Chapter 96: Conquering The Hollow Salt Forest Layer – Facing The Hollow Queen [1]

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BOOOM!

The First Layer of the Dimensional Labyrinth trembled. The tremors rippled through the White Salt Castle. Its ruler, the Hollow Queen, gazed out from her windows in surprise. Her large white eyes scanned the horizon as she spread her potent aura in every direction.

Her enormous body lumbered toward the terrace of her grand castle. She kicked aside smaller Salt Termite Workers attempting to serve her and stared down at the chaos below. Several Salt Statues had rebelled against her, slaughtering her army. Many appeared strangely altered—larger, stronger, overflowing with ghostly energies she could not comprehend. Two small energy signatures hovered close by, ghostly threads controlling the giants like puppets.

“Intruders… Nobody… Nobody… Can trespass… my Dominion… Kill… Kill them all!”

The Queen’s voice distorted with rage, yet her orders remained absolute. Salt Entities surged toward Louis and Zorba like massive tsunamis of salt crystals. The Prince met them with a sharp gaze. He decided to test his true strength now. He stepped off his flying sword, seized it in one hand, and sprouted skeletal hand-shaped wings by fusing with the Necromancer’s Hand.

“My Soul has grown stronger, and with the Nirvana Flame Essence… I can do this,” Louis murmured. He concentrated his Soul Aura into Gungnir and his Ashen Frost Blade—the embodiment of his mastery over the First Step of Sword Breathing.

Both weapons blazed with golden-red flames. Their power surged dramatically, expanding until they seemed five times larger. Louis gripped both weapons and swung them in unison.

His sword unleashed a vertical slash. His spear delivered a devastating thrust from dozens of meters away. Yet…

“Holy Dragon Lance Style.”

“Third Form – Heavenly Dragon Ascent!”

“Dragon King’s Divine Blade Art.”

“First Form – Ascending Heavens!”

He unleashed the same devastating combined attack that had annihilated Verdant. He expended over 50% of his Fantasium Reserves and a vast quantity of Soul Essence—simply to measure how far he could push now, standing only one step from Tier 7 as a Spiralwalker.

The results were as catastrophic as he expected. The splitting sword strike and ascending divine holy dragon roar merged, slashing and piercing through dozens of Entities at once. Consecutive explosions erupted, devastating even more.

Roughly 60% of the Hollow Queen’s army perished in a single devastating blow. If Louis repeated the attack, the rest would fall just as easily.

Over a hundred Entities died in that instant! Most were Level 1, but at least thirty Level 2s perished among them.

“I-Incredible…! Most surprising! Amazing! Splendorous! T-This is the power of my great lord! At last, I truly see! Those dreams must be prophetic. I am destined to serve you, oh lord Louis!” Zorba screamed in fascination.

“Hm.” Louis nodded. He consumed the Fantasium Cores from earlier kills and slowly began recovering his energy. “As long as we maintain the pace, we should reach the castle soon enough. Come on, let’s go. Zorba, raise as many Undead as possible. Here—I’ll assign you some Souls.”

Louis transferred the Souls he could not enslave himself. Zorba rediscovered the exploit: when two Desecrated Soul Spiralwalkers exchanged souls, the limitations seemed to vanish.

Of course, limits still existed based on each user’s capacity to hold souls. Even so, Zorba received nearly a hundred new ones. Barely able to contain them, he quickly selected five powerful golems to pour them into.

“I have the perfect idea—for my great prince, no, my king! I shall create his knights!” Zorba laughed. The souls of the Entities—once human, even the Termites—flowed back into their corpses. Zorba reassembled and combined them with his Necromancy, forming five new giants of salt crystal. The material shifted from red to black and purple, overflowing with ghostly energy. “Haha…! HAHAHAHA!”

The sight reminded Louis of the time Zorba used the bodies of those slain in the battle against Soma—though back then he could not claim their souls since he had not killed them. Now, with over a hundred powerful Entity Souls, Zorba revealed his true potential.

His Spiral resonated more intensely than ever. His eyes glowed bright red. His cursed aura intensified, emitting corrupted Fantasium that instantly withered the surrounding vegetation from the sheer Essence of Death radiating from his body.

“Gaze upon my new creations, my Lord. I believe in quality over quantity, actually! Five super-strong Undead will always be better than an army of a hundred weaklings the enemy can trample easily!” Zorba raised his arms. His power now linked to five mighty Undead, each containing roughly twenty souls. “I present to you the Knights of the Round Table!”

All five knights—each ten meters tall—stood powerfully beside Hecatoncheires. They were not as massive, but they were designed for both strength and agility. Each bore a unique carved design across their rocky exteriors. No longer mere salt rock, the material had been enhanced and reinforced dozens of times—harder than most magical metals.

“Sir Lancelot!”

The first stepped forward: a nimble, slender knight wielding a long spear forged from souls and salt crystal—now a beautiful purple-and-black crystalline weapon flowing with ghostly flames.

“Sir Gawain!”

The second was much larger, carrying a sword and shield of the same corrupted ghostly salt crystal—as Zorba had named the new material.

“Sir Percival!”

The third balanced between Lancelot’s agility and Gawain’s bulk. He carried a long sword and a spear strapped to his back for versatility.

“Sir Galahad!”

The fourth advanced to the front lines. Galahad bore a gigantic shield nearly as large as his body—resembling a literal fortress of incredibly durable material.

“Sir Tristan!”

Finally, Tristan wielded a pair of sharp blades blazing with ghostly, phantasmal cursed flames—perfect for dealing extra damage to Entities.

“Not bad,” Louis said. “I suppose you love Arthurian Legends, Zorba.”

“It is among the few books I read as a child,” Zorba replied with a gentle smile toward his beloved lord. “They kept me from wanting to end my life. These stories, myths, and legends flooded my mind with new, countless ideas.”

“I see. You lack King Arthur himself, however,” Louis noted. “Where is he?”

“Why, that is you, my lord,” Zorba said with fascination. “I cannot make a King Arthur because that’s you. You are their King. You are our Arthur! Our Hero King. Please, lead us to victory!”

“Hah… you’re indeed crazy,” Louis smiled, shaking his head. “Very well then. Here they are—charge!”

With a mighty roar, Louis, Zorba, and his creations surged forward. They clashed against swarms of Salt Termite Warriors, Soldiers, and even rare Sorcerers who conjured powerful magic and curses to weaken foes.

The Knights of the Round Table proved tremendously powerful. A single swing of their giant weapons shattered Entities before them, breaking them apart and exploding them into pieces.

Even the largest Salt Termite Warriors fell after only a few strikes. Galahad served as an excellent vanguard tank—charging forward, disrupting enemy lines, and throwing formations into chaos. This allowed Zorba and Louis to pick off targets one by one.

In just twenty minutes—faster than Louis had anticipated—they stood before the White Salt Castle, atop a massive anthill of white mud and salt crystals. Louis stored forty souls for himself. The flower in his chest consumed three, satiating his hunger for souls and instantly replenishing his Soul Essence. The rest he saved for emergencies.

Zorba, meanwhile, created three more Knights of the Round Table: Sir Kay wielding a very long spear, Sir Gaheris carrying a longsword, and Sir Agravain bearing a sword and a grimoire—the only knight Zorba envisioned wielding magic. The grimoire was formed from the same material as the other weapons, but its pages consisted of pure ghostly energy.

“Not bad, Zorba. You’ve proven yourself incredibly useful,” Louis nodded.

Louis wasn’t just pleased with the Knights. He was thrilled because he had unexpectedly made Zorba far stronger by bringing him along and allowing him to create these super-powerful golems. The Zorba from the previous timeline had never had such an opportunity. Even his strongest zombie, Hecatoncheires, had been a single being; every other undead served only as fodder or meat shields.

“I wish there was a way I could bring these Knight Golems through multiple timelines… If I can bring my contracted spirits and familiars, maybe there is some method?” he wondered. “Perhaps if I refine them into Soul Gear and make them my own Familiars… but that would mean stealing them from Zorba. And that’s not what I want.”

Louis pondered the idea briefly before refocusing on the present. “Alright, Zorba, we’re moving up. And… well, can they fly?”

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