Rise of the Undead Legion

Chapter 389 Desperate Situation

Dave was in a musty and dim-lit room with heavy steel bars locking the way out.

He could see several warriors moving in front of him, he didn’t have access to his armor anymore and was stripped off of them. His inventory was locked and he couldn’t access his weapons or items.

Dave was almost naked, the only item he could use was his Ring of True Undeath.

He was—obviously—in a prison.

"Dave, what’s taking you so long?" Lone’s voice came from the party-voice chat.

Dave smiled ruefully as he answered, "Yeah, sorry about that, I kinda got arrested," he replied casually.

"What do you mean arrested? How do you get arrested in a game man?" Flanker’s voice came right after Dave’s reply.

"Somehow, I managed to land right next to the Qin Kingdom’s capital and was captured,"

"SILENCE WRETCHED ONE!" a louder voice than Dave echoed through the party chat.

The rest of Dave’s party understood from the voice that the speaker was one of the persons that apprehended Dave or currently capturing him.

"Yeah, you get that," Dave said begrudgingly and turned the chat to muted. So that the NPCs couldn’t hear what he had to say to his friends.

"What do we do?" Perfect asked.

"Don’t do anything, Singund knows the plan, stick with him. Mercy, are you here?" Dave asked.

"Yes."

"How is your mission going?" Dave asked.

"I took care of one warehouse, we’re on the move for the second one. But I saw several Elite Soldiers rushing toward the Teleportation Gates the moment I blew the warehouse, I think they’re on to us."

"You’re probably right, they’ll be headed to the other cities now, most likely to increase the security on the warehouses. I think you should retreat."

"There is one more city close to here, I think I can take care of the food stocks there,"

"Okay, be careful, the rest of you guys, stay close to Singund. The whole plan will be in motion soon," Dave said.

Dave shut down the party chat, leaving his friends to take care of themselves. They needed the game EXP and experience itself in managing situations where he was not needed.

He was now caught and captured, and will probably be visiting Limbo soon enough. But as much as he waited, no one came to his cell, no one asked about his presence at the gates of the Qin capital, he was now a prisoner and he feared that his avatar might get stuck in the cell forever.

"Albert," Dave called.

A moment later, the man in Hawaiian getup appeared right next to Dave.

"Seems like you’re in a pinch here," Alfred said.

"Yeah, I thought that there was something wrong here, I’m under captivity but no one came to inform me of how long will I be staying here," Dave said.

"No wonder my twin brother went mad, Lad, your presence here made a lot of things go wrong. The game is an AI that developpes based on the decisions and choices the players make. To keep things realistic as much as possible, there is a need to do a lot of calculations and alterations to questlines and dialogue. Now that you’re here a few of the base scenarios that were going to happen have been removed. And I’m creating new ones to match your situation."

"Huh, so it’s like a loading screen, right?"

Albert thought for a moment, smiled then said, "Yes, you can say that. A loading screen."

"Right, I can live with that. How long will it take?" Dave asked.

"Less than an hour," Albert said.

"Kay, then." Dave laid his head on the rest at one end of the bench he sat on and closed his eyes.

"I’ll take a nap then," Dave said.

"Enjoy your rest, I’ll try to make things go as fast as possible."

"Before you go," Dave asked, "did anyone break the dungeon I made?"

The old man shook his head, "Not yet, more than three thousand adventurers had entered, none survived. Your traps were deadly." Albert said.

"Good, that’s more CP for me," Dave grinned and went silent. Queuing Alfred to leave.

After exactly one hour, a warrior came and rattled at Dave’s cell with a baton. Waking Dave from his dozing.

Dave groggily woke up, looked at the warrior and went back to rest.

"Wake up I say!" The warrior said.

"No," Dave said and kept his eyes closed.

A person wearing a red embroidered dress that had a golden collar and hems.

"Soldier, leave us," said the man.

"Magistrate!" the man said and gave a bow to the man then left.

The magistrate as Dave understood looked at the undead from beyond the steel bars and spoke, "To my knowledge, the dead don’t need sleep."

"I’m a bit special," Dave said.

"It is indeed how you say, we have reports saying that you came from the sky. Some speak of it as a sign of death."

"You wouldn’t believe that would you?" Dave said in a grin.

"Not if this very sign of death is locked up in one of the heaviest security prisons of the country."

Dave shrugged.

"Why did you come here?" the magistrate asked.

"Do you think I’ll answer you? I have my own agenda," Dave said.

"I bet you do, perhaps it is related to the disappearance of the many soldiers that we sent to check up on the broken teleportation gates and the destruction happening all over our empire."

Dave remained silent.

"Why are you attacking our food supplies?" the magistrate asked.

"Payback," Dave said.

The magistrate frowned for a moment then said, "The assault on the lost city?"

Dave smiled for the first time then sat upright.

"Yes, I don’t tolerate attacks on what’s mine," Dave said.

The magistrate laughed loudly. Making Dave frown.

"What’s so funny?" Dave said.

"You are, you just revealed yourself the leader of the Lost City."

"Yeah, so what," Dave laughed back.

"I don’t think you understood what I mean, you’re the leader, by capturing you, we can force your army to fold back and we can even press forward to capture your city without resistance."

"I thought you were smart, it turns out you’re the same as everyone." Dave shook his head.

The playful atmosphere around the magistrate dissipated as he waited for Dave to explain himself.

"We’re undead, we don’t die, don’t feel pain, don’t suffer. Whatever you do to me, won’t make my allies do squat shit for you, if you think torture or captivity is enough to force them to halt the attack you could never more mistaken, they’ll only press harder and you’ll bleed." Dave said in a matter of factly.

The magistrate shuddered, his reasoning was right by all means, but it only applied to humans. Indeed, torture or captivity is useless to the undead. Not to mention if he killed Dave, he would go to Limbo, then reappear in the undead realm.

"Guards, chain him, and follow me," the magistrate spoke solemnly. He turned and walked away from the prison cell.

Soon after, two guards came to Dave’s cell with chains in their hands. The chained his hands and legs and led him behind the magistrate.

The jail was actually huge, and Dave was locked in the lowest chamber. From the sight of the people locked in the same cell he was on, this place wasn’t kind to those it hosted.

Many of the ragged people looked like battle-scarred monsters. Every one of the prisoners in the lowest cell was quiet. Unlike what Dave would expect from a prison. The people occupying the cells had murderous looks in their eyes, they were all focused on the magistrate and the warriors, but some of the gazes fell on Dave giving him the shivers.

However, when surrounded by predators, one must never show weakness, Dave’s undeath form was a terrifying notion to any sane man. He turned to those who were looking at him, then simply smiled.

Any of the prisoners who were staring at Dave hurriedly looked away, some of them clearly shaking.

Dave followed the guards to the upper floors, turning lefts and rights. The prison itself was designed like a maze, but he could feel that he was getting closer to the top with every step. Also, the rowdiness of the prisoners increased the higher up he went.

From what appeared to Dave as mass murderers at the bottom of the jail to simple burglars or tax-evading citizens. The jail was hosting a whole lot of people, too many actually.

This was not a good sign, to have a prison filled to this much meant that either the law was too tight or that corruption was too high.

A bright light shone upon Dave, it was morning light. Looking ahead, he found himself on the streets.

One of the guards threw a hooded robe over Dave to cover his undead appearance as they led him ahead.

Dave’s face was hidden under the shade of the hood, but he could still see the streets he was walking on. The capital of the Qin Kingdom was extravagant, to say the least. Any building in sight had its own garden. There were statues of a person in armor all over the city.

The city, for its extravagance, was silent. Even the people who walked through its streets, they looked hurried and not willing to tangle with each other.

The citizen wore eastern styled clothing made of fine silk. Some walked on foot and most used carriages led by other men wearing steel collars.

’Slaves,’ Dave thought.

The guards wrenched the chains so that Dave would move faster, and stop his gawking at the citizen.

Soon after, Dave arrived at the front gate of a heavily guarded palace.

There were several guards stationed at the front gate of the palace and on its walls.

When they saw the magistrate, the guards stepped aside and let the guards lead the prisoner in.

Dave walked on a longe stone-paved way until he reached the internal palace. It was adorned with all kinds of engravings—gold made. While the garden had more of the status of the same person.

These statues, however, were carved with even more finesse and, the armors they wore were authentic and luxurious.

"Bruh, talk about narcissistic maniac," Dave mumbled.

"What was that?!" the guard spoke loud, clearly angered.

"You heard me, who’s this egoistic prick? I mean he has statues of him all over the city—"

However, Dave’s words were cut abruptly as the guard struck him in the jaw with the baton in hand.

-1,000 HP!

Dave grunted, looked the guard in the eyes, then smiled saying, "You’ll pay for that."

"Wretched fiend! Don’t dare speak of his majesty with your vile tongue!" then he raised his hand to assault Dave another time.

"Guard, calm down," the magistrate spoke.

The guard stopped reluctantly and gave Dave a cold stare then wrenched the chains even harder to lead him ahead.

Dave grinned as he moved forward. The situation he was in was nothing to be envied for. But he took it with a grain of salt convincing himself that at least he was the first player that got to see the capital of Qin.

Looking to his left, there was an enormous square building that looked like it was recently built. There was still a lot of building material sprawled all over the place.

Dave felt the building completely out of the place. It was like a giant cube placed there for reasons unknown.

Dave kept moving ahead being led by the guards through even more guards. They walked into the palace and through a long carpeted hallway.

At the far end of the hall was a throne made of gold and precious jewels, a person sat on the throne, one leg over one of the throne’s handles while he laid resting on the other handle.

Dozens of half-naked women were tending to the man’s needs. Some took care of his feet’s, some fed him grapes. The clichéd life of a king was painted in full colors in front of Dave’s eyes.

"Your majesty," the magistrate spoke in a respectful tone.

The man or youth, which by Dave’s understanding looked much less threatening or ’manly’ than what the statues had portrayed.

"Yes, Gu Dao, what do I have to sign on this time?" the king of Qin obviously reported in all boredom.

"I brought the prisoner to you," the magistrate said.

"Oh, it’s the undead," the king said in a more interested voice.

He sat hunched over and waved the girls away. He looked at Dave and said, "Can it speak?"

"Yes it can," the magistrate said then gestured to the guards leading Dave.

One of them struck Dave across the head, forcing out a muffled grunt.

"You’ll really regret this," Dave said.

"So it can speak, HA! Do a backflip for me!" the king said as he clapped his hands.

Dave thought for a moment then said: "How can I do that while I’m chained?"

"Right, you should release his chains, just the legs,"

"Your majesty, he is dangerous, he is the leader of the undead forces that are occupying the lost city,"

"Don’t worry about that," the king snapped his fingers and called, "La-Blaire!"

A man dropped from the ceiling and stood right next to the King, he was tall, stupidly so, at least eight or nine feet long, his muscles bulged out of his light armor and his skin was blood red.

***

The Demonograph has sensed the presence of a powerful Demonling!

Chosen one detected!

Take the utmost caution when facing such a foe!"

***

’Ah shit,’ Swore under his breath, apparently, he didn’t need to go looking for the Chosen one of the Ash King. He was standing right in front of him. Not to mention that Nick had mentioned to Dave To run the moment he saw the Chosen One of the Ash King. He was chained and couldn’t use any of his weapons or armors.

"Now, Undead, do a backflip for me!" The Qin’s King spoke in a wide smile.