Creating two high-tier undead right now was not an ideal choice.
Setting aside the costly materials, time was the primary issue.
Many humans harbored a misunderstanding about undead, assuming that casting Animate Dead and pulling a skeleton straight from a corpse produced a true undead.
In truth, skeleton soldiers created by such spells lasted at most a single day. They could hardly be called genuine undead—merely temporary puppets.
Their every movement depended entirely on the caster's manipulation, and their souls were not even whole.
Crafting a true undead that endured long-term and possessed a sense of self—let alone a high-tier undead retaining most of its normal faculties—demanded immense effort.
First, he had to check whether the two men's souls were still intact.
Anbaixiu was not worried about Hastings. A rogue accustomed to backstabbing likely had little faith; upon death, such a soul would linger inside the body for a long time, enduring torment.
The trouble lay with the half-elf ranger. The vast majority of elves worshiped the elven pantheon, and those deities placed extraordinary value on elven souls. For the most part, elven souls ascended straight to the elven divine realm upon death, rarely lingering.
Deliberately intercepting an elven soul risked infuriating those vindictive elven gods, which hardly seemed worth the trouble.
Yet when Anbaixiu inspected the corpse, he discovered that Hares's soul was still there after all.
"Doesn't worship that stingy elven pantheon? Very good. Spares me plenty of trouble."
A low incantation echoed through the gloomy laboratory like the mumblings of ancient shadows in an abyss. The temperature plummeted abruptly, visible layers of white frost spreading across their surroundings.
A pale-blue wisp of ghostly light drifted from the half-elf's corpse. It seemed to struggle to escape, only to be frozen by the pervasive chill, left floating stiffly in midair.
With both hands, Anbaixiu traced countless threads of magical light, weaving them into a dreamlike pattern that imprinted upon the soul.
Once the intricate ritual was finished, Anbaixiu addressed the soul fire: "You should be able to speak now. Hares, can you hear my voice?"
The soul fire trembled, uttering a faint sound.
"Hurts..."
"It is merely phantom pain caused by your soul losing its compatible body, making you think your limbs have been severed. You can no longer feel physical pain. Keep thinking; focus on your most deeply etched memories. That will help consolidate your willpower."
The soul fire quivered, and another intermittent voice emerged, far clearer than before.
"Mother... Mother... Don't die... Mother..."
Anbaixiu was unfazed. Every adventurer's past held enough tragedy for a sentimental melodrama, but only those who became legendary heroes ever had their sob stories set to verse and passed down in song.
Hares's soul cried out for his mother for quite some time before recovering a shred of sanity.
"What... what happened to me... It's so dark... so cold... Where is this place?"
Anbaixiu replied, "Darkness and cold, just like pain, are illusions. A soul observes the world differently, and you will need time to adapt. I temporarily sealed your ability to perceive the outside world, or your soul would collapse under the strain."
Lacking eyes, a nose, and ears, the way a soul perceived the world was more akin to reading an exhaustively, terrifyingly detailed instruction manual.
Earlier, when Anbaixiu drank at the tavern, he could not taste the spoiled ale, but his soul had long since tagged the mug with a string of keywords: "watered-down," "soured," "disgusting." Imagine holding up a gold coin: just its outward contour alone would suddenly summon dense descriptions hundreds of thousands of words long. An informational deluge like that could blow a fragile soul apart.
A poetic undead had once penned these words: "The world opens itself entirely to me, yet in cowardice, I close my eyes."
An undead spent its entire existence paring down its perception of the world to reduce the burden on its soul—filtering out unimportant details, for instance, lest it miss what truly mattered.
And that was merely the hurdle during initial adaptation. Next came practicing how to channel soul power to drive an undead body.
Just as the soul commanded the body, the body in turn influenced the soul.
Why did ghosts closely resemble their living forms? Because the soul had continuously adapted to the body's shifts.
This was why the undead predominantly assumed humanoid shapes; adapting to an original form was naturally far easier.
Only Anbaixiu, having mastered the craft of the Simulated Soul, could alter an undead's shape at will. He could directly create a Simulated Soul tailored to a specific form, drastically slashing the time needed for soul and body to merge.
As Anbaixiu had yet to craft a suitable undead vessel for Hares, he kept the soul sealed for now, restricting him to verbal communication and denying him other ways to sense the world. Otherwise, Hares would have spent months screaming in madness before gradually adjusting.
Once Hares calmed down a bit, Anbaixiu asked, "Did those paladins send you to infiltrate the castle?"
Hares's soul trembled once more, his tone laced with terror: "It's you, Master Ultraman! I remember now... That Headless Horseman was your puppet! You killed us!"
If Headless Bro had been created by Anbaixiu, he would have built an entire legion of them, marched across the Ryan Empire, and strung up that old bastard James Watson on a pyre.
"Answer my question, Hares. Infiltrating my castle—were you acting under the paladins' orders?"
Hares replied, "Yes... My brother and I only wanted to swindle some coin from them, but they forced us to break into the castle. We only planned to make a quick loop and leave."
Hares's voice dripped with regret. They had only meant to take a gamble, and ended up losing their lives.
Anbaixiu questioned him closely about the paladins, but gleaned little. The two brothers had had limited contact with the paladin named Fanxing, knowing only that he was a black knight sworn to the Oath of Vengeance.
"A black knight... troublesome. Paladins like that have virtually no moral bottom line."
As Anbaixiu muttered to himself, Hares seized the opportunity to plead: "Master Ultraman, it was our fault, but please, have mercy and spare my brother! I can serve you—whether you turn me into a skeleton or a zombie, just please spare Hastings!"
Anbaixiu asked curiously, "You brothers are quite attached to each other. But how are a half-elf like you and a pure human like him brothers? Same father, different mother, or same mother, different father?"
"Our father was a slaver. Hastings's mother was a human slave, and my mother was an elven slave... In the end, we killed him and escaped."
Another tragic tale, but Anbaixiu had no interest in prying further.
He pondered the value of the two brothers. That black knight named Fanxing was irritatingly cautious. Why couldn't he be like that fool Alan, charging headlong while shouting about the Holy Light?
He had to give this paladin a jolt; he could not let him keep laying plans so calmly.
Anbaixiu turned the matter over in his mind and formed a rough plan. Then he said to Hares's soul, "By the way, seeing as you're quite good with pets... why not try reincarnating as a lich?"
Chapter 59