Chapter 1406: Unannounced Visitor
The battlefield became even more chaotic. Leading his subordinates, Emir crazily wandered on the battlefield, and picked up the essence of the undead that nobody else was interested in. Although the odds of low-level undead creatures dropping essence of the undead were small, there were a lot of them.
Emir thought that since nobody wanted the essence of the undead in Dirty Blood where everybody was fighting, it was faster and easier to simply pick it up than to declare war on other people.
Unfortunately, the other undead lords didn't think so. They believed that Emir was invading their territory, so they fought back crazily.
The battlefield became more and more chaotic. At first, the lords were only fighting in pairs. A couple of days later, they were all fighting each other. There was even an army of exclusive dark creatures that were killed by undead creatures as cannon fodder.
When a couple of lords were fighting, they suddenly realized that one of them was a lord of darkness. Then, they all decided to kill the lord of darkness first.
Lin Yun didn't do anything these days, but hills of essence of the undead were piled in front of him. Even more essence of the undead was being delivered. There was no telling how much essence of the undead there was. Each of the hills of essence of the undead weighed a couple of tons…
The Sage Chapter swallowed the essence of the undead continuously. Gradually, the second and third spot for level-8 spells popped up. Unfortunately, after the three spots for level-8 spells appeared, there was not a spot for level-9 spells, even though the Sage Chapter was swallowing essence of the undead crazily like a bottomless abyss.
Lin Yun had been fully prepared, and wasn't truly disappointed. All the spells that were copied and cast by the Sage Chapter were their most powerful versions, and were generally two levels more powerful than normal. The level-8 spells that were copied would be as powerful as level-10 spells. Also, some of their features that even level-10 spells didn't have would be displayed by the Sage Chapter.
If a level-9 spell could be copied, then the trouble would be unnecessary. He could gather all the troublemaking undead lords in one place. The level-9 spell that was copied would be as powerful as a level-11 one. Because of the extreme features that the Sage Chapter unleashed, he would be able to annihilate all the undead creatures in the area.
If he grasped the law of light, and cast a level-9 light spell, it would be even more perfect. A level-9 light spell would be as powerful as a level-11 spell when copied and enhanced by the Sage Chapter, and would turn the entire channel into a world of light. All the undead creatures that attempted to come close would be killed…
Unfortunately, that was just Lin Yun's dream. He had stayed for days, and swallowed dozens of tons of essence of the undead. Still, there was not a spot for level-9 spells on the Sage Chapter. It continued swallowing the essence of the undead crazily. Obviously, the spots were available, but they couldn't be activated so easily…
After turning Dirty Blood into a complete mess, Lin Yun left quietly. Emir was trying to help Lin Yun collect the essence of the undead, probably because his wish that he had remembered for thousands of years had come true. His biggest wish at this moment was to help Lin Yun collect the essence of the undead.
Returning to his Demiplane and copying three level-8 spells on the Sage Chapter, Lin Yun turned into a skeleton, and appeared in the Plane of the Undead again. He even made a ragged cloak, and wore it on his back. He then carried the scythe of death that he obtained from the skeleton king earlier. In the end, a fresh skeleton king was born.
As a skeleton king, he found that much fewer undead creatures dared to attack him now as he walked in the Plane of the Undead.
The ordinary skeletons had a low social status in the Plane of the Undead even if they had awakened their wisdom or memories. If the undead creatures thought that they were strong enough to twist the head of a skeleton, they certainly wouldn't just stand by. They found it hard to refuse the temptation of a lone Heaven Rank skeleton.
Having no other choices, Lin Yun could only truly release his aura, and turn into a level-46 skeleton. However, it only brought more trouble to him. The other level-46 and even level-45 undead creatures were bold enough to charge at Lin Yun to swallow his soul fire.
Unfortunately, their own soul fires were all swallowed by Lin Yun in the end.
After swallowing the first Heaven Rank undead creature, Lin Yun discovered that their soul fires contained purer soul power, more death marks, and even their memories.
Watching through the undead creatures' memories like a movie, Lin Yun found the best way to find Agalon.
It was very difficult to investigate in the Plane of the Undead. All the undead creatures except the Heaven Rank ones were tireless and fearless fools. They didn't have many memories in their soul fires, only their instincts.
Only the undead creatures who had awakened their wisdom and memories could have a complete understanding of the Plane of the Undead.
Swallowing the soul fires of undead creatures and watching their memories for possible leads was the fastest approach. It was much easier than looking for leads aimlessly. When Lin Yun watched the memories, it was like he was having the same experience. He couldn't possibly neglect anything.
After swallowing the soul fires of a dozen Heaven Rank undead creatures, Lin Yun had to pretend to be a skeleton king. He was too eye-catching as a lone ordinary skeleton, and too many undead creatures wanted to swallow his soul fire.
The situation improved when he put on the skeleton king disguise. Although he was only half as tall as other skeleton kings, the scythe of death proved his identity. No undead creatures were willing to piss off a skeleton king.
Skeleton kings were a type of skeletons. They were natural-born commanders of skeletons. The scythes of death were one of the few weapons that could hurt the undead creatures' soul fires when they hit them.
No undead creatures were willing to attack a skeleton king, even though he was alone. Lin Yun encountered a level-47 Black Warrior on his way, but the guy didn't attack him.
The scythe of death would cut apart the undead creature's soul fire when it cut apart his body. He was unwilling to attack, even though his level was higher than the skeleton king's.
Nobody came to Lin Yun for trouble any longer, so he became the troublemaker. After killing a dozen level-43 or stronger undead creatures, he found some leads.
Gandaph appeared in one of the undead creatures' memories. He was once in a place called the Moaning Basin. Then, he left. At that time, he fought this level-46 undead creature, but for some reason, he didn't kill the undead creature, and left in a hurry.
Finding leads about Gandaph, Lin Yun moved onward towards the place that Gandaph had visited.
Five days later, there were more dark creatures. The power of death in the air was less abundant, but the pure power of dark creatures gathered. There were black woods on the blackened land. The trunks of the trees were all bones. On the ground in the forest, there were scattered bones everywhere.
The tall trees were like undead creatures in the shape of trees. The crowns of the trees were absolutely leafless. What was hanging on the branches were scary heads, some of which were skulls, and some were fresh and still dripping blood. In some other places, beating hearts were hanging.
Lin Yun frowned, and slowly rose to the sky. He looked into the depths of the forest, and discovered a gloomy castle there. He looked up at the sky, only to find that the castle was always enshrouded in the veil of night. The castle was only illuminated by moonlight that came out of nowhere.
There was nothing but dead silence…
Bloody trees and a dark castle. Seeing them, Lin Yun knew that he had come to the territory of a vampire.
The bones of at least 100,000,000 creatures had to have been buried here to grow such a huge forest of bloody trees. Also, there had to be a blood tree planter to take care of them.
The bloody trees swallowed bones and bodies, and transformed the power of death into fruits that contained vitality. The heads and hearts that were dripping blood were their fruits.
They were the vampires' food, or desserts. It was the only way for them to taste fresh blood in the Plane of the Undead, and was the only source of blood except the dark creatures.
The fruits in such a forest of bloody trees had to include all the possible categories of fruits. Only vampire ancestors were powerful enough to own such a forest.
The enormous gloomy castle and the eternal dark night further suggested that this place belonged to a vampire ancestor.
Gandaph had broken into the territory of a vampire ancestor?
Then it was a serious problem. It had been such a long time that he had probably been imprisoned as blood livestock—if he weren't killed.
None of the vampire ancestors were weaker than level 47. It was very difficult to kill those wretched bastards. At least, Gandaph was certainly incapable of killing a vampire ancestor.
Lin Yun frowned, and stepped into the dark forest.
The moment he entered the forest, he found that everything around him became dark. Unfortunately, the darkness was useless against undead creatures, who couldn't see anything with their nonexistent eyes, and had to detect their targets by soul waves.
The moment he entered the forest, feeble noises came from the surface of the quiet and weird trees. Twisted faces appeared on their trunks. The skulls on the crowns seemed to be back to life. They all turned to Lin Yun and laughed creepily.
Lin Yun sneered. He held the rear of his scythe, and waved casually, launching crescent aura attacks with the power of death.
The crescent aura attacks cut all the bloody trees into pieces as if they were just aura. One of the aura strikes flew a kilometer, and cut all the bloody trees on its way in half.
The bloody trees that were cut apart spouted sticky blood, which flowed out of the fractures, but it quickly disappeared from the ground.
The branches of the bloody trees turned into arms that took the broken branches to the original places. Blood surged out, and all the fractures were healed. They didn't seem wounded at all.
Such wounds didn't matter to the bloody trees at all—certainly not when they had formed a forest. They were a community. The cut branches could be reconnected. The spilled blood would be reabsorbed by the roots in the soil. Nothing would be wasted at all.
On the crowns of the bloody trees that had been restored, the skulls shrieked and roared furiously. But then, the shrieking and roaring became cries of fear.
All the skulls withered quickly. The faces on the bloody trees became twisted too. Eventually, they were twisted, and the entire tree quickly shrank, losing all its vitality. All the bloody trees that were cut by the gray crescent aura attacks withered and died.
Lin Yun moved onward. No bloody trees dared to shriek at him anymore. Those on his way even voluntarily uprooted themselves, and made way for Lin Yun.
After three kilometers, a bloody tree that was too slow to make way for him was cut in half. Then, dozens of other bloody trees were unfortunately killed along with it in the scythe's strike.
An ancient and twisted face appeared on the surface of a bloody tree by the road. He looked at Lin Yun humbly.
"Esteemed skeleton king, our king is waiting for you in his castle. Please forgive those idiots. They don't understand your grandeur…"
Before the ancient face could finish, a gray crescent aura strike had slashed him into halves.
"Stupid dark creature, there is only one king in the Plane of the Undead!"
The clone of the bloody tree planter was killed. If he hadn't reacted fast enough, he would've possibly been hurt, and part of his soul would've been cut off. Then, he would've been as good as dead.
In the dark castle, countless bats landed from the top, and flew into a bloody cape. Soon, a human-shaped creature that looked like a rotten body appeared inside the cape.
In corners of the castle, gargoyles were resurrected from stones. They came to the rotten body with exquisite crystal pots that were full of blood, pouring it into the rotten body's mouth. The body changed quickly.
A few seconds later, the body turned into a pale vampire who had a handsome face and bloody pupils. His pointy tusks gradually retracted into his mouth.
After he opened his eyes, the vampire stared at the gate of the castle.
A dozen minutes later, a few gargoyles opened the heavy gate together, and a skeleton who carried a scythe of death and wore a ragged cloak walked in.
Lin Yun gaze at the vampire, who was on his throne. Looking at the gargoyles and the bats over his head, he recognized the vampire easily.
The vampire was Lesonbora, the fifth ancestor of vampires.
"Lesonbora, you must remember that there has only been one king in the Plane of the Undead, the great King Fogus."
That was Lin Yun's opening line after his entrance, which made Lesonbora even paler. He instantly walked down the throne, and fell on his knees.
"There's only been one king in the Plane of the Undead, King Fogus. I never thought that I could be called a king."
Lesonbora was paler and paler. He was on his knees, and found that Lin Yun was silent. His eyes were shivering.
Oh, the stubborn undead creatures, and the stupid bloody tree planter. Were you trying to get me killed? This seemingly weird skeleton king has come probably for what happened earlier.
If the King of the Undead was angry with me for calling myself a king, I'd be screwed even if I carried out the task well. None of my brothers and sisters would defend me in front of the King of the Undead.
Goddamn it. I have to kill that bloody tree planter now. You shouldn't have called me that, not in front of this pious undead creature…
Lesonbora considered what to do on his knees. He suddenly gritted his teeth, and summoned the bloody tree planter.
A treant that seemed to be made of blood walked through the gate, but before he could say anything, Lesonbora had waved his bloody claws and torn him into pieces.
"Damn you, bastard, you demeaned the greatest King of the Undead…"
Lesonbora tore apart the bloody tree planter, whom he had groomed with a lot of effort. He then crouched on the ground obediently.
"This is a blatant setup. I'm the most loyal servant of the greatest King of the Undead. I've carried out the King of the Undead's mission for me, but I was badly wounded, and had to rest immediately. That's why I didn't report to the King of the Undead in time…"
Lin Yun quietly listened to what Lesonbora said, with soul fire glittering in his eye sockets.
To be continued