Chapter Eighty-Nine: The Formidable Skeleton Warrior

The pale face of the grinning corpse and the gleaming white bones of the skeleton fiend gradually darkened beneath the thunder.

In the sea of lightning, they flailed madly, as though dancing a dance of death. When they could no longer keep dancing, that would be the moment they turned to ash and vanished.

The black-jointed corpses were much the same, only far too stiff and clumsy to flail about; they could only tremble in place, shuddering violently as wisps of black smoke rose ceaselessly from their bodies.

As for the fierce and resentful spirits, they lasted less than ten breaths in the sea of lightning before their souls were scattered to the winds.

That was only because they were thirty-sixth-level dungeon monsters, far stronger than the thirty-first-level ones; otherwise, they should have been destroyed the moment the lightning sea appeared.

The only ones still able to force their way through the thunderstorm were the green-jointed corpses.

With earthshaking roars, green corpse qi billowed up from them like smoke from a chimney, like wicked specters and vengeful ghosts, yet they still managed to bounce forward step by step.

Judging by their movement speed and the rate at which their corpse qi was dissipating, they ought to be able to break out of the sea of lightning before they were completely burned into a pile of charcoal.

A thirty-first-level green-jointed corpse could endure for ten-odd minutes under the dual assault of a lightning talisman empowered by the Great Thunder God Incantation and a true-fire talisman empowered by the Six Ding Divine Fire Incantation before finally falling.

Though the Eight Directions Savage Thunder Array was mightier than the combination of lightning talisman and true-fire talisman, these green-jointed corpses were thirty-sixth-level dungeon monsters, vastly stronger than their thirty-first-level counterparts.

They would probably need to soak in the sea of lightning for at least half a quarter-hour before they were utterly destroyed.

There were more than thirty green-jointed corpses in the Mass Burial Mound dungeon. If they broke out of the sea of lightning, they would indeed cause Li Yunfei some trouble.

But could they actually get out?

...

Nearly three thousand thirty-sixth-level fierce and resentful spirits, along with more than five hundred thirty-sixth-level rotting corpses, were reduced in less than half a minute to ashes or charcoal.

This brought Li Yunfei, the little fox, and the ten skeleton warriors a vast flood of experience.

Together with the experience bonus for killing monsters three levels above their own, Li Yunfei and the little fox shot straight up to level thirty-six, instantly becoming equal in level to the dungeon.

As for the ten skeleton warriors, they rocketed from level one all the way to level eighteen.

Their original attributes had been: body strength 53 (5), soul strength 31 (3).

Now they had become: body strength 71 (5), soul strength 49 (3).

From this, it was clear that each time a skeleton warrior leveled up, both body strength and soul strength increased by one point.

Do not think that is little. It means that with each level gained, the body adds one-fifth of an ordinary person’s strength, and the soul adds one-third.

In other words, every five levels doubles body strength, and every three levels doubles soul strength.

That was already excellent, only slightly inferior to the attribute gains Li Yunfei received upon leveling.

The skeleton warriors’ bodies were covered by armor, so the change could not be seen, but the soul fire in their eyes had grown darker once more.

From brilliant gold it had turned to a deep, subdued gold, and their soul power had clearly advanced by a great deal.

With three consecutive level-ups, Li Yunfei’s energy had also reached twenty-three times that of an ordinary person.

At twenty times, when the yin spirit was formed, he could command ten skeleton warriors; thereafter, each additional doubling would allow him to command one more.

That meant he could now summon three more skeleton warriors.

Without hesitation, Li Yunfei bought three more Bone Spirit Emblems and summoned three skeleton warriors.

What delighted him was that these newly summoned skeleton warriors actually followed the levels of the old ones; there was no need to start them from level one.

That was superb.

This way, he would not have to worry that if an old skeleton warrior died, a new one would have to be trained all over again from level one.

Still, he suspected that if they truly died, the newly summoned skeleton warriors would only retain their original levels and attributes; the bonuses from Blood Pills and Soul Pills probably would not carry over.

Because the new skeleton warriors summoned at this moment had none of those bonuses.

After all, those were enhancements from external items, not innate attributes of the skeleton warriors themselves.

But that was no problem. For a wealthy man, anything money could solve was not a problem at all.

For the three newly summoned skeleton warriors, Li Yunfei still fed them ample Blood Pills and Soul Pills, and equipped them with armor of gang qi and crescent-bladed halberds.

His foundation grew once again.

With a wave of his hand, he ordered the three new skeleton warriors into formation, then looked outward.

In the brief time that had passed, the frequency of the thunderbolts from the heavens had lessened, and the power of the sea of lightning had weakened somewhat as well.

Li Yunfei said nothing. He grabbed two stacks of lightning talismans drawn with blue paper, empowered them with the Great Thunder God Incantation, and hurled them into the sky.

A full thousand streaks of blue light plunged into the black clouds, and the thunder that had begun to seem weak and faltering suddenly surged forth again, its roar endless.

Seeing that the green-jointed corpses were about to bounce out of the range of the lightning sea, Li Yunfei gave a cold smile and shouted, “All soldiers, heed my command!”

Clatter.

Thirteen skeleton warriors turned half around in perfect unison, faced Li Yunfei, and silently clasped their fists in salute, crescent-bladed halberds slanted across their chests, deep-gold pupils fixed upon him.

This was the skeleton warriors’ instinct, an autonomous action, not something they did under Li Yunfei’s control.

After all, constantly manipulating skeleton warriors through divine sense also consumed soul power.

Though controlling them with divine sense or issuing orders was more convenient and swift, whenever the situation was not urgent, Li Yunfei felt that shouting the command aloud had more flair.

He looked the skeleton warriors over from side to side and nodded in satisfaction. Then, full of vigor, he pointed ahead and said, “Guard the area beyond the sea of lightning. If those green-jointed corpses bounce out, strike them back into the lightning sea at once.”

The thirteen skeleton warriors bowed together, then turned and charged out from the altar. The orderly rasp of their armor scraping against itself strangely stirred Li Yunfei’s blood.

The skeleton warriors formed two lines, six in front and seven behind, spaced two meters apart from left to right, with the back row neatly occupying the gaps between those in front.

With such a formation, they could ensure the most saturated output of attacks.

Li Yunfei was astonished. It seemed that, now that their soul strength had grown to this extent, the skeleton warriors’ intelligence was already far from low.

They had no independent will, yet they possessed the capacity to think, like a group of artificial-intelligence robots whose reasoning existed solely for their master.

And artificial-intelligence robots still carried the risk of developing self-awareness and slipping beyond human control, because in the end, robots were stronger than humans.

But the skeleton warriors would never have that possibility.

They would never develop their own will; they would only obey commands.

Their existence depended on their master’s intent. With but a single thought, the master could decide whether they continued to exist.

Indeed, their existence was essentially the master’s own avatar. When the master’s consciousness entered their bodies, they became the master himself.

When that consciousness departed, they no longer had independent will, only the most basic capacity to think, or rather, instinct.

After sending out the skeleton warriors, Li Yunfei said to the little fox, “Honghong, keep an eye on things too. Don’t let those green-jointed corpses break through.”

The little fox nodded, rose to her feet, and stepped forward a few paces before standing behind the skeleton warriors.

She opened her mouth and spat out fireballs that had grown from the size of basketballs to the size of washbasins.

Those fireballs circled slowly around her body. With only a single thought from her, they could howl forth and blast toward a target.

They could even twist and turn in pursuit, not striking until they did, just like tracking missiles, and even more agile than missiles.