Bones crunched under his feet, too soft to withstand the might of a man on a mission. He could practically feel his journey's end. The wrong would be righted, and his skill would be restored. The Lich had stopped talking, too focused on the Oath Keepers. After all, Zack was one man with a thorn build against a summoner. Eventually, he would be worn down no matter how much defense and health he had. The regeneration attribute and skill were rarely taken, and who would be crazy enough to continually destroy themselves to level the skill?He smiled.Everything was finally going his way. A door with a blue skull handle stood between him and the underground under the tower. Zack grabbed the handle, and an electric shock struck him with the force of a thousand lightning strikes. He screamed and felt the charge throw him away from the door after a few tense minutes of spasming agony.One of the undead that was dismembered cackled with Lich's voice. "What's wrong, adventurer too weak to get through a simple wooden door? Maybe you should grab the handle again, and I'm sure that will work."The Lich had jokes. What else could he expect from a clown? Zack prepared for this.He went to work, grabbed some meatier undead, dragged their bodies toward the door, and tossed them in a pile. He stacked two piles up to the tunnel's ceiling in no time. Zack nodded slowly; they should be enough.Zack threw some seeds on the rotting piles and fed them his mana. The skill Green Thumb made the seeds receptive, and they grew quickly, bloating with his mana as they grew and mutated into monsters themselves. Zack established his control as they fully formed.It was a quirk of the chimera world that the monsters took on humanoid appearances. Their roots became feet; their blossoms appeared as ribbons in their vine hair, and their green plant matter became flesh. Corpse flowers only grew when there were intense battles filled with negative emotions. The undead filled with resentment after their bodies were desecrated in rituals to raise the dead worked well enough. One of the benefits of the corpse flower breed was their ability to consume the negative energy of the undead.Zack pointed at the door, held out his hand, and made a fist before smashing the two together."On it, boss." Plant 1 said.This was plants vs zombies. He might have taken his time if it hadn't been so serious, but he would have lost his chance if the oathkeepers had gotten the artifact before him. That couldn't be allowed to happen.One of the plant monsters formed battering rams from hardwood around her arms and reared back, taking up a stance he had seen before. It was the same stance he used when he had his old skill. She was going to ram through the door. Zack felt himself smile, and his chest warmed with pride. Mana could sometimes transfer powerful emotions and the memories they were tied to.She charged, and the protections made from necromantic magic broke on her skin like snowflakes on a furnace. The door blasted into pieces, and a black tentacle shot out and impaled the plant girl. She looked back just before the tentacle pulled her into the darkness. Undead rushed inside as the other one formed blades on her arms and started slashing.He heard chuckling from the undead. "Did you think it would be easy to sneak into a lich's domain? Foolish flesh bag, can your mortal mind not comprehend what you're dealing with?Another tentacle lashed out, but Zack was ready. He caught it and felt his fingers sink into it until he wrapped his hand around a segmented bone. Zack yanked the tentacle into the door frame, bent it, and gave the monster a harder time pulling its tentacle back. It pulled for a while, and when it stopped, Zack lifted the tentacle off the frame and pulled it, dragging the monster closer. With his off hand, he smashed the weak excuses for undead mobs the Lich threw at him.The enemies the Lich used on Zack were trash mobs. Clearly, the Lich saw them as less of a threat than the Oath Keepers.Zack saw the creature come into view after several more door frame uses. It was a single eye wrapped in tentacles with a massive maw that split along the middle of the eye. Ooze dripped from the lid as inches-thick cataracts stared blindly at them. His second plant monster lunged, driving a blade made from her wood into the eye and ripping it open. She opened her mouth and spat out a mix of pollen and seedlings in the creature's wound. Zack raised his hand and pushed mana into the mix.Vines and roots erupted across the monster's body, curling around the monster's many tentacles and then tangling the nearby undead. "That was for Lily."Zack nodded and stepped through the doorframe. Pieces of undead littered the floor around them from where his second plant monster had diced them. He debated making another one before deciding he didn't have time. He could sense the largest collection of esoteric artifacts at the top of the tower. He had no time to lose.He approached a set of double doors leading deeper into the tower. It was so close. A hard push knocked him out of the way of a club that shattered his last plant monster into mulch. Zack turned to see a Cyclops covered in stitches.The club came around again, and he ducked a horizontal blow that would have hurt like hell. What was that plant monster's deal? Why did it sacrifice its life to save him? He hadn't given it that order. It was infuriating he could have used it here. Zack clenched his fist and felt the absence of power that should be there.His brother betrayed him because Zack didn't want to enslave himself to the weak. Jason Hadrian took his power because of an ideological disagreement. It made him fight mad every time he thought about it.The cyclops swung his club, and Zack retreated from it. Another blow from the troll almost caught him. Zack clutched his arm, where he felt the wind from the club pass over. There was nothing he couldn't break with his bare hands. Cyclops weren't immune to Zack's might.He let the next blow hit and lost his entire defense bar. Zack flung three homing stake drivers, and they jabbed the Cyclops but failed to bring it down. He thought about using another breath attack from Gigadra. However, he could only call upon those three times daily while Gigadra was still young.The smell of the beast was terrible. It filled the room and clung to his clothes."Do you feel weaker? That's the gas. Good luck fighting paralyzed." The Lich said.His body attribute overpowered the gas.Zack dodged the Cyclops until his defense returned and took another club on the chin. More stakes appeared and pierced the undead cyclops, impaling it. Despite the damage, the job wasn't done."Good luck with that. My Cyclops was infused with the soul of a troll. It can heal from any injury." The Lich said.Possession of a soul gem confirmed. This Lich might be mentally challenged to brag about using such a dangerous artifact.Zack felt his back hit a corner and raised his hands as if to defend himself. The Lich cackled as the Cyclops raised its club. "Your defenses are down. There is nowhere left to run." The Cyclops swung.The thing about Zack was he didn't have a thorn skill for his thorn build. He wasn't a thorn build, even if he could function as one. Zack's skill, which allowed him to target enemies who attacked him, was called Revenge Crit. The skill that drove the stakes was Green Thumb. He kept many of the plant seedlings in his pocket and lobbed them in time with the activation of Revenge Crit. This gave the illusion of a thorn build.The club froze mid-swing. A homing mage build was very different from a thorn build. The cyclops' mouth opened, and a black flower emerged from it. Roots stretched through the monster as its skin cracked, and a corpse flower devoured necrotized flesh. Roots stretched from his other plant monster's body and merged with the growing roots. Much like the last one, a plant girl stepped out of the Cyclops' crumbling body.Zack knew he was facing a lich, so he purchased corpse flowers for that purpose and grew them in his demi-plane to counter the undead.His plant monster kicked open the double doors, revealing a large staircase leading up to the tower proper.They climbed the tower where a skeleton crew of undead stood against them. Zack could feel the artifacts through his Mystic Talent skill and knew where he would find them. He wouldn't bother with it if the Lich didn't stop him. Who knows, maybe it would flee or drive off the Oath Keepers. Miracles happen occasionally.He climbed the steps, each with more vigor than the last, bursting with excitement to reach his prize. There, he willed it to be in the Lich's treasury. When they opened the final door, it would be there. He knew it in his bones.The Lich cackled, and this time, he heard it in person. An emaciated creature wearing a black robe with blue flames running down it stood between him and the treasure room. Books of all kinds littered the floor, and the Lich clung to a staff made of the backbone of some poor creature. At the staff's head was a black goat with curved horns. Behind the Lich was a lock on the gate shaped as the goat head of the staff might fit inside it.He put on his best smile and thought about saying something, but it would just waste his breath. Zack was here to reclaim what was rightfully his. This undead stood between him and his prize.The Lich spoke with a raspy tone. Its dried lips and shriveled black tongue had some trouble forming its words. "The arrogance I sense from a mere silver-ranked adventurer is staggering. What did you hope to achieve racing here to your death."Zack sucked in a breath and let it out over and over, trying to keep his excitement at bay. He had trouble paying attention to the Lich when what he wanted was right behind a vault door. The question was whether it would survive a blast of Gigadra's breath. Could he use his faithful dragon to expedite this process, or would it risk the object he sought? The anticipation was killing him. He was so happy to have made it before the Oath Keepers could stick their fat noses in his business. At this rate, he might be able to get out without being seen by the paladins."Your grin is disturbing. Won't you speak and say something in your defense?"He slowly walked forward. No longer willing to entertain the idea of holding back. There would be no witnesses to report to the adventurers guild when he was done."I know you aren't a true thorn wielder; I've seen what you can do. While I remain a mystery." The Lich's head spun in the air after a blow from Zack shattered its ancient body. Impact wards sizzled in the air as Zack caught the head and slammed it down like a touchdown. Zack tipped the head aside to ensure its eye holes weren't facing him. "What have you done to me?"Zack's monster took hold of the staff and pushed its goat head into the goat-shaped keyhole.Old iron chains tolled like a bell as massive gears turned and the gates parted, revealing the rage-filled gaze of a skeletal dragon."Thank you for unleashing my ultimate undead fool." The Lich said.Black mana erupted around the creature, putting it squarely in the F rank. It was a skeleton dragon, the most magic-resistant creature known to man. He wasn't sure if Gigadra's breath could beat it. The beast opened its maw as deathly energy gathered for its breath attack.The attack would empower the Lich, and he had to let it free to dodge it. Zack cursed inwardly at this predicament. He stared intently at the skeleton dragon and tried to wiggle his monster-tamer skill into it, but the Lich was firmly in the driver's seat. Blue bones shaped like a dragon puffed up its chest."The world will know me as Azure, master of the Frost Dracolich." He didn't bother trying to find the Lich's phylactery because this wasn't a seek-and-destroy mission despite that being the parameters of his actual mission from the guild he wanted to trade for what he needed.Zack dropped a seed on the Lich's, and vines quickly grew across it. The Corpse Flower would drain its mana and hold off its reformation or possession of a new body for at least a few minutes."Pointless, this plant will die while I watch your flesh rot from your bones." Zack created two portals, one under him and another behind the Dracolich. He fell through and appeared behind the monster as it unleashed its breath attack.Black mana rotted the remaining books to dust, and even the stones dissolved as the breath attack tore through the tower. A path out to the world appeared, and the Dracolich roared in victory. It charged out of the tower, and the Lich bound by the corpse flower sapping its mana couldn't do a thing.The lich sounded defeated. "It has orders, if not contradicted, to attack intruders. When you broke its line of sight, it used the wards to target the listed enemies."Zack raised an eyebrow."You are vermin and were listed as such."Zack turned his attention to the treasury. He would have it and be free of his humiliation. For once, he would get one over on his brother.Patreon Chapters 4-6 5$ CH6 has Bunny Smut Link is in author's note.