"CHAAAAARGE!!!" - Nequitas goons

Underneath the new moon night, I watched as a horde of black-clothed goons ran into battle. However, from someone who didn't have any context regarding the situation, it looked more like a bunch of cosplayers who had to run to reach the last train.

"How long did it take?" I asked the others, referring to the speed of the 100+ group from Nequitas led by the two dangerous beauties (aka Filyn and Regina).

"1 minute and 10 seconds blank," replied Alf who had used a clock to count the time.

"Whatever! Let's move, or else there will be nothing left for us!" - Mira

Mira rushed us down the stairs to the Horror Hills station. After entering the pale-gray train terminal, there were no signs of the large group of goons sans a massive amount of footsteps leading toward the dead end Revi had shown us a few days ago. A large hole was visible in the wall now, big enough to allow even one of those gigantic undead dragons from the Church District to pass through. Or a horde of battle-maniacs.

"Huh, who'd have thought. If Revi hadn't told us about this, who knows how many months it would take to find this hole in the wall?" - Garami

"Less talk, more treasure hunting!!" - Mira

"Wait!" - Alf

"You're not going anywhere...!!" - Noire

I knew dividing our group into a "treasure team" and an "in-training team" was a good idea. FYI, I'm the leader of the trainees, which are Iron and Revi. As for the other people, two of them are forced to babysit a treasure-hungry berserker who I think is too excited over the thought of raiding a castle. Is this a common trait for anyone who originates from Solomar? Weird.

"Guild Master, can we not change groups?" - Alf

"Nope. Have fun." - Garami

"Garami, you heartless demon!!" - Noire

Duh.

After the trio went ahead, we followed them into the secret tunnel. The place smells old, like an old house with poor ventilation, and it's dark. Luckily, all of us have inborn night vision through our racial traits, so none of us requires any lights. In this case, it may have been better if we couldn't see the sorry state in front of us.

Bones, corpses, and lots of blood were spilled upon the walls, the floor, and let's not forget about the roof. Evidence of the Nequitas gang having met resistance. Unfortunately for the opposition, they met the Nequitas gang.

The tunnel seems safe enough, yet slightly nauseating due to the smell of rotten flesh and blood. You'd believe that the two (one former) undead wouldn't mind, but I could see Revi getting a little pale while holding her nose. Even Iron had wrapped a scarf around where his mouth should be. Really? Can even ghosts..., nah. It's better not to think too deeply about it.

---

One eventful underground trip later, which included a RIDICULOUSLY long staircase(!!), and we stood in the middle of what appears to be the royal garden. That's what Revi calls the place, but this place hasn't seen a gardener in the last century at least. Some parts of the previously magnificent garden have overgrown to be indistinguishable from wild bushes, while the other half has dried out. Give the poor plants some water, man! Or undead, in this case.

Speaking of water, I swear I can hear something... Over there! Just south of us, in the middle of the island, is a gigantic artificial lake...is what you could call it, but what's inside that thing? Black water...oil? It doesn't smell like it, but maybe we're too high up to notice the stench.

The castle is on a plateau higher than the rest of the city. We never noticed it because the walls surrounding it were so high that we couldn't notice even that. Thanks to our higher position, it's easy to look down at the lake, despite it normally being concealed by the same walls that separate the districts.

For some reason, that black goop gives me the chills. The further away we are from it, the better.

"Changing gears, time to locate the study." - Garami

"Study...?" - Revi

"Come on, did you already forget?! Iron, don't tell me...!" - Garami

"I remember. Nequitas will raze the castle, most likely aiming for the castle's war power. Meanwhile, Miss Mira's group will try to look for treasures, though touching the treasury could earn Filyn's ire, so Master Garami has forbidden the treasure group from going there. During all this, our group will look for information. The Royal Study, or the Royal Library, whichever one of those two might contain some clues regarding the strange events in this city." - Iron

"*Phew*, at least some of you remember." - Garami

"I-I remember that! Somewhat..." - Revi

Yeah, sure.

"And you don't know the path to the study?" - Garami

"S-sorry. The memories of that time are...foggy..." - Revi

Revi turned depressed as she failed to remember, but cheer up, kid! After everything she's been through, not to mention how MUCH she's been through, it's a miracle that she could remember even the secret passage we took here.

"No biggie. Leave the scouting to the professional." - Garami

With a dramatic snap of my fingers, my clothes transformed into the new form that I had added to them during our little break time. It's a masterpiece that's made out of the 2 items I obtained during my drunk "adventures", the Zombie King's Crown and the Netherworld Sludge. According to Alf and Bloom, I chose the latter in my stupor because I was getting thirsty. I'm SO GLAD the two prevented me from drinking it!!

Other than that, I also used the Soul Jar I snatched from the Halloween District. I was half in doubt whether to use the Dracolich Skull from the Church District, but in the end, I figured that high-quality material might overwhelm the others, so I kept it stored for now. An Alchemist's hunch.

The skills used are the analyzed data from the Lesser Lich (Regina bought the rights to kill the thing, ka-ching~), that nasty and faulty [Dangerous Necromancy], and finally, [Necro Ailments]. That last one only made it easier for my undead to inflict status ailments, and since it's undead-supervising-ish, I figured it was close enough to the Lesser Lich's thing.

Name: Nightmare Demon's Necromancy Robes [Armor (Set) - Light Armor] Rarity: Ex Quality: S+ Durability: --- Item Slot(s): Upper Body, Lower Body, Hands, Feet, Back, Accessory (1) Owner: Garami Stats: VIT: +50 RES: +110 SPD: +50 DEX: +60 Effects: Immortal Nightmare Item cannot be destroyed. Any potential damage to this item from outside forces will slightly recover the wearer's MP. Nightmare Allure Positive correction to the odds of inflicting status ailments on targets. Nightmare Growth: [Undead Royal Command]

And I was right. I love it when I'm right~. But only usually, since I have the habit of considering only the worst-case scenario lots of times.

The "Necromancy Robes" look like an anime-ish dress that's got a long skirt that shows one's legs, black gloves that give a vague image of skeletal claws, a top that seems designed to show off one's body lines, a cloak with a hood attached to cover my exposed back and shoulders (and I mean it when I say exposed. Why all the fanservice?), and a belt pouch around my waist. The outfit is mostly black with golden linings, along with a hint of turquoise in such a fashion that it makes it stand out the most.

In total, I could easily attribute this outfit to some witch princess or queen that worships the undead, or perhaps an evil god. Not that I'm gonna do the latter, especially if it's an evil goddess. The clothes are mostly black with sickly green lining and decorations. The type of green you could connect the undead with. Not a flush green like the forest, but a sickly one.

"Why the costume change?" asked Iron while tilting his head. Revi did the same, albeit more cutely.

"You gotta start from the appearance when doing something important." - Garami

I joked around as I started to summon an undead. The effects of the "Necromancy Robes" are more impressive than those of the Nightmare Weapon's dagger form. Heck, just the fact that this one outfit gives me 3 extra effects alone is impressive enough!!

#1 is the ability to reduce the necro-counters needed for creating the undead by 50%. The second effect allows me to turn up to 2 nearby corpses into undead bodyguards! And the final effect allows me to temporarily turn myself into an undead.

The reason for me to change into this outfit is for the first effect. That "turning myself into a living dead"-thing is just weird. I get as "durable" as an undead, but I also gain their weaknesses. It's nice that I can turn myself invisible to most status ailments, but seriously...

The second effect is relatively better, but using it will turn the corpses into dust after I cancel their reanimation, so no materials to harvest from them. Plus it is a big drain on MP for as long as the bodyguards are active, not to mention that I need to prepare free slots in my [Control Undead] group to control them. On the light side, they cost no LP, and they could be strong..., but I've only tested them on random zombie corpses while I snuck away from people to test this outfit in secret.

In the end, the big discount on my necromancy undead, ANY necromancy undead I might bring, is the biggest winner in my book. With it, I can summon stuff like an undead dragon, or an undead dragon, OR AN UNDEAD DRAGON. But for now, I'll settle with ghosts.

I summoned several F-rank Ghosts (upgraded from the G-rank Lesser Ghost thanks to the massive amount of necro-counters obtained from the Trials) and sent them out to scout for clues. And asked them to ignore the obvious warpath of the Nequitas gang. Who wants to travel through that road of destruction and mayhem? Even if the study was located along that path, it's as good as destroyed by the time we find it.

"These guys will map our way, so all that's left for us is to keep our heads..., down?" - Garami

Hey, what gives? The signal from my ghosts just disappeared! Those are worth quite a lot of necro-counter, just so you know!

*Cough*, anyway, the plan was to have the ghosts make use of the new [Auto-Mapping] skill. Summons and their likes also help map the map in my head, so I thought ghosts would be the best for that job. Unfortunately, I didn't think about including a bodyguard or three for the scouts...

"There's something over there," I warned the two as I removed the blindfold to see further into the distance.

...Yup. Two zombies dressed in old, rusted armor, a far cry from Iron's polished...body(?). Their swords seem fishy. They have this cursed aura on them. A little different from my own Aura skill, which may be cursed when you consider who the origin is, but the swords appear to be just swords with a fancy enhancement. Cursed, yet fancy. The zombies don't look that tough on their own.

What, you don't believe me? I'm both an Alchemist and a Spectermancer. I know a thing or two when it comes to enchanted items, the undead, or both at the same time.

"Revi, how do you feel about your first fight after coming to life?" - Garami

"...?" - Revi

After tilting her head questionably for a short second, Revi turned toward the direction of the zombies and started chanting something. Hey, what are you-

*BOOOOM!!*

......A massive blast of black light hit the area where the zombie knights were located. After the light disappeared, only the zombies were hurt, lying dead on the floor. Their equipment and even the surroundings were untouched by that massive magic blast. I've seen it before when I was teaching Revi. This is Death attribute magic. Hurting only those alive. Seems like it can bring the hurt to even the undead. Scary...

"Why would I have any problems?" asked Revi as she returned her gaze to me.

"...Now that you mention it, you did have all those Genocider titles..." - Garami

"Scary..." - Iron

Even the armor is agreeing with me!! But the culprit responsible for our freakout is just looking at us confused. I better keep her away from people like Filyn or Regina. If she gets...more corrupted into a battle freak, things will end up ugly.

In any case, the gardens are cleared! I should put the Ghost Scout plans on hold for now. At least until we reach a place where the mobs don't have any anti-ghost armaments. Which reminds me, I gotta scoop up those zombies and their toys~. Looting, looting~.