Cursed Immortality

After skimming through every tatter book, Jacob found nothing he could understand because these books weren't even in rune language or philosopher's language. They were in some entirely different language.

Helpless, he could only give up and decided to go with another simple approach: to enter deep within the castle where those dark beings were going. Especially the Extraordinary Dark Beings.

However, he didn't dare to do it right now because that 'Armor Leader' was still vivid in his mind, and those dark knights and lich minister outside.

If he wanted to do this, he needed some distraction to keep at least those on the outside occupied and, most importantly, make sure the Lich King wasn't in the castle!

So, for now, he was planning to remain hidden in this room and let those dark beings settle for now and then start his scouting.

He still had enough food and water to sustain himself for half a year or even longer if he stayed static and only ate a small amount once a day.

Meanwhile, he was going to prepare something just in case his life fell into jeopardy and also control the fluid acceleration to a higher level because he knew he would need it.

Although this place was still in the open, the Dark Beings were guarding the area against every side, and unless they ordered, no one would come here. Even if they did, Jacob could handle it as long as they were alone!

---

A month passed since the Lich King had garrisoned the central area of the Dark Ruins with over 60,000 dark begins.

Furthermore, the dark beings were constantly skimming through the dark ruins while also madly destroying any intact building as if they were searching for something.

At this moment, in the Dark Woodlands area-1, which was the military base of Light Nation.

Influential figures gathered in a spacious hall, and everyone had solemn expressions on their faces. There were elves, giants, dwarfs, kobolds, demi-humans, orcs, and all the intelligent species' upper echelons were gathered in this palace.

If it were any time else, they would've never left the Freedom Plains' safety, but now it was too late since they could fight or wait to get annihilated once the dark beings got rid of the protection over freedom plains.

This news had long been spread to the ignorant common public of the freedom plains. They all knew about the dark beings and the danger they posed to them.

It caused a massive commotion as all those people living their lives peacefully came to the realization that there was a terrifying force of the undead who wanted to eradicate them.

The matter about the Dark Ruins was also no longer kept a secret since it was meaningless.

The four power once deliberately tried to keep this information under tight wraps since they thought that it wouldn't do any good to let those people know about the presence of Dark Beings, especially those civilians, despite the three hegemonies wanting the opposite.

But the Four Freedom Lords went against it, and now, those people were too comfortable with their lives, especially those in high positions. This revelation hit them the hardest, and now everything was a mess.

However, the four powers were ready as they quickly controlled the situation and gave them hope by telling them that they had already broken a shackle and that as long as they broke another one, they would be able to live even more magnificently.

But the entire truth about shackles being more than three wasn't revealed.

This naturally gave everyone a glimpse of hope and even motivated them that they had a chance against those undead creatures.

So, now a widespread army recruitment called the Dark Annihilation Army was going on the Freedom Plains.

This army was going to be fighting in the dark ruins and searching for the last shackle, and every race present on the freedom plains will have to send 50% of their entire forces, or they will be banished into the dark wildlands.

Even those retired veterans weren't spared, and those aristocrats of prominent families who had never been on the battlefield and enjoyed the glory of their predecessors had to participate as well.

This decree was absolute because it was signed by the Five Freedom Lords!

Yes, this was probably the most shocking thing after the revelation of the dark beings and dark ruins.

It was disclosed that there were Four Freedom Lords who were the true rulers of the four powers of freedom plains, and now there was a Fifth Freedom Lord as well as the fifth power.

The Skull Kingdom of Killer Skull Society and the Fifth Lord was the Grace Freedom Lord.

This action of the four powers was seen as just how desperate they were and how grave this situation was.

If not for the revelation of the Dark Beings and Dark Ruins, most people would rather revolt than let the Killer Skull Society establish their own fifth power so easily.

But no one seemed to care because they needed every last bit of help they could get.

The Killer Skull Society did not come empty-handed. They had revealed a powerful potion that could be made a peak common tier expert a rare tier without any side effects, and this fact was verified by four nations!

This helped the killer skull society earn praise from many no one tried to oppose them for now, and so the fifth power came into prominence.

But this event quickly died as today was when the Dark Annihilation Army would be moved out toward the Dark Ruins while they would also start cleaning up all those hidden dark beings on this side of the Dark Woodlands.

Lastly, this army's leader was the 2nd Freedom Lord, the Golden Swords Freedom Lord, and he was personally going to lead this massive army of 100,000 into the dark ruins to fight with dark beings!

"Silence, the Army Lord has arrived!" A handsome golden elf wearing beautiful emerald armor announced.

The entire place fell into silence as they looked toward the high stage with curiosity and even reverence.

Until a month ago, some of them didn't even know what Freedom Lords were, but now that they knew, they were naturally curious about these mysterious Lords of the Freedom Plains.

Distant steps were heard before a tall man clad in exquisite white armor walked onto the platform, his face was covered under a white mask, but his blue eyes and long golden hairs were evidence of him being an Elf!

Many were shocked, but those old members of each race were calm since they already knew the four freedom lords were a Golden Elf, two Iron Giants, and a Demi-Human.

However, their identities were always mysterious, and only their race was known.

However, the Golden Swords Freedom Lord wasn't alone as closely following behind him were many figures of different races as they wore battle gears and had this wild aura and cold eyes of predators!

Jacob would've recognized one giant figure amidst them if he were here. It was Elbio!

Many people's faces fell when they saw all those wild figures following behind the Golden Swords Freedom Lord.

But they all kept their mouth shut as the Golden Swords Freedom Lord stopped in the middle of this platform while all those people stood behind him while coldly glaring at the crowd below.

Golden Swords Freedom Lord spoke in his calm voice, "Everyone, I'm pleased to see everyone standing united against this terrifying force who wanted to destroy our home.

"We are going to start a war which we had only a 20% chance of winning. I won't hide this from you. The Dark Beings are terrifying existences, especially the extraordinary ones, not to take above those Dark Beings with the status of Ministers and Knights.

"These Dark Beings couldn't be killed without destroying their Dead Flame Cores. They can recover as long as they have other dark beings around them by absorbing their dead flames, or they can outright absorb the life force from life crystals that they create by refining the life force of a living being like us.

"There are even more astonishing and deadly facts about them, like a Mark Zombie, could cast ten times more Basic Spells than a Basic Mage in our ranks. Although those zombies only know one magic spell, I don't need to tell anyone just what kind of damage a basic spell could cause, right?

"Then there is still their toxicity which they used in the sham of their spell, especially if those mark zombies were controlled by a sane zombie who is as deadly as akin to 5 Basic Master Mages and could turn any living into a zombie and continue to increase his numbers rapidly.

"Lastly, the Skeleton Grand Warrior is even scarier than an Extraordinary Giant when it comes to battle magic. They are the true vanguards of Dark Beings."

Golden Swords Freedom Lord coldly scanned the shocked faces of those below the platform and coldly uttered, "That's why we need veterans who were fighting them for a long time in Dark Woodlands, and some of them even managed to come back alive from Dark Ruins!"