As the battle went on—mostly a repeat of most orcish battles—the Surveyor was debating what to do, Yargul simply wasn’t interesting enough anymore. It took a mental note: that if it were to do such an experiment again, it would have to interfere a bit more to keep things interesting rather than to let nature run its course. For if nature was simply allowed to flow uninterrupted, nature would not deviate into new and far more fascinating paths in a relatively short amount of time. No, for that to happen, it needed a helping hand, a hand which the Surveyor would provide.

But the hand needed now needed to be more forceful, Yargul was no longer necessary, he was useless. So it would have to dispose of him, creating a Yargul much like what he had once done with Ieros. This was more to control the decisions that Yargul would’ve faced in the future, allowing the Surveyor to direct the experiment to more fascinating ends.

And so, as Yargul was battling for his very life, the Surveyor came to Yargul, pausing Time over the entire battlefield. Everything suddenly paused, weapons halting in place, fierce expressions frozen on even fiercer faces, and blood remaining still in the air, ready to fall. As for Yargul himself, he was frozen mid-swing, his axe glinting in the sunlight, ready to behead an unfortunate orc. The Surveyor then did something that it should’ve done long ago, it removed current soul of Yargul and stored it away, in turn fashioning an artificial soul which contained a part of the Surveyor. This would allow the Surveyor to influence Yargul, allowing him some control over the experiment. This soul was placed within Yargul’s former body and with that done, the Surveyor withdrew, allowing Time to flow normally.

And thus, Yargul took his first steps on this earth, the piece of the Surveyor beginning to utilize some of Yargul’s latent abilities. As Yargul had never tried to unlock the powers that were his, the Surveyor was unable to immediately access them but just its very presence began their awakening. And the result of such an awakening was a release of energy, energy that Yargul could absorb, thus replenishing his tired body. With this new bound of energy, Yargul was able to ensure his safety with relatively low risks, although it wasn’t enough to keep him fighting. Really, Yargul had been rather reckless in his fight, and reckless even before.

Really, the Surveyor should’ve done this earlier, it could’ve avoided all the redundant nonsense, such as Yargul entering into combat right after the feast. Perhaps even further back, it could’ve prevented Yargul from losing so many orcs to the orcish commander. All these things could’ve... well no matter. The data provided was sufficient and as they were really just redundant, it wasn’t important if it had or had not happened. It was on the right track now and that was all that mattered.

It left Yargul to his own devices, returning to his side of the orcish battlefield. The Ulgar orcs immediately went to his side, Yargul waving off their attempts to aid him and walking by himself to the camp. Only then did he finally take a rest, asking for something to eat and drink. The orcs hurriedly went to comply, although it would be a lie to say that none of them entertained thoughts of killing Yargul right then and there. But the title of Invincible deterred them from doing so, such a title suggested the fact that no matter what situation, no matter what condition, Yargul would emerge victorious.

And perhaps that title now held actual basis, for Yargul was nearing the perfect creation that he was meant to be, the perfect creation that the Surveyor made him to be. Well, not perfect, not even the Surveyor was capable of such a thing. But in the current environment, he might as well be perfect for glass surrounded by dull stone might as well be diamond. Blessed with the most perfect body the Surveyor could create and now the most perfect mind, Yargul was complete for his eventual conquering of this world, for the Surveyor’s experiment.

For to see the effects on the entire world, the Surveyor must first conquer it, then it would be free to study it at its leisure. A world of orcs, yes, what type of world would that be? It would set up this experiment, perhaps even guide it, but in the end, it would be up to the experimented on how it would go. It was like a commander giving orders to his troops, his orders will direct them, but how the results come about depend on how well the soldiers follow through.

Speaking of which, Yargul decided to give commands to his army, simple ones but commands nonetheless. He first summoned the clan leaders, which were not fighting, it was time that they made themselves useful. Once they were assembled, he told them all to secure the gate portion of the Skull Lord’s city, he didn’t want to fight his way back to his camp again. Two clans would be responsible for actually reaching the gate while the other clans would be supporting them, distracting the majority of the enemy’s forces. If the gate could be secured, then they would be able to more easily unite their forcse.

Yargul had no intention to lose, no, he was the perfect orc, destined to rule all of orckind. To have a defeat besmirch his title, that would be intolerable. So as he ate and drank, the forces under his command moved to answer his will, imperfectly of course, one cannot really expect perfection from orcs, but they did well enough. Their duties were basically to kill everything until they reach the gate and then kill any enemies that approach it. Even for orcs, this was a most simple task.

But the hordes under the two Orc Lords were not to be underestimated however, they had various clans under their command too, the completion of this task would not be easy. But Yargul did not expect them to succeed, this was more to keep the orcs distracted while he recovered. He did not think for just one second that his title of Invincible was enough to keep him safe. No, many things were still possible and his early death was one of them.

Under Yargul’s newfound wisdom, he managed to recuperate in the following months, although this process was lengthened as he entered combat before the more serious of his wounds had been fully healed. This was more to keep the clan leaders under his command from questioning his authority, after all, no orc would follow a leader who never led others into battle. And it was also helpful, slightly accelerating the rate at which his evolution would occur. And it came to be that during one of the many repetitive battles that Yargul finally managed to evolve his ice mana, his strengthened body and greater energy pool meeting the requirements necessary to begin the usage of the black mana.

Of course, the Surveyor’s fragment also provided help, allowing the ice mana to more easily accept the dark energy necessary to transform. It came to Yargul in a rush, the ice mana beginning to run wild as it prepared to evolve. This rendered him temporarily helpless, the orcs surrounding him taking this chance to hammer away at his stone armor. As it began to give, the danger Yargul’s body faced further accelerated the rate of evolution, giving it that final push. However, there was no burst of energy, no beam of light which shot into the sky. No, the ice mana had evolved but Yargul still needed to activate it.

He didn’t so so at first, Yargul too busy trying to fend off the orcs that battered away at his armor to try and activate his ice armor. Suddenly, it felt as if he was cast into the depths of an icy lake, an intense cold like none he felt before blossoming forth from his core. He gasped as he fell to one knee, the stone armor falling off in pieces as his skin began to freeze over with black ice. But ice didn’t stop there, it began to expand both outward and inward, digging into his flesh. He screamed out loud, the intense pain with the addition of the burning cold nearly making him pass out.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

The cold began to spread all over his body, the last to be covered being his face. His scream was cut off as the ice covered his entire body, becoming nothing more than a frozen statue of black ice. All was still on the outside but the inside was a turmoil of energy, the dark ice mana clashing with his life energy and stone mana. And then, after what was an excruciating eternity, Yargul burst free from the ice statue, the energies deep within him having reached a strange equilibrium.

Something had changed in Yargul, his body was no longer what it once was and as of yet, the effects on his mind were still unestablished. The evolution embedded permanent ice deep within Yargul’s bones, leaving a cold that would continue to permeate his body for eternity. As for the stone mana, it was forced deep into the bone marrow by the dominant dark ice mana, the dark ice claiming more and more of the bone marrow for itself, leaving little to the stone mana. Having forcibly converted most of the marrow to its own, the dark ice mana was strengthened and the stone mana was similarly weakened. But the stone mana wasn’t fully expelled so Yargul would still be able to use it, although how much was not yet known.

The Surveyor immediately recorded the newly evolved Yargul and proceeded to run analyse it, comparing it to the previous body of Yargul and recording the exact differences as well as noting down what remained the same. But it did not ignore Yargul just yet, it was still keeping an eye on him to see just how Yargul would use it in a real life situation. It had only collected empirical data, it had yet to obtain experimental data, that is, actual observation of Yargul using his newfound abilities. So it intensified its attention, memorizing everything that Yargul did.

So, freed from the dark ice which had imprisoned him, Yargul studied himself, feeling the strange energies which flowed beneath his skin. Visually, he appeared to be slightly different, his skin a darker shade of grey than before, the dark, nearly black skin contrasting sharply with his tusks which—although yellowed—seemed to be white. The orcs surrounding him stared on in curiosity, they were wondering just what had happened to Yargul.

But their curiosity was soon forgotten, this was a battlefield and some orcs thought that as the Invincible had suffered some strange magic attack, it was their chance to kill him. So enemy orcs closed in once more, only to be impaled by countless spears of black ice. They formed almost instinctively, without Yargul’s conscious command. He was surprised at this, his sudden awareness breaking whatever instinct was controlling the ice, causing it to shatter and fall to the ground. It quickly sublimated until there was nothing left of the black ice, leaving Yargul perplexed.

Even though Yargul had a piece of the Surveyor, it did not mean it shared the knowledge the Surveyor possessed, it merely meant that the Surveyor was now able to directly control Yargul as he wished, such as making Yargul more cautious and attentive to pieces of information. Essentially, what was imparted was experience, Yargul was no longer reckless and uncaring if he was ignorant of the situation, no, he was now able to take a look at the circumstances and make a decision based on it.

And right now, Yargul had made the decision that it was better to let the ice mana be controlled by instinct, turning his attention to the axe in his hand and the enemies in front of him. He charge forth, the almost sentient dark ice protecting him as the spines of a sea urchin does, moving and stabbing with complete independence from Yargul’s mind. However, the energy drain was far greater than normal and thus, Yargul began to make his way back to friendlies, his mind reasserting control before the dark ice could target his fellows.

Seeing this, the Surveyor was satisfied with Yargul’s performance, Yargul would have tried to control the dark ice with brute force and likely would have lost his life right then and there. No longer needing to worry about Yargul’s safety, the Surveyor sat back and watched the battle unfold. Orc numbers on both sides steadily dwindled as the battlefield began to change. The sight of corpses were the only things that could be seen, the once towering walls of the city now appearing to be half their height from the sheer amount of bodies, and the stench of rotting flesh which seemed to be permanent. Three years and over sixty million corpses had gone into making this sea of bodies, a vast expanse of uneven terrain wholly made of the dead. And even with so many dead, there were still those that were alive, each adding another corpse to this land of death, be it another’s or their own.

The fighting had been almost nonstop, orcs often dying before they had the chance to feel tired. And those that survived to be tired, well they were forced on to fight till death, no longer able to rest for there were no longer any reserves to be found. Here their only duty was death, both theirs and the enemy.

The Surveyor was slightly impressed at these orcs who threw away their lives in the millions, the once vast armies which numbered more than thirty million now reduce to a mere fraction of what they once were. Truly, they were a race that were born to fight and die, no race better suited, at least, no race that the Surveyor was familiar with. And through it all, where most other powerful orcs had fallen, Yargul had survived through it all. Whereas the previous Yargul may have died due to recklessness or the like, Yargul was far more cautious, making sure that whenever he was among the enemy he wasn’t too far from his soldiers.

The two Orc Lords were much the same, which is why any fighting between Yargul and they were inevitably cut short with one side retreating and their armies surging forth to protect their leaders. Yargul himself had challenged them multiple times, calling them cowards but these orcs did not respond, they had already gone this far, they couldn’t afford to mess it up by dying in a foolish challenge. And in turn, when Yargul was forced to retreat, he endured their insults without retaliating, for he too was wise enough to know that to accept their challenge was the height of foolishness.

Finally, at the end of the three years, the battle’s closure was in sight in the form of the Orc King, his sword thirsting for blood and his army hungering for battle. His army of elite orcs entered the battlefield with a great roar, confusing the tired orcs who stopped fighting. A figure, adorned in bloodred armor and a dented crown that seemed to small for his head, crested a hill of bodies, the scarlet Sword of Korbus at his side. More and more orcs began to crest the hill alongside him, their appearance not unlike a chromosphere of an eclipse.

These orcs differed from the others as they were all wielders of various wild mana, some radiating an aura of fire, others covered in stone armor, a few wreathed in electricity and countless more strange and peculiar mana that they took from magic beasts. These were the elite of the elite, the greatest of all orcish armies to ever march upon Agleon. The Surveyor leaned in with great interest, was the new Yargul capable of competing with the Orc King?