Chapter 132: 072. Skeleton King -2 (Part Two)
-Kuh… Euh…
The Black Dragon’s facial muscles twitched, but that lasted for only a short while. The dragon’s blood sprayed out seemingly everywhere.
THUD…!
The two lifeless halves of the giant lizard’s body crashed to the ground below. Blood continued sputtering out from the two severed halves. Meanwhile, the holy skeletons acting like parasites under the dragon’s hide crawled outside.
The undead king bit the golden bone sword in its mouth, and then used its four large arms to grab and lift up the dragon’s corpse.
When divinity flowed through its arms, the dragon’s flesh was cleanly stripped away from its bones almost instantly. The loose dragon meat flapped and fell to the ground with a loud thud.
The undead king took a closer look at the bones of the dragon, and then dipped them into the lake of holy water.
It was as if the lake itself acted like a portal connected to another dimension; the dragon’s bones were gradually sinking under the surface.
Now that its role was over, the glowing light within the Skeleton King’s eyes flickered out. Its sword was the first to sink beneath the lake’s surface; the gigantic undead king and the dragon’s bones followed soon after and gradually disappeared from this world.
The holy skeletons in the vicinity also vanished while scattering light particles.
And so, only the quiet stillness remained. Tina cautiously opened her eyes. She used her staff to prop herself up and then stared up into the sky above.
A searing sunlight was beating down on the land below.
And then…
“…?”
Tina slowly turned her head. She spotted something sparkling in the corner of her eye. But when she fully turned her head in that direction, her eyes nearly popped out of their sockets.
What she saw just then was literally a mountain of treasures.
From countless gold and silver coins, to innumerable jewels and expensive-looking antiques, etc, etc… All sorts of invaluable gemstones and treasures were reflecting the harsh sunlight. She could even spot several ancient magic grimoires strewn about as well – tomes that were thought to be lost to time.
Quite literally, she was now staring at a mountain of treasures that would’ve felt right at home inside a legendary fairy tale.
“There really was a treasure trove here all along!”
Tina muttered out in a daze, while Hans stared at their discovery in stupefaction before exploding in a fit of loud laughter.
He had already forgotten about his fear from a few minutes ago as his eyes were now filled with greed of highest order. “Ha, hahah… Hahahaha! I’m rich! N-no, I mean, we are all rich! Filthy rich!!!”
He began jumping up and down like a madman.
Damon too sighed in admiration at the sight, then shifted his gaze over to the dragon’s remains.
The creature had been split apart into two pieces. Damon found the sight of the dead dragon, with its tongue sticking out and all of its bones missing, rather pitiful to behold.
‘He managed to kill a dragon.’
Allen had summoned the king of all undead and killed the creature thought to be the strongest in existence. Not only that, through overwhelming means too.
First, it was the grim reaper. And now, even a mighty dragon as well.
‘He has already exceeded the limits of Necromancy.’
Was that all? He even possessed an ability to breathe new life into the land of death through his holy water. As an example, didn’t the Black Order’s temple turn into a verdant land teeming with life through his powers already?
Damon swallowed back his dry saliva.
Seeds of a small dream and hope were taking root within his mind. The withered and barren land of Aslan could be revived through the combined strength of Lord Angel and Lady Tina.
They could potentially turn the entirety of the land of death into a beautiful world of life filled with nature and greenery.
Damon’s expression hardened as he glanced at Allen, currently slumbering away on his back.
‘It’s him! He’s the only one who can deliver salvation to Aslan!’
It was unknown if Tina knew what Damon was thinking about at the moment. With a worried look on her face, she placed her hand on Allen’s forehead. Much to her relief, he wasn’t suffering from fever.
“How is he?”
Tina asked Damon, jolting the latter awake. He quickly took a closer look at Allen’s current condition.
“…Thankfully, he seems to be only asleep, my lady. Unfortunately, I don’t know for how long he’ll sleep this time.”
“Really?”
Tina was relieved to hear that.
Damon scanned the state of the ancient ruin.
The ceiling was practically destroyed now. It should take a considerable amount of time and effort to repair this place. Despite all that, the ruin was still far safer than the Black Order’s temple as far as its location was concerned.
Not to forget, a lake of holy water had been generated here as well. Just like what had happened back in the temple, the environment in this location would soon transform.
With these conditions, they should be able to develop a self-sustaining environment inside the ancient tomb.
“We should use this place as our base, my lady. I believe it’ll be more than safe enough for us to stay here,” Damon muttered out while glancing back to Allen on his back. “And also, it’ll serve as an appropriate location to build up a religious order dedicated to our Lord Angel.”
Tina smiled brightly at his suggestion and nodded her head. Once she recalled the faces of the kingdom’s subjects left behind in the Black Order’s temple, she responded to him with a cheery voice, “In that case, I’ll ask this of you, Damon. Please guide those subjects to this location.”
**
(TL: In 1st person POV.)
It was dark.
I felt really queasy.
It felt like I was dreaming a memory from a distant past.
-What’s going on here? What happened?
-S-sir, there’s been a malfunction with the machine! There was a sudden overload in the system, and…
-It’s on fire, you idiots! Put it out! Bring the fire extinguishers! Didn’t you inspect it beforehand?! What about the tester inside the capsule?!
-S-sir, that is…
-Dammit, why the hell did such a thing have to happen during the test?! …Uh?
-Wha, what… is that?
Unfamiliar voices belonging to strangers entered my hearing. And then, screams – followed quickly by the sounds of something sucking me in.
-Is that a black hole…?
-W-what the…?
-Run away…
It was at that moment I opened my eyes.
The first thing to enter my sight were a bunch of people kitted out in robes. I was jolted wide awake and quickly took a closer look at their faces. Fortunately enough, they came across as quite familiar to me. As it turned out, they were the slaves that stayed in the Black Order’s temple.
After sighing slightly in relief, I shifted my gaze elsewhere.
My eyes took in the sight of a ceiling with a huge hole that was falling to pieces, almost as if a huge sword had cleaved right through it. And the people around here were currently doing construction work in order to repair that very ceiling.
I smiled awkwardly and glanced at the chair I was sitting on.
It was yet another shabbily-made throne. Next to it was Tina, leaning her head against the arm rest and dozing off, looking like she was too exhausted to even stay awake.
Was she protecting me from the side?
Even before the feelings of gratitude entered my mind, an ominous foreboding managed to get a grip on me first.
I ended up losing my consciousness again. Just how many days went by this time?
“My lord! You’re finally awake!”
It was then, Damon hurriedly walked up to me while looking clearly stunned.
Since he was here, I might as well ask him my question, then. “How long did I sleep for?”
“It’s been around ten days, my lord.”
Ten days?
Man, I’ve been asleep for a pretty long time, haven’t I? No, hang on. Compared to three months, I guess it’s not that much of a big deal?
I looked behind me and was immediately taken aback again.
A massive monster, with its tongue sticking out, was laying dead on the ground in two pieces. And like some weird mollusc, it didn’t seem to have any bones in its body either.
…Was it because the corpse belonged to a dragon? Despite the sweltering heat, the meat had not rotted away and was somehow being preserved rather nicely.
I took a closer look at the dragon’s condition.
When I did, I sensed a faint but strange aura. Something was glowing from within all that dragon meat.
I walked over, and with some difficulty, managed to lift up the meat on the creature’s chest area. That’s when I got to see it.
…An ‘organ’ about a metre in width, permeating with demonic energy.
What else could it be other than the legendary dragon heart?
**
(TL: Back to 3rd person POV.)
The current location was the continent’s most well-known slave market – a place where regardless of whether you were a man or monster, everyone ended up as slaves. Not only were there human nobles or royal family members, but even the likes of the Orcs and Ogres that were labelled as monsters could be found here.
Although rare, this place even had Vampires as slaves as well.
It was the city of slaves, Evelyum.
There was a combat arena within Evelyum where life-or-death battles took place every day throughout the year.
It was called the ‘coliseum’, a grand stage where Necromancers wishing to show off their abilities participated in battles alongside the slaves they had purchased.
As long as you were skilled enough to win, you’d be able to get your hands on incalculable wealth. As for slaves, if they could fight ten times and survive till the end, then they would regain their freedom.
In such an arena, a young man in his early to mid twenties was standing around in a daze. He swallowed back his dry saliva and stared at his arm. A shackle was placed there, along with a sword tightly gripped in his hand.
The young man’s gaze drifted to his front.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
A Brown Orc was roaring out while banging its mace on the ground on the other side. That was the opponent of the young man, who had become a slave recently.
He scanned his surroundings.
His eyes took in the sight of the crowd cheering on fervently.
“Kill! Kill! Kill!”
‘…How did this happen?’
The mass-scale warp magic transported him to a barren wasteland, there was no doubt about that. As a result, he had to wander the desert without knowing where he was. Having not drunk a single drop of water, he eventually collapsed on the sand, only to be rescued by a traveller.
The traveller was a kind person.
For the past several months, the traveller led the young man and visited several different marketplaces, and despite his own challenging circumstances, the former still treated the latter fairly well.
And that’s why the young man grew to trust the traveller. This was the reason why he asked the latter to take him to the Theocratic Empire. The traveller nodded in agreement.
…And then, he sold the young man off as a slave.
“And they say there’s no one to trust in this world…”
The young man belatedly found out that the reason for them visiting all those different marketplaces was for the traveller to find a slave merchant who’d pay the highest price for him.
The young man held his head. To think that he trusted and relied on such a dastardly person!
But he had been stuck in a pit of despair, so it was only obvious that he’d seek out someone to rely on.
The Necromancers in the vicinity held back the Brown Orc while undoing the creature’s shackles. The monster tried to rampage around violently, but the skeletons summoned by the Necromancers forcibly suppressed it.
“Win ten times from this battle onward, and I shall bestow you with freedom and a little bit of prize money.”
The young man turned his head to his side. A Necromancer who said that was now undoing the shackles restricting the young man’s wrists.
“If you wish to earn your freedom, keep surviving.”
“…”
The young man now found himself in a situation where he had to win ten battles in this arena.
His name was Ruppel Olfolse. A man who, once upon a time, possessed the lofty status as the Third Imperial Prince of the Theocratic Empire.
He ended up in the middle of Aslan from the mass-scale warp magic, somehow became a slave, and was currently stuck in the city of Evelyum.
…All the while the two opposing forces, the Theocratic Empire and the kingdom of Aslan, were still searching for his whereabouts and hadn’t found him yet.
The Third Imperial Prince Ruppel Olfolse quietly squeezed his eyes shut as he muttered to himself. “Someone, anyone, please save me…”
“Ku-oooooh!”
The Brown Orc roared angrily and pounced on Ruppel.
< 072. Skeleton King -2 (Part One and Two) > Fin.
