Conqueror

We celebrated the return of us all in Itz by partying a little bit in the inn. Drinking here and there and eating large amounts of food. We even bought drinks and food for the whole bar. It was an enjoyable activity that we just did. We were all exhausted at the end of the day to the point that we had to sleep at the inn.

We woke up and prepared ourselves since our first destination is back at the village.

It was a short trip to the village but… is this really that village that I helped build? It has gotten so large and everything is so advanced… I'm amazed on how so many things changed in the last two years.

We walked through the front gate, it seems that there's one now seeing there's a wall surrounding the whole village.

"Welcome back my lord." Ortov and Grien greeted me as soon as the goblin guards in front of the gate opened it.

I couldn't help but smile seeing how much this place has progressed. "It's been a long time, Ortov, Grien."

"Yes. We've been in contact with this person called Herold and told us he was with you so that's one of the reasons we didn't abandon this place."

"I see. Show us a room wherein we can talk. I want to know what happened in the world in these last two years."

The two of them guided us to a large house at the very middle of the village. I asked them what it is but it seems that it's called a town hall.

We entered the town hall and a large desk greeted us at the very middle with chairs on each side. It looked like a group discussion room in my old world. Grien and Ortov then asked us to sit.

"Going down to business, what happened in those two years?" I asked.

Grien was the one to start, "Every kingdom in the whole world has fallen to the players."

Everyone was silent.

"I see." The only thing I could say.

"Since all the kingdoms in the whole world has been overtaken by the players, the inhabitants of this world made a revolutionary army to help kill every player. Some are agreeing to this plan but some are not. They're too afraid of the powers otherworldly players have."

"Any other news?"

"Monster spawn rate increased again in exchange of higher EXP gain. Gifts from leveling up will be disabled according to the message we received."

I don't remember seeing that since I was cultivating and absorbing all the mana. But it seems to be a worldwide notice seeing how all of them where all agreeing. "I see. Continue."

"Tartarus…"

"Hmm!?" Everyone was shocked including me. That one word made us worried for whatever Grien was going to say next.

"Tartarus has begun to open its gates."

"What does that mean?"

"We sent some of our own goblins here to observe Tartarus since we were ordered by Herold. But just about a year ago, Tartarus began spawning monsters."

"What kind of monsters?"

"Right now the monster it released is only one."

"One?��

"Yes. According to Lam, it was a basilisk."

"Crap."

"Why, what's wrong my lord?"

"Basilisks are incredibly strong. Their eyes can emit power enough to kill anything. Just seeing it is dangerous enough."

"It seems that my men were lucky enough to escape before the basilisk appeared."

"It seems so. Anyway, has the basilisk done anything yet?"

"Not that we know of. According to the reports we got, the basilisk only attacks if anything get closer to him. Right now the basilisk is sitting on top of a lake and has been passive. But no one has ever come back when some adventurers were sent there from Itz."

"So it's passive as of now and we don't know what it want… Hmm…"

"On to other news, the Burliande, it has been overtaken by the undead."

"Burliande?"

"The biggest continent in Pandir."

"Undead… are they coordinated?"

"Yes. They are arranged like an army. These information are gathered from rumors and information brokers at Itz so I don't know the accuracy."

"It's fine. Continue."

"Apparently the Burliande continent is now merged as one kingdom. The undead have taken over it completely. But what some of the people that I got information from said, they've been doing trades, moving in packs and been constructing houses and such."

"They're incredibly organized… What kingdoms are they friendly with?"

"We don't have information on that. I apologize."

"It's fine. But, if they are that organized, then there must be a leader on top of that. Maybe it's a new type of boss monster or a necromancer player. Either way they're dangerous. Extremely so. They will continue to overpower everything with numbers."

"I'm afraid that's the case."

"Do you know anyone that tried killing one undead?"

"Yes but they seem to just regenerate back."

"I see. So that's their weakness. They're too naïve." Zeta joined in.

"What do you mean?" I asked him.

"I can create undead too. Since there's no dead bodies or anything, here's just a summoned one, Summon Golem." A large golem enough to reach the top of the room was summoned right next to him. "Fireball." Zeta then blasted his own summon with it. "You see, when a summoned being is damaged, it doesn't get redirected to you. So you are free to summon more and more as long as you have mana. It's the same principle with healing them. You can heal them but you have to use mana." The golem suddenly got its parts back. "You just need mana to recover things. Same with undead. So if we keep killing their summons over and over again, they will run out of mana to make them recover to full health."

"Is it possible to not recover them?"

"It is possible to halt the heal process. That's why if we want to overtake them, we need to do it silently. Kill their summoned undead over and over until they run out of mana. And if one runs out of mana while using summoned undead, it'll all disappear in the blink of an eye."

"I see. That's a good idea. But wouldn't it be reckless? I mean, if they notices the fast rate of their mana going down, thousands of those undead will be heading for our necks."

"That's exactly what we want."

"Hmm… explain."

"We just need to drag their MP to be extremely low so that their attention will be ours. Killing thousands of undead will be easy since they're extremely weak to light magic which I remember Zieglind, you have lots of."

"Yeah."

"Controlling thousands of undead won't be easy so their full attention will be trying to control it. So we can send one of us to assassinate him and everything will come just falling down."

"That's a good plan. I can see it succeeding."

"So, what do we do from here?"

"Since Polk got destroyed, we need a new home. Let's take over this Burliande."

"That's an incredibly reckless plan."

"It has always been like that."

Everyone just smiled and agreed to my plan. We're finally getting back here. I'm going to do everything I can to get us stronger. To the point that we can challenge Tartarus. We're still weak. Far too weak. And we're all going to change that.

I dismissed everyone and Grien and Ortov led them all to their respective houses. It seems that they've prepared for that also.

I went into the house they've prepared for me. It was relatively small but it's enough for me. I dropped down on the bed and began to think what I'd do from here after we take over Burliande. But I still need something to talk about Herold. "Telepathy. Herold." It seemed to have connected so I was the one to start the conversation. "Herold, the Tartarus opened its gates and spawned in a Basilisk."

"It already happened? I was sure this happened in my fifth year living here in Pandir. When did it spawn?"

"A year ago."

"A YEAR? Oh no. When Tartarus opens its gates, every 3 months, there will be a monster spawning. It's not just a basilisk, there'll be more random monsters."

"Do we need to take immediate action?"

"No. I'll just trim some of the monsters there. I can't possible annihilate all of them as of now. There's about 12 monsters there as strong as or stronger than the basilisk."

"We're going to take over Burliande for now since it's overrun by undead."

"I could go with you if you want. I'm a necromancer's worst nightmare."

"That mana burn is just so strong isn't it. But no. You go and head on the twelve monsters the Tartarus spawned in. You don't have to kill everything. We'll go there after we take over Burliande."

"Then that's a plan. I'm going to prepare something now. Goodbye."

I then disconnected the telepathy.

The world is changing for the worse. It's time to take action.