaker and soon enough, the soldier became an empty husk of dried-up skin.


    His face was full of horror and tears.


    But like the two others, he disappeared.


    "Storage rings are truly the best tool to hide bodies after all." He mumbled before entering the door of where the man came from.


    "Mhm, there 5 other people in a range of [Eyes of the Damned]. Those others should be my target."


    The n of Danzel, the dark knight was simple.


    Kill as many as possible before the enemy realizes his presence.


    Though those guys that he killed were small fries, it was better to lower the numbers of the enemy now rather thanter when his misdeeds were found out.


    "It seems it was worth investigating a portion of the XP that I gained thosest few months into upgrading the [Presentless Steps] into the 3rd-tier. Such skilles really handy in such an undercover situation.


    A total of 6 months passed after he upgraded to his main ss after all.


    The amount of XP that he gained through each battlefield and his two harvesters was enormous.


    He had enough XP to even upgrade the skill which he didn''t use as much.


    One of them was [Presentless Steps] which turned into the 3rd-tier skill [Mist Presence].


    The modification was [Soul Affinity] and [Overall improvement].


    Thanks to being of [Soul Affinity], several of the skill and talents that improve this type of affinity increased the power of the skill to much greater heights.


    Even though Danzel didn''t specialize in being a sneaky snake and all. Those bonuses were enough to bring him a step lower than rogue.


    The skill is essential but his presence in an ethereal in makes his usual senses or way to spot him way harder than usual.


    The only disadvantage was that he constantly leaked dark most out of his body,


    At night it was handy to camouge himself in the darkness, but in the day, it would prove awkward to sneak around or hide...


    ''I wasted enough time here, I should start clearing all others before I-''


    "Enemy!!!"


    Before he could finish his thoughts, the yells of soldiers began echoing all around the castle.


    "..."


    If Danzel had a face, he would be frowning right now.


    He was sure that he didn''t leave any evidence except the sole undead.


    "But even then, that''s too fast of reaction."


    He was sure that he wasn''t found out when he was sneaking in here.


    He also put the corpses in his storage ring and did not even leave bits of blood on the floor.


    Going through the different possibilities, Danzel''s ethereal eyes re up.


    "This dumpass must even get caught in the act..."


    Danzel of course cursed the rogue that volunteered toe with him.


    Back then he didn''t say anything as that guy Kenn specialized in being sneaky.


    "No matter, I guess I will have to move the n forward."


    In the next moment, he let sever all of the corpses out of his storage ring to fall to the ground.


    Many of them were his in enemy of the past months and few of his allies.


    What each corpse had inmon was that each armor had the same rune carved on the inside of the armor.


    The corpses in total number more than 40.


    "Let''s see the results of the new version of this run."


    He said before spreading his dead mana inside each armor of the corpses.

 Chapter 309 Castle Raid (2)

    Having received the news that an enemy infiltrate the castle, everyone tensed up, but none of them showed a hint of panic.


    Most of them searched around the castle in groups, while others came to reinforce the walls in case an attackes.


    Among these reinforcements, they were a few magic casters in their ranks.


    Even if the Berum kingdom favored life force users the most, that didn''t mean none was practicing the ways of magic arts.


    Though most of them would be frowned at considering their nemesis being the Arcana Kingdom, a ce where magic casters drive.


    But even then, the fundamental rule of the strong being of respect was always there.


    And magic by its essence held many advantages that the life force couldn''t replicate.


    The most obvious is the range difference.


    In a fight between groups and armies, it wasn''t unreasonable to say that magic casters were the biggest threat in a war.


    Their weakness was that most of the time, their bodies were weak, and getting close to them spelled death to them.


    But being on top of several meters-high walls, they could rain hell on whoever tried to raid the castle!


    "Any sights of the enemy?" One of the magic casters asked the patrolling team.


    "No, the forest is still quiet as always. But..."


    Seeing the hesitation on the soldier''s face, the magic caster in turn frowned.


    "What is it? Did you notice something, or are you trying to keep information from the army?"


    "W-What? No, no, It might be just my imagination, but...doesn''t the forest look gloomier than usual?


    Hearing that, everyone looked at the forest with a frown on their face.


    Some of them saw nothing unusual some also confirmed the soldier''s im that the forest was indeed much gloomier than before.


    Once the magic casterys his eyes on the forest, his face is also distorted into a frown.


    " This is..."


    Maybe it was because it was the night that others couldn''t see the difference, but to a magic caster whose sense of mana was stronger, he could identify the dark most that shrouded the forest.


    If it was a normal mist, he wouldn''t even bother to give it a second nce, but seeking a mana-infested mist was too strange!


    And right at that moment, with the help of his mana enchanting his eyesight, he saw sever all figuresing through the mist!


    "E-Enemy! There are enemy troops in the forest!"


    As soon as he alerted the others, a cry of pain sounded through the distance.


    "Kyaaaaagh!!!"


    Turning their heads towards themotion, everyone''s eyes widen in surprise.


    As a man sunk his very own teeth at one of their colleagues with a ferocious expression on his face!


    His finger grows twice as long and they harden to the point that they became sharp ws, digging into the chest of the poor soldier who was being eaten alive.


    While this cannibal was busy feasting on one of their own, another 4 of those cannibals appeared from his side and dashed with unnatural moved towards the living.


    Though they moved unfit for the living, their speed far surpassed the leverage of 2nd-tier Joe and their killing intent broke through the roof.


    "Stop them!"


    The soldiers push forward their spears, waiting for the enemy toe close enough to impale them.


    "Fles~aaaaah!"


    With a sweep of their ws, they pushed the spears to the side while digging their free w right into their chest.


    The armor that those soldiers had prated and cut like butter.


    Nothing could save those soldiers from their fate.


    "You monster! Of fire! Head my call and burn my enemies. [Fire Swep]!"


    Raising his staff, the magic caster cast his spell which engulfed the cannibals and their prey in a wave of fire.


    Though it might have been seen as merciless in burning his allies, the magic caster knew that they were done with such injury through their chest.


    "Kiagh!!!"


    "S-Stop!"


    "Help!"


    ...


    Their cries of help soon calmed down after a while, but after the fire had gone out, while the soldiery down dead, the 4 cannibals were standard tall.


    Their skin was burned to the point where their muscles could be seen, but soon enough their wounds of them started to heal at a rapid past.


    "Food!"


    "Flesh!"


    "Kill!"


    "Human!"


    While still injured the four cannibals started charging at the other soldiers who were shocked at their regeneration.


    And those guys weren''t the only ones that were facing those guys.


    All around the castle, groups of those cannibals rampaged and ravaged the flesh of the living.


    Those who had a 3rd-tier expert had it the easiest as they were capable to y those monsters.


    But those a tier below had trouble facing them.<sub> </sub>


    The magic caster who saw the unusual regeneration of them and the long ws had finallye to recognize what those things were.


    "Dammit! From where did does undeade from."


    Hearing the key information, a nearby asked with a desperate tone.


    "What!? What kind of undead are they!?"


    Raising his staff, the magic caster answered.


    "They are ghouls!"


    Undead known for their unending hunger and regeneration simr to that of a troll.


    Unless someone finished them with one single attack, then one should be prepared to be the meal of that undead.


    Luckily for these soldiers, they had an overwhelming number difference against those few ghouls.


    And most of them were of the 2nd-tier with a magic caster backing them from the rear.


    In turn, the ghouls were divided and used no strategy at all, and moved like animals driven by their instinct alone.


    The surprise attack of the ghouls did make some casualties among them, but after getting the situation under control, it didn''t even take them a minute to finish the ghouls off.


    "Hu~mens!!!"


    "[Icy Circle]]!"


    With a sharp circle de shooting in thest Ghoul''s head, it dropped to the ground unmoving."


    It took them a total of 2 minutes to get everything under control.


    At the time of the surprise attack, they failed to realize the true intent of the ghoul''s appearance.


    But soon enough everyone started to find out by the screeching noise of the gate of the wall.


    *Crigh-Crigh-Crigh!


    With the noise attracting everyone''s22 attention, those who were close enough only now noticed the several corpses that were spread on the walls.


    The leaves controlling the gate were pulled down and broken, making every attempt to stop the gate from opening futile.


    Waiting in the middle of the gate down to the ground, was a sole figure wearing dark ted armor.


    Seeing all that happening, the magic caster had a shback of the dark mist in the forest.


    "Impossible! Was this their true aim!"


    Bringing his head to look down the walls, he like many other people notice the walls being shrouded by a dark mist.


    But even if they realised it now.


    Now it was toote.


    The gate fully opened, revealing the dark mist.


    A huge wolf figure with metal-like ws and a three eyes skull came walking together with an army of undead behind his steps.


    Each of them had the ethereal dark green eyes inmon.


    They couldn''t have expected this of happening.


    While the dark mist hid the undead army from others'' sight, the distraction that the ghouls served with their loud yells covered the noise that the undead army was making.


    Nheless, the gate was heavily guarded by several 3rd-tier experts, each of them being strong enough to face an army of hundred of the 2nd-tier soldiers.


    But not only were those guys massacred in such a short amount of time, but they didn''t even manage to warn the others who were focused on the loud and ferocious ghouls.


    Leaving them in the current situation where the undead army came right through the front door of their own house!


    "Hurry up and stop them! Don''t let the undead in the castle!"


    Hearing themand of someone, the soldiers of Berum quickly moved.


    Danzel, the mastermind behind all this could only chuckle to himself.


    "Hehe~you guys are toote."


    Looking at his undead troops entering the castle, he sends out hismand.


    "My undead! Head mymand!"


    Turning his back on his undead army, he pointed his sword forward.


    "Go and ughter them all! Leave none of them alive!"


    "KGwaaaahh!"


    Skull Crawl howl spread to his surroundings, making every soldier who heard it shake unconsciously.


    "For our liege!"


    "For our liege!"


    "For our liege!"


    Every undead chanted at the same time as the advantage forward.


    Their chilling voice turned into a terrifying echo as their footsteps seemed about to bring an earthquake to this mortal realm.


    Lowering his sword, the liege of that undead stepped forward.


    ''It seems like everything has gone ording to n. It was worth improving the runes of those ghouls.''


    "I wonder where this ipetent rogue is currently..." Danzel thought for a moment before shaking his head.


    ''No matter, for now, I will just harvest some of those guys.''

 Chapter 310 Castle Raid (3)

    Chaos quickly spread through the walls.


    The Berums side might have more numbers generally, but as of one everyone, one of them was spread through the whole base.


    Where the undead army walked in like a wave of death.


    Many of the humans died keeping the undead busy long enough for them to gather a force strong enough to face them.


    Among that force were several of the 3rd-tier experts who were easily able to cut down the undead forces.


    The only thing that they managed to achieve was attracting the master of all those undead.


    Wielding a ck kite shield with a half skull expression carved in the metal together with an ominous sword that leaked dark green light, once he appeared in front of those experts their fate was set.


    They barely were able to send out a few swings with their own weapon and those were easily blocked by the cken kite shield.


    As when the master of that undead swung his sword, they couldn''t even react properly to avoid itpletely.


    The constitution of a 3rd-tier did allow them to survive even if they were cut once or twice.


    But once they were, they felt as if a part of their very own soul has been cut apart.


    But even without such pain distracting them, the power that the dark knight had was just too overwhelming.


    They almost lose grip of their weapon when they shed with them.


    ''How is that guy still on the 3rd-tier!?''


    Their internal cries though we swiftly became silent.


    They even went out of their way to focus solely on the dark knight with several 2nd-tiers and a total 5 of 3rd-tier experts.


    s, even those guys were cut apart without even managing to wound the dark knight.


    "Good thing they decided toe at me, having them wreck my undead would have been annoying." Danzel said as his dead mana traveled towards his sword.


    "Now, serve upon my will."


    The nearby people who were fighting to the death couldn''t help but get cold sweat in seeing the corpses of the 3rd-tiers and their colleagues raise from the dead andsh out at them.


    Though it was already obvious, it only now downed them that death meant being enved in the form of undead.


    That also meant that their allies would be their enemies if they die!


    Worse of all was that the undead were quite tough to kill. They weren''t any weaker than them physically.


    That was the terrifying advantage of a necromancer.


    While the enemy would only lose soldiers, the army of the dead would only grow stronger.


    Of course, the school of Necromancycked a certain lethality in their own spells, but their spells were already vicious enough that it wasn''t even a disadvantage.


    And against a necromancer that couldn''t be beaten, the Berum could only watch their former allies raising as undead and overwhelming them one-sidedly.


    Skull w herself also proved to be a force of herself as she was able to use her strength against melee opponents.


    Normal weapons with the strength of the 2nd-tier soldiers could barely scratch her legs and the 3rd-tier that focused on her had their attack phase through her body as if she was a ghost.


    The few magic casters on the side of the Berum proved to be the ones with the most kills with their AoE spells.


    Sadly for them, they were the first put on Danzel''s target list.


    The soldiers could hold their own against the undead to keep their magic casters safe, but against the dark knight, they could only cry for help.


    The fight onlysted a total of 15 minutes with few soldiers retreating into the castle and barricading themselves from the undead.


    As for Danzel''s side, he was able to double the number of his undead.


    "They even hidden inside, huh? Hmpf, they are nothing more than trapped rats now." He scoffed while turning towards his undead.


    "The 30 of you follow me, the rest of you surround the castle in case some of them escape. Also, gather the corpses of the ghouls and bring them here."


    With his orders spread among his undead, they quickly went out to work. The only ones that stayed were 30 of his Draugrs and Skull w with her head lowered, fully disying her begging eyes to her master.


    Maybe if she were a dog or a cat, she might even looked cute. But her species itself wasn''t made to be cute as the head didn''t have any flesh even after death.


    "Skull w, you go around and search for those who might be hiding. With that new eye of yours, you should be able to do so, no?"


    Nodding her head, she sprinted in search of prey to present her master with.


    She wasn''t going to disappoint her liege!


    As to why Danzel sent his strongest undead to basically to errands, it was because he didn''t want to destroy the very same castle that they were going to be using.


    He could even try to destroy the gate and begin his own ughter with his undead if he wanted to.


    For the sake of sparing some of his mana and not destroying the castle, he came up with this n.


    "Though it seems I will be forced to break the castle gates." He said while walking on the castle gate.


    Raising his sword, he swung at the gate with all his strength, but surprisingly his sword got repealed.<sub> </sub>


    For a short instance, a blur light appeared in the gate before disappearing.


    "A barrier, huh?" Danzel said before touching the gate with his hand.


    Reading the barrier, it seemed to be that it used mana to block the damage.


    "Then there must be a limit of the mana..."


    Sending amand on his undead, they all began to swing towards the gate none stop.


    Danzel could have also swung to fasten the process but he decided against it.


    ''It''s a matter of time anyways.''


    And soon enough, the mana fueling the barrier reached its limit.


    "Move to the side," Danzel said as a dark green light escaped his sword.


    Swinging it down, a [Soul Reaping de] Pierced through the gate and opened a small gap for the undead to enter.


    *Boehm!!


    Stepping inside the castle, rows of Berum soldiers waited in a line.


    They seem to expect that the whole army of the undead woulde, but unexpectedly only 30 undead with the necromancer came walking in.


    That though didn''t cheer them at all.


    They came to know that the master of all those undead beings was powerful enough to single handling fight 5 3rd-tier experts with ease.


    Among the group of people, 2 figures came walking in the front, one with a Phoenix helmeted and a sword in his hand while the other held a staff in his hand.


    ''Their auras are much stronger than the ones I fought before.'' Danzel thought as he stepped forward,manding his undead to stay put.


    Each party stopped moving.


    There was a moment of silence between them and Danzel.


    But that didn''tst for long.


    "[Giants Strength]" the magic caster said, engulfing his teammate with his spell.


    He didn''t waste his time in the moment of silence and he already was preparing his spell.


    With the current information in hand, the necromancer in front of them was extremely powerful.


    Though using the soldiers as a meat shield would allow him to fire freely his spell at him, it also risked raising the army of the necromancer numbers.


    They were already d that they didn''t see hundreds of undead rushing to them.


    But he wasn''t the only one who wasn''t wasting time.


    "[Curse of Chaining Fatigue]!"


    With a dark mist shooting out of his body, it traveled towards the phoenix swordsman.


    "-Tch, a curse?" The Phoenix warriors said in annoyance.


    The dark mist soon enough entered the sword and body.


    He didn''t even try to resist.


    And invisible to the eyes of the other, ethereal chains appeared and bonded around the legs of the swordsman, draining his stamina and also weighting him down.


    He tried cutting the chains with his sword, but it only phases though.


    That spell was the upgraded version of [Curse of Exhaustion] in its modification stage.


    2 months ago, he chose both [Dead Mana Affinity] and [Soul Affinity] in the range the options.


    Back then he was most surprised to see the [Permanent in cost of Power] option.


    If he chose that, Danzel guessed that he would truly gain the infamous version of curses, the ones thatst forever!


    Though after thinking about it he decided to choose both affinities as [The Curse of Exhaustion] was his favorite curse.


    Though he wasn''t using curses all that much, that was because there wasn''t a need to do so.


    If he judge that he could kill his enemy, why spend his mana cursing him on the top?


    That would have been overkill on his side.


    As for why he castes it now, it was because he felt that those two could actually put a fight against him.


    "Let''s see how he handles another one..." He mumbled to himself.


    Hearing that, the swordsman dashed towards Danzel.

 Chapter 311 Castle Raid (4)

    Dashing towards the dark knight, a red glow covered the phoenix swordman''s body.


    With the glow also came an explosive amount of strength to him, allowing him to appear in front of the dark knight with his sword raised up.


    But even with such speed, Danzel was still capable to react.


    *Thing!


    "Hmpf, [Curse of Primordial Decay]"


    Casting the spell, another dark mist left Danzel''s body and leached into the Phoenix warrior''s body.


    "Tch-!" Annoyed by the fact of having another curse in his body, he swung his sword with a speed and precision that the other 3rd-tiers couldn''t evenpare to.


    s, the path of his de was blocked by the kite shield of the dark knight with ease.


    But he wasn''t very fond of being meatshield any time soon.


    The moment he blocked one of the swords and swung, he spread his mana all around his body and moved to the side with his sword ready to be swung.


    He moved so fast that the swordsman didn''t have enough time to block the swing of the ominous sword.


    "Die."


    The chilling voice said as the reaping de went to im the sword and life.


    But before that happened...


    "[Fire Emprace]!"


    Suddenly mes started appearing around the sword and body like in a bumble.


    Once Danzel''s sword made contact with the mes, not only was the mes tough like a wall of steel, but the mes themselves exploded right towards him.


    *Baahm!


    With the area they shed bring engulfed in mes, the swordsman didn''t stray idly.


    Jumping right in the mes, he swung his sword, only to be met with the ominous sword.


    *Thiing!


    "A barrier, huh?" The chilling voice said as he pushed this swordsman back together with the mes.


    "Elementals of the burning in! Head my call! [Summon Fire Elemental]!"


    The mes that were about to be snuffed out were suddenly moved to two locations with the mes growing stronger.


    By the magic caster''s will, the two mes came to life and two 4 meters tall figures with a whirlwind of mes being the bottom part of their body where the top was of a humanoid armored figure with their hands being ws.


    Of course, they were made out of purely mana and mes themselves.


    "Summoning magic?" Danzel said surprised.


    Though surprised, that didn''t stop him from charging at the swordsman.


    Swinging his sword down with incredible speed, the swordsman was forced to block it if he didn''t want to die.


    *Thing! Buagh~


    The ground under the swordsman cracked the moment he blocked the swing.


    That was when he released the sheer strength difference between them.


    The curses also started to take effect and slowly weigh down on his body.


    ''If this continues, it''s a matter of time when I am going to die. For now, I have to create some distance and think of another strategy.''


    Using his life force on his sword, a huge force exploded, pushing the ominous de away.


    Using that chance, he was going to retreat.


    But it wasn''t only the sword that he had to take into consideration.


    The moment their des were pushed to the side, Danzel had been using the skill [Shield Charge] on his shield too, directly mming the swordsman.


    "Gah!" Feeling the huge amount of force on his chest, the swordsman rolled several meters to the ground.


    Through his experience, he managed to get his footing back, the blood he coughed proved that it quite hurt him.


    But there was still a smile on his face.


    As he achieved this by creating some distance between the dark knight.


    "Fruitless efforts." Danzel said while looking at the two fire elementals that came from both his left and right.


    ''I guess I will deal with these things first...''


    With dark green mana engulfing his sword, he threw a [Soul Reaping Wind] at one of the fire elementals.


    As the elemental movement was too slow, it decided to swing its fire ws right at the iing wind de.


    But s, the moment the wind de came in contact with the fire elemental, he cut through him in half like butter.


    "Wgaaah!" A loud unnatural stretch came from the fire elemental before the mes disappeared into nothingness.


    "Huh!?"


    Seeing that the magic caster was shocked beyond belief.


    ''My fire elements can reform even after being cut Into pieces! Howe it was destroyed by a single attack!"


    In turn, Danzel was somewhat disappointed at the strength of that element.


    It was his first time seeing such kind of magic and it was quite interesting. The fire elemental seemed quite strong appearance-wise.


    "So weak."


    Throwing another [Soul Reaping de] at the other fire elemental, Danzel felt truly disappointed.


    The fact was, the fire elementals were incredibly strong.


    Other than their slow movement, they received minimal damage from both physical and magic damage. Wherever cut or blown to pieces, they could have gathered their lost mes pieces to reform once more.


    Other than ice or water magic, they were incredibly hurt to kill.


    From strength size, they were a bit stronger than the average arcanic mutants, but each attack was filled with mes.


    The reason they lost so easily was because of the nature of [Soul Reaping de].<sub> </sub>


    The wind was easily able to cut down their fire body, allowing for the soul essence of those elementals to be cut in arge amount.


    And as elementals were newly formed beings and mostly considered of a mana body. Their soul essence was all the more vulnerable.


    So when it was cut down, they couldn''t keep their bodies from existing anymore.


    In short, Danzel severely countered the fire elementals!


    It didn''t take him long before he switched his focus back on the swordsman.


    The swordsman cursed internally as of not even have enough time to recover.


    Moving at an incredible amount of speed, both of them appeared in front of each other and began shing with their swords.


    The sounds of swords shing echoed everywhere.


    The soldiers looking at the fight were extremely nervous were the undead were...expressionless.


    The magic caster tried to intervene in their fight, be it by giving the swordsman buffs or using offensive spells. But the situation didn:''t change.


    Whatever buff he gave the swordsman, he was always overpowered by the dark knight and offensive spells could harm him too.


    The swordsman holder was quite well, but after the wounds started to grow in number, his body started to fail him.


    Not only was his skin showing the effects of necrosis but he also felt physically and mentally weak as if his own soul was growing weaker by the second.


    Under such conditions, Danzel was finally able to drive his sword right tough the chest of the swordsman.


    "A-Agh!!!"


    Drawing his de out Danzel watched how the man struggled to keep swinging his sword at him.


    Unfortunately with his heart destroyed and decaying, the man fell to the ground.


    In turn, Danzel wasn''t even hurt once.


    "Compared to the other guys outside, you were quite strong-"


    Without being able to finish, a wave of scorching mes washed over him.


    Once the mes were gone, Danzel appeared totally unfazed.


    "Right, there was also you..."


    Turning his killing undead to the magic caster, he shudders in fear.


    "W-What are all of you guys do! Don''t allow him ofing any closer! Keep him busy until I finish my next spell."


    Hearing that, the soldiers showed their unwillingness on their faces, but they still followed the magic caster''s orders.


    Seeing the hundred or so soldiersing at him, Danzel scoffed out loud.


    "Hah! To think you would resort to that."


    In the next moment, the 30 Draugrs of his stepped forward.


    Though they were secretly outnumbered, it didn''t matter.


    This undead had only to keep the others frompletely surrounding him and allowing him the chance to cleave through the living.


    With hismand, he leads the undead to charge toward the living.


    "Spears! Push the spears forward!"


    ''Useless.''


    Covering his sword with his mana, 3 [Soul Reaping des] cut through their lines, allowing his undead to fight the soldiers evenly.


    Those in front of Danzel''s path were cut down mercilessly filing at the same time his cursed sword with their soul essences. Making their pain all the more painful.


    It didn''t even take a minute for new undead to raise from the avable corpses.


    The magic caster tried to cast whatever spell he knew at the dark knight, even if it hit the soldiers following his orders.


    Each physical type spell was blocked by his shield whereas AoE spells seemed to do nothing to him.


    In fact, those spells were harming him, but the damage was quickly recovered by the spell [Necromatic Restoraction].


    He had enough time to spare and he even used the swordsman to regain bits of his own mana by blocking his attacks with his shield.


    Though annoying, he is still on the winning side.


    Once the majority of soldiers became undead, they started to focus on the magic caster too.


    The now turned soldiers looked at the magic caster with hate, making them look as if they were ming him for their deaths when actually it was purely the curse of the undead that made them hate the living.


    Once Danzel decided to step in, the magic caster met his fate.


    His fate was joining the ranks of the undead.


    With everyone killed here, Danzel heated his sword back in his scabbard.


    "You all! Search the castle! Kill anyone you find! But try to not break stuff in the castle."


    His undead nodded and went exploring the castle under their liegesmand.


    "That took a while..." Danzel mumbled as he walked outside the gate of the castle.


    "I should notify the others..."


    Making his shield disappear from his storage ring, he raised both his hand in front of him.


    "Let''s see if it works this time..." He mumbled before pushing his mana into the middle of both his arms.


    Controlling his mana just like the books had written, his dark green mana of his slowly turned into a bright red color.


    And in the next moment, the mana turned into a small ball of fire.


    "Here you go!"


    Pushing the small ball of fire up into the air, the ball of fire was soon shot several meters up high, working as a beacon of light in the middle of the night.


    Mentally exhausted, Danzel fell to his knees.


    Reason being that this ball of fire wasn''t a skill of his,but was actually made by using his very own knowledge of magic.

 Chapter 312 Attribute Limit And Caught Of Guard

    Seeing the pathetically small fireball challenging the night, Wilhelm and the others understood what it meant.


    And secretly, everyone but Vanessa was quite shocked.


    While they were waiting for the results of those Danzel and the rogue, it didn''t take a long while when the rogue came back to bring the news that they failed infiltration.


    They have been waiting for Danzel to return and n their next move.


    But the small fireball indicated that Danzel actually seed!


    At the very start, Wilhelm was against sending him to deal with the castle and instead wanted Vanessa to go.


    As a 4th-tier expert was much more reliable than a 3rd-tier.


    s, he didn''t voice his opinion.


    Why?


    Because he knew that it wouldn''t have mattered.


    Compared to the Nature Dagger group that listen to him, Vanessa and Abdiel treated him as if he was a nuisance.


    Especially Abdiel''s gaze felt somewhat threatening.


    While Vanessa moved alone on every battlefield they went to, the dark knight Abdiel, for the better or the worse was the main force of their group.


    Wilhelm was more than once threatened to die by the hands of his enemies and he was forced to use whatever means he had to protect himself.


    Only when his death was unavoidable would the dark knighte and save him.


    He also didn''t want to be unsatisfied with Abdiel as he was the reason for most of their sess. And Abdiel''s sess was at the same time his own.


    Earning him arge number of merits in the Dynasty.


    ''I hate it that the most unreliable people are the most reliable ones...''


    After a few minutes of walking, they finally spotted signs of the castle walls.


    The archers, druid, and rogue frowned at the inspecting gazes of tens of undead on top of the castle walls.


    The night vision from the undead was easily able to spot the living under the night.


    Even a few undead were patrolling the surroundings outside the walls in case of enemies appearing.


    Walking towards the open gate of the wall, 2 undead taking the duty of guards gave the group of the living a quick nce filled with hatred before continuing their duty.


    Going past the gate, the number of undead skyrocketed.


    Some of them wore the armor of the Dynasty knights, but most of the undead were from the Berums side.


    Signs of a fight were to be seen everywhere.


    The spilled blood on the ground, and several undead corpses, slowly be dust.


    "Did he turn everyone into undead...?" Wilhelm mumbled to himself.


    For a nobleman who past few months knew nothing of a battlefield, the sight of skeletons with glowing eyes was difficult for him to get used to.


    He got even more disturbed when he saw the huge undead wolf whom he learned was named Skull w, was currently carrying 3 corpses in his maw, spilling the very much warm blood to the ground.


    And soon enough when they reached the castle gate, they found the one responsible for this whole massacre staring intently at a small ball of fire that was hovering over his right palm, while his other hand had arge book open.


    "Hey, Abdiel! Are you still at the level of producing such a small fire?" Vanessa said with a teasing tone.


    Being disturbed, Danzel quickly lost his focus on the fire, making the fire disperse and shortly after disappearing into nothingness.


    Seeing that, Danzel felt extremely bitter at losing control over his "supreme" fireball.


    "You..." Danzel looked at the dark elve in anger.


    Wilhelm who was looking at this exchange had to force himself not to burst intoughter.


    He fully understands how Abdiel/Danzel was feeling right now. As a magic caster himself, he also felt extremely annoyed when someone was disturbing him while practicing.


    Losing control of one''s spell wasn''t to be taken lightly as it could prove to be lethal to the caster.


    But looking at the spell that the dark knight was practicing, he almost burst intoughter.


    Closing the book that he was holding, he looked toward Wilhelm, making him freeze in horror.


    "Sir Wilhelm, my undead have cleared out the entirety of the castle. We should be able to use it now."


    Nodding slightly dyed, Wilhelm walked into the castle before stopping suddenly and looking back at the dark knight.


    "What about any hostages?"


    "...Sadly, as they resisted, I and my undead were forced to take ording to action." Danzel said with his ice-cold voice.


    There was a moment of silence between them.


    Turning his head to stare at the bloodied floor, he said.


    "I see...that''s too bad."


    s, his words didn''t match his original thoughts.


    ''Lies, he probably killed even those begging to live and turned them into his undead army. Damn Necromancer.''


    The other three mercenaries also followed their client''s suit.


    While passing, Danzel''s gaze wasser pointed at the rogue.


    The rogue also felt his gaze, but the feeling he usually got when facing him was different.


    Most of the time, those beside Danzel that had keen senses could feel bits of his hatred at them and killing intent.


    But the feeling the right got was one of total apathy.


    ***


    After the group made their own inspections of the castle, they went ahead and dered which room they would be using.


    With the hundreds of undead tirelessly patrolling the surroundings and inside the castle itself, there was no need for anyone to be ced on guard duty.


    Even though the senses of a 3rd-tier were much more reliable than of a Draugr, thetter had the advantage of numbers.


    They only decided to put someone on guard from both mercenary groups in front of the bedroom of Wilhelm in case someone slipped through the undead.


    Danzel and Vanessa were both unwilling to do this, s for the sake of the mission, they were forced to cooperate.


    After Wilhelm informed the higher-ups of the Dynasty of "his", sess in taking over the castle and being informed to wait until their troopse to reim it.


    And now in the middle of the night, the druid Borg and Danzel were standing in front of the door, behind them is the room where Wilhelm was sleeping at.<sub> </sub>


    They have been guarding the door for several hours, but neither of those two took the initiative to strike up a conversation with each other.


    The druid was on his knees, meditating while Danzel was aimlessly looking in front of him.


    In truth though, Danzel was looking at his [Status] somewhat troubled.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 100 [Max]


    Race: Wight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 79]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.80]


    Health: 50 325/ 50 325


    Mana: 9 870/ 10 032


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 964 Agility: 1084 Intelligence: 912 Endurance: 914


    Great Rune: [Great Rune of Undeath Existence]


    Talents: [Superior Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Consciousness ] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery]


    Skills: [Death Guarding Swordsmanship Lv.7] [Stone Wall Lv.9] [High Jump Lv.6] [Mist Presence Lv.1][Soul of Death Essence Lv.1] [Swift Movements Lv.3] [Shield Charge Lv.9] [Soul Reaping Wind Lv.5] [Existential Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Chaining Fatigue Lv.5] [Mortal Reminder Lv. 1] [Grasp of the Undying Lv.3] [Undying Guard Lv.4] [Armor of Vengeances Lv.8] [Siphoning Soul de Lv.9] [Soul of Death Lv.5] [Undying Preservation Lv.1] [Curse of Primordial Decay Lv.5] [Greater Raise Undead Lv.7] [Undead Reconstruction Lv.1] [Eyes of the Damned Lv.6] [Curse of Five Bindings Lv.2] [Necromatic Restoraction Lv.2] [Death Rune Removal Lv.9]


    [Remark: A wight who is able to influence the soul of others. A terrifying existence that witnessed the realm of the dead and can no longer be considered of the 3rd-tier. A freak among freaks from other natural-born Wights! Also, a being capable of harming one''s Soul! At every cost, avoid confrontation against the undead named Rue Danzel.]


    [XP: 8 068 000]


    If onepared his current status with his past self a few months ago, it wasn''t evenparable.


    Though killing thousands of people and having Agares and Azrael as his harvesters, the XP that he gained was quite enormous.


    At first, he went ahead to increase the level of his [Siphoning Soul de] skill to level 9 to increase the efficiency of making a cursed sword.


    Then he focused on increasing his [ck Guard] level to raise his attributes.


    While doing so though and increasing it a total of 48 times, he encounter a problem he wished he didn''t want to meet.


    And that was his body being unable to hold so much agility as he had now.


    Or rather, the limit would be reached if his effective agility crossed over the 1300 points.


    With [Superior Undead] and [Sin of Wrath], that limit would be crossed.


    When he first found out that he crossed his body limit, he felt that his bones were being pressured.


    Although the limit was barely crossed, if he had another 15-50 other points in agility, his very own bones would break from just moving.


    Making him regretted to upgrade his ss first rather than his [Soul of Death Essence].


    The skill directly discounted his skill and also increase all of his stats.


    Thetter not by much, but it was still a slight increase that would have raised his agility.


    Essentially, through his pure management of stats distribution, he reached the limit of his body for good.


    But that was only attribute wise.


    First of all, as the cocky remark says, he can no longer be considered of the 3rd-tier.


    He surpassed the strength of that tier for good.


    But that also didn''t mean that he could be considered of the 4th-tier.


    Being unable to check most of the information of the 4th-tiers he knew, he also couldn''tpare his own strength with that of a 4th-tier.


    That also made Danzel realize the significance of Velkir''s buffs that he once gave him.


    As they essentially allowed him to pass his limit without having any after effects.


    So with XP pilling up in his wallet, he went ahead and raised his skills by their importance.


    He could have lowered his cost if her first went ahead and leveled the [Soul of Death Essence].


    s, the milk was already spilled and all he could do was make sure that such a mistake doesn''t acquire again.


    The few skills he brought to the 3rd-tier were his following curses and the holy resistance skill that he never really used.


    s, it didn''t turn out as he wanted and the skill that came out was [Undying Preservation].


    He tried bringing out a secondary effect in the form of a buff, but all it became was increasing his resistance against holy magic, light magic, and additionally against mental attacks by a total of 30%.


    The modification of it gave the skill to reduce the mana cost of Death based skills a total of 20%.


    The precious useless skill became something that now he always used at the first sign of a battle.


    ''I could also go ahead and make a skill into the 4th-tied, but without knowing what the capabilities of a [Death Knight] are, I might make a mistake if the 4th-tier skills also have modifications...''


    Though he was endlessly curious about what the next skills had in hold for him.


    He decided to wait.


    ''My goal will soon be finished anyways...'' He thought as he gazed at his mission.


    [Currently achieved: 8932/ 10 000]


    "Soon enough..." He mumbled to himself with an eerie voice.


    ? As he said that, he turned towards the door where Wilhelm was sleeping with his ethereal eyes ring up.


    Noticing a presence that shouldn''t be there, Danzel drew his sword, making the druid who was seating a few meters to the floor widen his eyes. His eyes glowing with life force.


    "So you realized, huh?"


    Saying those words, several arm-thick veins burst out of his and directly moved toward Danzel while destroying arge chunk of the ground and walls.


    Seeing the sudden hostilitying from the druid, whom he fought together for several months, Danzel couldn''t help but curse out loud.


    "You!"


    Knowing that he wasn''t able to manifest his [Soul Reaping de] fast enough to cut down the wave of huge beings


    He brought out the kite shield with a skull carved in front and activated its effect.

 Chapter 313 Traitors

    Going a few hours back in time before Danzel was forced to activate the enchantment of his shield...


    The dark mist manifest by Skull w came right at the edge of the forest, where in front were the castle walls with all the patrolling soldiers.


    The rogue named Kenn stared at that exact dark mist with a frown.


    "Why is he using the dark mist? The magic caster patrolling the walls should be able to notice it with their mana senses when outside..."


    After all, the dark mist was purely a visual effect. Mana-wise, it was just a cluster of mana put together.


    Those inside in the mist who tried to identify someone by seeing their mana would in the end be blinded by all dark mist that is made out of dark mana.


    It was essential a smoke bomb, but 10 times better as the dark mana absorbed light itself to some degree.


    Being inside of it, one would be at theplete mercy of the caster''s mist.


    But that outside would be easily able to detect the mist if they try to scan for nearby mana.


    ''So ridiculous, at this rate I won''t even need to intervene.'' the rogue thought to himself.


    As soon as he thought that, a portion of the dark mist dashed with immense speed right towards the wall.


    Seeing that, the right guessed that the undead wolf used a tremendous amount of his own mana to speed up the mist forcibly.


    That speed onlysted till the mist rammed to the wall, revealing a shadow that catapulted up into the wall.


    Kenn could barely follow the movement of that shadow piercing something in the wall and using it as a stepping stone to reach the top of the wall.


    He saw with his own eyes how the soldier died and then rose up as if nothing happend.


    ''He turned him into an undead in order to avoid suspicion, huh?''


    "Tch, I guess the time hase to make our move." He said as he jumped off the tree he was on.


    "[Phasemorphosis]"


    Once he mumbled those words, the rogue''s entire body started to be shrouded, or rather, devoured by the darkness, leaving only his eyes free from this phenomenon.


    "[Reality Phase]"


    In the next moment, his entire body started to sink to the ground.


    But it wasn''t like he buried himself alive.


    If one were to dig where his body sunk, they would even find no traces of him.


    Where he appeared next was on the other side of the walling from the ground up.


    Seeing no one witnessing his appearance, he dashed towards the castle, literally entering the castle walls (like the walls of the building) as if he were a ghost.


    Moving past the guards and the various servants undetected through the walls.


    If one of them were to carefully look at the wall, they would even have noticed a barely visible silhouette.


    After a few seconds of travel through the castle, the rogue Kenn soon found himself in an office where the two phoenix warriors were looking at a map with great focus.


    He observed those two for a few seconds before the rogue decided to step out of the wall, only now singing his presence.


    The swordsman drew his sword at a breathtaking speed were the magic caster was already starting chanting his spell.


    "I am from the Natures Dagger mercenary group, I came here to deliver crucial information." The rogue said unfazed by those two.


    He brought out a small amulet that looked weaved from metal strings in the form of apass pointer or that of a leaf.


    "The sign of the elves?"


    The swordsman blurred out seeing the amulet.


    The two did lower their weapons, but their guard was still raised up in case the rogue does something.


    "The Nature''s Dagger, you say? Weren''t you guys send on an assassination mission? Why have youe to this ce!" The magic caster demanded, his mana clearly building up in the mana crystal from his staff.


    "The mission has been dyed because of some unexpected outside interference...I came to warn the Berum kingdom that those outside forces have passed through the walls. In the meantime we speak, some of the soldiers are probably dying silently in a dark corner and turned into undead"


    "...are you telling us that a necromancer slithers around and turns our people into those abominations while we speak?"


    Nodding his head, the rogue gave his parting words before going back into the wall.


    "The necromancer is going by, Abdiel the cruel. He focuses on meleebat and curse magic. While currently only he is here, the other outsider is of the 4th-tier... That''s all the unpaid warnings you get from me."


    The 2 phoenix warriors did want to stop the rogue for further questioning, but once he went into the wall, his presencepletely disappeared.


    Both of them tried to sense his presence, s to no avail.


    They had their doubts, but they couldn''t treat such information lightly.


    Those deployed in the war against the Dynasty have heard that they stepped into the territory of taboo magic.


    Many soldiers heard stories about how an army of their kingdom gets annihted and turned into beings that loathe life itself and know never to rest.


    The phoenix warriors in particr had much more urate information about what was happening in the war.


    They were aware of Wilhelms group that had a 4th-tier and a sword-wielding necromancer.


    Even if they decided to not trust the rogue''s words, his bring here would also mean that Wilhelms group was here.


    "Sigh, go inform the higher-ups, I will warn the soldiers," the swordsman said to the magic caster with a heavy expression.


    He and the magic caster knew, that if what the rogue said is true, then everyone here is going to die and that no support is to be expected from their army.


    After all, the enemy had a 4th-tier among their ranks.


    In front of a such powerhouse, their fate was already decided.


    ''I really hope that this guy said the truth. Killing that vile necromancer is the least that I can do for his majesty and the kingdom before I die.'' Ge thought in determination.


    At that point in time, he was unaware that hisst wish will never be fulfilled.


    ***


    A few minutes before the druid attacked Danzel.


    The rogue felt extremely annoyed.


    Their job was supposed to be extremely easy to execute.


    He and the other two of his allies were hired by his elder brother of Wilhelm with the official job to be his bodyguards.


    Or rather, the elder brother of Wilhelm made it so that their group will be chosen by his father.


    By pulling some strings and bribing the other bodyguard candidates, their Nature Dagger group received smoothly the bodyguard position.


    Their true mission was to assassinate Wilhelm in order to secure his brother''s position as the heir.


    In the nobility, such a thing wasn''t all that rare.


    Eliminating the threat to secure your position was the norm in a sense for most nobles.<sub> </sub>


    But the truth about the Nature''s Dagger group wasn''t as simple though.


    They were associated with the elves, a race that hides in the great forest on the "edge of the world"[1].


    And while this wasn''t known to the outside of the world, the elves had already created a secret alliance with Berum.


    Making the Nature''s Dagger group essentially double agents that sold information to Berum by using the clueless Wilhelm as their informant.


    At least that was the case with the rogue Kenn. His other two allies didn''t know of the second part of the mission, but they were very much in assassinating Wilhelm.


    But that proved to be more difficult than it seemed at the start of the mission.


    Participating in the war, they were countless opportunities to kill Wilhelm and make it scot-free.


    But because of Danzel''s and Vanessa''s presence, they couldn''t execute their mission without getting caught by them.


    While their group promised to kill Wilhelm, they weren''t going to put their lives on the line.


    They tried to look for opportunities, but after receiving information that Wilhelm will soon be recalled to his house, it was either now or never.


    ''We never know when such a chance will evere again. With that dark elve in another room, as long as I deal with Wilhelm, we could make a run for it.'' He thought before traveling through the walls and reaching inside Wilhelms bedroom.


    The person to be killed was sleeping much morefortably in his bed.


    With the recent merits that "he" achieved and how everything was going well, he became much less stressed and more energetic than before.


    The rogue who entered his bed chamber looked around the room for potential traps.


    He wasn''t going to lower his guard and let some kind of mistake ruin his mission.


    He never forgot that Wilhelm was a 3rd-tier magic caster that had much sharper senses than normal people.


    ''[Phase Location]''


    With his very secretive dark mana spreading to the walls of his room, he made it so that his presence wouldn''t be detected even by the Necromancer guarding the door.


    He was able to thoughtfully study the strength of that Necromancer through the many battlefields they took part in. And he knew how monstrous and powerful he was and how high his senses were. But even he doubted that he could see through [Phase Location] and all other buffs that he had on him to hide his presence.


    ''Still, I shouldn''t underestimate him. I will finish it and get away. As if the others follow or not I don''t care.''


    Walking on the edge of the bed, the rogue started down on the sleeping Wilhelm with ice-cold eyes.


    Pulling out of his sleeve an almost pitch ck dagger, he raised it above ready to pierce Wilhelm''s head.


    ''No, it doesn''t matter if the other two don''t make it. If they die, I will simply collect their reward.''


    Without any hint of hesitation, he pushed down his dagger, aiming for the kill!


    s, at the exact moment where he was about to pierce Wilhelm''s head, he felt an incredible cold sensation creeping from his shoulder.


    That cold sensation turned into pressure before feeling his shoulder getting pierced by something.


    The rogue''s eyes darted towards his shoulder while continuing to swing down his dagger towards Wilhelm. When his eyesy on his shoulder, all he saw was an ominous dark green skeleton hand seemingly piercing the flesh of his shoulder.


    His eyes raised in surprise, not because of the appearance of the skeleton hand, but from the pain itself.


    Someone like him has long ago undergone training that allowed him to withstand pain and poisons. Something like having his flesh barely pierced by the skeleton hand should even be nothing for him!


    But even then, the pain was enough to make his one hand start shaking.


    Not long before, the skeleton hand started flying back while pulling a part of a dark green replica of his shoulder. His body seemed to receive no physical harm.


    But the feeling of having lost a part of himself was still there.


    Not only did he feel his shoulder losing a part of its vitality, but that vitality couldn''t be reced even if he tried. But that wasn''t what made the rogue start panicking.


    What made him uneasy and surprised was the skeleton hand that dragged his actual body itself.


    It was as if someone was grabbing his shoulder from behind and dragging him in, the only difference was that he couldn''t resist nore hinder the pull!


    The pull-through wasn''t strong enough to throw him several meters back, but it did manage to make him do a 180* turn and take a step back so as not to fall to the ground.


    *Bahhhm!


    In the next instance, the door that was previously closed exploded violently.


    With the crippling sensation downing towards his head, the rogue reflects bends down his waist, making the ominous cursed sword barely miss its target and carve a cut in the wall of the room and a pir of the bed.


    *Crringshh!


    "Die!" A yell filled with pure hate echoed through the room.


    The massive figure standing in front of the rogue pushed rammed his dark kite shield right to the target of that hate with incredible speed.


    The rogue unable to dodge, received the full experience of the incredible strength that Danzel had.


    The force of the shield sent the rogue flying right to the wall, making him catch arge amount of blood from his mouth.


    "Waaahgh! What is going o-" Wilhelm yelled in horror as he woke up from all the noise happening in his room?


    The sweet dream of him bing a respectable Archmage and bing the head of his family suddenly turned into a nightmare, the people around him turned into undead and binned him down, one of them wielding a hammer ready to smash his head into pasta itself!


    It was true horror!


    But what does he wake up to!?


    A tall figure excluding an incredible amount of killing intent, making even himself who was of the 3rd-tier to start suffocate.


    Right as he was getting somber from his sleep and his survival instincts started to wake up. The previous 4 wooden pirs that held the roof of the bed had lost one of the pirs, making the whole roof of the bed copse right down to him and crashing the bed itself.


    "Agh!"


    Oblivious to Wilhelms suffering, Danzel didn''t stay dare and watch the rogue recover.


    Kicking the ground, small craters appeared on the stone floor.


    Seeing that Necromancer dashed at him with incredible speed, the rogue cursed out loud.


    "Dammit! [Reality Phase]!"


    Right as the cursed sword was about to cut his body in half, the rogue sank to the ground, disappearing from sight.


    *Creaghhshh!


    With only the floor being cut and the rogue nowhere in sight, Danzel''s ethereal eyes red up in engager.


    "As if I let you escape after messing with me!" His ice-cold shout of anger shook the room itself, making the dust stuck in the roof fall down.


    Spreading his will throughout the castle to every single undead of his, his furiousmand entered the minds of the undead.


    ''My undead! Search and kill the rogue! Find him at all costs! Find also that damned elve!''


    [1]: Edge of the world is a location that hasn''t been revealed yet. Don''t take it as the where Danzel is currently is t.

 Chapter 314 Traitors (2)

    Phase magic.


    A school of magic under the dark magic arts.


    Dark magic, in particr, has many forms of uses and some schools of it are considered taboo magic.


    Overall, dark mana was at its best in affecting one''s surroundings and being.


    It was an extremely strong element that gave birth to chaos magic and heretic magic.


    The former was infamously known as the best element for pure destruction while thetter could bend and w the mind of one''s enemies.


    Many mistaken thetter part as some type of magic school under death magic, thus categorizing it as a taboo spell.


    But the popr way to use dark mana was to conceal one presence and hide it from other people.


    The school of phase magic through brought that very idea to the extremes.


    This type of magic aimed topletely erase one''s presence by reality itself and hide their true body in a separate ce hidden by dark mana.


    s, such a kind of magic wasn''t without any disadvantages, to say the least.


    One of them is the extremely high mana cost.


    ...


    ''Dammit!''


    The rogue couldn''t help but curse internally.


    Appearing somewhere else in the castle, he held his chest with one of his arms trying to resist the paining from there.


    "I underestimated him...to think he could see through [Phase Location]..."


    Though some of his ribs were broken and we were creating to pierce his lungs, he was most angry about being found out in the act.


    He went ahead with the mindset of not underestimating the necromancer.


    He was even convinced that Borg would stop him long enough till he finished the deed in Wilhelms bedroom!


    But that guy didn''t evenst a minute!


    That ethereal hand came also as a surprise to him.


    It wasn''t like he has never seen it before.


    The skeleton did indeed appear before, but that was only for an instant before disappearing.


    Back then he couldn''t really guess what was expected of a modified version of the weak spell mana hands.


    But now that he experienced it first hand, he knew that he couldn''t be more wrong.


    The pull was unavoidable and the pain seemed to attack his mind, as well as his body.


    ''Wait! Does that mean...!''


    He had a sudden revtion.


    The necromancer not only sneaked into the castle with ease but also detected a peak 3rd-rated assassin that used magic that affects one''s mind.


    He must also be attuned with dark mana! Also submerged in the path of darkness!


    His mind trailed with the necromancer being capable of heretic magic, or at the very least created some form of blending between necromancy and heretic magic.


    "I should even consider the possibility of him being attuned in the darkness too." The rogue mumbled with a low voice.


    *Thud, Thud, Thud~.


    Hearing multiple footsteps growing closer to his location, the rogue cursed as he phased through the wall.


    In the next moment, he appeared right above the walls while hiding his presence.


    "Phase reality is way too taxing to use..."


    Watching his surroundings, he saw tens of undead running through the castle in groups.


    ''At least those things are way too weak to see through my morphosis...I should leave now before the necromanceres.''


    Right as he turned around and prepared to jump off the wall, a huge shadow fell upon him.


    rmed he turned around while moving to the side.


    The danger that was behind him had three ethereal eyes of Skull w staring at him with its high jaw slowly closing to take a bite him.


    Though his reaction was incredible, the huge jaw pierced his arm.


    "[Phase Reality]"


    Before the teeth rigged deep enough to bite the rogue''s whole arm, his arm like his body started to phase through the jaw and the floor of the wall.


    Where he appeared next was down to the outside of the wall several meters away to the right side.


    Skull w''s eyes though immediately followed the rogue''s movement as if knowing beforehand where he was going to appear.


    "Kwaaaaouhhhhhh!!!!


    With a dreadfully howl aimed at the sky, everyone undead turned their eyes towards Skull w, including Danzel.


    The undead on the walls jumped off the walls andnded their feet on the ground, ignoring that their joints became damaged from doing that.


    But to them that didn''t matter.


    Their liege has given them hismand and they were sure to follow his will.


    *Buhhh!


    The ground trembled by Skull ws''nding.


    Taking the lead of the charge, the undead is full of hate and killing intent towards the rogue.


    Cursing internally, the rogue turned around and made a run for it.


    The druid he left behind?


    He didn''t care. Inside his mind he considered him to be already among the undead of that necromancer.


    He also didn''t specialize in fighting head-on battles.


    He guessed that he could take on the huge death hound in one on one, but together with all his otherckeys and the raid bossing soon after them?


    Yeah, he wasn''t suicidal.


    Also, the fact that his hand started to show signs of necrosis didn''t make the option of fighting back more attractive.


    His dashing to the forest was the obvious choice with the undead shortly after giving chase.


    At that moment though, multiple jets of winds came raining from above to where the undead was.<sub> </sub>


    p And like some kind of invisible bullets crashed upon the undead and the ground itself.</anda>


    Crashing the draughts mercilessly with a single blow.


    The draugrs didn''t know what hit them, making them helpless under the barrage of wind bullets raining upon them.


    Skull w also finds herself severely damaging her legs and arge piece of junk in her skull. If it weren''t for the fact that she turned her body into an ethereal quickly enough, by now she would''ve "died".


    "Finally done something." The rogue mumbled as he dashed to the forest to meet hisst remaining colleague.


    His celebration thoughts though we''re soon


    "Kwaagggh! Kwagh!!!"


    Skull w howled as she tried to chase after the rogue while moving away from the air bullets. s, she was hit, again and again, making even her tough body slowly break.


    She waspletely helpless.


    She didn''t have any movement abilities which allowed her to close in on one''s opponent, making her quite the easy target for ranged attacks. Only her [Temporally Ethereal Body] allowed her vitals, mainly her skull to be kept safe except for the first surprise attack.


    But even though the skill [Temporally Ethereal Body] was strong, it consumed too much mana to be relied on against barrages of attacks. And the fact that the air built waspletely invisible didn''t help either in any attempt of dodging.


    If she didn''t retreat now, she was undoubtedly going to be destroyed and engulfed in the dark waters of the realm of the dead. But the idea of retreat never crossed her mind.


    Only themand of her liege echoed through her mind.


    And once her mana reserves were starting to reach the limit, a wave of dead mana washed through her body, slowly regenerating each damaged bone while also granting enough mana to activate.


    "Leave."


    The all-so-familiar cold voice sounded from behind her.


    In the next moment, like aet hitting the ground, a dark armored figure stood in front of Skull w.


    His dreadful aura makes even Skull w himself freeze in fear.


    But as soon as themand of her creator continued to echo in her mind, she dashed away and climbed the tall wall by piercing her sharp ws into the wall.


    Ignoring what was behind him, the dark armored figure kicked the ground and dashed like a charging train to his target.


    "Tch, [Phase Reality]!"


    Going underground, the rogue disappeared from its previous location and reappeared in the forest.


    "You aren''t getting away!" Danzel yelled as he swung his cursed sword, releasing several ominous wind des at the location where the rogue appeared.


    In the path of the dark wind des, several trees were cut apart and started to wither in the location where they were cut.


    The path that does ominous wind des was obviously towards the rogue.


    "Again!?" The rogue cursed as he moved to the side and dodge the wind des aimed to im his life.


    He was extremely frustrated that both the death hound and the necromancer could see where he would next appear after using [Temporally Ethereal Body].


    For him, it was quite easy to dodge the wind des, but the real problemy on the necromancer closing his distance.


    With no other choice in hand, he could only try and run away for his dear life!


    ''I won''t go without a fight!'' The rogue thought as he took several throwing knives in his finger from his cloak.


    Instead of turning around and throwing them directly at Danzel, he instead threw them right in front of him.


    "[Phase Arms]"


    As soon as the daggers hit a tree in front of him, instead of getting stuck there, the dagger sank into the tree itself simr to when his body used [Temporally Ethereal Body].


    Without losing the slightest speed, the daggers reappear around Danzel.


    A total of 8 knives were thrown by a 3rd-tier expert, eaching from a different location!


    The knives were also cooler blitz ck so that they can blend in a dark environment and also enchanted to suppress the sound of the cut wind.


    Making it a deadly technique for any 3rd-tier to face against.


    Sadly, Danzel was of no ordinary 3rd-tier.


    Screening every single daggering his way with his dark vision, his body was surrounded by mana.


    With a swipe of his sword, he deflected half of the daggers and blocked 3 with his shield while dodging thest oneing for his head without even turning his head around.


    Making the rogue curse internally.


    ''Do you have eyes behind your head!?''


    He now understood that the one chasing him was of no doubt way beyond the strength of a 3rd-tier. Making that revtion, the rogue started to despair.


    He could only run for his life, while the one chasing him was slowly but surely getting closer to reaping his life.


    Shortly after Danzel was only 10 meters away from him, he raised his now cursed sword, slowly gathering his mana into the de, preparing to finish the traitor right here and now.


    But before he could do such, he felt an immediate dangering from somewhere very far away.


    Looking at where the threat wasing from, Danzel saw the elve archers drawing her bow from kilometers away.


    The archers who sensed his gaze widen their eyes from the shock of being discovered. She was also surprised to feel the killing intent from him even after being so far away. Making her release the bowstring of her arrow.


    He instinctively hid most of his body behind his skull shield of his. He only saw her releasing her bowstring see neither heard nor saw any arrowing his way.


    In the next moment though while he was chasing after the rogue, a huge kic force hit right to his leg, snapping his tibia bone, resulting, in the end, falling to the ground face forward.


    Only through his quick reflexes did he manage to stay with a knee up with his shield guarding his body.


    "..."


    Confused at what just happend, Danzel stared at his leg, finding only his armor to have been prated.


    And in his confused gaze, he slowly saw how an arrow that was sticking out of his leg reappeared from thin air.


    ''Invisible arrows?''


    "...[Necromatic Restoraction]"


    Repairing his leg, Danzel stood up and looked around the forest while gritting his teeth in anger.


    "Dammit!!!" His anger itself manifested out, and pushed the nearby air away, creating a small shock wave.


    Wherever he looked, his [Eyes of the Damned] didn''t pick any living creature around him.


    In other words... he lost them.


    He considered chasing blindly through the forest in hopes to catch a glimpse of them. s, after calming down his hate towards the living, he lowered his sword and turned back to the castle.


    "At least that druid should still be on the castle." He mumbled ominously to himself.

 Chapter 315 Choosing The Talented Ones

    Walking back to the castle failing to catch the rats, Danzel felt incredibly frustrated.


    He had watched countless times how those three had fought before, but it turned out that the elf and the rogue had hidden their abilities.


    If he had known that the archers could shoot out invisible arrows that didn''t make any sound at all, he could even easily dodged the attack that broke his leg.


    After all, he was able to see the moment when she released the attack on him. Making the whole situation all the more frustrating for him.


    It was as if you watched someone moves as if he was throwing a rock at you, but not seeing the rock itselfing right to your face!


    As for the rogue''s strange magic, Danzel didn''t find it that difficult to deal with.


    Though it was the first time he saw this sort of magic, it didn''t really threaten him.


    He could even just let the daggers pierce his body and only protect his head and he would havee out fine. The reason he blocked them was that he was on guard against this sort of new magic.


    "If only the runes had even recharged the shields, I would even have caught them..." He mumbled in frustration as he passed the undead guards guarding the gate of the wall.


    Walking towards the castle, Danzel recalled all his undead toe back and watch over the castle that to aimlessly looking through the forest.


    Even if by some miracle they manage to find those two when he himself lost them, they would only be destroyed by the duo of 3rd-tiers.


    "Krrghh..."


    As he was about to enter the castle gates, Skull w came to him with a growl that to Danzel looked as if whipping for her failure.


    "You did well, biting that sucker once was good enough, go and patrol the surroundings in case they return." Danzel said as he ignored her whipping.


    He didn''t believe that those two will return to either finish the job or save their druid in the name of friendship.


    He just gave the order just in case and to get rid of Skull w clinking to him.


    He wasn''t in the mood to entertain the big Death Hound at all.


    Walking down the hallway and meeting his various creation patrolling, Danzel finally ended up in his bedroom of Wilhelm.


    And before he could enter the room, he heard a loud pping noise.


    *Baaah! Baaah! Baah!


    "You bastard! I finally found a decent bed after so long and yet you! You and the other two rats decide to betray us!? Stupid old hooligans of the woods. Take that and that!"


    Upon entering the room, the first thing that Danzel took notice of was how Vanessa was continuously pping the druid at his cheeks in the corner of the room to oblivion.


    Each p moved his whole head to either side, making one wonder wherever his head is going to fly out or not.


    The druid''s cheeks were swollen ck, mixed with his tears and blood. The man was trying to say something, but all that came out were some uprehensive words.


    Danzel guessed that the druid was trying to say something like "please stop" or "help me" or even "I will talk so stop".


    Watching someone of the 3rd-tier being reduced to such a state, even Danzel felt slightly bad for the man.


    Sure, he was cruel, but not to this extent!


    Though he dide with the aim of forcing the druid to talk and relief his frustration by inflicting him some amount of pain, he wasn''t a monster to reduce a man like him to such a state!


    ''If you don''t want to make him talk, just kill him already! He is probably better off than being pped by you!''


    One also had to remember that Vanessa, who despised how she looked, was a 4th-tier pugilist!


    Her ps carried behind several tons worth of weight.


    Fortunately for the druid, upon hearing Danzel''s armor, Vanessa let the druid fall to the ground while turning to look at Danzel.


    "How about the other two?"


    "They escaped..." Danzel said while shaking his head, further fueling Vanessa''s anger.


    And the target of relieving that anger is only the druid who cked out to escape the torture and had to reawaken to continue being pped by Vanessa.


    With the druid being of the 3rd-tier, he had an incredible amount of vitality and a tough body, making even bolts of crossbows useless against his iron skin.


    Sadly, such a constitution didn''t help him much in his current situation.


    "Ple-ases! St-mpo!"


    Ignoring the cries of the unfortunate man, Danzel walked toward Wilhelm who had a face full of pity towards the druid.


    "Sir Wilhelm, have you been harmed...?" Danzel said with a cold tone.


    "No, other than the bed''s roof falling on top of me, I received no other harm thanks to you..." He said before turning and bowing down to the necromancer.


    "If it weren''t for you noticing their treason, I would probably be already dead. Thanks for saving my life."


    "Mhm..." Danzel nodded, too embarrassed to say that he was the reason that the roof of his bed fell on top of him.


    "How do our current ns look like?" Danzel asked while ignoring the pping noises in the background.


    "I already informed the army and my household. After reinforcementse to look after the castle, we will head back to the capital of the Dynasty."


    "I see...then if my presence isn''t needed any longer, I will look out in case they return."


    Turning his back to leave, Wilhelm was about to call him out to stay as his bodyguard though out the night but stopped midway.


    Throughout the years of living in his house with a golden spoon and all the knowledge that one needed to reach the 3rd-tier, it was his first assassination attempt aiming for his life.


    Frightened and paranoid, he would very much like to have a strong man on the side of his bed.


    But after seeing that the dark knight was being escorted by two Draugrs, he was reminded that he was a Necromancer.


    Seeing him leaving, Wilhelm couldn''t help but gaze at the beautiful dark elve in the corner, pping a poor man''s teeth out of his mouth.


    ''...I should maintain a barrier instead of sleeping today.'' He thought while starting his spell.


    Meanwhile, in a room where there was a dining table several meters long with many seats and severalrge windows in the walls, allowing for a splendid view while enjoying one''s dinner, the room was now upied by several undead and their master.


    Thetter was seated in the middle seat of the table.


    Danzel did say that he would patrol the surroundings, but that was merely a lie to be alone.


    Though the Draugrs proved to be ipetent in seeing through the stealth skills of the rogue, in the end, it didn''t matter.


    As Vanessa will be with the noble and even that guy would be wary unless he was an idiot, he doubted he would fall into danger.


    Just in case, he ordered Skull w to stay near their room to keep watch with his third eye that had the ability simr to his [Eyes of the Damned] skill.


    His being there was just overkill and unnecessary.


    Instead, he decided to spend his time and relief his frustration with one of his favorite hobbies.


    Spending his wealth.<sub> </sub>


    And by that, he didn''t mean any gold of any sort.


    Ever since he had worked as a runesmith in his first year, he was gaining so many gold and silver coins, that in his eyes, they became meaningless.


    A merchant could have found out how to reinvest that wealth back then to make a profit and earn useful magic items.


    s, Danzel was neither then nor now a merchant.


    No, the wealth that he was talking about was his XP!


    The current him had a bit more than 8 000 000 XP. An amount that was quite enormous considering the amount he spent to raise his ss and other skills.


    The current him was honestly dying to upgrade one of his 3rd-tier skills into the 4th-tier.


    But he forced himself to reject the pleasure of upgrading them.


    He had decided that after bing a [Death Knight] and upgrading his main ss he would go and raise his various skills on the 4th tier.


    The reason for this decision was of gaining more information on the route he was going towards.


    Learning what he was best suited for would help him adjust the modifications of his future skills.


    Of course, that was based in the 4th-tied was actually another modification or somethingpletely different.


    He was also satisfied with the current level of his skills.


    Sure, he could go and try to upgrade everything to Lv.9 and make the best version of his current self.


    But not only would this increase his urge to make his skill reach the 4th-tier, but it would also not increase the options that he had.


    Coming to the conclusion of learning a few new skills and trying his luck in finding a [Great Rune]


    Pressing at the [Skills] in his status, a long page of several skills and their cost appeared in front of him.


    They were a total of 55 skills to purchase.


    Danzel''s first instinct was to buy the whole ''store'' first,then thinkter.


    Danzel though knew that this was merely a trap to make him waste his XP on useless skills that he might never use.


    They were skills like [Aim Javelin] which increased his uracy in throwing spear-like weapons.


    [Inspect Corpse], a skill that helped one see through the detailed damage of a corpse.


    [Strangle], a skill which passively increases the strength of his hand when he was choking someone...


    And many more skills simr in usefulness to those 3 examples.


    Danzel knew that gaining XP was hard and without the [Rune of Harvest] helping him, making such progress might have taken him a year or two.


    The more skills he had, the more XP he had to spend after all.


    And as far as he was aware, as long as a skill was registered on the "skill page", it would always be there waiting to be purchased.


    Though he might have to prioritize what skills to cultivate now, in the future he could always go back and buy them.


    He was undead after all.


    An immortal being.


    So being forced to pick the more talented child among his many, Danzel found 3 skills that he decided to learn.


    Them being the following:


    [Curse of Nature]


    [Wall of Bones]


    [Heavy Strike]


    ...


    2 out of the 3 skills were unlocked by increasing his [ck Guard] ss.


    Those obvious being [Curse of Nature] and [Wall of Bones]


    What [Curse of Nature] did was simply to lower the defense of one enemy against the basic elements such as fire and ice.


    Looking as it is, the skill, being a spell, didn''t do much than allow his "deadly fireball" to be much fiercer.


    What Danzel saw in this skill though was its potential.


    The curse essentially lowered one defense against elements. So once he reached the modification stage and chooses [Dead Mana Affinity] and [Soul Affinity]. The chance of lowering his enemy''s defense against those two affinities was high.


    It was an obvious choice to make.


    [Bone of Walls] inparison was just as it sounded.


    Using dead mana, he could create a wall of bones to appear from the ground.


    Compared to [Earth Wall] (that is now [Stone Wall]), it isn''t as tough.


    But where they were downsides, there were also benefits.


    The strong point of [Wall of Bones] was that it didn''t need any materials to make the wall appear.


    Danzel was also inspired by Velkir''s earth maniption and how he created a whole base in a matter of seconds.


    So what he decided to do was to make the skill [Stone Wall] be for building purposes and the [Wall of Bones] forbat.


    And since it was a Death spell, it also benefited from various amplifiers that he had.


    As for hisst choice of skills, it was quite the basic one, costing only 2000 XP.


    [Heavy Strike]


    A skill he witness in his early skeleton days back in the cursedke.


    He had finally chosen to get it after a total of 3 years.


    It wasn''t a particrly strong skill, as its cost may betray.


    But it was quite easy to use and could turn out to be a skill simr to [Mortal Reminder] in the modification stage.


    So with the addition of a total of 3 new skills in his arsenal, he nced at his [Dead Rune Knowledge] talent.


    Specifically in the option that had a price tag of [1 000 000 XP].

 Chapter 316 Same Creator?

    "Thankfully the 1st-tier skill doesn''t cost as much as those runes. I got only 8 chances to throw the dice and hope to get lucky." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Though he was extremely eager to see the so-called [Great Rune]. It wasn''t the only reason why he chose to spend such arge amount of XP on runes.


    After all, 8 000 000 XP was a huge investment to spend purely on something that doesn''t might appear.


    They were three core reasons why he wanted to learn more runes. upgrade his skills.


    One was that the armor that Nersan''rah had given him started to show how he abused the pure armor to its limit.


    First of all, the original metal of the armor that did most of the work on protecting his bones had been damaged. Several holes and scars had been made by it from des or other kinds of weapons and several tents had appeared from weapons that did bludgeoning damage.


    Thetter is the weakness of the skeleton type of undead.


    Weren''t for his armor, receiving a blow from a mace or a warhammer would easily break his bones.


    Though it would only be lethal if his head was hit, it would be extremely bad for him if he had his spine broken.


    Not only would he end up being a half-assed skeleton at this point, but regenerating such arge part of his body would take both time and mana.


    Though the dark tting covered the damage, making the armor appear as if it were new. That couldn''t be further from the truth. The armors enchantments had also been affected by the damage, making it more costly to make ck sand and slower to reinforce the sand to be the dark ting.


    In short, he needed new armor.


    And a new armor called for new and better runes.


    The other reason was that he finished some projects in his rune research list. Though the list was still enormous, taking 8 whole pieces of paper to list up all the potential future projects.


    Most of those future projects though consisted in how to utilize parts of the mon] and [umon] runes to improve the "recipe'' of the much better runes.


    Though [Rare] runes were powerful, he wanted to focus in strengthen the "quality goods'''', even if he still thought it was a bit hasty.


    Andst of them all, even if a [Great Rune] didn''t appear at all, the information that he would gain by [Epic] runes alone would good enough.


    8 000 000 XP was a lot, no doubt about it.


    But considering how great the [Rune of Harvest] was, betting his "hard-earned" XP was worth it.


    ''Even if nothing goodes out, I will simply need to get more.'' He thought before pressing the window in front of him.


    With his XP drained rapidly, an extremely painful headache appeared, so painful that he felt his mind was about to break at any moment.


    "Argh-!" Screaming out of pain, he suddenly stood up, as a result throwing the chair that he was seating on the ground.


    He tried to grab his head with one of his hands in hopes to relieve the pain, s the helmet he was wearing prevented such action.


    [You acquired an Epic Undead Rune Intimidating Will]


    [You acquired an Epic Soul Rune of ??olian Repent]


    [You acquired an Epic Rune Iron Fortress]


    <strong>[You acquired a Great Rune of World''s Gaia]</strong>


    [You acquired an Epic Undead Rune of Living Legion]


    [You acquired an Epic Soul Rune of Soul Armament]


    <strong>[You acquired a Great Rune of Ruined Vessel]</strong>


    [You acquired an Epic Rune of Mana Essence]


    ...


    Ignoring the several messages appearing in front of him, Danzel staggered to keep himself standing.


    "Our Liege!" The nearby Draugr called out with their cold voices of concern.


    "Be quiet all of you!" Danzel yelled in anger at his undead. Their mere voice not only made his headache strong but also extended the duration of the pain.


    Being told to stay quiet and by their master''s will to remain in ce, the Draugrs couldn''t do much but stare at their master in silence.


    After a passive few minutes, so did the headache became tolerable.


    "I should stop this bad habit of learning everything in one go..." He said as he picked up his chair and seated once more.


    Opening his status and pressing the [Dead Rune Knowledge], he found only the 6 [Epic] Runes there to see.


    As he was about to get confused, a new [Great Rune] box appeared in the talent, listing up all the [Great Rune]''s he had acquired. The only difference with that box was that there was no way to purchase them except of trying his luck to get one at [Epic] runes.


    ''I faintly expected to gain a single [Great Rune], but seeing that I got two...luck is on my side!'' He shouted internally, making his headache itch once more.


    "Aghh.."


    Reminded by the pain, he calmed himself down and looked at his [Epic] runes.


    He wanted first to start with the appetizer before digging into the main dish!


    A saying from humans that he vaguely remembered through his interactions with them.


    The first thing that he notice though in both [Epic] and [Great Runes] was that they were using 2 words instead of a single word.


    In his own experimentation, he created [Common] runes that had more than one word, or rather symbol.


    By doing that, one could squeeze more information into a rune.


    Of course, doing that would put the item under much more stress and take more space than was needed to carve other runes.


    In the end, he abandons the idea, dubbing it insufficient.


    s, the [Epic] runes proved that he was simply ignorant of the ways of Runesmithing.


    Not only were there 2 symbols that had the same limitation as the lower-tier runes, but the effect themselves were amazing.


    The Soul [Rune of Soul Armament ], was created by some death knight named Khalid who by this day is still fighting.


    What he was fighting wasn''t mentioned, but what was mentioned was the effect of the rune.


    As it stated, it allowed one''s weapon and armor to be in a "soul bound", allowing the user to call those items back regardless of distance.


    He didn''t particrly find that rune that useful.


    Not only would it waste precious "rune slots" of his item, but it was nothing more than a convenient magic trick.


    He imagined that it could be useful for assassination, but other than that, he pushed that rune to the side of his mind.<sub> </sub>


    The next rune he checked out was the [Rune of Iron Fortress].


    This one was made by someone called "Artificer", who created this rune to reinforce the defenses of something called the "Perfect Lifeform". Which he ultimately failed to aplish.


    Not caring much about the guy''s name, Danzel focused on the effect itself.


    And all he could think after reading was...simple.


    Way too simple.


    All it did was increase the toughness and absorption of the force of armor by a total of 50% in the cost of increasing the overall weight of the armor by 20%.


    During Danzel''s whole runesmithing career, Danzel saw dozens of such runes that increase the improvement of the defense of armor.


    But seeing such a high number was a first in a defense-type rune. Even the runes that brought negative effects to reinforce the main effect of the rune didn''t actually make armor essentially 50% better.


    Though it was the same type of rune, the negative effect was purely making your weight more.


    Going and reading the next rune, the Undead [Rune of Intimidating Will], it seems like the runes creator was an undead just like him. A Revenant to be specific.


    A type of undead that even his books didn''t cover about.


    Not much interested in him though, Danzel found the effect of the rune interesting.


    It was an activation-type rune that could only be carved in a helmed, its effect is that it brought the [Fear] status effect to others whether they were willing or not. But that wasn''t yet the full effect.


    The reason why it was categorized as [Epic] rune was that it drew the negative thoughts of his enemies, making them his enemies affected by [Fear] to truly fear him to the point of the effect turning into a permanent curse called [Terror].


    Usually, when an effect such as [Fear] is being forcefully ced unto someone, they would only feel slightly anxious at the feared person/object.


    After all, not everyone could feel instances of fear towards something that he originally didn''t fear. The [Fear] effect alone only lowered one mental resistance by 10% while lowering 3% of all their attributes.


    It was a nice debuff, but necessarily a game changer.


    The really dreadful part of that status effect was that it could develop into a more intense debuff.


    From [Fear] it became into [Dread], further enchanting the debuff and the fear on someone.


    And then after [Dread], was the third level.


    [Terror].


    For example, if someone was put into a dark room inflicted by [Fear], he would constantly feel anxious about his surroundings.


    In the second level, once it bes [Dread], the person in question would develop some sort of Nyctophobia, constantly seeing shadows movings and hearing things where in fact they were no sort of shadows or noise in the room.


    In the third level...


    Once one was inflicted by [Terror], the shadow that they would be hearing would be alive and reach out to w at his flesh where the none existence noise would be into whispers that were near his ears.


    Reaching that point was already bad enough, but for it to be permanent?


    Yeah, Danzel found the rune worthy enough to be of the [Epic] grade...


    Though he found the rune quite dreadful, that wasn''t going to stop him from using that rune to his advantage.


    Going through the list, he went next to read the [Rune of Mana Essence], made by a druid that was the priestess of some kind of tree.


    Though he didn''t understand why someone would worship a tree of all things, the rune that he received was the same type as the [Rune of Iron Fortress].


    What the rune essentially did was increase the mana flow and the amplification of an item by around 36% with no drawbacks unlike [Rune of Iron Fortress].


    Such an effect would essentially improve any types of mana skills or spells and make the casting of them all the easier (though it wouldn''t reduce the casting time by 36% in total).


    Though such an effect could be surpassed if the improvement focused on a single element. Proven by a rune umonly called [Rune of Levithin] on his possession, that did the same only for water-type spells and skills for 35% improvement.


    The amazing part of the rune and probably the reason why it was categorized as a [Epic] rune was that the effect covered every spell and skill that used mana.


    Danzel at first was excited about such a rune appearing, but after digging through the information about the rune in his mind, he was quickly disappointed.


    The reason is that the rune was designed to be a major rune for a staff/spear type of weapon.


    Major was a title that he came up with for runes that took the majority of space of an item and also brought out a big effect.


    But with the restriction of the rune being for a staff/spear, Danzel found that he couldn''t really use the rune for himself.


    Maybe it was because this tree priestess aimed to carve working runes into a wooden staff but in the end, end up failing with this rune being the by-product of her research. The reason why she failed was that this rune couldn''t be carved into wood, but only of metal of any kind.


    ''Ugh~here I found another subject to write in my list. Reforming the symbols without messing with the effect is always a pain to deal with. Reforming the rune to suit a sword might be too difficult...maybe I can make it work if I target the armor?''


    Writing down his thoughts in one of the many lists of rune carving projects, Danzel pushed such thoughts to the back of his mind.


    Although his thought suggested that he was annoyed that he found more work to do, that wasn''t really the case.


    He was quite excited about messing with the rune and trying all kinds ofbinations only to see an unfunctional rune that brought forth only negatives.


    In fact, he found such a thing quite fun.


    It was quite the novel feeling in the runesmithing job.


    Also, the feeling that came after sessfully making a better rune that would strengthen him was also amazing.


    s, that was only 5% of the runesmithing process with the remaining 95% being the frustration of things not working out and trying to find why it didn''t work out and to find a solution for the problem.


    In his opinion, it was worth it in achieving that 5% sess after working literally tirelessly.


    Also, the XP that he gained on top of that was also a form of motivation.


    ''No point getting excited about one rune when they are still two remaining.''


    Though the knowledge he received made him somewhat know what the runes were capable of, he found it better to be 100% of the effect of those runes.


    With the Undead [Rune of Living Legion] and the Soul [Rune of ??olian Repent] remaining, he went right ahead


    The first thing that he noticed in that description was the name of the creator of those two runes. Usually, he would consider it as merely vor text to honor the creator of the rune.


    But seeing a familiar name stuck on those two runes, he couldn''t help but get slightly surprised.


    The creator of those runes was the same guy who developed his runed contracts.


    The Warmonger conquered the whole continent, Uzal.


    How ording to the description, became an undead just like him.

 Chapter 317 Gods And Great Runes

    Danzel was genuinely surprised in seeing the name Uzal reappear again.


    Reason being that it was his first time seeing a rune having the same creator.


    Though out all of his runes, be itmon, umon, rare, or even epic. The only runes that had the same creator were the warmonger Uzal.


    ''So they must be other runes made by the same creators in the [Dead Rune Knowledge], right? Maybe there is the ''sessful'' version of [Rune of Mana Essence]. Well, if she even achieved making such a rune in the first ce. Nevertheless, for two other runes to appear by that Uzal...''


    "Could it be that this Uzal is famous for his runesmithing?" Danzel mumbled to himself.


    The only reason he came up with as to why he got those runes were either they weren''t many undead/soul runes in the [Epic] option to pull out of or that it was purely out of luck.


    Which of those two they were or if the reason was total, Danzel didn''t know.


    Maybe there was a pattern in the [Dead Rune Knowledge] talent that he wasn''t aware of.


    After all, the first time was luck, the second time was a coincidence and the third time is a pattern.


    A saying he remembered back when he was traveling with some mercenaries and one of them was being cheated of his money.


    Back then he could have stood up and pointed out that one was cheating him of money, but he didn''t find much reason to do as such.


    He quickly pushed old memories to the back of his mind and focused on the description of the runes.


    [Rune of Living Legion]: Following his beliefs to conquer the whole continent, the tyrant Uzal was betrayed by his own people. Awaiting his death on top of a mounted of corpses, he expected to feast with the gods even in the afterlife after all that he aplished. s, the next thing he knew he was surrounded by an endless world of darkness and weak souls. Refusing to fade and be like those weak souls surrounding him, he learned how to wield souls and their soul essences, bing ad himself. Using his new powers, he carved runes to serve as his mortal vessel and of his armies. This rune in particr was one of his many failed experiments achieving in creating 3rd-tier undead, [Living Armor] with the swordsmanship talent.


    [Rune of ??olian Repent]: Foolish mortals tricked by the call of endless power and immortality, open the path into the physical in for Uzal. They bent their knees and called him the God of Death, but he knew that Gods didn''t exist and granted their wish, sealing their souls into his weapon for all eternity and, granting them their immortality. Their souls strengthen his weapon. And by using this weapon, he gave them endless power that no mortal could match. After all, he wielded them, granting them unfathomable honor.


    ...


    Reading through those two runes, Danzel''s ethereal eyes red up in surprise.


    "To think that I will be capable to make 3rd-tier undead..." Danzel mumbled out loud.


    Just thinking of the idea made his finger start to twitch with excitement.


    He didn''t know what kind of undead a [Living Armor] was, but based on the knowledge he gained and the name of them, he could vaguely make up an image in his head.


    As for the other rune,[Rune of ??olian Repent], he wasn''t as sure as what the rune did.


    All he got was that he could imprison someone''s soul in an item and draw its power. In what kind of way that power would show up, he had no clue.


    It sounded quite menacing for sure.


    Just thinking of putting someone''s soul into a dagger and then throwing it into a river, for never to be found again was quite cruel.


    ''It''s bound to be good as it''s a [Epic Rune] and the requirement to get a soul is just to kill someone and activate the rune.'' He thought to himself.


    He kinda expected it from the [Rune of Harvest], but he was still surprised by how strong each rune single [Epic] was. One would even allow him to make 3rd-tier undead.


    Also, the description mention that gods didn''t exist, at least this Uzal believed that this was the case.


    But that brought another question to the table.


    If gods didn''t exist, then what the heck was holy magic? ording to what he knew, those who used holy magic, draw the power to cast them from their god in exchange for their mana. This is called holy magic.


    But if the entities they drew power wasn''t a god...what is it? Or is this Uzal wrong?


    Nevertheless, he quickly dropped the topic as he found it to be an endless rabbit hole. All he could do was specte.


    Putting his attention instead somewhere where it was needed


    Thinking about the [Great Rune]''s being above the [Epic] rune, he couldn''t help but get excited once more.


    Indeed, spending one wealth was the greatest joy out there!


    While trying to push the thoughts of spending a total of 8 000 000 XP back on his mind, he went ahead to search up his first 2 [Great Rune]''s.


    <strong>[Great Rune of World''s Gaia]:</strong> A rune said to be carved by the nature itself in taking the form of all four seasons to individuals who were deemed worthy by Gaia. Some say that the form resembles a treant by a dried up tree that has green leaves filled with unending vitality, from its roots beautiful flowers would blossom where the surroundings will be surrounded by a snow storm. Only those who received it know what form nature will take and carve those runes into their bodies. And those are forbidden to spread the knowledge. Though that didn''t stop a particr necromancer from replicating the rune to carve in his bones. Increasing 25% of all Natural Elements Resistances, Poison Resistance, Regeneration, and Body Toughness. Additionally, reduce the cost of nutrients needed to regenerate by 25% while also granting the affinities of all Natural Elements and increasing once Strength and Stamina by 10%. If ones are undead, Strength is increased by 15% instead.


    "..."


    Reading through the whole description of the [Great Rune], Danzel froze in ce simr to his Draugr''s


    Where his undead stood perfectly still by his orders, he was frozen open by the sheer shock of what he just read.


    "T-That''s too strong..." Danzel mumbled as he began reading the description again in case he miss read something.<sub> </sub>


    Confirm that he wasn''t seeing things, Danzel calmed himself down and tried to process what he just read.


    Here I wondered what could top the [Epic] runes.


    When the [Great Rune]''s put the others to the floor!


    The 15% strength increase would have been enough to amaze Danzel, but gaining all the natural elemental affinities too while with a whole package of improvements to one''s body?


    It was too generous!


    It didn''t even have any downsides put in the rune.


    ''How can a rune-like this exist? Compared to the other runes, it''s a bit smaller than a major rune. And yet it still has so many effects and buffs put into ce. It''s totally different from the runes I know...''


    He felt just like when he learned his very first rune. Clueless about how the letters of the runes work.


    It was as if someone threw a newnguage into the mix. He didn''t even know where to start at...


    p "Seems difficult...but nothing that practice can''t fix." Danzel mumbled positively.</anda>


    ''It was just more work and nothing more, I can take it.''


    "You can''t"


    A voice sounded behind him.


    Recognizing the voice, he turned his head slightly to the right, seeing the female figure who wore some weird ck clothes (she wore a suit).


    "...Disappear." he said with his cold voice.


    In the next second, an ethereal dark green skeleton hand grabbed the woman by her throat.


    The hand could momentarily pull the woman up to the floor.


    Thatsted only for a second before the woman disappeared.


    ''Annoying'' he grumbled from inside.


    He had learned how to forcefully make figures disappear only just a few months ago.


    It seems that soul-based attacks seemed to work out against them, but that was only a temporary solution as they didn''t make them disappear for good.


    He was quite happy in finding out this trick as those figures were only there to annoy him.


    "Sigh, I should check the other one."


    Though his mood has worsened a bit, the expectations he set for the other [Great Rune] were really high after reading the first one.


    <strong>[Great Rune of Ruined Vessel]:</strong>A soul is one Existence, Mind, and Will. Though a soul without its husk, its vessel, its tool. It''s extremely vulnerable. One is that ascent over the death this found the way to fix this ease. By carving this rune, the body will adapt to the soul that it keeps. Transformation of the vessel to be one with the soul entirely, thus ruining one''s Vessel to create a soul that has no need of a such tool. Absorb the Soul Essence of others to fill the runes requirements to adapt the vessel, oveing the stage, strengthening both body and soul. The total amount of stages is [???].


    ''Huh?''


    Danzel was bewildered.


    Compared to the first great rune where it t out pointed out what was to gain, this one, in particr, was the total opposite.


    It was fairly vague, but Danzel immediately started to consider the worth of this great rune.


    Those who didn''t believe that souls existed and that they were biological machines couldn''t understand the total worth of this rune.


    But he, who is capable to go to the realm of the dead knew its true worth.


    Once dead, the soul wouldn''t have the same strength as it had when one had a body to utilize. Making them invulnerable to the souls that are covered by the dark waters.


    As soul alone, Danzel was capable to fend off most of those souls as he could use magic and was "physically" stronger.


    But he would be arrogant to believe that his mana wouldst him forever to cast his spells and that he was the strongest soul out there.


    In fact, he had seen some souls that were ''physically'' stronger than him, albeit rare.


    He didn''t know how much each stage would improve his body and seal.


    Butpared to the [Great Rune of World Gaia], he found more potential in this vague descriptive rune.

 Chapter 318 Lack Of Etiquette

    s, Danzel wasn''t stupid enough to test those great runes on his very own body.


    He was very interested in trying out the [Great Rune of Ruined Vessel], but only after he can carve the rune into a suitable grade.


    Preferably into the [Beyond Perfection], but he would also be fine with the [Perfect] grade.


    After all, he never made a single rune out of the former.


    He theorized that he had to improve the original rune knowledge somehow and increase the effect of the rune.


    While he could increase the effect of the simpler runes, that wouldn''te without a cost, such as making the shape bigger, putting more stress on an idea, and so on.


    And as of now, he was very limited in doing any runesmithing with being the babysitter of a noble.


    If he didn''t have to hide his skills and pay attention to what he considered useless tasks, he could probably finish another page or two of his project list.


    "Sigh~at the very least I will be done looking after him." He shook his head, as he looked around the room.


    "So that''s what humans consider to be fancy, huh?"


    Standing up from his seat andmanding his Draugrs to follow behind him, he opened the door and left the room with thest thought in his mind.


    `Maybe after finishing "that" mission I will have to consider making a base for me and only me alone...¡ä


    ***


    Several days after the castle siege.


    Armed forces of the Dynasty came to take over the duty of holding the keep from them were another group traveled together with them as an "escort" of the young hero noble to travel back to the capital.


    "Laughable." A cold voice said out loud while ignoring the aggressive nce of the nearby soldiers.


    Seeing the enormous gates slowly open of walls triple the size of the castle he took over, Wilhelm who had an exhausted look with ck bags under his eyes looked over the owner of the cold voice.


    "Are you unsatisfied with anything, sir Abdiel?"


    Abdiel, who was actually Danzel gave him a brief look before ncing at the soldiers "escorting" them.


    "My undead would have been enough to guide us back. There was no need to use this sort of "waste manpower"."


    "Hah! He ain''t wrong." Vanessa gave a bigugh on top of Skull w.


    Thetter is dressed so that none of the bones show from the outside.


    Wilhelm sighed both internally and out loud at the same time.


    Those "escorts" were specifically chosen by his father and sent to protect his son after experiencing an assassination attempt that he was partly at the fault.


    They were fairly strong 2nd-tier soldiers and some magic casters who were nurtured by their families from the academy. Though they weren''t elite forces, for humans they were quite strong.


    But that doesn''t change the fact that they had to eliminate the hundred or so undead that could have been used for this escort mission.


    Though individuals were weaker than the soldiers, the Draugr were of the 2nd-tier and their numbers were enough to annihte those soldiers.


    "Sigh~Please understand that your undead is forbidden in the capital and that this was necessary. I even put myself at risk in bringing that one inside..." Wilhelm nced at Skull w.


    The dark knight linger his gaze a bit longer on Wilhelm, making thetter extremely ufortable before returning to his quiet demeanor.


    What the dark knight was thinking, Wilhelm didn''t know.


    With the two mercenaries achieved being his own, he could use this fact to stabilize his position and slowly, with the help of his majesty, secure the position of the head of the family.


    Walking through the gates, people ofmon blood awaited their return and celebrated his name. Though it wasn''t at the level of a whole festival, it brought some warmth into his previous innocent heart, making him show a small smile on his tired face.


    After contributing to the war and filling his hands full of blood while watching the dead returning back to life as part of the undead.


    He returned home.


    ***


    In the Ionarres mansion.


    A ce filled with hundreds of defensive enchantments that would make any intruder pale in fright.


    Each of the enchantments was second to only the king''s pce, costing more than several generations'' worth of wealth that a single noble bloodline could gather. Moreover, those enchantments were filled with the quality of mana crystals.


    Making the mansion a hundred times more difficult to take over that the castle that Danzel took over.


    And now the gates of this ce opened to greet the second son of the duke.


    Once the gates were opened, a row of maids and knights releasing the aura of a 3rd-tier were to be seen.


    "We greet young master." They said in unison while bowing slightly.


    In the middle of this crowd, awaiting in the stairs leading to the front door stood a man near his 30''s with fancy clothes worth of a noble with a big warm smile on his face.


    "Wee back home, my brother." His words contained a certain warmth and gentleness into them.


    But those words were nothing more than a facade of a poisonous sneak to Wilhelm.


    "You didn''t have to go out of your way toe out...brother." Wilhelm said with a simr tone, but by his forced smile, it was quite obvious that he wasn''t happy with his brother.


    You dare toe out and act as if you are my loving brother after sending others in my bed?


    You are just a snake!


    Of course, he couldn''t say such things out loud and was forced to y out that they had a good rtionship.


    Thest thing he wanted was a rumor going around in the circle of nobles.


    <o>,m Walking into the mansion, Danzel and the cloaked Vanessa followed behind his steps. Releasing a pressure that made the knights warry of them, especially to Danzel as they felt something simr to a killing intent.<sub> </sub></o>


    The two brothers who fought over the position of the heir hugged each other to show their "good" rtionship.


    "Mother, Father, and I have been worried about you joining the war. I am d you returned safely.


    "...Sorry for worrying you all." He said, rolling his eyes internally.


    "Mhm, let''s not idly stand here! Father has been waiting to eat with you and you..panions." He said, with a slight frown appearing on his face for a split second after seeing the dark knight.


    Only Vanessa and Danzel himself noticed this, but they weren''t in a position to point it out. Even if they were, they didn''t care enough to do as such.


    Being guided inside the mansion, revealing various paintings and magic items that proven their wealth. They soon arrived at a half leading to a door at the size that could fit Sartan the high troll sizes.


    Opening the door, there was a table simr to the one that Danzel saw back in the castle.


    In the ce where he was seated though was a man looking around in his mid 50 wearing a long blue coat with a white shirt. On each hand he had 4 rings of different colored mana crystals, making it a total of 8.


    He had a beard together with a horseshoe mustache, his eyes were ofmon brown while his hair was pushed back. His slightly aged look together with the mix of gray and dark hair showed that he didn''t particrly take much care of himself.


    "Wilhelm, my child, I am so d that you are safe."


    The man stood from his seat and directly went to his son and gave him a hug strong enough to be mistaken that it was done by a bear.


    The man was none other than the duke of Ionarres and one of the few Archmages of the Dynasty, Archmage Maximilien Ionarres.


    His love for his children was genuine and he would rather not allow Wilhelm to join the war. But because he understood that both brothers fought for the heir position, as a noble, he couldn''t interfere. He also promised the two not to show any favor to him and only the most worthy among those two will im his seat.


    Making part of the reason why Wilhelm endangered his life in the war.


    By giving his son hope, he did something that no father was supposed to do. Put his own son in danger.


    Wilhelm inparison was arrested by his father action as he wasn''t a kid anymore. But he was still d that his father cared so much for him.


    "Cough~cough, dear, if you keep the guest waiting the food will grow cold." A beautiful woman wearing a dame ounder said while pretending to be coughing.


    She shook her head at her husband''s action but didn''t openly disapprove. She was simply seated beside where the middle seat, the nearest spot of the family head.


    "Right, I showed you all a shameful side of me, Wilhelm, Weston, go take a seat, as for the members of the Deathfull Skulls...you might take part in our dinner, as a show of gratitude in keeping my boy alive."


    Vanessa was the one who nodded and Danzel simply stayed silent.


    "It would be an honor to eat with the duke..." Vanessa said with a tone that made it obvious that it was forced.


    "I thank the duke for his consideration, s my duty is to stay by the side ofdy Vanessa..." Danzel said with an ice-cold tone.


    Making the others frown slightly.


    Wilhelm included.


    The way Danzel acted, was a first for him.


    He acted as if he was the noble guardian knight of a beautiful dame. But considering that the beautiful dame, albeit beautiful indeed, from the inside was a killing machine that used her very own fist to obliterate her enemies.


    And the guardian knight? He was a necromancer who turned his enemies into his undead servants who obeyed his call.


    He also spend months of time with those two, and he understood that the dark knight and the dark elf didn''t act superior to each other.


    ''Why act all righteous now when you bunch are just some killers!?''


    He couldn''t understand why he went out of the way to act this way. After all, refusing the request of a duke in his own house was seen as quite rude.


    "If that''s what you want, I won''t stop you." The duke said to the dark knight.


    He didn''t want the savior of his son and a potentially strong ally to feel wronged because he acted ording to his duty.


    He did a background check on both of them and he didn''t find much other than Vanessa being a veteran member of the mercenary group whereas the dark knight known as Abdiel was someone new to the group who also was epted as the pupil of the "Great Necromancer".


    The true reason why Danzel acted as such was obvious he was undead. Vanessa was actually the one who suggested he y her guarding knight to avoid this exact situation.


    He found that reasonable and epted, but seeing the smile that she was showing him, he didn''t know if she suggest it out of concern or because she wanted to make fun of him...


    Soon everyone began seating in their ce, including Vanessa.


    The only ones who didn''t were the servants and Danzel, who stood behind Vanessa''s shield.


    "...Sir, please allow us to safe keep your weapon while you enjoy your meal." A maid at the height of 1.62 came beside him said while raising both her hands as if she were waiting to take a candy or something.


    "..."


    Danzel silently nced down at the maid confused at the request she was making.


    But before he was about to reject her request, Vanessa beat him to it.


    "You may give you weapon Abdiel, but the maid over here, can you keep his sword where my knight can see it?" She said while giving Danzel and the made a serious look.


    "Yes...will it be fine if I hold the sword behind sir Abdiel?" She said while looking at Vanessa. She couldn''t help but shiver at the dark armored giant looking at her.


    Danzel exchanged a few looks with the made and the dark elf before drawing his sword and cing it in the hands of the maid.


    By such sight, Vanessa almost burst intoughter while the others were shocked at the action of drawing a de in front of the duke.


    Because it happend so quickly, no one pointed it out and considered it ack of knowledge of the noble''s etiquette. Usually, when asked to give his weapon, one would also consider the scabbard if it was in the case of a sword.


    As Danzel didn''t know that and simply took it literally.


    The maid inparison froze for a moment seeing the de drawn and put in her hands.


    "T-Then I will safe keep it for you, sir..." She said with trembling hands and a voice as she walked a few meters behind Danzel.

 Chapter 319 Malicious People

    The duke had his eyes on the trembling maid with a frown on his face.


    "Dear..."


    Hearing his wife''s soft voice, he refocused on what was in front of him for fear of creating a misunderstanding.


    "Cough~Well then everyone, how about we enjoy our meal first before talking about your adventures?"


    With no one objecting, the noise of tes being moved together with tableware began.


    With everyone enjoying themself eating, Danzel felt as close to sleep as an undead could possibly be.


    He watched how the other multiple tableware that looked "exactly" the same to eat different kinds of food. Making him confused as to what they were doing.


    Like once Wilhelm used a fork to take a bite of the meat on his te, he switched to a different fork to take a piece from the sd and another one to eat something he didn''t recognize.


    It looked like a straight lizard with its blueish scales, but with no hands or legs.


    ''Do mortals eat lizards?''[1] Danzel asked himself internally.


    He basically spends his time scanning the dishes out of his boredom.


    The only one that was eating normally was Vanessa.


    She used the longest fork and knife that was suited for every item on the table to stuff her mouth. Making him see her in a different light.


    As he watched her usually eating with her hands while outside, he thought that she wasn''t eating correctly as she dirted her hands and all.


    Wilhelm even called her "savage" for the way she was eating when they were alone.


    But seeing her now, his opinion of her being a "savage" changed to that of one having good eating etiquette.


    Sorry, it was a misunderstanding!


    Though in truth, he didn''t feel much sorry.


    ...


    After a while of the 5 eating quietly together, everyone seemed satisfied with the food, and the servants who were waiting from the side quickly moved to take away the leftovers.


    The mood suddenly became serious.


    "Wilhelm, can you tell me what happend with those...mercenaries?" The duke asked his son.


    "Didn''t the army already give you my report and that of the traitor''s interrogation?" Wilhelm said confused.


    "Yes, they did. But I want to hear it from you."


    In response, he shook his shoulders.


    "Then there shouldn''t be much to add. They acted when I went to sleep. If it weren''t for Abdiel noticing the one who sneaked in my room, I probably would be here."


    The dukes nche turned toward the dark knight.


    "Mercenary Abdiel, I read that you chased after the assassins after saving my boy, is that true?"


    "I am not aware of what our sir had read, but after putting one of them out ofbat, I chased the one who tried to kill sir Wilhelm. At that time, there were no signs of the elf archers, but I had all my " units" look for her."His tone was cold and indifferent.


    "I see...then how did the one you were chasing escape? Did he simply slip through you or was he stronger than you?"


    At those words, Danzel''s head turned to look directly into the duke''s eyes.


    "None. It was because of the appearance of the archers. She hid her skills and took me by surprise with an invisible soundless arrow. The attack harmed my leg, making chase impossible."


    The other family members frowned at Danzel''s tone, and the wife of the duke stared daggers at him.


    For reasons unknown even to Danzel.


    "I see...thanks for telling me and~"


    Standing from his seat, the duke bent slightly his head to form a bow.


    "Thanks for saving my son"


    "Dear~"


    The servant as much as the others stared in shock as the head of the family bowed his head to the likes of mercenaries.


    His wife also stood up and looked at her husband.


    With her being the most scble after her elder son in the noble circle, she knew that such news could sprew out unnecessary gossip.


    And yet, the duke still held his bow for several more seconds to show that his gratitude was genuine.


    "I will also need to thankdy Vanessa for keeping Wilhelm safe." He said while raising his bow.


    "Also, if there is anything you two would like to receive as a reward, I will be happy to provide it to you, if of course, it''s within my power."


    The dark elve and the undead exchange nces, thetter unsure how to respond. Making the decision to fall on the former


    "With all due respect, we can''t ept such a request. We have already been paid beforehand to guard sir Wilhelm and support in the war." Vanessa said.


    The duke though shook his head on such a request.


    "No, I can''t have that. I ampelled to reward the savior of my blood. Doing otherwise will hurt our family''s prestige and honor. And I can''t have that." His voice was strict and firm. Allowing no room for negotiations.


    "Sigh~if that''s the case, put my reward on top of my knight. After all, he was the one who did most of the work."


    Nodding his head, the duke looked at Danzel.


    "Alright."<sub> </sub>


    Danzel in turn looked down at the dark elve and saw how she blinked one of her eyes at him with a smile on her face.


    ''A dept, huh?'' He thought internally as he looked at the duke.


    "If that''s the case, please transfer mydies and my reward towards my Master Velkir."


    Though she wasn''t the only one who had the same idea.


    ***


    After talking with the mercenaries of the Deathfull Skulls, they even went their way and left the mansion.


    While the whole family of the house of Ionarres we''re still gathered at the dinner table with only the maid who previously held Danzel''s sword.


    "You two...what did you think of those two? Do you think that they could be used as our allies?"


    Wilhelm widen his eyes the moment his father said those words.


    But before he could say anything, his brother beat him to it.


    "Father, may I speak?"


    "Go ahead, Weston."


    "Mhm, I believe that it would bring massive benefits if we made a connection with their group. Though necromancy is a despicable type of magic. I heard that this Abdiel killed thousands and took a massive role in Wilhelm''s mission. Though theyck ss as the mercenaries. We could use them to further increase our family''s status by gathering more achievements." He said while ncing at Wilhelm.


    "The current king values more the participation in war than economic support. If we make more of a difference with their support, we could push furtherws in the favor of the magical academies."


    "They are mercenaries after all. I believe it''s worth spending a portion of our wealth in turn on deeds. It will also increase our view of us themon blood. Which in turn will increase the magic casters who decide to stay on outside that of the army."


    "At least that''s what I believe."


    Nodding his head to his son, next the duke nced at Wilhelm.


    "And you, Wilhelm? What do you think of them? Do you think that we can allow ourselves with them?"


    For a moment there was silence, making Weston in turn scoff at Wilhelm.


    ''Pathetic bastard. You should have even died long ago. I presented the duke with an option that will make our household stronger and flurries and yet why doesn''t he official choose me?''


    Ignorant of his brother''s thoughts, Wilhelm opened his mouth to speak.


    "I believe it will be in our best interest to burn our connection with them as soon as possible. Allying with them will be...impossible."


    ''Heh, look at him'' his elder brother scoffed at him.


    ''Losing those mercenaries filled with a 4th-tier expert will be a huge missed opportunity to grow our influence over the Dynasty. Father is never going to agree to this


    "I agree with Wilhelms''s opinion," the duke said,pletely taking Weston by surprise.


    "Huh?" He blurted out by mistake.


    ''Why?''


    Seeing his son''s confusion, the duke sighed out loud in disappointment.


    "Sigh, you,e over here." He said to the maid who trembled continuously as if she was called by a butcher with her being the meat.


    "Weston, the ideas that you have are good and I agree with most of them. Such as using our wealth to contribute to Dynasty. But sadly you hold too little fear of magic."


    The maid by now was right beside the duke.


    His wife looked at him suspiciously and scanned the trembling maid. The thoughts of her being her husband''s concubine and that a child is going to be announced crossed her mind.


    Ignoring his wife, the duke looked at the maid.


    "You, pull out your cloves and raise your hands."


    With everyone''s eyes now focused on the maid, she bit her lips and did as her master said.


    The moment she did, everyone except the duke and Wilhelm gasped in fried.


    "What the~!!!"


    "Oh God!!!"


    Their screams echoed through the room. If it wasn''t for the duke''s voice-canceling barrier that he surrounded the room before, the knights would even bust inside the room.


    The reason why those two screamed so loud was that the maid''s whole arm was filled with sights of necrosis.


    If one had amazing mana senses, they could also see a faintyer of mana around the arm to remove the pain of such advantage stage necrosis.


    If the spell wasn''t there, the maid would have been screaming her lungs out of pain and probably die from shock from the pain. But the spell didn''t reduce all the pain.


    "Did is the result of the weapon that this Abdiel gave her to hold. It probably had a curse of decay on it or something the like."


    With a wave of his hand, a green gently light engulfed the maid''s arms, slowly healing the necrosis and bringing out how the skin was beforeing in touch with a cursed weapon.


    Making the maid cry tears of joy and gratitude for having back her skin.


    "There is a reason why necromancy is banned. And those who use it are one of the most malicious people out there. Partying with such a group of people is way too big of a risk for our family."


    "We could be branded as cultists by the church, deemed as necromancers by the ignorantmon fold. Even his majesty was forced to ask for the help of such people. If we deeper our rtionship with them, after the war has called down, the king will see us as a threat."


    "So under no circumstances, you are allowed to deal with them any longer."


    [1]: The dish they were eating is a whole grilled fish, as Danzel had never seen an actual fish before, he refers to it as a lizard because the fish that they are eating has scales. All he knows is that a fish is an aquatic, small animal.

 Chapter 320 Artifact And Grim Thoughts

    At the same time on Danzel and Vanessa''s side, once they went out of the mansion, right outside the front gate was a carriage with people with high-quality armor waiting for them.


    Seeing that Danzel turned around and looked at her.


    "Do you know who those are?"


    "Mhm, It''s supposedly our ride that boss sent for us..."


    And just like she said, a knight opened up the carriage door for the cloaked dark elve and dark knight to enter.


    While she was carelessness and he was wary of them, the moment the door closed, a faintly blue light traveled through the carriage room.


    Recognizing such light, Danzel touched the door and brought out the description.


    [High Noble Carrige]: A carriage crafted by a grandmaster carpenter and enchant with magical and physical barriers together with a sound barrier inside of it to keep others from hearing what the people inside talk about.


    "A sound barrier, huh?" Danzel mumbled as he scanned the carriage.


    "Does that mean that others can''t hear us?"


    Nodding his head in confirmation, Vanessa threw herself on the seat,ying on the whole seat with an arm supporting her head.


    Shaking his head, Danzel is seated in the opposite seat normally.


    "Hey, you know that you could have asked for new armor and sword from this rich guy, no? I bet even that the quality would be pretty high." She said her previous tone that she used to talk with them waspetly gone.


    "Was it going to be better than the equipment that Master Velkir could provide?" He said with an empty and cold tone.


    "Pfff~of course not. Even if they did, they would expect something in return, even if it was their reward."


    "Then there you have your answer. Moreover, I still need Master Velkir to finish my shield and hopefully, those two rewards from those guys will be enough..."


    "Heh, knowing how Boss does things, he would make most of those promises, if not even rip them off. I can imagine him using the fact that you saved that kid to drain them more of their wealth." Vanessa said with a mischievous smile on her face.


    Danzel also grinned from imagining Velkir ripping those guys off.


    "I bet those rewards will be enough to finish that shield of yours. But aren`t you forgetting something? One of them was my reward! In other words, you owe me now! You are in debt!" She said while pointing her finger at him.


    "...What do you want?" Danzel said with a cold voice.


    "Ohe on! You know exactly what I want! I want some runes too! You even promised me that! But it`s been months and you still have to deliver on your promise!"


    "..."


    `Did I really promise such a thing?` Danzel asked himself internally.


    There was an awkward silence between those two before Danzel gave up.


    "Alright, I will do it. But first, you got to show me the item." Danzel said with slight curiosity.


    His curiosity came from the time when he heard that Vanessa possessed an increadible strong artifact of some sort.


    Showing a big smile on her face and her purple eyes lighting up with excitement, it was clear that she was really excited about having her request done.


    Using the same hand that was pointing at him, she grabbed her cloak and pulled the fabric to the side, revealing her whole body.


    She had a killer body, and her petite yet muscr figure was sure a blessing to behold with one''s eyes. And yet mortals could only curse at the fact that all her private parts were covered with some kind of ck bandage.


    "Here you go, the goods that you asked for." Vanessa said with a teasing and proud tone. She wasn''t the slightest embarrassed about showing off her perfect body.


    Danzel scanned her whole body, not because he was overwhelmed with the lust of something simr to the like, but because he was confused.


    "I am saying just so that you know, but I can''t carvebat-oriented runes on paper of leather, at least not yet. I would need some kind of metal to carve runes to it." He said with a cold voice while adding some hope to her by telling them that in the future he might be able to.


    If possible, Danzel wanted to pay off his debt so that he doesn''t get tangled up in the future. The faster he cut ties with a potential problem the better after all. Also, it wasn''t that he was ungrateful for her efforts those past months of helping him out.


    After all, she was sent by Velkir to make sure that he doesn''t die to unexpected enemies that he couldn''t possibly deal with. Allowing him to grow and move towards finishing his evolution mission.


    "Hehe, I guess I still haven`t shown you my artifact." She said while extending her free hand to the air.


    In the next moment, another batch of dark bandages came out of the bandages hiding her breast. They extended and slowly moved around her shoulder and then her arm withst her finger.


    And then the dark bandages began thighing with increadible amount of force. The force was strong in fact that if her hand was a tree, then the tree would have been crushed and cut in two.


    There was also some sort of aura that made the previous bandages look currently like some kind of metal.<sub> </sub>


    "How about this? Can you carve runes to this thing?" She asked, her voice full of hope.


    "Give me a moment..." Danzel said activating his [Rune Vision].


    The whole world suddenly became gray and soundless.


    The only color that was in such a world was his equipment showing a mix of green, yellow and red and the bright green color of the dark bandage (now gray) on Vanessa''s arm.


    Deactivating [Rune Vision], allowing the world to be filled with color and sound, Danzel nodded his head slowly.


    "Yes...I should be capable of carving some runes into this "armor". Do you have anything in mind of the direction of effect that you want?" Danzel asked as he watched the ck bandage open up and slowly slither back on the bandage that hid her breast.


    `I don''t sense any mana in those things...how do they work?''


    "I honestly I ain''t too sure as I don''t know what the limits of you runes are. I generally want to make my artifact, "Enthralling Body", stronger and tougher. You got anything that meets this that you would rmend?"


    "So a strengthing or defense increase effect? If that`s the case I would rmend a bunch of defensive runes as I am more skilled on them. By the way, is your artifact able to cover more space than your arm?"


    In response, she nodded her head.


    "Yeah, I can cover my whole body with it."


    "I see...then that makes it easier. My best rune for something like this increase the toughness of your armor at the cost of increasing the weight of the armor. Would that be fine with you in carving that rune?


    Hearing that, Vanessa''s face distorted a bit as if she was told that carving the rune would make her fat.


    "Around how much will the weight increase." She said while standing up from herying position together with a serious voice.


    "I would expect around..15% to 20%. I could lower those numbers with enough practice of the rune. You see I recently figured out how to make it so..."


    "So you need more time, huh? Ugh, seriously?" She said annoyed.


    Danzel could only shrug his shoulders at her.


    "It can''t be helped, I just recently found how to make such a rune. The effect is worth the wait in my opinion. More of that if you n to use an item for a long period of time."


    "Tch~! Fine! Fine! But I will be holding you on that promise, got it!"


    "Of course." Danzel said with a nd and cold voice.


    `I guess I will have to find time to improve the [Rune of Iron Fortress]. And here I wanted to practice some of the great runes first.''


    The moment he thought about the runes, Danzel froze for an instant.


    His ethereal eyesnded on Vanessa who covered herself with her cloak by now.


    ''What if...''


    With a crazy idea sprouting in his mind, Danzel hesitated for a moment. But in the end, he decides to give up on this idea for now.


    ''If tell her now about the [Great rune of Worlds Gaia], I bet she would annoy me until I familiarize myself enough to decently carve the runes. I should first practice with my undead before testing the rune on living beings.''


    Danzel had many hesitation and reason not to reveal the existence of great runes. One of them was that the runes had to be carved in the rib bones.


    Not only did he never carve runes into bones, but he would essentially have to cut through Vanessa''s flesh and carve runes into her runes while she was alive.


    Something that he bet that most people would hesitate topromise with.


    The fact that hecked her anatomy of her was also a thing to be concerned about.


    He knew most of the vital parts of a humanoid body from fighting mostly humans. He knew what muscle to cut to make one hand useless, which bone to break, and what to pierce to make one sure to stay dead.


    But that was about it, and he was sure that this wasn''t enough knowledge to basically start surgery.


    Healing magic could help, but it was something that he didn''t have ess to. At least for the living that is.


    `First of all, I will have to practice with the undead to reduce the carving time. Maybe I should ask Velkir''s help and if he knows healing magic. I bet he will be interested in this rune so he is bound to help.''


    Ignorant of Danzel''s thoughts of slicing one open and carving runes into their bones, Vanessay once again and closed her eyes to take a nap.


    The carriage destination is the Dynasties pce.

 Chapter 321 Talk With The Council

    The way towards the pce was a long one even with a carriage.


    Danzel listed to Vanessa various other minor runes that he could potentially carve in the artifact.


    After all, if what she said to him was true, he will have a whole body''s worth of armor to carve into.


    How he was going to distribute the runes and how to maximize his given space was something he had to figure out.


    And honestly, he was quite excited to do this work.


    Though he only manage to get a nce at her "armor", he could tell with [Rune Vision] that this artifact had a high resistance towards runes simr to the alchemical weapons that Azrael gave him.


    Just that it was a level higher than those items.


    He could tell that by how bright the green light was from the [Rune Vision].


    It is like aparison drawing on a nk white paper and paper that had lines.


    While you could draw on both pieces of paper, the one without any lines would be much better to use in order to achieve a better painting.


    If he had anyints in the item he was set to carve runes Into, was the fact that he couldn''t secretly carve the [Rune of Harvest] into her item.


    Considering her strength, she would have been a great harvester for him.


    Other than that, he talked about the issue of how she would hide the runes, but it seems his worries were unneeded. Apparently, she could control how those bandages moved, and controlling which side they face was an easy task for her.


    Their talk was though soon interrupted with a faint light reappearing in the room of the carriages. Showing that the barrier has been lifted.


    *Knock, Knock~


    Knocking on their door, a knight that they saw before opened the door.


    "We arrived..." He said with a cold tone while staring at Danzel with a frown on his face.


    Danzel recognizes the gaze of the man.


    It was a face of hate and despise towards one person.


    The only reason why he recognized such face was only because he saw countless of them calling themself his allies. But in truth want to be his enemy.


    They were also the brave and the foolish ones that decided to take arms against him.


    But they ended up dying and serving his cause.


    Most likely the reason for all the hate was because they saw their friends being raised as undead.


    Be it for them or his means to get something done were immoral, he didn''t care about their opinion.


    Ignoring his gaze, he and Vanessa stepped out of the carriage.


    The same knight that looked at him with hate guided them inside the pce.


    The inside of the pce was quite spacious and the wealth of the dynasty was everywhere to observe.


    Danzel at first expected the pce to be simply a huge house for the king of the dynasty, but after seeing people who didn''t look like soldiers "running" away after seeing them, he guessed that he was mostly wrong.


    "Hey, Vanessa, do you know where we are going."


    "Do the boss...probably."


    Hearing thest word of her reply, Danzel became twice the warier of his surroundings.


    He ced his hand around the handle of his sword, making the knight who was guiding them look behind him, his frown growing much worse.


    "...You have been called to meet someone."


    "Who is it?" Danzel said, his killing intent rising and his cursed swording out of its sheath.


    "Wait, don''t try anything just yet." Vanessa said as she moved her hand and pushed the top of the hilt down.


    "He is provoking oblivious of the fact that you wouldn''t hesitate on cutting his head off. He is probably referring to some stupid nobles looking for us or someone simr to the like. Knowing boss, he wille to pick us up. Till then don''t kill anyone, not yet." Vanessa said to him, ignoring the fact that she spoke out loud.


    ''Aren''t you supposed to say something like this in whispers?'' Danzel asked himself while looking at the knight that started sweating.


    "Got it..." Danzel answered instead, continuing to follow the knight.


    Soon enough, they walked on a path that was opened up with stone fences, outside a garden with ake and a huge tree to see. In that path another set of knights awaited them.


    The knight that was guiding them turned around to face Vanessa.


    "Thendy Vanessa, please follow me. An important person has been earger to meet you."<sub> </sub>


    Before she could answer, the other knights waiting for them stepped up.


    "Sir Abdiel, please follow us."


    Seeing what was happening, Vanessa clicked her tongue.


    "Tch, don''t kill anyone before the bosses!" She yelled before turning around and following the knight.


    The other bunch of knights looked at Danzel and he stared back.


    They were both confused and scared of the dark elves''st words.


    Confused because the colleague that guided them was the one supposed to guide the dark knight known as Abdiel and not actually them. As to why they were scared...it was obvious.


    "T-Then sir Abdiel, please follow behind us, "that" person is waiting for you."


    Without answering back, Danzel walked behind the knight''s steps.


    After walking for a bit and climbing some stairs, they soon arrived at a door where the knights halted, which 2 other knights were guarding.


    "Please enter the room, his highness has been awaiting you." One of the knights said before opening the door for him.


    "..."


    They were a moment of pause as the door was opened before Danzel stepped into the room while watching the door behind him close.


    Then he froze.


    "Wee, to my humble space of wasting time. So I heard that you were one of the apprentices of that Veleron?" As soon as he finished speaking, a wave of faint dark lighting traveled through the room.


    Danzel recognized it as some sort of barrier, but the mana that was there for a moment disappeared without any hints of their having been cast any spell.


    The man behind a desk rose from his seat, he wore some simple ck clothing with a mix of gold, at least simple considering a nobles perspective.


    But the aura that this man released as soon as the barrier was put into ce was something that Danzel once experienced before.


    "But it is thoroughly puzzling, to say the least. Veleron, knowing that shameless guy wouldn''t waste his time on something like apprentices. Maybe I would have believed it if it was only you, but you are not." The man said, his voice bing colder and colder with each passing second.


    It was the aura of a king.


    But not from the living.


    "Nheless of lesser undead like you. So? Tell me why Veleron has been keeping someone like you on his side."


    In a blink of an eye, the man''s skin started decaying and his overall height began increasing, his eyes became nk before disappearing. His flesh was no more, and only a skeleton figure reced the human of before.


    A dark aura that hungered to devour the light envelopment his body and started to slowly spread to Danzel.


    "Tell me!!!" The skeleton in front of him yelled, his voice like that of thousands of banshees singing their curses.


    Danzel felt every single bone of his body bing fives times more heaving while an invisible hand was pushing him to kneel to the floor while whispers tried to convince him to kneel and answer the being in front of him.


    But Danzel held on to the surgery to kneel.


    Gritting his teeth, he drew his cursed sword and pointed it toward the undead in front of him.


    Without saying anything at Danzel pointing his sword at him, the undead raised his hand slowly towards him.


    Because of the mana surging around the undead''s body, he couldn''t tell if the undead was going to cast a spell or not.


    But his worries soon disappeared as the undead dragged his hungering aura back.


    "It seems you aren''t a stray as I had expected. Shouldn''t have suspected Veleron after all..." The undead talked to himself before pointing with his extended hand at one of two couches where there was a table between the couches.


    "Take a seat, no point pointing that piece of metal at someone like me. Forget the fact that you wouldn''t stand a change, but even if you managed to do something, it would have been pointless." The man said as slowly flesh filled his bones.


    Once he was on his human form again, he seated on one of the couches and looked at Danzel who was frozen in ce confused.


    "What are you doing? Come take a sheat already. Or are you nning to talk with me from there?"


    "..." Staying silent, Danzel sheathed his sword back on the scabbard before walking to the couch and seating apposite to the undead in human skin.


    ''If he wanted to hurt, he would already do so. Moreover, his wearing those cloths should make him an important person among humans. Even with the barrier, others should notice...'' Danzel through internally.


    "So you aren''t the type that talks much? Anyway, I have to say that I am impressed with keeping you cool after withstanding my aura. While usual undead would follow through with my will, the natural, lesser undead will at most bent their knee in front of me. At first when I heard that the discipline of Veleron was more of a warrior than a magic caster I couldn''t believe it. But it seems that you are special."


    "Thank you..." Danzel answered with a cold and nk voice.


    "Oh yeah, I forgot to introduce myself. I am Kingra''mash, a Lich and a member of the council. I hoped to have a conversation with you, as you are my dears friend apprentice."

 Chapter 322 Talk With The Council (2)

    "It''s an honor of making acquaintance with one of the friends of Master Velkir..." Danzel said while scanning the room for possible escapes.


    "Baah, no need to be so formal with me. I am merely someone who is trying to make a living in this ce and nothing more. But when we are outside you will have to pay respect ording to my rank among those vermins." Kingra''mash said as opened and closed his fist multiple times.


    "Damned flesh..." He mumbled to himself.


    *Blegh~


    Danzel heard a small and weird noise of something getting smashed together around Lich''s hand.


    He could faintly feel the dead mana travel in the Lich''s hand, probably because thetter didn''t try to hide his mana signature at all.


    Based on how it looked, the Lich was continuously shredding the muscles of his fake flesh and making adjusted improvements to match his skeleton hand.


    "I wonder how those fakes get used to wearing those flesh bags for so long. It''s such a hindrance you know? I still find how you master, Veleron, still getting used to it." Kingra''mash said before engulfing the hand that he was iparable within a wave of dead mana. Removing all the flesh of his hand and revealing the bony hand that had ck veins traveling inside the bones.


    "Anyway, don''t you think it''s about time that you introduce yourself."


    "Didn''t you already do a background check on me, considering that you called me here..." Danzel said with a cold voice.


    "I did indeed, but I still don''t know your name. At least not your real one."


    "..." Danzel''s mind raced on what to do.


    Having one Lich know his name was already a huge risk to which he exposed himself though. He was lucky with Velkir, but wherever the Lich in front of him was the same couldn''t be said for certain.


    ''I guess I will have to risk it...'' Danzel though.


    "I am merely a Wight who sought to learn the secrets of necromancy by master Velkir...nothing more, nothing less." He said in the end.


    Kingra''mash''s eyesnded straight towards his head and seemed as if he was staring directly at his ethereal eyes despised of the helmet. His eyes glowing in an ominous dark blue light.


    "I see...so you aren''t willing to share your name even after I shared my."


    He left those words to remain in the room before goingpletely silent.


    Considering the being that he was in front of, Danzel felt extremely anxious.


    "Don''t worry, though I called you here to learn about your rtionship with Veleron, I am not nning to force a natural-born undead like you to talk. Even if you are a lesser undead, the umted death inside you will probably bring you to the same level as where I and Veleron stand. I will wait till then to receive my answer when you join us that is."


    ''umting death? Does he by any chance mean the mission and my evolution? And what does he mean by joining us?''


    Many questions appeared in Danzel''s mind to the point he forgot the Lich knowing that he was a natural-born undead.


    "What do you mean...wait, what do you mean by umting death?"


    By that question, Lich moved his head slightly to the left as if he was confused.


    "Am I wrong? As long as I am aware, much lesser undeath have to meet a certain requirement to ascent to being a true undead like me. The mostmon of them all being umting death, or otherwise said, killing a huge amount of mortal beings." He said while tapping his head with his bone hand.


    "Beings like me, are capable to see through the such umtion of death. After all, we are the kings of the dead. Didn''t you join the war for this purpose?"


    `So he knows the requirements of my mission for my evolution. At least a portion of them.''


    By carefully examining what the Lich just said, the "probably" meant that he was unsure if he manages to reach the next tier and be what he calls a true undead.


    ''Wait, if he knows, doesn''t that mean that Velkir also knew my intention to join the war?''


    Danzel ethereal dark green eyes red in understanding.


    ''He didn''t give me just the knowledge of magic, but also a safe path in reaching the 4th-tier...''


    He suddenly felt much less confident that the reward that he gained would be enough to finish his armor.


    Considering what Velkir has given him, he doubted that his runes will be enough.


    Were it another undead trying to kill a total of 10 000 living beings.


    The years it would take together with the risk would be enormous.


    Destroying a few viges of just a few hundred alone would bring a huge rm on the kingdom controlling that region after all.


    Once the word of an undead rampaging appears and circted, the undead would end up being hunted down before it reaches the next evolution.


    Also, the other undead weren''t like him, who possessed a power that could crush others of the same tier. The remark itself said that he might as well be a cmity.<sub> </sub>


    He quickly pushed all thoughts of his and Velkirs deal to the back of his mind and focused on the Lich in front of him.


    "Excuse my ignorance, but are you and master Velkir working together? And what exactly does it mean to join you?"


    Hearing this question Kingra''mash froze.


    "I and your master Veleron are currently in a partnership. We usually don''t work together, but we are still a part of the same group. Specifically, we are members of the council."


    "..." Danzel waited for him to speak more, but after the continuous silence, it was clear to him that his exnation was done.


    ''He didn''t answer my question, but mentioned that council again...''


    "If that''s the case, what exactly is this council that you are speaking of?"


    As soon as he asked the question, Kingra''mash''s eyes seemed to be engulfed with a dark blue color.


    "What do you mean by that? Are you referring to that you don''t have any knowledge of what the council is?" Kingra''mash said as he raised up from the cough together with a cold voice of disbelief and a dark hungering aura escaping his body.


    rmed, Danzel unconsciously pushed the couch back and moved 2 steps back, his hand on top of the hilt of his cursed sword.


    "I have heard of its name, but no, I don''t know-"


    Before he could finish his sentences, a much deeper and colder voice echoed through the room.


    "Silence."


    As soon as the voice appeared, the barrier put in the room flickered with light before a crack simr to a broken mirror appeared around the door.


    The barrier exploded in mana fragments, showing that the spell broke for good.


    Once that happend, the shadows of the room seemed to merge together and rise up from the ground, slowly creating a cloaked humanoid figure with a staff.


    Once the staff tapped the ground, a wave of other spells spread through the room, recing the previous barrier with a set of new ones.


    While Kingra''mash could stop those spells from happening and attack the intruder. He let the shadows reveal the figure of Velkir.


    "What is the meaning of this, Kingra''mash?" Velkir said, his eyes glowing in gray color.


    "That''s what I am supposed to ask, Veleron! Why does your apprentice know nothing of the council!" Kingra''mash said in outrage,pletely ignoring the confused Danzel.


    "I said silence! Kingra''mash! I decide when or what I tell my apprentice!" Velkir''s aura exploded, revealing the huge mass of mana that inhabits his body.


    Following suit, Kingra''mash also revealed his aura, making several barriers tremble and on verge of breaking.


    It seemed like two pirs were shing with one another, on Velkirs side a gray pir was on Kingra''mash''s side a pir made out of dark blue color.


    "You...tell me! Why did you pick him as your apprentice!? What are you hiding!? Tell me!" Kingra''mash yelled as he turned around to look at Danzel.


    A wave of domination traveled towards him, much stronger than the one that he felt previously.


    Danzel was in mids of amazement at the mass of mana that the two were releasing but also terrified at the will of Kingra''mash overwhelming him, but not breaking fully.


    But that didn''tst enough before he was surrounded by shadows and dragged to the floor.


    "We will talkter." Velkir said.


    That was thest thing he heard before his environmentpletely changed.


    Before he was in a room full of luxuries and two Liches, now he was in an almost nd room with little to no furniture.


    "Teleportation?" Danzel asked himself.


    Meanwhile in the same room where two Liches were releasing their auras.


    Kingra''mash looked at Velkir with an unnaturally frown appearing on his face.


    "You better exin yourself, Veleron."


    Ignoring what Kingra''mash said, he went and raised up the couch from the floor before seating there.


    "Didn''t I already tell you not to call me Veleron?"

 Chapter 323 Talk With The Council (3)

    "Hah! Then what should I call you?" Kingra''mash scoffed out loud.


    "The Fallen Resurrector?"


    "Ancient Collector?"


    "Or would you rather be called Velkir Veleron Verres?" Kingra''mash said while ring at the seated aged dark skinned man with tattoos on his bald head.


    "If you want to start calling each other by our formal titles, I bet that paperwork that I am seeing on that desk over there wouldn''t solve itself."


    "Oh Dark Priest of the Hungering" Velkir added after a pause.


    "Ghhh...don''t ever call me by that name before." Kingra''mash said in annoyance before going and seating opposite Velkir.


    "Then I hope you start telling me you called my own discipline here, Kingra''mash"


    "Hmpf, there was no particr reason, I was just acting upon my curiosity. But I didn''t expect him to be just like us. A natural born undead..."


    "..."


    "Velkir...you know as well as I do, that he needs to join the council. An apprentice undead needs to be presented in front of the council-"


    "Why, because of the rules?" Velkir cut the Lich opposite to him short.


    *Baahm!


    "No! Because of our faction!" Kingra''mash said while hitting the table.


    "You of all people should know what is happening in the council! That other faction filled with fakes both outnumbers us and our resources! While our members can be barely counted by 4 hands! They have been gathering their forces while our sides stay the same! And in the past few centuries, there have only been 2 new members! And they joined only a few years ago." He said with his voice growing colder and colder.


    Velkir in response stared indifferently toward Kingra''mash.


    "Old news of the past decades that have been repeating ever since. I don''t see any reason why I should care now. My time is much more important than dealing with those measly fakes."


    There was a moment of silence between each two before Kingra''mash opened his mouth once more.


    "Velkir, one of us has been recently killed." Kingra''mash said with a heavy tone thatcked any empathy. It was as if he was talking about aing storm that ravaged a city without caring about the casualties.


    "Killed?" Velkir said in a nk voice, confused as to why he was talking about such useless things. As for them, death was only a temporary state of being.


    "What I meant is that they destroyed the phctery of Ravencrow, the gue Bringer."


    Hearing that, Velkir''s grip on his staff became much more intensive.


    "...What? They destroyed his phctery?" Velkir said in disbelief.


    "Not only that, but they burned his ce and stolen whatever was worth. Though it isn''t official, everyone on the council knows that the faction of fakes did it."


    Velkir stayed silent from such news.


    Ravencrow was a notorious Lich that gained the title of gue Bringer. He was one of the few Liches who saw the fall and rise of the old and new kingdoms and specialized in a rare type of death magic that allowed to spread as his title states, gues, and terrifying poisons.


    Though mortals have forgotten his name, several of his gues are left still by today several illnesses that gue themon man.


    Back then, such illnesses brought forth chaos as they suddenly appeared in the lives of the living. But in this day and age, others consider them as something that was always there. Ignorant of the truth.


    "For him to die...I see why everyone thinks that the faction of fakes done it." Velkir said feeling a tent of the emptiness of losing someone he knew for centuries long.


    "It hasn''t been only that. Recently those guys started messing with our goals, trying to sabotage our ns. I also believe that they informed the king about me. He has been more careful around me recently and the assassins thate for me are on the daily." Kingra''mash said with a bitter voice that didn''t match his face.


    "Those idiots have been seeking conflict with us recently. I don''t care what you are hiding with that Wight, but he needs to join us. I saw his strength and he is bound to reach the 4th-tier. For now, I will keep my mouth shut till he reaches that point. But once he does be a true undead, you got to present him to us, Velkir." Kingra''mash gave his ultimatum while pointing at him.


    By now Velkir''s face had grown to have a frown after hearing all the news.


    "Enough of that, we will hold that conversation another day. For now, tell me if the n changed or not."


    "...I made adjustments so that it can not. But it seems that we will have to skip some steps and hasten in achieving our goal." Kingra''mash said annoyed by Velkir attitude.<sub> </sub>


    "And what are those adjustments that you are talking about?"


    "..."


    Standing up from his couch under the watchful gaze of Velkir, Kingra''mash walked towards his desk, and with a wave of mana all the papers that fell from releasing his mana started levitating and organized in nice piles.


    "Our n to kill the king of Dynasty stays the same, just the date of it happening has chanced in around when the honors are given. I will try to do it with my pawns, but just in case you should inform your group in case I need support."


    Letting his body fall on the seat, he recovered the flesh of his hands before picking a pen and a report from the piles of papers.


    "But that alone wouldn''t be enough to give me the crown, the children of that human still have enough achievements to challenge me for their crown. Though killing them is my preferred option...it will be hard after the death of the king to do as such with thatncer around..."


    Writing the signature of the human that he was impersonating in the report, the Lich took another report and started to do the same.


    "For that reason, I came up with a more secure n. Something that will undoubtedly secure my potion of that mere throne of mortals."


    Finishing another report and putting it to the side, Kingra''mash stopped and stared at Velkir who stayed silent for his whole monologue.


    "And for that, I will need your mercenary group to attack the Tower of Arcana and steal its core."


    "Are you crazy..?" Velkir said with gray light escaping his eyes.


    "Though I preferably would like to have the tower of that guy destroyed, Stealing it would make that fellow hole up on his tower for a while, making the war between the Dynasty and Arcana stop for a while."


    "This wouldn''t only bring temporary peace to the Dynasty, But the Berum kingdom will also jump into the opportunity to take some advantage in their foolish war against the Arcana kingdom. And with theming to harm, it would also harm the supplies of those arrogant fakes. Three birds with one stone I am telling you." Kingra''mash said with a smile on his face, which was a bit unnatural and twisted.


    "It would have been a good n if it wasn''t putting me on at the end of the stick." Velkir said as shadows were slowly gathering to his feet and growling around his body.


    "You have no right toin when I was forced to y a human for years. Years that I could have spent disclosing the secrets of magic. So many theories I had to put on stop..."


    "Alright...I will see it done. Contact me when the first part of the n takes ce."


    With the shadows gathering his whole body and slowly sinking into the floor, disappearing from the room, the various barriers in the room broke apart.


    "Now only those papers are left to be dealt with..." Kingra''mash mumbled to himself.


    Taking one of the many reports in his hands, he cursed internally of having to do the chores of the likes of humans.


    ***


    At the same time where Danzel was teleported, a certain male dark elve appeared in front of him, besides with a huge high troll and his halberd resting on his shoulder.


    "Long time no see, Danzel." Azrael said while walking towards them with his hand opponent up towards him.


    Looking at the hand for a few seconds, Danzel shook the hand while nodding at Azrael.


    "Like ways..." Danzel said indifferently.


    Though the inherited hate towards the living was much less towards non-humans, that didn''t mean that it waspletely gone.


    <o>,m Hints of his killing intent were felt by Sartan and Azrael, but neither of them was offended by the slightest.</o>


    "Though you just returned after all those months, I hoped to speak with you about. Of course, if you have time that is." Azrael said, with a joke that went unnoticed by either of the two.


    "Alright. In truth, I also wanted to talk with you." Danzel said.


    "Mhm, then let''s go talk inside my room. But before that...there is someone else that want''s to talk with." Azrael said before stepping to the side


    "Hmm?"


    Turning his head to the side in confusion.


    In an instant, the halberd of the High Troll was swung down like the de of a guillotine right in front of Danzel with a speed that he couldn''t hope to react to.


    *Bouugh!!!!

 Chapter 324 Scrolls Of Blood Magic

    With the Halbert hitting the ground, the whole building shook, making dust gathered in the ceiling fall down.


    Looking in front of him, Danzel sighted internally in relief with the halberd only hitting the floor in front of him.


    The stone floor had a small crater where the halberd''s de was sunk into the ground. Where the de was pointing was a massive rip that had gone between Danzel''s legs and behind him as if a small earthquake happend.


    The several long rip on the floor showed that although the swing didn''t hold much technique into it, it instead showed the sheer strength of the high troll in front of him. And that was without even going using his whole strength.


    "Is that how High Trolls ask to speak with someone." Danzel said while ring at Sartan, one of the few ession that he talked with someone taller than him.


    "I heard that you can strengthen my weapon. Do it." Sartan said, his voice resembling a growl of a beast. Each breath of his was so hot that it was visible to a pair of naked eyes.


    "..."


    Giving Azrael a meaningful look, thetter just shrugged his shoulders.


    Staring at the halberd and then back at Sartan, Danzel''s voice became cold.


    "And why should I apply for such a request? What have I to gain from such request?"


    A portion of the killing intent that he was holding back was released to the side and an ominous aura surrounded his body.


    Though Danzel had no ns in fighting a losing battle, he also wasn''t going to do charity work without gaining something back.


    "Grrh~"


    Grinding his teeth, Sartan pulled the halbert out of the floor and rested it on his shoulder. Disyed his muscles that looked as if they were carved to perfection.


    "Death Caller once asked me the same question, and my answer stays the same."


    Raising his other arm and making a fist, tightening so hard that made his palm start bleeding and letting blood fall to the ground.


    "You shall receive the blood of immortal flesh!"


    Using the same hand, he hit his own chest so hard that it could have been mistaken for a drum sound.


    "And that`s the favor of a future king!"


    "..."


    Retracting his killing intent, Danzel looked once again at Azrael seeking answers for an uparable long time.


    "..."


    Seeing that he wasn''t getting any answers from the dark elve, Danzel turned to look at the High Troll.


    "May I ask where the kingdom of the future king is?"


    At his question, Sartan scoffed at him.


    "Hmpf, I will have to first build one to answer your question."


    "..."


    Danzel for a moment felt an urge to curse at the High Troll in front of him.


    It sounded like a scam where one would try to sell him a house that didn''t exist with the premise that it would exist in the future.


    At first, he thought it was a joke, but after seeing Azrael''s silence and Sartan''s proud face, he knew that this guy was serious.


    ''I guess not everyone is rich like Azrael and Velkir. It seems this deal will be as fruitless as the one with Agare''s He thought before nodding his head.


    "If that''s the case, then it would be rude of me to reject the request of a king."


    "Great, then I will leave it to you." Sartan said before raising his halberd and piercing to the floor and then turning around to leave.


    "That favor also goes to you, Blood Mage."


    With a bitter face, Azrael nodded at the leaving High Troll who left his prized weapon behind.


    Danzel would have made a simr face if he had nothing more than a skull for his head.


    It was already bad enough that he had to deal with Vanessa''s request, but having another one on his te made him more than annoyed.


    ''If it weren''t for the fact that I wanted to make him a harvested for me, I would even reject his deal.''


    That was the main reason for epting his request.<sub> </sub>


    Though that didn''t mean that he was going to be sloppy about it.


    He was nning to carve two epic runes, them being [Rune of Harvest] and [Rune of Mana Essence] with additional few minor runes.


    He wasn''t going to haste in finishing the halberd though.


    After all, he simply said his piece and left right after confirming that he would do his job. There was no date and no nothing. Heck, he didn''t even stay to discuss what kind of runes he would like to have on his halberd.


    "Sigh..."


    Reaching out on the halberd that was taller than himself, Danzel pulled it out of the ground and stored the weapon in his storage ring.


    "Hey Azrael, do you know anything about what he talked about...of building a kingdom and such."


    "Mhm, I am not surprised doubting his words. Even I, when I heard him say that for the first time I thought he was pulling my leg. But he is serious. Apparently, his dream is to return to his tribe and raise a kingdom in the Infested Lands after reaching the peak of strength." Azrael said.


    "Infested Lands? I don''t remember any ce called like that in the maps that I have." Danzel said in confusion as he tried recalling anything about such a ce.


    "Of course, he hasn''t. That ce hasn''t been recorded on any maps because of its ever-changing nature. It is also called the center of the world. That''s where most other races live, including the tribe that I and my sister came from..." He said with a cold expression on his face.


    "Anyway, follow me to the room. I even prepared some of the stuff for you."


    Danzel didn''tment on how he changed the subject and simply followed the dark elve back to his room, which was in a simr mess when he first entered his room.


    Of course, the building this time was different than the other time.


    But the only change that he noticed was that the bloody whittled spear that he once carved runes into it had changed its appearance.


    The previous material that was already in a weird form for being just bones now looked as if it was woven much more unnatural.


    The area where one would expect to prate his enemy also changed. It looked longer and doubled-edged de, with a huge orb holding everything together as if the double-aged de of the spear was fused with the orb.


    At first, he thought that this was another spear, but after activating [Rune Vision] for a brief second, he saw that this weapon had his runes.


    "Over here, Danzel." Azrael called out, taking Danzel''s attention off the weapon.


    "You said that you got something for me. Is this it?" Danzel asked while ring at the small box unimpressed.


    "Yeah, that''s for you as thanks for the runes. I even made a masterpiece out of that...spear." Hisst words brought out a reaction from the spear, making it shake for a split second. Something that Danzel missed.


    Opening the small chest, his ethereal eyes red up in surprise.


    "This is..."


    At first look, there were 5 pieces of rolled-up paper and nothing more. But once he picked one thought to read the description, his expectation became the truth.


    [Magic Scroll: Innate Blood Absorption]: 38 000 XP is required to learn this spell.


    "A magic scroll?" Danzel said while ring at Azrael in suprised.


    Magic scrolls weren''t like normal books that exined how to use a spell, but it was an item that allowed someone to feel how to cast the given spell.


    Once one inputted his mana on the magic scroll, they would experience some sort of simtion inside their head of how to cast the spell and potentially experience engagement over that specific spell.


    Because of its nature, the cost of making such an item was really high, even for a tier 1 spell.


    They were considered the item that masters would give to their apprentices as an inheritance.


    Of course, one wouldn''t be able to imminently learn the spell on the first try as it still required one skill, but the difficulty in learning that spell would lessen by an incredible amount.


    For that reason, they were mostly banned to be sold or made for other than one''s apprentices. Those who did would be looked down upon and seen as a threat after all.


    The mostmon magic scrolls were the ones made by professors of the magic academies and they were under the tier 1 spells. And even they were a rare case to be seen in any market.


    And currently, in front of him, Danzel had a total of 5 such magic scrolls.


    To him, such items were treasures aspared to the others.


    He just had to pay some of his XP to learn the magic scroll and pay once more to make it avable to use and continue improving it by leveling it up.


    ''If my guess is right, the other 4 scrolls will be of blood magic...'' Danzel thought, before gently putting back the scroll and slowly closing the small chest while resisting the urge to take all of them.


    "What do you want for those?" Danzel asked while ring at Azrael who had a mischievous smile on his face.


    "You understand me well, Danzel. I am really d that I met an undead like you." Azrael said.

 Chapter 325 Unconditional Actions

    Hearing out Azrael and his request, Danzel sighted before nodding his head.


    "Fine, I will do it. But don''t expect that I will finish them any time soon. I will have to undergo some tests with other pieces before I am confident to make a decent rune. Counting the fact that your sister and Sartan also requested stuff from me, it might take me months toe in your request." Danzel said before taking the items to the table inside his storage ring.


    "What item did Vanessa ask you to work on..." Azrael said with a serious voice.


    "It''s her artifact, that ck armor." Danzel answered while putting the small box in his ring too.


    "I see...thanks for hearing out her request. By any chance, you know what runes you will carve in that artifact."


    Seeing him frown with a serious voice, Danzel fell confused by his sudden change of temper. The way he talked was as if he said that he will strip his sister by himself.


    Something that he wasn''t interested in at all for multiple reasons.


    The biggest one was that he still had the will to live.


    Going against a 4th-tier such as Vanessa was suicide after all!


    "...I am nning to simple carve runes that enchant the artifacts defense and nothing more."


    "I see..." Azrael said with a face that told one that he was half convinced.


    Seeing that, Danzel quickly changed the topic.


    "By the way, I might be able to carve better runes into that spear of yours. Since its size changed, I might be able to squeeze one more rune. Maybe I could also rece the runes with better versions of them."


    Looking at the whittled Bloodthirster that was resting on the wall and then at Danzel, Azrael''s face became skeptical.


    "If you are able to make it happend, I would really be d. But why are you bringing it up suddenly?" Azrael said.


    He looked at Danzel as if he was some skezi man offering free candy to a child.


    They must be strings attached!


    "Hah! I can clearly see what you are thinking, but I won''t be expecting to be paid or gain your favor for doing this! I know the worth of those magic scrolls and I simply want to repay you for giving me those scrolls. Moreover, the new rune that I n to carve in the whittled spear will be the same as Sartan''s halbert, a rune that increased the efficiency of mana. So once I finished his weapon, I will also be able to improve your weapon. At most, it will an hour or two to finish it."


    "You can consider it as the pride of a runesmith wanting to deliver the best runes in a weapon that is going to be wielded by a 4th-tier." Danzel said, trying his best to mimic Gerak''s enthusiasm when he was talking about smithing to him.


    "Is that so...?" Azrael said in doubt.


    "That''s indeed how it is." Danzel said.


    When in truth he was full of other intentions.


    But that didn''t mean that hepletely lied to Azrael''s face.


    He indeed felt gratitude for gaining the magic scrolls, even if they had an equal exchange. But it wasn''t to the level where he was willing to offer additional service for free. He also didn''t feel as extreme as he described with the pride of a runesmith.


    He liked carving runes and doing so in a better quality weapon did indeed feel better than carving runes in second-rate weapons, that was the truth. But he didn''t feel anything of particr when someone was wielding an item with his runes.


    Though he loved carving runes in items that he would be using, it brought a certain excitement and a feeling of being rewarded with his craft. And this feeling wasn''t the same as when he made runed weapons for someone else.


    cksmiths and other kinds of craftsmen might find joy in making a masterpiece for a master warrior, but that might be because they couldn''t use their items themselves to their fullest potential. Making them transfer their inner wish to others.


    Danzel wasn''t sure if every other craftsman had such a mindset, but Gerak, the dwarf cksmith did.


    And in mixing pieces of truth in his lie while acting with references in mind, Danzel was sure that he hid his true intention from Azrael.


    His true goal was to find out what sort of process the whittled Bloodthirster had undergone to change so much.


    The longer he looked, the more he realized how impressive Azrael was.


    Of course, the bigger a weapon, the more space there is to carve and spread the stress in the weapon from the runes. But the most noticeable change in the spear was the level of stress that it had to withstand increased.


    The previous spots near the runes that had a red light now looked like a yellow color with hints of red color, where the more bright areas of yellow became green.


    If he were to be clever with it, he might fit a major rune together with another minor rune.


    That was a huge improvement considering a weapon.<sub> </sub>


    And Danzel was eager to find the cause of the changes in hopes to replicate the effect in his weapon.


    While he didn''t want to make his sword or shield any bigger, tempering his weapon only would be a huge achievement and a source that will further empower him.


    After all, the more runes the better!


    ''As far as I know, Azrael is more of the magic caster type while also being experienced in alchemy. I doubt someone like him is proficient with cksmithing to achieve such an effect. Maybe in the future, I will have to learn alchemy if that''s how it''s done if it''s alchemy at all...''


    ''Dammit, if it weren''t for the strength difference between us two, I would even check using my status. All it would take pping him once or shaking his head to see through all his abilities.'' Danzelmmed internally.


    "As it has been decided, I wille to pick up the whittled spear once I even finished Sartan''s halbert."


    "If that''s the case, I will have to trouble you with it, Danzel." Azrael said while slowly nodding his head, still feeling a bit odd.


    Turning his back on him, Danzel walked towards the door.


    Once he was about to leave, Azrael called out.


    "You said that you wouldn''t expect anything from me. But I will return this favor..."


    Deciding not to say anything, Danzel simply left the room, leaving the gray dark elve "alone" in his room.


    "..."


    Walking around his desk that was the house of a mess of papersying randomly with crimson ink that resembled blood.


    "That was unexpected..." Azrael mumbled as he picked a few papers and started screening them.


    "An unconditional favor, is it? It''sughable." Azrael said while putting the papers to the side and picking up the whittled bloodthirster that was resting at the wall.


    ''To think that the second person that will give me something unconditional except my sister will be yet another undead.'' He thought to himself.


    Azrael was someone that strongly believed that in life, there was no such thing as a free meal. He never believed in kindness. One''s actions had always a meaning and a goal behind them after all. Not even the kindness of possing the same blood was to be trusted.


    In fact, thetter was the most dangerous kindness of them all.


    Once ones lose sight of the goal and the meaning of that kindness directed upon you, his judgment is bound to be clouded.


    And once the suppose unconditional kindness bes to be an expected exchange of ''equal'' value for their kindness, only misery awaited them.


    As someone who was able to see through this twisted kindness and act upon it, he knew.


    Only those with different blood could be judged wholely by their actions and actions alone.


    Be it blood rtives or not.


    One true family can be chosen bytheir actions alone


    Just like his sister.


    "Heh, to think that the death with no blood in their veins will be better than the living." He said with a smile on his face.


    Raising the whittled bloodthirster up in the air, the spear soon started to shake.


    And not long after, the orb that fused the spearhead (that was double-edged) and the shaft started to glow in a light red color.


    "What do you think?" Azrael said, seemingly to the air.


    But suddenly, in the middle of the orb, a burst of dark and orange light appears. Forming a vertical eye simr to that of a dragon.


    The pupil that was of a dark color seemed like an endless abyss that tried to pull others in, whereas the orange light of the iris seemed like a closer look at the sun. Burning fiercely with killing intent and thirst for what it was named.


    Blood.


    The eye inside the orb looked throughout the room with incredible speed, stopping at Azrael for a moment before staring at the door where Danzel had left.

 Chapter 326 Dreaming Of Future

    Without witnessing the living weapon of Azrael, Danzel walked with a heavy mind.


    It wasn''t like he felt bad for lying to the dark elve.


    Far from it.


    Though their trade has been for both of them a bountiful harvest, that didn''t change the fact the time they spend with each other.


    The most time he spend was with Vanessa who was in a seemingly bodyguard duty of a noble, then it would be with Velkir with his lessons of magic and the duo with exotic clothes, Agares and Shiro who also participated in the lesson from time to time.


    Thetter only watches from behind so that the two undead don''t teach his grandaughter the all-mighty power of necromancy.


    Thest of them was Azrael and Sartan by this order.


    A few moments ago had the longest conversation with the high troll till today.


    His rtionship with Azrael was strictly business oriented.


    Other than he was a workaholic just like him, loved his sister dearly, and was the strongest of the group, with Velkir being the only one surpassing him.


    He knew nothing of this dark elve.


    What he really found saddening was the fact that hecked the XP to learn the scrolls that he was now in possession of.


    After learning a few tier 1 skills and spending his whole wealth on [Epic] rated runes, Danzel ended up broken with only a few thousand XP left in his wallet.


    Though the option of ignoring the skills in the magic scroll was also open, it would be foolish of him not to learn a new branch of magic while he had the chance.


    After all, knowledge could be reapplied to make his own improved version of spells and skills, or if even better, createpletely new ones.


    Though that was only in theory.


    After all, till far he never achieved the former result and only somewhat managed to make a few skills/spells of his own.


    Like raising the dead to serve his call without any spell or channeling pure death mana from his hand. Thetter looked like a methrower who spew out a ck mist.


    Of course, the reason why he didn''t use any of those was that thetter only created a slightly stronger version of a skeleton that when he used the [Lesser Raise Undead Lv. 10] version and thetter being simple too inconvenient.


    Not only was it a spell that he had to channel and make one of his hands useless, but the range with the damage also wasn''t at an eptable level.


    Thus never found a reason to use them.


    Such an achievement was only achievable by acquiring knowledge of the same type of magic.


    In essence, the knowledge of skills could be used as a reference for future development of spells and skills.


    So learning blood magic would open the path of learning such a branch of magic.


    And since he was immortal, he had enough time to waste figuring things out.


    In the far-encroaching future, he nned to do the same with every other type of magic.


    By far, from the basic elements, he had the most knowledge of earth magic, as he possessed the [Earth Wall] spell and started learning the fire element with the use of his books.


    Though it would be easier to learn the former if he had some experience, he chose to learn bits of fire magic so that he can light up things in the fire.


    To note, his previous method of achieving such a feat was to make a runed contract and use it as a lighter...


    If the people who desperately searched for his runed contracts were to hear of that, they would even try to strangle him alive (metaphorically speaking).


    ''Considering my current schedule though, I doubt that this will be anytime soon.'' Danzel shook his head.


    Even if he couldn''t, it was fine dreaming of his future.


    Considering that the mission keeping him from evolving being over soon, he had to start considering what to do after finishing it.


    ''I could stay with this mercenary group to continue my trade with Azrael and Velkir or leave the group and find my own ce. Build my own base and slowly cultivate my strength. Maybe spreading runed weapons with the harvest rune could gather XP for me and then hide a few years...''Danzel thought as his steps became slower and slower by each second.


    Gaining the [Rune of Harvest] was a game changer for him.


    It essentially did his work much faster and easier than doing it himself.


    The rate he gained XP by simply having few strong harvesters was tremendous. To the point that doing it himself was a waste of his own time.


    Although, the thought of spreading his runes will result in him being hunted down all over again. And thest time he checked, his bounty from the union has only further increased.


    But after he reaches the 4th-tier, Danzel''s options will be increased. After all, by then he will be a powerhouse, making others second doubt themselves when going after him.<sub> </sub>


    As long as he was careful, mass producing such weapons and selling them at either of the Arcana or Berum kingdoms who fought each other will in turn be a massive stream of XPing his way.


    ''Also, that Lich called Kingra''mash. He mentioned something about a council that the shadow merchant Hanson mentioned once. I don''t know what kind of organization it is, but he wanted me to join it. Velkir seemed to be a member too, butpared to that Kingra''mash, he didn''t want me to join. I will have to ask Velkir about it when he returns.''


    "It might be another potential path..." Danzel mumbled before halting his steps and looking around himself.


    "Now that I think about it, I should even asked Azrael where my room is..." Danzel said while cursing himself internally.


    Turning back to ask Azrael, mind way his highly increased senses picked up two presencesing. Which were the old man with his scythe sword, silver mouth mask, and weird clothing together with his granddaughter Shiro. Who looked different than usual.


    ''Was she always this tall?'' He asked himself in confusion.


    If before she looked around the age of 10-11 years old, her height could make someone believe that she was around 13-14 now.


    But in truth, Danzel had no reference to those numbers and simply pushed her to grow as something that was normal for the living.


    The duo also seemed to notice the tall dark knight walking toward them.


    "It has been a while, Rue Danzel." Agares said.


    "Yeah, it''s been a few months. How are the runes?" Danzel answered with a cold voice.


    "I have been impressed by them, it has been much easier for my shoulder to cut down...bad people." Agares said carefully to not say anything inappropriate in front of his granddaughter.


    "I am d to hear that."


    ''The easier for you, the easier my harvest'' Danzel added in his mind.


    "But still, I could even carve you something much better than those simple weapon-enhancing runes."


    "Haha, there is no need to go out of your way to make something fancy for this old man. Instead, I would be in your gratitude if you gave those fancy runes of yours to my granddaughter."


    There was a moment of silence before Danzel answered back.


    "...Have you already found an item that fit my requirements?"


    "Mhm, it''s a staff made out of special metal. I can''t remember what the material''s name is, but it should be of high quality, ording to Velkir."


    "Can I see it?"


    Nodding his head, a light appeared simr to when ones used a spatial storage item.


    The light quickly dissipated, revealing, a dark blue metal staff that at its end was a ce with a white crystal with bits of yellow lighting inside.


    Half of the crystal was diagonally covered with the same metal that the staff was made of while it continue to expand like a moon.


    In that moon shape were a total of 4 holes, each of them the higher they went, the smaller they became, containing small rings.


    Using his [Rune Vision] he confirmed that it was possible to carve runes.


    But seeing the staff and then back at Shiro,stly at Agares, Danzel asked in confusion.


    "Isn''t the staff a little too big for her?"


    Such a question wasn''t strange at all, as the staff was the height of Agares.


    If Shiro was going to use it, at best it would look ridiculous.


    "Well, it''s for the future. Also, requesting such staff was quite hard for Velkir as it doesn''t have any enchantments. But those can be putter on." Agares said slightly emperor sent.


    He seemed like a grandpa who didn''t have enough money to buy his granddaughter her favorite doll and was forced to buy half the doll.


    "It will take some time, but I will do it." Danzel said as he picked the staff and put it in his storage ring.


    Shiro looked at him with a frown as if he stollen her doll, but Danzel ignored her.


    "Thank you, Danzel. If you are interested in learning some techniques of my swordsmanship, I will always be avable. For now at least." Agares said with a bitter voice, aware that this deal wasn''t fair for Danzel.


    "Sadly, I will be busy in the meantime. If I find time, I wille and see you." Danzel said while shaking his head.


    "By the do you know where my room is?" Danzel said.


    Slightly stunned, Agares told him the way and saw how the undead that once threatened his granddaughter leave in the direction he had given.

 Chapter 327 Runesmithing And Blood Skills

    Once Danzel found his room, he brought out all kinds of items from his storage ring.


    He put the most important stuff on the table, them being books and magic items that he found on the various people that he killed. Unfortunately, they weren''t that impressive.


    He also had undamaged items of those masked magic casters from Arcana. They had the most impressive enchantments of all.


    Sadly for some reason, they had some kind of protection that didn''t let others activate the enchantment. Back then he found it weird how much 2nd-tier magic caster could use the spell of flight. But it turns out they simply relied on their equipment.


    For now, he simply had it for the sake of collecting it and didn''t have any ns to figure out how to deactivate the defense enchantment.


    His strongest, functional magic item was one called [Amulet of Burning Will], which simply improved one''s focus on the fire element by a small amount. It was an amulet with a big red mana crystal.


    He had some difficulties in carving the [Rune of Mana] into the crystal, but he seed and improved the magic.


    That item was taken by a 3rd-tier magic caster and for most of the item, he didn''t wear it and simply use it as a learning tool.


    As for the less important items, such as various weapons and armor, he let them rest on the corner. This will be his supply for his runesmithing.


    With his room looking now like a junkyard and his storage ring mostly empty, Danzel seated down on the floor and picked a random piece of armor, and started carving runes.


    Immersing himself in the colorless world by activating [Rune Vision], Danzel started practicing the knowledge of the newly acquired runes.


    Being a tireless immortal being, Danzel started working like a workaholic on his craft, trying to refine it to an eptable level.


    Without worrying about some noble learning about his craft or having to stay alert, he finished armor pieces with the [Rune of Iron Fortress] one after the other. The first came as [Poor] quality just like the second piece of armor.


    But each new attempt has small improvements that after several attempts increased the quality of the rune.


    That continued for hours, and once a day passed, another one soon followed.


    Isting himself in his room in the pursuit of his craft, the time he went out to interact has be minimal.


    Only when he was out of supplies of armor pieces did Danzel walk out of his room to meet Azrael was also hearing the recent news of their group.


    Apparently, his sister beat up a noble close to death on the day when he separated from her and met that Lich. As far as he heard, the noble wanted to recruit Vanessa to be a "mistress" of his. A word that he was unfamiliar with.


    And that Agares took Shiro out to continue participating in the war, guessing to earn enough favor of Velkir to enchant the staff that he gave me to carve runes.


    Gaining the supplies of alchemic weapons and asking around, he then went to check on Skull w that was brought back. He didn''t stay much as he was busy, but Skull w was excited to see him.


    Next, he went to meet up with Velkir to talk about the Lich that he met and what was the council. Unfortunately. he came empty-handed as the Lich didn''t tell him what he wanted.


    All he learned was that the Lich Kingra''mash and he were working together.


    When he asked about the council, he refused to tell him anything because of his capability of runesmithing.


    Unsatisfied, thought at the same time too busy to care, Danzel simply nodded and left the Lich to do his business.


    As Sartan and Vanessa were apparently out there flexing their muscles and beating each other while calling it training. By that, he remembered the first time they came out after their training session.


    Sartan missing a whole arm and Vanessa beaten senseless.


    What they were doing, he didn''t care, but the exotic duo leaving towards the war was some pleasant news for his wallet.


    After all, the quality of the runes that he was carving wasn''t sufficient enough to earn him any XP, making him to still remain poor.


    ? Motivated to change this fact, he walked back to his room and continued working on improving his runes.


    The closer he went in making a [Good] quality rune, the longer he spend in his room.


    For a change, he alternated between learning the [Rune Mana Essence], [Rune Iron Fortress], and [Rune of Tolian Repent].


    Other than the first one, he was eager to learn the two others as he nned to use them on his items.


    And as time continued to pass and XP was starting toe on his own wallet.


    A total of 4 months passed before Danzel finished and was able to push all 3 three runes into the [Good] quality.


    ****


    Seating crossed-legged in front of a table, arge half-naked skeleton was carefully guiding his finger on the surface of ck ttings. With two dancing ethereal dark green mes serving as his eyes, his head wasn''t that simr to a corpse.


    The eye sockets of the skull weren''t round but were bent down as if it was constantly staring hatefully at something.


    Moving away his finger from the armor, therge skeleton picked up the armor and started equipping it around his body with thest being the helmet.


    "Let`s see if Vanessa is somewhere around here." Danzel said before standing up and moving out of his room.


    Having finished improving his own armor and finishing the items that Azrael wanted for him, he nned to deliver the finished product to Azrael and ask where his sister was.<sub> </sub>


    He nned to finish his promises with all of them by today or early tomorrow. Though he would be carving an epic rune of just [Good] quality in their items, Danzel found it sufficient.


    Aiming for the [Well-done] quality for runes of epic quality would probably take him another set of months. Months that he wasn''t willing to spend.


    After all, he was eager to finish the mission and evolve.


    By now, with Azrael sometimes going out and Agares with his granddaughter constantly participating in the war, the XP that he umted was enough to bring several skills of his own to tier 4 and upgrade his main ss.


    If it wasn''t for the limit of his body holding him back, he would have long ago graduated from being a [ck Guard].


    At this point, he was thinking twice if he should break his decision of upgrading his skills only after he evolved.


    He could always find new skills to cultivate, but he kept himself from doing that.


    XP, as easy as it came by the use of [Rune of Harvest], was still a resource that was used on an endless bit.


    He would never have enough.


    Because he understood that, he kept himself needlessly spending it.


    He simply learned the 5 scrolls and bought them as his skills.


    The five scrolls gave them the following 5 skills.


    [Innate Blood Absorbtion], a spell that enchanted one''s weapon to absorb blood to restore the wielder''s mana.


    [Blood Puppets], a spell that directly controlled corpses like a puppet by using their blood.


    [Bleed Verocity], a targeted skill that forcefully pulls arge amount of blood from the target''s wounds.


    [Blood Sense], a passive skill that allowed one to sense blood and its condition.


    And [Vampiric Gaze], also a passive, that makes one gaze feel more predatory.


    All of them were a nice addition with [Bleed Verocity] being a tier 3 skill and the others of tier 2.


    While some were clearly better than the others, he was still happy to have the 5 on his arsenal.


    [Innate Blood Absoption] could rece the solution that he tried to find out in one of his runes.


    One could say that he tried for years to make a rune that consumes blood to use as a resource such as mana or to fuel another rune. This spell though gave him the solution that he searched for so long.


    And he wasn''t satisfied with that.


    After all, he tried for years to think of a solution and to create the such rune. Maybe if he put his entire focus on the subject, he could have already figured it out.


    But that simply wasn''t visible with his busy schedule.


    Maybe if his old sword, Veren, wasn''t destroyed, this job would have been much easier.


    Out of stubbornness, he decided to find out a rune that does the same if not better than this [Innate Blood Absorption] spell.


    Thinking around those lines, Danzel entered Azrael''s room, half expecting him to be missing.


    "Hmm? Did youe to pick up another supply?" Azrael said without even looking at Danzel, too focused on the papers he was reading.


    "No, I came to ask where your sister is." Danzel said as a matter of fact.


    Hearing that, Azrael''s whole body froze before moving his gaze off the paper and locking it on Danzel.


    "My sister? What do you need her for?" Azrael said with a frown.


    "I reached a sufficient level with my runes and to carve her runes. By the way, here are the items you requested."


    Bringing out Azrael''s request that was wrapped in arge cloth and putting it on the ground, Velkir eyes shed with light.


    "Did anything go wrong?" Azrael asked.


    Danzel simply shook his head.


    "I see, that''s good to hear. As for Vanessa, she is currently out with Sartan and should be arrivingter..."


    Groaning in annoyance, Danzel looked at the cursed wittled spear.


    "Well, nothing to be done about it. How about I finish your spear first then?"

 Chapter 328 Domination

    Seeing that he truly wanted to carve a rune on his spear, Azrael was slightly surprised before nodding his head.


    "If you don''t mind doing this favor..."


    "What favor, I will just finish the process that I started and nothing more. You don''t have to keep such a small thing in your mind." Danzel said as if stating facts.


    Azrael felt that something was off, but couldn''t really see any reason to refuse the undead generosity.


    "Alright."


    Walking towards the wall where the whittled spear was resting, he picked it up and raised his palm towards the orb.


    "[Oniro]" Casting out loud, a crimson magic circle appeared in front of his palm.


    Once the magic circle lighten up in crimson light, the spear was engulfed with the same crimson light.


    Walking towards Danzel, he pushed the whittled spear, inviting him to pick it up.


    "What kind of spell was that?" Danzel asked as he receive the spear.


    "Let`s just say that it is an assurance, just in case."


    "Is that so...?"


    "That''s how it is." Azrael answered.


    Seeing that he didn''t want to share the spell he cast, Danzel simply gave his farewell before walking with hasty steps back to his room.


    "If you think you can hide something from me, then you must be naive, Azrael." Danzel mumbled.


    Opening the description of the whittled spear, he found the answer that he seeks. Them being particrly surprising.


    [Bloodthirster: The Cursed Spear]: A Demonforged weapon created with the bones of a Dragon, even by the usages of alchemy to create its whittled shape, containing powerful and terrifying runes that drink blood and bring forth suffering, created by a Runesmith of Undeath. Demonic Magic to birth forth a blood Devil that shouldn''t exist in this ne of reality, while using the Blood Magic to bind and fuse the Devil inside the spear, together with his power. A Masterpiece created by a powerful dark elve, otherwise knowns as "The Engel of Riverblood". The weapon is currently under the spell of [Oniros].


    Reading through the information in the description, Danzel would even frown if he could.


    The amount of new information was something that he didn''t expect.


    He wasn''t surprised by the dragon bones as he had long ago known that.


    But Demonforged weapon?


    Demonic Magic?


    Those were terms that he waspletely oblivious about.


    Demonforged weapon wasn''t hard to understand. A weapon fused with a Devil, using blood magic. The worry of some part of all of this was the information about the Devil.


    There was only one time when he saw a Devil and that was back in the desert in the tower.


    He hadn''t seen that monster for long, but for the time he saw it, he burned the image of that Devil into his memory.


    A giant with half of his body being that of a dragon, two necks of a hydra, at the end instead of heads, they were the hands of a dragon, in the middle of palms of those hands, mouths with sharp fangs with the other half of its body being that of a leviathan,


    The most memorable of the Devil''s features though was the fused top of a humanoid figure in the middle of those 2 hand necks that looked as if someone melted a man to forcibly fuse with the Devil.


    It was a monster among monsters.


    Comparing that behemoth, with the spear that was shorter than himself.


    It was quite hard to believe that this spear contained a Devil.


    The next notable thing was the existence of Demonic Magic.


    The description of it didn''t tell him anything other than Demonic Magic it''s a thing of itself and not abination of affinities like Blood Magic and Soul Magic. More along the lines of Holy Magic.


    That was also magic of its own.


    "Such a weird weapon, why would Azrael make such a thing?" Danzel asked himself.


    The most confusing part of it all was that it didn''t have any detailed information about weapon power. Usually, it listed every capability of a weapon. The description did exin some of his runes, but not all of them. And that was about it.


    "Not so useful... Let''s hope the spell description has something more to offer.


    [Oniros]: A High tier spell that puts the target to sleep and makes them dream while subjecting them to the caster''s will for a certain amount of time. If the spell is resisted, it inflicts the target with [Confusion].


    "A spell that makes others sleep?" He said somewhat expecting something more.


    "I got what I wanted, now I just have to finish carving the runes." Danzel said as he turned his head down to see where to start first.


    But once he stared down on his table where the spear was.


    He saw how the orb of before, has now lightened in the form of an eye, which stared at him directly in his eyes.


    "Huh!?"<sub> </sub>


    Surprised by the huge eyeball, Danzel rose a step back and by reflex, he drew out his sword.


    But before he could do anything with his sword, the iris stretched and the orb glowed in crimson light.


    Soon the world around him started to be bloody red as if he was seeing in blood. The distance between him and the spear started to appear it was increased.


    His hate of the living seemed toe out and fill him with hate while a voice started to echo around him.


    "It''s all your fault! It''s all your fault!" A familiar female voice yelled in echoes. The same one that always med him.


    "You could even save me! Why didn''t you save me!" This time the echoes appeared of the male appeared who asked simr med him and asked him to be saved.


    Clutching his head with his hand to suppress the pain, Danzel heard a new voice.


    "You could even have done better." The voice was almost quiet yet at the same time the loudest among them all, taking Danzel''s focus away from the other two to focus on the male voice.


    This time, the owner of this voice was in front of him, his face seemingly hidden in some kind of fog. Danzel found this one, in particr, the most annoying.


    Not only did his voice feel familiar, but the illusion itself felt that it was someone he always knew and yet at the same time he never met. Also, out of all of those illusions, this one, in particr, talked the most.


    "Because of you-"


    "Enough!!!" Danzel yelled, stopping the illusion to finish his sentence.


    Raising his free hand, and doing a pulling motion, a dark green skeleton hand appeared and grabbed the neck of the illusion and dragged him towards him.


    Using his sword, Danzel swiftly swung his sword, taking the head of the illusion.


    Doing that, the world seemed to turn back to normal.


    [Resisted the Effect of Domination]


    Ignoring the floating window, Danzel''s head moved towards the spear in question.


    And without hesitating the slightest, he grabbed the orb with his hand and exerted a huge amount of strength, making the spear shake.


    Seeing that, the eye on the orb was surprised.


    It continues showering Danzel with the crimson light, but instead of letting go and sumbing to his domination, the strength of the hand only increased, making the Devil in the weapon start to fear the worse, making it give up putting up a fight.


    Hoping to seem like a harmless object.


    "You little piece of sh*t. You dare to mess up with my mind?" Danzel said releasing his killing intent.


    Now the spear itself started to shake abnormally on its own, its eyes looking aura the room in search of his master. s to no avail.


    At first, he wanted to escape from his master by mind controlling someone else to be finally free. It saw its opportunity with a new ck entity touching him.


    But it turns out it failed and was currently in immense danger.


    Now it only wanted to go back to its master and escape the hands of the ck entity.


    For Danzel''s part, he had a hard time suppressing the urge of destroying the spear.


    But after thinking for a bit, he shook his head.


    After all, it wasn''t his weapon, but Azrael''s, the one who entrusted him to make this spear stronger, not bring it back destroyed.


    "Tch, I guess I will have to do it." Danzel cursed before piercing the sword next to the spear''s orb on the stone table.


    "Hear me, Devil. Try anything funny and I promise you that I will destroy you."


    Letting go of the spear, Danzel pulled out 4 corpses that were still fresh out of the battlefield.


    Guiding his dead mana into the corpses to make them draugrs.


    ''Oversee my work, if I say so, attack this spear.'' Danzelmanded the undead.


    Thetter nod their head while moving their ethereal eyes into the eye of the orb.


    "Stop shaking, I won''t be able to finish otherwise." Danzel said with an ice-cold voice at the demonic weapon.


    Using [Rune Vision], turning the world colorless with no sound.


    Danzel run his finger on some of his old runes and started erasing them with his [Death Rune Removal]. Though he couldn''t erase the [Rune of Harvest] without damaging the spear, the other runes were quite easy to do so.


    Bloodthirster who felt the foreign run through his body and removed his strength, his eye started to shake in panic.


    The devil sought mind control and found a vessel for his cause after being freed from his master.


    Currently felt like an innocent maiden who was being stripped of her clothing in order to be vited!


    His fatey in the hands of the terrifying dark armored entity.

 Chapter 329 Loathing Towards The Ruling Class

    After hours of erasing and carving runes, he finally pulled his finger back from the Bloodthirster. Thetter showed not a single move, and the light that made out the eye waspletely gone.


    If he told anyone that this was a living weapon, the other party would have a hard time believing it as in its current state, the spear wasn''t showing any hints of its nature.


    ''Did I identally kill it?'' He thought internally.


    Knocking at the orb a few times and receiving no response, Danzel opened its description to see if he put this thing out of its misery or not.


    Taking a look, at first it seemed as if nothing changed with the description, but in the end, there was a line added.


    [Bloodthirster: The Cursed Spear]: ...It feels terrified of its second creator, Rue Danzel, and at the same time grateful for the power it received from him...


    "What the hell, now this thing considers me his creator?" Danzel said feeling quite weird.


    Before, only Azrael was considered its creator, but now the description titles him as one of the creators while also using his name.


    If he looked at it in another way, this thing considering a creator was like being its parent.


    He guessed that the description changed because Bloodthirster realized that the runes of its body were made by him and since he wasn''t there when the spear became alive, it couldn''t possibly know that I was the runesmith.


    In other words, this thing met both its parents and found how abusive one of them was!


    For Bloodthirster, it was torturous in erasing the runes of its body. If it could be described in a human''s anatomy, for it was like having one of his organs pulled out while still conscious.


    Of course, Danzel was oblivious of its pain and simply considered his work being like drawing tattoos on Bloodthirster.


    Sure, it might have hurt a bit, but ying dead was just the weapon of being a drama queen.


    At least that''s what he thought.


    Picking the Bloodthirster with one hand, Danzel gave it to one of his Draugrs.


    "Bring it back to a dark elve with gray skin color, while you other 3 watch over him in case he loses himself. You are allowed to kill him if he shows signs of resisting my orders."


    "Yes, my liege." The 4 draugrs bowed before leaving his room while carrying the living weapon.


    Watching them leave his room, Danzel sighed out loud.


    "Sigh~now, though I nned it to best since Vanessa didn''te, I have no other choice than to start with the Halbert."


    Bringing the huge halbert out of his storage ring, Danzel was about to start the process of carving runes, but soon enough a voice interrupted him.


    "That won''t be necessary."


    Hearing the familiar cold voice that most undead had, Danzel looked at the bald tattoed old man.


    "Master Velkir..? How did you manage to hide your presence?" He said somewhat annoyed.


    Sure, he might not be a 4th-tier, but he was the next best thing. His senses were incredibly sharp, at least those that an undead could possibly have.


    Not being able to sense the presence that was so close to him made him feel bitter from the inside.


    "Magic." Velkir answered, making Danzel''s ethereal eyes disappear for a brief moment.


    "I see..., What can I do for you?"


    "Mhm, I have several reasons, but first of them all, I have to thank you for the reward of those humans. I made good use of that gift of yours and Vanessas''s" Velkir said while making himself wee in his room.


    asionally gazing at the dozen of runed equipmentying to the ground.


    "There is no need for it. As long as you drained them dry from their wealth, that''s enough for me."


    "Hehehe, no need to worry about that." Velkir chuckled with a small grin on his face.


    "But my main reason foring is to bring you to discuss where the next battlefield of Deathfull Skulls will be."


    "By that, do you mean that the whole group will participate?" Danzel asked.


    Nodding his head, Velkir turned around and walked towards the door.


    "First of all, follow me. This matter is to be discussed among the whole group."


    Following him just as he said, they soon arrived in a muchrger room with seats made out of stone but carved to the level of the master and a round table.


    Inside the room, was the High Troll Sartan, the dark elve siblings Vanessa and Azrael withstly the exotic duo, Agares, and Shiro, seated respectively in their own seats that were made to be just in their size.


    "Took you long enough. We waited for a whole hour!" Vanessa said with annoyance.


    He simply shrugged his shoulder.


    How was he supposed to know that they were going to have a meeting if no one told him about it?<sub> </sub>


    Unbeknownst to him though, he was contacted by themunication device several times. But as he had it in his spatial storage ring, no messages were able to connect with it.


    And Velkir who saw that he was runesmithing, didn''t want to disturb him as he knew that there was nothing worse than someone wanting to talk to you mid-groundbreaking research.


    That, and he was also interested in witnessing how runesmithing worked.


    He was so absorbed by peaking at Danzel, that he forgot to notify the others that they would bete.


    Sadly for him, he didn''t understand anything about what Danzel was doing. All he got was the mana intensive was a time stronger while on other times weaker and the pattern of the rune.


    "Your seat is over there" Velkir pointed with his staff in a seat apposite the middle of the table.


    Nodding his head, the final two seated.


    Raising his hand, several magic circles appeared. Each of them with a different color.


    Velkir''s voice sounded as if he talked with three mouths at the same time, making it appear like he was mumbling to himself.


    The magic circle spread light around the room before the light became invisible to the naked eye.


    "That should be enough." Velkir said as he raised his staff and hit the ground, creating an echo.


    *Toouhhh!


    "From here forth, everything that is said here also stays. If anythinges out, be ready to forsake your life." Velkir said with an ice-cold voice, taking the others by surprise in his seriousness.


    "I will keep it short, we will participate in 2 more battlefields with the whole group."


    "The first battlefield will be in the borders of Arcana, and this time we will be the ones invading them. There will be a battlefield with tens of thousands of enemies of the main forces of Arcana. Our mission will be simple to ughter as many as we can."


    Hearing that, everyone else had different expressions.


    Sartan had a huge, ferocious smile on his face, Agares had a frown with Shiro trying to imitate him, Azrael with Danzel stayed mostly silent whereas Vanessa had a face that told that she was confused.


    "Excuse me, Boss! I can understand that it will be arge fight, but is that really noteworthy news for us to know?"


    Considering their group, except for Shiro, pretty much everyone could make it alive if they push their minds into it.


    Velkir also nodded in confirmation.


    "It is as you say. ording to the information, there will be not a single 5th-tier in their ranks. But the importance of this battlefield is right after it has ended." Velkir exined.


    "After wee out victorious, the human king of Ioratal will hold a ceremony, to reward the likes of us and those who brought forth great achievements in order to raise morale and give the new territory to those who achieved something. Apparently, the king is also going to execute some of their corrupted people and rece them with the "heroes"."


    "But that isn''t important." Velkir said


    "The main reason for the importance of this is the assassination of the human king."


    There was a small pause among them before their surprise was interrupted by a explosiveughter.


    "Muhahahahah! That''s more like it! Death Caller! I like it." Sartan said as he patted the round table with his hand with enough force to make it show several cracks.


    Seeing none acting up, Velkir continued.


    "My associated devised a n for this assassination and if everything goes as nned, we won''t have to act. When that happens, we will be expected to provide support in case something wrong happens. I will give you the details when it''s time."


    Though most of them were surprised, none said anything.


    Except for one.


    "Master Velkir, why does the king have to die? Did he do something bad?" Shiro asked while raising her hand like how a student would.


    Looking towards Agares and then back to Shiro, Velkir answered.


    "The king himself is doing his duties admirable by human standards. But there is someone far more..petent to take the throne."


    Hearing that, Danzel secretly remembered the existence of the other Lich and that he was called highness by the humans.


    ''Are they trying to overtake the Dynasty?'' Danzel secretly guessed before raising his hand.


    Seeing someone else want to speak, Velkir nodded to him to ask.


    "If that''s the case, what will our 2 battlefields be?"


    "More than a battlefield, it''s more like invading someone''s home." Velkir said while showing a smile.


    "The home in question is a tower that a magus residence in. A 5th-tier Magic caster, while also one of the ruling figures of the Arcana Kingdom"

 Chapter 330 Plans Of Mercenaries

    Hearing what the Lich in disguise just said, the atmosphere in the room became a decree colder than it was before.


    "Master Velkir, I disagree with this decision." Azrael said with a harsh tone, his eyes burning fiercely with mana.


    "And of what basic is you disagreement of?" Velkir said with his cold voice.


    "It''s off from the risk involved in that mission. Not only are we talking to face a Magus, but the main ruler of the Arcana kingdom. A 5th-tier who appeared amidst the highest of magic."


    "If we were to fight him somewhere out of the open, I wouldn''t have been disagreeing. But fighting him on his magic tower, a man with the resources of a whole kingdom? I simply don''t see the viability of that suicide mission. Someone like you, Master Velkir, should already know of this no?"


    Having his decision be questioned, Velkir didn''t feel much of anything and simply showed a small smile.


    "That''s indeed the case, Azrael. Fighting a magic caster on his territory is one of the stupidest things that someone could do. And considering who owns the ce that we will be raiding, it is understandable to question my decision."


    "In fact, I would even find it all the weirder if you haven''t done so. Fighting a 5th-tier inside a magic tower is close to impossible for us. Even someone of the same tier as the tower master will find it difficult to realize against the Magus."


    Sartan who was listening from the side, scoffed out aloud to show his disapproval of Velkir''s words.


    He found the word impossible to be some sort of challenge.


    Just like when he surpassed his own race and achieved what was said to be impossible. Killing the Magus and Conjuring his tower.


    A achievement worthy for a future king!


    Danzel in turn shook his head internally at Sartan.


    If Velkir and even Azrael say that it is impossible, then that was a matter of fact.


    The others were of the same opinion.


    While he noted this piece of information for the future, Velkir continued.


    "But that''s only the case if we enter the tower while the master is at home. As the day when we raid the magic toweres, I can confirm to everyone that the "Magus of the Tower", wouldn''t be pressed."


    Turning towards Azrael, Velkir''s nk eyes burned with gray mana.


    "If that were the case, will you still be in disagreement, Azrael?"


    "No, Master Velkir." Azrael said while closing his eyes and resting on his seat.


    Moving his gaze towards the frowning Agares, Velkir continued.


    "Our main mission in that tower will be of iming its core, in the worst possible scenario, destroying the core will also count as a sess, though with less profit..."


    "When the day arrives, we will split into two teams. Those who entered inside the tower toplete the mission and those who stay and hold off the armies of Arcana from interrupting the first team.


    "The first team who will be responsible for iming the core will be the following."


    Raising his staff, Velkir started to point at the member of the first team.


    "Agares and Vanessa."


    p "The members of the second team will be me, Azrael, Sartan, Danzel, and Shiro."</anda>


    "Velkir-!" Agares raised up from his seat, only to be interrupted by Velkir.


    "My decision has been decided, Agares. Among us, you two are strong enough to endure the arrays and traps of the magic tower. Where I and Azrael are at our strongest against the armies. Sartan is too unreliable to join you two." He said, receiving Sartan''s scoff.


    "As for Shiro, though she has talent, she is still a 3rd-tier with inexperience. For that reason, I will keep her on my side during the battle and guarantee her safety, unless you want her toe with you to the tower. Though I doubt you want that" Velkir said with a chilling voice.


    Making Agares sh*t up.


    He would love to stay outside beside his granddaughter and keep her safe just as he promised his daughter. But refusing to help at the tower might break the deal with Velkir. And considering that Shiro''s condition has been working, he couldn''t refuse.


    That, and he was also in debt to the staff.


    "I will do as you say..." Agares managed to say, with a voice that tell that he was unwilling.


    "As for Danzel...he should be able to endure to some certain extent the tower and unlike Shiro, he has fighting experience. If it weren''t for the fact that he is of the 3rd-tier, I would even send him to help you two."


    ''In other words, I will be looked after like Shiro because I am too weak...'' Danzel grumbled internally.


    He wouldn''t say that he had an overwhelming pride for his strength, as he would do anything to win and survive a fight. But being babysitted made even him feel bitter.


    "This is everything that I had to discuss with you."


    Tapping his staff to the floor and creating a small echo appear through the room, the magic barriers that were ced before crumpled and became visible before disappearing.


    "Our first fight will be in a few days, till then prepare and...rest ordingly."<sub> </sub>


    Rising up from his seat, Velkir left the room with the other soon to follow, including Danzel.


    Knowing that he had not much time left, he rushed to his rune to make some final judgments in his armor, in particr carving the [Rune of Intimidating Will] in his helmet and finishing the request of Sartan and Vanessa.


    Though for now, he decided to finish his armor first before carving out the other runes.


    ording to Velkir, the first fight didn''t sound as dangerous as the raid of the tower.


    If he was lucky, he could carve the [Rune of Intimidating Will] at the [Bad] quality.


    Not optimal, but far better than the other runes that he had carved on his helmet.


    "There is no time, I might as well start-"


    "Hey, Danzel! I heard that you called for me!" Vanessa said whileing into his room with overflowing enthusiasm.


    Seeing that, Danzel cursed internally.


    "I did indeed tell you brother to send you here..."


    ''A few hours ago.'' Danzel added in his head.


    "Does that mean that you can finally carve the runes?"


    Nodding his head, Vanessa''s purple eyes brightened up.


    "Great!"


    Throwing her cloak to the ground, revealing her almost naked body, her private parts covered by ck bandages that were in fact a artifact far stronger than some steel.


    Several ck bandages starteding under the already existing ones, but instead of them crawling on her skin, the bandages seemed to float around her whole body as if they were about to cover her whole.


    And Danzel expects to see what she once mention to happend of how this artifact covers her whole body and such.


    But what happend next came to be unexpected.


    The ck bandages seemingly floated to the air, instead of attaching to her skin, they started to fall to the ground as if the magic that kept them floating was canceling.


    Resulting in Vanessa''s whole body being exposed in front of Danzel.


    No hint of embarrassment and neither shiness was on her face, instead, she stood tall, prideful about showing her perfect body.


    "..."


    Danzel stared in silence at her before looking towards the artifact on the ground.


    His previous n of a few seconds ago waspletely out of the window.


    ''No all ns go ording to the n He sighed internally.


    ***


    At the same time, in the magic tower of the Magus.


    Inside a circr room with no windows in sight, brightened up only by artificial light.


    There were 3 different tforms with several small pulls of water.


    The lower the tform, the more pools were to be seen. A device that was able to project one whole body and voice from far distances using the water of the pool


    Marking those with political power and being titled as a Great Mage. The title is given only to the 3rd-tier magic casters.


    On the middle floor, only those who possess the title of an Archmage could be projected.


    And at the very top, the pools were made out of some kind of gold-like metal, containing crystal clear water where the rulers of Arcana would be projected. The 5th-tier magic caster, containing the title of Magus.


    But the master of the tower did not need to project himself in his own home.


    Currently standing at the top of the tform with his physical body, looking down on a single figure projected on the middle tform.


    The Magus of the Tower opened his mouth behind his mask.


    "Archmage of the mercenary organization, named Durendal, Nevvan. The Arcane is in need of your service at the borders."


    The pool that projected an old man with a long white beard and a staff in his hand, nodded his head.


    "As you wish, Magus of the Tower."

 Chapter 331 Warmongers

    Having a naked dark elveing to his room to take action on his promise, Danzel couldn''t just tell her that he will do it another time.


    Especially when she knew that the preparations were finished.


    Worst case scenario, he would have to stop at the realm of the dead and greet all the countless souls that sought to drag him into the dark waters.


    As unwilling as he was, he still sit down and carved the runes for dark elve going fullmando.


    But even then, he found it quite hard to carve the runes in their artifact of hers from the nature of its form.


    He eventually seeded in making the rune somewhat decent considering the hassle it was in nning the rune letters.


    Not only did it take him almost 8 hours to finish the damn thing, but the naked Vanessa stayed in his room and observed his work.


    As he wasn''t used to having someone else near him when he worked, he found it especially annoying. But after an hour, he learned to ignore her presence.


    When he was finished, he simply gave the still naked Vanessa her artifact withoutmenting on why she wasn''t wearing any clothes as he didn''t find a reason to do so.


    Be it clothes or armor, he simply considered them as protection. So he guessed that it was the same for humanoid species.


    Finishing with her, Danzel decided to finish with Sartan''s Halbert.


    The idea of improving any of his runes was thrown out of the window.


    At least he could rx and start carving runes in a lessplex item now.


    When he was done with it, Danzelmanded his 4 Draugrs to deliver the finished product before focusing on making some adjuments in his armor, such as adding on [Rune of Intimidating Will] on his helmet.


    Of course, the quality being of the lowest of the low, [Poor].


    As unsatisfying as he found leaving such a rune on his helmet, the most important armor piece, the fact was that this was the strongest rune that was focused on a helmet.


    Thest few days he decided that it was to move those bones of his and get out of his room.


    As every one of the Deathfull Skulls members was in the base except Velkir, it didn''t take him long to find his sparing partner.


    Him being Agares.


    Having previously promised to show him some moves, Danzel was sure to fully exploit the old man by sparing hours till the end.


    And despite fighting him for several hours, that damn old geezers were as tireless as him.


    And he was tireless!


    Literally.


    Also, despite reaching the limits of his race and the 3rd-tier, he was beaten effortlessly.


    Shiro who had nothing else to do except study the tomes that Velkir has given her, spend the rest of her time cheering at her grandpa to Danzel''s most annoyance.


    And just like that, as the days passed, the date of invading the Arcana arrived.


    The Lich who went missing through the days finally made his appearance back at the base.


    As soon he heard the news, Danzel went to fetch Skull w who was "guarding" the entrance back to the room they talked with the round table.


    With everyone pressed, looked at everyone to see if they were ready.


    Receiving a silent agreement from everyone, Velkir cast several barriers just as usual on the room, before taping his staff on the ground. The Array that was previously drawn on the floor, was activated, turning the shadows slowly to crawl and be 3 dimensional.


    "Don''t resist." He said with an ice-cold voice, mainly aimed at Skull w who looked at the shadows with anxiety.


    Danzel acted ordingly and gave her amand to resist the urge to resist.


    Soon enough, the array has been filled with a pool of shadows, the shadowsing out slowly crawling at their body and dragging them into the shadow pool.


    Once fully dragged down, the pool of shadows was closely on their end and another one opened in apletely different location. Slowly pushing the Deathfull Skulls group out of the pool.


    What awaited them outside were 5 kneeling dark-robed figures with ominous staffs.


    Looking around, though, was a whole army wearing the armor of the Ioratal Dynasty with a mix of people wearing all kinds of armor, far superior to amon knight.


    An impressive army for sure, but what Danzel found most interesting was the dark smoke surronding the whole army like a bubble.


    In the edges of the smoke were simr dark-robed figures, holding their ominous staff to the air and fulling mana in the smoke that surronded them.


    Their robes, though unimpressive looking, they held an incredible amount of mana, the same with the ominous staff. He couldn''t say for sure, but the equipment was of high quality for sure.


    But what Danzel paid attention to the most was their true nature.


    Just like him, import all and tireless undead.


    "We wee our liege." The 5 figures surrounding them said.


    "The array has been inefficient and the manifestation form was too slow, increasing the cost of mana on my end." Velkir said as he walked in front of the kneeling figures.


    "Despite all that, well done you lot."


    "We will work towards amending our mistakes."<sub> </sub>


    Nodding towards the undead, Velkir turned around to the group who stared silently.


    "Follow me."


    Doing as he said, the whole group followed him towards the edged of the dark smoke.


    A few hundred meters away from the dark smoke was a huge wall to be seen, stretching s kilometers far.


    "This will be our targets" Velkir dered to them.


    "Hehe, when will we go in boss?" Vanessa said while cracking her fingers.


    Sartan showed the same enthusiasm by cracking his neck and showing a huge smile.


    Before he could answer those questions, the elderly generally that they once met before in the forest of Gartera came riding on a brown horse towards them.


    "Great Archmage! I am d you arrived safely."


    "General..." Velkir said, acknowledging his existence, however, trivial it was.


    "I came to invite you to our strategic meeting with every other group to discuss a n for our troops. It will be a great honor to have you among our ranks." The old man said, ignoring Velkir''s opinion of him.


    Among the generals, he was chosen to go there and meet the necromancer whomanded the undead responsible for this mission even be possible for the simple reason that they meet once.


    Without the dark smoke surrounding their army, they would long be detected as the smoke makes them invisible from an outsider''s perspective while also hiding from detection spells and arrays.


    He just wanted to drag the old man capable of such terrifying magic and be done with it.


    Velkir though shook his head.


    "I refuse. Go tell those guys to prepare the troops to charge. Our group will make an opening for your army advantages."


    Hearing that, the general thought that he heard wrong, but once he saw Velkir turning around, he realized that he wasn''t joking.


    "Sir Archmage! Something like this-!"


    Before being able to finish his sentence, the horse that he was riding turned around and started running back at the army. Its eyes filled with crimson lights.


    "Ghhhhhhhh!"


    "Hey! Stop! Stupid horse~!"


    Seeing them go, Danzel turned to nce at Azrael before looking at Velkir.


    "Wouldn''t this cause a problem?"


    "Heh! Those guys simply want to discuss who the hero should be, the one to im glory and wealth. Among the elite troops, only around 20% of them are true soldiers of the 3rd-tier, the rest of them being like that noble you had to look after."


    "Their king told me to make it so that they don''t have many casualties. At most I will receive someints from those guys." Velkir said before ncing at Sartan and Vanessa.


    "Sertan, Vanessa. Open up a way for us." He said with a cold tone.


    "It will be done before you know it, boss!" Vanessa said.


    Sertan simply smiled and turned his head and pointed towards Danzel.


    "Death Caller, may I bring him with me?"


    "Hmm?"


    "Hmm?"


    Velkir and Danzel turned to look at Sartan in confusion.


    "May I know the reason for your request?" Velkir said, genuinely confused at Sartan''s will.


    "I want him to bear witness to my strength. I want him to see the strength of a future king, that holds a favor towards him!" He boasted with pride and an ear-tearing voice.


    Danzel wasn''t that impressed by his deration though.


    ''Is that supposed to be your way of assuring me that you will pay back what you made me work for?'' He thought to himself.


    Velkir looked at Sartan and then back at Danzel before nodding slowly and tapping his staff on Danzel''s shoulder, showering him with buffs.


    "Fine...but make sure he doesn''t die."


    "Of course! Come, my friend!" Sartan said at Danzel before walking towards the outside of the barrier followed by Vanessa.


    Smiling behind his armor, Danzel followed suit.


    Just a little more and he would be finished with the mission holding his growth. The sooner he joined the fray, the faster he will ascent to new power.


    Who knew how many he could kill if he waited for the army to join the ranks.


    Stepping out of the smoke barrier, they began walking towards the wall.

 Chapter 332 Warmongers (2)

    Danzel silently followed behind Sartan and at the side Vanessa. Wanting to know how to siege the wall.


    A few secondster, small echoes of voices could be heard from the walls. Suggesting that hiding their existence now was pointless.


    "Hmpf, took them long enough." Sartan scoffed, his muscles expanding and tensing up at the same time.


    "Let''s march!"


    His aura exploded, turning his surroundings to a boiling hot temperature and pushing the dust to the side.


    Kicking the ground and charging towards the wall, the other two followed suit at tremendous speed.


    Each of their steps left a footmark on the ground, except for Sartans.


    His footsteps left small craters, crashing even the stones to almost dust.


    As they got closer, many cloaked figures were to be seen on top of the walls. Some have a staff, orbs, and even magic gauntlets.


    ''Magic casters, and such arge amount...'' Danzel thought.


    The magic casters in question raised their respective weapons and pointed at them. Making Danzel have a bad feeling about this.


    "Hey! What''s the n!" He yelled at Sartan as he watched several magic circles and fire manifesting on the wall.


    "Hahaha! Isn''t it obvious!" Sartan burst intoughter.


    The fire-type spells which the magic casters were preparing were directly shot at the trio, making it seem like a tide of pure mes. The one in questioning directly their way.


    "Hey-!"


    "We are charging right through them!!!" He dered like a zealot.


    Vanessa in response chuckled to herself, whereas Danzel didn''t like this arrangement at all.


    "Dammit!!!"


    Bringing out his shield, he imminently activated the enchantment, making the eyes of the metal skull.


    With light barelying out of the skull, the sea of mes fell upon them.


    *BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM~


    A fuse of hundreds of explosions was acquired as if an air strike was dropped on them.


    The shock wave of the explosions traveled back to the army, where ck smoke rose into the air.


    But soon enough a humanoid figure charged through the smoke like a charging bull.


    His exposed muscle regenerated at tremendous speed, taking him not even a full second to bring him back to having skin.


    "You will need something better than to kill me!" Sartan yelled his voice creating shock waves that were felt back to the magic casters.


    "Use a different element! Kill him!" Amanding officer told the other magic caster who quickly went to work.


    Spikes made out reinforced stones risen up and impaled Sartan''s chest, and yet he didn''t stop.


    Air des attempted to cut him into pieces only to cause injuries of paper cut level.


    Ice magic attempt to immobilize or right of to make his body crumply, only to fail.


    Arcane magic to directly st him to oblivion barely wounded him.


    And even chaos magic, the most destructive magic that is known to man didn''t stop Sartan''s charge.


    His wounds would always regenerate, making any attempts of the magic caster seem useless.


    And once he reached the 200-meter mark, themanding officer started to sweat.


    "A-Activate the array! Hurry!"


    Following his orders, the magic casters did as he said.


    And in the next moment, several big magic circles appeared on the walls while rotating.


    Once they stopped spinning, the wall was engulfed with blue light, and the amount of mana focused on the wall reached dumbfounding level.


    And yet Sartan didn''t stop.


    He moved his hand in front.


    Seeing this motion, themanding officer paled as he realized what he was doing.


    "This crazy bastard! Is he out of his mind!? All of you! Stop him! Kill him! NOW!!!!"


    And yet it was toote.


    Like a charging train running through a house.


    Sartan broke through the wall and passed to the other side, leaving behind him the crumpling wall and dust.


    "Rooaaar!!


    Dering his presence on the soldiers who were waiting on the other side, he gripped his halberd with both hands and raised it up high.


    Suddenly, the halberd''s de glow with a crimson and fierce aura that red as if it sought destruction in its purest.


    "Bear witness!"


    And he swung.


    The fierce crimson aura spread like a huge shockwave, ripping the ground up and raising it to the ground, trapping the rumplings in the fierce.


    Essentially creating a granade that spread through the area.


    "Aggggh!"


    Screams of pain and despair filled Sartan''s ears.<sub> </sub>


    The result of this single attack was a waste of crushed corpses. It was as if a giant stepped down on mortals and rubbed his boots.


    Total destruction.


    The few lucky ones who managed to survive were shaken in fear but still picked up their weapons to fight the invaders.


    The smoke didn''t help them much, but they still charged at the troll.


    "Weaklings." He scoffed at them.


    Swinging his halbert, he cleaved the few who were courageous and stupid enough to face him.


    Seeing theirrades die by a casual swing of the troll, some of them abandoned the idea of dying by his monster.


    The smoke that Sartan made was now to their favor, as they made their escape away from preying eyes of hisrades.


    s, his fate was already decided.


    One of the soldiers who run was suddenly pierced through his heart from behind by a long sword.


    "Ahh~"


    The strength of his body quickly left his body.


    Bringing his hand on the de in a foolish attempt to remove the de, he simply brought himself more pain as his hand quickly cken.


    "N~No...I can''t die~!" He said with a weak voice.


    Forcing himself to look behind him, his eyes widen in fear upon the sight of a dark knight with misting out of his armor.


    "Pl-ease~I need to~ go back. I promised her-"


    Without letting him finish, Danzel dragged the sword up, opening his body while cutting a piece of the man''s throat.


    Falling like a puppet who had her strings cut, the soldier fell to the ground, his face filled with tears.


    Ignoring the corpse, Danzel nced at the wall where Vanessa was currently at.


    The screams of panic echoed everywhere up there.


    ''Such power...'' Danzel thought bitterly.


    In truth, once he saw the remark describing that he surpassed the 4th-tier, he consider himself the lowest of low of a 4th-tier.


    Low in the end, but still a 4th-tier.


    But that was him lying to himself.


    To inflict such destruction in such a short amount of time...


    Tightening his grip on his sword, he watched the lights representing the living.


    "If I don''t hurry, they will kill everyone before me."


    Before stepping forward, he infused dead mana in his sword and guided it towards the corpse of the knight.


    Turning him into a wield undead that he had no control of. Showing the greatest mercy that he could.


    "Aghhh~"


    Leaving the undead be, Danzel went to kill his next prey.


    Creating a ughter of his own.


    If Vanessa and Sartan were the meatgrinders of the battlefield, then he would be the silent reaper who imed the lives of those who run.


    While all this was happening, a few magic casters who wore faceless masks and were witnessing the chaos looked at each other before driving the metal staffs to the ground.


    Activating a warp portal to this location.


    One of them who was watching from the side and holding amunication device said with a voice.


    "We are in need of reinforcements. A group of 4th-tier broke through the wall."


    There was silence for a moment before themunication device responded.


    "Orders have been received, and the respective test experiments, A-14, T-98, and M-3AT with additional mutants will be sent in the first batch. "


    "But sir, those 4th-tiers are above the average of strength. And their appearance here is still unknown. Very highly there is a magic caster capable of teleportation among their ranks."


    "Those are the orders, discipline. Defend till the 2 patches out. That''s an order."


    Without waiting for an answer, the light of themunication crystal went out, implying that the signal was cut or the other party didn''t want to talk anymore.


    "Bastards...do they see this as an experiment sight for them to use?" The masked magic caster said as he nced at the portal showing silhouettes.


    And soon enough, those figures were leviathan up, bringing them into the battlefield.


    Out of the portal came out several humanoids that looked like a fusion of species going wrong, they were known as the arcana mutants. They were the majority of the troops.


    The other majority were their colleagues and fellow disciplines in the tower. The elite troops wearing a faceless masks.


    Thest that came out was special.


    First was a huge humanoid covered with ck feathers and arge tail of a fire lizard. His back was bent down and half of his face was covered in a metal te, blocking his mouth. In his tail was the number A-14.


    Next among the unique ones were22 an extremely tall humanoid figure at the height of 2,73 meters. her long hair made one guess that she was female together with the robes covering her. Out of her back though were a total of 6 spider-like legs that were almost twice high. She also wore a metal te on her mouth, there were the number T-98.


    And thest of them was the less mutant of them.


    A bulgy man that used 100x stronger steroids. He was of a height of 2.63 meters and also wore a metal te on his mouth. In his chest was the number M-3AT.


    The only unique part of him was that he wielded a huge long cleaver stained with blood.

 Chapter 333 Warmongers (3)

    Ignoring the small fries that he Sutter around, Sartan dashed further into the enemy lines.


    The soldiers of arcana tried to stop him from advancing by any means necessary, only to fail miserly and to be cut down by the massive halbert.


    The way he swung this weapon contained no art or mastery of the weapon, instead, it was used savagely only to cut down his enemies.


    Every attack that they threw at Sartan wasn''t blocked.


    Usually, doing as such was extremely foolish.


    But because of Sartan''s regeneration capabilities, such short of the eye for an eye tactic worked in his favor.


    The soldiers who were about to face such a thing couldn''t help but think of him as an immortal.


    Out of the crowd of soldiers, a total of 5 flew towards theing Sartan with extreme speed. Each of them wears a faceless mask with spears.


    "Hmm?" Sartan took notice of them.


    "Restrain this Mighty flow! [Arcane Suppression]!" Each of those masked figure said while pointing their free palm toward Sartan.


    In the next moment, a total of 5 magic circles appeared on Sartans limbs and neck.


    Sartan in result looked down at the magic circle in confusion.


    "Die! Immortal Juggernaut!" They said in unison, as they prated their mana imputed spears into his chest and one trying to prate his skull.


    Only for the magic circle on his left hand to break and caught the spears with ease.


    Seeing that, the one masked figure tried to pull his spear back by reflex. Securing his fate for you.


    Pulling the spear suddenly towards him, the masked man came to face in the face with Sartan.


    But the only thing that he saw next was red and ck.


    Sartan who opened his mouth wide closed his mouth, bit down half of the man''s head, and then chew, his tusk filled with blood.


    "Such a bad taste." He said while ncing at one of the masked figures.


    Seeing what happend to their colleagues, they decided to be wiser and let go of their spears to flee.


    But before they could, the other 4 magic circle broken.


    Raising his halbert and swinging it towards them, he directly cleaved through 3 of them, only one managing to distance himself.


    "Hahaha! Do you believe that you can escape me!?"


    Dashing at the escapee and leaving craters on the ground, it took him only 2 seconds to catch up with the masked figure.


    "Let me help you fly faster!" He said with a wide smile, his teeth and tusk stained with blood.


    Raising his leg and kicking the masked man with tremendous strength. The magic caster barely managed to generate a barrier around his body before feeling the leg hitting his guts.


    And then he was sent flying at 10 times the speed he flied before, his barrier broken into bits and all his internal being squeezed for good. Send flying towards the wall, once his body hit the wall, his bottom half was binned down where his other half was cut off and sent to the other side of the walls.


    At such terrifying sight, Sartan only showed a satisfied grin.


    The spears prating his body slowly went out of their own and once full out, they revealed no signs of any wounds.


    Though in the next moment, his chest was once again impaled by some huge insectoid legs, crashing his heart, lungs, kidneys, and liver.


    "Bwaagh!" Throwing up blood from his mouth, Sartan looked at the tall female who had 6 spider legs behind her back, 4 of them currently prating his body.


    The weird part of these all was that the parts of her body and clothes were transparent and slowly regaining color.


    Sartan''s eyes turned cold, his previous spread killing intent was now focused on that woman.


    Without showing any emotions in her eyes, she pulled the spider legs back and stepped back. But Sartan Halbert was faster, swinging and cutting the female''s head off.


    And yet her body still moved several meters away, standing on the ground with her spider legs.


    Seeing that, Sartan moved towards her decapitated head, and using his halbert to skewer the head, he brought the halbert close to his face and took a bite of the head.


    After chewing for a bit, Sartans spewed the squeezed remains to the ground.


    "B*tch...does every single of you taste like horse sh*t?"


    In the next moment, the huge holes in his chest closed up and all organs were regenerated to their peak state.


    ***


    Currently on top of one side of the walls.


    The magic casters were desperately trying to fight the enemy that was ughtering them.


    "What are you all doing!? Cast your spells at her!" Themanding officer yelled as he saw a humanoid figure covered with a ck bandage made of material that any metal he ever saw. Except for her long white hairing out of her head and those purple eyes, she was fully covered with this stuff!


    If it weren''t for her long hair and the curves of her body that couldn''t be hidden by the ck bandage, they wouldn''t have been able to identify her if she was a male or a female.


    But whether she was male or female didn''t matter to themanding officer now.


    He was thinking of how to get rid of her.


    The way she was moving was different from that of Sartan''s reckless style.


    Each of her movements had a goal and an end.<sub> </sub>


    Both the former andtter mainly focused on killing everyone in her sight. She moved like an acrobat while kicking and punching the magic caster to death.


    Any barrier conjured on them proved to be useless so far.


    Not only did any of the none physical elemental magic not harm her, but physical attacks also proved to be nothing to her. Mostly because she dodges them with ease.


    And he couldn''t order the usage ofrge area magic attacks to be used while she was among their ranks.


    All he could do was waste her time being here than anywhere else.


    He alreadymanded the other side of the wall to leave towards the backline of the army to regroup while they were here.


    ''Is this it?'' themanding officer thought internally as he saw the death''s scytheing closer to him.


    But then a huge shadow was cast down and soon after, a huge figurended behind themanding officer, crushing a few magic casters on hisnding.


    ''A mutant?'' Themanding officer thought as he saw 5 figures hover around the mutant behind him with ck feathers and a lizard''s tail.


    Realizing that reinforcements came, he celebrated.


    "Soldiers! Reinforcements of the Arcane came to our rescue! Now there is nothing to fear-"


    Before he knew it, the world froze in ce and slowly filled with ck liquids as he started to fall to the ground.


    More urately said, pieces of his body fell to the ground.


    The mutant hands now have talons stained with themanding officer''s blood.


    "Ghhhhhhh!!!!" The mutant known as A-14 screamed, behind the metal te of his mouth.


    His lizard tail swung violently and hit a few magic casters behind him out of the wall to fall before dashing towards Vanessa.


    Vanessa who saw all A-14 couldn''t help but said out loud.


    "Since when do chickens be sorge?"


    ****


    Back at the remains of Sartans destructive entrance.


    The smoke that Sartan raised was dissipating, making the disoriented soldiers start to recognize the hidden threat that he was.


    Since they couldn''t retreat with an immortal juggernaut rampaging behind them, they had to face the dark mist knight.


    But that was easier said than done.


    Danzel sword was merciless and swift, killing every attempt of fighting him.


    Making them change their tactics.


    They pointed their spears directly towards him and with their little mana, they activated the enchantments of their weapons to release a small mana shot.


    But even that was useless with the skull shield he had.


    Even the few that hit the target seemed to be ineffective.


    The few 3rd-tier warriors that were mixed tried to overwhelm them with numbers, but even they proved to be useless against him.


    In everyone''s mind, the dark mist knight was an existence that already reached the 4th-tier. A powerhouse they could never ovee.


    And amid despair, another problem showed from behind them.


    "Aghh!!!"


    Screams of pain were heard from those cowardly standing in the back.


    Turning their heads back, all they saw was a huge bulged man with a cleaver-like sword charging with a huge moment. Running over and crashing everyone in his path.


    Not only that, but he also swung the huge cleaver to cut the soldiers while he continued his charge.


    His speed was close to that of a train going at full speed, making the bulgy man close the distance towards the dark mist knight.


    Danzel who was focused on his killing spree reacted ordingly and pushed his shield between him and the charging man.


    But he underestimated the man''s strength.


    "Gaaaaah!!"


    Once the shield and the arm of the bulgy man-made contact, Danzel felt a huge amount of forceing from his shield.


    He was being pushed and his feet digging in the earth.


    And as he lost his footing, the bulgy man exerted more strength, sending Danzel flying.


    Falling and rolling a few times to the ground before catching himself.


    Though he didn''t waste his time rolling to the ground.


    With his cursed sword glowing in a dark green light, he swung his sword twice, releasing two [Soul Reaping Wind]''s at the bulgy man.


    And surprisingly, he didn''t bother dodging them and let them hit his chest.

 Chapter 334 Mighty Fireball

    The [Soul Reaping Wind]''s left tworge cuts on the mutant''s chest. His bloodshot eyes nced at the wound and then back at Danzel with enormous killing intent.


    In the next moment, a light yellow light surrounded the mutant, closing the wounds on its chest.


    Danzel who saw that, looked above to see 5 floating masked magic casters, wielding wooden staffs with two circr silver metals in the end.


    "Healing magic..." He mumbled as he alternated his gaze towards the furious mutant.


    ''This guy has created a strength that my-''


    Without letting him finish his thoughts, the mutant dashed with tremendous speed toward him.


    ''Its speed also looks equal to mine if not a bit higher, If that''s the case, then...''


    "I will have to start with the hard ones."


    Concentrating, the mist that he let out seemed to form into 3 balls of death mana around him.


    Without wasting any time, he sent the 3 [Curse of Five Bindings] towards the charging mutant. And as previously shown, it didn''t bother dodging at all. Letting the curses fall upon his body and reduce his stats by 3.3%. The decay part of the spell was hardly noticeable.


    Though Danzel wasn''t relying on this spell to do actual damage.


    "Let me see your strength now." Danzel said as he charged with both [Shield Charge] and [Swift Movements].


    Once theye close enough, the mutant named M3-AT raised its cleaver sword with both hands and swung it at Danzel.


    Danzel in turn raised his shield to block with [Undying Guard] guard active. But before the sword and shield met each other, Danzel activated the rune in his helmet.


    The dead man in the rune was instantly waved across everyone in Danzel''s sight, inflicting the [Fear] status effect.


    Further reducing the mutants attributes.


    Then the sh came.


    *Tiiing!


    Receiving the swing, Danzel''s feet dug slightly down the ground.


    ''Heavy! But~!''


    Using the opportunity of the mutant using both his hand, Danzel thrust his sword, piercing the middle of his throat and then dragging the cursed sword to the right, essentially cutting half of his throat


    "Gaaaah!" A beast-like growl came out of the mutant''s mouth, his eyes bloodshot. Realizing one of his hands, he created a fist bustling with veins before swinging the fist towards the dark mist knight.


    Seeing that, Danzel didn''t panic and activate the mark of [Mortal Reminder].


    Creating an image that pierced his heart.


    Feeling his heart being prated, the mutant head and eyes darted to the side to see another ethereal dark green copy of the dark mist knight without any helmet. Pushing a sword deeper and deeper.


    Changing his target, he swung the free hand behind him, hitting the ethereal image of Danzel using the back of his hand. Destroying ethereal image in half, but that wasn''t the end.


    In the next moment, the hand of the ethereal image had its gauntlet disappear and fly to grab the mutant''s wrist.


    Pulling in the other direction, M3-AT was forced to adjust its position, leaving a gap for Danzel to move behind him.


    Facing his back, Danzel swung twice his sword, leavingrge wounds on his back before stepping back and creating distance.


    ''This thing isn''t that intelligent and doesn''t seem to know how to fight. Other than its strength and speed being greater than mine, I have the advantage.''


    The magic caster also knew of the current situation is unfavorable for M3-AT. But that would have been if he was alone.


    Pointing their staffs at M3-AT, several light yellow lights washed over his body. And the bleeding of his back stopped, while the flesh of M3-AT''s neck started to regenerate and the bleeding started to weaken per second.


    "So annoying." Danzel cursed under his helmet.


    Pointing his cursed sword casually at M3-AT, a crimson magic circle appeared on the tip of the sword.


    "Let blood flow, [Bleed Verocity]"


    The crimson magic circle glowed intensely and in the next moment, a huge amount of blood was pulled and spilled from M3-AT wounds, making the work of the jackas*ses in the air useless.


    For the next 3 seconds before the bleeding stopped once more and M3-AT neck fully recovered.


    ''So much about of [Siphoning Soul de] making healing less effective.'' Danzelined internally.


    Unaware that the magic casters had to use 3 times the amount of mana to heal M3-AT wounds.


    "I guess I will have to kill him in one go." Danzel said as he brought out 2 other [Curse of Five Bindings].


    "Gaaaaah!


    Shooting out the two curses, Danzel brought out a spear from his storage ring.


    Gripping it with the hand that wore the shield, Danzel pierced the ground and this time waited for M3-AT toe at him.


    And once M3-AT came close with the built-up momentum, Danzel started his spell.


    "[Wall of Bones]!"


    With a wave of death mana escaping from his feet and going through the ground, Danzel was leviathan up high from the appearance of many bones seemingly glued together to form a wall.


    M3-AT already built his momentum and crashed through the wall as if it was nothing. Falling in Danzel''s trap.


    Having used the spear to keep himself from losing his footing, Danzel was capable of jumping forward and bending his body in a way that let him swing his sword right on top of M3-AT.


    "Give me your head." He said with an ice-cold voice as he swung his cursed sword at his neck.


    But the moment his sword started cutting the mutant''s flesh, a light yellow light appeared in M3-AT''s body. Making his whole body harder.


    Through this sudden change, Danzel failed to take the head of M3-AT, only managing to leave arge cut on the neck.


    "Gaaaegghhh!" M3-AT screamed, halting his step and swinging his cleaver sword at Danzel with all his strength.


    Danzel being mid-air currently could only push the shield in front of the cleaver sword to save himself.


    Though sessful, he was sent flying 3 times the force before.<sub> </sub>


    This time though, his being rolled through the ground was stopped by the sudden appearance of a stone wall behind him, making him crash at the wall.


    "Huh?" Confused, Danzel looked at the only people capable of magic.


    Looking at the 5 masked magic casters and three of them building a magic circle containing arge amount of mana, Danzel knew that he had to get away.


    Raising and trying to get away from his position, he was soon halted by the appearance of a golden magic circle under one of his legs, pierced by many needles made out of light.


    The needles of light didn''t seem to damage him the slightest, but they rooted him in ce.


    "Light magic?" He thought as he tried shing the needles of light, only for his sword to pass through the needles.


    "[Pyrost]"


    "[Pyrost]"


    "[Pyrost]"


    The finished magic circle lightens up in fierce mes before sending 3 huge fireballs with intense heat toward Danzel.


    Seeing that, Danzel pushed his shield forward and activated its enchantment.


    The eyes of the skull lighten up in dark green light.


    "[Stone Wal-]"


    The ground rose to create a stone wall, but it was toote.


    The 3 balls of intense mes washed over Danzel''s body, creating a huge explosion.


    *Baaaahm! Baaaahm! Baaaahm!


    M3-AT in turn copsed to the ground, but his body still twitched from time to time.


    The masked magic caster watched the spot where they cast their fire spell before focusing back at M3-AT.


    "The experiment is still alive. Quickly cast light magic. And bring the new of sessful experiment back to" Before he could finish his sentence though, something at incredible speed came flying towards him.


    Noticing, but unable to react, his head was blown off. Leaving the 4 others frozen in ce.


    And watching the item that blew their fellowrade''s head off falling to the ground, it turned out to be...arge stone.


    Turning their heads towards where they cast [Pyrost], there was the culprit.


    Being in a throwing position, the dark mist knight had molten metal fall off his armor and to the ground. mes still raging on top of his armor.


    "-Restoraction]." Danzel mumbled as he stared at the 4 remaining magic casters.


    "Still 4 to go..."


    Picking his sword that he pierce in the ground, he slowly walked forward, [Armor of Vengeances] eating the mes raging on his armor and storing the umted damage in his chest and armor.


    The masked magic caster, though shocked, they didn''t lose their cool.


    They quickly went and cast their healing magic on M3-AT. Thetter slowly raised up his feet, his gaze always glued to Danzel.


    Danzel used once more [Necromatic Restoraction] to restore his body before casting his spells towards the mutant who was slowly rising.


    "[Curse of Chaining Fatigue]"


    "[Curse of Primordial Decay]"


    "[Bleed Verocity]"


    Ethereal chains bound the mutants leg, the chains were as if they were being pulled from someone underground, and generally, his body felt much heavier and each action required more energy. Making M3-At grind his teeth.


    His body also started to feel a constant pain that started to increase by the second. It was bearable noticeable, but the longer itsted, the more pain and decay happened in his body.


    From the wound of his neck came arge amount of blood before being fully recovered.


    And yet M3-AT gaze hasn''t changed.


    "Gaaaaaah!


    Using his hand to push off the ground, the mutant dashed like a beast at Danzel. His killing intent being inordinately high,


    Butpared to Danzel, it was nothing.


    Once M3-AT swung down his cleaver using one hand, a huge amount of killing intent came out of Danzel. But that didn''t stop his swing.


    Danzel blocked the swing just like before, but this time using [Sin of Wrath] to empower himself. But even then, M3-AT strength was greater than his.


    Not by much though.


    M3-AT who learned from his mistake before used his now free hand to punch at Danzel with his tremendous strength.


    Danzel watched all this happening with a cold gaze.


    ''Better, but not good enough'' He thought as he drove his cursed sword in the M3-AT loket [1], forcing his punch to stop.


    Seeing that happening, M3-AT drew back his cleaver sword to swing once more at the hand that hold the cursed sword.


    It learned that the right weapon was to block and the left weapon to attack. An ability that the "others" like him didn''t have. The ability to learn.


    Though even that ability was very wed.


    Danzel put his shield in his storage ring, essentially leaving his left side open. But as the mutant was raising the cleaver sword, he had enough time to act.


    With his free hand creating sparks, Danzel grabbed M3-AT face.


    "Burn." Danzel said in a cold tone.


    And in the next moment, Danzel''s mighty "fireball" lighten M3-AT face in mes, burning his eyes in the process.


    [1]: I mean the other side of the elbow, where doctors usually draw blood from you. I wasn''t sure how it was called but my best guess is loket.

 Chapter 335 Reunion

    The mes conjured by Danzel, though weren''t strong enough to burn M3-At skin with his enormous endurance, they were still enough to scorch his eyes and make the mutant blind.


    "Gaaaaaghhh!" Screaming out of anger, the raised cleaver sword swung down like a guillotine, while several lights appeared at the cleaver, increasing its lethality.


    The magic caster knew that now without his shield and his sword currently upied, dodging the attack would be impossible at such close range. Bringing their focus to empowering the M3-AT attack instead of supporting him.


    But Danzel nned ahead of time for this exact situation.


    ''Activate!'' He thought internally, releasing the umted damage inside of himself towards the outside. Creating a shock wave from death energy all around him.


    Once the shock wave made contact with M3-AT, the mutant felt as if a huge wall appeared and pushed him back. In fact, the force was so strong that it forcibly pushed the mutant back, and fall to the ground with few ck spots on his body.


    Such effect was only possible after withstanding the [Pyrost] and the sea of mes outside the walls. Though thanks to his shield, he blocked most of both, the damage was enough to create a shock lethal enough to finish 2nd-tiers.


    All the result of his [Armor of Vengeances] skill.


    Not only did he damage his open, defended against an attack, and even created some distance. Danzel felt the pressure building up on him.


    "I got to kill him now." He mumbled before dashing towards M3-AT.


    He had used most of his trump cards already.


    While [Armor of Vengeances] required him to take damage, [Mortal Reminder] had a certain cooldown. That was also the case with [Grasp of Undying],pared to [Mortal Reminder] though, it had a much shorter cooldown.


    Making it the only skill that helped him control his enemies.


    If M3-At manages to recover, the situation will quickly turn disadvantageous for him.


    The magic caster in turn had to prevent him from doing exactly that.


    Their win condition was M3-AT, and once he was dead, they would be forced to retreat.


    As they specialized in light magic, their lethality was also limited. And since their strongest offensive tier 3 spell, [Pyrost] didn''t do much against the dark mist knight. Their options were limited.


    "Quick! Halt his movements. I recover the subject!"


    Pointing their staffs at Danzel, several magic circle appeared under Danzel and in front of him.


    ''I won''t fall for the same trick.'' Danzel said internally as he moved around the magic circle.


    While all this was happening, his cursed sword was glowing in a dark green light.


    His gazended on the one whomanded the magic casters, Danzel swung his sword three times while running. Releasing 3 [Soul Reaping Wind]''s at the magic caster.


    Taking notice of that, he broke his focus on the healing spell and flew to the side to dodge the dark green air des.


    And at that moment, Danzel closed his hand, making an ethereal skeleton hand appear under the magic caster''s foot and grabbing it.


    Without being able to react, the magic caster was pulled down from the position he was in before.


    A pain like any other appeared around his foot, but the magic caster didn''t have the time to care for the pain.


    "Tch! [Briliant Barrier]!"


    Before being cut down by the air des, a wall made of light appeared in front of him. Managing to block the first two [Soul Reaping Wind]''s. Though letting the final one break through the barrier and cutting his body.


    "Aghhhh!" Screaming in pain, arge cut appeared through his chest, revealing a huge wound behind his cut robe.


    But seeing that no XP notification appear in front of him, Danzel knew that this guy wasn''t dead.


    ''It''s good enough.''


    Bringing out his shield and raising his sword, he started casting.


    "[Innate Blood Absorbtion]."


    A short crimson glow appeared in his cursed sword before disappearing once more.


    Getting closer to M3-AT who was standing back and swinging his sword left and right randomly, Danzel crushed his chest by ramming him with his shield through the chest.


    Even if its senses were great, while being under the influence of the [Mist Presence], he was practically invisible in front of a blind brute.


    Moving behind him like an engrossing mist, Danzel raised his sword and shed down while using [Heavy Strike].


    Leaving arge cut on his back.


    "Gaaah!"


    The mutant swung his cleaver sword behind him, only to hit nothing but air.


    Danzel next did the same, but this time swinging at his arm,pletely severing it. Making the M3-AT cleaver fall to the ground.


    "For someone who has a metal te on his mouth, he screams too much." he said with a cold tone, before repeating the same thing on the other hand.


    Making the mutant armless and rageful kicking around him.


    Having enough of that nuisance, he finally drove the cursed sword into his Skull, making M3-AT freeze.


    Danzel though quickly moved back and observed the mutant who froze in doubt.<sub> </sub>


    And as expected, M3-At jumped in the direction where he was a moment ago with incredible force.


    "I have dealt with enough of you to understand that even after death, you don''tpletely stop moving." Danzel said as he looked at the 4 magic casters who started fleeing the scene.


    "So they decided to retreat, huh?" He mumbled as he forcefully deactivated [Sin of Wrath].


    Before starting at his surroundings.


    Though much further away than before, he could still see soldiers running to the back, something that surprised him.


    ''Have they decided to risk passing through Sartan that to stay and fight me?''


    Having still hundred of people to kill, Danzel felt pressured.


    But as he was about to dash forward, he suddenly heard voicesing from behind.


    Taking a look back, he saw the army of Ioratal entering through the hole that Sartan created. And most who came first were of the 3rd-tier.


    Seeing that, Danzel lowered his sword in regret.


    ''If this brute hadn''t appeared, I might even reach the mission''s requirement, but now it seems hopeless.''


    "Disappointed, my discipline?" Velkir said after creeping through the shadows and raising up behind Danzel.


    "..."


    Moving in front of Danzel, Velkir looked at the twitching M3-AT.


    "Hmm, that sure is something newing from the arcana kingdom, but an abomination is still an abomination. A mix of failures put together in order to achieve sess. I still fail to understand why they continue supporting this kind of magic branch." Velkir said while shaking his head.


    "Though letting such corpse rot here seems like a waste. Do you mind if I take the corpse, my discipline?"


    "I don''t mind...in the first ce, I didn''t n on taking it with me. At best I can create a slightly bigger Draugr with my current skills" Danzel said while shrugging his shoulders.


    His gaze is full of regret as he watched his "allies" killing the enemy.


    "I understand your point, but such a mindset with being like us is quite wrong. We are beings that don''t say "we don''t have the skills", but instead "we will have the skills". Not being able to use the corpse now doesn''t mean that you can''t use it in the future." Velkir said while walking towards M3-AT.


    Gripping his head with his hand, the mutant froze and then fell to the ground motionless. And in a sh, the corpse together with his cut-off arms disappeared.


    "Although I said that I still hold your words in keeping the corpse. No, takebacks."


    "..."


    Resisting the urge to call the damn Lich shameless. A sudden wave of cold air passed towards their side. Taking the attention of both undead towards the battlefield in front of them.


    What they saw were 4 huge ice pirs several meters wide.


    Inside the pirs were frozen soldiers of Ioratal, most of them being nobles young who managed to reach the 3rd-tier while the others were themon soldiers mixed in their army.


    Though Danzel couldn''t tell, the temperature around the battlefield started the decrease by arge amount and it still continued to drop.


    And suddenly, the ice pirs started to show signs of breaking.


    Danzel watched the ice pirs as if he was mesmerized by a spell.


    It was as if the world started to slow down, allowing him to observe how the cracks started to spread through the ice.


    "T-This is..." Danzel said, his grip on his sword bing much greater.


    And in the next moment, the ice pirs are broken into thousands pieces in an instance. Spreading a cold wave through their surrounding, generating snow all around the ce.


    "It seems like they decided to send an Archmage this time around." Velkir said as he stared at the middle of where the 4 ice pirs were.


    Following his gaze, Danzel saw a lone figure floating through the air.


    When he saw who the lone figure was, his ethereal eyes red up with intense light.


    Though he wore another robe.


    Wielded another staff


    Danzel could never forget the face and beard of that lone figure


    Unconsciously, [Sin of Wrath] was activated, his hate of the living reaching his peak. Making Danzel generate a killing intent that shocked even Velkir himself.


    "Hey, what`s the matter-"


    "YOU!!!"


    Screaming with a voice that brought chills down the nearby soldiers of Ioratal. Danzel kicked the ground and movent at extremely high speed, leaving the surprised Velkir behind.


    As he marched towards the who was responsible for his first death and opening the beginning of unfortunate events.


    Danzel only thought in mind was to kill that very person.

 Chapter 336 Reunion (2)

    "Move!"


    Danzel thunderous voice spread through the surroundings. Making everyone around him aware of his humongous killing intent.


    The soldiers of ioratal knowing what was best for them, moved to the side while the Arcana soldiers couldn''t do the same.


    "Stop him!"


    The arcana soldiers quickly made a wall of spears to face the dark mist knight. Their spear gathers mana and shoots it outwards.


    Danzel though pushed forward regardless of their realization.


    The attack did nothing to Danzel''s shield and the few that hit his armor only blew away the dark ttings. Which were soon regenerated back to normal.


    "Kill him!"


    Thrusting their spears towards him, they soon learned how pathetic their realization was.


    The spears that hit his shield had the shaft broken were those that hit his armor had the spear point itself break. Making them shocked.


    Those of the former were the most unfortunate ones as Danzel pushed them to the side with the force of a charging train, surely breaking a few bones if not causing internal damage.


    It was the perfect opportunity to finish them off, but Danzel let them live. As his target was in the air in front of him.


    He quickly passed through the soldiers and killed a few of them, progressing his mission.


    But the mission wasn''t in his mind.


    The only thing was to kill that old fart in the air.


    Soon he reached where Sartan was battling something that had no legs or head. Only the chest of a woman with her hands and 6rge spider legsing out of her back.


    Sartan''s surroundings were filled with destruction and spider webs.


    Noticing the killing intent radiating from Danzel, Sartan looked at him with a huge smile.


    "Hahaha! Did youe to experience some action in the front, ck Armor?"


    Ignoring the High Troll, he passed through the area like a wrathful gale.


    Sartan in turn frowned as he observed the focus of his killing intent.


    "Hey! Where you going-"


    Before he could finish, a wave of spider web spread all over himself. And in his throat was pierced by one of the spider legs of the previous female.


    Turning his attention to the thing in front of him, Sartan simply grabbed the spider leg and crashed it to the point it was caught off.


    Dragging the spider leg out of his throat and leaving his regeneration to take ce, Sartan looked towards the previous female as it started regenerating the cut of the spider leg.


    "B*tch! You dare interrupt me after going easy on you!?"


    Danzel didn''t stay long to see the oue of Sartan''s rage.


    He pushed further.


    And as he reached a certain distance away from his target in the air, he began to act.


    p "[Stone Wall]!"</anda>


    With his mana creeping into the earth, a wall made of stone started to rise.


    Jumping at the risen wall, Danzel used his [High Jump] skill and jumped into the air while his cursed de lighten in ck green light.


    shing through the air three times, three separate [Soul Reaping Wind]''s were towards the Archmage in the air.


    The one in question quickly took notice of the three air des.


    "That''s some impressive killing intent that you got there." The Archmage, going by the name of Nevvan said as he pointed his staff towards the air des.


    "[Shards of Primary Protection]" The archmage cast, his staff letting out mana.


    The mana moved at a quick pace all around him, creating a total of 3yers of almost transparent ss, looking extremely fragile.


    But once the [Soul Reaping Wind]''s made contract with theyered protection, the wind de got destroyed just like one of theyers. Thetter broke like ss, but clearly, its defensive capabilities were at the top.


    Having dealt with the threat, Nevvan watched confused at the dark mist knight.


    "At this rate, he will fall."


    But at that moment, the Archmage saw a brief image of a dark green tform manifesting under Danzel''s feet.


    Kicking the mana arms he manifested and using once again [High Jump] Danzel reached the same level that Nevvan.


    Having long raised his de, Danzel swung down like a demon who aimed to cut the heaves.


    The target in question watched all that with a little surprise.


    Before the de met his body, he was engulfed in a sh of light, disappearing and reappearing on the ground, looking up at his previous location.


    ''Teleportation magic!?'' Danzel shouted internally as he watched below him.


    "Hmm, quite fast for a 3rd-tier. Also being capable to breakyers of [Shards of Primary Protection]...if I am not wrong, you are Abdiel the cruel." Nevvan mumbled as he raised his staff, making the falling nearby snow halt mid-air.


    "Considering your killing intent, quite the fitting name. s, you overestimated yourself."<sub> </sub>


    Putting his mana into the show in the air, they started to turn into needles of ice, rotating in a circle before releasing it all at once.


    Being in the air, Danzel cursed out loud as he pushed his shield forward before he was washed by a wave of ice needles.


    The side of his armor and his leggings were prated with some scratching his bones.


    Falling like an anvil to the ground, the smoke was raised while the force of his fall traveled nearby.


    With his ethereal eyes ring up, Danzel sends another wave of [Soul Reaping Wind]''s while running towards the Archmage.


    Though the result was the same.


    The ssyered barrier appeared and blocked his long ranged attacks.


    In response, Nevvan raised his hand and created a light blue magic circle. The which let out the breath of the winter. A wave of air that was over -100 temperature.


    Making the stuck ice needles in Danzel''s armor to spread the coldness both on the outside and on his insides.


    But seeing no response from the dark mist knight, Nevvan frowned.


    "Cold resistances? If not immunity?" The Archmage mumbled as he tapped his staff on the ground, teleporting away from Danzel''s range.


    Making thetter frustrated.


    ''Letting things continue the way they are, I won''t even be able to reach him. I will have to find a way to prevent his teleportation magic.''


    Danzel tried to think of a solution but came up with none.


    Facing someone who could fly, though annoying, it was still possible as he could predict or manipte his enemy to fly in the direction he wanted.


    But teleportation at this level waspletely different.


    His openness could simply disappear and create distance in an instant.


    Making that as far as Nevvan had mana, he would be unstoppable.


    ''In other words, I will have to bleed him to death Danzel thought as he pointed his sword toward the Archmage.


    With the mist of his body raising and changing into [Curse of Primordial Decay], he let the curse lose.


    "A curse this time? It seems quite powerful at that too..." Nevvan said as he pointed his staff at the iing mist.


    "[Rays of Dominion Light]"


    With a muchrge golden circle appearing in front of the archmage, the magic circle let out rays of light, which slowly purged through the curse,pletely destroying the curse.


    ''A spell that negates curses? No, it''s more like damaging the curse before itnds on his opponent. It took more than 3 seconds topletely destroy the curse, so I should be right...I think'' Danzel analyzed his opponent''s spell.


    But even if he knew what he was capable of, that didn''t change the fact that one path of victory was cut almost for good.


    To be fair, it took a total of 3 seconds to erase a curse is quite a long time frame, but considering that curses flew quite slow to their targets, he would have to be near the Archmage to cast it if he had any hope to curse him.


    But then the question came was of why to curse him when he would be close enough to sh at him.


    s, the generated ice spears being created by Nevvan made him push all those though to the side.


    "I will kill you!" Danzel shouted as he dashed forward.


    ''And for that, I got to stop his teleportation.''


    The ice spears hovering around Nevvan were shot out, half as many as before but also three times bigger.


    Using his sword, Danzel cut through a few of the ice spears while also dodging most of them, the few remaining was blocked by his shield.


    And once he reached him again and saw the Archmage raising his staff to tap the ground, Danzel closed the hand that wore the shield.


    Bringing out an ethereal skeleton hand that grabbed the old man''s neck and dragged him towards him, more urately said towards the path of the cursed de.


    Raising eyes in surprise, the old man watched how the cursed de came for his neck.


    But before the cursed de came in contact with the mortal flesh, a sound of breaking was to be heard.


    And Danzel''s cursed de was deflected as if he hit some extremely hard.


    Danzel ethereal dark green eyes red up as he watched as the thinyer of mana surrounded the old man before disappearing.


    He was reminded of the spell of [Shards of Primary Protection] that Nevvan used before. An almost transparent barrier, which seemed to block any attack before breaking apart.


    Pushing those thoughts, he tried to swing once more, but the Archmage teleported away just like before.


    ''I missed my chance now, but now I confirmed that as long as I damage him, he wouldn''t be able to teleport away.'' Danzel thought as he dashed towards the Archmage.


    At least that''s what he wanted to do before he found that he was unable to move his legs.


    "Huh?" Confused looked down to see the reason for his immobility.


    What he saw there was dark blue ice spreading on the ground to his legs slowly but continuously.


    "To think that the likes of you dare to face the likes of me..." Nevvan said as he slowly walked towards Danzel.


    Watching how slowly the ice spread through Danzel''s legs.

 Chapter 337 Reunion (3)

    Not only did the ice spread aiming from his torso, but it only expanded.


    Exerting strength in his leg, Danzel broke the ice and step forward, only for the ice to spread to elerate to the ground.


    Every time he manages to break through the ice, the area he damaged will grow twice as fast as before. Like a bacteria that grew more the more you hurt it.


    "It''s useless. This kind of ice will continue to grow stronger till the target has been fully engulfed. Unless you cut the frozen part or meet your death, they are no other ways of removing my spell."


    "You!!!" Raising his sword and swinging it towards the Archmage, the 3 [Soul Reaping Wind]''s were shot.


    s, with Nevvan''syers barrier, the result was the same as before.


    "Do think that I have to deal with the likes of you stubborn people. Just wait to be an ice sculpture for me to break." He said with a hint of arrogance.


    Further fueling Danzel''s hatred towards him.


    "Do you really think that some mere ice can stop me? Once I am out, I will raise my sword, pierce through heart, torture you mortal soul and raise your body as the lowest of the undead." Danzel said, his voice filled with spite.


    Each step brought him closer to Nevvan, but at the same time strengthen the ice, making each of his movements much harder to execute.


    And after a few seconds, Danzel found himself unable to move his legs as the ice in his feet broke his bones.


    Looking down, Danzel stared at how the ice spread his torso and made its way towards his head.


    "For someone that still hasn''t reached the 4th-tier, I have to say that you did better than most people of your strength."


    Stroking his long beard before caressing his throat, a frown showed up on his aged face.


    "At least you were capable of reaching me and harming me. That spell of yours contained mana that I have never seen before. I notice the traits of death and life in your mana aptitude, a rarebination, but not unheard of. But this kind of magic...care to tell me what you call it before you freeze?" Nevvan said as he stopped a few meters away from Danzel.


    "Heed my words, the one who is going to im you''re pathetic life, will be me." Danzel said as his hands started freezing, the ice in his chest already expanding.


    "Remember my words, I will never forget what you have ever done to me"


    As the ice was creeping into his helmet, a sudden wave of bloodlust was spread, so strong that surprised Nevvan and made the other nearby people peek anxious and nced at the dark knight.


    "You hear me! I will kill you! MAGIC CASTER!!!~"


    He yelled before being engulfed in a block of ice.


    Nevvan in turn silently stared at him.


    Thest shout of Danzel made Nevvan frown.


    Not because he felt threatened, but because those words and this killing intent felt familiar.


    "Mhm, maybe the years are catching up with me. I better go and help the others now."


    Tapping his staff to the ground, the block of ice that engulfed Danzel showed some cracks which continuously began to increase, albeit slowly.


    "Crumple and take that grudge with you." Nevvan said as he waited for the block of ice to grumble together with the frozen dark knight.


    But at this exact moment, something unusual happend.


    The ice suddenly became much darker and from all the cracks bits of dead mana came out as if the ice was preventing an explosion from going outwards.


    Making Nevvan frown.


    And the exact thing happend 3 seconds after, with the quality of death mana being much greater than before. Resulting in the cracks bing much bigger.


    "Is he actually..." Nevvan mumbled, his staff mana letting out mana.


    And after another 3 seconds, the cracks lighten in dark light before an explosion of dead mana broke the ice into bits letting the wrathful dark knight out of its prison.


    Stepping out of the ice, Danzel dashed towards Nevvan with his sword raised up.


    But before Nevvan could cast his magic and Danzel swing his sword, the dark knight fell to his knees before copsing to the ground,yingpletely motionless.


    Seeing that, Nevvan couldn''t help but get surprised.


    "It seems like I underestimated you, but even after breaking through, death decided to im you. Quite ironic for a disgusting necromancer like you." He said while casting a spell to confirm if the dark knight was dead or not.


    "Hmm, it seems like he has some kind of item that resistance information search type spells. But even then, he is undoubtedly dead."


    Walking past the corpse of the dark knight, raised his staff, casting a silent spell. Which created several mirrors of ice, all of them showing a different image of this battlefield.


    After eliminating the useless ones, he let 4 remain.


    One of them, show a distorted image that didn''t make any sense.<sub> </sub>


    "Hmm, someone is tempering with the spell." He mumbled as he gazed at the other 3.


    1 of them was an image of looking down the sky, gazing upon the whole battlefield, while the other 2 were of two powerful beings.


    One of them was a white-haired woman standing in front of a burned-to-the-crisp mutant with a tail while the other was a huge troll that cleaved through the soldiers of Arcana with ease.


    "The Immortal Juggernaut and the cken Maiden, huh? Meaning that the member of Deathfull Skulls is participating here...I guess retreat is unavoidable." He said while stroking his beard.


    "Not before you die."


    An ice-cold voice came from behind him.


    Making the Archmage turn around while channeling mana into his staff.


    The cursed sword of Danzel was swung down to his neck.


    Unfortunately, a multyered barrier appeared before the cursed de managed to greet Nevvan''s flesh.


    Though the swing of his sword managed to break one of the transparentyers while cracking thest one slightly.


    Using his [Shield Charge], he bashed the secondyer, absorbing all the force of his attack before breaking.


    Following up by thrusting his sword, piercing theyer, and stopping halfway through.


    Nevvan, in turn, stepped back in, and using his free hand, he generated a huge ice spear in a blink of an eye before sending it flying and prating Danzel''s chest, all that while he cast his teleportation spell.


    Distancing himself from the revived dark knight.


    "This bastard! I was sure that he died." Nevvan cursed as he looked at the spear prating the dark knight''s chest having no effect.


    ''That confirms my suspicion. He neither bleeds nor feels any pain. Most likely an undead...a Wight maybe? He could also be a Bane Walker considering his unique mana aptitude.''


    ''Still, someone of the 3rd-tier managed to actually break through [Shards of Primary Protection]? Also, the fact that he came back after dying is worrying some.''


    Danzel in turn cursed internally of missing his only winning chance.


    If this surprise attack didn''t manage to cut it, then nothing else would.


    ''If only I had an instant damaging skill just like [Grasp of the Undying], I could still cling into the hope to win, but now I am too weak to face him''


    The Archmage gave him many chances to turn the fight around because he looked down on him. But he doubted that he would the same mistake twice.


    Even getting close was hopeless as the barrier was too strong for him to break with the addition of his teleportation magic.


    ''For now, I should retreat and call it a win from the information I gained. Just knowing that the spell [Shards of Primary Protection] breaks after one attack of whoever its power scale, his dark ice, and the curse purging light is enough.''


    All his reasons told him to run, but the hatred guing his mind tried, again and again, to convince him to fight to the death and kill the source of his hatred.


    Making him lose precision seconds that Nevvan wasn''t going to miss.


    Teleporting to the air and generating a winter storm through the surroundings and creates several ice spears. He went and let loose the rain of ice spears upon Danzel.


    Pushing his hatred to the side forcefully, he dashed away from the winter storm while blocking and shing the ice spears and he almost seded if it wasn''t for a huge and sturdy ice wall blocking his path.


    Having no other choice, he stood his ground while watching carefully to dodge any ice spears that had dark ice. He was even willing to let a few of the normal ones pierce his armor.


    And his caution did iee to show its fruit as he watched how a dark ice spear wasing directly towards him.


    Knowing the effects of the dark ice, Danzel dodged to the side and let the dark ice spear pierce the ground behind him.


    s, he should have been much more cautious against someone who reached the 4th-tier.


    The dark ice spear in question suddenly began growing towards Danzel in the form of a hand.


    Being pressured by the rain of ice spears, Danzel, albeit noticed the growth of the dark ice, he noticed toote.


    The dark ice barely touched Danzel''s gauntlet, before breaking.


    But even this slightest touch was enough of Danzel to act swiftly.


    He stored his shield in his storage ring and swiftly cut off his own arm once the rain of spears stopped and he judged the spread was about to reach his shoulder.


    *Ting!


    With his whole left arm falling off to the ground, revealing how hollow it was, Nevvan came down from the air.


    "A filthy undead, as expected."

 Chapter 338 History Repeating Itself

    Watching the Archmage descend, Danzel looked at his surroundings.


    His killing intent, albeit still there, the wrath that fuelled his strength, for the better or the worse, has gone dormant.


    In turn, deactivated the [Sin of Wrath] talent, decreasing his strength and the bloodlust he let out.


    ''No! Don''t shut down at times like this!'' Danzel cursed internally, but all he could me was himself.


    Before he was overtaken by the raw nature of the undead, letting his feelings influence his actions unconsciously. Or rather, he knew he was influenced by it, but he still let himself get in this mess, thinking that he had a chance against a 4th-tier magic caster.


    Something that he regrets and wished to punch his past self for being in this mess.


    But once Danzel''s true nature came out, his race''s raw nature was overshadowed by his true nature.


    Which was the drive to live and survive.


    It was something so fundamental and yet his obsession with this was much stronger than any others.


    So having his [Sin of Wrath] talent turn off could only be med on him and him alone.


    ''I got to escape from here! Master Velkir and the others aren''t that far! As long as I regroup with them, they should be able to deal with this magic caster! I will have another chance! All I have to do is to escape!''


    "All I have to do is to live!" Danzel yelled out loud while spreading an incredible amount of mana into the ground. So much that it made his mind start hurting.


    Nevvan who reached the ground took quick notice of the foreign mana in the ground and simply started levitating back to the air.


    In the next moment, the ground itself started to tremble as if an earthquake was going to happen. But Danzel had no such ability to create earthquakes.


    But what he could do was raise the ground.


    As soon as the temples started appearing, the ground started to raise up like smalls hills before the earth and concrete sand exploded to the side, revealing 5 circr stone poles that rose up, 2 of which aimed to cross each other right at Nevvan''s position, potentially crushing him to bits.


    But of course, something so predictable and slow was dodged by simply flying a few meters to the side.


    Danzel n though wasn''t to kill him with that.


    If it was, he wouldn''t have forcefully risen the 3 other pirs at seemingly random positions. In the first ce, Danzel had to alter the spell and in a way split the proportions of the original earth wall to make those pirs. Resulting in casting 2 [Stone Wall] at the same time.


    All for to activate the enchantment of his cursed sword.


    Suddenly, the concrete sand that was in the air and near the pirs started to rise up into the air and create a bubble around the magic caster. Raining him with the concrete sand and most importantly, blocking his vision.


    For the slimmer of hope that he couldn''t teleport to the location, he couldn''t see. After all, Velkir, the lich that lived who knows how many centuries old had also in need of exterior help to teleport in ces he couldn''t see. If not he at least needed a certain amount of time.


    Though it wouldn''t take even 2 seconds for the magic caster to leave the globe of concrete sand, considering the distance he could cross in mere seconds, it was worth the mana usage and mental pain.


    s, his hopes were soon crushed as a sh of light appeared not far away from him. The sh of light revealed to be the magic caster.


    He barely distances himself 35 meters from his previous location and the magic caster was already in front of him.


    And he could only continue running forward as this was his escape.


    "I had enough of your game. Now die, for good." Nevvan said as he created arge number of normal ice spears floating behind him before releasing them at bullet speed.


    Gritting his teeth, he halted and swung down his cursed sword at one of the iing ice spears, destroying itpletely and swinging at the next spear.


    Next after next, Danzel started cutting through the spears with extreme precision. Compared to the other ice spears he face before, those were muchrge in scale, making them inherit slower. But more importantly, more lethal.


    Essentially being rooted in the position he was, it was a matter of time when Danzel would mess up. And sadly for him, this time came sooner thanter.


    Among thest barrage, 3 ice spears came at the same time in all different locations. Danzel managed to quickly cut through the first and then guide his sword to destroy the second spear. But the third ice spear that was aiming for his right knee was far too apart to destroypared to the others.


    Making the spear prate his knee and directly cut half of his leg, resulting in him losing bnce and almost having his helmet prated by thest shots of the ice spears. Luckily, that spear only brushed through his helmet, creating few sparks, leaving few scratches, and taking the ck tings before falling to the ground.


    Being on his remaining knee while supporting himself with his sword, Danzel stared at his missing leg.<sub> </sub>


    ''Nothing has changed!'' Danzel screamed internally as memories of the past started to flood his mind.


    Memories of him supporting himself in a tree, desperately trying to run away for his life, only to be blown away and kneeling to the ground just like now.


    He also remembered how hundred of arms engulfed in dark waters were reaching out to him, souls trying to drag him in and potentially lose him in the endless darkness or a fate much worse than he could even imagine.


    Although his fear of the Realm of the Dead has lessened through the years, that didn''t mean that it waspletely gone.


    "I wasted enough time with an insult of magic just like you. It''s time to end this." Nevvan said as he slowly walked towards him.


    Hearing those words, Danzel''s ethereal eyes burn much greater than before.


    "I will live on! Regardless of the cost!" Danzel yelled while releasing his killing intent.


    Raising to one of his feet with the support of his sword, he nced at the magic caster in hate before raising his cursed sword infused by his mana.


    And Danzel started swinging, releasing [Soul Reaping Wind]''s


    "Ahhhhhhhhh!"


    And he didn''t stop at his usual limit of 3.


    He continued swinging and creating the 4th, resulting in an abuse of mana falling on his hand, making him feel like his hand was being boiled.


    And that feeling only grew stronger at the 5th, creating small cracks in his bones.


    But on the 6th one, the cracks opened up and pieces of his arm started to be dust in an instant, making Danzel fall once more to the ground.


    Each of the 6 [Soul Reaping Wind]''s traveled and cut down the earth as they traveled towards the Archmage.


    Nevvan seeing the ominous winds deing in his way didn''t even try to dodge. He simply raised his staff and cast his spell in a whisper.


    In the next moment,yer afteryer of transparent barriers started to appear, stopping at the 6, the exact number of the ominous wind des.


    And as proven in their fight, each [Soul Reaping Wind] only managed to destroy a singleyer. Once each wind de made contact with the barrier, ss-like sounds started to fill the area as theyers started to break one by one.


    Completely blocking Danzel''s desperatest attempt to inflict some damage to the magic caster.


    And yet Danzel still hasn''t given up.


    He tried to raise up, but with only one leg and hand, thetter which barely had the strength to grab his sword, he kept falling down no matter what he did.


    "N-Nothing has changed..." Danzel kept mumbling to himself.


    "You wasted enough of my time, undead." Nevvan said he got closer to Danzel while realizing a huge amount of mana.


    Turning his head towards the magic caster, Danzel''s ice-cold voice came out filled with hate.


    "I swear, I swear upon my existence. Even in death, I will wait for your mortal soul to go into "that" ce. When the dayes, I will personally drag you in and reap your soul apart." Danzel said, his voice growing cold by the second.


    "I have no need for the rambling of an undead. Even more of an undead who is about to cease existing." Nevvan said as pointed his staff towards Danzel. Aiming for his skull.


    As about the spell was going to be released and destroy the undead known as Rue Danzel.


    A loud howl echoed through the battlefield.


    Paying no heed to the howl, Nevvan released a much more powerful version of the magic missile.


    And as it traveled towards Danzel''s head, a sudden shadow appeared behind Danzel.


    And in a blink of an eye, the stronger magic missile was cut into 4 parts, the mana in the spell dissipating to the surroundings.


    All Danzel could see was a reversed curved de being held an aged hand from the side of his eye.

 Chapter 339 Coming To The Rescue

    Seeing the reversed curved sword, the identity of the sword wield was obvious.


    ''Agares!'' Danzel''s ethereal eyes red in surprise as he saw the old man with his exotic clothes standing behind him.


    But that wasn''t for long enough.


    Stepping forward with speed at least twice as Danzel, Agares held his reaper sword with both of his hands as he closed the distance between the Archmage in a blink of an eye.


    ''Fast...'' Nevvan thought in surprise, but he did not panic.


    Pointing his staff on Agares, he started preparing his spell.


    "[Shards of Primary Protection]"


    Three transparentyers of barriers began forming just as Agares appeared in front of him.


    "Agares! Eachyerpletely blocks an attack and breaks afterward!" Danzel shouted from the back.


    "Is that so?" Agares said indifferent as he spread his mana into his sword. His mana looks like hot concentrated steam.


    "If that''s the case..." Halting in front of the barrier, he raised his sword.


    "Sword art~"


    The steam-like mana in his sword suddenly spread throughout his body and left his body like ovepping mirror images, each wielding Agares that was more of an Odachi than his reaper sword.


    It was as if the mirror images held a reflection of his sword.


    "~of the Reversed Demon." Agares finally send, creating a total of 6 mirror images that swung from a different angles but all started at the same starting point.


    "[Shards of Primary Protection]!!!" Nevvan quickly abandoned his counterattack spell and cast anotheryer of protection.


    For the next instance, all of theyers are to be instantly shattered like ss.


    All the mirror images went back to Agare''s body.


    But the original body had yet to swing.


    And with all theyers of protection broken, there was nothing stopping him to get a piece of the Archmage.


    Thoroughly shocked, Nevvan stepped back to create as much distance as he could before the reaping dee to him.


    ''So [Shards of Primary Protection] wouldn''t work against him. At least I finished my teleportation spell. After I create some distance, I will be able to study his strength and weakness.'' The Archmage though, as he activated his teleportation spell.


    But just before the spell was about to activate, an ethereal skeleton hand grasped his throat and dragged him forward, dying his spell.


    "What!?"


    With eyes widened up, Nevvan could see how the undead he was about to kill had his remaining hand closed and pointing at his position.


    Releasing what was going on, Nevvan''s blood pressure rose out of the audacity of what the undead did.


    "You-!!!"


    Without being able to finish, Agares''s sword came down and shed down around the neck to his waist.


    A short light appeared around Nevvan, showing signs of a protection enchantment activating, but even with that, the reaper sword cut through the barrier and his ropes till it reached his flesh. Leaving an extremelyrge wound that spewed blood none stop.


    "Agggghhhhh! Activate!" Yelling in pain, Nevvan''s body was engulfed with light before disappeared and reappeared in the air.


    "You mere! lowly! UNDEAD! Do you have any idea who you are dealing with!?" Nevvan yelled, his body releasing a seemingly endless amount of mana.


    With one hand on his wound glowing in yellow light, signs of healing magic, and his other holding his staff up high, a huge magic circle appeared above him.


    "I will take my defeat! But not before I destroy you insult of magic! May the hand of the old frozen fall upon this world! [Edge of Nilfheim]!"


    The magic circle that was turning around suddenly stopped before the magic circle was covered in aplete ice te. That was when the true spell began manifesting.


    From the middle of the ice te, the ice started toe out, expanding by the second and bing so big that it cast a shadow through the battlefield.


    Many thought that a cloud blocked the sun, but once they looked up in the air, every one of both armies had a pale face with cold sweat running down their backs.


    As what they saw was a meteor-sized ice block falling down from the air.


    "R-Run!!!" one of the soldiers yelled at top of his lungs


    s, the one who was in the center of the falling ice block was currently unable to do as such.


    Using his cursed sword as support, Danzel tried to get out of the way, but through his hurrying, he fell to the ground.


    He turned to see where Agares was and after using [Eyes of the Damned] he found out that he has somehow gone up to the air and chased the magic caster.


    ''I have to go out of its impact range!''


    He tried to hurry and move away, resulting in him falling face forward to the ground.


    The world seemed to freeze around Danzel.


    He watched how the shadow was expanding around the area.<sub> </sub>


    "How did this happend?" Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Though he said that, he knew exactly how those events happend. Being influenced by his hatred and his race natures, it forcibly activating [Sin of Wrath] creates a snowball effect that led him in losing himself in hatred.


    Usually, when he forcefully activated [Sin of Wrath], he would only adapt to the hate of his race natures, that being the hate of the living. With enough practice, Danzel was capable to keep his rationality with little to no influence on his mind.


    But when all three reached the extreme levels and Danzel himself gave in, it result in this exact following of events.


    It would have been much easier to just ask for Velkir''s assistance or for the other group to kill the Archmage in question.


    And yet he rushed in hopes to get revenge.


    "I am such an idiot..." Danzel finally said as he tried to stand up once more, but was struggling to do so.


    He even used the enchantment of his armor to generate the ck sand but notpletely harden to the dark ttings. Instead, he used his sword''s enchantment to push the dark sand to lift himself even so slightly.


    He moved like a limping man who was beaten.


    He didn''t know how much time he had, but considering that he started hearing the sound of wind being pushed, he guessed that the ice block wasn''t much far away from the ground.


    Near the point of losing hope, Danzel felt a being connected to himing toward him.


    Turning his head slightly, he saw how a massive skeleton wolf with three ethereal eyes running at top speed while howling in the air towards him.


    "Gaooooof!"


    It took him barely a few seconds for the death hound to reach him and circle around him while making whimpering noise, actions that Danzel took as its way of showing his worry towards him.


    "Why did youe Skull w..." Danzel mumbled in confusion.


    His confusion was justified as he never ordered Skull w toe if even to fight on this battlefield. Skull w being here means that she willingly chose toe so far on the battlefield.


    "Wgaaaaf! She howled enthusiastically


    That alone made him grin to himself (as much as a skeleton could grin).


    "Well done, Skull w." Danzel said as he pulled his sword out of the ground and pierced one of therge ribs of Skull w.


    "[Necromatic Restoraction]"


    Casting the undead healing spell on Skull w, the cracks of the damaged rib closed down. But as Danzel''s sword was still stuck in the rib, the regeneration failed to happen. Resulting in his sword essentially being stuck firmly.


    Pulling himself up using his strength and resting his arm on the cursed de, Danzel yelled out loud.


    "Run Skull w! Run!!!"


    "Gwaaaoooooh!"


    Howling through the blocked sky, her three ethereal eyes red up as she began dashing away from the impact range of the ice block falling down the sky.


    Her ws left marks on the ground, while parts of her body became ethereal for the sole purpose of receiving less air resistance. All that while using the [Chase] skill. Making it not easy for Danzel who was hanging for his dear life on the side.


    The surroundings grew only darker and darker.


    Once Danzel raised his head to look at the ice block that was only 40 meters away from crushing to the ground and looking at the distance that they had to cross, Danzel''s ethereal eyes red up.


    ''Consider her speed and distance we will have to cross. The ice block will fall sooner than we getting away!''


    Danzel tried to think of some kind of solution and only once the ice block reached the 15-meter mark before it crashed did Danzele up with something.


    "Skull w!!! Prepare to jump and turn to the left when I tell you so! That''s amand!" Danzel shouted, receiving a confused howl from the death hound.


    Looking up and seeing that the ice block reached the 10-meter mark, Danzel looked at his sword.


    "Don''t fail me now. You are supposed to be a sword of an emperor..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    And once the block of ice reached the 8-meter mark, Danzel gave the signal.


    "Now!!!"


    Doing as hemanded, Skull w jumped and turned sideways.


    ''Activate!'' Danzel shouted out loud to activate his skill, even if it wasn''t needed.


    The magical damage that umted inside of him was soon released and turned into a shockwave of death that pushed everyone nearby.


    While Danzel wouldn''t receive the knockback effect of the [Armor of Vengeances] skill, others like Skull w could.


    The shockwave pushed against Skull w''s body, her being in the air not only increased the knockback effect, but being sideways, she was sent flying towards the other side of the impact range of the ice block.


    And as Danzel cursed sword was stuck on her ribs, Danzel was dragged with her.


    "MAKE IT!!!!" Danzel yelled.


    And shortly afterward, the ice block fell to the ground, creating a cold shockwave that traveled through the whole battlefield.

 Chapter 340 A Promise

    As the sun looked down on the battlefield, out of all reasons, it started to snow down in the exact battlefield.


    The ground itself was covered with a thinnyer of ice and even the walls were the same. The temperature itself was cold enough to keep the ice from melting from the rays of sunlight.


    And the source of all that coldness on the battlefield.


    In arge crater,rge pieces of ice were on top of each other, as if a small mountain fell from the air down to the earth.


    Once that piece of ice block fell, the shockwaves were so powerful that destroyed several internal organs of the 2nd-tier soldiers who reacted too slowly. Those too close were directly sent flying to fall who knows where.


    The smarter bunch fell down to the ground and covered their head, resulting in the shockwave passing above them while protecting their heads from any potentially broken ice pieces. Albeit that was the minority of them all.


    Those of the 3rd-tier strength had strong enough bodies to survive the shockwave, though not without damage.


    The frost that spread through the area didn''t help them much as most had almost their entire body frostbitten. Sealing the fate of those who were in a critical condition.


    Resulting in a thousand casualties from both sides.


    Proving that the power of a 4th-tier could be a natural disaster itself.


    Some even call them walking cmities from the seer power they held.


    [Edge of Nilfheim] was no normal spell it was one of the strongest ice-based spells that existed in the 4th-tier.


    Not only is the falling ice block like throwing a whole castle at one''s enemy, but the cold that it spread was not normal.


    The ice that covered everyone in ice contained a certain attribute that lowered the target''s resistance against the ice element, while the shown that fell on the area empowered ice magic. In a single spell, the caster would deal devastating damage to his enemy, debuff those who survived, and buff himself in the process.


    Albeit it had a high mana consumption, it was a multitasking tool.


    Although Nevvan said that he wanted to kill Danzel for sure, he wasn''t that petty to use such a grand of magic to eliminate one single undead.


    Most of the reason being was that he decided to abandon this part of thend. And as the Arcana''s kingdom''s soldiers were bound to die at the hands of the Deathfull Skulls, he might as well clear everyone up.


    Normally he wouldn''t result in such action, but with a necromancer of the 4th-tier being in the area, Nevvan refused to let those people be the cursed beings known as undead. s, he could only do so much for them.


    If the enemy decided to search for the corpses covered in ice, then their bing undead was bound to happen.


    Looking down at where the ice block fell, Nevvan teleported away just as he was about to be cut in pieces by Agares.


    "Let''s hope that [Edge of Nilfheim] got that filthy undead."


    Looking towards Agares who was falling and yet had still his gaze at him, he frowned.


    "I will remember your face. And make sure that the next time we meet will be yourst."


    Creating 2 magic circles, one on top of him and one below him, they started spinning before engulfing him in light, disappearing from his location and appearing somewhere far away from here.


    Seeing the magic caster escaping, Agares shook his head.


    ''Typical magic casters.''


    Looking down, Agares didn''t show a hint of panic even though he was falling from over 100 meters up high.


    In order to get to the Archmage previously, he jumped up from the ground and used the falling ice block to run up in the air.


    Although he could maneuver around the air, it was extremely limited. Compared to a magic caster [Fly] spell mobility, it was a bad match.


    He essentially used the same technique that Danzel was using. Creating tforms for himself to step up. The only difference was that Danzel was using his mana arms and he was directly using his swordsmanship.


    Soon enough, Agare''s feet dodged the remains of the ice block.


    Butpared to what one would expect, his fall was as light as a feather. Even the sound of stepping on the ice was able to be heard.


    "So that''s the level of magic that little Shiro will probably wield in the future, huh?" Agares said while wearing a bitter smile.


    Just the imagination of his granddaughter yelling spells out loud, summoning meteors, and creating explosions made him quite worried.


    Such thoughtssted only for a short moment before Agares went into the most important stuff.


    "Did Danzel manage to escape?"


    ''I remember seeing the undead wolf rushing towards him at the end. But the question is, did they make it outside impact radius?'' Agares thought as he closed his eyes.


    In his mind, the whole started to slow down to almost stoppletely.<sub> </sub>


    His senses quickly spread through the surroundings and picked up every presence location.


    Be it from Ioratal Dynasty or the Arcana kingdom, corpse or not, nothing escaped Agare''s sense. At least that''s what he believed.


    He frowned while his eyes were still shut.


    "He isn''t here..." Agares mumbled to himself.


    Of course, the one to who he was referring was none other than Danzel.


    He further expanded the range of his sense in case he was somewhere buried, but even that didn''t help him find him.


    That was when he started to fear for the worse.


    ''No, Danzel shouldn''t have died. Even if he was destroyed, it takes a while for undead like him to have their bodies turn into dust.''


    Going with that thought in mind, Agares started to search for something different. That were Danzel items. Although it was almost twice as hard for him to do as such and he could only faintly see the silhouettes of the item in question.


    Agares knew the shape and the length of Danzel''s sword. But most importantly, their sword of his would show up in an ominously ck aura.


    Doing exactly as such, he soon saw a silhouette with an ominous ck aura stuck in a block of ice far away.


    Opening his eyes and gazing towards the way where the sword was stuck.


    Agares, speed up till he came to see the lone sword stuck into the ice.


    "If his sword is here, then he must also be here." Agares said as he closed his eyes once more, trying to see through the different presence, though this time he focused only near him.


    And among the many presences, Agares could feel a certain small ck mist and something muchrge having almost a nonexistent presence.


    Moving towards the crumpled ice where the two presences were, he needed but a single swing to carve arge cut through the ice.


    And what he saw there was the undead wolf being almost ethereal and Danzel''s armor letting out the dark mist.


    "Agares? Did the magic caster leave?" Danzel asked while holding his shield quite unstably. Mostly because his remaining arm has missing pieces and he himself is low on mana. Even now he was barely fulling his [Mist Presence] with mana to hide in the ice.


    In Skull w''s case, even if she was full of almost full of mana, forcing her to keep [Temporarly Ethereal Body] active drained her mana by the second.


    All for not being caught by anyone, especially by the magic caster.


    With their bodies broken down, their fighting potential was at its lowest.


    Skull w herself lost arge piece of her ribs and front right hand when she blocked the flying broken ice pieces.


    "He left just about when that huge ice piece fell."


    Nodding at him, Danzel put his shield in his storage ring and brought out a spear to support himself. He additionally brought out two mana arms to support himself up. In Skull w''s case, though awkward, she too managed to get out of the hole they hid in.


    Coming to Agares''s level, Danzel looked at him for a brief second before passing him to get his sword.


    Drawing the cursed sword out of the ice, Danzel said.


    "Thanks for saving me Agares...I will not forget it."


    Though Danzel''s tone was cold, he was sincere in those words.


    Thanks to him, he avoided the worst possible scenario that there was.


    His death.


    "It''s nothingpared to what I owe you." Agares said with a frown.


    Turning to face Agares, Danzel''s cold voice came out.


    "I didn''t mean. Making those "kinds" of items is nothingpared to what you did. And that, I will not forget." Danzel promised Agares.


    And just as Skull w finally manage toe out of the hole, a sudden shadow was cast on top of Danzel.


    Wearing a dark brown cloak with worn-out bandages covering his mouth, Velkir cast a certain spell on Danzel that started to recover his body and mana.


    "Mission aplished, we are going back."

 Chapter 341 Covering Ones Weakness

    Once the Lich came to deliver the news, did Danzel hit that he missed one of his best opportunities to actually finish his mission.


    Not only did a vast amount of people die from the magic caster dropping an ice mountain on top of them, but now Velkir himself intervened in the "clean up" of this whole mess.


    The deal he had was to not let too many people of the dynasty die here.But with how many died and are currently injured, Velkir took matters into his own hands.


    And that is by summoning an army of undead to annihte the remaining soldiers and magic caster of the arcana kingdom. Robbing Danzel off his opportunity to evolve.


    Albeit, he was very much aware that he was at fault.


    Also considering the damage that his body and armor had suffered, he gave up on cutting the few that are still alive.


    It didn''t even take half an hour for the dynasty side to shout out the victory and for the whole crew to regroup on where the previous camp was. Where there was Azrael with Shiro already waiting for them.


    When they regrouped, the most noticeable thing was Sartan bringing an amputated, headless body that hadrge and broken spider legs in the back, twitching from time to time.


    Except for Agares getting angry at the High Troll for terrifying his granddaughter, nothing else exceptional happend.


    Velkir epted Sartan''s "gift" and let some of his undead carry that, to even Danzel''s surprised, still living mutant body.


    Other than that, several humans came to ask Velkir to join their conversation, though Velkir tantly refused.


    Watching the faces of the supposed generals of noble blood distort while making threats at the century-old Lich that could annihte was enough to make Danzel grin to himself.


    After the confirmation of annihting the whole enemy troops, Velkir went ahead with some others of the Dynasty to literally destroy the walls of the bourders.


    With the array of the walls manually shut down by Velkir, the wall became nothing more than a block of stone in front of the assault of 3rd-tier and even a 4th-tier magic caster.


    As the wall was on the border of the Arcana kingdom, support was bound toe and retake this piece ofnd. Not only that, but this ce was another hotspot for the kingdom of Berum to attack. Making it essentially impossible for the Dynasty to hold this territory on their own.


    And it never was nned to take over this piece ofnd for themself. As it was far too away from their territory and for the previously mentioned reason. It simply wasn''t worth it to hold unto the territory.


    Though Danzel didn''t know what the higher-ups of the Dynasty were nning, he thought that they had some kind of "if I can''t have it, neither can you!" kind of mindset.


    It was essentially stealing the candy from someone before throwing the exact candy into the mud and leaving it for the ants to eat.


    He quickly gave up trying to understand the politics of those mortal beings.


    Instead, he let himself consider what he lost and what to do going forward.


    And as they had to escort the dynasty army back to their kingdom, he couldn''t much of anything else other than stare at his status window.


    Sitting alone inside the carriage, with Azrael looking at the skeleton horses in the drives seat and Vanessa sitting on top of the carriage roof.


    Looking at his armor, Danzel sighted internally.


    "Such a mess..."


    Not only did he have to rece his hand and leg armor with a much inferior armor, but the pieces also didn''t fit perfectly together. As for the armor that survived, calling a junk by now would be justified.


    Not only were several small holes everywhere to be seen, but there was also a big hole through his chest that was currently covered by the dark tting just like all the other holes.


    Although the missing armor allowed him to make the dark ttings much thicker than before, in the end, they were essentially inferior to the armor itself. Worst of all, the enchantments themselves were heavily damaged, making one disappearpletely even.


    The main enchantment that created sand and hardens became much more mana inefficient than before and it took much longer to generate the dark ttings.


    Another problem that came out with those damages was that arge amount of space was cut away for his runesmithing.


    At first, his chest te might seem to be just as it was before, but that wasn''t the case at all.


    Before, he could carve runes in both his armor and dark ttings as if they were 2 totally different pieces. But now the former had much less space to work while thetter stayed the same.


    If he had to put a number of the remaining space that could be carved, his true armor would now have 80% of its original 100% while the dark tting didn''t increase and stayed at 100% space capacity.


    The fact that some runes needed to be recarved didn''t bother him. But the fact that he could carve fewer runes into his armor did.


    But despite all that, he did receive a few hundred thousand XP, mostlying from the Sartan rampage.


    And taking to ount that he had saved for several months of XP, he was quite rich despite the fact he upgraded his skills through time.


    After all, he killed over 6000 people through the people, mostly reaching the 2nd-tier with a few 3rd-tier and mutants in the mix. That isn''t even counting what Azrael and Agares harvested for him.<sub> </sub>


    His XP storage is a total of 17 708 300.


    A new record of his.


    The original n was to hold on to this amount of XP and spend it once he became a [Death Knight]. Then most likely the limits of his body will be lifted, allowing him to upgrade his [ck Guard] main ss to the 4th-tier.


    Unlocking much better skills and options, while showing the direction that he would need to go with.


    Such information could prove to be vital in upgrading his skills into the 4th-tier in case it''s like the modification stage that happens in the 3rd-tier.


    But after today, Danzel realized how naive he was.


    Maybe it was because he reached a level of strength beyond the 3rd-tier and because he only fought seriously with other 3rd-tier beings. Fights that were bound to be won by him.


    Closebatants would lose through his superior strength, though most of them had more special skills than Danzel, the few skills that Danzel had were made to kill.


    His weakness was still being a magic caster with their long-range attacks.


    He faced many 3rd-tier magic casters to know how annoying they were,


    The ability to fly into the air and potentially teleport away was the most annoying and effective ability they had. While the former could be death awkardly, thetter needed the magic caster''s entire focus to be cast.


    Making the Archmage an anomaly in the ways he fought magic casters.


    The level of strength was as clear as night and day.


    One needed to focus on teleport while the other could cast another 2 spells while preparing his teleportation spell. Also, the power of each spell of thetter could be much trickier. Making even his shield and armor useless.


    Leaving him to think of his own weaknesses.


    Mobility and long-ranged attacks.


    And possibly even defense abilities.


    Although he had both of those options in the form of [Swift Movements] and [Soul Reaping Wind], he needed something much faster and more instances.


    And for that, he was even willing to spend his saved-up XP a bit earlier than he had actually nned to do.


    He was going to upgrade his skills into the 4th-tier.


    The candidate for the mobility issue were the most obvious ones, being [High Jump] and [Swift Movements]. Other than those 2 skills, he had none other.


    But it was much harder to choose for thetter need as what only fitted the description was [Grasp of the Undying], which was both instances and long ranged.


    As no other skill was just like that.


    He doubted [Soul Reaping Wind] will fit the requirements based on its nature alone. And that was the same case with all his remaining long-ranged attacks.


    [Bleed Verocity] did prove its worth by fighting that mutant with the cleaver and he already nned in upgrading it.


    Though to work he needed his enemy to be wounded.


    Once the requirement was met to activate the spell, it was pretty useful for guaranteeing damage to his enemy.


    He also carefully searched for the skills that he could buy, but he found nothing that met his need.


    Leaving him with no other choice but to risk evolving one of his other skills.


    And after thinking about it, for the better or the worse.


    The best candidate for evolution was the skill [Mortal Reminder].


    Worst case scenario the skill bes not that good, he would have to keep using the [Mortal Reminder] skill even after it evolves.


    But in case the skill became what he hoped to be.


    The skill will always remind the mortals.


    Why they fear.

 Chapter 342 Tempering Process

    [Mortal Reminder]: Cost 700 000 XP (+ 50 000 per level)


    Danzel stared at the cost in silence.


    The cost alone was one of the reasons why he hesitated to upgrade his skill. It just required too much XP to bring a skill up to the maximum level.


    9 levels of a single skill cost him, 3 690 000 XP!


    And that was only possible thanks to his 45% discount.


    If he really had to pay the full price, more than a third of his savings would have been burned away.


    At times like this Danzel question the existence of his status window.


    It was so designed that it would encourage him to kill or simply make it extremely slow to level on theter stage. If he had to actually rely on gaining XP from training, it might even take him decades to bring himself to his current level.


    But even if he question what his status window actually was, he couldn''t do much about it even if he wanted.


    Also, the benefits it was clear.


    [Mortal Reminder level has increased from Lv. 1 to Lv.2]


    [Mortal Reminder level has increased from Lv. 2 to Lv.3]


    ...


    [Mortal Reminder level has increased from Lv. 9 to Lv.10]


    [The skill [Mortal Reminder reached the Tempering Process!]


    [Choise 3 of the given options and enchant 1 of the picked options.]


    [Dead Mana Affinity]: the skill will be more attuned to the death attribute and change ordingly.


    [Soul Affinity]: the skill will be more attuned to soul essence and souls. The change will happen ordingly.


    [Power Increase]: increase the damage inflicted and lethality rate in both body and soul in cost for a cost.


    [Ranged activation]: the skill will be able to be activated without a mark from the medium range for a cost.


    [Curse]: the skill will leave a curse upon the target.


    [Cooldown Reduction]: the skill will be able to be used more frequently.


    [Number Activation Increase]: the skill will be capable to be used more than one time.


    [Heal]: the skill will heal the user ording to the change.


    ''Modification changed into Tempering, huh?'' Danzel thought to himself.


    Though choosing 3 options stayed the same, the enchanting part got him interested.


    1 out of the 3 options he chooses will be twice as worth as a single option. Making picking all the more difficult.


    But the sudden appearance of the new text was a pleasant surprise.


    Although most of the time they were self-exnatory, it was better than nothing.


    And looking at the many options, Danzel grinned by having [Power Increase] figured out. He theorized that this option was at the cost of something and with the new text, his suspicions were found to be true.


    But such information also weighted his mind.


    Of the many options, one, in particr, caught his attention, the one being [Ranged Activation]. An option that would most likely change [Mortal Reminder]just like [Grasp of the Undying], but that wasn''t with a cost.


    A cost that he wasn''t aware of.


    But even then he decided to pick that option as it did the exact thing that he wanted. And as for the second option, they were many great ones.


    The [Curse] sounded quite appealing with his abilities and [Cooldown reduction] with [Number Activation Increase] also sounded quite interesting.


    Each of them had an advantage on their own, but they were also the 2 affinities that he could choose, further mutating his skill into a certain direction and potentially adding something.


    The only two options that sounded bad were the [Heal] and [Power Increase].


    While for the former he had many other alternatives, thetter in turn will bring another negative unknown negative effect upon the skill. He already had [Ranged activation] bringing some kind of cost already.


    Bringing him to do a process of elimination, the ones who weren''t eliminated were the [Curse] option and the two affinities for simple reasons.


    The other options wouldn''t strengthen the skill, but just make it more frequently to use and [Power Increase] was just a troublemaker on its own. As for the [Heal] option, he already had [Necromatic Restoraction] and [Undying Guard].


    After weighing his options, Danzel finally decided on the option.


    Them being...


    [Dead Mana Affinity]


    [Soul Affinity]


    [Ranged Activation]<sub> </sub>


    The reason the [Curse] option was left out was that he already had aplete curse. Although a new curse is quite tempting, he didn''t necessarily have to force a skill that wasn''t specialized in curses to hold one curse.


    And as he will pick [Dead Mana Affinity], the chance of [Mortal Reminder] to receive a curse wasn''tplete zero. He found choosing the affinity much more natural and for the most part, picking the affinities never went wrong.


    If it didn''t receive a curse at the end of the tempering, that just meant that the skill wasn''t meant to be a curse in the first ce.


    And for the "tempering point", at least that''s how he called it was put into the [Soul Affinity], as that affinity was basically the entire soul of this skill.


    After confirming his options, arge amount of information rushed through his mind.


    [The Tempering Process for the skill Mortal Reminder has been finished!]


    [Mortal Reminder Lv.10 bes Soul Ender Lv.1]


    [Soul Ender]: A manifestation of soul essence shall remind all mortal souls where their destined mortality would bring them to. Manifest a part of your soul essence that can only be seen by you and the target to directly pierce one other soul essence with a high chance of damaging one''s soul and bringing forth the end of their soul. If marked, this skill is 150% stronger, and if not it''s 50% weaker. The one who uses this skill will also be known as the [Bringer of the End].


    "This is..."


    Digesting the information he receive and reading through the description, Danzel fell silent.


    Using the knowledge he gained, Danzel used a portion of that knowledge to manifest a part of his soul essence in front of him.


    Taking only a few seconds of testing, Danzel finally managed to do it.


    From someone else perspective, nothing would seem to have changed.


    But in Danzel''s POV, he saw an exact clone of his in an ethereal dark green form without the helmet. And that clone stared back at him.


    Or rather...he stared at himself?


    It was as if he could see through his clone''s ethereal eyes and his own.


    ''So that''s how it feels to manipte soul essence itself?'' Danzel thought as he risen up and reached out to touch his clone.


    But before he could, the ethereal clone slowly dissipated into nothingness.


    He watched every single detail of it happening and he released that the soul essence didn''t disappear, but instead it moved back into his body.


    Of where he didn''t know for sure. But if he had to guess, it would be his very own soul.


    He realized long ago that soul essence was something essential for every being. So important that in fact could affect one''s soul.


    To him, it didn''t make sense for such a seeminglyrge amount of soul essence to simply disappear. Adding to that, when the soul essence "entered" his body, he was reminded of the touch of the dead souls engulfed by the ck waters of the realm of the dead.


    It wasn''t the same but it was somewhat familiar...


    "Interesting..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    ''That clone of mine also wielded a sword just like me, maybe if I figure out how to manifest just the sword, I might find a way to weaponize it.''


    He next went to see what was the [Bringer of the End] and all about.


    [Bringer of the End]: One of the many who can orchestrate the final end of a being. Depending on [?], those close to the end might see visions of one of the many. Once that vision manifest, one''s end has been destined. Increase all Death attuned abilities by 5%.


    ''One of the many, huh? Does that refer to the ones who are capable to destroy souls?'' Danzel thought slightly annoyed by the [?].


    As for the vision, he found them quite weird, but the 5% bonus was quite nice to see.


    ''The important question though was...how do I gain this skill? Or is it a talent?''


    Ideas flooded his mind, of how to use this exact knowledge and gaining [Bringer of the End]. And while he had many things he wanted to try. He decided to test those ideas forter.


    "For the time being, I should write them down..." Danzel said as he brought a piece of paper and his worn-out magic pen.


    He had some difficulties writing with a moving carriage and all, but after finishing another to-do list and putting it back in his storage ring.


    He stared at his status window to see what skill to upgrade next, listed by their importance.


    1:[Swift Movements]


    2:[High Jump]


    3:[Armor of Vengeances]


    4:[Shield Charge]


    5:[Death Guarding Swordsmanship]


    6:[Bleed Verocity]


    7:[Siphoning Soul de]


    And the list continues to go on.


    For the sake of not finding himself in the same situation as today, Danzel was willing to spend every drop of XP.

 Chapter 343 4th-Tier Skills And Arriving In The Capital

    Through the days of ying escort for the Ioratal army, Danzel had lots of time to think of what skills to upgrade.


    He prioritized the usefulness of the skill while also making sure that he had enough XP, in the end, to upgrade [Soul of Death Essence] and make it a tier 4 skill.


    One of the requirements that needed to be done for him to evolve as a [Death Knight]


    He would have loved to increase it more, but as his body reached its limit, he couldn''t do as such since it gave him attribute points.


    Although he doubted he would explode if he passed the limit by a bit, it surely would bring him someplication.


    So he decided to save a whole of 3 690 000 XP for now.


    So in total, he had 10 328 300 XP to work with.


    Although the number was quite big, such an amount of XP was worth 10 [Epic] runes.


    When he thought of that, he felt quite bitter from inside.


    s, he had to do with his given allowance.


    At first, he upgrades his movement skills, them being [Swift Movements] and [High Jump]. The former is level 3 with thetter being level 9.


    In his early years, he aimed for the [Swift Movements] skill to be a constant buff that made him faster thatsted quite a while. After all, using one focus to use a skill time and time again to move faster was inconvenient.


    While he didn''t regret it, what he needed now was something that closed the distance at an extremely fast pace.


    Making him pick [Death Mana Affinity], [Soul Affinity], and [Speed Increase].


    Using his tempering point on the [Speed Increase] option.


    While he could pick other options such as reducing his weight, making it a buff to be used on others, and so on.


    He chose the two affinities in order to get the bonus.


    In the end, the skill became [Phantom Phase].


    [Phantom Phase]: Moving like a phantom and phase through reality at incredible speed. Allow the user to be engulfed with dead mana to be an immaterial mist. While in that state, you receive physical damage immunity, increase 80% magic resistance, and move 4 times faster than you are capable. If the user moves further than 5 meters upon activations of this skill, the mana usage increases per 0,5 meters for thrice the amount. Can''t physically affect the physical world while in that state of being.


    Though Danzel found the range quitecking, the power of the spells was something else.


    The next upgrade was his second movement skill, [High Jump]


    Just leveling it once brought the skill into the modification stage.


    And for it, he chose only [Dead Mana Affinity] and ignored the [Soul Affinity]. Instead for the second option, he went for [Power Increase].


    He could also go for the overall improvement, but he decided to make the skill stronger by [Power Increase] and with the [Dead Mana Affinity] to hopefully bring out some kind of effect into the skill other than making you better at jumping.


    Turning the skill into [Death Descent].


    [Death Descent]: A modified skill of a warrior who learned to use dead mana for his usage. Increase your jumping strength by 7 times while surrounding yourself with dead mana. Once the warrior of death descends to the ground, the dead mana will be released and create a shock wave of death.


    Danzel wasn''t sure if he liked the skill or not.


    While it increased how far he could jump, it could prove to be awkward if every time he jumped he spread shockwaves of death.


    At times like this, he was thankful for the fact that the knowledge of the previous version of the skill remained in his head.


    He let that skill remain in tier 3 before moving on to the next candidate.


    And that was his defensive skill, [Armor of Vengeances].


    Which was at level 8.


    Being one of his best skills and one of the most expensive ones, it cost as much as [Soul of Death Essence] and [Mortal Reminder].


    And since [Armor of Vengeances] was categorized as Death Magic, the discount was only 25%.


    Making the 2 levels cost a total of 1 500 040


    And as the skill proved to be useful in multiple situations, was worthwhile the investment.


    The option he picked was the following...


    [Dead Mana Affinity], [Mana Resistance], and [Overall Improvement].


    His Tempering point going towards [Mana Resistance] to make himself the bane of all magic casters.


    While he was choosing [Overall Improvement] and [Tougher], he chose the former so that he further improves the magic resistance and [Dead Mana Affinity] in the hopes to add something to the skill.


    And it truly did.


    The skill turning [Armor of Undying Protection]<sub> </sub>


    [Armor of Undying Protection]: The user learned how to make one''s own dead mana to reject all other forms of mana and to use the rejected mana to gather to be used as a shockwave that puts the [Curse Siping Mana] to all nearby enemies. Increase resistance of all magic at 40%, with Holy, Death, and Light magic increasing by 50% Instead. Increase the toughness and durability of armor by 60%. If the user is undead, the stored damage can be used to either heal, recover one''s mana, or extend the duration of the [Curse of Siping Mana].


    Once Danzel saw the new chance of the skill, he was imminently surprised by it. While it wasn''t without disadvantages, the improvements that it brought were of what he would expect from a tier 4 skill.


    But even that disadvantage could prove to be a blessing in disguise.


    The kills before were like casting ayer of protection on top of his armor, which if the attack was weak enough, couldpletely negate the damage to his armor.


    But now the skill turned more of a buff on top of his armor. Meaning that all damage will be inflicted on his armor with no exception.


    The removal of the extrayer of protection though, skill would make his armor 60% tougher and more durable. Making it a blessing as it influenced the [Rune of Iron Fortress],


    And that was half of the whole skill.


    What made the skill truly terrifying was the [Curse of Siping Mana], which if inflected would draw his enemy mana and store it inside his chest to be used for multiple things.


    Next on his list of upgrades was [Shield Charge], a tier 2 skill that had all kinds of usage.


    And since it was level 9, it didn''t take him a lot to improve it.


    And for it, he simply went with both affinities in hopes of bing a powerful skill like [Mortal Reminder].


    The end result of it was [Shield of Tremble].


    [Shield of Tremble]: The user is able to elerate towards the pointed direction of the shield. If the shield manages to hit something that has a soul, the target''s soul essence will be shaken for a brief moment. Duration depends on the level of the skill, the foe''s strength, and equipment.


    The [Shield of Tremble] was quite the surprise to Danzel.


    While it didn''t much improve the eleration part of the skill, the original intent of the skill remained. It wasn''t all that often in him hitting someone purely by his shield, but now once he did, it will be much more effective.


    At least that''s what he believed. Since he didn''t test the effects on anyone and was stuck to a crappy carriage, all he could do was wait.


    Following the list, next was one of his most important skills.


    [Death Guarding Swordsmanship]


    Currently, at level 7, all the skills needed 3 upgrades for the tempering process to begin.


    Of all of them though, this was the hardest to choose.


    Previously in the modification phase, he made the skill focus on being only sword-focused and adding the [Dead Mana Affinity].


    But now there was no point choosing [User Weapon Focus].


    And from the previous tempering process, [Death Guarding Swordsmanship] had by far the most option, a total of 11. Be it [Technique], [Shield Focus], [Sword Focus], and all the others.


    For it, he decided to go with the safest.


    [Dead Mana Affinity], [Soul Affinity], and [Overall improvement].


    The tempering point going towards [Overall improvement].


    Till now he was satisfied with what the skill brought.


    A 20% increase in effectiveness on all death-attuned skills that used a sword or a shield while also giving him knowledge of swordsmanship.


    All he wanted from the skill was to be simply better.


    And maybe because he put the tempering point towards [Overall improvement], his wishes were mostly met.


    [Death Warden Swordmanship]: Your learned how to masterfully use thebination of a sword and a shield. Additionally, by putting your inherited affinities into your swordsmanship, all skills that are Death and Soul attuned together with all other skills that use a shield and sword will be increased by a total of 30%. If the user is undead, you will passively surround the edge of your sword with dead mana, making every wound inflicted by that sword leave dead mana in the wound. Making it 5% harder to regenerate the wound. This passive effect is close to invisible, but notpletely.


    Once he upgraded the skill, a vast amount of information flooded his mind, so much that it was nothingpared to the other skills.


    He realized how wed his swordsmanship was before and the ways to fix them, while also learning how to influence better his ability with the sword.


    That was when he decided to take a break and digest all the information that he just gained.


    While he still had leftover XP, it wasn''t necessary to be used as currency.


    He stepped out of the carriage and decided to speak with Agares about his swordsmanship.


    Though he couldn''t start having a spar with him with all the soldiers of Ioratal, the old man with exotic clothes proved to be rather wise in the ways of the sword.


    And so several days passed.


    Soon enough, the high walls of the capital of the Dynasty of Ioratal came into sight.


    Once the army entered the walls, they were many thousands of people cheering them and calling them heroes or whatnot.

 Chapter 344 Meeting The King

    Shortly after arriving at the military base of the Dynasty, those of noble blood who participated in the fight moved back to their home. Though most that went didn''t make it.


    Many were wounded and had their skin pulled out from the frost that was spread after the fall of the ice mountain.


    Though most that held powers of a 3rd-tier had a much easier time, those below that tier needed the attention of professionals. Those closest to the impact that though some miracle avoid the initiative impact were even at the risk of losing a hand or leg from their limbs be like that of a statue.


    An event that was supposed to be celebrated by delivering a heavy blow was instead met with grief inside the military base.


    And the generals responsible for guiding the army were pitting each other''s throats to throw the me on someone other than themself.


    As for the Deathfull Skulls group, they were currently waiting in one of the rooms of the military base. All were there except Velkir, who was talking with the generals.


    "Boss must be really pissed off." Vanessa said from the side, her body still covered by her artifact, making her voice more sinister and robotic.


    "That''s to be expected, after all, he was dragged to be the scapegoat of those humans." Azrael said as he was stating facts.


    "Scapegoat?" Danzel asked confused.


    He found it difficult imagining a century-old lich bing some sort of goat.


    ''I heard that transform does exist, but still...''


    Seeing that Danzel was looking at him as if searching for an answer, it finally clicked to Azrael that the Wight might not know the meaning of that word.


    "Scapegoat, meaning in the sense of putting your responsibilities to another person to escape the me. Those humans are trying to do this exact thing with Master Velkir."


    "They will use excuses such as us being lowly mercenaries and not following their order resulted in the losses the human army had. It makes it worse that Master Velkir moved on his own without the army."


    "Originally, one of us alone would have been enough to annihted those walls if we really put their mind into it. And with every member participating, the king might have thought to be a good opportunity to raise some of their morale and cheer the people up." Azrael scoffed out loud.


    "And once those nobles took a sniff of their n, they all sent their sprouts on the supposed "easy fight" to earn some merits or whatever. I guess they didn''t expect those many deaths."


    "Naive and stupid, so human." Sartan said while taking a bite of a questionable piece of meat.


    "I would describe them more as ignorant and foolish. They had probably never seen 4th-tier fighting before and their strength that affects the surroundings. There is a reason why people with strength like us are often called cmities." Agares said while rubbing Shiro''s hood.


    Everyone looked at the old man in surprise from joining the conversation as he usually only cared for his granddaughter.


    "Well, a sh between 4th-tier is rare. And does who witnessing it are either dead or lucky to survive to tell the tales." Azrael said while looking at Danzel.


    "But I guess Danzel fits both criteria."


    "I am not dead..." Danzel said with a cold tone.


    "Right, undead was it?" Vanessa said with a chuckle.


    "What kind of skeleton were you again, ck armor? It would be embarrassing for a king to mistake his benefactors for a skeleton after all." Sartan said with a huge green on his face.


    "Do I have to call bad fish, bone bad fish now?" Shiro whispered to Agares while pulling lightly his long sleeves.


    Maybe it was because she tried her best to be as quiet as possible with her question, that made Sartan burst outughing, with the other trying to resist the urge tough.


    After all, everyone here in the room had a supernatural hearing.


    If they focused, they could even hear the sounds of ants walking (they weren''t any ants in the room).


    If Danzel had a face, his eye brown would twitch from annoyance.


    From the past few days, the other made it pretty obvious how stupid he was in fighting a 4th-tier alone and gave him a light jab on his side by making fun of him.


    As Danzel was about to realize, the barrier that surrounded their room suddenly broke, making everyone except Shiro go on the edge and release their aura.


    Wherever they were going to be paid today or called criminals made them stay alert.


    Coming out of the bottom of the door began a shadow emerging.


    nting his staff on the ground and going out of the shadow Velkir looked at the whole group before replying to the barrier in the room.<sub> </sub>


    "While what Danzel did was undoubtedly one of the stupidest things that I saw, you guys need to keep in mind that except for Shiro, he is younger than all of you." Velkir said, his words surprised the group of 4th-tier.


    "Master Velkir..." Danzel said while looking at his magic teacher.


    ''Even the shameless Lich is making fun of me!'' He thought to himself.


    As for his age, Danzel had no idea of what basics he came to that conclusion and he wasn''t interested in correcting him.


    After all, he couldn''t say that he would soon be 5 years old...


    "I am stating facts. Moreover, I don''t me you for the decision you made. After all, you were suffering under expirypsychosis." Velkir said.


    "Expirypsychosis..?" Danzel said, confused by the term.


    "Amon thing that every undead, including me, experienced in his early years of being. In short, the emotion of hate towards the living gets the better of you. It''s the main reason why so many stories of the undead exist out there. The undead in those stories is learning to adapt to that emotion while killing a few hundred in the process."


    "It could be described as a baby trying to learn how to walk. Nothing more, nothing less." Velkir said.


    "Enough of that though, I deal with those annoying insects for now but we got another problem for using here." Velkir said while raising his staff.


    In the next moment, several magic circles appeared around the room, the other recognized them to be the same as the mass teleportation magic that Velkir used.


    "Did anything go wrong?" Azrael said with a frown.


    But instead of teleporting them away, the magic circle all descended till they meet the ground, making a donut-like shape of several magic circles before the mana became invisible to both the naked eye and supernatural senses.


    "Hehe~, just the king of this ce wille at any moment."


    As soon as he finished speaking there were a few knocks at the door, gaining the attention of everyone.


    Turning to face the door, Velkir raised their hand and using his own mana the handle turned.


    "Also, the Dynasties spear will be tagging along."


    Opening the door, a man around his 70 with gray hair and a crown on his head wearing ted chest te and many magic items walked into the room, beside him being someone wearing full te armor and holding a spear that had a dark gold metal as its tip.


    While the aura of the man with the crown was almost unnoticeable, that wasn''t the same for thetter.


    Even without putting his aura for others to see, it held a huge suppressing nature for the likes of Shiro and Danzel.


    Shiro is hidden behind Agares clothes, scared of the suppressing aura. Danzel though wasn''t the same, instead, he released every fiber of his aura to countereffect the man''s aura.


    Simr reacting were all the others, who drowned the room with their auras alone, each of them being unique of their own.


    "Archmage Velkir, I apologize foring unannounced at times when everyone one of you should be tired. But I couldn''t help myself bute personally to thank you for your efforts in keeping the Dynasties citizen safe." The man with his 70 said as he walked towards the suppressing auras of them. Closely following behind him was the man with the dark golden spear.


    "There was no need to trouble yourself with such things. All we do is what we were paid for, nothing more, nothing less." Velkir said as he shook hands with the man wearing the crown.


    Seeing that exchange, Danzel was surprised in seeing that the man with the crown was actually the king and not the man beside him.


    ''Why is someone so strong following a man so...weak?'' Danzel thought to himself.


    ''Compared to that guy with the spear, he is close to nothing. His strength is close to that of the goblin shaman that I once killed, maybe a few attributes stronger or weaker.''


    He was sure of at least that much.


    Wherever the man was weaker or strong that the goblin shaman didn''t even matter.


    The fact that someone of this strength ruled a whole kingdom was something that Danzel didn''t expect.


    Compared to the phoenix that he heard in Berum or the Magus in the Arcana Kingdom.


    The man talking with Velkir was nothing.

 Chapter 345 Hiding Identities

    The king of the Dynasty introduced himself to all other members while also hinting at his eagerness to recruit Azrael, Vanessa, and Agares while mentioning various benefits.


    Making Danzel realize that this king might as well be as shameless as the century-old Lich. Though he didn''t especially point it out, it was clear enough of his intent that even Danzel realized it.


    After all, the leader of our group, Velkir was in the same room.


    As to why he didn''t seem eager to recruit the others, it wasn''t hard to guess...


    Shiro and he were known as the apprentice of Velkir, a powerful necromancer. It was natural for others to assume that we will follow his ways of magic.


    And with necromancy being quite unpopr among themon folk, it was best to avoid recruiting troublemakers.


    As for Sartan...well, I don''t me the king for not trying towards the immortal juggernaut.


    And none one surprise, everyone passively rejected his invitation with exception of Vanessa. Which directly scoffed at the king. If it wasn''t for Azrael being here, Danzel could easily imagine her starting to curse at the king...


    Her reaction was also the fuse that made the king bid his farewells and leave after inviting everyone here to be present in the day where they will dere the reward and merits of the heroes that fought in the war.


    ***


    After leaving the room of the Deathfull Skulls, the king of the Dynasty of Ioratal is seated in his office while rubbing his eyes from exhaustion.


    "Tell me your honest opinion... Spear of our Dynasty. What do you think of them" The king said as he used amunication artifact for someone to bring him a cup of tea.


    "They are a danger to our Dynasty and yourself, you majesty." The man with the title of Dynasties spears answers coldly.


    "Me too? be more specific, and don''t exin the obvious." The king said.


    "Except for the little girl, everyone else wasn''t restraining their aura at all. Which technically could prove to be fatal to someone of your strength, your majesty. If it weren''t for the magic items you were wearing, one could easily suffocate in there."


    "That''s mercenaries for you. Most of them are criminals and taboo magic users." The king said as he suddenly heard a knock on the door.


    "Come in."


    Opening the door, a maid with a small cart containing sweets and his requested tea.


    "Those people were different, your majesty. I could sense an abnormal amount of mana surrounding the room. Not only were their barriers, but also some kind of spell being held and ready to be activated at any time."


    "What kind of barriers and spell was it?" The king asked, only for the spearman to shake his head.


    "I am sorry your majesty, but that I don''t know. But if they were offensive-oriented spells, it could prove to be dangerous even with his majesty magic times..."


    There was a pause before the spearman continued, his gaze now being attracted to the maid.


    "We also are unsure if their leader is an undead or not. Also, ording to the reports of the son of duke Ionarres. His apprentice, the one that they call Abdiel the Cruel has yet to reveal his face to anyone. Considering that he is skilled with the sword and is an apprentice, he could very well be an undead."


    "Mhm, so you think so too, huh..." The king said as he looked towards the cup of tea with a small te having a few of his favorite sweets. Though his doctor told him to stop eating them. He still didn''t find himself refusing his sweet tooth.


    The maid picked up the cup of tea and te and moved them towards his majesty, but before she was able to drop them on the table, the cup was exploded into pieces by the spear of the guard.


    The spear guard moved so quickly that neither the maid nor the king was able to see his movement.


    The maid out of shock, let go of the te full of treats and attempted to scream, but was swiftly grabbed in the neck by the spearman.


    "Aghh~S-Sir?" She said amidst a gasp of air.


    The king raised from his seat and looked at his guard with a frown, but didn''t try to interrupt him at all.


    The spearman in question looked down on the tea and shook his head in disappointment.


    "Elisa Valson, rmended by the head maid of a noble house to serve his majesty, worked here for over 10 years and also built many rtionships among other staff members with simr rank as you. Now my question is, why is such a person poisoning his majesty''s drink?"


    The midst pleading eyes suddenly grew solemn and dark.


    Lowering one of her arms to the side, a sudden brief light appeared in her hand, after the light disappeared, a small crossbow with bolts stained by poison appeared.


    And without hesitation, she pulled the trigger aiming toward the king.


    They were two sounds to be heard.


    *Ting!


    A sound of shing metal.


    *Crack!<sub> </sub>


    And a sound of bones breaking.


    Letting go of the maiden, she fell to the ground like a puppet who had her strings cut.


    The spearman who effortlessly blocked the bolt with his spear bent down and pulled an arm ring.


    "A dimensional storage item. I believe it''s one of your son''s assassination attempts you majesty...again." The spear said solemnly as he ced the storage item in front of the king''s desk.


    "Sigh~" The king sighed exhaustedly.


    Letting his body fall on his chair, he put his hand on top of his chest, trying to calm his heart from the sudden surprise.


    Reaching out of themunication device and ordering a group toe and pick up the corpse, the king looked at the spearman.


    "Those children...I know it''s my fault for not choosing my heir, but ending my stay in this world is too cruel. Thanks for doing so much for the Dynasty, Lancelot."


    The spearman, also known as the Dynasty spears stayed silent as he was called by his name.


    "You majesty, my loyalty will always rest upon your hands. If you will it, I can find the culprit and bring him to justice." Lancelot said with a serious voice.


    "For now let it go, I don''t want any bad rumorsing out now with the announcing daying. You can look after who of my sons it was after." The king said, before adding after.


    "In case you don''t manage the culprit of this assassination, find a way to push the me to my bastard son and have him executed."


    "May I ask why him, your majesty? Through the reports, he is one of the prime candidates that gained the trust of the magic academies and solved various problems. Is it because of his blood?" Lancelot said with a frown.


    "My dear friend, you know that I don''t care about bloodlines. If it weren''t for the already establishedws of my ancestors and the nobles obsessing on them, I would even already remove them."


    "Then why?"


    "..." The king stayed silent before looking out of the window.


    ''I can''t tell him because he died...'' The king thought to himself, remembering the day of the ident that one of his concubines had together with his son.


    On a night filled with thunders and heavy rain, when they were returning back to the capital after taking a look into a different territory. An explosion caused by people fused with mana crystals on their bodies caused their carriages to be blown off the road and to fall several meters high.


    He survived the fall thanks to his magic items, but his son and concubine didn''t. Once thunder lighten the world, he saw their bodies pierced by the pieces of the carriages, their limbs bent and broken.


    But momentster, he saw how the silhouette of his son, despite his broken body seemed to rise from the ground and twitch beforeing to check on him.


    At first, he thought it was a miracle given to him by the goddess, but with time he learned that this wasn''t the case.


    After this event, his son changed in a noticeable decree. He first med it on the loss of his mother but after time, he started thinking back on the night of how he survived and what he saw back then.


    The doctors and magic caster that he ordered to check on him confirmed that his son was healthy and maybe has some trauma of that day, but his mind told him otherwise.


    ***


    2 days before the announcement of rewards and merits...


    Seating on the couch in a lone room with only him inside, the bastard son of the king of the Ioratal Dynasty had a huge grin on his face to the point that it seemed about to reap his cheeks.


    Or rather, the being that uses the bastard''s prince''s dead body as a being born of miasma and death itself.


    An all-powerful Lich knew as Kingra''mash.


    In the next moment, a total of 3 magic arrays lighten from the floor, reviving the shadows to rise up.


    In each magic array, different robed figures appeared.


    One of them being Velkir, another Lich that was hiding his true self with flesh.


    But the other 2 people had no such flesh.


    Instead, they were two robed skeleton figures, one having one single eye socket, while the other had no teeth nor mouth, instead pure bones.


    Their eyes burned in ethereal mes.


    Raising up from the couch, Kingra''mash opened his arm while burning away his flesh, revealing his true form.


    "Wee, fellow undead."

 Chapter 346 Historical Moment

    "Why did you call everyone here, Priest of darkness." The Lich with no mouth said, his voice being deep and cold. The color of his ethereal eyes is a teal color.


    "Has the n changed?" The one-eyed Lich asked after, his ethereal eye having a mix of dark light, with the middle having a concentrated white light.


    "Hey! Don''t bring up titles!" Kingra''mash yelled at the teal-eyed Lich.


    In response, the teal-eyed Lich shrugged.


    "Alright, but stop wasting our time Kingra''mash and tells us why you called us here."


    The other two Lich nodded in response, making Kingra''mash sigh internally.


    "Got it, got it, since everyone here is as busy as me, we might as well keep it short."


    Raising his hand and spreading his mana, several light constructs appeared making something simr to a hologram projection.


    In the certain projection, there was arge room with a throne room.


    "The n changed, instead of assassinating the king as we nned, we are going to kill him when the merits and rewards ceremony had ended. I already nned to copse the whole throne room. Creating an opening for you two to kill that king. Veleronr and his group are your assurance. If anything goes wrong...I will need for you to finish the job, Veleron." Kingra''mash said as he pointed at the mouthless Lich and the one-eyed Lich.


    Hearing the n, Velkir frowned while the ethereal eyes of the two other Liches red up.


    "What is the meaning of this, Kingra''mash? The original n was an assassination, not an open-up murder. I heard that they will also be showing the whole event though out the kingdom using a "View-See Crystal". Doing what you told us will reveal our identities! Even if we hide under the flesh, the spear guard will force us to reveal our necromancy powers." The teal Lich said.


    "He is right, and the chances of us being destroyed is high without our phcteries. If we two were to have our bodies destroyed, it will disrupt the next n." The one-eyed Lich added in.


    "Also if my group interviews, we can call the second n offpletely. Not only that but it is known that you prince person and my group have built a connection. Wherever the other two seed or not, the me will fall upon you. Once two other necromancers will reveal themself, my group will fall suspicious. Making it a lose-lose situation without achieving our objective. Making you the king."


    "Why the change of n?" The 3 Liches said in unison.


    Kingra''mash stayed silent for a moment and looked at the other three of his kind, before sighting out loud.


    "Sigh~it''s because we run out of time. That damn malingerer decided to announce his heir on the same day as the event!" Kingra''mash announced angrily.


    "Though my observation, despite doing everything perfectly! The king hates me through his core. He would never appoint the throne to me, even if it''s the most logical option that should be on his mind!"


    Hearing Kingra''mash''s reason, the other three fell in silence.


    Their intelligence being one of the highest out in the world, they clearly knew what the appointment of an heir meant for their goal.


    If the king were to announce his heir, Kingra''mash wouldn''t be able to inherit the throne unless they kill the heir and king.


    Even if they could kill both, given the time, it was impossible to do as such without messing up the next part of the n or making Kingra''mash''s position unstable.


    The original n was to cause a fight among the princes for who may sit on the throne once the king was assassinated. Kingra''mash''s position is already seen quite positively by many people and even described as the perfect prince making him an advantage over others aiming for the throne.


    He would only need thest push topletely secure the position, and that push was by creating a moment of peace in the Dynasty.


    But if the heir were to be announced, a civil war will ur in the middle of the war. Leading to a chaotic situation that they couldn''t control as much. If that were to happen, not only would they have to deal with the king''s family, but also all the other power-hungry nobles who fancied the throne.


    Something that they couldn''t effort.


    "So there is no other choice than to do it, huh?" The one-eyed Lich said, shaking his head.


    "That''s what happens when you try to mimic the fake ones, Kingra''mash." The teal Lich said.


    "I will go inform my group." Velkir said as he sunk into the shadows, the other two following suit.


    "Here are the details." Kingra''mash said while making 3 scrolls appear and magically controlling them to fly to the other three.


    Taking the scrolls with them, the other 3 left through the same shadows they came in.


    Seeing them leave, Kingra''mash spread his dead mana around his body, and through some magic he manifested flesh, turning into the persona of the perfect prince.


    ***


    Days passed and the day of the announcement of merits and rewards for the heroes who participated in the war.


    One could call it a historical moment for the Dynasty of Ioratal.<sub> </sub>


    Or rather, the king nned to make it historical.


    Walking with his guard, Lancelot. The only 5th-tier that waspletely loyal in this kingdom to the throne room, where all the supposed "heroes" were there waiting for him to arrive.


    He had waited long enough for such a chance.


    With many foolish nobles now dead or weakened in trying to attain glory, he was finally capable to appoint new people to the missing position, people that were loyal to the throne.


    Such a decision will anger most of the nobles who put importance on one''s bloodline. They would find those with talent whose achievement results in war, unfitting or even barbaric to be nobles. Despite the very nobles trying the grow their position with the war.


    ''Hypocrites that I would have long removed if the system allowed me.'' the king thought to himself. Even though the very system put his family in the safe waters for the kingdom being a dynasty.


    Through his years of rule, he tried to remove the Dynasty part of their kingdom, even though he knew the risk. With their kingdom always being in danger to be destroyed by the two other kingdoms, what they needed was a society that motivated the talented ones to join their cause and cultivate them.


    Aspared to the other kingdoms, only Lancelot was a 5th-tierbatant.


    Others would argue that they were simply unlucky for no people with talent to be born into their kingdom, but he didn''t believe it to be the case. After all, he saw through the records of the previous rules and the other kingdoms.


    And what was obvious was that the Dynasty of Ioratal was alwaysst in having powerhouses. So his mission ever since he stepped on the throne was to change the whole system.


    But even after years of hard work, though things got better, his body didn''t.


    ''If only I was 30 years younger, I could build the foundation for the next ruler. But it seems that I will have to rush things.''


    That''s right, he was going to choose his heir today.


    Arriving at arge door, the soldiers guarding the door opened it.


    "The ruler of our Dynasty! His majesty has arrived! Lancelot, the spear of our Dynasty has arrived!" the soldiers announced his and his guard''s arrival.


    Many nobles and mercenaries who participated in the war together with some soldiers of the dynasty who made a name for themself looked at the king''s arrival. Everyone who participated in the war, the most powerful entities was gathered in this room.


    ''And I will show it to everyone he thought as he walked to his throne.


    Magic caster to the said operated the "View-See Crystal", which transferred the shown image to different magic items with a dy of 10 to 20 minutes depending on the distance.


    The magic items that will receive the image of this event were ced in the most popted ces in the kingdom of Ioratal. As those devices were expensive and hard to make, they weren''t that many.


    Reaching his throne, he raised his hand for silence and lowered his hand next.


    Seeing the second movement, everyone except the guards and Lancelot who was beside him bowed to one knee to show respect for the ruler of the Dynasty.


    Some were slower than others, and those were mostly the mercenaries and soldiers who didn''t know the etiquette of such things.


    Most nobles gave those a look of disgust, with only a few not showing care.


    The king saw nodded internally at the ones who didn''t care while also remembering those who showed disgust toward the others.


    "Heroes of the Dynasty of Ioratal! Thanks for answering my call at this historical moment! You have my utmost gratitude and respect for all of you, who in the times of need came to assist our kingdom even if had no connection to it or no need!"


    "Everyone here present, be it a noble or ofmon blood, has saved hundreds of our civilians with your sacrifice. And for that, fair rewards require everyone who protects our Dynasty! Our People!" The king said with a voice worthy of a king.


    Raising from his throne, Lancelot moved and brought out a golden cup, filled with wine and gave it to the king.


    In the Dynasty, there was a tradition that seeing a king drinking in a golden cup is one of the greatest honors and also meant that the king will shoulder the sins of murder inflicted in the war himself. An old-fashioned tradition that survived through the years of history.


    "With this cup! All deaths will be my to bear and all sins will continue to flow through my blood till the end of my days arrives! For The Dynasty of Ioratal!"


    Raising the golden cup to his lips and drinking the red wine.


    He suddenly felt something.


    An intense pain never before felt assaulted his chest as something was pressing from behind him.


    Widening his eyes from the pain, the king looked down at his chest.


    Only to find a sword piercing his heart.

 Chapter 347 Death Of A King

    Slowly, the sword piercing the king''s heart was pushed even further into his chest. Making the king cough the wine he drank together with hinds of his own blood.


    Blood, that none other could see other than himself.


    Dozen of questions rose in his mind.


    He could see his guard, Lancelot staring at him confused and not even rmed by the fact someone was piercing his heart!


    And he wasn''t the only one, the others looked at the king confused and with frowns.


    Such a response was natural if they just witness the king drink from the golden cup just for a second andter spit it to the ground. Such action could be independent of the king not taking sensibilities for all the killing the others did up upon hismand.


    What was abnormal though was that none seemed to care about the king of this kingdom is assassinated right in front of their eyes.


    Lowering his gaze towards the sword, he weakly raised his other arm and grabbed the bloodstained sword with shaking eyes.


    He tried to look to his side, to see who was the one who was piercing his heart, but then the sword that pierced his heart was drawn out of his body with such force, that forced the king to falter a few steps back.


    *Ting!


    With the golden cup falling to the ground together with its liquid content, the king grabbed his chest in hopes to lessen the extreme pain.


    "Ha~Ha." He started breathing, dizziness guing his mind.


    "Your majesty~"


    Lancelot called from his side, but the king could no longer hear him.


    The only sound that he could hear was heavy footsteps from armor.


    The king scanned his magic items under his clothes, only to find that none of them had activated. Seeing his wound, he saw a flow of blooding out of his body, and yet when he touched his chest with his hand, he could feel no opening of a wound.


    "H-huh~?"


    Confusion befalls him.


    He could clearly see his blood and the open wound, but there was no such physical wound.


    Raising his head weakly, he stumbled one step forward, almost falling face forward if he didn''t catch himself.


    And there it was, the one who held the sword seemingly stained in his blood.


    A tall figure, wearing a ck ted armor, engrossed in a dark green mist that made him seem as if he was ethereal. Each step of his left a crack in the world, making space for some kind of ck liquid to surface among those cracks.


    "L-Lancelot~" The king mumbled as he stepped a step forward, the pain in his chest increasing.


    But the most noticeable feature of this tall figure was that its face was just a skull.


    ''K-kill him~Lancel-''


    Words no longer came out of his mouth even if he tried.


    All his strength suddenly left his body, making him fall from the stairs that lead him to the throne.


    *Baahm!


    "Your Majesty!"


    "-Healers! Now!''


    Echoes of sound appeared through his mind, sounds that he could not recognize what they were. The king could only see darkness emergy in the world.


    He wasying motionless on the ground, unable to move a single muscle. He could only stare as the world crumbled into nothingness.


    Except for one thing.


    Having fallen with his face looking at the one who did this to him.


    The ethereal undead suddenly stopped in front of a kneeling mercenary with identical armor.


    The undead turned and faced the dying king, his eyes sockets shaped as if the undead was hiding eternal wrath. An ominous grin appeared on the undead.


    And slowly, the ethereal undead slowly sheathed his sword to its scabbard, while bending his knee in the exact manner of the mercenary with the identical armor till those two oveppedpletely.


    "Ah~" the king let out a whisper of a sound though some kind of miracle.


    ''That mercenary~! So he was an undead~"


    Before he could finish his thoughts, the ck liquid filling his visionpletely engulfed him.


    His cracked soul being unable to sustain itself without a vessel, quickly grumbled, resulting in the king of Ioratal having his soul destroyed.


    Snuffing out his very existence for all eternity.


    ****


    [You received 3200 XP]


    [You achieved what most couldn''t and destroyed a soul!]


    [You acquired Bringer of the End].


    Danzel silently stared at the ground as amotion was happening, everyone except for the few raised from their knees and looked at the soulless body of the king in shock.<sub> </sub>


    "Kyaaaa!"


    "Shut down the View-See Crystal, now!


    "Your Majesty!"


    "Where are the healers!? What is taking them long!" The 5th-tier yelled, his aura released to the surroundings, making most shut their mouth while bringing the mercenaries in guard.


    "None one leaves this room unless I say so! Till we figured out who it was, everyone one of you is suspect!" Lancelot yelled as a magic caster with white robs came running towards the king.


    "Fast! Use your magic! Heal his majesty!" Lancelot yelled at the group of healers.


    They instantly went to work, making several magic circles made out of golden light appear around the king''s body while using tons of mana for what Danzel guessed was healing magic.


    ''Healing magic ain''t going to work.'' Danzel thought with an ominous grin under his helmet.


    ''You are trying to heal a hollow husk. A body that sustained no physical damage, but instead has lots it''s very soul.''


    And soon enough, the frowns of the magic caster became apparent to everyone.


    "S-Sir Lancelot, his Majesty...has passed away."


    "W-What!?" His eyes widen in shock, and out of anger, he grabbed the color of the one who told the bad news.


    "How! How did he die!?"


    Breaking cold sweat from his back, the magic caster answered with a trembling voice.


    "S-Sir, his Majesty''s body has suffered no damage and neither poison nor foreign mana was detected. It`s as if his Majesty''s body shut down suddenly...We don''t know the cause~Ahhh!"


    Being sent flying towards a nearby wall, the 5th-tier breathes heavily.


    Walking to get the wine from the ground, he bent his knees and touched the spilled wine with his finger, and took a taste.


    ''The cup wasn''t poisoned, then it must be some kind of magical effect. The healers must have missed something!''


    Going back to the corpse of the king and examining it, he also found no foreign source of energy, making him nce at his hand hard enough to cut his skin.


    ''I was constantly on alert for this exact thing to happen, but how did this happen when I was beside him!?''


    A sudden wave of guilt and sadness washed in his mind.


    How could he, a 5th-tier and the strongest of the Dynasty, not see through an attack on his king!?


    "S-Sir Lancelot...we believe that his Majesty had a heart attack, nothing else exins his Majesty''s condition-"


    Before the magic caster could finish, among the crowd, one of the princes of the Dynasty finished for the healer.


    "It''s a sign from the Goddess! the Goddess judged the king and deemed his time in among us to have ended! A sign that his majesty fulfilled his purpose in this world and that another one has to step in!" The prince yelled like a fanatic.


    His golden and white robs, together with a cross on his neck showed that he believed in the religion of the "Sacred Cross".


    Taking the hint of the prince, the other nobles also seemed to be fanatics.


    "He is right! Our king has been guided to meet the Goddess!"


    Lancelot turned towards the noble''s rage.


    ? He could read those nobles'' intentions as if they were a nk piece of paper.


    With the king now dead, and no heir selected, the fight over the throne has begun. Those nobles who talked about the goddess showing her mercy were merely trying to lick the boots of the fanatic prince of the Sacred Cross.


    Most other nobles who didn''t support the fanatical prince also began forming ns of who they should support. The soldiers and mercenaries who were raised in glory from the war didn''t know what to do excepty silent and digest the meaning behind the king''s death.


    Of course, among each of those crowds, there was always some exception.


    Kingra''mash watched silently from the side whilemunicating with his colleagues that the mission is called off. He nkly stared at the corpse of the king confused.


    How the heck did you die? I didn''t even make my move!


    As for the Deathfull Skulls group leader, he had a frown on his face, simrly confused by this whole ordeal.


    But among this group, Azrael silently stared at the kneeling Danzel with suspicion.


    He remembered the day when he met Danzel and fought each other.


    In their fight, he experienced an illusion that brought the pain of having once heart pierced by someone.


    ''The bodynguage of this human indicated that he felt some kind of pain in his chest, could Danzel have...''


    And from this day forth, this event became one of the historical moments in the history of the Dynasty of Ioratal.


    Some told that the king drank too much of the sins of war, calling this event "The drink of the virtuous king.


    Others said that the goddess deemed the king worthy to join in her holy realms, calling the event "Last Blessed Drink".


    He was remembered as a great king.


    As for the truth of his death, it was far grimmer than others could ever imagine.

 Chapter 348 True Necromancy

    With the king of the Dynasty of Ioratal now dead without appointing someone to take the throne. The civil war between nobles that the immortal Liches predicted didn''t happen.


    Instead, only those of the royal family and those who pretend to be one were now fighting for the throne. Their respective factions would have long ago raised arms to force the others to give in if it weren''t for the still raging war between the Arcana and Berum.


    While they destroying border walls in the Arcana kingdom brought out an opportunity for Berum to counter-attack, essentially lowering the pressure on them.


    It wasn''t to the point where it would put a stop to the war or remove them from the targets list.


    The ones who actively sought to start a civil war in the current stay of events will receive the dissatisfaction of both people and more importantly, Lancelot.


    The spear of Dynasty.


    Being the most loyal to the kingdom and the most powerful, despite his dislike of politics, his influence on who should be the king was essential.


    Without him, the dynasty would be unable to respond to threats that only a 5th-tier could solve.


    Sure, they were a very small number of 5th-tier in the dynasty other than him, but they were essential rogue and were none different, if not worse than mercenaries.


    Without him supporting the throne, the few nobles of the 4th-tier could seek to better their position. After all, they would be the strongest beings after the 5th-tiers.


    If that were to happen, the fate of the dynasty will be like tossing a coin flip.


    After all, armies of lower tier could never defeat someone that reached a 4th-tier or above. Or at the very least, it was close to impossible.


    Nevvan''s spell was a perfect example of that.


    A single spell was enough to severely crimple a whole army.


    In other words, he was essential.


    And that made it all the worse with him temporarily taking the throne together with the help of the king''s adviser. The adviser was the previous king''s trusted secretary and a far cousin of the king.


    Those two operated the current dynasty and kept things in flow,


    But that wasn''t going tost.


    Other nobles and those of the royal family criticized Lancelot for forcefully taking the throne when he is not worthy with others specting that those two were the ones who assassinated the king.


    Despite the fact that there was no proof of poison or something unordinary about the king''s death.


    He simply appeared as he receive a heart attack and died.


    No poison was found and with the hundreds of eyes of powerful being present, any attempts of assassination would have been seen.


    Further proof of his innocents was the fact that the king''s several protection magic items didn''t activate at all.


    Despite all the proof of their innocents though, it still made things all the more ugly for Lancelot and the adviser.


    The view-see crystal that showed the terrible event proved at that time to be a blessing in disguise with the events being capable to be yed back.


    Sadly, not all people wanted to listen to reason and logic. Instead, some still believed that they were the killers.


    The burial of the king did manage to save them a few days, but after then every one of the royal familyined for Lancelot to leave the throne.


    Something that he dearly wanted and yet couldn''t allow happening.


    They were more than the 6 princes after all.


    It would be as if he opens the front door of the sheep barn to a bunch of walls. The barn contained only a single sheep.


    And decided which wolf is supposed to eat the sheep and leave the others starving was something that Lancelot and the adviser had a hard time thinking about.


    Until they came up with an answer.


    That one is that the faction that gained the most merits in the war, will have the prince be the king of the dynasty. He even oathed in front of a view-see crystal. So if he lied, he could be held ountable.


    Lancelot knew that the wolves wanted to rip each other throats. And since he couldn''t effort having them fight inside the house, he changed the aim to the neighbor''s farm. Thest remaining one should take the sheep.


    Of course, that brought a ton of problems internally, but for the sake of fairness, Lancelot didn''t mind.


    Though his decision and the follow-up of events were easily predicted by an entity that disguises itself as one of the royal families.


    ***


    After assassinating the king of the Dynasty, several days passed.


    There was a time when they were watched by the soldiers for the reason of being a suspicious subjects. And that''s only his group but all the other people present there. But thanks to his perfect assassination, he and the others were left alone.


    Originally, he didn''t want to get involved in the assassination of the king, as he found the risk of doing much too high. But after hearing out Velkir''s n, he decided to act on his own.<sub> </sub>


    After all, the n that he suggested was way too dangerous. If they had to act, not only would his group be put on the target list of the 5th-tier spearman, but the other powerful people present would also act ordingly.


    In short, a chaotic situation that he would have no control over.


    Resorting in using his new skill, [Soul Ender].


    And even then, there was still risk involved.


    But he was confident that [Soul Ender] would destroy the king''s soul. His confidence came from the reaction other people had with [Mortal Reminder]. Not only was it level 1 then, but activating [Mortal Reminder] back then would be enough to bring someone with the strength of the king close to death.


    When he tested it on people of the 1st-tier, most of them would fall to the ground and shake constantly, their faces bing as pale as ghost.


    Though he never managed to kill someone purely by [Mortal Reminder], it was enough to paralyze the body of weaker people for a minute or two.


    So his assassination went smoothly and was unknown to anyone, at least for the most part.


    The king, despite his weak body,sted more than he expected, but died in the end from having his soul destroyed, a potential risk.


    And Azrael seemed to have figured out what happend back in the throne room by the way he stared at me meaningfully from time to time.


    Though surprised, he wasn''t shocked.


    After all, Azrael was the only one present that experienced [Mortal Reminder]. Though [Soul Ender] and [Mortal Reminder] were different skills, they shared some simrities.


    ''I still fail to understand why the Dynasty appoints such a weak king to rule.'' Danzel shook his head.


    He acknowledged that knowledge was power and that a wise king would be better for a kingdom than someone that was just powerful. But with existence such as himself or Velkir.


    They just needed a flick of their finger to end the life of the king.


    Even if they had a 5th-tier as a guard.


    Danzel was of the opinion that they should have seen something like this happening. After all, magic existed. And with thebination of two elements being possible to bepletely new magic, simr to blood magic and soul magic, unique abilities such as his [Soul Ender] could be born.


    In a way, ignorance was a sin such as weakness.


    ...


    He didn''t linger long on the reason why humans do such decisions. Instead, he focused on the sight in front of him.


    A wall hiding behind massive buildings, but most massive of all of them was a sky-piercing tower in the center.


    Thest that the Dynasty of Ioratal has given us ording to Velkir.


    Its ce is overseen by one of the kings of the Arcana kingdom and one of the biggest military bases. The Magus of the Tower.


    Just watching from afar, Danzel could see the seer amounts of mana in the air circting around. Danzel was reminded back when he fell into the cursedke. Howrge amounts of dead mana were everywhere to see.


    And the ce where he was looking was simr, only muchrge, and instead of dead mana, only mana was there.


    "Is it your first time seeing such an amount of mana?" Velkir said from the side, Danzel having long sensed him.


    "Yes...the sheer amount together with how it surrounds the whole ce is impressive." Danzel said, receiving Velkir chuckle, something so rare that made Danzel look Velkir in the face.


    "If that''s the case when the mission is done. I will show you a ce that is much greater than this ce. A ce filled with our element." Velkir said as he summons his staff in one hand and amunication device in the other.


    Looking at the device, it started lighting up after a few seconds.


    "It''s time..." Velkir said, his dead mana inside his body released to the surrounds.


    "Prepare. Vannesa, Agares go for the core of the tower."


    Velkir dead mana filled a huge area that span several kilometers far and wide with shadows


    "The others~"


    Within the shadows, armored undead started to raise, each bearing incredible artifacts and powers. From hundreds to thousand started to appear, with no sign of their numbers stopping increasing.


    "-annihte those humans!"


    The undead who came from the shadows raised their weapons and yelled harrowing battlecries.


    Looking at the stunned Danzel, Velkir said.


    "This is what true necromancy looks like, my discipline." he said.


    As the undead army marched towers the tower.

 Chapter 349 Trapping The Magus

    A few minutes before the rising of the Undead army, in a different location.


    The news of one of the Arcana borders breaking apart has long since traveled to the airs of the Berum Kingdom.


    No longer being in a disadvantageous position, their army marched through the crumbles of the wall and pushed their des dipper inside the heart of Arcana,


    Their aim is of thergest city named Canemacia which is known for hosting several magic academies which teaches thousands of young people to be magic caster or researchers and a mana crystal mine is being guarded inside the city. Which fulled the academy''s needs of materials while also providing magic items to the city.


    Though a mana crystal mine was considered dangerous if mined by an inexperienced person, Arcana being so focused on their magic had long ago figured out how to harvest them safely with less capable people.


    Some even say that if it weren''t for the fact that mana crystal needed arge amount of time to be generated, then the Arcana Kingdom would have been the strongest new kingdom.


    Only falling short at thest remaining kingdom that was far older than any of the other 3 kingdoms.


    Nheless, Canemacia was one of the backbones of the Arcana kingdom that was also closed at the borders that Velkir''s group destroyed.


    In other words, the perfect target.


    Thousands of soldiers of the Berum kingdom marched, their goal being the city of Canemacia. With most of the soldiers being capable of using life force, their physical power and body toughness was far stronger than the average man of the same tier.


    While they were magic caster, the majority was using life force.


    Making the army specialized in closebat, whereas the Arcana kingdom waspletely the opposite.


    Arcana sought to peer through the secrets of what is magic, energy much more easily controble that life force and more versatile. As magic could enchant one''s body to pass its limit, though with less potency.


    Which didn''t leave the arcana soldierspletely vulnerable in closebat, but they would have a disadvantage. But the long-range capabilities of magic well paid for minor disadvantage.


    Usually, they would bombard the Begum''s army with magic and cut arge number of their forces.


    But once the Berum kingdom came close enough, they would send the talentless soldiers to serve as their meat shield to continue their bombardment.


    ...


    "Kyyaaah!" Screams of pain echoed through the Berum''s army as their soldiers were engulfed with fierce mes that consumed their flesh.


    Once the mes weaken, the talentless soldiers with little special abilities except their physical strength pushed forward through the mes, their spears prating the stunned Berum soldiers. The enchanted armor of the soldiers of Arcana reduces their pain senses while also slightly improving the armor''s resistance from the elements.


    The spears that prated their enemies started gathering mana before being unleashed on the other soldiers, killing and wounding many of them.


    Though they might be considered talentless in the ways of magic, their mass-manufactured magic items such as the spear made them still a force worth fearing.


    With the mes no gone, the Berum soldiers quickly faced the other army in c?pse quarters, using their physical powers and their life force to forcefully move their bodies faster, they were able to cut a few of the Arcana soldiers.


    But not enough before the next spells came flying towards them.


    Be it spears made out of all the basic elements of fireballs, the Berum soldiers in the front couldn''t help but stare at the magic defeated.


    In only a few seconds, their bodies will be cut, torn apart, burned to crisp, or blown up. If not all of those.


    And once death''s door was slowly opening to them, a sh of light surrounded them.


    A barrier made out of warm mes with intense strength manifested and blocked all the magic thrown at them. A huge explosion urred and smoke rose.


    But that smoke was blown away by mes, revealing the safe soldiers who couldn''t believe what just happend.


    A soldier who stood stunned that he was alive heard a voice from behind him.


    "Don''t just stand there, fight."


    Before he could turn around to see who spoke, someone with incredible speed dashed towards the army of the Arcana kingdom


    And the cries of those soldiers started to echo through the battlefield.


    Figures wearing helmets to resemble the head of a phoenix entered the enemy''s lines. They were like tornadoes of sharp des, cutting their enemies with extreme ease while shooting out waves of mes from their swords, killing hundreds in a fraction of a second.


    Seeing the threat, the magic caster of the arcana quickly began aiming toward the phoenix warriors even if it meant at the cost of the lives of their own soldiers.


    But once the barrage of spells came running down towards them, several tornadoes of mes began engulfing many of the arcana soldiers. Those tornadoes of mes twist into the shape of armored humanoid elementals, taking on all the spells before they reach the phoenix warriors.


    The armored humanoid me elementals exploded and were destroyed from blocking all the spells, but as if refusing to die, the shattered mes started to gather once more and reform to the previous state of the fire elementals.


    Once again in their previous state, everyone near them meets the same fate, being burned alive.


    "It''s the phoenix warrior!" One of the Berum soldiers called out in joy.


    "Follow them! kill those bastards!"


    "With them at our side, victory is on our side!"<sub> </sub>


    The sudden appearance of the elite forces of Berum raised the whole army''s morale. Their bodies moved faster and their sword was more precise: That momentum made them like a scythe cutting through wheat.


    If things continued as they were, their victory was certain.


    But suddenly, the whole world seemed to slow down.


    On top of the arcana talentless soldiers, a sudden appearance ofrge amount appeared.


    That mana slowly becamerger andrger till it formed what looked like a portal.


    Coming out of the portal as if he was stepping into the air with his hand behind his back, the man with the mask looked at the surroundings.


    Looking at the army of the Berum, a burst of mana spread through the battlefield, making every single one present notice the man with the mask.


    But before they could even utter a word.


    Thousands of spikes came out of the ground, each of them impaling one Berum soldier. One spike is reserved for a single soldier.


    It was as if someone flipped a switch, once turned on, every single one of the Berum''s sides was impaled by one of the spikes. Not even the phoenix warriors were spared. Just before they were prated barriers appeared to protect them, though those were pierced just like paper.


    Silence befell the battlefield.


    Everything happend in an instant, they couldn''t even react to the appearance of the masked magic caster with a pair of gauntlets. Otherwise known as the Magus of the Tower.


    "Do you really think I will let you do whatever you want into my territory?" The Magus of the Tower said while making his spear go back into the ground, leaving thousands of corpses to fall to the ground


    Just as those words left, each corpse of the phoenix warriors was ignited with raging mes as if a volcano exploded.


    The mes gather in one ce and started forming into a bird several meters tall, made out of pure immortal mes.


    "Heretics! I shall purge you and let your body burn for all eternally for what you have just done!" The bird made out of immortal mes, the phoenix shouted.


    "Hmpf, a mere bird thinking it''s immortal. Laughable." The Magus of the Tower said.


    Both their auras were released to the surroundings, making the soldiers of arcana run in fear for their lives.


    The phoenix''s body burned with life force, making his body temperature rise twice its original amount and it was still rising.


    The Magus raised his hand and pointed his palm towards the phoenix, indicating that he would cast magic at any moment.


    And just as they were about to fight.


    Walls of foreign mana started to rise with unfathomable speed, making a box that crossed several kilometers. Trapping both the phoenix and the magus inside.


    "A barrier?" The Magus of the Tower mumbled as he sensed mana forming several meters away from those two.


    The mana that appears lightens up in the light. In that light were two robed figures that held an increadible amount of mana on their own.


    The newly appeared figures had an aura of death surrounding their body, indicating their mastery of necromancy. But theirck of flesh and their head a skull with ethereal mes was all the proof that one needs to tell that they were undead.


    One undead had a teal ethereal eye with his mouth being t with no teeth whereas the other undead had one single ethereal eye with dark light within the middle beingpletely white.


    "So you even allied with those abominations, heretic!?" The phoenix yelled towards the magus.


    Ignoring the immortal bird, the magus started at the undead.


    "Liches? What business does the council have toe here?"


    The Lich brought out amunication device from his storage item. Once it lightens up, he put it back into his spatial storage item.


    "We aren''t sent by the council. We simply came to kill you." The teal-eyed Lich said, a burst of dark wind making him float and cut his surroundings.


    The one-eye Lich bent his knee and touched the ground, making a burst of ck mes appear and spread through the surroundings


    The ck mes started to raise and form into beings simr to the fire elementals with their face being one eye and skulls.


    The being made out of chaos magic used its mes to fly into the air toward the magus. The teal-eyed Lich sent hundreds of wind des with a simple wave of his hand.


    The Magus''s first response was to teleport away, but once he tried he found out he couldn''t.


    ''A barrier that prevents teleportation...''


    Raising his hands in front of him, a huge amount of mana flow to the magus gauntlets.


    "Fine, I will show you all the peak of magic!"


    And so began the battle between two 5th-tier beings and two immortal 4th-tier undead.

 Chapter 350 Spearheads Of The Undead Legion

    Looking around the thousand of undead, Danzel couldn''t help but look at Velkir differently.


    Each and every undead wore all kinds of different armor and weapons, but the quality of them might be simr to his items before they were damaged, not including the bonuses that his rune brought.


    Not only that, but the undead wore a cloak of dead mana around them. They were like a well that let out dead mana into the surroundings while making the living ufortable, it was the best environment for an undead just like Danzel to be.


    He felt like he was in his own element. His aura grew much strong than previously.


    But then again, looking at the amount of all the 3rd-tier undead, Danzel felt somewhat depressed.


    ''What''s the point of being the strongest of my tier when a necromancer could make of undead of the same tier?''


    Sure, individual, he was much stronger, to the point he could fight off multiple of his own tier. But a thousand was a feat he wasn''t confident in achieving.


    At times like this, he questioned if the path of a warrior instead of a magic caster was the best.


    "Danzel." Velkir said.


    Being called out, he turned around, only to be met with a wave of dead mana entering his body and strengthing him.


    "You will take the front of my army."


    Hearing this, Danzel moved his head to the side in confusion.


    While it worked once with Sartan forcing his way through the walls, doing the same with all the others behind him will result in casualties. They might be of the 3rd-tier, but they weren''t undestroyable.


    As if reading his mind, Velkir pointed his hand towards the wall. Where huge portals appeared to the outside,ing out of those were legions of soldiers, each of them wearing or holding a magic item.


    <o>,m "You don''t have to breach the wall, just deal with them with all the others."</o>


    Nodding his head, Danzel stared at the legionsing their way, still confused.


    "Why do theye out when they have the walls?"


    "It''s because they already know who we are." Azrael said, carrying his demonic weapon and wearing a robe simr to Vanessa.


    "They know that their walls are useless against Sartan. So they came out to stop prevent him from breaking their wall."


    "In other words, the big guy is at fault, eh?" Vanessa said while lightly punching the high troll''s thigh.


    "Hmpf! I just have to kill them all before breaking their wall." Sartan said, annoyed at the dark elve.


    "Enough!" Velkir said with a certain coldness in his tone.


    "Vanessa and Agares stay put till we cleared the way, save your strength. Shiro with me. Azrael and Sartan, you deal with their elite forces. As for you Danzel."


    Staring at him, his blind-like eyes lighten in gray mana.


    "Kill everyone else."


    Hearing his orders, Danzel''s ethereal eyes lighten up.


    "Understood?" Velkir said.


    "Yes! Master Velkir."


    "Yes! Boss."


    "Yes! Master Velkir."


    "Yes! Master Velkir."


    "Yes! Death Caller."


    "Yes! Leader."


    Saying so in unison, everyone moved separately.


    Danzel turned his head and stared at Skull w.


    ''Follow me.''


    Ordering Skull w to fall, Danzel took the front of the left side of the undead army that stared at the living army with hatred.


    Mounting Skull w, Danzel looked like the general of this undead legion.


    Sartan took the right side of the undead army with the middle being reserved for Azrael.


    In the next moment, a huge wave of gray dark mana washed over all the other undead, making the signal for their march.


    Like a spark of dynamite, each of Velkirs undead charged with speed befitting one of the strongest 3rd-tier out there.


    Skull w dug her ws into the earth before dashing with simr speed but taking the lead of all the other undead.


    Sartan showed a crazed grin on his face before dashing toward the human army at a speed that left the undead army behind.


    Azrael cast a spell that made him the leviathan and simply flew like a spearhead but kept his speed up to the undead army.


    Seeing their advantages, several auras of pure power explode among the armies of arcana.


    The source of those auras ascending to the air, they looked like mighty gods wielding staffs that channel mana.


    They were a total of 6 of those people, each of them wearing a different kind of robes and staff. But the one that Danzel paid the most attention to was quiet in histe years with a long white beard.


    Danzel inner hatred clutched the iron bars inside of him and tried to break free, but Danzel pushed the useless hatred back inside of him.<sub> </sub>


    ''I have to push my hatred inside before I lose myself. He beat me once and he will do it. I doubt upgrading just my skills will be enough to win against him.'' Danzel rationalized internally.


    With their speed, crossing kilometers was a breeze for them all.


    Being in their range, the soldiers of Arcana built a wall of three spears while the magic caster shot waves of either earth or ice, with a few being made out of light.


    Focusing on the threat in front of him, Danzel''s sword glowed with ethereal dark green light.


    ''So they decided to use physical type spells, instead of fire and lighting. I get they aim for our weakness, but it''s still a foolish decision.''


    Though they weren''t immune to fire magic and lighting magic, those sorts of magic worked best at enemies that could feel pain or had flesh.


    The lighting will at best strain their bones and leaves cracks where the fire wasn''t effective. Only the initial explosion was the dangerous part. Melting their bones wasn''t optimal.


    "The light spears seem the most troubling..."


    Seeing them beingunched towards them, Danzel swings his sword in front of him, releasing 3 waves of [Soul Reaping Wind] at the spears.


    Traveling much faster than the spear themselves, Danzel destroyed all of the spears that were aimed in front of him.


    Though he alone wasn''t able to block all of them.


    But that didn''t mean that the undead was helpless.


    Far from it.


    Some undead rose their hands to manifest a thick wall made out of dead mana around them, while others strengthen their weapons and directly destroyed the spears. Some even used magic to make spears of dead mana and shoot them like javelins at the spears.


    The only unlucky ones were those targeted by the light spears. Those spears prate or we''re mostly unexpected by retaliation.


    23 undead were hit on the head and fell to the ground motionless.


    89 others managed to avoid the detection of their skull at the cost of being hit in another part of their body.


    To Danzel, those kinds of undead were impressed with how they had different abilities and magic to use.


    He himself couldn''t make his undead have skills or spells except by granting them some swordsmanship knowledge.


    If it was his own undead, thousands would have been destroyed.


    And even considering 23 died 3rd-tier undead died was quite many. But not many enough for a whole army.


    The spears pointing toward them lighten up and shot concentrated mana, damaging them further.


    But Danzel didn''t care for the magic spears attack but instead watched out for the magic caster.


    The former was a nuisance, but not lethal whereas thetter was both.


    "So first the magic casters." He mumbled as the undead and Skull w crashed at the enemy''s army like a tsunami.


    The former weapon cuts or crashes the human soldiers in the front with thetter digging her ws at their flesh.


    Danzel who was on top of Skull w guided his mana around his body, with arge amount of dead mana around his legs.


    ''[Swift Movements], [Death Descent].''


    Using the level 10 version of his previous movement skill with his new one, Danzel catapulted himself above the enemy''s lines with incredible speed towards where the magic caster was preparing their magic.


    Bringing out his shield from his storage ring, Danzel fell on top of an unlucky soldier who was crushed by his weighteding force.


    But once his feet met the ground, the dead mana around his leg explode outwards in a huge shock wave of death energy. Fallen directly in front of where the magic caster was, the shockwave passed through those magic caster and nearby soldiers, pushing them back with a minor decay effect.


    "Aghhhh!"


    "Kyaaagh!"


    With screams of pain, Danzel''s glowing sword was swung in front of him, sending a [Soul Reaping Wind] to cut down the others in front of him.


    Everything happens too fast for the magic caster and soldiers to react.


    Once they did, many of their friends were cleaved in two with terrified faces lingering on their faces.


    Without letting them get a hold of the situation Danzel dashed with his shield in front like a spearhead.


    Digging further into the enemy lines and creating chaos.


    Everyone who crossed his path was crashed or cut down.


    Danzel who moved with much greater speed thanks to the level up of [Swift Movements] cut the soldier like vegetables.


    Though risky going in the middle of the enemy''s forces, Danzel had a goal.


    ''I might not be strong enough to face the ice magic caster in my current state, but that just means that I have to be strong enough so that I will be able to!''


    Cutting another man''s neck, letting blood stain his armor, he looked to the side of a floating window.


    [Requirement: Kill over 10 000 of the living with your own hands]


    [Currently achieved: 9178/10 000].


    His hatred was suppressed, though not gone.

 Chapter 351 The Engel Of Riverblood

    Azrael''s POV.


    Walking in front of the undead army, Azrael silently cast the [Fly] spell before ncing at the human army that he and the others were ordered to wipe out.


    Sensing the death energy of Velkir enter to the undead legion, Azrael led the undead while minding not to be too fast for them.


    Though they were the minor minions of his teacher, they still wore valuable armor and weapons that nobles could even consider an heirloom. Although his teacher consider them failed prototypes, it still pained Azrael in seeing them being damaged considering that each piece of equipment was enough to fund a week or two in his expenses.


    Leading the undead legion, Azrael nned to wipe out the whole army in the fasted possible and most efficient way.


    But when he watched to his right, he saw how Sartan charged alone with a warcry and shook his head.


    He never understood the fighting style of Sartan, currently, he was being pierced by hundreds of spears like he wasn''t giving a damn.


    Azrael knew Sartan''s regeneration capabilities thanks to his countless time experimenting with the high trolls'' blood. So while the title immortal juggernaut was justified, he knew that there was a limit.


    After all, an immortal body wasn''t able to exist, as that would bean an endless source of energy to repair the immortal body.


    Ignoring the high troll overtaking the undead legion and beginning his massacre, he sensed 6 strong auras among the human army.


    Staring at where the auras appeared, he saw 6 people with staffs in the air.


    "I total of six 4th-tiers. They all look to be magic casters..." Azrael mumbled as he raised his cursed spear, Bloodthirster.


    ''Sartan can''t be counted on in fighting magic casters, I guess I will have to be the one to deal with them.'' he said internally as the whittled spear started to circle around his hand and root at his shoulder.


    Several veins appeared in the bones of the spear and in the next moment, blood started toe out and fill up the gaps of the spear, making it seem as if Azrael''s hands and spear fused together. While the gaps were filled with hardened blood, one could still see that previously they were gaps.


    "But first, I will need to attract them to me." Azrael said, his eyes burning like two crimson suns.


    He suddenly elerated his flying speed by twice the amount, his sudden speed was met with several magic spears being pointed toward him and magic casters aiming at him.


    Hundreds of spears were aimed at him, but he was easily able to see the trajectory with inject mana into his eyes and dodge them with ease this spear being put in front of him blocked all the mana shots that were lucky enough to hit.


    It didn''t take him 3 seconds for him to reach the front of the arcana army. But instead of flying in their ranks, Azrael canceled his flying spell momentarily and touched the ground with his spear raised to his side.


    Arge amount of blood traveled in the spear and once he swung horizontally, the blood of the spear was spread like a wind de, a wind de that grew longer with each passing moment.


    Once the blood made contact with the human soldiers, the blood created a hardened spear toucher sharper than steel, prating the front of the human army with several other spears contiunue being generating behind the first wave.


    "KyaAAAA!!!"


    It was like a wave of bloody spears.


    The same attack that almost killed Danzel once.


    Those who were pierced by the spears would see no tomorrow as even if they survived having a spear piercing their body, they would end up having their blood sucked till they were dry mummies.


    Reactivating his [Fly] spell, Azrael kicked the ground for more speed and jumped on top of one soldier who was sent flying up in the air and was still alive.


    Appearing on top of the shocked soldier in the air, Azrael gave him a brief nce with his eyes.


    Seeing the pair of two crimson suns staring at him, the soldier opened his mouth to say something, but before he could even utter a single word, Azrael used the man as a tform to fly faster up in the air.


    Resulting in kicking the man in the guts and sending him directly under one of the bloody spears, impaling the soldier in the process.


    Being now in a position to oversee the whole human army, Azrael''s eyes searched for the magic caster hiding in their ranks.


    Once he locked his gaze with them, he pointed his spear towards them. In the next moment, the closed gaps continuously shot out small pieces of blood with extreme speed, containing a pressure far superior to that of any bullet towards the magic caster.


    The small blood shots instantly filled the magic caster with holes as if they were swiss cheese, some tried to put out mana barriers to protect themselves against those attacks, though with little sess.


    It was as if Azrael''s spear was a minigun with no recoil and unlimited ammunition.


    The human soldier though didn''t stay and watched how their magic caster was being destroyed. They raised their magic spears and pointed them towards the dark elve, gathering their mana to shoot at the target.


    Without even giving the soldiers a nce, he activated the rune of Bloodthirster.


    The harden bloody spears started to copse one by one and be liquid again, but instead of falling to the ground, all the blood of the spears together with the blood they sucked traveled towards where Azrael.


    ''It seems like it works well.'' Azrael thought was satisfied with his spear.


    Though he still had to manually speed up how fast the blood traveled towards him, the Bloodthirster made the process much easier for him.


    The blood gathered to him at the same time when the soldiers fired their mana shots at him.


    Suddenly the tons of blood seemed toopressed while also circling Azrael, creating an almost transparent blood barrier around himself with the use of magic.


    The mana shots hit the blood barrier, but all it did was simply create a short rimple in the blood, as f throwing a small rock into ake.


    With the hundreds of mana shots, it looked like a light show.


    Shaking his head, Azrael raised his hand in an "X" in front of him before pointing them at his left and right.


    In the next moment, the blood barrier started to get inted and berger before exploding into thousands of small blood bullets all around the area.


    Resulting in another wave of humans bing filled with holes.


    Those who were out of range shuttered at the dark elves'' power. Killing thousands in a matter of seconds!<sub> </sub>


    Locking his eyes on the other soldier, the shuttered and stepped back, creating chaos in the process.


    But before he could begin with this bunch, Azrael saw several different signatures of mana appearing all around him.


    Where the foreign mana was, a brief light appeared before revealing 5 magic casters surrounding Azrael.


    "What an honor. Having 5 Archmagese for my head." Azrael said with no emotion in his voice.


    "You will die here for the people you killed!" One of the Archmages yelled in anger, his mana raging to the outside.


    Ignoring the furious Archmage, Azrael concentrated his senses, trying to find thest remaining Archmage.


    ''It seems thest remaining one went for Sartan. I just have to deal with them then.'' He thought before elerating himself to fly above the sky.


    Reacting ordingly, the 5 other magic casters followed after Azrael, one of them, Archmage Nevvan raised his staff towards him, creating several ice spears with incredible mana density.


    Letting the ice spear lose towards Azrael with speed simr to his blood bullets, Azrael who reached the clouds turned around and raised his spear in front of him.


    A huge amount of blood flows into Bloodthirster.


    Once swung, a huge wave of blood was spread at the ice spears, the blood still attached to his Bloodthirster.


    The wave of blood split into 4 pieces and harden but still stayed flexible.


    And as if controlling 4 new limbs in the form of tentacles, they moved like whips to destroy the ice spears so fast that they created after images.


    Destroying all spears, Azrael didn''t pull the blood back to him, instead, he let it bepletely liquid, making the Archmages frown.


    They moved to the side to dodge the fall of the blood, but the blood instead of falling levitated in the air, and spread though out the sky, splitting the blood into tiny drops that harden like needles.


    "This guy! Barriers!" Another Archmage told his colleagues as he generated a barrier all around himself as he realized what the dark elve was going to do.


    The other also figured out what he was nning to do and did as their colleague suggested, making a barrier around themself.


    Looking down at the Archmages making barriers, Azrael grinned to himself.


    "[Tears of Blood]." He cast his spell.


    All the thousands of small needles of hardened blood suddenly flew down to the earth with incredible speed, though weaker than his blood bullets, his blood needles were twice as fast.


    And like a heavy rain of blood making his appearance, the barriers of the Archmages were washed with hundreds of blood needles, creating a sound of heavy rain falling into the roof at their barriers. Though violent, their barriers held pretty well.


    Azrael didn''t care about their barriers, he didn''t aim to kill those humans with this spell. His aim was the ones below them.


    And as if someone pressed a button, screams of pain echoed from the ground, making the Archmage realize the dark elves'' objective.


    The soldiers on the ground weren''t skilled enough or if at all to generate barriers just like the Archmages and even if they could, they weren''t going to be strong enough. So once the needles of blood fell on top of them, all they could do was cry from the pain and dying after having one''s bodies pierced by hundreds of needles.


    Though the spell, [Tears of Blood] didn''t cover the whole battlefield, Azrael pretty much killed the front of the Arcana''s army.


    Soon enough, the rain of blood stopped, making the Archmages remove their barrier while ring at Azrael.


    Looking at the Archmages with little emotion, he raised his left in front of him and closed it into a fist.


    Once he did, the blood of the thousands of soldiers that died on the ground started to be drained and fly towards the air.


    Frowning at this, the Archmages teleported away so as to not be washed by the tons of blood rising into the heaves.


    The tons of blood traveled inside Azrael''s Bloodthirster and under his cloak, disappearing as if Azrael was a sponge for blood.


    "Let''s see if it was worth trading those magic scrolls." Azrael mumbled as his aura was manifested into the air in a crimson color, influencing even the clouds to be dyed in red color.


    The orb of his Bloodthirster lightens up with a vertical iris another set of 8 smaller eyes appear in the cursed spears gabs with the sclera being orange.


    Under his cloak, the medium armor that was mixed with his previous robe started to be filled with blood, slowly creating a crimson-ted armor all around Azrael''s body with a helmet that had not a single opening like a faceless mask.


    The cloak that he was wearing was pulled by something growing from his back and torn apart till the cloak couldn''t manage before.


    Revealing a pair of two ck angel wings with the weather tips having a crimson color.


    It was like an angel of blood descent from the heavens to incur his wrath towards the mortals.


    pping his pair of ck wings, Azrael nodded as his armor satisfied before ncing at the Archmages.


    "Now, shall we begin." He said as liters of blood escaped from his armor and created 8 balls of blood around him.


    The ball of blood slowly shifted and became an exact copy of Azrael.


    Wielding a bloodthirster with his orb eye light up and his crimson-ted armor together with the pair of ck angel wings.


    Each of those copies had an aura of a 4th-tier and also held an increadible amount of mana inside of them.


    Azrael stared at his Bloodthirster of how it closed the small 8 eyes before gazing at the Archmages.


    "Humans." Azrael and his 8 copies said in unison, his copies voice being unnatural and twisted.

 Chapter 352 Under A Crimson Sky And Under A Mountain Of Corpses, He Stands

    Seeing the crimson sky and the one who caused it from afar, Danzel couldn''t help but remember the nickname of Azrael and how he is the strongest on the battlefield, or rather second to Velkir.


    ''Angel of Riverblood my underbone!'' He cursed internally.


    Thanks to his attributes, he was able to see how Azrael changed into a winged being while wearing the armor he carved runes on, though even that changed shape just like his spear.


    He wasn''t that surprised by the powerlessness of the blood rain as hepared his spell with Nevvan''s ice mountain. Danzel guessed that he could survive the onught of the rain with his shield. But what surprised him the most were the other 8 copies of Azrael.


    He wasn''t sure how strong they were, but their auras were of the 4th-tier, making a single dark elve have thebat ability of nine total 4th-tiers!


    ''And Velkir is supposed to be stronger than him!?''" He thought as he shed down his sword and cut down the soldiers.


    Stepping forward, leaving a trail of corpses behind, the human soldier surrounded him and pointed their magic spears toward him.


    "Fire!"


    Reacting to one''s order or panicked shout, the magic spear charged with its meager mana amount before shooting the mana towards Danzel.


    "Hmpf." Danzel scoffed as a wave of mana shots washed from all directions toward him.


    But as if being an imprable fortress, the mana shots hit his armor before bursting into small mana particles, leaving no hint of damage on his armor, only barely scratching his dark ttings.


    It helped him store arge amount of mana inside of him thanks to his [Armor of Undying Protection]. Though the skill was only level 1, the protection it offered was an ability of a 4th-tier being.


    Once they were unable to continue shooting, the human soldier stared at the dark knight with shock.


    "W-Why won''t he fall!"


    "Monster!"


    "Where are the magic caster!"


    Seeing them panicking, he raised his sword which glowed in a dark green light.


    "My turn." He said with an ice-cold voice while activating the rune in his helmet.


    Spreading fear in everyone that was in front of him.


    "Ahhhh!"


    A total of 4 stumbled back to their feet as they started crying, Danzel guessed that those few triggered the [Terror] effect, while the others stepped back.


    ''The amount is quite low." Danzel shook his head internally before swinging his sword towards the human soldiers, releasing 3 [Soul Reaping Wind].


    The dark green wind des cut through the ranks of the soldiers as if they were wheat before continue traveling further than a line. And with how little they had to move, they couldn''t escape having their bodies cleaved though together with their soul essence.


    They let a cry of pain before falling down dead, leaving only a path for Danzel to continue going deeper into their ranks.


    With Velkir''s undead being killing machines by themself, if he didn''t dig deeper then all those undead would steal his kills.


    Gazing to his side, he looked at the floating window.


    [Currently achieved: 9358/10 000].


    ...


    [Currently achieved: 9437/10 000].


    ''Not enough...'' Heined as he sensed the undead army getting closer.


    Hesitating no more, he dashed with speed far superior to the human soldier like a speeding train towards the path he created with his shield in front of him.


    "Hiiiek! S-Stay away!" The soldier standing directly in front of him shouted with a shaking voice, his legs trremling in fear.


    He could only have his spear in front of him and hope the dark knight impale himself with his momentum.


    Once Danzel came close to that one soldier, thetter closed his eyes and waited to be crushed. But to his luck, Danzel''s whole body turned into a dark mist and passed right through the soldier.


    Being turned into mist, Danzel could feel weird but not hard to move. The speed of his mist traveled through the soldier at an incredible amount of speed.


    That was when the mana cost of [Undying Preservation] helped him a lot with the insane mana cost of this skill.


    He even went overboard and wasted 5000 mana to travel till he stopped in front of a soldier.


    Once the mist gathered once more into one location, making Danzel physical again, he thrusted the spear to the heart of the stunned soldier, who was probably confused.


    "Ah~"


    The other soldiers beside him tried to shout, but Danzel gathered mana and started to push out, creating a strong shock wave of death energy, sweeping all nearby soldiers in the air with incredible force.


    It was as if dynamite exploded, killing many from the initial shockwave and others from the fall or being injured by the weapons of their allies.


    [Currently achieved: 9532/10 000].


    Without stopping, Danzel dashed at the nearby soldier and started swinging his sword, killing each of them with a clean swing.


    [Siphoning Soul de] would guarantee their death even if they managed to somehow survive and his [Innate Blood Absorbtion] restored bits of his mana by the blood that the runes of his sword drawn.


    Some of the soldiers tried to injure him with their magic spears, only further helping him recover while the more brave ones tried to thrust those spears at him. Thetter was the first to die.


    His shield would always stand and block their attack before they were cut down. And even if they hit his armor, the result was the same as the magic shots.


    With none being able to damage him, he was left loose to massacre everyone on his path.


    As the count of his mission was increasing, the faster his de moved toward reaching his goal.


    Any attempt the human soldier did only hasten their death.


    But it didn''t take long before the elite forces came to him.


    A sh of light appeared behind Danzel, the light revealing to be a man with a faceless mask and a much stronger magic spear than the othermon soldiers.


    The man''s mana gathered into the tip of his spear and thrust it towards the dark knight, aiming for his head.


    But before it could even reach him, Danzel turned around and blocked the spear with his shield.


    "A melee magic caster, huh?" Danzel mumbled before he closed the distance and began his offense toward the spear user.


    After a few shes, the magic caster started to take steps back.


    ''For a 3rd-tier, he is quite strong, but still too weak.''


    Pushing the spear to the side, Danzel used his to m towards the man''s chest like a charging track.


    Once he was struck by the shield, an ethereal image of his body came slightly out of his body before entering once more.<sub> </sub>


    "Agggh!"


    Rolling to the ground, Danzel moved to finish him.


    With his whole body shaking and his faceless masked now broken, revealing an aged man, he picked his spear to activate the enchantment.


    Suddenly, two magic circles appeared on top and bottom of Danzel, halting his move for a brief second.


    "Now!" The aged man shouted.


    Once he did, 2 other figures came rushing towards Danzel, one woman with a sheated sword and another man with some gauntlets wearing no chestte or clothing on the top.


    Looking at the two wearing two talismans with B+ carved into a te.


    ''Where have I seen those things before?'' Danzel thought puzzled as by his seer strength he broke the magic holding him in ce.


    But the brief moment alone allowed for the two other people to close their distance at him.


    The woman touched the handle of her sword and draw it with incredible speed out while the man''s fist was burning by intense mes created by the life force.


    "Ah, now I remember." Danzel said as the woman behind him stopped moving altogether for a brief seconds before falling down to her knees coughing, barely her sword out of the sheath.


    The man''s fist was interrupted by an ethereal dark green skeleton hand grabbing his wrist and turning it around, essentially ruining his posture.


    Stepping to the side, Danzel quickly at the man''s chest with his sword, leaving arge wound on his shoulder and torso.


    The man jumped regardless to create some distance but felt strength being drained from his body.


    "Though body, but such a wound is lethal. Mercenaries."


    "You~agh..." The man fell to the ground.


    In the next moment, [Existential Sense Danger] activated, making Danzel turn around only to see the woman swinging her sword at him, aiming to decapitate him.


    ''Fast..." Danzel would have frowned if he could.


    Sadly for her, her sword only passed through his body.


    Turning into mist, Danzel appeared behind her and pierced his sword in her heart. Making her experience once again having her heart pierced, the first one being the [Soul Ender] he used.


    "You guys might have been my match if it were a year or two ago." Danzel said as he pulled his sword out of her chest. Though fallen to the ground, her eyes still red at him, weakly.


    "Now rest, into your endless darkness." He said with a cold voice, the runes in his helmet spreading fear in her just before she died.


    Danzel turned around and faced the magic spear man, pointing his spear towards him.


    "[Ball of Explosion]!" He yelled out loud, creating what seemed like a fireball in Danzel''s eyes.


    ''Not worth risking with that kind of spell name.'' He thought as he raised a wall of stone between the man''s spell and him, he even made the wall much higher just to be safe.


    Once the [Ball of Explosion] made contact with his wall, like a granate that was filled with tiny [Fireball]''s, several explosions urred in front of the wall.


    The wall crumbled into pieces just as the spell ended. Behind the wall, was Danzel with his sword raised up.


    "Die." Swinging it down, 1 [Soul Reaping Wind] came out, unable to react, the old man was cleaved in two while the wind de continue killing other soldiers.


    [Currently achieved: 9774/10 000]


    Seeing that they were still a few more to kill, Danzel crumpled internally.


    ''Just a bit more before I can remove the limit of my body. It''s a good thing that every one of them is so cramped together. A few more [Soul Reaping Wind] and I-''


    Before he could finish his thoughts, out of blue, the stomach area of his armor was prated by a spear, taking his attention away.


    He looked behind him and made eye contact with one shaking soldier, who flinched.


    "I-I...why won''t you die~!" He screamed as he tried to pull his spear back, with little sess.


    Seeing the strength of the soldier being bare of the 2nd-tier, Danzel cursed at himself.


    "Tch, I got too careless..."


    Swinging his shield at the soldier, breaking his neck, Danzel''s mood grew worse.


    ''No matter how weak those guys are, I am still on the battlefield. I can''t believe I let myself get distracted to let such a guy near me''


    Pulling the spear out of his armor, the only spot that was filled with pure dark ting and not actually, he spread his dead mana on the nearby corpses around him and raised them as undead to continue fighting.


    Following Velkir''s advice, Danzel stored the corpses of the woman and the pugilist mercenaries in his storage ring before walking on top of the remains of the stone wall to get to the high ground.


    Being in a position that made him vulnerable and allowed him to see the rest of the human army, Danzel''s long sword glowed in dark green light.


    "I should have done this from the start."


    Swinging his sword and sending [Soul Reaping Wind]''s at the army, screams of pain began appearing.


    Each time he would release 3 waves before taking a small break before doing that once more, each wave another wave of pain.


    And soon enough, he finally reached the milestone


    [Currently achieved: 10 000/10 000]


    "Haha~"


    Making his shield disappear, he brought out his status screen.


    And under a red sky.


    Crimson blood stained the ground so much that it formed a pond.


    Based on the crimson color that oozed from the corpses that were the source of such blood, one could guess that those corpses were in recently.


    And the corpses weren''t a few to say the less.


    One could count thousands of mortalsying dead on the ground.


    And watching from the top of all those corpses, a figure wearing dark-ted armor and releasing an aura of death to his surroundings.


    That figure pressed the upgrade button [Soul of Death Essence].


    Achieving all the requirements to be a being that wields death itself in his very hands.

 Chapter 353 Tough Choises

    The option to choose 3 modifications out of many appeared in front of Danzel in the [Soul of Death Essence] passive skill.


    From them all, Danzel chose [Soul Affinity], [Dead Mana Affinity], and [Power Increase]. He could have also chosen to make the discount for getting skills much bigger, but he decided against it.


    Since this skill affected the performance of almost all his skills, he hoped to increase the 20%.


    Though he still found it too risky to put his tempering point into that option. Ending up putting it at [Soul Affinity].


    Turning the skill into [Unceasing Soul of Death Essence]


    [Unceasing Soul of Death Essence]: A case where an undeadpletely ustoms dead mana on his soul and vessel. Raising all attributes by 50% while being [?], also making the soul more capable to preserve in [?]. Resulting in all Death and Soul-attuned skills and talents being 40% more effective. s, such a soul would never again be able to be hosted in a body that hasn''t been created or born from dead mana.


    All Attributes increased by 70.


    Lowers the cost of Curse, Death, and Soul Attuned Skills by a total of 25%


    Every 4 years, 25 attribute points is being granted.


    [Talent [Superior Undead] turned into [Exalted Undead]


    Danzel only manages to nce at the new talent before a wave of notifications started rapidly appearing in front of him.


    [You have met the requirements to evolve!]


    [Evolution will continue!]


    [You choose to be a Death Knight! Evolution will proceed!]


    [Choose 4 out of 9 Talents to permanently gain!


    [Reinforced Body]


    [Magic Resistance]


    [Deathless Will]


    [Dread Aura]


    [Dominate the Dead]


    [Soul Nemesis]


    [Grand Undead General]


    [Carving Fate with Death]


    [Cursed Hands]


    [Can temper one single Talent of your choice]


    Danzel ethereal eyes red up at the number of options and how many talents he could pick this time.


    He saw some familiar options such as [Dread Aura], [Magic Resistance], and [Reinforced Body] from his previous evolution option. While [Dread Aura] could be considered a nicebo with the [Rune of Intimidating Will] as it would trigger [Nightmare] as soon as the [Terror] triggers, he still didn''t want to go the route of breaking others'' minds with a simple stare.


    Though if the other options were bad, he would consider picking it as he also had the [Vampiric Gaze] skill.


    As for the other two talents, they were good, but not great enough to be chosen.


    Going down the list, there was [Dominate the Dead]


    [Dominate the Dead]: A talent that only the undead of higher tier have the privilege of having. Lesser Undead will bend to your will and serve as their lord regardless if they were created by you or not. Can be resisted with great mental capabilities or a will greater than yours. Can briefly animate corpses to fight for you, no mana cost is required.


    ''I see...it''s basically a better version of [Undead Domination].'' Danzel moved to the next talent.


    He wasn''t interested in forcing other undead that wasn''t created by him to work for him and even less in creating zombies for free.


    [Soul Nemesis]: A undead who has the rare affinity of souls. Having destroyed a soul with his own soul essence, you became the nemesis of the soul. Allowing you to absorb the soul essence of others made by a physical weapon with no after-effects. Once per day, you can designate one weapon, allowing it hit the soul''s essence.


    ''That''s more like it!'' Danzel yelled internally.


    ? While cutting one''s soul essence wasn''t the same as cutting a soul directly, he had long ago learned that harming one''s soul essence was quite harmful, considering that it affects the soul.<sub> </sub>


    But the most attractive thing about this talent was the fact that he could absorb other soul essences, solving the problem that he had with the [Great Rune of Ruined Vessel].


    Till now those two talents brought the urge to instantly pick them, though he perceived to see the others even if he doubted that it couldn''t get any better.


    [Grand Undead General]: A higher tier undead thatmanded thousands of undead and led them to im the lives of the living while being victorious. The dead will easier raise for your cause and hear yourmands thoughnds far and wide. All undead created by you will have 25% more attributes than they were supposed to gain permanently, yourmands willst longer and distance will be creater. Additionally, allow yourself to see through the vision of one of your undead for a period of time. The undead that will share his vision with you will receive a 50% buff on all attributes and their death attune skills for the period of the duration.


    ''That''s indeed powerful...I would bet that Velkir has something of this sort.''


    This seemed like a must-have talent for necromancers which Danzel half*ssed trying to be. He started to feel the pain of having to choose only a limited amount of them and he still hasn''t gone through all the skills yet!


    He didn''t even have the time to think about it as his body was urging him to hurry. Not to forget that he was on the battlefield. Till now he spends a total of 20 seconds reading through it and that was only because of how high his intelligence stat was.


    Another example of great talent was [Deathless Will], which would increase his mental resistance by a total of 50% while also when he dies for good, the talent will bring him back to 500 HP and make his body move in top shape.


    It was essentially another lifeline just like his [Undying] Talent, but it would also make him resist mental attacks and lessen the struggle of [Sin of Wrath].


    The other talents were also hard to miss.


    [Carving Fate with Death]: A Undead who is capable to carve runes into items that decide the fate of others. Most of the time their fate is death itself. Through mastery of your art, you managed to find out how to make your runes smaller, make them put less stress, and increase their effectiveness by a total of 25%. Only works on runes that are either death or soul attuned.


    [Cursed Hands]: In your hands, you cursed hundreds and let them to their demise and being there to see their suffering till the very end of your curse. Granting you the knowledge to learn curses while also improving the potency of your cursed just as the duration for a total of 25%. You gain the Talent of [Leech Touch] and [Drain Vitality Touch].


    Reading through them, Danzel felt bitter only having to choose 4 of all those amazing talents.


    Except for [Reinforced Body] and [Magic Resistance], all other options were a must-have in his eyes. [Cursed Hands] granted him a total of 2 talents and probably allowed him to learn spells and runes just like [Dead Rune Knowledge] and [Lower ss Death Magic].


    And the others were massive bonuses that couldn''t be overlooked!


    ''Why can''t I have all!?'' He cursed internally as he felt the undead he made to stop others from annoying him to dropping in their numbers.


    "I must hurry..."


    He quickly did a process of elimination on the must-haves and the lesser good ones,


    [Soul Nemesis] and [Carving Fate with Death] was the must-haves on his list.


    The former was way too good to pass on while thetter was because he invested way too much into runes to pass the chance of not improving them further. It would also allow him to carve a great rune into his body.


    Making them an easy pick.


    Now the questiony upon the [Cursed Hands], [Grand Undead General], and [Deathless Will].


    The other talents while they were alright, they weren''t great for Danzel''s needs.


    [Cursed Hands] will raise his individual strength by far the best.


    [Grand Undead General] in turn was theplete opposite, it would grant him utility to see for a far while also strengthing his undead.


    As for [Deathless Will], it will probably help him suppress his [Sin of Wrath] while also granting him another lifeline which was slightly inferior to [Undying].


    Being pressed on time and his body slowly cracking from passing the limit of his body didn''t help him either.


    Contemting what to choose, he decided to pick out of the 2 remaining slots, [Deathless Will] so that he wouldn''t ever be overwhelmed by his emotions and march to his death just like he did not too long ago.


    Also having another life in your pockets proved till now to be quite useful. And with the healing abilities that he has now, the disadvantage of having 500 HP could be prevented.


    But the tough choice with the remaining slot.


    [Grand Undead General] or [Cursed Hands].


    It was like asking him if he rather wanted to give up on curse magic or the creation of the undead.


    A task that he found impossible to do.


    s, he had to make a choice.


    ''And I didn''t even choose what talent to temper yet!''

 Chapter 354 Death Knight

    It was a decision between quality and quantity in which each option had quality on its own.


    The questiony, what was the right choice.


    On one hand, [Cursed Hands] had a better potential than [Grand Undead General], but the bonuses of [Grand Undead Genral] were far superior that [Cursed Hands]. In fact, it seemed like an essential talent for raising undead armies.


    But did it really fit him?


    He had several curses by now that could make use of [Cursed Hands]. And picking it will also grant him two other talents, which weren''t that impressive.


    He wondered, even though he didn''t have the time to think things through.


    *Crack~


    Hearing cracking soundsing from his ribs, Danzel was forced to make his decision.


    ''Dammit, let''s hope this doesn''te to kick my underbone in the future.'' He cursed as he raised his hand and picked hisst talent.


    It being [Cursed Hands].


    In the end, he decided on individual strength.


    ''Though I more often use raised undead, curses are for opponents that are at my level. And based on what I have seen of 4th-tiers, they are easily able to annihte armies.'' Danzel concluded in his mind.


    But there was another reason that weighed in picking this talent.


    And that was the [Rune of Living Legion].


    It a proof that runes alone can create undead far stronger than those made with necromancy.


    ''[Grand Undead General] wouldn''t increase the strength of "runed" undead anyway as they weren''t raised but created by runesmithing. And by the growth that [Greater Raise Undead] has shown, at best I would have the ability to create a peak 3rd-tier undead if I am lucky a barely passable 4th-tier undead.''


    ''I have better chances in creating a stronger undead in runesmith, where I have lots of bonuses there, I bet there is a way to make a better version of [Rune of Living Legion], as a "god of death" tried to bind his body using those runes.''


    "Yeah, instead of raising an army I can just make one.'' Danzel mumbled to himself.


    It would take him a long time and would put another project on his list of stuff to learn and do. But he was fine with it.


    He was an immortal being after all.


    [Can temper one single Talent of your choice]


    Seeing thest window, Danzel clicked on the [use] option in the window, stretching the window to berger and showing all his options.


    Talents: [Exalted Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Consciousness ] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying] [Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery] [O Fearful Death] [Soul Nemesis] [Carving Fate with Death] [Deathless Will] [Cursed Hands] [Leech Touch][Drain Vitality Touch].


    ''And here I thought I will only be able to temper only 1 of the 4 new talents, but instead, it allows me to pick 1 out of all my talents.'' He pondered slightly surprised.


    If it was only the 4 of them, Danzel would have either picked [Soul Nemesis] or [Carving Fate with Death]. But now able to pick one of all his talents, he discarded that idea.


    He could choose to upgrade [Undying] and probably give himself another life or two, depending on how much the talent improves from this tempering.


    [Dead Rune Knowledge] was also a nice option, but he had no idea what will happen with this if he upgraded it.


    If he had gone the route of intimidating others and inflicting fear just by standing there, [O Fearful Death] was a nice candidate also.


    The only big no-no would be upgrading [Sin of Wrath].


    Though powerful, it was an extremely annoying talent to use.


    [Dead Mana Affinity] was also an option to think about. Though he wasn''t sure how it would turn out.


    His best guess was bing a new affinity simr to [Soul Affinity] or just a bonus on all death attune abilities, which was tempting just alone.


    s, Danzel had already decided where to put the tempering point.


    Among all his talents, the strongest of them all was currently a considerably new talent.


    That being [Exalted Undead].


    The talent that could be considered his race talents.


    Born from the [Superior Undead] and it is from the [Undead] talent.


    [Undead] being his very first talent if one ignored [Sin of Wrath].


    The talent itself was the benefit of being undead and the [Superior Undead] was just like it but with all his stat multiplier being increased from 1.0 to 1.1.


    A whole 10% bonus on all his attributes


    And now [Exalted Undead] gave him a total of 1.3 stat multiyer.


    Which was essentially a total worth of 1214 attribute points.


    It was the simplest and yet the strongest talent of his essentially.


    If the 5th tier was the highest point that a being could achieve and he achieves the limit of attributes that his body could handle, he would be a fool, not t choose the option that will allow him to pass over the limit.


    Upgrading [Dead Rune Knowledge] might unlock runes of unknown power, but this power wouldn''t be his own and even carving runes in his body would have a limit.


    "I might be wrong and I might regret it- But~!" Picking [Exalted Undead] to receive the tempering pointing.


    "I have long surpassed the point of regret!"


    At his shout, the dead mana that built inside of himself was released and an overwhelming aura of death spread for everyone to see and feel.


    The thousands upon thousands of corpses through the battlefield began letting out their own dead mana, which was attracted by the overwhelming aura of death like a ma and travel.<sub> </sub>


    It was like a dark mist of death began being sucked towards a central point.


    The mortals near enough to sense the aura of Danzel felt inherent despair. As if they knew the being that was about to be born or ascent wasn''t allowed, otherwise only death awaited them.


    In turn, the undead that Velkir controlled stopped what they were doing and looked toward Danzel''s direction despite them being ordered by Velkir.


    The very own dead mana of that undead was being leaked out of their body only to join in the sea of death.


    The dead mana wasn''t being absorbed by Danzel, in fact, it simple travel around him as if the dead mana itself waited for the being of death to ascent to his new form.


    Velkir who was witnessing from afar showed a frown on his fake face.


    "So he finally met the requirements, but this amount of dead mana....is not normal." Velkir said.


    "What is happening, Master Velkir? Is it something bad?" Shiro asked from the side, her eyes under the hood staring at the aura of death inside the mist of dead mana.


    Giving Shiro a nce, he simply pointed at his army of the dead.


    "Your fellow discipline is simply ascending to the 4th tier, is just that it seems much more impressive than I originally know." Velkir said but didn''t exin why it was not normal.


    Hearing that, Shiro pouted, feeling surpassed by Danzel.


    The abnormal part of this was that his very own undead stopped following his orders and even willingly let their dead mana out of their body, which was something unheard of.


    ''Even his aura isn''t normal...'' He thought to himself.


    Others attracted by his aura were the immortal juggernaut, who looked in the direction of Danzel, with a huge smirk on his face.


    "It seems like I will have another sparring partner." He mumbled in excitement before several swords of light prated his body.


    Gazing at the Archmage that took him off guard, he "tch".


    ''Annoying. I guess I will ask him after the mission.''


    Others who took notice of the sudden surge of dead mana and Danzel''s aura was the Archmages who were fighting Azrael with his angelic demon clones.


    "This feeling of mana! Someone is reaching the 4th-tier!" One of them yelled as he teleported away before one of the angelic demon clones was about to impale him.


    "For damn''s sake! Someone go and deal with it!" Another said while summoning spears of magma to fly toward Azrael.


    Nevvan who looked at the mist of death to the ground frowned.


    "I will go, I have fought him before." Nevvan said.


    "Then go and make it quick!"


    "Of course. Hold on till then." Nevvan said as he started flying down back to the battlefield.


    ...


    As for Danzel, his body started to crack open and be repaired by his own dead mana itself over and over again as a wave of notifications started to appear right after another.


    The weird part of them was that they were shaken unnatural, something that was a first. But he put this anomaly in the back of his head.


    Instead, he focused on the information of said notifications.


    [You acquired Soul Nemesis]


    [You acquired Carving Fate with Death]


    [You acquired Deathless Will]


    [You acquired Cursed Hands]


    [You acquired Leech Touch]


    [You acquired Drain Vitality Touch]


    [[Exalted Undead] bes [Mythic Undead]]


    [Your Talent Superior Unique Consciousness gets upgraded]


    [Proficiency and skill cost reduction of soul-based skills bes 35% and all attributes increase bes + 30]


    [You acquire the Race Talent [Armor of Death Knight]]


    [You acquire the Race Talent [Wielder of Death]]


    [Strength increased by 300, Agility increased by 250, Intelligence increased by 200, Endurance increased by 300]


    [Talent limitation has disappeared. Achievable Talents are now Avable!]


    [You Became a Death Knight]


    As soon as thest window appeared, the circling dead mana exploded through the battlefield like a wave.


    The dead mana that passed through the undead empowered them as their howling battlecries sounded through the air as if to celebrate the manifestation of a Death Knight.


    The dead mana that passed the corpses of the arcana soldiers in turn sipped inside their bodies and made them raise once more as undead far stronger than they were before.


    From [Wight]''s to [Bane Walker]''s and many other skeleton-type undead of the 3rd-tier, they began rising once more with their weapons in hand as newly born undead. And they numbered thousands.


    The dead mana traveled kilometers far and wide, killing rats and other small animals unable to withstand such death energy and raising them as undead.

 Chapter 355 State Of Body And Rematch

    Watching the thousands upon thousands of newly corpses raising up and 3rd-tier undead, Danzel was surprised that his evolution had this sort of effect.


    "Sadly I got no control over them..." Danzel mumbled as he looked at his body.


    The dead mana volume of his body has increased by at least 3 to 4 times the previous amount. He felt as if he shed an invisibleyer that restrained him and only now was he free from it.


    Though he couldn''t breathe, he now could feel some sort offortable sensationing from his mouth, confusing him quite a bit.


    Putting his helmet in his storage ring, he touched his mouth to see what it was. Once he did, thefortable sensation became stronger.


    "Is it the dead mana...?" He mumbled to himself.


    To confirm his suspicions, he made a huge lump of dead mana appear in front of his face, recreating thefortable sensation.


    "So it''s the dead man..." He said as he absorbed his own dead mana back, which was easier than before.


    ''I am not sure if I should be happy that I could breath dead mana or not...'' He shook his head, as he touched his face, finding out that his skull has reformed from the evolution.


    While he wanted to check the changes in his body, with no mirror present or in his storage ring, not to forget being on a battlefield. he let it be for now as he tried to gauge how much stronger he became.


    ''At least it seems like I didn''t get much taller than previously'' he thought as he tried to gauge how much stronger he became.


    Closing his hand and opening repeatedly and that was when he noticed that he grew stronger.


    No just stronger.


    A lot stronger.


    To the point that he himself was shocked by the seer power inside his body.


    He thought that by now he was used to having his strength increased suddenly by attributes. But the increase this time around was so shockinglyrge that he couldn''t get ustomed to his strength.


    "Let''s see..."


    Raising his sword and casually swinging it to the side, arge wave of wind was created that was easily able to throw a normal person off bnce and to the ground.


    "..."


    Dumbfounded, Danzel couldn''t hold it anymore and made his status screen appear in front of him.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 100


    Race: Death Knight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 79]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.80]


    Health: 96 750/ 96 750


    Mana: 19 305/ 19 305


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 1339 Agility: 1459 Intelligence: 1287 Endurance: 1289


    Great Rune: [Great Rune of Undeath Existence]


    Talents: [Mythic Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Consciousness ] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery] [O Fearful Death] [Soul Nemesis] [Carving Fate with Death] [Deathless Will] [Cursed Hands] [Leech Touch] [Drain Vitality Touch] [Armor of Death Knight] [Wielder of Death]


    Skills: [Death Warden Swordsmanship Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.9] [Death Descent Lv.1] [Mist Presence Lv.1] [Unceasing Soul of Death Essence] Lv.1] [Soul Reaping Wind] [Phantom Phase Lv.1] [Shield Tremple Lv.1] [Soul Ender Lv.1] [Existential Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Chaining Fatigue Lv.5] [Grasp of the Undying Lv.3] [Undying Guard Lv.4] [Armor of Undying Protection Lv.1] [Siphoning Soul de Lv.9] [Soul of Death Lv.5] [Undying Preservation Lv.1] [Curse of Primordial Decay Lv.5] [Greater Raise Undead Lv.7] [Undead Reconstruction Lv.1] [Eyes of the Damned Lv.6] [Curse of Five Bindings Lv.2] [Necromatic Restoraction Lv.2] [Death Rune Removal Lv.9] [Innate Blood Absorbtion Lv.1] [Blood Puppets Lv.1], [Bleed Verocity Lv.1], [Blood Sense Lv.1], [Vampiric Gaze Lv.1] [Curse of Nature Lv.1] [Wall of Bones Lv.1] [Heavy Strike Lv.1]


    [Remark: A knight who wields the de of death in his hands and is capable to grant a true death upon other beings by having their soul destroyed. Fighting this being one would have to risk his soul essence and body if they are foolish enough to face an undead worth being a myth among his kind. Despite hisck of knowledge in magic, Rue Danzel managed to learn two different types of magic thatbine the elements of life and death. If confronted by this being, run, if not, not even your soul will be safe as this Death Knight can pass through [?].]


    ...


    At first, when he saw his attributes, he was somewhat surprised, but after seeing his health and mana he felt genuinely shocked at how much it increased.


    ''It''s too much for it to be the attributes alone...it has to be this talent.'' Danzel thought as he searched the main subject of those absurd numbers and his strength.


    [Mythic Undead]: A undead that has managed to infuse beyond an incredible amount of dead mana into his body and temper it to its utmost perfection. A close to impossible feat for any undead to achieve. Each undead that reached this level left a myth of his existence for others to remember his power. The stat multiplier bes from 1.5.


    "A whole 50% bonus on all my attributes..." He mumbled, shocked.<sub> </sub>


    When he decided to temper this talent, he expected the multiplier to be around 1.3 or 1.35, but for it to be a multiplier of 1.5 was totally and absolutely absurd!


    He also gained a few loads of stats for free at that, making him realize the reason why 3rd-tiers never stood a chance against 4th-tiers.


    Gaining over 1000 attributes and potential 6-8 talents was alone enough to beat other 3rd-tiers.


    ''Now that I think about it, I also gained two other talents that I didn''t choose. Were they Race Talents called?'' He thought as he made the two talents appear.


    [Armor of Death Knight]: The undead known as Death Knights are being of death that wore a suit of armor for the majority of their existence and grew an attachment to their armor. By infusion of his very dead mana, a Death Knight is capable to create a link with his armor and body, allowing the armor to be repaired by healing his own body with the use of dead mana. Making many believe that the armor of a Death Knights is a piece of their body. Can''t repair the damage inflicted before the link. Can be activated once per 7 days and can be de-activated by the Death Knight''s will alone how far the armor is. If this effect is activated, reduce the total mana of Death Knight by 10%.


    [Wielder of Death]: Death Knights are known to wield weapons that had killed thousands of the living. Making their weapons be cursed and allowing them to gain various abilities depending on the Death Knight''s own abilities and potential change. The cursed weapon doesn''t affect the Death Knight in question. A weapon cursed by this talent will increase the effectiveness of death-attuned skills that use a weapon by 30%.


    Reading through those two, Danzel felt quite conflicted by the [Armor of Death Knight]. It could repair his armor by essentially using something like [Necromatic Restoraction] on him. The effect he tried countless times to figure out with runes, especially when he knew that a rune such as Veren existed. But the effect would essentially put a curse on him and lower his total mana by 10%.


    An effect with positive and negatives.


    For now, it was around 1930 mana, which was quite a bit and the armor itself would probably also cost mana to repair, making the negative effect quite big in his opinion.


    But after giving it a thought, it was an essential ability for his armor to have. With his current armor so damaged, it affects the runes and enchantments which in turn affects his performance.


    ''Kinda pointless to use it on my current armor. Though it''s worth considering for the future. As for [Wielder of Death], it goes well with [Soul Reaping Wind] and since the curse doesn''t affect me, it shouldn''t too bad.''


    "Maybe at my current state I might be able to make that old man sweat." Danzel thought to himself as he imagined sparring with Agares.


    He was also eager to inspect the others and see if the hidden information on their status screens are now there.


    Though they had to first finish the mission.


    But looking at the army of undead he identally raised, he doubted he needed to do anything else.


    "Still, they are quite a lot still alive, I might as well gather some funds while I can." Danzel said as he stepped forward with a radiating aura of death.


    But once he stepped forward, his [Existential Sense Danger] started reacting like never before.


    With his ethereal dark green eyes ring up, Danzel turns and points his sword towards the direction he felt the extreme danger.


    But once he turned around, he found nothing except the marching undead of Velkir.


    His senses strained to the limit, Danzel looked around with [Eyes of the Damned] but still found nothing there.


    "Nothing..." Danzel mumbled as his ethereal eyes burned intensely.


    "No, this feeling, it''s not gone, but there was definitely something there. As if..." Danzel said as he lower his sword.


    ''I was being watched...''


    He felt the exact same feeling when orphans looked at him while hiding in the church, though the feeling was 100 if not 1000 times stronger. He only felt it for a split moment, but he was sure there was something there.


    Before he could make sense of what, he felt foreign mana appearing nearby.


    Swinging his sword in that direction, he let arge and much more powerful than before [Soul Reaping Wind] towards that location.


    And towards the direction of the foreign mana, a sh of light revealed a robed figure with a huge white beard.


    "Hmpf." The Archmage Nevvan scoffed towards the soul essence cutting wind de.


    Pointing his staff towards the wind de, he mumbled something and made a ss-like barrier appear.


    Once the barrier and the [Soul Reaping Wind] made contact with each other, both neutralized each other.


    Looking at Danzel''s newly shaped skull and his aura, Nevvan grumbled to himself.


    "Such a headache, I should have killed you back then, you lowly undead."


    Looking up at the magic caster, Danzel''s bloodlust has risen to new levels just as his strength did thanks to the [Sin of Wrath] talent.


    But this time, he wasn''t driven by worthless emotions.


    "I thank you foring here." Danzel said as his shield appeared on his left hand.


    "You spared me the trouble looking for you." He said in his ice-cold voice.


    Releasing his hand to his face and equipping his helmet but he let the nk ting fall down the floor so that his ethereal ring dark green eyes were to be seen.


    "Now, let me repay you in kind for what you did to me."

 Chapter 356 High Tier Undead Vs High Tier Magic Caster

    Both started casting their magic at the same time, but with Nevvan being a magic caster, his abilities to cast magic were far superior to Danzel''s.


    "[Neils of Frozen Pain]" Nevvan casted his spell as he raised his staff, creating several sharp ice spears with magic circles in front of them.


    Releasing his spell, the ice spears alone were quite fast, but the magic circles hasten their travel speed of all the ice spears by double the speed.


    The moment the ice spears were sent flying was also the moment when Danzel finished his spell. [Curse of Primordial Decay].


    A dark mist escaped from his armor and went through the ice spear as the mist sought to decay the body of the powerful magic caster.


    "Not enough!" Nevvan said as he raised his palm towards the dark mist and casting [Rays Dominion Light].


    The golden magic circle appeared in front of the Archmage and created rays of light that purged the curse.


    He even input more mana into his spell to destroy the curse faster considering that the distance between them wasn''t that great.


    The dark mist was then destroyed into bits, holding no more power of the curse, but the fact that his empowered spell didn''tpletely destroy the mist made Nevvan frown.


    ''So his ascendance on the 4th-tier made his curses much more powerful. Troublesome, but now that I know about it, dealing with his curses wouldn''t be a problem'' Nevvan thought as he looked in front of him, only to notice that the undead wasn''t in front of him.


    ''He is gone?'' He thought, unaware that the bits of dark mist that he thought were the revenants of the curses started had started to assimte and be the death knight with ethereal dark green eyes.


    The whole process of Danzel turning into his physical form didn''t even take a full second.


    Only when he appeared did Nevvan feel the presence of death behind his back.


    Using the core skill of magic casters, [Mana Eyes] to greatly enchant his perception, he could see how the ominous sword wasing for his head, extremely slow.


    But the fact that Nevvan was supposed to see the movements of others in slow motion spoke to him about the danger of his situation.


    He turned around while flying away from the sword while casting [Shards of Primary Protection], creating 3yers of transparent ss barriers just as the ominous sword was about to reach him.


    *Ting!!!


    Upon the first swing, the firstyer broke.


    Danzel ethereal eyes red upon the appearance of the barriers.


    Not discouraged, he swung once again his sword against the secondyer with the speed of a 4th-tier before breaking thestyer with his shield, positioning his right arm to swing at the magic caster.


    Seeing his barriers broken into bits in such a short amount of time, Nevvan clenched his staff, making the mana crystal of the staff glow in blue light.


    The light engulfed him with blue light and transformed his aged body into lighting, bolting in away from the death edges, leaving the death knight to kill nothing but air.


    ''I won''t let you go.''


    Danzel wasn''t going to let him take a breather.


    Turning his body into dark mist with [Phantom Phase], Danzel moved towards the direction of the lighting, but at a much greater speed.


    Once Nevvan reappeared from the lighting, all he saw was a dark misting in front of him and reforming the death knight in his physical form.


    ''So that''s how he did it!'' Nevvan finally understood how the death knight appeared behind him a moment ago.


    Though he didn''t expect Danzel to be right on his tail after using one of his saved spells in his mana crystal.


    Danzel once again swung with the intent to kill.


    Seeing that there was no time to create a barrier, he groaned in annoyance.


    "[Hasten Haste]!" An orange light engulfed Nevvan''s body, greatly strengthing his capabilities to move his body, at the very least making him fast enough to push his staff between the ominous de and block Danzel''s sword from making a lethal wound.


    But on Nevvan''s side, he felt like a whole mount was swung towards him, resulting in being sent flying like a bullet while also dislocating his shoulder and breaking the bones in his one hand.


    "Agh! [Chains of Avalon!]"


    Being sent flying didn''t mean that a magic caster like him couldn''t cast spells.


    The spell was put into action, manifesting 10 magic circles around Danzel, and from those magic circles, from each, a chain of ice traveled around Danzel. The 10 of them made a and chained Danzel in ce.


    But just as they did, out of nowhere, Nevvan''s whole body was pped by a huge w that was as hard if not tougher than steel.


    Luckily for Nevvan, the enchantment of his armor activate and left him uninjured except for the initial shock.


    While being sent flying now towards another direction, he looked to see what hit him, only to see a three-eyed undead wolf.<sub> </sub>


    "A Death Hound!?" Nevvan recognize the undead that Skull w was.


    Using his fly spell to fight against the force, he quickly lost his bnce as soon an ethereal skeleton hand grabbed his leg and pulled him down towards the range of the newborn undead who wouldn''t mind getting a piece of him.


    "Die!"


    Two Wights jumped on the opportunity with their magic spears to kill Nevvan.


    "Begone!" Nevvan yelled in anger as a wave of frost burst through his surroundings, turning the Wights into ice sculptures.


    Before he could break the ice sculptures, Nevvan saw how 3 dark green wind des wereing towards his direction, forcing him to teleport away up in the air.


    But once he created arge amount distance, he found that a dark mist wasing on his way like some homing missile.


    Danzel didn''t use [Soul Reaping Wind] to attempt to hurt the magic caster, instead, he used it to force him to teleport away.


    While his spell, [Shards of Primary Protection] was a perfect counter to his [Soul Reaping Wind] as it seemed like itpletely blocked one and only one attack. But he knew that Nevvan couldn''t cast the spell while being surrounded by all kinds of undead that were of the 3rd-tier.


    While they were on the lower scale of the 3rd-tiers strength, nheless they were still on the 3rd-tier and a threat to magic casters with weak bodies.


    That''s when he took advantage of the nature of his curses, by casting [Curse of Chaining Fatigue] and [Curse of Primordial Decay], more specifically their homing nature.


    In his current state, he could cast two hard spells at the same time, though it was a bit straining. And [Soul Reaping Wind] was more of a technique than a spell.


    As for the chains, they broke easily thanks to his [Armor of Undying Protection] absorbing the mana from the chains.


    Though after breaking them, he felt his armor bing heavier.


    Nheless, Danzel used his surroundings to his advantage to deliver a blow to the magic caster.


    And with how the dark mist that was the mix of 2 curses entered Nevvan''s body, Danzel maliciously smiled to himself (as much as a skeleton could smile of course).


    Nevvan in turn cursed internally at how a newborn 4th-tier being managed to guide him to make such a mistake.


    He felt his vitality slowly disappearing from his body and he could see how ethereal dark green chains were binding his legs and sucking on his stamina.


    He found it way more annoying that the curses had the unique mana of the undead in front of him.


    Destroying and removing curses were two entirely different things. Thetter was ten times harder than the former to do as the curses will stick on one''s body and mana like a parasite.


    Killing one that wasn''t in your body was much easier than killing one inside it.


    ''I underestimated this thing''s unique abilities.'' Nevvan criticized himself as he flew up in the air to see the death knight now on top of the death hound.


    "I am at disadvantage with all those minions though out the area. I guess I will have to remove them." He said as he pointed his staff towards his broken shoulder. Making a white and gentle light surround his arm.


    "[Restore Body]"


    Once he finished the spell, Nevvan could once more move his broken hand.


    He took a nce towards the death hound and its master riding it dashing towards him, but being quite far away, he started channeling a huge amount of mana into his staff.


    Once he considered them to be in range, he released his spell.


    "[Frost Nova]!"


    Bursting outwards of his body was a wave of extremely frost air that froze everything it touches, leaving a wave of ice sculptures of undead while also freezing the ground too.


    Seeing that Danzel cast [Stone Wall] in front of him and told Skull w to stay put behind the wall.


    And soon enough the wave of cold air hit the wall and createdyers of ice on the wall, protecting Danzel and Skull w from the frost that passed through the surroundings.


    While he himself might have been fine, Skull w wouldn''t be able to handle such a spell.


    The hundred of 3rd-tier freezing to sculptures was perfect proof of that.


    It took only a few seconds before the spell stopped. Once it did, all the ice sculptures exploded into dust-like pieces, leaving a huge field covered in ice and snow.


    The stone wall also crumbled into pieces.


    Only Nevvan floated in the middle and Danzel with Skull w remained in an ice field.

 Chapter 357 High Tier Undead Vs High Tier Magic Caster (2)

    Nevvan knew that he had to take the undead in front of him as if he was fighting an expert of the same tier.


    "But still, I am at such a disadvantage." Nevvan mumbled as he let himself fall to the ground and mmed his staff on the frozen ground, spreading his mana far and wide under the ground till it reached the edges of the frozen ground.


    And suddenly from the edges, the ice started to be created and rise up to the sky, slowly building a wall so that none enters the frozen field.


    Seeing that, Danzel made his move.


    "Skull w!" He yelled as he jumped off his back.


    "Kgweehhhoooohh!" Skull w howled towards the heaves, activating his skill, [Death Howl].


    Once to the ground, Danzel made eye contact with the magic caster and activate the runes of his helmet, inflicting the status effect of [Fear] on Nevvan.


    "A mental attack..." Nevvan frowned as he noticed the change in his state of mind.


    Out of Skull ws'' body came out a dark mist that spread around where the walls has been created and hiding inside there. Despite her eagerness to fight with her liege, hismand was absolute.


    Danzel knew that if he let Skull w fight on an open field, she would be destroyed almost immediately. It was better to keep Skull w around and restrict the area where the magic caster could move around.


    Danzel used [Swift Movements] to dash with incredible speed toward the magic caster with his shield in front of him.


    Seeing the death knight running towards him, Nevvan stopped raising the ice walls and pointed his staff towards the undead.


    "Come! [Frozen Warlord]!"


    Casting his spell, an armored giant figure twice Danzel''s size made out of ice starteding out of the ground in front of Danzel''s path at an extremely quick pace. It was like the frozen ground was ake and the armored figure started resurfacing.


    The armored ice figure used both of its hands to "pull" a huge hammer made out of ice and swung it at Danzel.


    With his sudden appearance and how fast Danzel was traveling, he was forced to block the hammer with his own shield.


    And once it hit, Danzel felt like a train came crashing towards him.


    "Gwaaaaagh!" The armored giant send a battlecry as the death knight was pushed back and almost send flying by the strength of the ice hammer.


    Danzel feet were desperately rooted to the ground as he tried to stop and once he did, he left 2 trails to the ground.


    Once he stopped though, several fairlyrge ice spears appeared around him and were sent flying toward him.


    ''Activate.'' Danzel activates [Armor of Undying Protection] the second effect, letting out the stored mana in the form of a shock wave filled with decay. Once the shockwave hit the ice spears, they crumbled into ice cubes and fell to the ground.


    Next, he swung his sword in the direction of the ice giant who by now fully came out of the ground, releasing 3 [Soul Reaping Wind]''s in the process.


    The armor ice giant stared at the iing wind des and reacted ordingly.


    No longer holding the giant ice hammer with both hands and instead with one now, he held his now free hand sideways in front of him.


    In the next moment, the ice started to gather around the free hand, creating what looked like a circr ice shield.


    The 3 [Soul Reaping Wind]es crashing towards the ice giants shield, only leaving 3rges scars on the shield. The scars regenerated a few momentster.


    "So annoying..." Danzel mumbled as he stared at the magic caster that was floating behind the giant.


    ''He even made my saved-up mana and even summon this elemental. He alone was already annoying enough with that ck ice.''


    With everything he knew, the magic caster could cast a minimum of 3-4 spells at the same time, and being hit with the ck ice meant death for the most part. So as long as he dodged that ice, he should be fine with how slow the ice spells were his.


    "I should aim for the magic caster..." Danzel said as he dashed forward.


    And unsurprisingly, the ice giant came forward to stop him.<sub> </sub>


    "Gwaaagh!" Raising the giant hammer with only one hand, he swung it down as soon as the undead was in his range. Creating severalrge ice spices on the area around where he hit.


    It was fairly easy for Danzel to move to the side considering his speed. But he was soon surprised that the giant followed his movements and dashed towards him aiming to m him with his own ice shield.


    Forcing Danzel to return the attempt in kind.


    Despite their size difference, the one that was pushed back was the ice giant and not Danzel.


    Using this opportunity, Danzel moved to the side and swung his sword at the giant''s leg and cutting it off and even stealing a small portion of his soul essence.


    "Gwaaaaaaaghhh!" The frozen warlord screamed in pain as it started losing its bnce, leaving itpletely at Danzel''s mercy.


    But before he could destroy the ice giant, a spike of ice starteding from the ground, forcing him to step back.


    But that wasn''t all.Nevvan summon a tornado filled with sharp small ice spikes around Danzel. The ice spikes came crushing towards his armor and destroying his dark tings and hitting his armor. Thetter didn''t receive much of any damage, but therge hole covered by dark tting made Danzel go out of the tornado.


    Once he came out, Danzel saw how the mana of Nevvanpletely healed the ice giant legpletely but watching closely he see how the new leg was shaking a bit.


    The frozen warlord stared at the death knight and did something unexpected.


    The ice shield in his arm dropped to the ground and letting go of his ice hammer, the frozen warlord picked up the circr shield and threw it like a frisbee toward him. With how fast it was turning around, it was like a moving saw was thrown at Danzel.


    Seeing that, Danzel didn''t n to wait and get hit by the shield throw, but once he moved to the side, the ice shield changed its direction and followed after him as it get closer.


    Seeing the homing property of the shield, Danzel stood his ground and blocked the ice shield with his ground. And with how fast it turned, sparks started toe out. Helping Danzel recover bits of his mana thanks to his [Undying Guard].


    As much as he liked standing here and recovering his mana, a magic circle appearing on top of him made him reconsider standing in one ce.


    Moving to the side, the next thing that happend was a huge spike was dropped on the area he previously stood at.


    But once he moved to the side, his vision caught a huge block of ice traveling towards where he was.


    ''Again?'' He cursed, annoyed.


    Raising his sword, he directly thrust his sword on the ice block with such force that itpletely broke the ice.


    That''s when he noticed how gradually the weight of his armor has increased once more, but not by a whole lot.


    "I see, so that''s what you are trying to do, but are you sure you aren''t going to die by my curses by the time I slowed down enough?" Danzel said towards Nevvan who was silent.


    Seeing no response, Danzel stared at the ice giant, making him release that the ice block he destroyed was the hammerhead of the ice giant, leaving him with only the shaft.


    The frozen warlord picked the shaft in both hands, making Danzel think that he would use it as a staff, but that wasn''t the case.


    As if drawing a de, the frozen warlord draw a de of ice out of the ice staff, making it seems like it was a scabbard. But the "scabbard" also turned into a second de.


    Next, it took a stance as if it was challenging Danzel toe.


    "..." Danzel gave Nevvan a look before cursing internally.


    ''Fighting this elemental is a waste of time, but with him flying around, I can''t have such a strong minion of his be ready to attack me.''


    He didn''t regret allowing the magic caster to create distance as he managed to hit him with two of his strongest curses, but now he was stuck with having to deal with the minion instead of the caster.


    The thought of the magic caster trying to exhaust his mana dide across his mind. If the magic caster knew how expensive his [Phantom Phase] was, then he would be in big trouble if he were in his ce, I would try to waste the opponent''s mana before taking my time flying around and finishing warriors like me that were incapable of flying.


    "After this whole thing is done, I will have to ask Velkir how to deal with flying." Danzel mumbled as he dashed towards the frozen warlord readying his two swords at him.

 Chapter 358 High Tier Undead Vs High Tier Magic Caster (3)

    Dashing towards the ice giant, he raised his ice sword and swung towards him.


    Using his shield though, Danzel was easily able to brush off the first swing. He then blocked the thrust of the other ice sword using his own sword.


    *Ting!


    The frozen warlord was of considerable strength and speed that could have matched if not surpassed Danzel when he was a Wight.


    Danzel went into offense, forcing the frozen warlord to step forward and block Danzel''s swing using both of his ice swords.


    "Gweeegh!" Make a grown-like sword, he pushed Danzel''s sword away and started his own onught.


    But after Danzel became the 4th-iter, gaining strength far superior that the frozen warlord, he was easily able to see through the elemental swordsmanship and react ordingly.


    In the next moment, the death knight and frozen warlord started exchanging shes with their swords and Danzel''s shield. They moved so fast that if a normal person were able to witness it, they wouldn''t even be able to keep track of their movements, at best they would see only after images of them moving around.


    Each sh pushed the air away while each block with a shield made the ice on the ground crack.


    Not only was Danzel stronger and faster.


    "Gwaaaaagh!" The frozen warlord let out a scream as his chest was cut and his soul essence drained by the death knight.


    But Danzel had the ability to drain one soul essence with [Siphoning Soul de] and [Soul Nemesis].


    In this world, elementals are notorious and known as one of the hardest beings to kill out, as their bodies can regenerate easily. But they had a fundamental weakness. And that they have an extremely little amount of soul essence.


    In truth, they are nothing but wisps of one element of mana that has yet to form a soul. Only their soul essence kept them intact and even then, their soul essence was vulnerable and it required a magic caster to sustain them into being.


    So having a being able to hurt and take their alreadycking soul essence was lethal to them.


    In other words, Danzel was the nemesis of elementals.


    Each wound that Danzel inflicted made the frozen warlord''s body much more unstable. Until the ice giant reached the breaking point.


    Literally.


    The frozen warlord tried to swing his sword to continue his sh with the undead, but before his sword could connect, half his arm broke into pieces suddenly together with its sword.


    The frozen warlord turned to see at his arm confused.


    Sadly for this elemental, this small distraction was enough for Danzel to cut half of his stomach area and deliver the lethal blow.


    "Grew-ggght." Letting a low death cry, the elemental grumbled into pieces.


    Danzel raised his head and stared at the magic caster and if he could frown, he would now.


    ''Why hasn''t he acted till this whole time he questioned to himself as his fight with the elemental was for the first half uninterrupted.


    ''Is he recovering his mana? But even then, he used spells to support the elemental...or did he conclude that it was no longer necessary to spend mana on the elemental.''


    Danzel thought of quite a few reasons, but he still was feeling that something was off.


    The sh between the elemental was only beneficial to him as he could recover some of his mana.


    He thought about how he should approach the magic caster when Nevvan finally spoke again.


    "I will give you that, for a cursed and lowly being just like yourself, you are strong."


    "But!!" Nevvan shouted as he raised his staff in the air.


    "You are far too inexperience to fight someone of my level, undead."


    As the crystal in his staff lightens up for a brief moment, then it happend.


    As if someone flipped a switch,ing out of invisibility were several ice spears that easily numbered thousands.


    All of which covered the whole area inside the frozen field if they were to fall.


    "I will show you the difference in power of a true magic caster!"


    Danzel eyes red up in surprise from the sheer number of ice spikes this man has created and hidden with some kind of invisibility spell.


    But the most shocking part of them all was that among those spears, there was a fairly amount of those ck ice-shaped spears.


    ''Skull w, move towards the outside.'' Danzel gave the death hound hiding in the newest orders.


    ''And also guide all the most towards my direction as you followed the first order.''


    As soon as he gave his mentalmand, Nevvan lowered his staff, making the fall of thousands of spearse down.


    The dark most traveled towards Danzel just like how the spike came down to strike the earth.<sub> </sub>


    And just as both were about to reach their target, Danzel''s body started to be a dark mist.


    A moment before the ice spears came crashing down.


    *Ting! Ting! Ting!~


    Spears prate the earth and broke right after for only the next spear to make the hole deeper all around the ice field.


    It was like a continuous air strike was ordered to annihte the target area.


    And Danzel saw it all happen as several ice spears passed through his mist.


    He wasn''t physically hurt, but he was still getting hurt by the spears as proof that he was losing health in his status screen, though each spear only made him lose around 500-800 health.


    Though Danzel didn''t care.


    As long as his body was capable to move and his head was intact, he was fine losing health on his status.


    The skill also made him avoid the "instant" death ck ice of hitting him.


    Though he noticed something strange from some ice spears. That was the fact that some normal ice spears contained content of water inside of them.


    At first, he thought that it might be acid or something harmful, but after reading the description of the liquid that fell upon him being water. He was confused as to why that was the case


    Soon enough, the devastating rain of ice spears ended and Danzel materialized himself but he still waited, hidden in the dark most of Skull w.


    "You think hiding will do you any good?" Nevvan scoffed as he looked at the dark mist.


    Holding his staff with both hands and raising up in the air, Nevvan released his next spell.


    "[Thunder Judgment]"


    The spell created a magic circle that released a huge lightning bolt toward the center of the dark mist.


    Though it missed Danzel, the lighting spread Into the water that was on the ground and hit everything standing inside the ice field, including Danzel.


    The magic circle continuously generated the lighting for a whole 6 seconds before stopping.


    Nevvan expected some kind of response after showing the undead could be hit regardless if he was fighting or not.


    But the fact that there was no response at all annoyed him.


    ''I already wasted enough mana creating this arena. If now I keep throwing lighting at him, I would have no mana left to join the others fighting that dark elf.''


    He looked through the distance and saw the other Archmage having a bad time dealing with the angelic blood demon with even one of them severely injured.


    "Tch, it can''t be helped. I will have to force the rat out of his hole." Nevvan was troubled by the situation he was in.


    He wasted an enormous amount of mana just creating the field to fight the death knight and the many spears. If he could, he would rather keep his distance and react to his opponent.


    But time not being on his side without even counting the curses, he decided to bait his opponent.


    Preparing 2 [Shards of Primary Protection] just to be safe while keeping hisst spell he could focus on open, he lowered his altitude slowly while watching the dark mist.


    And like a fish biting the bait, a small part of dark mist traveled at immense speed towards Nevvan.


    In not even 2 seconds,the mist was in front of him and started to form in the physical form of Danzel with his sword raised up.


    Even though he already knew the speed, Nevvan was still surprised by Danzel''s ability to move so fast.


    But unlike before he was prepared.


    Danzel swings down his sword only for 1yer out of 6 barriers to be destroyed.


    Having finally revealed himself, Nevvan prepared to create distance with a teleportation spell.


    He was aware that the death knight had a weird ability that would instantly hurt him, but with 5yers of protection, even if interrupted he would be able to finish his spell.


    Danzel continues to destroyyer afteryer.


    And Nevvan was just about to finish his spell.


    ''Come.'' Nevvan prepared himself to feel a hand grasping something inside of him and dragging it out.


    s, he felt no such pain.


    No, he felt something way worse than the ethereal hand.


    Instead, he felt a piercing pain going through his chest

 Chapter 359 Why Wont You Die!?

    <strong>"Hahahaha!"</strong> an ethereal replica of Danzel without a helmetughed full of malice as it pierced his sword through the heart of the magic caster.


    Shocking Nevvan in the process.


    By turning his head slightly to the side, he saw the ethereal dark green death knight pushing and staring back at him.


    "Agh! This is~" Danzel groaned in pain as he tried to continue his teleportation spell. Nevvan based the copy of the death knight to be some sort of illusion created by his unique mana simr to the skeleton hand.


    By associating the two spells'' mana and what they did, Nevvan was sure that the de in his heart wasn''t really, or at the very least, it was hurting something other than his physical body that he was unaware of. But just to be sure, he made spikes out of ice toe out of his clothes and prate the ethereal copy and destroy them.


    Doing so by shifting his focus briefly away from his teleportation spell.


    And as soon as he had the teleportation spell finished, Danzel broke through the finalyer, s as he swung already, Nevvan knew that he could get away before the sword was swung once more at him.


    Before Nevvan could celebrate, Danzel''s other hand that was closer made his shield disappear and grabbed Nevvan''s hand with extreme force. Activating [Leech Touch], [Drain Vitality Touch] and the [Rune of Eniv] in his hand, rapidly draining and decaying Nevvans''s hand.


    Not expecting to be suddenly grabbed, Nevvan activated his teleportation spell, engulfing himself, and because of the nature of his spell, the death knight himself too.


    In one instance, they both teleported near the wall.


    Only thing was that Nevvan only intended to teleport himself and only himself.


    "I got you." Danzel said with ice cold tone as his eyes red up. His killing intent traveling through his raised sword, he swung it toward the magic caster.


    ''This guy~!?'' Shocked and realizing the danger he was in, Nevvan put his whole focus on creating ayer of armor made out of tough ice.


    The ice barely made an appearance as the sword cut through theyer of desperate protection and his enchanted robe, opening a lethal wound through Nevvan''s chest.


    Not even the beard that Nevvan cultivated throughout the years to be so big was spared.


    "Aggghhhh!" Screaming out of pain, Danzel''s sword draws the blood of Nevvan while leaving the dead mana to further decay the wounded area additionally making and regeneration process all the harder.


    For a moment, world Nevvan froze and he could only stare at arge amount of blood flying out of his body.


    Although faint, he could also see the world be darker.


    ''Am I going to die?'' He questioned in his frozen world.


    Once that thought appeared in his mind, he clenched his teeth in anger.


    "You mere insult of magic!" Nevvan yelled with fury as he threw his staff away and pushed his free hand right into front of Danzel''s face.


    "[Shatter Ice]."


    As soon as he cast his spell, several ice pieces were shot like a shotgun right in front of Danzel''s face, destroying his helmet and his skull in the process.


    Having his skull destroyed, Danzel''s grip on Nevvan''s hand disappeared and he started to fall from the air towards the ground with no hind of movement.


    Suddenly though, Danzel moved forward like how a mortal would regain his breath. Dark green light escaped his armor and turned into mist, the mist, in turn, gathered where his skull was and started regenerating his whole skull in a brief second.


    Adjusting midair his body so that he won''t fall head first to the ground and insteadnds on his feet, once he reached the ground, the ice under him broke.


    He next turned his head towards the magic caster who was trying to heal his chest with a hand hovering about the wound. And albeit slow, the wound was slowly recovering.


    ''I won''t let you.'' Danzel thought as he cast his spell.


    "[Bleed Verocity]"


    A crimson magic circle appeared and lighten up with red light and just as it did, arge amount of blood was dragged out of Nevvans wound forcefully, re-opening the wounds that he recovered.


    "Agh!! Bastard~!"


    Before Nevvan could finish cursing the undead, Danzel raised his free hand and closed it to a fist. Doing so by using every scrap of his remaining mana, he made an ethereal skeleton hand grasp the wound of Nevvan and draw out his vitality and soul essence towards Danzel to heal himself.


    The pain was too much for Nevvan, making him lose focus on the [Fly] spell and fall to the ground from several meters high.


    But just as he was about to hit the ground, Nevvan created a bubble out of the air, making his fall of over 30 meters only at 4.


    But even then, with his wound, he failed to stand on his feet and instead fell on his knees. One hand above his chest and continuously using healing-type magic.


    "Haah~Haah~." Letting out heavy breaths while blood was falling out of his chest, Nevvan forced himself up to his feet.


    ''This vicious bastard, to think he would leave a curse that makes healing less effective.'' He thought to himself.


    If it weren''t for the fact that 4th-tier beings had much greater vitality than normal people, he would have long ago died from blood loss and as for pain, he wasn''t currently feeling any as he shut down his pain receptors, or at the very least numbing them just enough to not interfere with his focus.


    In such a moment of weakness, Danzel wasn''t going to miss the chance to finish him off.


    And with not a drop of mana left, Danzel was d that [Swift Movements] wassting till this far.


    "Haah~[Astral Explosions]!" Nevvan yelled as he pointed his hand towards Danzel making 3 balls of intense energy appear and be sent flying toward the death knight.<sub> </sub>


    Nevvan knew that in his current state and unable to move without making his wound worse, he couldn''t rely on his ice magic and instead decided on other types of magic. Ending up casting an arcane spell.


    Danzel saw the 3 balls of intense energy flying toward him instead of getting out of the way, he raised his shield in front of him and activated the enchantment. Making the skull of the shield glow up in dark green light.


    And suddenly, 1/3 of the mana that was contained in the 3 [Astral Explosions] was pushed out of the spell and made the mana disappear into the air. This sort of effect also affected Nevvan''s healing spell for just a brief second.


    The now 3 [Astral Explosions] that had lost 33% of their mana content, making them essentially weaker came in contact with Danzel''s shield, resulting in an explosion that was made out of blue and purple mes.


    But out of those mes, Danzel kept running, using his shield to push away the mes.


    Nevvan continued to bombard Danzel with [Astral Explosions] and once he reached the 10-meter mark, a magic circle appeared under his feet and on top of him.


    And those magic circles simultaneously created a simr explosion to that of [Astral Explosions] while trapping the explosion from getting outside with a minor barrier.


    "Did I get him?" Nevvan said with a weak voice.


    And just as he said that a wave of bloodlust escaped from the mes inside, only for Danzel to appear out of the mes and break the barrier with his sword raised up, ready to thrust at the magic caster.


    Reacting to the death knighting out of the mes, he raised his hands aiming for the weakness of Danzel''s kind, his skull.


    But once he positioned himself and aimed at the death knight''s skull, the ominous was thrust down into his chest and pierced his heart.


    Nevvan looked into the ethereal dark green ring eyes of the undead looking like countless souls trapped inside those ethereal mes, seeking toe out and screaming to be set free.


    "Ah~'' Nevvan let out an almost inaudible sound of his mouth.


    *Thuad.


    He heard his heart pump onest time before the sound was gone.


    Though after having lost all this blood.


    Having his heart pierced and his inside slowly decaying.


    The mana in his hand was gathering like never before.


    "[Ast-][Astral Explosions]!" Nevvan yelled as a ball of energy shouted right in front of the death knight.


    *Baaaaahm!!!


    Receiving the explosion head-on, Danzel''s body was sent flying and rolling to the ground for several meters, his sword still left on the magic caster''s body.


    Once Danzel stopped rolling to the ground, hey emotionless to the ground with his skull and the hand that wielded his sword missing.


    "Buagh~! Baaah!" Nevvan faltered a few steps back as he threw blood out of his mouth, staining the remains of his beard full of blood.


    Slowly with shaking hands, Nevvan grabbed the cursed de piercing his heart and pulled it out, and threw it to the ground.


    With the pressure that the sword was giving now released, more blood fell to the ground filled with ice.


    Nevvan felt overwhelming dizziness guing him, his mind begging him to sleep as his body grows colder and colder.


    Falling with one knee to the ground while having one of his hands attempting to heal his heart. but with too little and too slow of progress.


    "S-Something like this...won''t be my death." Nevvan whispered weakly as he focused his mana all around his body.


    Using the very mana that he studied for his whole life to rece the work that his heart was supposed to do. His mana forcefully guided the blood to travel around his body, and wind magic generated air into his lungs to breathe more easily.


    Though because Nevvan wasn''t familiar with blood magic, his forcing to do what his heart was supposed to do only prolonged the total shutdown of his body.


    Essentially bringing him into a state where his body was neither alive nor dead. Just something in between.


    ''To think I will be forced to do something like this...'' Nevvan thought to himself as he tried standing up, only to notice dead mana traveling into the air.


    "Dead mana? Why is there-" Before Nevvan could finish his sentence, a sudden thought crossed his mind.


    "Impossible! It can''t be!!!"


    He followed where the dead mana was gathering, only to find it was traveling toward the death knight''s body.


    The dead mana in which slowly recovered the death knights missing hand and skull.


    And once against the eye sockets of Danzel were filled with those ethereal dark green eyes as he slowly raisen up with the support of his shield up to the ground.


    Seeing that, Nevvan couldn''t help but yell.


    "Why!? Why won''t you die!?"

 Chapter 360 Death Though Servitude

    ''This is what I want to ask, you damned magic caster.'' Danzel cursed at the magic caster as he slowly lifted his body from the ground, his body shaking from theck of dead mana inside of him.


    "No, you won''t." Nevvan said as he pushed his mana into the ground and guided it toward the death knight in front of him. Making the ice that has been reinforced with mana under him starting to cover the death knights legs.


    "You!" Danzel shouted as he used his shield to crash the ice that has grown till his waist. But once he did, the ice only showed small cracks.


    "I have fought beings far stronger than you and I always came victorious with my magic. This won''t change even to this day! Even less by a cursed being just like yourself." Nevvan said as he raised on his two feet with difficulty, his head staring at the spilled blood on the ground.


    "I spend all my years studying the ways of the arcane and reached the peaks that many people can''t even hope to achieve. Andpared to my colleagues of the same level, I went out and joined countless battlefields as a mercenary."


    "Killed beings that were named as cmities and even witnessed the source of the iing disaster, meeting countless abominations far worse than yourself. A newly born 4th-tier...a cursed being at that? Hah! You Never stood a chance against me!" Nevvan yelled as he raised his head looking at the half-frozen death knight.


    Though without him realizing it, the dark mist that was present though out the wall, was slowly creeping closer and surrounding him. Then suddenly a spot of the dark mist explode, revealing to be a being with steel-like ws ranning towards the magic caster with his maw open and it''s 3 ethereal eyes staring at him.


    Being none other than Skull w, she jumped into the air with her mouth fully opened and her ws reaching out towards Nevvan.


    "Kwaaaagouuhh!"


    Shifting his head slightly to the side, Nevvan looked at the death hound solemnly and moved the hand that was focusing on Danzel towards Skull w.


    "I had enough of you." Nevvan said with a weak voice as his mana traveled through the ground, creating 3rge ice pirs with sharp points from the ground.


    The pirs prated Skull w''s ribs, one of her back legs, and one prating her skull. Only the first two managed to break her body as thest aiming for her skull passed through her as that area was ethereal.


    But even then, the pirs stopped Skull w''s ambush and threw her body at the same side where her master was.


    "Beagh!" Nevvan threw up a load of blood from his mouth as he shifted his body towards Danzel, who was getting closer to destroying the reinforced force.


    "Haah~Let''s end this already...insult of magic." Nevvan said as his shaking hand pointed at Danzel and creating slowly two spikes made out of the dark ice.


    ''This guy! How much mana does he have left!?'' Danzel cursed as he started breaking the ice than was rooting him in ce even faster.


    But Nevvan wasn''t going to wait for him to be set free.


    "Die!" Nevvan yelled as he shot out the two dark ice spears toward Danzel.


    Just as he did, the world of Danzel seemed to slow down as dread slowly started to appear in his mind. The slightest touch of those ice spears meant death and being sent toward the realm of the dead with potential no return.


    He never stopped swinging his shield at the ice trapping him and he was almost about to break the ice, but by the time he broke the ice, the dark ice would touch him and freeze him into a sculpture and break apart.


    He had no mana left, all of his was sucked with repairing the broken parts of his body, and even then he had a few ribs missing and a few cracks here and there.


    Escape before iing doom was...


    Impossible.


    ''Dammit!!!'' Danzel cursed internally, mming his shield full in anger at the ice, making it crack, but notpletely break.


    And just as the dark ice spears reached the 10-meter mark, Danzel couldn''t find to ept that he was going to die just like that. He started looking back at the fight and he started regretting it.


    It was a foolish move to stay inside the ice field and fight isted from the battlefield, where thousands of undead were there to help him and even humans to use to recover his mana.


    The magic caster aimed to eliminate him instead of the army of the dead, speaking that he was a much greater threat. If he was out, he wouldn''t have to deal with the ice elemental and instead focus his entire being on the magic caster.


    Even then, he still couldn''t believe that this human was capable to still stay alive after what wounds he inflicted on him. He bet everything on killing him by piercing his heart and he lost the bet.


    When he thought of the n, the odds definitely were on his side, but in the end, here he was, waiting for his death being unable to move, basically at the mercy of the magic caster.


    Like the same bitter fate was repeating itself.


    But unlike, unbeknownst to Danzel, his death was when he was helpless alone on top of the stage, and being shot to death.


    ...


    This time someone stepped up to take the bullet for him.


    "Kwaaoooh!" Skull w howled through the heavens as if dering something.


    Despite one of her legs being broken.


    Despite her body being close to her destruction.


    Despite her not being fully controlled.


    Despite her not being ordered to do so.


    Despite having the option to leave her master to die and finally be free from his influence.


    She chose to raise her broken body above, dig her ws into the earth and dash forward.


    Towards her creator and eternal master.<sub> </sub>


    She jumped forward.


    In the path of the dark ice spears that troubled her master greatly.


    *Thack! Thack!


    "!!!"


    For a moment, Danzel couldn''tprehend what just happend.


    At first, the sound of ice breaking he heard thought to be the dark ice spears prating his body and starting to freeze him. But the ice in front of him told him that the one hit by the dark ice spears wasn''t actually hit.


    He watched how Skull w''s spine and a chunk of her skull were prated, and falling to his side, taking the dark ice spears with her.


    *Thunk!


    Finally, with a swing of his shield at the ice, he managed to break what was rooting him and he dashed forward towards the magic caster with newfound bloodlust, that even [Deathless Will] couldn''tpletely suppress.


    "This thing-!" Nevvan cursed as he started creating several new ck ice spears and sending them flying to Danzel.


    Though now unrestrained in the ice, dodging the ck ice spears to the side was easy for him.


    Nevvan was starting to step back as he saw the death knight rushing at him dodging all his attacks anding ever closer.


    "You damned lowly Undea-"


    Before Nevvan could finish his sentence, Danzel arrived in front of him and used his shield to m his head with all his strength, sending Nevvan flying to the ground a few meters now with a cracked skull.


    "Agh~agh~agh!" Nevvan lying on the ground could only groan from the pain, despite his magic numbing his pain sensors.


    "Four years." Danzel said as he picked his sword from the ground and walked towards Nevvan.


    "Four years ago, in a lone forest where you froze an undead and broke his body into pieces. You should even made sure that this undead has stayed dead for sure." Danzel said as he arrive in front of Nevvan, who had a shocked look of revtion.


    "Y-You are-"


    Not even allowing him to finish, Danzel thrusted his sword toward Nevvan''s neck, making him drown in his blood.


    ? "I never forget about you, magic caster." Danzel said.


    Nevvan''s eyelids felt heavy and his whole was growing darker, but even then he didn''t give up.


    He weakly raised one arm to aim at the death knight in front of him.


    But before he could, Danzel drew his sword out of his throat and swung it at the raising hand, cutting it and throwing it to the side.


    "I have grown tired of your magic." Danzel said with a cold tone, as he pierced his sword into Nevvan''s chest.


    Nevvan''s body nowy emotionless, but his eyes filled with mana stared at the undead halfway closed.


    "But don''t worry, I won''t turn you into an undead."


    Hearing that, Nevvan''s eyes gain a bit of color.


    Even if he were to escape, Nevvan knew that he couldn''t survive with all those wounds. While unwilling, he epted his defeat. Though he doubted the death knight''s words, inside his heart, the hope of not turning into a cursed being known as undead sprouted.


    He slowly closed his eyes waiting for his death, but then Danzel twisted his sword and rune letters started to glow in an ominous dark green light.


    "As my revenge is through servitude."


    The dark green lighttched on Nevvans body, forcefully dragging his soul out of his body towards the outside, looking like a copy of his body.


    The soul of Nevvan looked confused at the surroundings of his now, dead body.


    "W-What have you done!?" Nevvan''s soul yelled as he suddenly felt a force dragging him into the ominous de.


    "Eternal servitude is the fate that your soul awaits." Danzel said while ring at Nevvan''s eyes.


    The re of his and the words that the death knight, made Nevvan realize the terrifying situation that he was in.


    "N-NO!!! YOU CAN''T DO THAT! Something like this! Someone who reached the highest level of magic! I CAN''T ACCEPT IT!! Noooooo~!!!" Nevvan''s defenses echoed through the surroundings as his soul was being sucked into the runes


    But even then, his soul found his way, trapped into the [Rune of Tolian Repent].


    Danzell gave the lifeless and soulless body of the magic caster ast look before turning to look at Skull w which was slowly freezing.


    "You..."

 Chapter 361 Soul Equipment

    Seeing the dark ice slowly spreading at Skull w''s body, Danzel couldn''t quite exin what he was feeling.


    "Why did you do that?" Danzel asked as he walked closer to Skull w, her ethereal eyes looking at Danzel.


    "Kouugh~" Skull w let a small growl which could be described as a puppy begging for a treat or to be praised by his owner.


    "..."


    Staring that the dark ice has already touched a portion of Skull w''s skull, Danzel knew that saving her from the ice wasn''t possible. All he would do was elerate the growth of the dark ice, hasting her travel towards the realm of the dead.


    "My solemand was for you to get out of here, and yet here you are." Danzel said as he pierced his sword to the ground before getting on his knee.


    "K-Koughh~" Skull w growled like a puppy trying to be forgiven for breaking something with her cute growl.


    Since she was undead and couldn''t express pain as she didn''t feel any, Skull w behaved just like she did when Danzel woulde out of his room and hang out with her when she was on "guard" duty.


    Making Danzel feel bitter from the inside.


    "To tell you the truth, Skull w, you were my favorite and yet most untrusty worthy undead that I had ever created." Danzel said as he caressed her skull with his skeleton hand.


    "You were the strongest of all my creations, but the fact that your connection with me wasn''t as strong as the others, I couldn''t bring myself to fully trust you..."


    "K-Keeegh~"


    "Sometimes you would follow my orders and other times you will twist my orders to do it your way, honestly, I always thought of you as unreliable." Danzel said while staring at the ring eyes of Skull w.


    Though he wasn''t sure why he could imagine Skull w ready to burst into tears.


    ''I guess I could be considered the father of Skull w, despite being the one who killed the living version of her.'' Danzel said as let go of her skull and risen up to his feet.


    "Maybe it was because of my past experience making me doubtful of others that it made me I couldn''t trust youpletely..." Danzel said while walking away, before stopping in front of the storage rings that were dropped from having his hand blown away.


    Picking the storage rings and putting them into his finger with a bit of force, Danzel looked at Skull w, the dark ice now covering one of her skull sockets.


    "I guess you wouldn''t know as you weren''t yet born at the time that this happend." He said as he walked back to Skull w and back to his knees.


    "Skull w." Danzel said as he caressed the side that wasn''t frozen with his still-armored hand.


    "You have disobeyed my orders, your master and creator." He said while staring directly at the middle eye of Skull w.


    "Keeughhhh~"


    "Doing so though, you saved my...life. Despite being not ordered to do so, you still didn''t hesitate in sacrificing yourself to save me. And for that... I thank you." Danzel said, with an ice and heavy voice.


    He lowered his head and touched heads with Skull w, his ethereal eye staring back at Skull w''s middle eye. Meanwhile, the dark ice covered her second eye and all of her body except bits of her skull.


    "That''s why, Skull w, I will have to ask you to wait." Danzel said and suddenly Skull ws''st eye red up in surprise.


    Surprised by the fact that Danzel pierced a dagger inside her skull, a dagger which had its runes lit up in a dark green light.


    "Your loyalty towards me...I won''t discard."


    The runes of the dagger started to begin to work, slowly dragging the soul of Skull w out of her body.


    "Keeeugh~?" Skull w growled confusedly as to what was happening.


    "Skull w, though it might be ufortable and it might take a while...maybe even years. I promise you to find a new body to host your soul. A body much stronger than your current one, so..."


    Danzel distanced his head so that he wouldn''t get the dark ice on him and showed a smile at Skull w.


    ''Can you wait till I get you the coolest body out there?'' Danzel said with an internalmand to Skull w.


    Being unable to respond with her whole jaw being covered in dark ice, Skull w could only re her ethereal eye.<sub> </sub>


    And once she did the [Rune of Tolian Repent] activating, sucking her soul inside the dagger and trapping it just before the dark ice was about to touch the dagger.


    Danzel swiftly pulled the dagger out of Skull w and watched how the dark ice fully covered her body.


    "..."


    Staring silently at the husk of Skull w''s body, Danzel raised to his feet and looked at the dagger inhabiting the soul of Skull w.


    [Death Hunts Dagger]: A sharp dagger that was created with alchemy from a dark elve and has been used as an experiment by a runesmith. The dagger hosts the soul of a rare variant of a death hound, granting the dagger the special ability to allow the wielder to locate people wounded by the dagger. Also, the edge of the dagger has dead mana massively running, making the weapon have a decay effect.


    Reading through the description, Danzel couldn''t help but get surprised by the fact that the dagger gained an enchantment-like ability thanks to the rune.


    Though Danzel wasn''t nning to use this dagger at all. After all, he just promised Skull w to give him a new body.


    He didn''t know how he was supposed to do it, but he was sure it was possible as it was hinted by the supposed "God of death" Uzal.


    A fellow runesmith tried making an army with souls with armor being their body. It wasn''t stated if he had seeded or not, but if someone who reached the level of being called a God by others had thought that it was possible, then it might as well very well be.


    "I had to learn how to craft undead out of runes anyway after I discarded the grand general talent." Danzel said with a bitter tone.


    He brought out the sheath of the danger and sheathed the dagger inside while putting it at his back.


    Sadly, he couldn''t store soul-infused equipment in his storage rings, forcing him to carry them at all times.


    "Now...let''s see what the soul of the magic caster did to my sword."


    Picking his sword from the ground, the hole in the ground let out white smoke. From cold air.


    [Sand Emperors Chilling Frost]: A de made by a master cksmith that was acknowledged as the best among his people by the emperor itself, who was tasked to make the best de for one of his sons. The emperor himself enchants this weapon and the soul of a powerful Archmage allows the de to use [Frozen Wave], [Breath of Frozen Field], [Frozen Ice Lances] and reach a temperature that freezes flesh by just a second of touch. In an attempt to harm his user, the enraged soul makes the handle extremely cold, making holding the weapon impossible for being below the 4th-tied, s, the undead isn''t of the 2nd-tier or above and isn''t affected by this...


    "That''s...quite impressive if I have to say." Danzel mumbled to himself as he read the description.


    The soul of an Archmage granted his sword a total of 3 spells to use and a beneficial passive.


    As far as he read, the speaks sounded around the 3rd-tier, [Breath of Frozen Field] and [Frozen Ice Lances] we''re simr to what the magic caster used against him, but at a lower tier.


    The former was the lesser version of the ice field. Releasing cold air into the surroundings and slowly freezing his surroundings where thetter was the ice spears he saw countless times.


    [Frozen Wave] in turn described itself as creating a wave of ice spikes in the swing direction.


    They all sounded interesting, but with no mana to y around them, all that Danzel could do was sigh internally.


    As he was near the wall Danzel didn''t have to walk for long until he reached the ice wall.


    And with a swing of his sword, Danzel managed to break a small hole big enough for him to fit and go to the outside, seeing that the undead advantaged much further.


    "Ugh...here I thought I could recover myself with some nearby weaklings."


    Though he said that, he still waited to regenerate a bit of mana to use blood magic on his weapon, so when he kills he recovers mana.


    Waiting outside the wall, Danzel suddenly remembered Azrael. That was fighting several magic casters with the same power as Nevvan.


    Raising his head to see if he was alright, Danzel became speechless as he saw Azrael''s clones holding 3 bodies of those supposed Archmages.


    ''Yeah...I shouldn''t look for trouble with Azrael.'' He thought, internally calling Azrael a monster.


    Here he fought to his bitter end to win against one single Archmage. But seeing that at the same time the dark elve managing to do what he had done, just times 3 more without looking like he was having a hard time.


    "I guess I should catch up with the others..." He said as he finally got the required mana after a few minutes.

 Chapter 362 Into The Tower

    The archmage, who held the second highest title in the whole Arcana was considered to be demigods in the eyes ofmoners and soldiers. Beings capable of powers that could destroy a whole city if they ever wished to do so.


    So when 6 Archmages arrived to support the army, the soldiers of arcana were confident that victory was in their hands.


    s, they were severely wrong.


    Only a single enemy of the same tier of the Archmages had easily killed most of them and annihted 1/3 of their soldiers, who were already facing thousands of fully equipped undead.


    Worst of all, the soldiers who died were raised into simr undead, albeit weaker, they still had the strength of a 3rd-tier.


    Not to forget that they had to deal with a rampaging troll who killed one of the archmages and a death knight who killed another archmage, even one fairly well-known from joining hundreds of battlefields anding victorious.


    The army outside the walls was through thempletely destroyed to the point that they didn''t even pose a threat to the undead army and their generals.


    The magic caster on top of the walls tried to inflict as much damage as they could, but though means unknown, they all suddenly dropped dead to the ground. Only two magic casters were standing there, them being a small girl with exotic clothes and a dark-skinned man with tattoos on his head.


    Soon after, the whole gate exploded in ck mes, disintegrating arge portion of the gate.


    Bursting through the mes was an old man with an amigasa hat and a silver mask, wielding a scythe sword in his hand.


    The soldiers who prepared to make their stand in front then felt the wraith of Agare''s swordsmanship.


    Wherever far or close, be it from behind him or above him, Agares cut through everything around him without only swinging his sword. Though the soldiers cut down by him could swear that this old man swung more than once at the same time.


    Of course, that was quite impossible as every cut made by Agares brought someone to death''s door.


    Then from the gate the thousands of undead rushed inside and spread through, killing everyone that went against their instincts.


    Only a group of undead was organized and continued pushing forward, with the front of them being the supposed general.


    To the left were a High Troll covered with blood from top to bottom, one of his hand holding his halbert and his other hand holding a headless corpse of someone wearing robes. The High Troll was also munching something in his mouth, as what it was was a mystery on its own.


    To the right was a death knight with ethereal dark green ring eyes, wearing dark armor and wielding a shield with a skull shape in front and an ominous sword that radiated a death aura on its togetether with a cold aura.


    In the front was a being that could be considered beautiful and horrifying at the same time. A ck-winged blood angel with 8 simr-looking retainers hovering above him.


    And behind the leader of the demonic angels, was a woman covered with ck bandages toucher that steel, allowing others to see her figure. Also, her long white hair and purple eyes attracted others mostly to her face despite her body.


    All of them walked towards the tower.


    "Though I already knew that, you were an undead Danzel. " Vannesa said while staring at Danzel.


    Turning to look at Vanessa with his ring eyes, Danzel answered.


    "You got a problem with me being an undead?" Danzel said with a cold tone.


    "Not at all. But I will be lying if I say I wasn''t disappointed. We could had~ lots~of~fun~together. If you get what I mean."


    "Vanessa!!!" Azrael yelled back at his sister.


    "Ugh." Vannesa groaned in annoyance as she started pickering with Azrael.


    Danzel quickly lost interest in the two siblings fighting and instead focused on the path in front of him.


    He had already killed a few hundred soldiers and fully regenerated himself to peak strength full of mana.


    Though he couldn''t revive anymore for today.


    ''I also gained lots of XP through all of this fighting. At least enough to evolve my main ss and find some interesting skills.'' He thought to himself.


    After fighting with Nevvan, Danzel realized that despite his belief of not getting more skills, hecked arge number of options in a fight.


    Although he had a nice base with skills that cover all the needed areas, he decided to look for alternative options by getting other skills.


    He wasn''t sure what to get, but after upgrading his ss and his other skills, he was sure something useful woulde out of it.


    While Danzel was thinking of future investments, Agares who finished the small fries came to join them.


    Then he gazed at Danzel.


    "Hmm, you definitely reached the 4th-tier. I can see you became quite powerful." Agares said with his hand on the chin area of the mask.


    "Mhm, would you like to spar after we are done with this mission? The difference in strength is so overwhelming that I find it hard to control. In fact, I believe I might have an actual chance of beating you." Danzel said with a grin.


    "Hahaha~I don''t mind, I don''t mind. I still owe you for your work and I find our spar quite enjoyed myself. Though don''t expect me to go easy on you." Agaresughed before in the end his tone bing serious.


    If one saw the rtionship between Agares and Danzel when they first met and now. It would practically be a difference between night and day.


    Although mostly transactional, the spars that they had reminded Agares back when he was teaching the way of the sword. Also, Danzel''s willingness to carve runes made Agares see Danzel in a better light.


    The only thing that kept Agares from building aplete friendship was the fact that Danzel was undead.


    On Danzel''s side, the fact that he was saved and was willing to teach him some tips made him warm up a bit, but not to the level of a friend.


    They each see the other as allies.


    Hearing the small talk of Agares and Danzel, Sartan decided to step up.


    "If you guys are nning to fight, then count me in." He talked while swallowing what he was chewing.


    Danzel nodded after a bit of dy.


    He wasn''t sure if Sartan could hold back, but if he were to spar with him, it would be with both his revives up and ready.


    As they were walking,suddenly shadows started to rise in front of the group, bing the figures of a small girl and a robed figure.


    "Grandpa!" Shiro shouts in excitement as she runs towards Agares.


    Agares bent his knees and picked up Shiro with one hand up to his chest.<sub> </sub>


    Ignoring the duo, Velkir walked in front of Danzel.


    "Congrattion, I see you became a Death Knight, huh? Suits you well." Velkir said as he started scanning Danzel from bottom to top.


    "Thanks." Danzel said as he suddenly remember the corpse of Nevvan.


    "By the way, are you interested in that body? It was of a 4th-tier and I ain''t nning to use it." Danzel asked as he brought out the corpse of Nevvan from his storage ring.


    "Hmm, who was this guy again..." Velkir mumbled before making the corpse disappear.


    "Though damaged...I could figure something out. As for the payment, I will put it in the next enchantment of the shield." Velkir said while looking at the corpse that Sartan holds.


    Looking back at Velkir, Spartan made an "oh" expression.


    "Here is a gift from me, Death Caller." Spartan said as he dropped the headless and crashed corpse to the ground.


    Velkir stared at the corpse for a full 2 seconds before making it disappear.


    "I have the rest of the bodies, but would it be alright to give them to you after I do some...experiments?"


    Velkir simply nodded at Azrael without saying anything.


    They knew each other work and Azrael knew not to damage the bodies before giving them.


    "We don''t have much time, let''s go." Velkir urged.


    They met some resistance through the road, but against a group of 6 4th-tiers, it was a hopeless attempt.


    The tower had arge t gate with various magic circles carved as designed into the gate.


    Putting his hand on the gate, dark gray mana started to sip in the gate.


    "As we don''t have much time, Vanessa and Agares, you go and pick the core of the tower. If stealing it is impossible...break the core." Velkir said as his mana sipped inside the gate.


    Danzel hearing that fell into deep thoughts.


    He was thinking about whether he should join them or not.


    Originally he took that as an already-decided option, but now Velkir saying that we don''t have much time, and he started thinking of joining.


    It wasn''t a guarantee, but Vanessa and Agares will be with him if he joins. Both owning him a favor.


    And based on Velkir''s information, they were no 5th-tiers inside the tower.


    ''I technically still own Velkir and making me enchantments for the shield.''


    He worried that it was too dangerous without being able to revive, but with the ability to turn into mist, he decided to join.


    "If we are so pressed for time, I could join them. After all, I also became a 4th-tier."


    Just as he finished, Sartan was the next to speak.


    "Death Caller, I also want to go into that tower inside."


    Velkir turned his head to look at the two of them confused.


    "Danzel, honestly, I don''t want to risk you going in the tower. A craft is something rare, risking it and losing it here would weigh my phctery I regret for a few centuries. As for you Sartan...why?"


    "Hmpf, as far as I heard, this tower is the home of the king of this kingdom. And a as future king, I got to see the standards of other ces. Nheless, I hadn''t enough with from my fight."


    Velkir wanted to exin that Arcana doesn''t have a sole king but several magus ruling the kingdom. But he stopped himself from doing so.


    "Alright, but don''t forget our mission. As for you Danzel..."


    Before Velkir could finish, Danzel tuned to most and traveled in front of Velkir almost instantly, receiving Vannesa''s whistle.


    "Don''t worry, I have the ability to escape if pushes to shove.


    Velkir''s eyes frown just as he opened the gate of the tower, revealing some kind of blue portal.


    The speed of Danzel somewhat impressed Velkir.


    "Is that so...? Then alright. But keep in mind that you got to survive." Velkir said while ring at Agares long enough to send him a message.


    Agares simply nodded his head.


    "Alright, once you are inside, search for the highest concentrated mana ce in this tower. There will be the core. Azrael and I will prevent the arcanas support from disturbing you. Shiro, you stay by my side."


    "Now go."


    With Velkir urging them, the others knew they had to hurry.


    All 4 of them entered at the same time inside the portal.


    Transporting them into an extremely spacious ce made of marble-like material.


    Before they could get acquainted with their surroundings, almost immediately a red magic circle expanded under their feet and lit up.


    Notice the magic circle, Agares, Vanessa and Danzel moved like a ghost and moved out of the magic circle.


    Only Sartan stayed and watched the magic circle under his feet.


    "What is that?"


    Before anyone could answer his question, the magic circle released its magic.


    *Booom! Booom! Booom! Booom! Boom!!!

 Chapter 363 Golems And Core

    Seeing Sartan being engulfed in several explosions, not even one of them thought about his well-being.


    ''Where is the magic caster?'' Danzel just like the others thought to themself.


    Scanning the area, Danzel saw a giant spider with a donut-shaped head and its body made out of the same marble as the towering out of what seemed like a portal.


    "What-" Before he could even his question, another simr magic circle appear under him much faster than the one before.


    Having been distracted by the weird spider appearing from the portal, Danzel only managed to turn his head to see the magic circle explode and engulf him in mes.


    *Booom!


    "Danzel!" Vannessa called out seeing the death knight being eaten by the mes.


    Suddenly though, surrounding her, several portals appeared, anding out of those portals were hooded figures wearing a faceless masks and wielding a spear.


    With just half their body fullying out, they thrust their spears at Vanessa.


    Before the spears could impale her though, Vanessa jumped high up and stepped to one of the spears to go even further above.


    "Rat like bastards." Vanessa said with her eyes filled with killing intent.


    Raising one of her legs while being in the air, ck mes engulfed that certain leg. The me''s identity was known to be the most destructive type of magic branching from dark magic out there. Chaos magic.


    She then made swiped her leg and kicked toward where the faceless figures were, releasing the chaotic mes of pure destruction like a wave toward the ground.


    The faceless figures quickly dived back inside the portals before the chaotic mes burn them into nothingness.


    The chaotic me disintegrated the marble-like material without leaving dust behind.


    Once Vanessa fell down, 3 times the amount of portals appeared around her. And from them came out faceless figures with different kinds of weapons.


    One of them took the lead and thursted his spear at Vanessa, which with little to no movement dodged to the side.


    The figure thrust again and again at a speed simr to that of a peak warrior of the 3rd-tier. Though in the eyes of Vanessa, he was extremely slow.


    "You done?" With a swift movement faster than lighting, she kicked the faceless figure at his head, making it explode into several pieces.


    The pieces were made out of seemingly stone.


    With the fall of the first figure being their signal, all others surrounding Vanessa dashed at her.


    s, even if surrounded by all sides, Vanessa''s battle sense was as sharp as having a thousand eyes around her. With minimal movement and precise strikes, she dodged and annihted the faceless


    But in the mids of the fight, she noticed something strange.


    The broken pieces of the dead figures will get sucked back near the "corpses" before a portal appears and takes the "corpse" and broken pieces somewhere unknown.


    Once that happend, another portal would appear and spew out a replica of the faceless figure that was sucked in.


    Vanessa saw it happend again and again, making her realize that they weren''t replicas but that those figures were getting repaired once inside the portal. That or someone was sending new of those every time. But Vanessa decided to stick to the former.


    Agares who saw Vanessa getting surrounded was about to go and support her, but from the side of his eye, he saw a strong lighting toward him.


    Hearing his danger senses, he jumped back, barely dodging a ray of extreme heat targeting his previous location and shortly after following Agares.


    Forcing him to run further away from Vanessa.


    "A spider?" Agares asked out loud as he saw the spider up in the wall shooting aser from his donut head.


    The spider on the wall continued to track Agare''s movements and the faceless figures continued to rush at Vanessa without pause.


    With the spiders focused entirely on Agares, she missed the sudden appearance of dark misting behind her head and slowly forming a being with ring eyes.


    Now fully formed, Danzel swung his sword at the spider''s head and cut it into multiple pieces. Its head was destroyed which was used to focus the energy into one point to create theser, resulting in the energy blowing up.


    *Booom!


    With theser no longer following him, Agares eyes moved like a sharp de toward the faceless figures before disappearing from his location.


    At the same time, from the location where Sartan was previously, the smoke exploded.


    And at the same time, Agares and a furious Sartan had their weapons raised toward the faceless figures.


    "Sword art-"


    "HOW DARE YOU GREET A KING LIKE THAT!?" Sartan yelled full of bloodlust as he swung his halbert at those figures and sent a huge shockwave that swept through many of them.


    Though feeling bitter from being interrupted, Agares sword wasn''t interrupted in cutting the rest of the figures into small pieces.


    Vanessa wisely jumped away andnd beside Agares.


    "Move away if you don''t want to get burn your muscle head!" She yelled as moved her right leg towards the left side with her leg burning in chaos mes.


    Then she dragged her leg to the right side in a waning crescent moon shape, making a small moon of chaos mes that exploded like a tsunami towards the "corpses" of the faceless figures.


    Knowing what those mes were capable of, the rage in Sartan''s face disappeared and quickly moved to the side, letting the chaos mes remove the remains of the faceless figures.


    Sartan looked at the ck mes and then stared at Vanessa with a frown.


    "They were getting to recover." Vanessa said while shrugging her shoulders.<sub> </sub>


    "Do they have my brethren''s blood?" Sartan said while scratching his head.


    *Buagh!!


    The sudden fall of the spider brought everyone''s attention to the one who yed it.


    "Those things aren''t living beings. They are some kind of golem variant..." Danzel said while his armor was slowly regenerating the ck tings.


    "Golems?"


    "Golems?"


    Vannesa and Sartan tilted their heads in confusion.


    "Mhmm~, I see." Agares mumbled to himself, making the two ignorant people turn at him.


    "Hey Agares, do you know who does things?" Vanessa asked.


    Agares nodded his head.


    "Yeah, one friend from my vige used to makerge wood puppets that could move on their own which he called golems...though everyone called them guardians rather than golems." Agares exined to everyone, with Vanessa and Sartan saying "ohh" while Danzel made a mental note that wood golems were a thing.


    Reminding him that he still didn''t know a lot about this world and its magic.


    "I don''t know what kind of golems your friends make, but those things that came from portals use the core of this tower to repair themself and charge themself. As long as we take the core, they should run out of mana." Danzel shared the information he got from the spider''s description.


    "Then what are we still waiting for, let''s get to it"


    With everyone agreeing, they let Vanessa take the lead as she had the highest mana perception among all of us and was capable to track the core supposedly if Velkirs words were true.


    As for this ce itself, the dimensional shift was 10 times more impressive than the sacred vault in the desert.


    In the vault, it seemed that it simply expanded the space, but here, they were stairs going up and down and long paths with hunters of traps. As they were in a tower, moving like that was quite weird.


    And the guardians of this ce were much more impressive than those flesh golems.


    In each different path, arge number of traps and other golems were to prevent them from moving forward, with every time being one or two "superior" golems just like the spider there.


    Be it flying serpents golems that crossed through space by using portals or a humanoid golem that was capable to summon elementals of some kind of different variant.


    They were quite powerful.


    Nevertheless, all those golems only reached the peak of the 3rd-tier.


    Against Sartan, Agares, Vanessa, and Danzel...


    They had no chance of defeating them.


    Those 4 steamrolled their way toward their goal, devastating the golems blocking their path. And as they were in hurry, most superior golems didn''t even manage to show their abilities.


    And for the being that was observing the group of 4, it felt threatened.


    ***


    In a wide and empty room with only a small altar standing in the middle of the room.


    Hovering above the altar was the being that was threats by the newly arrived intruders.


    "4 Targets of the cmity rank, a high troll, dark elf, undead, and an unknown race in the memory space. 4 warriors, with 2 capable of magic."


    The being that analyzed the footage from the golems had no facial expression, not a humanoid body.


    As the being that spoke in a feminine voice was a...


    A mana crystal.


    More precisely known as the core of the tower.


    "Contact Master of imminent threat of the tower...,munication failed. Undergone repeat...munication failed. Under gone~."


    "Failed."


    "Failed."


    "Failed."


    The mana crystal repeated the same thing again and again until its words changed.


    "Self-defense protocol has been judged without authorization to be put in action."


    Suddenly the altar lightens up in white light, the light slowly revealing a white te armor with a hole in the middle.


    Slowly, the core of the tower lowered itself inside the te armor.


    Just as it did, mana spread through the armor at a such great amount that it made physical.


    And under the control of this mana, the core was capable of controlling the piece of armor.


    "For my lord and master, I will protect this ce" the core dered as it continued seeing the footage of the 4 Deathfull Skull members.

 Chapter 364 Deathfull Skulls Vs Armored Core

    After fighting off several of the golems and reaching a long pathway with a huge door, in the end, Vanessa moved the bandages away from her face, before sighting out loud.


    "Sigh~, the one who made those things has a really bad taste. Good thing that Danzel came with us."


    Being his name mentioned, Danzel turned to look at Vanessa.


    And in the moment of distraction, a portal opened from his side ready to thrust his spear at his skull.


    But before he could, Danzel prated the golem''s head with his sword.


    The Golem shook for a moment before stopping moving. Danzel next tested his sword [Breath of Frozen Field] ability, freezing the golem.


    Though that wasn''t the reason why Danzel could eliminate the golems, instead it was the fact that he could drain their soul essences. Wherever he drained enough, they would still move without showing any pain of the sort, but they would no longer receive a portal.


    Compared to the flesh golems that he had to face, those guys wereplete constructs and he double-checked their descriptions.


    Leaving him to believe that something else was creating the portals.


    Although those golems had the spell to make portals, they couldn''t use them when they were destroyed, making him deduced that something else was repairing them.


    ''Though as who or what it is I don''t know.'' Danzel thought as he pulled his sword out of the frozen golem.


    "Hey ck armor, how are you keeping them dead?" Sartan asked annoyed.


    With only Vanessa and Danzel being capable ofpletely eliminating those golems, Agares and Sartan were left with temporarily destroying them.


    Agares didn''t mind, but Sartan being on the receiving end of fighting a seemingly immortal opponent annoyed him quite a bit, as ironic as it was.


    "With some kind of death magic. And keeping them dead isn''t slightly off. Something else other than their own keeps creating those portals and repairing them before sending them back to fight. I simply cut the... connection from that something." Danzel exined with a cold tone.


    "So something is interfering you say..." Vanessa mumbled to herself.


    "I felt no presence that was capable of this though out the whole time." Agares said under his silver mask.


    "Well, whoever it is, he bettere out." Vanessa said while controlling the ck bandages covering her head except for her eyes and hair and turning to see the door in front of them.


    "I can sense a tremendous amount of mana behind the door, even more, that of the boss. At the very least twice as high."


    "So you saying that the core is behind the wall?" Danzel asked while going and touching the door.


    "It has a barrier, no?" Agares said while taking a closer look at the wall.


    "Yes, and quite a powerful one. Unless the damage exceeds the amount the barrier can hold, it will regenerate by using mana." Danzel exined.


    "In other words, it needs a single strong attack." Agares said with a frown.


    "Yeah, I myself wouldn''t be able to break it. How about you Vanessa, will your chaos mes work?" Danzel asked.


    "Well, we won''t know till we try." Vanessa said as she walked closer to the gate with her arm slowly catching on fire with chaos mes.


    "Let me do it." Sartan said while blocking Vanessa with hisrge hand from going forward.


    Vanessa simply shrugged her shoulder and walked back.


    Walking in front of the gate, Sartan pieced his halberd into the ground. Then he took an oi zuki stance with his left palm on the gate and his right curled into a fist.


    Then suddenly, a blood red aura started limiting out of Sartan''s body, spearing overwhelming pressure through the building and the 3.


    He curled his fist and started gathering the bloody aura there.


    "Haaah!" Opening his mouth, pure hot smoke came out.


    And then as soon as the ground cracked, Agares unleashed his fist towards the gate.


    *BOOAHMMM!!!!


    Like firing a wind cannon into a piece of paper, the whole gate exploded to its entirety while a huge shock wave made the broken pieces fly to the surroundings with the bullets'' speed.


    Seeing that, Danzel raised his shield to protect his head.


    Agares made his mirror images out of the smoke, blocking every small piece of the gate.


    As for Vanessa, she simply stood still and let herself be showered by several small gate pieces. Though she didn''t even feel the impact of those flying pieces by one tiny bit.


    "Hmpf, so much about the barrier." Sartan scoffed as he picked up his halbert and walked inside. Followed by the rest of the group.


    Once they went inside, all they saw was arge and empty room, with a small altar a piece of armor with a mana crystal in his chest.


    Except for the armor, it seemed like the mana itself became physical, allowing the armor to move.


    "For what reason have you entered the tower, Intruders." A feminine voice devoid of life called out to them.


    With the armor moving and the voiceing from it, the 4 of them realized that the armor was alive.


    "Everyone, that mana crystal inside that armor is the core. So don''t break it, Sartan." Vanessa said.<sub> </sub>


    "Hmpf." Sartan scoffed at being singled out.


    "You have no right in being here. So as intruders, I will eliminate you!" The core spoke as it raised the armors hands wide open.


    Once she did, Danzel felt his [Existential Sense Danger] warning him.


    "No, you won''t!" He yelled as he swung his sword, releasing one [Soul Reaping Wind] towards the armor core flying at immense speed.


    "For my master''s sake!" As the armor core spoke those words, a huge magic circle covered the whole empty room.


    Seeing that, Agares, Vaness, Sartan, and Danzel dashed toward the armor core.


    "Change Reality! [My Worlds Will]!"


    Before the [Soul Reaping Wind] and the 4 of them managed to reach the armor core, the magic circle let out a blinding light that was engufling the room itself.


    And once the light disappeared, the 4 of them found themself free-falling through the sky under a golden bright sphere letting illuminating everything and magically eliminating all shadows to be cast down.


    That''s right, there was a sky.


    The previous empty room with the small altar now gone, they found themself somewhere that had several levitating pirs circling around. Which reflected the light from the bright golden sphere.


    "Aggghhhh!" Danzel let out an echoing scream.


    Not one out of panic from free falling, but one of true pain.


    "Danzel! What''s wrong!?" Vanessa yelled, surprised by the sudden scream of pain.


    Suddenly though, a portal appeared in front of Sartan, revealing a light elemental with magical armor shooting towards Sartan and kicking him to the stomach with such force that it made him being sent flying towards one of the flying pirs, breaking through one of them and crashing into another one.


    The equipped light elemental then moved by the speed of light and appeared where Sartan was and sending another blow, raising arge smoke cloud.


    Meanwhile, on the ground, another portal appeared letting out the armored core.


    "Fall and Crumble, [Weight of the World.]" The armored core cast as it pushed both her hands to the ground.


    Making arge purple magic circle appear.


    Once the magic circle lighten up, the gravity of the area that the magic circle covered increased by an immense amount, turning Agares, Vanessa, and Danzel into living anvils.


    It happend so suddenly that except for Agares, the other two fell with their whole body face down to the ground.


    The gravity was so strong that it made the ground itselfpress and lower.


    Having his jingasa destroyed by the seer gravity and being the only one standing on his own two feet, Agares dashed forward at a speed that questioned if the gravity spell worked or not.


    "Unknown race intruders need to be re-evaluated in the memory space." The armored core said as she escaped from her location with the use of a portal while also keeping the gravity spell active.


    Agares eyes moved sharply to a certain location and disappeared from his location like a ghost.


    And as if he saw through the future itself, the location he appeared was the same as the portal of the armored core.


    "Re-evaluated is needed." The armored core said as it created a mana barrier around itself almost instantly.


    "Sword Art of the Reversed Demon." Agares mumbled as he stared at the armored core with cold eyes.


    "Jakino~"


    7 mist mirror images moved in an instant and surrounded the armored core with their reversed des.


    And at the same time, they all swung at the barrier.


    Not once, but every single mist mirror imaged swung a total of seven times. Completely destroying the barrier and hitting the armor several times, trashing the armored core, and leaving several cuts to everyone except the core itself as it was protected by another barrier.


    The mist mirror images disappeared then after, leaving Agares to yet swing his de.


    "~Mezasi." Agares said inplete apathy as he swung his reaper sword, directly aiming to cut down his open in one singr and urate swing.


    Realizing where Agares was aiming, the armored core put his hands in front of his core while bringing out 2 magic gauntlets.


    Barely saving itself in the process.


    Agares then disappeared and repeated behind the armored core, moving and swinging at such speed that even the armored core couldn''t keep track of him.


    Resulting in both its hands with the gauntlets together with the "neck" of the armor being cut off.


    The armored core then created a portal and went through it, teleporting into one of the floating pirs with her cut-down body. But that didn''tst long as the cut pieces fly back to her armor,pletely repairing it.


    "Raising evaluation of target from cmity to disaster level." The armored core said.


    While a dark mist was forming into a death knight behind it.

 Chapter 365 Deathfull Skulls Vs Armored Core (2)

    Coming into being from the mist with ring dark green eyes. the death knight swung his sword toward the armored core.


    But before the sword could reach the core, physical lights appeared and pierced the death knight''s arm, preventing it from moving.


    "I have seen what you are capable of, Intruder." The armored core said as she turned around and pointed its palm toward Danzel.


    The light constructs showed cracks, but before Danzel could break through the light constructs, the spell of the armored core had finished.


    He raised his hand towards his front the moment the spell came flying towards him.


    "[Storming Gale]."


    And in one instance, a huge gale push appeared like an air cannon being shot. It was so strong that it send Danzel flying.


    "Dammit!" Danzel cursed as he used all his strength in his legs to stop himself from being pushed back while also digging his sword into the pir''s ground.


    s, he wasn''t able to stop himself before he met the edge, throwing off the pir, making him free fall once more towards the ground. He even tried to use [Phantom Phase], but even his mist was pushed back.


    The armored core watched how the undead fell off the pir, before turning his attention back to the disaster-level intruder.


    But before it could, Vannesa came in front of its sight with chaotic mes surrounding her ck bandage like a secondyer of armor.


    She raised her leg and performed an axe kick toward the armored core. It managed to jump a step back and avoid her attack, but the sheer axe kick Vanessa held such force that it traveled through the whole pir, creatingrge cracks and destroying the pir. Not only that, but from those cracks, the chaos mes spread like poison.


    Engulfing all pieces of the pir with ck mes.


    Naturally, with the loss of footing, the armored core started falling inside those very pieces.


    The armored core didn''t care about touching those mes though, instead, it searched for Vanessa who wasing towards it using the broken pieces as footing to move.


    "[Ray of Obliteration]." The armored cast creates a much more destructiveser than the donut-head spider golem.


    Theser disintegrates both the ck mes and the stone pieces of the pir.


    "Hmpf!" Vanessa scoffed as he kicked her footing and dodged theser of the core.


    ? Afternding into another broken piece, she did the same again, moving around the armored core at a speed that even the armored core couldn''t keep track of her.


    And once Vanessa stopped, the armored core turned around at pointed his hand toward her.


    But before it could release his spell, Vanessa was already in front of it.


    She kicked the stomach of the armored core, releasing ck mes on its body.


    "Pass!" She yelled, sending the armored core flying towards the air while breaking through the pir''s stone.


    Once in the air, another shadow fell upon the armored core. A huge one at that too,


    "Catch!" Sartan yelled as he held his halbert with both hands


    The bloody aura surrounded his whole body and halbert before swinging the halbert down towards the armored core.


    The mana barrier that it conjured around its body instantly broke upon the impact of the halbert, resulting in being shot down towards the ground.


    *Greeagh!!


    A huge crater with an armored core being on the middle became the ground with the shock wave being strong enough to raise the ground around the crater.


    In the middle of all this, was a wracked-up armor that was wrecked in all sorts of ways, though even then, the armor still raised its arm and gathered mana.


    In the next moment balls of extreme heat show out of its arm toward Sartan and Vanessa.


    Once one of those balls hit, it created a chain reaction, resulting in the other balls to exploded in mes, filling the above with a sea of mes.


    The broken-up armor of the core meanwhile repaired itself as it continued its bombardment.


    "Updating memory base, light elemental ineffective at cmity level troll." The core voice said out loud as it pointed its free hand towards Agares running towards it.


    "Priority set, Disaster level intruder."


    Without an incantation, several light constructs appeared around Agares before shooting toward him.


    "Magic is purely an imitation of power." Agares said as he swung his sword and destroyed the light constructs. Those that came behind him were cut down by his mirror imagesing out of his body,


    "Update memory base, restrain magic ineffective on disaster level intruder."


    The armor core then released upon Agares the balls of extreme heat in quick session.


    "True strengthes on those who decide to wield it."


    Agares precise and fast reaper sword cut through the attacks of the armored core as if they were butter and before they could even explode in mes, Agares had passed through the range of the explosion.


    "Come forth, wielder of daylight, [Greater Light Elemental of Daylight]"


    A bright golden magic circle appeared on the ground and once lifted, a new presence of a 4th-tier being arrived in the room.<sub> </sub>


    The light of the room became the vessel to manifest a greater elemental, in the form of a giant golden white knight holding a greatsword in his hands. It wore a crown on its helmet and simr to the undead, its eyes burned with golden mes that were made out of light.


    Raising its de, the greater elemental of light raised its greatsword made glowing in golden light up to its head.


    "[Fall upon the Light]." The greater elemental mumbled as it swung its greatsword down, releasing a wave of light cutting through the ground toward Agares


    Seeing the wave of lighting towards him, Agares breathed out slowly and stopped moving forward, instead, he took a stance with his reaper sword on the side of his hip.


    "Sword of Art of the Reversed Demon~"


    As he muttered those words to himself, suddenly out of his forehead pushing his white hair away was a pair of horns bathed in blood and even his Agares eyes changed color towards a crimson color.


    "Sen Surasshu Oni."


    And Agares swung his sword toward the iing wave of light.


    No.


    He and thousands of his mirror images ovepped on top of his body and did the exact action just as he did.


    And without creating much of any sound, the floor where the reaper sword was aimed was cut in half. The cut started to expand and cut through the light wave of the greater elemental.


    Seeing the iing silent attack, the greater elemental created a barrier of light, but even its barrier was cut in half, followed next by itself.


    Witnessing that, the armored core saw the threat of the iing silent cut and created a portal to get away. But after only entering halfway through the portal, an ethereal skeleton arm appeared and grabbed the core itself, and started to drag it out.


    The core reacted swiftly by using the armor to push the core back inside the armor and seeding after a struggle of 2 seconds.


    But those 2 seconds alone were long enough for the silent cut to meet the armored core body.


    *Chiiiiigh!


    The barriers of the core struggled while releasing sparks, the ones breaking almost instantly.


    In the second round, its armorsted 1-second max before being cut down, resulting in the armor being cut in two.


    Now only its core struggled to survive being cut down by the silent cut of Agares.


    The mana core used a more advantageous version of [Mana Shield] which could block any damage by the cost of using one''s mana. But the greater the damage, the more mana the spell would eat to stop the attack.


    But even then, if the attack was too overwhelming, then even such a spell couldn''t hold on.


    The core of the tower was like a wheel of mana, created by the highest grade mana crystal and the knowledge of a magic caster who reached the height of the 5th tier.


    But no matter the amount of mana a construct had avable too.


    No barrier in this world could fully block Agares "Sen Surasshu Oni.".


    Proving this point, the barrier around the core broke and the silent cut continued digging deeper and soon enough, cutting through the mana crystal.


    But before it could go any deeper than a few inches, out of desperation the core made anotheryer of a barrier inside of its body to stop the silent cut.


    Which sessfully managed to do.


    But no without any damage.


    "Need to inform master for maintenance...contact Master of imminent threat of the tower."


    The silent cut of Agares cut through the cores portal and because of its armor being cut in half, it took time to repair as it floated and the pieces of the armor started to move back together.


    "Failed."


    From the front of the core, stood the blood-horned Agares with his reaper sword.


    "Failed."


    From the cores behind, a dark mist started toe and form a death knight with a sword and shield.


    "Failed."


    *Borough!


    And from both her sides, two figures fell to the ground, one being a female covered with ck mes.


    "Failed."


    And from the other side, a huge high troll wielding a halbert had his skin burned, revealing his flesh. But the High Troll skin regenerates soon enough.


    "Failed..."


    The auras of four 4th-tier beings surrounded the core.

 Chapter 366 Deathfull Skulls Vs Armored Core (3)

    There was a moment of silence between everyone involved in the fight.


    Even though the core had received a portion of his master knowledge, allowing it to cast powerful magic and even having the mana to cast them without any care.


    It was still too much for it to fight against those 4.


    Though she watched how each of them fought and vaguely knew their strength. That didn''t mean itpletely knew them.


    The magic of the undead and the strength of the unknown intruder was one that took it off guard.


    One could use magic that prated her defense which felt as if something scratched her mind while the strength of the other was a level above the others.


    ''A need of distance is required.'' The core though.


    As soon as the first piece of the broken pir met the ground, that''s when the silence was broken.


    Under the armored''s core feet, a portal appeared.


    But at the same time, the death knight turned into mist and closed the distance almost instantly and Agares moved so fast that he too arrived in front of the armored core. Both of them swung their swords at the armored core.


    Having anticipated such speed from both of them, the armored core acted beforehand and used one of the golems toe out of the portal and drag its feet inside just before the swords of the two managed to cut its armor into pieces.


    The endpoint of this portal was at the very top of the center of the golden sphere on the very top.


    "Come forth. Arrowheads of the light. [Mass Light Element of Piecing Light]"


    The mana of the armored core spread to its surroundings, creating humanoid light elementals which had no legs and a hood covering their faces.


    Despite no wings or any of the sort, 20 of those elementals floated in the air, each of them holding an unloaded crossbow in one hand and a bolt made out of light in the other hand.


    While the elementals were reloading their crossbows, Sartan swung his halbert with both hands toward Vanessa.


    "Girl!"


    Seeing the halberting towards her, Vanessa jumped above the sharp weapon.


    But instead of simply dodging it, shended her feet on top of the halberts de while her body burned intensely with ck mes.


    With her on top of his halbert, Sartan step forward and used the momentum of the swing to raise his halbert.


    Resulting in Vanessa being shot in the air like a missile.


    "Elementals! Shoot the dark elf." The armored core was ordered.


    Having reloaded their crossbows and aimed at Vanessa, each elemental pulled the trigger and the bolt of light was split and turned into 5 other bolts.


    "So annoying." Vanessa mumbled as she used her ck mes to create an explosion to move her slightly away from light boltsing her way. Though it hurt her hands, such a method made her not lose the speed that she was flying.


    "Burn into nothingness!" Vanessa yelled as she arrived in front of the armored core with a fist raised in intense ck mes.


    Seeing that she was too close, the armored core escaped away from her path.


    "Ugh! So annoying!" Frustrated, Vanessa didn''t give up on her umted mes and instead swung her fist toward the golden sphere.


    *Baaaaghhhh!


    The results were simr to what happend with the pir before. Cracks filled with chaos mes, breaking the golden sphere, thus destroying the source of light for the whole room.


    The armored core having escaped the fate of the golden sphere, reappeared in the air before scanning the destruction of the dark elf.


    But before it could do that, it felt an immense bloodlust being targeted at her.


    Turning around she saw the high troll rooting his one of the floating pirs and ring at it with a grin on his face.


    Kicking the pir and leaving a crater behind, Sartan catapulted himself off where the armored core was.


    It managed to move out of the way of the flying troll''s path and even moved to the side where Sartan wasn''t holding the halbert.


    But instead of using the halbert, Sartan reached out his hand and grabbed the armors leg.


    "Hahahaha!" Laughing menacingly, Sartan made a swing and throw the armored core like a rock toward one of the floating pirs,pletely destroying them just like the elemental of before did to him.<sub> </sub>


    Nheless, the core didn''t suffer much except for its armor being damaged once again.


    ''A need to change a battlefield is required'' the armored core thought as it started acting.


    "Change Reality! [My-"


    Before the armored core could finish her spell, a dark mist moved through the rumbles of the pir and appeared in front of her, the mist which a momentter turned into Danzel that thrust his sword at the core.


    The armored core quickly change the spell and created the light constructs to pierce the hand of Danzel that wielded his sword.


    "This won''t work twice on me." Danzel said as he rammed his shield into the armored core''s body. Taking the armored core off guard.


    She couldn''t understand why the undead would ram his shield while she had her barriers active. Doing such with a shield would only damage her armor at worst and the force would push it back and create distance for her.


    As a magic caster, that benefits her.


    And this exact thing happend.


    The ramming shield pushed her armor in and sent her flying out of the rumblings of the pir, thus creating distance from the undead. What it didn''t expect was the same kind of magic as before to harm her core as if someone shook its mind violently around.


    "T-This magic-" The core shuttered its words, but before she could even finish her sentence, Agares appeared behind it like a ghost.


    "Jakino Mezasi." Agares said as 7 mist mirror images appeared from out of his body and swinging their swords at the armored core, turned her armor into shreds while Agares''s swing broke through her core barrier, slightly scratching the core itself.


    "Intruder!" The core yelled with its feminine voice as it created several balls of heat to explode around her.


    *Booom! Boom! Boom!


    With Agares being engulfed in the explosion, the core itself floated out of the explosion while regenerating her whole armor.


    But once the armors chest piece, helmet, and right arm have regenerated. An ethereal longsword pierced through all her barriers right through its body. Making it hear a ss cracking sound.


    The mind of the core itself feels as if a huge chunk has been cut off her has disappeared and pain that it shouldn''t even be able to experience struck her mind.


    Before the core could make sense of what she lost and the pain, a dark green mist appeared in front of her body and manifested Danzel.


    Danzel swung once more his shield at the core''s armor, sending it flying to the ground while activating [Shield Tremble], shaking once more the core''s soul essence.


    "T-T-his Magic... Master needs to" Before the core could finish her sentence. Danzel fell on top of its armor and pierced his sword into the right arm of the armor and freezing the ground and the arm with ice.


    "I hope master Velkir will be satisfied with this." Danzel said as he put his shield into his storage ring.


    And with his now free hand, Danzel pierced through the armor and grabbed the core itself with his hand. Activating his new talent [Leech Touch].


    Which drained the health director of its target.


    Of course, the [Leech Touch] wasn''t all that power to break through the barrier of the core on its own far from it.


    But the important bit of this action was that it did damage to the barrier surrounding the core''s body. Which allowed [Soul Nemesis] to slowly draw the soul essence of the core towards Danzel.


    Making the mind, the consciousness of the core slowly bleed out of its body. Andpared to a conscious body that had a soul fitting for its body. The core was a construct that had a mind forced into bing a conscious being.


    Compared to elementals the soul essence and their bodies wear fragile but one. The core waspletely the opposite. Its soul essence and body weren''t one, but they were building together.


    And after Danzel''s many assaults of her soul essence, the consciousness of... her.


    The host of the core took only a brief second beforepletely disappearing inside Danzel''s cursed long sword.


    "M-Master..." The core let out an echoing whisper before the core, became a mere construct.


    Losing her mind but still containing the abilities of the core of the tower.


    And once the core became a mere construct, the spell [My Worlds Will] copsed, filling the room with light and transforming it back to the empty room where they first found the core.


    "To think that a mana crystal can be turned into such a thing." Danzel stared in amazement as he read the description of the mana crystal.


    [Tower Core of the Magus: Isabel (Minor Damage): The work of a Magus who created a magic tower on his own and this being the core of his work. Built by a brilliant mind that managed to store a portion of his knowledge inside the core and lost consciousness of his loved one to turn the core into more than a mana generator for the tower, but also a replica of that lost consciousness. It has been damaged by a master swordsman and the consciousness of the Magus lost loved one has beenpletely wiped out by a death knight.

 Chapter 367 Mission Complete

    "So this is what Death Caller wanted us to get." Sartan said as he took the core out of Danzel''s hand, looking at it with one eye closed, trying to see if something was inside the core.


    "Don''t touch it you muscle head!" Vanessa said as she took the core out of Sartans hand.


    "Knowing you, you would have tried to take a piece of it just to see if it''s tasty or not."


    Hearing that, Sartan scoffed at Vanessa.


    "Ha! What do you take a future king for? A fool!?" Sartan said as he nced at the core.


    "How does it taste anyway?"


    "You!!"


    "What!?"


    Looking at the duo solemnly, Danzel extended his hand and made an ethereal skeleton hand grab the crystal out of Vanessa''s hand and bring it to him.


    "Huh?" Vanessa only realized the hand only after it had already its finger on the core.


    "I haven''t finished looking at the tower core yet. And since it''s damaged, there is a need to be careful with it." Danzel exined.


    After hearing his words, Vanessa and Sartan could only let Danzel have it. Since he exined various things inside the tower that they themselves couldn''t know and that he was learning under Velkir, they consider him the all-knowing entity in their group.


    Where in fact Danzel was as clueless as they without the description that he had, or at the very least he knew one or two things more than them.


    Although Danzel didn''t lie about the core being damaged, Danzel wanted to continue to see the nature of the core and what was different from other mana crystals.


    ''How did this Magus even manage to use soul essence?''


    Though that was his main worry.


    If he were to go by what the core said, the core itself didn''t know of his soul magic. And since the Magus shared a portion of his knowledge into this core, the chances of him knowing soul magic were low, but not impossible.


    Another possibility that he thought was that this Magus knew necromancy or another type of magic that allowed him to do something with soul essence.


    While Danzel was mind storming on his own, Agares came and suddenly brought him out.


    "Danzel, you said that the core is damaged. If I may ask, to what extent is the core damaged...?" Agares asked, with his horns slowly going back inside his head and his eyes turning back to normal.


    Danzel turned around and gazed at the horns disappearing before noticing the worry that Agares eyes were expressing.


    "The core it''s indeed damaged, but I don''t think that you have to worry about it. Though I ain''t an expert in this kind of stuff. The core''s main function is still intact, meaning that all the spells that it used or information should still be inside the core as far as I am aware. The damage that you did will at best make the core unstable to be usable but knowing master Velkir, he will have a way to repair it."


    "Honestly, I worry more about the fact that I wiped the personality of this thing. It hasn''t broken or anything and it still has lots of mana inside but I turned the core into a braindead, nom I turned the item back into an item." Danzel assured Agares.


    "Huh? Isn''t that kinda bad?" Vanessa said.


    In turn, Danzel simply shrugged his shoulders.


    "Velkir sent us here to either break it or steal the core. While he said thetter was more favorable, the option of breaking the core was always there. Besides, I doubt we could have taken the core when it had a consciousness. Am I wrong?"


    Vanessa thought about it before shaking her head.


    "Yeah, we wouldn''t have been able to take this thing while it tried to kill us. Well done Danzel." Vanessa raised a thumbs ups.


    "Hahaha! You done well. Dark Armor!" Sartan said enthusiastically as he patted Danzel''s back with such force that made Danzel almost drop the core and have his spine break in two.


    "For now let''s get out of here..." Danzel said.


    They soon turned around in the empty room and walked to where they came from.


    But this time, no traps or golems tried to stop them from leaving the tower.


    Though once they arrived at where they came from, there was no portal. Making Sartan punch through the tower, opening a wall to the outside.


    And what they saw were thousands of destroyed undeadying on the ground and another thousand continuously fighting what Danzel thought were the reinforcements of the Arcana kingdom.


    Danzel shook his head at that.


    After seeing the power of everyone, especially Azrael, he doubted that numbers would make any difference.


    Walking towards the outside, there was Velkir with little Shiro on his side waiting for them.


    "Grandpa!" Shiro yelled excitedly upon seeing Agares and ran toward him.


    "Shiro." Agares went to his knee and hugged Shiro into his arms.


    "Grandpa, what happend with your hat?"


    "My hat? I identally tripped and stepped on it, thinking of what today''s dinner I should make for my little Shiro. But enough of me, was your teacher nice to you?"


    "Mhm." Shiro nodded her head and started exining what she saw.


    Ignoring the duo of exotic clothes, Danzel walked towards Velkir and put the core forward.


    "Is this the core?" Velkir asked with a frown.


    "Yes, the damage was unavoidable." Danzel said with a firm voice.


    "No...the stay of the core, mhm, it''s way better than I had originally expected. You guys done well." Velkir said as he picked the core on his hand and made it flow above his hand.


    Creating two circles under and above the core, a sudden sh of light engulfed the crystal, making it disappear.


    "I will hear out everyone''s experience inside the tower when we get out of here. But for now, we should get away from here." Velkir said as he gazed upon the battlefield.


    Nodding their heads, Vanessa called out of Azrael and he came to rejoin the whole group.


    "Has the job sessfully finished." Azrael asked while ring at Velkir, who nodded back.


    The 8 demonic angel aides of his flew behind him and slowly turned into blood and went back towards the demonic cursed spear of Azrael. Making the spear open up the closed eyes.


    Bloodthirster stared around curiously but once it gazed at Danzel and he gazed back, all eyes shook a bit before disappearing.


    "Hmm?" Azrael looked at his spear in confusion.


    "Alright everyone, the contract of Deathfull Skulls has been fulfilled with the Ioratal. Gather and I will start the mass teleportation spell.


    Gathering near Velkir, a huge magic circle appeared under their feet, slowly turning as the magic circle was beginning to form.


    ''Such aplex spell...'' Danzel thought internally as he observed the magic circle.


    And then he suddenly remembered that he became a 4th-tier being, a death knight.


    ''Wait, maybe now I will be able to see Velkir''s whole status? And everyone else?'' He suddenly had the urge to see through everyone''s status andpare himself with them.


    ''No, I will have enough time once the spell is finished.''<sub> </sub>


    And soon enough, the magic circle was upon itspletion.


    "I will begin the spell." Velkir said solemnly as he raised his staff up high.


    And then he brought his staff down, but once the staff was halfway to meet the ground, Velkir''s blind-looking eyes were filled with mana as they darted towards the tower.


    Using mana vision, increasing his perception, everything became to move in slow motion. Gazing at the tower, he slowly watched how a portal began to extend.


    And from this portal, a figure wearing a faceless mask wasing out and within him, was an immense amount of mana, far greater than the core of the tower.


    The sheer amount of mana that was to be felt made everyone else turn toward the new presence. But when the faceless figure mumbled something, only Velkir and Azrael were able to hear it.


    "[Magic Destruction]"


    ? The mana of the faceless man moved at light speed and shed with Velkirs mass teleportation, instantly breaking dozens of holes through the magic circle.


    ''Now from all times!?'' Velkir cursed as he stared at everyone else, readying to fight. Danzel pulled his cursed sword, Vanessa slowly gathered her ck mes, Azrael made his own spell, Agares horns came out and Sartan was surrounded by a bloody aura.


    "Sigh..." Velkir sighed as he tapped his staff to the ground, cutting pieces of the magic circle and rearranging them to repair the magic circle before activating.


    "I hate butchering my spells." Velkir said in annoyance as the magic circle lit up in the light.


    Seeing what Velkir just did, Azrael widen his eyes in shock.


    "Velkir! No-"


    Before he could finish, the light of the magic circle engulfed everyone except Velkir, turning them into lighting chaotically flying above the skies.


    Once the lighting disappeared through all directions, the location of Velkir exploded suddenly.


    "Bastards." The man with the faceless mask said furiously as he stared at the lighting and walked in front of the mes of the explosion.


    The mes suddenly exploded into nothingness revealing an unscathed Velkir.


    "You arrived sooner than I expected, Magus of the Tower." Velkir said solemnly.


    "Where is the core, undead?" The owner of the tower, the Magus said, with fury present in his voice.


    Seeing such emotioning from him, Velkir couldn''t help butugh.


    "Hahaha! Was my flesh too obvious?" Velkir said as he raised his hand and pulled the ragged bandages covering his mouth off, revealing his whole mouth having no flesh.


    "Hmpf, a Lich?" The Magus scoffed while instantly creating 4 spikes around Velkir to pierce him.


    Before they could, Velkir teleported 3 steps away from the spears.


    "Indeed." Velkir said as his eyes burned with gray mes just like his body did. The mes ate upon the flesh, leaving nothing else but a skeleton with ring fray eyes.


    Seeing the Lich, the Magus throwed two skulls to the ground, one having only a single eye whereas the other skull''s mouth was t and had no teeth.


    "Did you send those two to stall me?" The Magus said.


    "Heh! Hahaha! I can''t wait to see those two again." Velkir ignored the Magus as he stared at the two skulls before he suddenly stopped and stared intensely at the Magus.


    "Magus of this kingdom. Do I really need to state the obvious?"


    *BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!


    Several explosions urred where Velkir was.


    But in the air a sh of light appeared, revealing Velkir.


    "I remember the day when the subordinate talked in myboratory about the Small Fire Magi a few centuries ago who now achieved the rank of the magus. How you scorched thends of the immortal bird with mes. I got to say that back then the story earned a goodugh. But-"


    Suddenly Velkirs mana spread through the battlefield, bringing out an aura of death far greater than that of Danzels and all the thousands of undead on this battlefieldbined.


    "- Seeing you know, I see nothing but a failure of a magic caster." Velkir said as he descended back to the ground, his gray mana spreading through the ground and inside the destroyed undead.


    "Fuelled by emotions and clouding once judgment. So...<strong>HUMAN</strong>"


    The gray mana spread through each destroyed bone of the undead and slowly made them float and slowly repair the thousand of fallen undead bodies.


    And each of the repaired undead, had their ring eyes reignited.


    They picked up their weapons.


    Halberts.


    Spears.


    Swords.


    Daggers.


    And they rose once more.


    Veleron then stapped his staff into the ground, making a pool of gray mana.


    "You kind is not suited for the art that is magic." Velkir said with a cold voice as a presence just as strong as the Magus of the tower appeared inside the pool of gray mana.


    And the owner of that aura came out.


    Two hands that of a dragon were the first toe out and touch the outside world. The entity pulled itself from the pool of gray mana before spreading its wings and flying up in the air.


    With half of its body being that of the legendary beast of the sea, the Leviathan, and the other half of the Dragon. Having 2 necks of a Hydra and where the head was supposed to be was a hand of a dragon instead.


    The middle of each hand has a mouth with sharp teeth.


    And between those two necks, was a humanoid figure with his bottom half merged with the body of this entity.


    The humanoid figure was covered with the same material as Vanessa''s artifact, a ck bandage. The humanoid part of this entity wielded a ck long sword on his right arm.


    "KYAAAAAAAAAGH!!"


    "KYAAAAAAAAAGH!!"


    "KYAAAAAAAAAGH!!"


    The beast''s cry mixed with its aura seemed to shake the world itself.


    Formerly known as the Devil of Azu''rah.


    "I am Velkir Veleron Verrens. A Magic caster!" Velkir said as his immense deadly aura spread though out the battlefield.


    "The Fallen Resurrector!"

 Chapter 368 Consequence Of Deathfull Skulls Actions

    The news of the tower of a Magus being raided by a mercenary group strong enough to fight against a whole army spread through the surrounding kingdoms like wildfire.


    A total of 22 575 soldiers were sent with 5000 magic casters and a total of 10 Archmages as support. Each soldier was equipped with armor and magic weapons that would allow even the weakest of peasants to easily kill a wolf even if he never practices before.


    Of the 5000 magic casters, 4750 of them gratitude out of the highest ss academies that teach magic, received the respect of their peers, and were cultivated to be the best that the Arcana kingdom could offer.


    Thus allowing them to directly be stationed in the most honorable and rewarding ce of them all.


    Directly in the ce where the most famous Magus was stationed and called his home. The magic tower.


    A tool that is said to be the strongest tool that a magic caster could have and inside the tower, the magic caster''s defeat was deemed by many impossible.


    The remaining 250 magic casters also worked directly under the Magus himself and also received his guidance, allowing them to further progress their magic to be considered the elites of the Arcana Kingdom.


    They also held the title of "Arcane Seeds" for they had the potential to reach the 4th-tier and be granted the title of Archmage.


    Making them one of the strongest entities in this whole world.


    And from all of those forces that the Arcana kingdom cultivated and had hoped for them to grow into something much greater.


    In the span of not even 3 hours.


    Not even the remains or the ashes of those people were ever found again.


    The ce that was a symbol of the Arcana Kingdom, the magic tower fell into ruin.


    And its surroundings were turned into a desert of gray sand going through several kilometers far and wide.


    No one knows what exactly happend for such a ce to turn into a desert of gray sand.


    Only the statement of the Magus was there, saying that a mercenary group called Deathfull Skulls was the one responsible and the world-shaking scream that was felt heard even in the Capital of the Arcana kingdom was there to known.


    That resulted in the mercenary association Durendal being seen in a bad light in the poption for purely wearing the title of mercenary.


    The death of one of the executives of the Durendal, Archmage Nevvan resulted in many people also dropping their support of the Durendal association. Leading them to a decline and in the future the disbandment of the association.


    The people called this event "The Comming of the Gray Fiend".


    And despite being a great disaster for the Arcana Kingdom, the other kingdoms saw it as a chance for peace and conjure.


    ***


    In the Berum Kingdom, after the event of "The Comming of the Gray Fiend"...


    Near the border of Berum, a meeting between the phoenix warriors was taking ce.


    Over 50 phoenix warriors were standing tall in five lines with their backs straight, staring into a small stage.


    Suddenly, another phoenix warrior wearing armor much better than any of the 30 of them walked upon the stage and stared at the group of 50.


    He was themander of this elite group.


    "Warriors who serve the immortal me! The time of our counterattack against the Arcana Kingdom has finally arrived upon us! Mercenaries of the Dynasty wrecked the famous magic tower of the Magus that killed countless of our men and people!"


    "The borders of them were breached! And arge number of their troops were defeated! This is a sign! Be it from the ever light of the goddess or the guidance of the immortal me! It''s our duty as men and women being born in thisnd to step up and wipe out the invaders once and for all!"


    "We won''t be blinded by pride or arrogance! We are here to create a better future for our people! And for that, we need to drive our scorching des into the enemy! And if they break, we reforge them to pierce through those invaders!" The Commander said while turning his head and gazing at 4 young men and a young woman.


    "And those reforged des are those 5, recently selected as the elites of the Royal Academies to join our goal and learn to be those scorching des that protect our people."


    "Come forward and state your name you all." Themander said.


    "Yes!"


    "My name is Adalius Megarn!"


    "My name is Charlotte Charlotus!"


    "My name is Rome Arias!"


    "My name is Samuel Crafbinder!"


    "My name is Ellen Darcy!"


    ***


    In the Dynasty of Ioratal Kingdom, after the event of "The Comming of the Gray Fiend".


    With Berum now gaining a chance of a lifetime, they drew back their troops and gave up on invading Ioratal so that they could focus on the Arcana Kingdom.


    Forcing the Arcana Kingdom to abandon the idea of conjecturing morend of the Dynasty so that they protect their own kingdom at its weakest state in decades.


    Granting the Dynasty of Ioratal the peace that they sought and desperately needed.


    Because of this peace, Kingra''mash, the Lich that was impersonating one of the princes of thete king has been able to im the throne of the Dynasty for his own.


    The bards on the streets sang songs of prosperity and the people were celebrating their new king bringing peace to those war-ravagednds.


    And a month under his rule, the most reasonable noble looked at the new king in favor, saying that the golden age of the Dynasty of Ioratal is upon them.<sub> </sub>


    The current location of the king was at the treasure of the Dynasty.


    ...


    Entering the treasury filled with ancient artifacts, rare resources, and forbidden knowledge of the like, the king, Kingra''mash stood in the room alone, with a solemn face.


    "~~~~" Kingra''mash mumbled some inaudible words, creating several magic barriers through the treasury.


    "Heh~Hehe~ Hahahahahahaha!" And he suddenly startedughing crazily.


    His flesh slowly disappeared, revealing his true form with dark blue ethereal ring eyes.


    "Come!" Kingra''mash said as he went to his knees and touched the floor, creating 3 magic arrays.


    Those magic arrays, slowly litten up in a dark light, making the shadows extend in the air and form 1 figure for each magic array.


    And once the shadows of those figures were removed, a total of 4 Liches were present in the treasury.


    One with a single eye, burning with dark light and its middle being white light.


    Another with his mouth being smooth with no teeth and his ethereal ring eyes having the color of teal.


    And thest Liching from the arrays wore gray robes and his ethereal ring eyes had the color of gray.


    "Look! Didn''t I tell you guys that it would work!?" Kingra''mash said while opening his hands wide.


    "You really managed to bring us in the treasury..." The one-eyed Lich said in disbelief.


    "Even if we split everything, this wouldst everyone hears a few decades'' worths of research funds, if not even a century." The teal eye Lich said, also surprised.


    Velkir silently stared at the treasury before turning his head towards Kingra''mash.


    "Kingra''mash, are you sure you want to throw away the throne of this kingdom? Wouldn''t it be more resourceful to rule and take a cut of what humans earn for the long run?" Velkir asked, with the other two Liches nodding their heads.


    Kingra''mash scoffed at them.


    "Hah! As if! While in theory, we could amass more wealth on our own. Ruling over all those humans and making sure that they prosper to be worth it would waste the most important resource of all. My time."


    "Being with those humans I learned how self-destructive they are for their own. It simply isn''t worth a single day inside myboratory. Nheless, those guys expect me to make some kind of heir." Kingra''mash said as his gazended on the countless treasures.


    "Now let''s get paid and get out of here." Kingra''mash dered as the other 3 Liches nodded their heads and started to clean the treasury.


    On this day, the new king that was said to bring prosperity to the Dynasty of Ioratal disappeared.


    And with him so did the whole treasury of the royal family.


    Resulting in the other princes causing a civil war for the throne.


    ****


    Though those events will happend in the future and not the current present.


    In the present where everyone was engulfed by Velkirs mass teleportation spell.


    The light that was supposed to shoot straight up like an arrowhead towards the heaves became disarrayed by the interferences of the Magus.


    The spell was supposed to break and be dispelled, but thanks to Velkir''s quick reaction, he managed to make the spell work enough to teleport them.


    As result, the spellcked a few very importantponents.


    And that is the destination and everyone teleporting together.


    ***


    Though and unknown to many, 2 spears of lightning broke tough the sky andnded on the earth.


    *Fsheeeeenn~


    From the ce where one of the lighting hit, was a tall kneeling figure wearing dark armor, holding a cursed sword in hand and a shield in his other hand.


    That figure was Danzel.


    "The teleportation worked, huh?" Danzel said before being assaulted by a strong wind filled with snow.


    Surprising in seeing snow raiding through the wind, Danzel just realized that something was wrong. Looking in front of him, he could only see white snow wherever he stared.


    "Where am I?" Danzel said as he raised up to his feet, looking at the endless snow around him.


    He tried to look for something else other than snow till a small trembling voice caught his attention. behind him.


    "G-Grandpa? W-Where are you?" Shiro said while tears started to fall onto the snow.


    Danzel silently stared at Shiro crying with his ethereal dark green eyes.


    Unsure of what to do.

 Chapter 369 In The Frozen Lands With A Death Knight

    *Poouf~ Pouf~Pouf


    Faintly through those frozennds, the sound of cold metal stepping into the white snow could be heard.


    The one who made those sounds walked through those purends that had only ice and snow to show.


    With a long sword on his hip and wearing a full-ted dark armor with a pair of 2 dark green ethereal ring eyes, the death knight walking in the snows suddenly came to a halt as he found what he was searching for.


    *Booough~


    *Booough~


    *Booough~


    Staring in front of him, there was a small herd of arge beasts, looking like oversized buffalos that had their horns extended in front of their faces. Another key difference from them was their long beautiful brown hair that covered their whole body.


    Some of those beasts were resting in the snow as if they were taking a nap while others were to what looked to the death knight as socializing among themself.


    "Those would work..." The death knight mumbled as he stopped his advantage to them.


    Opening his right palm, a sudden sh of light made an ordinary spear with runes on its tip appear on his hand. And took a stance as if he was about to throw a javelin.


    "This one will do..." The death knight mumbled as he gaze at one of those haired buffalos who seemed to just wake up from his nap.


    *Bough~


    Taking a step forward, the death knight threw the spear towards that haired buffalo stronger than any ballista could aplish.


    *Fsiiiiiihn!


    The spear flew through the air at extortionary speed before meetings his target and piercing... the haired buffalo''s neck.


    *Bouooooughh!?~


    The haired buffalo was instantly woken up wide as it felt a piercing pain on his neck, making it cry out in pain, resulting in the other haired buffalos sleeping to wake up, and the others looked surprised at the sudden pain from one of them.


    *Bough~?


    *Boough~??


    *Booough~???


    "Sigh... I missed." The death knight sighed out loud as he stretched his hand.


    And suddenly, an ethereal dark green skeleton appeared and drew the spear out of the haired buffalo''s neck, making lots of its blood in the white snow with blood.


    The hurt-haired buffalo gazed in the direction of where the spear that hurt it was going, making it finally notice the armored skull holding the spear.


    *Booough~!!!


    Enraged at being hurt, the haired buffalo started running head-on toward the death knight despite his wound.


    The Death knight, in turn, made his spear disappear and put his right hand on top of his sword handle, before shaking his head.


    "No, not with this." The death knight mumbled before letting go of the handle and chose instead to simply stay still, waiting for the haired buffalo toe to him.


    Once the wounded-haired buffalo was about to ram the death knight with his horns and run him over, the death knight raised his hand and grabbed hold with both hands of the horns.


    *Psouh~


    The death knight was pushed slightly back from the charge of the haired buffalo, but he wasn''t overrun.


    Starting his strength towards the horns, the death knight began pushing the whole-haired buffalo back, shocking the haired buffalo in return.


    *Bough~!?


    The death knight managed to raise slightly the haired buffalo''s front two legs up to the air together with his head before he turned the horns and pushed it to the side. Making the haired buffalo be thrown to the side and fall.


    Seeing that, the other-haired buffalos had already run toward their king and circled around the undead.


    The death knight drew his long sword out of his sheathed and pierced the ground, resulting in a wave of ice growing around the body of the haired buffalo, barely enough to stop it from raising up.


    Moving up closer to its face, the death knight made a different sword appear in his hand.


    And using that sword, he swiftly swung it at the haired buffalo''s neck, making the haired buffalo cry in pain. The cry became weaker by the second.


    *Bough~Bouuugh....~


    Looking at the silent-haired buffalo, the death knight made the sword disappear from his hand and picked up the long sword stuck into the ground. Once picked up, the ice surrounds the now dead-haired buffalo disappearing at the same time.


    Sheathing the long sword back to the scabbard, the death knight moved close to the dead-haired buffalo, and using a single hand, he managed to lift the corpse behind his back and started carrying it away while ignoring the other haired buffalos who surround him and were yelling at him with their "*Bough" and "*Bouuugh".


    Though none of them stepped up to stop the death knight carrying one of their kind away from their herd.


    None except of a single one.


    *Bouuughh~!!!!


    One-haired buffalo stepped in front of the death knight''s path as it yelled at him.


    Compared to the others, this one horn had signs of mana being always present, its body much more muscr than any of the other haired buffalos and its eyes even burned with a faint sign of mana.


    "So that''s the guardian of the herd, huh?" The death knight mumbled as he stared at the muscr-haired buffalo that looked ready to charge toward him.


    "Soul Ender." The death knight said in a whisper.


    The instant those whispers came out of his mouth, the mana burning in the muscr-haired buffalo for an instant disappeared altogether before reappearing.


    Next, it started to shake abnormally before falling to its knees, looking to the ground while sweat started toe out of its body.


    Looking at the reaction of the muscr-haired buffalo, the death knight slowly walked towards it while still carrying the corpse of the other-haired buffalo. Making the muscr-haired buffalo only start shaking more.


    Walking to his side, the death knight stroke the muscr-haired buffalo hair with his hand softly, but the very touch of this undead made the hair of the buffalo wither.


    "Continue protecting the herd, guardian." The death knight spoke in as cold of a tone as those frozennds.


    The other-haired buffalos seeing their guardian in such a state stopped yelling at the death knight and only surrounded the guardian trying to see if he was ok.


    With only a few of them staring at the trail of blood of their kin disappearing through the distance.


    The death knight in question then continued walking with the corpse of a haired buffalo towards the frozennds.


    He could see how white-furred wolves came looking at their noses after smelling the blood of the haired buffalo.


    s, the presence of death that was always on the death knights'' side kept them from attempting to do the impossible.<sub> </sub>


    The death knight ignored those that kept to themselves and killed any other beast trying to get in his way.


    After an hour of marching, a winter storm seemed to make its appearance, but that didn''t stop the death knight to stop moving.


    And after 3 hours of walking, the death knight arrived at the beginning of one of the many mountains.


    Spreading his mana into the mountain, a wall of stone suddenly started toe down from the stone, revealing there to be a cave, with a small me flickering.


    Near the small me, was a small girl covered with a robe and pale skin, shaking from the cold despite being near the mes.


    "You are back..." The small girl with pale skin said seeing the death knight, a being who holds a hatred towards the living.


    Without answering back, the death knight let the haired buffalo fall to the ground and made the wall of stone behind him raise once more before he walked near the firece.


    Taking out half of a tree that he found in those frozennds, he started to crash the tree with his bare hands into small pieces and throw them in the firece. In an attempt to make the fire strong, albeit because it was soaked from the snow outside, the added wood didn''t do much.


    "It''s still wet..." The death knight mumbled as he put his hand near the mes near enough to burn someone''s hand.


    Using his mana, he started generating fire in hopes to be strong enough to burn on its own.


    s, with little sess.


    "The way you use your mana isn''t efficient." The small girl said while looking at the death knight attempting fire magic.


    "I know." The death knight wasn''t offended by the small girl saying that he sucked.


    "Do it for me. I will prepare the meal..." The death knight said as went towards the haired buffalo. He moved towards the other side so that the small couldn''t see him butchering the animal.


    He pulled the dagger that he was carrying and started cutting the haired buffalo''s stomach. Though he said he would prepare the meal, the death knight had no idea if everything was eatable or not. So instead he decided to cut the muscles first into small pieces.


    And once enough, he went and settled at the firece with the gathered meat on top of a few stacks of paper.


    He then brought out another clean spear from the thin air and grabbed it with his hand.


    His hand suddenly emitted some kind of death aura while his gauntlet lighted in dark green light. On top of that, mes started to appear in his hand.


    Slowly, he pulled the spear in his burning hand.


    "W-What are you doing?" The pale small girl asked while staring at the death knight burning a metal spear.


    "I am cleaning the spear." The death knight said as the matter of fact. Making the small girl confused.


    After the death knight was done "cleaning" the spear, he pierce pieces of meat in the spear and raised it on top of the mes.


    He also made 2 hands of mana to slowly rotate the spear with the meat, while he looked carefully at the meat.


    "Have you done this before?" The small girl asked while staring at the rotating pieces of meat.


    "I have not." the death knight answered.


    Then there was an awkward silence between the two.


    The one to break the silence first was the little girl.


    "D-Do you know where we are?."


    The death knight shook his head.


    "I do not. Neither of the maps that I have contains information about and filled with snow and ice. Not even themunication device that master Velkir given me seems to work." He answered.


    "Then how did we get here? A-And how can we go back?" The small girl said with a shaking voice.


    At the such question, the death knight could only sigh out loud.


    "For your second question, I do not know. We might be in unexplorednds, but that doesn''t mean that we can''t find our way back. As for how we came... it seems like something interrupted master Velkir''s spell at thest minute, resulting in our situation."


    Hearing the harsh reality of the situation that they were in, the small pale girl buried her head between her knees.


    And it was only after Danzel judged the meat to be cooked that the girl speak once more.


    "Bad fish...why are you helping me?" She said, with a voice that suggested that she was resisting crying.


    The death knight made the mana arms raise the "cooked" meat above the mes before looking at the small girl, trying not to cry between her knees.


    "Out of obligation." The death knight said.


    "Though saying that, is only half the truth. Shiro, your grandpa saved me through a fate that I avoided my whole existence and I promised him to return the favor of saving him."


    "Nevertheless, I never specified how I will return that favor to your grandfather. I am undead, a death knight at that. A being that holds hatred towards the living as his instinct. And that instinct doesn''t exclude you, Shiro."


    "I could let you alone to these frozennds to fend for yourself. Leaving you to die with someone knowing. Not even your grandfather."


    "I have other ways of repaying you, grandfather. My runesmithing for example..."


    Danzel exined while staring at the small girl named Shiro, who raised her head and looked at his ring dark green eyes.


    "Doing so would repay my debt, but at the same time that will make me ungrateful in being saved by you grandfather." He exined as he started cutting the piece of meat and putting it on top of a piece of paper.


    "The other half of it is... there is no reason not to help you. A fellow discipline of a shameless Lich and a member of the deathfull skulls." He said while giving the piece of "cooked" meat to Shiro.


    "Also, I am immortal. Wasting some time to bring you back to your grandfather isn''t such a big deal."


    He stayed silent for a moment before talking again.


    "What I am trying to say, While I will try to bring you back to your grandfather... It won''t be at my risk. The only one that you can trust is yourself and only yourself. Now eat before it gets too cold."


    Shiro looked at the "cooked" meat and then at the death knight before slowly nodding her head and cleaning her face from the tears with her sleeve.


    "Thank you." She said before stuffing the meat of the haired buffalo in her mouth.


    "Also, my name is Danzel."


    "Rue Danzel, not bad fish."


    Once the death knight, Danzel said that Shiro''s face shallowed what she was eating.


    And soon enough, her face distorted as if she ate somethingpletely disgusting.


    "Blegh!"


    "..."

 Chapter 370 In The Frozen Lands With A Death Knight (2)

    "Hey, Shiro, how about this?"


    "E-Ehm....what is this?"


    "Liver, you think you can eat this?"


    "I-I don''t think so..."


    "How about this?"


    "T-That is...?"


    "Lung."


    "No..."


    "How about the heart? Seems like a fruit that I saw before. It should be eatable, no?"


    "I-I can''t..."


    "Sigh, such a picky eater." Danzel shook his head as he continued separating the eatable and the uneatable meat. Thetter being mostly the organs. Despite Shiro looking at him in horror, which he didn''t realize.


    Of course, what was eatable and not was for Shiro to decide as he didn''t see the difference between them other than the color and shape.


    Thanks to his skills, he was able to make the waste disappear by draining the meat''s vitality, decaying it, and burning the dust.


    The rest of the haired buffalo''s meat was cut and put in one of his storage rings for preservation purposes.


    All that was left in the end was the bloodied hide and the skeleton of the buffalo.


    Though Danzel wasn''t able to feel cold for being undead, he still had the minimum awareness to recognize that Shiro shaking body was from the cold.


    "Hey, Shiro, can youe and see if this is warm or not?" Danzel asked as he made 2 mana hands keep arge piece of the haired buffalo hide in the air.


    "Mhm." Shiro nodded her head upon seeing the long and fluffy hair of the hide.


    Walking neat the floating hide and stroking her hand at the hair, she put a smile on her face from the sensation.


    "It feels nice to touch."


    "Is it warm?" Danzel asked solemnly.


    "I-I believe so."


    "Alright then, let''s make this into some kind of robe or something for you." Danzel said, making Shiro look at him with surprise.


    "A robe? But...this thing stinks?"


    "Stinks?" Danzel asked back while tilting his head to the side.


    He circled around the hide, inspecting it before looking back at Shiro.


    "Can you remove this...stench? Got any spell for that?"


    "I-I don''t think so..." Shiro said awkwardly."


    Danzel stared at the little girl for a full 3 seconds before shrugging his shoulders.


    "Well, then you will have to deal with it. It''s either that or freeze to death outside." He said as he picked all the hides and put them on top of the ribs of the haired buffalo.


    Shiro had her mouth open as she wanted to say something, but before she could, Danzel went and sat at the firece, gazing at the fire.


    More urately though, it would be he stared at his status window.


    ''There are so many things to look after in my evolution into a death knight. From the talents, upgrading my main ss and upgrading my other skills...'' Danzel thought for a moment wherever he should dive into the rapid hole of upgrades.


    From his massacre and killing of the Archmage, he had saved quite a generous amount that he could spend on stuff, but after thinking about it, he decided to postpone this forter and focus on the task at hand.


    ''Now, where was it again...ah, found it.'' Danzel stopped scrolling through the skills he could purchase at a particr old skill he unlocked, but never found the necessity to get it.


    [Deceased Bone Shaping]: 2500 XP required


    The skill wasn''t anything special, to say the least, and was self-exnatory as what it did by its name alone.


    With his use of dead mana, he could simply stretch bones to the form he wanted but only worked on corpses that weren''t undead or non-undead. He also had a pretty good idea of what the evolution of the skill could be from the few records of undead in his books that could shape bone into their armor.


    A skill that was only useful on that poor undead that couldn''t effort armor. Not only were bones more fragile and his runes weren''t to be used on bones. Only the great runes that he got were capable to be used on bones.


    For that skill, he had other ns.


    ''It''s cheap anyway...''


    Getting the skill to his arsenal, he closed his status screen and walked to the bones of the haired buffalo.


    Raising his sword, he cut through one particrrge bone and grabbed it in his hand.


    "Let''s see..."


    Using [Deceased Bone Shaping] on the bone, Danzel found that his mana was being resisted, but he still was able to slowly bend the bone without it breaking.<sub> </sub>


    "Still fairly difficult for my purposes..." Danzel mumbled as he went ahead and upgraded the skill into the 2nd tier.


    Turning it to [Bone Shaping].


    The skills evolution turned out to be just an upgrade from the previous one with the restriction of shaping non-undead bones now gone. Nothing special, but that was enough.


    Trying the skill once more, shaping the bones to his will was fairly simple now.


    He made various shapes and tried to stretch the bones as far as he could, but at some point, the bones broke from them.


    "So it doesn''t get strength by it, huh?" He mumbled to himself as restored the bone with [Necromatic Restoraction].


    "What are you doing?" Shiro asked as she got closer to see Danzel''s magic. Forgetting for a moment him butchering the haired buffalo right in front of her.


    "I had an idea of how to make that robe of yours. Though if you ask for my magic, it''s necromancy."


    He then cut several bones of the dead-haired buffalo and ced them together with the hide.


    "Hmm,e over here." Danzel called out Shiro, who nodded in response.


    He then picked up the hide stinking hide and wrapped Shiro with it like a roll.


    "H-Hey! What are you doing!?" She yelled while struggling to get out of the roll, albeit with little sess.


    "Stop struggling..." Danzel said before freeing her from the roll of the hide.


    He then proceeded to do the same thing with her arm, legs, and feet.


    Having taken the measures of the little girl in his head, Danzel started to work.


    He cut the leather pieces ording though his measurements of Shiro while also looking at Shiro''s clothes as a reference so that it wouldn''t impact her movements.


    The hide was tough, but with his strength and his sword, it was a piece of cake to smoothly cut it.


    Once he was done, he was left with cut pieces of the robe.


    That was when his new skill, [Bone Shaping] was going to take action.


    Danzel never made some time of clothing and never used a needle and string. Heck, he didn''t even have those things on him.


    So, he had to improvise.


    And what better way would it be for a death knight like him to use necromancy to reach his goals?


    He asked Shiro and even used his skeleton ethereal hands to hold the hide in a ce he got to work.


    He then cut arge bone into pieces and shaped half of them in the form of 4 needles and the other with 4 holes. He then pierced the hide and connected the two bones with the holes and then used his [Necromatic Restoraction] with [Bone Shaping] at the same time topletely seal the holes.


    He did that a total of 4 times,pletely sealing the chest pieces. Thankfully, the hide was sturdy enough to not get messed up with this process.


    Next, he did the same with the rest of the hide.


    The arms were two pieces, one on the wrist and the other upper limb. That area proved to be the most difficult of all of them, taking most of his time as it was bigger in the wrist area than he originally wanted.


    To make it tight, he used 1 rib of the haired buffalo to connect the wrist with several bones. Turning it to look like a wrist guard made out of bones.


    A simr issue came from the legs, but the annoying part was to see how to shape the bones around the armpit, but in the end, he sessfully made a leather piece connected by bones!


    Though he aimed for a robe, it became more of a winter cloth that was reinforced with bones.


    "Alright, try it." Danzel said, and Shiro nodded awkwardly.


    Shiro struggled to get in the piece that Danzel made, but after a few tries, she managed.


    "Is it warm?" Danzel asked.


    "Yes, but..."


    "But?"


    "It stinks, it''s awkward to move around, and heavy."


    Danzel looked at Shiro and she looked back at him.


    They gazed at each other for a full 3 seconds before Danzel shrugged his shoulders.


    "Well, then you will have to deal with it. It''s either that or freeze to death outside." Danzel said before moving to the firece and bringing 2 full pieces of armor.


    "T-That is..." Shiro wanted to voice out herint, but with Danzel activating [Rune Vision], the world became silent and colorless.


    The only colors to see were in the armor in front of him.


    Seeing the death knight ignoring her, felt quite helpless.


    ? "Sigh~, at least now it''s warm." Shiro said as she walked in front of Danzel and inspected their hand movement of Danzel.


    The next few hours went inplete silence, with only the flicker of the fire making noise.

 Chapter 371 Hollow Bodyguards Of Two

    It took Danzel several hours to finish the runes of those two sets of armor. Usually, he manages to finish runes of the mon] and [rare] runes in 15-25 minutes depending on how many times he made a certain rune.


    But for the more advanced runes such as [Epic] runes, it would naturally take longer as they were moreplex. But trying a rune at such rank for the first time would naturally take longer with the end result being rather...faulty.


    And the following rune that he tried now was the [Rune of Living Legion].


    He was a level above a major rune as the rune letters went through the whole armor.


    If he carved the rune when he was still a Wight, then the single rune would upy the whole armor, making carving any more runes pointless. But now thanks to his new talent [Carving Fate with Death], he was capable of squeezing the rune letter to be much smaller without making the original rune any weaker.


    In fact, the talent alone boosted the rune by a total of 25% while also leaving a spot for a few minor runes.


    "You finished?" Shiro said the moment Danzel deactivated his [Rune Vision].


    Danzel stared at her for a moment before focusing back on the two armor sets.


    ''Let''s see...'' Danzel thought as he activated the runes.


    Once he did, the rune letters litten in dark green light and let out bits of dark smoke before starting to shake.


    The loosely set armor then suddenly thighed together before starting to move.


    "Huh!? Bad fish! Those things move!" Shiro yelled in shock as she jumped from her seat.


    Ignoring her, Danzel looked closely at how the armors started to move and how exactly it was done.


    "It''s as if an undead is being born, but without a body..." Danzel mumbled, faintly remembering the wraiths of the tower he once resided in.


    Seeing the armors slowly rise from the ground with the help of dead mana reminded him how skeletons or other undead would rise naturally, but as the armors had no body, Danzel guessed that the process was more simr to how wraiths are being created.


    ''I wonder if the armor itself will be the undead or an ethereal undead will be wearing the armor.'' Danzel through internally.


    Hoping that it will be the former than thetter.


    And soon enough, the two sets of armor stood on their feet in front of Danzel, the rune still glowing from inside the armor and letting bits of dark smoke out while also radiating an aura of death suitable for undead of the 3rd-tier.


    Though it was more of the faint side of aura.


    In the next moment, Danzel brought 2 swords out of his storage ring and hold them in front of the living armor.


    ''If you can understand, pick up the sword.'' He gave them an internalmand.


    And without hesitation, the living armors did asmanded.


    "It seems like the connection is fine..."


    "Are they undead?" Shiro asked.


    Danzel nodded his head while examing the bodies of the living armors.


    "It seems like it''s the former..." Danzel mumbled, somewhat relieved.


    ''Those runes have potential...but first I will need to see the knowledge of the swordsmanship mastery that they had received.'' He thought internally.


    "You two, start sparing with each other, The first one that hits the other with their swords wins."


    As soon as hismand was voiced out, the two living armors immediately swung their swords to cut the other head.


    *Ting!


    Their swords shed with each other, creating a small echo to travel in the cave.


    They contested their difference of strength before the first created living armor jumped back to create distance from the other living armor.


    The second created living armor followed the first and shed once more with their sword.


    *Ting!


    They continued shing with their sword with little waste of movement.


    Danzel could see some small faults in their movement, but what fascinated him was the fact that they moved as if they were able to see through the other swords and intent.


    "A-Aren''t you going to stop them." Shiro asked as she watched how the two living armors were fighting at the speed of a 3rd-tier master swordsman.


    "There is no need to. It''s just a spar and nothing more. And if one ends up being destroyed... I can create another one." Danzel said with a cold voice, his gaze not leaving the two living armor shing none stop with their swords.


    Their fightingsted for over 15 whole minutes, with the winner being, by Danzel''s surprise, the first one that he created.


    As by rule the first rune will always be the worst, Danzel expected the second created living armor to win as it should be stronger.


    Though the first living armor only managed to scratch the body of the second, technically winning the spar, in a fight, such a wound would be nothing.


    "For a first try, it isn''t that bad." Danzel nodded his head before turning towards Shiro.


    "That''s an order, from now on, you two will be her bodyguards of her, Shiro. If you understand nod your heads."


    The living armors nodded their helmets while gazing at Shiro with their hollow eyes.


    "Bodyguards?" Shiro of course was surprised by that turn of events.


    "Yes, those two are the strongest of undead that I am capable of making currently. See them as some kind of insurance in case something happens. But even then, you shouldn''t rely on them for your safety. Now pack your stuff, we are leaving." Danzel said with his cold voice that left no room for discussion.


    "Shouldn''t we stay a bit longer here in the cave?" Shiro said as she remembered the first day they arrived here and how she almost froze to death.


    "It has to be now, the winter storm has stopped." Danzel said while lowering the stone wall that hid the cave.


    Shiro sighed out loud, before following Danzel out of the cave, with the 2 living armors following behind her steps.


    Outside was cold, but now with the leather cloth that Danzel made, it wasn''t as bad as before.


    "Hey, bad fish. What are the names of those two?" Shiro asked while gazing at the 2 living armors.


    "Didn''t I tell you to call me by my name? As for those two, they got none." Danzel said with an ice-cold voice.


    "Aren''t you going to name them?"


    "No."


    "Why?"


    "There isn''t a reason why I should, I just don''t."


    "Then...can I name them?"


    Danzel shrugged his shoulders at her request.<sub> </sub>


    "If you start calling me by my name, you can."


    "Mhm, alright." Shiro nodded after thinking about it.


    "My grandpa called you Danzel the whole time, but which one do you prefer? Rue or Danzel?"


    "Suit yourself, I just find being called bad fish annoying." Danzel said indifferently.


    "Then Rue it is! It''s much easier to say that Danzel."


    "..."


    Danzel stained silenced by her choice as he continued walking through the snow, and almost like a whisper, he could hear a female voice constantly ming him.


    But upon using [Grasp of the Undying], at the figure that was slowly manifesting in front of him. Making her disappear.


    "If I may ask Rue, since you are an undead, who granted you the current name that you have?" Shiro asked out of curiosity.


    In response, Danzel answered with only 2 words.


    "I did."


    ***


    At the same time in the frozen valley where the haired buffalos were resting, they were many fewer of them socializing with each other.


    Among them, the guardian of the herd, which usually socialized the most and was always on the lookout for danger, it wasying on the ground while ignoring the female-haired buffalos who circled around him in worry.


    The guardian stared in the direction where this "entity" came and imed one of their own.


    And suddenly, from that very direction, he saw two lone shadowsing their way.


    The guardian''s eyes instantly widen and risen up as fast as they could, before warning the herd.


    *Boooooughh!!!!


    The guardian''s aura spread as the ice of its horns started to spread, while from his body a cold radiating aura escaped.


    *Booooughh!


    *Boooooughh!


    *Booooooughh!


    The other-haired buffalos stepped behind the guardian while making a circle and making a circle around the children of them.


    And soon enough, the two figures came closer.


    They both wore leather from the white wolfs.


    One of them based on their body shape and long hair suggested that they were a woman with the other being a man.


    The woman wore a white wooden mask that resembled a fox head while the man was without a mask but instead held a wooden shepherd''s staff.


    What was most unique of them, or at the very least of the woman, she had a long fluffy golden tailing behind her butt.


    The two figures quickly noticed the hostility of the haired buffalos.


    "Why are the Bekai''mou so hostile?" The woman with the white wooden mask asked with a gentle voice at the man, who only showed a frown.


    "One of their own is missing..." The man said as he recognized the signs of fear from the haired buffalos, who were called Bekai''mou.


    "Might have been a wild beast or that they lost one while wandering, but by their reactions...I would say it''s the former."


    The woman nodded as she and the man walked closer to them.


    *Boooooughh!!!!


    "Shou~you poor thing~ we don''t hear to hurt you~" The woman said with a serene voice that traveled through the whole herd, making the Bekai''mou start to calm down.


    Those two arrived in front of the guardian who started to rx and feel safe in front of those two people, but despite that, its body couldn''t stop shaking.


    "What possibly could have happened for the guardian to continuously shake like that?" The woman said with a bitter voice.


    Though the moment she said those words, something clicked inside the guardians heard.


    "Continue~" the cold voices from the "entity" echoed through its mind.


    "Please be careful." The man said as he gazed at the woman and the guardian.


    "It''s just scared." The woman said as she stroked the fur of the guardian to calm it down.


    And as she did, she noticed a white line on the guardian''s fur.


    "This is..." The woman reached her hand to touch the white line on the guardian''s fur.


    But once she did, the echoes on the guardians became like a scream of urgency.


    "~protectic the heard."


    The guardian visioned, the touch of the woman reminded of this "entity" and the man turned to look like the figure with the dark armor,ing to im one of their own once more.


    *Boooooughh!!!!"


    Enraged, the guardian gathered his mana and raised its feet, and stopped the ground to crush the woman.


    The man reacted fast enough and dragged the woman a few meters away as the stomp of the guardian released cold air.


    *Boooooughh!!!!"


    "Mydy! Step back! It''s too dangerous!" The man yelled as she dragged the woman behind him.


    But despite the aggression of the guardian, his shaking body didn''t allow it to attack the two of them.


    "It''s scared." The woman said as she looked at the guardian with bitty.


    "The guardian...has a mark of death on his body."


    Hearing that, the man''s eyes widen.


    "Let''s go, If that really is the case, we have to tell the others." The man said, with urgency.


    The woman only nodded as her eyes were gazing at the guardian with pity.

 Chapter 372 Unlocked Talents

    Danzel and Shiro, together with the two living armors have been walking over a whole day, with no chance of scenery except the night crossing over and making the frozennds much colder than they were before.


    Though the cold didn''t affect him, it sure did to Shiro.


    The clothing that he made proved to be extremely useful for her and the fact that Shiro was of the 3rd-tier, also made her body much tougher than you everybody Joe.


    s, the fact that she was a magic caster who was known for their weak body and that she was essentially a child or one that is about to hit puberty. Didn''t make her body strong enough to resist the night''s cold or all the walk.


    So they decided to take refuge by shaping an artificial tunnel with Shiro magic big enough to fit feat the 4 of them.


    "There is nothing but ice and snow outside..." Shiro said somewhat depressed.


    Danzel crashed another of the small trees that he found and put it in front of Shiro to light up.


    "We will probably see such scenery for a long time, I suggest that you get used to it." Danzel said while bringing out pieces of meat and skewering them in his spike.


    Shiro looked at the skewer for a moment before she digested the words of Danzel.


    "H-How long will it take us to go back? My grandpa must be searching for me! M-Maybe he is in danger."


    Hearing that, Danzel couldn''t help but chuckle dryly.


    "Heh, I would be more worried about Agares dying from old age like how you mortals do, than him being in danger. Him being in danger...seems impossible to me." Danzel said while remembering how they ganked up at the armored core of the tower.


    Shiro seemed to calm down a bit after Danzel threw the reality of the situation at her. And as she rxed, her stomach groaned, turning her focus towards the meat.


    "Rue...Isn''t the meat burned?" Shiro said after seeking the meat starting to turn ck.


    "Is it?" Danzel asked somewhat confused, before taking the meat away from the fire and cing it on top of a bone that was shaped like a te.


    Making Shiro stare awkwardly at the te.


    "Eat and get to sleep. Tomorrow we will try to cross morend." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    He then made took a piece of paper from his storage ring and tried to half-assed make a map.


    By the time he finished, Shiro was resting on the side of the stone wall with her eyes half closed.


    "Hey, you-" Danzel tried to say to the second living armor before he was interrupted by Shiro.


    "Niyuki."


    "Right...go and give that to her." Danzel said as he gave the remaining leather of the haired buffalo to the second living armor, named by Shiro exclusively, Niyuki.


    As for the first, it was Koji.


    He found those two names quite exotic and...well, weird. But he still went with it as she stopped calling him bad fish.


    "Thanks, Rue~" Shiro said as she wrapped herself in the leather. Though not as soft as being in a bed, it sure was better than sleeping to some cold hard stone.


    He waited before Shiro went to sleep before he opened his status.


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 100


    Race: Death Knight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 79]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.80]


    Health: 96 750/ 96 750


    Mana: 17374/ 19 305


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 1339 Agility: 1459 Intelligence: 1287 Endurance: 1289


    Great Rune: [Great Rune of Undeath Existence]


    Talents: [Mythic Undead] [Sin of Wrath] [Reinforced Soul] [Superior Unique Consciousness ] [Rune Vision] [Dead Rune Knowledge] [Undead Carver] [Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [Undying][Lower ss Death Magic] [Mastery of Himself] [Affinity Carving Mastery] [Bringer of the End][O Fearful Death] [Soul Nemesis] [Carving Fate with Death] [Deathless Will] [Cursed Hands] [Leech Touch] [Drain Vitality Touch] [Armor of Death Knight] [Wielder of Death]


    Skills: [Death Warden Swordsmanship Lv.1] [Stone Wall Lv.9] [Death Descent Lv.1] [Mist Presence Lv.1] [Unceasing Soul of Death Essence] Lv.1] [Soul Reaping Wind] [Phantom Phase Lv.1] [Shield Tremple Lv.1] [Soul Ender Lv.1] [Existential Sense Danger Lv.1] [Curse of Chaining Fatigue Lv.5] [Grasp of the Undying Lv.3] [Undying Guard Lv.4] [Armor of Undying Protection Lv.1] [Siphoning Soul de Lv.9] [Soul of Death Lv.5] [Undying Preservation Lv.1] [Curse of Primordial Decay Lv.5] [Greater Raise Undead Lv.7] [Undead Reconstruction Lv.1] [Eyes of the Damned Lv.6] [Curse of Five Bindings Lv.2] [Necromatic Restoraction Lv.2] [Death Rune Removal Lv.9] [Innate Blood Absorbtion Lv.1] [Blood Puppets Lv.1], [Bleed Verocity Lv.1], [Blood Sense Lv.1], [Vampiric Gaze Lv.1] [Curse of Nature Lv.1] [Wall of Bones Lv.1] [Heavy Strike Lv.1] [Bone Shaping Lv.1]


    ...


    [XP: 14 500 300]


    ...


    Danzel was d to see that the remark didn''t update in insulting him by any given chance and the amount of XP that he has.


    ''Killing that magic caster sure did give me quite a lot.'' Danzel thought to himself.


    But the mass massacre was the main source of his now rich wallet.


    But when he considered that this amount of XP was only 14 [Epic] runes, well...


    He was certainly much less excited.


    He could certainly upgrade some of his skills and even ss with this amount,


    But first, he tried the new option that came with bing a death knight.


    And that was the [Talents].


    He always found it weird that [Skills] had several stuff to get and [Talents] didn''t. Weird because he could interact with thetter on the status screen.


    He concluded that either he wasn''t talented or that talents couldn''t be gained from status.


    But then again, he saw countless talents of others that have been achieved through doing some kind of action or experiencing something.


    Like how he has seen in those arcana mutants bearing the [Tortured Ones] talent.


    He started to believe thatpared to other beings, he couldn''t earn himself talents, but it turned out that this status locked his earned talents till he reached the 4th-tier.


    So when he opened it, he was quite surprised by the amount.


    [Talents]:<sub> </sub>


    [Soul that Walks Between Death]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Magical Talent]: 1 000 000 XP


    [User of Dark Arts]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Horder]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Torturer]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Contractor]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Arisen from Death]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Soul Torturer]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Devil yer]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Tower Master]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Minor Fire Resistance]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Warmonger]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Apprentice of Death King]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Cursed Banner]: 1 000 000 XP


    [King yer]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Royal Assassin]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Death between insight]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Feared Existence]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Knight that Deals with Death]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Ancient Taboo of Death]: 1 000 000 XP


    A total of 20 talents in a total of 5 years.


    If he were topare himself to someone else, he would either be considered a genius or a monster.


    And he would bet more on thetter as his talents were rather...


    Ominous.


    First of all, he was greatly saddened that each of those talents cost 1 000 000 XP to get.


    s, such was how the status was, XP hungry.


    ''Let''s see what we have here...'' Danzel thought internally.


    He slowly went through all the talents one by one, readying each of them carefully.


    In a way, all those Talents represented his whole history and what he had done though out time.


    The first of them was [Soul that Walks Between Death] which he guessed he got from entering the Realm of the Dead anding out in one piece. The Realm of the Dead] was titled [???] just like other of his skills.


    As for its effect, it simply stated that it would reinforce his mind and soul by 5%


    Which he didn''t find all impressive.


    ''Maybe there might be an interaction with the [Great Rune of Ruined Vessel], but for now, I pass on this one.''


    Sure, it could help him suppress [Sin of Wrath], but 5% was a meager amount for the asked cost.


    The [Magical Talent] talent was one that really surprised him and made him feel quite happy. The talent itself stated that the one who has the talent is actually talent for magic. It essentially made it easier to learn magic and have 5% more overall mana. And as [Phantom Phase] used quite a lot of mana, he went ahead and got this one.


    [User of Dark Arts] was a better version of [Magical Talent], but it focused on, well, dark arts. Necromancy, Curse Magic, Blood Magic and all other kinds of stuff. The best part of it though was the fact that his runes also counted among the "Dark Arts". At least his soul and death runes. It granted him no mana, but the 15% learning bonus and 5% strengthing of Dark Arts were enough to make him buy the talent. The next two were the less exciting ones.


    Next were the [Torturer] and [Contractor]...


    Which hepletely ignored.


    The former will amplify the fear of those who he would torture whereas thetter would make it so that when he does a contract, his voice bes more...agreeable.


    Going to the next one, a final strong talent appeared.


    [Arisen from Death] clearly came with his [Undying] and [Deathless Will] talent.


    What it did was that when he dies and gets "Revived", all his attributes will be increased by a total of 10% for 3 hours. And this effect is stacked.


    Although he was of the opinion that nning a fight in the mind of his death was...wrong. The talent suggested otherwise. Making it the third talent he got.


    Next, though the list was another ominous one.


    [Soul Torturer]


    Which further proved the fact that the being in the Realm of the Dead, were souls.


    As those talents seemed to be listed based on an order, [Soul Torture] muste from the one time he cast a curse on one of those souls in the Realm of the Dead.


    Maybe his trapping souls into weapons also made this talent appear, but he wanted to think that his first guess was the correct one.


    Otherwise, that would mean that being imprisoned inside weapons brought such pain that could be considered as torturing the soul.


    And he didn''t want to think that Skull w and the Magic caster were currently being tortured.


    He didn''t give a crap for thetter, but for the former, he did somewhat care.


    ''I will just think of them being imprisoned and not being tortured.''


    As what the talent did was the same as the [Torture] talent, but one that works on souls.


    Which he wasn''t much interested in.


    Well.


    For now, that is...

 Chapter 373 Unlocked Talents (2)

    For now, though, he wasn''t keen to torture souls.


    He instead went to read the other talents, which came out to be the most unique ones.


    Of why he had the [Devil yer] talent unlocked can only be for one reason only.


    And that was from killing the devil that was on the deserts of Azur''rah. Honestly, he only managed through luck.


    Looking back at it, the devil came to his tower pretty injured, as such a monstrosity couldn''t possibly have a total of 20 000 health.


    The talent overall only would give him a suppressing aura towards devils, which would lower their stats by 1-30% depending on strength difference. Making him ignore this talentpletely.


    After all, through the 5 years, he only saw 2 devils.


    One is a monstrosity and the other is trapped or fused in a spear.


    The following next talent he also gained because of his "achievement" in killing a devil of the 4th-tier while inside a tower he considered home.


    ...Even if he used the tower itself to kill the devil.


    The talent itself was good too, as it would increase his natural mana regeneration by a total of 300% inside his owned tower.


    s, he couldn''t make use of it.


    ''Maybe If I upgrade my [Stone Wall] and focus on shaping stone just like Velkir did, I could raise my own tower from the earth.'' Danzel considered the idea for a bit before putting his attention on the other talent.


    He still nned on doing that and turning his spell [Stone Wall] into an "earth shaping" skill or something that is for building and focusing his [Wall of Bones] to be his wall spell instead.


    [Minor Fire Resistance] was a really bitter talent to see in the options.


    As it suggested that he was burned and engulfed so much in mes that the status found reason to unlock a resistance talent for it.


    Though he couldn''t me the magic caster for learning fire magic, after all, he himself started learning fire magic on his own.


    It was one of the basic elements which were destructive that even 1st-tier spells were a threat to the 2nd-tierbatants.


    He considered buying it, but he decided to put it on hold even if it made his body 15% more resistant to fire. The reason for his decision was that currently, he was in a ce where fire wouldn''t be 100% as effective.


    So for now it is put on hold.


    [Warmonger] was also under the same situation.


    A good talent, but specifically focused on a task that isn''t that good in his current situation.


    The talent itself would raise his presence in a fight with 2000 beings'' presence by 1-50% based on his kill count and his overall stats of 10% when he fought in basic wars.


    He sure wished that he had this talent a few months ago, s, this talent now is pretty pointless and a waste of XP if he gets it.


    The next talent was quite special.


    [Apprentice of Death King].


    A talent that referred to him, as the apprentice and the Death King, his teacher, Velkir.


    And as one would suspect, that talent was entirely focused on necromancy and the undead. By itself, it would strengthen all types of the undead under his influences by 10% and strengthen all his death-stunned skills by 25%. Additionally, the aura of death that he naturally let out would be increased by 20%.


    An absurd powerful talent that is on par with his other stronger talents.


    An easy choice.


    [Cursed Banner] was in turn on the weirder side.


    The talent focused on his curse magic and it simply extended the range that the curse can work and the duration that the curses work when out of his range.


    It was quite good but also pointless in a way.


    As a meele-focusedbatant, if he were to let his enemies go so far as the curse duration is starting to tick, he might as well lose them.


    He put the talent under consideration depending on the new curses that he can get.


    As for the next 3 talents, Danzel wasn''t sure how to feel about them, as they all came from doing a single task.


    Killing a king of a kingdom.


    [King yer], [Royal Assassin], and [Death between insight] were probably from that.


    A yer who killed a king, which in turn was an assassination. And as a king is a royalty, thus the talents of [King yer] and [Royal Assassin]


    And as he used him [Soul Ender] to kill that king while he was in front of him, the [Death between insight] came to be.


    At the very least that was his guess.


    And out of the 3, only one caught his attention.


    That being [Death between insight].


    All that [King yer] did was to make him more intimidating in front of someone of a socially higher position. [Royal Assassin] in turn would reduce his presence on people with high social positions.


    Though [Death between insight] increased the strength of abilities that go unnoticed by the naked eye, which included [Grasp of the Undying] and [Soul Ender].


    Though the bonus was 10%, he still went ahead and got the talent.


    The next two talents he guessed came from him bing a 4th-tier undead that wields a sword and a shield.


    [Feared Existence] were generally what 4th-tier beings were, but as an undead was pretty much hostile by default, many would fear an undead 4th-tier.


    It increased all fear-attunned effects by 15%, which wasn''t that bad.


    If he managed to find a nice helmet and improve the [rune of Intimidating will], it sure will be useful, spending another 1 000 000 XP.


    [Feared Existence]: 1 000 000 XP


    [Knight that Deals with Death] in turn was one of the more unique ones that could be activated.


    What it did was raise those that he kills into an undead called [Dying Soldier], which had a lesser ability of this talent, which whoever they kill would in turn be a [Skeleton] or a [Zombie].


    The [Dying Soldier] was a 2nd-tier undead, which he didn''t find much of the charm for.


    Though manual, he already could raise undead minions or "craft" them as living armors. Sure, this talent made it free, but he didn''t see it being worth 1 000 000 XP.<sub> </sub>


    Thest talent though was more of the bizarre ones as the description...was small.


    [Ancient Taboo of Death]: A soul that resisted Death more that one time, grants the soul to be able to persist in [???] better.


    Though he couldn''t be 100% sure what [???] actually meant, based on his other skills, [???] probably referred to the Realm of the Dead.


    He pondered for quite a while whether he should get it or not, but in the end, he decided to get it.


    Though it wouldn''t make him stronger, Danzel knew that assurance was indeed in the case he died.


    He did an awful lot in thest months.


    ''I should start nning in case I die for real'' He thought to himself.


    ''Nersan''rah''s soul managed to survive in the Realm of the Dead for decades if not centuries long despite having not a single ability that allowed him to. If he could do it, so can I.'' Danzel thought as he closed the status window.


    [You acquired Arisen from Death]


    [You acquired User of Dark Arts]


    [You acquired Magical Talent]


    [You acquired Death between insight]


    [You acquired Feared Existence]


    [You acquired Apprentice of Death King]


    [You acquired Ancient Taboo of Death]


    And in instant, his wallet was cut in half mercilessly.


    ''Let''s test them out...'' Danzel thought as he brought out one of the books that Velkir gave him about necromancy.


    The rest of the night, he spends readying about necromancy.


    And surprisingly, the content was...much easier to understand than he remembered.


    To the point that made him feel that his previous him was... dump.


    ***


    Morning arrived through those frozennds.


    Danzel brought out the haired buffalos'' meat and cooked it on the fire. And once Shiro ate two full tes, they left with the 2 living armors behind them.


    And after several hours of walking, unluckily for them, thought more about Shiro.


    A storm started to appear.


    "Why now!?" Shiroined as the flying snow hit her face constantly.


    "Hmm, I do have some helmets in my storage ring, interested?" Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "A helmet? Don''t you realize how cold your armor is for you to ask? If I were it my whole head will be frozen!" Shiro said as she put her hand in front of her face to block the snow from getting in her eyes.


    Achieving in protecting her eyes, but her hand in turn started to be assaulted by the snow.


    "Is that so? Maybe my helmet is made out of bones. Or maybe a mask would be better?" Danzel thought as he suddenly halted his step, resulting in Shiro almost back.


    "Why did we stopped walk-"


    Before she could finish, the two living armors, Niyuki and Koji raised their swords and stand in front of Shiro.


    Their des pointing at the newly arrived beings


    *Grrrghhhh~!


    Wolfs with white fur surrounded them.


    Therger ones had bulging muscles were the smaller wolfs looked quite skinny.


    And one of the smaller wolfs that one could see his rib, stood in front of Danzel, baring his teeth at him.


    "Starved wolves seeking meat in those frozennds." Danzel said while ring at the wolf in front of him.


    "R-Rue...what are we going to do?" Shiro said as she went closer to Danzel while gathering her mana into her arms.


    Without answering, Danzel simply drew his sword and pointed at the wolf in front of him.


    Such action made all the wolfs tense up and wait to jump on Shiro once the skeleton made his move.


    But what happend next, none of them expected it.


    The wolf in front of Danzel...


    Fell to the ground, motionless.


    *Ghhh~?


    "Come." Danzel said to Shiro as he walked towards the fallen wolf.


    He bent and touched the copsed wolf, and in an instant, its body disappeared into nothingness. Making the rest of the wolfs jump back in fright.


    "D-Did you killed it? H-How?" Shiro asked, understanding that the disappearance of the body was because of their storage ring of his.


    "Death magic." Danzel said before staring as he raised his head to see somewhere that they could go higher from here.


    "Let''s go there. We will be able to see what is around thisnd up higher." Danzel said as he continued walking, forcing Shiro to follow suit.


    "What about the wolfs...? They still follow us." Shiro said as the wolfs stalked them while hiding in the winter storm.


    "Let them follow, they aren''t a threat. Even if I kill them, my spatial storage rings wouldn''t able to fit all of them." Danzel said.


    As someone who dealt with much death, he knew that the dead spoil faster than the living.

 Chapter 374 Shiros Magic

    The two together with the living armor bodyguards continued through the frozennds.


    Since Danzel saw a spot that was much higher than before, they walked toward there even though wolfs were on their trail.


    They walked a good few hours before they finally arrive at the mountain range. Though the winter storm was ever present, though the time it began, it had grown weaker.


    "Can you see something, Rue?" Shiro said while anxiously staring behind, looking to spot a wolf.


    "Give me a minute..." Danzel said as he stared intensely into the distance.


    Though weakened, the winter storm still blocked his view, but from the single fact that he was of the 4th-tier, he could see much further and in more detail. Yet even with his enchanted senses, he could make little work with the current storm.


    ''Should we make to make camp here and wait till the storm has ended?'' Danzel thought as he stared at Shiro, her face slightly shaking from the snow hitting her face constantly.


    "Hey, do you think that you can continue, or are you in a need of a break?"


    "I-"


    *Grrrrr~


    As soon as she opened her mouth, her stomach made itself present, which made her lower her head, in embarrassment.


    "I guess that answer my question..." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    ''Hasn''t she eaten 4 hours ago? Or was it 5hours? '' Danzel questions internally.


    As Danzel was trying to remember how much they walked when he should be heard wind piercing sounding their way.


    Shiro and the 2 living armors, Niyuki and Koji did also notice the sound, but once they turned around, a cracking sound was heard.


    And next thing they knew, Danzel, who was in front of them a moment ago had now appeared behind them, his sword pulled out and destroying an ice spear that was shot at them.


    "Magic..." Danzel said annoyed as the misting out of his armor diapered.


    The pieces of the ice spear soon fell to the ground and soon after the wolfs that was trailing them began revealing themselves from the storm, with their paws and bodies radiating mana.


    ''So they think that they have cornered us now that we are on some kind of edge?''


    He knew that the wolfs were probably desperate in taking a piece of Shiro to survive.


    But even if he was suppressing his aura of death, he still found it weird.


    "You two, protect her." Danzel instructed the living armors, Niyuki and Koji before looking at one of the wolfs slowly making another ice spear.


    ''And here I thought that I wouldn''t face ice magic any time soon.'' Danzel cursed internally as the wolf that was casting dropped dead.


    s, the wolfs seemed to already have chosen as they too started making ice spears.


    Starve or fight so that they want to.


    The oue of both choices was obviously the same.


    Death.


    "I don''t need all of you." Danzel said as he raised his sword, and 4 times as fast as the wolfs, he made severalrge ice spears with the use of his sword.


    And as the ice spears were shot, they hit the wolfs like ballista bolts Completely making a mesh out of the unfortunately wolfs that met those ice spears.


    Though they were more of the, more than Danzel had expected.


    "Use your magic, remember that only you can protect yourself the best." Danzel said before turning into mist and dashing forward toward the wolfs.


    Those who were to face him were quick to be cut despite their ice magic.


    Despite that though, some of the wolves slipped through Danzel and went right toward the meat. Which was Shiro.


    Shiro looked at the hungry wolfs with fear, but despite that, she didn''t hesitate to use her magic.


    "[Chain Dancing Lighting]" Her small hand pointed at the iing wolfs and in the next instance, several lighting was shot through her hand and traveled like a wave to the ground chaotically, electrocuting 6 wolfs and killing them instantly.


    But the 15 rest of them were still dashing at their meal.


    3 of them quickly crashed upon the wall of bones that appeared suddenly in front of them and another wolf was dragged by an ethereal skeleton hand to crash into his neighbor.


    The other 20 or so wolfs tried to jump to Danzel, which they quickly regret.


    Though 10 wolves still dashed and quickly arrived at where Shiro was, who was preparing her next spell.


    But her spell was interrupted as a blood stter happend in front of her.


    The sword of the living armor, Koji, was swung down and split the head of one of the wolfs, making a mess and some blood fall in front of Shiro.


    Though Shiro was used to seeing things dying and massive destruction, seeing the brain and the blood fall on her face was too distracting for Shiro.


    "Ah~"


    The two living armors stepped forward and became the shields of Shiro, they cut down the wolfs with precision and mercilessness, looking at how to efficiently cut their enemies and execute their master''s order.


    They did as such, though because of that, they didn''t see a reason to defend against minor attacks.


    One of the wolves bare his teeth and dug them into the leg of Niyuki and spread ice while another wolf jumped in the back of Koji in an attempt to bite near the shoulder and the neck.


    Of course, such damaged was nothing to them and they quickly disposed of those wolves.


    Though in Shiro''s eyes, the way they were injured and protected her made her hands shake.


    "F-[Fire Shock Breath]!" Shiro said while touching the ground full of snow with her small hands, in the next moment, mes came out around her like a tornado and quickly expanded.


    Engulfing the two living armors and some of the wolfs in mes.


    After the mes went out, the burned bodies of the wolfs were on the ground, dead and the living armor was still standing with no damage.


    Shiro despite her age, knew very well that such a level of strength wasn''t going to melt armors.


    4 wolfs remained aiming to be the first to eat, but they soon realized that starving was better than being burned alive.<sub> </sub>


    Though when they looked behind them, Danzel had ughtered most of the wolfs, with 5 remaining.


    *Ghhwoooooooohh~!


    One of them howled in retreat, but before they could, a light appeared in front of them.


    With Koji and Niyuki standing in front of her, Shiro raised both her arms.


    One holding a ball of mes while the other holding a ball made out of the darkness.


    The two balls of two elements soon started to weave into each other, and fuse into one, while Shiro''s hands were shaking.


    She remembers Danzel''s words.


    That she should protect herself.


    She had learned from a master of magic how to handle magic and she practices it constantly.


    Putting what she had learned into action was what she needed to do.


    And what she has created from that effort was something close to a miracle for her age.


    The ck mes symbolize chaos magic holding the strength of a 3rd-tier magic caster.


    She lowers her hands and sends the ball of chaos mes toward the 4 wolfs. Resulting in an explosion that scorched the ground and send a shockwave through the area.


    The result of the 4 wolfs was total obliteration, of course.


    Facing a 3rd-tier spell with the most destructive type of element there was, was an obvious result.


    Danzel who had finished the rest of the wolves also was surprised by the appearance of ck mes. And he couldn''t help butpare his "all-powerful fireball" to those ck mes for a split second.


    Honestly, though, he let those wolves slip passed him only to see the strength of his living armor.


    Overall, he was satisfied with their strength, though the fact they didn''t care much about defense and only executed their orders as best as possible was fault on its own.


    "Maybe I should order them differently." He said as he sheathed his sword back on his scabbard.


    He walked towards those three when he suddenly felt a vibration on the ground.


    "Hmm?"


    Turning around, Danzel''s ethereal eyes wentpletely out for a good 2 seconds.


    "D-Dammit!!!" Danzel immediately started running towards the three of them behind his back.


    As an avnche was behind his back,ing like a tsunami made out of snow.


    "Hey, Rue! Did you see my magic-"


    Before Shiro could finish, Danzel grabbed her and put her on his shoulder, running towards the edge of where they are.


    "Ah..." That''s when she finally notices the result of her magic.


    "Hey, can you use flying magic?" Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "I-I don''t know of such magic..."


    Danzel shook his head internally.


    "You two, hold your ground and stain intact." Danzel ordered the two living armors.


    They followed his orders and pierced their sword to the ground while kneeling.


    Danzel also used his magic to create several walls of stones in front of them, before leaving them behind.


    "Hey! Why are you leaving them behind!?" Shiro said while hitting Danzel back, with possible force.


    Ignoring her question, Danzel said with an ominous voice.


    "It''s time to learn how to fly..."


    "Huh?"


    Halting his steps at the edge of the mountain, Danzel grabbed Shiro with both of his sends and literally threw her with all his strength off the edge, as high and far as he could possibly do.


    "K-KYAAAAGHHHHH!!!!"


    Of course, Shiro started to cry out in fright.


    "So annoying..." Danzel said as he jumped off the edge.


    Secondster as he did, the avnche reached them, and a wave of snow started to follow the mountain as if it was chasing Danzel.


    Wherever the 2 living armors survived he didn''t know. He simply waited till he met the ground. But as he was falling, he noticed a small light appearing through the distance. It was so brief that one would doubt wherever it happend but Danzel saw it.


    Though that wasn''t his priority.


    After falling several tens of meters, he soon met the ground.


    The ground cracked as Danzelnded with no damage at all.


    He then turned into mist and traveled through the air towards where Shiro was screaming her throat out.


    Once he appeared at her, he didn''t catch her in case he would break her back. He instead dragged her with him, which reduced the fall till he was sure he wouldn''t break anything by grabbing her.


    When he arrived at the ground, he drew his sword and swung it into the air, which resulted in a wave of ice spreading, and making several spikes in a form of a wall.


    He then cast [Stone Wall] several times.


    "Shiro, cast any type of barrier that you can," He said with a cold yet urgent voice.


    Though her eyes filled with tears, Shiro made a barrier out of mana around them just before the snow arrived and crashed at the walls that Danzel created.

 Chapter 375 Shiro Throwing The Truth

    The avnche came eventually to a stop, leaving the nearby covered in snow.


    But though one certain area of the snow fields, a dark green light lightens up.


    Where the light was, came out 2 dark green wind des that pushed the nearby snow away, revealing a small pocket space with no snow and 2 figures.


    One undead and a small girl.


    "To think such arge amount of snow will fall from the mountains." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    While he doubted that such a wave of snow would be of any danger to him, that was only because he was of the 4th-tier.


    ''Right, how about her?'' Danzel thought as he turned around to see how Shiro was doing.


    "Mmm~Hiiik!" And Shiro was crying while holding her right leg.


    "So fragile..." Danzel mumbled as he shook his head.


    He activated [Eyes of the Damned] to see at her leg.


    As the skill allowed him to see the vitality of the living. It wasn''t optimal as they would only light up his vision, but it was enough to see if someone was hurt or not.


    And as he suspected the obvious, Shiro harmed her leg, possible fracture the bone. But he also saw that the vitality, while slow, was healing unnaturally quickly.


    "Do you know of healing magic?" Danzel asked as he went to one of his knees.


    Shiro''s eyes lighten up in realization while still crying.


    "T-Tent my wounds. S-Spirit of home. [Tendering Warm Healing]" Shiro''s hand that held her broken leg lightened up in golden light, increasing the vitality of her injured leg and healingpletely and her tears stopped flowing.


    She stood on both of her two legs, but then she started crying before seating down and hugging her knees.


    "Waaah! I don''t want to be in this ce anymore! It''s cold! Monsters are trying to eat me and now this pain! Waaah! Grandpa~! Where are you!?"


    Seeing her full of tears, Danzel was unsure of what to do.


    He simply shook his head and turned to see the snow field around him.


    ''If you survived,e out.'' Danzel sends an internalmand though out the surroundings.


    And hismand was soon met with a reaction.


    2 hands reached out through the snow before their owner dragged each other out of the snow. Them being the living armors named by Shiro and created by Danzel, Koji, and Niyuki.


    "They really survived..." Danzel mumbled surprised.


    Albeit survived, they were of no good shape.


    Each of them was missing a hand and their helmet. Koji had his right arm missing and Niyuki his left.


    ''Come...'' Danzelmanded and living armors applied.


    He still was somewhat surprised that those guys could still see, without their helmets.


    ''I guess their helmets isn''t their head?''


    He wanted to test to see what would kill that undead, but he decided that it wasn''t the time.


    ''One of you, pick her up and follow him.''


    The first to follow his instructions was Koji, his first created living armor.


    Koji picked Shiro up on her shoulders and did as ordered by his liege.


    They both followed.


    With Shiro slowly falling asleep from exhaustion.


    ****


    It was a good 2 hourster before Shiro woke up.


    The winter storm has calmed down and was no more and instead of holding up inside a tunnel, she was resting her back in one of the rare trees on those frozennds, sitting on top of the fur of the haired buffalo with a firece being in front of her, warming the area.


    "You even woke up." A cold voice said to her.


    Turning her head to see the owner of the voice, she saw how Danzel was sitting opposite the firece while carving runes in a spear. But what really caught her attention was the staff that was beside him.


    "Isn''t this staff..."


    "The one that your grandfather wanted to give you? Yes, it is." Danzel interrupted her.


    "I am currently working on the runes that I will carve to your staff in that spear. Though finished...they aren''t perfect." Shiro opened her mouth as if she wanted to say something before giving up.


    "Can I...hold till you you ready to carve the runes."


    Danzel hand stopped carving and she looked at Shiro in the eyes for a moment.


    "It''s your staff...but if you damage it, the quality of the runes might suffer." Danzel said while picking up the staff with his hand andying it on top of her knees.


    Shiro tried to pick up the staff, but once she touched it, she dropped it almost instantly.


    "It''s cold..." Shiro crumbled to herself.


    As the staff was made out of some kind of metal, it was obvious that it would be cold.<sub> </sub>


    That was when the two living armors arrived with each carrying one of the trees on their shoulders.


    "W-What happend to Koji and Niyuki?" Shiro asked, somewhat shocked at their state.


    "They were lucky to survive, but at that state..." Danzel shook his head.


    "Can''t you fix them?" Shiro asked while staring at their missing "heads".


    "Hmm?" Danzel once again stopped carving before staring at the two living armors.


    "Probably? Not too sure, will have to carve new runes and connect them with the old ones. Might be faster to make new ones." Danzel said.


    "Y-You can''t leave them like this, you were the one who created them..."


    Danzel eyes red up and he stared at Shiro intensely.


    ''Did she get attachest those two?'' Danzel questioned himself.


    Sure, he didn''t like destroying his own undead, but he wasn''t going out of his way to support them. He wasn''t the patron of that undead, he was their master.


    Though he didn''t reject the idea of Shiro''s as the action of reconnecting missing runes was worth trying out.


    As he was aiming to create undead using runes, he might as well start now, he thought.


    But he realized that Shiro''s request, while it would be reasonable to fix them in the end, how she said it made him feel that she warmed up with those living armors.


    Despite the fact that they were created not too long ago.


    ''Maybe it''s because she named them?'' Danzel thought internally, as an idea crossed his mind.


    "Alright." Danzel said while making Shiro flinch.


    His staring at her with those ring ethereal eyes of undead was still quite scary for her.


    "I will try to fix them, in fact, I will give those two to you." Danzel said.


    ''You two...Koji and Niyuki. Will now recognize her, Shiro, as your master while continuing to protect her. Though my orders hold priority.'' Danzel gave those two an internalmand.


    Though giving away beings of the 3rd-tier could have been seen as overkill. Danzel was a Death Knight.


    A 4th-tier being with skills that bring death to both the mortal body and the soul.


    "Huh? Why?" Shiro was only confused by that arrangement.


    "Consider it in the case I won''t be there. As I said, don''t rely on my strength. Rely on yourself. Those two are just precautions to dy the day when you will have to rely on you strength alone."


    Upon saying that, Danzel continued finishing the rune of the spear and Shiro stayed silent staring at the mes, digesting what Danzel just said to her.


    It was only after Danzel finished with the spear and put it in his storage ring that Shiro finally spoke again.


    "Rue...will it be alright to burrow your...magic book? And maybe teach me some magic...?" Shiro asked while looking at him with expectation.


    "So you weren''t asleep..." Danzel said with his cold voice while staring at her, Shiro in turn dodged his gaze as if she was guilty.


    He sighed internally for the fact that he didn''t realize.


    ''I was too excited with the new talents...'' Hemented before taking [Elemental magic of Spell studies], one of the books that Velkir has given him.


    "That is one of the books that Velkir has given to me. And you are only borrowing it, I will take it back wherever I want." Danzel exined while giving the book to Shiro, who looked at the book happily and yet puzzled.


    "You weren''t readying this yesterday though..."


    "That one was a book containing the ways of necromancy. I doubt that your grandfather would like you to learn death magic. And most of my spells are of death magic."


    "Nheless, what do you have to offer me to teach you magic? I am fine with you borrowing my book, but teaching you will take part of my own time. That I could improve in some other fields." Danzel with his cold voice.


    Shiro''s face was one of frustration and of helplessness. She only opened her mouth and closed it like a fish.


    "I...I..." Shiro had lots of thoughts in her mind.


    Her grandpa clearly told her that she should never tap into the ways of necromancy, but her teacher was such a create magic caster in other elements of magic even though he was supposed to be a master of necromancy.


    She loved magic and all of its impossibleplex nature.


    She knew why necromancy was bad, using the bodies of the dead to make them your ve was cruel after all.


    And yet her curiosity was still perceived.


    "I-I can teach you magic too! I am way better at other types of magic than you! We can exchange knowledge! You teach me, and I teach you!" Shiro said full of confidence.


    Knowing how to be evil and actually doing evil stuff.


    Shiro was confident that she wouldn''t be some kind of evil necromancer just for knowing magic. After all, her master, though scary, did help them.


    And Rue, an undead who is known to hate the living was also helping her.


    Both of them might not be the best of people around everyone, but they weren''t terrible.


    Is what Shiro thought, ignorant of how naive she was.


    As for how Danzel took Shiro''s offer, he epted, but at the same time, he felt extremely bitter.


    As Shiro threw the truth of her being better in magic right in front of his face.

 Chapter 376 Repair Of Bodyguards And Bone Mask

    After having Shiro eat the unseasoned meat of the haired buffalo, Danzel went ahead to see how he should go and repair Koji and Niyuki.


    First, he had to decide what pieces of armor would suit them. Which was one of the few problems.


    Compared to weapons which are slim in nature, armor pieces take much more space in Danzel storage rings. Sure, he had two, but even then, he didn''t have arge collection of armor in his possessionpared to the weapon.


    That was the main reason why he had to butcher the haired buffalo in the first ce and separate the suppose eatable meat and his leather.


    He essentially had saved around 5 armor sets in the storage ring that Velkir gave him as a gift with the books. He mainly had them to carve runes and in times of need wear them.


    The former option didn''t need lots of armor as he had the [Death Rune Removal], which worked for most of his work without damaging the armor, while thetter rarely happend...


    But as he had now the talent [Armor of the Death Knight], he had no need to worry about repairs as his armor bound itself in his body. So the need for hoarding armor like a goblin has lessened.


    Which brought him to the second problem, the quality of the armor pieces.


    The previous armors that made the body of Koji and Niyuki were ones with barely a few scratches, but the 5 armor arms in front of him had some holes and even the helmets had a few dents.


    He originally was going to pick what would fit them best, but Shiro started suggesting which ones he should even if they weren''t optimal.


    Though Danzel decided to y along, he mainly gave those two as some kind of emotional support for Shiro anyway so that she gets distracted in front of her bleak situation.


    She chose two armor hands with quite a few amount of holes and chose 2 helmets that he got from 3rd-tier experts from Berum.


    They looked the same except for how one of them had arge sideways to the opening of the mouth and the other helmet near the eye.


    Suggesting that one of them had a sword pushed to one''s throat and the other one through his eyes...


    Those were past victims of Danzel.


    Shiro gave the mouth-damaged helmet to Koji and the one-eye-damaged helmet to Niyuki.


    After all those unnecessary steps, Danzel went ahead and tried "repair" the runes, which mostly was a much easier process than he expect. The hard part was when the new and old runes had to be carved together as thetter resisted and the former.


    Making the mana flow that Danzel was channeling quite chaotic.


    If he had to describe it, it was like creating a new arm for someone and trying to make the body ept the arm.


    And as runesmithing was a delicate manner of mana and symbols, the resistance was as annoying as it was fresh, which he eventually learned to bypass rather easily after getting used to it.


    ''If it was a few years back, I can imagine myself scratching my skull with this.'' Danzel thought internally as he finished the runes of both Koji and Niyuki.


    Their arms and helmets shook for a while, before gaining full control of their new "limbs"


    "That took longer than I expected..." Danzel.


    "Hey Rue, I got an idea for their arms..." Shiro said while pointing at the holes in the living armor.


    After hearing her suggestion, Danzel sighted internally before bringing out the white-furred wolf and butchering it simr to the haired buffalo.


    Storing the meat, Danzel took the fur of it and ced it around the new arm of Koji and used the bones to pierce through the fur inside the holes of the armor and shape it into a hook of both sides and tighten up.


    He did the same with Niyuki, but only with haired buffalos leather instead.


    The end result was of white-armed Koji and a brown-armed Niyuki.


    "They look great!" Shiro said while pping her hands.


    ''How did she evene up with this...'' That was what Danzel thought.


    In his opinion, he should have used both the haired buffalos'' leather as it was much sturdier than the wolf''s fur.


    But oh well...


    "You two -"


    "Koji and Niyuki."


    "Yes...you can choose one sword that you like the most." Danzel said while pulling all kinds of alchemic swords, that Azrael had supplied him.


    Compared to armors, he had all kinds of different swords as the space required for them was much less and he most needed them for both his undead and runesmithing.


    Koji surprisingly took one of the few rare ones, arge sword that resembled an odachi.


    It was a sword that he requested Azrael specifically so that he can practice hir runes on Agare''s sword. As he found the sword of Agares quite weird to carve at.


    As the sword was as big as Agare''s one, it was much easier to see how many runes would fit or not before going and carving runes on Agare''s sword.


    Niyuki, in turn, took much longer to decide what to choose and it would stare at the swords and then at him continuously.<sub> </sub>


    It was to the point that Danzel thought that he couldn''t process the order containing his preference, but once Niyuki looked at the sword that Koji choose, he ended up picking a mberge that he had ages ago.


    There was a time when Danzel experimented with other types of long swords to see if something will suit him better, and the mberge was of the few he requested Azrael to make so that he can see if it fits him.


    He still remembered the bandit that wielded this weapon and he still find it enough. But after trying it, he quickly gave up on it as it was awkward to use against armor, though it shed the flesh quite easily.


    The mberge was a bit shorter than the "odachi" of Koji, but it was still rtive a long sword.


    He then went ahead and removed the old runes of the swords and instead he carved the [Rune of Tolian Repent] on each of them.


    After seeing the power that the soul gave to a weapon, he was interested to see how far the effect would extend for a "weaker" soul. Or rather, something that was much weaker than an Archmage.


    "Activate the runes when you kill something that is capable of magic." Danzel ordered those two.


    ''Though I would also need to test it on someone that is strong but doesn''t know of magic to see how it will affect the sword. Also, erasing the rune while a soul is still trapped might be a thought worth considering...'' Danzel thought, suddenly realizing why the status allowed him to gain the [Soul Torturer] talent.


    Afterward, he also carved a few basic runes such as making the swords more durable, and even sequenced some in the body of the two.


    During the time he was doing that, Shiro was absorbed in reading the book quickly.


    Once she noticed he had finished, she made the fact that she started to feel hungry.


    Brining the meat out and piercing it at his spear, the mana arms slowly rotated the meat, while Danzel put in front of him one of the ribs of the haired buffalo and shaped it like a mask in order to protect her face from snow.


    At first, he shaped it with just 3 big "o" holes, 2 for the eyes and one for the mouth, but Shiroined about being weird, making Danzel feel annoyed.


    "Would you rather like your face to be hit by snow every time a stormes or wear the mask?" Danzel said with a harsh and cold tone, taking Shiro slightly back.


    "C-Can''t you make the mask a bit more...artistic? Like the face of some kind of animal?" She asked while stuttering her words.


    Danzel groaned internally, before shaping the bone mask to the most familiar animal he knew. A wolf with only two holes in her eyes. He made the mask in a Y shape and intentionally not made a hole for the mouth so that she wouldn''tin all the time.


    He then stood up and walked behind her and pulled the hood down, revealing her long white hair, one that reminded him of Vanessa, the dark elf that spew dark mes from her hands.


    "H-Hey! What are you doing!?" Sheined.


    "Quit..." He didn''t care.


    He then made several small holes in the hood and the mask, connecting the two with small rings out of bones.


    He then forcefully pulled the hood up, making the mask to be in front of her face.


    "Hmm... it isn''t firm enough." Danzel mumbled as he channel his mana in the bone mask to shape it.


    He extended 2 t bones to press against each of her cheeks, making the mask more secure and not easily shaken off.


    But as he was about to call it a well-done job, he suddenly remember the horns that Agares grew.


    "Right, do you have any horns on your head?" Danzel asked while moving his head to the side and his hands crossed together.


    "Ehm...yeah? Wait, how do you know about my horns." Shiro answered by reflex before the question dawned on her.


    "I saw Agares growing a pair while fighting in the tower, now show me."


    "Wait-"


    He didn''t wait, he pulled her hood and mask up and touched her head. Just extorting a portion of his strength could crash her whole head, and Shiro realized it the moment her head was gripped, making her freezepletely.


    Danzel pushed a few strains of hair till he felt two hard ces on her head. And there he saw 2 small dark and white horns which barely came out.


    He then pulled the mask down and made two other much smaller holes where her horns were so that if they grow up, the mask wouldn''t disturb them.


    "Alright, that should do it, for now, I think..." Danzel said while sitting back opposite her.


    Shiro stared at him as she was about to curse at him and cry at the same time.


    "Don''t do this again..."


    Danzel in turn shrugged.


    "I made the mask that it pushed at your face firmly enough to not shake and not to be too iparable. And the small holes there is an opening enough for your horns to feel less pressure...and precocious if they grow." Danzel said.


    "They won''t grow...at least not yet." Shiroined.


    "Well, I don''t know what your race is capable of. I never heard of a race with elerated regeneration with horns on their head, while also looking very much... human-like." Danzel said while staring at her with his ring ethereal eyes.


    "Are you willing to enlight me of what your race is?"

 Chapter 377 Ways Of Magic And Dread Of Necromancy

    "Why can''t you do it?" Shiro asked confused while wearing the bone mask.


    Her confusion only further fuelled Danzel''s own frustration.


    After Shiro eat the unseasoned meat of the haired buffalo, they continued walking on those frozennds. He informed Shiro about the light he saw and she quickly regain her vigor in the chance the light was from some kind of natives on thosends.


    Which Danzel doubted.


    He couldn''t imagine how people could live here in the frozennds, with only wolfs andrge beasts. Sure, their meat could be turned into food, but as far as he heard, people rely on growing thoserge weeds called "farms" from the ground.


    Though on and poor of winter storms, snow, and ice, nothing could grow to the least of his knowledge.


    s, he decided to spare telling his opinion on Shiro.


    And as they were walking for hours without saying much, Shiro took the initiative to open the conversation about magic.


    Which he wasn''t against.


    And currently, the conversation shifted toward her teaching them how to improve his "all mighty fireball".


    "Like I told you! You simply gather glitches of fire element and concentrated it! That''s wrong! You have to weave the fire mana in a way that it doesn''t interfere while concentrating the weaved mana!" Shiroined while watching Danzel''s "all mighty fireball"e into existence.


    "Weave the fire mana...that''s easier said than done." Danzel shook his head internally.


    Sure, weaving mana itself wasn''t an impossible feat, but weaving the mana while fusing it with the fire element? It was quite hard. Though it did improve his "all mighty fireball" to the level of [Firebolt].


    "Are you horned people like...talented by birth in the ways of magic and mana?" Danzel asked as the "all mighty fireball" almost exploded in his face.


    "Nagaiki Oni! Not horned people!"


    "It''s about the same, no? Also, your race name is too long." Danzel shrugged his shoulders.


    "Hmpf!" Shiro puffed her cheeks annoyed.


    "I am not too sure, as I was too young when I left my vige. Grandpa told me that we aren''t proficient in magic and that most practice weapons. He told me that I am an exception and a genius in magic." Shiro said, thest bit with pride.


    "I see..." Danzel said while crashing the small fireball with his hand.


    "I am asking just to be sure, why do you want to learn necromancy?"


    "Because it''s magic..? Shiro said confused.


    "Heh, you want to learn death magic for a simple reason like that?" Danzel couldn''t help but chuckle.


    "Sorry to disappoint you, I doubt that I could help you all that much. I focus more on the necromancy school of curse magic. You wouldn''t be able to learn of my "unique" as it''s like blood magic. At most I could teach you how to raise corpses into undead minions, make you able to see the vitality of others, and few of my curses."


    "I focus more on closebat than being a magic caster, so most of my abilities would be useless for you." Danzel exined so that she would understand that he wasn''t the greatest necromancer out there.


    "Still...you can teach me the basics, no?" Shiro asked, still determined in learning death magic.


    "..."


    Danzel stayed silent for a moment, thinking of how he should discourage her.


    Agares warned him not to teach her, but then again. Shiro clearly knew more than a few things about magic than himself. To the point that the small conversation with her allowed him to see how to improve his "all mighty fireball".


    Sure, the option to get the spell [Firebolt] from the status was open. Though the whole aim of learning manually was not to rely on the status window. Learning magic on his own and getting it packaged were two different things.


    While the books of Velkir were helpful, having another more experience mind in the mix would elerate his growth in magical knowledge.


    Having seen the prices of upgrading the 4th-tier skills, Danzel knew that sooner orter he would reach a point where learning manually would be more reliable in the long run. That or starting a mass genocide.


    Though he had all the time in the world to learn magic, where Agares''s dissatisfaction might be worse that learning faster magic, as he faintly nned to learn the skills that Agares promised him.


    A dilemma.


    "You know that with advancing with necromancy, would have to deal with corpses. I for myself skip many steps in weing the dead to death. Preparing and experimenting with corpses to see what works better or not. Before making them your own soldiers. Are you fine with that?" Danzel said in his cold voice.


    However serious she was of this unless Danzel was sure that she was dead serious about learning, he would teach her, but otherwise...


    "Imagine a necromancer, like me for example killing your grandfather and raising him as undead to fight against you. As impossible as this scenario is...if you learn this magic, you will be the one that raises the corpses to fight their allies and friends. Hearing that, you still interested?"


    "..." Shiro stayed silent while looking for Danzel as if to see if he was joking or not. But his gazing forward without looking at her made his words sink into her mind much more heavily.


    Necromancy had many forms and schools of magic.


    Though the core of it is the school of undeath.<sub> </sub>


    The magic to create and control immortal beings such as the undead.


    Avoiding the essential type of magic is like learning fire magic with the aim of not burning anything.


    It was possible, but the nature of the magic goes against the basics.


    Adapting to that magic and changing is what a great magic caster is capable of, but for that, one must be aware of the basics. Completely avoiding the basics of magic is bound to limit a magic caster.


    And Shiro was made aware of that by Danzel.


    The other types of magic school didn''t require one to question the morality of one''s actions.


    Most starting learning fire magic wouldn''t start by thinking that learning this magic would force them to burn someone alive. Though they were exceptions


    Other schools of magic were like owning a gun with the mindset of not shooting someone. Sure, the soldiers who protect theirnd will kill others for a cause and in the name of self-defense.


    But necromancy was essential like getting a gun with the sole purpose of attempting murder.


    While both types of magic could have simr results, one''s mindset was important.


    And the silence of Shiro further proved to Danzel, that she wasn''t prepared to dive into that rabbit hole.


    ''Still...having her to teach me wouldn''t be half bad.'' He thought to himself.


    The silence between the two continues for a full 15 minutes before Danzel makes his decision.


    "If you want...I can teach you the less gruesome spells of mine if you want. In return, you help me out with my magic." Danzel said with an ice-cold voice.


    "..." Shiro turned to look at Danzel, finding that his ethereal dark green eyes were staring back at her.


    "You interested in necromancy, yes or no?" He said, his ring eyes flickering ominously.


    "Mhm...alright." Shiro nodded, though by her expression one could see that she wasn''t too sure.


    She wasn''t used to Danzel being so...blunt in stating the reality of the situation.


    "Though if you change your mind, I could also teach you the more gruesome spells, particrly the one that raises undead from corpses. For now, though, I will teach one useful ability that I use quite often. One that allows you to see whoever is dead with your eyes."


    Hearing that, Shiro leaned her head to the side confused.


    "Isn''t that ability...useless? Why would I need something like this if my eyes can judge for themselves if one is...dead or not?"


    Danzel shook his head.


    "I will let you know, that no spell is heartily useless. For example, this spell." Danzel said while bringing out two mana arms.


    "I heard from many that this spell is useless and that is only used in helping a magic caster with cleaning his room, but what if-" Danzel brought out 2 daggers from his storage ring and throated it into the air.


    Controlling the mana arms, they flew and caught the daggers before flying and piercing a lone tree.


    "-you gave them weapons? The mana arms by themself don''t have much strength to speak of, and they break easily, but give them daggers and such a spell that can be maintained by focus bes deadly."


    Danzel recalled the mana arms with the daggers and collected them back into his storage ring.


    "The ability to see if someone is dead can be useful based on how you use it. For example, does your race... Nagaiki Oni was it? Have a dark vision?"


    Shiro shook her head. "No."


    "Then if you learn this ability, you will be able to see the living even in darkness. And if you advantage it to a level such as mine... you will be able to see others through walls. Knowing that, do you think that it is still useless?"


    "Looking at it this way it does sound useful..." Shiro said while making a thoughtful expression.


    "Knowing the capabilities of one spell is extremely important. The hardest opponents that I faced were the ones who used their spells in a unique way after all."


    He remembered the archmage who now had his soul trapped inside his sword and that one girl that was in the group of adventurers and used earth magic by moving the ground.


    While the archmage by himself was from an entirely different level of magic caster he faced so far, if he had to give which enemy had the best potential, it would have been that girl despite the fact he met many 3rd-tier magic casters.


    "Magic isn''t just learning, but also putting into practice." Danzel exined.


    His words reflected many pieces of advice for war veterans that face the wrath of the magic caster.


    The strong magic caster was scary, but the truly dangerous magic caster were those who knew their spells at best.


    This a lesson that many magic casters learn way toote when going to the battlefield for the first time...

 Chapter 378 Making Dead Mana And The Place Beyond The Mountain

    For the first time in the 5 years of his own existence, Danzel tried to teach one of his spells to someone else. That someone else being Shiro, a particr genius of magic.


    He thought that someone like her would easily be able to understand a spell-like [Sense of the Damned]. But once he started teaching her, he found that she couldn''t fully understand the concept of dead mana.


    That''s when Danzel that he had to start with the basics with her.


    He tried to exin to her how to create dead mana and manipte it.


    Her first attempts were frustrating to watch, as instead of dead mana, she would create dark mana with only a tiny amount of actual dead mana. Which lead to some confusion for Shiro as dead mana and dark mana had little visual difference from each other.


    For Danzel it was particrly annoying in watching attempt after attempt of her failing, which further dispirited Shiro, who was always very understanding of magic and mana.


    In Danzel''s point of view, it was as if someone gave him a ss of water, with 99% there being water and the remaining 1% being apple and that person insisted that he was selling apple juice.


    Also, the fact that Danzel wasn''t much aware of how dark mana is being created, made his exnations a bit less detailed information for the little Shiro, who was used to learning from a Lich who studied the ways of magic for who knows centuries.


    In short, Danzelcked the broad perspective of magic to be an effective, good teacher.


    "Can''t you exin in more...detail?" Shiro asked while failing again to create dead mana.


    "I already exined the core of it. Dead mana is the essential "death" of mana, that happens through an event, action, or forcefully made by us necromancers. Though the "death" of mana doesn''t apply to the consumption of the mana, It''s more like letting the mana...."


    Danzel stayed for a moment silent trying to find the words so that she understand.


    "...Spoil. Yes, you can see it as letting the mana spoil, but doesn''t get consumed."


    "When someone dies, arge chunk of the mana that the person has disappeared through the air naturally, but there is still some mana remaining in the body, which at this point is "clean"."


    "If the mana isn''t being disturbed by other forms of mana for a long time, it will slowly turn to dead mana. Though at times, the life force of the corpses also disturbs this event, which further stops the creation of dead mana." Danzel tried to exin.


    "So...life force is something that fights dead mana?" Shiro asked with a frown.


    "Mhm...that''s indeed the case. Though, both of them can co-exist with each other, to some level that is. For example, skeletons have bits of life force remaining in them together with dead mana. Albeit, for the undead to grow stronger and create his own consciousness and soul, they have to remove the life force."


    "Doesn''t that mean that the living can''t use necromancy?"


    Hearing that, Danzel raised his hand and emitted visible dead mana.


    "No, they can, though their bodies aren''t suited for it, as dead mana decay one vitality. Undead like me have the perfect body to use dead mana and we can emit arge amount from our bodies, but for most of my spells, I still have to make my mana into dead mana."


    "We have an advantage in necromancy, while mortals like you have to be careful not to decay yourself from the dead mana"


    Danzel brought out arge piece of wood while letting his dead mana do the work.


    And shortly after, the wood started to wither and fall into tiny pieces to the ground, making Shiro gulp.


    Danzel demonstrated again and again slowly how the creation of dead mana was made with pieces of wood and Shiro stared intensely at the ominous mana.


    She tried to figure it out for hours long to the point that Danzel stopped withering the wood and simply recreated dead mana in his hand.


    They had to make a break and take shelter for the night, mostly because of Shiro.


    That is when Danzel noticed that the amount of food that Shiro was eating was weirdly quite a lot. While he didn''t have a weight or anything of the sort, the amount that Danzel cooked was around 1,3 kilos of meat.


    Though, he shrugged it off as she using her mana and being of a race that eats a lot.


    In the night, she still was trying to make dead mana till she was tired to continue and eventually fall asleep.


    Danzel went back to practicing his runes.


    As for Koji and Niyuki, they stood emotionally around.


    ...


    The night passed and the time for Danzel''s cooking to be change came.


    Though his cooking was mostly making sure not to burn the meat.


    After Shiro eat, they continued traveling toward the direction where Danzel saw the brief light.


    Shiro spends her time trying once again to create dead mana and after 3 hours of trying...


    She seeds.


    With her hands facing forward, a dark ominous mana flickered above her hands. The mana that was the source of the undead.<sub> </sub>


    Seeing that she seeded, a wave of excitement washed over her.


    "Rue! Look, I did it!" She raised her hands to show the small amount of dead mana.


    Though by doing that and herck of control over the dead mana, it slowly moved closer to her hands.


    Danzel ethereal eyes red up upon noticing that.


    His hands turned to mist and movent faster than the speed of sound. And before the dead mana touched Shiro''s hand, Danzel crashed the dead mana in her hands and guided it away.


    "How reckless." Danzel shook his head as Shiro''s eyes lost all light for a moment, and nkly stared in front of her eyes.


    "Haven''t you paid attention yesterday? Dead mana makes thing decay and withers naturally if not controlled or changed. If I hadn''t interfered, your hands might have decayed, albeit a bit." Danzel exined before looking at Shiro, doubting if he should continue teaching her.


    ''Wouldn''t she just blind herself if I teach her [Sense of the Damned]?'' Danzel thought to himself.


    Sure, the spell was awful simple for necromancy, but taking to ount that the spell was taking ce in someone''s sight, ack of control might harm her eyes.


    ''She does know healing magic, would it be enough to heal her eyes though if that were to happen? And if not, wouldn''t I be killing myself if I bring her to Agares blinded by necromancy?''


    Danzelined about the idea of starting with a different spell.


    "Mhm, it seems like we will have to leave learning spells forter...For now, try to learn to control the dead mana withouting in contact with it. The amount that you generated should be easily heble with your magic, but until you learn to control the dead mana and not harm yourself with it, curse magic is the most that I can teach you." Danzel said while turning around and continuing walking.


    Shiro stared nkly at Danzel''s back, before noticing Koji and Niyuki looking down on her while beside them.


    "W-Wait for me! Rue! You walk too fast!" Shiro said while running to catch up with Danzel.


    "It''s you who walks too slow..." Danzel said with a cold and emotionless tone.


    Danzel wasn''t much aware of how harsh she was with Shiro, who was a child in her early puberty. Literally crashing her efforts was a bit shocking for Shiro, who wanted to show off her talent.


    Though Shiro was quite bitter about it, she understood that Danzel crashed her efforts for her own good.


    She put her attention to better control of her dead mana while they continued walking in the frozennds.


    Danzel only observed a few times in between before focusing on the path in front of them. And after hours of walking, they found a small mountain, with a clear and yet rough path leading to the top.


    ''If I remember right, the light came from this mountain...'' Danzel thought as he tried to remember what he saw.


    And as the path was rough, Shiro had to pause her training and focus on not misstepping and falling.


    Danzel observed her hands, and her finger seemed to have been harmed by the dead mana, but Shiro''s healing magic seemed to fix the damage with no side effects.


    "Are you still interested in necromancy?" Danzel asked with his cold voice.


    "This type of magic is scary...but I still want to learn it" Shiro said while looking at her fingers.


    Danzel at this point could only shake his head internally.


    The rest of the path they walked in silence, with only the armors of the 3 undead to be heard.


    And they arrived after walking half an hour at where Danzel suspected he saw the light.


    Danzel turned his head and saw the other mountain where the avnche happend, confirming that this was the location.


    "Rue...nothing is here." Shiro said, disappointed.


    "Let''s follow the path, there might be something." Danzel said as he followed the path.


    The path leads to the peak of the mountain, with nothing else to see other than snow and stone.


    But beyond the mountain, Shiro was quick to take notice of something.


    "Rue! Look!" Shiro yelled as she pointed her finger to the other side of the mountain.


    Danzel turned to look, only for his eyes to re up.


    "This is.-"


    "Houses!" Shiro finished for him, albeit what he wanted to say was not only houses.


    But smoke as well.

 Chapter 379 Familiar Natives?

    "What are you waiting for? Let''s go!" Shiro urged Danzel with clear excitement in her voice.


    Danzel could imagine where her thoughts were going. If they were houses there, that also meant that there were natives there.


    s, he did remember that a vige smoking was no sign of some celebration or festival of any sort.


    "I wouldn''t be so fast to get excited, Shiro." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "Why?" Shiro turned towards Danzel confused.


    "..." Danzel stared at the small smoking vige and drew his sword out of his scabbard.


    "For now let''s go and see what this ce offers..." Danzel said while talking down the mountain.


    Shiro stared at his ominous sword for a moment before walking behind him with both Koji and Niyuki.


    ...


    The two took almost half an hour to walk done the rough path of the mountain.


    The 4 of them rushed towards the vige, though for Danzel, it was more him trying to match the speed of his two living armors.


    Koji held Shiro in his arm while running at their top speed.


    Thanks to Shiro''s clothing made by the haired buffalo and Koji''s arm having the fur of the white wolf, it was partly ufortable for Shiro to touch their ice-cold armor.


    And once they arrived just about 300 meters away from the vige, Danzel halted and looked down the snow, just to seerge foot marks that couldn''t have been done by a human.


    ''The shape suggests that the natives are humanoid, though onlyrger...''


    "Shiro, be prepared to use your magic." Danzel said with a serious voice.


    He knew by experience, that most of the time, bigger meant stronger. At least that was attribute-wise. Various beings had different attribute multipliers that had clear differences from others.


    In a way, Danzel was one of them.


    While humans do also get to improve their race talent and increase their attribute multiplier, Danzel as a [Mythic Undead] would always be superior to someone that has the same amount of attributes and doesn''t have the multiplier to catch up to him.


    Of course, attributes didn''t specifically result in one''s whole strength, but it was arge part of it.


    And for those footprints alone, Danzel could guess that the natives were physically strong.


    Of course, Shiro had other worries.


    "Are you going to... kill them?" Shiro said while looking at Danzel''s ominous sword.


    "Maybe...though, let''s first see what is happening." Danzel said as they walked towards the vige at moderate speed just in case they might the natives might see them dashing towards them as a threat.


    After walking for a few minutes anding in front of the vige, the first thing they came to notice was blood staining the snow and humanoid bodies that had half their bodies crashed with a few arms and legs spread around.


    "W-What happend here...?" Shiro mumbled in shock upon the sight.


    She was only slightly disturbed by the state of many bodies. She was already used to seeing them as her grandfather, and Agares supported their living by being a mercenary.


    Danzel in turn shook his head.


    ''Such a mess... would even [Undead Reconstruction] even work on such bodies?'' Danzel thought like a necromancer would do.


    With Shiro attempting necromancy and he himself needing some bodies to carve his greater runes, they would be in need of bodies.


    ''I will take a lookter, but for now...''


    "Let''s go find those natives first." Danzel said to the group.


    Shiro together with Koji and Niyuki followed behind Danzel.


    Entering the vige, Danzel scanned the buildings, and if he could frown he would.


    ''The buildings are quite small for the size of the footprint of before.''


    That meant that there were two possible cases.


    One, the race of the natives was rtively big-footed but still as tall as a human. That wasn''t impossible as he remembered that dwarfs despite their height, had quite muscr andrge legs.


    Though Danzel doubted that to be the case.


    He found the second oue to be more likely the case.


    That being...


    "Raiders." Danzel spoke out loud, as he sensed 3 presences nearby.


    "Raiders? What is that?" Shiro asked confused, unaware of what it meant.


    Taking a turn of their path, the three presences that Danzel sensed were in front of them.


    The owners of the three presences had huge and muscr bodies, with pale blueish skin with several tattoos painted on their bodies. They had a clear humanoid body structure and the only thing that they wore was a piece of leather covering their legs and private parts.


    Their heads matched their body''s volume, though they had a strong jaw, and sharp teeth, with a pair of tusks growing from their mouth.


    One of them in particr held someone that looked like a human but also not by his leg, raising him on top of his mouth.


    And as the mouth of the one with the tusk opened-


    *Cracked~!


    It closed down and devoured 1/3 of the body of the human alike, crashing his head by chewing inside his mouth, resulting in bathing the tusked one in warm blood, while drinking the same blood at the same time.


    "Ahhh, such warm meat, It seems that I have forgotten the taste of those cattle." The one bathed by blood said with a rough voice as he licked the blood around his face.<sub> </sub>


    Seeing that, Shiro faces paled even more behind her mask, despite her already pale skin.


    Though, Danzel couldn''t help but see familiarity in those tusked beings.


    Or rather, those guys were almost the spitting image of someone he knew for quite some time.


    Their muscr body.


    The pair of tusks.


    And eating others like some kind of savage.


    If he were not to count the tattoos on his body.


    They were almost the splitting image of Sartan, the High Troll.


    Well...


    Almost.


    "R-Rue..." Shiro whispered as he got close to Danzel''s leg, trying to hide from them.


    s, her whisper was heard by the keen senses of the tusked ones.


    "Hmm? Taraka, look." One of the other tusk ones pointed at the 4 of them.


    The one bathed in blood turned his gaze and stared fiercely at first at the 4 before his stare turned to one of confusion.


    "Living bones? What are those weak things doing here?" The tusked one dropped the partly eaten body to the ground and picked a wooden mace that had spikes of metal. Identifying Shiro and Danzel as skeletons.


    His gaze went towards Koji and Niyuki.


    "Though the two of you look stronger than those bunch." The one bathed in blood said as he stepped forward.


    "You will have a nice meal after all." He said as a fierce aura came out of his body, tightening his muscles and bulging them, tremendously increasing his strength.


    Seeing that, Danzel stepped forward.


    Seeing that, the blood bathed on their frown before his frown turned into anger.


    "You dare mock me, Taraka, by letting one living bones to face me!? I kill you!!!" He yelled as he dashed towards Danzel, the ground where he was standing cracking by his seer strength.


    "I will take my time eating the both of you!" Taraka said as he swung his mace towards Danzel sideways with enormous.


    *Ting!!!!!


    Though, Danzel only raised his sword and received the swing, resulting in Taraka''s mace fiber as if hit something indestructible.


    "Slow..." Danzel said with a cold voice, as his death aura came out of his body, making Tarakas every single sense scream to get away and to run away.


    Though before he could, Danzel swung through the air in front of Taraka.


    "You-!"


    "And weak." Danzel said as a dark green wind de cut through Taraka''s body at a speed that the other two tusked ones barely managed to see it.


    Taraka''s whole body froze in ce, but in the next moment, half of his body was cut horizontally and fell to the ground. Lifeless.


    Spraying Danzel''s armor and sword with bits of blood.


    Though, the dead mana he was releasing quickly made the blood decay and disappear.


    "Compare to him...you guys are weak." Danzel said with an ice cold voice as his ring eyes stared at the 2 tusked ones.


    "Is it because you are ice trolls and high trolls?" Danzel mumbled to himself as he gave Koji and Niyuki an internalmand.


    ''Kill them, but don''t activate the runes of your swords. They are too weak for that.''


    The two nodded and dashed almost instantly towards the two ice trolls, one used an axe, and the other another mace.


    Though the speed of the two was proven to be far superior to those ice trolls. Koji uses the length of his odachi-like sword to inflict long cuts while being rtively safe, whereas Niyuki was way more aggressive than Koji.


    Making the effort to get closer and inflict devastating cuts with his mberge sword.


    The ice trolls stood no chance against those two.


    Once Danzel was sure that their victory was determined, he used [Eyes of the Damned] to see if anyone else remained in the vige.


    He saw a total of 4 remainingrge lights, which he guessed were other ice trolls.


    But what gained his attention, was that one of those lights was chasing 3 other lights.


    ''They will get out of range of [Eyes of the Damned]'' He sighted internally as he stared at Koji and Niyuki who just won.


    "You two, protect Shiro. I will be going for a short." Danzel said, making Shiro''s eyes open wide.


    "Rue...where are you going?" She asked, her voice betraying how anxious she was, despite her mask hiding her facial expression.


    Danzel stared at her for a moment before exining.


    "With the advantage ability that I am trying to teach you, I saw what I believe to be the natives. I will go and bring them here. The two...Koji and Niyuki should be enough to protect you."


    Danzel said before turning his back to her, without letting her respond.


    "If something happens...scream as loud as you can, and I wille." Danzel said as he turned into mist, and traveled toward the location of the small lights.

 Chapter 380 Natives Of The Frozen Lands

    In the frozennds, assaulted by winter storms on a daily bases, life had found a way to sprout even on those harshnds.


    "Haah~Haah~, Shit." A girl in early 16 voice cursed


    Where survival is everything, whoever strong a being is in that residences thesends.


    "Why did those savagese here!? "* Bang, the sound of a wooden door violently closing


    Of course, they are always exceptions to such things.


    Some beings will naturally adapt to face the ways of those harshnds. And corpses of the weak ones might rise once more with no concern for the condition of the frozennd, albeit with the mana levels of the air having been attuned to an ice/cold elemental, those that raise from the death are merely but mindless skeletons. And even their creation was a rarety on its own here.


    "W-What should I do, what should I do~! What if they find me~!?" The girl whispers panicky as she pushes herself on the walls of the wooden house, trying to hide as much as possible.


    It was an environment where everyone had to adapt to survive, with the weak eventually being punished by death, be it through the fight, starvation, or losing their warmth.


    s, even the weak were able to find their own way to fight, to adapt.


    "The vige~Hiek~how could they eat the others." The girl said while forcing herself not to cry.


    Some animals such as the wolf of thosends banded together to hunt prey stronger than their own, while more intellectual, the natives of those frozennds banded together to yearn for the warm fire, the shelter of houses, and just like the wolfs, to prey on those stronger that they own.


    Thus the creation of this vige.


    s, the strong will hunt the weak, to survive.


    As in thesends, they are only 3 things.


    Life.


    Death.


    And Hunt.


    "Why~Why do savages hunt us~!?"


    And sadly, the vige was marked as prey by the stronger hunters. The ice trolls.


    While hiding inside a house, a girl with blond short hair was pushed to one side while the other side of her hair was cut. She wore simple leather clothing stitched together though without sleeves.


    She had leather armguards of shorts on both hands and a pair of boots with white fur. Something exceptionally rare for her age.


    What differentiated her from a human, was a long and somewhatrge fluffy tailing behind her, slightly above the deposit hole of waste...


    "Oh~god of the hunt~! Why have our vige been subjected to such fate~Hiee~" She whispered while trying not to cry, albeit failing.


    "Why do we have to die like that?"


    She cried unwillingly, as she remembered, how her mate, who gave her the boots with the fur of a winter wolf hunted by himself as a betrothal gift, was crushed by the mace of those ice trolls.


    "Why do we have to be eaten like this?"


    How her father and mother cried to run away, as they were picked up and eaten alive...


    She thought that today will be like any other day, her motherining how her haircut was too boyish and how they would fight.


    Going out to learn how to swing the axe her father.


    Teasing her mate and dreaming for the future...


    All those little things have been snuffed out, by the very nature of those cruel frozennds.


    Hunt to survive.


    Survive in order to live.


    Otherwise, only death awaited.


    "Wgaaaaaagh!! Stop Running!" A harsh yet loud voice traveled through the walls of the house that the girl was in.


    "Oh no..." The girl''s face turned pale as she heard the voice of the hunters.


    ''What should I do, What should I do!!!'' She thought as her gaze looked around her house, finally, her eyes blue eyesnded on the axe that her father was using.


    Her eyes widen as she stood up in hurry, only to fall because of her nervousness, hitting her knee.


    "Kggh~" She felt the pain going through her knee and wanted to yell out of pain, but she covered her mouth with her mouth, before crawling the axe that her father had left in the house.


    "Everything will be alright, keep it together Alka, they aren''t going to find you." The girl, named Alka said as she hugged her axe before running back to the wall that she was.


    She peeked through one of the holes that her house had to see the outside. Only for her eyes to widen up as one of the ice trolls, was hunting a couple in their mid 20''s, with the woman carrying a small baby in her arms covered by leather.


    "Oh no~..." She whispers in despair.


    "You can''t run away!!!" The ice troll hunter yelled as he was closing in on the couple.


    Recognizing the danger that they were in, the husbandturned around and faced the ice troll hunter.


    "Dear! Run away with the young one! I will buy you some time."


    The woman holding the baby clearly didn''t expect that and turned her head in haste.


    "Honey, No~!"


    Before she could finish, the man dashed towards the ice troll hunter.


    "Tired of running!? Hah!" The ice troll hunterughed before swinging his mace at the man.


    The man went to his knees and slide through the ice, barely dodging the mace of the ice troll.


    And suddenly, vines started to show up in the man''s arms, and inthe next moment, his nails were extended and covered a bit of his finger like bone. But more importantly, the extended nails became incredibly sharp.


    The man with his sharp bone-like fingers swiped towards the leg of the ice troll, cutting through his flesh on the ankle area, forcing the ice troll to fall on his knees.


    "Run! For the young one!" The man yelled as he went and shed at the ice trolls'' backs.


    "Kwaghh~ You mere food!" The ice troll yelled as he tried to swing his mace toward the man, only for the man to move away.


    The wife of the man bit her lips and turned to run away.


    The ice troll hunter felt particr annoying by seeing his prey running away, unleashing his rage toward the man.


    The man was extremely relieved upon seeing his wife running away, before focusing in fight the ice troll.


    Though not long after a few seconds, an air-piercing sound was to be heard.


    The ice troll hunter reacted ordingly and looked to his side, only to see a rtively small yet shaped ice spikeing his way.


    He raised his hand and let it pierce his hand instead of his face.


    "Kwgh..." The ice troll groaned as she looked at the wife of the man that returned and raising both her palms on top of each other and aiming towards him.


    "Get away from my husband you monster!" She yelled as she very, very slowly created another ice spear.


    The man seeing her wifeing back had a look of pure despair on his face.


    "What are you doing here!? Go and run with-"


    "Shut up! As if I let you die and leave our girl fatherless! We will kill this thing and run. Together." The wife yelled in anger as she shot her next ice spear, which the ice troll blocked with his arm once more.


    The man cursed internally.


    Meanwhile, watching the two fighting the monster that eat her mate and family, made Alka grab the axe of her father much tighter.


    "They are winning..." Alka mumbled as the thought of going out and helping them out grew stronger by the second.


    The ice troll received many other wounds around his body, and his arm was continuously being prated by the small ice spears, making Alka resolve to help them to grow.


    ''I need to help them!'' She said to herself as she stood up.


    The moment she did though, a loud sound of the wound being crashed was to be heard.<sub> </sub>


    *Creakkkk!!!


    "What was that...?" Alka asked herself as she peaked through the hole once more, only for her whole body to start shaking.


    "Oh no..." She mumbled as she fell to the ground, her eye glued to the small holes.


    The man tried to use the fact that the ice troll couldn''t move thanks to cutting his ankle to his advantage.


    Once the ice troll swung his mace towards him, the man run towards the front of the kneeling ice troll hunter, to cut his throat.


    But once he did, the ice troll stood up and used the same leg that had his ankle cut to kick the husband with enormous force through his chest, sending him flying to one of the wooden houses.


    "So annoying. And hungry." The ice troll mumbled as the wound of his ankle was nowhere to be seen and the many cuts were slowly closing.


    The ice troll pulled the 3 ice spikes from his arm, letting everyone see the regeneration of the ice troll.


    "Tch, I broke the one." The ice troll stared at the husband who wasying dead with many broken bones.


    "Ah...honey~ oh no..."


    Looking at her husband dying like that, tears started to flow in the wife''s eyes.


    "I guess I will make do with you." The ice troll hunter said as he walked towards the frozen wife who was devasted by the death of her husband.


    The ice troll raised his mace and then-


    Alka closed her eyes unable to see what was to happend next.


    Though the *Crack, sounds alone made her whole body flinch.


    "Boring..." The ice troll said as he picked up the corpse of his wife and...started eating it.


    Each chewing sound made Alka remember her father and mother being eaten alive, making her cry no stop as she pushed her hand in front of her mouth, so as not to be heard.


    "Haah, such warm meat." The ice troll hunter said as he threw the remains of the wife to the side like it was some kind of trash.


    Alka thought that she reached a further level of despair, but once she heard, the innocent cry of a baby girl...she froze.


    ''Oh no!!!'' She turned to look at the small hole again, only to see that the baby was ced only a few meters away on the ground, to start crying and be noticed by the ice troll hunter.


    "Heh, what is that? A small prey." The ice troll said as he licked the blood that was on his face.


    "I wonder how it tastes."


    Hearing those words, Alka''s eyes were filled with anger as much as despair.


    ''Not only did you kill my family, my friends, but you also want to eat the children too!?'' She yelled internally.


    "I ca-n''t...mother, father. S-Sorry but I can''t let this happend." She whisper as she gripped her axe, ready to step out and face the ice troll, despite knowing that she will end up just like the others.


    She run towards the door with the axe dragged on the floor, but before she could go out, an ominous pressure appear that even she felt inside her house.


    And with the pressure, a sound of metal was to be heard.


    "Huh?" The ice troll of course turned around to see where the sound came from.


    All it saw though how a dark mist gathered in one ce and manifested a dark armored skeleton walking towards the ice troll with an ominous voice.


    The aura of death surrounding this skeleton made the ice troll''s survival instincts scream as if facing a predator way above his leagues.


    Though seeing what it was, the ice troll calmed down.


    "H-Hah! Just some living bones with some magic! Your magic has no use against me!" It yelled, but his body was clearly shaking.


    Alka who heard that went back to see what was inside, only for her whole body to freeze.


    "O-Oh god..." She whisper as she watched the ring green eyes looking at the ice troll.


    What shocked her next thought was that upon raising and pointing it at the ice troll.


    The ice troll went on his knees and then a skeleton arm dragged something out of his chest, making the troll fall on his knees with the support of his hands.


    And next thing that Alka knew, the skeleton with the dark armor appeared behind the ice troll, only seeing bits of smoke moving.


    And even that was at a speed that her eyes couldn''t keep up.


    "W-Where?" The ice troll was also confused as the skeleton disappeared in front of him.


    But before it could anything, his head heal to the ground.


    "Huh?" The ice troll head said before the body and the headpletely dying.


    The area where it was cut decayed rapidly and turned ck by the ominous sword.


    "T-The mark of death..." Alka whispered as she watched all events happening hidden in her house.


    But then...


    "Waaaaah! Waaaah!" The baby seeking the attention of her mother and father made his presence clear, making the dark-armored undead take notice of this small existence.


    "That is..." The voice of the undead was as cold as the winter, if not colder.


    The undead walked towards the baby and seeking that made Alka react with urgency.


    She opened the door of her house and run towards theundead while dragging her father''s axes through the ground filled with snow.


    She run as fast as she could.


    Without even thinking at this point, she raised the axe of her father and swung at the undead back.


    "Don''t you dare touch her!!!" Alka yelled as her swing connected.


    *Tinggi!!!


    The sound of metal shing.


    *Creak.


    And the sound of the handle of the axe breaking was to be heard.


    "Huh?" Alka was stunned as her father''s axe broke and the armor of the undead...had received no damage.


    Though as she looked at the undamaged armor, a cold voice spoke.


    "You..."


    Before she could say anything her hand was grabbed and raised to the raised.


    "Kyaaagh!" Alka yelled from the pain of being raised through the air, but most of the pain came from her arm quickly having its vitality sucked and her skin, slowly turning ck.


    She looked at her arm in shock and fear, but her eyes then gazed at the 2 ring ethereal dark green eyes, that looked at her with no empathy to say the less.


    "Ahhh~"


    Frozen through fear, her life started to sh before her eyes and she was assured, that she was going to die.


    But suddenly, a quiet echo of sound was to be heard.


    "~kyaaaaah~"


    Alka barely heard that, but the undead holding her twisted his head and looked in the direction of the scream.


    In the next moment, the undead turned into mist and left Alka to fall to the ground.


    "H-Huh?" Alka stared confused as the ominous pressure and the undead went away, only the scream of the baby left to be heard.


    "Waaagh!Waaaagh!"


    Afraid of this...being toe back, Alka took the baby and started to run away.

 Chapter 381 Shiros Body State

    Few minutes when Danzel left Shiro behind with Koji and Niyuki.


    Shiro stared at the dark green mist leaving at a speed that her eye could barely follow.


    She didn''t expect that Danzel would simply leave her alone like this, in front of 3 ice troll corpses and a few bloody, eaten bodies of the natives of this vige.


    Shiro was also observant in her surroundings and came to the same conclusion that Danzel did, that those ice trolls probably invaded this vige and their people.


    In fact, it was pretty obvious all things consider.


    Though she expected him to take her with him to the natives instead of leaving her here.


    Though seeing how fast the mist moved, she somewhat calmed down, saying that he will be back in a few minutes.


    "L-let''s wait for Rue to return, Koji, Niyuki." Shiro said somewhat awkwardly at the two living armors, who nodded their "heads" at her.


    To her, Koji and Niyuki looked quite cool and the idea of them being her personal guards also enchanted their presence to her. Though she found it frankly quite awkward that Danzel gifted them those 2 to her.


    The idea of them following her every order felt off to her.


    She named them mainly because calling them living armors was weird, more that when both of them looked sentient.


    ''Are they though?'' She thought as she looked at the two behind her mask.


    "Koji, Niyuki...are both of you sentient?" Shiro asked awkwardly.


    It felt as if she were asking if someone had a brain or not.


    Koji and Niyuki red at each other, before ring back at Shiro with their hollow gaze.


    "Mhm... Rue did talk to you before so you should understand him. Maybe you two can''t speak?" Shiro crossed her two hands together while thinking.


    "Maybe this spell will work..." Shiro mumbled as she started weaving two threads of mana toward Koji and Niyuki.


    The threads of mana were quite wobbly and moved extremely slowly, though they soon connected to the two.


    ''How about now?'' She sent her thoughts to the many threads.


    ''Yes, Mistress''


    ''Yes, Mistress''


    Koji and Niyuki spoke simultaneously with an ice-cold voices. Taking Shiro by surprise.


    "Ohhhhh! You can speak!" Shiro yelled in surprise, before looking at the mana thread.


    ''Oh...rather you can think.'' Shiro corrected herself, making the two nod at her.


    Albeit both had the cold voice of undead, to her, Koji sounded much more refined with his words whereas Niyuki sounded a bit rougher.


    Now that she knew that both of them were sentient, Shiro started throwing them her questions.


    ''Are you fine being my guards and not Rue''s?''


    ''It is our liegesmand.'' Both of them answered without hesitation.


    ''Are you fine being named by me?'' Shiro asked awkwardly.


    ''Our liege has acknowledged those names'' They said.


    Making Shiro look at them weirdly.


    ''Are you capable of... independent thinking.'' She asked out of curiosity.


    Making the two look at each other, and then back at her.


    ''We are, though our lieges and mistressmand takes priority.'' Koji was the one to speak for both of them, with his cold voice there was a hind of confusion too.


    "I see?" Shiro said while tilting her head confused.


    She wanted many more questions, but before she could, she suddenly felt a few trembles going through the ground.


    Once she noticed them, Koji and Niyuki moved swiftly in front of her, making her turn her head around, only to see 4 blueish-skinned muscr beings.


    "Here is the smell of our brethren''s blood." One of the ice trolls said to the ice troll beside him.


    The ice troll beside him was a good head taller than the other 3 and despite an ice troll''s regenerations capabilities, that one troll hadrge scars on his body.


    That one had a worn ck spear that had multiple hook-like thigh needles on his back. Where the ice troll had a pair of axes that were connected with arge metal chain.


    That one ice troll stepped forward with a frown on his face when he stared at the state of the ice troll corpses.


    "Were you the ones that did it?" The ice troll with the chain axes said at Koji and Niyuki, who naturally didn''t respond. As they couldn''t.


    Shiro who was behind the two started to be pale as she watched the massive ice trolls.


    ''Can Koji and Niyuki win against those 4? That one, in particr, seems way stronger than the other too...'' Shiro stared at the 4 anxiously.


    See saw that the two were easily able to 2 ice trolls, but now they were double at that with one of them being clearly much stronger.


    "No, it doesn''t matter if you killed them or not. As you are nothing but food." The ice troll with the axe chains said as he motioned the other 3 to face them.


    "Those two smell off."


    "They don''t smell good."


    "Though the small one smells delicious."


    Once one of the 3 ice trolls said that their eyes went towards Shiro and made a smile with one of them liking his limps.


    "Limps."<sub> </sub>


    "Head."


    "Body.


    Hearing what the ice trolls were saying a chilling run through Shiro''s body, making her step back from just imagining what their intent was.


    She couldn''t help but be reminded of Danzel butchering the wolf and the big-haired thing.


    Though when she remembered that, she also remembered Danzel''s words.


    To not rely on him and the living armor.


    To instead use her own magic.


    Though she still remembered her blunder when she used magic and caused a whole avnche.


    Making her hesitate.


    "Ahh..." She didn''t what to do.


    But the closer the ice trolls came to her with their killing intent, the more tears started to form in her eyes.


    "Why..." She mumbled to herself.


    The ice troll started running.


    "Why is this happening to me!?" She yelled as she raised her hand towards the ice trolls.


    And as if a switch was lifted, an incredible amount of mana was being released out of Shiro''s body, which made her eyes glow with mana.


    A tremendous amount of mana traveled through her arms, making blue veins start showing on her skin. Making a tinder of fire appears in front of her arm.


    ? 2 out of the 3 ice trolls sensed that the small food wearing a bone mask of a wolf was something extremely threatening, making them dash to the side.


    The remaining one dashed forward without any fear.


    Though the next moment, as if someone opened the door of a mana well, the mana of Shiro''s arm was released in the form of a beam of dense mes.


    The mes melted the ground with little to no resistance and the ice troll that was hit howled like a beast from pain.


    Though even his screams were engulfed by the mes.


    The beam out of mes quickly stopped, revealing the ck skeleton with bits of the flesh of the ice trollying on top of the molten ground.


    "~agh~agh~."


    What terrified the two other ice trolls that moved to the said was the low growls that the ck skeleton was made with bits of flesh.


    The ice troll with the axe chain frowned as he watched Shiro''s powers.


    "M-Monster...!" One of the ice trolls said as he stared at Shiro in fear.


    Though Shiro moving her hands towards him, made the ice troll truly start to fear.


    "N-No!" The ice troll runs sideways.


    ring at the running ice troll, the blue veins of Shiro''s body started to further spread through her body with some starting to beat like a pulse. And as Shiro gathered her mana in her other hand, her nails started to grow.


    And in the next moment, a wave of lighting started to chase after the running ice troll. Cutting the ground like some water pressure while also melting the ground itself.


    The lighting soon enough reached the running ice troll. And unlike lighting that spread through one''s body, those lightings were as sharp as des and cut through the limps of the running ice troll with ease while also electrocuting him.


    That was when the vitality of an ice troll was indeed a curse.


    Something that would kill someone instantly didn''t kill a troll immediately.


    While Shiro was still electrocuting one of the trolls, she pointed her other arm toward the other ice troll.


    Which made the ice troll in question drop his mace and start to run away.


    Shiro tilted her head towards the running ice troll as the horns of her head started to glow in mana, and grow, albeit very slowly.


    The image of a little girl wearing a wolf mask that looked harmless before turned into something very scary from the ice troll''s viewpoint.


    And as the mana was guided to her slightly twisted arm, the mana was instantly moved around the running.


    And in the next moment as if something hit the ice troll with a sledgehammer, the ice troll fell to the ground and was pressed to the ground.


    And with each passing second, the ice troll felt the pressure growing and growing without any signs of stopping.


    Even the ground around himself started to be pressed together as gravity around him became heavier.


    "Agh-aghhh!


    *Crack~Crack~Crack~Crack~crack~.


    The ice troll''s body just as the ground descended. Resulting in a small hole where the constant noise of bones breaking was to be heard.


    And once Shiro stopped her magic, her eyes behind the bone masknded on the ice troll with the axe chains.


    "I will protect myself! And go back to grandpa!" She yelled as aimed her left hand at the remaining ice troll and channeled her mana for her next spell.


    But as the spell was forming in front of her arms, the blue veins in her skin started to glow and around the veins, her skin started to turn red and she felt an incredible amount of paining from her head.


    The pain was so intense that it made Shiro yell as loud as she possibly could into the air and fell to the ground in a fetal position.


    "KYAAAAAAAGHHH!!!"


    Her voice full of pain echoed through the vige.

 Chapter 382 Shiros Body State(2)

    Seeing Shiro, their mistress curls up and screams in pain, Koji and Niyuki were extremely confused and worried at the same time.


    They have been in watch of how their mistress was using powerful magic to devastate the enemies in case of any danger, but then suddenly she copse in pain.


    They didn''t see any sort of attack or the sort of attack on their mistress. Both of them felt as if they failed the order of their liege.


    And all they could think of where the source of pain wasing from was thest remaining enemy, the ice troll with the axe chains.


    The light of the runes grew stronger and the amount of mist leaving from their armor increased as they stepped forward toward the ice troll.


    "Hmpf, so she gave out after 3 shots?" The ice troll with the axe chains scoffed as he stepped forward in response to Koji and Niyuki.


    Koji stared at Niyuki for a short moment before thetter nodded.


    Acting both at the same time, Niyuki went and grabbed Shiro while running away and Koji went and dashed towards the remaining ice troll.


    Koji was running in a low poster at the speed of an average 3rd-tier warrior, which in hindsight was extremely fast.


    "Buying time?" The ice troll scoffed as he raised one of his axes and threw it at Koji''s location. Koji was easily able to step to the side and dodge.


    *Bough!


    The axended on the ground with incredible force, throwing the snow away together with the earth as the axe was rooted to the ground.


    Any of that didn''t stop Koji from running straight toward the ice troll.


    The ice troll raised his other axe and seeing to wait for Koji to approach close enough.


    But once the ice troll judged Koji as being 3 times away of his range, a vicious smirk appeared on his face.


    The ice troll guided mana towards both his legs and the chain of his other axes and suddenly, the ice troll grabbed the chain and dragged himself forwards as he dashed towards Koji, closing the distance between him and Koji almost instantly.


    "Die!" The ice troll swung his axe down right towards Koji like a guillotine.


    Though what the ice troll didn''t expect was that Koji saw right through the ice troll''s intent by the time it grabbed the chain and decided to halt his steps and jump away out of the axe range, if not only barely.


    Resulting in the axe hitting the ground and raising arge amount of snow.


    *Boughhh!


    Once the snow fell down and reveal the two of them standing opposite to each other, the ice troll gnashed his teeth.


    "Tch!"


    As he did, arge wound appeared in front of his chest and throwing lots of blood.


    "Such a long yet sharp weapon," The ice troll said as the wound on his chest was regenerating.


    Koji was none discouraged or annoyed by that.


    There was a stalemate between the two, the ice troll despite looking fine, was still regenerating while Koji was only ying the waiting game.


    And soon enough, Niyuki came running back with his mberge resting on top of his shoulder while running.


    "Disgrace of warriors," The ice troll said with anger as he grabbed the chain of the axe he threw.


    Wrapping around his hand and stepping to the side, the axe came out of the ground and together with the chain swung towards Niyuki who was trying to get to the ice troll''s ice.


    Niyuki didn''t even halt for a split second and continued dashing to surround the ice troll, and once the chain with the axe came towards him, without even his "head" looking, he jumped above the swung chains and easily avoided them.


    The ice troll though annoyed by that wasn''t going to waste their momentum and energy on him swinging those chains. He changed his poster and raised the chains up in the air before swinging them down towards swinging them down to Koji that was in front of them, the action alone dislocated his arm swinging the chains, but forced Koji to step away.


    *Brack.


    Seeing the chance, Koji dashed forwards with his odachi.


    The ice troll in turn put his axe on his mouth while fixing his right arm.


    And then a load of mana moved through his arms and the chains.


    The mana made the chains move unnaturally fast and in a way that wouldn''t have been possible normally, and even then it would require a mastery of controlling the chains, something that the ice troll already had.


    The chains moved around Koji into a circle, which once pulled by the ice troll, the circle around Koji closed while creating sparks, aiming to crash Koji into half with the amount of force that was on the chains.


    Koji though was all observant of his enemy''s actions, the use of a skill that he had no knowledge of was asking too much to predict.


    Though even then, Koji wasn''t nning to disappoint his liege by getting destroyed and no longer able to perform his duty.


    And that was when Koji used the nature of his body, the body of a living armor to its full advantage.


    Both Koji and Niyuki were hollow armor, they had no restrictions on muscle structure, bones, or any of the sort that made their body move. Although they couldn''t control a body part of theirs if disconnected, other than this restriction, they could move their body as they wished.


    Half of Koji''s leg twisted and he bend his body unnaturally to the point it was close to touching the ground. His other arm turned almost to the other side as he support himself.


    That movement alone allowed him to escape from being crushed by the chains.


    Though Koji wasn''t satisfied with only dodging, no.


    He started fixing his body which made him make a fast turn as he swung his odachi with one arm at the ice troll''s belly, creating arge wound.


    Shocking the ice troll.<sub> </sub>


    "What the hell!?" He yelled as he grabbed the axe from his mouth and was about to swing at the living armor in front of him, but before he could, Niyuki was already behind him with the mberge being held by both of his arms.


    And he swung the mberge at the ice troll back.


    And once the mberge began cutting through the ice troll''s back, an immense pain run through him. mberge was best used in cutting flesh as it left deep cuts and the vibrations alone were very ufortable.


    "Gahhh!" The ice troll yelled as he finished his swing towards Koji, forcing him back and using one of his legs he kicked Niyuki, who blocked with his mberge.


    Niyuki then went to join Koji, readying to assault his face forward.


    Seeing that while breathing heavily, the ice troll gnashing his teeth.


    "Ghhhhhhh!!!"


    The wound on his back and belly started to smoke as an elerated regeneration was taking ce.


    "Cowards, I will give you that, you are strong. But-!"


    Letting go of his axe to fall to the ground, the ice troll grabbed the spear with many needles on his arm.


    "I will be taking one of you out!" The ice troll yelled as the arm holding the spear like a javelin bulged up and the mana surrounded the spear.


    "I was nning to use this to hunt the thousand screaming one...so be honored to receive it!!!" The ice troll went on one of his legs and his aura changed totally as veins started to form around his neck and head.


    Both Koji and Niyuki knew, that the throw of the spear will be as fast as it would be strong...strong enough to take one of them out.


    Koji was the one to step forwards and advantage of the ice troll, despite making him the most likely target, Niyuki reacted a second toote before him to run to stop the ice troll.


    The ice troll''s gazended on Koji and his total focus was shifted to him.


    He ignored everything else and went to throw the spear.


    But suddenly, he heard a small sound simr to a mosquito near your ear.


    Even though he noticed the sound, the ice troll ignored the source of the sound.


    Though, even if he saw the source of the sound, he wouldn''t have been able to react.


    *Fseeeeen! Fseeeen! Fseeeen!


    Just as he was about to release the spear, 3 swift dark green wind des cut through him. One severed the arm that held the spear, one other cutting his body half of the body while thest remaining cut his other arm.


    "Hu-hagghhhhh! AGHHHHHH!!!??!?!"


    A pain as real as ethereal assaulted his mind as he felt his flesh and something else that was of him being cut away. Resulting in a pain that he never ever believe to exist.


    He tried to forcefully elerate his regeneration, but something was making his racial talent not work, or rather to reduce the regeneration to meager levels.


    "A-Aghh!!! W-What agh! is thi-ghhgh PAIN!!!?" The ice troll howled in pain.


    And then, he noticed a dark green mist form in front of him and materializing a dark-ted armor.


    Taking upon notice of that, the ice troll gazed in front of the dark-ted being with a skull that had a pair of dark green ring eyes.


    But suddenly the image started to change as hey his eyes upon the skull with ring eyes. Or more urately, the ice troll was seeing a vision, of a ckened world with thousands of millions of souls trying to w their way toward him, with only the figure in front of him holding those souls back.


    s, to him, the figure in front of him was the scariest thing he saw through his entire life to the point he couldn''t stop shaking.


    "What-are-you!?!?" The ice troll yelled as he was under the effect [Bringer of the End].


    Danzel stared at the disliked ice troll as his cruel cold voice responded.


    "Death."


    The ice troll''s eyes widen in shock as he watched the souls wing toward him.


    "It-can''t be-! You-!"


    Before he could finish his sentence, an ice spear came from the ground and pierced his mouth


    "Gha-!?"


    And then spears started growing out of the ground and pierced his body into bits.


    Receiving the XP notification, Danzel went and looked for Shiro which was ced in one of the wooden houses'' front door.


    Turning into most, he almost immediately appeared in front of her, screaming in pain.


    "What is this..." Danzel looked confused as he saw her horns grow a bit and the blue veins bing ck though around her face and arms.


    Danzel undid the bones holding her haired buffalo cloth, only to see ck veins all through her body.


    "What the hell happend here?" Danzel said confused as he inspected the ck veins.


    Figuring nothing out, Danzel brought out her status screen.


    And after reading a bit, he understood what was happening.


    "Seriously...?"

 Chapter 383 Shiros Body State (3)

    [Status]


    Name: Haruki Shiro


    Level: 45


    Race: Mana Tainted Nagaiki Oni


    ss: [All Knowledgeable Magic Caster Lv. 51]


    Sub-ss: [Adept Highborn Oni Vessel Lv. 31]


    Health: 7200/15500


    Mana: 17500/ 19680


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 85 Agility: 120 Intelligence: 734 Endurance: 309


    Talents: [Demon Kin Oni] [Long Lived] [Demonification] [Mana Veins (Advantage)] [Mana Grow Endoskeleton] [Mana Influenced Grow Body] [Hasten Mana Growth] [Mana Vision] [Demon Mana Eyes (Iplete)] [Demon Mana Heart (Iplete)] [Demon Mana Influenced Muscles (Iplete)] [Magic Genius] [Natural Mana Sense] [Third Mana Sense] [Mana Sensation] [Affiny of all Natural Elements] [Survivor of Body Vitality Exhaustion] [Mental Mind Fortitude] [Pain Resistance (adept)] [Quick Caster] [Protected by Sword Master] [Apprentice of Death King]


    Skills: [...] [...] [...] ...


    [Remark: A Oni Demon who has been once engulfed by an extraordinary amount of mana when she was little. The fact that she stayed sane and alive is a miracle to behold by itself. This Oni Demon hosts an amount of mana that shouldn''t be normal and with her potential of magic, her potential is terrifying for any magic caster to imagine. Though that is if she were to survive with all this mana inside of her. A true anomaly in its own right.


    "What the..."


    ''Hell am I seeing right now?'' Danzel finished internally in shock.


    Compared to his status, Shiro''s own status was close to 3 times bigger than his very own.


    Albeit his talents and remark had much more content than hers, the number of skills and spells that she had was at least +150 if not more.


    He could at least count 20 spells of a certain basic elemental and a few more unique elements such as light. He recognized a few spells that were of the 2nd-tier and a couple of other lower-tier stuff, though that was the minority of them.


    The only few elements that shecked were darkness and death. He suspected a few of the dark elements, but there was apleteck of death and holy type of spells.


    But what truly surprised him wasn''t the number of skills and spells that she had.


    No.


    He had seen other magic casters with a simr amount, though not with so many talents.


    What truly shocked him was the fact that Shiro had more mana than himself.


    A 4th-tier being.


    Though he wasn''t focused on magic, the fact that he had more than 500 attributes in intelligence and that he was gaining arge amount of stats from the stat multiplier, the fact that she had more mana than him was...abnormal.


    And watching the blue veins where he felt mana flowing through around her body to turn ck made him suspect that the cause of her pain was due to her mana.


    ''The remark also points at the mana in her body to be the problem, but why?'' Danzel thought as he went and started reading her talents to find some clues.


    [Demon Kin Oni] was her race talent which had various bonuses like higher senses, greater regeneration, and its own stat multiplier, which were of the 1.2.


    The next one was [Long Lived] done nothing more than increase one''s lifespan in the cost of fertility rate.


    [Demonification] was the talent that he suspected Agares used to grow his horns and be stronger.


    Once Danzel realized it was a buff of some sort, he went to the next talent as he realized that Shiro was losing [Health] with each passing second while also having all her attributes increasing too.


    Reading through her next talents of her, he was surprised to recognize them.


    "She has the same talent as that Kayn kid, butpared to his iplete version, she seems to have advantaged..." Danzel mumbled as he read the details.


    [Mana Veins (Advantage)]: A vessel that has been saturated with such a huge amount of mana, that the flow of mana through the veins is 400% times greater than usual and the flow speed of mana increases by 200%. Additionally increases the effectiveness of positive effects on ones by 50%.


    If Danzel could frown, he would already.


    Based on the talent name and its effect, he was sure that the ck veins were because of this.


    ''Though the effect is more positive than negative, is that not the cause of her pain?''


    Going through the next talents to see what the problem was, he soon enough found the problem.


    [Mana Grow Endoskeleton]: The vessel has been saturated with such a huge amount of mana that the growth of the vessel''s skeleton has been forced to elerate its growth in order to evolve into greater heights. Attribute gain depends on growth. Can only be activated if the vessel has enough vitality in her body to support the growth. Can''t result in death.


    [Mana Influenced Grow Body]: The vessel has been saturated with such a huge amount of mana that the growth of the vessel''s overall body has been forcefully elerated to make the vessel have the required flesh to hold upon the huge amount of mana. Attribute gain depends on growth. Can only be activated if the vessel has enough vitality in her body to support the growth. Can''t result in death.


    [Hasten Mana Growth]: By having content such as a huge amount of mana inside one''s body, the total mana is increased by the growth of the vessel. Can only be activated if the vessel has enough vitality in her body to support the growth. Can''t result in death.


    [Demon Mana Eyes (Iplete)]: Eyes that have been saturated with such a huge amount of mana, which resulted in the channeling of mana to be much more easily done in the eyes. Additionally, increase the Intelligence multiplier by 0.1. If fully developed, the pair of demonic eyes will make for a high-tier ingredient for alchemy. Can only be activated if the vessel has enough vitality in her body to support the growth. Can''t result in death.


    [Demon Mana Heart (Iplete)]: A heart that has been saturated with such a huge amount of mana which resulted in the channeling of mana being much more easily done in the heart. Additionally, increase the Intelligence multiplier by 0.2. If fully developed, the demonic heart will make for a high-tier ingredient for alchemy. Can only be activated if the vessel has enough vitality in her body to support the growth. Can''t result in death.


    [Demon Mana Influenced Muscles (Iplete)]: The muscles of demon kin have been saturated with such a huge amount that each muscle channels passively mana, which forces the body to evolve and grow. Additionally, increase the Intelligence multiplier by 0.4. Increase of attributes based on growth. Can only be activated if the vessel has enough vitality in her body to support the growth. Can''t result in death.


    ...


    Danzel continued reading through the talents with incredible speed thanks to hisrge amount of stats and being left confused most of the time.<sub> </sub>


    He understood that Shiro currently was experiencing something like elerated growth which exined why her attributes were increasing. He could also attribute her pain to the hasten to grow of hers, but he still failed to see why she was losing so much health.


    The talents stated they will only activate when she has enough vitality, but the longer he watched, the better he understood that Shiro''s elerated growth isn''t going to stop any time soon.


    Though, when he read [Survivor of Body Vitality Exhaustion], he realized that something was wrong.


    [Survivor of Body Vitality Exhaustion]: Someone who survived having one''s vitality drained by one''s very body own body to the brink of death itself. Wherever one experience growth where the body couldn''t support or has one''s vitality being drained constantly with a meager amount left, it''s a miracle that one survived. You experience death only after your health is at negative 105%. If reached negative health, you will be weakened.


    Though he found it interesting that negative health was a thing, his entire focus went towards the "Wherever one experiences growth where the body couldn''t support" line specifically.


    That''s when he realized what was happening.


    He quickly used [Eyes of the Damned] and saw how Shiro''s body was greedily eating her own vitality to hasten her growth.


    "Her own body is eating her alive." Danzel cursed out loud before raising his hand and activating the runes of his gauntlet, resulting in an ominous dark green glow appearing.


    ''It wasn''t that her talents had some kind of negative effect. It was the exact opposite!'' Danzel though was unsure of what to do.


    The core problem of the whole situation wasn''t the talents that elerated her growth. As they stated that they won''t suck Shiro''s vitality till she died.


    The core problem of this was the [Mana Veins (Advantage)] talent.


    Though seemingly harmless with pure positives, that very talent was actually killing Shiro! As the talent increased the effectiveness of all positive effects by 50%.


    And since the talents that made her grow were deemed as positive, her growth has been increased by half the amount that it was supposed to be.


    It was as if there was an error in one calction. The original talents that made her grow calcted the basis to drain around 60-80% of her own vitality to hasten her growth. But that was without calcting the 50% increase from the [Mana Veins (Advantage)] talent.


    It was as if her own body was trying to chew more than it could, even if it meant killing itself by doing as such.


    He tried drawing her vitality back with the [Rune of Eniv] from his gauntlets to guide her vitality away from the areas where she was growing.


    Though it helped with easing Shiro''s pain, that was Danzel buying time as her body will seek and drain her vitality to fuel its growth.


    And the [Rune of Eniv] itself wasn''t perfect on its own.


    Albeit the rating was [Perfect] by itself and Danzel was activating and deactivating the rune constantly, the fact that he pulled bits of her vitality out of her body was worsening the situation.


    "This is bad..." Danzel mumbled as he watched Shiro''s vitality grow weaker by the second.


    ''She is going to die at this rate if I don''t find a way to restore her vitality.''


    "Shiro...use your healing magic." Danzel said while gazing at the crying Shiro with a serious voice.


    "At this rate, your vitality will be exhausted. You have to use your magic. I...I don''t have the means to heal you." Danzel said with his ice-cold yet serious voice.


    Danzel waited for her to use her magic, albeit, by simply watching the state she was in, he realized that she could hear a single word, forget about casting magic.


    He focused his entire mind on not drawing out her vitality and also disturbing portions of the vitality of her body, s he knew that it was a matter of time before Shiro...dies.


    Danzel racked his mind trying to remember if he had anything useful inside his storage rings, though he very well knew that there was nothing there to save a life.


    Only weapons, books, magic crystals, and some magic items.


    ''That''s why Agares worked as a mercenary for Velkir. It was because he could treat Shiro from this thing. But now in the middle of nowhere, how am I supposed to treat her when I can''t use holy and light magic?''


    ''Maybe one of those natives had the ability to use this kind of magic, but all of them seem to have died. And that girl that I met had little to no mana. She also probably run away...'' Danzel thought as he watched around with his [Eyes of the Damned] seeing no one but Shiro with vitality remaining.


    "Dammit...if we came earlier and killed those ice trolls, one of the natives with healing magic could have been here." Danzel mumbled as he suddenly remembered something when he started working with Gerak the dwarf.


    Of how someone sold a potion made out of ice troll blood to make one''s body tougher to some noble pig.


    Also, Shiro''s talent that wrote of her body parts being an alchemic ingredient made something click inside his mind.


    "You two! Bring me the body of an ice troll! One that still has lots of blood remaining!" Danzel ordered Koji and Niyuki with an oppressivemand that gave no room for talking back.


    Not that they could anyway.


    The two reacted ordingly and dashed toward the corpses of the ice trolls. Niyuki went and picked up the crushed ice troll by gravity magic and Koji went to carry the one that he killed on his own.


    And soon enough, the corpses of ice trolls were on the side of Danzel.


    Raising his hand, he touched the blood of one of them.


    [Ice Troll Blood]: The blood of an Ice Troll, having endured the relentless cold, their blood holds properties of toughing one''s body while also containing the regenerative attribute of trolls. An alchemic ingredient sought by many alchemists.


    "Though it''s raw, it should be better than dying." Danzel mumbled as he utilized the knowledge of [Blood Puppets] to control the blood itself and slowly drain it out of the ice troll''s dead body.


    He then used [Blood Sense] to see the condition of the blood and push away the blood with lesser quality that has been dirtied or gone bad. Only keeping the "fresh" blood in the air.


    His control over blood was less than ideal, which resulted in him dropping bits of the "fresh" blood to the ground, but with the amount of blood that the huge bodies that an ice troll had left enough room for him to waste some blood.


    Once he concentrated the blood to form a ball, he guided the ball of "high" quality ice troll blood in front of him.


    And then he raised both his arms to the sides of the ball.


    Making him look like an ominous undead cultist with the dark green glow of his gauntlets and his ring eyes together with the ball made out of the blood.


    "Hope that this works, kid." Danzel said before slowly drawing the blood like a small stream and guiding it inside Shiro''s mouth.

 Chapter 384 Experimenting With The Dead.

    After Danzel forcefully made Shiro drink the blood of the ice trolls while being careful not to drown her in blood in the process, he did notice Shiro''s overall status improving and her health recovering.


    But her growth didn''t seem to stop.


    He already let her "drink" 1 liter of blood and he was worried that any more would be worse than good.


    All that he could do now was watch how her own body was eating from the inside to fuel the body''s growth. And all that blood that she gave her only recovered around 1500 health.


    He tried to tell her to cast her healing magic, but with no sess.


    So he waited while watching her health drop lower and lower.


    Though also her attributes were increasing.


    The most noticeable change from this growth, was the fact that Shiro was gaining height, her hair was bing longer with even her nails growing.


    "It''s as if she is growing older..." Danzel stated as he watched quite helplessly.


    As Shiro''s vitality was drained to fuel her growth, she was also bing thinner despite bing stronger.


    And by the time her growth has stopped, she looked like she grew 2-3 years older and her hair almost reached her knees. And albeit she hasn''t turned into a mummy or anything of the sort, one could see that she became quite petite.


    "Ahhhhh~" Shiro let out a tired moan as her blurry eyes stared at where Danzel and the two kneeling living armors.


    Her voice has given out with all the screaming.


    And the pain together with the constant tears made her very tired.


    She wanted to say something, but she fell unconscious from exhaustion the next moment.


    Staring at her, Danzel shook his head.


    "You are as lucky as you are a handful, you know?" Danzel shook his head as he stared at her status.


    [Status]


    Name: Haruki Shiro


    Level: 48


    Race: Mana Tainted Nagaiki Oni


    ss: [All Knowledgeable Magic Caster Lv. 51]


    Sub-ss: [Adept Highborn Oni Vessel Lv. 40]


    Health: 735/17500


    Mana: 18750/ 20680


    Attribute points: 63


    Attributes: Strength: 145 Agility: 110 Intelligence: 784 Endurance: 349


    ....


    Technically, she would have survived even without giving the ice troll blood, but her health would have gone negative health, which he guessed was less than ideal.


    "She should recover better like this." Danzel mumbled as he picked up the sleeping Shiro in a prince''s carry and walked towards the door of the house that he was at.


    He went and opened the door, entering the empty house with Shiro in his arms.


    Looking around, the house had only some basic furniture with only 2 rooms.


    One room is the living roombined with the kitchen with the second room being a bed.


    Guessing by the size of the bed, the house was probably owned by a couple.


    Not that Danzel cared about whoever the owner of the house was.


    He gently ced Shiro on the bed while he seated beside her.


    "Sigh~let''s see..." Danzel mumbled as he brought out an empty runed contract and his magic pen, which was honestly in quite a bad state after years of use.


    "Dammit, I should even get myself a new one when I had the chance..." Heined out loud as he started to fill in the details of the contract.


    Once he finished, he confirmed that what he wrote was correct and then turned and raised Shiro''s hand with his hand.


    Raising a finger of his other hand, the enchantment of the armor created the dark sand.


    Using his sword enchantment, he shifted the sand before hardening the dark sand.


    Resulting in making one of his fingers extremely pointy.


    With that finger, he pricked one finger of Shiro, making a drop of blood flow through his finger.


    Raising his finger above the runed contract, he let the blood drop fall in the designated spot of the contract.


    By also sensing bits of his own mana, he forcefully activated the contract.


    "It has been a long time since I used this method..." He mumbled as he rolled the contract multiple times before cing it inside a 10cm ss bottle with a small string attached.


    Once the contract was inside, he wrapped the string of the ss bottle like a smile around his neck.


    Danzel then brought out Shiro''s staff while also being out the remaining fur of the white wolf and a few bones of the haired buffalo.<sub> </sub>


    He then proceeded in wrapping the staff with the white fur and using the bones to tighten the fur in ces.


    For that, Danzel had to tighten the bones and connect them all so as not to fall apart.


    Resulting in the metal staff being transformed into a white fur bone staff.


    The moon was shaped together with its small holes with rings also the light crystal matched extremely well with the staff to the point that Danzel was impressed by his own work.


    ''Damn, this could be a hobby of mine...'' Danzel joked internally as he ced the staff beside Shiro''s bed.


    His new skill was like sculpting, but with bones.


    Overall, they didn''t provide any kind of protection other than the fur allowing her to touch the metal staff without getting frostbite on her hands.


    Standing up from the bed, Danzel closed the door of the bedroom and let her rest while he was out. Going out of the house, he saw Koji and Niyuki still kneeling on the ground.


    "Protect this ce till Ie back..." Hemanded in a cold tone before passing them and going out of his way.


    He had other things to do than watch her sleeping.


    Using his extreme speed while also using [Swift Movements] to make himself faster. And soon enough, he arrived where he found the girl with a tail and the baby.


    Though finding neither of the two here.


    They already left, huh?" He mumbled as he went to the corner of the vige and jumped on top of one of the houses.


    He looked around the surroundings in hopes to see if they were still within his sight.


    s, none was in sight.


    ''Dammit, I should even have used the [Death Hunt Dagger] on that girl before leaving for Shiro. I even let valuable information leave my grasp.'' Danzel cursed internally as he jumped off the building and back to the ground.


    He then used [Blood Sense] to search for the remains of the natives of this ce [Eyes of the Damned] and only worked on the living.


    Walking around the whole vige, Danzel started picking the corpses and what remained of them before dragging them all to one ce.


    That took him a bit more than an hour before he collected all the corpses of those "fox people" and a few ice trolls.


    Thetter had minimal damage, but their size alone was an annoyance on their own, as he found it quite displeasing raising draugrs that still have flesh.


    He used his decaying touch to make all the flesh of all those corpses disappear which took another half an hour. The sight of that was quite gruesome by itself, though it was nothing that bother Danzel.


    Once he had only the bones of the corpses, he used [Undead Reconstruction] to repair and make the corpses whole again.


    He even experiment with [Bone Shaping] in changing how each of the bones looked.


    The first he tried to do was make the overallrge by stretching out the bones to make them around his size. After a few experimenting, he only managed to make around 2.10 meters from the taller "fox people" and 2 meters for the others.


    Though doing that, made their bones naturally much more fragile as he simply stretched the bones with his magic.


    For the tallest 5 of them alling from 3 men and 2 women, Danzel put them aside and provided in making drastic changes on their bodies.


    He decided to use the ice trolls'' bones as material for his "bone sculpting" and to include them in his experiments.


    In the first one, he used the ribs and make them smaller so to reinforce his backbone to make him the tallest among them even stretching his arms by using the bone of the ribs.


    He had to distribute the bone here and there to match the under part with the upper part. He also made his pointy finger slightly curved and pointy like a dagger and also changed his skull a bit.


    For the next male corpse, he did nothing more thanpletely close his eyes sockets and change bit his skull...


    He was simply curious about what will happen by doing that and nothing more.


    For the next one, he tried to tten the ribs to make it look like armor while also changing his skull to be bulgier. He wanted to see how the changes will affect his body.


    For the 2 female corpses, he simply covered one of their eye sockets.


    One of them had their left eye covered while the other had her right eye socket.


    The reason for that was to simply see how it will affect them.


    He also shaped their skulls to look different than all the others, but he also tried to make the two look simr to each other in the image of twins.


    ''I will have to upgrade that [Bone Shaping].'' Danzel was tough internally as his mana reserves were running low.


    Honestly, other than the experiments that he wanted to test, his shaping their skulls was more for the fun of it.


    And while he was admiring his work, sudden windows appear in front of him.


    [Though your pursuit of learning the secrets of Death Magic and experimenting with the dead, the talent [Lower ss Death Magic] turned into [Intermittent ss Death Magic]]


    "That was unexpected...I almost forgot that I had this." Danzel mumbled as he opened his skills and saw some new spells and skill that was added.


    "I will take a look at themter." Danzel dismissed the window as his focus was on the many corpses in front of him.


    Though he used [Bone Shaping] on all of those, the main reason for bringing all those undead wasn''t to create different-looking draugrs or create undead minions for his cause.


    Those reasons were secondary at best.


    "Let''s see how much I can improve..." Danzel said as his finger glowed in dark green light.


    The main goal of them was for him to practice his Great Runes on their bones.

 Chapter 385 Call Of Anabast

    What next followed after his preparations, was practicing runesmithing with all those corpses.


    Specifically, he would practice the hardest runes that he had avable that is.


    The Great Runes.


    While he had many other experiments to do with other runes, he could no longer postpone them.


    Their effects were simply far too powerful to simply dismiss and put at the bottom of his to-do list.


    For now, he only had two, but by just thinking of the information of how to make them, Danzel felt somewhat overwhelmed.


    Though he knew that practice makes perfect through his years of experience.


    ''Albeit this part of runesmithing sucks...'' Danzelined as he went and skipped the unique 5 and started carving on the other corpses.


    He had other ns for them.


    So he seated down and started carving.


    And as usual, the quality of the rune came out to be [Poor]. Which was within his expectations, though it sucked to see.


    The first great rune he started was the [Great Rune of World''s Gaia].


    Once he finished with the great rune, he didn''t go to the next corpse, instead, he used his [Death Rune Removal] to erase the great rune before once again trying out on the same corpse.


    Albeit that harmed the bones itself, which even his [Undead Reconstruction] couldn''t restore. More urately, he could repair the corpse itself, though by using [Rune Vision], he could see that the green light had deem and be slightly yellow.


    Though he was saddened that he couldn''t abuse the spell to have an endless amount of tries in only a single body.


    ''I guess I will have to...live with it.'' Danzel shook his shake head and regretted saying he somewhere heard once.


    The moment of distraction barelysted a few seconds before Danzel continued refining his craft.


    After 2 hours, he found out that the best that he could do was erase 3 times the great rune and still have spots to carve the rune.


    The fourth time he tried to erase the rune, they were no more spots to carve runes.


    Which made the first corpse have no great runes in its body.


    Though it''s a pity that when he raised the corpse as an undead, he wouldn''t have great runes to strengthen him.


    Though knowledge doesn''te without sacrifice.


    With the newly acquired knowledge in mind, he started carving exactly 4 of the [Great Rune of World''s Gaia] and erasing the first 3.


    Though in fact, he could carve both [Great Rune of World''s Gaia] and [Great Rune of Ruined Vessel] on them if he really squeezed them together, previously he couldn''t do that, but after [Carving Fate with Death] and the [User of Dark Arts] talent it was possible. Though erasing them after would make recarving them impossible, which he found out after sacrificing another corpse for this cause.


    If he has done that he would only manage to carve 2 great runes for each corpse.


    While he would practice both great runes at the same time, he would essentially carve 2 fewer times per corpse, which wasn''t efficient at all.


    And as of currently corpses were a limited resource.


    "For now that is..." Danzel mumbled as he finished with another corpse.


    Thanks to all his bonuses and increase of attributes to intelligence, it was much easier to finish with runes, each corpse taking up to 2 hours of none stop rune carving.


    For the rest of the day, he spends his time carving [Great Rune of World''s Gaia] till tomorrow morning.


    He then decided to check on Shiro even though he knew that she didn''t wake up.


    Although he didn''t have much knowledge of the needs of the living, at the very least he knew that water was essential for them. Food was also there, but he had no idea how he should feed her.


    He searched for some kind of bucket and simply used his sword to create an ice spear and break it into small pieces.


    "Koji...follow me." Danzelmanded as the living armor walked towards him.


    Entering the room of Shiro with the bucket full of ice, Danzel opened her mouth and gently ced a small piece of ice in her mouth.


    "Continue doing that till the bucket is empty... once one melts, put another one." Danzel said as he left the bucket in Koji''s hands before leaving to continue his work.


    Leaving Koji to tent Shiro, Danzel closed the door and stared towards Niyuki, the other living armor.


    "You, go and gather any food that there is in this vige and bring it back here together with that you judge to be useful or that it could be used as a weapon." He ordered as he went to continue his rune carving.


    ''I should even order him to do that yesterday, but oh well...'' He thought internally as he started once again doing only rune carving.


    He entirely focused on his rune only going to Shiro to fill the bucket with ice.


    Though many who saw him using his sword that contained the soul of an archmage wouldin of his use, creating ice like so was probably cleaner that picking the ice from the ground.


    Other than that, his focus was on the 60 corpses.


    Could have been more if the ice trolls didn''t eat a few of those "fox people".


    And just like that, the day passed with no signs of Shiro waking up.


    Since she wasn''t losing health and was breathing just fine, he let her be.


    It didn''t take long for the days to pass by.<sub> </sub>


    Near the end where he was finished carving, Danzel had to move the corpses with the help of Niyuki to various homes because of a snowstorm, but other than that, he finished all corpses except the 5 special ones with different bodies and skulls in the span of the next 4 days.


    In thest few tries, he managed to push the [Great Rune of World''s Gaia] to the [Good] quality, granting him surprisingly, double the XP of an Epic rune that is.


    "If I even had a hundred or so other corpses, I might have managed to bring the quality to [Perfect], but oh well..."


    Sending an internalmand, Niyuki came over.


    And with him, he dragged the now runed corpses to the outside for him to raise.


    Once done so, he dismissed the living armor as he watched across the many corpses on the snow-filled ground and then back to his status, watching the [Greater Raise Undead Lv.7].


    Thinking about it for a bit, he decided to push the spell to the 4th-tier, spending close to 1 000 000 XP by doing that.


    [Greater Raise Undead level has increased from Lv.7 to Lv8]


    [Greater Raise Undead level has increased from Lv.8 to Lv9]


    [Greater Raise Undead level has increased from Lv.9 to Lv10]


    [The skill [Greater Raise Undead] reached the Tempering Process]


    [Choise 3 of the given option and enchant 1 of the picked options]


    [Dead Mana Affinity]: the skill will be more attuned to the death attribute and change ordingly.


    [Soul Affinity]: the skill will be more attuned to soul essence and souls. The change will happen ordingly.


    [Strength Focus Minion]: The minions created by this spell will have greater strength.


    [Inteligence Focus Minion]: The minions created by this spell will have greater intelligence.


    [Agility Focus Minion]: The minions created by this spell will have greater agility.


    [Endurance Focus Minion]: The minions created by this spell will have greater endurance.


    [Command Range Increase]: the range where onemand the minions created by this spell will increase.


    [Mass Spawn]: the spell will be able to summon more minions with a minimal mana cost increase.


    [No Resource in Cost of Power]: the spell will require no materials in the cost of power.


    Seeing the options in hand, Danzel would have made a thoughtful expression if he could.


    "What to choose..." he mumbled to himself.


    ''Let''s cut the useless ones first and for all. [Mass Spawn] would work nicely on a battlefield and it would also pair well with [No Resource in Cost of Power], though that''s more of quantity than quality that we are speaking of. As I am for thetter, I hard pass on those...''


    That also meant that [Command Range Increase] is out of the picture, although it would be quite handy.


    "That leaves the attributes and the affinities..."


    He found the choice quite hard to make.


    He was weighing his options on wherever it was worth picking the [Soul affinity] for the various bonuses that he has.


    He didn''t want to make his undead ethereal and be wraiths or banshees type of undead. Also, he chose to learn how to make stronger soldiers by the use of runes, as whatever undead he would summon, would be much inferior that from a Lich or any other necromancer that focuses on summons.


    Heck, Velkir was capable to summon an army of 3rd-tier undead and by the looks of it, they looked like his inferior undead.


    Because of that, he gave up on contesting with having the best minionsing from a spell. He nned in contesting with his runes. The living armors were proof enough that powerful undead could be created by runes alone.


    ''So I will have to see how to cover something that runes can''t do...''


    He tried thinking about it in the long term based on eachbination andparing them to the living armor.


    After thinking through it, he chose to make a risky choice.


    That being picking both affinities, [Soul Affinity] and [Dead Mana Affinity], and also [Inteligence Focus Minion]. And even putting the tempering point at the [Inteligence Focus Minion] option.


    If he had no other way of creating undead, he would never make this choice, but as he had, he was fairly confident in thebination. Though he feared for them to be ethereal undead.


    Even if they did though, he would be able to create a magic caster as the back line and the living armors as the frontline of his army.


    If he ever nned to make one that is.


    Though he could probably make stronger physical types of the undead by picking strength and agility if not even endurance. He didn''t find much of a point as he himself would be miles stronger than anything he would create.


    And the stronger he would be, the stronger the gap between his minions would be.


    Thus, he confirmed his choice.


    [The Tempering Process for the skill Greater Raise Undead has been finished!]


    [Greater Raise Undead Lv.10 bes Call of Anabast Lv.1]


    Raising his hand, his dead mana leaked out and he spread it through all the corpses while simtions cast two

 Chapter 386 The Five Anabast

    Though as he was following the knowledge of his new spell, the magic that he was casting created a pitch-ck magic circle that created threads that reached out slowly toward him. he midway withdraw his dead mana from all the corpses, canceling the spell and making the pitch ck magic circle dissapear.


    "What kind of spell did I learn? It''s as if it wanted to take more mana from myself..." He said as looked at where the magic circle was.


    ''I was too hasty casting this one, I should have first read what the new spell does...'' Danzel thought internally while calling himself a dumpass.


    [Call of Anabast]: Though you call, you learned to create and summon forth the fabled Anabast with a corpse as their vessel. Extremely rare and powerful undead. Most think that they are beings from stories to scare children, while does more knowledgeable about them, calling them the reapers of necromancers or revenants, despite not being worthy to be referenced with such names. Even such information is extremely rare, to the point that their existence stays unknown to many worlds. To summon one, the magic caster has to forsake 1-100% of his mana pool so that they can anchor themselves in the mortal realm. The forsaken mana can be forced back to the magic caster no matter the distance of the Anabast, though that results in the Anabast disappearing after a short amount of time, this effect can''t be interrupted. Forsaking 1-2% of your mana pool has the chance to turn the Anabast into a Wraith hostile to you. The more mana is forsaken, the stronger the Anabast will be. If more than 55% is forsaken in a single Anabast, they will seek to take the rest. A mistake that many necromancers learn toote before their deaths.


    Danzel took his time reading his newly acquired spell to summon those so-called Anabast, but the more he continued reading, the more serious his gaze became.


    That was because the spell was way too ominous by its very nature.


    He didn''t know what kind of undead Anabast were, but referencing them as revenants who were supposed to be 5th-tier undead, they were probably very powerful.


    Also, the part about forsaking his maximum mana didn''te off well towards him, despite the skill saying that he can get it back wherever he wanted. The fact that a portion of his mana would be unavable and that those guys were traps for clueless necromancers was also a worrying point.


    "I guess my luck has run out this time around..." Danzel said as he shook his head, disappointed.


    Till now, he was quite satisfied with the [Soul Affinity] and [Dead Mana Affinity]bo that he was going with, s there was bound to be a crappy item in a treasure vault.


    He was fine in forsaking 10% of his mana for the [Armor of Death Knight] talent, as the armor was essential for his runes.


    But doing the same for potentially weaker than him minions was something that he doubted would be worth it.


    ''Though, judging as useless will be me getting ahead of myself.'' He thought internally.


    Most of the time, he had plenty of mana to use his spells and skills without minding much of his mana.


    The main glutton that eat up his mana was [Phantom Phase], even with [Undying Preservation] trying to sweat to make it cost less.


    "Giving out 1-2% of my mana is a no-go, even if weights are powerful, they will be still of the 2nd-tier and hostile towards me. And for safety sake l should give them a bit more than necessary... maybe 4%?" Danzel mumbled to himself as looked at the many corpses in front of him.


    ''Mhm, let''s do 5% each. Though I got to deal with those first of all.'' He thought as he spread his dead mana to all the corpses and cast two [Greater Raise Undead] of the 10 levels.


    The given dead mana was sucked to each of the 55 corpses in almost an instant before each of them awoken their ethereal dark green eyes simr to Danzel''s.


    Each of the Draugr was at least 2 meters tall and held the strength that reached out to the 3rd-tier thanks to the runes increasing their strength and body toughness together with other various resistances and even giving them the basic affinity of all-natural elements.


    Without the runes, those draugrs would be considered the peak of the 2nd-tier based on attributes, but with the runes, they were capable to touch the first step of the 3rd-tier.


    "Our will is yours tomand, our liege~." All the newly created draugrs said simultaneously with their eerie voice before kneeling before their creator, Rue Danzel.


    ''No problems with the runes or their bodies, that''s a good sign.'' Danzel nodded internally before turning his back to them, focusing on the 5 tallest and reshaped corpses.


    "Let''s see if you are worthy..." Danzel mumbled as he followed the knowledge inside his head to cast [Call of Anabast].


    From his hand, dead mana escaped before flowing into the air, slowly creating a pitch-ck magic circle.


    And unlike before where there were many ck threads reaching out, this time came 5rge dark hands slowly reaching towards him.


    "Quite slow for a spell... also the hands seem to react to the targeted corpses." Danzel mumbled as he guide the ever-slow ck arms to pass through his armor and touch one of his ribs.


    The touch of the ck hands felt extremely uputable to the point that Danzel was surprised, it felt as if the ck arms were cing some kind of marking on his very soul, it wasn''t inside his soul, but right outside like some kind of tattoo, but on one''s soul and body that is. That alone made him reconsider the spell, though the knowledge he receive had also the ways to remove those markings.


    ''So that''s how they get my mana...'' He thought internally,


    Though worried some, that didn''t stop him from stopping the spell.


    The next part he found quite difficult but at the same time quite reassuring. As the man wasn''t leaving his soul, but was merely being saved inside the markings and not leaving his body.


    Though he never really worked with his very own soul and franklycked the knowledge to interact when being in the physical realm, it was hard.<sub> </sub>


    He also understands why 1-2% wouldn''t have worked out.


    Those markings were both separate, each marking having a copy of itself in the body and soul. Both made some sort of connection with each other to share the mana. Danzel body and soul are attributed to his total mana in a way.


    And when Danzel finished giving each hand 5% of his mana, the ck hands moved back inside the pitch ck magic circle before traveling slowly towards the 5 special corpses and for each hand, they touched the spine of one corpse, leaving another mark, which contracted the other marks on him.


    There were a total of 3 markings, with each requiring at least 1% percent, that was the true reason why this spell would have not worked out.


    Maybe even 3% was pushing the limits of the spell.


    As for the spell, once the markings were ced by the hands, they withdraw right back inside the pitch-ck magic circle.


    Once back inside, Danzel then had to put an insane amount of mana inside the magic circle just to activate it.


    But once he was done, one by one, 5 extremelyrge shadows escaped through the magic circle that was glowing in dark light.


    The 5 shadows then flew towards the 5 avable corpses and the shadows moved as if they were inspecting the 5 corpses, the first shadow that came out chose the tallest corpse with no ribs with the others picked one of their own.


    Once inside, ring dark green eyes appeared in each of those corpses except for one of them and then let out an unnatural.


    "Gaaaaaahhhhh!!!!"


    "Gaaaaaahhhhh!!!!"


    "Gaaaaaahhhhh!!!!"


    "Gaaaaaahhhhh!!!!"


    "Gaaaaaahhhhh!!!!"


    The next thing that happend was that the shadows started to emerge from their body and cover them, as each of them let out a death aura simr to Danzel when he was a Wight.


    Their bones were soon hidden within shadows just like their ethereal ring eyes as their bodies started to rise up and levitate off the ground.


    Each of their bodies started to be taller and the shadows formed long-sleeved robes with a hood thatpletely hid any signs that their bodies were of bones.


    Even their hands had shadows flickering ominously.


    Albeit those who knew of Anabast considered them as some kind of ethereal undead, that was half the truth.


    Their bodies function like the other ethereal undead such as wraiths or banshees, but their bodies were also physical. Which was hidden within their shadows and only when they chose would they reveal it to others.


    That was the case right now.


    The shadows hiding their skulls dissipated and were reced with the ring skull that Danzel shaped uniquely before. All of them except the one that had no eye sockets revealed their skulls as they turned toward Danzel.


    "You called upon us, Creator?"


    "You called upon us, Creator?"


    "You called upon us, Creator?"


    "You called upon us, Creator?"


    "You called upon us, Creator?"


    Each of them said in their eerie and ominious cold voice.

 Chapter 387 The Five Anabast (2)

    With them showing off their immense death aura, Danzel only finds it fitting to reveal his own.


    Slowly, his dead mana slipped out of his armor naturally and mixed with his aura before it exploded outwards to all the undead and the 5 Anabast.


    Making the draugr''s gaze in awe and the Anabast feel as if they were nothing before this undead.


    If one were topare their death aura in a battlefield, the aura of draugrs would seem to be bloodthirsty warriors.


    The Anabast auras would be like a giant reaper reaping through masses with ease.


    As for Danzel, his aura would seem like a giant skeleton carving through the whole battlefield with his sword, ughtering and altering the battlefield itself whileughing.


    To the undead, it brought forth both awe and fear upon such existences far above their own.


    "I indeed called you, though wherever you remain to serve or not is yet to be determined." Danzel said with his cold voice, snapping the Anabast off their awe in his aura.


    Though his words brought confusion upon them. As they didn''t understand what he meant.


    Danzel didn''t go ahead to exin what he meant, instead he raised his arm and pointed towards the first Anabast that was also the tallest.


    Using [Grasp of the Undying], an invisible ethereal skeleton hand reached out towards the skull of ribless Anabast.


    Before the ethereal skeleton hand was about to touch its skull, unexpectedly the Anabast that didn''t have eye sockets turned his head towards the ribless one as if he was seeing the ethereal invisible hand.


    That of course didn''t go unnoticed by Danzel.


    ''Hoh? He can see it?'' Hements internally as the ethereal hand use one finger to tap the skull of the ribless one, making the skeleton hand appear.


    The ribless Anabast imminently after noticing his skull being touched didn''t even waste a split moment to back off several meters back.


    Around his arms was mana being channeled as its ethereal dark green ring eyes stared at the ethereal hand with caution and focus.


    Danzel nodded at his quick reaction, but what he aimed wasn''t to use [Grasp of the Undying] to harm him, but to make a contract to open his status.


    Ignoring the wary Anabast, Danzel gazed upon the status screen of his new undead.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Level: 70


    Race: Anabast


    ss: [Death Shadow Magic Caster Lv.1]


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 11407/11407


    Mana: 13 000/13 000


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 650 Agility: 750 Intelligence: 1000 Endurance: 350


    Talents: [Exalted Undead] [Fabled Undead] [Reinforced Soul] [Magical Talent] [Talent of Affinity] [Unique Consciousness ] [Greater Dead Mana Affinity] [Dead Mana Resilience] [User of Dark Arts] [Feared Existence] [Ever Lasting Manifistation] [Shadow Body] [Fire Affinity] [Water Affinity] [Ice Affinity] [Nature Affinity] [Earth Affinity] [Air Affinity] [Lighting Affinity] [Dark Affinity] [Mark of Call] [Undead Servant] [Subordinate of Death Knight] [Negative Effects Resistance] [Shaped Body: Hands]


    Skill: [Robe of Shadows Lv.8] [Shadow Movement Lv.7] [True Death Lv.6] [Drain Life Lv.3] [Eyes in Shadows Lv.4] [Final Word Kill Lv.1] [Death Sharing Presence Lv.1] [Animate Shadow Lv.1] [Shadow Effigy Lv.1] [Death Shadow Bolt Lv. 3] [Death Shadow in Descend Lv.[Max.]] [Calling Illusion Lv.2] [Scare the Young Lv.1] [Shadow Entity Lv. 3] [Tempting Voice Lv.5]


    [Remark: A 3rd-tier Undead wearing the shadows of death as his robes and using its magic to inflict death. Information about them is scarce and those who fought them called them immortal shadows or revenants. If you spot one of that undead, death is but certain. Even those matching their power need a miracle to survive once their shadows taint the world. This Anabast is a servant of the Death Knight named Rue Danzel. His master also carved Great Runes upon this Anabast body.


    Reading through the status of the ribless one, Danzel would even frown if he could.


    They were many many anomalies that he found out through the status of the Anabast.


    A few of them were the [Exalted Undead], [Feared Existence], and [Death Shadow in Descend Lv.[Max.]], a maxed-out skill that was a first.


    He found those two talents quite weird because they were supposed only to be unlocked when an undead reached the 4th-tier.


    Even if his [Shadow Entity] was the Anabast version of his [Unceasing Soul of Death Essence] that granted him the [Exalted Undead] talent, [Feared Existence] was reserved for only the 4th-tier undead if he were to trust the description of the talent.


    Having it should have meant that this undead in front of him was of the 4th-tier, but his level as much as his remark suggested that it was a 3rd-tier undead.


    As for the maxed-out skill that they had, he didn''t even know what to think of it, as he has never seen a fully maxed-out skill.


    Even when he upgraded a skill to the max level of 10, it would still not show up like [Max.].


    For all he knew, that skill can be of the 5th tier, if not above if a higher tier than the 5th existed. That, or the skill was of the lower tier and reached a point where it can''t improve further.


    What also surprised him were his attributes.


    Sure,pared to him, they were mainly low, but if you consider that this Anabast didn''t have a sub-ss yet...


    He went ahead to read through his skills and talents, which resulted in many of his answers being answered.


    The most interesting from the talents side were [Fabled Undead], [Talent of Affinity] [Ever Lasting Manifistation], and [Subordinate of Death Knight].


    [Fabled Undead] was the reason why the Anabast had the 4th-tier talents and [Exalted Undead].


    What it did was essentially upgrade your race talent while also opening some skills and talents of a tier above his own, which exined [User of Dark Arts] and [Feared Existence].


    [Talent of Affinity] in turn randomly upgrade one of the magical affinities or generated a new affinity, which in the ribless Anabast case, was the [Dead mana Affinity], making it [Greater Dead Mana Affinity].


    [Subordinate of Death Knight] was in turn also something he just noticed.


    It essentially raised all the stats by 5%, which was pretty good.


    Though the most interesting and most powerful of all its abilities was [Ever Lasting Manifistation].


    [Ever Lasting Manifistation]: The unique ability solely reserved for Anabast, the Immortal Shadows of Death. Their existence shall never vanish even if their soul and body are destroyed and even if they were to be destroyed, they will manifest once more after a millennium with both body and soul repaired. Additionally, this effect in turn reduces the total Health of Anabast by 50% while also every 2 secondspletely recovering 100% of their health. This effect can''t be negated or affected with heal reduction effects. Making their ability to manifest evesting for all eternity. Can''t stay in the physical realm without some kind of support.<sub> </sub>


    The fact that a soul can be repaired was incredible knowledge on its own, but their second effect of theirs was stupidly incredible.


    Their health being reduced to half was a really big downside as their bodies will be less tough and other effects could one-shot them, but the fact ofpletely recovering after 2 seconds was way too good...


    As for his skills, the most interesting was the maxed-out one, but when he tried to see through the information, all he saw was [???] despite being able to read the name.


    Other than that one, he had some instant death spells just as [True Death] and [Final Word Kill], but the most useful ones that he saw were [Eyes in Shadows], [Death Sharing Presence], and [Drain Life].


    The first two were a skill with thest being a spell.


    [Eyes in Shadows] allowed Anabast to stay inside the shadows of others and travel with them while also being able to watch the outside world.


    [Death Sharing Presence] in turn was an aoe activable passive that temporarily reduced the maximum health of the living by 0.1% every 2 seconds and it stops when the enemy''s health is reduced by 50%. And once 50% was reached, the change of instant death spells to activate is increased by 50% of the effects changes.


    As for [Drain Life], it was very simr to his [Grasp of the Undying].


    It literally drained a portion of vitality and turned it into mana for the magic caster.


    As for his other abilities, while they were interesting, they weren''t as powerful as the other ones, except [Mark of Call] talent.


    Which potentially was a monstrous talent.


    It essentially increased the effectiveness of all spells by the amount he has forsaken.


    Since he gave 5%, that talent only gave them a 5% bonus on all their spells.


    ''But if I gave one of them all my mana, how much power would they have be...'' Danzel thought as he looked at the 5 Anabast.


    Of course, he noticed that their true strength was against the living and not the undead such as him. So he didn''t fear being killed by them.


    ''Though that shouldn''t be possible as they have the [Undead Servant] talent and I also can cancel their anchor but seeing how Shiro ended up, I shouldn''t fully trust the information of the status...'' He thought as he read every single detail of their status just in case there was some kind of abilities that can lift away his control over them.


    He even checked the over 4, which surprisingly weren''t the same.


    Each of them had a talent that had something to do with how he shaped them and [Talent Affiniy] chose another affinity or make them have an additional affinity that the others didn''t have.


    And the one Anabast that didn''t have any eye sockets seemed to gain a talent that granted him some kind of mana sight. Which exined how he saw through his [Grasp of the Undying] despite supposedly being invisible.


    "You five asked me if I called upon you. That isn''t entirely right." Danzel said with his cold voice as he drew his sword from his sheath.


    "I created you five and I also gave a portion of my mana to anchor yourself in this ne, to serve. Albeit I ain''t going lying to you, your strength isckingpared to the investment that I made." Danzel said with an ice-cold voice towards the five Anabast.


    Hearing his cold words, the five Anabast red their eyes before them going to the ground and falling to their knees with their arms to the ground.


    "O the Creator of us. What can we do for you to not forsake us?" The ribless Anabast said with his eerie and cold voice of the dead.


    Despite theck of facial expression of skeleton type of undead, though with his connection to them being stronger than those of his draugrs, Danzel could feel faint emotion from them.


    Each of them held a certain fear within them the moment he said of withdrawing their anchors.


    The two eyes Anabast were the most distressed by his words but keptpletely still so as not to show it.


    The one whose bones tten like armor, despite being covered in those robes had the most apathy in their situation. It was as if he would ept any oue of his decision.


    As for the one who spoke for all of them, he had the biggest emotion of fear and urgency among them. Though thetter wasn''t affected by the former for reasons that Danzel couldn''t understand.


    But despite each of them having some certain fear within them, the most surprising emotion was of the "blind" Anabast, who held a strong emotion of awe towards him.


    Experiencing this for the first time, Danzel somewhat froze as he digested this new experience.


    Of course, for the Anabast, his silence made them feel as if the whole world was bing heavier.


    Despite their strength is incredible, they were still newborn undead with little to no knowledge except the one that they had since they were made.


    They didn''t know what will happen if their creator forsook the anchor binding them here, but they had an ingrained feeling that something bad will happen to them.


    They feared being abandoned by their creator, but the fear of the unknown was as terrifying as their abandonment.


    "It''s simple really, you just have to prove to me that you are worth keeping. At least more worth that the mana that I granted you all." Danzel said as he pointed his sword toward them, making them stare at the sword with hesitation.


    His will ran through them and they knew that this will be a test.


    They slowly levitated through the ground from their kneeling position as mana ran through their bodies. Their hoods made out of shadows were slowly being submerged by the same shadows while their death aura slowly escaped their bodies.


    Danzel matched them with his death aura as his sword was covered with an ominous dark green mana.


    Though, before they could get to it, the small ss bottle hanging through his neck containing a piece of paper suddenly burst with dark green mes, making the ss bottle explode into tiny pieces.


    Danzel nkly looked at the ss bottle that exploded before swinging his sword aimlessly to the side and withdrawing his mana and death aura.


    "Though, that day will have to wait it seems. For now, stay here and familiarize yourself with your strength." Danzel said towards the Anabast as he turned towards the drugs.


    "And you all! In that house, there is stuff to be used as weapons, chose any of you liking." Danzel pointed at the house where he gather the vige''s weapons and his own weapons from his storage ring.


    Turning his back, Danzel started walking away from them all as he gather his mana to use [Phantom Phase].


    Before he could though, the ribless Anabast said in a worrying voice.


    "Where will you be going, Creator?"


    Danzel turned his head and stared at them all who revealed their skulls once more.


    "I have some...business to attend, for now, wait here." Danzel said as he was shrouded with dark green mist.


    And the mist that covered moved an extremely fast-paced.


    All that the five Anabast could do, was stared at the speed of the dark mist.

 Chapter 388 Arriving And Waking Up

    A day before Danzel raised the natives as his undead and summon upon the nightmarish Anabast''s, thest remaining survivors of this vige.


    Alka that held the baby was walking upon those frozennds.


    She held the baby of the couple inside her clothes to her chest while also stuffing her fluffy tail inside her front in order to keep the babyfortable and warm, despite how ufortable it was to hold her tail in such a position.


    She held both her tail and the baby with one hand while the other was just hanging there.


    She suddenly felt a pinch of pain in her tail.


    Once she turned her head down, she saw how the baby was drawing the fur of her tail and attempting if the hair could be drawn out or not. While doing so, the baby had a smile and was giggling to herself.


    Seeing such an innocent smile after having seen her whole vige destroyed, put a bitter smile on her.


    "You really a lucky girl...if not favored by the gods themselves..." Alka mumbled as she quickly made a prayer to the god of the hunt.


    Though once she did, her thoughts were broken by those ethereal dark green eyes that she saw. Making her hand hang to ache in pain.


    ''We really are lucky to escape...'' She tried to remember what she saw, the cover with the metal darker than she had ever seen and strong enough that even the axe her father couldn''t even prate the dark metal.


    Just raising his ominous sharp metal, the monster fell to the knees with means beyond her very understanding and it send shivers through her body.


    "Maybe it''s the cold getting to me..." She mumbled as though the distance he saw several builds much bigger than her vige to form.


    Looking at her legs, they were bright red from the cold.


    If it weren''t for the boots that her mate had gifted her, her legs might have long ago given out.


    If it weren''t for her mother had bought the Bekai''mou milk not long ago, the baby that she was carrying would had starve.


    Though her mother got the milk for her, she was sure that she would forgive her for using it like this.


    The meat that her father brought, despite just being dried meat, kept her from falling into exhaustion.


    "S-Sorry everyone...sorry that I Ieft you all."


    Despite knowing that it wasn''t her fault and it was only of those ice troll hunters, she still felt guilty.


    So she started running towards the distant houses despite her body screaming for a break, just so that she would get distracted by such thoughts.


    As she came closer, Alka started seeing two figures.


    ''They must be the guards'' She thought as she continued running as her vision started to be teary and blurry.


    She knew running like that will make them worry, but she couldn''t stop now, if she did her body will copse from the umted exhaustion.


    "Hey, you~! Stop~!"


    She faintly heard their warnings.


    At this point, her whole world was shaking from dizziness. Which made her trip face forward.


    Luckily, she used her hand to barely catch herself so as to not fall on top of the baby.


    "Haah~Haah~" With her heavy breathing while her head burning, she fell to the ground sideways.


    Using the same hand that caught her, she put it to her chest and brought out the baby, and ced it on the ground with the little strength that she had.


    She could faintly hear the baby crying and the two guardsing her way.


    "T-The baby..." She muttered before her hand fell to the ground. The umted exhaustion finally reached its peak and forced Alka''s body to fall unconscious.


    The guards that swiftly arrived, were surprised to see a young girl copsed with a baby pushed towards them.


    "Hey! Alright!?"


    One of them went to his knees and checked at Alka and the other picked up the crying baby and awkwardly moved it back and forth to calm her down.


    "Sghhh~ there, there, you are safe now~. Do you know her?" The one carrying the baby asked.


    The other shook his head.


    "No, I don''t recognize her, must be from a vige."


    "But why did shee here alone? She even brought a baby with her..."


    They were quite unsure of what to do as guards with an outsideing and falling to the ground.


    And as they were discussing what to do, suddenly a woman with a white wooden mask appeared behind them with a man holding a shepherd''s staff running towards them.


    Seeing who it was, the two guards were surprised, but upon recognizing her, they calmed down.


    "My Lady~"


    "My Lady~"


    They said while slightly tilting their heads down.


    "What are you doing? Bring the baby and her inside, they will die outside with this cold." The woman with the wooden mask said as she reached out to Alka.


    And as she did, she identally shifted her front cloth a bit to the side, allowing the woman with the wooden white mask to see something ck on her skin.


    "Huh?"<sub> </sub>


    Frowning behind the mask, she pulled on her cloth so to reveal her shoulder and arm.


    Though once she did, her eyes behind the mask widen in surprise upon seeing arge spot of her hand being wither and ck from severe necrosis.


    The man with the Shepherds arrived and looked at ck skin of Alka shocked.


    "Mydy, this is~"


    Before he could finish, the woman with the wooden white beat him to it.


    "The mark of death..." She said with a grave voice as she looked at the two guards.


    "Take her to my house and provide her baby with care. I won''t take a no as an answer."


    The guards were for a moment hesitant upon seeing Alka''s ck skin, but they nodded regardless of how they felt.


    "Let me help you carry her." The man with the shepherd''s staff said as the guards nodded.


    The woman with the wooden white mask stared at their backs, deep in thought.


    ''First the guardian and then her with the mark of death...'' She thought as she turned around to see where the young girl came from.


    "This might be more serious than it looks like..."


    She went to one of her knees and took a prayer position.


    ''Hear me thee O primordial god of the wild hunt, is a trial waiting for my people? Or the wrath of the gods?'' She prayed.


    ***


    Shiro''s POV:


    Opening slowly her heavy eyelids, Shiro gazed left and right, scanning the room that she was in.


    "Where am I?" She mumbled as she tried to stand up, only for her whole body to ache in pain.


    "Agh..."


    Giving up on standing up, she let her body fall and stared at the wooden ceiling aimlessly.


    "It seems that it happend again..." She said while her finger raised her now longer hair to see.


    Remembering the pain that she had to go through once more, she almost wanted to cry herself to sleep.


    Almost.


    Her throat was feeling extremely dry and she was practically starving. Not only that, but she also felt that her clothes were full of dried sweat.


    She felt extremely ufortable, sleeping again.


    "He must even bring me here..." She mumbled to herself as she let herself experience the bed that she was on. Though she was used to sleeping in rough ces as she traveled with her grandpa constantly, the few days on those snow-fillednds were one of the worst ces to sleep.


    And while she was thinking of what to do next, an ice-cold voice arrived in the room.


    "About time you woke up." The cold voice said, coughing Shiro''s attention.


    Looking at the door, she saw how the dark green mist was escaping through the gaps of the wooden door and slowly gathering to a single ce and forming an under with dark armor.


    ''Scary...'' Shiro said internally as she looked at the death knight manifesting in front of her.


    She stared at the dark green mist in fascination, trying to figure out how to make one mana to have the such result, though she had no idea of where to begin.


    "Rue..." She said in pain from her dried throat.


    "You are aware that you were extremely close to dying no? If I weren''t there, your mana would have eaten upon your whole vitality." Danzel said as he walked towards the side of her bed.


    "Albeit you would have probably survived because of a certain trait of yours, a body with no vitality is simr to a corpse. Quite interesting to be frank, though you dying on me will make my efforts till now meaningless." Danzel said as he started down on her.


    He next brought various items out of nothing from his storage ring.


    Shiro felt somewhat jealous of him having such a convenient magic item in his hands. Though such thoughts were quickly gone after seeing the best meal ever since she arrived on those frozennds.


    Danzel, in turn, wasn''t much interested in her excitement and simply took her staff that he ced near her bed before and ce it to the side of her.


    "First of all, eat those and restore your nutrients, I found them in the other house nearby and as far as I am aware, they should be eatable..." Danzel said as he continued throwing food in front of her.


    "As I expect you to know, for the living to regenerate their bodies, they need nutrients regardless of the circumstance. Though others use fewer nutrients than others to heal the exact same amount, they fundamentally need them as fuel for their healing. As something can''t appear without some sort of energy." Danzel exined as Shiro looked at him confused.


    "Once you restore a certain amount, use your magic and heal your body. then repeat. The staff should make your magic more efficient so use it, despite not having done its runes. Repeat till you reached your peak condition. As I couldn''t feed you while you were asleep.


    Hearing all that, Shiro was frankly quite stupified as she looked at the staff and her food and then back at him.


    She understand what Rue was trying to do, but, she was suspecting that he didn''t know that the living had first to digest their food and couldn''t just throw whatever wasbeled as food and make it to nutrients.


    ''Should I exin it to him or not?'' She thought internally to herself.


    Of course, seeing her silence, Danzel took it as hesitation.


    "What are you waiting for? I still need to hear how that growth of yours happens and why." Danzel said.


    Shiro felt he was staring at her with an expression that said "hurry up and finish" despite his skull having no facial features. Though his ring scary eyes had pretty much the same effect.

 Chapter 389 Lifespan And Learning Experiment

    In the end, Shiro ended up exining how food needed to be digested and all before casting her healing spell.


    She could cast the spell despite how tired she was.


    But doing that would strain her body and potentially shrink her muscles while also risking organ failure to happen.


    And since her body was fine and she onlycked vitality, it was much harder to recover with magic with her body in such a state.


    Danzel was somewhat knowledgeable of this fact too, so he simply nodded at her.


    He remembered reading in one of Velkir''s books of necromancy went about how repairing an undead body wasn''t as efficient as the living.


    Which made healing skills for the undead quite taxing in mana.


    But on the plus side,pared to that minor weakness, they didn''t have to restore flesh like the living, which cost mana too. At least that was the case for the skeleton-type undead.


    He didn''t know how it worked on other undead like ghouls or ethereal undead.


    Understanding her point nheless, he waited for Shiro to finish eating before talking about her certain condition.


    And she eat...a lot more than he expected.


    Though she was first hesitant to try this white liquid, she seemed to enjoy it to the point she asked even more. Albeit, that was all the "milk" that he found in this vige, which after sharing that news made her sulk a bit before finishing her meal.


    ''Or would a feast be more appropriate?'' Danzel thought before shaking such useless thoughts away.


    ''If I remember right, thees from that big animal that I killed before, but where ites from...'' Danzel had no idea.


    He tried to remember if there was some of that "milk" when he butchered that animal, but no memories came to mind.


    In the end, he shrugged it off and focus on Shiro who was finishing her "feast" with thest remaining milk in a wooden cup.


    "Haah~delicious," Shiro said with a satisfied grin as she put the cup to the side while above her limps were still bits of milk being there.


    "Alright, I am done. What do you want to know about?" She said while focusing on Danzel.


    ''...''


    "...I want to know why you have the such condition and how you got it. Also what exactly triggers a such reaction in your body."


    Shiro put on a thoughtful and serious expression as she touched her chin with her hand, which with the milk above her limps make her look quite silly despite how serious she looked.


    "Alright, I will tell you." Shiro nodded her head.


    "..."


    "Though to be honest with you, I don''t know why I have such a condition. All I know is what my grandpa told me, as I was too young when I received this...sickness. I-"


    "Wait there, received?So you weren''t born with it?" Danzel asked.


    "Eh? E-Ehm...apparently I wasn''t born with it, at least that''s what my grandpa told me. When it happend I was way too young to remember...around 3 years old? Unlike humans, we Nagaiki Oni live much~much longer than them." She said while lowering her head to look at her long hair and nails.


    "We also grow faster in our early years till we first reach adulthood. ording to grandpa, we be an adult when we reached 35 years of age as that''s when our hastening to grow stops and our total lifespan is around 500-1500 years, if not more, grandpa told me that it depends on how much we can extend our horns, but that isn''t the case for Shiro..." She said while letting her hands fall to the bed on top of her hair.


    "Because of my condition, my body grows much faster than those of my race. I am only 13 years old and yet my body is that of someone above 25 years..." She said somewhat depressed.


    ''A lifespan of potential 1500 years and possibly more... not better than my immortality, butpared to humans, that''s an awfully long time. And with the informationing from Agares, then he possibly could be more than 1000 years old. Not as old as Velkir I guess, but still...''


    Though it was quite surprising, it wasn''t mind-blowing to say the less as he knew beings that were immortal just like him.


    But even then, he could understand as of why those with finite lifespans would be discouraged by them growing faster. As he knew what came after death.


    ''It also exins why Agares sought out Velkir in the first ce...''


    He always wondered why Agares started doing mercenary work when he clearly didn''t want Shiro to get dragged in.


    ''He must have asked Velkir for ways to fix it and considering that I saw it happend, there must be a treatment, but no cure...'' Danzel despite connecting the dots, still wanted to hear it from her.


    "If I am not wrong, Agares and you went seeking help from Velkir, though seeing you still have it, there isn''t a cure, but there is a treatment, right? Do you know what it is?"


    Shiro shook her head.


    "No, I don''t know. Master Velkir said that he maniptes my mana without using any of his own to dy the sickness from happening and lessens the pain. But I don''t know how he did it..."


    "I see." Danzel nodded his head in understanding.


    ''In short, we are screwed.''<sub> </sub>


    Although what she said was simple enough, actually doing it was hundreds of times harder.


    Manipting mana that was everywhere and manipting mana that was owned by someone else while inside their body?


    Even he couldn''t do it.


    Maybe he could make a change if he used his own mana to go inside her body and forcibly move her own mana, but that by itself would be extremely hard to do and harming by itself for many reasons.


    And she is talking about doing this exact thing without any usage of mana?


    Impossible.


    At least for him, it was impossible.


    ''That means that I will have to gain more of that troll blood for just in case her talents try to kill her again. Despite how inefficient I am using the blood...''


    "I understand your current situation and I can think of a few ways so that you won''t die, but as for the pain..." Danzel shook his head.


    "In any case, how did you receive such...sickness?"


    "My grandpa told me that a wave of mana hit our vige... and that I and grandpa are the only survivors, with me getting this sickness. At least that''s what he told me, I-I was too young to remember. Mostly it happens when I use mana, but it also can happend randomly, I-I don''t know what causes it..." She said, her voice growing more depressed.


    Seeing her mood, Danzel decided to call off his questions for today.


    "That should do it for today. Can you walk?"


    Shiro tried, to get up from the bed, though her whole body ached in pain before deciding to give up.


    "It hurts..."


    "I see...I guess we will wait a few days till you recover before leaving this vige. For now rest." Danzel said while going towards the door to leave.


    "W-Wait Rue!" Shiro said identally too loud.


    "What?" Danzel turned his head around, his ring dark green eyes ring at her, his eyes showing little to no emotion.


    "E-Ehm...you see, would it be possible to...like, borrow one of your books while you are not here? It will be quite boring if Iy here all day..."


    With her request, Danzel stayed silent as he thought of something.


    "I-I promise that I won''t damage them the slightest! I will take care of them!" She said nervously and yet full of determination.


    Danzel found it quite ironic how she, who loved magic to this extent,has her lifespan reduced by the source of magic itself.


    Honestly, he didn''t like the idea of giving his books to her unsupervised, as those were extremely valued items to him.


    But remembering the Anabast that he summoned, an idea of an experiment crossed his mind.


    ''What if they are able to learn? The content of those books?'' He thought internally.


    Not only did they have the [Magical Talent] talent, but they also had a various amount of affinities. Their intelligence attribute was also high. Although those numbers didn''t disy how wit or clever you actually are, they improved the efficiency of one''s mind by a lot.


    Though it went till the 3rd-tier those books, the Anabast were of the 3rd-tier too. Once the idea sprout inside his mind, he wanted to test it, but Velkir told him once not to spread such knowledge willy-nilly or those he doesn''t trust.


    But as the Anabast was essentially bound to him and had a connection with him, he guessed it would be fine to share Velkir''s knowledge with them.


    Though for that, he needed multiple books and not just one set.


    And looking at Shiro, he brought out all his books of magic except the one of Nersan¡ärah and ced them at Shiro''s side.


    "Sure, but you will have to do something for me in return. Just like our previous deal." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Shiro looked at the books in fascination before remembering Danzel''s words, making her face turn serious as she remembered that nothing was free with this petty undead.


    "What will that be?" She said while looking at Danzel with suspicion.


    In the next moment, Danzel brought out all his remaining rune contracts, which were stacks of papers.


    "It''s simple really, you just have to help me make some copies of those books."


    Though using the runed contracts could be considered wasteful and would essentially exhaust most of his supplies of paper, Danzel decided to use them regardless just to honor Velkir''s wish.


    And make sure that other than them, no one will get to see the content of those books except their owners and the creator himself.

 Chapter 390 Rise With Him Or Be Left Behind

    Danzel liked the idea so much, that he decided to stay with Shiro and work on those books.


    Shiro would do the copying while he would try to make the book frame.


    Which was much harder to do than he had anticipated.


    First of all, Danzel had no glue of any sort to stick to any wood. Also, he quickly abandoned the idea of making the books out of wood as in his storage ring, he only had a few magic items and weapons. No tools of any sort.


    Which forced him to rely on his newly acquired skill, [Bone Shaping] to make the actual books.


    And once he started experimenting with this idea, Shiro gazed at him weirdly and faintly disgusted, though he ignored her.


    ''It''s much harder than I had thought to be...'' He said internally as his first prototype failed.


    He tried to do something simr with Shiro''s fox mask that was connected with her hood on those books, though piercing the paper with bones turns out to be a terrible idea.


    He saw iting, but he still wanted to try his luck.


    The next prototype he made was the book of 3 pieces.


    One piece will hold the papers and the other two that will be the cover of the book.


    On the piece that will hold the papers, he went and simply made fine thin lines, barely enough to fit one page. And once inside the thin opening, he would slightly press the thin line to secure the piece of paper.


    Though that brought another problem.


    And that to turn a page, one had to slightly fold the paper, which would damage the paper over time.


    Not the best solution, but Danzel decided to stick with it.


    ''I just have to make the paper more durable if that''s the case.'' He thought to himself.


    And that''s exactly what he did with the help of runes.


    While he had only one rune that worked on paper, that just meant that he just had to make another rune that is "carvable". Not the easiest of works, but through his experience as a runesmith, it wasn''t impossible.


    Since he also just aimed to slightly increase the durability of the paper, the rune itself wouldn''t put much of a strain on the material. Albeit paper was already a difficult material to work with and quite fragile for his runes.


    Albeit he seeded in creating such a rune on his first try, the effect of the rune wasn''t as great as Danzel wanted. It was good enough.


    It would have been better to perfect such a rune, but he didn''t want to waste his time on things like that.


    And since the rune wasn''t thatplex, it took him only a few minutes to be done with it.


    That''s how he spends the day and the one after.


    He gave Shiro his worn-out mana pen while he was carving the small runes on each page. It was quite boring work, though Shiro constantly asking questions based on the content of those books made the whole task a bit more lively.


    Sometimes he would stop and exin the few things that he understood while other times he would shake his head as he didn''t understandpletely the content of the book.


    Realizing that he knew best of necromancy, Shiro focused her question on this school of magic.


    Danzel was at first somewhat hesitant in teaching her necromancy, but now he didn''t even care as she saw the content of the necromancy book from Velkir.


    In fact, now that she had vague, very vague directions of where to start, it would have been more dangerous not to teach her necromancy.


    Of course, even in that case, he wouldn''t do it for free.


    And when they both finished making copies of the books, Shiro gave him a sour look when he told her that he won''t make copies for her.


    Though she could onlyin and fall asleep as she practically stayed up for two days up.


    Danzel decided to let her and left, leaving the two living armors to guard her.


    In his hands, Danzel held 5 especially thick books in his hand.


    They were so thick, that Danzel was confident that he could smash someone''s head with them. The reason for them being so thick was because they contained 3 books worth of content inside them.


    It exhausted all his contracts, leaving him with only 10 remainings, but if what he nned really worked, then it was a worthwhile investment.


    ''If it doesn''t goes the way I hope so, worst case scenario...I will remove the Anabast.'' Danzel said as he stared at the books.


    They wererge, but for his size, they were quite fine. And the Anabast were around his size even though they appeared taller when they floated around. But he somewhat found those books quite in as the bones were quite t.


    Halting his steps, Danzel went to one of the houses and seated on the stair in front of the house.


    "Hmm...how should I change it? The books are about magic focused around" He mumbled to himself.


    [Elemental Magic of Spell studies] focused on elemental magic


    [Studies of necromancy by Revivor Veleron] was of necromancy.


    Andstly, [Learning of wicked magic for beginners] contained overall knowledge about magic with a focus on more "wicked magic" and how to use them. It was the only book that went up to the 2nd-tier, but as far as it was the easiest to understand.


    All 3 of them were meant to be used for beginners until the 3rd-tier and their journey towards 4th-tier.


    Keeping that in mind, Danzel started changing the shape of the front cover to match all those 3 books.


    First, he made a skull in the middle of the cover to represent the content of necromancy.


    Second, he focused on elemental knowledge.


    He simply made on each corner the basics of the elements, water, air, earth, and fire.


    Of course, they were many moreplex elements existing, but just doing the basic ones was him stretching his artistic sense to the very limit.


    Then shaped chains 90 degrees on each corner to represent thest book.


    Andstly, behind the skull, he faintly made what looked like a magic circle.


    It came quite ominous as it was made out of the bones of the ice trolls and it wasn''t overwhelming with details for the cover to look like a mess.<sub> </sub>


    That work alone took him an hour long, but copying it to the 4 other books took only half that time.


    And after almost 2 days, Danzel went back to meet all his creations.


    Putting the books in his storage ring, Danzel equipped his shield before turning into a mist.


    Moving at an extronery pace, it took him mere moments before he arrive where he left this undead.


    The Anabast were the first ones to take notice of his presents with the now equipped draugrs being a secondte.


    "We wee our creator." The Anabast said in unison.


    "We wee our liege." The Draugr said in unison while going to one of their knees.


    Staring at the draugrs, Danzel sent out hismand.


    ''Rise. There is no need to bow to me.'' Danzel cold voice was heard by all the undead who followed his orders immediately.


    Seeing the draugr''s now on their feet, Danzel nodded to himself before giving his nextmand.


    "You are ordered to create a group of 5 in the next 10 minutes. Once done so, spread with your group outside the vige and patrol at the edges of my will. If you find any ice trolls, report back, and if not possible fight back."


    "If you find the natives of this vige...detain them and bring them to me alive. If not that isn''t possible either report back to me or kill them if they show any aggression. Now go." Danzel said with his cold voice upon all the Draugrs.


    Hearing themand and the will of their liege, it didn''t even take them a minute for the Draugrs to create a group and go out of their way to follow hismand.


    And in a matter of 5 minutes, only the 5 Anabast and their creator, Danzel stood there.


    "Now about you all..." Danzel turned to face the Anabast, his ethereal dark green eyes ring up strongly for a brief second.


    "Our will is yours tomand..." The tallest ribless Anabast said as all of them were traveling their skulls to him.


    "That is only but expected for one of my creations, especially on those to who I gave my own power." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    His words alone made the Anabast feel as if some extra weight has been added to their bodies.


    From them all, Danzel could feel that 2 of them werepletely calm, 2 were panicking internally which were the one-eyed ones and the one that talked to him was a mix of both.


    "As I even told you before. I have no need of ipetent servants who draw upon my own strength. For me not to remove you, anchors, chaining you into the mortal in, he will have to prove yourself."


    "..."


    "..."


    "..."


    "..."


    "..."


    The five of them stayed silent upon hearing those words and Danzel paid attention to how they would respond and what emotion they had now.


    The one eyes one panic only turned worse and they gaze at the others searching for an answer.


    The one that had his ribs tted to look like bone armor stared towards him with some kind of resolve.


    The tallest one had the mostplex emotions of them all. A mix of emotions that rapidly changed. If Danzel had to guess, that guy was working his mind on overdrive to guess what the best answer would be to his words.


    ''Last one has...curiosity?''


    Before he could get a good read of the blind ones'' emotional state, it was this Anabast that spoke to him instead of the tallest one.


    "What do you require for us to prove our worth towards the creator?" The voice of the blind one has the certain coldness of the undead, but it also signs of calmness.


    The other Anabast except the bone armor one looked at him in surprise, not expecting him to talk.


    "You..." The tallest among them was about to say something but Danzel beat him to it.


    "Proving yourself to me is as simple as it is hard." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Seeing that he was to reveal what they needed to do to stay anchored in this mortal in, all their attention was focused on Danzel''s next words.


    "And that is, to grow stronger, strong enough worth sharing my strength with you all."


    Those words alone made the blind one and the armored ones feel excited, the tallest one focused with the other two confused.


    Deciding to ignore their emotions, Danzel continued.


    "More specifically, to be stronger magic casters. I have given you all bodies that have affinities with many elements of magic and I seek to see you all trying to achieve your own Mana Aptitude"


    Suddenly out of thin air, 5 books with a bone frames appeared.


    Using his mind alone, Danzel created 5 mana arms that held those thick books.


    "And for that cause, I am willing to share the knowledge that I have with you all." Danzel said as he made the mana arms fly towards the Anabast to give them their books.


    Of course, his words made all of them excited despite their different mindset.


    Though his next words made them much more serious,


    "Wherever you achieve it or not shall decide your fate. If there is no improvement..." Danzel didn''t finish his sentence on purpose.


    And the Anabast understood what it meant.


    Either rise with him or be left behind


    There was no other option.

 Chapter 391 Anabast Talents

    "What I gave you all is the knowledge that a powerful Lich has given me that even I haven''t fully mastered yet. So my guidance of magic is all but limited, albeit there is a person from who you can request guidance. Though that person isn''t exactly here now but..."


    ''She is sleeping instead of being here.'' Danzel decided to not exin further.


    The Anabast stared at the cover of the book with great interest and all except the two one-eyed ones also had the emotion of awe. But at the same time, there was still some confusion left.


    "Do open your books." Danzel said with his cold voice and the Anabast did exactly that.


    "Now pay attention as I will exin it only once. The book that you are holding has 3 parts. First are the basics and general knowledge, which I rmend you start with, second is focused on elemental magic with thest part to death magic. Keep that in mind when you study it."


    "Though more importantly, it''s the content behind each page. There, you can find I small circle which I will require that you all put bits of your mana inside. Once done so far for each page, I will exin further."


    The Anabast turned to look at each other before staring at the other side of the page and giving bits of their mana to the designated area.


    It took them only a few minutes to imprint their mana inside the rune to activate the contract.


    Though Danzel knew that they already read the content of the contract, most of them were still confused by it so he went ahead and exined what they just did.


    "With that out of the way, let me exin. Each page has my runes carved into them to create a contract that if broken, the contract itself will break. So if any of you were to activate the contract in some kind of way, the books that I gave you all will burn to ashes." Danzel said with a grin on his face.


    None of them expressed how they felt to the outside, but the two one eye ones felt as if they were holding a bomb in their hands while the others had a mixed reaction.


    ''Weird that those two have the same kind of reaction...does simrly altering their bodies make them have simr personalities? I will have to potentially test this in the feature.'' Danzel thought as he made a mental note to write this on his to-do list.


    Of course, the contracts were as simple as sharing the content of the book with others without his approval or being 10 meters away from the book for longer than 5 minutes will break the contract.


    Though there were more details, that was the basic idea of it.


    "If you have any questions to ask me, do so now."


    Danzel stared at them as they stared back at him.


    It was only after a few seconds before someone took the lead to satisfy his curiosity.


    That being the "blind" Anabast.


    "Creator, you mentioned something called "Mana Aptitude". If possible, can you exin what exactly it means?"


    Danzel nodded at him before starting to exin.


    "Mhm, simple put, Mana Aptitude is an affinity of magic that is built from one aspect of 2 different elements that bes ustomed to your mana."


    ? Raising his hand, Danzel let out his dark green mana toe out.


    "For example, my Mana Aptitude holds the elements of life and death, though that doesn''t mean that Ibine two elements to achieve one single result...my own mana has changed to reflex that Mana Aptitude and it holds quite unordinary effectspared to other types of mana."


    "Though, aiming for the same elements such as those doesn''t mean that you will create the same Mana Aptitude as I. For example, the Lich that I mentioned and a dark elve have the same kind of elements, but their aspect is different. The dark elve that I knew made his Mana Aptitude for blood magic."


    "An extremely powerful type of magic. I was "taught" a few spells of blood magic directly by him, but for me to learn on my such magic will be extremely difficult without his Mana Aptitude." Danzel said as he hid the part that he learned from his scroll and not directly by him.


    "In short... Mana Aptitude isn''t abination of two elemental magics to make a spell. I heard that there is a magma affinity that uses aspects of fire and earth to create a mana that fits that type of magic. A Mana Aptitude is creating magma itself and not directly melting rocks to create magma."


    Danzel exined as he stared at the blind one.


    "And I expect all of you to reach such a point and be strong magic casters. And in case someone asks, a magic caster has the potential to learn 2 Mana Aptitude, at least that''s what I heard. But from you all, I will be expecting only 1."


    Although he said that all though, the truth was that he severelycked knowledge about this topic. The most that he knew was based on his experience and what Velkir said to him.


    Back then when Velkir mentioned Mana Aptitude, Danzel didn''t go ahead to ask for specific details as he already reached his Mana Aptitude which was soul affinity. And since he wasn''t a fully focused magic caster, reaching the second aptitude was probably impossible.


    And in his case, he was of the rare cases born with his aptitude.


    Which for natural-born undead wasn''t all that impossible.


    Though for him, the type that he gained was never seen by Velkir himself.


    And in most cases, such Mana Aptitude is awakened muchter down the evolution part of the undead.


    A skeleton mage might have Mana Aptitude, but it might only awaken once he reached the next level of existence.


    Though such a unique feature was unfortunately unavable for created undead.


    Which was the case for those Anabast.


    "Creator...to achieve our Mana Aptitude, what kind of aspect of element should we aim to use?" This time the tallest among them said.


    Danzel looked at him and felt a mix of caution and respect from him.


    He stayed for a few moments silent before gazing at all the other Anabast, gazing at him with some expectation.


    "...Well, though I can''t directly point you towards what type of aptitude you all should aim for. I can tell you what in what affinity you all a talent in, which if you choose that affinity to be a part of your aptitude, it should make it easier to achieve Mana Aptitude." Danzel stopped for a moment before continuing.<sub> </sub>


    "But that doesn''t mean that you have to choose that affinity to be a part of your aptitude. I am giving you 5 total freedom of the Mana Aptitude that you want to build."


    Although choosing their affinity that they were talented would had be better in the long run, Danzel didn''t want to take away such freedom of choice.


    ''Heh, you hypocrite.'' Danzel said to himself internally.


    Yes, he was a hypocrite.


    Creating undead, at least to this level wasn''t just making mindless puppets. At least the Draugrs and Anabast weren''t.


    And what he was doing was nothing but enving them in a sense and using the excuse of him being their creator to control them.


    Although all of them held gratitude for being created and would because of his connection to them, dly sacrifice themself for him. That didn''t mean that they were puppets.


    For a brief moment, Danzel touched Skull ws dagger that was behind his waist, before refocusing on the Anabast, who by now he saw bending their backs to make a 45-degree bow. Which made Danzel freeze for a moment as their action felt somewhat familiar in a way he couldn''t exin why.


    "O Supreme Creator, we beseech for your knowledge." The tallest one said, with the rest soon to follow.


    "We beseech you."


    "We beseech you."


    "We beseech you."


    "We beseech you."


    ''Though that isn''t kneeling, well, whatever...'' Danzel shook his head internally as he walked closer to the tallest one.


    "You have a talent towards dead mana affinity. Which is used in Death Magic, you can find all types of death magic in the third section of the book..."


    Walking towards the next, Danzel arrived in front of the bone armor Anabast.


    "You have a talent towards earth affinity. Though earth doesn''t just mean stone and dirt, it can be metal or sand. Make sure to look for details in the second section of the book..."


    Walking towards the left one-eyed Anabast, Danzel continued.


    "You have a talent for air affinity. It''s a versatile element that can be used both offensively and defensively while also having great mobility potential. There is all kind of air type of spells with different types, read carefully about all the types in the second section..."


    Next was the right-eyed Anabast.


    "You have a talent towards dark affinity. Whichpliments most of your existing abilities. There are many paths on such, both offensively and versatile. There should be something in the second section..."


    Lastly, he went towards the "blind" one and he simrly waited to learn his talent.


    Though what he heard wasn''t what Anabast expected to hear.


    "You...have no particr affinity that you are more talented on.-"


    Hearing those words made the Anabast by reflex raise his head to stare at his creator frozen in ce.


    Though Danzel did amply that he had all the other affinities that the other Anabast had. Having an affinity on its own is seen as a talent.


    To the "blind" Anabast, it was no different from calling him talentless.


    Feelings of disappointment and despair started to fill Anabast''s mind.


    Though his creator next words quickly prevented that.


    "-Thoughpared to the others, you have an arcane affinity that the others don''t have. Quite a rare type of magic that can change to a different kind of magic. Albeit the book mightck advantage knowledge, there should be some..."


    Those words alone made Anabast feel conflicted.


    Though he wasn''t talented, he was special among the others and could learn magic that the others couldn''t.


    It will be hard, but he was obsessively determined to not disappoint his creators and regret his creation.


    "We thank thee, creator, for sharing his knowledge." All said in unison.


    "Mhm, now go study the books that I gave you. In a day or a few, I will introduce you to someone with more "experience" in magic. Now if there aren''t any questions to ask, I have experiments of my own to do."


    He waited for questions, but seeing none of them speaking up, Danzel turned around and was about to use [Phantom Phase] when the left-eyed one suddenly spoke.


    "Creator, do we...have any names?"


    Danzel was taken by surprise by this question as he didn''t expect it.


    As his body was turning into a dark green mist, Danzel left a few words before leaving them.


    "I will think about them..."

 Chapter 392 Waking Nightmares

    Everything was dark.


    The morning has arrived and through a small hole in her house, the light seemed to fall upon her eyes. Which annoyed Alka greatly as she wasn''t yet ready to wake up.


    Though she could turn to the side to avoid the light, she didn''t open her eyes.


    "Alka! Wake up! The food is going to grow cold!"


    Hearing the voice of her mother, Alka immediately widens her eyes and rose halfway up from her bed. nkly staring around her surroundings, seeing nothing more than her room.


    "Huh?"


    For a moment she was confused and froze in the position.


    It was only after she heard her name again that she reacted again.


    "Alka!!!"


    "Mother?" She mumbled halfway confused before she got up and started dressing up.


    After finishing putting on the boots her mate, she was about to leave her room before she turned around and stared at the small hole in her room, which greatly annoyed her while sleeping.


    ''I will have to fix thatter...''


    Turning away from the hole that let light in, she opened her door and went to the living area which at the same time was their kitchen.


    There he saw her father sitting on the table with her mother cleaning her tail beside him.


    "Alka! What would you mate think if you woke up sote each time? You got to drop those habits once you made your own family! Now sit. I also got the Bekai''mou milk that you always loved when you were little~"


    Hearing her mother''s usualints and how she still brought the expensive milk, Alka would have normally rebuked her like a child anymore.


    But for some reason, Alka just warmly smiled at her mother and father and seated to eat.


    "Thank you, mom."


    Seeing her different reaction, both her father and mother stared at each other before looking concerned at her.


    "Did you have a bad dream sweety?" her mother said.


    "Or did that lustful guide say something to you, if he did, I will personally-" Her father said while taking his axe near the table to his hands.


    "What!? Nothing of that sort. There was a hole in my room that let out a light, but no nightmares. And Dad!!! Don''t go to my mate with the axe! I already told you that I will be living with him in the future!" She said while using the food to keep away her frustration.


    ''Why do they always have to be like that'' She thought internally.


    "Ugh...I know, but I still find it hard that my girl will leave this old hut. Sigh, I will be going then." Her father said as he rose up from his seat, with her mother soon to follow him.


    "Hmm? Where are you guys going?" She asked while staring at the back of her parents.


    "The hunters called me to help them carry the wood that his nice piece has provided. Shouldn''t take long." Her father answered.


    "I am going to meet my friend and give her advice on how to take care of her baby. She worries that her touch will kill her cutey." Her mother said.


    Alka stared at them while for some reason feeling very ufortable.


    "Make sure the cleanup Alka." Her mother withpared to hers, with long blond hair, said as she left the house.


    Her father soon followed, but before he could close the door, he said turned to look at Alka.


    "Alka, my daughter. Just stay in the house for today. And whatever happens...don''t open the door." He said almost in a whisper-like tone, but for Alka, it was loud enough to hear.


    "We love you, our daughter." The father and mother Alka said before closing the door, leaving Alka alone in her house.


    "..."


    Once they closed the door, everything grew silent.


    Considering her being alone in the house was to be normal.


    ''Something feels wrong...'' She mumbled as she stopped eating as she was feeling more ufortable.


    She stared at her house as if searching for the iparable feeling.


    But then she noticed something after looking around.


    And that the axe that her father took a moment ago out of the house, was now right in front of her, broken.


    "Huh? Why is it..."


    It was extremely bizarre to her as she saw her father pick the axe. It was more bizarre with the fact that the axe was broken.


    Then she remembered her father''s fewst words.


    ''Don''t open the door.''


    The moment she recollected her father''s words, she felt urgency never before like now. Then for just a split moment, he saw an image of her bloodied father.


    "No..."


    Ignoring her father''sst words, she rushed towards the door and swung it open despite her father''s warning.


    And outside the house, everything looked normal.


    At first.


    "Where is everyone?" Alka said as she looked around, only to see not a single soul.


    Walking towards the outside, once her eyesnded in front of her, she saw something terrifying.


    It was a beheaded head of an ice trollying on the snow and training the very snow with his blood.


    That sight alone was very terrifying, but after gazing at the lifeless head for more than a second, she notice long blond hairing out of the mouth of the headless ice troll.


    "Huh?"


    "Huh?"


    Both Alka and the headless ice troll said at the same time, despite seemingly impossible for thetter.


    "M-Mother?" Alka said with a shaking voice.


    Although it could have been any hair in this vige, Alka recognized the long, beautiful blond hair that her mother had...inside the ice troll''s mouth.


    And that''s the moment when she remembered everything.


    About the raid.


    "N-No."


    About the ice trolls.


    "N-No, it can''t be."


    About the vige.


    "W-Why?"<sub> </sub>


    Andstly, about her loved ones.


    She remembered everything.


    "Run!!! Run Alka!!!" A desperate voice yelled from afar to her, a voice that she could never forget.


    Her mate.


    Turning around towards the direction of the voice, she saw her mateying on the ground on top of his own blood.


    She impatiently wanted to rush towards him to help him, but her mate raised his hand and yelled at her.


    "Don''te Alka! Run! Run away! Please! Before it''s toote!"


    Alka stopped at her cracks and she remembered how her mate simrly yelled at her to run away when from the ice trolls.


    ''Am I going to run away and leave them behind?'' She thought to herself.


    The moment she made up her mind to run towards her mate, she notice a dark green mist manifesting from the building slowly creeping behind her mate, and slowly moving towards her.


    "Alka....please." Her mate said with a pleading voice and tears on his face.


    "Ah..." Alka tried to say something but couldn''t.


    When she gazed at the dark green mist creeping closer to her mate and her, she felt a primordial fear just staring at the mist.


    What she next heard were quiet, almost silent metallic footstepsing from the very mist.


    ''That sound!'' She yelled internally as she remembered the owner of that sound.


    She gave her mate ast nce, before deciding to run while biting her limps.


    "Sorry."


    "Sorry"


    "Sorry."


    She mumbled to herself while running to the opposite of the mist, towards where the sun was rising.


    Her mate looking at her put a warm smile on his face.


    "Run Alka! And Don''t turn back! Run!" That were hisst words, before the mist covered his bleeding body, bringing quiet through the vige.


    The only thing to be heard was Alka running through the snow, away from the mist.


    s, the dark green mist gave pursuit.


    The mist grew bigger and became faster, everything it touched, from tools to houses, decayed rapidly and disappeared through the dark green mist.


    With each second that passed, the mist grew closer and closer to the running Alka.


    "Haah~Haah~Haah~" Her ragged breathing was the only thing to be heard.


    ''Just a bit more. Just a bit longer and I will be out of the vige.'' Alka thought internally as she soon was only 100 meters away from getting out of her vige.


    And from afar, she could see several silhouettes standing there and waiting for her.


    Though she couldn''t be sure, all the silhouettes to her seemed to like her whole vige and her loved ones.


    "I-I will be right here! Wait! Don''t leave me!" She reached out her hand as she was getting closer.


    And as she reached the 30-meter mark, a cold voice with no hind of emotion was heard behind her.


    "You..."


    Alka''s eyes widen at how close the voice was.


    And before she knew it, the mist had finally caught up to her and a cold hand grabbed her hand and dragged her to turn toward the dark green mist.


    Being forcefully dragged to turn towards the mist, Alka''s eyes saw the owner of the hand.


    Wearing dark armor and his head was a skull with two ring dark green eyes ring at her.


    "Ah~"


    Dread washed off her body as the other hand of the skeleton was revealed through the mist, holding an ominous longsword in his hand and rising up to the air.


    That''s when she realized that death was upon her.


    That all the sacrifices of everyone will be in vain if she died here.


    The ring eyes that locked at her eyes red once more before he swung that sword towards her neck.


    ''Fseeeeen!


    That''s thest thing that Alka heard.


    Before so woke up.


    "Aaaaaahhhhhhh!!!"


    Jumping up from her bed in screams, her hands quickly moved around her neck, checking if her head was attached to where it was supposed to be.


    "Ha~Ha~ha~" With haggard breaths and her body full of cold sweat, she dropped her hands tiredly to the bed while breathing out.


    ''I am alive. '' She thought, never before more relieved by being alive than as of now.


    "You even woke up, had a bad dream?" A female voice suddenly said, coughing Alka''s attention.


    Turning to see who it was, she was surprised to see a girl wearing a white wooden mask.


    "Where am I? Is this the Vashara vig-aghhh!" She tried to get up from the bed, but upon using one of her hands as support, she felt immense pain going through her, making her almost fall off to the ground if it weren''t for the white-masked girl catching her in time.


    "Careful, you almost died. Rest for now." The white-masked girl reassured her before gently forcing Alka to lie in the bed.


    Alka was slightly stunned at how she moved from one ce to another at such speed.


    ''She is stronger than she looks.''


    "This is indeed the Vashara vige and your daughter is also safe. So just rest here in my house, though I would like to know what kind of dream make you so pale...or how you received this mark." The white-masked girl said while pointing toward Alka''s shoulder.


    There her skin had turned ck looking as if she suffered through necrosis, though that was only on the surface.


    "I tried healing that mark...but I couldn''tpletely get rid of it, which never happend before..." The masked girl said while staring at Alka who was staring at her shoulder.


    Closing her eyes in eptance, Alka let her head fall on the pillow while closing her eyes.


    And once she opened her eyes and stared at the white-masked girl, she gave her answer with a serious voice.


    "Death, Death did this to me."


    Hearing such words, the girl behind the mask frowned upon such words.

 Chapter 393 Teacher Meets Students

    Leaving the Anabast to read through the book and learn magic and the Draugrs to patrol the outside of the vige, Danzel had a lot of stuff to think about and to do.


    His to-do list has only been increasingtely and considering the paper shortage that he was facing, he focused on getting things done with little to no distraction.


    To achieve that though, he decided to spend the rest of his XP.


    Currently, he had close to 7 000 000 XP.


    In the early part of his, that would have been a huge number, but now he knew that thisrge amount of XP wasn''t that much.


    Cursing internally, Danzel saw what to upgrade.


    They were quite a few options for sure.


    Mainly his ss and skills.


    ''Sadly I don''t have enough to bring [ck Guard] to level 100.''


    He shook his head.


    He was thinking if getting the talents was a bad call or not.


    But after he considered what those talents brought to the table for him, he put his regret to his aside and stared at his skills.


    They were also numerous new skills that he could buy thanks to his [Intermittent ss Death Magic] talent.


    Which were quite interesting.


    A few to mention were [Spread Graveyard], [Undead''s Bone Armor], and [Curse of Evesting].


    The first, [Spread Graveyard], reminded him very much of [Miasma Corruption] and [Undeath Corruption]. Mainly the corruption effect.


    It was a spell where he could proactively infest the surroundings with dead mana, which alone would make it much morefortable for the undead. But the main effect was that it increased the attribute of all undead by 5%.


    The only downside was that it mentions that it takes up to 2 weeks to fully infest an area.


    [Undead''s Bone Armor] was also a spell that allowed him to create bone armor. Though that didn''t mean unlimited bones. As the armor has to be bounded to the undead, otherwise it disappears in a matter of minutes.


    In a way, the spell was quite weak, but that was to be expected for the 1st-tier. It managed to take his notice only because of his bounding ability.


    [Curse of Evesting] in turn was noticed because curses were quite hard to get unlocked. Though that now was no longer the case with his [Cursed Hands] talent.


    But that particr curse came from [Intermittent ss Death Magic].


    Despite the spell''s name though, [Curse of Evesting] would increase the duration of all his curses by 10%.


    In short, it was a debuff that buffed his other curses.


    It wasn''t good, but Danzel saw potential in the spell in the modification stage.


    Those 3 were the only ones that he decided to buy as they were on the cheaper side except for [Spread Graveyard].


    He then went ahead to upgrade [Wall of Bones] and [Heavy Strike].


    Thetter was always useful, but because he neglected in improving it, it wasn''t worth using. It essentially was a stronger hit.


    In the case of the former, he wanted to upgrade it to rece [Stone Wall].


    He didn''t want to raise the ground and cause another mountain of snow to fall on him, though the first wasn''t his fault but Shiro''s.


    But that''s beside the point.


    His various talents and skill would also buff to spell and the fact that it create the wall out of nothing was also another bonus.


    So he pushed those 1st-tier spells/skills towards the modification stage.


    For [Wall of Bones], he merely chose [Dead Mana Affinity] and [Toughness].


    Which made the spell turn as [Wall of Death Warden].


    Despite overall improvement, the special effect that it got was that the first attack, be it of magic or physical will have its power cut by 80% for the next 1 second. Additionally, if the caster was undead and is 15 meters away from the wall.


    The moment the wall gets destroyed, 50% mana spent on the wall will return to the caster.


    Overall he was beyond satisfied.


    The second effect was a nice bonus while the first would fulfill the purpose that he aimed to achieve.


    As for [Heavy Strike], he chose [Dead Mana Affinity] and [Soul Affinity] in hopes to get something like [Soul Ender].


    The result of that modification was the birth of [Kindred Judgement].


    Once he learned the skill, it brought forth quite arge headache.


    Though considering what it did, it was understandable.


    The skill held knowledge of how to use his soul.


    Or more urately, how to use his soul essence to affect his physical body.


    The skill was simr to one of the many weapons skills, which use the mana to forcefully guide one''s body to do a certain action in order to hasten the action. In its case, the action was rising up the sword and swinging it down.


    Not only would the action be hastened, but the swing itself will hold much more power and be heavier.


    The awesome part of this skill was that his action will be followed by the use of soul essence like a mirror image simr to Agare''s swordsmanship.


    The result of that, in turn, will be like [Undying Guard] if the attack happens to be blocked, if not blocked, it will directly cut a part of soul essence out of his opponent''s soul.


    Except for the fact of being forced into a programmed action, the skill resulted in a win-win situation regardless of the oue.


    The rest of his XP, he spend towards his ss even though he couldn''t reach level 100.


    Considering his budget, were only 15 levels.


    [ck Guard level has increased from Lv.79 to Lv.80]


    [ck Guard level has increased from Lv.80 to Lv.81]


    ...


    [ck Guard level has increased from Lv.93 to Lv.94]


    [Strength Increased by 60, Agility Increased by 45, Intelligence by 60, Endurance Increased by 60]<sub> </sub>


    [You gained 45 attribute points]


    With his attribute points, he went ahead to raise his strength while adding a few points to his other stats


    [Status]


    Name: Rue Danzel


    Level: 100


    Race: Death Knight


    ss: [ck Guard Lv. 94]


    Sub-ss: [Runesmith of Undeath Lv.80]


    Health: 101 325/101 325


    Mana: 20 250/ 20 250


    Attribute points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 1440 Agility: 1504 Intelligence: 1350 Endurance: 1350


    ....


    After he finished, a status window came out.


    [A New Talent has been unlocked through your feats!]


    Looking at what it was, he was quite disappointed.


    It was a talent called [Endurance of Higher Being], which increased his health by 5% and that was it.


    If it was endurance itself, it would have been much better as it would toughen his body, but health wasn''t as important.


    Apparently, he got the option to unlock the talent because he passed over the 100 000 Health mark.


    Now officially broke, Danzel put his focus on finishing perfecting Shiro''s staff rune.


    From there, he went to a house and went to practice with the spears that he had.


    He also visited Shiro daily to give her food as he had spatial storage rings.


    And on Shiro''s side, her body still hurt, and was in no condition to move. Though the book that Danzel gave out temporarily kept her entertained for the period of her recovery.


    And after full 4 dayster, when Danzel walked inside the room where Shiro was, she found her up on her two feet, stretching her body.


    "You recovered?" Danzel said.


    "Mhm, I believe so." Shapiro nodded her head.


    Walking to "her" bed, she picked the book of Danzel and pushed it towards Danzel while holding it with both hands.


    "Thanks for letting me borrow your book, Rue."


    ncing at her and then at the book, Danzel picked up the book and put it inside his storage ring.


    "I told you that before, but I expect something for providing such information." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Albeit Shiro has grown taller, she was still a midget in front of Danzel.


    Having somewhat grown used to his cold voice, she nodded her head.


    "Well, I can teach you magic and give you some tips, right? Other than that, I-I don''t know what to offer." Shiro said, somewhat nervous in the end.


    "Don''t worry, I am fine in trading knowledge and learning magic with you. But you won''t be teaching only me. Nowe." Danzel said as he turned around.


    Shiro could only follow and tilt her head in confusion at Danzel''sst words.


    Just as they left the room, Koji and Niyuki, the two living armors followed behind her outside.


    That''s when ideas came to her mind.


    "Ehm, do you want me to teach Koji and Niyuki magic?"


    For a moment, Danzel halted his steps beforeunching at the two living armors.


    ''Actually, that might now be a bad idea


    .'' he thought internally.


    ''Though theyck the potential and affinities, they should be able to learn.'' But theyck the potential...''


    "Close, but not exactly. If you wish to teach them, I won''t stop you. As I gave them to you. The ones who you have to teach though are somewhere else."


    ''The ones?''


    Shiro tried asking for any clues of who was to be though. Albeit to no avail.


    She felt somewhat annoyed by the fact he didn''t just tell her.


    The answer that she was seeking though was soon answered as they moved to the center of the vige.


    And what she saw brought chills up in their spine and cold sweat came from her back.


    As she started at 5 huge living shadows floated through the air with a frightening aura.


    "Huh?" She mumbled subconsciously.


    Though the moment she did, the heads of all 5 shadows turned around and stared at her, with a face filled with darkness.


    Once they did, their alright terrifying aura exploded and made them look like giant shadows ready to swallow Shiro in.


    Shiro''s body froze upon the gaze of all 5.


    ''I-I am supposed to teach...them?''


    As she was effect by [Scare the Young].

 Chapter 394 Names And Teacher Shiro

    Seeing the teenager with long white hair, someone of the living, the killing intent of the Anabast was clear as day.


    But seeing her beside their creator and master, they held back their death magic.


    Floating towards their creator, they bend their backs to Danzel.


    "We greet thee, creator and master." The Anabast said in unison.


    Seeing them bowing their heads, Danzel felt quite awkward, but he still nodded his head in acknowledgment.


    "Rise your heads, Anabast''s. I got someone to introduce you to." He said in his cold voice.


    Doing asmanded, all 5 of them raised their heads and stared down at Shiro while clearly showing their hostility.


    Seeing that, Koji and Niyuki stepped forward in front of Shiro while tightening their grip on their respective sword.


    Danzel recognized their hostility and found it understandable, but not eptable.


    "This is here Shiro." Danzel said while he put his hand on top of Shiro''s head, making her whole body freeze in ce.


    Luckily for her, he didn''t keep his arm for long on her head.


    "Shiro is under my protection under a promise. And that same protection is expected to be done by all of you. Other than that, she is a great magic caster that learned from the same teacher as I did. So any questions about magic except for necromancy, you can ask her for advice." Danzel exined, which made Shiro look at him dumbfounded.


    "H-Huh? But Rue-"


    Before she could finish, the eyes behind the shrouded darkness of the Anabast red up dark green light while their hostility grew only worse the moment Shiro mention a part of his name.


    Ignoring Shiro''s clear reluctance, Danzel stared at the hostile Anabast.


    "Though I believe that I don''t need to say this if any harmes to her, the one that will share her knowledge with you will have their anchor removed and their own souls trapped of all eternity by me personally. You have been warned." Danzel said.


    Those words alone made the Anabast shake a bit.


    Deep inside of them, they knew that their anchor was essential to them, but trapping their souls of eternity? They didn''t even understand what it fully meant, but their nces toward Shiro changed.


    So they decided to aim their hostility toward another thing that their creator said.


    "Creator, may I ask permission to speak?" The tallest one asked.


    Danzel simply nodded at his question.


    "I thank thee creator, and I apologize for my potential ignorance, but can someone weaker than us be able to surpass your knowledge and teach us nheless despite being weaker?"


    Danzel stayed for a few moments silent before answering his question.


    "I think you are overestimating my knowledge of magic. Except for death magic, I am considerably a beginner in other types of magic. Compared to Shiro who is a pure magic caster, I am mostly a melee fighter."


    "That alone makes her more qualified to teach that myself. As for your second point, despite how she looks, she almost doubles the mana that one of you posses and she is more experienced in magic. And that''s everything that it matters. Even though you guys are stronger, she is capable enough to have a chance to win."


    Once he finished, the Anabast turned to look at Shiro, which made her all the more ufortable than she already was.


    "Ehm, are those you undead? And I am supposed to teach them?" Shiro turned her gaze towards Danzel.


    ''Won''t they just kill me?'' She thought internally.


    "That''s right, they know few strong spells, but I want them to learn way more than they already have. If you help them and me, I will keep my promise of teaching you necromancy and lend you my books."


    "Though that''s about it, if you reject my offer, you will simply don''t get ess to such knowledge. In the end, I will keep my word to Agares as best as I can, regardless of your choice." Danzel said before looking her in the eye.


    "So, what will it be? Though remember, nothing is free."


    ''Don''t do anything even if she rejects.'' Danzel told Anabast with an internalmand.


    Regardless if she epts or not, she will simply slow down there and his development in magic and nothing more.


    And as immortal beings, all that they had enough of was time.


    Shiro stayed for a long time in silence as she stared at the Anabast.


    No matter how she looked at the floating living shadows, there was something that brought her an ufortable feeling.


    ''I still have a lot to learn from Rue''s books and trying necromancy without him might make a grave mistake...but are those things worth enough to risk being spread by those...what even are those?''<sub> </sub>


    Though Shiro could be somewhat naive and that would be for fair reasons. It wasn''t to the point where she won''t doubt someone who was showing hostility towards her to not actually harm her.


    It would be no different than giving a cat a fish to safe keep.


    Anyone expecting any other result than the obvious would be just in stupid.


    So she was leaning towards rejecting Danzel''s offer.


    But a sudden change made her change her mind.


    And that was the particr Anabast bowing their heads towards Shiro while also revealing their skulls to her.


    Those two are the armored and blind Anabast.


    "Magic caster Shiro, I will be grateful if the one who my creator rmended would teach us the ways of magic." The blind Anabast said.


    "I promise to uphold my creator''s wishes and uphold gratitude if you were to bestow us yours. knowledge." The armored Anabast said.


    The other 3 Anabast looked at the two surprised of bending their heads to someone who wasn''t their creator and saw it as some kind of disrespect towards their very creator.


    Danzel in turn saw it aspletely the opposite.


    ''Those two are quite smart.'' Danzelplimented them internally.


    Considering what he told them before, their results would be what keep him to keep the anchor. Shiro could be vital to improve their results.


    So he expected a simr response from all 5, but from now he only got 2. At worst he expected 3, with the tallest being among the two.


    Though he wasn''t going to me them for showing their none-stop hostility as they were exposed to their undead instincts for the first time.


    "What is your decision, Shiro? Even they promise not to harm you without me giving themand to do so."


    Shiro stared at the revealed skulls of the two Anabast for a few seconds before nodding her head towards Danzel.


    "A-Alright, I will do it. B-But I am not sure if I can do a good job teaching...what are they even called?"


    "Their race is called Anabast, as for their name... the one with no eyes is called...Ss. And the other one is named Baron. As for the other ones...there is still in progress." Danzel said somewhat embarrassed.


    He had thought of a few names for the others but he only announced those two as they were the ones to make an actual effort to convince Shiro to the deal.


    For the blind one, he went for Ss as it somewhat sounded as sightless.


    And for the armored one, he named him Baron based on a title he heard of the nobility of human society. Based on his emotions, he seemed the most straightforward and serious among the bunch.


    He also considered Duke, but he didn''t like how it sounded.


    That, and he couldn''te up with better names and be still hesitant in revealing the other 3.


    Luckily for him, the two now named Anabast seemed to find their name to their liking.


    As for the other Anabast that were left out, they tightened their hands and felt various emotions.


    The one feeling the most regretful, the tallest one suddenly spoke up.


    "Creator, we recently came to learn a spell from the book that you gifted us. And I ask you if it is alright to show our efforts and receive further guidance..."


    Hearing that, the missing eye ones both nodded their head with excitement while Ss and Baron looked at him with an expected look.


    Danzel in turn was surprised to hear such news.


    ''I just recently gave those guys the book and they actually managed to learn something...'' He thought to himself. Feeling somewhat depressed.


    Albeit he didn''t have time to go out and study magic ever since he got his [Magical Talent] and [Apprentice of Death King] to test his learning capabilities,paring his past self with them was still depressing.


    Nheless, he still that he saw that growth was possible for them.


    "Alright, let''s see what you guys learned. Use the spell that you leaned against me. Shiro, you can watch them and look for mistakes." Danzel said as Shiro nodded her head.


    Drawing his sword out of its sheath, Danzel stepped forward the Anabast.


    "Nowe at me. Show me what you learned.

 Chapter 395 Weak Magic

    Hearing their''s creator words, each of them red their death aura and were eager to show what they learned.


    For the Anabast, this time was the first showcase of their worth ever since being created.


    ''We can''t mess this up each of them though internally.


    Nodding to each other, each of the Anabast spread around Danzel and surrounded him.


    It took them mere seconds with their attributes to achieve that.


    And the first Anabast to take the lead in showing its magic was the left-eyed one.


    Raising his right arm to his chest and concentrating the mana there, he used that hand to swing into the air twice aiming at Danzel.


    That resulted in the creation of 2 wind des to fly toward Danzel''s side.


    *Fsheeeen!


    ''Silent double casting, huh? Not bad'' Danzelmented to the left-eyed Anabast internally.


    "But..."


    Turning to face the wind des, Danzel didn''t even bother to block the iing wind des and simply, let them him.


    And shortly after, the wind des came crashing towards Danzel to the surprise of the left eye Anabast.


    But after a second of its own observation, the wind des didn''t even manage to cut through Danzel''s dark tting. Far from dealing any damage to him.


    ''No way...'' The Anabast said internally.


    But her failure didn''t mean that the other Anabast stopped doing their magic.


    The first to gain Danzel''s attention was the newly named Anabast, Ss, who raised his hand up to the air and created a circle of mana. But by the looks of it, Danzel noticed that he wasn''t done yet.


    That''s when a change happend which directed his attention somewhere else.


    And that was a dark magic circle that appeared under his fit.


    Searching where the mana wasing from, it appeared to be the right-eyed one Anabast.


    "Shadows of deep dark,tch and drag down thee!" The right-eyed Anabast cast out loud, which made the dark magic circle activate.


    Making shadows rise andtch on Danzel''s feet while trying their best to bring him down.


    ''A magic circle, huh? Also with a quick activation, though itcks strength.''


    By only moving his one leg, he easily cut through the shadows as if they were toilet paper.


    Once torn off, Danzel noticed the shadows slowly reforming and attempting to move once more, but that process was endlessly slow.


    Though the fact that the shadows will be remade and try totch onto one''s enemy was quite impressive to him.


    And right after he stomped at the regenerative shadows, the next to realize his magic was Ss.


    With the ring of mana spinning above his hand, Ss swung his hand down which made the flying spinning circle of mana fly towards him.


    Danzel stared at the spell and only reacted when it was about to hit him.


    Moving his free hand at incredible speed, Danzel grabbed the spinning circle of mana with his hand alone.


    *Tshsshshkkkk!


    Though the spell continued spinning even after Danzel grabbed it by his hand, creating none stop sparks.


    Only when Danzel put more strength on his hand, did the spell got destroyed at the mana fading away.


    "Hmm..."


    Looking at his hand, albeit small, Danzel noticed a small scratch on his ck tting.


    ''Other than the cast time, not bad.''


    Considering that Ss didn''t have an upgraded affinity, the result was quite impressive from him to say the less.


    Using the enchantment of his armor, he repaired that scratch before he felt a wave of mana flying toward him.


    Turning his head, the identity of the mana was a dark mist flying toward him. Which surprised him.


    "That is..." Before he could finish his toughs, the dark mist went inside him, making the spell take effect.


    ''A curse?'' Danzel thought as he gazed at the tallest one in surprise.


    He could feel his body feeling heavier by a slight bit.


    It was his first time being on the receiving end of a curse so he was taken by surprise. But upon examing his body, the curse was extremely weak and he could easily see that it hasn''t taken root in his body.


    "You are underestimating me quite a bit..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    Using his own dead mana, he forcefully influenced the cursed and pushed it out of his body.


    [Effect [Curse of Weight] has been removed]


    ''Not bad.'' Hepliments internally before sensing one of the Anabast charging at him.


    Having been distracted by experiencing his own medicine, Danzel turned around to find the newly named Anabast, Baron, having he had raised up while holding a sword made out of the stone itself and swing it towards him with all his strength.


    Though it was too slow.


    Danzel raised his sword and blocked the swing of Baron with ease, making the air around them to be pushed away.


    *Crack~


    The result of the such sh was the destruction of Baron''s stone sword.


    Baron stared at his sword dumbfounded and the remains with a bit of sadness.


    "Shaping stone into an object, huh?" Danzel mumbled as he sheathed his sword.


    Speaking of firepower alone, Baron had the highest till yet with his new spell. But most of that power came from his strength and not the actual spells.


    So he wasn''t sure what to think of it.


    But the other 4 Anabast really impressed him.


    Albeit what they learned were spells of the 1st-tier. It hasn''t even been a week since they started their studies.


    The Anabast looked at him for feedback and Danzel was unsure if he shouldpliment them or not.


    Although the fact was that they did well, he wasn''t sure if it will be beneficial for them to say it like that.


    Unsure of what to do, he turned his head towards Shiro for a second opinion.


    "What do you say, Shiro? How was there magic?" Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "H-Huh? Me?"She asked surprised by being called out.


    The Anabast in turn turned also their focus towards Shiro who was asked this question.


    Which input lot''s of pressure on Shiro herself.


    Under pressure, Shiro said out loud what she was thinking about those spells.


    "Ehm...they were weak?"


    Once her words came out, the 5 Anabast froze in ce and even Danzel stayed silent for a moment before nodding his head.


    "Mhm, well...you aren''t technically wrong Shiro. After all, what they used were "mere" 1st-tier spells. Yeah,paring them to the spells that we use is not that optimal. Shiro, if it were up to you, how long would it had take you to learn one of those spells?"


    Putting a thoughtful expression, Shiro answered.


    "Except for the curse...probably 3 days to reach such a level of mastery?"


    Hearing that, Anabast expect the tallest, and Ss was relieved to hear that.


    But in Danzel''s case, he wanted to curse at Shiro and the three Anabast that was relieved.


    He went ahead and did thetter.


    "You three over there, I wouldn''t get relief if I were you. Although Shiro has more experience in magic than you all it is only fair that you guys will take longer. You forget that you are undead and she is one of the living."


    Hearing that, Baron and the one-eyed Anabast became dense again, with thetter panicking.


    "Compare to us undead who are tireless, Shiro has many other needs that we don''t have. Realistically speaking, if she worked under the same condition that yours, she might have finished in 2 days."


    Which Danzel and the majority of the poption of this ce would consider a monstrous learning ability.


    The Anabast felt quite bitter and so did Danzel.


    And he wasn''t nning to just discourage them.


    "Though that doesn''t mean that you guys did bad. As of now, I am satisfied with your learning speed. But I will be expecting improvements in the near future." Danzel said while walking towards Shiro.


    "And she will be the one that will help you guys towards that goal. Let''s see...how about you teach them 4 hours and I teach you death magic for about 4 hours then?" Danzel said.


    Hearing those words, Shiro froze for a split second before she energetically nodded her head.


    "Will it be alright to make my lessons for...2 more hours?" She said shyly.


    Danzel looked at her with a nk face while his ethereal eyes went out.


    To him, 4 hours were already long enough to spend, but 6?


    That was one-fourth of the entire day.


    "It depends, but we can make them longer. Though we will be teaching each other magic. As for now though, teach does guys for a bit and then go rest. As we will have to get going."


    "Huh? W-Where are we going to go?" Shiro asked.


    "Isn''t it obvious? The food that I have collected is bound to be exhausted, we also have to find a way out of those frozennds. Most importantly though, we have to find more of those ice trolls, otherwise, the next time you grow, you will exhaust your whole vitality and potentially die."


    Danzel said as he turned around to walk away.


    "Unless we find a way to safely stop that sickness of yours, we have to find ways to recover your vitality. And we can''t use either light or holy magic. And as of now, only the ice troll blood is your insurance for not dying on me."


    ''Do not forget my warning. No harm is toe to her.'' Danzel sent an internalmand to the Anabast before leaving to further practice runes.

 Chapter 396 Talk And Go Out To See

    Stepping forward, Danzel made a footmark through the snow.


    And behind him, were respectively 35 of his own creations.


    5 which consisted of his elite soldiers, the Anabast, and the rest of the Draugrs.


    While they were vastly inferior to the Anabast, their strength was of a considerable amount of the 2nd-tier.


    And beside him, was Shiro with Koji and Niyuki, the living armors.


    Which started also learning magic from Shiro herself.


    As for how the two parties seemed tomunicate so well, he had no idea how.


    He suspected it to be a skill or a spell of the sort, but he spared himself the effort to search all spells and skills of Shiro.


    It was certainly interesting to see if living armors could learn magic, but Danzel had high hopes of them, as attribute-wise, they were more melee-focused than for magic.


    But as for now, he paid no attention to any one of the above-mentioned, as of currently he was staring at a ball of fire that was hovering on top of his hand.


    ''It''s stronger than before, but channeling the mana feels awkward.'' Danzel thought as he tried to make the mes stronger while maintaining their shape ording to what Shiro taught him.


    Although it would have been faster to simply buy the [Firebolt] spell with his XP and upgrade it, he wanted to learn magic without any help from his status.


    So staring at his fireball in hand, Danzel slowly moved his soul mana to mix with the fire in hopes to create something new, though it was extremely hard to do so.


    The mes were bing unstable and all the more chaotic the more he attempted to make soul magic with those mes.


    With no results this far.


    He already attemptedbining his mes with dead mana, which worked much better in making mes simr to chaos magic, but different.


    They simply bring forth a decay effect while still being extremely hot. What made him abandon that direction of magic was that the mes became slower the more he seeded in fusing the two.


    Which was a big w.


    Nheless, the mes in front of him were bing more unstable, requiring his whole focus to keep them up.


    ''What am I doing wrong? Why does it be so unstable and doesn''t mix?''


    And currently, where he was putting his every focus on preserving the mes, a sudden yet quiet voice came from his side.


    "Rue, what is that bottle on your neck?"


    Getting distracted, the mes were extinguished and the mana he used disappeared into the air.


    Staring at the distraction annoyed, he answered.


    "It''s something in case someone returns back to that vige. It will break if the undead I left behind see someone returning." He said before making another attempt with the mes and ignoring Shiro.


    But whatever he tried, no improvements were to be seen.


    Shiro watching with interest at what Danzel was trying to do looked at Danzel''s skull before shaking her head.


    "You will get it eventually, no need to get frustrated..."


    ring his eyes, Danzel crashed the mes with his hand and stared at Shiro.


    "I have the slightest need of yourfort, Shiro. Wherever I am frustrated or not doesn''t matter, with time I will get it right." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "So you are admitting that you are frustrated?" Shiro asked while carefully staring at Danzel''s ring eyes.


    ''Of course, I am.''


    Would have been the easiest answer to that. But he didn''t want to admit it.


    "Is there a reason as to why you trying to see what an undead feels or is there another reason?"


    Hearing this, Shiro looked to the said.


    "Well...we didn''t do much of anything except studying and walking those past 2 days, and well...ehm."


    Seeing her struggle with her words, Danzel shook his head.


    "I won''t cut your head for asking a question or two. Considering how boring is to see only snow and ice, I might as well hear you out. First though, how did you like the runes of your staff?" Danzel said with a nk voice.


    Tightening her staff, she nodded her head to him.


    "Your runes are amazing Rue! I feel like my spells are half as strong as they were supposed to be!" Shiro said while raising her staff.


    "It should be around a third though...well, as long as you like it." Danzel said.


    "Yes, it''s amazing! If only I could enchant it, it would have been so amazing." Shiro said while imaging her staff fully enchanted.


    "I see..."


    Danzel of course didn''t care much.


    For a moment the atmosphere became awkward and Shiro hesitated before speaking again.


    "Rue, might it be possible to also learn-"


    Without letting her finish, Danzel stopped her right there.


    "No, teaching you death magic and teaching you runesmithing is somethingpletely different. Even if you manage to learn it, I have not the slightest intention of teaching you how to make runes." Danzel said with an ice-cold voice.


    "Oh...I see." Shiro said while looking down at the ground disappointed.


    Staring at Shiro, Danzel shook his head.


    "To begin with, you shouldn''t even have time to learn magic and runesmith. You don''t even know flying magic or teleportation magic. How do you expect to fight a melee fighter of the 3rd-tier?"


    "I-I just defeated them before they reach me, I also have some movement spells. And those spells you mentioned are already hard to learn and I don''t-"


    Without letting her finish, Danzel drew his sword and swung in the air three times, releasing 3 air des moving at incredible speed and cutting arge stone into pieces.


    Shiro and Anabast were surprised by Danzel''s actions.


    "Someone of the 3rd tier is capable of doing what I did while closing the distance to you. You will have to make a barrier strong enough to block something like this and that will result in loss of mana while putting unnecessary focus."


    "Teleportation is an extremely powerful tool to have against a melee fighter. As they can create more distance and dodge such attacks, whereas with flying magic you can maneuver to dodge the such attack. Just being in the air, is a huge advantage if the enemy can''t reach you..."Danzel halted for a second before continuing.


    "Or not getting buried in a wave of snow."


    "It was an ident!" Shiro yelled embarrassed before putting on her hood and covering her face with the bone mask."


    "What I am saying is, focusing on magic. You got enough talent to reach the 4th-tier if not higher. When you reached that point, I might be willing to make you a few runed items. Of course, for a certain price that is."


    "Mhm." Shiro nodded her head and smiled behind her bone mask for a moment.


    Though her smile didn''tst that long.


    "Rue...do you think that magic can heal my sickness?" Shiro asked hesitantly.


    "Impossible." Danzel said without hesitation, taking Shiro by surprise.


    "Huh?"


    Looking at his mistake, Danzel started exining.


    "Let me correct you, that sickness that you so speak of is no illness of any sort. The truth is that your body has evolved differently than is supposed to. Which gives you a huge amount of mana. The problem is that your body has still to adapt to such evolution."


    "Maybe it gets better when your body has fully adapted or you will have to experience that growth for your whole life. As for treatment, the core problem is losing vitality and pain. The former can be treated with your healing magic, so searching for a way to remove the pain with magic can be a way to treat your problem."


    Though he wasn''t too sure what would happend if her various becameplete, his solution was simple. Remove the pain so that you can heal yourself.


    Shiro of course didn''t like his answer that much and felt depressed by those facts.


    "Is it really uncurable? Not even with...death magic?"


    Danzel stayed silent with a such question and continued walking through those frozennds.


    ''Is that why she wants to learn necromancy?'' He shook his head internally.


    Shiro waited for an answer, only to get none in the end.


    ***


    At the same time, in the Vashara Vige.


    Stepping out of bed, with her whole shoulder covered with something close to bandages together with her chest, Alka walked outside the house of the masked woman to get some fresh air.


    "Her house is quite high up, huh?" Alka mumbled as she stared down the Vashara Vige.


    She still couldn''t believe that she managed to reach this ce after what happend to her and her vige.


    She stayed there to appreciate the sight and to forget her nightmares, but before long she noticed a few warriors moving out of the vige.


    As she asked herself what they were doing here, a gentle voice came from her side.


    "You still haven''t recovered enough to step out of your body, Alka."


    Turning around, Alka was surprised to see the masked girl.


    "I just wanted to take fresh air..." Alka said with a bitter smile on her face.


    The masked girl moved closer to her and stared at where Alka was looking at. Which were the warriors.


    "Are they going to hunt?" Alka asked curiously.


    The masked girl shook her head.


    "No, they are going to see your vige and what happend more closely."


    The moment Alka heard what she said, her eyes widen in shock.


    "What!?"

 Chapter 397 Proving Strength

    A few days have passed ever since they had the talk about runesmithing and Shiro''s condition.


    Ever since then, Shiro avoid talking about those subjects and instead focused on learning death magic with Danzel while she answered and exined stuff to the Anabast.


    Though among them, the tallest Anabast asked him to be present at Shiro''s lesson.


    As he was the only one that Shiro couldn''t guide in the ways of magic as she herself was clueless about death magic.


    Which was a problem of its own as the tallest was much better at learning from him than Shiro herself considering he has an upgraded affinity for dead mana.


    Moreover, once he epted one, the others also wanted to take part.


    So in the end, they decided to make a big session each day once they took a break from walking.


    It was 3 hours of him teaching and then Shiro teaching everyone else, with all the time Koji and Niyuki being present and listening from the side.


    Wherever they were paying attention or not Danzel was unsure as they stayed quiet the whole time.


    Though those lessons were a massive time investment and slowed their march toward the unknown.


    If it weren''t for the fact that Shiro was getting tired, they would even have longer lessons.


    Though that didn''t mean that Danzel won''t be efficient at this point.


    When those 9 were learning, he alwaysmanded his draugrs to spread around to scan the surroundings for when they once again went to travel, they will know which direction was the best to go.


    But generally, the only thing that came out from it was which was the easiest path to go towards.


    But today was different...


    "I can feel bits of dead mana mixed there, but youck control of that mana..." Danzel said as he stared at Shiro''s hands trying to create dead mana.


    Her mana looked extremely dark which was the result of dark mana, but hidden inside that cluster of mana, Danzel was able to see dead mana. He was trying to make Shiro aware of that mana to target and control the dead mana.


    "Mhmmm!"


    Shiro tried her best and Danzel could observe small improvements, but far from reaching the level of raising a skeleton.


    And as Shiro was trying her best to control the dead mana.


    One of the Draugrs came running towards them and called Danzel.


    "My liege, we found something that might be worth reporting."


    The sudden voice distracted Shiro, which made her lose control of the dead mana, but before it could touch her hand, Danzel send a wave of his own dead mana to wash off her mana. His control was so delicate that no harm was inflicted on Shiro.


    That in turn made Shiro look at the Draugr with annoyance.


    "What is it?" Danzel asked the Draugr with curiosity.


    For one of his undead toe back before the designated time, it must mean either a threat or signs of people.


    And as he suspected, it was one of the above.


    "We found signs of potential beings residing nearby."


    Nodding his head, Danzel raised up from seating down.


    "Lead me there." Danzel said with the Draugr nodding his head.


    "What about our lesson, Rue?" Shiro said confused.


    "Postponed, this matter is more important. You should know."


    Sighing to herself, she quickly followed behind the undead with Koji and Niyuki by her side.


    It took them around 30 minutes to arrive at where the Draugr was leading them as they just walked there. Thanks to that, the spread-out Draugrs were able to catch up with the group.


    And what they saw was quite the familiar sign.


    Well, at least for Danzel that is.


    What was in front of them was a skull of those haired buffalos that Danzel had killed which was stationed on top of a tree with many other skulls tight on its branched.


    For Shiro, it was quite a terrifying thing to see, but to Danzel it was just bizarre.


    Walking towards the skull tree, Danzel went ahead and started picking the skulls, only to find nothing particrly interesting.


    It was only after he touched the big skull of the deceased-haired buffalo that something interesting came up in the status description.


    [Bekai''mou Skull of Warning]: Having lost his way through a snowstorm, this Bekai''mou was hunted down by ice trolls. Now its skull was ced here as a warning that beyond this point, only death awaits.


    "Hmpf, it seems like we found what we were searching for." Danzel said as he scoffed at thest pit of the description.


    "Did you find something, Rue?" Shiro asked while avoiding staring at the skulls.


    "Yes, this tree is just a warning that ice trolls have ced, marking their territory and such I would believe." Danzel shook his head.


    He truly found it dump from the ice trolls to put a sign that was no different than telling others that they are nearby.


    Drawing his sword, Danzel cut the tree with ease.


    "Collect, the skulls." Danzelmanded his Draugrs.


    Once stored for future bone shaping, Danzel took the lead to walk in front of the warning sign.


    And not far away from the warning sign, they arrived to see various tents though the distance withrge pale figures walking around.


    Seeing that, Danzel smiled maliciously as his eyes red up.


    "It seems like we found them. That''s one worry out of the way." Danzel said out loud.


    Shiro looked at him and then at the vige.


    "Is it really alright to kill them?" Shiro asked awkwardly.


    "Hmm, I don''t see a reason not to. We are in need of their blood for you. Also, their information and bodies to continue my research. While killing them all is too much, the death of the majority would benefit us." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "C-Can''t we ask them for blood and information? Even if they are unwilling, I am sure you Rue are strong enough to force them toply, no? As for the bodies-"


    "No, that wouldn''t do. Even if I do what you said, I bet some of them will fight. Nheless, we are in need of their food. Or rather you are. Although we have enough, for now, that won''t be the case forever."


    "And taking into ount the nature of those frozennds, food must be scarce. I bet that for them, taking their food could mean no different than death to them."


    Hearing those words, Shiro grabbed her staff with both hands and looked down at the floor.


    Danzel didn''t know wherever she felt guilty or ashamed and even if he knew, he wouldn''t change his choice.


    "Shiro, listen to me." Danzel said as he put his hand on her shoulder, making her look towards his ring eyes.


    His voice was neither sweet nor gentle.


    But instead was the cold voice of the undead.


    "I don''t think you realized that your life is at stake here. If there is a point your illness acts and you don''t have enough nutrients, you will seriously die. If that happens while you are starving, the chances of you dying is extremely high."


    "And I don''t know about you, but I don''t want to give Agares the corpses of his granddaughter. When it goes for your survival...morality is secondary."


    Bringing his hand away, Danzel turned around.


    "Also, that magic that you learn is also a tool to kill. Although it''s fascinating and can be used for good. You WILL encounter a moment where you can use that exact magic to kill. And when that moment arrives, hesitation can mean the end of you."


    Shiro fell silent upon Danzel''s words and couldn''t see her face.


    Wherever she was crying or was disgusted by his words, Danzel told her the truth and nothing more.


    He also found magic fascinating and it was fun to discover its secrets.


    But at the end of the day, it was primarily a tool to kill and protect oneself.


    "Let''s go! We are moving out!"


    Danzel said out loud to everyone.


    But unexpectedly, as the undead were preparing to move out, the tallest Anabast came forward.


    "O Creator, may I make a suggestion?"


    Surprised, Danzel looked at Anabast and observed his emotions, which were full of expectation and nervousness.


    "And what might that suggestion of yours be?" Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "I would like to suggest the eradication of that ce to be left to us. There is no need to trouble thee, Creator, with a such small task."


    Looking at the Anabast, Danzel fell into his thoughts.


    ''Leaving the job to them would make me miss the XP, but...''


    After examing the feelings of each Anabast, he noticed what tallest was aiming with that suggestion.


    "So you want to prove yourself?"


    "Yes," All of the Anabast said, though the tallest and the one-eyed Anabast also had some desperation in their feelings.


    ''I guess not naming those 3 stressed them out.'' Danzel could only conclude.


    So after thinking about it, he nodded his head despite the fact that he will lose some XP.


    "Alright, I order you. All 5 of you, go!"


    "Leave 3 alive and if possible also their leader alive. As for the rest, kill them without any exception!"


    "If you seed, I will give reward each of you, now go!"


    Hearing thest bit, the aura of the Anabast exploded.


    "We won''t fail there Creator!"


    "We won''t fail there Creator!"


    "We won''t fail thee Creator!"


    "We won''t fail thee Creator!"


    "We won''t fail thee Creator!"


    The Anabast said before their skulls were hidden within shadows and flew towards where the ice trolls were residing.


    With only one goal in mind.


    Proving their strength.

 Chapter 398 Shadows Of Death

    Meanwhile in the small settlement watched by the Death knight.


    A group of half-naked ice trolls, each holding axes, and clubs. Their bodies were painted with tattoos of some kind of animal''s mouth and their muscles were bulgy despite theck of food to support such body mass.


    But for ice trolls, who adapted themself to such cold and starvation, such physic was only natural in their race.


    Resistance to the cold, incredible regeneration, and strength to crash a bolder.


    One could consider them the apex hunters of those frozennds.


    And in the group of trolls, in the middle standing above a badly made stage made by crashing a bolder t to stand, an ice troll filled with arge scar from his stomach up to his left shoulder, has physic far greater than any of those ice trolls and was a good head taller than them.


    On his neck was a ne filled with the huge teeth of some kind of beast and his tasking out of his mouth had a metal ring.


    The troll looked at the ice trolls below him before opening his mouth.


    "Wronged warriors of the frozennds!" His rough voice echoed through the whole small settlement. Catching each Ice troll''s attention.


    "We have waited for our brother''s triumph return! And they have yet to return from their hunt of the small tails!"


    Hearing that, the Ice troll looked at themselves and started talking to themselves.


    *Bough!


    The ice troll wearing the bones talisman had enough and smashed his spear which had severalrge needles on its tip to the stone tform, making arge crack and sound, which brought back the attention of the ice trolls.


    "Those brothers are no longer our brothers! They abandon our great goal to glory and run away scared to face our goal!"


    Once his words came out, one of the ice trolls who was only a bit shorter than the talisman ice troll spoke up.


    "Lies! I have known Axe Chain ever since our warrior ritual! We were sworn brothers and I know that would have never abandoned us or our goal!"


    The ice troll wearing the talisman frowned upon such words as he stared at that troll.


    "Then are you saying that Axe Chain would have been defeated by some mere small tails!?" He yelled back.


    Upon such words, the other ice troll shut up, unsure of what to say.


    Agreeing that his brother had been defeated by mere small tails was an insult to his brother himself.


    Having him shut up, the ice troll on the stone stage raised his spear into the air.


    "I also hoped for our brothers to return! But! We have waited long enough for their return! Any longer and we won''t have food to achieve our goal! Hunting down the Thousand Screaming One!"


    Hearing that, each ice troll became excited.


    "Tomorrow we march! And I! Merloun''gurak! Will use this very spear to bring down the Thousand Screaming One! And together! We will bring it back to the main n! And reim what our honor! And be the greatest warrior hunters of the n!"


    "For honor!"


    "For honor!!!!" all the other ice trolls raised their hands as if they could already imagine themself ying down the greatest beast with their own hands.


    The Thousand Screaming One.


    "Now go and rest! Tomorrow will be the first step towards reiming our honor!" The ice troll with the spear dispersed the grew of ice trolls, who went to do their own thing.


    "Hmpf!" The ice troll that was previously against him scoffed and turned his back.


    ''My brother losing to small tails!? Impossible!'' He thought internally as the other ice trolls followed him to one of his tents.


    "Daranrock...could brother Axe Chain really have been defeated by the small tails?" Of the ice trolls who followed him asked.


    The ice troll in turn looked at that troll full of anger.


    "Impossible! Something must have happend!"


    He, Daranrock, Merloun''gurak, and the one that Danzel had killed was the strongest warriors of this settlement.


    Their strength ced them as the leading figures of the other exiled warriors of the main n. Originally, he and his brother ruled together over everyone else. Though his brother has yet toe from his hunt.


    Merloun''gurak, who was stronger than him stepped up to take the leading spot from him by unifying everyone to their original goal.


    His body was getting heated by anger and he had to force himself to stop himself and fight Merloun''gurak right here and there.


    "My brother had survived against The Thousand Screaming One, he can''t possibly have died by mere small tails!"


    Taking his weapon, arge axe simr to a halbert, he went out of his tent.


    "Equip your weapons and take your rations! We will go and see for ourselves what happend to that small-tailed vige! I refuse to believe that my brother died there!"


    The other ice trolls looked at him hesitantly.


    "But Merloun''gurak...what about the hunt of The Thousand Screaming One?" One of them decided to speak up.


    Leaving now was no different than telling them to not take part in the hunt with the others after all.


    "Shut up! Go already!" Daranrock yelled with anger, making the other ice troll reluctantly go and pick up their weapons.


    Though Daranrock''s goal was to see what happend to his brother, the truth was that he didn''t want to take part in the hunt because he was afraid.


    Everyone here was an exiled warrior from the main n.


    Who either managed to survive the hunt with The Thousand Screaming One or were too scared to fight it once it was in front of it.


    It was a trial to the ice trolls and escaping the trial without any achievements was considered disrespectful and honorless.


    Even his brother who was the strongest was gravely wounded and the chief of the main n only managed to fend off The Thousand Screaming One. But not actually hunt it down.


    His brother and he nned to build their own n, but Merloun''gurak was aiming to kill everyone by facing that beast.


    ''One day I will kill this bastard!'' He thought internally as he went to follow the other trolls.


    But once he was about to take the first step, he found out that he couldn''t move his one leg.


    "Huh?"


    Lowering his head in confusion, he nkly watched how a hand made out of shadows anding from those shadows was gripping his leg tightly.


    Before he could make any sense of what that hand was or say anything, he heard an ethereal whisper of anguage it never heard of and yet could fully understand.


    "[True Death]."


    "..." Daranrock''s whole body froze in ce.


    The light of his eyes was snuffed out like the fire of a candle against a breeze.


    His whole body then started to fall to the ground like a puppet that had its strings cut. But the next instance shadows started crawling on his body and forcefully keep the dead ice troll standing in his ce.


    s, the axe still fell to the ground, creating enough noise for the other ice trolls to turn around.


    "Hmm? Daranrock? What happend one?" One of the ice trolls asked as he stared at the axe on the ground. But the next moment their eyes widen in shock as the shadows were bing alive right in front of them.


    "W-What the hell is-!" Before the ice troll could finish, 5 ice cold voices sounded in unison.


    "[Final Word Kill]."


    And simr to Daranrock, the 5 ice trolls fell to the ground with their life taken in a few instances.


    "You should even have been more careful." One of the shadows spoke as it started to rise with a robed figure, revealing a skull with only its right eye socket.


    "I will be more careful next time..." The next shadow rose, revealing this time a skull with only its left eye socket.


    "It was a matter of time till they realise anyway." Another robed shadow rose with a skull of no eye sockets.


    "We can''t keep the creator waiting, it will be fastering out of the open." The next robed shadow rose. The ground started to rise up and create a sword made out of stone, which soon after was engulfed with shadows.


    "Baron is right...the faster the better." Another shadow rise behind all others, which was the tallest among them all.


    "It''s the first mission given by the creator personally, mistakes are uneptable." The tallest among them said.


    "Hey! What are you doingying on the ground you all?" One of the ice trolls who seemed to notice the corpses came with another group.


    But upon arriving, they noticed the robe shadow in front of them.


    "W-What the hell are those things!?" One of them yelled as it equipped his weapons just like the other ice trolls.


    "Death to everyone, except 3 and their leader. That is the creator''smand." The tallest one said as dark lighting started toe from the robed shadows.


    And the next moment, the lighting filled with death was shot out, prating the ice trolls'' bodies and burning them from the inside.


    "Ahhhhhh!!!?"


    The ice trolls screamed before they fell to the ground now dead, everyone except one ice troll who was lucky enough to resist the instant death effect.


    But before it could scream, the robed shadow holding a stone sword full of shadows, appeared from behind the ice troll despite the ice troll seeing a copy of the same shadow in front of him.


    Which was slowly dissipating.


    "We must fulfill our Creator''s will perfectly." Baron, the Anabast said as it crashed the ice troll''s head with his stone sword.

 Chapter 399 Shadows Of Death (2)

    "Grab your weapons! Enemies are here!"


    The appearance of the 5 Anabast quickly spread through the small settlement. Though some ice trolls werezier than others, the moment they heard a thunderous noise and the cries of fear, the ice trolls were soon fully equipped to face the enemy brave enough to attack them in their settlement.


    But what they didn''t expect to see were huge robes and shadows floating through the air


    And one of the ice trolls that was being held by those Shadows hand was struggling to get free while swinging his axe towards the shadow.


    Though the shadows seemed to be cut and ripped off, the "wounded" part of the shadows was soon recovered in an instant.


    "You are not one." The ice-cold voice of the Anabast said, in anguage that the ice trolls didn''t know and yet somehow understand.


    "[True Death]" It voice, his hand lighting up in a dark light.


    The ice troll who was struggling in the next instance felt limp and all his energy that it put cursing the shadows to let go vanished.


    Letting go of the ice troll, it fell to the ground, now dead.


    The ice troll who watched everything happend couldn''t understand what exactly happend, but seeing one of their own die just like that fuelled them with anger and fear towards the unknown that was the Anabast.


    "What are those things!?"


    "Does it matter!? Let''s kill them!"


    With the lead of an ice troll, the more hot-blooded ice trolls dashed with their weapons in hand to fight against the Anabast.


    "They are neither," The tallest Anabast said as they raised aimed at the ice trolls.


    "[Final Word Kill]"


    And like stringless puppets, the ice trolls began falling to the ground motionless and imed by death.


    The original 15 ice trolls that dashed had now only 5 members remaining who reached the Anabast.


    Those 5 also used their mana to force their body to perform some kind of attack with their weapons, which ripped a part of Anabast''s body, technically harming them.


    The Anabast simply reached out their hands and briefly touched the ice trolls and cast [True Death]. Dropping the ice trolls dead to the ground.


    Shortly after their bodies regenerate to their peak.


    The ice trolls that stayed to observe and others that just arrived had their mouth wide open, unsure of what happend.


    From their perspective, 15 of them dashed with battle cries before 10 of them dropped dead for literally no reason!


    And the 5 who managed to reach those shadows turned dead with just a simple touch!


    And their bodies regenerated in an instant!


    "What should we do!?"


    "They are the Shadows of Death!"


    "They must be the apostles of Death!"


    "No! They must be Death itself! Didn''t you watch how a mere touch killed them!?


    "Shut up! Call Merloun''gurak! Quick! Those things must be using some kind of magic!" One of the ice trolls yelled as he pointed his club toward the Anabast.


    Though the next moment, arge dark magic circle appeared and covered most of the ice trolls, including the one who spoke.


    From that magic circle, came out several shadows which clung around the legs of the ice trolls, observing their movement.


    Making many ice trolls panic.


    But before they had the chance, to destroy the shadows, 4 out of 5 Anabast flew towards the ice trolls.


    The most catchy of them all was Baron, who swung his shadow stone sword which crushed the skulls of the ice trolls with ease.


    The left-eyed Anabast in turn swung his hand at the ice trolls and directly cut their bodies using wind magic like a sharp de.


    Albeit her magic was weak and of the 1st tier, using a sharp wind de at point-nk range still managed to do its job.


    Ss, in turn, was the only one who used the inherited magic of his race, [Death Shadow Bolt] to fry the ice trolls with a good chance of triggering the instant death effect.


    The spell''s prability was the reason he chose to use it to hit multiple of the ice trolls and save mana.


    Though [True Death] was a cheaper mana vise, it was a spell that required direct touch while [Final Word Kill] was a single target and mana vise expensive type of spell.


    So [Death Shadow Bolt] was better to use for both speed and mana usage as it didn''t require touching every single of his victim.


    As for the tallest Anabast, he didn''t participate in his masseter and instead went to the one ice troll that spoke a moment ago.


    "Stay put and don''t resist, do as I say and we will spare you life." The tallest said with a voice full of temptation.


    The ice troll tried to resist, but the tallest swiped his weapon away and grabbed his arms, restraining him.


    And from the robe of shadows, another set of shadow arms grew and touched the ice troll''s face, forcing it to stare inside his hood.


    "Resistance is futile. ept the mercy of the Creator."


    The ice trolls despite his vigorous body, the ice troll felt like he was going to get a heart attack. He remembered how the touch of those things could kill one of them in an instant.


    Cold sweat run through his body as the monster in front of him was physically stronger than him.


    ''ept~''


    ''You will be killed~''


    ''I will be killed~''


    The ice troll''s own thoughts began to urge him to ept and unsure as to how, but he could feel that the Anabast words sounded sincere to him. Making him ept the mercy of the being seemingly lording over death.


    s, those were mere illusions created by the spell [Calling Illusion] and the skill, [Tempting Voice].


    Originally, it was a skill that the Anabast used on their weak-willed masters to grant them more of their mana and break free from their control as servants.


    So the weak necromancers who found the ritual to create Anabast and were of the living had a 95% chance to die after being tricked by the Anabast.


    The tallest watched the ice troll fall under his illusion before going and helping eliminate all the others.


    He simply spared that ice troll because he seemed smarter than the others.


    And their mission was to keep 3 and their leader alive.


    So like butchers walking around the farm, they killed the majority while leaving the needed ones.


    In theory, the ice trolls had a realistic chance to win against the 5 Anabast.


    As they were heritable and born with high strength and endurance with considerable agility attributes


    Though none of them matched the Anabast, a few were just 100 attribute vise behind in physical strength.


    Albeit they were vastly faster, the ice trolls had the advantage of numbers.


    The sad truth though is that against an enemy of unknown abilities that instantly killed one of them, fear was their worse enemy.


    They might have hope if they saw any damage on the Anabast, s the nature of them made them seem like they have immortal bodies.


    So in their eyes, the Anabast was an immortal monster that could kill them by just ring at them.


    Which resulted in the very massacre that was happening here.


    And as the Anabast was finishing thest of the punch, a wind-piercing sound was suddenly to be heard. Coughing each Anabast attention.


    And what they saw was a spear with severalrge needles flying toward the left-eyed Anabast with incredible speed.


    The left-eyed Anabast having seen the spear toote knew that he couldn''t dodge, so it tried to move so that the attack won''t be lethal.


    Which seed in doing, but before the spear reached the left-eyed Anabast.


    Baron moved in front of the spear and created a shield made out of stone around his other arm while engulfing the shield with shadows.


    Shortly after, the spear hit the shield, and prated through the left side of his body,pletely ripping off Baron''s left arm in the process.


    The spear continued flying and once it reached the ground, a small crater was created before through the usage of someone''s mana, and flown back to its owner. Which was of arge troll with a bone talisman.


    "How dare you all kill my brothers you bastards!!!?" The ice troll yelled as the Anabast.


    "Not touch enough, huh?" Baron mumbled to himself before his left arm was regenerated in the next instance.


    Seeing the strength of the ice troll, the tallest said in a cold voice.


    "Are you the leader of them?" He pointed at all the corpses.


    "Bastard! What if I am!? Don''t you dare think that I! Merloun''gurak! The strongest of troll warriors will let you live after what you have done" Merloun''gurak yelled while veins started to show on his body from his anger.


    "Is that the leader of the ice trolls?"


    A sudden voice much colder than the Anabast suddenly asked, making the Anabast turnaround and move to the side while bowing their backs.


    Their shadow covered the corpses of the ground and the living ice trolls to the side, to make the path of the owner of that voice.


    From that path, came the owner of the voice, followed by several undead and a small girl with a fox bone mask and a staff with her respective own bodyguards behind her.


    "We apologize for the dy, Creator, we will swiftly suppress their leader as you havemanded." The tallest Anabast said.


    The Death Knight going by as Creator or as Danzel reassured the Anabast.


    "That''s good enough, you all done well. I will reward youter on..."


    Seeing that, Merloun''gurak suddenly yelled out.


    "Bastard! You are their leader!?"


    Raising his hand, several veins popped up full of strength.


    He took a throwing position before shooting the spear toward the Death Knight.


    "Die!!!"


    The Death Knight went to draw his sword, but suddenly, a huge barrier of crystalized golden light was ced in front of them.


    The spear that was the shoot like a javelin hit the barrier.


    Sadly, only the tip managed to go on the other side of the spear and the rest of the spears were outside of the barrier.


    "Quite the nice barrier," The Death Knight said while looking at the fox-masked magic caster on his side before turning to look at the ice troll.


    "You are the strongest of trolls?"


    Before Merloun''gurak could answer, an ethereal pain pierced his chest, bringing forth a soul-reaching pain within him.


    "Aghhhhhhh!!!" He screamed in pain and tried to grab the sword on his heart, only for his hands to pass right through the de inside his chest.


    A sense of dread started to appear in his eyes as he stared at the Death Knight that reveal his overwhelming death aura.


    "Don''t make meugh. Someone as weak as you are nothingpared to the strongest troll."


    Only then did Merloun''gurak hit him with what was in front of him.


    "Someone as foolish as you are not even worth keeping alive..."


    In front of him was Death together with his army.


    And that his life was destined to end here.

 Chapter 400 All Names

    Staring at the withered corpse of the ice troll in front of him, he dragged his hand away from his head before drawing his ominous sword and with a swift swing, cutting its mummified head.


    The surviving ice trolls who watched the powerful Merloun''gurak having his head cut and his body turned to such a state, had long snapped out of the illusion of the tallest Anabast and were now shivering in fear.


    Danzel looked at the corpse of Merloun''gurak before scoffing at it.


    "Hmpf. yousted even less than I gave you credit." Danzel said before making the corpse disappear inside his storage ring, making the ice trolls behind him yelp in fear and shock.


    ''Forget about regenerating a head, you couldn''t even regenerate an arm.''


    Although what he asked could be considered absurd, Danzel couldn''t help butpare the ice trolls with the self-proimed king of trolls, Sartan.


    Though he hadn''t the best rtionship with Sartan, he also didn''t have the worst one.


    And one thing that he respected about the high troll was his strength and regenerative capabilities. He saw more than once the reason why humans gave him the title of the Immortal Juggernaut.


    Although he knew that he couldn''t possibly support such regeneration forever, the high troll sure made it seems like he was truly immortal.


    He originally wanted to keep the leader of this group of ice trolls alive because he thought he would have more information and be smarter than others, but once he saw how full of himself that ice troll was and ignorant of the situation, he didn''t even bother with him and instead chose to gain his XP and use his body for his means.


    That was the main truth, but a part of himself was dissatisfied with his im.


    Albeit he didn''t know the Deathfull Skulls for considerable long and that he mainly was there for business. He still built friendly rtionships with them.


    He wouldn''t go as far as saying that they were his friends, but also the word "friends" wasn''t so far off of what he considered them.


    ''Though it''s a bit waste of blood, I guess using him as an example will make it easier for those guys to talk.'' Danzel thought as he stared at the 3 ice trolls who were shivering in fright.


    "I heard that you were exiled from your main home..." Danzel said before gazing at Anabast, who nodded in confirmation.


    "So take this and draw a map of where that home of yours is." Danzel said as he threw each of them arge te-shaped from bones together with 3 runed daggers to scribble on the bone te.


    "Also, tell me more about that...beast? What was it called again?"


    "They seem to refer to that beast as The Thousand Screaming One, Creator." Ss said from the said.


    "Right, tell me more about that. If you satisfied my request, I might let you live." Danzel said with his ice-cold voice and his ring eyes staring at the ice trolls.


    "I-Isn''t that a bit too much?" Shiro said hesitantly to the side.


    He shook his head.


    "Not at all, I originally nned to kill them all before extorting them from their information, though that screaming beast sounds interesting enough to let one of them live." Danzel dismissed Shiro''s tant request.


    He wanted to make her realize that being nice doesn''t the job done and could be considered dangerous. The sooner she fully realized this point, the better in his opinion.


    Also, his words were also for the ice trolls to hear.


    They went from relief, to pale and in the end desperation as soon as they understood that there was only one slot in the surviving spot.


    "I-I haven''t seen The Thousand Screaming One personally! B-But I heard that he has more eyes that in both hands!" One of the Ice trolls yelled in hurry.


    "It''s said to be bigger than the whole mountain!" Another said.


    "His scream echoes through all thends!"


    "So you haven''t seen it yourself and just spew hearsay from others?" Danzel stared at them with killing intent, which made them flinch and go to draw a map.


    Danzel shook his head before staring at the Draugrs.


    ''You all, go and gather their supplies, from food to weapons, bring everything that seems useful." Danzelmanded them with an internalmand before staring at the Anabast.


    "As for you all, I am quite satisfied with your quick performance, so I reward is a must...first, the three of you. I will give your names." Danzel said while mentioning the tallest and the two one-eyed Anabast.


    Hearing that, the 3 Anabast felt excited were Danzel was feeling somewhat anxious.


    He had thought long and hard for a few names that would suit them and he came up with a few.


    Though the most trouble that he had, was with the one-eyed Anabast.


    He had no idea if they were female or male...


    Their corpses were of those female fox people, but as they turned into Anabast, he had difficulties choosing a name from them.


    As it would be weird to give them a male name when they considered themself female or the other way around.


    So in the end, he decided to go with a unisex name for both of them.


    Though he first started with the tallest Anabast.


    "I came with the decision to call you Talon as for now..." Danzel said while observing the Anabast reaction.


    Luckily, he seemed satisfied.


    "I, Talon, will honor the name that thee Creator has bestowed upon me. And I will work to live up to this name." The tallest Anabast, named Talon as of now bowed his back to Danzel.


    Danzel nodded at Talon despite feeling quite awkward about how guys bowed to him.


    "Now you two..." Danzel stared at the one eyed Anabast, which were...overly excited to gain their names.


    The left eyed Anabast''s ring eye was sorge that Danzel couldn''t help but get distracted.


    Though those mes were ethereal and wouldn''t burn their skulls, it made one question wherever they were mes for a brief moment.


    "As for your name..." Danzel looked towards the left eyed Anabast.


    "It will be Leyone."


    "And for you, it will be Rayone" Danzel said atst to the right eyed Anabast.


    "W-We thank thee Creator, for such names!" Both now, Leyone and Rayone said excitedly while bowing their backs.


    ''As long as they are happy with them...'' Danzel thought internally, feeling somewhat guilty.


    If one looked at the names carefully, one could call himzy, as Talon was simr to "tall one", while Leyone and Rayone were "left one" and "Right one".


    Though to him, he found them really suited for them.


    If Leyone and Rayone considered themself as female in mind, they could be referred to as Leya and Ray at worst.


    With his worries unfounded and all the Anabast now named, Danzel looked towards Baron and Ss.


    It was their time to be rewarded.


    "I am also satisfied with your performance, Ss, Baron. Thoughpared to the others, I have already given you a name. So I wanted to ask you what kind of reward you want. As long as is within my capabilities, of course. I can give the respective reward."


    Baron and Ss were surprised to be asked for a reward and they both fell silent for a moment.


    But shortly after, the first one toe up with something was Baron.


    "Creator, would it be possible to be taught you swordsmanship with the shield?" Baron asked with his cold and confident voice.


    Danzel was confused for a moment upon such a request, but after taking a better look at Baron, he notice that he had a shield made out of stone simr to his own shape vise together with a stone sword that albeit was a bit bigger than his, it very much was a long sword.


    ''Heh~is that guy trying to imitate me?'' Danzel would have a wry smile if his face wasn''t just a skull.


    "Swordsmanship, huh? Wouldn''t you be more interested in a shield or a sword with my best runes?"


    Baron in turn shook his head.


    "I would like to use my magic to create my equipment. And I found thee Creator''s swordsmanship to hold more value to my future improvement."


    ''So he isn''t tantly asking and excuses his request to achieve my orders to grow stronger. Not bad.'' Danzel nodded internally.


    Though of all the Anabast, Baron was quite straightforward and didn''t speak much in his lessons or generally. But his words alone show that he was smart.


    Which was a satisfying point in his opinion.


    "My swordsmanship isn''t something that can be learned, but I might be to bring you to the level suitable for your strength. Although I ain''t promising a schedule, your request is epted."


    "I thank the Creator." Baron said while bowing his back, though his words were indifferent, Danzel knew that he was happy based on his connection with him.


    Danzel next stared at Ss.


    "And what will it be for you, Ss?"


    Ss stayed a bit silent despite being asked.


    But after a few seconds, Ss hesitantly pointed his shadowy finger at Shiro''s staff.


    "Would it be possible to gain something simr to Shiro''s weapon, Creator?"


    "Hmm..." Hearing his request, Danzel felt in his thoughts.


    ''Now that''s a difficult request...''


    "I do have some in my possession, their quality is rathercking. And I personally can''t carve runes as they are made out of wood."


    Hearing that, Ss felt quite bitter internally.


    "But...I might work something for you. Sadly, your request will have to be pushed back."


    "I thank thee Creator for such consideration." Ss answered, feeling less bitter than before.


    There was a moment of awkwardness between them, but such a moment was broken the next moment.


    The sk that Danzel had hanging on his armor suddenly exploded in dark green mes.


    *Ting!


    "Hiie! R-Rue? What was that just now?." Shiro asked surprised by the sudden sk exploding.


    Danzel nkly stared at the broken ss falling to the ground full of ice before he drew [Death Hunts Dagger].


    Danzel briefly stared from where they came from, before walking towards the 3 ice trolls and finishing what he promised with the dagger in his hand.

 Chapter 401 Warriors Arriving In The Village

    At the same time when Danzel with the others noticed the small settlement, in the raided vige of the natives.


    Nothing extremely special happend.


    The undead created by Danzel, the Draugr, were patrolling the vige and the surroundings under the orders of Danzel.


    Though considering that the vige was already empty beforehand, it was frankly just safekeeping the vige and the surroundings for their liege''s return.


    Till then, their job was to see if anything changed and report what they saw to the "Overseer".


    And from the 5 groups of Draugrs, one came back to report to the "Overseer."


    "Overseer, we witness signs of the living marching to our location." One of the 4 Draugrs said to the other Draugr in front of him.


    The so-called Overseer, despite his title, was no different than the other Draugrs.


    He wore just like the others the clothes of the deceased viges and he was the same type of undead as the Draugr.


    The only noticeable difference was that he held a sword of way better runes than the others. Although the others also had weapons with few runed ones, the sword of the Overseer could be said to be a level below Danzel''s sword based on runes alone.


    It was one of Danzel''s experimental swords in fact, which was quite powerful in only it was of average quility.


    He gave that sword because he had no need for it anymore as he could no longer use it to runesmith and to make the Overseer position seem more impressive.


    As of why he appointed the title of Overseer to one of his Draugrs, it was because that Draugr was responsible for holding down the runed contract to notify him.


    "The living?" The Overseer looked at the group with his ring dark green eyes.


    "Have you been noticed by them or are they aware of our existence?" The Overseer asked.


    "We are certain that we were unseen... although we can''t be certain of that." One of the Draugr said in his cold voice.


    "Mhm...were you able to confirm their numbers?"


    "We suspect a group of 15, with 12 wielding weapons. They looked like warriors."


    "Any chances that the other 3 are magic casters simr to mistress Shiro and the Lords?"


    "...We weren''t able to discern this fact..." The Draugr said as he looked at his group, who were also unsure.


    Seeing no confirmation, the Overseer fell silent while he held the runed contract given by his liege.


    "Overseer...will you notify our liege?" One of the Draugrs of the group asked.


    "Our orders are to confine and capture any living in sight and to notify our Liege...only after we secured the living or our doom is near are I to notify our Liege." The Overseer said in his cold voice.


    "Call the others to return! The time to fulfill our task is near! If we were too satisfied with our Liege''s expectations, we might receive a name just like Lord Baron and Lord Ss!"


    The group of Draugrs had their eyes red up before following the orders of the Overseer, gathering the rest of the Draugrs in one ce.


    "Prepare an ambush! The living ising! 15 of them in total!" The Overseer said with his cold voice to the others.


    "Our orders are to confine them and present them to our Liege! If not possible kill them! Our Master needs only a few alive!" The Overseer reminded the Draugrs of their orders, despite none of them forget them.


    The Overseer then looked at the group of 4 Draugrs who spotted the living.


    "You 4...hide outside the vige in case we fail our Lieges orders. You are to follow them in the case we fail..."


    "Overseer...that''s it..."


    "Unlike the 5 Lords and the mistress guards...we are weak. You 4 are to hold the will of our Lieges in case we all fail. Our Master has given me the authority tomand the others, as the Overseer..."


    The Draugrs fell silent, before bowing their heads in eptance.


    Though Danzel only briefly exined the Overseer authority which technically could overwrite hismand, he did so in the case he wouldn''t be returning to the vige. Although within time and distance, hismand and connection will inevitably disappear.


    He made sure in the case he won''t being back, that the Draugrs won''t be confined by his orders.


    Nheless, the Draugrs started preparing just like the Overseer.


    Raising the sword granted by his master and creator with both hands and backward, he pierced the ground with his sword, activating the respective runes of that sword.


    Making the nearby cold wind gather within the de.


    "We are the creations and followers of the Great Death Knight! His will is absolute! And our task is to fulfill it!" The Overseer said with the Draugr''s following along in the middle.


    The runes glowed in an ominous light blue color before the effect of the runes took ce.


    The gather cold wind trapped inside the sword came out like a cold mist and spread through the surrounding vige like an avnche and even bit outside the vige before the cold mist was circling around the whole vige.


    The runes of the sword were no ordinary and were in fact Danzel''s own creations bybining and mixing various runes to create the rune responsible for the cold mist.


    Though it was a failed product, as his original goal with the rune was to prevent the cold air while creating a barrier of wind to block the snow in a winter storm. Just to make the travel for Shiro easier.


    Having seen that it would take a whole lot of time to finish such a rune, he gave up the idea. And the failure with the [Frost Rune of Ice Breath] was on the sword that the Overseer had in their hands.


    It was a rune that barely was of the [Epic] rating, which sadly didn''t benefit from various of his bonuses as it was a frost rune.


    ***


    At the same time, just a few minutes ago...


    "You didn''t have toe with us..." One of the Vashara warriors said to the young girl with a short heart, forcing herself to drag an axe in one of her hands.


    Even though the axe was barely not being dragged through the ground.


    "Xesan is right, with your hands and your body''s condition, you should even stay back at the vige." Another warrior as his eyes looked at the shoulder of the young girl with worry.


    "This is my vige...of course, I have toe. It''s my duty as one who lived to hear..." The girl with the wounded arm, who Alka said with a determined voice.


    Although within her voice, there was a hind of fear hidden that one of the warriors noticed.


    "If I remember right, you said that a cursed warrior came and killed the ice troll that attacked your vige, right?"


    "Yes..." Alka said while looking down at the ground.


    "Don''t worry young girl, we, and as much as the other warriors fought and won over cursed warriors and ice trolls before. Together with our numbers, your vige shouldn''t be dangerous. Xesan over there even has a frozen relic weapon. So don''t worry." One of the warriors said with a smile.


    "Hey, you..." Xesan said while staring at the man with a frown.


    Alka stared at the two and tilted her head to the side.


    "Frozen relic weapon?" She asked confused as she stared at the warrior named Xesan.


    The man held two short axes, one of each hand, but the de of the axes was covered with tight bandages.


    "Heh, never heard of them? Then let me tell you, they are weapons blessed by one of the primordial gods. Just a simple hit will make any ice troll run to their holes, I tell you!"


    "One of the primordials?" Alka asked back with curiosity,


    "Hey! stop talking nonsense Maxxren!" Xesan yelled at the other warrior.


    "Tch~ alright, alright! The girl seemed scared so I wanted to break the ice, you know? I know that you don''t like talking about your relic." Maxxren said.


    "More of a cursed weapon than a relic..." Xesan mumbled to himself, focusing his mind on the path forward.


    Seeing that Maxxren wasn''t willing to say anymore, Alka couldn''t contain her curiosity and asked with whispers.


    "By the primordial gods...do you mean that his weapon is blessed by the God of Wild Hunt?"


    Maxxren shook his head as he watched carefully towards Xesan before leaning toward Alka while covering his mouth with his hand.


    "If it was really blessed by the God of Wild Hunt, Xesan wouldn''t have called it cursed."


    "His weapon is blessed by the oldest and cruelest primordial gods...the one who covers thends full of snow and hardship. Where all warriors have to face eventually."


    Leaning closer to Alka''s ear, Maxxren whispered the name of the primordial


    Though just he was about to speak the name of the cruelest primordial god, the warriors finally came to see.


    "We spotted the vige!"


    Having finally reached, both Alka''s and Maxxren''s focus was driven to the vige, covered with a cold mist.

 Chapter 402 Cursed Warriors Vs Native Warriors

    Walking towards the vige and entering the outside of the cold mist, the native''s body couldn''t help but shiver.


    "Hey young girl, was your vige always so cold? Also that mist..." One of the warriors asked.


    Though their races had some cold resistance in their blood, which allowed them to dress quite lightly even in those frozennds. The cold mist that lingered around the vige reminded them of the cold of the winter storms.


    "N-No, we never had a such cold, no less the mist. It''s the first time that I am seeing something like this happening." Alka said as her harmed armed etched, reminding her shortly of the events that happend in her vige.


    "I have never seen something like this, what about you Xesan?" Maxxren asked while looking around.


    Though the cold mist wasn''t as thick as to make it impossible to see, it still obstructed their vision.


    "Neither have I...which is quite worrying." Xesan answered with a frown on his face.


    "The mist isn''t natural, it''s magical...but I can''t sense a spell, it''s weird." One of the female natives said as she scanned the mist with a frown.


    "So the mist is someone doing...maybe another vige? The doing of another shaman?"


    The female, who was the shaman of their group, shook her head.


    "It isn''t impossible that this is the doing of another vige...but the mist isn''t made by a shaman. As it would require lots of mana to move and keep the spell to do such a thing, but the amount of mana inside the mist is almost none existent..."


    The answer from their shaman only worsens Xesan''s frown.


    For a moment he stared at Alka before shaking his head.


    "I guess we will have to see for ourselves, everyone prepare and watch your steps! Don''t go too far away from each other!" As the one holding the frozen relic weapons, naturally, he was their leader.


    Entering the vige filled with cold mist, except for their footsteps, no sound was being made which brought an eerie feeling to the group.


    The preview''sment of their Shaman made them feel quite dense and they couldn''t help but look at the house which could barely be seen.


    Soon enough though, an additional sound got mixed with their own, making them more observant warriors to halt their steps.


    "What is that sound?"


    "Do you guys also hear it?"


    "Everyone stop moving! And prepare for battle!" Xesanmanded.


    Soon enough everyone got in their fighting stance toward the source of the sound.


    *Pou~


    *Pou~


    *Pou~


    "Footsteps?" Maxxren whisper what everyone had in mind.


    Having lived in those frozennds, it was impossible for warriors like them not to recognize the sound of stepping through the snow after living in those frozennds.


    But because of that, they also recognized that the sounds felt a bit off from the usual footstep.


    Compared to what they were used to, the sounds of the footsteps were rather light in nature.


    And soon enough, the group of natives was able to spot a tall shadow approaching them in front of them.


    "Halt! Who goes there!" Xesan yelled towards the approaching shadows from the cold mist.


    "I am the Overseer appointed by the supreme creator and master. O living ones." the tall shadows spoke with an ice-cold voice.


    And soon enough, it was revealed the identity of the tall shadows.


    Wearing the clothes of the vige while standing 2 meters tall, was a standing skeleton (Draugr) with an ominous long sword in one of his hands.


    And the undead who called himself the Overseer stared at the living with his ethereal dark green, ring eyes.


    "A cursed warrior that can speak?" Xesan mumbled to himself while staring at the undead in front of him.


    But what caught others'' attention was that Alka dropped her axe to the ground and fell to her knees, with her good arm holding her mouth.


    "N-No way...why are you...?" Alka mumbled with tears starting to flow down her face.


    "Hey, girl, what happend?" Maxxren said as he went to his knees near Alka while he stared at their shaman.


    Who simply shook her head.


    "Is that the cursed warrior that you told us about?" Maxxren asked.


    While her face was filled with tears, Alka shook her head.


    "N-No, he isn''t the one. B-But he is...the clothes that he is wearing..."


    Although the Overseer was dirty and had been damaged by the troll raid a bit, Alka was still able to recognize the owner of those clothes.


    As she herself had made them.


    "Thi-I- He was my mate..." Alka finally managed to say, making the others frown as they stared at the Overseer with understanding.


    "I see...poor girl." Maxxren as he helped Alka stand up.


    Xesan, gazed only briefly at Alka before he focused on the Overseer.


    "You...you mentioned something about your creator. Where is he as of now?" Xesan asked while staring at the ring dark green eyes.


    ''I never heard of someone being capable of creating cursed warriors, even less making them intelligent.'' He thought to himself.


    "I have not the privilege, knowledge, none the intent to share such information towards the living. My only mission is to guard and present you with the living in front of my master."


    Hearing thest bit, many of them frowned.


    "And what if we were to refuse?" Xesan asked while looking at Maxxren and the others to prepare.


    "That would go against our master''s will, which is uneptable." The Overseer said as he raised his free hand towards them.


    "Refuse or give in, the end is the same-"


    Then, the Overseer closed his hand as if he was crashing something.


    "His will shall be fulfilled."


    "Bastard! You think that you can take us all out!?" One of the warriors yelled agitated.


    "Hey! Stop it!" Xesan yelled back at the agitated warrior.


    Although he wouldn''t have agreed, openly refusing the cursed warriors'' request would make them lose the disadvantage of the other party not knowing their stands.


    ''Nheless, I also got a bad feeling about his weapon.'' Xesan thought internally as he stared at the long sword with strange letters.


    "Daring to refuse the will of the great one..." The Overseer mumbled while his killing intent was being made aware to the others.


    "As the Overseer, I will follow through his will and fulfill his will, even if it means killing some of you!" The Overseer said as he raised his runed long sword toward the group.


    And the next moment, the rune lightens up in an ominous light blue color. resulting in the trapped cold wind spewing out in an avnche made out of the cold thick mist toward the native group.


    Being concentrated in more of an area, the cold was much strong while the vision of the warriors grew much worse.


    "He is responsible for the mist!" The Shaman said to the group.


    Though suddenly, from all their surroundings, sounds of wood breaking apart and doors opening were to appear with soon after multiple footsteps closing in.


    And before the warriors could make up the situation, a de soon came into the mist and shed at his back, making him cry out of pain.


    "Kyaghhhh!"


    The warrior soon fell to the ground, not knowing what hit him.


    An axe also searched to kill Maxxren, but his quick reflex was able to block the axe with his shield while being in front of Alka.


    *Tinck!


    Grinding his teeth, Maxxren looked through the cold mist to see the owner of the axe.


    And soon enough he found a skull staring back at him that lighten his eyes in the same ring dark green color as the so-called Overseer.


    "Dammit! It''s an ambush! There is more than one of those cursed bastards!" Maxxren warned the others.


    Though, from the 15 they were, already 3 fell victims to the surprise attack.


    "Dammit!" Xesan cursed at the current situation and was about to go and help the others.


    But what stopped him from doing so were the running footsteps that came towards him.


    And soon enough, a runed long sword was swung towards his head.


    Raising both of his small axes he caught the runed long sword.


    *Tinck!


    "You should even have surrendered to the great ones will. Living ones." The Overseer said in his cold voice.


    "You cursed bastard...!" Backing up, Xesan swung his axes towards the Overseer, who either dodge or deflected the axe swings.


    Xesan though suddenly used his mana to forcefully move faster his hand, managing tond a hit and break 3 rib cases of the Overseer.


    But the Overseer wasn''t outdone.


    Though hecked any active skills, the sword that granted him the title of the Overseer was enough.


    Having realized early that he couldn''t dodge, the sudden hasten attack, he went ahead tond a hit too.


    He seed, albeit his sess was a minor cut on Xesan''s chest.


    But that was enough for the Overseer to act.


    Once the wound was made, a crimson light came out of the Overseer''s sword, drawing arge amount of Xesan blood out of his body forcefully before backing back.


    "Huh!?" Xesan of course was surprised and confused by the sword stealing so much of his blood with such a minor wound. His short moment of confusion though let the Overseer continue acting.


    Circting the stolen blood on the long sword, the crimson light was soon mixed with a light blue light.


    And once the Overseer swung his runed long sword in the air and let the cold mist carry the stolen blood towards Xesan.


    Who was assaulted by his own blood and cold mist. Where some blood, unfortunately, ended up on his face.


    Seeing his opponent being blinded, the Overseer stepped up and swung his sword.


    And managing tond another hit despite Xesan moving back to dodge.


    Drawing more blood from him.


    If Danzel were to have seen how the Overseer has been using the runes of the sword, he would praise the Draugr.


    If one looked from the side, Xesan was clearly at disadvantage and the Draugrs had the number advance while also holding the element of surprise.


    It was a matter of time before they fulfilled their master''s will.


    But in the next moment, a green light spread through the warriors with one particr stronger lightnding on the wounded Xesan.


    Healing his wounds slowly butpletely.


    At the same time, the situation seemed to stabilize and the native warriors were starting to fare against the undead and their ambush.


    The Overseer started at the others before his ring eyes wanted to a certain person.


    The female shaman.


    His gaze towards her was shortly interrupted though by Xesan dashing forward.


    "I am your opponent!"

 Chapter 403 My Will Is His Will

    With a swing of an axe, a loud cracking sound was to be heard.


    *Crack!


    And within the sound, a Draugr fell to the ground, his ring eyes vanishing in defeat.


    And he wasn''t the only one.


    Draugr after Draugr started to fall to the ground with their ribs crashing and their skulls, falling to the ground, no longer able to follow their lieges will.


    The sounds of weapons shing didn''t seem to be ending, s the undead surely did.


    Despite taking the natives by surprise and blocking their sight by a certain amount, the Draugr was starting to fall one by one.


    *Ting!


    One Draugr wielding a sword shed towards Maxxren, though was swiftly blocked by his shield.


    Then another Draugr moved through those two and raised his sword to sh down at Alka.


    Alka raised her axe forward and even grabbed it with both of her hands, making her shoulder ache in pain.


    *Truk!


    The Draugr managed to destroy the wooden handle of the axe and raised his sword to give the killing blow.


    But before he could, a spear appeared from his side and destroyed his skull.


    Seeing that from the side, the Overseer felt anger and helplessness.


    ''They had a magic caster after all...'' He thought regretted it.


    With their surprise attack and the advantages of numbers, it could be said that the two parties were equally strong.


    But the Shaman turned the whole battlefield upside down and worse, the warriors became faster and stronger on their own.


    If they were natural-born Draugrs, they would have easily been able to overwhelm them.


    But that wasn''t the case.


    ''At this rate, we will fail his will...'' The Overseer though.


    Nheless, he couldn''t do anything to change the current reality.


    Despite being created by a Death Knight and having runes carved into their bones. Making them far more powerful than other Draugrs created by lesser necromancers.


    It wasn''t enough to ovee the current situation.


    And though the support of the Shaman and the warrior Xesan became stronger, he failed to doge an attack and one of the axesnded on his ribs and cut through time before cutting his free.


    The force of the attack together with how light the Overseer''s body was, was sent a few meters flying and rolling to the ground.


    Be the Overseer quickly managed to look at his opponent despite having his arm cut.


    He thought that he would see the warriore rushing towards him, but instead, Xesan turned around and helped eliminate the other Draugrs.


    Having his opponent turned his back, the Overseer couldn''t help but think of how weak he was.


    ''We aren''t like the Lords...we are expendable.''


    That fact he and the other Draugr knew but hated to admit.


    That they were expendable and unneeded for their Liege.


    They liked to think otherwise, but the Overseer knew best how true this pitter truth was.


    As he watched the other Draugr falling to the ground, the Overseer remembered the orders bestow by his liege personally to him.


    ''Within my absence, you should be the Overseer of this vige. And I grant you the power to overwrite my orders in case I won''t be returning.''


    Back then he was honored for being granted a name and also puzzled at his liege''sst words. Making him ask for details.


    ''There is a slight chance that I won''t be returned back here. If that were to happen, you are to forget my orders and lead the others.''


    That statement alone made him back then despair.


    That was also the reason why the Draugrs were trying their best to earn their Lieges recognition.


    Unlike the Lords, they weren''t special to their master.


    "I am unworthy of his will..." The Overseer said as the rest of the Draugrs fell to the ground, with simr regret''s as his.


    Raising up to his two feet, the attention of the other living went towards him.


    "Though, I refuse to disrespect the name that his liege given to me!" The Overseer raised his long sword up to the air and the runes lit up in an ominous blue light.


    ''You shall be the Overseer...and this sword should prove to the others the name that I give you now. It has 4 runes, though 3 are worth mentioning as one is for durability. Remember each rune, one is called [Rune of Ice Breath]~''


    Suddenly, all the cold mist that was spread throughout the vige started to rush back on the Overseer''s long sword now started to have his light mixed with crimson color, which sucked the blood from the warriors.


    "Tch! The dead should stay dead!" Xesan cursed as he rushed to finish off the Overseer.


    ''The second rune is called [Rune of Thirst]~''


    Once Xesan was close enough, he jumped with his axes above his head, readying to swing them down at the despicable cursed warrior.


    Before the warrior could reach him though, the Overseer held the sword backward and pierced the ground.


    *Tring!


    Once it was done, all the sucked cold mist of before together with the nearby air exploded around the Overseer sword as a continuous stream of powerful cold mist while carrying the blood of everyone.


    *FSOOOOOOOOGHHHH!!!!~


    It was so powerful that Xesan was pushed back and sent rolling to the ground until he pierced his axes to the ground so that he won''t be swept away by the powerful pressure of the cold mist.


    Even the others who were further away were being pushed back and they had to crouch as the nearby building was getting destroyed by the cold mist and the snow that it threw at them.


    The Overseer wasn''t unaffected, but having known the power beforehand, his piercing the sword to the ground while holding tight left him pretty much unaffected.


    ''I am d that I let those 4 hide...'' The Overseer thought as his mana was almost drained dry by the runes.


    Raising to the ground with the support of the long sword, the Overseer put his hand back on his small back and brought out a small piece of rolled paper.


    "W-What was that?"


    "Is it over?"


    "To think magic this powerful existed..."


    The warriors mumbled as they raised to the ground.


    But suddenly, someone noticed the piece of paper that the Overseer was holding.


    "Hey! What is he holding?"


    "Looks like leather or threat...?"


    Some asked.


    But the Overseer didn''t care to exin.


    As he was following his lieges orders.


    ''If the livinge, and you judge that you can take them with the others, hold 1 or 2 hostages. If not possible killing them all is also fine. If you judge that they are too much to handle...use the rune contract as I exined. Prioritize your survival over my orders if necessary...''


    Opening his mouth, the Overseer suddenly bit through the runed contract with his teeth and dragged his hand with the contract.


    Ripping the rune contract right in front of the native warriors. They were at first confused.


    But then, dark green mes exploded through the piece of paper.


    Lighting the Overseer''s clothes around his neck in those dark green mes simr to his hand.


    Now with his neck and whole hand burning in the dark green mes, the Overseer picked up the long sword and pierced through the ground.


    "O living ones...I might have failed my liege, but know thee!!!" The Overseer yelled with his ring dark green eyes burning fiercer that the mes around his body.


    Raising the sword to his side, the Overseer remembered thest rune that was carved into the sword that proved his name.


    And thest rune activated in an ominous dark green light.


    "My will is the will of my Lieges!!!"


    "And his will is <strong>Eternal!!!"</strong> The Overseer shouted with his death auraing out of his body as he swung the long sword.


    The warriors expected some sort of ranged attack to happend but what happend next left them truly dumbfounded.


    *Crack!!!


    The cursed warrior in front of them swung his own long sword at his skull.


    The dark green light of the runes suddenly enveloped the Overseer and sucked the dark green mes just like his soul inside the weapon.


    <strong>"Eternal~!!!" </strong>An echo of the Overseer''s voice spread through the surroundings before vanishingpletely and his soulless body falling to the ground.


    The long sword fell soon after to the ground, making the natives rx with thest enemy now gone.


    "Don''t lower your guard as of yet, more of them might be hiding nearby..." Xesan said as he turned around and saw that 7 of them died.


    "I would say that we leave Xesan. If they are truly more, heck, their creator might even be" before Maxxren could finish, Xesan interrupted him.


    "You are right, we lost already enough good people..." Xesan said as he walked towards the corpse of the Overseer.


    He put his axes axe on his hips before bending down and picking the long sword off the ground.


    "Let''s pick those weapons and return. ording to Alka, they might be more than twice the amount of cursed warriors here..."


    Alka was shaken by the idea of the rest of the vige has be what her mate has turned out to be.


    With tears on her face, she went to help the others despite being told to take it easy.


    She med herself for letting those 7 die as if she hadn''t arrived at their vige and died somewhere in the wild.


    None of these would have happend.

 Chapter 404 Tracks Of The Living Ones

    *Pugh!!


    Through the frozennds, d in dark tted armor, on one hand, wielding an ominous sword while in the other carrying a teenage with a fox bone mask.


    Danzel was running back to the vige at full speed while carrying Shiro at a speed faster than a train.


    ''Do idiots, after what I even told them...'' Danzel cursed internally while ignoring Shiro''s shout to slow down.


    Not only was her long hair getting in her way, but the cold wind was simtion assaulting her. Even with her strong body of demon kin, the cold was getting through her and she started to get quite nauseous.


    Despite that, she hugged her staff and was using her magic to make a barrier around them, but as she has never before moved at such speed, her barrier wasn''t all that great as she had to move it.


    Once Danzel saw the contract of his getting burned, he knew that the matter with the ice trolls could wait and let the Draugr build a base around the settlement and took Shiro to see what happend to the vige.


    Shiro also wanted to interact with those fox people and Danzel had to take her anyway as he had the troll blood, so taking her with him was a must.


    At first, he was only casually running back, slow enough not to be ufortable for Shiro.


    But once Danzel realized that his connections with all his undead has been cut except for a few, he knew that the worse situation took ce.


    That they were all annihted or the majority.


    Which resulted in him rushing at top speed back.


    Crossing the days of walking in a matter of minutes.


    And as an undead, he felt neither the cold nor exhaustion.


    It took him only one and a half hours to reach the mountain where beyond was the raided vige.


    "They aren''t here..." Danzel mumbled as he searched for the connections of the Draugrs.


    ''Although they aren''t gone, they are much further away...''


    "R-Rue...can you put me down first?" Shiro said with a weak voice.


    "...Endure for a bit more." Danzel said with his cold voice before going towards the vige.


    Entering the vige, Danzel put Shiro down and supported herself with the staff while her legs were trembling.


    Danzel gazed around before giving his orders.


    "Anabast, scout the vige and notify me if something is missing..."


    As soon as he finished, his own shadow started to extend and split into 5 parts.


    And from those 5 shadows, Baron, Ss, Talon, Leyone, and Rayone risen from his shadows and bowed their back to Danzel.


    "As you wish, thee Creator." Their cold voices said before flying away to fulfill Danzel''s orders.


    Although he saw none of the living with his [Eyes of the Damned], it wasn''t impossible for someone to be able to hide from it. But more importantly, he wanted to find clues why someone would return to the vige.


    Though he highly doubted it, there might be something in value hidden somewhere. But really, he suspected that they came to either pick the corpses of the dead vigers or take the resource of the vige, such as food.


    As food in a dead vige is free food for others. However bitter it sounded.


    "Can you walk, Shiro? Or want me to carry you..." Danzel said as he stared at Shiro with his ring eyes.


    "N-No! I can walk! I am good!"


    "Really...?" Danzel said in doubt as he watched her legs tremble.


    "Y-Yes..." She said while nodding.


    He mentally shrugged his shoulders and walked further them the vige while being followed by Shiro from behind.


    Following where he could feel the miasma, they soon enough reached the ce where the Overseer and the Draugrs fought with the native warriors.


    "R-Rue...look." Shiro pointed at the remains of the Draugrs.


    "..."


    Walking silently towards the remains, Danzel scanned the surrounding destroyed buildings.


    He stopped only after he was in front of the remains of the Draugr he named the Overseer.


    His skull was broken andying on the ground, simr to all the other undead.


    And their bones were havingyers of ck dust.


    If left for long enough, those remains would eventually turn into dust.


    ''Whoever came here took also their weapons...and left those guys here.'' Danzel thought as he watched the 7 corpses of those fox peopleying badly cut down.


    For a moment he thought about raising them as undead, but shook his head.


    Shiro stayed silent as Danzel walked around and touched the remains of the Draugrs one by one. But once Danzel touched the remains of the Overseer, a different notification appeared, unlike the other Draugr.


    [Soulless Remain''s of Undead]: A undead that had lost his soul before its destruction just to fulfill his master''s will. Despite having lost his fight, he made sure the will of his creator will be fulfilled.


    ''He lost his soul...?'' Danzel would have frowned if he could.


    He touched the remains to see their description, to see if they died by magic or something to be wary of, but seeing that description, Danzel couldn''t help but doubt.


    ''If I were to take the description as the truth, then that means that this guy...''


    "Used the [Rune of Tolian Repent] to himself..." he mumbled quite dumbfounded.


    It wasn''t like the Overseer didn''t know what the runed sword did as he went ahead and exined its function in the case he abandons them.


    So there was no way that he didn''t know what the [Rune of Tolian Repent] did.


    "Was it because I told him to prioritize their survival?" Danzel shook his head.


    ''Though [Greater Raise Undead Lv.10] made the Draugr stronger and way more intelligent, I would have never expected the Overseer to use the sword to himself to preserve himself...''


    Gazing towards the directions of the remaining intact connections.


    At the same time, the Anabast arrived back and moved behind Danzel and Shiro.


    "O thee Creator, we have found no changes or anyone present..." Talon spoke with his cold voice.


    "Well done..." Danzel said as walked forward.


    "Where are we going, Rue?" Shiro asked as she followed behind Danzel.


    "Where else do you think? We are going to meet the ones who made all this mess and stole my weapons. Maybe they would have a map where we can return..." Danzel added in the end, making Shiro''s eyes lighten up with expectations.


    Oblivious of Danzel''s thoughts.


    ''Be it by force or not, wherever they like it or not. I will bend them to my will. At the very least I won''t let you get away after destroying them and stealing from me.'' Danzel thought internally.


    Albeit he didn''t have a great attachment to the Draugr and saying otherwise would be a rightful lie. As he had already created countless of them to be his cannon founder when he was fighting in the war.


    They were still his creations.


    There was a minimal level of responsibility that he had to take care of his creation. That''s why he made sure for those Draugrs that he might leave behind to be equipped with good weapons.


    ''I am such a hypocrite...'' Danzel shook his head.


    This very fact he knew for a long time, but now this didn''t change what he had to do.


    Giving an internalmand to the Anabast, they collected the corpses of the 7 fox people and he put them inside his storage ring, which was at its limits by now.


    "Might as well use them as materials..." He said to himself, with Shiro turning her head away.


    Soon enough, the Anabast went back inside Danzel''s shadow and he together with Shiro followed the connections with hisst remaining undead.


    It didn''t long to catch up to them with Danzel carrying Shiro in his hand.


    And from afar, Danzel and Shiro were able to see a group of 8 people walking away.


    And with the group of natives beingpletely oblivious.


    They were slowly guiding a Death Knight to their very vige.


    An existence that is also considered the wielder of death.


    ***


    In the group of native warriors, after a few days of visiting Alka''s vige.


    After having fought with the cursed warriors and having lost a few of their own people, they went back to their vige quite depressed.


    They had to go back and tell the families of the ones they lost that they had died and were left behind in a ce where one of the primordial gods had cursed.


    Though the weapons that they brought back were of incredible quality, some of them considered them cursed by the oldest of primordial gods.


    And considering that their vige was worshipping the God of Wild Hunt and the youngest primordial god. The God of White Life.


    It couldn''t be considered a positive for bringing weapons wielded by cursed warriors.


    They eventually arrived at the vige.


    Though out their journal, Alka''s marked shoulder was etching each day. She passed the pain as the guilty and sadness within her. Unknowning that the being that inflicted her such wound was following them.


    In the end, they werepletely oblivious to the existence that they were guided to their vige.

 Chapter 405 Just Knocking At Their Door

    "Open the gate! The Warriors have returned!" The guards shouted, bringing the attention of the vigers of Vashara.


    Once the wooden gates were opened, the guards outside stepped inside with the group of warriors. Their walls were made out of sturdy ice made by continuous use of magic.


    "The warriors are back!"


    "Look! They have brought back new weapons!"


    "You are right...but aren''t their numbers less than they left?"


    "Yeah...where are the others?"


    "Did something happend to them?"


    The atmosphere quickly became from a joy''s one to one filled with worries.


    Though warriors dying in a hunt wasn''t impossible, for a total of 7 warriors to die was quite shocking.


    The family members who saw their loved ones missing were the first ones to dash forward and question Xesan, who was considered the leader of those warriors.


    "Sorry..." Xesan said with a heavy voice as he shook his head to the family members.


    Of course, some started crying while others couldn''t ept it and asked for details.


    "There is no way that my son died!" One of the elderly raised his staff to hit Xesan in frustration, but Maxxren stepped forward and receive the staff to his head instead of Xesan.


    With his head starting to bleed, Maxxren bitterly smiles at the elderly.


    "I can''t apologize enough to you, Old Lue. We also lost our friends. He died bravely fighting to protect the others...Wild Hunt would surely be pleased by such warrior..." Maxxren said, making Xesan grind his teeth to himself as he watched the old man tear up.


    ''How could I even tell them that we left their bodies to the ce where it was cursed by potentially the oldest primordial?''


    Though he very much hoped that this happend because of someone else interference such as another tribe and that a primordial god wasn''t involved.


    His eyes then went towards the weird weapons that the cursed weapons had.


    Only was metal extremely rare to the point that they focused on weapons that didn''t require much metal such as axes. And with the absence of metal, their cksmithing methods weren''t that advanced.


    So to see such weapons with so much metal and quality was something he never had seen before.


    The most impressive one was the weapon of that Overseer, which the Shaman called simr to his frozen relic weapons.


    ''Weapons of unknown origin. Intelligent cursed warriors, and that girl...'' Xesan stared at Alka''s shoulder, which was covered in something simr to bandages, that has the mark of death.


    "Maxxren, sorry but can I leave this to you? I got to talk to the Lady about this..." Xesan said as he grabbed the Overseer''s sword and for a split moment, he as if he was being watched.


    But that feeling vanished as quickly as it disappeared.


    "Yeah, I...will deal with them. Though you own me one Xesan!" Maxxren yelled as the Xesan walked towards the house of thedy up on the mountain.


    Their Vashara vige, half of which was built on a mountain and built houses while carving a portion of the mountain and building their houses.


    They did so, at least their ancestors did, to not only avoid winter storms but also to be closer to the primordial god of the Wild Hunt.


    After walking to the top of the mountain, he saw a girl wearing a white wooded mask.


    "I see that your travel towards that girl''s vige didn''t go so well. Xesan." The girl with the white mask said.


    "Sigh...it hasn''t, but before I tell you the details, I want to show you this..." Xesan said as he showed the sword of the Overseer.


    From the side, a man with a herding staff came and holded the handle of the long sword and frowned before showing it to the masked girl.


    "This is..." The masked girl leaned to take a better look, but before she could say anything, a loud wood-crashing sound appeared out of the blue.


    "What is that sound?" Xesan turned around confused to look down at the vige.


    What he saw though made his eyes widen in shock.


    As he saw the gate that holded several blows from ice trolls in the past, has now been broken into pieces.


    "The gate!!!"


    ***


    A few moments before the gate has been broken.


    Danzel saw from afar how the natives they were following went inside the vige.


    Which proved to be his own challenge.


    Aspared to his Draugr and Shiro, Danzel was extremely tall and his armor was with dark tting.


    In a ce that was full of snow, was not that ideal.


    Even if they watched over them from far away, if those natives turned their backs and carefully observe, spotting them wasn''t impossible.


    The Draugrs managed to reduce such risk by halfway crawling.


    When he found them made he was quite confused.


    One could consider the sight itself quite funny, but once the Draugrs started apologizing early for what happend to the other Draugrs and not following his direct orders.


    After talking with them, he realized it wasn''t true as the Overseer changed his orders to follow them.


    Which made him quite impressed by the Overseer''s decision.


    Although he lost the fight, he made sure that his mission will be done regardless of their defeat.


    Though abandoning 4 fighters could be crucial, after hearing out the details, he nodded in satisfaction.


    Which made him half-expectant to see what effect the soul of the Overseer had on the sword he gave him.


    Though first, he had to deal with the problem at hand.


    He started first by fixing Shiro''s clothes which he made.


    Copying the phenomenon that he saw once he touched the guardian of those haired buffalos, he let loose bits of dead mana with extreme precision, to make the fur turn almost white.


    Though that meant that the durability of the fur will be lessened and that it wouldst much less, it was strong enough tost quite a long while.


    Shiro herself liked the change of color matching her hair.


    The main problem though was himself.


    In the end, he couldn''te up with a quick solution and simply decide to use [Phantom Phase] the moment the natives turn around to move much further away.


    He had to do it a total of 2 times, which was annoying by itself, but atst, their journey wasn''t wasted.


    As they found the vige of those guys.


    "Alright, let''s go meet those guys." Danzel dered out loud.


    "Ehm, Rue? Are we going to simply walk to them?" Shiro asked confused.


    "If you allow us, O Creator, we can arrange for them to open the gates." Talon said as he picked his head out of the shadows.


    "Rejected." Danzel said as he looked at the gate.


    "Though I ain''t doubting your ability, it''s better for you all to stay hidden in my shadow...in fact, Baron."


    "To youmand, O Creator." Baron said as he came out of the shadows.


    "Transfer to Shiro''s shadow and protect her in case I won''t be able to."


    "Understood." Baron said with a firm and cold voice before entering Shiro''s shadow.


    "Ehh~?" Shiro of course felt awkward in having an Anabast under her shadow.


    "You know is necessary, Shiro. For all we know, that vige might have some powerhouse that could challenge me."


    "I know..." Shiro said to herself.


    Although he preferred Koji and Niyuki, they were too slow to keep up with Danzel.


    And those two were left behind to look after the Draugrs.


    "But how are we going to contact them?"


    Danzel shrugged his shoulders at such a question.


    "How else? We are going to knock at their door." He said before starting to walk towards the vige with the panicking Shiro trying to keep up with her much shorter legs.


    "Isn''t that too reckless? Won''t they just see us as enemies?" Shiro said in a hurry behind her fox bone mask.


    "Whatever we do, they will perceive us as enemies. I am undead after all." Danzel said with a bored tone.


    "Although they might ept you, they most probably won''t ept an undead like me. Heck, they might even perceive me as an active threat."


    "You don''t know about that..." Shiro mumbled in almost a whisper, though Danzel was able to hear it.


    "No, it''s because I know this exact fact, that a show of force is necessary..."


    "But Azrael, Vanessa, and the others of the Deathfull Skulls were able to. Maybe those people might too..."


    Danzel shook his head.


    "Too naive, Shiro. The people that you just mention had already dealt with undead before and knew what they were. They also were strong enough to protect themself. Most people aren''t like that..."


    It is a fair point.


    As the undead truly held hate toward the living.


    Although they could control it, befriending an undead was like befriending a wild animal that is motivated to take a bite at you but chooses not to.


    "..." Shiro stayed silent at Danzel''s words.


    "Hey, you two! Who are you?" The guards shouted as Danzel and Shiro became visible to the guards.


    "Rue, don''t be too harsh on them..." Shiro said as she looked toward him.


    "Don''t worry, I will just knock on their door. As for the rest that happens-" Danzel said as he slowly drew his sword and his death aura spread to the guards


    The guards who were about to shout once more, their faces paled into a white sheet of paper as soon as they saw the two figures walking towards their vige.


    "W-What the hell is this!?" The guards shouted full of fear.


    Danzel own long sword glowed in an ominous dark green light as it was raised.


    "-I promising nothing." Danzel said as he shot out 1 [Soul Reaping Wind] towards the gate.


    And once it came in contract, the gate exploded with little resistance into pieces.


    *Trikkkkkkkghh!

 Chapter 406 Overwhelming Dominance

    It was like an instant.


    The guards only managed to see a dark green lighte out before their gate exploded into pieces.


    That was shocking enough, but the death aura that they felt made their bodies shake in fear alone. One of the guards who gate directly in those ring dark green eyes had his legs give up.


    Though they were guards, such a position wasn''t counted the same as a warrior. It was merely a role for those who will be warriors in the future.


    Mere seedlings hoping to be warriors.


    Their job was merely to notify the vige of approaching enemies.


    Though they could fight, it wasn''t to the level of facing a being like Danzel.


    "M-Monster!!!" The guard on the ground yelled struck in fear before awkwardly running back inside the vige.


    "Hey, you! Don''t run!" The other guard yelled, but hisrade was long gone.


    "Tch! Ahhhhhhh!" Dashing forward with the spear in his hand, he went to impale Danzel despite his fear.


    Danzel with the others didn''t stop walking toward the vige.


    And once the guard was close enough, he thrust his spear toward Danzel''s chest.


    *Tring!


    s, the spear shaft broke as the tip of the spear only left a tinny tent to the tting.


    "Fearless...but weak." Danzel said as he went and grabbed the guard''s neck and lifted him up.


    "Guagh! L-let go!" The man struggled though with no sess.


    "Rue..." Shiro said in worry as he gazed at Danzel.


    "..." Danzel didn''t gaze back at Shiro, but he understood what she meant.


    Using some of his strength, he tossed the guy he was holding inside the vige.


    The guard felt the world itself turning to him before rolling to the ground andying down to the ground. Not dead, but in pain.


    Danzel and the others followed suit inside the vige, where were met with a crowd of people looking at the gate and trying to help the guard he threw at them.


    "T-That''s the monster! That thing broke the gate!" The other guard who abandoned his previous colleague yelled while pointing at him.


    "So loud..." Danzel said as he raised his free hand, before closing it.


    And at the same time, a skeleton hand appeared around the other guard''s neck and raised him up to the air.


    Before anyone could understand what was happening, the dark green skeleton hand dragged the guy away from the crowd into Danzel''s grasp.


    Although [Grasp of the Undying] of undying would shortly after stealing their vitality disappear, that was only if he used it to steal it. If used only physically, it was like mana arms, though the way is stronger and more durable.


    Essentially it was made to bully the weak while also being useful against any opponent.


    Having his new victim on hand, dead mana beganing out of his hand.


    "I am far more than a monster, living one''s." His cold words weren''t loud, but despite that, his words were nheless heard by everyone.


    Using the loudest guy as an example, Shiro looked away.


    "N-No!!! Aghhh!!!Aghhh!!!"


    Under the watch of the vige, the guard''s body was quickly decaying as his skin turned ck and into dust.


    Though Danzel wasn''t just going to kill the man, his dead mana kept the bones intact and turned the guy into one of his Draugrs.


    Once turned into an undead, he knelled down to Danzel.


    "My servitude to my Liege." The newly created Draugr said, making the vigers turn pale at what they saw.


    "I-Impossible!"


    "He became a c-cursed warrior..."


    The warriors of the vige had a disgusted expression while the others had one stricken in fear.


    Not only have they seen someone of them be just mere bones in a matter of seconds, but he also became a cursed warrior.


    And from the crowned, suddenly an old man started to dash with a short axe towards Danzel.


    "How dare you do that to my son!!!" The old man yelled.


    Moving extremely fast, Danzel recognized such speed at someone of the middle 3rd-tier level.


    ''He also utilizes his mana well to move faster, but...''


    Danzel coldly gazed looked to the old man before stepping forward.


    "Rue! We aren''t here for this!" Shiro yelled back, making Danzel turn and nce briefly at Shiro with a cold gaze, which made her shiver for an instant.


    As for the old man with the axe, he had alreadye close and had raised his axe up and was only needing to swing it down to hit Danzel.


    Though the next moment, moving twice as fast as the old man, without hesitation he cut the arm of the old man with a swift swing.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    It was so fast that the others who were watching and the old man himself didn''t realize it.


    Only when the cold wind from Danzel''s swing burst towards them did they came to the realization that the old man''s hand fell to the ground.


    Having lost his hand and the pain starting to kick in, the old man fell to the ground and used his other hand to put pressure on the wound itself.


    "Gghhhhh~!" The old man ground his teeth while tears were flowing down his face. Though his gaze was aimed at Danzel.


    "Not bad." Danzelmend, slightly impressed by the old man.


    Despite his sword decaying part of his shoulder and his [Soul Nemesis] talent doing its work. The man still had the strength to look at him with such an expression.


    Though he didn''t know, that old man was a retired warrior who was respected though the vige. Even with age catching up to him, he still held such strength.


    "I will kill you~! Harsch Death!" The old man said before copsing from the pain.


    Seeing that, Shiro walked towards the old man and stared at Danzel for a moment before she hover her staff on top of the old man''s hand.


    Mumbling a spell behind the mask, a golden light started to fall on the wound of the old man.


    And in a matter of seconds, miraculously his hand started to regrow with first the bones and before fleshing together to create a new arm.


    Though Shiro didn''t know how to make her spell to remove the pain, healing a body part wasn''t impossible. Albeit she found it difficult to heal herself as the healing of a body by itself brought new pain, making her focus waver.


    Of course, the vigers werepletely dumbfounded at seeing a whole arm being regenerated. But their focus was drawn back to the being who cut the arm, to begin with.


    "Mortals who have stolen from me, bring out your representative at once! Unless you want to serve for all eternity with your bones alone!" Danzel''s ice-cold voice was heard by everyone, bringing a chill to their spines.


    Many of the people were panicking and even a few run away and hidden in their houses, some were also encouraging the warriors to fight, but thetter realized the difference in strength by just Danzel swinging his sword.


    As they couldn''t even follow the swing when it happend!


    Alka who was behind the group of warrior''s had the palest of expressions of all the warrior''s and her shoulder started to be etched in pain.


    "It''s him..." She mumbled as she step back in fear.


    She remembered how the troll bent down and had his head cut in an instant and how her axe did nothing against the armor he was covered with.


    Maxxren who was beside her heard what she said and leaned toward her.


    "Hey girl, is he the one you were talking about...that thing?" He whispered to her.


    Alka nodded at him, and Maxxren gulped his saliva.


    ''Damn, just looking at him makes my left nut shudder, I can''t believe that I am going to do this...'' Maxxren cursed internally before walking in front of the crowd and staring at what looked like the manifestation of death itself.


    "Ehm...by stolen from you, what are you referring to?" Maxxren said in hopes to buy time.


    Though he guessed what he was referring to, he prayed on his other right nut to be not the case.


    Sadly, his prayers were unfounded.


    "ying ignorant I see, maybe those few will answer you." Danzel said as, in a brief sh of light, 7 familiar corpses appeared on the ground.


    The Warriors had their eyes widen as they recognized those 7 as the ones who died against the cursed warriors.


    Worse of all, the corpses started to stand up on the front in a line with the use of [Blood Puppets] spell.


    "Bring the Lady here!" He yelled as he saw his mistake.


    Maxxren bit his limps before going to his knees and bowing his head into the snow.


    "O great one, please forgive us of our ignorance...but please, can my life enough request your mercy on my people?" As he finished speaking, he went to take a peek at Danzel reaction, but once he did, Danzel used [Phantom Phase] and moved in front of Maxxren.


    Then, he gripped Maxxren face and raised him up, barely his feet touching the ground.


    "You think I am so easily deceived, mortal?" Danzel said as his ring eyes stared directly at Maxxren eyes, which were currently feeling like his head was about to be crushed.


    "Not only once, but twice you lied. That alone is worth your deat-"


    As Danzel''s killing intent was increasing and together with the strength of his hand. Making Maxxren scream in pain, Danzel felt some pressure around his leg.


    "Rue! You can''t kill them all! Please~!" Shiro said as she pushed his leg with one of her arms while looking up at him.


    Gazing down at Shiro for a few long seconds, Danzel sighted internally.


    Hearing Shiro''s plead he let go of the man.


    "Bring me to your representative at once."


    Despite his pain, Maxxren went up to his feet and started the others to make a path.


    "Thank you-I will guide you to her..." he said before briefly gazing at the fox masked girl before gazing at Danzel


    "O great ones...what should we refer to you as?"


    Danzel scoffed at his request.


    "You don''t deserve our names, but for you all, I might as well be your Death."

 Chapter 407 Misunderstanding

    Many of the warriors wished to rush toward Danzel and crash his skull, but none of them were stupid enough to attempt the such act.


    And those who looked about to do were stopped by those with sane minds.


    Although retired, one of their strongest warriors was incapacitated in an instant. Also, the capability to make corpses move and turn them into cursed warriors (undead) was terrifying on its own.


    But what really had them panicking was the appearance of the two and thest sentence that Danzel spoke.


    One d full of dark metal, which was known to inherently hold immense cold to be used as armor with a fleshless head, with two ring eyes gazing the beyond.


    And the other wore something that resembled the white wolf fur but was held up by bones. Her small body together with her white hair and her fox mask made out of bones. She didn''t look particrly threatening, but her ability to regenerate limbs was shocking to them.


    And while they were panicking about what to do, some were also theorizing that those two were the incarnations of the two primordial gods.


    The youngest Primordial, God of White Life.


    And the oldest Primordial, God of Harsch Death.


    "They must be them! Didn''t you see!?"


    "Shut up! They are just myths! They aren''t real!"


    "What are you saying!? If the God of Wild Hunt, exists, those two can also exist!"


    "This isn''t the time to argue about this! That guy is going towards the Lady!"


    Many argued about the situation at hand and they split into 3 groups.


    The ones who wanted to stop Danzel from meeting their Lady consisted of a few warriors and were the minority.


    The other group was urging the others to run away from the vige in fear of death.


    And thest group was those who werepletely panicking by the fact that Danzel and Shiro were potentially the gods that they knew.


    Unaware of such thoughts, Danzel walked behind Maxxren to meet the representative. They were walking the mount up, which made him look over the whole ce.


    ''Compared to that other vige, this one seems to be muchrger.'' He thought.


    Looking down at the vige though, made him also look at the chaos that was happening because of their arrival.


    ''Since I opened their door, I should also close it, huh?'' Danzel mumbled internally before raising his arm and started umting dead mana.


    Maxxren who was leading them, felt the ominous mana and turned around and stared at the dead mana of Danzel in shock.


    "What are you doing-"


    Before he could finish, Danzel made the dead mana fly toward the gate which he lightly "knocked".


    And once the dead mana entered the ground, a wall of merged bones with faint ck veins started to rise, blocking the gate.


    ''Though the [Wall of Death Warden] is better at blocking one attack, it should be sturdy enough for now.''


    Though a wall without his Warden''s will inevitably be breached.


    "Come out." Danzel said, resulting in his shadow being stretched before bing alive and rising up.


    Maxxren''s eyes shot up in fear as he saw 4 shadows wearing the aura of death with them as their cloak.


    "You will is our''s, O the Creator." Talon spoke while each of them bowed their backs slightly.


    "Make sure that none escapes, you are allowed to kill them if they resist."


    "Huh? W-Wai-"


    "Your will is ourmand." Ignoring Maxxren, Talon, Ss, Leyone, and Rayone dashed down to the mountain like a mist filled with shadows.


    Maxxren''s eyes were filled with urgency and fear, both things that Danzel didn''t want to address.


    "It would be wise to continue showing the say, mortal. Otherwise, you people might show resistance down there."


    Understanding what he was implying, Maxxren nodded his head swiftly.


    "Y-Yes! Just a bit more and we will arrive... it''s this way." Maxxren said as he stepped hasten from before, making Danzel think that this guy was trying to buy time.


    ''Should I just kill this guy?'' He thought internally, but looking at Shiro who was staring at him, he abandoned the idea.


    He could, but aimlessly killing a weak guy like that held no point except of making an example out of him and showing his strength, which he already did.


    At least he hoped he did.


    Though it wouldn''t weigh down his inexistent heart if he were to kill a few more. In fact, his instincts would reward him for doing as such.


    And soon enough, they arrived at the house of the representative.


    And waiting outside the door was a man with two axes in his hand, someone else with a herding staff, andstly, a girl wearing a white wooden mask with behind her few fluffy tails dancing.


    "Maxxren...what is this?" The man with the two axes said as he started at him with a frown.


    Maxxren put on an anxious face as he peaked at Danzel before speaking up.


    "H-He is Harsch Death... and came to pick the items that we stole from "that" vige."


    Xesan, looked at his friend as he became insane.


    "Is he the one who blew up the gate?" Xesan asked as he looked at Danzel, ready to fight.


    "Is he the representative of your vige?" Danzel spoke as he stepped up.


    "N-No, he is-"<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    "Then there is no need of him." He spoke with a dead cold tone.


    And suddenly, Xesan''s body became stiff in whole instances, he let go of his two axes and fell to the ground would touching his chest, unable to breathe, or scream in pain.


    But death hasn''t imed him.


    Yet.


    Closing his hand, an ethereal dark green skeleton hand appeared and pierced (not physically) through Xesan''s chest, before the hand raising the suffering man.


    Swinging his hand to the left, Xesan body was thrown to the sight and a dark green light came out of his body and traveled towards Danzel to his palm.


    Where the light was absorbed.


    "Now with one thief less...who of you two is the one who leads this ce?"


    Ignoring Maxxren who was shaking and Shiro who was staring at him behind her mask, Danzel let loose his death aura on them.


    The man with the hearing staff and the masked girl frowned at the aura.


    And the girl stepped towards such an aura of death.


    "I am the one who guides the vige of Vashara... they are more, but I hold the highest standing." The masked girl stared at Danzel in waiting.


    Though were it because of her mask not showing it or Danzel not carrying to introduce himself, Danzel simply nodded.


    "That''s good enough. You people have destroyed my creations and stolen their possession, I want them returned. Be it byint or by force, doesn''t matter to me. Pick whichever you prefer, mortal."


    Once again, the 3 of them frowned at the such statement.


    Though he worded it like they had a choice, the truth was far from it.


    In short, it was either give in or die.


    There was no choice, to begin with.


    "It seems like there must be a misunderstanding between you and our vige, though we don''t have all in one ce, I have one of them inside my house...as for the others, they must be with the others." The masked girl said with a soft voice.


    "Hey, Rue...can you understand what thatdy with a mask is saying?" Shiro asked confused as she pointed her finger toward the girl.


    "What do you mean?" Hearing such a question, Danzel looked at Shiro in confusion.


    "I can''t understand what she is saying..."


    "You can''t...?"


    Danzel would have frowned if he could.


    But as he had to deal with those in front of him, he pushed the matter forter.


    "Let''s talk about thatter once I am done with them..." Danzel said, making the frowns of the people here grow stronger.


    "You can''t kill them! We came here for information! Not ughter!" Shiro yelled at him.


    "I will see what I can do..." Danzel said as his gazended on the confused people.


    ''They neither can''t understand?'' He thought before shaking his head internally.


    "Bring me first to the weapons, afterwards we can have a more detailed conversation with all of you leaders together."


    Of course, his words implied that he wasn''t going to leave after getting the weapons of the Draugrs.


    Maxxren gave the masked girl a worried look.


    "Of course, let me lead you to one of them." The masked girl''s voice was still soft, hiding any worry or malice.


    Opening the door, the man with the herding staff and the girl entered the house.


    Danzel looked behind him, specifically at the Draugrs that he brought with him.


    "You all, stand behind and await my return, also watch over this guy." His cold voice said as he pointed at Maxxren.


    Without waiting for their answer, Danzel entered the house with Shiro.


    "I usually don''t have many guests, so I apologize if it''s a bit messy..." The masked girl said as the man with the staff walked towards the table, where the Overseer''s sword was at.


    "Is this the one...dear guest?" The man said as he hugged the sword into his embrace and walked like an old man toward Danzel.


    "Hand it over..." Danzel said as he stretched his arm to the man."


    The man who walked like someone with back pain moved slowly with the support of his staff making the constant sound of


    *Tick, Tick, Tick.


    And once he was a few meters away from Danzel, the man just happend to miss-step and fall towards the ground with the sword thrown at Danzel.


    Danzel reached out to grab the Overseer swords before they fell, but in the next instance, a burst of mana came out of the man and pushed the wind away.


    Before he was about to fall, the man somehow managed to get his footing before pooling at his herding staff.


    And like a scabbard of a hidden de, the wood was pulled away, revealing a spike of ice with dark veins inside.


    His arm moved at extreme speed with the use of one skill of the man as he trusted that spike of ice towards Danzel''s skull.


    Aiming to destroy the cursed warrior in front of him once and for all.

 Chapter 408 You Have To Do Better That This

    The man wielding the ck vein ice spike was fast and through the use of some sort of skill, he moved exceptionally fast.


    Though he wasn''t as fast as Danzel.


    Danzel by reflex raised his arm and it would take him but an instant for him to summon his shield and block the spike.


    But seeing the material of the ice, he was reminded of the ice of the magic caster inside his sword.


    A single touch and it would be the end.


    Terrifying ice that only broke after death came to his target.


    Though it looked different that the ice he remembered, it was something to be still concerned about.


    ''If it''s the ck ice that I know, then I have to..."


    Having already considered his action, he let the ck veined ice spike pierce through his skull.


    *Crack!!!!


    "!!!" Shiro''s eyes widen as he saw Danzel''s skull getting destroyed.


    Everything happend so fast that she didn''t react to the absurd that was happening in front of her.


    The seemingly overwhelming and scary undead who happend to look after her died in an instant.


    Before she could disy her shock though, the headless Danzel raised his sword at immense speed and swung it down to the man.


    "Huh!?" The man raised his spike to block the falling sword, though once the two weapons made contact with each other, he soon regretted his decision as he felt the weight simr to that of a mounted fall on his hands.


    Making him fall to his knees while the building''s floor got destroyed by the sheer force of Danzel''s swing.


    "You have to do better than this, to kill me." The death knight said as the dead mana regenerated his skull as a whole.


    He nced briefly at his sword touching with the ck veined spike, and his eyes red up upon seeing that it wasn''t the same ice.


    Using the [Grasp of the Undying] to drag the Overseer sword to his other hand, Danzel thrust at the kneeling man, who had a shocked face.


    "Moster!"


    Tilting the way he held the spike, he then used his mana to strengthen his feet to jump away to safety.


    ''Fast, but barely on the edge of the 4th-tier.'' He thought before raising the two swords to his chest, the left hand holding the Overseer on his right chest and his own sword he held on the right hand on the left chest.


    And both swords glowed in an ominous dark green light, wielding immense power.


    The man who barely escapes bes a skewer cursed upon seeing the umting mana on Danzel.


    "My Lady!!!" He yelled as he dashed towards the white-masked girl.


    And just as he reached her, Danzel swung both of his swords, releasing 2 [Soul Reaping Winds]''s at them, cutting through the floor and the house as they traveled.


    *Baaahmmm!!


    The sound of the explosion echoed through the whole Vashara vige and the vigers turned and watched how the house of the supposed "Lady" exploded with some necromantic dark green light.


    Through the smoke that was created by the fall of the whole building, the man carrying the white-masked girl jumped away down the mountain.


    The white-masked girl looked at the man carrying her who was bleeding from his hand.


    "[Curing light]." She said behind the mask, creating a warm light around the wound of the man.


    s, the effect was minimal.


    "We have to run, mydy. No, I will stay behind while I buy everyone some time. 10- No, at least 2 minutes. I will buy at least 2 minutes."


    "No, you can''t-" Before she could finish, the overwhelming death aura was felt up the mountain.


    Cutting through the smoke, Danzel looked at the duo.


    "You won''t escape." He mumbled as he jumped down the mountain filled with snow.


    But instead of running like the man did full of experience, he had another idea.


    Once he jumped with [Death Descent], releasing necromatic energy around him and having the snow rise up through that.


    And going through the snow, was Danzel sliding down the mountain as he created a path of snow constantly down his feet he the use of his main sword.


    "Seriously!?" The man shouted dumbfounded at what he saw.


    Replying to his shake, Danzel gathered with his other sword his mana before firing a [Soul Reaping Wind] at the duo.


    And as if a giant was shaping the mountain, the dark green wind de carved through the snow as it went towards its target.


    As the distance between them was quite considerable, the man was able to move to the side just enough to not lose any momentum.


    Though the wind de was stronger than he anticipated, it pushed a wave of snow toward them. Which made him halt for a moment.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    Momentster though, cutting through the wind snow appeared to be Danzel with the Overseer sword raised high and swinging it down.


    "Dammit!" The man yelled as he kicked the ground and jumped through the whole remaining way down the mountain.


    Once reached the ground, he immediately used one of his hands to grab the masked girl and throw her to the said.


    Making her role several meters away towards the nearby vigers that happend to be there.


    "My Lady! Everyone! Run!!!" Before he could say anything else, a shadow fell on top of him, making him urgently raise his spike in panic.


    Though he didn''t make the same mistake as before in receiving the full front force of his swing by tilting his pike a bit to deflect.


    Once the sword was swung down, the man suggested letting the sword slide to the side.


    Though even then, the swing was only half as heavy as before which he could manage without falling to his knees.


    Nheless, once the two weapons met, both hands shook abnormally as an ethereal copy of his hands came out while shaking before re-entering his hands.


    ''Aghh, what was that!?'' The man thought for a moment.


    Though Danzel wasn''t going to let him think in peace.


    Using his other sword, he released a [Soul Reaping Wind], forcing the man to jump away and Danzel following suit.


    Once the mannded, he had to face the two long swords of Danzel that held incredible power in each swing.


    And despite the man''s weapon being of ck veined ice, sparks flew through the air as he shed with Danzel.


    *Tign! Ting! Tugh! Ting~!


    With the constant assault of the two long swords, the man was inventible pushed back further and further away, slowly going to the wall of their vige.


    The vigers together with the white masked girl couldn''t help but stare at the fight between those two beings.


    Just the sh of their weapons made shock waves through the air and their movement was to another level that many didn''t ever see before.


    To the warrior group, they could see, although barely, that the man was only in a defensive stance and was simply taking hits.


    And the white mask who was staring at the fight was clenching at the fight.


    As she knew that running away was impossible.


    Even if they run now, see-saw that the entrance of their vige has been blocked which would take time, and if by some miracle they broke through, they wouldn''t have any food to support everyone here.


    And that is if the cursed warrior in front of them wasn''t going to chase after them.


    She was racking her mind with what to do, but then she saw a robed shadowing down the mountain and carrying thepanion of the cursed warrior.


    Though she herself didn''t look threatening, the robed shadow very much did.


    And shortly after, other robed shadows started appearing on top of the ice walls, watching over them with their ominous aura.


    "We can''t run away..." She mumbled as a loud sound appeared.


    *Thunk!!!


    Looking back at the fight, it seemed that the man received another of Danzel''s attacks which resulted in his handing out in an ethereal form shaken before rentering.


    Once that happend, the man''s arms shaking grew to the level where he could no longer push as much strength to the weapons.


    Seeing that, Danzel swung the Overseer''s sword from downwards to upwards, pushing the ck vein ice spike above to the side.


    Though he could decide to cut the man in half right here and there, Danzel instead raised his leg and kicked the man to the chest with the force of a train.


    Shooting the man toward the ice wall like a lightning bolt.


    *Broughhh!!


    With a small crater appearing on the wall, the man let go of the ck veined ice spike before coughing a load full of blood from his mouth.


    "I usually don''t dual wield, as how awkward it is..." Danzel mumbled to himself.


    "Kughhh!" He coughed before falling to the ground.


    Seeing that, the white-masked girl rushed towards the man with horror behind her mask, before channeling her healing magic at him.


    "..." Shiro in turn gazed at Danzel silently.


    As he could not see her expression of worry behind Shiro''s fox bone mask, he thought that her gaze was because of the condition of the man that he just kicked.


    "I didn''t kill him." He whisper to her before gazing at the vigers who were stricken with fear.


    Raising his main long sword up to the air, Danzel''s eyes red up as he gazed at them.


    "From now on, you all shall fall under my servitude! Be it while living or dead!"

 Chapter 409 Death Living Next Door

    Though many had faces full of resistance and unwillingness.


    What could they do against Danzel''s statement?


    Servitude or death?


    If it weren''t for the fact that a being radiating the aura of death around him, many would have scoffed at such a statement.


    But against such a being, how could they?


    Heck, if they were to refuse, they clearly saw how one of them was turned into a cursed warrior.


    Just the imagination of being turned into an eternal ve and into a cursed existence brought anyone chills up in their spines.


    But even with does being the facts, they couldn''t do anything.


    They couldn''t run.


    Neither could they fight.


    So they bitterly had to fall under the rule of a cursed being.


    Which of no surprise, had many that couldn''t suppress their fear of the such situation.


    "W-What should we do? At this rate, we are all going to die!" A man yelled as he hit the table with both hands on the table while staring down.


    "He is right!"


    "If we stay here we will be turned into cursed beings!"


    "He killed our people! We got to do something!"


    Many people started voicing their opinions of the current situation.


    After Danzel has dered that they will be under his rule, he imed the weapons of his Draugrs before leaving the vigers to digest his words and leaving the important talks for tomorrow.


    Which lead to this meeting of the whole vige, with the leading figures taking the spot on the table in the middle.


    The building in particr that they were in was originally designed to shelter all the vigers when the cold was unbearable as not everyone could use wood to warm their houses.


    Though the gathering of the vigers might have not been for the unbearable cold, instead of a threat that they could do nothing about.


    "Calm down! That monster would have killed us already if he wanted us dead. Aimlessly panicking won''t bring us anywhere, we got to see things objectively." An aged man said with a gray beard like the mane of a lion.


    "How do you expect us to calm down when he beat the strongest warrior!? We are at his mercy and there is no telling when he decides to butcher us one by one!"


    "He is right! We can''t trust the words of the cursed being."


    "We have to run!"


    "No! We got to fight!"


    "Idiots! He is the primordial god of Harsch Death. Neither will work!"


    "Shut up! There is no way that thing is a primordial god!"


    With so many people driven into a hopeless corner, the chaotic conversation was but expected.


    Though there is a saying that a cornered rat is the most dangerous. There was a limit to it. A limit that the rat couldn''t ovee no matter the case.


    Seeing them all argue, the white wooden masked girl who was seating at the table spoke up.


    "Everyone, please calm yourself first, we only have a limited time and if this continues, we will reach nowhere."


    Though her voice wasn''t as loud as those standing loudspeakers, many still heard her voice and started to calm down, but whispers were still being shared around.


    The masked girl then looked towards the man with the mane beard.


    "Old Miyu...if we were to no longer hunt, how long would our foodst?"


    The old man whose name was Miyu put a frown on his face before closing his eyes.


    "2 weeks, the food that we have willst for 2 weeks and that''s only because few hunters returned with meat...at best if we ration it...we can manage 3 weeks." He said with heavy words.


    The masked girl shook her head upon hearing that.


    "Rationing 2 weeks'' worth of food for an additional week will make the pups too weak. If by then we haven''t found any food, then you know what will happen..."


    "Realistically, if we are lucky at that, at most we have 10-12 days'' worth of food. As the hunters will have to find prey and carry it back. But if they are unlucky."


    This time the one who spoke was Maxxren, who temporarily took the position of Xasen, as one of the leaders of the hunting and warrior parties.


    Old Miyu gave him a burning re for spouting such ament.


    He himself knew of this fact, but telling it while everyone was present was bound to bring more anxiety to the people.


    The masked girl closed her eyes for a moment, before speaking her thoughts.<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    "Then it is unavoidable to ask "them" for permission to hunt. We will have to"


    Before she could continue, one of the people in the crowd suddenly spoke up.


    "Lady Priestess! Forgive me for interrupting! But are "them" the two primordial gods!? The ones of Harsch Death and White Life? As the one who inherited our ancestor''s knowledge, you should know, right?"


    The moment that one man finished, others who were in simr beliefs started voicing out that they wanted to know too.


    The masked girl stayed for a long time silent as she recalled the two entities that came to the Vashara vige and the story about how the fox-masked girl managed to grow a new limp.


    She also managed to hear how the cursed being said that he hold back from killing, Yamarun.


    One of them had extremely healing abilities and wanted mercy.


    While the other was fleshless capable of ice magic, raising the dead, anding back from death.


    Because of those facts, she found it difficult to remove the possibility that those 2 might be 2 primordial gods.


    Though she still had a hard time believing.


    "Sadly, I can''t confidently confirm or disregard the possibility that this is the case. Our Ancestor, The Frozen w, Wallren Sengata, is said to have seen all 3 primordial gods, the God of the Wild Hunt, the God of White Life, and the God of Harsch Death."


    "Though in time, only the existence of the primordial god of the Wild Hunt has been confirmed. And none except Wallren Sengata was able to confirm the existence of the other two. The stories that I know from the previous priest of our vige had a different depiction of those two, so it''s hard to confirm what is true..."


    "Some say that the Primordial God of White Life and Harsch Death is but one entity while others say that they are their own entity just like Wild Hunt. But among those stories, there is somethingmon in each of them."


    "That is...that Harsch Death is a cursed being without flesh that never dies and holds winter on his will. White Life has long hair, holds mercy on the weak, and has extremely healing powers. So the chance of them being the real deal is..."


    She reyed many times how Danzel''s skull got destroyed only to be repaired, his ice magic and his necromancy. As much as his strength.


    "Extremely likely..." She finally said after contemting internally many times.


    "Hey!" Old Miyu yelled, but his shout was quickly drowned by the other''s exmation of surprise.


    "So they really are the primordial gods of the myth!"


    "I always believed that White Life existence!"


    "But for that cursed being to be Harsch Death..."


    "Hey! Weren''t you listening? Extremely likely doesn''t mean certainly-!"


    From the Lady Priestess''s statement, even if she didn''t really confirm it, the majority were taking the fact that the entities that came to their vige were the primordial gods.


    Be it for the better or the worse.


    And one of them who believe that to be the truth was Alka that was carrying the baby and thest survivor of her vige.


    "The god of death really did mark my shoulder, I even attacked him..." Alka mumbled with a pale expression on her face.


    Unbeknownst to her and everyone here though.


    Was the fact that everything inside these walls, was being heard from the very being that they called now a primordial god.


    ***


    Up in the mountain, in the house that Danzel had dered as his own.


    It was small yet simple from the inside and kept the cold quite well away.


    And inside that house, was Shiro sitting on the floor (Seiza-like) while reading the book about necromancy.


    Soon enough though, a dark mist entered through the front door before the same mist started materializing into Danzel.


    "Rue, you are back." Shiro said as she closed the book and holder it for Danzel to take.


    Taking his book back, Danzel nodded at her.


    "So what did they say?" Shiro asked full of curiosity.


    As she couldn''t understand thenguage of those fox people and only Danzel and his undead could.


    It was natural for her to ask such a question.


    Though, unlike her expectations, Danzel stayed silent at her question.


    "Rue?" She turned her head confused.


    "Oh, right...well, apparently does guys think of us as some kind of...gods?" He said somewhat confused.


    Hearing such a response, Shiro tilted her head confused.


    "Huh? Gods? We, no...rather you? Seriously?" She said dumbfounded.

 Chapter 410 Playing Gods And Impressive Weapons

    "Howe they came to such a conclusion? I mean, you are..."


    Danzel in response shrugged his shoulders before sitting on a small bed.


    "An undead? Well, that''s one reason." He said while staring at Shiro.


    "Apparently our actions and looks are close to 2 gods that those natives believe in."


    Pointing his finger at Shiro, he continued.


    "You Shiro, they take you as the god called White Life because of your long hair and for the fact that you healed that one guy''s arm. And though I ain''t too sure, some of those natives might worship you as the god who brought life."


    He then pointed at himself.


    "While for me, they believe of me being the god of death and that brings the cold, called Harsch Death. Honestly, so idiotic." Danzel shook his head.


    Although 4th-tier existences could be seen as god-like figures to themon man as they held strength far more immense that their own imagination,


    It was far, very far from the truth.


    "If they mistake us for those two though, what about the real gods that they believe in?" Shiro asked, somewhat confused by the idea of being considered a god.


    "Though I ain''t too sure if those two gods exist or not as they themself don''t know of them. But if they do exist, they definitely have no gods. As the very existence of a god can''t possibly exist." Danzel said with a cold voice.


    Hearing that, Shiro tilted her head in further confusion.


    "Huh? What about the goddess that some humans believe? I heard that believers can learn holy magic from the goddess. If a god doesn''t exist...what about that goddess?" Shiro asked.


    "Ah, you are talking about the goddess of the Sacred Cross, right? Well, I personally don''t think that the so-called goddess is god by itself. A demi-god or existence with immense strength, but a god? There is no such thing." Danzel spoke full of confidence.


    "In the first ce, a god should be a supreme being full of omnipotence. Though even such being must have been created by something else." He said before staring at Shiro.


    "Calling something with immense power a god is fundamentally wrong. In my opinion, the limit that a being can achieve is the level of a demigod. Though the weaker the people are, the less power it requires to ssify something with such strength."


    "After all, even without using your magic, Shiro. You could probably break someone''s arm if you want to and restore their limbs. To them apparently, that some godlike feats, well, at least thetter one is."


    "...So what are we going to do about this?" She asked.


    "About what?"


    "About them thinking of us being gods! Are we going to pretend to be them? And what if they find out? What will we do then!?" Shiro yelled while pointing at Danzel who shrugged his shoulders.


    "Nothing."


    "Huh?" Shiro repeated confusedly.


    "We are going to do nothing. There isn''t even a need to satisfy their curiosity. They can think of us as gods or not. In the end, it doesn''t change their situation. Though if you want them to go and worship you, well... I won''t say anything about your fetishes. I heard from Vanessa that some people have few, for the better or the worse." Danzel said.


    "I-I have no such fetish!" Shiro yelled as she has risen up and pointed her finger at Danzel with anger.


    "I know, but it wouldn''t take long for one to be created." Danzel said with a serious voice.


    "Though we won''t give them a direct answer, it would be beneficial for us to be thought of as some kind of divinity. And with me taking the role of death and you the role of life, there is bound of people that will try to get on your good side."


    "What I am telling you is, don''t get toofortable with those people and don''t grow attachment to them or worse, confuse yourself into their beliefs. We are simply here to get information and resources to continue our travel." He said before bringing out the meat from his storage ring.


    "Here eat."


    Pouting her cheeks, Shiro took the meat and stared at it with a bitter smile.


    "That meat again?"


    "I don''t have much of that meat, though other than the ice troll provisions, that''s about it with your food. And I doubt that this vige would be able to give us much of any food." Danzel shook his head.


    He internally thought that the undead had it best.


    No need to scavenge or trouble yourself with useless tasks such as searching for and consuming food.


    ? Though he always wondered how it felt to taste something when he watched Shiro eat or sleep felt, he was still d to be undead to avoid those things.


    "After you eat, let''s work on your necromancy a bit more."<novelnext>  </novelnext>


    And before long, the session of teaching necromancy began while under the roof of their newly imed house.


    ****


    Just like usual, they spend several hours working out Shiro''s necromancy. Which mainly focused on her getting ustomed to dead mana.


    At this point, Shiro could safely use dead mana around her body without getting injured, but Danzel still forbade her to use dead mana on her eyes as he deemed it too early for her.


    Shiro of course pouted at that but she still heard of the big bad undead that he was.


    Danzel expected, if things continued like that, she would get the [Sense of the Damned] spell in a week or two. At worst he expected 3 weeks, but considering their tremendous improvement of hers, two weeks should be enough for her.


    As for the Anabast, this time they couldn''t attend the session as he put the 4 to look around the Vashara vige walls and Baron to look around the mountain.


    And Shiro now went to sleep, leaving Danzel to his own bidding.


    He once again was d to be a tireless undead.


    ''I can''t see how people see that as a curse...'' He thought internally.


    Though in times he yearned to try stuff that only the livings out of curiosity and boredom, he still liked the tireless and unstarving state of himself.


    Walking out of the house with his [Phantom Phase] so as to not wake up Shiro with his armor.


    Though before he left, he picked two particr weapons that he had gained interest in.


    And those, in particr, are the Overseer''s long sword and the ck ice spike of that man.


    *Puah, Puah, Puah~


    Walking further away from the house and stepping on top of the snow, with one weapon to the left and one to the right hand.


    He raised and pierced the ck ice spike into the ground. Which was easily done despite the ground being of stone.


    "Let''s confirm this first..." He mumbled before raising the Overseer sword and swinging it to the side against the dark ice spike.


    *Ting!!!


    The collusion created sparks and a loud sound simr to two metals shing with each other.


    "No damage huh..." He said as he stared at the Overseer''s long sword and the dark ice spike.


    Though he felt it before as he shed against these weapons, seeing that merely some ice was so sturdy, it did incur his surprise.


    Touching the dark ice spike, he opens its description for his ethereal eyes to witness.


    [Life Leeching Ice Vein Spike]: A piece of ice that has been thoroughly corrupted with a huge amount of mana and miasma. The corruption inside the ice turned to ck veins of miasma, which upon contact, severely drains one''s vitality. The amount of mana made it tougher than any steal of its nativends. Together with how it''s shaped, it''s a deadly spike for both enemy and user alike.


    ...


    Reading the description of the dark ice spike, Danzel was surprised to see miasma inside the ice. Though he could feel it, miasma usually would dissipate without a corpse or generally death around.


    The nature of ice is generally made out of...well, the ice and water elemental. And it had nothing to do with death.


    "I have to see where guys got this weapon." Danzel said while making a mental note to himself before looking at the Overseer stuff.


    Opening the Overseer sword, he was surprised to see the new name of the sword and its effects.


    [Death Knight''s Overseer''s Eternal Sword]: A high-quality sword taken from a knight by the Death Knight known as Rue Danzel, who modified the sword with his ominous runes that drew both the winter and the enemies blood to the sword while being incredibly durable. Also though the rune of [Rune of Tolian Repent], the will of the Draugr named Overseer runs through the de. Holding an eternal will to follow his creator and master. The Soul inside the long sword despite itsck of strength, managed to manifest the will and state of his dying body to his enemies. [mes of Eternal Will-Weak], [Watch Over Will], and [Undead Wielder].


    ...


    "Impressive, but..."


    Danzel was honestly shocked at the effects the rune brought.


    But what made him feel somewhat bad was the sincerity of his will shown in the description.

 Chapter 411 Playing Gods And Impressive Weapons (2)

    Seeing the names of the abilities that the soul of the Overseer gave to that sword, his curiosity was intrigued.


    From the epic rune came 3 abilities, which were [mes of Eternal Will-Weak], [Watch Over Will], and [Undead Wielder].


    [mes of Eternal Will-Weak]: The will of this soul''s master is the will of his master. And that soul swore to follow such will for all eternity even though in hisst moments his body burned in mes. Now the strong will of the soul manifested the ability to create the same mes one hisst moments to his enemies. The will of his master is eternal just like the mes. Despite the soul wanting to follow his will though, theck of strength reflects on the mes. Continuous use of mana is required needed for the mes to stay intact, spread, and burn for all eternity.


    [Watch Over Will]: The will of the soul watched over his wielder. If the soul deems the wielder as an enemy of his master, the moment [mes of Eternal Will-Weak] activates, it will engulf the wielder within mes and use his mana to fuel the mes. Additionally, if the wielder is deemed as an enemy, he will whisper inside his mind to use [mes of Eternal Will-Weak], the longer the sword is being held, the louder the whisper bes. The wielder will feel no pain from the mes made by this effect. All for one goal, to fulfill his master''s will.


    [Undead Wielder]: A undead wielder''s soul resides inside the sword, Increasing all attributes by 5 except for intelligence if the wilder is undead. If the wielder is the master of the soul, all effects of the swords get increase by 20%. If the wielder is one of the living, the whisper is 20% stronger.


    ...


    Reading through the variety of effects, Danzel found them to be surprisingly good.


    When he first learned that the Draugr sealed his soul inside the weapon that he gifted him, he expect 1 or at best 2 effects at the level of [Undead Wilder]. Useful, but severelycking in firepower.


    After all, the Overseer was just a Draugr, a tier 2 undead.


    Though considered rare and strong, capable to raise groups of undead, and if given the chance armiespared to the higher tier undead, were nothing.


    The Overseer was worse in fact, as he wasn''t naturally created which made himck several abilities.


    So seeing such an abilityes out, Danzel was extremely surprised.


    ''So the [Rune of Tolian Repent] effect is also reflected by the soul''s will and his surroundings. If the person burns, the soul might manifest fire effects such as does. Though to learn the details, I will have to see with other examples, but for now, that''s a good start.'' He thought before activating the [mes of Eternal Will-Weak] effect at his hand.


    "Mhm, well, I should have expected it with the effects name being tilted weakly..." He said as he watched his health not drop a single digit.


    Though the mes were dark green just like when the runed contracts activated, other than the color of the mes, they were just normal mes.


    And with his body being so durable, one would need more heated mes to actually start melting his body.


    "Though I good sword...I already have my, so..." He mumbled as he stared at his sword that shook for a split moment.


    Though others wouldn''t have taken notice, Danzel did and he felt quite awkward.


    ''Right, that guy is still conscious inside the de.''


    "...Well, I could make use of such a sword..." He said out loud for the Overseer to hear, though there was no reaction.


    Taking its scabbard and putting it where his other scabbard was for his main sword, he slowly sheathed the Overseer''s sword.


    "Maybe in the future, I might get you out, but for now..."


    Danzel didn''t finish hisst words.


    He just decided to walk back to the house and think of what tomorrow will bring.


    ***


    The gathering of the Vashara vige on the day that Agares and Shiro arrivedsted till tomorrow as many couldn''t rx their nerves about the situation at hand.


    The brave ones who seek to fight against the self-proimed overlord went outside and looked around the walls. Though some wanted to retaliate against him, the leaders of that group were smart enough to stop the idiots from acting.


    And with over 4 robed shadows looming over the walls while reading ominous books made out of bones, convincing them to act was but easy.


    s, 8 people still went up the mounted their weapons with the aim to vanquish the evil crowing in their vige.


    And soon enough, Danzel and Shiro walked down the mountain, with 8 corpses walking from behind them with the use of [Blood Puppets].


    Currently, very few were outside.


    But those that were, became terrified at the state of those 8 people.


    After all, they only argued a few minutes ago and each person knew the other as they were born and lived in the same ce.


    The group stared away at their former colleagues.


    "O thee Creator, should I deal with those of the living." Baron said as he carried the book on his chest.


    "Hmmm..." Danzel didn''t respond and simply looked at the people with his ethereal dark green eyes.


    "P-Please wait! T-They haven''t don''t anything, so please~" A woman with a white wooden mask came and fell on her knees in front of the group and Danzel. And beside her, was an old man together with a young girl.<novelnext></novelnext>


    "Isn''t she the girl from yesterday?" Shiro said while pointing at the masked girl.


    Danzel simply nodded his head.


    "You are right." his cold voice washed over them.


    The old man and the young girl on the knees couldn''t help but stare at Shiro.


    But Danzel walking forward caught their attention more than the foreignnguage that Shiro was talking.


    "Now, let''s go somewhere where we can disguise the condition of you people not receiving the terrible fate of death."


    "Y-Yes..." The woman with the mask said as she stood up with the other 2.


    "Lady Priest..." One of the leaders of the group said as he stared at Danzel with fear.


    "Go back with the others you idiots..." The older man said as he stared at the leader with a harsh look.


    The man who lead the group nodded and guided the people to leave.


    Though momentster when he convinced them to leave, the moment they started walking, the man leading them gasped for air as he touched his chest.


    The man turned around and stared at Danzel before copsing to the ground, motionless.


    "Hey! What happend!?" One of the group went to look at the leader on the ground, only to find him...


    "He is dead." Danzel said with a cold voice.


    "Rue..." Shiro said with a frown behind her mask.


    "Be quiet." Danzel stared down at Shiro with his eyes ring up with killing intent.


    "My patience is waving, so take that as your final warning." Danzel stared at the group.


    "You-!" Before he could finish, an ethereal dark green skeleton hand touched the side of the man''s neck before disappearing in thin air.


    The man of course who felt his neck being touched had cold sweat on his back and fell to the ground while grasping in fear.


    "Hiiieiee!!!"


    "Don''t forget that your death is always in my grasp. This is the final time that I let this go." He finished as he looked at the masked girl in front of him.


    "Now, where shall we go and have that talk with you all."


    "Yes...please follow me," She said with a sad voice as he watched the group before leaving the body of their leader behind.


    And as their destination was the same as where the body was, they unavoidable had to pass next to the body.


    Though the next moment when Danzel bent down and touched the corpse, making it disappear into nothingness, made the eyes of all 3 of them widened in shock.


    Soon enough, they arrived in one of the many houses which were slightly bigger and better that the others.


    "Though it might becking, pleasee into my house." the old man spoke as he opened the door for them to enter.


    With the young girl and the masked girl entering, Danzel turned around and looked at the corpses and deactivated [Blood Puppets], reverting them to normal corpses.


    ''Look the outside, Baron.'' Danzelmanded the Anabast.


    Baron simply nodded, before Danzel took the lead to enter the house.


    "Mhm..." Entering the house, he looked at the ceiling that was too near his head forfort.


    "I prepared you all a seat, but..." the old man said before staring at Danzel and then back at the chair with worry and fear.


    Danzel looked at the "small" chair and then looked at Shiro.


    He then picked up the prepared chair and put it in front of Shiro.


    He then grabbed the scabbard of his main sword and used it like a stick to ce his two hands on top of the hilt.


    "Now, let''s begin." He said with his ring eyes lighting up.

 Chapter 412 Laying Claim On The Dead.

    "Before we start, let me mention this. There are 3 absolute rules for all of you." Danzel said as he raised 3 fingers for the others to see.


    "First, any simr attempts like those of before will have to embrace Death. As it''s too annoying to deal with it every time, for each person attacking any of my minions or us, I will additionally kill an innocent from here." He said before lowering one finger.


    "Second, you all will follow my will without exception. Those who break it will share the same punishment as the first rule. So make sure to keep the people in check." Once again he closed a finger.


    "Third, adding up to the second rule, I will be capable to make use of all of your possessions." Danzel said before closing hisst finger and making a first.


    "As long as you follow through with those rules, I promise that you won''t embrace death as of yet. And to some certain, those who follow me will be under my protection."


    Danzel gazed at the three of them with his cold ethereal gaze.


    "On those rules, I will make nopromises. In fact, it''s easier to kill you all and extract information once you all are turned into the undead. Though for the sake of her...see that as my mercy. Now say your part." Danzel said as put his hand on top of Shiro''s head.


    Of course, what he told those three was nothing but lies about extracting information from them.


    Of course, making them all into undead would essentially make things all the simpler, but making an undead was like creating apletely new being.


    That meant that the previous memories of the body would not be avable on the undead. Though the undead could inherit some parts of their past living self.


    Nevertheless, that was most of the case in the skeleton type of undead, and many exceptional existed in the undead race.


    Most notorious of these was ethereal undead-like wraiths, Banshees, and many more.


    A perfect example was the Death Spirit, Nersan''rah.


    Once a 4th-tier magic caster, re-animated into an ethereal undead with his memories intact.


    There was many undead with such nature, some would receive partial memories,plete memories. Though they were quite rare.


    But one thing was certain, skeletons, Draugr''s, and Anabast''s didn''t go under that category.


    And in fact, Danzel was bullshitting those 3 people in front of him.


    Though dead they had some of their uses, what Danzel was desperately in need of was information about thosends.


    He simply lied to make them realize the situation that they were in was far from severe.


    He also used Shiro as a sign of hope.


    Although he wasn''t going to y or tell them that he was some kind of primordial god, he didn''t mind adding fuel to their imagination.


    And by the look on their faces, his threat made them have pale faces.


    Well, at least two of them as the supposed priestess were wearing a white wooden mask. Albeit by looking at her tails flying in a chaotic way, he imagine that the meaning behind his words reached.


    And he was right.


    The so-called priestess was currently under a great deal of stress.


    When she followed Danzel, she didn''t exactly know what to expect.


    And when the group that wanted went to resist the being in front of her, she genuinely thought that everyone will be ughtered and turned into the cursed beings that the being called "undead".


    ''He even said that he would have done it if it weren''t for her...'' She thought as she sneaked a nce at the fox-masked girl opposite her.


    But once she looked there, her eyes and Shiro''s eyes met with each other despite both wearing masks.


    Making her quickly avoid her gaze.


    ''She is also not so simple...'' She thought internally.


    The priestess only nced for a single moment, but even then, the eyes behind the fox mask followed her.


    That''s when she remembered the discussion of yesterday''s gathering.


    ''They must be the primordial ones!!!''


    That was the opinion that many had because the resemnce of the two beings in front of her held an extremely simrity in knowledge of their ancestor. She couldn''t help but think the same.


    So after thinking it about a while, she couldn''t help but ask the two what was on her mind.


    "O great ones...as one of the representatives of the vige, I will try- No, I will enforce your words on the people of the Vashara vige. But for rity''s sake...what should we call you two?"


    Upon such question, Danzel turned his gaze towards the masked girl.


    "What you call us doesn''t matter. Through the years I was called many names from the ten of thousands that I even killed. Some call me Cruel, some call me the Creator and many had called me Death with many more. You people might refer to me as you want, as for her..."


    Danzel looked at Shiro for a moment, before grabbing her head with his hand.


    "You call her, Shiro... I think you told me that it means white, right?" Danzel asked Shiro.


    Shiro in turn nodded at her head.


    As Shiro and Danzel were pretty much the whole time together, in between small talk, Danzel remembered that Shiro mention that her name meant white.


    ''Cruel and Death...and she is white... they should be them then...'' The masked girl said contemting.<novelnext></novelnext>


    As for Danzel''s side, though he didn''t lie to her, his words were specifically used to sprout further misunderstanding her.


    He was once called Abdiel the Cruel while he was a mercenary.


    Creator by his creations.


    And Death by a few soldiers that he killed.


    For a necromancer to gain such titles wasn''t all that difficult.


    Though for Shiro''s name to mean white was aplete coincidence.


    And as the name of their primordial was white life, he went ahead and put more fuel to increase the misunderstanding between them.


    Although he wasn''t keen on ying the role of their primordial God. He knew that if they truly believed it, things will go way smoother.


    And while he was in his thoughts, the old man who was also the owner of the house that they were in suddenly spoke out.


    "You mentioned that our possessions will be used... Might I ask you for more details" the old man asked Danzel with an extremely worried look.


    Danzel looked at him briefly before nodding.


    Albeit to the old man, his brief look felt like hours long.


    "Firstly, I would like to see where you are making your weapons and where you get resources like the ck ice and metal ore. A map for thetter would suffice for now." Danzel said.


    The old man nodded somewhat wary before he stands up.


    "Then let me show you where our cksmith is. As for thetter...we don''t have a map avable as it''s guarded information. It will be some time till we can make one urate one..."


    "I will give you 7 days to make you one." Danzel said with a cold voice as he and Shiro followed the old man toward the cksmith building.


    Once they arrived, the difference between this building and the other ones was clear to see, as it was mainly built with stone.


    Apparently, the actual cksmith wasn''t here today, for better or worse.


    But once Danzel entered the building, he could see a clear difference between this cksmithing forge and a certain''s dwarf forge.


    The one in front of him was much smallerpared to the one he was experiencing with.


    "I''ve seen enough, tell the man who works here that I wille and meet him," Danzel said as the 5 of them walked out.


    "Now, now show me where you people are burying your dead." Danzel said suddenly.


    Making the masked girl look at him shaking.


    "W-What might you n to do there?" She asked.


    "I can make someone else guide me if you are not willing." Danzel said while gazing at her and revealing his death aura.


    Biting her lips under that mask, she nodded her head unwillingly and showed the way toward the Vashara vige graveyard.


    Though as a priestess, leading what probably was the primordial god of Harsh Death to their vige was a massive sin. Her dying there was a much greater sin.


    She was the only one capable of healing magic in her vige after all.


    Essentially their only doctor.


    She was still young and had not arranged an heir, which make it all the worse.


    Her death would be a massive blow to the future of the Vashara vige.


    And soon enough, they arrived in a vast ce after walking through an artificial tunnel.


    The tunnel lead to a ce with a variety of items pierced in the snow. Acting to what Danzel guessed were gravestones.


    "The amount of miasma is so little..." Danzel said somewhat disappointed.


    "You people must have been keeping this ce quite well maintained." He added.


    "Of course, here rest our people and warriors of many generations, it''s my duty as the priestess to keep it so." The white-masked girl said, somewhat proud.


    Danzel then gazed toward her.


    "As for now, you don''t have to do that anymore." He said with an ice-cold voice.


    "Huh? What do you mean...?" The masked girl asked confused.


    Danzel grinned at her question.


    "I will beying im on the dead here, your work here is no longer required." Danzel said as he gazed at the graveyard.


    ''With this amount of bodies, I might bring the other Great Rune into the perfect stage.'' He thought internally.

 Chapter 413 Carving Days And Familiar Face

    The priestess and the old man indirectly urged Danzel and Shiro to leave the graveyard and show the rest of the vige, but Danzel refused, as he had seen and said enough.


    Although he wasn''t sure if they were saying the truth about there not being a map for the resources or thend, Danzel gave them 1 week to finish one.


    In fact, he told them that till it was done, no one is allowed to go out of the vige.


    Once he said that, made the 2 of them put worrying faces with the masked girl swinging her tails around. Taking it as a sign of stress.


    Danzel knew very well their situation and what it meant to forbid them to stay inside the vige. There was a finite amount of food and the longer it took them to rece the food, the more stress would the people will suffer.


    Which was bound to make some do irrational things.


    Such as attacking him or Shiro.


    Through them getting food would be good for him too as Shiro needed to eat quite a lot.


    Despite the haired buffalo being extremelyrge, that could feed a family for weeks, Danzel wastes lots of meat that could be eaten and Shiro eats like a whole family.


    For now, he had enough food for her as he raided that ice troll settlement, but he would much prefer to have a guaranteed ie of food for Shiro.


    So the bringing for food was good, but even then he decided to put more pressure.


    Wherever it would backfire or not, Danzel had just to wait and see.


    And as of now, he had enough stuff to keep him busy.


    With an incredible amount of corpses in front of him, he could finally start practicing [Great Rune of Ruined Vessel] and maybe perfect it to carve into his body.


    Although he still needed to perfect [Great Rune of World Gaia], he put that to the side to work on the other great rune.


    Although the Gaia rune was extremely powerful, it took a lot of a body to have such a rune.


    One great rune could be carved for almost everybody, but two needed much greater skills of a runesmith and a superior body. There were several further reasons as to why that was the case but in short.


    As of now, Danzel could only carve 1 great rune on his body.


    Albeit the [Great Rune of Ruined Vessel] description was rather vague, it sounded like it had way more potential that the [Great Rune of World Gaia].


    And as hecked the current skills to remove a great rune without harming his body, Danzel wanted the [Great Rune of Ruined Vessel] to be of the [Perfect] quality.


    Much better would have been [Beyond Perfection] quality.


    But till yet, he failed to create a single rune out of such quality.


    ''Though a pity, [Perfect] quality is enough'' he thought to himself.


    [Perfect] quality meant that the rune reached the peak performance that the original creator intended.


    [Beyond Perfection] he guessed that the rune will surpass one of the creators. At least that was his guess.


    He once aimed to achieve such quality but ended up failing.


    He could naturally make a rune stronger with his knowledge, but that would be by changing the rune, which at this point would make a different rune.


    Which made him give up on reaching this point.


    For now, he focused on achieving just the [Perfect] quality.


    Which meant digging up the corpses out.


    Of course, he let his Draugr do such a job.


    Wearing bone armor created by the [Undead''s Bone Armor] spell, they dug through snow and earth with their rune-strengthened weapons to find the remains of those "fox people".


    Of course, there were a few minor problems.


    Compared to the corpses that Danzel had worked on before, the remains of those "fox people" weren''t in the best condition.


    If it weren''t for his [Undead Reconstruction] spell, then most of those corpses would have been useless to him.


    The spell did restore the cracks and missing bones, but with such a long time passing, the bones naturally weaken. Albeit not to the point that carving a great rune would be impossible.


    Which left him with digging out the corpses, carving runes into them, and then raising them as Draugr''s.


    Rinse and repeat.


    Which put Shiro into an awkward situation.


    In the time that Danzel was carving, he called for a period of self-study.


    Danzel gave Shiro one of his spatial storage rings that contained the books, before leaving her to do her own thing.


    As for her safety, with Baron as her guard, none will manage to harm her.


    At worst, Baron will hold the vigers long enough before the other Anabaste.


    Shiro herself was strong that could unleash quite a dangerous magic if she put her magic into it.


    So he wasn''t worried about anything happening to her.


    And as days passed full of carving and raising the dead, he was informed that Shiro was spending her time with the "lords".


    Which were none other than the Anabast.


    When he first heard what his Draugrs call the Anabast, he was both confused and curious as to why they named those 5 like this.


    He also heard the news that Shiro used her healing magic on a few of the "fox people".


    Other than that, Talon reported that few are plotting against him, but honestly, he couldn''t care less.


    Making the next few days just him sitting there and carving bones without much pause.


    And by the time he raised more than 100 Draugrs with the [Great Rune of Ruined Vessel], on the sixth day, a young girl with short hair came to him, escorted by his Draugrs.


    Canceling his [Rune Vision] to observe his runes, Danzel finally noticed the unfamiliar presence behind him.


    Turning his head to the side, Danzel watched a terrified young girl looking at him.<novelnext></novelnext>


    "...Aren''t the girl that was with those 2?" Danzel said as he cast [Greater Raise Undead] on the corpse that he was working on.


    His dead mana entered the corpses, giving them strength and a pair of ring eyes in his eye sockets.


    "Go join the others." Danzel said to the newly created Draugr as he sent further instructions mentally to it.


    Walking towards the girl, he looked down at her, making look extremely oppressive to her.


    "What have youe here, girl." Danzel said as his ethereal eyes red up.


    With one of her shaking abnormally, the girl handed with the other hand a piece of the rolled-up leather piece.


    "A-As promised...the map that you asked for."


    Looking at the piece of leather, Danzel fell silent as he took it from her hands and opened the roll of leather.


    Revealing the contents of the other role, it was indeed a map.


    Though somewhat roughpared to other ones that he had seen, it was readable enough and seemed like a lot of effort was put into it, despite seeming inferior to other maps that he had seen.


    ''It seems like the skull and mask on top of those houses is this vige, as for the mine and the ce of that dark crystal to be much further away than I expected. No wonder those guys used mostly axes. The simpleck the supply.''


    If he had toin, was the number of mountains that was drawn on the map. But other than that, there were also a few locations where other viges were drawn with an "O" and an "X" on top.


    "Hey, girl, what are those "O" and "X" suppose to be?" Danzel asked despite having a faint guess as to what it can be.


    "Ehm... the "O" are other viges of our race that we were able to confirm. With the "X"...being the Ice Troll hunter''s viges...though they told me that as they keep it to themself, this information might be outdated." The girl said while avoiding Danzel''s gaze.


    "Mhm..." Danzel nodded before gazing at the girl more carefully.


    More specifically, he gazed at her shaking.


    ''This feeling...miasma?'' Danzel thought before finally recognizing the girl.


    Raising his hand, Danzel ces his hand on top of her shoulder before stepping one step closer to her.


    "Aghhhh!" The girl screamed out of fear and pain.


    "You are that girl, from that vige, are you not."


    Though not fully unleashed, Danzel let loose some amount of his death aura. Making the girl, Alka, have a pale face.


    "So you remember me..." Alka said in a whisper.


    "Of course, I remember you. You swung an axe at me if I remember right. Nheless, how could I mistake my own miasma?" Danzel said as dead mana run through his arm.


    Making Alka freeze in fear of the simr sight.


    She imagined her arm and shoulder decaying rapidly and dying shortly after, making her shut her eyes closed, though what she didn''t expect was that instead of pain, she felt the opposite.


    The pain from the death mark on her shoulder and hand that gued her mind these days seemed toplete.


    And once she opened her eyes, the pressure on her shoulder vanished. For a split second, she also wished that the big bad primordial god of death in front of her would also vanish.


    Though she was severely disappointed.


    "You heard the consequences of going against me as you were there when I told you. Even then, that priestess girl should also spread the word to the vige. And yet here you are in front of me?" Danzel said with his cold voice as he stared down at her.


    "Girl, what is your name?"


    "A-Alka..." Alka said with a shaking voice as she imagine herself being killed in 10 different ways.


    "Alka is it? Know that if you were someone from this vige, I would have cut your head and picked someone else to pair up your heads. Though my curiosity prevents me from doing as such. So tell me, why did youe in front of me and not hide? Or did you think that I would have forgotten you?"


    "..." Alka looked down at her feet in silence before speaking up.


    "I...I had to." She finally spoke.


    To others, those few words might not have been a satisfying answer. And it was the same for Danzel.


    But that didn''t mean he couldn''t imagine her position.


    "Hmm, though that is my guess. Were you pressured to be in front of me? I can imagine them saying that you led us here and that it is your fault that we are here. How wrong am I?"


    Hearing what Danzel said, Alka''s mouth opened up in shock.


    Making it clear enough that he was either point on or at least close enough.


    And as the girl, Alka exined her situation to him after being told so to do it, Danzel could only shake his head.


    ''Complete morons...'' He thought internally.


    Though Alka was supported by the priestess, she was in the end outside with the supposed mark of death.


    Those with not much magic knowledge could easily mistake and connect things that look simr.


    In short, her "mark of death" was thought of as a tracking spell.


    Why he found those people as pure idiots, was from the rules he set in.


    Based on the rules, if he really went and kill Alka, he would also kill someone else.


    As for why he brought back his miasma from her shoulder and let her live till this long, it wasn''t him showing favorite, but a small thought.


    Waking closer to her, Danzel looked at her while speaking in his cold voice.


    "To avoid death, what would you do, Alka? I will be willing to let you live if you serve. Though if you are unwilling, I shall meet the expectations of the people who sended you here." Danzel said as he rested his hand on the hilt of his sword.


    Ask a fell silent upon such words.


    "Choose, in what state do you want to serve? As living? Or as one of the dead?"


    Albeit he didn''t necessarily need her for the task that he had in mind.


    It would still be a waste not to use her.

 Chapter 414 Setting Out For The Search.

    After giving Alka a few instructions, Danzel continued to carve runes till the next day.


    He had reached the point where he was gaining XP in the [Great Rune of Ruined Vessel], though it was far from enough in getting 6 more levels in [ck Guard] and reaching the evolution point of his main ss.


    Whether level 100 was it or not, Danzel didn''t know, but he found it very likely for it to be the case.


    And if it really were the case, then additional abilities woulde with it.


    ''Although they are few other skills seeming core to the [Dark Guard] ss, they go more in the direction of giving support to others.'' He thought to himself.


    He wasn''t much interested in such skills, at least for now.


    "Half of you all, follow me." Danzel said, making his newly created Draugr follow him as instructed.


    Walking back to the vige with 50 or so undead.


    The first thing that Danzel was Shiroing towards him.


    "Rue! Have you finally finished carving, ehm, them?" Shiro said somewhat awkwardly.


    Danzel nodded his head towards Shiro.


    "How have you been in your studies?" Danzel asked as Shiro walked beside him, with all the Draugrs following them.


    "Hihi, witness!" Shiro yelled full of pride as she stretched her hand, revealing an ominous dark mana.


    "Mhm, you improved quite a bit, the quality of the dead mana isn''t bad. And you aren''t harming yourself anymore..." Danzel said as he gazed at her hands.


    Though others couldn''t tell, a 4th-tier undead could tell by just a nce, that Shiro''s hand held an ominous fragment of dead mana still present inside her arm.


    "Albeit, using your body to practice isn''t something that I rmend you. Even if it''s meant to hasten your understanding of dead mana."


    Hearing that, Shiro avoided Danzel''s gaze.


    "I used light magic, so I should be fine..." Shiro mumbled under that mask.


    Danzel shook his head upon hearing that.


    "Even if your light magic heals the damage, that doesn''t mean that your body willpletely recover." Danzel said as he went behind Shiro and grabbed her hands with his.


    "Cold..." Shiro shivered at the metallic cold of Danzel''s gauntlets.


    Ignoring what she had to say, Danzel drained the remaining feint fragments of dead mana off Shiro''s arm.


    Usually and in most cases, manipting the mana of another being was extremely difficult. But because it was dead mana and there wasn''t much, to begin with, Danzel was capable to extract the fragments of dead mana.


    "If notice that you continue using your body as a practice dummy, then you can say goodbye to the books that I gave you. With your condition, we don''t know how you will react with dead mana inside your body."


    "Though the amount of bitterly small, by the off chance your condition is triggered and the mana turns into dead mana. Even I won''t be able to help if that were to happen."


    Hearing those words, Shiro shivered just imagining it.


    She had already studied the result of this happening.


    "..."


    "If you are that eager, go find a few vigers to be your test subjects. Either by force or negotiations. I heard that you healed a few of those "fox people". I bet there will be one or two who would be willing to do it if you offer your healing magic." Danzel said.


    "In the first ce, it was foolish to offer you services for free. Don''t deceive yourself with being their god." Thest few words he spoke in whispers, as they started seeing a group of the vigers lined up with the masked priestess waiting, with beside her being Alka and the old man he talked to before.


    "Greetings to the primordial ones..." The masked priestess said as she stared at therge amount of Draugr behind Danzel and Shiro.


    Unlike before, those had armor made out of bones, making them way more intimidating.


    "Are those all you hunters?" Danzel said as he stared at the people in front of him.


    Though they had weapons, some of them had none at all.


    "Yes...we gathered to take your permission to go out and scavenge for food..."


    Nodding his head, Danzel walked toward them and slowly drew a dagger from behind.


    Of course, seeing that, many of the hunters flinched in response and some took a step back. Even the masked priestess looked at him worryingly.


    Danzel in turn walked to the few who were brave enough to stand their ground.


    Stepping in front of them, Danzel overshadowed them with his size and the pair of ethereal eyes make their instincts scream to run away.


    But beforethe man in front of Danzel could listen to his instincts, a cold sensation mixed with pain came from his chest.


    "K-Kyah!!?" The man finally reacted and jumped back as he touched his chest, only to see a very shallow cut on his chest.<novelnext></novelnext>


    "So much about hunters. Getting scared of merely being scratched." Danzel said with his cold voice as he stared at the rest of the hunters.


    "Everyone who is willing to go beyond that wall is entitled to have a cut from me."


    The hunters were confused by such a statement and looked for answerers from the masked priestess and the old man.


    "Ehm...of course, our hunters would agree, but would it be possible to learn the reason for...this?"


    Without turning to look at the old man, Danzel walked to the next hunter.


    "It''s insurance. With their blood on my de, they would never escape my grasp by the chance they decided to run." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Making the hunters gain pale faces.


    Knowing what he was doing now, the small scratch was all the more fearsome.


    s, they couldn''t and wouldn''t dare to refuse.


    In the end, each of them had a shallow cut made by Danzel''s dagger despite their dissatisfaction.


    "Rue, should I heal them?" Shiro asked while looking at the hunters.


    "Do whatever you want..." Danzel said coldly before turning to the priestess.


    "You,e and tell more of those viges on the map. What are the chances that they still exist of the ice trolls or of you people? Also, how is the condition of the mines?"


    After he finished speaking, arge golden magic circle appeared beneath the hunters, showering them with warm light, which healed the shallow cuts, amazing the hunters and the masked priestess.


    "Cough~Cough." The old man coughed while looking at the priestess, making her get back to her senses.


    "Ah! Yes... Our contact with other tribes and viges has been cut for a long time. Only our hunters meet hunters of other viges, but thest contact was after a long time with few of us have actually been there, but that was ages ago."


    "The situation is simr to the mine... because of the distance and the frequent raids of the hunters, we gave up on them a long time ago. As for the ice of the frozen relic...it''s on the territory of the primordial god of Wild Hunt. Where also many hunters are living."


    Hearing her exnation, Danzel would have frowned if he could.


    As the information that he was given was full of uncertain noise and no guarantee.


    ''Also the territory of one of their gods? That sounds like this "Wild Hunt" truly exists. Though the most troublesome thing among is that...'' Danzel thought internally for quite some time before deciding to ask what was on his mind.


    "Does your vige know in which direction thend isn''t filled with ice?" Danzel asked the most important question of them all.


    The previous questions were just considerations of the future of making this vige their base and slowly finding their way back to thends filled with war and bad merchants.


    "What do you mean..?" The old man suddenly stepped forward and stared at Danzel with a burning gaze.


    The others who heard Danzel''s question were also confused.


    The masked priestess went also silent.


    Making Danzel realize ethereal eyes go out in disappointment.


    "I see...well, no matter." Danzel mumbled as he turned his back to them.


    The masked priestess opened her mouth behind the mask to say something, but before she could, Danzel''s cold voice echoed through the surroundings.


    "Anabast!!!"


    Upon his shout, the next momentter 4 robed shadows descended in front of Danzel with one robed shadowing out of Shiro''s shadow.


    "We head the call of thee Creator!" The five Anabast said in unison.


    In the next moment, a sh of light appeared in Danzel''s hand, revealing to be the hide of the haired buffalo. And in the hide with the use of dead mana, there was a replica of Danzel map.


    "Here." Danzel threw the copies of the map to 4 Anabast"


    "Ss, Talon, Leyone, and Rayone. You are to go and scout if the locations marked on the map contain life or value. You are to return and report your findings. Understood?"


    "Yes! O the Creator..." The 4 of the said as they bowed to him.


    "As for you, Baron, you will continue to follow us." He said as he raised his hand towards the bone wall blocking the exit of the vige.


    And upon hismand, the wall of bones copsed and turned shortly after into dust and dead mana.


    "Find a few people that have been to the vige before to follow me and you girl." Danzel looked at Alka.


    "You will be following us."


    "Huh?"

 Chapter 415 What Awaits One In Death

    Walking above the snow, were more than 50 undead on those frozennds. Being led by an existence that was responsible for their creation.


    And among that group, except for Shiro, they were only 4 of the living following


    And except for Alka, the other three were considered as the strongest 3 in the vige next.


    They were respectively Maxxren, Xesan, and the guy who managed to actually destroy Danzel''s skull once


    Though except for Maxxren, neither of those two looked like they had better days.


    Xesan in particr looked exceptionally bad.


    Under his eyes, he had ck circles and asionally he would shake and touch his chest as if searching for something that wasn''t there.


    While the other guy would look behind at the undead and nce at their ethereal eyes before staring at the figure leading them.


    "I have to say, I am surprised that the girl with the mask sended you three in particr. Where any of you really in that mine that we are going to?" The one leading the undead said as he turned his head and nced at the living with his ethereal eyes.


    "We have indeed been there. I and Xesan helped them carry those stones when we were little. Wherever it''s upied though is beyond our knowledge though." Maxxren said.


    "When you were children you say? Heh, I came to learn that children are particrly foolish you see. I knew few that treated me. Ahhh~ I still regret the day that I didn''t spill their blood with my sword. s, I was too afraid to back then..." Danzel mumbled thest part in whispers.


    "What about you, the one who broke my head. Are we aimlessly walking to nothingness or what is your story about this mine?"


    "...I was on thest group that went to retrieve the stones used by the cksmith. I believe it was around 5 years ago since west went there. We gave up once the hunters overtook that ce."


    "5 Years, huh? And by hunter''s, are you talking about the ice trolls?"


    "Yes...I believe they were called so, though most of us know them as hunters."


    "So you weren''t able to beat them despite your strength and that ice needle of yours?" Danzel said before gazing in front of him and taking the map out.


    ''Maybe I should have gone alone and scouted before leading the Draugrs here...'' Danzel thought.


    It has been quite a few days since they started walking and they still haven''t arrived to does mines.


    But as the map didn''t show how far away it was and only vaguely the direction, how far it was actually was a mystery to Danzel.


    It reached the point that he suspected that he was given to walk somewhere far away to give the vigers the chance to leave.


    Though as the 3rd-tier guy joined with him, he pushed those thoughts away.


    Even if it was the best time to run, the vige would suffer immensely without their strongest figure with them.


    Albeit the masked girl seemed to have the potential to eliminate many of his Draugr, they were still over 50 Draugrs in the vige.


    Despite that, just leaving the vige would be a risk for them, all the more with their remaining food supply.


    So he put such thoughts away.


    ''No, leaving Shiro alone would be a risk on its own. If her condition activates...'' He quickly pushed his previous thoughts away.


    Although he could probably reach the mines alone in less than a day if the map was truly correct, he needed his Draugr to be with him to make use of the mine.


    ''Maybe I should even send Baron first and wait for confirmation. I would have more time to carve while having a guaranteed...''


    "No, it''s too risky..." Danzel mumbled.


    Although Baron was strong, he was still the 3rd-tier being.


    Even with his regenerative body, he had still a considerably frail body for a 3rd-tier. Even more that of a magic caster. Albeit their body was incredibly strongpared to themon man.


    "Hey Rue, what is it that is troubling you." Shiro suddenly spoke to him, making him trail his attention to her.


    "Nothing considerably important." Danzel said before putting his map away in his spatial storage ring.


    "And, how was that girl? Learned anything?"


    Shiro nodded her head.


    "Yes, though theirnguage is different, they aren''t hard to pronounce." Shiro exined.


    "I see...what words did you learn, Shiro?"<novelnext></novelnext>


    "Mhm, For now, I learned yes, you, no, and thank you. I think it will be a while until I will be able to formte sentences..."


    "I see...just out of curiosity, can you speak out those 4 words for me to hear?" Danzel asked.


    "Of course, yes in theirnguage is "yes", you is "you", no is "no" and thank you is "thank you". Ick their ent so it might not have been as good as theirs..."


    "..." Danzel stayed silent upon hearing Shiro''s bizarre answer.


    ''As I expected... I can''t tell the difference between the twonguages, but I still understand them...why though?'' He thought internally.


    Although he once question how he knew thenguage of others, he put such knowledge to having been acquired from the previous owner of his body and that everyone was speaking the samenguage.


    Although thetter was true in thends where the arcana and the Berum kingdom were. Being now somewhere where a differentnguage was established, made him realize that something wasn''t quite right.


    ''Not only that, but also my undead inherits such an ability, but the natural born undead isn''t like that, so why...?''


    He tried to think of a reason as to why that was the case, but in the end, he ended up with nothing but the suspicion of the status screen being somehow involved.


    ''I will have to ask Velkir next time I meet him, just to be sure.''


    "Rue...might I ask you something?" Shiro whispers to him.


    "And what might it be? Depends on your question, I might not be able to answer though." Danzel answered carelessly.


    He was too mentally tired to think of something with no way of finding a concrete answer.


    "Ehm...you don''t have to answer, but... you mentioned being afraid of something a moment ago. Might I know what you were afraid of?"


    Hearing her questions, Danzel couldn''t help but look at her with a grin.


    "What? Now you are trying to figure me out? Don''t worry, As long as you don''t force my hand or the situation is unavoidable, I won''t kill you or let you be killed." Danzel said with a grin on his face.


    "No! I didn''t mean it like that! I just thought that someone like...you, wouldn''t be afraid of anything..." Shiro said hastily.


    Danzel shook his head.


    "Everyone has fears. Even those who imed to not have any are just beings who haven''t encountered their fears as of yet. The same it''s for me." Danzel exined to Shiro.


    "Personally, I fear the concept of death. As hypocritical as it sounds, having been responsible for more than ten thousand deaths. The knowledge of being put into a situation that might result in my death, frighten''s me immensely, as I know what awaits me after I die..." Danzel said as he gazed at Shiro.


    "Agares for example also bring such fear in me together with the other Deathfull Skulls members. Just the idea of facing any of them to death..." Danzel shook his head.


    Even the weakest member, Vanessa, Danzel had no shred of confidence that he could win against her even if they were two of him facing her.


    Andpared to the others, Danzel felt the most hopeless in the scenario of fighting Agares.


    Shiro who heard that was confused by such a statement.


    In her mind, the undead were beings that never tire, never hunger, and never fear the concept of death.


    Also, a small detail that Danzel revealed sprouted her curiosity.


    "Rue, you just mentioned that you know whates after death... Did you mean that literally?" Shiro asked, making Danzel fall silent.


    Shiro felt that she asked something that she wasn''t supposed to ask, making her lower her head without pursuing the question further.


    Only after several hours when they finally managed to see the signs of the mine did Danzel finally speak up.


    "In the world beyond, ckened ichor filled though you sight, where the withered souls await to pull you to wither with them...for possible of all eternity. That is what awaits everyone who loses their vessel of the physical realm." Danzel said with a much colder and more serious tone than usual.


    "No goddess awaiting you in her safe heaven, circle of reincarnation, or absolute nothingness. Once your time hase, only those with the strongest will-No, even them, will have a difficult time escaping such an end." Danzel finished before stepping forward with his ethereal eyes ring up.


    "Are those the mines that you know of?" Danzel asked the living behind him.


    The man who prated his skull nodded his head.


    "Yes...that''s indeed the ce, but those walls...weren''t there before. They should be-"


    "The ice troll hunters, I assume?" Danzel finished his sentence for him as he gazed at the life force far beyond.


    And as he gazed, he put his hand above the hilt of his sword.

 Chapter 416 Ice Troll Slaves

    *Tick!! Tick!!! Tick!!!


    The echoes of metal hitting stone traveled through a tunnel.


    And there wasn''t just one of such sounds being made in that certain tunnel.


    But it wasn''t before long that a different sound appeared in the tunnel.


    *Ting~ting~ ting~~


    "Haah~haah~haah...so hot..." A man with haggard breathing said as he felt his body burning from the inside.


    "Hey! What are you doing!? Pick up your pickaxe before theye!" The voice of the girl that was not far from him spoke with a harsh voice.


    The man briefly looked at her before nodding.


    "I-I know..." The man said as he stared down at the pickaxe that he dropped.


    His gaze was dizzy and he was thoroughly exhausted.


    But he knew that the girl was right.


    He bent his waist, reaching out with his two arms to pick up his pickaxe to continue, seemingly aimlessly hitting the rocks that they assigned him to hit.


    But once he slightly raised the pickaxe, suddenly like thunder, he felt all his strength leaving his body, making him fall to the cold ground.


    And despite the man wearing barely any clothing, having little meat on his bones, and no shoes whatsoever. The man was feeling like burning alive even after touching the ice-cold ground.


    Seeing the man copse, the girl near him cursed out loud.


    "You piece of shit! What are you doing copsing to the ground! Hey, wake up!" The girl cursed before leaving her own pickaxe and running to the copsed man.


    Just like the man, she wore little clothing, just enough to cover her private areas. Highlighting her fit body. Unlike a delicate noblewoman, her muscles were clear to see with her abs despite theck of meat in her body.


    She had a few ck-lined tattoos on her right arm, but the most noticeable of her was the severalrge fox tails behind her.


    One could mistake her for the same race as those "fox people" that Danzel knew. But the fox ears on her head begged to differ.


    Also, her long, white and ck hair with those gray eyes was quite umon to the Vashara vige.


    Grabbing the man''s shoulder, the white-ck-haired girl shook the man to the ground.


    "Hey! Wake up you idiot! You will get me in troubl- huh?" Only now did she notice the man''s red face and the amount of heat that his body was generating.


    "This prick! Get up already!" The girl cursed as she noticed the fever of that guy.


    Seeing the man not listening to her, she gritted her teeth in anger. Looking like she was about to throw a punch at the guy.


    The next moment though, her fox-like ears twitched as they caught a sounding to them.


    ''Shit! They are here...!'' She cursed internally as picked the man off the ground and ce his pickaxe in his hand.


    s, the man copsed back to the ground, aimlessly looking at the ground.


    "You bastard-" As the girl was about to end her curse, loud footsteps appeared in the same tunnel.


    The owner of those footsteps was from beings taller than 2 meters with muscr and robust bodies. They had pale blueish skin and tattoos running through their shoulders and chest.


    "What is this?" One of the huge figures said, clearly being off the ice troll race.


    "Ghhh, it seems the fox meat''s have been cking off, brother." The other ice troll said while staring at the man and the woman that are to the ground.


    Hearing what the other ice troll said and looking at the two, the ice troll referred to as brother gnashed his teeth.


    "You useless fox meat! Take your stick and continue your work!!! The chieftain is awaiting the stone spears! Get up!"


    The girl with the white and ck hair and tail picked her pickaxe, but then she stared at the man who was struggling to even rise up.


    Cursing at the man''s weakness, she tried to help him up.


    s, the man was in no condition to do as the ice trollsmanded.


    Seeing that the two of them weren''t doing as hemanded, the ice troll''s frown grew much worse as he walked toward them.


    "Pick you sticks fox meats! NOW!!!"


    "He can''t! His head is burning hot! Any more and he will-" Before the girl could finish, the ice troll swiped his hand the girl with such force that send the girl flying toward the stone wall of the tunnel


    "Kyaaagh!!!" Screaming in pain, the girl fell to the ground with her head bleeding.


    The ice troll then kicked the man to the ground in the stomach, sending him a few meters of rollings.


    Seeing no response except for a light-grown of pain, the ice troll walked to the man.


    "Tch! Broken like a tool, this fox meat is. There is no need of him anymore."


    Reaching out with his hand, the ice troll picked up the man from his hand to his eye level.


    And in the next second, the ice troll opened his mouth and dug his tusk and teeth into the flesh of the man. Making the man''s eyes focus for a brief second with his mount opened, though no screams came out.


    The ice troll only took two bites, and those 2 bites alone devour 1/4 of the man.


    "Dammit, only bones and no meat. Even as food those fox people are useless." The ice troll said as he gazed at the girl who was bleeding from the head.


    "I guess this one is useless too by now." He stepped towards the girl before picking up her hand and dragging her to the floor.


    ''You piece of shit, I will have you had your head with an axe...'' The girl thought internally as her eyes stared at the ice troll ice full with ferocity of a wolf ready to leap and take a bite of someone''s neck.


    Seeing how the girl looked at him, the ice troll frowned before smiling at the sudden idea that he got.


    "Hehe, little brother, you can have the rest of the useless meat. I will take that one and have some fun."


    Walking over to the dead man, the other troll picked him up and started to take a bite at his throat.<novelnext></novelnext>


    "Don''t kill her brother, the chieftain might take a bite out of us if those fox meat dys the stone collecting."


    "Gghgh, I know. I just don''t have to kill her right? She looks useless anyway." The ice troll said as she dragged the girl through the ground.


    As they walked through the tunnel, many like her and the man were seen, with their pickaxe in hand and swinging at the walls.


    Most of them had way more filial traits than the people of the Vashara.


    Those people who watched one of the ice trolls drag the girl out of the tunnel gridded their teeth and clenched their pickaxes.


    Letting out killing intended towards the ice troll, s, they all knew that it was useless to go against the ice troll hunters.


    Those who were capable or wanting to object to them were already dead. Each of them knew and saw how they died.


    Raised up to the air while the tusk and teeth of the ice troll hunters eat their bodies like some wild beast.


    While most of them were quite strong, the bodies of the ice trolls were gifted with strong bodies full of vitality.


    All of them were from different tribes deeper into the territory of the primordial of the Wild Hunt. Many of them were great hunters, but now they were merely reduced into ves to mine till they die or be eaten by a hungry ice troll hunter.


    That was all that they were reduced to.


    The girl dragged by the ice troll tried her best to hold to something on the ground as she knew exactly her fate awaiting outside the mine.


    And soon enough, they came out of the mine.


    "Y-You bastards...I will kill you all." She said as she was suddenly lifted and thrown to the side of the stone wall with great force.


    "Ghighi, as if you fox meats can go against us. You are to be ves to the chieftain, and tools for us." The ice troll said while putting his axe to the ground.


    "And tools are meant to be broken, ghighi." He said as the ice troll slowly tried to undress his pants.


    Seeing that, the girl gritted her teeth.


    Despite her injury, her hands flew strength while her nails extended and became sharper than a dagger. Using her strength, she directly cut a part of the stone behind her and grabbed it with all her strength.


    Awaiting for the chance to smash the ice trolls'' hunter head.


    But before the ice troll hunter could pull his pants down to begin the deed.


    A sudden sound of an explosion appeared.


    *Boughh!!!!


    Surprised, the troll pulled back his pants and turned to look where the sounde from.


    "W-What are those!?" The ice trolls shouted in shock with many othersing to watch the shocking sighting in front of them.


    The gate that they have built, was destroyed and spewing fierce mes of a dark green color, slowly spreading and devouring the rest of the wood walls.


    And at that moment the ice trolls were in shock at the sight of the strange mes, suddenly 6nces of the exact dark green mes were shot out at an incredible speed, aiming at 6 ice trolls.


    The ice trolls were too slow to react to thences of the dark green mes, letting thences pierce their bodies.


    Killing 2 immediately while the others were left to suffer in the dark green mes.


    They tried to put out the mes, but they couldn''t.


    The only thing that they achieved was revealing that thences of fire were actually ice spikes, on fire by the dark green mes.


    "KGwaaaagh!! Why won''t they go out."


    "It burns!!! It burns!!! Stop it!!!"


    "It hurt!!!!"


    The 4 ice trolls were yelling in pain as they tried their best to put out the fire.


    As futile as it was in reality.


    And among those screams, a sound of metallic footsteps was to be heard.


    The girl with ck and white hair was the first to hear them inside the dark green mes.


    How the ice trolls were able to notice the sound wasn''t with their great hearing, but from the death auraing from the mes.


    And slowly, a tall figure wearing dark te armor, from the gaps the dark green mesing out.


    But the most noticeable thing was that his head was a skull with the same mes as his eyes.


    "Quite the pathetic wall that you got, to be broken by just this." An ice-cold voice came out of the undead wielding 2 swords.


    Swinging one of the swords in front of him with ack of vigor.


    A dark green wind de flew at the ice trolls while carrying the mes of the sword that the wind de was swung by.


    The wind de cut through a few ice trolls while letting their remains be eaten by the mes.


    A few of the ice trolls dashed with their weapons up high.


    The undead second sword then briefly touched the ground.


    Resulting in the next second, making ice travel through the ground and raise sharp spikes to impale the few dashing trolls.


    "For only to die by just that...pathetic." The undead like all the ice trolls finally reacts to the flow of events.


    "Call the others! Bring on the ves too!" One of the ice trollsmanded as it looked at the ethereal mes of the undead.


    Who was none other than Rue Danzel.

 Chapter 417 Slaughtered By Fire And Ice

    Within a thought, the ice spikes impaling the ice trolls that run to him copsed and turned into tinny shards of ice.


    Several notifications of XP started to pop up, but Danzel ignored them as he stared at the other ice trolls.


    "There are more of you, trolls here than I expected." Danzel said as he slowly walked with both of his swords toward them.


    "Great."


    Upon saying that, the ice trolls had already equipped themselves with their weapons and let out a battlecry as they run toward Danzel.


    "Kill!"


    "Break the walking bones!"


    They yelled as they run, their steps shaking the ground like a stampede.


    The speed they run was unnaturally fast, making it clear that at least every single of them was of the 2nd-tier with great physical attributes. Danzel could also recognize a few of 3rd-tier ice trolls too.


    "It seems I will have to wee them..." Danzel mumbled as he pushed his two swords at each other. Spreading the mes of the Overseer''s sword to his other sword while a crimson light hovered for a moment around his sword.


    A clear sign of the [Innate Blood Absorbtion] spells being cast on his sword.


    Additionally casting [Swift Movements] on him, Danzel dashed forward at the closed ice troll in front of him.


    The ice troll took the charge and then immediately had his hand that held an axe and his torso severed.


    And it wasn''t the only ice troll that was killed in almost an instant.


    With Danzel''s speed and strength, nothing could stop him from cutting the ice trolls'' bodies like butter.


    The ice trolls themselves were confused trying to locate him, but once they saw him, he run towards either them or someone else.


    It was only after the 3rd-tier ice trolls stepped up that they managed to stop Danzel for a brief moment.


    One of the ice trolls used his mana to perform a forced movement to speed up his action, resulting in his swing about to reach Danzel.


    Nheless, even if the swing held tremendous force and was incredibly fast, Danzel was easily able to see it and react to it.


    Using the Overseer''s sword, Danzel blocked the axeing above him. Resulting in all the force washing down upon him and pushing the snow around them.


    Afterward, Danzel moved a step forward and swung at the ice troll''s chest with his other swords, leaving a huge cut with seemingly eternal dark green mes, while also starting decay.


    And thanks to his spell and runes, the amount of blood that he drew out of the ice trolls was enough to half a bucket.


    And that was in an instant.


    Though as Danzel wasn''t too used to duel wielding, the way he blocked with his left hand was awkward which left the other 3rd-tier ice trolls enough chance to close up together with the others.


    "Break him!"


    The ice trolls of the 3rd-tier quickly enclosed around Danzel. Theirrge and barbaric weapons were swung down, left and right towards Danzel.


    Though Danzel blocked with his sword their weapons with extreme ease while also delivering fatal wounds or right off killing the ice trolls.


    Despite their tough bodies and regenerative powers, against Danzel''s runes and abilities. Those things proved to be nothing.


    Also, the advantage of having arger frame than their enemies were greatly reduced, as Danzel wasn''t that much shorter than them.


    In human heights, it would be like a man of 1,86 meters fighting someone 2 meters tall. There was a difference of course, but not that big one.


    And with the strength difference being sorge, it was clear that theirrge bodies only made them a bigger target for his ominous des.


    Though the ice trolls didn''t stop their attempt to kill Danzel.


    The weaker ice trolls dashed with the mindset of overwhelming their opponent with their numbers and strong weapons. Just like they would do against manyrge beasts of the frozennds.


    Compared to the other ice trolls that Danzel met, those he was fighting still held their honor. Making them cloud their mind and unable to see the thread that they were walking towards.


    Of course, Danzel needed only one swing to kill those ice trolls or incampitatied out of the fight.


    Those that survived would eventually die by the mes anyway after all.


    Despite Danzel''s ughter though.


    Without him using any special skills and duel wielding, which he was most unfamiliar with, the numbers of the ice trolls eventually let off the strongest of the 3rd-tier ice trolls, and also therge to dash from behind him with a huge double axe raised.


    "Be crashed!!!" The tallest ice troll said with saliva flying out of his mouth.


    Danzel saw the attack and instead of blocking or dodging, once the double axe was about to hit his body, he achieved one of his skills.<novelnext></novelnext>


    In the next moment, the double axe cleaved through Danzel''s bodypletely in half. And his inside was burning by the eternal mes of the Overseer''s sword, which resulted in the des of the double axe being engulfed with the dark green mes.


    Before the ice troll could celebrate his victory over the being that killed many of them, he noticed the body of the being was reced by a dark green mist with mes burning.


    And suddenly, the dark green mist with mes dashed forward with enormous speed directly at the ice trolls'' faces.


    Resulting in the dark green mes pressing against the ice troll''s face and engulfing him with them.


    "Kayaaaghhh!!!" The ice troll screamed in pain.


    Although the mes weren''t capable of hurting his skin with how tough it was from being a 3rd-tier.


    The mes still melted the ice troll''s eyes and resulting in enormous pain traveling into his brain. It was even worse as his eyes were getting regenerating only to be burned.


    Not only that, but the ice troll was unable to breathe with the mes covering his whole face.


    Although the ice troll could withstand far-fierce mes and regenerate from fatal wounds, it was still a living being.


    The pain of having his eyes melt in mes drove his mind into madness. Additionally, it was also a mortal being.


    Like how witches died from the smoke first then the actual fire burning them at the stake, the ice troll was experiencing that at extreme levels.


    Driven in madness, it recklessly swung his double axe, hitting other ice trolls at it.


    As for the culprit of his suffering, the dark green mist with mes gathered together and reformed into the being that was Danzel.


    "I can now somewhat imagine how that guy must have felt using his mes..." Danzel said as he turned around to be at his work.


    ''Though quite a fun ability, duel wielding is way too inconvenient. A shield and a sword are much better.'' Danzel said as he started the Overseer''s sword to its sheath.


    "Now, let''s end this." Danzel said with his cold voice as he dashed forward with his main sword in hand.


    He first went to finish the pain-crazed ice troll, which was also thest of the 3rd-tiers.


    Once he was killed and began ughtering them with ease, a few of the ice trolls abandoned the idea of fighting him and decided to run.


    Which of course had no sess.


    As Danzel was just too overwhelmingly powerful.


    And in a way, he was going easy on all those guys. As he didn''t have his shield equipped.


    Thest of the ice trolls swing desperately at Danzel with his axe, but Danzel simply raised his hand and caught the axe.


    "For the likes of you, I don''t even need my shield..." Danzel said as he pushed the axe away with his sheer hand before cutting the ice troll''s throat with his sword.


    The cut than was immediately frozen, checking the ice troll slowly to death with the tough ice on his throat.


    Beforehand he put out the mes.


    Although killing brought forth a to y satisfaction from his undead instincts.


    Danzel wasn''t keen on torturing someone.


    Though he used the mes to burn the ice trolls, he did that to test the limits of the Overseer''s sword abilities.


    After all, having the abilities but knowing not how to use them was a huge waste and risk in a fight.


    And although he liked his "ice sword" more as it was more powerful and frankly got too used to using it.


    Wielding a fire sword was of the few things he always wanted to test around ever since being in the cave.


    "Though a waste of blood, I don''t t have the space to bring them with me," Danzel said as he stared at the corpses.


    But before long, he notices another presence.


    Gazing towards the certain presence, Danzel saw a girl that looked simr to the people of the Vashara people.


    ''Is she from the same race? She does look kinda different though''


    Before he could say anything, lots of footsteps were to be heard from the ground.


    And momentster, out of the mines came an ice troll guiding several other natives of thosends.


    Seeing their state, Danzel could somewhat guess their situation.


    ''So even this ce has ves, huh?''

 Chapter 418 Rising Up Against Oppressors

    ''Does guys do look different from the guys that I had bought though. Are they from a different species? A sub-species maybe?'' Danzel wondered as he watched the miners being led by 3 ice trolls who wielded leather whips.


    Although those people had simr traits, they weren''t all the same.


    While all women had multiple tails and the man''srge builds, they were different.


    Some women had feline ears while others had not.


    Others had white fur like that of a wolf sticking out of their body with one, in particr, having white fur around her neck, while the man had little of such difference.


    Few of them seemed like their fingers were coated by a sharp bone finger. The most unique of them all had a singrrge golden white tail, which was wayrger than those of the woman.


    And just like Danzel observed everyone in silence, the other party did.


    And they were as shocked as horrified.


    "W-What happend here?" Most said with a shivering voice.


    Looking at the cut-down and burned corpses of their oppressors alone was a sight that they never expected to see.


    Though the most intimidating thing of all was the figure standing in front of the ferocious dark green mes on the wall.


    Wearing ck te armor and wielding two swords in his hand his size. And most importantly enough, the death aura that he wore around him together with the pair of ethereal eyes inside a skull.


    His presence itself awakens most of the primordial fear of death. To the weak-willed with not much strength, Danzel''s presence felt like a giant skeleton reached out to them with countless ck skeleton handsing out of his ribs, trying to reach them out.


    Some unconsciously stepped back while others put their hand in their mouth, afraid that their breath would gain the being''s attention.


    "You mere fox meats! What are you doing!? Go and kill that! Go!" One of the ice trolls yelled as he whipped one of the people.


    "T-That''s impossible! Look at all the corpses!!! Something that kills all of you, we don''t stand a chance!!!" One of the people yelled in anger at the request of the ice trolls.


    "Shut up!"


    *Bwaaggh!


    Swinging the whip at the man''s back, the man fell to the ground yelping in pain.


    "Kyaaghhh!"


    "Unless every one of you useless fox meats wants to end up in our stomach, go and kill that thing!!! He is just one!!!" The ice troll yelled.


    He was clearly angered by one that talked back to him, though in truth, he was like the other ice trolls, tremendously anxious.


    They knew that a being that could reduce all the others to such a state was nothing they could take. And those 3 were frankly speaking the weakest of them all.


    Because they were the weakest, they were assigned to watch over the fox people. Which to them seemed dirty work.


    But now they were d that they were put into such dirty work.


    Otherwise, their bodies would be on the pile in front of them.


    ''We have to run and tell the chieftain~! Those fox meats should buy us enough time!!!'' They thought as they exchanged looks with each other and nodded.


    But before they could express more pressure on the fox people, Danzel''s ice-cold voice echoed.


    "Heheh~Don''t make meugh, march forward and end up like them, mere mortals." Danzel said as his dead mana escape his body and entered the corpses of the ice trolls while cheating the Overseer''s sword.


    With ethereal dark green mes igniting in the corpses, they slowly started to raise up to the ground.


    *Ting!


    Once he sheathed his Overseer sword though, the dark green mes of the surroundings vanished in almost an instant.


    And with no longer the mes blocking the destroyed gate, the undead wearing the armor of bones were revealed, with a tall being floating and wearing robes made out of shadows.


    The eyes of disbelief were to be seen among the other side, as they watched those beings of death walking towards them.


    The undead stopped only a few meters behind Danzel.


    "Now, ves of those frozennds, I will leave you two choices." Danzel said as he reversed his grip on his sword before piercing the ground, activating the effect granted by the Archmage trapped inside the de.


    As soon as the de touched the ground, chilling ice started to spread with incredible speed toward the ice trolls and the fox people alike.


    And in a matter of 2 seconds, the ice had already reached them, covering the feet of the fox people and the 3 ice trolls, bringing forth an extreme frost upon them despite either race having cold resistance as a trait.


    The ones on the weaker side, couldn''t break through the ice, while those who could didn''t do so immediately.


    The ice trolls inparison, with their naturally strong bodies, broke through the ice immediately.<novelnext></novelnext>


    "Some mere ice can''t trap us!!!" One of them yelled back at Danzel.


    Danzel didn''t even care about the ice troll that talked.


    Instead, his gazey on those who were quick enough to jump away and cling to the stone walls of the mine.


    They were 4 four people in total who managed to do that.


    Respective 2 women and 2 men.


    One of the women was the first that Danzel saw, tails and hair with the color of white-ck hair.


    The other was the woman who had white fur around her neck and had 2 more tails than every other woman.


    As for the two men, one was the one with the single golden-white tail.


    Compared to the people that he saw in the Vashara vige, those 3 were on the more unique side.


    Thest man who managed to leap away before his ice reached him was the one whose fingers were covered with sharp bones.


    Just looking at them, Danzel recognize that their current stay was the "awaking" state that their race had. He had seen it up close when he fought the one who destroyed his skull.


    ''If that''s them, they might able to pull it off.'' Danzel thought as he opened his mouth.


    "Your first option is to join the ranks of the dead and follow me as you master for uing eternity. Your souls shall be destroyed and your vessels shall rise as my soldiers, freeing you from the experience of death." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Though not every one of the fox people understood the second half, the first half of what he said was enough to bring them cold sweat on their backs.


    And those who understood theplete meaning of his words shook by the mere idea of experiencing what he exined.


    And among thetter, we''re the 4 who cling to the stone walls.


    And as despair was taking its roots, Danzel gave them the second option.


    "Your other choice is to raise up and kill your oppressors with you own hands. Show me that your vigor is worth keeping you lot alive."


    The moment he finished, the girl with ck and white hair kicked the wall and flew towards one ice troll.


    "Die bastard!!!" She yelled as sent out a kick toward the face of the ice troll.


    Thetter barely turned his head to see the kicking.


    The kick connected, and despite how to think she looked, the kick she sended held quite the force.


    Resulting in a few teeth flying out of the ice troll.


    "Gwaaah!? You bitc-"


    As the ice troll was about to realize, a sharp pain run through his chest.


    Looking down, he saw how one hand with sharp bones around the fingers held what looked like the ice troll''s heart that was still beating.


    "That''s for my vige~" The man of the 4 said as he pulled his hand out of the ice troll chest before raising it up for everyone to see.


    "And for the ones that died!!!" He yelled out loud.


    The ice troll tried to resist but having his heart pulled out brought the end for him. Making him copse into death.


    The other two also went for one ice troll.


    The woman with the white fur around her neck magically extended her tails while making them incredibly tough.


    Keeping one ice troll in check while the other man managed to cut one arm of the ice troll thanks to the woman''s help.


    "What are you all standing there watching!? Kill the hunters! Kill those who killed our families and viges!" The woman with the white fur around her neck said.


    With the lead of those four, those who escaped and were courageous enough went to fight the 2 ice trolls.


    Those who escaped and couldn''t fight in turn help others escape to join in the fight.


    The ice trolls in turn were bbergasted at the situation at hand.


    The mere ves who were also their snack not too long ago had now be savage beasts that cut through their flesh with their mere nails.


    And as they scream in pain.


    Danzel watched with an ominous grin on his face.

 Chapter 419 Changing Masters

    ''Fast judgment with quick and lethal action, not bad'' Danzel nodded at the 4 strongest fox people.


    If they had reacted one or two seconds before the ending of his words, the ice trolls would have already been wary themself against the fox people.


    But their quick action led to the death of one of the ice trolls while seriously injuring one of them.


    But Danzel knew how stupidly resilient a troll could be.


    Thoughpared to Sartan and those guys, in Danzel''s opinion. They wouldn''t even be worthy to be insects.


    But a troll was a troll, even if those in front of him were ice trolls.


    The 2 remaining ice trolls started to fight back against the 4 strongest and the few who escape from his ice.


    Though, freeing yourself from the ice inflicted quite damage on the fox people. Some unlucky enough had their skin ripped off. Which made maneuvering far more challenging.


    The 4 were strong, strong enough to be ssified as one who stepped up in the 3rd-tier. But without the element of surprise, they couldn''t inflict a lethal wound on the ice trolls.


    And while those ice trolls were nothing to Danzel''s eye, not even capable to regenerate arge limp or a heart.


    Any other surface flesh wound was regenerated in mere seconds.


    The man with his "ws" managed to pierce the stomach of one of the ice trolls. But it took only a short whileter for his body to close the hole in his stomach.


    While the 2 ice trolls were of the 2nd-tier of the higher end, they were brutes with physical-based attributes. Additionally, theirrge bodies were a weapon of their own.


    They managed to trample some who were stuck on his ice while killing 2 people with just a punch.


    s, the fight onlysted for more than a minute before the 4 strongest with a few others managed to kill both the ice trolls.


    The white and ck-haired "fox" managed tond a quick kick a little above the ice troll''s calf, resulting in him to the knee.


    Once on one knee, the many-tailed "fox" restrained him with her tails, leaving the ice troll back wide open for the golden "fox" to finish him off.


    Which left the one-handed ice troll at the mercy of the 4 and the many fox people. Some of those people had vicious smiles on as they bullied the ice troll to death.


    Danzel couldn''t me them for such reactions, after all, those guys were ves to those ice trolls for who knows how long.


    He himself was for an amount of time a ve, or more realistic prisoner under the hands of the shadow merchant.


    ''Their experience might have been 3 times worse than mine, considering their mortality.'' Danzel thought as he turned his back to watch Shiro halfassed hiding behind him with her staff in hand and mask on.


    "Shiro, I will need your magic in short." Danzel''s whisper is loud enough for her to hear.


    She turned her focus on him before nodding.


    Turning his gaze away from her, Danzel pulled his sword out of the ground, cracking the ice as result.


    *Crack~


    The sound of cracking and his suddenly moving was noticed firsthand by the 4 strongest fox people.


    Those 4 moved in front of everyone else and took defensive postures, while does that was freed of his ice stood behind them and in front of the rest.


    Although the 4 strongest show determination to fight, Danzel could see the hesitation in their eyes with even the many-tailed "fox" looking to run away.


    As for the others, they expressed their stress quite clearly.


    Though Danzel focused only on the 4 strongest.


    *Crack~Crack~Crack~


    With each of his steps, the ice was cracking under his feet.


    Stopping at the 8-meter mark, Danzel stares at the 4 with his ethereal eyes.


    There was silence between the dead and the living that was gone for several seconds. The one to break the silence was Danzel with his chilling voice.


    "Offer me your servitude while being one of the living. Do as such and I will offer the touch of my power to you. Refuse and your servitude will be eternal" Danzel said.


    Of course, Danzel knew that from their perspective, he looked like a big bad undead asking to be his ve and potentially being turned into an undead.


    And theck of an immediate answer only proved his thoughts.


    Although he couldn''t me them as their hesitation was justified.


    Danzel wasn''t going to take no for an answer.


    "You answer?" Danzel said as the point of his sword barely touched the ground.


    Resulting in the ice of the trapped people growing up to their knees in an instant.


    The 4 strongest moved their eyes behind them for a split moment, surprised for the ice to move so fast even after having seen it once.


    Now even those who were freed once were once again trapped, leaving the 4 strongest free to move.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Though once they moved their eyes back in front of them, there was no sight of Danzel to be seen.


    "You all should know, that death is as horrible as swift with my de." Danzel chilling words came from behind the 4 strongest as his body was let out pits of mist escape.


    "!!!" The 4 strongest widen their eyes in shock at the appearance of Danzel behind them.


    They only lost sight for a moment and he already moved past them without realizing it.


    And now his aura itself was felt to the 4 very clearly.


    Which was, nicely put, taunting.


    The 4 of them immediately jumped away to create distance while under Danzel''s silent gaze.


    Though they already knew the difference in strength, seeing it with their own eyes was different.


    "If we were to serve servitude...what will happen and of what power are talking about!?" The many-tailed "fox" said in a hurry.


    "That was no answer." Danzel said as his killing intent washed over them.


    Using [Phatom Phase], Danzel moved in almost an instant in front of the many trails and grabbed her neck with a swift movement.


    "But I will humor your question. My very will shall be everyone''s else will. I have no especially need of your bodies and I won''t put you to ve away at mines and such. Even if I did, the dead would be better than any of you." Danzel said as he let go of her neck, making her fall to the ground and gasp for air.


    "As for the promised power...the worthy shall be granted ess to it." Danzel said.


    ''Wherever the worthy survive or not though is not guaranteed.'' Danzel didn''t say thisst bit and only thought about it.


    Though Danzel didn''t want to y the god of death at them, he needed information.


    And not just information about the frozennds.


    As those guys were ves, the chance of them from multiple tribes was quite high in his opinion. That information alone was enough to save time in mapping this white ce and working forward to going back to the mainnds filled with war.


    He also needed them to direct how his draugr should mine ore and all. His idea was to ce the tireless draugr to mine for him to transport to the Vashara vige to the cksmith.


    Although carving runes at corpses was now profitable, eventually he was going to reach a limit with the number of corpses that they are. He needed weapons to carve runes to improve his runesmithing not knowing how long they were to stay on those frozennds.


    Lastly, he wanted to finally try out the idea he had once he acquired the Great Runes.


    And that was carving the runes into one of the living.


    ''In theory, it should be possible considering the description of [Great Rune of World''s Gaia] having a version for living and undead. Wherever the processes are survivable though...'' Danzel shook his head internally before looking at the rest 3.


    "Last time, you answer?" Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Though in the end, wherever they refused or not, Danzel was still going to get what he was after.


    As for carving runes into living beings, he wasn''t nning to do it in front of Shiro.


    ''At worst, I will choose an ice troll to tortur-, no, to give power.'' Danzel thought as he waited for their answer.


    The 4 strongest exchanged looks with each other, before finally nodding to each other and falling to both knees and hands to the ground.


    "Please...let us serve, oh strong one..." the many-tailed "fox" said with the others awkwardly repeating after her.


    Danzel nodded before rising his sword and piercing the ground once more as he did before.


    "Good."


    *Crack~


    Once inside the ground, the ice that trapped the people broke apart into small shards, freeing them. Albeit their legs still received damage, resulting in many falling to the ground.


    "Shiro,e." Danzel called Shiro, who run towards him with Baron behind her.


    The 4 gazed at Shiro in silence as to why a small child was with someone like Danzel.


    Though they were warier towards the floating robed shadow close behind her.


    They felt his gaze and they felt threatened.


    Once Shiro arrived beside Danzel, he only said two words.


    "Do it."


    Knowing what he meant, she walked beside him and raised her staff, aimed toward the many people.


    The fox people were wary and scared by such a motion, but soon enough, a warm light started to shower everyone, which mended their wounds and bruises.


    "She and I shall be who you will serve. Those who go against my or her will shall have their body to serve and their soul destroyed for all eternity."

 Chapter 420 Knowledge Of The Frozen Lands And Possible Extinction

    After "asking" the fox people "gently" to serve under him, the first thing that Danzel went to do was tomand hid undead to gather the supplies of the mine for them to take back to the Vashara vige.


    Afterward, he ordered his new, "willing" subordinates to start to exin to his undead how mining works. Be it where to find the ore for the certain metal they use, how to strike it, and further smaller details.


    As he couldn''t just tell his Draugr to bring him the ore from the mine, expecting his orders to be fulfilled.


    He was sure they would try to fulfill his request, but that will result in them doing a trial-and-error process.


    Till they found the right way with questionable efficiency, time would have been lost, which might result in his endeavor to walk to this mine kinda pointless.


    As he was currently aiming to exterminate and drain the blood from the ice trolls while also gaining XP and exploring further the frozennds that he was in.


    Those were the most important aims at the time. The mine was merely a bonus as it was in the middle of the exploration.


    It was 3 birds with one stone to say.


    Though if the mining took too long, they might have found their way out of those frozennds. Making it time-wise his loss as he slowed down his advantage towards the mine with all his draugr.


    ''I also can sense the other 4 of theming back from their mission. They shouldn''t be far.'' Danzel thought as the connection of the other Anabast, Talon, Ss, Leyone, and Rayone grew faintly stronger by the second.


    Although his connection with the Anabast never left his side by the nature of the spell, [Call of Anabast]. It was only natural for the connection with them to weaken if they are far enough.


    ''I guess I should deal with those first though.'' Danzel looked at the 4 strongest before looking at Baron.


    "Baron, the other 4 are soon to arrive, go and receive them, also exin to them not to kill any of them. At least not without reason." Danzel''s cold voice sent chills to the 4 strongest fox people.


    Baron nced briefly at Shiro before turning around and flying out of the mines.


    Once he left, Danzel stopped, making the whole groupe to a halt.


    Touching his sword to the ground, the ice quickly raised up in the shape of a throne before seating on it.


    The ice made out of the throne wasn''t smooth and they were a few pointy pieces of ice here and there.


    For others, a freezing torture device with a seat full of spikes. For him though that was not at all ufortable.


    "I will let you borrow it till I am finished with those guys." Danzel said as he pull out his gauntlet and gave Shiro his spatial storage ring that had his magical books in the pocket space.


    Revealing his skeleton hand to the 4 strongest.


    They expected it already seeing his head as a skull, but it further spoke to them of what kind of existence they were aligning themself with.


    ''A cursed warrior with intelligence and enormous strength. Also capable of creating lesser cursed warriors...'' The many-tailed "fox" thought to herself as she was reminded of his iron grip.


    ''Also, it doesn''t seem for us to be the first to be caught by him, but those people are...'' She gazed at the people of the Vashara vige who followed behind him and settled behind his throne.


    The other 3 also noticed the presence of the people of Vashara and their gaze toward them wasn''t all that friendly.


    Danzel in turn didn''t pay any need to that and went to ask his question.


    "Now, I will be talking to you 4 as the leaders of the people who were enved. We will skip the introduction as it would be a waste of time. You can ask those guyster on who were are. As for your names, I ain''t that interested." Danzel said while pointing at the people of Vashara.


    "What I am more interested in is how you people arrived here, where you came from, and why you look different from each other... satisfy my question and I will allow a single question from each of you. You first, many tails." Danzel pointed at the girl he grabbed not much long ago by the neck.


    Being now the focus of those ethereal eyes that urged her survival instinct to run, her voice trembled for a brief moment.<novelnext></novelnext>


    "Y-Yes, well, most of us were dragged here after our tribes were attacked by the hunters. Though the majority of use from different tribes. My tribe in particr came from thends of the primordial god of Wild Hunt. We inherited the numerous tails of our ancestor, The Frozen w, Wallren Sengata."


    Nodding at him, Danzel stared at the golden-tailed man.


    "You?"


    "A simr situation as many tails over there. My tribe was also inside thends of Wild Hunt with us men having tails unlike everyone else. We fought against the hunter for a long time, but eventually lost and became ves, our ancestors were also The Frozen w..." The golden "fox" said with a deadpan face.


    "My tribe ancestor was also The Frozen w and inherited his sharp ws. We lived under the providence of the primordial god of Wild Hunt. We were a small tribe and we tried escaping the hunters, though it didn''t work out as you can see." The w "fox" said with a frown on his face.


    "It''s about the same for me. My tribe was destroyed and I got enved by those bastards. My people left at thends of the wild hunt. The elders of my vige told me that we inherited the ck and white hair of that Wallren. As for why those guys are different from us, aren''t they one of the forsaken tribes?" The ck and white-haired "fox" said while pointing at the people of Vashara.


    "You-" The one who pierced Danzel''s skull frowned as bits of killing intent leaked out.


    "Shut up." Danzel interrupted the man as his ethereal eyes washed over him, making the man close his mouth afraid of receiving another beating from him.


    Danzel then went ahead and considered what those 4 said to him, particrly thest one with the double-colored hair.


    He found it somewhat weird that every one of those guys had the same ancestor.


    As to their lives before vehood, he foresaw it ahead of time. It wasn''t hard to guess that the ice troll''s hunted them down considering that they could be used as food for them.


    Having known Sartan for quite some time, he knew that those of the troll race pretty much eat anything that was breathing.


    Considering also the fact that the frozenndscked food, it wasn''t that much of a surprise that the ice troll would result in hunting down viges.


    What gained his attention though was thest thing the ck-haired "fox" said.


    "You with the ice needle, what does she mean by forsaken." Danzel questioned the guy who seemed unhappy about being called like that.


    "...She refers to the ones who left thends of the primordial god of Wild Hunt and arrived on this part of the vast whitends."


    "Mhm, basically moved ces here, huh?" Danzel said as he pulled the map he got from Vashara.


    ''Thends of their god, huh? It''s on the side where I left Koji and Niyuki with the others. And if the map is right, it is quite far away. If the ice trolls are really hunting down those fox people and they still arrived here, then pretty much every one of those fox people must have gone extinct on that part of the frozennds.'' Danzel thought internally as he pulled the dagger that had the soul of Skull w inside.


    The others around him flinched, but he paid them no need as he concentrated on the weapon.


    Activating its ability, he felt a connection with the one ice troll that he left alive in that settlement.


    It wasn''t a connection like he had with his undead or the Anabast.


    Unlike having a link with them, the connection while using Skull w''s dagger was more like having applied a curse at someone or in simpler senses, attaching an invisible threat to someone that he could follow.


    ''After clearing this side of the frozennds, I guess I should make a visit to thends of the supposed god.'' Danzel scoffed internally before rising up.


    ''The idea of the existence of gods is a fault on its own, there are only powerful beings that are mistaken as gods.''


    "Those answers should be sufficient enough to allow each of you to ask a question." Danzel said in his ice-cold voice while staring down at them.


    "So what will it be, mortals."

 Chapter 421 Sight Of Soul Essence

    *Pouf~Pouf~Pouf.


    The footsteps of stepping through the white snow were to be heard together with her staff stopping the same snow.


    Despite her shows, the cold still managed to sip in.


    It was ufortable and tiresome walking through the snow every day.


    Her original clothes though still intact, she knew it was a matter of time before they would be nothing but a rag.


    Even after the white-furred clothes protecting them and keeping herself warm.


    They were very ufortable and every time she remembered that the fur was being held together by bones made her stomach feel sick.


    She hated all those things.


    She wanted to go back to her grandfather.


    The only thing that she liked was the small mask that he did for her. The mask was smooth and felt nice to be on her face and it fitted her perfectly.


    And most importantly, she found the mask itself somewhat cute, s, simr to her clothes, every time she remembered the material that the mask was made brought an ufortable feeling inside her.


    Though, eventually, she grew used to seeing bones, despite knowing that it wasn''t good to get used to it.


    Seeing numerous of the walking dead walking beside them didn''t help either.


    She grew ustomed to seeing people getting killed ever since she was small by her grandpa''s sword. So watching others die wasn''t a traumatic experience for her.


    But seeing the dead waking up as one of the undead felt always wrong to her, despite having asked herself to learn necromancy.


    And thanks to that very magic, she was able to gain a newfound sight in front of her.


    With her pupil filled with dead mana, she watched the world around her, looking way too different as it was described to her.


    The moment she activate her magic, the world itself became darker and gloomier, barely having any color left in her perspective.


    ''I finally did it...'' She thought internally.


    No pain or damage was being done despite dead mana being present in her eyes.


    ''Did I do it right though? Rue didn''t say anything of the color changing.'' She thought as she turned around to see her supposed "attendants" that Rue put for her.


    There were the two new people that Rue took under him. All she knew about them was that Rue called them golden "foxes" and many "tails" while also being the leaders of the other people.


    Thest one that escort her was Alka, the one which she felt mostfortable being around as she was teaching hernguage.


    Originally she asked Rue to make a book for her to study as he seemed to speak theirnguage. s, he refused to make excuses for being unable to teach her theirnguage.


    Shiro at that time felt annoyed as she assumed Rue was unwilling to teach her and that he simply threw someone else to do it for him.


    Although it was half the truth, she enjoyed her time trying to speak with Alka and not to the undead. She enjoyed her time with her even if it was somewhat awkward at times.


    The moment she stared at them though, she froze as she watched not the green light she was described to.


    But a red light mixed with light blue inside their bodies.


    The light in the center of their chest beat like a living heart and nothing like it was described to her.


    "Huh?" She said unconsciously, gaining the attention of others.


    "Is something wro** **** ***, Great Shiro Life?" Alka asked cautiously, which gained the concern of the entity guardian her.


    Coming of her very shadow slowly, a tall robed shadow appeared behind her.


    "Is everything alright?" The Anabast, Baron said with the cold voice of the undead.


    "Ah, yes. Everything- Huh!?" Without being finished, the moment she turned around towards Baron, she stepped back a few steps as a disturbing dark light moved inside Baron.


    Even if his body was mostly made out of shadows, Shiro was able to see a dark light covering Baron whole, making him look much taller and threatening.


    And she couldn''t exin why, but the very light disturbed her in ways she couldn''t exin, making her worried that she did something wrong with the spell.


    "I need to go to Rue." She said before running to the house where Danzel was.


    Baron would have frowned if he could see this and chased after Shiro.


    The other 3 did act like Baron and chased after her, leaving Alka in the dust as she was the weakest among them.


    And as Shiro run through the vige that they have acquired, she watched numerous creations of Rue walking to the side, searching houses, carrying corpses of the ice troll that they were previously here not long ago.


    And wherever she looked, she saw the same disturbing dark light in each of the undead, butpared to Baron''s light, theirs were much more disturbing in her eyes despite seemingly looking the same. But at the same time, it felt less threatening than Barons.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Even the corpses that the Draugr were dragging from the grave had dark light with specks of blue mana.


    Shiro couldn''t understand what she was seeing, making her haste her steps.


    Though solely focused on magic caster, a 3rd-tier being was no joke.


    Soon enough, she arrived at the house that Danzel was in.


    But before she touched the door handle, her body froze as a shriek of pain escaped from the house.


    "Kyagggghhh!!!"


    Despite the door being closed, Shiro was still able to see through the door. Or rather, the lights.


    They were 3 figures, one kneeling with red and blue light, one that resembled a Draugr.


    Andstly, a figure shrouded in flickering light that looked like it was moving by a mind of his own.


    Butpared to the others, she could clearly see cracks through his bones emitting a dark green light.


    And the two ring ethereal eyes were always present.


    Put the most noticeable thing was the sword that he held was swimming with the same dark light that he was emitting through his bones, and was currently piercing the chest of the figure with red and blue light.


    Now she understood the cause of the scream.


    Shiro couldn''t exin what exactly she was actually watching, but she could clearly see how the sword was drawing more dark green light out of the victim, which as result made the red light grow weaker and the blue light flicker between the dark light.


    ''Is this necromancy? But what do the lights mean?'' She said somewhat afraid of the sight in front of her. Albeit she knew that necromancy was crue and was somewhat afraid, it still made her wonder how that sort of magic worked.


    Out of nowhere though, a sudden burning pain struck both of her eyes as she felt a surge of mana traveling toward her eyes.


    Her gaze together with the sudden change of her mana though was noticed by none other that the master of all those undead.


    "Shiro?"


    In fact, the moment she gazed upon him.


    Before Shiro was able to close her eyes out of the pain, the master of all those undead turned his gaze and stared directly into her eyes.


    Andpared to everyone else, the moment he gazed at her, she felt a suffocating pressure. What was bizarre to her though, was the fact that she felt like she was being stared at by two of the same entity.


    She unconsciously stepped back, but as the ground was slightly frozen, she slipped and fell to the ground.


    Before she could make sense of what was happening, ck veins started to slowly surface on her skin and travel towards her face that was hidden behind the fox bone mask.


    And with them, the pain started to grow.


    Resulting in grabbing her eyes with her hands before letting out a scream.


    "Kyaaaghhhh!!!"


    And with her scream, her horns started toe out. If it weren''t for Danzel carving holes in her mask for the horns, the horns would have pushed her mask away otherwise.


    ''Why?'' Shiro thought with the ongoing pain.


    Then, shadows around her started to rise up from the ground and surround them, manifesting 5 robe shadows.


    And in the middle of them, a dark green mist made his appearance and formed the figure that brought forth the pressure she felt before.


    "That''s sooner than expected..." The figure said with the same cold voice, which at this point Shiro couldn''t really tell from who it was.


    ''Why.''


    "Endure, Shiro or everything will be for nothing." The cold voice seeped into my ears.


    She felt her mask being taken away by a cold touch and her hands being warped around by the shadows themselves.


    "No, even if you can''t endure it, you will survive. For the sake of that promise, I will make it happend." The cold voice said as he hovered over the same sword that Shiro saw a moment ago above her very head.


    She saw a few of the symbols of the sword light up in a crimson light.


    Thest thing she remembered seeing, was the crimson blood and that ethereal dark green ring eyes of Danzel.


    Herst thought was...


    ''Grandpa...help me.''

 Chapter 422 Sight Of Soul Essence (2)

    In those frozennds, warmcked its presence and the chilling cold took prolonged residences on thosends. The sun had still its mercy to shine down on those frozennds to bring light and warmth.


    While thetter attempt was futile on thosends, the sunlight still shined down.


    Illuminating those who lived there.


    The mostmon thing that was to be seen on thosends was hunting. Be it animals, essential beings, or a mix of the two, the hunt for food was essential to survive.


    And among those hunters, the ice trolls of the frozennds were among the supreme beings that brought death to their victims once spotted.


    Ironically, what those hunters would have never expected was for the day toe when the dead and their prey would start hunting them.


    ****


    *Pouf~! Pouf~!


    "Run!!!"


    With a piercing voice, one ice troll said to all the others that were following him.


    Each of their steps was powerful and heavy, leaving footprints on the snow and hard earth.


    The one who yelled to run was the most muscr of all of them, butpared to the others who held weapons, that one held a staff that circled in the end, and in the middle of the circle was a skull that was being held by several strong strings and wolf teeth as decoration.


    No matter how you looked at it, that was no weapon for meleebat.


    He was no ice troll hunter, but a rare caster of the ice troll race.


    "Leader! Why are we running and not fighting!? They are mere fox meat and walking bones!" One of the ice trolls yelled as they followed the ice troll "caster".


    "Shut up fools! We are lucky that this "thing" isn''t chasing after us! Until it decides otherwise, we have to cross as much distance as possible!" The caster yelled with rage as strong pain run through his chest.


    Gritting his teeth, he ces one of his arms on his chest, on top of arge sh wound.


    The wound wasrge and had ck color surrounding the edges of the wound, clear evidence that he was cut with a weapon filled with miasma.


    ''Why doesn''t it recover!?'' The "caster" yelled internally as his regeneration failed to close the wound despite the time passed.


    Other than rage, he felt an immense fear against the being who wounded him and the army of the dead behind him.


    He was lucky that today he decided to walk through the woods to familiarize with the nature''s spirit and having met those beings before they reached the vige to evacuate hisyout subordinate and leave the rest to buy some time for them to escape.


    ''I was lucky to escape him once with my reserved totems, but a second time will be the death of all of us.''


    In that he was certain.


    They barely managed to bring their rations in the form of a living fox and the things that their chieftainmanded to obtain before the cursed army with fox people came to raid "their" vige.


    "But leader! We left most things that the chieftain wanted behind! How can we face him if we go empty-handed like this!? We have to go back and fight


    Even if they left most things behind, it was better than dying at the hands of that being.


    Because he understood this, he felt extremely infuriated with others not understanding the situation at hand.


    "It doesn''t matter! We got the majority of spears with us, leaving a few behinds is no big deal! Moreover reporting what happend to the chieftain is way more important!"


    Just as he said that, though the distance, one white and ck-haired fox woman and a man with bone-reinforced ws in his hand were in the lead of chasing after the group of ice trolls with several undead trailing from behind them with few other fox people.


    "Leader! They are chasing after us! We got to fight back!" Another ice troll said while a web made out of sturdy string, inside containing several naked fox people let out quite growls of pain.


    "No matter! Keep running! Don''t fight!" The "caster" said without even ncing at the ones chasing after them.


    Of course, the ice trolls following him weren''t very happy about this, but still decided to follow their leader.


    s, they were few exceptions.


    "I have misunderstood you, leader! Running away against a few fox meat and bones! You are a coward! Brothers! If you don''t do it, I will uphold our honor and crash them." The same ice troll that held the "rations" said and stopped in his tracks together with 2 other ice trolls.


    Unfortanently for the caster, from the 3 of them, 2 of them were the ones who were carrying the fox people. Effectively leaving the bigger group with only 1 string web full of fox people.


    Essentially cutting their rations in 2/3.


    "Fools!!! Come back!" The caster yelled, knowing that running away without the rationing, even if they escaped, they wouldn''t be able to go far.


    Ignoring the "casters" words, the 3 dashed towards their chasers, releasing their war cries in the ear.


    "Mere fox meat! I will show you the ce where you belong." The ice troll in the front said as he got closer to the ck and white-haired fox woman.


    Thetter had a mischievous smile on her face, looking at the ice trolls as if they were idiots.


    "As expected of muscleheads." She whispered to herself as they closed the distance.


    Once each party reached the 8 meters mark, the ck and white-haired fox shadows suddenly stretched towards the ice troll incredibly fast before rising and manifesting in physical form.


    "Wh-!?" The ice troll cried out in surprise, but before he could react the robed shadow grabbed his head with one hand.


    "Die." The shadow said with a cold voice, that had little traces of the woman''s voice, barely noticeable.


    In the next moment, the head of the ice troll exploded like a balloon.


    The other 2 ice trolls were shocked by the sudden appearance of the robed shadow, but that didn''t stop them from reacting.


    "How dare you!"


    "Monster!"


    One ice troll swung his axe mercilessly and cut through the shoulder down to the waist of the robed shadow while the other ice troll pierced with his spear the arm of the shadow just in case it reached out to them to do the same that it did to their brother.


    s, momentster, the shadows that seemed about to disappear at any moment, expanded at immense speed and reformed the body of the robed shadow.


    "What!?"


    ? "What!?"


    The 2 ice trolls of course were shocked by that.


    The robed shadow didn''t care about their shock and just moved forward with his hands reaching out towards them.


    Scared of its touch, the 2 ice trolls stepped back to create distance, but before they could their thighs were pierced by 2 shadow spokes that were being held by 2 set by another robed shadow under them.


    Making them unable to move away from the first robed shadow, his touchnded on each of their chests.


    At first, nothing happend, but if one looked closely before the robed shadow''s handnded on their chest, they could see one each hand, spikes of wind turning around like a drill.<novelnext></novelnext>


    "Experience the gift of the creator." The first robed shadow said while an ethereal dark green eye red up under the shadowy hood, revealing a skull with only his left eye socket still there.


    The ice trolls in question only felt like a small dagger piercing their stomach, but the next moment, the wind spike suddenly started to expand while still on their chest in an instant, crushing and twisting their inside before a burst of air happend.


    Leaving a clean,rge hole through their chest.


    Leaving their fate to death sealed, regardless of their vitality kept them alive for a few more seconds.


    The other group of ice trolls who were watching was shocked by the performance of the robed shadow.


    The caster cursed internally for having lost their "rations".


    "Tch, leave the meat! We got to run!" He yelled at the others.


    But once he turned his head around in the distance, his eyes widen in shock as slowly, another 6 robed shadows appeared in front of them and effectively blocked their path.


    Fear started to reach his heart, but he knew that their only chance was to break through the shadow robes and run for it.


    "We are breaking though! Use the reserved spears!" The caster yelled, making the other ice troll hesitate.


    "Leader! The spears are for the chieftain! If we use them-!"


    "No matter! If we die, the chieftain would get none of them anyway." The caster yelled, cursing the stupidity of his race.


    Unable to refute their leader, the ice trolls equipped the spears with many thick needles before throwing them like javelins at the 6 robed shadows.


    The shadows didn''t stay idle and moved towards them.


    They started dodging their spears, but a few of the shadows got pierced and dissipated.


    The "caster" didn''t stay idle and threw 2 small totems looking like foxes.


    Using its magic, the totems became alive, revealing tworge blue foxes made out of mana and life force. They were very simr to elementals, butpared to elementals, they had no soul essence of their own.


    The foxes dashed and shed with 2 of the robed shadows, making an opening for the ice trolls to run away.


    s, the foxes made out of mana and life force were destroyed in an instant with ck lighting.


    In the next moment, dark mist escaped from one of the shadow robes and entered the ice trolls'' bodies, one by one.


    While that happend, the other robed shadow raised his hand towards them.


    And by the next moment, a blue mana disc appeared around the legs of the ice trolls.


    At first, it seemed like it did nothing, but the next moment, the blue disc closed in, cutting one leg off the ice legs.


    Cries of pain were everywhere to be heard, but the "caster didn''t dare to turn around to watch the fate of his subordinates.


    He knew that if he was caught, death awaited him.


    Nheless, shortly after he felt 2 presencesing closer to him.


    ''No way! The shadows reached up to me!?'' He thought terrified as he turned his head.


    And what he saw wasn''t the robed shadows, but the cked and white-haired fox with the w-hand fox running beside him.


    "Tch! Piss off, fox meat!" Raising his staff, he conjured 2 floating wolf heads that went flying toward the two to bite them.


    But what he didn''t expect was for the two to dash forward and dodge the fox heads.


    Before he could react, the fox-wed hand went and swung his ws at his calf, resulting in the "caster" to unable to put the weight of his body on his leg, making him copse and roll to the ground.


    "Ghuh! You!" The "caster" ground his teeth in anger before aiming his staff at the culprit.


    Or at least he tried to.


    "Man-eating bastard!" The ck and white-haired fox said as she dashed from the side, arriving in front of his face thanks to the power around her legs.


    "!!!"


    "[Shield of Fro-"


    Before the caster could finish his spell, the ck and white-haired fox kicked his jaw with immense force.


    Dislocating his jaw and shaking his brain.


    ''No! I don''t have the time to deal with those two, I got to run-''


    Before he could finish his thoughts, the ck and white-haired fox dashed on top of his body and punched him in the face mercilessly.


    "Take that you bastard! How dare you! Treat us! Like mere food! Bastard!!!"


    *Bough! Bough! Bough!


    Punch after punch, they fainted the consciousness of the ice troll "caster" became.


    "Stop, he told us to bring him to him~" The wed-hand fox said as he put his hand on her shoulder.


    "Tch, you are right~" she said before punching the ice troll once more in his face.


    *Bouughh!!!


    That was thest thing he heard before the caster nked out cold to the ground.


    ***


    And after a few hours, the ice troll hunter woke up.


    Not to the ground that he remembered, but under one of the houses of the viges.


    With half of his body frozen by sturdy ice.


    "I-I alive?" He mumbled in relief.


    s, his relief was short-lived as in the view of his eye, he saw a being wearing a ck ted armor, with a skull filled with ethereal dark green eyes, staring directly towards him.


    "You are alive, for now." The chilling voice said to him while drawing a long sword filled with an ominous aura.


    Seeing that, his heart was gued with dread and fear.

 Chapter 423 Sight Of Soul Essence (3)

    "Y-Y-You are from back then..." The ice troll "caster" said in a stutter.


    He could already picture himself being cut with the de that the being of death was drawing.


    "I see you still remember me, shaman. You took me by surprise with those trinkets of yours." Danzel said while holding a small wolf totem before crushing it with ease.


    "You reminded me of how annoying a magic caster is with teleportation capabilities."


    Hearing this, the eyes of the ice troll shaman widen.


    "H-How?"


    The shaman was clearly confused.


    He never told any of his tribe or even anyone about his teleportation spell. It was one of his trump cards and reassurance in case he found himself in a bad situation. So there was no possible way that the being in front of him could possibly know how his spell was.


    Seeing the clear confusion on his face, Danzel shook his head.


    "Your magic is far superior to the one I have seen. Seeing through your magic is but a small matter." Danzel lied through his teeth.


    While the first part was true, thetter waspletely false.


    At first, when the ice troll shaman teleported away, Danzel was quite surprised as the small totem of a wolf appeared where the ice troll shaman was.


    But as he had injured the ice troll shaman, he browsed at his status screen, only to find a spell called [Totemic Beacon of Safe Return].


    Basically, a spell that swapped the magic caster with a totem ced not too far away from his location.


    Danzel saw through the advantages of the teleportation spell and its disadvantages.


    It could be used in an instant without casting, making the spell a life safer, its cons of course were the distance where the totem could be ced between the caster and its limited use of having only one deployed.


    Regardless, saying that he could read his spell wasn''t something he would tell.


    "Regardless if you are a magic caster, I expected the wound to heal already, as you are a troll." Danzel nced at the wound on the ice troll''s shamans chest which he inflicted.


    While it did close a bit than it was before, deep necrosis was taking ce at his chest to the point he was doubting if regeneration was even possible.


    The ice troll shaman wanted to curse and tried his best to free himself from the ice, s with no sess.


    "The level of your guy''s regeneration is quite pathetic, huh? That might be a problem." Danzel said while shaking his head in disapproval.


    The ice troll shaman was digesting the words of being in front of him, but before he could fully understand his meaning, his leg frozen in ice was pierced with the de of Danzel in a shifted manner.


    Widding his eyes, the ice troll shaman let out a shout of pain and anger.


    "Kyaghh! Y-You bastard!!!"


    Ignoring the words of the ice trolls, Danzel focused on his swords as he was mesmerized by them.


    "Come." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    In the next moment, one of his Draugrs without bone armor came beside his lieges.


    Without exining further, Danzel raised his hand and touched the ribs of the Draugr.


    It took a while before the runes at the Draugr''s ribs started to glow in a dark green light.


    Once the light of the runes appeared, the ice troll shaman felt an intense ethereal pain going through his leg.


    "Kghhh! You bastard...Kghhh!!!" The ice troll shaman gritted his teeth.


    The more the de was inside his leg, the intenser pain was going through him.


    He was about to fully scream in pain, but then Danzel drew his sword out of his leg and closed the ice once more, making the ice troll feel a short-lived relief.


    As the pain was still there, if not a degree weaker than before, but still there.


    Danzel ignored the ice troll shaman and observed the draugr.


    For a moment, he could see cracks forming around the letters of the Great Runes of Ruined Vessel before disappearing.


    Danzel quickly observed the status of the Draugr, only to find a new addition to have been added in under the [Great Rune] section.


    Which was [Ruined Vessel Stacks]: [???(1)]


    For a moment, Danzel was confused by the fact he couldn''t read through his undead status.


    He fell silent for a moment before he sent an internal message to his undead.


    ''Tell me, what did you feel?''


    "My liege, an ufortable feeling appeared for a brief moment, but now I feel as if my body became...tougher?"


    Nodding at the answer, Danzel scanned the [???(1)] just in case something reveal to him.


    He didn''t expect much, but the description that came brought him relief.


    [???(1)]: The result of the Great Rune of Ruined Vessel, progress cannot be witnessed by others.


    ''Mgh, making his body tougher, huh? It isn''t simply an increase in endurance as his health didn''t increase. I wonder how much it increases. Also, the ufortable should make sense considering what the rune does. But the bigger problem is...'' He thought as he looked at his hand with difficulty.


    ''Soul Essence...It''s so weird to direct something that you can''t see.'' Danzel thought with a grin on his face.


    Well, he didn''t have a face, but oh well...


    "It''s so differentpared to mana..." He mumbled to himself.<novelnext></novelnext>


    He concentrated for a moment on his hand.


    And after a few minutes, he felt something starting to leave his hand that he could control.


    It was unpleasant, but not painful.


    ''So that''s soul essence, but being unable to see it is quite the problem.'' Danzel thought as he carefully put the stuff that he dragged out into his hand, making the unpleasant feeling disappear.


    Closing and opening his head, he looked at his own status silently and stared at a specific skill.


    Which was none other than [Eyes of the Damned Lv.6]


    He was thinking about wherever he should upgrade it in hopes that he would gain the ability to see through soul essence.


    And after thinking for a while, he bitterly chose to upgrade it despite the XP that he saved was to be for his [ck Guard] ss. Though, the ability to see soul essence casually was something he thought he needed considering some of his more potent skills had something to do with it.


    ''It''s only a 2nd-tier skill anyway...''


    He could also choose to upgrade [Blood Sense] to achieve the same effect, but he thought that it was more suitable for [Eyes of the Damned] and more likely to achieve that effect.


    So with bitter feelings, he threw his XP into the skill.


    [Eyes of the Damned level has increased from Lv. 6 to 7]


    [Eyes of the Damned level has increased from Lv. 7 to 8]


    [Eyes of the Damned level has increased from Lv. 8 to 9]


    [Eyes of the Damned level has increased from Lv. 9 to 10]


    The skill Eyes of the Damned has reached the modification stage!]


    [Choose 2 of the given option for the skill to focus on]


    [Dead Mana Affinity]


    [Soul Affinity]


    [Range]


    [Overall Improvement]


    Danzel recognized themon options which were pretty self-exnatory.


    One of that choices had to be [Soul Affinity] considering what he wanted to achieve.


    The trickier part was what to choose next.


    The skill was already considered a death-attuned skill, so choosing [Dead Mana Affinity] would bring an uncertain factor and by his experience, would add a new effect on top of the skill.


    [Range] he could imagine to be quite useful, but for most cases, a neat tool.


    [Overall Improvement] would as its name suggested, improve everything, even range despite the increase being inferior if choosing [Range].


    But because of that, he chose to pick it.


    So not that his range would increase, but his actual sight would be better.


    [The modification for the skill of the Eyes of the Damned has been chosen]


    [Eyes of the Damned Lv. 10 bes Eyes of Damnation Lv.1]


    Once the message appeared,pared to the sudden rush of knowledge that usually happend with skills, he felt those ethereal mes that were his eyes change.


    There was no pain or something like that.


    He just felt that things started to clear without him actively trying the skill.


    And as he started around dumbfounded, he could see a dark green color on himself, the draugrs, and the ice troll shaman.


    Without even going out of his way to read the skill, Danzel tried to control his soul essence just like he did a moment ago.


    And under his gaze, the dark green aura that was previously invisible to his naked eyes without the use of other skills was now fully visible.


    "So that''s how it usually looks like..."Danzel mumbled before sucking his soul essence back into his body.


    Then he gazed at the shaman.


    The prolonged silence made the shaman incredibly anxious.


    He tried his best to stay silent in hopes he won''t notice him.


    s, Danzel had ns for him.


    "Don''t misunderstand me, I don''t favor the actions of torture, but..."


    Without finishing his sentence, Danzel pierced his de at the shaman''s chest.


    Invisible to the naked eyes except for his, Danzel could clearly see the burst of soul essence that was being sucked from the shaman''s chest.


    "Death is something that I don''t hesitate to deliver..."


    In the next moment, the house that they were in was filled with screams of pain.


    All this happend while two eyes of a small magic caster were watching this scene.

 Chapter 424 Demonic Eyes And Soul Essence Experimentation

    Watching the dark green light that was the soul essence of the shaman, Danzel immediately went to get a hold of the soul essence.


    ''It''s difficult as before, but...!''


    Danzel swiftly started refining his grip on the soul essence to make it easier for him to control it. Being now able to see the soul essence enables him to see mistakes of before and correct them now.


    s, learning how to properly and efficiently control soul essence wasn''t something that he could do in a matter of seconds.


    Nevertheless, he saw the potential to improve.


    ''There seems to be some resistance to the traveling of soul essence at the sword. But for now, it will do.'' Danzel thought as he guided the foreign soul essence and traveled it to the other side of his arm.


    ''One more time.'' Danzel said internally to the Draugr.


    Seeing through his lieges will, the Draugr stepped forward.


    In the next moment, Danzel touched the runes of the Draugr and directly fueled those runes with the necessary soul essence. Making the runes glow in a dark green light.


    Though it took him just a momentter that he felt the gaze of someone else on him.


    "Who?" Danzel said as he turned his head around.


    The next moment, he felt turbulence in mana just outside his door.


    To Danzel''s sharp perception, it was like someone screaming and knocking at the door.


    As he gazed towards where he felt the gaze and mana, he already had a pretty good idea of who could it be, but his eyes, revealing the soul essence of a small figure did confirm his doubts.


    "Shiro?" Danzel said confused as to why she was hiding and so obviously.


    He didn''t hide his abilities after all.


    Runesmithing was something that couldn''t be easily understood without prior knowledge of the subject while necromancy was something that he was already teaching Shiro.


    He also knew that Shiro, despite her curious nature to learn magic, was smart and patient enough to understand that you couldn''t rush magic.


    Several other reasons went into his head as to why she was hiding.


    But within the next moment, the reason became clear.


    "Kyagggghhh!!!" A scream of pain prated through the walls of the house.


    The moment he heard them, Danzel''s ethereal eyes red up.


    ''Shit!!!! It can''t be!''


    Danzel immediately yanked his sword out of the chest of the shaman, stopping the process of sucking out his soul essence, making the shaman aimlessly look at selling with unfocused eyes. Still felt the pain of before, but his throat was too exhausted to scream anymore.


    Though his regeneration was sure to fix that in a minute or two.


    Danzel only spared the shaman a nce before swiftly swinging his sword and cutting his throat, making the shaman''s unfocused eyes to re-focus on the scene in front of him.


    "I don''t have time to deal with you." Danzel said his body turned into mist and exited the house.


    Only toe at the sight of Shiro falling to the ground and screaming in pain with ck veinsing out of her body.


    ''Crap, it already started!'' Danzel cursed internally.


    ''Talon, Leyone, Rayone, Ss, Baron. Hold Shiro in ce, don''t allow her to move an inch!'' Danzel gave amand to his Anabast, who immediately started acting up.


    The Shadows under Shiro started to be alive and engulf the limbs and torso of Shiro.


    The Anabast used their hands while adding up [Animate Shadow] for more safety.


    While they haven''t been around the first time that Shiro''s condition started to act up, they could feel the urgency in their liegesmand.


    "That''s sooner than expected..." Danzel said as he gazed at Shiro.


    "Endure, Shiro or everything would have been for nothing."


    He reached out and removed her mask, revealing her growing horns and the signs of dead mana inside her eyes.


    ''This brat! Don''t tell me!!!'' Danzel cursed as he noticed the dead mana. The urge to p her in the head appeared for a split moment as he recognize her attempt to try necromancy.


    He pushed such thoughts away, knowing that he had to focus.


    Drawing his sword slowly, Danzel said.


    "No, even if you can''t endure it, you will survive. For the sake of that promise, I will make it happend." He said with his cold voice, bringing out several corpses of ice trolls from his storage ring to the side before hovering his sword above Shiro''s head.


    The runes of his sword lighten up in crimson color. Next instance, the blood of the ice troll corpses started to fly towards his sword.


    That to his spatial storage ring, the corpses didn''t decay the slightest, making their blood as fresh as it could have been. Additionally, he also has chosen the highest quality blood with the help of [Blood Sense].


    When he got the skill from Azrael, he didn''t think it woulde to any use except of expanding his knowledge of blood magic.


    But who would expect that it woulde in use like this?


    He certainly didn''t.


    In fact, he never thought the day woulde when he would try to save someone''s life that wasn''t of an undead.


    While guiding only the highest of ice troll blood that he had in hand inside Shiro''s throat carefully. Danzel looked at her status.


    He notice the blood slowly taking effect, but the amount of health that it recovered was pitiful.


    Maybe if he had refined the blood somehow and created some kind of elixir, it would have had greater effects.


    s, he had no knowledge of alchemy.<novelnext></novelnext>


    As he continued the treatment, he notice a change in one of Shiro''s talents.


    The previous talent [Demon Mana Eyes (Iplete)] had it is (Iplete) removed while a skill was added.


    He was able to notice the new skill among the dozen for the sole reason that each new skill was added near or at the bottom every time.


    It was a skill called [Demonic Gaze of Mirroring State].


    Once he read it, it seemed at first extremely simr to his [Eyes of the Damned], but it mentioned being able to see the mirroring state of beings or whatever this meant.


    ''I will have to ask her once she wakes up, but first I have to make sure that I don''t deliver a corpse to Agares.''


    He already decided to make the effort to bring her to Agarrs, letting her die now would have made his efforts pointless.


    Yes, he could go out of his way to repay Agares in some other ways.


    Though it wouldn''t be sincere if he had the chance to save his granddaughter and choose not to.


    He didn''t want to disregard the fact that Agares saved him from potentially ending up in the realm of the dead for good.


    A situation that he absolutely wanted to avoid and would never allow to happend.


    Also, it wasn''t that he wasn''t receiving any benefits from Shiro.


    Wasting a bit of time of his immortality was no big deal after all.


    ...


    ***


    After a few hourster~


    "Sigh~, her attributes, level, and sses increased." Danzel said as he sessfully treated Shiro this time around and put her temporarily in one of the houses to rest with Baron as a guard.


    ''That would have been good if it weren''t for her growth extending for longer and consuming more vitality...''


    Danzel found the state of Shiro''s body as fortunate as it was unfortunate.


    If it weren''t for one of her talents increasing the power of her other talent, she would have been experiencing more durable growth even if it was slower.


    Because of that though, it was bing worry some.


    It was like treating a wound that was bound to re-open.


    s, that was all that he could do.


    Opening the door of the house where he was before, Danzel saw the corpse of the shaman stuck into the ice.


    Seeing that made him sigh internally.


    ''Too bad, I wasn''t finished with him.''


    But after getting closer to him, Danzel noticed a faint light of soul essence.


    "Weird, there is still soul essence?"


    Considering that the soul essence was tired with the soul ording to the status, he thought that once the soul left one''s body, it would take the soul essence with it.


    While some part of it was true, Danzel noticed a severe cut of the soul essence in the corpse.


    So much so that he had to get closer to notice it.


    "I suppose I should make use of it." Danzel said as he put his arm at the corpse and like before, he dragged the soul essence.


    ''So I don''t need to inflict damage to drain the soul essence from a corpse.'' Danzel made a mental note to write that down in his notes.


    He then tried to put the soul essence back into the corpse just to see if it works.


    Only you find out that it was impossible.


    Or rather, so hard that it seemed possible.


    It was totally differentpared to pulling his own soul essence and putting it back in.


    ''My sword has umted quite a bit of soul essence thanks to the curse, so storing soul essence isn''t impossible...''


    He found that quite the problem.


    The fact he couldn''t store soul essence was a huge issue.


    "I will have to figure something out if I were you to carve the great rune of Ruined Vessel on me." He mumbled out loud.


    Though he pushed the issue of now forter as he still had a few things to test out.


    "Just in case..." Danzel said as he pierced his sword at the corpse trying to drain the remaining soul essence.


    He seeds but found out that dragging the soul essence through his sword result in conflict.


    The most probable cause that he could think of was the curse of his sword.


    While it was easier to draw mana up to a certain point, afterward getting the soul essence away from the sword was way more difficult, proving one of his suspensions.


    The next experiment was to watch what will happen if he let the soul essence float into the air.


    Which resulted into the soul essence to spectacrly do nothing and disappeared.


    What he did next tried to make an undead with a corpse with zero soul essence.

 Chapter 425 Reason Of Creation?

    Forcefully removing the soul essence of the corpse, Danzel went ahead and cast [Greater Raise Undead] to the corpse.


    His expectation of doing that was of course to see a new Draugre to be.


    His dead mana flew out of his body and traveled towards the corpse and under his gaze, he would have frowned if he could.


    Momentster, the corpses shook before starting to move once more.


    Naturally, Danzel broke the ice with the use of his sword, allowing the newly awakened undead to rise to his feet, gazing with his hollow eyes toward his creator.


    "Why?" Danzel said as he put his hand towards the undead in front of him, making his status appear.


    [Status]


    Name: ----


    Race: Skeleton


    Level: 1


    ss: -----


    Sub-ss: ----


    Health: 200


    Mana: 10


    Attribute Points: 0


    Attributes: Strength: 4 Agility: 2 Intelligence: 1 Endurance: 3


    Talents: [Undead] [Undead Servant] [Subordinate of Death Knight]


    ...


    "Why a skeleton?" Danzel said as he put his hand away, looking at the skeleton confused.


    ''Not only that, but the skeleton even has 1 less strength that the usual skeletons. Is it because of theck of soul essence? But why?''


    Danzel wasn''t convinced.


    He thenmanded some nearby undead of his to bring two other corpses to him.


    Once they arrived, Danzel this time cast [Lesser Raise Undead] to one corpse while to the other, he put his own dead mana to forcibly raise the corpse.


    Of course, that was done after he pulled out their soul essencepletely.


    The results were not as he expected.


    The spell, [Lesser Raise Undead] had the same result as his [Greater Raise Undead]. A skeleton that was even weaker than normal.


    On the other hand, his forcing his dead mana on the undead made a skeleton that had around 25-30 stats on each attribute except for intelligence.


    For a 1st-tier being, such stats weren''t that bad.


    The problemy that the usual skeletons that he raised were much stronger than this one.


    "That doesn''t make sense." Danzel sheathed his sword and crossed his hands, confused at the skeleton in front of him.


    He was almost sure that the reason why the first 2 skeletons were so weak was that the spell itself wasn''t designed to raise corpses like this. A fundamental level of a w in the base of the spell.


    As of why the corpses even raised as his undead was from the dead mana that was cast in the spell. Danzel also suspected that if he weren''t a Death Knight, he wouldn''t even raise the corpse as the amount of dead mana wasn''t that much.


    As for why it worked...it was probably because his miasma was just that strong.


    What he did was nothing more like abusing a broken machine to fix something. But because of how high quality the machine was, it still managed to get things done when it was supposed to have not...


    As for the third skeleton, he could have dismissed the problem by saying that theck of soul essence affected the strength of raising the undead.


    If he thought like that, he would have been a fool and a failure as a necromancer.


    While Danzel wasn''t a seasoned veteran at magic, he still knew his stuff.


    If what he created was some other kind of undead, he would have different thoughts.


    But since what he created was a skeleton.


    He was confident that something different was in y. Something he wasn''t aware of.


    After all, a skeleton was an undead that had no soul.


    The soul essence was located inside a soul ording to the status description.


    Raising his hand, Danzel used the knowledge of [Grasp of the Undying] and slowly made the ethereal hande out of his hand directly with difficulty.


    He slowly guided the hand to grab the skull of the skeletons one by one and crash it.


    And that was without closing his hand at all,pared to [Grasp of the Undying].


    "I am missing something...but that confirms it." Danzel said as he returned the ethereal hand back.


    Danzel opened his status window and gazed at it with his ethereal eyes.


    Then he closed the status, just to open it a momentter.


    He repeated that action in silence.


    Closing and re-opening the status window time and time again.


    That action repeated till at one moment, his dark green ethereal eyes red up and the soul essence of his hand hovered just barely outside.


    And in the next instance, without a millisecond of a pause, the moment the status window opened, he pushed his one hand as fast as possible towards the status window.


    The sole sudden movement causes the wind to blow and push away the little furniture that the house to the side.


    But Danzel didn''t care about some stupid furniture getting ruined.


    After all, it wasn''t his.


    What he cared, about was that currently, at this exact moment.


    His hand touched the status screen physically for just an instance.<novelnext></novelnext>


    An instance that wasn''t even a second long.


    Danzel touched the window before his hand passed right through just how it usually was supposed to do.


    "I always thought it was weird and suspected it...how a skeleton has a mind of its own. And a soul at that...also this status that none else can see and it''s only I who is capable to see it."


    "Also those annoying illusion that I keep seeing and how their appearance is getting dyed when I use an attack that damage soul essence."


    In the next moment, his death aura together with his dead mana came out and drowned the room.


    His hand clenched as he stared at the status window.


    "I am no anomaly or a talented individual, an undead who just happend to have this status window..."Danzel said as he looked at the status window.


    "Someone, whoever it is, fiddled with my own creation. There is no doubt, there is someone who fiddled with my soul..."


    That was the only logical answer that Danzel could think of.


    He had realized this fact ever since he was in the cursedck.


    The first indication was his talent, [Sin of Wrath].


    But he had no proof. The talent also had mentioned that he has to do something to receive it, so he couldn''t have written it off that someone gives it to me he naturally got it as the reward of some action.


    If even it could be called a reward.


    But with the knowledge he has gathered and his experience.


    It proved to him that he wasn''t a natural-born undead, despite Velkir insisting on him being one.


    A natural anomaly at that too.


    ''I could also be wrong, but this status window is too unnatural.''


    "Also the fact that skeletons can''t have souls is too early to think so as a fact. They might be a way for a skeleton to host a soul and I simply don''t know...a natural way at that." Danzel thought, cursing internally at theck of presence of seamless Lich missing.


    If someone knew about this, Danzel was sure the shameless Lich would know more than him.


    ''That''s right.'' Danzel said internally as he calmed down and gathered his death aura and dead mana back to his body.


    ''I can''t be sure wherever that is the case, despite the status window being abnormal.''


    After calming down, Danzel left the house and aimlessly walked around the vige he was "liberated ", with various thoughts in mind.


    He gazed at his undead working upon his orders, the fox people who were desperately trying to be of help to his undead despite being afraid of them and not even ordered to do as such.


    He also remembered how the warriors of the fox people also suggested to a begging level to hunt down the remaining ice trolls and shamans.


    Danzel understood what kind of desperate thoughts they might have, so he let them help around to ease their nerves. Receiving something without giving anything to its benefactor could awaken one''s worry.


    It was but natural.


    But despite that, Danzel didn''t trust those guys a single bit. That''s why he sends his Anabast together with the fox people and a few Draugrs to chase the ice trolls.


    Of course, unless the fox people were idiots, they would have picked up his distrust towards them, possibly making them work harder despite there being no need to.


    Danzel didn''t care what they thought about him.


    So long they didn''tin in front of him or make things difficult for him, they would keep their life.


    He passed and watched how his undead and those guys worked.


    The former showed more enthusiasm than thetter and the new fox people that were previously the food and ything of this vige were shaking like a rabbit inside the mouth of a predator.


    He interacted a bit with his Draugrs, about what kind of items they found, corpses, and the amount of food. He also tried to speak with a few of the fox people with simr topics, but their distress made him leave to continue their work.


    Only once he was outside the vige, he looked towards the sky as white as the frozennds.


    He didn''t know what to make of the information that he learned.


    Who gave him the status window?


    What are the illusions?


    Did someone mess with his soul?


    If yes, why?


    For what cause?


    Did it also give him the status?


    For what reason?


    But what if none one messed with my soul?


    What is the status window? Why give him such power?


    What was the source of that power?


    Such thoughts gued his mind and bounced around, making him have a stream of possible scenarios.


    He spends aimlessly staring at the sky thinking of such thoughts, before getting tired of the possible possibilities that are possible.


    In the end, he decided the take that he would take such thoughts.


    "Sigh~Do I even want to know?" Danzel said as if he asking himself.


    Noticing the confused tone of their liege, the Anabast came out of his shadows and asked worryingly.


    "I everything alright, o thee creator?" Talon took the lead to ask.


    Danzel looked at his Anabast, making his eye sockets that unknowing to him have their ethereal mes extinguish, to ignite once more and re as usual with the dark green color.


    "Yes, everything is as it is supposed to be." Danzel said and turned around and went to the vige.


    "Come, I will make an exception today and have our magic lesson early..." Danzel said with his cold tone towards Anabast.


    Hearing that, the Anabast became excited from the inside and followed silently behind him.


    Danzel smiled at how those guys reacted from the inside.

 Chapter 426 Fadding Mark

    With the newfound knowledge that Danzel was able to gain thanks to being able to see soul essence, he called to settle down for a few days in that vige to further his knowledge.


    And as far as he was aware, he was in every known vige on this side of the frozennds. A few of them were abandoned while other ones were like the one he was now, controlled by ice trolls with fox ves under them.


    Of course, the ice trolls were yed and the fox people joined the group that was following him.


    He didn''t know what to do about them.


    Although the food that they gained was substantial and wouldst them quite a while, Danzel was surprised to know how much food was being spent per day once he asked the undead who was keeping track of him.


    Although they went out hunting, with the food that was being spent and the food that was being supplied, sooner orter a food crisis was going to happen.


    He couldn''t care less about them honestly.


    He just needed a few of them and in the worst situation, he could go back to Vashara and find some "volunteers" to receive his "blessing".


    Shiro wouldn''t like it, but even then, the deed had to be done.


    Though, he wasn''t stupid enough to attempt it without Shiro''s help.


    He saw countless times how the living would scream in pain once they had a limp cut or a sword inside them.


    Opening them up and carving runes in their bones would probably push them to the limits and kill them from the sheer pain and then from the blood loss.


    Leaving him with only being able to work around what soul essence.


    While it took him a while, he did figure out some stuff thanks to his experimenting around.


    The first thing was that the soul essence itself was naturally recoverable simr to mana. Just the rate of its recovery was far, far slower than mana itself.


    Also that it was way trickier to make use of it. And his very own soul essence was much easier to and stronger that the soul essence of others.


    Thetter he found out by trying to mix his soul essence with someone else soul essence.


    And while it took a while of hard focus, his soul essence was able to overwhelm the foreign soul essence and make it its own.


    Or rather, being able to make use of the extra soul essence for his abilities.


    The additional soul essence that was foreign couldn''t be ced in his body or rather soul.


    Danzel saw potential in such a finding, as it was basically a new energy source that could be saved ahead of time.


    Regardless of having a few extra rules in it, energy was still energy.


    As long as he learns and found a way to use it, his strength and options will also develop regardless of the status screen.


    As he had already proven that he can learn stuff manually without the help of the status window.


    He was already thinking of how to make use of it, but first, there were two crucial problems to achieve that.


    One was generating soul essence and the other was containing it.


    A soul by itself generated soul essence as far as he knew. Making it a limited resource that he had to manually gain with arge focus of his mind.


    And storing the energy forter use was the most important part.


    As long as he figures thetter, he would be able to make use of soul essence.


    Or at least starting to figure out how to make use of soul essence.


    And by the fourth day when Shiro had her second "growth", Danzel managed to find a hint of how to possibly store soul essence.


    And that was by use of his mana aptitude was soul affinity.


    Or rather let the soul essence stick to his mana.


    He only managed to learn of this after using [Soul Reaping Wind] at a pack of wolves that happend toe at the time when he was talking about his drugs.


    Once he used the skill, he realized how special his mana aptitude was.


    On the fourth and fifth days, he spend figuring out the details of what his mana did to "dominated" soul essence, his own and from others.


    With all those details known, Danzel had something in the mind about how to store the soul''s essence.


    And that was by the use of a mana crystal.


    But none of a normal one, but a mana crystal that had his mana "signature".


    Now usually, mana crystals are being delicate mined. They mostmonly have neutral mana or one of the natural elements. Rarely has it been seen for mana crystals to form other types of mana such as light, darkness, chaos, or arcane. Though a mana crystal with the signature of death mana has never been formed naturally. Even if there were some expectations, no mana crystal existed that was of such mana aptitude.


    Though the magic caster found a way to bypass this rule throughout history in many varieties of ways. To form a change or to form a mana crystal with an element or their specific mana signature.


    And Danzel, just happend to have a method for thetter avable to him in hand.


    On the sixth day, Danzel spent his time leading a lesson with his Anabast and "overlooking" them.


    He put them to practice the [Necromatic Restoraction] while being open to their questions as he was reading a particr book that he hasn''t touched for a long time.<novelnext></novelnext>


    As for why he was teaching them this spell, it was of course with the mind of supporting him in the battle. For the Anabast this spell might as well be useless with their regenerative bodies and Danzel didn''t hide that fact from them.


    If they were apprentices and he was their teacher, they might have been less motivated to learn a useless spell. But as they were the creations and his was their creator and master.


    They gave it their all to learn it.


    Their progress was fast, with the one taking the lead being of course Talon, who thanks to his improved talent on dark mana were much easier to learn the spell.


    In fact, Danzel guessed that he needed another day or two topletely learn the 1st-tier version of [Necromatic Restoraction].


    And while they were training he was reading that one book.


    Anabast were beyond happy with their creator overlooking them and resolving the questions that they had with magic. It was a first.


    But even then with the book that they received, they couldn''t help but wonder what kind of book their creator was reading. As they saw it before.


    Baron was the only one that had no interest in it, focusing on his task of learning the spell that to distract himself from such thoughts.


    But Leyone, Rayone, Ss, and Talon couldn''t help but be curious.


    They looked at each other as if urging the others to go and ask.


    Their gaze though atstnded on Talon, who time and time again took the lead to speak to their creator and technically, was the oldest amongst them.


    Talon immediately felt annoyed at his younger "siblings" actions against him. A word that he learned from those fox people.


    s, as he was the most qualified as of now, he could give in and relieve his and the other''s curiosity.


    Going towards their creator, thetter was already looking at him.


    Already having noticed the weird feelings of those Anabast.


    "They seem to have put you into something, Talon." Danzel said with his cold voice as he closed his book.


    "I apologize o thee creator...our curiosity got the better of us and we couldn''t help. I will go right back and-"


    Danzel raised his hand to stop him.


    "It''s alright, I told you guys toe wherever you got any questions. I might as well relieve that curiosity of you all." Danzel said while eying the other Anabast.


    Talon stayed silent for a while before pointing his hand toward the book that Danzel was holding.


    "We were wondering of what kind of book thee creator would be so upied with...It''s different from the one that you gave us." Talon asked.


    Nodding at Talon, Danzel raised the book.


    "You are indeed right, that one is apletely different book than the one I gave you. It was given to me by a..."friend" sort of. A gift for separating ways to say the less. He was also the one that gave me this sword and armor, well most of it." Danzel said as he remembered the damage to his armor.


    "The book contains how to make a mana crystal with your own mana signature. I didn''t give a copy of this to you guys as it doesn''t contain information about spells."


    Nodding in understanding, Talon couldn''t help but ask after.


    "What kind of person is the thee creator''s friend?"


    "..."


    Danzel stayed silent as he thought about the question.


    Seeing him no answer, Talon quickly bowed his back as having gone too far with his question.


    "I apologize thee creator, I have-"


    "No...it''s alright." Danzel said as he remembered the one that gave him this book and who proimed to rebuild a fallen empire.


    "He was someone who would proim to build an empire, an undead like us. A great magic caster who controlled sand and turned the same sand harder than steel. His name was Nersan''rah..." Danzel said as he recollected his memories about the Death Spirit.


    "He was-" Before he could continue telling his experience with the Death Spirit that he had met Talon.


    He suddenly felt a thread of connection being cut away.


    ring his eyes, Danzel put his book down and drew the Skull w Dagger, and examined it closely.


    "No, the connection was damaged..." Danzel mumbled as he looked in a certain direction.


    ''The ice troll is dead, huh?'' Danzel mumbled as he rose up from his seat.


    Holding the dagger, he could feel the connection fading by the second.


    Danzel tried to remember the way where the connection line was before it waspletely broken.


    s, it didn''t take long before the connection vanishedpletely.


    But even then, Danzel was able to gain the vague direction of where the ice troll that he had marked could have died.


    Making his map appear from his storage ring, Danzel put his hands towards where the supposednds of the Primordial god of Wild Hunt were supposed to be.

 Chapter 427 The Strongest

    At a different point in time, somewhere around the frozennds, inside the so-called territory of the primordial.


    A stench of blood was to smell all over the ce where 3 ice trolls were talking.


    Two of the ice trolls walked by each side of thest ice troll, whopared to the two who wielded axes and only had some simple clothing hiding their lower body.


    The middle ice troll wore what looked like leather armor mixed with fur with a hood while also wearing several bone essories made out of bones and teeth of all kinds of beings,


    Together with his staff on its tip that was frozen by dark ice and inside had several third pieces of skulls inside, also with 4 curved spikesing out of the same size.


    Each spike has attachments of small wolf teeth hanging. Making a unique sound each time the staff hit the ground.


    The staff that looked like the dead were trapped inside of the staff and were wailing from pain was, in particr, intimidating, though his overall aura matched the image of that stuff, if not suppressed it.


    The two other ice trolls would even have felt pressure from him if they weren''t distracted by the sight in front of them.


    Ice trolls like them shatter through the distances, their bodies broken down, crashed, and cut in half.


    Close to a hundred of them were to be sightedying dead on the ground, which also bore scars of a battle, filled with craters and huge deep carvings.


    Even their weapons were destroyed despite bearing no blood except the few spiked metal spears that were on the ground.


    It seemed like a great battle has been fought here and indeed that was the case.


    s, the most bizarre thing was that the corpses weren''t just here, but were shattered kilometers far and wide.


    Taking a look far away, the ice troll wielding the ominous staff could see simrly crushed corpses in other mountains.


    "Such a waste..." The staff wielding ice troll said as he gazed he stopped at a particr pool of blood and waited.


    The two other ice trolls looked at each other and then at the staff-wielding ice troll.


    "Great Shamac, why have we stopped here?" One of the two said.


    "We are waiting." The staff-wielding ice troll otherwise referred to as Great Shamac said with an indifferent tone.


    After those words left his mouth, only an ufortable silence followed right after.


    The two ice trolls at firstplied with his words, s the longer they stayed, the more anxious they started to be as they looked around in fear that the being that did this whole mess woulde back.


    "Great Shamac...this must have been done by The Thousand Screaming One! The blood of our fallen brother may attract the beast..."


    "Brother is right, Great Shamac. The Thousand one must be near! We have to get away before ites back!"


    "..."


    The Great Shamac stood with his eyes closed and in silence. Ignoring the two.


    Making the other two as a result way more anxious.


    Trying to convince the Great Shamac to turn back before disasteres.


    "Great Shamac!!! We need to run before The Thousand Screaming Onees!" One of the ice trolls yelled.


    Only then did the Great Shamac open his eyes and gaze.


    Not towards him, but at the pool of blood in front of him.


    The next momentter, a small ripple was to be seen in the blood before the rimple intensifying as if it was boiling.


    And then the blood seemed to explode and a shadow was cast on the ice trolls.


    "Ghaa~So loud." A rough and deep voice said of the being that risen from the pool of blood.


    The two ice trolls who were previously anxious stepped back in shock at the sudden new presence.


    "Wha-?"


    Hearing the shocked voice, the being soaked in blood raised his eyes and inspected the ones that made noise.


    "Were you the ones who interrupted my sleep." the new presence said.


    As blood slowly started to fall down his body, it soon came to reveal to the two what this presence was.


    Bearing muscles seemingly carved by gods, his chest had a tattoo that looked like two des axe facing the other way with the being what looked like a pointy cross that had its left, right, and bottom broken.


    Wearing a ne that hadrge and sharp teeth unlike any normal beast and out of his mouth his two dusks came out, each of them wearing a metal ring and his skin being of a pale blue.


    Seeing the one in front of them, the two ice trolls were so shocked that they couldn''t speak properly.


    "C-C-Chi~!!!"


    "C-C-Chi~!!!"<novelnext></novelnext>


    Seeing thatthe Great Shama finished what they were about they say instead.


    "Chief~" The Great Shamac said as he bowed slightly his head.


    That''s right.


    The being who rose from the pool of blood was none other than the Chieftain of the trolls.


    The strongest ice troll on the frozennds.


    And now that ice troll gazed at the Great Shamac for a brief moment before ignoring him and focusing on the other two.


    "So it was you two who woke me up." A sudden killing intent shed in front of them. So intense that the two couldn''t even react to it before the next moment, one of the ice trolls was sent flying so fast that it broke the sound barrier. At least half of his body did.


    The wind burst by the sudden movement and the second ice troll gazed at where the other was, only to see on his ce a quarterstaff that was being held by the chieftain.


    The quarterstaff directly sted a giant hole through the ice troll''s chest and made a big hole while his top part flew and his legs stayed only to fall to the ground shortly after by the wind.


    The second ice troll was shocked before bing terrified as the eyes of the chief locket to him.


    "Chief-"


    Before finishing his words the Chieftain grabbed his head with an immensely strong grip.


    "You as well do." The chieftain said as he raised the struggling ice troll closer to his face before taking a bite at his chest while the trapped ice troll was still alive.


    With muffled screams, the ice troll had to endure having big chunks of his body eaten before finally dying.


    Seeing the ice troll dead, the Chieftain lost his interest in him and threw the corpse casualty to the side.


    "Hmpf, weak, honorless, disgusting. Like all the other bunch." The chieftain said with his rough and deep voice.


    "Was the hunt disappoint, Chieftain?" The Great Shamac said.


    "Weak hunters with no honor, they run once upon seeing the hunt. Those with honor were too weak to a mint of anything. I managed to wound the screaming one, but Icked the spears! If I had another thousand ones I would even have-!"


    The more the Chieftain spoke the louder his voice was bing.


    Before he was going to finish though, he calmed down and looked at the Great Shamac.


    "Magic User, I trust that your wisdom already knows the result of my hunt!" The Chieftain yelled as he walked off the pool of blood and hit the ground with his quarterstaff. Cracking the ground.


    "So, why did youe here for!? You even brought those noisy honorless guys with you." The Chieftain said.


    The Great Shamac shook his face at such words.


    "Compare to you Chief, this lowly one is of weaker strength and relies on the mystic parts. Guards are but necessary."


    The Chieftain narrows his eyes at such words.


    "s, I came today as back at our camp, an important matter seemed to have arrived. One possible regarding a being of higher strength."


    "Hmpf! And you came all the way here to tell me just that!? I hunted through all the mountains of thosends and the only thing deserving to be called strong is the Screaming One" The Chieftain scoffed at the Great Shamac.


    "I do not doubt your judgment, Chieftain. But one of the honorless that left has returned alone, semi-fly iming of such being to having killed each honorless troll."


    "Weaklings dying from weaklings is but natural. Maybe I misjudged your judgment, one who ims wisdom."


    The Chieftain passed the Great Shamac.


    "The honorless one sprouted ridiculous ims, but his news, if the truth may be worrying. iming that the "One Who puts the End" hade from them. Also bearing his mark.


    Hearing that, the Chieftain turned around and looked at the Great Shamac with interest.


    "I don''t believe all his words, but a powerful cursed beinging to existence could have happened..."


    At such words, the Chieftain smiled.


    "Interesting, show me the one who spouted such nonsense!" The Chief Said as he started walking away from the pool of blood.


    "Also, freeze that pool of blood with your magic arts. I would like to take the trophy back to my camp."


    "It shall be done..." The Great Shamac said as he turned around to look at the blood pool.


    Raising his staff, his mana traveled to the pool of blood and slowly started to freeze it.


    Once he was done, he went ahead to follow the Chieftain.


    Though what couldn''t be seen before, was now revealed.


    The blood pool that has now frozen, is revealed inside a huge eye pierced by a ck spear and ballrger than the Chieftain''s whole body.

 Chapter 428 Common Sense

    On the different mountains of the frozennds.


    Her mouth was dry and her body felt incredibly weak.


    And worse of all, she felt an immense headache simr to when she broke once her leg from being thrown off a cliff.


    At least she currently didn''t feel the pain that she felt back then.


    Slowly opening her heavy eyelids, she looked up at the sky.


    The bright white sky made it difficult for her eyes to adjust, making her vision hazing at best. Though with her being of the 3rd tier, her eyesight became clear just a momentter.


    And once they did, she realized that the sky was shaking.


    "Huh~?" She mumbled confusedly.


    Slowly raising her head despite the headache, she saw around her, only to see that it wasn''t the sky shaking, but it was her that was moving.


    Looking around, she realized that she was in a moving wagon.


    "So it''s me that is movi-kya!"


    Before she could finish, the wagon that she was on suddenly bumped into some rock, resulting in her hitting her head on the wood.


    "Ah~It hurt..." She said while grabbing her head in hopes to ease the headache, a drop of tear building up in her eye.


    And while she was touching her head with her hands, a dark mist slowly moved on top of the carriage, making her flinch.


    The dark mist then slowly took a physical form of an undead wearing dark ting armor, seating on the side of the wagon.


    "Hey you, you''re finally awake?" The undead said with cold words.


    Shiro could never mistake the owner for such a cold tone in his voice. But once she took a nce at the owner of the voice and saw the dark green cracks on his bones that were hidden behind a mist, the headache spiked once more, making the sight in front of her disappear, easing the pain.


    "Rue?" She said confused.


    "What happend?"


    The undead, who was Danzel shook his head once hearing that.


    "You should know already of what happend, Shiro."


    "..."


    Shiro at those words went silent.


    ''My condition huh?'' She thought.


    Letting her head fall to the floor of the wagon, she stared at the white sky while also raising her hand, feeling sad from the inside.


    ''How much did I age? Months? Years?'' She thought as she stared at her fingernails having overgrown once more.


    The only indicator to prove that she had aged.


    With her race''s long lifespan, it was extremely difficult to tell her how much she aged.


    ''Will Grandpa even recognize me once we meet again?'' She thought with closed eyes.


    Danzel in turn stared at her in silence, giving her time to gather her thoughts.


    It was only a whileter before she opened her eyes.


    "Rue, where are we now? Did we leave the vige?" Shiro asked while trying to stand up with the support of her hands, albeit struggling.


    While her hands were shaking, her eyes caught a dark green hand appearing in her vision, making her eyes wide a bit.


    The dark green hand in question grabbed her shoulder and helped her to put her back at the side of the wagon.


    "...Yes, we left two days ago. Though for you it must be a bit more of a week." Danzel said as he pulled the dagger from the skull w.


    "Do you remember what this is?" Danzel asked.


    Shiro nodded in response.


    "You mentioned that the dagger ces a tracking curse on its enemies...Wait, did something happend to the target?" Shiro asked while connecting the dots of Danzel''s question.


    Making Danzel somewhat impressed.


    "Indeed, the ice troll that I market has died."


    Hearing that Shiro frowned.


    "Was it a beast? Or was it-"


    "It was thetter of what you are thinking." Danzel cut her short.


    "If it was really a beast, the connection would have disappeared close to instantly. As the beast would kill the ice troll. But that wasn''t the case, the connection weaken only to disappear shortly after." Danzel said as he sheathed the dagger in.


    "Unless there is a beast that likes to y with their food...the most likely culprit of his death must be his kin."


    "What about the connection now though?" Shiro asked.


    "Indeed, the connection has vanished, but I was able to get a vague direction of where he died. Around the territory of the so-called Wild Hunt."


    Shiro slowly nodded her head.


    ''So he is really nning to hunt them all down...'' Shiro thought to herself.


    Although he already exined to her his n to her, she still couldn''t get over it.


    Danzel''s n was simple and cruel at the same time.


    Moving her head to the side, Shiro frowned at what she saw.<novelnext></novelnext>


    She saw "her" ominous students made out of shadows reading their magic books and undead.


    Undead everywhere to be seen.


    And it wasn''t just a few dozen as she had remembered before she had copsed, but instead this time they were hundreds of undead with ethereal ring eyes and armor made out of bones.


    For any normal person, such sight would have been shocking beyond belief, but to Shiro? Who watched Velkir raised much greater armies of the undead? It was only slightly shocking.


    Danzel''s n was pretty straightforward and simple.


    Well, simple for any mediocre necromancers that are.


    His n was to make an army of undead to spread through the frozennds to cover the ground and scout thends of the frozennds.


    It was basically the basic strategy of any necromancer.


    Overwhelmed you problems with numbers.


    That n also brought many side benefits for Danzel, few that Shiro wasn''t aware of, but she still was able to see that Danzel was using the corpses to practice runesmith.


    A form of art that she had no clue how worked.


    She remembered a few of Danzel''s runes of how to be drawn and she tried once to inject mana just as he did, s with no sess.


    "Rue, how many...of them are here?" Shiro asked while looking at Danzel.


    "A bit more than 300 Draugrs, I left 200 of them back to the viges that we visited to explore the area."


    "...300." Shiro mumbled.


    Silently staring at her, Danzel raised his hand and brought out some of the food supplies, and gave them to Shiro.


    "Here, you should be hungry, right? Because I can''t really tell." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    Once the food was out, her stomach decided to make its presence clear.


    *Grghhgh~


    With slight embarrassment, Shiro reached out and picked up the food given to her.


    "Thank you, Rue. Really." She said while biting on the food.


    It wasn''t the best, but at the same time, it also wasn''t a Danzel meat roaster. Which in her book was a plus.


    Danzel silently stared at her eating with his ethereal eyes gone out. Making it somewhat awkward for Shiro.


    "Ehm...Rue, it''s kinda awkward you looking at me eat like that." She said awkwardly.


    "Don''t mind me..." Danzel answered, his eye still not lit up.


    Shiro continue to eat, but having a skull watching her eat in silence made her feel awkward.


    "S-So, when are we going to reach the location of the daggers connection Rue?" Shiro asked awkwardly.


    "We aren''t going there yet, first we are going to meet up with the Draugrs of the mine and then travel back to the vige of the fox people with that priestess. Afterward, we will go and see the other side of those frozennds."


    Shiro halfway nodded her head before she froze, suddenly being reminded of something.


    ''Right! The native people! Oh no!!!'' Shiro screamed internally as she tried to rise up from the wagon.


    If she were at her peak, she would have immediately jumped off the wagon.


    She stared through the hundreds of undead as if she was in a panic before her eyesnded on the only living beings inside the undead army.


    They walked among the undead while their bodies shaking and their movements somewhat haggard. Also, many of them had ck circle''s in their eyes and some others helped each carry each other.


    At a nce, one could tell that these people were exhausted beyond reason.


    "Rue! Can we take a break for now? Those people are about to copse." Shiro pointed at the fox people.


    With his eyes finally ring up, Danzel gave the fox people a cold emotionless stare, before shaking his head and raising up from his seating position.


    "I see...then I will give them 6 hours. Should be long enough to recover." Danzel said as he turned to dark mist.


    Shiro couldn''t bother to where Danzel was going now.


    Looking around her wagon, she found her staff.


    Using it as support, she climbed down the wagon before walking towards the fox people.


    The undead already received Danzel''s instructions and went to do their given work, if they had any that is.


    As Shiro walked closer to the fox people, she couldn''t help but sigh internally.


    She totally forgot how Danzel would sometimes forget that the living had limited stamina and that their condition never stays the same.


    Seeing the exhausted people, she felt like she watched herself on the first few days of traveling with Danzel.


    Unrelentless travels without any pauses and food are only provided by him when someone makes him aware that others are hungry.


    Unlike her though, those people couldn''t just go to Danzel and ask him for food or a pause, considering their position.


    ''Rue probably only made a break when someone copsed to the ground through either exhaustion or starvation, leaving them in such a state...''


    She found hisck ofmon sense quite annoying at some point. But considering that he was an undead that had differentmon sense, she med herself while cursing at Danzel internally.


    And once Shiro arrived in front of the fox people, letting them know that they can take a break while also arranging food, many saw her as their savior.


    While on the other side, they looked at Danzel thepletely opposite way.


    He was too much!

 Chapter 429 Racial Differences

    After a few days, at the Vashara vige.


    The guards on top of the wall of the vige had terrified looks on their faces as they turned around to look at the white wooden mask of a girl.


    "Priestess...what shall we do. He is..." The guard said while pointing in the opposite direction of the vige.


    There, where he was pointing was what looked like a massive army of undead marching towards their way.


    Wearing bone armor and in their hollow eyes, bright dark green mes burning. They walked in their direction.


    And leading them was none other than Danzel with his 5 Anabast, Talon, Baron, Ss, Rayone, and Leyone.


    Though the people of Vashara, have given that existence the name of...


    "Harsch Death and his Lording Shadows areing back...also, those cursed warriors-! The amount is-! Priestess! What should we do!?" One guard who was clearly younger than the other guards yelled in panic.


    "..." The priestess didn''t immediately reply, but instead gazed at the army of undead marching towards their way.


    A frown nted on her face, which was covered by her white wooden mask thankfully.


    ''So he is reallying back...'' The priestess thought with mixed feelings.


    She felt relief as the great hunter Shin''Yen was probably alive with the others that followed the King of Cursed Warriors. At least she hoped that this would have been the case, as losing their great hunter would have been as great of a loss as it would be of her dying.


    Though also the fact that the King of the Cursed Warriors was a bad omen of the entirety of their vige. If he chooses to make the whole vige join the ranks of his army, they would be helpless even if each person run in a different direction.


    No, rather than risk, it would be but a matter of time before they would die. The undead stationed in their vige has proven their strength to be equal to a veteran hunter. Getting away from those alone would be difficult.


    Thest thing that started to worry her, was the build-off of reverence on her people, calling the King of the Cursed Warrior and the small child with him the two missing primordial gods that have never been sighted except their ancestor.


    Although the knowledge of their ancestor pointed out that those beings were indeed the gods that they worshipped or believed in, she still found it hard to believe as few details of her knowledge were different that those two.


    She was also confused why now, why did those beings appear now, in their generation of offspring instead of a generation before?


    Because she had the knowledge of her ancestor, she had her doubts, but her fellow people?


    More and more were associating the two beings as the primordial gods.


    And she could do nothing about this fact.


    "Pristress! What shall we do...?" The older guard asked with a worried look.


    His question made her push her thoughts back and focus on the problem in front of Vashara.


    "Open the gates, we are going to prepare to wee the primordial gods back..." She said with heavy words before going down the wall.


    She quickly went out to gather the people to greet the suppose primordial gods back in their vige.


    And just as she gathered all the people in front of the gate that was opening, the cursed warriors had also in their vige also gathered in their own ranks in lines.


    And as the new build gate, much inferior to the one they had of before opened, the being with a dreaded aura stinking of death walked inside their vige once more, followed by the army of undead.


    The dreaded being then called one of the stationed cursed warriors of their vige to what she guessed was informing him of the situation of the vige.


    She couldn''t hear their conversation, but she still managed to hear thest word of the King of the Cursed Warriors.


    "Ridiculous." He said before staring with his dark green ring eyes towards her.


    Walking towards and looking down at her, his cold emotionless voice came said.


    "It seems that you kept the vige in ce in my absence, priestess."


    His seer cold voice brought a shiver down her spine.


    Gulping down her fear, the priestess responded with a calm voice.


    "It is but natural to follow the will of the primordial god and for everyone to wee his arrival."


    "Wee me, huh? Quite the use of words." Danzel said while staring at the vigers who had a hint of fear and hate towards him. Making the priestess have an awkward expression behind her mask.


    "My people-"


    Before she could finish though, Danzel stopped her.


    "I don''t n or care enough to hear excuses, as long as they behave, I don''t care. More importantly, I brought material for the cksmith to use, bring your cksmith to follow me. I will be acquired with that. In turn, I have another job for you people."


    Nodding her head, she turned her head and stared at one particr old man who was quite muscr despite his age.


    "I am the cksmith of this little vige, Harsch Death. The name is Bolrorg." The old man said while directly staring Danzel in his ethereal eyes without flinching.


    Danzel stared at the man for a bit before nodding.


    "Bolrorg, you will be following me." Danzel said as he internallymanded his undead who were gathering the supplies of the metal iron to pass through and go toward the cksmithing workshop.


    Bolrorg''s eyes lighten up in surprise at the amount of ore and grinned to himself, Danzel though ignored it.


    "You people,e forward!" Danzel said as he looked behind him.


    The vigers of Vashara were at first confused and shocked by those words, but a few secondster, they were surprised.


    Among the army of the cursed warriors, fellow fox people started to walk through.<novelnext></novelnext>


    Andpared to the vigers of Vashara, almost every one of them had some other racial characteristic, but mostly simr.


    Where the racial characteristic was clear to see though were 4 people.


    One of them was a woman with ck and white hair, a color of hair and tail that has never been seen by any of the people of Vashara.


    The woman was quite beautiful, but she had an aura of strength around her.


    Though the girl next to her among the 4 shocked many of the young people and were somewhat excited by the beauty.


    Having tails far more than ever seen, and some gentle fur around her neck, she brought forth a charm of pure beauty and gentleness.


    Even the fox people of the same sex were attracted to her.


    As for the other two, it was two men that also brought a surprise to the people of Vashara.


    One of the men was muscr which was both thin and muscr at the same time but everyone''s eyesnded on his hands which were protected by some bones like some kind of carapace, making his hand look like some kind of w.


    Butpared to him, the other man raised more shocks as the man had a single golden tail.


    The color of his hair wasn''t that unusual, but the very fact that a man had a tail was never before seen. It was something only seen by females of their race.


    Seeing those people, many started to whisper among themselves.


    "Look at her hair ck and white hair, it''s as if she has been blessed by the primordial themselves."


    "Or cursed...look at her, she looks so scary..."


    "Look at her tails! How does she have so many!? Also, the fur on her neck is so beautiful..."


    "If I could mate with her..."


    "Idiot, shut your mouth~!"


    "Hey, look at that guy''s hand, he looks like he has ws."


    "Is that a weapon or do those wse out of his body?"


    "That one with the golden hair...doesn''t he look like a man? Why does he have a tail?"


    "Idiot! It''s clearly a girl dressing as a man, are you blind and you can''t tell the difference between the two?"


    Those 4 people brought so much attraction that they almost forgot that Danzel was in front of them.


    Almost.


    They whispered to one another so as not to be heard by Danzel.


    Though their attempts were hopeless as Danzel was able to hear every single worth thanks to him being a 4th-tier. In fact, any of the 3rd-tier could hear such whispers.


    Danzel frowned internally, but he decided to ignore it and finish hismand.


    "Priestess, I will be entrusting does people to you. Make sure that none dies." Danzel said as he walked passed her.


    "Come, Bolrorg." Danzel called the old cksmith.


    "Yes! Harsch Death."


    The priestess, in turn, was quite in shock as of now and simply stared at the supposed primordial Harsch Deathleaving, followed by the Lording Shadows and the small girl that they called the primordial god of White Life or Shiro Life.


    Shiro waved towards the fox people not from Vashara before following Danzel.


    The undead army also started to go into action to follow themand of their liege, amand that the priestess had no idea of.


    Making her people and herself stare at the newly arrived fox people.


    ''They must be from different tribes, but I never heard of tribes with such differences from us. But that doesn''t matter now, the food required to feed all of them, the houses and...''


    It was as if a whole box of problems was dropped on top of her head to deal with.


    Just thinking about all the problems that this amount of people would bring such as food shortage made her feel a headache.


    Looking down at the ground filled with snow, she couldn''t help but mumble.


    "What should I do..."


    In the next moment though, a man walked in front of her and patted her head.


    "Priestress..."


    Raising her head in surprise and looking at who it was, she put a warm smile behind her mask.


    "Hunter Shin''Yen, I know." She said while staring at the newly arrived fox people.


    Putting all future problems aside, she looked straight at all the fox people and said with a warm voice.


    "Wee to our vige, Vashara."

 Chapter 430 Forsaken And The Proud

    Leading the new arrivals with different racial traits towards the gathering hall or rather their shelter for the freezing times.


    Though as of now, the big building with the big table in the middle was used as their gathering hall to enact the meeting with the new arrivals.


    "Make the representative of "you" people sit on the table?"


    An old man whose name was Miyu beside the priestess said with his staff pointed at the big table.


    The priestess frowned at old Miyu from his words implying that the new arrivals were outsiders.


    Many of the new arrivals also picked up and frowned at that, few even were close to yelling at the old man, but before that happend the many-tailed fox standing in front and spoke for everyone.


    "Thanks for your hospitality, old Miyu. We will take up your offer." As soon as she finished her words, the 4 strongest of the new arrivals went and seated at the table, making the old Miyu frown at that.


    "You 4 ...-"


    Before he could finish, the ck and white-haired girl stopped him.


    "We 4 are the chiefs of our respective groups. There is no representative as you say. Got a problem with that, old forsaken?"


    Hearing that, old Miyu raised his eye brown at the word forsaken before frowning.


    "So you people are foolish-"


    "Old Miyu!" The priestess underpinned before things started to escte.


    "We aren''t here to talk about past grievances of our ancestors. We are here to discuss the future of everyone involved here. Let''s sit first and talk..." The priests with the white wooden mask said.


    With her working with both parties, despite her technically being a member of one of the parties, the leaders cheated to the table while the majority of the vigers of Vashara stand to watch the show together with the neers.


    "Now, before we talk about our future together, let me introduce myself. I am the priestess who worships the 3 primordial gods of the Vashara vige and this here is old Miyu, someone that helped administrate our daily base." The priestess said while staring at the 4 leaders in silence.


    What her stare implied was clear to the four.


    The first to speak was the many-tailed fox.


    "My name is Sernatta and leader of 6 broken tribes. It''s a pleasure meeting you, people of Vashara." She said with a warm smile and calm voice.


    "Name is Gilgamash, leader of 6 broken tribes saved by the primordial. It''s a pleasure." The man with the golden tail said while nkly staring at the people of Vashara.


    "Leader of 10 broken tribes, Herlin." The man with the ws said in a deep voice.


    "Hmpf, Leader of 8 broken tribes, Kuroshi. Forsaken who abounded the primordial''s greatnds." The ck and white-haired girl said while staring at the Vashara people with a frown.


    "..." The priestess at Kuroshi in silence before opening her mouth.


    "Please stop calling our people by such title, leader Kuroshi. If we are to live to" The priestess said.


    She wanted to continue, but old Miyu interrupted her.


    "Priestess, it would be unwise to make a hasty decision without knowing their connection to Harsh Death. What''re your connections with him?" Old Miyu said while staring at the leaders who were clearly more powerful than him with an unshaken gaze.


    "There is no decision to make elder, the primordial god of Harsch Death has already given his will to you people. Going against his will means bing our enemy." Herlin said with his eyes looking at old Miyu as if he was prey.


    Seeing that, Shin''Yen who was standing behind the seat of the priestess walked a step forward while staring at Herlin.


    "Drop it Herlin, there is no need for bloodshed." Shin''Yen said.


    "No, I would have to agree with Herlin on this, Shin''Yen. We follow the primordial''s will and will alone. You were there when we pledge." Gilgamash said while staring with his nk gaze at Shin''Yen.


    The three of them put an aura around them as if they would jump and reap the throats of each other and any moment was bing more intense by the second.


    Shin''Yen slowly lowered the grip of his staff, ready to draw the ck ice spike hidden in the staff while the other two were ready to bounce at him if he ever did.


    At the moment when the tension peaked, someone spoke out loud.


    "Sigh, men. Stop it already you two. And you two Shin''Yen. Do you want to open a conflict and drag the primordial here?" Sernatta said while shaking her head at those two before looking at old Miyu.


    "As for your question, we own our lives to the primordial. He saved the lives of everyone here from certain death or a much worse fate. I hope this answers your question, elder Miyu?" Sernatta said with her calm voice.


    "Saving everyone''s life..? How exactly?" Old Miyu said with a frown, making Sernatta frown.


    Before she could respond, someone else did.<novelnext></novelnext>


    "Tch, Everyone here that you see has been a ve from the ice trolls old man. Subjected to work till they die, being the toys to relieve their urges of those animals and used as food when they felt like it. If it weren''t for the primordial of Harsch Death, some of us would have already been eaten."


    "And all he asked us in return for our salvation was us pleading at his will and even offered us power while the second primordial healed our wounds and even recovered the limbs that we have lost against that beast." Kuroshi said while staring at the vigers with disdain.


    "I saw you lots hate towards the primordials once he arrived, unworthy of the primordial''s protection. Just like you ancestors who run away from the holynds dictated by the primordial''s will, you lot don''t take the will of the primordials seriously."


    "Kuroshi!!! That''s enough!" Sernatta raised up from her seat while yelling at Kuroshi.


    Kuroshi gave Sernatta a look before raising her hand that pointed towards the priestess.


    "Many tails, you know that I am right, don''t you? Heh, after all. The supposed priestess who is supposed to worship the 3 primordial has the same doubt in her eyes as her own people."


    Her words brought a wave of shock to the vigers of Vashara.


    "Stop spouting nonsense outsider!"


    "The priestess is the holiest of all, how dare you doubt her!?"


    ...


    Kuroshi ignored the yells of the vigers and stared directly at the priestess''s eyes behind the mask.


    "Ain''t right? Forsaken?


    "..."The priestess frowned in response.


    ***


    At the same time, in the cksmithing workshop,pletely ignorant of the chaos which he resulted with his simple order towards the priestess.


    Danzel followed behind Bolrorg into the workshop.


    "Where do you want the ore to be ced." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "Please tell them to put it over there." Bolrorg the smith said while pointing to a small corner.


    Gazing at that corner, Danzel stared at his undead who were carrying the ore.


    ''This all ore won''t fit inside here, ce whoever much you can, then go and call others to carry the rest. For now, ce the remaining ore the wagons.'' Danzel said the Draugrs with a mentalmand.


    The Draugrs nodded their head and did exactly asmanded, all that while under the gaze of the old cksmith.


    Once the Draugrs had left, only Danzel and Bolrorg remained inside the workshop.


    Shiro had long gone with the Anabast to study magic. With Shiro attempting to learn [Lesser Raise Undead] and the Anabast the lesser version of [Necromatic Restoraction].


    He would also have been with them if it weren''t for taking care of the ore they had gathered.


    "So Bolrorg, do you know what I need you to do?" Danzel said.


    "To smith and create weapons for your army?" Bolrorg asked while tilting his head at the question.


    "Yes, but that won''t be everything that I will need you to do. First of all, weapons won''t be enough. I will also need armor to be made. Do you know how to make armor?"


    Hearing that, Bolrorg frowned.


    "Forgive me Harsch Death...I have never practiced making armor simr to yours. Armor such as yours is usually extremely cold for our people to wear..." The old man paused before continuing.


    "But...I can learn if given the time and a few examples that I can take inspiration of. Forgive this ipetent smith, Great one." He lowered his head.


    Danzel in turn shook his head.


    "I am not ming you for not knowing what you have never tried. Though I would need you to learn now. I will also provide a few armors for you to study." Danzel said before continuing in his cold voice.


    "But that won''t be all that I will need you to do. I will have to ask you to teach a few of my creations you craft Bolrorg."


    Hearing that, Bolrorg''s eyes widen in surprise.


    "Huh?"

 Chapter 431 Manufacturing And Seeing Through Them

    "W-What did you just say...?" Bolrorg said with a stunned expression.


    Staring at the cksmith''s reaction, nkly answered with his cold voice.


    "What, you find it surprising, Bolrorg?" Danzel walked passed him and stared at the forge.


    "Tell me, how many cksmiths are here, in Vashara?"


    Bolrorg frowned at this question.


    "I am the only smith of this vige...while I have a few apprentices. For the work you all looking for, I am the only one."


    Nodding at his answer, Danzel pushed his hand inside the "hot" stones as if the flesh-melting heat was nothing to him.


    Which stunned Bolrorg as he knew best what the heat in his smith was capable of.


    "That''s right, there is only one smith. And 500 of my creations are unequipped with neither weapon nor armor. And those numbers will only increase by the day, Bolrorg." Danzel said as he clenched his hand inside the forge and guided his mana into his arm.


    His mana turned into fierce mes, generating a split wave of hot wind which made Bolrorg take a step back.


    While staring at the fierce mes he created, Danzel continued.


    "You are but a mortal, Bolrorg. Despite your promises, you will eventually seed against your exhaustion until your body will eventually be unable to provide the services that I have in need. Something that my creations will never have to experience."


    Pulling his hand out that was still in the fire, Danzel moved his head and looked with his ethereal eye at the cksmith.


    "Did you understand?"


    ''You monster...'' Bolrorg cursed internally as he ground his teeth.


    Though despite his anger, his head lowered down. unable to stand the gaze of the being in front of him anymore.


    "I understand, O Harsch Death."


    Hearing his answer, Danzel extinguish the mes from his hand and walked towards Bolrorg.


    "Good, I will bring you a few examples of weapons and armor for you to replicate. I will also bring a few of my creations to learn your work, so you might as well bring your own apprentices if you want of course." He said in his cold voice.


    Before he could pass the poor cksmith though, Danzel raised his hand and lightly grabbed the old man''s shoulder.


    Albeit his light touch to Bolrorg was like a metal grip that if Danzel choose to, he could easily rip his shoulder like a piece of paper. Not only that, the grip was chilling cold, making the Bolrorg shiver from both fear and the cold.


    "Also, it seems like youck that "stone" fuel. So I will provide you with some more of it too. I have high hopes for your progress. Mortal~" Danzel said, near the end, his body turned into a ck mist, and leaving the workshop.


    Once he have left, Bolrorg was frozen in ce despite him having left, his eyes aimlessly staring at the ground.


    It was only a momentter that he regained his grip.


    "Heugh!" Yelling out of fright, he stepped to the side and swung his hand at where Danzel was a moment ago. Tripping in the processes.


    He is barely able to catch the edge of his tool bench and not fall to the ground.


    "Ha~Hah~Hah~ M-Monster~!" Bolrorg said amidst heavy breaths and trembling legs.


    Still feeling the cold touch on his shoulder.


    ***


    With a dark mist traveling up to the mountain before stopping at a certain house,


    The dark mist halted in front of the house and started manifesting a death knight watching down the vige.


    "Sigh, will that even work out?" Danzel mumbled out loud.


    ''The Anabast proved to be quick learners, but can the Draugrs be the same? No, even if it were the Anabast, would they be able to learn to smith?''


    Feeling in deep thought, Danzel tried to remember how a certain dwarf was smithing.


    Despite it being quite a few years ago and he only having briefly watched him at his work, he doubted that his undead could learn to smith anytime soon.


    If even at all.


    Shaking what he thought as useless thoughts to the side, he strengthen the connection of 100 random of his undead.


    ''Follow my will, and choose 10 among your group to learn the art of cksmithing. The 10 chosen shall present themself tomorrow in front of me.'' Danzel sends themand to the draugrs before withdrawing his attention from the connection that he held over his creations.


    Danzel would have liked it if he put more of his Draugr''s to learn cksmithing, but he knew that there was a limit to how many Bolrorg could teach. He even thought that 10 was a bit too much.


    But as it wasn''t his problem, but Bolrorgs instead, he shrugged it off.


    Turning his back from the sight of the Vashara vige, Danzel walked towards the house that he imed on his first "friendly" visit.


    Standing in front of the door, Danzel''s ethereal eyes red up. And the next second, the door was pushed open with neither man nor his touch.


    ''Even pushing the door open is hard with my soul essence...'' Danzelined as he drew back the soul essence he used to push the door open.


    Entering the house, Danzel quickly noticed dust on the floor and other furniture.


    ''It seems like no one of them hase in...'' Danzel thought to himself as he walked inside the house.<novelnext></novelnext>


    He somewhat expected people toe here after he and Shiro left their vige. But apparently, that wasn''t the case.


    "Hmm..."


    Raising his hand ever so slightly, a wave of dead mana spread through the room before disappearing a momentter, destroying the dust around the house.


    Though it wasn''t an all-use cleaning method, it was good enough for Danzel.


    Walking towards the only bed in the room, Danzel seated and brought out the book of Nersan''rah and his mana crystal. Slowly studying the book and fiddling around with the mana crystal.


    At times he would only read for around 15 minutes before he tried applying the knowledge towards the mana crystal and at other times he would straight up readying for hours without any practice, just trying to understand the content as best as he could.


    And after several of those attempts, to the point where it was already night, Danzel looked away from the book after a 3-hour reading session and stared at the mana crystal.


    Lifting the mana crystal with his left arm, he started wrapping his own mana around the crystal and then he drew the mana of the crystal.


    That was already difficult, but then he tried recing the mana crystals mana with his own.


    Although it sounded like drawing out water and putting juice in the same cup, it was nothing the like.


    After all, once reced, his mana wasn''t willing to stick and merge with the mana of the mana crystal. After all, to the mana crystal, it was like foreign mana.


    Like trying to mix oil and water, it was seemingly impossible.


    And Danzel''s job was to try to convince the water that the oil was literally the same substance.


    It was a ridiculous endeavor to go about.


    Danzel tried his best, only managing to extend the time he could hold his mana inside the mana crystal for a few more seconds that his previous attempt.


    Albeit an improvement, it was a failure in the end.


    "Sigh, is this what advance knowledge is?" Danzel crumpled in frustration as he put the mana crystal beside him.


    He theny his ethereal eyes towards the book to try out to find his mistake and how to fix it.


    Reading the book in silence, his hand suddenly twitched and his ethereal eyes red up for a split second.


    Without moving his head, his gaze fell to his side.


    Previously nothing beside him was now a woman with long ck hair that matched her weird clothing (business suit), staring down at his book in silence.


    "..."


    *Bagh~


    Closing the book in his hand, he changed his gaze in front of him, seeing how slowly two other figures appeared out of thin air.


    "I-It all you fault! All your fault!!!"


    He couldn''t really see through their faces, but the ming voice of an old woman made it easy for him to guess the figure next to her.


    "It was because of you! Because of you!" A male voice full of hate started yelling at the older woman towards him.


    ming him as if they were cursing him with a voice full of hate.


    "..."Staring at those two, Danzel put his book and the crystal back inside his maa storage ring and rose up from the bed.


    "Don''t you have anything else to say?" Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "Because of you! You ruined it!"


    "It''s all your fault! You-"


    Before the male voice could finish what he was about to say, Danzel seemingly disappeared from where he was and reappeared in front of those two. Simple use of his speed.


    "Don''t you have anything else to say?" He said with a chilling voice as he stared at those two with his ethereal dark green eyes.


    Raising his hand, both the older woman and the man tried to step back.


    But before Danzel''s hands could even reach them, he controlled his soul essence with much effort and created two copies of his hands with the use of soul essence and grabbed the neck of those two.


    He then dragged those two back directly to his hands, recing the grip from his ethereal hands with his physical ones. A technique thatrgely relied on the knowledge of [Grasp of the Undying].


    "I have long grown tired of hearing you two." Danzel said with an empty voice as his gaze alternated between the two.


    He didn''t pay attention to whatever the two were saying anymore, instead.


    He was more interested in what those "Illusion" were made out of.


    And as his gatey longer on them, he soon came to the realization.


    That those illusions.


    Were made from soul essence.

 Chapter 432 Words Of Final Moment

    "4 Years." Danzel said as his grip on their neck tightened more.


    "No, more than that, I always asked myself what you all were. At one point I even thought that I went mad." Danzel said with a hind of anger, that slowly grew with time.


    "At first I thought that I was cursed in watching pointless illusion''s inside my mind. Or maybe seeing people from the previous owner of this body before I came to be..." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "After all, I sensed no mana or life force in being the culprit of your creation. Not even Velkir was able to see a hind of foreign energy on you all. So I couldn''t help but think that I was insane pretending to be sane, heh, hahahah!" Danzel said as startedughing maniacally with his shoulders trembling with anger.


    Which resulted in him increasing the strength of his grip on the two "illusions" of the man and old woman slowly disappearing.


    Seeing that happening, Danzel''s ethereal eyes red up.


    "Soughable..."


    Changing his posture, he dragged the two "illusions" and mmed them to the ground with a single swift motion.


    *Brggh!!!


    Despite the two "illusions" being seemingly ethereal, Danzel touched them as if it made them semi-physical in nature. Which resulted in breaking the wooden floor.


    Which resulted in them breaking down and starting to disappear before Danzel''s eyes.


    "Ah~there goes the floor..." He mumbled as he let go of his grid and slowly watched the two disappear.


    ''The soul essence is gathering to me before disappearing. Why is that the case?'' Danzel would have frowned if he could?


    If the soul essence was being spent somewhere, he would feel morefortable. But what it looked like to him was the soul essence of the "illusions" was simply gathering around himself and disappearing or bing invisible in front of his sight.


    For a moment he weighed the idea of upgrading his [Eyes of Damnation] with his remaining XP in hopes to see what was happening. Though he abandoned the idea shortly after.


    "It doesn''t even seem to get consumed, but simply disappear, also..." Danzel mumbled as turned his head slightly and gazed at the woman with the ck clothes.


    Exterting his strength on his legs, and moved with such speeds that might have been seen as instant teleportation to others of inferior strength.


    Now standing in front of the cked clothed "illusion", Danzel stared down with his cold ethereal eyes.


    "The fact that the soul essence that you guys are made out of feels extremely simr to my own is weird. It isn''t my soul essence and yet it feels it is...why?" Danzel said with his chilling voice and waited for a response, only to get none.


    "Am I missing something? If the soul essence came from me, I should have realized it. Or am I stillcking in perceiving my own and the soul essence around me?"


    "I also have to figure out how you guys are made or at least where that soul essence goes. It has to have some sort of vessel to store what you guys are made out of. There is also the possibility that soul essence can exist without a vessel, but that would go against my observations... not to forget that it seems like their soul essence doesn''t get spent. A way to recycle the soul essence maybe? But that wouldn''t make sense as it would be the same as using energy that is being spent..."


    Several ideas came into his mind, and the longer he thought about the existence of those "illusions" the more possible possibilities of the nature of soul essence came to his mind.


    The "illusion" of the ck-clothed woman stayed silent for a bit more, silently staring at Danzel and thinking out loud. But that soon changed when she opened her mouth.


    "Please, don''t p-"


    s, before she could finish her sentence, an ethereal de stuck through her chest. With the de came ominousughter from behind.


    "Hehehehe~" The oneughing of course was none other but an ethereal copy of Danzel, piercing with his sword through her chest.


    Danzel''s ethereal dark green self is none but the manifestation of the [Soul Ender] skill that Danzel possesses.


    Twisting the ethereal sword in the "illusions" chest, she immediately after crumpled into soul essence as just like the other two, traveled towards him before disappearing.


    The ethereal version of Danzel that wasughing ominously then walked straight to Danzel and became one with him.


    "Despite the two looking simr, the skill is different that does "illusions". So annoying." Danzel shook his face in annoyance.


    Seating on the bed that he was readying a moment ago, Danzel had lost his mood to continue reading the book of Nersan''rah.


    He silently contemted the information that he had gained from the appearance of those 3 "illusions".


    But before he coulde to a clear conclusion, he sighted out loud as he watched how thest and most annoying "illusion" came to be.


    "Sigh, rare seeing you, when was it thest time you decided toe out?"<novelnext></novelnext>


    Simr to the other "illusions" he couldn''t see his face, but based on his clothing and body structure it was clear that it was a man, different from the one that constantly med him.


    The sole "illusion" that brought him immediate anger simply by his words was simr to when he faced a human by instinct but much worse.


    "...What have you done?" The "illusion" spoke slowly and with hints of anger in his voice.


    "You mean the three others that came before you? Isn''t it obvious?" Danzel said as he clenched his hand and resorted to using [Grasp of the Undying].


    The ethereal skeleton hand firmly gripped the man''s neck.


    Though that didn''t halt the man''s ability to continue talking.


    "I finally can take a good look at you. Last time I missed it in the church, but no matter. And as for what I am about to do, The same that I did to the other that came before you." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    The "Illusion" of the man though continue speaking as if the ethereal hand didn''t even bother him.


    "You haven''t even realized what you are doing...You are but a hypocrite. You could have done better and yet, look at yourself. Have you still not realized it?"


    "Hah!" Danzel scoffed at those words.


    "Could have done better? A hypocrite? You all repeat nothing but empty words. I would much more like discussing how you all are being made instead of hearing empty words that I had long grown tired of." Danzel said, but despite his words, he activated the main effect of [Grasp of the Undying].


    Pulling the "illusion" towards him while setting, Danzel draws his sword and lets the "illusion" be pierced by his sheer momentum.


    "Actually, don''t even bother. I wouldn''t even bother to take the words of foreign entities seriously..."


    And just like the others, the "Illusion" of the man broke down into soul essence, but unlike the others, despite being destroyed, Danzel could still hear his words.


    "You fool, you don''t even know what you are doing. But no matter~" Suddenly, the voice grew much more grim and cold. As if the "illusion" was reced by another entity.


    "Till you meet your final moment, I shall await thee moment. And for the better or the worse, I shall decide thee souls fate, even if it means-"


    Before the cold voice grim voice could finish, in lighting speed Danzel drew his sword and swung at the soul essence that was disappearing.


    Making the voice around him disappear for good.


    *Brghhh!


    Danzel swing into the air alone generated a wind de that cut the ceiling of the house clean and that was without the support of mana or any other energy. But just his own physical power.


    With the wooden parts of the ceiling falling down and crashing, the snow of the outside night started to fall on top of Danzel.


    Surrounded by his death aura unconsciously, Danzel spoke out loud.


    "The moment that you speak of shall never arrive. Whoever close Ie, I will never meet my final moment, even if my soul were to grumble and to be ruined, the moment will never arrive." He said with his chilling voice and hollow eyes staring at the night sky of the world.


    He nkly stared at the night sky with now his hollow eyes, his mind lost in thoughts.


    What pulled him out of such thoughts was the creaking sound of the door opening and an eye peeping at him.


    "Rue..." Shiro said while looking at Danzel''s concern.


    Danzel tilted his head in confusion.


    "Shiro? What''s wrong? Why are you pretending to be hiding?"


    Tilting the door open, Shiro walked carefully into the house.


    "Ehm...I just finished my lessons with Anabast. I left them as I grew a bit tired for today." Shiro said as she peeked at the broken floor and the ceiling.


    "So, ehm...did Ie in a bad time or did I miss something while I was gone?"


    Hearing her response made Danzel be reminded of the broken floor and the ceiling of the house that they were staring at.


    Which made him feel awkward.

 Chapter 433 Relying On Yourself

    With the sun lighting up the frozennds and the people of Vashara waking up to do their own work. A few of them saw several undead training with each other and other simple carrying stuff, giving them the scare which woke them faster than an ice bath.


    There were also a few of the unfortunate who lived near enough where the undead was training, which resulted in them walking out as if they had their vitality sucked out. Which earned those few the sympathizing look of the outsiders that Danzel and Shiro brought into the vige.


    Unlike them though who woke up to work, a particr small magic caster was still asleep in a house with a hole in its roof. on top of the mountain with a hole in its roof.


    At first look, it looked like an abandoned house, but those who knew better, residing inside there was what few believed were primordial gods.


    And at the very same house, a breeze of wind hit the house, moving the snow off the roof ever so slightly, making a sizeable block of ice fall inside the hole. The piece of cloth that was blocking the roof had by the night already umted quite an amount of snow, but the additional block of snow made the cloth copse from the weight.


    Dropping all the snow on top of the nket of the bed.


    *Pouff~


    There was a certain silence as one would expect of an abandoned house, but the slight movement of the nket proved otherwise.


    "Mhmm~, cold."


    Suddenly the nket was pushed to the side, revealing a petite small figure with pale skin and messy white long hair.


    It was none other than Shiro.


    While half asleep and rubbing her eyes, Shiro gazed around confused.


    "Rue?"


    Founding no one and experiencing the cold breezeing from the hole in the roof, Shiro finally looked at Danzel''s work.


    "Uwah~so cold~! Stupid Rue and him punching holes in the house." Shiro cursed Danzel as she reached for her staff on the side of her bed.


    Picking her staff while stillying on the bed, she attempted to raise up from the bed.


    But once she pulled her nket, the ice that was still there fell on top of her feet, making her jump from the cold one step forward.


    And the next moment she knew, the floor that was supposed to be there had vanished yesterday, making her fall inside the hole in the floor. The hole was only deep enough t


    "Kyaahhhhh!!!"


    The hole was only deep enough to fit half her body, but because of that, the moment of her fall made her head directly ss with the floor to ensure dominance.


    *Tuck!


    "Hurt~!!!" Shiro groaned in pain as she let go of her staff and touch her forehead to ease the pain.


    The scene spoke of utter defeat.


    Which didn''tst for long as Shiro raised up from the floor and used water magic with a mix of fire and air magic to clean herself as best as she could. Even projecting a mirror made out of ice which helped her fix her hair before leaving the house and closing the door strongly.


    "Damned Rue, him and destroying the house! Just because you don''t feel the cold doesn''t means you can punch a hole through the roof! Stupid Undead!" Shiroined out loud as she looked at her arm, particrly the clothing that Danzel had made with the fur, which had arge cut resulting from her fall on the floor.


    Other than her sh with the floor and her head, she wasn''t harmed as despite how petite she looked, she was of the 3rd-tier.


    Despite the fact that she was a magic caster, her body was much tougher than one would expect. Though that didn''t count for her clothing too.


    "Sigh, how will I exin this to Rue? It''s not like I can tell him that I fell on the floor and ruined the clothes that he made..." Shiro mumbled.


    Even if she found the clothes somewhat awkward and the material bringing a bad taste. It was undeniable that the warmth that they brought was superb.


    As she was wondering what to say to Danzel, her thoughts were interrupted by a small sound in the distance.


    *Thikk~


    "Hmm? This sound is..."


    Putting her hood on and mask white fox mask on her face, she followed the direction of the sound.


    As soon enough, she arrived at the source of the sound.


    *Thikk! Thighkk! Tghnggh!!!


    shes of swords.


    One made out ofpressed stone and one of refined metal, 2 beings much taller and more powerful than her were shing in front of her.


    The former being a living shadow and thetter a death knight, one of the strongest undead out there.


    Both shed with their weapons with speed and power to blow the nearby air away with each sh.


    "Why is Rue fighting Baron?" She said confused as she observed their fight.


    Danzel was only with a sword while Baron had a shield and a long sword together with armor around his shadowy body made out of tough stone.


    At first, she was worried, but after taking a better look, she quickly recognized that those two were training as Danzel didn''t take many initiations on attacking while Baron was the one on offense.


    ''Those two are so fierce, if I were in Rue''s ce, I would already be...'' She thought as she hid and focused on the ongoing battle in hopes to pick up from the two.


    *Thikkt!


    Blocking another attack from Baron with his sword, Danzel slightly moved his head to the side, gazing for a moment at Shiro.


    ''What is she doing over there?'' Danzel thought confused at her attempt in hiding herself.


    He also remembered how she also tried to hide on the door yesterday awkwardly, making him question if she had ack of talent in stealth.


    On Baron''s side, despite being severely unskilled in swordsmanship, he was sharp enough to pick up how his creator was distracted for a split moment.


    His ethereal eyes red up in the same color as his creator''s eyes as he jumped at the opportunity in hand.


    Baron raised the stone long sword up in the air and swung it down at his creator.


    "Naive." Danzel said coldly as he moved a half step to the side and raised his guard with his sword, but instead of blocking the sword. He parried it and let the stone sword slide to the side and hit nothing.


    Leaving Danzel the perfect opportunity to sh toward Baron.


    Fortunately for Baron, he already had his shield in front of him, and he was able to block Danzel''s sword, which was directly carved at the stone shield.


    Baron felt awkward with his sword position as he swung from top right to left bottom, making any counterattack against his creator impossible.


    Forcing him to fly back to create distance.


    At such actions, Danzel didn''t chase but instead raised his left hand and opened it in a palm while gathering his mana.


    And a secondter, his mana turned into fierce mes which upon their manifestation, were shot toward Baron like a bolt of a crossbow.


    Which wasn''t that impressive, to say the least considering Baron''s strength.


    ''Fire Magic?'' Baron thought confused as he raised his stone shield, which had already regenerated thanks to his magic, blocking the mes that were shot at him.


    Once in contact with the shield, the mes exploded at the shield. Blocking the view in front of him with mes.


    s, though the very same mes appeared his creator at his right side., readying his sword with an ominous aura.


    ''Wha-!? Dammit!'' Baron cursed as he tried to move his sword and get away from his creator.


    But it was toote.


    "Toote." Danzelmended coldly as he swung his sword and cut through the shadowy body of Baron.


    He directly cut the hand Baron down to his waist, leaving Baron with half his chest, his left arm, and his head.


    Unshaken of the loss of his body parts, Baron wasn''t going to allow himself to be defeated like this.


    Swinging his remaining hand, he shield bashed his creator so as to create distance and allow his body to regenerate anew.


    Seeing that, Danzel had no other choice but to block the shield bash using his own sword.


    Even though he could destroy the shield with ease if he wanted, that would have destroyed the point of the training if he were topare Baron''s strength and equipment to his.


    Nheless, despite his holding back his strength and skills, he wasn''t going to go easy on Baron on his use of battle experience which he had cultivated through all the fights to the death though out the years.


    Once he was pushed back, he raised his hand once more and shot another volley of fierce mes right at Baron''s face.


    Andpared to before Baron had his shield in front of him, but now that wasn''t the case.


    Letting the fierce mes explode at Baron, engulfing him with fierce mes.


    "That''s enough." Danzel dered as he sheathed his sword back.


    Meanwhile, Shiro was dumbfounded at the sight of the whole battle and the fact that Danzel without any hesitation shot Baron with fierce mes.


    "Shiro! Come, your cover sucks." Danzel said as he turned to look at her directions.


    Making her flinch and hide behind the side of the mountain wall.


    ''Dammit! How did he notice me when I hid so well!? Damn your perception Rue!'' Shiro cursed as the lingering gaze of Danzel made here out of her hiding spot.


    "I didn''t want to interrupt your...fight?" Shiro asked as she looked at the mes behind Danzel.


    "Fight? What do you mean? That''s simple training and nothing else. Also Baron, how long are you going to stay inside there? Don''t tell me that those meager mes were able to beat you?"


    "Never, O great creator!" Baron shouted as if he was offended before he put mes back with his stone sword.


    No hint of any damage lingering on his body.


    Danzel nodded but at the same time frowned, well as far as an undead could frown that is.


    "You did improve Baron, but there are still several mistakes that I saw in our training."Danzel said coldly before turning towards Shiro.


    "As you were so drawn at our training Shiro, can you tell me what Baron did wrong?"


    Being questioned, Shiro flinched.


    ''How am I supposed to know!? I only saw you two fight for a few seconds at best!''


    That was what Shiro wanted to yell at Danzel, but she actually consider Danzel''s question seriously. She reyed the few seconds that she saw in her mind and thought of what did Baron wrong.


    And a certain scene of the fight did make her see a w in Baron.


    "Is it that Baron let you create distance for you to use magic? In the end, too, he gave you the necessary distance and opened himself up for you to use fire magic. Also your first use of magic...was a warning towards Baron, was it not?"


    Hearing her answer, made Danzel sigh out loud.


    "Sigh, as expected of a genius of magic, Shiro is correct. If your only reliable weapon is meleebat, you shouldn''t let a magic caster space or time cast spells. Your pushing me away with the shield was one of your worst mistakes. If I were you, I would have tried to crush my opponent''s skull. Even if you had failed, the position of your shield would still be the center of your body."


    Seeing her answer is correct, Shiro put a smile behind her mask, but that smile was extinguished as fast as it appeared.


    "Though that is only one of the many mistakes that Baron did. Can you tell me the rest, Shiro? Or how about you Baron?"


    His questioning was met with the silence of both of them with Baron feeling frustrated and ashamed internally, only managing to say a few words quietly.


    "I apologize, the creator, as I am ipetent."


    Danzel sighed out loud as he perceived negative feelings of Baron.


    "I am not ming you, you simplyck the necessary experience. In fact, you learning extremely fast."


    ''If not a bit too fast...just like all the others.'' Danzel thought but didn''t voice out those thoughts.


    "Your mistakes are nothing but mistakes that I always used to make back when I started using the sword. The first mistake that you did was jumping on the first opportunity that appeared. Do not forget, an opportunity doesn''t just appear on its own, but is created by some disturbance."


    "The moment you saw me get distracted by Shiro, you jumped tond a blow, making your movements readable to anyone with a good amount of experience. The opportunity that you thought appeared might turn out to be a trap in the mind you take the bait."


    "The most reliable opportunitiese when you yourself force them out on your enemies. Other opportunities that may arise should be second-guessed and doubted first before going in for the kill. Do not forget it." Danzel exined looking down at Shiro too.


    "You too, Shiro. You alsock experience in a battle to the death. There is going to be a time when no one is going to protect you and you will have to fight on your own. And that time wille."


    *Gulp.


    Shiro gulped her saliva at Danzel''s words at the sheer idea of fighting alone. As till to this day, she never fought alone without the assistance of her grandpa or someone else.


    Just the idea alone terrified her, making her legs go weak.


    ''He is right, it isn''t a matter of if it happens, but when it is going to happen.'' Shiro nced at her hand, regaining the resolve and strength on her legs back.


    Unaware of her internal turmoils. Danzel continued with his lecture.


    "And Baron, don''t lower your weapon this low again. At the very least have it have the "de" at waist level. Not only that but you have the habit of thinking of the shield and sword as two separate weapons when they are supposed to be used as one."


    "Your shield doesn''t only block attacks, but it also restricts your enemy''s action that can take. Your sword is there to capitalize on those restrictions and to punish your enemies if they go beyond those restrictions, further limiting the actions of the enemy. You have to be more aware of the effects that your sole weapons have on your enemy."


    Danzel said as he drew his sword and brought out his shield.


    "Let''s try once more, but this time you will be attacked and I will be the defender. Though that doesn''t mean that I will not retaliate."


    "Yes! I thank thee creator for sharing your wisdom despite being unworthy. I will try my best not to disappoint." Baron bowed his back once before bing battle ready.


    That resulted in Shiro''s thoughts bursting away and refocusing on the auras of the two undead bing fiercer by the second.


    Despite knowing that, no, one believed that she would ever have to face Rue or Baron or any of Rue''s undead. The mere thought of going against beings at Rue''s level scared her off their strength but was also frustrated at the fact that she wouldn''t be able to do anything against them.


    Suddenly, an idea appeared in her mind.


    And with it came a great hesitation as she stared at Danzel back.


    His aura of death was so immense that made her feel like an alpha predator was always looking at her neck while her eyes flickered between seeing Danzel''s body having dark green cracks.


    Despite such sight, her will to make the correct choice.


    At least what she considered correct wasn''t hindered, making her clench her staff and step forward one step closer to Danzel''s death aura.


    "Rue~!!!" Shiro yelled, taking Danzel and Baron''s attention.


    "Hmm?" Danzel turned around and looked at her with his cold eyes confused.


    Before he could ask her what was going on, Shiro stared at his eyes unflinching with pure determination before saying.


    "Please teach me how to fight! Just like you do teach me magic. I beg you, please teach me how to not rely on anyone but myself!"


    Despite knowing that the being in front of her killed thousands of people.


    And one of the strongest kinds of undead that were cursed to hate the living.


    It didn''t matter.


    In order to not rely on anyone.


    In order to protect herself.


    To go back alive and reunite with her Grandfather.


    To be proud to stand by her grandfather''s side and be a member of the Haruki n.


    She wasn''t going to be a hindrance to herself.


    Seeing all the desires and determination inside Shiro''s eyes, Danzel couldn''t help but smile.


    "It isn''t going to be as easy as you think." Danzel said.


    With neither a cold voice nor that of one that contained any warmth.

 Chapter 434 Self Made Promise

    "Those that mean then-!"


    Before Shiro could finish her words, Danzel raised his hand signaling to stop.


    "But, we even start, there is a minimum that is required for you. Before that requirement has been met, I won''t be teaching you." Danzel said with his voice bing cold once more.


    "What do you mean?" Shiro asked confused, her previous determination and excitement shaking.


    "It''s simple, really. For me to teach you, you have to learn the "Fly" Spell or something simr to it. You don''t know any of such spells, right?"


    Danzel question made Shiro fall silent and nodded her head in silence, confirming Danzel''s words.


    "But why do I need to learn the such spell? The books that you gave me-"


    "Lent you." Danzel corrected her sharply.


    "...That you lent me, doesn''t contain the information of the "Fly" spell. If I were to figure it out by myself, the time that it would take me will be quite a lot. I might not even seed. Nheless, my grandpa told me that such a spell isn''t that good or worth it in a fight and that I should spend my time in teleportation magic instead."


    Danzel put his hand on his chin, before nodding slowly at Shiro''s words.


    "What Agares, your grandpa told is correct but at the same time not." Danzel said.


    Only after he watched Shiro''s confusion did he borate.


    "Hmm, maybe I wasn''t very clear with that. You see, flight magic has an enormous disadvantage against those of the higher tier. In my experience, flying magic can only make you fly so fast, and redirecting your flight isn''t instant, which in the end makes you predictable. As one turn could spell your doom."


    "Which can make you an easy target for those with ranged attacks. The stronger they are, the more likely for you to be shot down. Of course, if you face weaker opponents that have no such attack methods, they can do nothing against you, or at the very least, their attack pattern is very predictable. Most close-ranged fighters are like this."


    "Take off up in the sky and they wouldn''t be able to catch you. Even if they jump and try to take a piece of you, if they miss, unless they have some sort of movement spell or ability, they will turn into a free target for your spells. But if your opponent is weaker than you, then learning such a spell is, as your grandfather states, not that worth it as it can expose you to danger." He said before shaking his head.


    "But nevertheless, despite all disadvantages, I still see it as a crucial movement tool for all magic casters to have."


    He said before turning his head to Baron.


    "And you Baron! Don''t think that I haven''t noticed your habit of mimicking my footwork! That''s a bad habit. With how your body is made, you should use your natural flight ability to its fullest and develop your own kind of swordsmanship. Although I promised to teach you my swordsmanship, it was the idea of being inspired by it. Not mimicking it. You understand me?"


    "I will heed thee''s creator''s words." Baron said.


    Inside himself doubting himself wherever he could do what his creator asked him or fail the expectations of his creator.


    Danzel was able to feel negative thoughts of Baron but decided to say nothing to him and to refocus his attention on Shiro.


    "Till then Shiro, teaching you will draw too much focus from the other subjects that you are on and you should know it."


    Shiro looked visibly dejected at his words and even more so by the fact that what Danzel said was true.


    From teaching the Anabast, learning necromancy from Danzel or the books, trying out what she learned, andlearning thenguage of the fox people from Alka. She basically had no time left to squeeze in another set of training when she already stayed for 18-20 hours awake.


    Something that her grandpa never would have allowed her to do. Staying awake for so long to study the wonders of magic. She did it a few times by her grandpa, resulting in getting an earful while also being forbidden to use magic for a whole week.


    s, for better or worse, Rue didn''t seem to care how long she stayed awake. In fact, she suspected that at times he would forget the fact that she had to actually sleep at all.


    Though despite staying so long, she still found no time to do anything else.


    Leading her to consider wherever she should try and increase the time she was staying awake.


    Danzel in turn who was oblivious to her thoughts saw her dejectedness and sighed out loud.


    "If you are really that eager, we can push a few of your lessons back and I can teach you the basic ofbat. Of course, the true training will begin once you learned-"


    "Really!? Thanks, Rue!" Shiro yelled in excitement as she stepped closer to Danzel.


    Taking Danzel the surprise by how quickly her expression turned from dejected into life in a matter of seconds.


    "Yes, but-"


    "Yess!!! No, take back alright!" Shiro said while turning around and running away.


    "And sorry for interrupting your training you two! But I got to go, Alka must be waiting for me. See youter you two! And don''t forget what you said, Rue! Tomorrow you will teach me!" Shiro said hastily, getting away before Danzel could take back his words.


    "...We didn''t even discuss my payment. Not even the date of the training." Danzel mumbled as he watched Shiro move away from his sight. His voice fell on deaf ears.


    p¦Á§ád¦Á §«?¦Í¨º|,§ã¨°§® Only being heard by a fellow undead who stayed silent at his creator''s grumbles.


    "...I can''t believe she actually runs away. Should I chase her down and p her head?" Danzel though was tempted to put his out-loud thoughts into action.


    "O thee creator, I doubt that the mistress would survive that." Baron replied in turn in worry.


    "Shut up! That was rhetorical!" Danzel yelled, swinging his long sword and releasing a wind de toward Baron.


    Taken by surprise Baron barely raised his shield and protect his front, s the shield wasn''t able to block the whole wind des cause of its length.


    CuttingBaron''s hand in the process.


    Which regenerated in a matter of seconds.


    Beginning another round of training with Baron being continuously cut apart.


    ***


    Walking down the mountain, Shiro couldn''t help but feel excited about tomorrow.


    ''I can finally learn how to fight! I hope Rue isn''t too mad though...'' Shiro thought to herself.


    Her excitement came from the fact that Agares never had really made the attempt to teach how to fight seriously. Although Agares had decided to let her get more ustomed to the idea of killing people if needed. He thought that she was too young.


    Considering her race considering those of 25 years old still children, in Agares mind, Shiro was in no way mentally prepared for such things.


    s, circumstances and Shiro''s condition hasten the development of her body, which included her brain.


    Shiro as of now was no different from someone who entered their teenage years.


    Also being constantly reminded by some incredibly powerful undead of the cruel reality at hand made her feel helpless.


    A feeling that she wanted to ovee.


    But not at the point abandoning of what was important as of right now.


    "Look, the *#&* &*#**, Shiro Life came down!" One of the vigers of Vashara pointed out at Shiro who came down the mountain.


    Being stared at by so many while the people talked in anguage that she could barely piece together their words made Shiro feel awkward.


    Making her hasten her steps toward a certain house.


    Meanwhile, the nearby Draugrs walked to her and followed her as bodyguards, driving away the viger in fear of the undead.


    "Alright, I will go take my lessons, so you guys can already leave." Shapiro said while pointing at the Draugrs with her staff.


    The Draugrs looked at each other before leaving Shiro in front of Alka''s house.


    Shaking her head at the undead, she knocked on the door of the house.


    Which shortly moment after was opened by Alka.


    Entering the house and closing the door, suddenly, the shadow of the house started to stretch unnaturally, before rising up and gaining physical form.


    As the tallest and oldest Anabast, Talon.


    Watching over the house where Shiro was in.

 Chapter 435 Troubles Of Vashara

    After Shiro entered the house where Alka resided, they began their usualnguage lessons of the fox people.


    Shiro found out that the name of their races varied based on the vige where they originated.


    They had done many lessons already, most of them while on the move with Rue''s quest of searching the other viges to increase his army of undead.


    By now,pared to the others, Shiro and Alka were much morefortable with each other, although the fact that there was always that edge between their rtionship always existed.


    And the longer she interacted with Alka and heard others in the vige, the more it downed to her how the people viewed her as some kind of primordial god.


    More specifically, the youngest Primordial God, White Life.


    Which was absurd in her opinion.


    The fact that she showed her healing magic more than once also didn''t help miscalcted the situation but only reinforced their viewpoint.


    "Shiro Life, this stands word stands for "Harsch" and this one over there stands for "Death" Alka said while pointing to a few letters carved in a piece of wood.


    Making Shiro nod her head.


    ''Although adding "Life" in my name is awkward, Rue at least managed to make them call me Shiro'' Shiro thought internally as she nodded at the letters of theirnguage.


    They were several other wooden pieces that were connected with string on the side of the bed where they were taking the lesson.


    A Shiro equivalent way of taking notes, as the Vashara vigecked the ways of creating paper, and leather was way too wasteful to create their version of papyrus.


    The wooden notes were awkward at first, but Shiro quickly got used to using them.


    Picking up a small dagger, she started carving the words of the fox people''snguage and the trantion to the side.


    "Yournguage letters are way too big." Shiroined as 4 words filled one-third of the wooden notes.


    Putting the wooden note to the side, she nced at all the other notes that have already pilled up on her side.


    ''Carrying them all back to the mountain looks annoying...maybe I should ask one of Rue''s undead to help out.'' Though as she was about to pick a nk wooden note, a cry got her attention.


    "Waaah~Waaah~"


    Hearing the cry of what was obviouslying from a baby, Alka''s face went into distress.


    "Ah~I apologize primordial for her distraction, but she..." Alka looked towards where the sound wasing from in concern.


    "It''s alright, I was thinking of calling it quits anyway. Go ahead." Shiro said with a smile, which couldn''t be seen thanks to her mask.


    Nodding, Alka quickly went to take care of thest survivor except her from her vige.


    Shiro quickly followed suit to observe the baby in Alka''s hand with curiosity.


    Alka tried to calm down the baby, but being clueless as to how, she tried gently moving the baby left to right in her embrace, albeit it didn''t seem to work out.


    Shiro kept watching how Alka''s fruitless attempt was stressing her out as she kept switching her gaze towards the baby and her, a sign that she recognize as some sort of fear.


    She had seen several others when her grandpa had killed a few bandits and saved the others, despite they were those who held gratitude towards him, most showing the face of fear towards them.


    No more smiling anymore, Shiro raised her moon-shaped staff on top of Alka and gathered her mana.


    The golden mana crystal in her staff lighten up, as her magic came to be.


    "Tent my wounds. Spirit of Home. [Tendering Warm Healing]." With her spell cast, a golden light fell at Alka and the baby that she was holding. Improving the vitality of the two and healing potential wounds while embracing the two with warm light.


    The baby stopped crying and instead stared at the golden light in wonder before starting to giggle to itself before finally falling asleep a secondter under the embrace of the warm light.


    "This light...was that magic?" Alka said as she gazed at Shiro''s staff in wonder.


    "Yes, a spell of light magic used for healing internal wounds. It can fix bones and organs if cast correctly, though in this case the spell should have washed away the remaining strain on your two muscles and increased once vitality. She must have fallen asleep as the nutrients were spent to fix any sort of strain. But don''t worry, the vitality increase shouldpensate for the loss of nutrients." Shiro exined with bits of pride and excitement talking about her spell.


    Putting the baby back to bed, Alka stared at Shiro somewhat confused and overwhelmed by Shiro''s exnation.


    "Thank you for using your magic on us, Shiro Life."


    Scratching her mask with her finger, Shiro turned her head towards the many wooden notes.


    "W-Well, since she has fallen asleep, won''t you help me carry them up the mountain, Alka?" Shiro said while pointing at the masses of wood on the bed.


    "I would be more than happy to help, Shiro Life."


    Taking as many wooden notes as they can, the two left the house, making the first thing to see outside a huge shadow waiting for them.


    "Hiiek!" Alka jumped back in fright, almost dropping the wooden notes.


    Shiro albeit surprised, wasn''t t surprised by the tall shadow in front of her.


    "Talon, what are you doing here?" She said as she noticed shortly after that the Draugrs that followed her were standing nearby.


    "The creator has given his orders to guard you against potential danger." Talon said with his ominous voice.


    Despite his head being covered by a good and shrouded in shadows, Alka could have a sweater that he started right towards her.


    Making a chill run through her spine.


    Seeing her reaction, Shiro grumbled internally.


    "Sigh, I shouldn''t be surprised, but isn''t so many of you a bit too much?" She said in thenguage of the "mainnds".


    Talon stayed silent for a moment before turning around and waving his hand at the Draugrs.


    Making them leave to continue their duties.


    "I can''tpromise more of thee''s creator''s will, mistress." Talon said as he disappeared into the shadow of the house and then traveled in Shiro''s own shadow.


    For a moment Shiro felt a burning sensation in her eyes, allowing her to briefly see the outline of a skeleton shrouded in most under her very own shadow.


    Though such sight w disappeared as fast as the burning sensation did.


    "Aghhh~" Shiro groaned as she tried to touch her eyes with her hand, though her mask blocked such a gesture.


    "Is something wrong, Shiro Life? Are you feeling unwell?" Alka asked with concern.


    "I-It''s nothing, don''t worry about it. Let''s go."


    Nodding her head, they made their way toward the mountain. That meant walking through the vige.


    At first look, everyone seemed to continue their business, but the more Shiro looked around, the more she realized theck of women and children in the vige.


    Or rather, all women that Shiro could see were the ones that they rescued from the Ice trolls. And unlike them, Vashara looked dense enough for Shiro to notice.


    Few who saw her avoided it like the gue, and few fell to their knees and did what Shiro believe to be praying.


    She also saw one who was crying and staring at her with zealous eyes, mumbling something that Shiro couldn''t make out.


    It was to the point that Shiro turned towards Alka for the question.


    "What is wrong with everyone? Why are they acting like this."


    Alka frowned upon Shiro''s question.


    "They...are afraid."


    "Most people here still can''t ept the idea that the graves of their forefathers had been...used by the eldest primordial god. The idea of them bing cursed warriors and that walk around, is for few...a bit too much to ept." Alka exined while choosing her words from words that she taught Shiro.


    Even now she was unsure if the youngest primordial god, White Life still understood everything that she said.


    s, Shiro understood everything.


    ''I see...I thought that those people were acting afraid because I was with Rue and his undead. But for those people, what Rue does is much worse.'' Shiro thought as she was reminded of her Grandpa''s words about Necromancy and his warning to never try to learn such magic.


    She thought that objectively, Necromancy was efficient but disturbing.


    After all, offensive spells could inflict death.


    Intense mes, burning one''s body.


    The chilling cold froze her enemies.


    To the simplest of arge rock smashing one''s head.


    Inparison, Necromancy was magic that simply brought death and used the result of that oue to further one magic.


    She always was aware of how hical such kind of magic really was.


    And she knew that her Grandpa was right.


    Right but except for one thing.


    Shiro firmly believes that magic at its very bases is neither evil nor good.


    However, the casters to use the spell decides the nature of the magic caster.


    "Then what about the others? That doesn''t look that scared but rather, looking odd at me?" Shiro asked as she clenched her staff with a bit more strength.


    "Ehm, I am not too sure, but I believe that they are the ones who are thankfull towards you and admire you. Or rather, worship you?"

 Chapter 436 Troubles Of Vashara (2)

    ''Ehhh...''


    "Ehhh..." Shiro voices her thoughts out loud as she looked at those who were "worshiping" her before turning towards Alka.


    Alka put a small awkward smile upon Shiro''s reaction, interpreting it as her being annoyed at being worshiped.


    "Many of us believe in the 3 primordial gods and thews that they govern over life. In our perspective, you are our gods that our ancestors told us about."


    "The beauty of life that surrounds us with the white color of the clouds in the sky. The white light of the sky embraces us with the warmth that let us continue our life. Our ancestor left us the name of the being responsible for all those events, as White Life."


    "Although many are afraid... upon seeing your healing powers and your mercy. Put more importantly your long white hair..." Alka''s words trailed off, unsure if she should say that her hair was what made most people believe that she was a primordial god and not actually her magic


    ''So you see my hair more important than everything else. Hmpf!'' Shiro of course was able to see through what she wanted to say.


    Though their conversation was shortly interrupted upon hearing several voices, louder than usual, and people walking towards the voices.


    Turning her head toward the direction of themotion, Shiro pointed her staff toward the voices.


    "Alka, do you know what is happening over there?"


    Alka frowned as she looked at the directions, before shaking her head.


    "No, I don''t know." She said before continue walking towards the mountain.


    Shiro stayed silent as she stared in that direction, her eyes glowed in a dark color for a split moment, making her face frown.


    "Alka, let''s go take a look first. We can goter towards the mountain." She said before walking in that direction without waiting for Alka.


    "W-White Life! Wait!" Alka said while flustered following behind Shiro.


    Following themotion, in only a few seconds, she arrived at the locations, where a crowd has already has gathered, surrounding two men.


    "Bastard! Take it back!" One of the men yelled as he pointed his bone-sharp fingers with fur toward the other man.


    "There is nothing to take back! I only told the truth!" The other replied with simr anger in his voice.


    Their anger against those two men boiled up inside of them and it resulted in action.


    Violent action.


    The man with the sharp bone fingers lunged towards the other man, which resulted in the other man stepping back in surprise at the sudden attack, unconsciously raising his arm to protect his face.


    Though that same action to protect his face resulted in being barely in range of the other man''s sharp fingers.


    Leavingrge but not deep cuts on the other man''s right hand.


    The blood from the cut stained the fur of the fingers of the other man while the white snow on the ground was painted bright red from the blood.


    "Kyagh~Look everyone! I told you that those outsiders were corrupted by Harsch Death! They are savages! Look at his ws! How do we share the same ancestors with that beast!?" The man who was hurt yelled while pointing at the man with bloodied arms.


    Some of the crowned frowned at the man''s words while others started mumbling to each other.


    "Hey, isn''t he part of the group that came with the primordial gods?"


    "I heard that Harsch Death was willing to give others powers..."


    "Is it because of this power that their bodies look different that ours?"


    "Have they been corrupted, simr to the frozen artifacts??"


    Most whisper''s were from the vigers of the Vashara, and their gazes were bing colder toward the people who were rescued by Danzel. No one knew who spread the news of Harsch Death giving powers to others or if it even corrupted others in the first ce.


    Hearing the whispers of those people and their look at him, the man with the bloodied finger, ground his teeth.


    He turned around to yell at the crowd about how wrong they were, but once he turned his head, he received a punch in the face from the other man who was cut. Sending him flying to the ground.


    "That''s payback for before! Outsider!"


    "Bastard!"


    Yelling out loud, all thoughts to prove the crowd wrong disappeared as he dashed into a melee with the man.


    Shiro who observed all this from the side frowned behind the mask.


    Alka also arrived and looked at the whole event with a frown.


    Pointing at their fight with her staff, Shiro asked.


    "Alka, why are those two fightings? And why aren''t the others stopping them?"


    "..." Alka''s frowns became worse upon the such question before sighting out helplessly.


    "Sigh...it''s because the other party is different from another. Be it their bodies or where they came from."<novelsnext>please visit </novelsnext>


    "As I mentioned before, Shiro Life, many people hold fear within them. And one of those fears is aimed at outsiders. But unlike the eldest primordial, they-"


    "They can go against them." Shiro cut off Alka in the middle of the sentence.


    Making Alva smile bitterly at Shiro''s words.


    As her words were the truth of the current situation.


    Unlike Danzel, who was seen as the personification of death and the harsh cold spread through thends. An entity that as far as they knew, couldn''t be killed or be bested.


    Alka remembered how shocked she was when she heard from Shin''Yen that he once seeded in destroying Harsch Death''s skull, only for it to be restored and toy with him.


    Facing an immensely strong being was taunting on it''s, but knowing that the same opponent was also an immortal being brought a certain despair and helplessness.


    Many of the Vashara came to the realization of this, but unlike Danzel, the new people were simr to them. Resulting in their fears and hatred towards Danzel being aimed toward the outsiders, who were associated with the primordial god as far as the Vashara people knew.


    Realizing the situation, Shiro couldn''t help but frown at Alka.


    "What about the words of you a priestess? Isn''t she the leader of the vige? She epted these people in your vige and yet look at this!" Shiro pointed at the gazes of the vigers of Vashara towards the outsiders and the two men fighting.


    Alka didn''t know what to say, or at least she couldn''t say what she wanted to.


    After all, she couldn''t say that their priestess had no other choice but to ept the people that Harsch Death brought over. Or how many were dissatisfied with the priestess''s decisions?


    Seeing no answering from Alka, she nced at her staff harder.


    "Tch, so stupid." Shiro mumbled as she run towards the crowd.


    "Everyone! Stop this fight immediately!" She yelled, but the encouragement of others towards the fight covered her own voice. Shiro wasn''t used to yelling on such asions.


    She tried to make her voice be heard, but no one was able to listen to her.


    Once she was behind the crowd, Shiro found herself being a mere dwarf among the people there. As she had the body of someone who just became a teenager and the people of the frozennds had naturally tall bodies.


    With no one noticing hering, she couldn''t help but yell to gain the attention of everyone.


    "Stop Fighting!!!"


    Her voice made the others in the crowd flinch in surprise, but before they could turn around to see the owner of the voice, a chill ran through their legs.


    Someone thought that a cold wind passed through their legs, but the few who looked at their feet shrieked in dread.


    Those few were the ones who were able to see with their own eyes how the shadows under their feet moved like flowing water below them.


    The shadows swiftly charged toward the duo fighting it out and cursing at each other.


    But it was only when they felt the same chill that fears struck them as the shadows surfaced and took physical form.


    "This is- Kyagghh!


    "What the- Aghhh"


    Before they could finish their sentence, the shadows finished taking their form, revealing a robed shadow in the middle of them. His hands made out of shadows grabbed the neck of the man with the bone fingers while the other hand grabbed the head of the man of Vashara with enormous force.


    "You of the living have broken thee''s creator and the mistress will. Your insolence shall no longer be required." Talon said with a chilling voice as he raised the two men in the air, spreading a dark mist through their bodies.


    If Danzel saw it, he would recognize the mist as nothing but a curse.


    "Talon! Wait, don''t kill them!" Shiro yelled at Talon as she pushed through the crowd.


    Talon slightly moved his head to the side. His ethereal eyes headed in a hood-covered fill in shadows.


    "L-Lording shadow! H-He insulted the primordial! I-I..." The man with the bone fingers said with difficulty as he was being choked to death.


    Hearing those words, the other man panicked.


    "I-I didn''t! He is lying! He attacked me and I defended myself!"


    "Talon, that''s enough, you can let them go." Shiro sighed in relief at Talon''s presence stopping the whole fight.


    Upon her words, Talon stared ahead and let go of the man with the bone fingers.


    ''Good thing that Talon was here to stop all this, if he wasn''t here, I wouldn''t know how to stop th-''


    Before she could finish her through them, a sudden *cracking* sound appeared.


    And in the next moment, a ssh of blood happend, as Talon crashed the other man, leaving the body to fall to the ground.


    Shiro fell in shock and froze at what just happend.

 Chapter 437 Troubles Of Vashara (3)

    Everything seemed to have frozen as everyone stared in horror at the crashing of one''s head.


    The blood dripped from Talon''s shadow hand as he stared at the fallen corpse on the ground.


    Opening his hand made out of physical shadows, dead mana sipped out of like falling smoke on top of the corpse.


    Which was seemingly drawing the dead mana towards inside the body.


    Not only that, but the corpse shadow was also seeming to be affected by the dead mana, turning bits of the dead mana into dark mana to mix up with the other type of mana.


    Though that was a sight only Shiro was able to perceive.


    To others, the shadows of the corpse seemed toe to life and enter the corpse just like the dark mist.


    Which resulted in the dead body starting to twitch, making the vigers and the refugees of all the other viges remember the sight of how the primordial god, Harsch Death was raising their kind and his enemies alike.


    Few stepped back in dread and most felt their legs grow weaker while a few forced themself to run away from the events happening here.


    Only when they began to run, did the corpse start to rise unnaturally, as if something was pulling his chest to rise, where it was actually the shadows that infected the corpse''s body to forcefully pull him up.


    Though the movement of the shadows wasn''t gentle.


    The shadows forcing the body to move ripped muscles and pierces through the skin, revealing that truly, the shadows were taking over the body.


    And when the corpses stood with a straight back in front of Talon, the location where the head was only a few moments ago was covered by shadows, effectively stopping the bleeding.


    Or rather, stopping the blood from spewing out of its neck.


    In turn, turning a corpse into a headless undead was supported by abination of necromancy and dark magic.


    Seeing his creations, Talon felt disappointed more than anything.


    ''So it was a failure...'' Talon''s ethereal eyes hiding inside the shadows of his hood disappeared, reflecting what he thought about his creation.


    Pure disappointment and dissatisfaction.


    Though that didn''t stop him to gather his attention on the living who was watching him.


    "Thee creator has already warned all of you. Resulting in conflict is seen''s as an attempt to break your allegiance towards thee creator." Talon said with a chilling voice turning his head left and then right, trying to see if there are further traitorous though hidden in the people''s eyes.


    "You either serve as one of the willing"


    "Or you are made to serve as one of the dead."


    Those words reminded the vigers of Vashara of the dread of the whole situation, re-igniting the fear they had when Danzel had firste to their vige, And increasing it at that.


    The refugees in turn were much better off as they haven''t need to be reminded of it.


    And among those refugees, instead of backing off like the others, stepped closer toward the living shadow. One decided to step closer.


    Unlike many others, the one who stepped closer was half naked with his chest showing and only wearing pants without even any sort of shoes.


    His face showed no fear towards the living shadow and his gaze was extremely focused. He had a certain aura of strength around his body and the sharp bones on his finger were razor sharp at the very least.


    The man was none other than Herlin, one of the leaders of the refugees and of the few who reached the 3rd-tier strength.


    Herlin stepped in front of the man who initiated violence and was let go by Talon''s grasp.


    The man could barely raise his head and look at Herlin, as the curse weighted his body down.


    "C-Chief- I did-" Before the man could finish, Herlin''s cold gaze at him made him freeze.


    And without speaking to the man, Herlin threw a kick right at his stomach and sent him flying to the rest of the crowd.


    Leaving the man coughing and shaking.


    He stared at the man for a second before Herlin turned his gaze towards the living shadow who was observing him.


    Next thing he did, he bent down, not on his knees, but on his back just like that Anabast always did at Danzel.


    "Lording Shadow, I apologize for failing to keep people like him in check and having one of you step in. I will make sure to discipline him and make him follow the primordial gods will. But I ask for thee mercy." Herlin said with a deep yet unflinching voice.


    After a pause to see Talon''s reaction, Herlin added in.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    "If it isn''t possible, then please punish me instead of him. As I hold just as much fault for letting something like this happen in the first ce."


    "H-Her-lin~ No, Sto~op, *cough! *cough!" The man who was kicked said as he tried to reach out to Herlin despite his pain.


    "Shut up." Herlin turned his head a bit and stared at the man, his eyes burning with killing intent.


    Talon observed the whole interaction before he floated closer to Herlin and looked down at him, literally though who much taller Talon was.


    Talon raised his hand and was about to touch Herlin, but before he could a barrier made out of light surrounded Herlin, resulting Talon in touching the barrier, which once in contact seemed to burn his hand, making Talon withdraw his hand and stared at the one who erected the barrier made out of light.


    Which was none other but Shiro.


    "That is far enough, Talon. Go back in my shadow." Shiro said while pointing to her staff that was erecting the light mana from the golden mana crystal.


    That sight by itself seemed to aggravate the shadows that made out Talon''s body. But that onlysted for a moment.


    "The thee#s creator is my will." Talon finally said as his body slowly entered the shadows of the ground. Before he left the scene though, Talon turned ast look at the undead he created and willingly made the shadows inside his body to shread the body, leaving for the second time nothing but a corpse.


    Shiro clenched her staff with greater strength upon seeing this event before her gaze towards the other man on the ground.


    "...Light, embrace and south. [Healing Light]. Tent my wounds. Spirit of Home. [Tendering Warm Healing]." Shiro cast two healing spells in quick session."


    Once the light fell on top of the man, making his pain disappear just like his wounds, Shiro turned and left once she made sure that he wasn''t hurt.


    "Thank you, your grace, White Life." Herlin said at the leaving Shiro.


    Alka followed behind Shiro''s hasty steps, but even she couldn''t help but look at the Shiro''s shadow in fear.


    It took them a few minutes for these two to reach the house at the mountain where Shiro and Danzel were staying. Alka was panting from walking at such hastened pace and looked at Shiro with worry, as she hasn''t spoken a word ever since what happend with the man.


    Putting the wooden notes that they were carrying, Shiro exited the house with Alka.


    "Thank you for your help, Alka. You can go now." Shiro said.


    Alka felt like saying something, but the reminder that under her shadow was Talon, she looked away from Shiro and nodded her head.


    "As youmand, oh primordial god of White Life."


    Seeing her leaving down to the vige, Shiro stayed there in front of the house for a few moments in silence.


    Raising her hand and taking off the bone fox mask that Danzel had made for her, her eyes browns were furrowed with frustration and anger.


    "Talon! Come out!" Shiro yelled.


    In the next second, her request was met with her shadow stretching and rising up.


    Slowly taking a physical form of a tall roped shadow floating in front of her. Twice as tall if not further than Shiro himself.


    Despite being her called Talon, Shiro still felt intimidated by the Talon''s sheer presence.


    "You called upon me, mistress?" Talon said with his chilling voice of the undead while staring at Shiro while taking peaks around for potential dangers.


    "Yes, Talon, I did call you." Shiro said in frustration.


    "I wanted to ask you why you killed that man in the vige!" Shiro yelled while pointing her finger at Talon.


    And despite how straightforward her words were, to Talon, they brought him more confusion than anything.


    "Because I wasmanded to?" Talon said truthfully, making Shiro anger re.


    "Commanded to!? I told you to let go of the man! That is enough! Not to go and kill the man! Didn''t Rue, your creator also follow my will!? And despite his orders on you, you killed that man!" Shiro yelled at Talon.


    Talon heard Shiro out in silence and only when he waited for Shiro to continue and she didn''t, did he respond while turning his head in confusion.


    "I simply followed the will of thee creator as much as I followed your will, mistress." Talon said, further frustrating Shiro.


    "Liar! I never told you to kill the man! The people weren''t also going against Rue''s will either!" Shiro yelled though Talon stayed silent watching Shiro.


    Clenching her staff, waiting for an answer, but got none.


    "Fine! Let''s go and see Rue!

 Chapter 438 Overwriting Order

    Danzel stared in front of him in silence.


    Contemting what Shiro told me about one of his Anabast.


    ''Though I expected some trouble to brew with those people. To think that something like this will happen so soon. We haven''t even been here for a day.'' Danzel grumbled internally.


    He thought that the presence of his undead and his own would dy if not prevent such issues from happening in the first ce.


    ''Is it because I myself wasn''t present? The people that followed me were obedient enough. Are the guys of Vashara at fault for this trouble?'' Danzel thought, annoyed by the turn of events.


    He had already troubled himself and wasted days of time in making this ce a temporary base of operation. And had several parts prepared for his projects, while not dismissing the main "mission".


    Which was scouting the frozennds to find their way back to the "Main Lands".


    Problems to ur were but natural, but for them to happen so soon, someone had to be at fault. Or rather, was at fault.


    He then looked at Talon with his ethereal eyes.


    Getting hold of his connection with him to see even his most inner desires and feelings.


    He felt many things, be it the hatred of the undead, his interest in magic, to prove himself, disappointment, contemtions, or confusion.


    But none of those feelings held any shred of betrayal or anything of the sort.


    In fact, it was the total opposite.


    Talon despite standing in front of him in silence, felt confused and worried wherever his actions went against his will.


    Making Danzel smile bitterly, knowing full well what the cause of the situation was all about.


    "Overwriting orders with orders, huh?" Danzel mumbled to himself as he stared at Baron.


    "Unfortunately Baron, this has to be the end of our session. Go with Talon down the vige and tell a few Draugrs to specifically patrol the vige. It doesn''t need to be many...10 or 20 should be enough to make this for happening again in the meantime."


    "I shall impose your will as theemanded." Baron said, but the hid of disappointment he felt from losing the time to learn from his creator couldn''t be hidden from Danzel.


    "O thee creator, I-" Talon tried to exin himself, but Danzel looked at him with his ring ethereal eyes.


    "You got your order Talon, fulfill them." Danzel said out loud, but at the same time, he internally spoke to Talon.


    ''Talon, I can imagine your course of action. And I ain''t ming you for acting upon them. But it seems like you have lost Shiro''s trust, the one who teaches you and the others magic. For now, go and do as I ordered.''


    Hearing his creator''s words from his connection with him, Talon clenched his hand and bowed his back.


    "-I will do as youmand, thee creator."


    As he watched the two leaving, he put his focus on the small girl with long white hair and pale white skin.


    "There you have it, Shiro. Would that be all?" Danzel said.


    Hearing his answer, Shiro frowned and yelled back.


    "What do you mean "Would that be all"!? Aren''t you going to punish Talon!? You told me that an undead that you created couldn''t define his creator''s order. And you told them that as long as they don''t breach your will, they will hear me out!" Shiro yelled back at Danzel, making him frown (can''t show it as his face is a skull).


    "Careful with your words, Shiro. You are getting ahead of yourself, blinding yourself in the process." Danzel said with a chilling voice, making Shiro freeze in the spot.


    "The actions of my undead are my own, a simple extension of my will bestowed upon them. Punishing Talon for simply following my will makes me no less responsible for killing that man that makes you responsible, Shiro." Danzel said, shocking Shiro from thest bit he said.


    "W-What? How am I responsible!? I told Talon to stop and let go of the man! Not to kill him! I-"


    "Did you know? Did you truly tell Talon to not kill that man?"<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    "Yes! That''s the first thing that I told him! I already told you so!" Shiro replied, seeing no point in the whole conversation.


    Though Danzel shook his head.


    "Indeed, this order made Talon stop the two from fighting and not kill them in the process. He also made sure to incapacitate the two men. The important part was when you ordered Talon to dismiss your order. Leaving for my own orders to take ce.


    "W-What do you mean?" Shiro said while taking a step back.


    Danzel shook his head and sighed out loud.


    "Sigh, you been there when I have ced my orders with all my undead. And among them was to eliminate the ones who disturbed and misbehaved. Your "that''s enoughmand" was understood as removing your previous order by Talon. That resulted in my order to take ce and, well, kill the man."


    Shiro eyes shook upon the revtion while shaking her head in denial.


    "No, t-this isn''t what I meant! I didn''t want I wanted-"


    "And I believe you, Shiro." Danzel raised his hand to stop her from continuing.


    "But as you I told you before, depending on the quality of the spell that made the undead, they will be able to understand the will of their creator and move ording to the intended will or orders of their creator. We''ve gone through this before, Shiro. And Talon has the same connection with me, but what does that mean for you?"


    Danzel looked at her in silence, letting here up with the answer.


    It took her only a few seconds to gather herself and think of what Rue was telling her. And once she figure it out, she lowered her head.


    "T-That I don''t have this connection, as I wasn''t the creator." Shiro said, with tears building up in her eyes.


    "Correct." Said as he stared at her with his ring eyes.


    "If anything Talon could be med for, that would be his decision as to why he killed the one man instead of the other. If you want to me anyone, me me for imposing the orders on my undead." Danzel said as he walked one step closer to her.


    "But even if you did, my orders will still hold and people will continue to die from their stupidity. I only need a few of all of those people alive. I know that you are smart Shiro. And because you are smart, you should know what the fasted way to return to the "Main Lands" is and to meet Agares, your grandfather, and Velkir, who can treat your body."


    Albeit Danzel wasn''t yelling and he was simply stating the reality of the situation, to Shiro it felt like Danzel was yelling at her.


    Shiro tried her best to hold her tears while thinking about what to say to prove Danzel''s words wrong. s, inside her, she knew that what he said was right. Making the tears that build up fall to the ground.


    Making Danzel feel extremely awkward about the whole situation. Unsure of what to say.


    The two stood there, with Shiro crying from guilt and Danzel standing there.


    It was only after a while when Danzel noticed that their clothes of Shiro have been damaged that he decided to speak up.


    "Even if it doesn''t mean anything to you, know that you aren''t at fault Shiro. In life, there is bound to be a situation like this that you will have to face, regardless of wherever you like it or not. How about we go to the house and see how to fix your clothes? We can forget about all the lessons today if want..." Danzel patted her head like pressing a big button with his hand before removing it, knowing that his gauntlet was chilling cold and the dead mana surrounding him was anything but pleasant for the living.


    Shiro sniffed and used her free hand to clean her tears.


    "Can an undead talk about how life is supposed to be?" Shiro tried to say while hiding her face by putting her bone fox mask on.


    Danzel shrugged his shoulders, releasing how ironic his words truly were.


    "For a midget to holding such a big staff with one hand, I find rather more amusing than my words." Danzel countered back.


    Shiro face''s pouted a bit, despite still feeling conflicted and sad about what he told her minutes ago. Holding her staff though, she was reminded that despite being far away from her grandpa, she still had something that he gave her with him.


    Staring, at Rue, she remembered that despite the situation, she wasn''t alone in this cold ce, even if the one being with her wasn''t of the best character.


    "I am not a midget." Shiro retorts back.


    "If you aren''t a midget, then I am one of the living. I would be more eager to believe you if you told me that you were a dwarf."

 Chapter 439 Lies In Truth, Hypocrisy In Actions

    Once Danzel and Shiro went to the house, they stayed till night there.


    Despite being reluctantly himself, Danzel decided to give Shiro that day to her.


    From lessons to casual talks of magic.


    To some of what Shiro considered his "adventures" to somehow fixing the roof and floor, which was damaged, with means "unknown" to him, till fixing Shiro''s clothes.


    Hours where he could spend learning magic, bettering his runesmithing, or teaching his Anabast''s.


    Opening the door and leaving the house once Shiro went to sleep, Danzel shook his head helplessly.


    "I shouldn''t have offered her to make her new clothes, how should I even manage to make a robe? In the first ce, I am a death knight...not a damn tailor."


    When he offered her to make her new clothes, what he had in mind was something simr to what he had done. Stitching together fuer and leather with bones to make it wearable and warm.


    That would allow him to practice a bit more with [Bone Shaping].


    A skill-like spell that he found interesting to use.


    He could imagine that the spell had potential in necromantic ritualism. Where it revolved it messing with a corpse to raise a weirder or more powerful undead.


    He already proved this through the creation of Ss. Allowing the undead to gain a new kind of sight.


    Also, the book that Velkir has given him had a section of this kind of stuff and he already could purchase a few skills and spells that might go that route of necromancy.


    In short, it was arge branch of the necromancy tree.


    Though Danzel had pushed away from starting learning it for now. As he had already his hands full with all the other stuff. Also, the branch was more suited for necromancers for the magic caster route.


    As a necromancer focused on meleebat, that sort of specialization would bring him little reward in the short term. And most likely strengthen his undead creation''s rather than himself.


    He considered an interesting branch to keep in mind, but nothing more.


    As an immortal being, he could always go back and study it after a few years or decades.


    "That is if I even have time then..." Danzel mumbled as he walked down the mountain.


    He looked at his side at all the other houses, his sight telling him that only a few decided to stay in their house in the mountains. The other houses that he stared at had no signs of vitality or soul essence.


    When he first came, those were filled with vitality, but now that he came back, it seems like they abandoned their houses. Danzel guessed that those that lived in the mountain decided to live with some rtive down to the vige.


    In the first ce, he didn''t even care.


    Switching his gaze down the mountain at the vige, he could see several of his undead walkings and doing their thing despite no living soul being outside.At least that''s what he thought at first, before spotting a group walking around the ice walls with a few of his undead.


    "What are they doing there?" Danzel mumbled.


    He cast to himself [Mist Presence], masking his presence as if it were on a different in, resulting in his bones letting out a dark mist, which escape from his armor.


    Then his body turned into a simr dark mist like a wave down the mountain with the usage of [Phantom Phase].


    Arguably one of his most powerful skills.


    In a matter of seconds, the dark mist traveled down to the vige and swam through the streets before smashing into the ice wall


    Upon contact, the dark mist twisted itself as it rose to the air as if the dark mist was wing its way up the ice wall.


    Meanwhile at the same time...


    One woman of the group who was walking at the ice wall looked at a man with a worried expression.


    "Hey, are you sure that we are allowed to be here?"


    The man in question looked pointed at the Draugrs who they passed.


    "What? You don''t believe me? Look at the followers of Harsh Death. Do you really believe that they would have left us alone if what we were doing is forbidden? I even asked one of them if we could patrol the wall for them." The man with a voice of confidence, made the nerves of his group rx a tiny bit.


    Though what the man didn''t say to his group was that the Draugr that he asked hadn''t given any confirmation or denial. Being among the ones that were created from the "foreign" viges. He among few others had yet to receive such specific orders wherever they were allowed to "stand" on the wall.


    All they were ordered was that anyone who left the vige without the permission of one of the Anabast was to be killed and their body to be brought to either the Anabast or Danzel.


    And as the wall was technically a part of the vige, the Draugrs left the group of 3 to go only having a few tallying them.


    "I guess you are right..." The woman said, from her face alone one could easily tell that she was anxious.


    "As long as we can be of some help and show our dedication to Harsch Death, no matter how small. That''s all that matters." The other man who held a spear made out of bones said with a serious voice.


    A spear he was extremely grateful for receiving, despite being one of the extras that Danzel made.


    "As of now, we are unwee here. Practically outsiders.And our only patron is Harsch Death. If he weren''t here we would have-" The man dramatically halted what he was about to say and even had his mouth open like a confused finish, making the other two look at him weirdly.


    The woman also froze a secondter, forcing the man to halt his step and look at the duo confused.


    "I get that you guys are worried, but you really need to calm your nerves. We had it far worse when we were marching with Harsch Death. True to his name ain''t I ri-"


    Before he could finish his sentence, he felt a cold and heavy grabnd on his shoulder. Making the man turn by reflex to see who it was.


    "-ght?"


    But once he turned his head, his face quickly lost all color, and his body froze from dread, forgetting even to breathe at the sight of who was grabbing him.


    With dark misting out of his full-ted armor, the undead with dark green ethereal eyes, the same entity they referred to as Harsch Death, was now standing behind him.


    "What are you three doing here at the walls?" Danzel said as he let go of the man. Once his hand left his shoulder, he couldn''t help but turn around swiftly, which made him fall butt-first to the ice floor.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    "I-w-we were-" The man struggled to speak and showed signs of distress.


    Though the other man immediately acted in a level-headed manner despite his fear.


    Whispering to the woman to go to their knees and helping the other man get in the same position, it took them only 3 seconds for him to answer Danzel''s question.


    "O thee primordial god, w-we thought that we could help your followers with the patrolling of the walls. A-As we saw them how they worked the whole day and protect the vige, we felt the need to give them support no matter how small. F-Forgive us if we stepped over the line that we shouldn''t have. Please." The man said as he mmed lightly his head on the ice floor.


    And simr to how the duckling followed the mother duck, the other followed suit.


    "Please!"


    "Please!"


    "..." Danzel felt somewhat annoyed with the man mimicking the way how his Anabast talked.


    His cold gazey on top of them.


    Danzel called the two Draugrs who were tailing the group to see why they were allowed here.


    And asmanded, they did as such.


    Having heard his Draugr''s thoughts and what those guys talked about, Danzel came to the realization that those 3 were either ignorant or stupid.


    Maybe both.


    "You three were lucky, if one of the five were to find you three here, you would have been put to death. Also, down bow in front of me like that..." Danzel exined, making the 3 shudders with their death being mentioned.


    "Now leave, none of the living is allowed here from now on. Your help is unnecessary, if not a liability."


    "Y-Yes! We thank thee eldest primordial God."


    The three quickly left with hastened steps.


    Danzel watched them leave before shaking his and looking at the mountain, specifically at the house where Shiro was sleeping now.


    ''It seems like I failed to spread my will though my creation''s probably. I might have fooled Shiro this time, but who knows how severe my will and orders are going to bent..''


    That''s right.


    Though what Danzel told Shiro waspletely the truth. He had purposely let out a detail about his Anabast. Or rather covered by ying them being the undead card.


    Throughout his existence, Danzel might have done several mistakes. But that didn''t make him a fool.


    He wasn''t as naive to believe that one of his Anabasts, Talon at that. Wasn''t capable toprehend Shiro''s true will through her orders.


    All 5 of the Anabast were extremely intelligent. But the smartest of them had to be Talon and Ss. In his eyes, they showed the most talent of being a magic caster.


    He found Baron to too adhere while Leyone and Rayone seem to be relying on each other for their studies.


    So for Talon not to understand the meaning of Shiro''s words was in his opinion impossible.


    And he knew the exact reason why Talon still did what he did despite knowing.


    That reason is the very nature of the Anabast races.


    There was a reason why the status window described the Anabast as killers of their very own creators.


    And after hearing Shiro''s story, Danzel finally understood what exactly the description meant.


    The power to bent order''s to fulfill their goal while still abholding the order.


    Like making a wish to be rich and the wish teleports you under the sea near a pile of treasures full of gold. Your wish would be fulfilled, in ways, one hadn''t intended.


    ''I had thought that the little mana that I had given them would have made them have a simr mindset of order as the Draugr''s.'' Danzel though.


    He couldn''t evenprehend how much free his Anabast would have if he were to forsake more than 55%, when 5% was already enough for them to y around with his orders.


    Though despite being aware of that, Danzel wasn''t going to punish Talon for his decision.


    As there were many factors that could determine such decision.


    The most obvious is the instinctual hatred towards the living.


    At times even he couldn''t keep those emotions in check. For undead who were created not even a year ago, their control over those instincts would have been far inferior that his.


    "At least for reference sake, I know how the Anabast could act without my will instructing them. And for the better or the worse, for this to happen now and notter is a gift in disguise." Danzel mumbled, changing a saying that he remembered from a human years ago.


    Though Danzel was sure that Shiro would disagree with this statement.


    Withdrawing his gaze from the mountain, Danzel stared down at the vige.


    ''To the original people of Vashara, what I am doing is nothing but the same that Hanson once did to me. Imprisonment in their own house, except for the few who believe in that primordial god''s bullshit, in time, if given the chance, they will act as I did once.''


    Danzel then remembered what the group of fox people said on the walls.


    "The others though may be worth giving them a chance to prove themself useful more than I have intended from them." Danzel said as he stepped off the wall.


    ''To think that I would reach the point that I would act the same way as my captor once did.'' Danzel thought bitterly, fully aware of how much of a hypocrite he was being.


    But those thoughts weighed him only for a split moment and disappeared as Danzel''s feet touched the ground and turned into a dark mist.


    nning to visit the few candidates for his and possibly future designs.

 Chapter 440 Primordial Gods Mission

    ?


    At the same time, at one of thergest houses in the Vashara vige.


    A man with bone-reinforced ws on his hand walked towards the same house with a frown on his head. His steps and demeanor bore an aura of strength and that of a hunter.


    The man raised his hand and knocked at the door with an unmoving gaze.


    *Knock~Knock~


    It wasn''t long before he could hear steps from the other side of the door and for the door to open.


    "Come on in." The owner of the voice who opened the door was a beautiful woman with multiple fluffy tails dancing behind her.


    The man with the ws nodded at the woman and went inside the house, staring in front of a table that had 2 other people staring back at him.


    "You arete, Herlin." Another man said to Herlin with a frown.


    Unlike Herlin, the man had a golden tail behind him.


    Which for fox men, was such a rare evolution that was unheard of before. As only women grew tails.


    "I had to deal with the recent events. Also moving around the town without being noticed by the primordial god''s followers is a task on its own." Herlin said with a cold expression.


    The man with the golden tail, Gilgamash scoffed in annoyance.


    "What about the lording shadows?" This time it was the many-tailed fox woman that asked as she passed Herlin and took a seat at the table.


    "Do you really believe that he-No, that any of us would have noticed them without being noticed back, Sernatta?" The woman named Kuroshi said, her tail and hair are a mix of white and ck color.


    She had her hand supporting her headzily.


    "You have seen them, going in and out of our very own shadows. For damn''s sake! We wouldn''t even know if they are here or not in the first ce!" Kuroshi said in a mocking and frustrated tone.


    "And that''s not talking about the primordial one." Gilgamash added in.


    Sernatta stayed silent at the two reminding the existence that they were now serving.


    "We are getting off the point of this meeting. The strength of the oldest primordial is unfathomable to us. The only one who fought him was Shin''Yen and he told me that the primordial toyed with the whole fight. He even told me that he destroyed his skull, which is well known for being the weakness of all cursed warriors. s, the primordial has the capability to evade death, if not even surpassed death itself."


    "Unkible and immortality, with the strength to stand supreme. For all we know, he might be older than all our ancestorsbine." Gilgamash added in.


    "Not to forget that albeit he seems to favor the use of that long de, he is still capable of magic. I can''t even imagine what kind of magic such being could have mastered if we considered how long he live- No, how long he even existed." Sernatta said as she was brushing one of her tails on top of herp with her hand.


    "The lording shadows call him the creator, which hinds that they could be more or at the very least, create more lording shadows. Hehe~ We might be seeing five, but under our feet, it could be ten more if not a hundred!" Kuroshi say as she chuckled at the disparity of the idea.


    The 4 strongest of forsaken ones fell in silence as they let all those things sink in.


    It was only after a few seconds of silence that felt like hours that one decided to change the subject.


    "I would say we stop there and talk about why we all came here." Sernatta said as she looked at Herlin.


    "Today''s ident, it was one of the Vashara people and one of your tribe, right? Though we heard few things, we would like to hear it from you, the leader of your tribes."


    Herlin frowned but still nodded his head and exined everything he heard from the man who was lucky enough to escape from Talon.


    After hearing the whole story, Kuroshi had an indifferent look while Sernatta and Gilgamash.


    "We...were wrong. So wrong..." Sernatta said while looking down at her tail.


    "If that one of your tribe hasn''t used the other of sphemy, he too might have died." Gilgamash said with a grim tone.


    "I think so too. I believed we got the wrong idea about the youngest primordial, White Life." Herlin nodded at the too, making Kuroshi confused with Shiro being mentioned now.


    "Hoey, weren''t we talking about Harsch Death and the lording shadow the whole time? Why mention White Life now?"


    Sernatta turned her head and looked at her in annoyance.


    "Don''t you understand? White Lifemanded the lording shadows to not kill either one of Vashara. But the lording shadow still did it."


    "Which means that her influence among the Harsch Death followers is limited and can''t be relied on to keep them away from our people by getting close to her." Herlin added.


    "Making the will of Harsch Death all the more important...as those who broke his will can''t be saved by White Life." Kuroshi mumbled as she finally understood the problem.


    They had witnessed Shiro multiple times healing their wounds and even ordering a few Draugr''s around to do her bidding.


    Danzel speech of them falling under servitude also made them believe that she held the same authority on the undead as he had. Except only him able to overwrite her orders with his.<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    s,


    Today''s events proved to everyone in this room that White Life, or rather Shiro, had no reliable control over the undead.


    Before they considered Shiro as their savior and protector.


    And albeit their view hasn''t changed much, it made the pressure that was put on them feel all the heavier from Danzel''s orders.


    "I do not understand why you all make those long faces. Seriously, in the end, we all are just supposed to do the same thing that we have done till now. Following the will of the primordial gods." Kuroshi crossed her arms together.


    "The forsaken who died well deserved his punishment. Unlike them, they had already abandoned thends of the primordial gods. And yet he still dared spheme and insult the very gods. While Herlin''s man defended Harsch Death."


    "As there was already a dispute among them, hence breaking the peace, both of those idiots broke the will of Harsch Death. Meaning that both should have died and be his followers for eternity. But despite that, the lording shadow spared you tribe member for defending Harsch Death where that forsaken one was punished rightfully."


    "In my opinion, we should be thankful for the kindness of the primordial one. Without them, the woman of each of our tribes would have been raped to death and the man worked too exhausting to end up as food. We first need to be grateful to be unsatisfied with their will." Kuroshi said, her eyes glowing with mana and her aura radiating from her body subconsciously.


    Sernatta closed her eyes and her face was emotionless, still brushing her tail as she heard those words, while Gilgamash had a frown on his face, clearly showing his dissatisfaction at Kuroshi.


    Herlin in turn, nodded at her words.


    "Kuroshi is right, without them many of us would have died and continue to be abused. Few of our people even reunited with their families after being kidnapped. I dreamed countless times of rising up against the hunters and freeing the people from all that suffering."


    "I thought it was but a mere dream, wishful thinking back then, but that very wish was granted by Harsch Death. Just as our ancestors did, we should dedicate ourselves to their will and prove our worth." Herlin''s calm yet deep voice made the others look at him, before nodding in confirmation.


    "He is right, we should make ourselves useful even if it isn''t directly asked of us. Prove to the primordial''s our worth." Sernatta said


    "To also guarantee our safety and goodwill of the primordial''s to our people." Gilgamash added in.


    "So that we can live like our ancestor, Wallren Sengata, and make the great wolf proud. We need to prove ourselves to the primordial ones like how he did once. For our tribe''s man." Kuroshi said.


    "For our tribe''s man."


    "For our tribe''s man."


    "For our tribe''s man."


    The 3 others voiced herst words in unison, creating a certain bond among them.


    s, before they could savor the creation of a bond of survivors.


    Each of them felt a sudden chilling run through their spine.


    And just a momentter, a cold voice echoed through the room.


    "I apud the four of you." The cold voice said.


    "!!!"


    All four, at the same time, at the same second.


    All stood up from their seats looking around them for the cold voice that they had all heard before.


    And soon enough, their expectations were met.


    Through the small openings of the wooden walls, a dark mist started to go in the house through the whole house, filling the whole room with a dark mist that circled around them.


    And from inside the dark mist, footstep''s te boots started to appear.


    Slowly, the appearance of the owner came out of the mist, looking down at the fox people with his ring dark green eyes.


    "I have heard your motivation, you four." Danzel said as he showed a malicious grin.


    "And it just happend that I may be able to put your motivation into practice. To see if you are really worthy or not." Danzel eyed them one by one.


    "For those who are sessful, I will grant them unimaginable power." Danzel said in his cold voice.


    "As for those who are not..." Danzel didn''t finish his sentence. Letting their imagination do the rest,


    And his sudden appearance fills them with fear, dread, admiration, and many other emotions.


    His words felt many times heavier in their minds.

 Chapter 441 Battle Training

    ?


    Tomorrow morning in the Vashara vige...


    The newly build gate of the Vashara vige started to slowly open, revealing the vast whitend outside the viges.


    And waiting in front of the gate, were the 4 fox people that had been visited by the personification of the chilling cold and death.


    Or at least that was what they thought that Danzel was.


    The 4 of them looked at the vast whitends lost in thought, but not long after, their attention was drawn to the sound of several footsteps stepping at the snow. And from all the footsteps, one particr made them flinch.


    Without even turning around, they felt the ominous aura of death radiating from him.


    Of course, the being in question was the death knight known as Rue Danzel.


    Or to them, as Harsch Death.


    "It seems that all 4 of you have decided to take upon the task." Danzel''s chilling voice said with amusement.


    "Your will is ourmand, O primordial one." Sernatta said while bowing the same the Anabast tent to do.


    The others nodded at her words, despite a few of them notpletely believing in her words.


    In fact, Sernatta herself was one of them who didn''t mean her words.


    Danzel stared at her in silence with his ominous ring eyes. Aware that not all of them if not any of them truly meant it.


    ''If I truly want, I could figure out wherever they lie or where their true allegiance is with the rune of Uzal. But that would be a waste of paper and effort.'' He thought while pushing the idea to the back of his mind.


    In the first ce, making thempletely blindly follow his will was extremely difficult for beings that weren''t his undead.


    "Words are easy to say, but actions..." Danzel said as kept his gaze on Sernatta, which made her flinch.


    Walking towards her, Danzel raised his towards her, making the 4 of them flinch.


    Sernatta in particr started to imagine her head exploding, being strangled, and many other things that this hand could do to her.


    "Here, you guys would need that." Danzel brought out a map from his storage ring, waiting for Sernatta to take it.


    Realizing their mistake, they all rose from their bowing position, and Sernatta who was being offered the map stared with a lost look before epting the map.


    "It contains the vague directions of where you need to go. I will also give you 4 of those guys." Danzel pointed at the 20 Draugrs that were behind them.


    The Draugrs acted swiftly, a few taking the role of holding the supplies of the 4 fox people that were soon to depart.


    The 4 of them looked at the undead working in silence until Kuroshi opened her mouth.


    "By all the respect O Harsch Death, I believe that the 4 of us would be sufficient to fulfill the binding that you have given us. Though not as great as the five lording shadows... we also are strong. We alone can fulfill the mission without the help of our followers. There is no need to waste manpower-"


    "If I wanted manpower, I wouldn''t have sent any of you to do my binding in the first ce. If I wanted manpower, I would have killed the unneeded ones and made them serve me for eternity. Never tiring, never hungering. Andstly, never fearing to perform my will." Danzel said as he turned his back on them, starting to walk away.


    ''And If I really wanted, I could finish the task in just a few hours if I wanted. The whole reason why I make you do such minor binding is to make you believe that you earned the right to have great runes carved in your bodies and to also give me time to get more familiar with them. As they are only 5 realistic candidates. 7 at best.''


    Danzel thought as he left the group to do his binding, walking at the "streets" with one Draugr at each of his sides. Deep in the thought of how to perform the great runes at livings beings.


    The process was quite simple for corpses and undead despite howplicated the runes were to carve. But using the same technique towards the living was torturous.


    For obvious reasons.


    ''It might have been better if my first test subjects were Azrael or Sartan. Maybe Vanessa would also have been suitable to withstand the process, but as of now, I am stuck with 5 tries...'' he thought.


    Not even considering the other people who were of the 1st and 2nd-tier to able to survive a quarter of the carving process.


    "Maybe I will have to figure out how to use blood magic while carving for it to be a sess, but still using magic while carving would be..."<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    While considering the application of runesmithing and using the magic of how to best make it work, one of his Draugrs came towards him.


    "O Great Master and Creator. Is it now an appropriate time?"


    "Hmmm? What is it?" Danzel looked at the newly arrived Draugr confused.


    "As we have been tasked, me and the others tasked to produce weapons with the help of that cksmith, have finally created the first patch of weapons and are ready for inspections."


    Hearing that news, Danzel''s ethereal eyes red up.


    "Really now? I expected it to take a bit longer considering how long it took for that dwarf to make one... tell me, how many did you guys make?


    "A total of 20 weapons. Half of them are swords and the other half are polearms of different arts."


    Nodding his head, Danzel thought of going there to inspect the work that they have done in person, but after thinking of it for a bit he shook his head.


    "Well done, for now, organize those weapons to be sent at the mountain to where I work for the inspection. Inform those who worked at them to await my report before continuing their work. Till then, you all are to take a break. Or rather, the cksmith is to take a break, you all are free to better your skill if you so wish or train with the others inbat. But leave the cksmith alone for now, as he is only a mortalpared to us."


    "It shall be done." The draugr said while bowing his head and heading off to do as he was told.


    Danzel nodded at his answer before continuing his walk through the vige.


    He spend half an hour just walking around and looking around at what people were doing before getting bored of it and going out of his way to meet his Anabasat to teach them a part of his magical knowledge while also talking to them about what they found out about much, their difficulties in some aspects of magic, theories that they had and such.


    The time he spend talking with them was quite refreshing as he watched them stumble into some problems that he stumbled before in magic. And hearing of what they learned was interesting as he himself didn''t know the spells that they knew. Also, the progress that they made in learning [Necromatic Restoraction] wasn''t too bad.


    After leaving them on their own, Danzel finally decided to go and inspect the weapons that his Draugr had made.


    Turning into dark mist, the mist traveled so fast that it took him but mere seconds toe to the house of the mountain.


    Opening the door, Danzel found the boxes with weapons and Shiro who was also holding one of them while sitting in the bed.


    "So you woke up?" Danzel said while closing the door.


    "Hmpf, who wouldn''t be awake after a few undeades inside the house where you are sleeping?" Shiro said annoyed, as she knew that the Draugr had to bemanded toe to the house by him.


    Using his own soul essence, he created an ethereal hand that snatched the halberd sort of weapon that Shiro had in her hands.


    Making Shiro puff her cheeks at Danzel who had his eyes on the halberd-looking weapon.


    [Frozen Iron Rough Halberd]: A weapon made out of frozen iron with the hands of an undead whose skill is worse than an apprentice. The bnce of the weapons is off and the edge hasn''t been sharpened thoughtfully or skillfully. It''s better suited for tearing than cutting with such an edge. The weapon is constantly cold from the result of the material. Overall, a weapon of awful quality that shows theck of skill of the cksmith. Despite that though, the weapon''s durability is decent enough tost throughout a battlefield.


    "..."


    Reading the description, Danzel would have cringed if he had a face.


    He didn''t even have to read the description to see the quality of the weapon.


    Just holding it made him feel the imbnce of the weapon and the edge wasn''t smooth. Making him somewhat disappointed, but also at the same time satisfied with the work of his undead.


    "The durability isn''t that bad so few runes could fix the shorings, for a first patch not bad." Danzel said as he put the halberd down, focusing on the Shiro who looked at him with anger.


    "Sorry for calling them, I forgot that you sleep..."


    Hearing that Shiro, scoffed and picked her staff from the bed before jumping off the bed.


    "Hmpf! If you are really sorry, then let''s practicebat!"


    Hearing that, Danzel shook his head.

 Chapter 442 Battle Training (2)

    ?


    Seeing her pointing her staff at him, Danzel found it more ridiculous than few would consider cute.


    "Rejected, I already told you that before you learn the "Fly" spell, teaching you would be pointless." Danzel said with a monotonous tone.


    Hearing his response, Shiro puffed her cheeks.


    "What do I need to learn the "Fly" spell just to practicebat!?" She said while swinging her staff, making the metal rings attached to the staff ring like bells.


    "The magic caster''s that I have seen rarely used that spell! Not even Master Velkir said anything about learning that spell! And he was a great magic caster! The greatest that I have seen!"


    If it was anymon magic caster, they would have considered Shiro''s point as fair. As they existed great magic casters who brought down enemies by just standing in a spot and lived to be written down in history books.


    Compared to them though, Danzel immediately dismissed her ims.


    "Your grandfather asked Velkir to teach you the mysteries of magic, he didn''t ask him to teach you how to fight as a magic caster. As there was no need to do as such. With someone as Agares protecting you, I doubt any harm would havee your way."


    And that was indeed the case, Agares didn''t want Shiro, his only granddaughter, to grow used to fighting. At least not at her age.


    Considering her age of their race, she was practically a child.


    "...My grandpa isn''t here though. You said so yourself, that I need to prepare to take care of myself!" Shiro yelled with frustration.


    "..."


    Danzel walked towards her, towering over her and staring silently at her with his ethereal ring eyes. And Shiro stared back to him, with a determination and fearlessness.


    Which was something amazing on its own.


    Even ignoring the fact that Danzel was almost twice as tall as her, the kind of existence that Danzel had be would make even war veterans too dense upon sighting him.


    He was no longer the skeleton that he was once before, a pile of animated bones from the dead mana waste of theke.


    Now he was a death knight, a being constantly surrounded by a death aura caused by the immense miasma inside him and his equipment. With the power that only a few beings are able to achieve.


    And while he was restraining himself, there was always the constant leak of aggression toward the living.


    Despite the leak being at a minimal level, it was always there and present.


    Not to forget, in Shiro''s case, her eyes were able to see much more than was in to see.


    Showing such a demeanor in the face of a death knight was impressive on its own, s, the longer the silence grew, the more Shiro was getting anxious as she stared at the ethereal eyes.


    "The-ehm...the deal that we made is unfair..." Shiro said while avoiding his gaze.


    "Teaching those five, teaching you, learning necromancy from you, and learning spells of my own. I don''t want to sound like I amining, but..."


    "N-Not to forget thatpared to you all, I am also getting tired and hungry..." She said thest bit in a whisper of a tone.


    Which of course Danzel was able to hear.


    Albeit he tended to forget about the basic needs of the living, when he was indeed paying attention, Danzel could tell that Shiro was pushing herself in the form of sleep deprivation and overall stress.


    And despite understanding her situation and what she was experiencing.


    Danzel didn''t hold any empathy towards her.


    Taking a step closer to her, he opened his jaw, letting the cold voice of an undead.


    "I can see your point, but it seems that you are gravely mistaken about something, granddaughter of Agares."


    His words felt heavy upon Shiro as if something was pressuring or weighting her down. Enough so to feel like amp in front of a predator.


    As she took a step back and opened her mouth to take her request back, Danzel turned his back on her.


    "But...very well, I shall grant your wish. Even without the "Fly" spell, there is one thing that I can teach you." Danzel said with a harsh tone.


    Shiro felt d that her request was heard, but at the same time, she felt nervous and anxious about Danzel''s words.


    With Danzel opening the door, Shiro followed suit.


    The only thing to be heard was their footsteps walking on snow.


    It didn''t take long before the house was out of sight as they were going to the mounted area that hasn''t been built anything yet.


    It was the same ce where Danzel and Baron were practicing not long ago.


    "Prepare yourself." Danzel said as his body slowly lost its shape and turned into dark mist, creating some distance between him and Shiro.


    Shiro flinched at his words and clenched her staff with both her hands. Already have an idea of what is toe.


    "Are we...going to spar?" she asked nervously.


    Looking at her with his ring eyes, Danzel put his left hand on his sword and slowly sheathed it out of its scabbard.


    Despite how slow he seemed to draw the runing de, the slight swing generated enough wind for Shiro to feel despite being several meters far away.


    "A spar, huh?" Danzel shook his head.


    "The bare minimum for us two to spar would be for you to gain any short-of-movement spells. What were are going to do is something much simpler." He said in his cold voice


    "The lesson that we are going to have is simple...While I will try to approach you, all that you will have to do is prevent me from approaching you, by any means necessary." As he was speaking, his usual death aura that was invisible to themon naked eyes began to resurface around his body.


    "Even with means aimed to kill."


    "Huh?" Shiro said confused by Danzel''s words.


    "S-Such sort of thing...Rue, what is this supposed to teach-"<novelsnext></novelsnext>


    Before Shiro could even finish her sentence, an ethereal dark green hand pierced her chest.


    "Ahh-!"


    Despite its ethereal form, she felt as if someone has punched her right in the chest, she was pushed back and was barely able to catch herself from falling with her feet.


    s, the ethereal that seemingly was piercing her chest rose Shiro up in the air for a short amount of time before an ethereal dark green light from Shiro''s body mixed with the hand.


    Changing its shape and traveling towards Danzel. Albeit Shiro wasn''t able to grasp a glimpse of it as before she knew, a wave of strong wind mixed with snow hit her like a wall. And as she was already mid-air, she was sent flying back and rolling through the snow of the mountain.


    "Cough-Cough-Gahhh..."


    Coughing and growing in pain, her whole body suddenly flinched as she felt an immense killing intent washing on top of her.


    "What are you doing Shiro!? Stand up!"


    Danzel.


    No.


    The cold voice of the undead of the 4th-tier yelled at Shiro, admonishing her actions.


    Shiro gazed at the undead, the dark-colored mana in her eyes blending her view with reality and an unbroken ether world.


    Surrounded by an ominous dark green light and his skull has cracks. His armor sounded to her like several chains hitting each other by being dragged per step of his.


    His killing intent, the death aura with the dark green light surrounding froze Shiro in dread and she was almost not able to recognize Danzel.


    Almost.


    "...Rue?" She said with a scared tone.


    Which made Danzel''s eyes re up brightening with much denser killing intent.


    "You are a magic caster! What are you doing sitting around and letting your enemy close the distance! Stand up and fight!"


    "..."


    Biting her own lips, Shiro clenched her staff and supported herself up with it while trying to ignore the pain in her chest. Her head still lowered down.


    Slowly raising her free hand aimed at Danzel, she created several mana-reinforced ice spikes that floated around her with her mana alone and not any incarnation. Which for a magic caster of the 3rd-tier was impressive.


    Once the mana-reinforced ice spikes went sent flying aiming at Danzel.


    In response, Danzel simply raised his sword and swung in the air with the t side of the sword with enough strength to create a wind wave, much strong that the one that hit Shiro.


    The wind wave crashed against the flying ice spikes and slightly altered their flight, making them as they came closer miss their original target.


    *Crouackkk!~Crouackkk!


    Hitting the ground behind him, carving the stone itself, and raising up the snow as if an explosion happend, Danzel continued walking leisurely towards Shiro.


    The wind wave itself though hasn''t weakened at all, crashing towards Shiro just like before.


    But this time despite the wind wave being strong, she had ced her staff on the ground to support herself from being thrown off.


    In the end, the wind only barely pushed her back and made her long, white hair came out of the hood.


    "Weak. You wouldn''t even survive on your own." the cold voice said, making Shiro flinch.


    She remembered how she saw constantly being protected by everyone and how she was a burden to everyone who was near her.


    Being chased out of cities because of her illness. Forced her grandpa to move from ce to ce and do sketchy jobs till ending up as a mercenary despite clearly disliking it,just to earn enough for food, treatment, and magical education.


    Which resulted in being separated from as far as she knew herst family member still left.


    Ending in a ce foreign to her and being the burden of someone else once more.


    "N-No more..." Shiro whispered as she slowly raised her staff with both her hands.


    The white fur of her armor started to raise up as Shiro was guiding her mana on her staff. Before secondter using that mana to form her spell.


    "Oh element of dawn~"


    As she began casting, the mana that she was gathering in her staff turned into the form of a mana circle, which slowly was being filled with arcanic letters.


    "Oh element of scourge~"


    As the arcanic letters started to fill the circle, the wind started to sucken in the magic circle like a vortex.


    ''Rune magic, huh?'' Danzel thought as he halted his step to observe the spell.


    "Circle magic, huh? And this amount of mana..." Danzel mumbled as the magic circle turned into a triangle, with each corner having a smaller magic circle.


    And as Danzel was observing her spell, Shiro continued her spell.


    "~Show you might in front of me~, Show you might in front of my enemies~"


    And as the magic circles were beginning to gain color~


    "~Let your strength show my might! And let my enemies be scourged by your endless might! Element of scourging dawn!"


    A blinding light appeared

 Chapter 443 Battle Training (3)

    Chapter 443 Battle Training (3)


    What was a dawn?


    Some would say the beginning of the day or when the sun began to rise, to open yet another page of one''s life. Some even say that it''s the beginning of life.


    Most people would have an answer to such question, of what dawn is.


    But to the residents of those frozennds, more specifically the vigers of vige Vashara.


    Close to none would be able to answer such a question.


    Only one single person would be able to form an answer. And that answer would havee from the details of their ancestors.


    And the person who had ess to such information was none other but the priestess.


    But even she was stunned when a warm light appeared on top of their mountain.


    Even the cursed ones that she has been observing turned to look at the warm light.


    "The former priestess didn''t lie...our ancestors really saw the red light of dawn in their time." She mumbled to herself. Shortly after though she was distraught as few vigers panicked by the new sight while most gazed in wonder.


    "Sigh..." shaking her head, she turned to resource the vigers in panic.


    But before she did that, she took ast look at the crimson light with a smile hidden behind her mask.


    ***


    Few seconds before the crimson dawn appeared...


    "~Let your strength show my might! And let my enemies be scourged by your endless might! Element of scourging dawn!"


    The three magic circles at the triangle corners started to spin as the arcanic letters started to gain a crimson bright red color like that of heated metal.


    "[Scourging Dawn''s Ray]!"


    With the magic formationing to an end, an endless amount of concentrated raging mes in the form of a huge ray spew with immense speed. Creating a sh of crimson light in the surroundings. Melting and burning everything on its path with but an instance.


    It didn''t even take 2 seconds for the raging mes to be in front of Danzel.


    Despite its speed though, Danzel stared in front of the ray of raging mes and found the mes...


    Slow.


    "..."


    As the mes were about to touch them, Danzel raised his free hand and directly grabbed the beam of raging mes.


    The mes seemed to halt for just a split second before devouring Danzel whole.


    That itself didn''t stop the travel of the mes.


    After a few meters away from where Danzel was, the mes hit the ground, spreading the mes to the surroundings and melting the stone itself, and creating magma itself.


    And the spell didn''t show any signs of stopping at all.


    Shiro''s mana was continuously fueling the destructive spell with mana, which for the scale and power of such a spell was no friendly upkeep for a 3rd-tier magic caster.


    But that wasn''t the case for Shiro.


    For any above average 3rd-tier magic caster, [Scourging Dawn''s Ray] was a huge use of their mana. If they weren''t careful, constant use of that spell would burn a huge chunk of their mana reserves.


    Shiro though had no such problem, at least not to such an extent.


    But even she wasn''t keen on wasting so much mana.


    Moving her gaze away from the mana circle that was still pumping the raging mes, she looked towards the direction of the ray of mes. Which by itself wasn''t something one of the 1st-tier could do, as gazing at such intense mes would hurt their eyes, if not damage them.


    But for those of the 3rd-tier with strengthened bodies, it was put a mere annoyance looking at such mes.


    "Even if it''s Rue, that should be enough-"


    Before she could finish her sentence, her vision changed for a split second, revealing inside those scourging mes a cracked undead gazing directly at her.


    "-Huh!?" Shiro couldn''t help but scream in confusion and take a step back.


    And not long after seeing the cracked undead, the ray slowly started to split into two. And the middle where the ray was splitting into two was a lone figure, splitting the ray of mes into his sides with purely his hand.


    "N-No way..." Shiro mumbled dumbfounded as she canceled her spell.


    Leaving the mes to linger around the field.


    There was a moment of silence where only the sound of the mes and the magma were still there.


    But a secondter, the sound of thetter vanished and it''s ce a different sound came.


    From the mes inside, the ice started to spread at a quick pace, freezing the ground. And momentster, a shock wave of dead mana appeared from the middle of the mes, killing any lingering mes nearby, making the field as if the ray of raging mes didn''t even happen.


    And all that happend in putting an instance.


    *Crack~Crack~


    The sound of heavy footsteps breaking the newly created ice appeared, the owner of them being no other than Danzel.


    His armor, or rather, the dark ting made by the enchantment has molten and started to drip to the ground, revealing the hole in his grayish-blue armor.


    As drops of the molten dark tting were falling to the ground, the drops suddenly stopped mid-air.


    Raising his sword, the molted drops started to gather around his sword by the use of its enchantment.


    "React, or you will die." Danzel said with a chilling voice.


    Gathering only bits of mana, he swung down his sword and send out a low-efficiency wind de, carrying the molten drops while shaping them into needles. Which with his strength and the mana made them essentially like bullets.


    "!!!"


    Raising her hand in response, Shiro made a barrier made out of light construct around her just as the wind de and metal spikes were about to hit.


    *Bugh~Bugh~Bugh~


    The air de disappeared in an instant the moment hit the barrier and the metal did nothing to the barrier either. Which made Shiro sigh internally in belief.


    A momentter though, the remaining metal pieces hit the surroundings.


    *Crack! Crieak! Teegh!


    Each spot where a needle found it''s way cracked or even carved the stone of the mountain. The constant sound of stone being cracked made Shiro shake at the idea of not activating her barrier in time.


    ''If those had managed to hit me, my body would have been reduced into holes...'' she unconsciously gulped her saliva from worry.


    ~Bugh!~Bugh~!


    Shiro flinched at the sound of being attacked once more, gazing in front of her, she watched how Danzel was continuously sending out wind des with molten drops.


    "R-Rue! What kind of training is this!? How is this supposed to teach me anything!" She yelled in frustration, but seeing Danzeling closer with his ethereal eyes on her, she tightened her grip on the staff and raised it on top of her head.


    "Piercing light! Take form and appear! [Light Spear]''s!"


    With the golden mana crystal on her staff glowing, several balls of light appeared which took shape as long needles which flew at incredible speed towards Danzel.


    "The light element?" The undead said as he put his sword in front of his face.


    As soon as the light needles were in Danzel''s range, he swung at them with his de full of dead mana,pletely destroying the first needle.


    Every light needle was destroyed by a swing of his weapons even when 10 of them wereing at the same time.


    Or at least that''s what Danzel thought at first, as when he swung his sword at thest light needle, it did indeed break, but notpletely.


    Or rather, he only destroyed half of the light needle, as that one was designed by Shiro to be 2 separate needles that were put together to look like one, with a slight difference in direction.


    So when his sword met with the first part of the needle, it did indeed break, but the one that came from behind continued its path, barely passing his sword and flying directly to his face.


    And the light spear almost seeded in piercing his skull.


    Almost.


    As when it was about to pierce his skull, Danzel raised his hand and let the light spear pierce his palm, despite its distance.


    "...Not bad, s, it''s stillcking." Danzel said with his cold voice as he looked at the dark smoke his pierced hand was making, being the result of the light element burning the miasma in his body.


    Which in turn inflicted him with physical pain, something that he rarely experienced.


    "Annoying."


    Raising his dead mana to his hand, the light needle broke down by the opposition of the dead element.


    "Tricks like this can only push you that far." Danzel gazed at Shiro while fuelling his killing intent.


    Each second passed the next step was made.


    And as Shiro took a step back, Danzel took 2 steps forward, making it clear that it running away would be pointless.


    That fact and his continuous release of killing intent together with his death aura surrounding his body, Shiro felt pressured to believe that maybe this wasn''t training at all...


    Her heart ached being reminded of the pain she felt but a moment ago.


    Her mind started thinking of what spells she could use to win or achieve what Danzel wanted her to do. In a matter of two seconds, she considered several spells thanks to her high intelligence mid-spell and hit him.


    "But if he really doesn''t attempt to dodge, then I could use that attribute.


    Albeit she crossed each scenario as she remembered that one of her most powerful spells had no effect against him.


    ''Spells in the form of physical objects won''t do, they would be slow. Light magic should be effective against Rue, but I know none that would be strong enough to harm him in a serious manner. I also need to hold the barrier, so any big spells would be too slow and be easily dodged even if I managed-''


    Her mind suddenly came to a halt as she suddenly realized.


    That being of the fact that although Danzel was moving closer, he only walked in a straight line without dodging.


    Originally she used [Scourging Dawn''s Ray] because although the casting time is a bit long, she could continuously change her aim mid-spell and hit him.


    "But if he really doesn''t attempt to dodge, then I could use that element..." Shiro mumbled as she grabbed her staff with both hands, preparing her next spell while concentrating on keeping the barrier up.

 Chapter 444 Lesson of the Strong

    Chapter 444 Lesson of the Strong


    Holding her staff up in the air with both of her hands, Danzel could see the huge amount of manaing out of Shiro.


    Halting his wind de attacks, Danzel raised pointed his sword towards and activate the enchantment of his sword.


    The pieces of metal which missed Shiro and were now burrowed into the snow started to rise up in the air. And with a mentalmand of the undead, the metal pieces spend up towards Shiro''s back like a thousand knives.


    Before they could hit Shiro though, the barrier of hers blocked them.


    "..."


    Danzel nodded internally as he observed that mana of hers changing into a color that made Danzel frown.


    The dancing mana slowly gathered into the golden crystal of Shiro''s staff, slowly ckening the crystal just as like the mana.


    The dark mana next was being sucked into Shiro''s staff.


    "Haaaah!!!" Yelling out loud, Shiro hit her staff to the ground, releasing her spell.


    As if a giant put a nail to the ground, the ground itself started to crack open, spreading the crack towards Danzel like a manifesting earthquake.


    Which of the cracks every few meters, small dark mes appeared for put a second.


    Making Danzel frown mentally.


    ''Chaos magic...'' Recognizing the dark mana and knowing full well the danger of what chaos magic was capable of, Danzel didn''t stay idle in a ce like before.


    Just as the crack was nearing him and was about to be under his feet, using his one foot, he kicked the ground and jumped to the side a few meters away from the cracks.


    He could have jumped much further away, but he decided against it to show Shiro that such slow spells are useless.


    s, Shiro was aware of the slowness of her own spell, which is the reason why she put a small smile behind her mask when Danzel jumped to the side half-assed.


    With her eyes following Danzel''s movements, the cracks that were till this point going in a straight line, suddenly made a turn, stopping right under Danzel''s feet.


    "Annihte! Element of destruction!" Shiro yelled as she raised her staff.


    Releasing the dark mana that she held back into the cracks.


    Like a trail of oil being set on fire, the dark mana pushed through the cracks at immense speed, rivaling Danzel''s.


    And once the dark mana reached the end of its trail, the true spell came to its fruition. In the form of a burst of dark gray mes.


    Essentially a me strike of destruction.


    It was a spell strong enough to activate Danzel''s danger sense, Danzel hurriedly acted ordingly.


    "Shit-!"


    Piercing his sword into the ground, magical ice started to spread while dead mana started to surround his armor, activating [Armor of Undying Protection] just before a howling scream spread through the frozennds.


    *Waggghhhh! Waaaaaagh! Wargghgh!


    "Haah~haah~"


    And Shiro who cast the spell stared at the dark gray mes in worry and anxiousness, making it difficult for her to breathe. At least that was what she thought it was, when it was actually a few ck veins appearing on her neck, going up and down, reappearing and disappearing.


    "Aah~what have I done..." She whispered with a shaken voice.


    ''Even for Rue, chaos magic must be too much, even if he can regenerate his skull...'' Shiro thought while staring at the dark gray mes.


    Unlike what one would think of such mes, the dark gray mes bore no heat. A traitmon to the school of chaos magic.


    Though it varied from the skill of the magic caster, wherever they had talent enough to adapt chaos magic to bear the heat or their ipetence of being unable to remove the impurities of other mana.


    True chaos magic only had one singr purpose.


    That was to annihte everything.


    Devastation and destruction were its calling.


    To the point that it was universally known to be the strongest type of magic.


    In terms of firepower that is.


    The ground where the chaotic dark gray mes touched had turned into dust and Shiro was afraid that Danzel had met the same fate.


    She had canceled her spell and the chaotic mes started to grow weaker while they continued raging. Despite that though, suddenly the chaotic mes seemed to inte as if something was pushing them from the inside.


    And like a balloon popping from being inted, the dark gray mes exploded by some necrotic energy.


    Making Shiro''s mouth hanging wide open.


    "H-How?"


    Within the dissipating dark gray mes, two dark green mes emerged.


    And from them, an armored undead walked through.


    "That was unexpected~"


    *Crack


    His armor was filled with holes.


    "Your magic exceeded my expectations, Shiro~"


    *Crack


    One arm holding the ominous de, while the other arm turned to dust till his elbow.


    Shiro felt relief for a split second, but with the intensity of killing intent suddenly increasing and the look that Rue gave her, she felt genuine fear.


    ''...''


    Staring with his ethereal eyes at Shiro, Danzel opened his mouth.


    With half of his jaw turned into dust and half of his skull cracked to the point that it could fall apart, Danzel''s death mana came out of his body together with his aura.


    "But!!!"


    Raising what was left of his arm to the air, Danzel''s eyes red up.


    "[Necromatic Restoraction]!"


    The dead mana around him started to go back into his body, repairing the damages that his body received, closing the cracks of his body, and reforming his jaw and hand back to whole. The restoration of his body activated the trait of all Death Knights.


    Which was the talent [Armor of Death Knight].


    Resulting in all damage to disappeared, except for those that were already there before performing the binding.


    Closing and opening his hand, Danzel said with his reformed jaw.


    "ytime is over..."


    "Ahhhhh~!"


    Once the killing intent was focused on her Shiro almost instantly pointed her staff towards Danzel and started casting hastily a spell.


    Stone appearing from thin air started to gather into a single point, being pressed to its limit while new earth pilled up. Soon enough made a huge boulder of mana-reinforced stone that float in the air, which weighed several tons.


    "M-[Meteor Shot]!" Shiro yelled as a magic circle appeared in front of the boulder, which by contact shot the boulder of several tons to fly like a cross bold towards Danzel.


    Staring at the iing boulder, Danzel raised his hand and received the elerating boulder of several tons with his newly made hand.


    By contact, a shockwave pushed against him while his fingers dug into the boulder.


    It looked like Danzel was about to be crushed.


    Sadly though the boulder had lost all its momentum, which turned the boulder into nothing more than a pebble in front of Danzel''s absurd strength. Which by a simple movement of the hand, tossed the boulder to the side of the mountain as if it was a pebble.


    At a greater speed, Shiro threw that to him at that too.


    *Booguuhh!!!~


    "This ends now." Danzel said as he put his hand to the Overseer''s sword, slowly drawing it out of the scabbard.


    Which made Shiro panik.


    "W-Wait Rue! I-I surrender! I can''t defeat you! Any more of this it''s pointless!"


    Having drawn his sword, the ground under his feet cracked.


    And without any other words, Danzel kicked the ground and dashed towards Shiro.


    Biting her own lips behind the mask, she raised her staff to the air, making light appear.


    "Piercing light! Take form and appear! [Light Spear]''s!


    With numerous light needles appearing, way more than she previously managed to make, they were all shot toward the iing undead.


    Raising his chest, Danzel used both of his swords to cut down the needles of light with extreme uracy while those that he couldn''t destroy were dodged by moving slightly his body. All that while his advantage towards Shiro hasn''t stopped.


    "Haah~Hah~Ha~"


    Breathing heavily under all the pressure and the dark veins in her neck progressing further towards her mouth, she pointed her staff towards Danzel.


    A small spark appeared before lighting directly pierced the undead.


    *Zgzgzgzzzz!!!!


    The lighting danced around the undead''s armor.


    s, it was a bad choice against the undead andcked the punch to inflict any sort of damage.


    Brushing the lighting off, the undead raised his swords and swung down one of them at Shiro''s barrier.


    The impact of the first sh traveled though out the whole barrier before breaking like some delicate piece of ss.


    "Aahh!"


    Surprised, Shiro stepped back and raised her staff in front of her to block the sword with her eyes closed.


    With his ethereal eyes ring up, the undead swung his sword, not at Shiro, but at her staff that she held with both hands.


    "Kyaah!" The impact was so strong that raised Shiro up in the air together, barely holding her staff now with one hand now.


    But that was only for a short time as the undead used the first sword that broke the barrier to sh towards the stuff with such force that broke Shiro''s grip on the staff and almost broke her wrist in the process.


    Using that momentum, the undead made a turn with his body and delivered a kick right at Shiro''s stomach.


    "Agghhh~!" Sending her flying and rolling a few meters with all the air in her lungs pushed out, she held her stomach in pain while coughing. Tears already building up in her eyes.


    "You talked about unfairness, didn''t you Shiro? " The undead said in his chilling voice.


    "And I answered that you have been mistaking something, do you know what that "something" I was referring to was?"


    The undead walked closer, with only his footsteps to the snow and the groans of pain to be heard from Shiro.


    "That is the battlefield." The undead dered.


    "In a battle to the death, fairness doesn''t exist. Be it numbers, dirty tricks, or magic items. It doesn''t matter. Only victory matters."


    "Either be strong enough to overwhelm the odds." the undead said, remembering Sartan, Agares, and Vanessa''s overwhelming strength.


    "Or use your knowledge to ovee the odds." he said while remembering, Velkir and Azrael''s overwhelming magic.


    "If that none are possible, there is only one option left!" he said while remembering his early days of awakening.


    The encounter between the merchant who used shadow magic and the Archmage who utilized ice magic.


    Clenching the hilt of his swords, the undead continued.


    "That is to run away!"


    "As long as you get away! As long as you persevere! As long as you can try again! That is an absolute victory! And you failed to see the only avable option."


    Laying still on the ground, with one hand using healing magic on her stomach, Shiro looked at the undead while slowly raising her hand that conjured mana. The mana veins make Shiro horns erge slowly.


    Not a secondter though, the undead turned into dark mist, and before she knew the cold feet of the undead pressed against her shoulder, pinning her hand that conjured mana to the ground and stopping the growth of her horns."


    "You had the knowledge that I was several times stronger than you and despite that, you decided to fight me head-on instead of running away." The undead said while raising both his sword into the air. Both swords are ominously surrounded by dead mana.


    Making Shiro''s eyes focus on the two swords raised up.


    Though she was in pain and was terrified to the point of tearsing out of her eyes, she still found the mana of the undead, despite being dead mana, to bring her a sense of peace, like staring at a painting that resonates with you.


    ''Ahhh, what kind of magic can I make with this kind of mana? I can''t wait to see...'' She thought.


    As she watched the 2 swordsing down towards her, her face distorted into bitterness, unable to stop her tears.


    ''I don''t want to die.''


    Hearing the wind being sliced, she couldn''t help but mutter...


    "~I don''t want to die, Grandpa~"

 Chapter 445 Howling Movement

    <h4>Chapter 445 Howling Movement</h4>


    *Shiiiin!!!~


    With a air shrieking sound, the two runed des closed in Shiro''s head.


    Intense killing intent supporting each de.


    *Sniff~


    As the swords were about to meet the crying Shiro, Danzel''s eyes red up at thest moment and shifted his grip.


    *Wrooguhhh!


    His swing generated a big wave of wind, pushing the snow up into the air, as well as Shiro''s snow-white hair.


    As the snow fell down to the ground, tworge clean cuts revealed at the ground in an "X" shape just above Shiro''s head.


    "..."


    Staring at Shiro in silence, Danzed raised the foot that was stepping on her shoulder and moved a few steps back.


    Putting the Overseer''s swords back into its sheath, Danzel looked at Shiro coldly.


    "Although evading me was impossible in the first ce, you should have attempted to distance yourself, despite how futile such an attempt it would have been. Any fighter, despite how stupid, would try to close the distance between magic casters. Where they have the advantage."


    "And speaking from my own experience, circle magic isn''t to be relied on as it''s too obvious and takes too long to prepare. Making it unsuited forbat without a distraction. Even if the spell is more powerful, you should always consider the distance and the time that you will be sacrificing in pulling such a spell." Danzel said as Shiro started to roll up and touch her shoulder which he stepped.


    "...Such distraction could be in different forms, one of them being summoning elementals or through the use of necromancy summoning undead minions. I personally would rmend thetter for their permanence and numbers. But even then, you would need at least a spell which will let you move through the battlefield."


    "That''s the reason why I told you to learn the "Fly" spell for starters. Staying in one ce is asking yourself to be killed after all. And barriers won''t help, they can be broken and are truly just a temporary measure, that chaos spell that you even used could also be used defensively, if used we''ll at least..."


    *Sniff~


    Looking at Shiro who was kneeling with her back face at him and crying, Danzel looked at her in silence.


    Thatsted only a few seconds before Danzel mentally frowned at her.


    Slowly raising his hand, an ethereal skeletal hand came out of his hand, invisible to everyone except him.


    Staring at her with his cold ethereal eyes, he was about to use [Grasp of the Undying] on her.


    But as he stared at the bone mask that he had made for her, his hand movement suddenly stopped as he noticed her tear-filled eyes behind that mask were staring not at him, but at his ethereal skeletal hand.


    His ethereal dark green eyes red up and he froze for a split of a moment.


    At that same moment, Shiro turned her body, showing the hand that she was hiding under her towards Danzel.


    And in almost an instant her mana gathered around her hand, turning into an exploding wave of wind at Danzel.


    s, it was too weak to affect a death knight, it only resulted in a handful of snow to be thrown on his mouth and ring eyes.


    But the true intent of the spell wasn''t to throw Danzel back.


    No, it was the opposite.


    It was to push the caster away.


    The wave of wind aimed at the ground, resulting in pushing Shiro away from Danzel.


    *Puuff! Pufff! Pufff!


    Rolling to the ground from the result of her spell a few times, Shiro grits her teeth and uses the hand that she was injured to touch the ground, creating another wave of wind to hit her.


    Resulting in it catapulting herself up into the air.


    And despite feeling disoriented and in pain, her head swung towards the direction of the mountain, her eyes locked into where her staff was lying.


    "Come!"


    Opening her arm, a hand made out of mana materialized where the staff was, and picked it up before flying at high speed towards its owner.


    *Ting~!


    With the metal rings of the staff ringing upon touching the staff, Shiro looked at fast approaching ground.


    Pointing her hand to the ground, she swiftly gathered her mana around her.


    "[Fly]!"


    And she was about to crash into the ground, her mana supported her body and liberated any weight that held her done, making her float only a meter above the ground.


    However, thatsted only for a moment, as the spell around broke done not a moment before it was cast, making Shiro fall to the snow.


    But despite falling, her eyes were locked on where Danzel with her staff aimed at him.


    Her eyes behind her bone fox mask lighten with intense mana


    And Danzel stared and smiled from amusement.


    "That''s more like it." He said, with his death aura once again building up around his body.


    Creating an invisible pressure around him.


    "Now, let''s try again-"


    He suddenly halted what he was about to say and swung his head towards the direction of where the the 3rd-tier fox people had gone.


    Staring aimlessly towards the direction, he lowered his sword.


    "The link...is gone?" He mumbled while emitting an ominous yet intense aura around himself.


    As for Shiro, she still kept her spell ready and aimed at him, but the sudden change of his aura filled her with a feeling of an approaching dread, while the speed that Danzel showed her with [Phantom Phase] surprised her.


    In fact, it terrified her as she couldn''t keep her eyes on him till the dark mist reformed the death knight.


    But despite her fears, the moment she perceived where he was, he shifted her aim toward his location.


    Which in turn made Danzel refocus on her.


    "...I guess something easier would be more appropriate for a lesson." He said with a cold voice.


    Sheathing his sword back into its scabbard, Danzel extended his right hand.


    And in the next moment, the book that Velkir had given him, the one that contained information about necromancy appeared in his hand.


    Using his knowledge of magic, the wind from his surroundings was overtaken by his will. Opening the book and flipping its pages with the help of the wind.


    Stopping at a specific page.


    Gazing at the page with his ethereal dark green eyes, dead mana starteding out of his body and turning into miasma.


    The dark mist that was the miasma started to spread.


    And slowly but surely traveling towards Shiro.


    "Upon my will I call thee to serve. Upon my knowledge of the arcane I create thee-"


    His voice has turned into echoes that even if you had covered your ears, would still be heard clearly.


    Shiro was fascinated by how his voice entered her head without the use of sound amplification magic or wind magic. However, her focusy more towards the miasma, trying her best to understand it.


    And as she observed, she suddenly felt a wave of killing intent from the miasma.


    With the intent slowly growing stronger the closer Danzel cast came to its conclusion.


    "As an acolyte of-"


    Before Danzel finished the cast of the spell, he halted his action and his ethereal eyes red up as he decided to change the cast lyrics on his own.


    "As an entity of death, Imand you!" He closed the book, thus finishing the spell.


    Upon thepletion of the spell, the miasma suddenly started to shrink, or rather.


    Starter to get sucked in by itself in several locations within.


    At each location, white bones started to manifest before turning into different types of skeleton beings.


    From skeleton hounds to human skeletons with ws or spikes recing their hand.


    Despite each of them being different, each of them was built with a weapon of some kind infused with their own body.


    The only thing that they had inmon was the dark green ethereal mes serving as their eyes.


    Looking down upon his creation of over 50 different skeletons, he opened his mouth and gave their firstmand.


    "Kill her."


    With hismand, the skeletons who were aimlessly looking to the ground, all simultaneously flinched and shot up their heads towards the sky and let out a howl, spreading their intentions to the surroundings.


    "Gwaaaaaghghgghh!"


    "Gwsaggghgh!"


    "Whaghhhht!"


    *Gulp.


    Seeing all those undead and the coldmand of Danzel, cold sweat runs through Shiro''s back.


    But despite fear building up in her, she still nced at her staff, preparing to fight against the undead for her life.


    Unknowingly to her Danzel''s vocalmand wasn''t the same as his mentalmand to his undead.


    Which forbids them from killing her and only allows them to injure her to some extent.


    s, Shiro couldn''t possibly know that as the skeletons trashed and pulled their bodies towards her, screaming with resentment.


    As for Danzel, he looked upon his creations before gazing in the direction where he started losing the mental link with other creations of his.


    "..."


    ****


    At the same time...


    In a cavern where his walls and floor were made out of some kind of ice which lightened up the cavern with its magical light, a troll with a hood and several bone essories was looking upwards with its eyes closed.


    Secondter, the troll opened its eyes, which for a second werepletely white before regaining its pupil.


    "Gghh...useless bunch." The troll grunted in annoyance.


    Raising up from his kneeling position, his eyes glowed with mana.


    Extending his hand, a flowless hole started to form through the floor made out of magical ice. And from that hole, an ominous staff with dark ice floated toward the troll''s hand. Resulting in the ice toe back together.


    Completely erasing the forming of the hole.


    Walking out of the cavern, another troll who waited outside flinched upon feeling the gaze of the staff-wielding troll.


    "Great Shamac! Do you have any needs that need to be fulfilled? I, Shararack, shall do my best to fulfill them." The troll boasted his chest while holding his axe with much more vigor.


    The troll holding the title of Great Shamac gazed at the troll guard with a cold gaze and briefly with disdain before shifting his attention toward the path in front of him.


    "Follow me."


    "Yes!"


    The two trolls walked in silence as they navigated through different pathways.


    Before finally ending up on a pathway with a door made out of ice.


    Recognizing the door, Shararack frowned.


    "Great Shamac...why have wee here?"


    The Great Shamac touched the ice door with his staff. Which resulted in the dark ice lighting up, making the ice door open, revealing a horrendous smell of waste and blood mixed with low cries of pain.


    The source of all that was several fox people of different tribes that had each of their four limbs frozen inside the wall, letting them suffer from their own weight. Making their hands and legs bleed.


    All that while suffering through the cold of the whole room.


    Despite fox people being especially resistant to the cold, with only rags barely covering their private parts, it was freezing cold.


    s, worst of all, what made each of them shutter nonstop was the dark ice that was infused in their flesh at the chest.


    "Bgeh! Stink!" Shararack said while holding his nose with his hand, gazing at the fox people as if they were the ancestors of all trash.


    "I even came to make use of those things. As the hunting party that I sended has perished..." The Great Shamac said, looking at the fox people with the same disdain that he gazed at Shararack a moment ago.


    "W-What!? A hunting party perished!? Was it from the thousand-one!?" Shararack yelled in shock, fearing the answer to his own question.


    "No, it wasn''t the screaming one, but mere pretenders. Nothing but a cursed husk." The Great Shamac answered, his voice growing angrier as he continued.


    "Those stupid fools, I sent them to clean up the mess, but they only turned out to make more mess for me to clean up!" The Great Shamac halted his outrage, calming himself down as he looked at the fox people who looked at him with fear.


    "I would have gone and cleaned up the mess myself if it weren''t for the orders of the chief. s, preparations of the great hunt are underway..."


    The Great Shamac went silent as he stared at Shararack ominously.


    "Shararack, would you be interested in clearing the mess that you brothers failed to achieve? A deed worth mentioning to the chief."


    Hearing those words, Shararack eyes lightened up and he smiled, revealing his sharp teeth while at it.


    "I! Shararack! am willing!" He boasted with confidence.


    Knowing that this mission will remove him from the hunt against the thousand screaming ones while also adding to his contributions.


    Seeing that sight, the Great Shamac nodded.


    "Good, I will send a few other of you brothers to participate in clearing those cursed husks out of thosends. And with them...I will give you those hunting wolves to you." The Great Shamac said while pointing his staff towards the fox people.


    "Them?" Shararack tilted his head in confusion, gazing at them with disgust.


    Answering his question with actions, the dark ice of the Great Shamac''s staff glowed in an ominous light.


    Which triggered a simr response to all the dark ice infused on the fox people.


    With an ominous glow appearing, the ice started spreading into their flesh.


    Both internally and externally, resulting in a constant mind-boggling pain. s, that wasn''t the end of it.


    As within pain came change.


    The fox people''s nails started bing longer, slowly turning into sharp enough to challenge a steel de. All the while fur started to appear around their body.


    The females of the fox people had their muscles be sturdier and more flexible, with few even growing another tail while the males had their muscles develop simrly, only gaining more additional muscle masspared to the female, with their hair growing much more than the female.


    Though most had a simr transformation, with few having a bit more or less in some areas of development, the only thing that matched with all of them was their eye and overall aura bing feral like that of a starving beast.


    Not only that, but the mana inside their bodies steered, giving them an incredible amount of strength, making them slowly start cracking the ice that they were trapped in.


    "Yes, them." The Great Shamac said as he tapped his dark ice staff into the ground, making the ice trapping each of them drawn back, making them fall to the ground.


    But before they could hit the ground, despite all the pain their legs and hands were.


    They caught themselves before meeting the ground in a posture simr to that of cats


    "Follow him and my guidance, beasts. And destroy the enemies of "My" tribe." He said while making the dark ice in their chest glow and grow.


    Resulting in everyone howling with their aura weighting the air around them.


    *Kwaaaaogghhhh!!!!


    *Wragggggghhh!!!


    *Kreeeghhhhahhhh!!!!


    Shararack gulped nervously from their aura before grinning to himself.


    "Follow me, you scums!!! We depart immediately!" He said in excitement before leaving the Great Shamac behind and running off to fulfill the mission.


    All in one motion, the fox people shot their heads up toward the running troll and dashed with incredible speed, wing and cracking the ice floor beneath them depending on who walked in their fours or just their two legs.


    The Great Shamac simply observed the whole thing with a cold gaze and was about to walk off the room before he heard a wing sound from behind him.


    Turning around, there was a lone fox womanying on the floor, one hand digging inside the ice while the other at the dark ice in their chest, grinding her teeth in pain.


    "Weird..." The Great Shamac with a frown on his face.


    Pointing slightly his staff at her, the glow on the dark ice intensified, making her yelp in pain.


    s, she still stayed on the floor.


    "Arise." The Great Shamac said, taking a step forward, making the dark ice to spread further.


    "Follow mymand." and further.


    "Follow my will." and much further.


    To the point, the dark ice slowly started to prate her lungs.


    Which made her grind her teeth to the pain they started cracking and bleeding.


    Stopping right in front of the kneeling fox woman, the Great Shamac looked at her with disgust.


    "You..."


    But the woman, despite in pain and fear, she raised her head at him.


    And smiled.


    "Eat shit and died! You oversized piece of meatball bastard!"


    "..."


    In response to her words, the Great Shamac raised his staff on top of her head.


    "I don''t need an insubordinate beast in my tribe."


    Grabbing his staff with great strength, he pushed it down at her head.


    *Crack-!


    Resulting in a cracking sound to echo through the ice paths.

 Chapter 446 Meeting of Subordinates (1)

    <h4>Chapter 446 Meeting of Subordinates (1)</h4>


    While Shiro was undergoing Danzel''s training on the basics of fighting against others, being through the ropes of necromancy and what dead mana is capable of in more detail.


    Shiro was showing astonishing learning capabilities.


    However, Danzel couldn''t tell if Shiro was particrly talented in fighting or not, as he never really taught anyone else before her.


    He was still surprised at how easy it was for Shiro to understand and implement new knowledge. By the fourth day, she managed to form a small amount of miasma around her hands without actually harming herself with decay.


    Unlike dead mana, which miasma was extremely closely rted to. It was extremely difficult for someone of the living to manifest.


    Essentially the life force of the living together with their ''living'' mana was tempering with the miasma.


    Although her miasma onlysted at best a few seconds, that alone was praiseworthy if one considers that it hasn''t been long since she delved into the arts of necromancy. Proving that if given the time, Shiro could be a necromancer worthy of dread.


    s, Danzel could only see Shiro as a brat, trying to be something that she wasn''t.


    Despite that, Danzel approved of her training.


    ***


    Shiro was busily training with Danzel, studying thenguage of the fox people with the help of Alka, while also studying together with the five Anabast.


    The vige of Vashara wasn''t willing to fall behind in effortpared to Shiro.


    Or rather, they couldn''t.


    With the addition of the former ves that Danzel bought in the vige, housing was one of the smaller issues that came with so many people living in the same area.


    Everyone was feeling uneasy about the future, which put them on the edge.


    Disputes and disagreements among groups were amon urrence in Vashara. Though after a certain event with Talon making an example out of those who resulted in violence, every dispute was more in the form of only barks with no biting.


    Which tenses the whole situation more than it was before.


    The undead walking out of the "streets" without seeming care didn''t help with calming the nerves of the fox people.


    And with no one willing to go andin about what they thought was a primordial god of death, they sought the best next thing.


    Namely being the priestess with the wooden mask and Shin''Yen.


    However, that was only for the original vigers of Vashara and not actually the enved but now free fox people. As they had their own groups and respectively, their own leaders.


    s...


    Without much notice, all four of their respective leader received a divine mission from the oldest primordial to suddenly move out together with the cursed ones.


    Unknown if they will evere back or not.


    And if they do, wherever they will be among the living or the walking dead.


    ***


    At the same time where the uneasiness of the people of Vashara was growing by the day.


    In a ce far away from there, the marching of a group of undead was to be seen through a valley, their flickering ethereal eyes in the form of mes gazed upon the path in front of them.


    But not all of their group were among the undead.


    Mainly 4 fox people, exerting an invisible aura of strength walked in front of the group of undead, their strength far superiorpared to the undead among them.


    Of course, they were the respective leaders among the people who swore their loyalty towards the creator and master of the undead walking among them.


    Suddenly, the one man with two golden tails looked to one undead whopared to the others, had a halberd with runes carved into the cold metal.


    "Hey, it has been days since we departed from the vige...how long till we reach our destination?" He said with a cold voice, which was returned by a cold stare of the undead.


    "Speak with more respect towards the creations of the primordial, Gilgamash." The fox woman with ck and white hair said, looking at the man with a golden tail with a harsh look.


    "Don''t mention my name so lightly, woman-"


    Before Gilgamash could finish, an inch of killing intent washed toward him.


    The source of it came from the man whose hands were covered by bones, making his fingers natural ws that could tear through metal easily.


    "Continue and I will have your jaw ripped off." The man''s eyelids stretched to that of a beast, making Gilgamash shut up.


    "Tch! You think I am scared of any of you!? Kuroshi, Herlin?" He spoke, slowly flexing the muscles of his hands.


    Though before the situation could turn worse, a delicate hand was ced on Gilgamash''s shoulder.


    Making the man turn his gaze towards the many-tailed fox who gazed at the undead beside him.


    "...I know." Gilgamash said while looking to the side.


    Nodding at the man, the woman stared at the wed Herlin.


    "Though the way he said it could be fixed, I agree with his worry about how far our destination is. As we speak now, the others back home will have it difficult without us present. I think it is only fair to know so that we can better "fulfill" the primordials quest." Sernatta said, ending her sentence while looking at the undead with the halberd that was observing the whole situation from the side.


    "ording to our master''s will, our destination should be visible after that turn. There we shall meet with the mistress guards and the rest of us." The undead said with a cold voice, without further continuing.


    "I see, thats great." Sernatta said with a smile on her face.


    Though her eyes looked no less cold than those of the undead.


    And soon enough as promised, after making a turn, they saw a huge area that looked like a settlement from far away.


    Instead of feeling relief thought of finally arriving at their destination and meeting up with the two "guards" and the rest of the undead.


    What they saw was nothing but a graveyard, with the snow spread through the settlement being tainted with blood and corpses of trolls and undead alike.


    The settlement itself was broken down, with no undead in sight to be seen.


    "This is..."


    "Hunters arrived before us," Herlin said before the undead could finish, the bones extending slightly, making his ws slightly sharper.


    Without saying anything else, he dashes forward, with the Sernatta, Kuroshi, and Gilgamash following right behind them


    The Draugr with the halberd stared silently at the 4 and then at the many corpses before following after them with the rest of the undead.


    For someone of the 3rd tier, it didn''t take long for the 4 of them to arrive at the center of the settlement.


    Going to the ground, Gilgamash crouched down and touched the blood of one of the ice troll corpses.


    "A few hours...at best half a day since the death of those bastards." He said while eyeing a few corpses in particr with a frown.


    Few had their waist separated from their body and their arms cut off.


    Recognizing that each cut was made by a single swing.


    While other corpses had parts where their skin ckened, and thinned.


    "Let''s search the area first." Kuroshi said with the others nodding.


    Despite nodding though, Sernatta stayed behind and looked at the undead with the halberd.


    The other undead were simr looking through the settlement.


    "That was the group that we were supposed to meet with, right?" She asked, making the Draugr nod at her question.


    "...Yes." The Draugr said with a cold voice of doubt.


    "So our trip was pointless...do return back?"


    The undead stood unmoving before shaking his head.


    "No, the will of our master is still within me, unless we find the bodies of the mistress guards...we will stay here and wait till they return."


    Hearing that, Sernatta frowned.


    "And how do we know that the White Life''s guards will return or not? For all that we know, they could have been destroyed." She said before adding.


    "Would it be possible to contact the primordial, your master and confirm their continued existence?"


    The draugr turned and looked at her with his ring eyes intensely.


    "The distance is too far for us to hear his will, but his will itself is evesting. And his will towards the two mistress guards was to guard this ce. Unless they have been really destroyed, they will return, without a doubt."


    "And if they were really vanquished by those insignificant mortals, I will know. My master gave me a way to prove his will..."


    "I see, then I guess we have to wait for them to return." She said with a smile while thinking...


    ''So they can''tmunicate without an item, those cursed must really be puppets made out of magic...''


    Before she could finish her thoughts, she suddenly heard Kuroshi yelling.


    "You three! Come here and see this!"


    Dashing towards her location thinking of a hunter or undead to be alive.


    What they met made them freeze despite being a corpse like the many others.


    s, the corpse they saw was of a fox woman with ice covering her body.

 Chapter 447: Meeting of Subordinates (2)

    It wasn''t to say that the fox people of those frozennds were soft enough to freeze with just a look of a corpse.


    On the contrary, they knew death well before they were enved by the ice trolls.


    Death through starvation.


    Sumbing to the cold temperature of thosends


    A failed hunt resulting in the death of the hunter.


    Or even a mere disease.


    Although some of those deaths were lessmon than the other ones.


    Inherently, for the better or the worse, this resulted in the fox people growing ustomed to the sight of corpses and death itself by a very young age.


    And the four 3rd-tiers gathered around the corpse were no different. In fact, they were the ones that could be said to be more used to seeing death.


    Despite that, they froze when they saw the corpse of a woman fox.


    "Serrenes?" Sernatta mumbled as she slowly walked towards the corpses.


    With her hand shaking, she touched the face of the now-dead woman.


    "Do you know her?" Herlin said with a frown on his face.


    "...Yes, we were born in the same vige. I knew her as a friend, but got separated once they arrived..." Sernattasaid, moving her hands gently towards the ice stuck in the body of the corpse.


    "Does it matter who she was when she is dead now? There is something more concerning in front of us." Gilgamash said, pointing his finger toward the corpse''s wounds.


    "The wounds of the dead hunters and hers are the same..." Herlin said, his frown deepening.


    "Right on the meat, Herlin." Gilgamash nodded.


    "Now tell me, suchrge clean cuts and this ckened flesh. Doesn''t someonee to mind who is capable of such a feat? Someone that we all know?" Gilgamash said, making the others flinch as an image started to form in their mind.


    Standing among corpses, a tall figure wearing ck steel colder than the winter itself. His bodycked any flesh and the de he held was stained in blood.


    Both an entity of death and the savior of their lives.


    They couldn''t help but be reminded of Danzel, as every swing of his sword left decayed flesh together with an unnatural clean cut.


    While as the strongest of their people, they respected, awed, and feared the power he showed against the ice trolls.


    Yet, now that they looked that such power was aimed towards one of their own kind, they felt uneasy.


    "..."


    As the silence remained, with only the sound of wind growing louder, Herlin''s eyes went towards the ice that the corpses had as if it was fused with her body.


    The longer he inspected the eyes, the more his eyes narrowed from the feint, yet still moving mana trapped inside the ice.


    "Sernatta''s, you delve yourself mainly with magic, right?"


    "...H-Huh? I...yes, that''s right." Sernatta said somewhat thrown off by his question.


    "Mhm, could you then inspect-"


    Before he could finish his sentence, the sound of wind that was present grew louder and louder to the point it was unnatural.


    *Sweeeeeeheeeeeehhhhhh~!!!


    All of their eyes moved instantly towards the sound, Sernatta''s body letting out mana while the other three tensed their muscles as they witnessed huge metal rod-like spears flying towards their way faster than one out of a ballista.


    The three quicked the ground, leaving small craters to the ground, but Sernatta was different.


    With her eyes glowing with mana and holding her now-dead friend in her hands. She stared at the metal spear as it approached her head.


    "Sernatta''s!" Herlin yelled, but before he and the other could see anything else. A huge shock wave appeared at Sernatta''s location like a man-made bomb, throwing the nearby show and dirt up in the air.


    But before the other three could make out Sernatta well well-being, other simr cases happend all around where they were. Metal spears flying, blowing up the ground and snow.


    And while they reacted fast enough to dodge, that wasn''t the same with the undead Draugr''s spread through the area.


    While the other metal spears didn''t pack the same power as the one aimed at them, holding at least half the power of it.


    They were enough to devastate the field of the ruined settlement, resulting in the demise of a few unlucky Draugrs.


    Among the Draugrs, the one holding the halberd quickly assessed the situation and yelled with his cold voice to the other undead.


    "Spread out! We still have our master''s will to follow!"


    And follow they will.


    Having figured out the general direction of where the attack came from and no longer under surprise, the undead dodged any uing metal spears


    The volley of spearssted a few seconds longer before finally stopping.


    Yet before the silence of the wind could reign over, an echoing sound sounded like the call of an old moose followed.


    The three fox people froze upon hearing the all-so-familiar sound.


    "This sound! It can''t be...!" Gilgamash said swinging his head toward the direction of the sound.


    And they there were, jumping from a small hill a few hundred meters away from their locations,rge figures numbering dozens started emerging from the hill and rushing towards them with frenzy that vibrated the ground that they stood.


    "The hunt is on!"


    "Catch them!"


    "And kill all the prey!


    The sprinting figures yelled, with murderous grins on their face.


    Though those surpassing their killing intent were none other than the undead.


    With their eyes ring up intensely, the Draugr with the halberd pointed at them with death mana.


    "Kill the unworthy! As this is his will!"


    "Death upon his will!" The Draugrs chanted, death mana rising from their bodies and covering their respective weapons. Charging towards the ice trolls.


    "The hunters...this ce was a trap." Kuroshi cursed, flexing her muscles, readying to charge the undead, but a hand on her shoulder stopped her.


    "What are you doing!? We got to get out of here before those bastards reach us!" Gilgamash yelled as he pulled Kuroshi.


    "What are you talking about!? We got to help the creations of the primordial! That''s why we have been sent here!" Kuroshi yelled back as she pushed his hand away.


    "Are you crazy woman!? Now is the best chance while puppets are holding those bastards off to get out of here!"


    "Are you defying his will Gilgamash!?" Kuroshi yelled, aiming her killing intent at him.


    Gnashing his teeth and looking at her with disdain, Gilgamash turned to Herlin.


    "That idiot...! Herlin! You have seen that they have at least a great hunter among them! We can''t fight them without knowing how many of those great hunters are among them! The primordial can rece those puppets! We need to retreat first and gather information!


    You understand right!?" Gilgamash yelled while ignoring the look Kuroshi was giving him.


    "..."


    Herling in turn stayed silent as he observed the numbers of the ice trolls.


    If he count himself with the others and the undead, they would have the number advantage, s, he knew the strength of the creations of the eldest primordial. He had seen them fight many times while liberation other fox people.


    This was also the reason why he didn''t rule off Gilgamash''s suggestion, as he knew that the creations of the primordial god of death.


    Were inferiorpared to the hunter''s.


    Side-ncing at where the metal spearsnded, he could observe a few aftermaths that were simr to the one that attacked them.


    ''They definitely have few great hunters among them. And if I am right, those guys are intended to hunt down the guardians of White Life...''


    Though Herlin hated to admit it, Gilgamash''s request was reasonable. If the shaman of the hunter tribe had sent out all those hunters to eliminate the guardians. The next decision he was going to make was to be a dangerous one, whether it was to flee or to fight.


    ''If the guardians were of the same strength as the lording shadows...''


    Herling clenched his hand, his ws digging into his palm as he remembered the event that ruined his vige.


    There he was the chief and the greatest hunter in his vige.


    Simply put, he was the strongest, thus no equal.


    s, when the ice troll hunters came to his vige, he had to make a choice to make.


    One simr to the one in front of him.


    To fight.


    or


    To flee.


    The choice that he had made back then was one that he will and still regrets to this day.


    The decision to fight.


    He alone fought off waves of the hunters, crashing their bones and shredding their flesh with his sh.


    But despite that, in the end, he was enved and his people and his family were turned into ythings of those hunters.


    He had bashed his own head countless times into the walls of the mine, cursing himself why he didn''t decide to flee with his people.


    He had wished that there was someone there.


    Anyone, who could have told him what was the right decision back then and as of now.


    He never wanted to be a chief or the leader of the people.


    All he ever wanted was to be the greatest hunter.


    Ironically, his own wish pushed him towards what he loathed.


    As someone who had no equal, the strongest was meant to lead and guide the others.


    Which made him consider Gilgamash''s offer more.


    "We are going to..."


    *Trghhtghhh!!!


    Before Herlin could voice out his decision though, a metal bending sound was to be heard.


    Earning the three fox people''s attention.


    "I am amazed that you would suggest something stupid, I always suspected you to be damfool, but now I am certain, Gilgamash."


    With the previous cloud of snow and dirt from the metal spear now fully disappearing, there was Sernatta still sitting on the ground and holding her now passed friend in her arms.


    Her many tails extended and twisted in front of her, having a firm grip on the metal spear.


    Not only was the grip firm, but it was so strong that the metal itself started to bend in ways that it wasn''t supposed to be. Only finally to snap all together into many pieces.


    *Ting Ting tign~


    With the remains of the metal spear falling to the ground, Sernattay her passed friend to the ground while gazing towards the iing ice trolls.


    "Maybe those bastards wiped you enough to turn you into a docile coward, seeing how want to flee from those weaker than us." Sernatta said, her eyes glowing with mana.


    "You!!!" Gilgamash yelled in enrage but was stopped as Herlin held a palm toward him.


    "Hmm?" Sernatta turned and tilted her head at Herlin''s approach towards her.


    "Sernatta''s...are you sure that that we can win?" Herlin said with a serious voice.


    She frowned at his question and silently stared at him.


    "No."


    Her answer made Herlin close his eyes in disappointment, opening his fist in defeat.


    ''I guess we need to fle-''


    "I am certain." Sernatta continued where she had left off.


    Herlin''s eyes shot wide up, staring at her in shock.


    "I alone would have a decent chance in killing all those bastards with the help of the creations of the primordial. But if at least two of our group go with them, I am certain that we will win." She said, her voice full of confidence as she stared at the ice trolls.


    Herlin''s shocked expression onlysted a brief second before turning into a huge grin.


    "Then what are we waiting for!?" He yelled as his mana intensified his aura.


    His pupils stretched into a vertical slit while his grin turned more vicious.


    His ws extended and became sharper than ever, but most notable was how his mana flowed outside his hands, creating a secondyer of ws made out from his light blue mana.


    "We won''t run! We will spread their flesh and crash their bones. Offer their remains to the eldest primordial."


    He gazed at Gilgamash.


    Which made him feel as if Herlin was about to slit his throat with his ws.


    "And those who don''t, the primordial shall judge."


    "You..."


    Before Gilgamash could finish, Herlin dashed, followed by Kuroshi and Sernatta.


    "Dammit!" Gilgamash yelled with frustration as he followed suit toward the battle.


    As for Herlin who was charging towards the battle, he havee to the realization.


    While in the past he had no equal to share the burden of leadership.


    Now, it was different, as three others walked the same path as him.


    Being the leaders of their respective tribes.


    And holding the strength of an equal.

 Chapter 448: Strength of Tribe Leaders

    Running at a speed of where each step cracked the earth itself right towards the ice trolls.


    It begged for the troll nearest to grin viciously.Raising his axe and swinging it down.


    "Hahaahahaha! That''s one weakli-huh?"


    Hisughter came to a sudden stop and turned to confusion as where he expected to find the fox woman cut in half by his swing, was found to be standing with one leg on top of his axe.


    Before the ice troll could pull his axe, the figure with ck and white hair jumped towards him.


    "Dieeee!!!!!!"


    Sending out a kick right towards the center of his chest, the ice troll was sent flying and rolling to the ground like a ragdoll right past the other ice trolls.


    "Gaaaghhh!!!"


    Landing on the ground, the ck and white-haired woman with arge fox tail let out a satisfying grin upon seeing the caved-in chest of the ice troll.


    The other ice trolls scoffed at theirrade who nowy to the ground twitching with pain.


    "Tch! Let the gifts of the chief loose! We don''t need that one!" One of the ice trolls yelled as he and two others pulled out from their back the metal spear, swiftly taking a stance and throwing the spear, flying and piercing the wind right towards the fox woman.


    Despite that, Kuroshi stayed in ce while staring at the flying spearsing to impale her body.


    "Damn bastards underestimating us..." she whispered to herself.


    Once when the spears were a few meters away from her, her eyes widened and her body sprung to action.


    Kuroshi swung her hand with a speed far greater than that of the spears, hitting the first spear with the back of her hand.


    Bending the spear and directing it to the side for the first spear to crash into the ground.


    *Tagnnggh!!


    Right after she raised her leg and kicked the seconding metal spear just behind the sharp tip.


    This time breaking the metal, resulting in the rest of the spear flying to her other side.


    Using the same momentum she turned around and nted her hands to the ground before kicking with the other leg at thest iing spear.


    In a way that made the spear lose all its momentum and spin into the air


    "..." Raising up, Kuroshiside-eyed the ice trolls with a chilling stare.


    Slowly taking a stance, she waited as the spear was spinning down.


    "Huuff~" Letting her breath go, her pupils started to be more vertical while tensing the muscles of one of her hands.


    The moment when the metal spear came down to her chest level where it was horizontal to her, an explosion of bloodlust came out of her body.


    With the ground cracking to the sheer pressure, she stepped forward and hit the bottom of the spear with her palm.


    "Die!!!"


    Making the spear fly at abnormal speed right towards the ice troll whomanded her death.


    The ice troll in question widens his eyes upon the dangering his way.


    "Dammi-" He tried to move to the side to escape.


    But with hisck of speed, he only managed to move away just enough to avoid death.


    s, the spear that was aimed at his head, had now pierced the side of his neck. Ripping half of his neck off.


    "Gagghhhh!!!" Screaming in pain, the ice troll fell to the ground, grabbing the missing part of his neck in the hope of stopping the bleeding and hopefully enabling him to breathe.


    "Gegh! H-Heglp! I Br-Bre-ath!"


    With the world going blurry, the ice troll went to his knees and looked for others for help.


    But once he raised his head up, the only thing he saw was a small barefoot right in front and a menacing grin hidden with ck and white hair from the side of his eye.


    "H-Huh?"


    Those were hisst words before his head was blown off his body and kicked to the ground, resulting in a small explosion of the ground and the head.


    The body of the ice troll twitches as its headless body tries to look for its head for a brief moment, before copsing to the ground. leaving a trail of blood right under the ck and white fox woman.


    "Hmpf, trash." Kuroshi scoffed, before gazing at the rest of the ice trolls.


    "Come at me, I will crash every single one of you on my own!"


    "Gwegh!"


    Growling with anger, the ice trolls charged towards her, and Kuroshi followed suit.


    But before they could engage inbat, spears of ice flew toward the ice trolls, prating their bodies and spreading the ice around their wounds.


    "Huh?" Kuroshi stared confused at the ice trolls that she was about to engage, now finding themselves on the ground.


    The one responsible shifted her focus away from the reckless ck and white fox woman towards the undead having a hard time against the ice trolls.


    ''Even if they are mere puppets, I can''t have them all destroyed here.'' Sernatta thought internally, fearing the concourses of that happening with the primordial.


    With her eyes glowing blue from mana, she merged her mana with the one around her surroundings.


    Shifting it and controlling it like a cold breeze towards a Draugr who was about to be destroyed by the axe of an ice troll.


    That particr cold breeze shifted like a protective sphere around the draugr and hardened into a sphere of magical ice, making the troll axe bounce off despite having the power to feel a whole tree.


    "Such mere attacks aren''t enough to break my magic..." Sernatta mumbled before closing her fist except two of her fingers and swiping to the side, thus reshaping the protective sphere of ice into several ice needles and extending them towards the ice trolls.


    Impaling him in the process.


    Moving her attention away once she confirmed the fate of the ice troll, she looked at the Draugr with the halberd who was having a difficult time against one of the ice trolls.


    ''At the very least, this one has to survive...''


    Turning her palm downwards towards the direction of the fight, the cold breeze moved like living serpents gliding through the wind. Crashing towards the ice troll''s left leg.


    Turning into the breeze into magical ice that rooted into the ground itself and up the knee of the ice trolls.


    "Haha-Huh? What sorcery is this!" The ice trolls yelled in disbelief at his own leg failing to break the all so fragile looking ice.


    The halberd wielding Draugr seeing this red his eyes.


    Moving to the right side of the ice troll while it was distracted, he swung his halberd surrounded by dead mana.


    The ice troll swung his axe at the Draugr, s his distraction left the undeade to close. Leaving him in an awkward position where the undead with these dark green ring eyes was behind him.


    Swung down, the halberd took the right leg of the ice troll, tainting the ground with his enemy''s blood and leaving the ice troll to fall to the ground.


    "Gweaghh!!! You pile of bones!!! I will eat you-" The ice troll cursed as it turned his head around enraged from having his leg cut off by something that looked so fragile.


    But before he knew it, a spear made out of bones pierced the front of his chest.


    "Wha-!?"


    Turned his head forward in shock.


    The next thing he saw was 2 other spears flying towards him.


    He tried but he miserably failed in grabbing the spears before they met his chest.


    "Bagh-How could I...!" The ice trolls mumbled as he fell backward, his bloodied eyes refusing to ept the current events.


    As he stared at the sky with his blurry vision, a being made of bones with ring dark green eyes moved in front of him, staring down at him.


    Raising up the weapon that his liege has given him.


    "For some mere bones-! *Crack!"


    "Defying his will brought you to do this, mortal." The Draugr said, pulling his halberd from the ice troll''s head, staring at his twitching body.


    The other three Draugrs slowly came to retrieve their spears from the troll''s chest.


    Pulling them out only to continuously pierce the ice troll''s body till it stopped twitching.


    "His will shall be followed." The three Draugrs said.


    "Even if it''s by all means." The one with the halberd said before going to his next battle, followed by the three.


    Seeing that from the side, Gilgamash frowns before moving to the side to dodge a maceing to crash him.


    *Brackkkk!!


    "Running fox! Let me crash you!" An ice troll yelled in frustration, raising his mace to the side and swinging at the golden tailed man,


    Only for him to jump back slightly and dodge the swing effortlessly. His mind being on his own thoughts.


    ''As expected from his puppets, ruthless just like their creator.''


    Albeit he found great satisfaction in seeing the hunters being skewered and mutted. He was well aware that the creator of those beings could very possibly point those undead toward those of his race.


    And while they weren''t all that strongpared to him and the other 4. He recognized the danger they would pose to anyone else, especially with their weapons having dead mana employed.


    Decaying flesh and all that is living.


    ''Beings that neither hunger nor tire on top of all that. And that''s not talking about those lingering living shadows that he has around him. If he were to decide to make us join the ranks of his minions...''


    "Maybe if I had "her" as my own, then maybe-"


    "Aghhhh! You moving fox! Stop and let me crash you!" The ice troll yelled, making Gilgamash''s eyes brown twitch.


    "Tch-Annoying." He mumbled as his tail moved around his arm unnaturally.


    "Die." He said coldly as he swung his hand to the side.


    His tail now covered his hand extended and swung like a wip to smack the head of the ice troll.


    But unlike the damage one would expect of having been smacked by hair, the ice troll''s head exploded upon contact with the tail effortlessly.


    "To think I was hearing orders of such filth." Gilgamash said full of disdain as he freed his arm from his golden tail.


    "I guess I should focus right about now as one of the tribe leaders."


    He stared towards Herlin who around him had several victims of his ws.


    And currently, he faced an ice troll radiating a simr aura to them.


    The aura of the 3rd-tier.


    And it wasn''t the only 3rd-tier ice troll that was on the battlefield.


    As ice troll slowly walked towards Gilgamash and Kuroshi, their faces full of grins and bloodlust."


    "Took you long enough, great hunters." Herlin said emotionally and calmly.


    "Hmpf, a mere fox dares to talk back." The ice troll facing Herlin scoffed.


    Sernatta who looked from the side, slowly raised her hand while doing her best to hide the mana she controlled towards the ice troll that Herlin was facing.


    But before she could, a metal spear came flying through the battlefield, destroying a group of Draugrs or leaving them wide open for the undead to crash them while on the ground.


    "Shit." She cursed as she stared at the distance, faintly sensing an ice troll that she guessed was of the 3rd-tier.


    And from there, another metal spear came flying towards the battlefield.


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