Chapter 9

At first I ordered my men, to unload the dead bodies right at the outskirts of the city, and go back to our fortress, and guard the openings of the walls. I may have build quite a big structure, but it was not able to cover the whole area around the settlement, so there are a few gaps in our defense. While they do this Gerad should go around and ask if there is anyone living there who might be interested in a better live. From my experience, many people who don’t have a good live, think that the live they live is all they can ever accomplish, but that’s only because there is no one who gives them a helping hand, to build something worth living for. I hope some of the living population are willing enough to entrust these matters to people like us…

And I myself am building some sort of stone brick surface, where the dead people from the city should be loaded onto…

It’s a bit aside from the path that leads to the churchyard, so I make a gravel path to connect the path and the stone brick area, big enough for a cart to be pulled directly to the area, where the dead should be stored…

I said that I respect the dead sometime ago, but to be honest, it’s better to directly use them, then burying them into the earth to let them rot, right? So with no moral concerns, I open my first cadaver transit camp.

After making the finishing touches, Gerad comes back and reports a few people who want to try living in my dominion, so they will be transported to the fortress over the day. Most of the new citizens have a few things they want to move with them, because of that, we have to make a few loads, or else we won’t get everything with us…

With that decided, I have to build many new homes, but I won’t have enough mana for this, even when absorbing the dead bushes and animals in front of the town…

“Gerad is there a place in the town, to inform the people about new important information?”

“Yes my lord, it would be the marketplace, it’s not as well visited as a few years ago, but it will help spreading messages through the town faster”

So they also have a marketplace, that is important information…

“Then please tell the citizens to bring all the dead towards this transit camp, and let them know, that your group will no longer get them from wherever you got them till now. From the area here I can just absorb them, and we don’t have to waste our time with getting more dead people”

Gerad leaves after a quick bow, so with nothing left to do here, I leave towards the fortress.

With the few mana I can gain through absorbing the dead animals and plants in my territory, I begin building shacks, around the walls, so everything together is like a medieval village.

For the floor a simple stone base, then with wooden planks, I build the walls and the roof. thanks to me sticking to this plan, I can save the building plan after making two of these houses, so I don’t have to execute every step manually…

After building them, I begin to build simpler wooden palisades, to connect the stonewalls. Thanks to stone being a more costly option, I have to stick to wood. The wooden parts of the wall are not as high as the stone parts, so I use stairs to make it easier to navigate from one to the other…

As I make a break, I notice, that there are many more new tombs on the old graveyard, so many more then there were at the beginning. after controlling them, I notice, that they are the skeletons of the people I absorbed till now, means when ever I absorb someone their skeleton gets buried in the graveyard…

Gerad comes near me “My lord, the message you gave me is now circulating in the town, you should expect the first dead bodies in a few hours, but I have something I have to speak with you about”

“What is it Gerad? Let me hear the thoughts that trouble you”

“Winter is coming, and the the town does not have enough food to survive, not enough medicine nor enough warm clothing, can you please help us?”

That is indeed troubling, if winter is coming, then they would need more food, medicine and warmer clothing, and with helping them I will gain more experience...

“I see, I will look into it, but how many people would be expected, to survive until winter? I need to build new homes, so they have it warmer”

“Ohh, I see, well the current population is about 1,8 thousand people, we once had over 5 thousand, but because of the greed of the nobles many couldn’t afford to buy food or find shelter, so our population drops every year.” he seems very sad about that, has he lost someone because of that?

But about 1,8 thousand people, that are a lot, I have to give it my all, so the city can once again flourish…

“Then can you please gather the refugees that will come over the day, and show them into the houses I build. They are just temporary shelters, but when I have enough mana I will make them a better place to live in”

Gerad bows to me, and leaves to welcome the first cart with refugees, and show them a shack to live in…

At that time, I notice, that there are some dead bodies lying at the stone pavement. My plan works, I don’t have to go and waste time searching for them anymore…

After absorbing them, I begin building more shacks, thanks to the building plan, I can build many of them in a short amount of time, and I don’t have to use as much mana as before. I don’t know why this is like that, I only know this…

I make the same canalization system as I did at the graveyard, so we have a bit more water. I build the system so the water that got through the tanks filled with the filtering plants goes into a big underground cistern and is accessible through a well.

A few trees planted, and thanks to my ability, they about 10 years old trees when I plant them, so I don’t have to wait so long till are grown enough to give fruits. Winter is coming, but in the next year, they should bear fruits…

Then I make some furniture for all the houses, they may have brought a few pieces, but I don’t think that they have enough pillows, or the most important a tea set. So I’m helping them with that a bit…

After a few hours of waiting till there are new dead bodies to absorb, and using the mana to plant some trees, make a few little fields, and making a better road to the fortress, using gravel, finally all new servants of mine are there, have seen their houses, and are now gathered in front of the walls, where my undead warriors keep guard. I see many men, a few children but only 5 women, why only 5? shouldn’t there be more woman in a town? they are important...

“Thank you for coming, I hope you are satisfied with your current houses, sadly we don’t have enough resources to make better ones for you, but with the time you all will be prepared for the winter. So fear not our saviour the dungeon has come and will help you out from now on” Gerad speaks with confidence, while crowd cheers and cry out their thanks for saving them…

Is this some sort of cult? Well doesn’t matter…

due to adding people to your community and building houses for them, you have leveled up to level 8

due to having more than 40 followers, you now get extra mana every hour for the beings living in your territory

current mana gain per hour: 12

Whoa that’s a lot…

And I only have about 50 followers, when I can get the whole city, I will gain much more…

Thanks to these I might be able to finish the house upgrades earlier…

But now my 5 newly gained skill points, it seems to be the case, that when I upgrade a skill, the price to upgrade it again gets more expensive…

so now 2 skill points for ‘building’ should I do that? well yeah, I need the skill, and the better it is the better for me…

due to getting the skill ‘building’ on level 3 you are now able to place ‘little magic stones’

Ohh, so I can make a magic light source, that will be helpful in the future…

and about the other skill points, should I use them to upgrade ‘building again? No, should upgrade everything, and not just ‘building’...

with that I upgrade ‘summoning’ and ‘expand territory’ so they both reach level 2

with that my skill window looks like that:

SkillssummoningLevel 2expand territoryLevel 2make treasureLevel 2buildingLevel 3AppraisalLevel 1to see the description of a skill or any sub skills, simply think “open and you will see all information regarding the skill

It will get dark in a few hours, so my new followers quickly get shown around the whole area. At that time, I summon more undead warriors:

What kind of undead do you want to summon ?awesome undead farmerHe died while caring for his crops, if you summon him, he will continue caring for the fields, and he will do the job better than the normal farmerstronger undead warriorhe died while fighting, if you summon him he will crush your enemiescrazy undead dogit died while waiting for it’s owner to come back, and got crazy because of that. If you summon it, you have to cuddle it so it’s loyalty goes to you

Oh, so better undead? well only the farmers and the warriors, the dog got only crazy… poor thing…

I summon about 20 awesome undead farmers, so we do not have to care about the fields that much. Then when the darkness comes, I begin placing some magic stones near my core, so I can do a few things, even in the darkness. And then my ‘guarding’ skill informs me of something…

They haven’t left the outskirts of the town, but why are there armed men coming towards my village?

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Thanks for reading

If you have any ideas for how to continue the story, please let me know. I have some pretty nice ideas but I would enjoy adding some of your ideas in the story^^

If you find grammar or vocabulary mistakes, please tell me so I can correct them and you can read the story easier...