Dohnaseek swallowed a thick glob of saliva as he stared at the back of the creature moving in front of him, trying his best to think of a way out of his current predicament. Unfortunately, no matter how hard Dohnaseek tries to think, he sees no way to escape.
Dohnaseek was not a moralist nor is he a pacifist, if he were, he would not have survived in the world of the paranormal, not to mention doing quite well among the ranks of the Fallen Angels… That is, 'not bad' relative to his rather insignificant level of power, being nothing more than a two-winged Fallen Angel.
He did not own palaces, nor command personal armies. But the fact that Dohnaseek had enough money to dine out quite often, and could buy branded suits occasionally, spoke to the fact that Dohnaseek was the kind of man who interpreted both the laws and the rules of morality within fairly wide tolerances.
So when he learned that the Father, the Biblical God, had returned to earth, he, understandably so, had fallen into panicked despair. Too few of the things he had done in his life correlated with the Biblical Commandments. And even those things that did were usually done either by accident or under the influence of altered consciousness, and not always by alcohol.
What Dohnaseek didn't expect, however, was that the Lord who had returned centuries later after His supposed death, would turn out to be a completely different Lord than what Dohnaseek had remembered.
Dohnaseek had only met Father once in the past, and that was at the moment of his creation, after which he had immediately found himself embroiled in a seemingly endless war. It was there that he had lost his white wings. However, unlike many other angels who had fallen under the influence of battle madness, Dohnaseek had left his sacred mission a little earlier. He had refused to go on a suicidal charge, defying his Father's will.
He had left that battle, flapping blackened wings, but he was simply glad that he was alive enough to be able to use those blackened wings. A thousand and one excuses were thought of by Dohnaseek to explain why his wings had changed, and why he had betrayed his Father and fellow Angel so badly…
Who knew that history would repeat itself? His wings, sadly, remained blackened by the sin of his cowardice and treachery.
The demon's appearance, along with the still living and somehow now four-winged Raynare, was the first blow to Dohnaseek's psyche. The news of Father's return was the second. And the order from that Father's summoned Devil, Demiurge, who had immediately begun to impose new rules, was the third.
Father did many things, definitely formidable and in some ways terrible, but always with meaning and reason behind them. In his formidability one could see a strict love for his children, and even when that strictness took the form of a blow, it was always a blow of mercy.
But the Devil's actions were far from that.
He didn't hide how he reveled in suffering, at how he looked at the people who had once been Raynare's subordinates as expendable, mindless cattle. Their continued life, needed only as draft animals to turn the gears of his grandiose plans.
Father has changed, as blasphemous a thought that was, but it's not like he could Fall twice.
No one knew definitively what happened to the Gods after their death and return, there were too few examples of such a miracle happening. And, those who could tell what had happened were not friendly enough to tell others, since for most, their cause of death were the other factions in the first place.
So Dohnaseek did not know whether something had happened to Father since his death, or whether his return had revealed a new facet of his personality to the world. But, Dohnaseek knew for certain that what was happening now, what was happening with Father's permission and connivance, was not something He would normally do.
Dohnaseek had no doubt that the Father of the past would do His everything to halt the Apocalypse, not harken their arrival.
Was Dohnaseek then supposed to now be in the business of saving the world from an already appointed apocalypse?
Maybe so, if just by circumstance, but in this case, Dohnaseek wished to simply escape Father's presence, as impossible as that might sound.
Kalawarner and Mittelt may have adapted well enough to the current circumstances to not wanting to join Dohnaseek's most likely doomed plan, but Dohnaseek himself could not afford to be so calm. If Father was now allowing Devils to satisfy their basest urges on humans, who knew if his Commandments had changed?
Has Father lost his Mercy?
Dohnaseek didn't want to find out, on another random day, that He had decided to teach his Fallen children a lesson after all. Dohnaseek was too attached to his own life to risk that.
The ironic thing was that Dohnaseek, in his desperate need to preserve his own life, had made sure that he would lose it. He was glad to be out of the limelight, a way from the sight of Father and the machination of the Devil, Demiurge. So, when he was appointed as a simple guarantor, acting as the supposed 'third' party for Father's and the Devils' negotiations, realizing just how dangerous such a position would be, he began hatching his plan to escape.
Before Dohnaseek could even parse the impossibility of such a thing, a creature which had been hiding in his shadow had suddenly grabbed him. It had taken him to a place whose cold felt as if it was freezing his very soul.
As far as Dohnaseek himself could tell, he had just been dumped in Cocytus, the ninth circle of hell…
That is, Dohnaseek, who did not want to become an example because of his past betrayal of Father, was right now moving towards becoming an example because of Father's betrayal. Fate clearly had its own wicked sense of humor… Or was it not Fate, but Father who possessed [Omniscience] had made it happen? Dohnaseek didn't know, and frankly, he didn't have the presence of mind to care about such a trivial thing.
Before Dohnaseek could even internalize the fact that his future looked extremely bleak, he was pushed out of his new prison by a large lizard-like creature. Dohnaseek wanted nothing more than to demand answers from the creature, but the oppressive silence had sucked in all of the fight from his body.
Dohnaseek didn't need to think too long or too hard on the subject of why he was in this situation. Father had clearly arrived to judge Dohnaseek, and no matter how hard he wanted to cling to life, what could he do about that fact!?
An agonizing death likely awaited him for his attempted betrayal…
His single attempt at trying to measure the strength of the lizard behind him to see if he has any chance to escape, ended with him choking any thought of escaping. The creature was too powerful and would surely just catch Dohnaseek in his first attempt to run away… Or maybe even just crush his head outright.
But what else could Dohnaseek do? Hope that he was able to justify his actions to Father? The core tenets of Christianity, Father's teachings, were forgiveness and second chances, couldn't Dohnaseek count on that to save his life?
And if he couldn't be forgiven, well… He was going to die anyway, so why not at least try to bargain for his life?
So after coming to such a conclusion, Dohnaseek finally noticed that he was no longer walking on the blasted frozen wastelands, instead walking on the packed ground of, from what he could see, some kind of Colosseum. Without him noticing, he had moved from the icy caverns of Cocytus into a semblance of some ancient arena under a darkening sky covered in stars…
'At least I can try to escape if the conversation goes the wrong way, even though I know it's a futile gesture…' Dohnaseek let out a deep sigh, trying to prepare himself for a dialog with Father. Maybe call out for mercy? Beg for his life? Accuse him of betraying His own tenets that he had once condemned sinners to Hell for?
Dohnaseek's mind wrestled with itself, panicked, searching desperately for an answer to a simple question. How would he survive his meeting with Father? All other concerns, a very distant second.
Up ahead he could see Father and some figure beside Him.
They were two children, and judging by their clothes, a boy and a girl, judging by their appearance, elves? Where did they come from… He didn't think long about the matter, as another figure caught Dohnaseek's eyes.
Another monstrous creature, similar looking to the one leading Dohnaseek at the moment.
He tried his best to calm his beating heart, trying to calm his nerves before his feet made its way closer to Father. Or, as he had been calling himself lately, Momonga.
A plan of action in mind, and his best arguments at the tip of his tongue, Dohnasek opened his mouth to speak.
"[Grasp Heart]," What came out of his mouth was not the prepared argument, not even a single syllable could be uttered. Instead, globules of blood and a strangled wheeze of pain.
His whole body is wracked in pain, and Dohnaseek couldn't even comprehend how that happened.
He had no time to think, nor did he have time to reveal his prepared verbal defense to Father, crumpling like a puppet whose strings have been cut, his last thoughts being how unfair it all was.
Much to his regret, he never learned that his fate had been sealed the moment Demiurge learned of his impending escape plan.
***
"Hmm, the spell works as it did before," Momonga sighed contentedly, nodding at Dohnaseek's crumpled form. He probably should have started with some other magic to test out a larger arsenal of his abilities, but [Grasp Heart] was his favorite attack spell. And that dragon, the Great Red of this world, had ignored the effects of instant death, so Momonga wanted to see if his favorite spell was still effective on the creatures of this world.
He still needs more testing, of course, but the preliminary result seems promising.
"Are we done already?" Mare's voice caused Momonga to turn towards him, catching some semblance of disappointment in the voice, causing Momonga to internally panic for a moment before immediately calming down.
Logically speaking, it was only natural that Mare wanted to see some more powerful magic performed by Momonga, so he might actually be unhappy that it had ended so quickly and unspectacularly. Not that Momonga had promised spectacle in his experiments, but now that he had an audience, perhaps he should have done something more spectacular!?
"Lord Momonga is indeed merciful…" Mare looked up at Momonga, now sounding impressed, making him inwardly shudder at the pure expression of admiration directed at him. But, considering how Momonga had disappointed Mare a second ago, he'll take admiration any day… Even if he didn't exactly understand what was merciful about his actions, that wasn't really important.
'Definitely need to show Mare something more exciting… And for Aura too.' Momonga glanced at the dark elves' siblings, before thinking about that thought more.
'In order to demonstrate stronger magic, I need a strong target. Nazarick can only freely create monsters of level thirty and below, higher level creatures are either NPCs created by my friends, which of course I won't fight, or creatures whose repeated summoning would require resources. Most likely irreplaceable ones…'
Momonga thought for a moment before coming up with an ingenious solution.
'Right, I haven't checked my undead summoning abilities yet!'
"[Create Middle-Tier Undead]!" A moment later, a dark haze appeared next to Momonga's body, gathering into a black cloud. Before, seemingly having a mind of its own, headed towards the dead body of the Fallen Angel. Descending towards it, the haze spread over the Fallen's entire body, engulfing him in its smoky embrace.
The haze seemed to soak into the corpse, making it bleed black viscous slime from its orifices a moment later, the black slime consuming the flesh and changing the body as it goes. A Death Knight soon rose, as the slime receded a moment later, seemingly devouring the Fallen Angel's body and turning it into the basis for the undead's existence.
'That looked very different in YGGDRASIL!' Momonga would surely have twitched or gag at both the surprise and the general disturbingness of such a scene, if not for the emotion suppression that had been triggered.
'So far, this is one of the most noticeable changes among my abilities!'
In YGGDRASIL, Momonga's combat abilities as a battle mage were relatively low. He possessed a vast array of spells, of course, making him able to pick the most advantageous magic at any given time against many opponents or situations, but, his effectiveness as a direct DD was not great. Even Tabula outclassed him in this regard, despite the fact that he himself was not a battle mage at all, let alone a true monster specialized in burst damage like Ulbert.
However, Momonga's undead summoning did increase his combat abilities rather substantially. The low-level undead he created had many applications, ranging from being scouts, disarming traps, or even serving as a meat shield with the unique trait the Death Knights possessed. Furthermore, his high-level undead increased his combat potential quite a bit.
However, the undead in the game had been created in a completely different way in the past.
And because of this, it was only by suppressing his emotions that Momonga was able to keep from making a strange sound while watching the scene of how his summoning had changed in this new world. Especially when the black slime started engulfing the Fallen Angel. It was a very disgusting looking procedure.
But whatever he might have felt about the process, there is now a Death Knight silently waiting for Momonga's orders. And he didn't know what to do next.
In the game, Momonga could control his created undead by determining their starting commands when the spell was used.
Commands like [Support] or [Defense], plus simple macros embedded in their artificial intelligence.
But in this world, as one would expect, Momonga was not given the ability to do such a thing.
However, to his shock, the undead creature was already following his unspoken command. That is, to stay nearby and check the functionality of the created undead.
So, under his attentive gaze, he began experimenting. Sending in mental commands, the Death Knight took a few steps forward, then back, spun in place before dropping to its hands and doing a few push-ups. The action demonstrated that the Death Knight was not only fully functional as a created being, but also able to perform actions that he couldn't do in YGGDRASIL.
On a lark, Momonga decided to have some fun. The Death Knight flipped over, standing on its hands, walking a few steps back and forth on those before removing one hand in an acrobatic étude designed to charm the audience, leaving it balancing on one hand. Then one by one, it raised its fingers, finally leaving it standing upside down balancing solely on its pinky finger. Then finally, in a display of athletic excellence, the Death Knight pushed off with its pinky finger and completed a somersault, landing on its feet like a gymnast that had just finished their routine.
Momonga couldn't state unequivocally, of course, but he was willing to swear that if the Death Knight's decayed and anger-filled face could emote, he would surely be looking at Momonga at this moment with excited pride. Like a child who had just shown his parents all the tricks he had learned in class, or perhaps like a faithful dog satisfied that it had just performed a trick at its master's command.
After dispelling the mental picture of the Death Knight waving his tail, Momonga instantly heard clapping beside him. Turning around, he saw Aura and Mare, as well as the two Draconids clapping, the two elves' faces full of excitement, watching him and the summoned Death Knight.
'Why are they clapping! Did I do something wrong? Isn't a Death Knight nothing impressive?' Momonga panicked for a moment, as the suppression of his emotions allowed him to calmly think.
'Yes, a Death Knight is a creature of only thirty-fifth level, but let's not forget that the average human of this world hardly exceeds even level five. A Death Knight, even when only focused on being a shield, is still dozens of times superior to humans even in terms of acrobatics. But I suppose that even acrobatic tricks easily done by trained athletes can still look spectacular. The same principles must have applied here… And Aura and Mare are children.'
Nodding internally to his musings, Momonga calmed down before frowning slightly internally as the experiment showed him an extremely weak point for his summoning spell.
'However, changing the workings of this ability… If my summoning of undead now only works if I have a suitable body at hand, then it will make combat use much more difficult… Let's try another spell.'
"[Create Middle-Tier Undead]!" Another black smoke cloud reappeared beside him, but without a dead body around, seemed to freeze in place. Momonga began to fear that the spell had failed, before the black smoke soon began forming into the familiar figure of the Death Knight.
With an imaginary pop, a Death Knight appeared, identical to the previously summoned Death Knight.
This in turn made Momonga frown instead. 'Is there really no difference? But the first Death Knight didn't just absorb the body lying next to me for no reason, did it?'
Momonga glanced at the two Death Knights in front of him that instantly turned their heads towards him, their posture that of a soldier awaiting their orders, causing Momonga to sigh internally. There would be more work ahead.
'Alright, whatever difference exists between them – I'm sure it will come out during further experiments.'
***
Lucifer was impossible to defeat, that was an immutable fact. There were no conditions that existed where Azazel, or even the rest of the Fallen where they could defeat the Lucifer.
There were also no conditions that could even be called victory.
Azazel had used every bit of his strength, every drop of his abilities, his intellect, and all that got him was a lost arm, a leg, an eye, half of his wings and more of the skin on his body. Worst, his [Sacred Gear] was on its last leg, earning him the hatred and curses of Fafnir, but all he had accomplished in his clash with the Lucifer was to make him stop for a moment before launching another attack.
It hadn't made the Lucifer stop attacking, much less retreat. He hadn't even inflicted a single scratch on him, but it had earned him a moment's hesitation from the Lucifer. A moment's hesitation, a spark of rational thought to the Lucifer's all-consuming rage.
It couldn't be called a victory, the Lucifer wasn't hurt, and his attacks weren't stopped – but a better moment Azazel couldn't have found under any other circumstances. At least because when the Lucifer had stopped for a moment, Azazel was on his last breath, bleeding out, counting down the moments of his remaining life.
Azazel simply couldn't afford to wait, in the next second he could die… He could only bet everything on zero, that the roulette wheel would stop at the green, and trust the invisible gods of luck.
In case he survived, he should treat them with much more respect in the future.
In a flash, taking advantage of the Lucifer's split-second hesitation, Azazel rushed towards Kokabiel, who was himself now barely a mangled piece of meat. The Lucifer, even in the midst of his madness, wanted nothing else but to savor his revenge on the bastard that had rung the death toll for the Fallen.
Azazel then threw him forward towards Lucifer, hoping to gain half a second in the time it would take Lucifer's attack to destroy the cadre's body. He then drove his only remaining hand into the body of his armor, his [Sacred Gear], causing Fafnir to scream in pain. He was going to use his last Trump Card.
Azazel had not planned to use this ability, but like any worthy artificer, he had left a secret back route in his artifact. Of course, it was a violation of his [Contract] with Fafnir, created in the image of demonic [Contracts], but Azazel was willing to pay a portion of his [Soul] for such an act.
He didn't need his powers dead anyway.
A moment of concentration was all Azazel needed to execute his plan. A moment of concentration that had been allowed with the body of Kokabiel, who was instantly turned to ashes by Lucifer's power.
A multitude of cracks ran through his armor, and his artificial [Sacred Gear], his magnum opus, cracked, then quickly crumbled into a thousand tiny shards. As it happened, though, the huge body of a golden dragon appeared out of thin air beside Azazel.
Fafnir was scarred and emaciated, in many places his scales were fused to his body or torn away entirely, exposing bleeding chunks of muscle, while his very form shuddered with exertion. With each and every breath, it was sending curses at Azazel, but he couldn't care less.
The wounds on Fafnir reflected the state of the [Sacred Gear], but Azazel didn't care. He didn't even dignify Fafnir with a second glance or even a retort, Azazel lifted his body with his remaining wings to balance on his remaining leg before darting away.
Fafnir wanted nothing more than to tear him to pieces, but luckily for the fleeing Azazel, the dragon had more things to worry about. The Lucifer, seeing Azazel running away, roared in rage, and started sending beams of Destruction the shortest distance to Azazel. That is, right through Fafnir.
Indeed, the Lucifer didn't care at all what kind of opponent in front of his face he would destroy, Fafnir would serve as a worthy distraction, thanks to his draconic strength, he might last a little longer against Lucifer.
Not much, but enough for Azazel to escape, perhaps even save someone else…
Fafnir howled a mad howl of betrayal, but Lucifer's blow cut short his furious howl, causing Fafnir to turn his head sharply toward his current foe.
Azazel ran away, remembering all the gods he could, pleading earnestly that his mad plan would work and Fafnir would buy him at least ten seconds of time.
The surrounding space rippled, which made Azazel clench his teeth, instantly going through tens and hundreds of thousands of options in his head at how to handle whoever it is that had just teleported into this charnel ground. But, the person that had just appeared, the Beelzebub, only made Azazel curse his luck and the bastard Gods of Luck that must be laughing at him now.
He immediately stopped trying to flee, trying his best to keep his comical pose of a cripple balancing on one leg as dignified as possible.
Azazel would be foolish, or insane, to count on the Devils' mercy at this point, even if the Lucifer was the only one who had fallen into madness after what Kokabiel had done. If the Beelzebub had come to the Lucifer's aid and decided to destroy the Fallen… Well, in that case, Azazel couldn't do anything at the moment anyway and could only accept death.
He'll at least look dignified doing it!
Only to have the Satan ignore his existence entirely, content to watch as the Lucifer brutalizes Fafnir. Waiting for a few moments to see if the Beelzebub would change his mind, Azazel continued his escape.
That bastard probably already knows that the Fallen Angels are already doomed, no matter if he kills Azazel now, or not. Cursing the Satan, Azazel flapped his wings and made his escape, nodding to the Beelzebub as he went away. If nothing else, letting Azazel live is a kindness.
With his life preserved, he now has the unenviable task of making sure that the Fallen would not die today, if it's the last thing he did!
***
Ajuka certainly knew Azazel's thoughts, not that they were all that hard to figure out. Even if Azazel wanted to do something about it, there was nothing he could do. And even if he were to try and to stop Sirzechs, he had no way of fixing what had happened to the Fallen Angels in any way.
It was all simply too late.
Even if the Fallen suddenly decided to not hold any grudges over the massacre done to them by the Devils, it would take centuries for the Fallen to regain even a fraction of their power. Far more likely, the Fallen would never recover from this and would die out in the next few decades, a century at most.
The Fallen were no longer a threat to the Devil.
Especially after the Devil had recovered from their long peace and cleaned up their shattered fortifications and neglected guards. Yes, the Fallen still had surviving Cadres, but how many Fallen were left after Sirzechs massacre?
Ten thousand? A thousand? Only a hundred? All Ajuka saw in the future regarding the Fallen was extinction, if not from Sirzechs right now, then as a result of it.
An almost pitiful sob from the dragon in the distance, so unfamiliar to those who normally associated the dragons with symbols of might, distracted Ajuka. He saw the scarred body of the huge Fafnir, no more dangerous to Sirzechs than a large stuffed toy, flying desperately to avoid Sirzechs attacks.
Ajuka's gaze was momentarily fixed on the golden dragon's form; he could see that Fafnir's remaining life span was numbered in seconds, but comparing the facts he knew, Ajuka did not interfere with Sirzechs' actions. Fafnir was, like almost all other dragons, a loner and a recluse, but still possessing a dragon's trait; overbearing pride, rage, and more importantly, excellent memory.
Saving him would only create an unnecessary opponent for the Devils in the future, not to mention having to make Sirzechs stop. Something that Ajuka was completely unwilling to do…
Speaking of the enraged Lucifer himself. It seems that his rage, which had been unleashed, was also beginning to subside. Most likely, after having destroyed Fafnir and finding no more enemies in front of him, he would stop for good. His rampage lasted only a few minutes, in fact, an insignificant period of time, it shows Sirzechs' great restraint and mercy.
Who else but Sirzechs would only go on a few minutes of rampage after learning of the death of his closest family members? It's just that the Fallen Angels were too weak to withstand those minutes' worth of anger.
For a Devil with his level of strength, even a second of rage meant incredible consequences that the entire world could feel. A few minutes, and an entire faction was doomed. But Ajuka felt no pity for the Fallen Angels, it's they, after all, that had fired the first shot.
Ajuka calmly looked as Sirzechs's blurry figure, returned to his usual more human form, but a detail caught his eyes, causing him to raise his eyebrows. He had expected Sirzechs to use no more than five percent of his power during his rampage, but as it turns out, his mana supply was down by more than half!
For a moment, Ajuka considered stopping the now fleeing Azazel and trying to learn his secret, the secret card that had forced Sirzechs to use up half of his available power to neutralize it, before abandoning the plan.
Any attempt to hold the Fallen back at this point meant that Ajuka would have to wipe out any remaining Fallen completely. Plus, Sirzechs would surely make light of the events that had transpired as he wiped out the Fallen. Even while in absolute rage, Sirzechs would not forget tactics, and information is the basis of that.
Indeed, there was hardly anyone in the world equal to Sirzechs… In might and in intellect.
***
Momonga looked at his summoned creatures thoughtfully, trying to internally organize the information he had gained during his experiments about the many summons in his repertoire of skills and abilities. Certainly, all the summoned creatures Momonga had summoned so far possessed the abilities that they had in YGGDRASIL, whether as passive or active abilities. The summoned creatures almost completely copied their essence from YGGDRASIL… Well, almost all.
Like some spells, some abilities of the summoned creatures did change with Momonga's arrival in the new world. Mostly the basic abilities were changed, though the effects of those abilities should be more multifaceted, as with some of Momonga's spells. However, the summoning of creatures couldn't help but change drastically at its core, with Momonga being summoned to another world.
The simplest change is their behavior. In YGGDRASIL, summoned creatures could have one of a few simple behaviors that could be further customized with additional macros when summoned, like prioritizing certain abilities. But creatures summoned in this way could not fully mimic human mind, due to the limitations of YGGDRASIL itself, they could not take initiative for example.
In the new world, however, the summoned beings were fully sentient beings.
Indeed, the summoned beings even possessed different levels of intelligence and even a character of their own. The summoned first-level skeletons were virtually brainless creatures, able to operate only with simple orders like 'serve' or 'attack'. While the undead of the elder lich level could maintain dialog on such a level that Momonga were asked about…?
What was it again? Apocrypha, yes, that's right, a summoned elder lich had asked Momonga about how Nazarick was supposed to treat the Apocrypha. Of course, Momonga had no idea what the word even meant. And so, panicking, Momonga dispelled the summoned elder lich and said that he had tested his ability to dispel summoned creatures…
As Momonga hoped, the observers of his experiments, Aura and Mare, believed his explanation entirely.
However, having verified that the beings he summoned possessed intelligence independent of Momonga's actual intelligence, including ones that surpasses his intelligence, which is quite easy actually, Momonga did no further experiment with the intelligence of the summoned beings. But he did determine that the summoned beings possessed different personalities, the skeletons were brainless, the elder liches communicated in dry yet intellectual language, and the summoned vampires mostly used colorful metaphors and many compliments. Usually ones that are focused on his appearance…
Momonga could not determine if there were differences between the individual summoned beings amongst themselves, but such a study would have taken too long. Not that it was possible to do so with the summoned beings.
And that was only one natural difference between the summoned creatures of this world, the other being their use of equipment. In YGGDRASIL, summoned creatures were limited to the equipment they are summoned with.
Barring a few unique abilities, summoned creatures were a ready-made template, with armor and weapons already assigned to the creature, and they are unable to activate consumable items. In this world, however, some summoned creatures were able to use certain types of consumable items or use equipment that they could not use in YGGDRASIL.
Nothing prevented a Death Knight, for example, from picking up a blade given to him and wielding it, with the blade's effects remaining virtually unchanged in the hands of the mob. A poisoned blade is still poisoned, the damage dealt by a high-level blade was higher than the damage dealt with a standard Death Knight blade, enchanted armor provided an additional increase in stats.
At the same time, any effects relying on the [Item Box], i.e. the player's inventory, did not work at all, due to the fact that the summoned mobs did not have their own inventory.
Likewise, summoned mobs did not gain experience for killing mobs, and they still have class restrictions. Summoned creatures with the warrior class could not use scrolls, and summoned mages could not pick up a sword.
In other words, in a way, these restrictions partially equalized the position of summoned creatures and full-fledged NPCs, maybe even Players.
Momonga conducted a long study of the creatures summoned in this way before he stopped. He had collected what information he could, and he needed to further organize it before he continued to investigate more details, otherwise he risked confusing the results…
A moment later, the elder lich next to Momonga dispelled, then another, then a death knight and a corpse collector, the undead summoned by Momonga began to disperse one by one in the order they were summoned. As Momonga noticed from his internal timer, the creatures summoned in this manner existed for the same amount of time as they had in Yggdrasil…
One by one, the creatures under Momonga's control dispelled before leaving him alone with his watchers…
No, after a moment, ready to end his experiments, Momonga stopped.
One undead he had summoned had not disappeared in its appointed time. The first, which should have been dispelled long ago.
Momonga turned his head to the Death Knight, then frowned inwardly for a moment, had he remembered wrong? If not, then what factor had caused such a change!? Had he used some kind of item by accident!
Before remembering that at the moment of summoning that Death Knight, Momonga had used the body of a slain fallen angel to summon it…
Momonga shifted his gaze to the Death Knight that seemed to have gotten close under Momonga's gaze before frowning inwardly for a moment… And a crazy idea flashed through his mind.
If the effect was not an enhanced duration of summoning, but instead permanent summoning…
"Aura, Mare…" Slowly Momonga turned his head to the two dark elves who had instantly gotten close when he had uttered their name, and spoke slowly, rolling the words over his tongue,-
"Demiurge… He didn't leave any more unwanted people in Nazarick?"
"Unfortunately, Lord Momonga, we are not aware of such a matter." Aura answered first, causing Momonga to sigh, bleakly. He definitely needed to do some more experiments… Wait, he just needed bodies, right?
"Hmm, or maybe bodies? Or do you know of any recent major battle sites?" Momonga said, rather to appease his desperate need to continue experimenting, not expecting an answer at all.
"Lord Momonga, so y-your plan really saw this coming!" Mare's voice, however, caused Momonga to turn around.
Mare, who had instantly become the center of attention of all the observers at once, immediately lost his confidence, and stared at the floor in embarrassment.
"That is… I know that L-Lord Demiurge has recently created such a place…" Momonga's non-existent heart started to beat quicker when he heard that information.
"In that case… Tell me more about the place where you can get a lot of fresh corpses…"
Momonga could scarcely imagine the possibilities if his summoning could become permanent, just the force multiplier alone!
Mare, stared at by Momonga's heated gaze, immediately turned red, almost wilting from the attention. Aura looked at his brother with jealousy, she, too, knows that information! But Mare beat her to the punch.
Mare, stuck between Momonga and Aura, almost broke down crying.