Dragon Gods Reign

[Bral Kingdom]

Striding through the halls of Duke Wallace's castle with determined steps, Melidra showed no fear despite having a fourth rank constantly around her. The duke had ordered this immediately after Helenia had told him about her, informing her of it during their first meeting. Though rather refreshingly for her, he didn't even pretend that it was for any reason but his fear of her.

This honesty continued through their following meetings, allowing the two of them to quickly reach a compromise in most matters. Today's meeting had thus only been to notify the relevant individuals of the changes that were to come.

“Are you leaving directly?” Helenia called out to her from behind.

Stopping and allowing her to catch up, Melidra took care to walk slowly and allow her to keep up with her.

“Yes. The faster I can get the people from my village to move to the final destination, the less time they have to spend in their current situation. The improvised village may be better than what they had during the travels, but the sooner it changes the better.”

“Then I'll accompany you.” Helenia said in a tone that left no room for discussion.

“If you want.” Melidra answered her indifferently.

Contrary to this, the aura user that was accompanying her on the duke's orders looked at Helenia in utter shock. Quickly he realized the ramifications of her words and the duke's reaction, making him hastily try and stop her.

“Young miss, don't think your father would like it if you discussed it with him beforehand?” He said.

“Maybe, but I'm not forbidden from doing it. And as long as he doesn't know, he can't change that.” Helenia said with a grin, “So either tell him or complete your current task, your choice.”

Momentarily stunned, the man soon sighed in defeat. Silently following the two out of the duke's estate and towards the city gate, he soon started scribbling something on a piece of paper.

“Then at least allow me to accompany you.” He said to Helenia.

“Of course, that was always my plan.” She answered him, having already predicted this outcome.

Just like Coralia, he was a member of her family's personal guard so this prediction wasn't all that hard. And with her leaving the city, he would never leave her side unless another person from the guard replaced him.

Pressing the paper he had written on into the hands of one of the city guards at the gate, he ordered him to deliver it straight to the duke. On there he had summarized the situation and that he would accompany Helenia while she was away.

Stretching the importance of delivering it to the soldier, he hastily followed after Melidra and Helenia who had walked on without him.

They were currently making their way down one of the routes that forked off from the main path, heading straight for the forest where Melidra had ordered her undead to stay. After taking about half an hour of running to arrive there, Helenia gave the aura user a warning before they entered.

“Roswell, we'll meet up with her troops so don't attack then. Understood?” She asked.

“Understood.” The aura user replied to her.

But despite being prepared for it, he wasn't ready for what he saw a moment later. When Melidra had led them a few hundred meters into the woods, a massive clearing revealed itself to him.

Scattered all over it were different groups of undead of different kinds. From humanoid zombies and skeletons to towering beasts of sizes reminiscent of second rank ones, though the latter were exclusively zombies.

This wasn't too unexpected as most necromancers would prefer raising powerful existences as zombies instead of skeletons. Only when it wasn't possible, whether due to a lack of skill or the time since the being's death would he pick the alternative.

The reason for this was simple, with zombies carrying over more of the power and potential they had as living beings. In return, they lose out to skeletons in the variety and power of their undead traits, with especially their potential from being undead being vastly inferior.

When reanimating the corpses of mana-less individuals, the decision between the two was simply between picking quality or quantity. Zombies could form unending hordes under even weak necromancers as they needed very little energy, while skeletons could be elevated to great heights rather easily.

But once one reached mana users and especially when talking about the third rank and up, this convention quickly shifted. With mana-less beings and low ranking ones, zombies may be the weaker but less expensive option, but with more powerful corpses this quickly changed and their cost caught up with that of skeletons.

In exchange, one would no longer create a simple meat shield that had neither retained powerful abilities from its life nor had any powerful undead abilities. Instead, they carried at least great potential, keeping much of their physical strength, affinities, and mana control. And often they would surpass their living selves soon after, with their ability to grow as before not being hampered.

Unusually expensive zombies from the corpses of mana-less beings were thus sought after by necromancers, indicating a zombie with great potential.

Skeletons on the other hand would retain little of this power and none of the potential, instead having it replaced by their undead one. Thus their creation was often a gamble as it was hard to know which parts of their power they would keep and whether their new undead abilities would fit together well with it.

The exception to this rule were undead that retained their original soul, with their form being irrelevant. Instead, they both retained their original potential and gained the undead one. But the difficulty of their creation made them exceedingly rare, especially at higher ranks. Even those that existed at lower ranks were mostly created by high ranked necromancers for whom their power was irrelevant.

For the necromancer Melidra had faced to have two whose power neared the third rank was such a rarity that most other necromancers would faint from envy. And had any mana users below the fourth rank or nobles heard of it they would likely also have fainted, though from fear instead.

Luckily all of this didn't happen and there was no larger force sent after him, allowing Melidra to take control over them thanks to her inherent advantage against the undead. And now that she was on good terms with the duke, it was unlikely that their existence would send everyone into a frenzy even after Roswell figured out their nature which would undoubtedly happen.

Though he himself may be another story as the sight of the undead before him alone already shocked him greatly. Not just did their number eclipse any of his previous guesses, but they were also capable of siphoning death energy out of the air despite there being no dead zone.

This meant that contrary to normal undead, they would grow not only in one such zone but everywhere. They did this by using their rather substantial resistance to life energy, at least for undead, that was common among all those raised by Melidra and her subordinates.

And as a side-effect of using the death energy part that they drew in and releasing the life energy back into the surroundings, they created an area with a slight surplus of life energy. And this was the second part of Roswell's shock, their ability to continue existing in such an environment.

“Maybe I should have just led my father out here, his reaction would have been even more amusing.” Helenia suddenly said with a laugh.

Shaking off his stupor when he heard her word, Roswell turned his attention back to the present.

“Young miss, please take this seriously. Undead that can survive even against life energy has never been seen before, we can't take them lightly even if they aren't a danger right now.” He said.

“Oh, I am. But my father and I both share the sentiment that such a unique existence is better utilized if we don't overreact out of fear. Not to mention that I trust Melidra and she has reassured us that her control over her creations is impeccable.” Helenia answered him.

Dutifully nodding in response to her scolding, Roswell couldn't help but wonder what kind of advantages she saw in these undead. Quickly realizing that his initial fear would be an asset if pointed at the right targets, new questions emerged for him.

“And your father agreed with this idea?” He asked.

At his question, Helenia laughed wholeheartedly.

“No, he has others. In fact, he even scolded me for directly thinking about how to militarize their traits, though, in the end, he agreed to it. His idea was to instead allow her undead to inhabit specifically chosen areas near cities, with the created life energy being used to increase the health and longevity of the citizens.”

This left Roswell momentarily stunned but he quickly realized the feasibility of such benefits. The fact that a surplus of life energy in the environment would lead to beneficial effects was well known, though exploiting this fact was exceedingly difficult.

Firstly, mages capable of utilizing it were exceedingly rare. The two main groups that did were those specializing in the conceptual magic of life and death element users who focused on the life energy half of the element. The first one's rarity came from the general rarity of conceptual magic, while the second one came from the death element's reputation that largely scared off those people who would choose the life path.

But if someone could overcome this and a multitude of other difficulties, he or she could give even mana-less individuals an infinite lifespan. This was because lifespans were simply the result of nearly all species's inability to separate life and death energy when it was in an equilibrium to draw the former into their body.

Instead, all beings had to rely on their innate production of life force by converting other types of energy, like nutrition. Compared to the usage of life energy, this process was flawed as most species couldn't completely fill their need for life force with it.

Even in mana users, who no longer stored their life force spread throughout their entire body but instead in ethereal cores in their mana pool, this degradation was only slowed. Up to the fourth rank, it would be done by reducing the life force that was wasted, afterward its production would rise.

Using life energy on the other hand had no such limit, with it being the original source of life force. By mixing with the energies that a person's soul constantly emitted, it formed a new energy that both stabilized the connection between body and soul while also keeping the body alive, namely life force.

With these thoughts currently flying through his head, Roswell muttered longingly, “A city of eternal life.”

“Even with multiple options for it. Because it would be inhabited not just by humans or other living beings, but also by higher undead. Over time some of the undead would undoubtedly rise and become as intelligent as we are. Liches, reapers, and vampires will all be granted normal rights within this prospective city, just like every undead that rises to intelligence from the masses.

Though this also means we have to find ways to ensure a permanent stream of new low-level undead to produce life energy, we'll find a way.”

“And she worked all of this out with the lord?” He asked.

“That and more. For example, Helenia here wanted to satiate her hunger for adventure and what better to do it than to unify this squabbling peninsula.”Melidra said, suddenly inserting herself into the conversation.

After a short pause, she added, “Well, officially it's to bring these benefits to all, but I don't particularly care. Whatever the reason, I'll have a war at hand to grow my army. And from what Duke Wallace mentioned about the reports from the other side of the mountains, we'll need it soon.”

Leaving her ominous words hanging in the air, Melidra heaved herself onto the tank-like spider. With Helenia following shortly after, Roswell hurriedly joined the two lest he be left behind while still staring on in shock at the news.