[Rose of Decay: You still want to buy mines? The City of Alchemy is an active war zone now. Can't you just seize them? If you offer to pay, who's going to bother negotiating a deal with you?]
Anbaixiu sighed. Sure enough, you could never take other people for fools.
Within the Elegy Poetry Society, Headless Bro was probably the only one slightly deficient in the wits department—he was, after all, a knight who focused on raw strength.
The rest were spellcasters, all possessing a respectable intellect. Swindling them was no easy feat.
Unable to admit that it was merely an excuse to embezzle some funds, Anbaixiu changed the subject: [Speaking of honoring contracts, those elves came near my territory and forced the local lords to sign relocation agreements. The contracts seem to carry some special effect, but my intel is limited, and I haven't been able to pry anything out.]
[Rose of Decay: Signed contracts? Do you know the exact terms?]
Anbaixiu relayed the terms he had gleaned from the Porcupine Knight to the Rose of Decay. The Undead Queen seemed to realize something, leaving behind only the words, "Wait for my word," before going silent.
While it was a pity he couldn't scam any coin, Anbaixiu still intended to prioritize the propagation of mercury soul puppets.
The elves were advancing aggressively, while the desert dwarves were being pummeled into the dirt by Ryan. Unreliable at a glance, it looked like Anbaixiu would eventually have to shoulder the burden alone.
Mercury soul puppets were the ideal high-tier combat unit. Whether in terms of sheer battle prowess or cultivation cost, they offered the best value for money.
Spreading out a map, Anbaixiu found three mines near his territory, but each belonged to a major lord.
Unlike the Porcupine Knight, a "rustic commoner" who had risen through martial valor, these three major lords were great nobles with centuries of heritage, likely possessing blood ties to members of the Alchemists' Council. While great nobility had a penchant for producing profligates and perverts, they also possessed a massive advantage: immense accumulated wealth and meticulously developed domains.
Each of these three great lords commanded over a thousand soldiers under their banners—not hastily drilled militia from a few days of training, but true soldiers. They might not be fully suited in plate armor, but they were vastly superior to ordinary levies.
Furthermore, their domains were fully fortified with watchtowers and stone ramparts, and they might even possess a concealed magitech cannon or two.
Ordinary folk wouldn't dare provoke such powerful lords, constantly having to guard against them coveting their own lands instead.
With the chaotic warfare having only just begun, these lords were likely gathering their strength and biding their time. When they finally made their move, they would surely sweep through the surrounding lands with thunderous speed, swallowing everything in sight until fully gorged.
Yet now, Anbaixiu had set his sights on their mineral resources first.
"Which one should I strike first?"
Anbaixiu searched his memory for details on these lords, only to find he had little impression of them. He usually preferred shutting himself away in his castle conducting experiments, having next to no interaction with his neighbors.
He only remembered that their family crests were rather distinctive: one was a cerberus, another a raging thunderstorm, and the most interesting of all, a human figure wrapped in thorns.
If those three family crests were tied to their religious beliefs, things became very intriguing indeed.
The cerberus went without saying: they were bound to be worshippers of some Archduke of the Nine Hells. The raging thunderstorm typically represented Talos, the Storm Lord. And that final thorn-wrapped figure was almost certainly a devotee of Loviatar, the Maiden of Pain.
If these three groups of believers shared any common trait, it would be just one: they were all utter lunatics.
The Nine Hells needed no introduction; good souls simply did not exist there. Evil was their innate mark, and those who worshipped an Archduke were required to regularly offer blood and souls.
Talos, the Storm Lord, was a powerful, deranged deity enamored with destruction, war, and havoc. Consequently, faith in Talos was relatively fringe, but anyone willing to practice his tenets was a warmongering maniac who relished destroying everything—not just living beings, but the creations of civilization itself.
To destroy all in the fury of a storm—that was the doctrine of Talos.
Curiously enough, Talos was also quite a generous god. Perhaps because he had so few followers, he was remarkably unsparing when it came to sharing divine power, resulting in a steady abundance of storm priests under his mantle.
He was equally generous to subordinate deities. For instance, Velsharoon, the God of Liches, had once been Talos's subordinate, and one could even say he attained godhood thanks to Talos's bountiful sharing of power.
Yet the mad greater deity's frantic exploitation proved too much for Velsharoon to bear. In his own words, he was "unwilling to be worn through like a footsoldier's boots." In the end, Velsharoon had no choice but to flee and pledge allegiance to Azuth, the patron god of mages.
One could only wonder what the God of Liches had endured to utter words like "unwilling to be worn through."
Still, this tale clearly demonstrated that the Storm Lord was a true lunatic, one that even a lich couldn't endure.
The last one, Loviatar, the Queen of Pain, was a heavyweight in her own right. Simply put, Loviatar was the goddess of sadists, bullies, and torturers, reveling in all forms of torment and agony. If you could embrace such pain and find ecstasy within it, you would receive the goddess's blessing.
If you indulged in pleasure and rejected pain, Loviatar would personally show you the true meaning of suffering.
"The City of Alchemy truly is a place of boundless freedom, allowing three varieties of lunatics like these to become great nobles."
Just as Anbaixiu felt a twinge of amazement, he suddenly remembered that he was a lich. In the eyes of ordinary mortals, a lich was far more terrifying than any of those three families. They merely held peculiar faiths and were still human after all, whereas a lich belonged entirely to the evil alignment.
Framed that way, it didn't seem so outrageous anymore.
The City of Alchemy was truly formidable, managing to keep all these lunatics gathered together in peaceful coexistence for so many years. But now that the city was destroyed and the restraining hand completely removed, the side effects of this freedom of faith would erupt into explosive prominence.
After studying the map for a long while, Anbaixiu decided to target the Storm family first.
The reason was simple: they were the closest.
The other two families were rather far from Anbaixiu's territory. Not only were their lands separated by several minor lords' domains, but the terrain between them was difficult to traverse. Even if he could erect a teleportation circle, distance remained an annoyance.
Since all three were lunatics anyway, he might as well pick the nearest one.
Anbaixiu planned to scout out some intelligence first, seeing how many troops this great family commanded and whether they had any formidable classes among them. Passing by Isabel's laboratory, Anbaixiu peered inside. The girl's efficiency was decent enough. Though she was merely following step-by-step procedures to assemble the undead production line, she was a fast learner and hadn't caused any major blunders.
The only problem was that the moment the girl spotted him, she came rushing over, calling him "Teacher! Teacher!" before frantically flipping through her notebook and rattling off dozens of questions in a single breath.
Anbaixiu had no choice but to answer each one, realizing after a lengthy explanation that his departure had been significantly delayed.
Yet every single question she asked was directly tied to the task at hand. Anbaixiu couldn't ignore her even if he wanted to, as that would only hinder his own profit-making.
After finally finishing his answers, Isabel took a deep breath, gathered her courage, and asked, "Teacher, thank you for guiding me all this time. I have one last question for you."
"One last question? That sounds a bit arrogant," Anbaixiu remarked.
Alchemy was a field of boundless depth; this girl would have plenty more chances to ask questions in the future.
"No, no, that's not what I meant..." Isabel stammered, flustered. She drew several deep breaths before asking, "Teacher, this might be presumptuous of me, but what does it feel like to become undead? Does it hurt?"
Anbaixiu looked at Isabel strangely. Why was she suddenly asking this?
"What, did you finally see the light and decide to abandon those meaningless worldly desires to reincarnate as an undead?"
If so, Anbaixiu could certainly grant her wish, though she'd have to wait until the undead production line was complete.
"No, I just..." Isabel's face turned pale, and she whispered, "I just realized I don't really have a choice. Working here, won't I ultimately be turned into an undead and enslaved for eternity?"
Anbaixiu shook his head. "You don't need to worry about that. A genuine undead conversion ritual is very expensive. If you're unwilling, no one is going to waste the resources to forcibly transform you."
Transforming into an undead while retaining one's original consciousness was far from cheap; Anbaixiu had spent the greater part of his fortune to become a lich. And an undead evolving toward higher tiers, like Erha, required continuous investments of resources. High-tier undead possessing self-awareness had always been exorbitantly priced.
Isabel's greatest value lay in the alchemy she possessed. Turning her into an ordinary skeleton would be pointless, while converting her with her consciousness intact would carry an immense cost. In fact, Anbaixiu had intended to offer that as a grand reward.
If Isabel didn't want it, he wasn't about to foolishly cough up the funds for a conversion ritual.
Yet to Isabel's ears, it sounded like something else entirely.
"Teacher, do you mean... this is all just a matter of money?"
"Of course. Undead don't harbor those worldly desires to begin with; the only thing to negotiate with you is profit. Your sole purpose in this castle is to generate value. As long as the profit is sufficient, anything can be negotiated. Remember that, and go finish your work."
Leaving her with that parting piece of advice, Anbaixiu hurried out of the castle.
Getting his bearings, Anbaixiu cast Fly and soared toward his destination.
This family devoted to the Storm Lord was named Leitman. They had existed long before Anbaixiu settled near the City of Alchemy, ruling over a main city and three satellite towns, with an estimated population of thirty to forty thousand.
With such a population, fielding a standing army of over a thousand full-time soldiers would be seen as reckless militarism in other regions, where grain production was a constant bottleneck. Near the City of Alchemy, however, it was hardly an issue, as enchanted seeds were readily available for purchase.
With properties like enhanced yield and pest resistance, bulk orders placed regularly yielded harvests far superior to those of traditional farmland elsewhere.
And if a lord maintained a cadre of in-house alchemists, they could even modify enchanted seeds—which normally degraded after a single crop—to last four or five harvests before losing potency.
When Anbaixiu entered the Leitman domain, he noticed an air of outward calm masking internal vigilance.
Though outsiders weren't barred from entering the territory, the moment he stepped into an outer satellite town, Anbaixiu felt four or five sets of eyes lock onto him, scrutinizing the stranger intensely. The Leitman family had evidently caught the scent of the approaching storm; there were more patrols on the streets than working commoners.
"They certainly are well-trained. A frontal assault would likely be a hassle. Could I just set up a teleportation circle directly in the mining area and steal the ore instead?"
The Leitman territory was vast, bristling with defensive watchtowers and fortifications. There was no telling how long a siege would take. Moreover, raising an undead army had its costs; after taking the place, who knew how long they would have to mine to offset the casualties?
As Anbaixiu weighed more cost-effective methods, a figure clad in noble attire approached, politely saying, "Greetings, stranger mage. Have you come to sample our local specialty, the thunderfruit brew? Our lord is very hospitable. When meeting a guest such as yourself, he insists on treating you to a cup."
The words were courteous, yet the guards flanking the noble had already encircled Anbaixiu, weapons ready for combat at a moment's notice.
Anbaixiu had initially thought of speaking with Lord Leitman first to see if they could strike a cooperative deal—such as buying ore at a discounted price to avoid an unnecessary war.
Suddenly, he sensed something amiss. As the guards closed in, an uncomfortable gaze fell upon him.
Extending his senses slightly, Anbaixiu pinpointed the source: an elf wearing the leather armor of the Twilight Guard.
Sure enough, the elves hadn't focused solely on petty lords like the Porcupine Knight; their elite squads had already penetrated the various domains. Seeing that this Twilight Guard had no Leitman soldiers watching over him, could it be that they had already reached an agreement?
Seeing Anbaixiu remain silent, the noble took half a step back and continued, "Mage, what do you say? Will you drink a cup of our complimentary thunderfruit brew, or would you prefer we go somewhere else to talk?"
Anbaixiu flashed a smile and replied to the Leitman envoy, "Of course I'd love nothing more than to sit down with Lord Leitman for a drink. I bring a verbal message from the dwarf king of the Golden Kingdom, which must be delivered to Lord Leitman in person."
Chapter 97