Chapter 374: New Sacrifice
“My Lord, please do not cross this line. You will be attacked if you get any closer.”
Outside the previously broken city gate of the [Underworld], the Lich, whose arm had been repaired, walked with the short-haired girl to a distance of nearly two meters from the city wall. He conjured an ice shard in his hand and extended it forward, speaking to Kazumi behind him.
“Swish—”
As Lei’s words fell, the sound of sharp blades cutting resounded from the ice shard in his hand. The ice pillar, originally as thick as an arm, instantly seemed to be cut by a fierce wind, turning into countless ice chips that scattered on the ground.
“This is…”
Looking at the smooth, even sword marks on the once majestic city wall before her, Kazumi couldn’t help but frown.
The girl had already understood most of the events from Lei’s previous report. Although Kazumi was quite pleased that the Lich Governor did not reshape his arm to save the territory’s energy, out of humanitarianism, Kazumi had found an arm bone from a corpse and attached it to him.
Otherwise, as the only useful talent under her, his appearance was truly too shabby.
In fact, Kazumi hadn’t expected such a thing to happen in this ruined territory. Initially, the Lich Governor’s first action to rebuild the entire territory was to use energy to control ice elements to clear the ruins and recycle usable raw materials.
But unexpectedly, upon clearing near the original city wall, they were subjected to extremely terrifying attacks. The frost elements conjured by their abilities were instantly cut into countless pieces, frightening Lei into directly activating the entire territory’s defense system.
And Lei’s arm injury was caused when, after confirming safety, he accidentally stepped into the attack range while investigating the situation of this place.
“Lei, so what’s the situation here?”
The smooth and flat sword marks were like exquisite works of art, even more regular than the city walls built of stone. The sharpness contained within them made one’s eyes tingle just from looking at them.
Kazumi withdrew her gaze from the imposing, broken stone wall and, after thinking for a moment, posed the question to Lei, who had already investigated the situation.
“Reporting to my Lord, based on my subordinate’s deduction, the city wall was likely the first barrier to withstand the attack at that time, and the subsequent attacks spread out from this point. As for the cause of all this, it should be the sword intent on this sword mark.”
Lei clasped his hands together and, based on his previous experiments and his own judgment, revealed the results in his heart.
“Sword intent, huh…”
Lei’s answer made Kazumi’s face look somewhat grim. The figure that had been so casual yet emanated boundless menace seemed to reappear before her eyes, and the image of the sword energy that could sever the entire world in her heart slowly emerged, bit by bit.
At this moment, Kazumi didn’t know whether to admire or fear. That unreliable and greasy swordsman, Shun Muto, had shattered the girl’s daydream of being the Underworld Emperor, and it took her a long time to recover.
And now, even though the person was no longer here, a mere mark cut several months ago could still cause her so much trouble.
This was too outrageous! If the high-end combat power in this world could be this terrifying, Kazumi was considering whether to give up her abilities and just be a normal high school girl.
“If frost elements don’t work, can ghouls and zombies get close? Or can we directly use abilities to destroy the entire mark?”
Rubbing the bridge of her nose with her hand, the girl knew that no matter how much her head ached or how difficult it was to resolve, this was something she needed to face on the path to pursuing power.
Suppressing the bad feeling in her heart, Kazumi turned to Lei and asked.
“Reporting to my Lord, zombies have been tested, and they are still cut by the visible wind blades. Ordinary ghouls have less physical strength than zombies, so to save resources, I did not conduct experiments.”
“My maximum attack can reach the city wall, but after being weakened by the wind blades, the attack cannot cause significant damage to the city wall.”
Zombies were the product of the [Graveyard Hill] ability, roughly equivalent to low-level ghouls with high health and low agility, and they had no additional abilities. Moreover, due to the limited number of corpses in [Graveyard Hill], their output was extremely low, and they were basically used by Kazumi as labor for Lei as territorial laborers.
Lei nodded and reported the results of his previous experiments.
“What about Little Black? Did you try using it?”
An excellent subordinate always anticipated the questions posed by their superior, but this all-encompassing answer only made Kazumi’s headaches worsen. Originally, Kazumi had intended to use ranged attacks to destroy the integrity of the city wall and thus disrupt the diffusion of the sword intent, but Lei’s results made the girl give up on this idea.
Although, with the supply of territorial energy, her destructive damage could be higher than Lei’s, doing so would consume the territory’s already scarce death energy, not to mention this was just her speculation.
Glancing at Little Black, who was standing beside her staring blankly, the girl beckoned it over.
“Lord Little Black is an important power for protecting the Lord. This subordinate would not dare to experiment on him.”
Lei’s answer was also within Kazumi’s expectations. After all, this loyal subordinate, whose safety was paramount, would certainly not do such a thing alone without her explicit command.
“Is there no way…”
Kazumi murmured regretfully while stroking Little Black’s head, frowning as she looked at the broken city wall before her.
Indeed, as Lei had said, she really couldn’t bear to use Little Black for such experiments. If Little Black were to die as well, her strength would decline drastically. It was unknown when she could nurture the next elite troop, let alone Little Black’s unique and powerful abilities.
But if she were to just leave this section of the city wall untreated, it seemed like a problem too.
The foundation of the [Great Graveyard] meant that it was very difficult for the girl to re-plan a new city. Although the expansion of the territorial space had made the available locations much wider, re-locating the [Great Graveyard] would consume resources that her current territory could not afford.
Completely destroyed buildings like the [Dark Altar] and the [Corpse Crow Nest] could only be rebuilt, but their resource consumption was much less compared to the core internal affairs building, the [Great Graveyard].
“Wait, the altar?!”
As if recalling something, the girl turned her head, looked at the empty ground behind the city wall, and then asked Lei again.
“Lei, are there enough building materials to construct other buildings?”
“Reporting to my Lord, the [Corpse Crow Nest] still has a large deficit in blood and avian corpses, but the materials required for the [Dark Altar] are basically sufficient. You see…”
“Yes, it’s enough.”
Hearing Lei’s answer, a hint of excitement appeared in Kazumi’s eyes. She waved her hand and pointed to the ground beside them.
“What impact would building the altar here have?”
“Building it here will not achieve optimal energy circulation, and the sacrifice speed will be reduced by about five percent.”
The Lich’s magic book flipped rapidly, and the soul fire in Lei’s eyes kept burning. He quickly reported the extremely precise figure.
“Five percent is acceptable. Build the altar behind the city wall for me.”
The girl’s decisive command made Lei pause for a moment. He was about to persuade her, but then he seemed to recall something and hesitantly asked.
“My Lord, you intend to…”
Kazumi nodded coldly, her voice icy and resolute.
“Yes, sacrifice all of this city wall!”
