An entire day passed before I figured out the trick to using the message stones. My brilliant solution was to ask Ghost how to do it. After staring at the stones for hours, I finally remembered that Ghost was carrying one in her belt pouch.

I well recalled the fateful moment when I put an end to Voulos’ reign of terror, but I remember little of the events preceding it. Putting the day back together I could dimly recall that it all started when he received word of approaching adventurers. We had been in the [Corpse Explosion] training room when one of his stones began to glow. What happened afterwards overshadowed the messenger stones, so I had forgotten how he got it to work.

In my defence, how was I to guess that I had to hold the damned thing up to my ear? As a severed head, that kind of manual manipulation was beyond me. I had been hoping that I could activate it with a click. Cordelia had taught me that the language used wasn’t important for most magic. Spellcasters only used ancient and obscure languages to be dramatic. Of course, I might have figured it out sooner if I had over five minutes of uninterrupted time to think about it. It turned out that running an entire kingdom is incredibly time-consuming.

As king, and the smartest zombie in the world, it was my job to check that no one was doing anything too stupid. Most of the issues that arose were small, just little annoyances, but they quickly added up. From a shrine zombie worshipping a frying pan to Abs losing a warrior out on a jog, there was always something going wrong. Even I made the occasional mistake, as hard as that might be to believe.

The latest problem to arise happened while I was watching the [Warriors] work on their footwork. I was staring at the one that got lost by walking off the edge of a small cliff. Its arm was bent in three places, but it could still wield the spear in both hands. The [Warriors] were now officially part of Abs’ warband, but that didn’t stop her from throwing them around like dolls. [Drill Warriors] was a [Talent] that let Abs train a [Warrior]’s attacks without anyone taking damage. The [Talent] was like a job-specific ability that increased the effectiveness of her warband’s attacks.

I was on the verge of asking one of the traumatised [Warriors] to hold the magic stone to my ear when Bob strolled up to the nearby Pecs and snatched the [Inkless Quill] right out of his hand. Pecs looked at his empty hand for a moment, before turning to face Bob. The hulk towered over our [Crafter]. His [Anabolic Necrosis] gave him a massive frame, with unevenly enlarged muscles. Pecs curled his giant hands into fists.

‘Hey! No fight!’ I told Bob, mostly for her own benefit. I could see Pecs winding up a [Chomp], and the now upgraded [Bite] did a lot more damage than its base form.

‘No more shrines! Not enough coins.’ Bob explained as she turned to me.

‘Coins in shiny pile?’ I asked, confused. Voulos had been a wealthy orc, and his satchel had contained a hefty number of polished silver coins in little drawstring bags. The coins in these bags had made their way to the pile of junk designated for all things shiny.

After some back and forth, I felt like I had a grasp on the problem. As our [Crafter], Bob’s role was to provide the tools and equipment for other zombies to do their jobs. She had been the one to provide [Stone Spears] for the [Warriors], and the [Stone Pickaxes] needed to research [Mining I]. Bob had been so effective at providing whatever we needed, that I hadn’t thought to question how she was doing it.

Making these tools by hand was a long process. It required hours of patiently chipping away at rocks, cording plant fibres to make rope, and tying the stone heads to wooden shafts. However, the system gave Bob the option of instead choosing to skip all of that by spending [Wealth] to [Rush Production]. That was why we had no coins left. She had converted Voulos’ money into wealth and used almost all of it to save herself from a tedious and boring job. That part I understood. What I didn’t get was how Pecs came into it.

Over the last day, when he wasn’t blessing random zombies, Pecs had been creating more shrines. After some practice, Pecs had more or less gotten the hang of drawing skulls on the cave walls. We now had shrines that gave out [Sea-Legs] and [Boozy Blood] blessings on top of the [Tactical Eyepatch], and [Roguish Charm] shrines. Each shrine was operating at half capacity, but we were still making enough [Faith] for a couple of blessings every day from each shrine.

However, while the shrines were easy to make they were not free to maintain. Each shrine cost us a point of [Wealth] each day, which was equivalent to one system-approved copper coin. Moreover, apparently [Warriors] and other professions had to be paid! Our [Warband] cost us the equivalent of two silver, or twenty copper coins each week. The clan needed [Wealth] to function.

Fortunately, the problem wasn’t as bad as it first appeared; we still had enough to keep the shrines running for a couple of months, but we were down to our last hundred [Wealth]: the equivalent of a gold coin. That was also how much it cost Bob to [Rush Production] of a single stone tool. She had spent seven whole gold coins to avoid doing her job properly.

The only reason I didn’t tell Pecs to [Chomp] her head off was that I probably would have done the same thing. Instead, I had him throw her down the mountain with [Hurl Zombie] to let everyone cool off. It was oddly satisfying to see her fly through the air, and contrary to my first assumptions about the ability, she wouldn't take any damage from the fall. Maybe the long walk back up to the cave would teach the lazy [Crafter] a little bit of patience.

There was a practical divide between zombies smart enough to experience boredom, and those that weren't. The key factor seemed to be their wisdom skill, as any zombie above five developed enough self-awareness to experience boredom. It was something to keep in mind if we levelled up our shrine zombies. Innovations like frying pan worship were undesirable, and the culprit behind that incident was in fact a level three zombie with the wisdom boosting [Amplify Fragrance].

Once Bob did the shuffle of shame back to the cave we began work on fixing our nascent economy. The first thing I did was work out why the stone tools were so expensive. [Rush Production] was supposed to be a premium tool, used to speed things up in a pinch. However, a whole gold coin for primitive stone tools was extortionate considering Bob’s mission to make a storage hut only gave her the equivalent of a silver coin.

As it turned out, the reason it was so expensive was due to having a ninety percent reduction in her crafting effectiveness. When she used her [Crafting] talent there was a warning in the box that said she needed access to the appropriate crafting station. Crafting without a crafting station took ten times longer, so rushing it cost ten times more [Wealth].

‘Why no make crafting station?’ I asked Bob, annoyed at the squandered coins.

‘Not in menu.’ Bob replied defensively. Her trip down the mountain had left her in a rather sullen mood.

‘Should be there, I finish [Stone Tools V] many day ago.’ Hans helpfully added.

‘Is not there!’ Bob protested.

I’ll admit that it took me a while to see the right building when I had a look for myself. Despite our lack of technology, the building box was cluttered with a bunch of mostly decorative structures, as well as a variety of fires from the [Fire] technology. The structure we were looking for was a [Knapping Station], which I had ignored the first couple of times I skimmed through the box. Zombies don’t need sleep, so why would we need somewhere to nap? However, it was the only structure with the word station in its name, so I had a closer look.

Knapping Station

Upkeep: None

Stored Stone/Fiber/Sticks: 0/0/0

Knappers: 0 / 2

Actions:

Craft (0 / 2)

Assisted crafting of stone tools and dry stack stone walls.

The [Knapping Station] wasn’t hard to make, and could easily fit into a corner of the cave. It was categorised as a building, but it was really just an area set aside for crafters to sit down and smack stones together. The only remarkable thing about it was the short fence of stacked stones that marked the area. When I asked Bob what the point was of a wall that even a dwarf could step over she just said “Safety.”

I left Bob and Leggy to finish building the [Knapping Station] and considered the next step forwards. As long as Bob didn’t waste any more [Wealth], there was no pressing need to fix our economy. We did need to start generating it at some point, but we had time to do so.

Our general resource situation was quite good as far as I could tell. My council members were slowly pushing through their clan missions, which awarded plenty of their respective resources. Ghost, in particular, had accumulated a large stash of [Information]. Her missions generally just wanted her to explore, find and claim points of interest. Completing the first two groups of missions gave plenty of [Information], but I forbade her from attempting to claim anything without the whole party there.

When I contacted Ghost about the messaging stones she was headed towards the forestry in her old territory. She had taken a wide berth from Voulos’ tower but was still close enough to make me nervous.

Perhaps if she had some company things would be safer. ‘Bob, pick up this stone, please and thank you.’ I sent the message to her just as she finished placing the last stone in the wall of the [Knapping Station].

'Why?' She asked, but complied nonetheless.

'Talk to feral zombies.' I explained and began reaching out to the lost scouts.

There were ten stones to try, and so Bob and I went through them one by one. At first, I thought that we were doing something wrong because the first two stones wouldn’t activate even when Bob pressed them right into my ear. When we tried the third stone we finally got a reply, but the feral on the other end wasn't interested in joining us, even with the promise of juicy grey matter. I skipped the fourth stone, as its partner was being carried by Ghost, and I could talk to her whenever I wanted. it wasn't until the fifth stone that we had any real success and met a friendly feral that was open to working with us.

I was quite excited to recruit another elite zombie ally, but directing it towards our cave was a little problematic. Without adding it to our party we had no reliable way to meet up. The feral knew how to make its way to Voulos' tower, but I told it not to when the feral started heading that way. The feral was smart enough to remember what directions like North and South were, so we worked out that it was roughly North of the tower. Ghost would have to go through feral number five's territory on her way to the forestry. Perhaps I could figure out some way to help them meet up without attracting too much attention.

Then we tried the sixth stone. "Hello?" Bob said. There was a long pause.

"Howdy there. I'm sorry, but your little friend can't answer right now. Can I take a message?" A confident and vibrant voice with an unfamiliar accent replied.

Zed's End of Chapter Sheet:

King Zed ‘The Red’

10:34, 29th of Iosi, 1465 3A

Total Level: 6 (Copper)

Levels: Overseer 2

Experience: 1279 / 3400

Type: Overseer Zombie (C)

Attributes:

Resources:

Dexterity: 6

Stamina: N/A

Strength: 13

Power: N/A

Vitality: 15

Health: 180/180

Wisdom: 8

Willpower: 96/96

Intelligence: 5

Mana: 60/60

Charisma: 10

Soul: 120/120

Decay: 24% (Stage 0)

Affinities: Nether (100%), Poison (50%), Fire (-25%), Holy (-100%)

Titles:

King of the Braindead: Access to Kingdom subsystem.

Red-Handed: +1 Intelligence, sets alignment as evil, hands are permanently dyed red.

Traits:

Made to Serve: +1 Intelligence, +1 Charisma, -1 Wisdom. Gives understanding of system common, and the primary language of its creator (Orcish). Is able to follow simple commands based on the creator's intelligence divided by ten (3 words long). Gives access to a portion of the knowledge contained within the host brain, better preserved brains retain more information.

Flesh Construct: Sustained by nether magic, does not need to eat, drink, sleep or breath. Does not regenerate Health. Does not use Stamina or Might, but instead uses Decay.

Overseer: +2 Charisma.

Not Braindead: +1 Wisdom, +1 Intelligence and +2 Charisma.

Skills:

Hordesight: +1 Wisdom and you can share vision with any visible non-hostile zombie.

Abilities:

Unarmed Strike - Copper - Level 1 (Unavailable):

0% Decay

1 Second Cooldown

Strikes at the target with an unarmed limb for 10 bludgeoning damage.

Dash Attack - Bronze- Level 1 (Restricted):

0% Decay

5 Second Cooldown

Dashes to a target within 3 metres for 18 bludgeoning damage with a chance to push back or knock over the target.

Poisoned Bite - Bronze - Level 2 (Restricted):

0% Decay

5 Second Cooldown

+1 Vitality and Bites the target for 18 piercing damage and a further 16 poison damage over the next 30 seconds.

Enrage Zombie - Bronze - Level 4 (Restricted):

500 Soul

No Cooldown

The user lets out a rage-filled shout at a target zombie to increase its Strength, Dexterity, and Vitality by +50 for 11 seconds.

Overseer’s Aura - Bronze - Level 3 (Restricted):

10 Soul / Second

No Cooldown

+1 Strength to all zombies within 10 metres.

Corpse Explosion - Steel - Level 2 (Restricted):

200 Mana

20 Second Cooldown

Explodes the targeted corpse to deal damage equal to the health it had when alive in a 2m radius. Any corpses in the range of the explosion have a 25% chance to explode as if targeted by this ability.

Attunements (3/1):

Ring of the Jester (Cursed): +2 Charisma but curses the wearer with [Jester’s Curse].

Princess Tiara: +3 Charisma and makes the wearer more attractive to Princes.

Intellect Ring: +1 Intelligence.

Status Effects:

Jester’s Curse: The target is cursed by the jester. The curse can only be lifted by a Sphinx’s laugh.

Team-Killer (351 days remaining): -2 Charisma

Blessing of Roguish Charm (17 hours remaining): +1 Charisma, the higher your infamy the more attractive you are.