Chapter 47
Episode 47
An orc warrior who had spent his whole life roaming battlefields, never knowing fear.
Right now, for the first time, he was feeling a terror that made his spine crawl.
"Come out! Snort! Come out, you coward!"
Aktum swung his axe in circles and shouted in every direction.
But the darkness did not answer.
Instead.
One.
Then another.
And then another.
His subordinates were vanishing without a sound.
They had definitely been right beside him, but when he turned his head, they were gone.
Into that brief darkness beyond the torchlight.
They were being sucked in, one by one.
"...."
Only then did Aktum realize.
That the top of the wall was completely empty.
That was why he had been chewing out the goblins earlier.
Because there had been no sentries on the wall.
Since when?
Since when had it become like this?
"What is this... snort. What... what is happening...."
Aktum's simple orc brain could not comprehend the situation at all.
A fortress that had been guarded by hundreds
was emptying out without a single scream.
That was when it happened.
Grab.
From the floor of the wall.
Something seized his ankle.
"...!"
Aktum's entire body bristled in an instant.
A cold, damp, yet iron-hard grip.
He slowly, very slowly, looked down.
There.
Half-sprawled on the floor of the wall was a human corpse.
A lifeless, pale face.
An emotionless, expressionless dead face was slowly raising its head to look up at Aktum.
"Snooort...."
A sound close to a scream leaked from Aktum's mouth.
He instinctively tried to let out a war cry, and the moment he opened his mouth wide.
Whoosh!
His vision.
Spun around.
Crunch!
"...Gurk?"
The world flipped upside down.
The wall, the torches, the night sky.
They spun and flowed through his vision.
And within that spinning vision.
Aktum saw.
Right in front of him, another human corpse stood motionless, clad in black martial robes.
That corpse's hand.
Was resting where his own neck had been just moments before.
"...."
Only then.
Belatedly, the pain surged in.
That dull, crushing pain, as if the back of his neck were snapping.
And Aktum finally understood.
'My... neck... is broken...?'
That was the last thought of Aktum the orc warrior.
His spinning vision slowly sank into blackness.
And Aktum lost his life and collapsed.
The corpse in black martial robes, Black Impermanence.
Slid silently toward the next target.
The night at Fortress Broktan.
Was only just beginning.
* * *
-Wait hold on is this a horror movie???
-This is Corpse-Spirit bro's channel, but suddenly The Conjuring started
-Is it real that orcs are disappearing without even screaming
-My spine actually went cold watching this
-Corpse-Spirit bro's stream genre changed to horror...
The chat window was visibly filled with screams and fuss.
Everyone seemed thoroughly spooked by the sight of Black and White Impermanence silently erasing enemies in the darkness.
It was scary even though they were watching from afar, not up close.
Well, that was understandable.
The sight of comrades evaporating without a single scream was horror beyond horror.
"Haha. Were you all scared?"
I smirked and spoke while seated on the throne.
"Among martial arts, you see, there are arts specialized in stealth and assassination."
This was as good a chance as any to give the viewers a lecture on martial arts from the martial world.
"Have you all ever heard of the Phantom Divine Art? It's called the Phantom Divine Art because it moves silently like a phantom. There's also something called the Shadowless Divine Art. It's called the Shadowless Divine Art because it leaves no shadow."
In the martial world of my former life, there had been quite a few stealth-type martial arts like these.
They were arts of the shadows, favored by assassins and killers.
-Oh the martial arts lecture started
-Isn't that the stuff that always shows up in wuxia novels
-So what do Black and White Impermanence use??
-What do Black and White Impermanence use, bro?
"Oh. What Black and White Impermanence use? You curious?"
I grinned as I looked at the chat.
"It's called the Black Moon Killing Art."
An assassin's art performed beneath a black moon.
Even the name sounded ominous.
"This one's worthy of being called a divine art. It completely erases your presence, and in darkness it's practically invincible. Of course, it's not actually invincible. That's just a figure of speech. Still, it's useful, right?"
Especially the environment of darkness at night.
Now that those conditions were met, the Black Moon Killing Art was truly like a fish in water.
I finished my explanation and quietly looked down at the scene spread before my eyes.
Corpses with broken necks were stacked neatly on one side of the slope.
Corpses that looked to number well over a hundred.
From goblins to orcs, quite the variety.
In just four hours, Black and White Impermanence had infiltrated the fortress, broken necks one by one, and hauled back the spoils.
"Wow. They sure do clean work."
These two really were the definition of capable subordinates.
Actually, that wasn't all.
Whoooosh.
Around my body, a grim horde of vengeful spirits was swirling.
They were the vengeful spirits of the monsters that had just died, and when I counted them, there were exactly 48 entities.
It seemed like more vengeful spirits should have come in, so it was odd that it stopped exactly at 48, but after thinking for a moment, the answer came quickly.
[Armor of the Vengeful Spirit Horde] apparently could store a number of vengeful spirits equal to exactly twice my level.
And it seemed to operate separately from Undead Control Capacity.
Since my current level was 24, 24 times 2 was exactly 48.
Well.
If it could store vengeful spirits without limit, that would've been completely broken.
A restriction like this was something the Dimensional Tower could reasonably impose in good conscience.
"Well, it's still plenty reassuring."
Since the vengeful spirits would automatically increase as my level rose, it was a growth-type skill.
This is going to be pretty satisfying to develop, isn't it?
And one more thing.
The remaining vengeful spirits that couldn't fit into the vengeful spirit armor.
I had stored all of them neatly in [Vengeful Spirit Orbs].
Since one Vengeful Spirit Orb held 100 ordinary souls.
The monster vengeful spirits I caught today alone were enough to fill several orbs.
This is all money, isn't it?
Vengeful Spirit Orbs were items that fetched a decent price in the marketplace.
And I needed them as materials in the subdimension too. By looting a fortress today, I had gotten corpse resources and vengeful spirit resources—truly a big score.
I came to a rescue stage and was even making money on the side. This was the ultimate two-birds-with-one-stone situation, wasn't it?
It was while I was contentedly wrapping up the tally.
Flash! Flash!
Black Impermanence and White Impermanence silently revealed themselves from the darkness.
"Sovereign. We have carried out your command."
Black Impermanence knelt on one knee and made his report.
"There are three that exceed our capabilities. All others have been dealt with."
"Oh. Is that so?"
I nodded with interest.
"Good work. Well done."
Three that exceeded Black and White Impermanence's capabilities, huh.
Right now Black and White Impermanence each had thirty years' worth of internal energy, divine arts, and even complete egos—and they couldn't win?
"Those three are probably this fortress's boss monsters."
The fortress's core fighting force, and the final line of defense guarding the hostages.
Two mid-bosses and one boss.
That had to be it.
And nine times out of ten, the hostages would be held where those bastards were.
"Shall we go deal with those fellows soon?"
I lightly rose from the throne.
"Dignity of the Corpse Lord."
Sssshhh!
My Necromantic Mana seeped into the pile of corpses stacked on the slope.
Shudder.
The hundred-plus corpses lying with broken necks.
All at once shuddered and began staggering to their feet.
Now this is a spectacle.
In an instant, a horde of undead had been completed.
Ten-corpse limit or whatever.
Making them on the spot didn't count toward the limit, so I could raise an entire legion like this.
And that wasn't all.
The four palanquin bearers supporting my throne, Call Wind and Summon Rain, caught my eye.
Thanks to the steady supply of Necromantic Mana while I waited.
These fellows had also at some point been reborn from half-jiangshi into complete Copper Jiangshi.
Preparations were perfect.
Black and White Impermanence, Call Wind and Summon Rain, Bihallat.
Plus the freshly raised undead legion, and even the Armor of the Vengeful Spirit Horde.
With this much, I could easily cook three bosses.
"Alright. Shall we get going, then?"
I leaned back into the throne and stared at the deepest part of the fortress far away.
Alright. Boss.
Can you entertain me?
Please. Entertain me.
I'm asking you to make me feel the thrill of my former life again.
* * *
"Alright. I've remade the undead army. With this much, a boss is nothing."
I spoke while seated on the throne, looking around at the freshly raised undead legion.
The sight of over a hundred undead filling the slope was quite reassuring.
-Not just easy—easiest of the easy lol
-First time seeing someone call a boss "nothing," Corpse-Spirit bro
-It was horror just now and suddenly it's a musou game
"Yeah. You all saw, right? My legion is complete again."
After bantering with the chat, I turned my gaze toward the fortress.
"So, about that. It looks like there are three bosses here. Because Black and White Impermanence said there were exactly three they couldn't take down."
When I quietly examined the fortress, its structure came into view at a glance.
Two towers rising on either side of the main keep, and the main keep stronghold at the deepest point.
It was a structure where three bosses could obviously each be stationed.
"First, the right side. I'm going into that tower that looks suspicious."
From the top of the right tower, eerie purple smoke was seeping out.
At a glance, it was a visual that advertised, "An evil wizard lives here."
I drove the throne palanquin that way and entered the tower immediately.
[You have entered the mid-boss room.]
"Snooort! Who dares intrude upon the laboratory of me, Guldin!"
The moment I stepped into the tower, a grim voice boomed out.
Standing hunched in the middle of the laboratory was none other than an old orc.
In his hand he held a staff studded with skull ornaments, and his whole body was covered in eerie sorcerous patterns.