Ghost Knight King's Dungeon Project

Chapter 8 [Valak's Demon Raven and the Fishing Demon King]

“Valak, the lord of the underground city of Kana Wasteland,” Talia replied in a low voice.

"It is indeed I." A huge red-eyed demonic raven with a crest hopped on a branch, its crest trembling with each step, somewhat resembling the sulphur-crested parrot that Samael had seen in his previous life.

"Stop your feeble psionic energy and stop trying to steal my raven. It's pointless. This is my territory. My psionic energy is rooted in every inch of this land. I am the ruler."

Talia pursed her lips and extinguished the faint blue light in her eyes beneath her helmet.

“I’ve heard about your father, that half-blood girl from the Ronoway family. But I wasn’t involved, nor am I interested.” The crested raven slowly raised its claws and marched in formation on a branch before flapping its wings and hopping onto the head of a corpse. “The cold Rondoran Mountains of the North are too far away for me; I only care about my beloved Kanas Plain.”

“Tell me, you girl from the Ronoway family, what are you doing sneaking onto my territory?” The raven’s claws dug into the corpse’s scalp. It lowered its head slightly, its blood-red eyes glaring at Talia. “Seeking refuge? You wouldn’t be so foolish as to think that just because your father helped me, I will protect you?”

“My father has already paid the price for his foolishness and idealism, and I have learned to adapt to this cruel and realistic world.” Talia subtly stepped in front of Samael. “I’m just passing through here on my escape. I don’t expect you to help me, nor will I cause you any trouble.”

The demonic crow cawed loudly, swaying its body back and forth.

"Don't be afraid. Your father did help me a few times before he died. Although we people of the same race don't care much about feelings, if I were to use your head to ask Sitika and Marna for the bounty, I... would feel a little embarrassed, as it would damage my dignity as a monarch." The demon raven lowered its head, pecked out the eyeball from the corpse at its feet, and swallowed it.

The corpse was struck and bumped by the giant demonic crow, and swayed on the branch like a swing, suspended by hemp rope.

“But you’d better not wander around my territory. Those monarchs’ men are hunting you all over the world. You’d better not lead them to my territory.” The demon raven grabbed the skull of the corpse, swaying it back and forth as the skeleton, suspended by a rope, swayed. “Get out of here as soon as possible, get out of the Kanas Plain.”

“Uncle, so you’ve been very busy lately?” Samael suddenly interjected.

Talia was taken aback, turned to look at Samael, then at the Feathered Crow, and chuckled softly.

"How far have the adventurers broken into your dungeon?" she asked with a smile. "You sent your Raven Scouts all the way to this place, practically spying on the Adventurers' Guild outpost. The situation must not be too optimistic, right?"

The crested raven snorted, and its folded crest suddenly opened like a fan, revealing the hideous, blood-red eye spots on its massive crest, making it appear somewhat enraged.

“The Third Ring,” it answered reluctantly. “Happy now, you gloating half-blood girl from the Ronoway family? Can you get lost now? I don’t have time to deal with you right now, and I have your pursuers to catch. I’ll let you go for now—what’s with that talkative follower of yours? A demonized human wizard? An elite demon warrior? A high-ranking confidant left behind by your father? Forget about the Nether Bronze weapons, what kind of insane warrior would wear full-body Nether Bronze Knight Armor? That’s not equipment for the living. If it were an armored skeletal warrior, why would an undead creation speak on its own?”

“It’s none of your business,” Talia replied.

"Very well, then get lost." The Feathered Raven put away its crest. "Don't provoke me anymore. I haven't fed my Earth-Eating Demon Worms today—although the Alliance outposts have mages running a constant expulsion array for the worms, Earth Tsunami is a long-range attack—want to take a hit from Earth Tsunami?"

“We will leave—it will take some time, and in the meantime, we will leave each other alone, how about that?” Talia said. “We will not take advantage of your dungeon to cause trouble, nor will we tell the other demon lords about this. But you must keep it a secret for us and not reveal our whereabouts.”

"Alright! It's a pleasant agreement then—you're not allowed to get involved in the tug-of-war between me and the adventurers, and I won't leak any information to those lunatics under Sitika and Marna. Get out of my territory as soon as possible and don't cause trouble. Let's pretend we didn't see each other, like the north wind of Rondoran lightly passing by the white bone rocks of the Kana Plain, just brushing past each other indifferently." The Feathered Raven shook its large crest of feathers back and forth, its words as poetic as poetry.

"However, if you dare to interfere with the tug-of-war between me and the adventurers, don't blame me for being ruthless."

“Understood,” Talia said.

"I'll be keeping an eye on you. You'd better leave here quickly, before I back out." The raven nodded arrogantly, cawed loudly, spread its wings, and flew towards the Adventurers' Alliance stronghold on the distant horizon.

Talia breathed a sigh of relief.

“Things are better than I thought…” she smiled gently.

"Are you two very familiar?" Samael asked. "He doesn't seem very hostile."

“I guess we got to know each other a bit. My father helped him, and he reciprocated. They even cooperated as allies a few times. So he remained neutral about our affairs,” Talia recalled. “However, demons are generally less emotionally invested and don’t usually have any truly long-term allies. My father was a very special demon; it was because he was too naive, too kind, too idealistic, and too trusting of his friends that…”

She sighed.

"This Demon King seems to be in a bit of a mess lately," Samael commented. "Why do adventurers always seem to enjoy messing with the Demon King?"

“Advanced adventurers love exploring dungeons because the dungeons built by demon lords contain more spiritual energy than ordinary demon realm ecosystems, resulting in better quality materials and loot. They might even stumble upon the demon lords' vaults, armories, loot stores, and treasure troves of divine artifacts. In short, anyone with the ability wants a piece of the pie,” Talia explained.

"Since the adventurers keep harassing us, why doesn't the Demon King just move to a remote, desolate place and hide away from the Adventurers' Alliance?" Samael asked, puzzled. "If my house is always crawling with cockroaches and other pests, I'd also love to move. But on the map you drew before, almost every dungeon is right next to an adventurer's territory, as if you're afraid that there won't be any adventurers to harass you."

Talia smiled gently.

“You still don’t quite understand the demon race, Samael. To the demon lords, adventurers are not pests,” she said, “but rather livestock on a farm, fish raised in a pond.”

"Do you think the Demon Lords' loot and treasury were acquired through their own conquests? Were all those high-level weapons crafted by the Demon Lords themselves?" She chuckled. "Of course not. The loot, wealth, and powerful equipment are all relics of adventurers who died in the dungeons. Little by little, they accumulated into a vast treasure trove. The adventurers' remains are the raw materials for the powerful necromancers under the Demon Lords' command, and also excellent fodder for feeding the dungeon's psionic ecosystem."

"This is a top-notch balance of power. Both sides have their own plans. The Demon Lord lays out the benefits openly, but buries the risks in the treacherous underground ecosystem. The adventurers themselves are blinded by greed, like fish attracted by the fishbone on a hook."

"Valak's current situation is not urgent; it's just a temporary imbalance caused by the growing power of regional adventurers. Once he kills another batch of high-level adventurers, weakening the regional adventurer power, things will return to normal, with livestock herding and fishing going back to normal."

"You might think Valak is in a terrible predicament, but in reality, he could easily command the Earth-Eating Worms to destroy the entire foundation of the worm tunnel and bury all the adventurers in the dungeon alive." "However, doing so would destroy two-thirds of the dungeon's architecture and psionic ecosystem. He's reluctant to abandon the magnificent buildings and thriving ecosystem that he's painstakingly built over the years, and he's also worried that weakening his own power would allow other demon lords in the surrounding area to take advantage of the situation. Therefore, he prefers to engage in a stalemate and protracted struggle with the adventurers."

The dungeons seemed to hold considerable significance for the demon race. Samael pondered, for this was tantamount to an exceptionally efficient and powerful way of survival.

Not only can demons enhance their talents and abilities, strengthen their power, and develop their influence by utilizing the psionic ecosystem of dungeons, but they can also lure adventurers from surrounding areas and continuously obtain relatively stable profits from the corpses of dead adventurers.

The demon crows have already left.

Talia gazed at the giant tree with the hanging corpse before her.

“There should still be some usable things on these corpses…” She turned her head and looked Samael up and down, then suddenly reached out and grabbed the ankle of a corpse, pulling it down from the tree.

The half-dried, decaying corpse lay on the ground, its loose leg joints broken, and Talia was only holding half of the lower leg in her hand.

"What the heck are you doing? Stealing offerings and looting their loot?" Samael was a little uncomfortable at first, but after thinking back to the things he did in Dark Souls in his previous life for a nice set of equipment, he felt that stealing offerings from bandits and looting their loot wasn't so bad.

Thinking of this, Samael looked at the tree full of hanging corpses and couldn't help but rub his hands together. "Okay, so then—we'll loot the whole tree? Like what an old farmer does to his fruit trees in an orchard in autumn after a good harvest?"

“No! Of course not. This corpse tree is a warning from the Adventurers’ Guild to the Wasteland Bandits. We can’t destroy it all; that would attract too much attention.” Talia dropped the half-leg she was holding. “But if one or two corpses fall, it might be because the crows bit through the rope. Perhaps the crows thought there was something shiny on the corpses, or they wanted to put the corpses down to eat them, so they bit through the ropes and took what they wanted—that’s normal. They won’t care.”

She tore a tattered gray cloak off the corpse.

“The Wilderness Exile’s cloak offers little protection, only keeping out the wind and sand. But it’s perfect for you, as it can cover the gaps in your armor on your back, preventing others from seeing what’s underneath.” Talia draped the gray cloak over Samael, carefully adjusting the collar buttons and hood of the cloak.

"After all, you don't need any more armor. Nether Bronze itself is very strong, but Nether Bronze equipment has a faint necromantic aura. Long-term contact will cause joint numbness, rigor mortis, and a near-death, bone-chilling cold. Living people using this equipment will seriously affect their combat movements and physical condition."

“The Nether Bronze aura affects both enemies and equipment wielders equally. The ancient magic used to create Ghost Knights was lost in the age of the gods. Therefore, even if the demons find Nether Bronze equipment in ruins during underground excavations, they won't use it; at most, they'll give it to the already clumsy skeletal warriors.” Talia pulled her hood up over Samael's helmet, explaining, “Although Nether Bronze is very rare, and humans generally can't recognize it, it's still better to conceal it just in case.”

She bent down and peeled off the light leather armor from the corpse, stuffing it into the joint gaps of Samael's armor to fill the empty gaps.

"That should be about right..." She took a few steps back and looked around.

Samael now looked like a knight in exile, his old bronze armor draped in a grey cloak of an exile, the gaps in his joints filled with old leather.

“We can add a little more.” Samael bent down and tore off the cloth from the corpse, using strips of cloth to wrap and bind the gauntlets and the junction between the leather armor and the bronze, securing and covering them.

“I also need to disguise myself a little…” Talia tugged at her cloak, tearing the already tattered red cloak even more, then grabbed two handfuls of dirt from the ground and rubbed it haphazardly on her armor, until she looked like just a wandering knight in black armor.

"If I had known I would do something like this now, I would have gone crazy." She chuckled softly beneath her demon horn helmet. "I used to dislike armor altogether, thinking it was ugly and hideous. If only I could wear a long dress again someday..."

She stopped talking.

“They are all very beautiful,” Samael said.

"Hmm?" Talia looked up.

“The armor is beautiful too,” Samael said sincerely. “I play Dark Souls, and I’m an armor enthusiast… This kind of slender armor is simply gorgeous. The curves of the armor plates around the waist are both cool and beautiful, just like the armor of the dancers in Irithyll of the Boreal Valley. I’m so horny…”

Talia remained silent for a moment.

"Oh, oh, I'm sorry, my lord! Red bean paste is a secret of Marseille!" Samael realized and gave a deep bow at a 180-degree angle.

"Alright, alright... let's go." Her face flushed under her helmet; she was a little agitated and her heart was racing.

Halfway there, she suddenly came to her senses and paused.

“Wait a minute, you only like armor?” She turned her head.

“Yes.” The bronze armor in front of him nodded.

“And what about the person inside the armor?” Talia asked.

"As long as the armor looks good, that's all that matters. I'm an armor enthusiast," said the Dark Bronze Armor. "Why do you look so disappointed... My lord! Godfather, slow down! Wait for me!"

He held onto the brim of the gray hood with one hand to prevent it from falling off, and jogged after it, the bronze knight's longsword at his waist clanging against his backside as he ran, like a joyful war drum.

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(End of this chapter)