Volume 5: The Elegant Tea Party (Remastered) Chapter 2: Introduction
The looting of the two treasure troves made Yu Bin earn a lot of money.
Although the collection was only a collection of wealth that Martan had looted when he was the tax collector of the Kingdom of Virgil, since the unlearned miser was only interested in valuable things, the treasury was dominated by all kinds of beautiful-looking artifacts and antiques, followed by a large number of gold and purple gold coins. Equipment and items make up a very small portion of this.
Those handicrafts and antiques are completely chicken ribs for Yu Bin, because these things are difficult to sell, only those nouveau riche and aristocrats will be interested in this kind of thing, and the former only takes out gold coins, and the latter will bring additional risks to Yu Bin, who knows if these nobles have a special channel to discover the origin of these things, and they will cause a commotion if they are not careful.
Rice is even more completely disdainful of these things. Compared to him and Kel'thugad, a veteran lich who has existed for at least thousands of years, the combined value of these two treasure troves may not even be comparable to a ring on their fingers, at least Yu Bin knows that the ring on Rice's left index finger is the legendary equipment [Garcia's Disguise].
However, Yu Bin still strictly followed the original agreement and handed over eighty percent of the wealth to Rice. Of course, with Rice's deliberate connivance, these treasures brought back to the Psychic Academy were all handicrafts and antiques that Yu Bin didn't want, and those treasures that could be used to increase his strength were taken into his own pocket by Yu Bin.
For example, the dragon marrow identified by Les, which is the product of the dragon marrow seeping into the ground from the dragon's bones when it dies and fusing with some high-grade ores. Even the Wurm's Dragon Pulp Ore is a rare material, let alone the Dragon Bone Ore formed after the death of this ancient dragon.
In addition, there are dragon crystals, this kind of crystal that grows in the dragon's head is the fundamental reason why the dragon can release magic, most of the more than ten dragon crystals in Maltan's collection are ordinary dragon crystals, and only one green dragon dragon crystal comes from the ancient dragon.
In fact, although the things that Yu Bin took looked very precious, in the auction hall of Kodila, they were probably not as good as the elven slave who had the status of a natural priest.
As for the other three treasure troves, one in the Felta Empire, it was accumulated little by little after Maltan was transformed into a corpse witch, according to Maltan, in order to find the inheritance of the great wizard Griman, most of the collections in it were replaced with various magic scrolls and props, so it is difficult to say what else is left in the treasure house. Les decided to give all this treasure house to Yu Bin as a reward.
The last two are more special, located in the Griman Mausoleum in the Great Hengduan Mountains. It was not so much Maltan's treasury as Griman's last treasury. While Martan was inherited, he naturally inherited these two treasures. Some of the items and treasures in the treasure house have been brought out by Maltan and used, and the remaining items in it are either unknown to Martan or cannot be retrieved.
Yu Bin himself did not have the ability to enter the depths of the mausoleum to open the treasure house, and it was impossible for Les to break into Gryman's sleeping place without making any preparations, so he could only think long-term.
While Yu Bin happily fights the local tyrants to divide the land, Maltan, who has almost nothing, finally finds two of his men, Drake and Hills. He had thought that even if the two fools did not fulfill his demands and share the pressure for him, they would at least leave him with a large army, so that he would not be left alone again.
Unexpectedly, the reality was a hundred times crueler than he imagined. By the time Martan found them, the heroic ghoul Drake was already in a state of serious injury, and the heroic Shears was slightly better, but the cyan zombie body was also covered in scars.
It turned out that while the entire Ladre Castle was covered by the skyfall ice explosion released by Antonidas, Queen Fiona, who had been following all this, gave the order to attack very decisively, targeting the army of undead who had been roaming the border between Minas and Almeria, looking for an opportunity to break through the pass. She knew that it was impossible to plot against the kingdom of Minus, and Antonidas's intervention was both a sign of support for the two kingdoms and a warning against rash acts.
Drake and Sears' low IQs could not have guessed that the fatal blow would come so quickly, and the unprepared army of the undead was cut into pieces like butter by nearly 20,000 human cavalry in an instant. In just half a day, Drake was seriously injured and near death, and Hills finally rescued Drake from the siege of several heroic warriors, but his troops were almost completely lost. I could only take two or three kittens who escaped by chance, and they hid in a cramped tomb to survive.
Maltan didn't expect the blow to him to be so violent, and in less than a day, the powerful force he had built up was wiped out. This morning, he was still thinking about how to torture the Virgil family in the castle of Radley, and the hundreds of thousands of undead army made him feel that no one could stop him from completing his revenge, but now, not only his body was broken, but even two of his men were almost killed, and the hundreds of thousands of undead army were left with less than half a hundred.
This strong psychological gap almost made Maltan crazy, and he was robbed by Yu Bin before and robbed him of his life savings, which made Maltan sad, if he hadn't become an undead, he almost couldn't help crying.
But the harsh reality forced Maltan to bring up the last mental thinking about what to do next. Although he was greedy for money and stingy, he was not stupid, otherwise he would not have grown from a small nobleman to what he is now.
He can be sure that Mantein will not use his precious forces to hunt him down endlessly, and the king of the kingdom of Virgil now needs to completely calm the situation in the country, and find out as many evil elements as possible in various parts of the kingdom to avoid a repeat of the tragedy in the province of Barria. At the same time, he had to appease the nobles of the country and restore normal order to the kingdom. For the same reason, it is impossible for the army of the Minas Kingdom to take a wreck for Mantein, and the butcher is a guy who cannot afford to make a profit, and it is impossible to give Mantein a day job.
But the Almerian Empire, which prides itself on inheriting the legitimacy of the Griffon Dynasty, is not only ambitious, but also has the power to match. Queen Fiona had already made a bad impression on the other kingdoms, and since it was no longer possible to plot against the Minas Kingdom, she would definitely make great efforts to capture herself and restore the reputation of the Almeria Empire.
The thought that he would face more than 100,000 elite Almerian Imperial troops next, and that he only had a bunch of wounded soldiers and cannon fodder in his hands, Maltan felt that his future was bleak. It was as if he had seen himself locked in a magical cage, purified by the human hypocrites with the flame of light in the squares of Virgil.
Thus did Maltan spend a sleepless night in this cramped and damp tomb. However, when the sun rose again, he was not greeted by a swaggering human soldier, but a dusty Ingman.
"It's great that you're alive, Master Maltan!"
Ingman's arrival finally gave Maltan some comfort, and he was now desperate to know how the outside world had developed since his escape from Radre's Castle.
"I have to tell you the bad news. Bunker is dead! "Not a single one of the half a million undead survived that terrible magic, and when I got there, the entire camp was covered in snow and ice, and I saw with my own eyes that Bunker had been turned into an ice sculpture by those damned humans who had been thrown from the sky with griffons and chopped into a pile of rubble. ”
In fact, the heroic gargoyle Bonk Craik fled with all the gargoyles in his hand as soon as the Skyfall Ice Burst fell, and now he should have joined up with Marduk and returned to the Psychic Academy with a large amount of supplies and undead soldiers obtained from the Krk Fortress.
Maltan lowered his head gloomily, although he had already been mentally prepared, but when all this was confirmed, it still made him feel very painful.
"What about Steyr and Enrique? Didn't they get out? ”
"Steyr is dead, his body is hanging on the flagpole of those humans, and as for Enrique......" Ingman paused, and finally said the news that made Maltan almost faint in anger, "He surrendered, and the last time I saw him, he was kneeling before Dorman Watson of the Kingdom of Virgil, begging for forgiveness, and expressing his willingness to confess everything about you without reservation. ”
"This traitor! I'm going to kill him! I'm going to imprison his soul in the magma of a volcano for 10,000 years! Maltan yelled angrily.
In general, men like Enrique and Ingman would inevitably sacrifice a portion of their soul fragments to Maltan as a sign of their complete obedience to Maltan, but this form of allegiance was not without side effects. As the master, Martan must ensure that his power can completely suppress these men, otherwise, the soul fragments consumed by him will not only not become the key to control them, but will in turn consume his soul fire and turn him into a slave.
That's why Elvira didn't let Yu Bin devour Vidala's soul fragment, but deliberately imprisoned it. With Yu Bin's current strength, as soon as Vidara's soul fragment enters his soul fire, I am afraid that it will instantly turn him into a puppet controlled by him.
And now Martan can be said to be at the lowest point in his life, his strength is almost one in ten, and there is still the damage caused to him by Calva in his body. In this case, he simply didn't have the extra strength to suppress the soul fragments that were devoured by him by these few subordinates. Fortunately, Derek was seriously injured and dying, and Hills was also injured a lot, although Ingman's strength did not decrease, but as a necromancer, it was impossible for him to abandon Maltan for the time being, and it was obviously easier to follow a lich than to explore the knowledge of magic alone.
Buncraik and Steyr were killed in battle, so their soul fragments are negligible (Bunker didn't actually die, but Kel'thugad had a way to replenish his soul fire, and the soul fragment that Martan devoured would naturally be assimilated). Only Enrique has become the biggest hidden danger. Once the mages of Dalaran found the location of the soul fragments through Enrique's soul fire, they naturally found Martan's hiding place.
Therefore, while cursing this traitor, Martan did not hesitate to completely annihilate Enrique's soul fragment, and completely devoured the remaining soul power, which was used to make up for his soul fire a little. Poor Enrique is now being held in a special magical cage, and this undead warrior will be escorted to Virgil City as proof of the victory of the Kingdom Army, before he can be used by the mages of Dalaran to study.
Unfortunately, Antonidas was destined not to get more information from Enrique. With the destruction of the soul fragment, Enrique, whose soul origin was affected, fell from the hero level in an instant, and his strength dropped all the way to less than the sixth order, and because the soul origin was incomplete, the soul fire was also greatly damaged, causing Enrique's intelligence level to drop significantly. In short, this guy can only be considered a large soldier now, and can no longer be called a heroic-level high-level undead.
This situation is similar to that of Thassarian, except that Yu Bin used the Soul Suppression Bead to repair Thassarian's soul, so that the poor undead knight would not become a mindless undead puppet. Enrique, on the other hand, was not so lucky.
"The hosts! We can't stay here any longer! Hordes of human soldiers are out there, and it won't be long before they find this place, and we'll all be the spoils of those humans! ”
"I know! But where else can we go now? Of course, Maltan knew that if he continued like this, he might not be able to see the sun tomorrow, but he didn't know what to do, after all, he was not a lich with a deep background like Rice, except for the good strength he gained from Gryman's inheritance, neither his identity nor status had changed from the beginning.
The only thing he could think of was to leave here and go back to the mausoleum in the Great Hengduan Mountains. But not to mention how to make his way through the nets of the human soldiers, the terrifying beasts of the Great Hengduan Mountains alone were enough to make Maltan fearful. He was now seriously injured, and where did he still have the ability to travel thousands of kilometers through the wild land of the Great Hengduan Mountains.
"Maltan the host! In fact, there is another place that is very suitable for you to not only repair your body safely, restore your strength, but also allow you to rebuild a strong army. ”
"What do you say? How did I not know there was such a place? Say it! Ingman's words made Martan instantly very interested.
Ingman said word by word: "The underground world where those dark elves live is the best choice for you to make a comeback!" ”
There was a fierce light in Maltan's eyes!