The giant battle at Eschen prolonged well into the evening, mostly due to the large numbers of zombies, skeletons and ghouls that kept coming with no fear.

I mean, the undead didn't suffer much from morale, even when our guns and cannons destroyed them by the thousands.

Of course, I kept an eye out and directed the troops from the air when needed, or intervened when some monster threatened to break our lines.

The Stirland spears and the cavalry also got a bit of action, but most of the damage was done naturally by our artillery.

A normal Empire army would have 4 cannon batteries at most, and even then the cannons would barely have enough ammo for 20 shots or less. We had ten times that, and thus the damage dealt was proportionally larger. On the other hand, given the poor metallurgy of the Empire, the cannon barrels started to wear out and lose their rifling grooves, which impacted the accuracy and range of the shots.

Oh well. Surely the gunsmiths of Nuln will be happy to produce 100 more cannons for me. I paid very well, and they got more practice for their craft.

The worn out cannons will need to be installed onto more War Wagons for grapeshot firing, which didn't require either range or accuracy.

As for the rifles of the infantry, same thing happened but wasn't so easily fixed. Yes, I could sell or trade the smoothbore guns to other provinces anyways, since even without rifling they were still breach-loaders, and far faster to reload than the old muskets.

It was mostly the poor quality iron used for the guns though. I needed to fix that soon, perhaps a steel converter to transform the normal iron into steel?

It was possible, once I had enough charcoal or coal to higher grade flames. Then add a bit of carbon and miraculous steel would emerge.

Damn Dwarves, keeping all these things a trade secret while the world was going to Hell, in less than a century.

I frowned while diving down to demolish a bunch of Crypt Horrors in melee. I may need to 'find' a lost Dwarf city and see how they did metallurgy. Maybe find some relic weapons too.

A flutter of wind warned me just in time, and I dodged a Vampire Lord that emerged from the city, sneakily hiding in shadows for a assassination strike.

Then I grabbed his arm and gracefully returned his oily dagger into his face. "Gaahh! Just die!" the foolish Vampire yelled.

"You didn't wash your neck, I am quite disappointed with your hygiene." I quipped back while dragging the (probably) poisoned dagger through his jaw, neck and lastly into his heart.

The Vampire groaned and died impaled through the heart. What can I say? My jokes were to die for.

Almost immediately, the skeletons began to crumble to mere bones, as the Dhur or Dark Magic that animated them faded away.

"Cavalry...charge!" I shouted while fly up once more.

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Closing from both sides, our horsemen slammed into remaining zombies and ghouls that were engaging our spearmen, and in 15 minutes it was all over.

Might have been wiser to chase after the Vampire Lord first, and remove the numerous skeletons from the battle without wearing out the guns, but I wasn't a good general.

Not a good Wizard either. I still only knew a dozen spells, and only 6 of them well enough to produce decent effects.

Now, don't take this wrong. Anika only knew 9 spells too, but all of hers were extremely efficient and polished, likely due to rigorous training in the Ice Court of Kislev.

She just didn't have enough breath to cast more than 5 spells in a day.

"Hunters' Moons!" I casted, increasing the vitality of the army again and closing minor wounds. My spell wasn't powerful, but I did manage to extend its range over the entire battlefield. A minute later, I cast the spell again, and again...for a whole hour. I could cast the spell a hundred times more and still wouldn't get tired. The Ghur was strong with me.

I just sucked at being a proper Wizard.

As I was searching through the treasures of Eschen, Odin arrived behind me, and just stood there in quiet. "Yes, my dear apprentice?" I asked while testing the magic items for any interesting effects.

"We lost 19 men in the cavalry, 21 in the spears and 3 riflemen. There were other injuries, mostly among the cannon and war wagon crews, but they are better now." Odin disclosed with a weary voice.

I nodded to myself. About 1 percent casualties, in such a big battle was fine. And mostly from the melee units, as expected.

As I turned, I swallowed a curse. The poor boy was missing an eye, although the wound had healed, probably from my own spells.

"You should have started with your eye, Odin." I murmured in a sad voice.

"It barely hurts anymore, Master Pef. It was my fault too, as I failed to renew the Amber Hood and a cannon shell burst too close." the boy admitted in a wise tone.

I sighed, mostly to myself. "Stop trying to copy me, Odin. I can engage in melee because I am invulnerable. And very fast." I muttered and ruffled his blood-soaked hair.

"Also, I dropped my runic helmet, when I entered my beast form. It is a bear, like you predicted, Master Pef." My apprentice continued with his self-flagellating words.

I nodded and smiled a bit sad. "And Thor?" I asked, changing the subject a bit.

"Oh! Thor became a White Wolf. Moving faster than a bullet too." the boy gushed with an admiring voice.

"A wolf, huh?" I mused slowly.

"White wolves are the messengers of Ulric, Master. I think I see why Magister Martak chose us to become Amber Wizards..." Odin spoke in a somber tone.

Thinking back to the End Times from a distant past, Gregor Martak was the Avatar of Ulric then. And I think he was killed by a Demon Lord or something.

"Uhm. Martak is favored by Ulric, that's true. Maybe Thor is favored as well?" I wondered out loud, while dragging a giant book from under a pile of gems and gold coins.

*You have found a Book of Nagash.

-This provides opportunity and danger alike.

Wow. If my game menu showed up, this was probably important. I've only seen the menu appear a few times, and always for important things. The book must have been how this Vampire Lord learned to summon so many skeletons, and other undead.

"Is that a magic book?" Odin asked with childish curiosity.

"Sure is. Want to read it?" I hummed with a wry tone.

Odin hesitated, his lone eye becoming cold and cautious. "It is very dangerous, isn't it?"

I smiled. "Of course it is. We just fought an army of undead created with this book."

Odin turned and ran away, without bothering to read my book.

Poor child. But maybe he was wiser than I thought.