Chapter 674: Progress

Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Kurisu

Without any notice, Sandro quietly left the Northlands right after the new year.

We discussed many things and made various agreements, in a way that both of us were happy.

During all of this, both of us tacitly forgot about a certain missing Undead Emperor… Since I would never be willing to release Conservation, avoiding this dead-end of a topic would itself be a negotiation technique.

According to our agreement, Sandro would send a group of high-level undead to the Northlands within two months. These undead would nominally belong to the Xiluo Empire, and they would bring large amounts of resources and magical data, especially magic textbooks that would be important for training human undead mages.

As for me, Sandro was indeed quite generous with what he gave me. He wasn’t stingy even in the slightest, being willing to teach the new generation. Harloys and I both learned much from him. Of course, in exchange, we also gave him some of our research results.

“Permanent magic effects…”

In a way, Undead Emperors were so dangerous because their research results had already surpassed the limits of the Creator Goddesses. It was often the case that even something seemingly insignificant would also become incredibly dangerous as long as one researched it long enough.

This was a real world, where you would die if your head was cut off. This was no game world where people would only die when their hit points reached zero. Trying to figure out combat strength and levels would be laughable. As long as you could strike a vital point, a rusty dagger would be no different from a forbidden spell.

Sandro’s personal research focused on making the magic effects of buffs and debuffs permanent. Basically, he studied why some magic spells were able to affect a person for a long duration, and why others would last only an instant.

Then, he progressed in making short-term magic spells’ effects permanent. It was a miraculous specialty that started from the mundane… Well, if you readers have difficulty understanding this, let me give you an example. For instance, if you made a fireball spell into a permanent buff magic spell, then the buffed person would constantly emit flames as if that person was a burning sun.

“Transforming the living into a state of energy, and then a state of magic… it’s almost inconceivable.”

As for how Sandro accomplished this? He didn’t explain it to me. I figured that it would be quite difficult to explain regardless, just as how it would be quite difficult for me to explain using words how I created my Seven Original Sins.

So, let’s ignore the process and only look at the results. The end result was that Sandro abandoned his physical body and transformed into a being of pure magic. His current entire physical body was just a spell—an ultimate withering magic spell.

Withering magic would be a seven-circle magic spell in undead magic. It wasn’t particularly rare. However, it would be incredibly deadly to anyone living. Sandro specialized in draining all the water from all life forms within a certain radius around him, withering them to death. This would be incredibly effective against anyone living, but limited in attack power against the undead… But of course, with Sandro’s power level, it would be quite easy for him to wither even skeletons into dust. The undead wouldn’t be able to handle his withering, either.

Sandro’s physical body, which appeared to be corroding, was a constantly progressing withering spell. It was forever active and constantly changing. Previously, the fairies’ combat report had said that he instantly cast a forbidden spell. However, what really happened was that Sandro showed his true form, a withering spell that could envelop the entire plains, which allowed him to forcefully resist the archmages’ forbidden spell and injure/kill ordinary warriors in an incredibly large radius.

This was no major secret of undead society. Anyone who had records of fighting with other people would naturally see parts of their fighting style exposed. This was why Sandro had nicknames such as “The Witherer” and “Waterless Dust”.

This was also how Sandro had broken past the natural barriers that undead would face with their physical bodies being unable to reach the peak. He had already transformed his physical body into pure magic, so why would he be limited? From a certain standpoint, he technically wasn’t even undead anymore. It could be said that he was technically an entire new species of his own.

I had long since learned this information on Sandro from Aso’s inherited memories. This was why I mentioned previously that Sandro would be more dangerous than 10 Conservations put together. Human mages would have all sorts of restrictions when casting forbidden spells, and would always be significantly weakened for a lengthy period of time after casting a forbidden spell. Yet, Sandro could instantly transform himself into a forbidden spell with basically no restrictions. If he truly attacked with his full power, and started slaughtering the living, he would become an unstoppable calamity.

However, the price for Sandro’s transformation into pure magic was that it appeared that Sandro was no longer able to use standard undead magic. However, when compared to the destructive power of his forbidden spell form, this restriction would barely matter.

Sandro was a major weapon of mass destruction. He simply hadn’t attacked with full force yet. If he really did, he would easily create new areas on the map filled with death, where no living beings could survive.

I should also mention that any place that Sandro used the full extent of his abilities would see the entire land, all animals, and all plants be finished. All the water in the land would be drained, transforming the terrain into nothing but desert. Even the undead would transform into dust, withered away to death. No enemies or allies of his would be able to survive. Sandro would basically create an entire new mini Death Plane.

Sandro’s ability could only be used for destruction. It was impossible for him to create, but he was capable of total annihilation.

He didn’t have a so-called Myth-ranked weapon. Or, maybe another way of putting it was that he himself was his own Myth-ranked weapon.

Besides, he was pure magic himself. This would mean that in order to eliminate his frightfully powerful forbidden spell, it would be impossible to eliminate his magic without eliminating Sandro himself. This would be an impossible endeavor.

The other Undead Emperors were also incredibly dangerous. However, Aso’s memories unhesitatingly categorized Sandro as the most dangerous existence among them. Even the wars between Gods during the Immemorial generation hadn’t managed to make Sandro as much as lower his head.

This was why I mentioned previously that I would profit so much as long as I obtained Sandro’s combat strength for my side. Even in my upcoming battles against the Gods, Sandro would be one of my best pieces.

Perhaps it would be impossible still for Sandro to single-handedly kill a Main God. However, he would be fully capable of destroying everything the Main God had, and it would be impossible for a Main God to kill him.

Actually, Main God was simply yet another power level assessment. Basically, Main God meant “an existence capable of easily defeating a powerful God.” Ancient existences such as Sandro had long since been forgotten by history, and thus they weren’t recorded as being on the level of Main Gods. However, not a single Main God could claim that they could easily kill Sandro.

But, judging by how Sandro had still lost in battle long ago and been exiled to the Death Planes, he still did have a mortal enemy who countered him. Of course, his mortal enemy was also one of my enemies. This was why Sandro hadn’t dared to act as he pleased. Still, I’d talk about this topic at a later time.

Sandro generously gave me and Harloys much of his research data. A lot of it was too advanced for me, and I would need time to study it myself. Meanwhile, Harloys benefited much more as she discussed many things with Sandro.

In return, I also gave Sandro a new discovery of my own. Although it was only a lowly one-circle magic spell, in a way, this spell could actually change the entirety of undead magic society.

Magical bone creation, a one-circle magic spell. The caster could spend a certain amount of mana to create some bones which were capable of casting undead magic.

Alright, perhaps some perceptive readers might have already noticed that it wasn’t actually my personal invention. It was really Undead Emperor Conservation’s unique invention.

When I forced Conservation to the brink, trapping her in an environment with no resources to create undead cannon fodder with, she had actually managed to create something out of nothing, using her infinite mana in a state of conservation to create bones that then stacked up into undead giants as one of her final aces in battle against me.

And after she was defeated, I naturally obtained her research results.

At the time, I even scolded her for how wasteful she was being. This magic spell had the potential to change the entire world, yet she was hoarding it as one of her personal secret trump cards. That was such a waste!

Although undead magic was cheap to cultivate, it still required resources. You wouldn’t be able to obtain corpses and bones out of thin air, after all. Even though obtaining corpses would be quite easy due to constant warfare all over the world, corpses were still a type of “valuable resource” to some. As more people started studying undead magic, the nimble-footed… er, I meant graverobbers would constantly increase in number. Many problems would then arise.

Besides, the spread of undead magic meant that undead magic was no longer solely the realm of undead mages.

The development of new magical engineering techniques had brought major changes and great developments. But, no matter how technology developed, it would always be best for there to be as many mages as the source of the magic powering the new technology as possible. Since it was much cheaper to cultivate undead magic, with much lower requirements for talent as well, even an acolyte undead mage who lacked the ability and talent to become a full-fledged undead mage could easily make a living by “selling their mana” and “selling zombie laborers”.

Undead mages were now like cheap mana batteries who were becoming ever more common on the market.

It would be quite obvious that standardizing undead magic training would improve all of magical civilization. However, people would often mention the problem of “resources”.

Magically created bones were foundationally no different from magically created ice or earth. It would simply be a transformation of magic and elements. I felt that Conservation being able to succeed with inventing this new spell was actually connected to the power of death becoming one of the new four major elements of Hell. Otherwise, undead magic grandmasters from the past would never have missed such an important opportunity.

Since Conservation resided in the Ice Plane, and was already a powerful Undead Emperor, such an accidental invention probably didn’t mean much to her. This was because she could already casually summon as much cannon fodder as she wanted. However, this would be an incredibly important new foundational stone for all of undead magic.

“…You, as expected of being the only new Undead Emperor in the past 3,000 years. You’re truly incredible, incredible.”

Sandro appeared rather scary with his eyes open. However, his delight that came from his heart was real. I even felt rather awkward about taking the credit, but now wasn’t a good time to tell him that it was actually Conservation that had invented this spell, which would bring up the topic that we had intentionally ignored: the missing Undead Emperor Conservation.

Conservation had become my slave and an infinite mana battery for my Yongye City. I was even having an undead magic magical engineering factory being constructed with her at the core. This was a core plan of mine for concretely raising my personal combat strength. I would never be willing to stop this.

Ahem, let’s get back on topic. At the very least, Sandro was quite obviously pleased when he left. We had also gained significantly.

Harloys was now one step closer to becoming an Undead Emperor herself. I also gained more ideas about my future death magic sword. As Sandro was an old artifact, he truly possessed an immense amount of knowledge. Since we now had shared mutual benefits, he wouldn’t be stingy with his knowledge. He answered all of our questions about undead magic. His experience and knowledge from countless millennia helped us greatly.

It would be quite rare that anyone could guide us at our knowledge level, and if we accidentally took a wrong path, it might take several years, several decades, or even several centuries to fix.

As I gradually drained more and more knowledge from Conservation, along with unlocking more of Aso’s memories, I was gaining a tremendous amount of undead magic knowledge.

Harloys, Aso, Conservation, Sandro, and myself. The combined knowledge of five Undead Emperors was all before me. It was likely that my four powers would become unbalanced. My knowledge in all the other magical fields couldn’t even come close to comparing to my undead magic knowledge.

But after learning so much, shouldn’t I be showing off some things as well…?

Anyways, I felt that I could now do a little something that would perhaps even shock everyone with all this undead magic knowledge.

“You should first focus on obtaining a Myth-ranked weapon and entering SemiGod rank. You’re quite ambitious to want four magic swords, but you haven’t even fully completed a single one. You might run into a powerful enemy who will instantly kill you at any time. Not only that, I’m getting impatient.”

“Hey, isn’t this all because it’s too difficult, so I’m taking things slowly…? Wait… You’re getting impatient? Are you about to make a breakthrough? You’ve discovered a method to break through to the next power level?”

I paused in surprise at Harloys’ words, but then felt delight. A magical pet’s power level was permanently magically bound to be impossible to surpass her master’s power level. But since she was feeling impatient, her next breakthrough would mean a tremendous difference in power level.

“I want to try. There should be at least a 50-60% guarantee. It’s also thanks to you…”

I was rather surprised to hear this. While other types of breakthroughs could rely on taking certain potions or reading secret technique manuals, breakthroughs to become an Undead Emperor, which would surpass the Creator Goddesses’ own limits, would mean creating one’s truly unique path. How could Harloys possibly have relied on me?

“Not only have I also learned so much knowledge from the different Undead Emperors, this half-living, half-dead physical body you gave me has been a great help.”

For once, the silly cat wasn’t acting tsundere. It seemed that she had much to exclaim about. I supposed that transforming between the living and the undead a few times would indeed help one gain a better understanding of the power of death.

“Alright, I’ll do my best to improve my power level quickly. At least, I’m quite satisfied with my progress on my ice magic sword…”

My personal residence was already filled with all sorts of ice sculptures and drawings of snowy scenes. These weren’t resources for my ice magic sword, but rather tools I was using to deepen my memories of the Northlands. As the Ice Treader, and in order to sculpt my Northlands ice magic sword, I would need to remember many past memories and disasters.

But sometimes, when you thought about past disasters and misfortunes, thinking that your current life was so wonderful, new disasters would instantly come to visit you.

It was now right after the new year, so all the governmental departments were having a short vacation. But when the government started operating again, I received nothing but bad news.

As for calamities in the Northlands, I would of course have to mention the yearly beast stampede.

“Our major winter hunt squadron was ambushed by the beasts? How are our losses?”

Sandro’s visit had caused me to set aside all other matters, so I left Reyne and the others in charge of the winter hunt. I was heartbroken to learn that Kelly showed no mercy on me, as she took away all of my spending money like she’d promised…

Ahem, I meant that I definitely hadn’t thought that our Mist Alliance’s current military forces would actually lose against the beasts!

“…The beast stampede was much smaller than expected. We barely suffered any losses. However, Her Highness Reyne felt that something was wrong with the situation. This is a letter that she personally wrote.”

The messenger instantly left after handing me the letter, which I started perusing.

Reyne wrote using simple and direct words. Basically, there was indeed something off about the beast stampede. The stampede was less than one-third the expected size, yet it unhesitatingly attacked the large Mist Alliance army.

Beasts also had their own wild intelligence. They would avoid fully equipped military squadrons, and instead go to hunt weaker prey, such as regular villages. Since Reyne’s army had such an obvious numerical advantage, the beast stampede shouldn’t have tried to attack the main fighting force.

But, not only did the beast stampede attack the winter hunt squadron, the beasts instantly ran away after the initial ambush, but not very quickly. Instead of hiding deep in the mountains, the beasts remained within sight as if they were luring Reyne’s army into following them. Reyne and I both instantly thought of classical guerilla warfare and kiting tactics that would primarily be used for buying time.

I couldn’t help but recall those strangely distorted noodle-like devils. This was definitely all because of the devils’ schemes. But, just what were they up to? Did they really think that the beast stampede could pose a serious threat to the Mist Alliance?

The beast stampede was a lot smaller than expected. However, I didn’t think that this was good news at all. The druids had long since come to the conclusion that large numbers of ordinary wild beasts would transform into magical beasts due to the increased Elemental Tide. These magical beasts would be even more difficult to deal with than usual due to being in a stampede. Not only that, the magical beasts would increase in power level, rate of reproduction, and require much more food. These magical beasts would ravenously come out to hunt, so it was expected that their numbers would rapidly increase.

Reyne’s calculations had been made with the previous year’s beast stampede as the base number. Meanwhile, my calculations were more than double her expected numbers. This meant that more than 80% of the expected beast stampede had suddenly vanished, while the remaining beasts were trying to stall the Mist Alliance’s major winter hunt squadron. Who would believe that there was no scheme behind this?

“Where has the beast stampede’s main force gone…?

“Where else could they go? If they’re not in the Mist Kingdom, they’ve definitely gone to another country. This will bring great trouble for other countries in the Northlands.”

“…Harloys, please don’t say things so directly. Didn’t you notice that I was trying my best to forget about this possibility? If my family’s dogs bite someone else, I’ll have to take responsibility!”

“Why don’t you just refuse to admit anything? It’s not like it’ll be the first time for you.”

“Excellent idea. I’ll write back immediately to Reyne that Elven Empress Harloys suggests— Silly cat, please don’t bite me on the head! Do you still want to become an Undead Emperor or not!”

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