Several corpses and bushes were burning, creating black smoke. A few Goblins were still alive, and trying to crawl away. Alaster watched one climb to its feet and stumble away a few steps before a slender man in black dropped onto it, driving two long daggers into its back.
Alaster ordered the Black Guards to hide while he crouched lower against the pile of Goblin bodies and continued to watch.
After the first man appeared, eight more appeared from the shadows. Most of them quickly got to work extinguishing the fires with Water Magic. The rest of them continued to execute the Goblin survivors, there weren’t many.
Alaster continued to watch them, hidden in the hole. The Black Guards hid themselves against the pile of corpses. In mere moments, the fires were out, and the survivors were dead, at least enough to be sufficient to the group.
The young man spotted a patch on their shoulders, so knew they were from the same group. It didn't take much to know they were from Sicon. He was tempted to reveal himself, thinking they would escort him back to the city. But he thought better of it. They might just kill him too. And if they didn’t, Alaster could feel himself stifled in Sicon.
He refused to tell anyone about his Class, as it would reveal too much about him. He had been somewhat forced to tell Astrid due to the situation and not being prepared for it, but not he was. He was prepared to properly hide his Class and his Undead. But now? Now that he had the Wisdom bonus, it would simply hinder him to continue to hide his Class. Being too close to the city would have serious risk of exposure if he used the Bonus to its fullest. After all, while he couldn’t be sure, Alaster believed that if he meditated while he had the Bonus Active, he could raise more than five excess Undead.
If he mediated, he should be able to raise twenty, five from his normal Mana Regen, and fifteen from his [Meditation] Skill. He had just been about to try it on the Goblins when this group arrived. They were clearly Adepts, and very high leveled and skilled ones. They knew what they were doing and how to do it in the most efficient way.
Instead, Alaster hid. He wasn’t going back to the City. He needed to be able to operate independently and at his own pace. Astrid would think he was dead, which was fairly cruel, even for Alaster, but she was ready. Alaster had taught her enough to be able to survive.
Her Buff had also leveled enough to be felt. It was still pretty pathetic, but other Novice Parties would understand its value. The Buff only affected the living, and only received experience when someone under its influence killed something. So it had leveled very slowly when in a party of mostly Undead. She would quickly be recruited and would be fine. Alaster was sure of it. She was no longer his concern.
Just as quickly as they appeared, the group left, heading back to Sicon. Alaster relaxed, as did the Black Guards, who sat down against the walls, but they remained hidden in the hole. He wanted to ensure they had left. Nearly an hour passed before Alaster felt comfortable enough to leave, plus the corpses were starting to smell, which in the small hole, with minimal airflow, was horrible.
Alaster had his Black Guards shove the pile of corpses, blocking the entrance, away. Exiting the hole that had served as their savior, Alaster stood straight and stretched his back, which popped in several places. He looked around at the carnage. His view from the hole had not done it justice.
He could see the exact point each of the fireballs had landed, as it had created a little crater, instantly melting snow and sending a shower of dirt away. Many of the corpses had body parts missing where the extreme forces of the explosions had simply ripped them off. Blood mixed with loose dirt to form a slurry.
The scene was horrible, but the only impact it had on Alaster was annoyance. Both because he now had to search the entire area to loot their bones, and the explosions had thrown them quite far. And because he was incapable of replicating such an effect. At least for now. Alaster was grateful that they had unknowingly saved him, but he was mad at himself for needing the rescue at all.
Alaster started at the hole, using [Bone Crafting] paired with [Mana Manipulation] to pull the bones out of the Goblin bodies without having to carve into the body himself. It cost quite a bit of mana, but he was willing to spend it in order not to be up to his elbows in Goblin blood and guts. He had sold his fancy clothes he had escaped the Siphas Manor in, and instead bought more normal and sturdy clothes he could adventure in. They were already dirty, but dirty and blood soaked were two very different things.
Alaster simply called the bones out of the bodies, and left them for the Black Guards to gather into a single pile for Alaster to gather later. While one of the Guard picked up the bones, the other began to haul the corpses away from the hole.
Alaster knew that the harvesting of the bones would take a long time and probably take the rest of the day. While he knew the bodies would attract predators, and this deep in the forest, they would be quite powerful. But the hole was very defensible, and Alaster was not sure if he could find another similar spot. But he set to work, wanting to be done before it was dark.
* * * * *
After the Elites had left, the Goblin Lord set to organizing the survivors of his army. It quickly became apparent that he no longer had the size needed, nor were they strong enough. After the chase and clearing battle, and then the second chase and the hole, the Goblin Lord had learned much. But what he did learn, was enough to teach him that he didn’t know nearly enough.
He turned to the horde of Goblins around him. First step, he decided, would be to train his army. Then, he would focus on rebuilding it, where those already trained could assist in the teaching. He looked down at the sword at his hip and then to wooden clubs and spears the rest used. His own personal guards, and the few guards of the other Goblin Lords he had killed, had actual weapons.
As they trained, they would try to steal better weapons, or, at the very least, make better weapons for themselves. The Lord understood that any weapon they made would be much weaker than even the standard weapons of the humans. But he also understood that value of the bows.
The Goblin Lord looked in the direction of Alaster and grinned, revealing his sharp teeth. He would be back, and when he returned, it would be with a true army behind him, not the horde he had sent. He could hardly hold back his excitement at the thought.
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
The Goblin Lord turned away, the survivors following.
* * * * *
The pile of bones had grown quite large. The Black Guards were just finishing up with piling the boneless corpses further away from the hole. Alaster was busy pushing the pile of bones into the hole, their shelter for the night. He would have put them all into his Ring, but there were simply too many. They didn’t fit.
He would use some to create another Night Child. The first one was still hiding up in the tall branches, and had concealed itself when the Elites from the city showed up. Alaster was sure that if they were looking for something, they would have found the Night Child. Before Alaster had taken shelter in the hole, the Night Child had been killing the stragglers of the Goblins.
Alaster grumbled to himself. He was quite annoyed that he had left behind his Bone Shelter. The feeling of security the portable shelter had offered was great, and it had taken a lot of bone and time to create.
‘Haaa, at least Astrid can still use it. Wait! No she can't! I sealed the door!’
Of course, she could simply break in, the bone wasn’t that strong. But it still irritated him. Which caused him to make a few mistakes in the creation of the Night Child, making him have to go back and fix them.
The Black Guard finished their work just as Alaster was putting the finishing touches on the Night Child. They entered the hole and sat down at the entrance. A few moments later, the Night Child ran out to join its twin.
In just a few minutes, he had a small fire burning, as well as a stockpile of sticks and branches. He had put the fire in the middle of the hole, which he hoped to warm it quickly. A few minutes later, he had constructed a Bone wall to cover the entire entrance of the hole, leaving only a small slit at the top for airflow.
He would have used a similar wall during the attack, but to make it strong enough would have taken too much time. Instead, as the hole warmed, Alaster began to create thick poles out of bone. Both ends were sharpened, intending to be shoved into the ground to impale anything that ran into them. Alaster couldn’t make spears out of bone, as they required more durability than he was currently able to make with bone. A spear was blocked, and parried. But these spikes, wouldn’t face that issue. They would be deployed, and any charging foe would have an issue with them, as fragile as they were.
After he had made two dozen, and stored them in his Ring, he turned to the pile of bones. Even after he had created a Night Child, a bone wall, and several strengthened spikes, the pile was still too big to put into his Ring. At least without taking out everything else, including his food, water, books, and the shield. However, they were ordinary bones. And Alaster had no use for them as they were.
Grabbing some, he condensed them into a cube, roughly eight inches small. Alaster didn’t push himself to condense them too far, so instead of the dark gray of the Black Guard, they were a much lighter gray.
Alaster made cube after cube, and with each cube, the large pile of bones dwindled. However, he did not turn all of them into cubes. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have the bones to make more of the Excess Undead. At least, not without reconstructing the bones.
As it was, he could currently have four skeletons, or two Skeletons and two of some other kind of Undead. In addition, he could raise another five with his Wisdom Bonus, but to do so would drain his mana by one hundred and fifty, nearly half, and would prevent him to regenerate any unless one of them died.
However, if he was meditating when he raised the Excess Undead he could increase the raised Undead from five to fifteen, but he wouldn’t have the mana to raise all of them at the same time. At most, if his Mana Pool was full, he could raise ten at a time, which would still leave him with five remaining mana regeneration, which he normally had.
However, those summons would be reliant on him to keep his [Meditation] Active. If he stopped meditating, Alaster was certain they would be unsummoned, their bones clattering to the ground. At least the ones over his Mana Regeneration.
Alaster took out some meat and began to roast it while he ate some cheese from his Ring.
‘No wonder my Class prioritized Wisdom over Intelligence. But why did it put some into Constitution?’ Alaster thought, thinking back to when he first received his class, in a situation remarkably similar to his current one.
Back then, and as with any fifteen year old receiving their Class, the Class had come with ten stat points that it automatically assigned. This was used by the user to know what their Class specialized in, and give a hint of what they should put their free points into later. Most Classes designated three, as Alaster’s had, but not all of them.
Alaster had never heard of a Mage Type Class that didn’t designate Wisdom and Intelligence, but instead of Dexterity as a third, which most Mage Types had, his third had been Constitution. Alaster’s Class had prioritized Wisdom with five points, Intelligence with three, and Constitution with two.
‘I’ll have to wait until I unlock the bonuses for Intelligence and Constitution.’
Already, less than a day after unlocking his WIS Bonus, he was changing strategies to revolve around it. He was excited for his next bonus. Had he known just how vital they could be, he would have prioritized getting them over keeping his Stats fairly spread out.
Luckily, his closest stat to fifty was INT at forty-two. And he hadn’t checked after the long and bloody day.
[Class: Death Mage
Level: 10<11
EXP: 43%<63%
Health: 310/310
Health Regeneration: 8/min
Mana: 320/320
Mana Regeneration: 5/min
Spells: Necrotic Bolt, Raise Undead, Bone Crafting, Mana Manipulation, Death Touch, Skeleton Creation, Meditation
Strength: 40<42
Dexterity: 35<37
Constitution*: 40<42
Wisdom*: 50<52
Intelligence*: 42<44
Free Points: 5]
‘I’ll put it all into Intelligence, which will bring it up to forty-nine, then the next time I level, it will automatically go over fifty, giving me the bonus. The next level will also bring Constitution to forty-four, and the Free Points will boost that up to forty-nine. Meaning I will get a Bonus each level, for the next two levels.’
Smiling to himself with his plans for the next few levels, he began to eat the roasted cut of meat. With this, he would get the first bonuses for the Class Designated Stats. For now, he wouldn’t put any Free Stats into STR or DEX. He simply didn’t need to. His true power now truly lay in his minions, so he didn’t need much STR. And if he needed to move quickly, such as another chase, he could just have his minions carry him.
‘Should probably make some sort of platform or something they can carry me on.’
However, he decided to do that tomorrow. He was exhausted from the day and was struggling to keep his eyes open with the heat of the fire thawing him out. Alaster laid down and closed his eyes, giving one last command to his Undead to stay hidden and protect him, before he fell asleep.