As I was finishing my thought, I realized that I had gotten side tracked from trying to decide upon which skills I needed to increase their levels. As I returned my focus to my status/skills view, I noticed a new notification had popped up recently.
[Unlocked Undead Mastery]
Seeing the new skill I paused, curious as to what this skill did, I figured I could try analyzing it since it definitely appeared to be a class skill instead of a random skill.
Undead Mastery:
Your skills with necromancy grows stronger, and your understanding of the unlife grows deeper. Passive skill that increases the max level for your undead, allowing for max level to reach level 3.
[Hidden Upgrade Quest: ???]
I could almost dance for joy, my undead could continue getting stronger, but I paused as I realized that they couldn't continue getting stronger unless I increased this skill's level; meaning I would have to devote one of my skill points to increasing my skill level. I sighed and began thinking to myself. Both Casper and Poky were still level 1 with White Death being my only level 2 undead. And based on their different actions in the past few days, the undead had to kill things to increase their level, implying that if I had White Death stop hunting, he wouldn't continue to level up. But that would also imply that Casper would need to be killing things if I wished for him to continue leveling up as well.
I then looked at the Hidden Upgrade Quest that was mentioned, glowering to myself upon seeing the question marks that made it so that it was unknown as to what exactly the quest or its requirements were. I sighed and exited the description of my Undead Mastery skill. I would hold off on increasing my Undead Mastery, and instead focus on my three other class skills.
Pulling up my skills window once more, I realized that they were all jumbled together and that there was no organization to them. 'I wonder if I can organize them into class skills, and gained skills. Maybe I could even organize them further?' As my process of thought finished, I watched my skills window glow brightly, blinding me from being able to see what was happening for a split second before it began to dim. When I looked again, it had changed to an entirely new view.
<[ Class Skills ]>
[ Combat Skills]
Raise Feeble Bone Creature [Level 1] {1/1}
Animate Feeble Corpse Creature[Level 1] {1/1}
Summon Feeble Spirit [Level 1] {1/1}
[Non-Combat Skills]
Undead Mastery [Level 1]
<[ Gained Skills]>
[Non-Combat Skills]
Inspect (Activation)
Gathering - Level 1 (Passive)
Herbalism - Level 1 (Passive)
Extra Skill Points: 2
Now that I knew upgrading my Feeble Creature skills wouldn't increase the max level of my undead, I realized that these skills should undoubtedly allow me to summon more of those undead types. Now I had the choice as to which undead I would like to have more of. Looking at my Feeble Bone Creature, I thought back to White Death and immediately decided that I would be putting one of my skill points into increasing the number of bone undead I could summon due to how efficient and quick they were. For my Feeble Corpse Creature, though Poky had a lot of health, the fact remained that he was extremely slow and carried necrosis. With his necrosis he could turn thousands into lesser undead with complete ease, and I felt that having another of his kind would just put me in greater jeopardy due to the fact that I was trying to remain hidden at the moment.
Having decided that I wouldn't put any points into my Feeble Corpse Undead in the near future, that only left me to decide on whether I should increase my Feeble Spirit or just go all in for the Feeble Bone Creatures. Thinking back to Casper, I remembered that Casper had an effect called Lingering Presence which produced miasma and dropped the surrounding temperature to freezing. If I were to have another spirit going around and hunting, people would immediately sense it, which could in turn lead to them finding out about my other undead, and even my existence.
Wait… Finding out about my existence? Shite! I truly wanted to bash my head in for the stupidity I had been showing the past few days. Why did all those necromancers in the stories of old always seem so intelligent and were like one step ahead of the hero compared to me?! I had completely forgotten to have my undead go and rebury White Death's empty grave last night. Judging by the fact that the guild hadn't released an emergency announcement ordering its members to begin hunting through the woods to find a risen undead, I figured that no one had yet to go to the graveyard and see the mess that I had accidentally caused.
"White Death, Poky! I want the two of you and Poky's lesser undead to go and push the soil that Poky had dug up in that graveyard back into the hole we made a few days ago." I looked up watching as a blood coated White Death immediately took off sprinting through the gorge while Poky and his lesser undead began stiffly crawling after him. I looked towards the sky, and was satisfied to see that the moon was nowhere near descending, meaning they would have the entire night to finish the task and get back here. I paused as I thought back to White Death's gruesome appearance, realizing that he had seemed both taller and thicker somehow. I would have to double check when he had returned.
Looking back at my skills, I decided that I should just go ahead and deposit my two skill points into my Feeble Bone Creature skill, raising it from level 1 to level 3. After this was finished I quickly did a check over my entire level 2 stat window.
<[ Eric]>
<[ Human ]>
<[ Necromancer ]>
<[ Level 2]>
<[Exp: 127.5/150]>
Health: 51/51 (45 -> 51)
Stamina: 22/22 (20 -> 22)
Mana: 15/22 (15 -> 22)
Willpower: 54/200 (100 -> 200)
<[ Statistics ]>
Strength: 12
Agility: 7
Intellect: 11 (10 -> 11)
Vitality: 14 (13 -> 14)
Energy: 28 (25 -> 28)
Extra Stat points: 0
<[ Class Skills ]>
[ Combat Skills]
Raise Feeble Bone Creature [Level 3] {1/3}
Animate Feeble Corpse Creature[Level 1] {1/1}
Summon Feeble Spirit [Level 1] {1/1}
[Non-Combat Skills]
Undead Mastery [Level 1]
<[ Gained Skills]>
[Non-Combat Skills]
Inspect (Activation)
Gathering - Level 1
Herbalism - Level 1
Extra Skill Points: 0
I was satisfied with my new makeup, though I did notice that I was getting quite close to leveling up to Level 3. 'Damn, I've leveled up nearly two levels in only 3 days. At this rate, I'll be able to out level all the adventurers who've been leveling up for the past month in less than half a month. Hell, I may even be able to out level those who've been leveling up for the past few months in the near future.' I chuckled at the notion that I would be stronger than any of the other adventurers in my hometown in a very short period of time.
But seeing my rate of leveling, I began to wonder why necromancers weren't as powerful and as conquesting as they should've been, that was until my subconscious reminded me of my brother and of what class he had received. That would explain why necromancers had never conquered the continent like they should've. They were always being hunted down by Divine Battle Mages.
But if other people can see the connection between the two classes in the stories of old, then wouldn't that mean they would immediately know that a necromancer would be roaming the world now? If they knew this, I hoped that they would make the assumption that the necromancer was an escapee from an undead dungeon instead of someone who was supposedly classless.
Turning back to my main focus at hand, which was getting stronger as quickly as possible, I figured it was time I tried to learn of the different locations of the nearby dungeons, and how to create spells and what not. Basically the courses that the other adventurers were taking so that I could increase my strength, after all one didn't just gain class skills from leveling up, but from also practicing and experimenting with different things. It was how I had gotten my gathering and herbalism skills, though I didn't know if I could continue leveling them up through basic "practice" like I had done to attain them in the beginning.
I reentered the cave and made my way down to the two piles of corpses, glancing at Casper who rested in between the two piles, keeping them frozen so that they wouldn't rot and decompose. I smiled breathing in the cold clean air, with Casper freezing everything, the scent of rot was no longer prominent. My eyes widened in realization as I looked back up the cave, thinking about Poky and his zombies. They didn't smell, meaning I wouldn't be forced to live the rest of my life smelling ungodly shite! I laughed merrily as I did a little joyous dance that only I and Casper witnessed.
When I regained my sense of calm and looked back at Casper, his flickering spectral light almost made it appear as if he was judging me, but that wasn't possible because he was nothing more than a summon, and I was his master.
Looking at the pile of mutilated corpses, I decided that it would be best not for me to touch them since Poky, with his necrosis, had been eating from them and as such I could risk screwing myself over in the ass. So turning to my pile of other corpses, I noticed a Prancing deer, along with four Hashoret mice, and ten Blue Wings. The Blue Wings were far to small for me to summon a Feeble Bone Creature with them, and I intended to save the Prancing deer to make some coin, so looking at the four Hashoret mice, I chose to keep the largest one as profit as well before raising my hand over the two smallest ones.
"Arise legionnaires and serve the untiring horde."
I watched as my mana poured out of my hand before gathering around the two bodies. Looking at my amount of mana in the bottom right hand corner of my vision, I watched as it fell from 15 points to a measly 5 points, and I immediately felt like I was tired and drained once more.
Forcing myself to resist the drowsiness, I watched as my two new bone undead would soon join my ranks. I was quite curious to be honest, after all this was my first time raising my to skeletal undead from a fully intact corpse instead of the skeletal remains of a deceased being.
The flesh on the bodies began to fester and boil, and I watched as it seemed to begin melting from the bone itself, and seeing the gloopy mess that was appearing beneath the two, I was glad that I had already gathered all the other remaining carcasses into my inventory so that I could properly clean them later.
Once all the flesh had melted off the skeletons, I watched as the necrotic gas began to rip the skeletons apart, reform the different bones, until finally two waist high, hunched back, demon horned undead stood before me. Just like how White Death had looked before he had leveled up to level 2.