Witch Troupe and the Undead

As for Leslie and the others, they were simply attendants accompanying the prince in his studies. The fairy didn't like the battlefield and almost never went out. She was either researching strange desserts with Livia or playing around with Roach and the others. As for the war against the undead, what did that have to do with her?

The following day at noon, after a period of continuous rain, a rare sunny day finally arrived. In the cloudless sky, the sun radiated endless light and heat, illuminating the entire town with golden rays. The Imperial Army and Soul-Binding Corpse Warriors who had stormed into the town were doing their utmost to slaughter their way through the streets, houses, and alleys.

Screams, the clanging of metal, and the roar of raging flames mingled together. Burning bonfires and broken roadblocks were visible everywhere in the town. The knights of the Beast Slayer Order practically trudged through a path paved with corpses as they charged into the town center, only to be met by Soulbinders riding fearsome skeletal warhorses in neat formation.

There was no exchange or hesitation between the two sides. The living and the dead had nothing to communicate. Gavins raised the spear in his hand. The faint light of the blade made this weapon, which was so heavy that it was difficult for an ordinary person to lift with both hands, let alone swing and slash, seem much lighter. For Gavins, who possessed [Extraordinary Physique - Strength], it was not much heavier than an ordinary wooden stick.

"Kill!" The hoofbeats of the highland warhorses were heavy and rapid. They lacked long legs, but their thick limbs and strong muscles provided them with great weight, which was their greatest advantage. Their "sprinting" speed, which was like that of an ordinary warhorse at a trot, made the Grim Riders the best at fighting in cities and complex environments, such as the Orc Alliance camps filled with various roadblocks and spikes.

The Soulbinders' terrifying skeletal warhorses were transformed from tall horses, their slender skeletons wrapped in rotting, dried muscle fibers and shrouded in the power of death magic. In contrast to the Beast Slayers' rapid acceleration and slow galloping speed, the Soulbinders were the complete opposite. Their mounts accelerated slowly, but their speed was like a ghostly storm sweeping across the battlefield.

"Bang!" "Crash!" In the instant of contact, the first row of skeletal warhorses shattered into a pile. The Beast Slaughter Knights cut into the Soul Binder Knights with astonishing speed. The heavy spears and swords spun in Gavins's hands, each slash leaving a trail of afterimages, as if a meat grinder composed of countless solid blades was pulling in the enemies in front of him and grinding them into dust.

"..." The Soul-Binding Mage observed the battlefield and, finding neither the black horse nor its master, finally relaxed. He waved his hands, and the shattered horse bones transformed into countless sharp spikes, piercing upwards from the abdomens, which the horse armor could not defend against, directly piercing the thick-skinned highland warhorses and forming countless flickering blades.

"Avoid the bones on the ground!" Gavins keenly realized it was a trap, but it was too late. Warhorses, their bellies ripped open by bone blades as they galloped, fell, throwing their heavily armored knights off their backs.

The heavy full plate armor allows the Grim Riders to deal with tall enemies like orcs who lack armor-piercing weapons relatively easily. However, it also makes it difficult for them to get up when faced with Soulbound Warriors and Zombie Warriors who keep pouncing on them and pinning them down.

Bone weapons and claws made a piercing noise against the plate armor. The knight gripped his mask tightly, desperately trying to break free from the monsters' clutches. However, the heavy armor made it impossible for him to get up with a pile of heavy corpses on top of him.

Finally, in the midst of the battle with the tireless monster, the knight's hand relaxed for a moment, and his mask was ripped open, allowing a bone spear to pierce his throat.

The howling soul was released from the corpse. Before Gavins could throw the holy water bomb, the soul turned into a beam of light and entered the smoky gray crystal. The withered body bound to the crystal rapidly expanded as if inflated, and the bones and metal fragments adhered to the body, reforming into a jet-black knight's plate armor.

"Damn it..." "Boom!" Just when the Soul-Binding Mage thought victory was assured, a burst of flames exploded on the smoky gray crystal. Countless souls were thrown out of the crystal's restraints by some kind of impact. Some of them screamed and turned into nothingness in the sunlight, while many more screamed and flew wildly around the crystal, bringing with them a ghostly wind that seemed to be trying to form a layer of protection.

"Damn it, kill him!" The Soul-Binding Mage pointed to the source of the attack.

"This weapon invented by Master Roach is really useful!" The grenadier glanced at the second [Soul Impact Bomb] that he hadn't had time to throw yet, and without hesitation, he hurled it at the Soul Binders, sending them flying.

Unfortunately, this impact bomb did not meet Roach's design requirements. For ordinary resurrected warriors, it could shatter or even knock out the remaining traces of their souls.

As for these Soul-Binding Warriors, they can only temporarily expel their souls without shattering them. However, their bodies will be entangled by the life force, causing these souls to linger for a while before they can re-enter their bodies under the guidance of the crystal.

Roach stood guard beside the carriage, gripping his thorn sword. But for some reason, even though the front camp was being slaughtered by the ambushed undead, their rear camp didn't have a single undead bat.

The black horse standing beside the carriage chewed on hay, lazily watching the militia and resting infantrymen fighting with the resurrected soldiers in the front camp. It twitched its ears, looking as if to say, "I'm just a horse."

However, among the large group of frightened horses and livestock, the calm black horse, which seemed to be on a picnic, stood out even more. However, it was a bit difficult to get this guy to pretend to be frightened. After all, the resurrected warrior was at most dangerous to threatening level. For a lord-level creature like this, it was not quite qualified as prey or food.

"Whoosh!" Leslie stood on the roof of the carriage, nocked another arrow, and felt like she was about to become a professional archer. She hadn't practiced many poems, but had been practicing archery all the time.

Moreover, although she had practiced singing for quite some time in the Hearth City Square, compared to the various methods of Roach, Vivi, Livia, and even the fairy Titania, the bard Leslie found that she seemed to have no other use besides carrying luggage.

Roach is particularly good at thinking things through, and his explosions are spectacular; Vivi is a professional alchemist who can make all sorts of simple alchemical products; Livia is even more so, as long as she has her hands free, it's only a matter of time before she wipes out both sides on the battlefield; as for the fairy Titania, she also knows all sorts of enhancement magic.

On the contrary, Leslie's poetic spells were not only weak, but she also didn't know many of them. However, her archery skills became increasingly refined.

Arrows made from wood shavings crafted by the little witch lacked penetrating power, yet each arrow could elicit a piercing scream from the resurrected warriors. However, no matter how loudly they screamed, none of them dared to approach the carriage, as if restrained by some kind of coercive command.

"So noisy!" Livia, sitting at the back of the carriage, looked up from her book and gently clenched her small hand. Several resurrected warriors closest to the carriage were stunned. The atmosphere solidified into chains that tightly bound their limbs. Scythe-like blades of air swept across the ground, cutting through the vegetation and severing the resurrected warriors in half.

At this moment, the only things left on the battlefield besides the death magic that could only heal these undead creatures were the remaining life force of the fallen. So, as the little witch made her move, the corpses stiffened at an astonishing speed, and the remaining life force was extracted and bound in the little witch's palm.

The next second, everyone who was still alive felt a surge of heat, and their bodies were filled with almost inexhaustible strength. Their wounds healed at an astonishing speed.

"Blessing of Life" is an extremely large-scale life ritual spell. Ordinary ritual mages would need seven or eight people and several hours to prepare the ritual before they could use it. But in Livia's hands, it was like an ordinary little spell that she could just casually cast.

Chapter 45, tell me, is it shocking enough?

Ballista Town, in its central location. The corpses of knights and their horses littered the entire small square, intertwined with the bodies of the Soul-Binding Knights. Gavins, clutching the wound on his left arm, stared at the tall, imposing figure before him.

"The Beast Slaughter Knights..." The Soul-Binding Knight Commander pulled his two-handed sword from the ground and nodded to the knight in front of him whose armor was dim. "Not bad."

If it weren't for the problem with the Soul-Binding Crystal, these Beast Knights should have been wiped out here. But now, the Soul-Binding Knight Commander glanced at the dim crystal and frowned slightly. Each time the resurrected Soul-Binding Knights were revived, they became weaker and weaker. In the end, only their core souls remained in the crystal, making it impossible to perform the Soul-Binding Ritual.

This gradually widened the exchange ratio between the two sides. In the end, the Beast Knights, at the cost of losing nearly half of their personnel, killed all the Soul Binders in the square.

No one chose to run away, whether facing the orcish warg riders or these Soulbinder Knights. The reason was simple: their heavy warhorses were too slow to run away.

"I really want to fight you to the death here, but now is not a good time. If you want to avenge your brothers, then come to the fortress. I'll be waiting for you there." The invaded body withered at an alarming rate, releasing the soul, which flew away into the distance along the Soul-Binding Crystal. Cracks appeared on the crystal itself, and a few minutes later, it suddenly shattered.

As the Soul-Binding Crystal shattered, the resurrected warriors and Soul-Binding warriors on the battlefield also fell. After suffering heavy casualties, the Ballista Town was successfully recaptured, forming a pincer movement with Stone Bridge Town, with the Wool River as the boundary.

Afterwards, the militia spent a whole day cleaning up the ballista town, repairing the wooden outer walls, and using the remaining parts and tools from the workshop to assemble a siege ballista and mount it on the cleared watchtower.

Most of the buildings in the town were burned down, and a few collapsed during the battle. The armor and weapons of the professional soldiers were removed by their comrades, and the remaining corpses were thrown into the incinerator and burned to ashes along with the corpses of the undead.

The armor and weapons would be taken back by the comrades and sent to the homes of the fallen. However, the money and other valuables on the body would be the reward. This was an unspoken rule. Of course, there were people who broke this rule, but most of them did not live long, and no one would want to team up with such a guy on the battlefield.

The knights received the treatment due to knights. The accompanying priests and apprentices performed basic cleaning and purification on the knights to prevent their bodies from becoming new undead. They were then wrapped in cloths covered with scriptures, like mummies, sprinkled with holy water and spices, and placed on a cart along with their armor, sword, spear, and the corpses of their warhorses. After a simple prayer ceremony, they were sent back to the cathedral in Hearthstone.

Waiting for the other party's family to come and pay to claim the body. If it's just the body, the other party's family may not be so willing to pay. But if the armor and weapons are included, then they will be very willing and act quickly, because if the time limit is exceeded, these things will belong to the church.

"Miss Livia, I apologize for the intrusion." Viscount Carius arrived at Livia's carriage with two servants. The blonde little witch sat obediently on a wooden stool, letting Leslie comb her hair. Two wooden combs flew around, looking for an opportunity to interfere, but could only circle back and forth impatiently.

"..." The girl raised her eyes and looked coldly at Karius and the two servants behind him. Only when she saw the long wooden box did her eyes flicker slightly.

"We found some strange crystal fragments in the town. The alchemists accompanying the army couldn't determine the origin of these crystals. I wonder if you...?" Inside the box were slender crystal fragments, smoky gray in color, with a faint shimmering light flowing slowly within them.

"Hmm~" The girl stared at the crystal for a while, then opened her palm, and the crystal floated from the box into her hand. The moment it fell into the little witch's hand, the crystal quickly turned grayish-white, and finally turned into fine white sand and fell down.

This reaction caused Livia to tilt her head slightly, a rare look of confusion appearing on her face. Her little nose wrinkled slightly, and after thinking for a while, she shook her head, indicating that she had never seen such a strange thing before.

"I see..." I was originally planning to ask Master Roach, but if even his mentor didn't know him, then the chances of Roach knowing him were slim. However, Roach could solve another problem.

"An alchemical weapon powerful enough to destroy this crystal at long range or close range? Or a potion to counteract this crystal?" Roach looked at the smoky gray crystal shards in front of him and thought for a few minutes before saying, "Okay, I'll give it a try." The latter would be difficult without knowing the properties of the crystal, while the first one would be much simpler.

In Karius's mind, Roach was to create some kind of alchemical potion or tool to counteract the crystal's effects, causing it to shatter or become ineffective. Roach's thinking, however, was: Just because I don't know what this thing is doesn't mean I can't destroy it!

One idea is mystical destruction, the other is physical destruction.

The following day, Roach tested the crystal's mechanical properties, including tensile strength, shear strength, relative hardness, and its effectiveness against vibrations and various magical forces. This experiment was also the first time the little witch participated in Roach's work.

"Like this?" The witch pulled with her little hand, stretching the crystal into a sharp, thin fragment. "No, no, no, it's not shaped like this, but rather violently pulled, using muscle strength." Roach made a chest-expanding exercise gesture. Livia listened for a while, then gripped both ends of the crystal tightly, her face turning red, but the crystal didn't budge.

"...No, no, try using the wind or something else created by magic." Finally, the little witch understood. Her eyes were full of curiosity and a little annoyed. If ordinary arcane magic was like cooking with an excavator for her, then Roach's method was like programming an excavator and then letting the program-controlled robotic arm cook.

Fire, ice, knocking, vibration, infusion of life force, transformation into nothingness—Rocky tested every possible performance method and recorded a long list of parameters in his notebook.

"Hardness close to quartz, toughness greater than quartz, weak shear and tensile strength, weak vibration resistance, ineffective in infusing with life force, ineffective in transformation into nothingness, low specific gravity..."

As Roach filled in the performance parameters one by one, he gradually had an idea. However, this method was difficult to implement with alchemical magic tools and would be very costly. Using the composite paradigm of the arcane sorcerer, he could not use it on anyone other than himself.

Originally, Roach didn't want his title to develop in the direction of something like "explosive genius," but fate had other plans, and in the end, he still took another big step towards becoming an explosive genius.

Next, he would use his extraordinary wisdom and unparalleled skills to achieve this technological goal. After using all the spell effects for reference, Roach finally selected a spell effect called [Spirit Realm Repulsion Defense] and a tandem missile structure.

Ballista Town, temporary command post.

“I have two options right now,” Roach said, placing two objects on the table: a triangular pyramid-shaped smoky gray crystal structure and a rather large cylinder.

"Two options!?" Karius was overjoyed. He only needed one passable option, but he didn't expect Roach to have two more.

"Yes, the first option isn't universally applicable: using armor-piercing arrows made from these crystal shards, paired with sufficiently powerful ranged weapons, to try and destroy the target." Roach didn't recommend this option because the armor-piercing spikes were made by the Little Witch, and he hadn't found any convenient way to process this kind of crystal.

“The second option is to use this shock cannon.” After studying it, Roach discovered that the crystal itself has excellent mechanical properties, but it is very light. This means that if it cannot be broken, it can be knocked away. So he developed this tandem alchemical bomb, which can launch an extremely powerful explosive shock wave. It is not powerful in itself, but it is enough to knock the crystal away from its base.

Are they all effective?

“I can’t guarantee it, but the second option is at least cheap enough.” This was a byproduct of Roach’s previous research into artillery and firearms, but he abandoned it after discovering the average armor coverage and armor thickness of the world’s population.

In the early days, muskets really couldn't penetrate these monsters. They could only bully peasant soldiers and conscripts who were only wearing military uniforms and simple protection. Even slightly wealthy adventurers couldn't handle them.

"I call it an impact missile launcher." I originally wanted to call it a rocket launcher, but considering that this thing belongs to the category of "non-lethal weapons" in this world, Roach renamed it impact missile. "It should be effective if we focus fire."

“Then let those adventurers give it a try.” Karius made a decisive decision; those adventurers were meant to be used in situations like this.

Crossroads Village is located between Deathwhisper Fortress and Ballista Town, connecting Ballista Town, Stonemason Village, and Copper Mine Village. Resources from these places are transferred and briefly replenished in this village before being sent to the fortress to maintain its needs.

Bloodstains were everywhere in the village, but no corpses could be seen. The most magnificent house of the elder had been reduced to ruins. A smoky gray crystal tablet stood on the ruins, surrounded by patrolling Soul-Binding Corpses.

"Is this distance okay?" The adventurer swordsman, wearing an armored uniform and a rusty chainmail underneath, lay prone on the edge of an abandoned wall. His companion behind him pulled out several cylinders from his backpack and distributed them to his friends.

“Aim at it…” Roach made a simple crosshair on the cylinder, but due to the instability of handmade products, the trajectory of this thing can only be described as not flying back in reverse.

The novice priest in the "Ready" team gave his companion a simple and precise blessing.

"...We don't have enough base bodies, the outer walls need repair, and humanity must take this place." Taking this place would cut off the routes for other places to support the Deathwhisper Fortress. At the same time, it would allow us to launch attacks from all sides, targeting various undead strongholds and seizing the initiative.

A rat has sneaked in.

“Ignore them, they’re just a few little mice.” The Soul-Binding Mage examined the skull on the pedestal. The head of a handsome blond boy was stuck directly above the pedestal, his eyes vacant, and dried blood flowing from his nostrils and ears.

The monk looked at his collection with satisfaction, reaching out his withered, claw-like hand to stroke the golden hair, as if trying to sense the last trace of humanity he once possessed from this young head.

"Comrades, attack!" Just then, a row of people suddenly stood up from the ruins of the inn in the distance, each carrying a cylindrical alchemical tool on their shoulders. Before the Soul-Binding Warriors could pick up their bows and arrows to shoot these exposed rats, a series of muffled thuds were heard, and a crooked ball of light slammed into the crystal at a considerable speed.

With a loud bang, the intersecting spiritual energy fields spread in all directions, shoving the Soul-Binding Warriors who were about to shoot the adventurers off balance. Some who were too close were even pushed away.

The crystal, which had withstood the maximum force of the expanding spherical repulsive defensive field, spun out right before everyone's eyes, flying over the heads of the undead. The abundant soul power within it attracted the gaze and attention of all the undead creatures, who, lacking physical vision, relied on their soul fire and life force to locate their enemies.

On the altar of bones, white flames of soul fire shot nearly 10 meters high, and countless wailing souls, as if released, soared into the sky, turning into a rain of light and disappearing. The skulls also decayed and withered at an alarming rate, while the adventurers threw down the metal cylinders they were holding and ran wildly out of the village without looking back.

"Boom!" The spinning crystal crashed into the village's bell tower, getting stuck in the middle of the tower with only half of the smoky gray crystal showing. Almost immediately after the crystal flew out, the Soul-Binding Corpses heard the thunderous sound of horses' hooves coming from outside the village.

Although the Beast Knights suffered heavy losses, Viscount Carius's family knights and regular armed cavalry, which had maintained their strength, remained intact. In this plain, when a large-scale cavalry charge occurred, even these Soul-Binding Corpses could not distinguish what was coming from—knights, ordinary cavalry, or mounted infantry.

Massive cavalry charges are the ultimate battlefield strategy of the empire. Even the Soul-Binding Warriors, who have long lost their true physical bodies, still feel a sense of dread when faced with the roaring wall of dust.

It was too late to dig for crystals now. The Soul-Binding Mage could only hastily order the undead army to resist, and then decisively abandoned the body. Just as his soul rose and headed towards the fortress, he felt the direction of the Nether Wind change.

"No!" The Nether Wind formed a huge vortex, absorbing him along with the souls of the Soul-Binding Warriors who had abandoned their bodies on the battlefield, as well as the tiny fragments of light that erupted the moment the cavalry regiment and the undead army made contact.

In the realm of the soul, the spirit world, which was originally as calm as a lake, has just been stirred up by raging waves. These fragile spirits cannot even maintain their basic integrity in these waves.

When the storm subsided, the Soul-Binding Mage found himself before a pair of emerald-green eyes. This unique color instantly brought back a memory. "No! Impossible, you are…!"

"Snap!" The little girl clasped her hands together, and the souls she had just collected were compressed into a burning silver-white fireball. She threw it into the container she had prepared, ready to extract the soul's secret source. The unwanted emotions and thoughts were also stripped away and turned into spiritual secret source. Finally, the remaining residue was casually released and dissipated in the wind of the underworld.

"A great harvest, hmm~" The little witch nodded. In the forest, she couldn't collect this much soul power in a whole year. She generously distributed the leftover scraps to the activated devices in the carriage, and the unactivated devices also showed some abnormal signs.

“Young Miss, I’ve said it before: war is the best way to collect materials.” The black horse came closer and licked the little guy’s hand with its tongue. “Hmm~” Livia stroked the old horse’s mane, indicating her approval. This trip to the front line of the war was specifically to verify this. As it turns out, it is indeed the best way to collect soul materials.

"Then can you approve the plan I proposed earlier? How to use rumors, nightmares, prophecies, and the supreme power bestowed upon you by your creator god to ignite war across the entire continent, and use the lives and blood of these lowly creatures to write your legendary story, just like those witches of the past?"

“No way!” The little witch said sternly, banging hard on the black horse’s head, making a sound like a wooden fish.

“Then we can take a step back. First, how about we instigate a large-scale war between humans and the undead? For example, we could incite them to launch a major attack on the Black Abyss Cemetery. This would require me to provide them with some… assistance.” The Empire’s idea is that retaking the Deathwhisper Fortress would be ideal, and if that’s not possible, they can build a second line of defense around it.

After all, it's impossible to negotiate or compromise with undead. Otherwise, given the prestige of the imperial nobles, they would have signed an agreement with them long ago. As for the undead slaughtering villagers, that's a joke. Who cares!

"no!"

"Then, at the very least, let's prolong this war..."

"no!"

"That......"

For a long time afterward, the black horse's head kept making the sound of a wooden fish.

Chapter 46 Who spread the rumor?

In Nupao Town, the sounds of carpenters and stonemasons are everywhere, repairing damaged houses into barracks and workshops, and restoring the town's factories to work. After taking over Crossroads Village, it became the new logistics hub, with a steady stream of supplies and personnel being transported to this large town via the bridge in Stone Bridge Town.

The original low walls were raised, and repaired ballistae and several spirit crystals were deployed to provide good protection in the event of a surprise attack by a small group of undead.

The witch's carriage was parked on the side of the square. Roach had set up several wooden sheds there as workshops to manufacture disposable impact missile launchers. The advantage of this alchemical weapon was that it was cheap, but its disadvantages were that it had low lethality and very poor accuracy. Apart from using it to bombard those resurrected skeletons, it could only be used to disrupt formations most of the time.

Low accuracy also means that it will be very difficult to use concentrated fire to create a powerful shockwave to shatter the undead formation and shell. It is only useful for bombarding those huge crystals, and that is only because the crystals themselves have a low specific gravity, making them easier to shake and be knocked away after being impacted.

"Zombie teeth," "Resurrected skeleton bones," "Ghost dust"—Vivi checked the materials on the shelf. These materials were used to extract death essence and alchemical materials. With the right ritual array, the prepared wooden blocks could be transformed into impact missile carriers.

Any alchemist who sees what Roach made will say it's poorly made. As a consumable magical tool, its half-life is less than 7 days, which means that after 7 days, the effect of these magical tools will be reduced by more than half.

In addition, it is easily damaged during transportation, has extremely poor accuracy when used, and even requires a metal cylinder for installation. There is also a possibility that it will get stuck inside.

However, it is cheap and simple enough that even an apprentice like Vivi can make it smoothly. Other alchemy apprentices and even magic craftsmen can make it. A large batch of these impact missiles have been produced in the past few days.

In the battle at Crossroads Village, it did indeed show remarkable effectiveness. Karius distributed these cheap items in large quantities to adventurers and frontline archers. Whenever they saw those crystals, they would concentrate their fire on them. Even if they couldn't knock them away, they could at least make them shake.

"Master Roach... this is all the money we have." The adventurer, looking embarrassed, approached Roach and laid out nine gold coins. "Do you have any... usable alchemical equipment here?"

Next comes the attack on the Deathwhisper Fortress. For these adventurers, it's necessary to replenish and strengthen their equipment. Just like in the last town and supply point outside the Demon King's castle, you need to equip yourself with the best gear to have any chance of winning or surviving.

"Why not buy from those merchants who accompany the army?" Roach was referring to the caravans in other parts of the square, where alchemists and merchants displayed a dazzling array of weapons and various items for adventurers and even soldiers with a few coins in their pockets to choose from.

"...We can't afford those over there. We heard you have some unwanted 'defective products' for sale here."

“Defective products…” Roach’s expression was complicated. What the hell are defective products? Who is spreading rumors about him? He looked at the merchants in the distance. Not only was he looking at the merchants, but the black horse next to the carriage was also looking. The two of them looked at each other and seemed to have reached some kind of consensus.

The black horse raised its front hooves, as if making an OK sign. The things Roach was selling were for purchasing materials and raw materials. Not only were there various essence materials he needed, but also various ingredients and potion materials that the little witch needed. Moreover, this money was for their upcoming travel expenses and purchasing costs.