Undead Mage: I Have a Skeleton Clone

Chapter 790 - 507: Skeleton Mage Materials, Rare Magic Book!

The Soul Enemy skill was one Fang Zhou had possessed for a long time. He acquired this special skill through the Soul Enemy Awakening Ceremony after being successfully selected as a Seed Student at the Sea City Military Academy.

This skill didn’t require practice. It only required continuously killing demons to increase its proficiency and enhance its effects. Although Fang Zhou had experienced many battles before, this was the first time he had engaged in a large-scale slaughter of Abyssal Demons.

Previously, in the Forest of Nature, Fang Zhou had also killed many Abyssal Demons, but they were nothing more than pathetic wretches infected by the Abyssal Desecration Aura. In the Simulation Battlefield of the Sea City Military Academy, Fang Zhou had killed thousands of Abyssal Demons, but they were merely projections and not acknowledged by the Soul Enemy skill.

For this reason, although the tier of Soul Enemy consistently increased with Fang Zhou’s level, its proficiency had gradually fallen to the most basic Beginner rank, rendering the effects trivial and unremarkable.

It was only this time, when Fang Zhou slaughtered over a thousand demons in one go, that he met the advancement requirements for the Soul Enemy skill and successfully advanced it from the Beginner to the Master rank. The various exclusive damage bonuses against the Abyssal Demon species also saw a visible increase.

Moreover, the activation of the new title, [Demon Slayer], was evidently related to this overwhelming victory. Unlike the Soul Enemy skill, which predominantly affected Fang Zhou himself, the effect of the Demon Slayer title could extend to the Summoned Creatures and armies under his command. Though the individual bonus might not have been much, when spread across an entire army, it resulted in considerable gains.

Fang Zhou nodded with some satisfaction. Although there had been moments of danger during the battle, the rewards were undeniably substantial.

Furthermore, this wasn’t all. After killing so many enemies, the numerous Artificial Undead who had exerted great effort were granted opportunities for advancement. Originally, when Fang Zhou had just advanced to Bronze Upper, his Artificial Undead had not been sufficiently nourished with flesh and souls, so their strength remained at Bronze Middle. But now, thousands of demon corpses lay on the ground, waiting for Fang Zhou to loot them. With these corpse resources as reserves, they could quickly keep up with Fang Zhou’s progression.

An Undead Mage has a limit to the number of Artificial Undead they can simultaneously control. With the hundreds of high-quality Frozen Corpse Jades from the Naraku Civilization’s mage tomb setting such a high standard, Fang Zhou was no longer indiscriminately accepting enemy corpses. Only the corpses of extremely powerful individuals or those with significant racial advantages were worthy of being selected by Fang Zhou as backup materials.

As for corpses like those of Horned Demons and Dog Demons—Black Iron-tier Abyssal Demons with low energy concentration—they could only be used as consumables for Tiamat’s [Heaven and Earth Devouring] skill or be devoured and digested by his existing Artificial Undead.

Counting carefully, the various Artificial Undead Fang Zhou possessed were nearing the limit of what he could control and store. The strongest were naturally his three Leader-Level Undead Summoned Creatures: the Dragon Bone Hatred Warrior, the Frost Skeleton Mage, and the Six-armed Snake Demon Warrior. Due to their exceptional innate talents and considerable potential, as long as resources were invested, their levels and combat power could keep pace with Fang Zhou’s own growth for a long time.

Additionally, there were the hundreds of Ice Remains Earth Dragon Knights, all of whom had now advanced to Bronze Upper. They were the most powerful force under Fang Zhou’s command.

There were also dozens of Bronze Middle Corrupt Hatreds that acted as a defensive core to absorb enemy firepower. Supporting them were over 150 melee Corpse Warriors and over 150 ranged Corpse Shooters, all at Bronze Middle strength. Furthermore, over 50 Bronze Lower Skeleton Bats served as one of Fang Zhou’s few scouting and aerial combat forces.

In total, Fang Zhou currently possessed nearly 500 Artificial Undead. The number he could summon simultaneously for sustained combat was about two hundred.

It wasn’t that Fang Zhou was incapable of summoning them all at once. However, maintaining these powerful Undead Summoned Creatures in battle consumed an astonishing amount of mana. Fang Zhou was fighting frequently in the Desert of Beastmen. To maintain enduring and adequate combat power, a force of 200 Artificial Undead was just right.

If Fang Zhou were to go all out and disregard mana consumption, summoning all 500 Artificial Undead at once would pose no problem. However, in that case, he could only sustain one high-intensity battle before his mana would be depleted, leaving him powerless to fight on. This scale was only achievable thanks to enhancements from various sources, such as the [Summon Tomb], [Strong Undead Summoning], and [Magic Conductor] skills, as well as his [Contract] affixes.

Of course, the key among them was the research and breakthrough of the [Artificial Undead] skill. If he were still relying on ordinary Undead Magic to sustain his undead army, the number of same-tier Undead Summoned Creatures he could continuously control would be considerably smaller.

Nevertheless, the fact that a Bronze Upper Undead Mage like Fang Zhou could summon 200 Bronze-tier Undead Summoned Creatures and sustain them for long periods of low-intensity combat was already astonishing enough to any Professional. Although Fang Zhou himself was not entirely satisfied deep down, this news, if it got out, would be enough to drive all Professionals of the same tier mad with envy.