Building the Strongest Undead Empire from Scratch

Chapter 280: Bone piles

Alex's interest in alchemy magic had been piqued, and she planned to delve deeply into it. The effects on the skeletons had already been tested and proved to be without issues.

With nothing pressing to attend to, Alex found herself with some free time to tinker around in the city, aiming to boost the combat capabilities of her undead forces.

Currently, the Undead City was a chaotic sprawl of bones everywhere—one could hardly step without crunching on them. These were the remains of the Skeleton Soldiers that had been stationed within the city walls. More bones piled up as Skeleton Soldiers from outside the city continued to stream in.

"What's with all these skeletons falling apart? Are they dead?" Sophie asked, puzzled as she looked out from the palace, where she and the others had gathered after hearing the commotion caused by Alex setting up the magic circle.

"These skeletons are absorbing energy!" Xiao Hui, a Lord of the dark elements, had a keener sense of these energies than Xiao Mu and Sophie and could discern what was happening.

"It's like the effect of a special building, isn't it? The undead can not only rapidly increase their numbers but now they can also collectively strengthen and absorb energy," Xiao Mu observed, having noticed the enhancements in the undead more than once. It was almost like having a cheat code.

Meanwhile, Alex was deep in thought, then came to a realization. "Undead Summoning Magic can be combined with dark alchemy magic!"

Her summoning magic was also high-level, capable of more than just raising undead from corpses. The magic directly affected both corpses and the undead. This new idea came to her as she observed the city filled with piles of bones.

The piles of bones could be fused using summoning magic to form a sort of core that autonomously summons entities. In simpler terms, under the influence of Alex's summoning magic, the city's piles of bones could merge into a single massive pile, with the enhancement effects of alchemy magic still intact!

Moreover, Alex could also fuse skeletons together, potentially breaking through the upper limits of the Skeleton Commanding level. However, this ability didn't particularly surprise her, as John and the liches had demonstrated similar capabilities before.

Alex cast her magic again, and a gray-white magic circle rapidly expanded, enveloping all the bone piles in the city.

Moments later, all the bone piles began to merge, and a deep green magic circle was released, covering them as the two magics worked in tandem. Soon, Alex completed her masterpiece.

After the fusion, what remained was a vast mound of bones, slightly raised in the middle like a small hillock, topped with numerous skulls burning with blue flames. Moreover, a dark, mysterious energy enveloped the mound, with faint blue sparks moving about like fireflies, emitting an ominous aura.

"Although the result is sweet, I feel like the magic circle was a bit wasteful..." Alex mused. It would have been sufficient to set up a magic circle just beneath this bone mound; covering the entire city seemed excessive.

"Oh well, who doesn't make mistakes on their first try?" Alex consoled herself, moving the bone mound to the main gate's wall of the city, then set up another magic circle.

Whenever undead city sensed an enemy approaching, Skeleton Soldiers would continuously emerge from the bone mound. Alex tested it, and hundreds of soldiers appeared each second—not too shabby a speed.

But that wasn't all. Not only could she disassemble it, but under her summoning magic, these hundred thousand Skeleton Soldiers could also be fused into a gigantic skeletal creature. The more she fused, the stronger the summoned entity would be. Alex estimated that the upper limit was close to half-step Emperor level.

"Now this is a real bone pile," Alex nodded in satisfaction. Although it indirectly cost her an army of a hundred thousand skeletons, it could serve as a handy ace up her sleeve.

"Summoning magic isn't weak; it's just that its lethality isn't as conspicuous, which is why I've always felt it only played a supportive role."

The bone pile formed from a hundred thousand skeletons was Alex's current limit, not the limit of summoning magic. Alex believed that as her power continued to grow, she could fuse even more, turning what was once mere cannon fodder into a formidable force.

Nowadays, the battle hardly relied on standard-level skeletons, and their role was indeed diminishing.

"Bone dragons are technically skeletons too, right? Could they even be considered a type of bone beast?" Alex pondered anew. If skeletons could be used this way, why not bone dragons, since they seemed quite similar in appearance?

She spent the afternoon researching this, not even returning to the palace once.

This left the trio at the distant palace dumbfounded. "What's gotten into Miss Alex? Has she gone mad?"

"Bone dragons and skeletons, although both made of bones and seemingly of one race, differ vastly in strength. It's probably not so easy to figure out," Xiao Mu knew Alex was trying to create something akin to a bone pile with bone dragons, but she hadn't succeeded yet.

"Knowledge is static in the mind; it needs to be applied flexibly. Big Shot might just not have figured it out yet, but I believe she can," Sophie said, and surprisingly, Xiao Hui didn't retort but nodded in agreement.

"I get it, it's like how a math teacher teaches you to count to a hundred, but the exam is on quadratic equations. How's that for an analogy?" Xiao Hui looked around, seeking approval.

Sophie remained silent, while Xiao Mu gave Xiao Hui a look as if he were an idiot.

"Hey! Why are you looking at me like that? Did I say something wrong?" Just as Xiao Hui loudly questioned Xiao Mu, they saw a specter flying towards them.

A specter approaching the palace meant only one thing: there was news from outside. Xiao Hui immediately stopped fooling around.

"Leaders, there's news from the Savage Plains," the specter announced, having chosen to come to the palace since Alex was busy, and it happened to find the three there.

The news was about the Minotaur camp and the Beastman Empire. The ancestors of the Minotaurs were said to be born from a human male and a beastman, a history only a few hundred years old. Naturally, the Minotaurs couldn't be accepted by humans, as such unions were taboo.

Besides, apart from walking upright like humans, Minotaurs bore no resemblance to humans. It took hundreds of years for the Minotaurs to develop into the small-scale race they were now.

Interestingly, the ancestors of the Minotaurs were a male and a female twin. The trio found this detail rather odd.

"So all their descendants are from inbreeding?" Xiao Hui felt uncomfortable all over, almost wishing he could slap a Minotaur.

"No wonder they have descendants and formed a camp," Sophie realized.

But if you asked how other beasts reproduced, the answer would, of course, involve plundering females from other races, much like the Goblins.

Over time, this layering of mixed blood led to increasingly bizarre appearances in newly born Orcs. Meanwhile, the truly powerful beastmen focused more on their bloodline, practicing survival of the fittest and gradually strengthening their genetic traits.

The idea of mixed-blood beastmen caring about bloodlines sounded like a joke.

Eventually, all the beastmen united to form an Empire, slowly becoming a force that lesser powers steered clear of.

This was the brief history of the Beastman Empire. As for its location, the specter hadn't yet discovered it, but it was definitely not in the Savage Plains.

The Minotaur camp was merely an auxiliary race of the Beastman Empire, which had grown too powerful to accept just any riffraff.

The trio took this as just another story, finding the beastmen disgusting yet somewhat fascinating.

It was hard to believe that a group of mixed creatures could develop to such a scale.

"So, to sum up, we can completely wipe out the Minotaur camp without any problem, right? The Beastman Empire won't come knocking," Xiao Hui caught the essence of the matter and pulled Xiao Mu outside.

"What for?"

"To wipe them out!"

"It's getting dark."

Xiao Mu noted the dimming sky.

"Perfect, it's double experience at night. Just call up the Death Spirit; it's King level now!"

That made sense.

The Death Spirit quietly appeared beside them, and Xiao Mu and Xiao Hui entered the main fortress, leaving the Undead City.

Only Sophie remained, standing alone at the palace entrance, watching Alex in the distance.