Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead

Grabbing Poitirus's spear as it was sent floating his way, Loimos approached the felled beast, it had managed to pull itself by the bootstraps at one point, this was a good thing, it would make for a good undead, its body dimming, Loimos pierced its brain with a bone spike, making it into a proud servant of death, as for Poitirus, he had been caught by surprise by the beast's sudden understanding in how to utilise its power, losing an arm and half of his face, damage which was harder to recuperate from due to the nature of divinity.

A dark with hints of bright gold washed over the mistborn, healing his injuries, Loimos spoke in death tongue to the beast, it did not answer, but nodded its headless neck to show understanding, that was a good harvest, and it was nearly a certainty that many other creatures were just waiting to be made into followers of Nitok, from the smallest of algae to the largest of beasts.

Placing a miasma generator in the heart of the hidden city, the beast was left to watch over this area for now, much like the stone drake, guarding the places they knew best until further notice.

Loimos and Poitirus ascended back on the surface, stepping back onto deck, this venture had been fruitful, expanding upon their control of the nearby ocean, it was of importance, especially for their future assault upon Bermude, the sunken continent, it was less important for Durter and Dragonnerie, respectively said to be underground and floating in the sky.

This little expedition had lasted a week or so, planting miasma generator upon the areas already conquered by Vespertillo and the exploration of still living waters, taking in a sea serpent and a divine beast, Loimos returned to the mainland, the training of his troops was progressing smoothly, the two foremost knights very excited to show him how many new rank and files, knights and other castes had reached the levels set beforehand.

Including mages, which the two knights were especially elated to show off, those mages were actually a part of the rank and file, garbed in heavy robes, gauntlets of dark irons upon their hands, these were catalysts, replacing staves and the likes, although training required for them to cast the necessary spells without them, upon promotion, they were given those to enhance their mana and spells, the crest representing the Lithitree upon both front and back, unlike the soldiers who wore the chain mail all over their heads and shoulders, the mages had a hole to fit their faces in, leaving space for a mask.

All were the exact same, save for a single detail carved upon the forehead, a rune from the death tongue, special runes created by Loimos, with the assistance of Unacunerra and Nitok, it enhanced the casters mana as well, the mages were only four at the moment, Loimos had chosen for his regular mages to be of those that had no particular elemental affinity, they were taught not simple magic, but what the pure undead called a sorcery.
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Combining a few obscure magical concepts, the very own mana of the user was cultivated and transformed into dead mana, like Loimos's, the fact that they were undeads certainly helped in this regard, and then, they would be taught a variety of spells that utilised this mana.

After being shown the advance in his ranks, Loimos moved on to experimenting with his black flame some more, making minor improvements upon it, not quite reaching what he was aiming for.

Following by visiting the Lithitree, which seemed to be have grown larger every time, its foliage denser and more diverse, bleak sap seeping down its trunk, it did not have any that at first, the tree of death was not quite in its greatest state just yet, collecting some of that sap, Loimos moved on to his next appointment, which greatly diverted from the usual routine he had set upon himself.

It had been a little while since he had last talked with her, stepping into his quarters at the royal crypt, he normally would have just met anyone anywhere there, but his notoriety was a bit too great, some of the architects and such had passed by, in fact, they weren't the only ones that visited the champion for one reason or another.

Said architects had insisted to make him an office, which basically served no purpose, if anything, Loimos would always be the one moving to whoever he meant to discuss with, today however, it would see some use, like a bull on a glass floor, the undead simply looked completely out of place, they had gone all in in designing a space they deemed worthy of housing the regime's champion.

Sitting down on a fine leather chair, the desk was populated by all sort of trinkets and tools that Loimos could just manifest from rot, the craftsmanship was definitely impressive though, perhaps they should have focused on more important affairs, Loimos knew that convincing those guys that accommodating him was not important was pretty much impossible.

The ceiling was high, a number of chandeliers and other decorations hanging from the ceiling, paintings of all kinds, finely forged weapons hung upon the walls, at least they had restrained from making a statue of him, or perhaps they had run out of space before they could.

In any case, he put a crystal of concentrated death on the desk, this one different from the rest, it was especially formed for the living that stepped into the room, lowering her head to fit in through the door, the giant-blooded woman looked at the chairs available, and just decided to kneel down instead.

Still garbed in nothing but beast fur, Elenantiel, who called herself The Desirerer for reasons Loimos had not asked about, pointed at the crystal.

"Is this it?"

"It is not certain to function as expected, but it will at least lay the proper foundations" he explained, the crystal held a slight shimmer of light red, almost pinkish in its center, on his way to Dracula's domain back when he acted as messenger to gather the gravelords, Loimos had encountered Elenantiel, a living that was incredibly, perhaps too much, interested in bearing a child from the draconic vampire lord, but it was not possible, the undeads could not really reproduce in this way, two undeads could not mate and expect anything to come from it.

But that was ridiculous, if the living could do it, then why not the dead? Elenantiel was not here just because of her peculiar interests, but also because those interests came from a special ability she claimed to have, which was to have control upon any newborn growing within her, control upon how they would turn out and ensure that all would be perfect.

And apparently, it was also why she had been living in the mountains, Loimos did not bother to question those things, more interested in the prospect of introducing more ways for the undeads to multiply.

"I have also prepared an entire room to ensure that the process works to its best, prepare as much as you want before using it" he pushed the crystal toward her.

Obviously, Elenantiel was not exactly thrilled about the concept of dying, but it also represented a great opportunity for her 'craft' as she liked to refer to it.

Keeping the precious crystal close, she quietly ran off.

The putrid skeleton saw many opportunities if he could usher something new in, but it was certain that if that worked out, a certain vampire would go completely hysterical.

In any case, Loimos was going to go back into the ocean with Poitirus, work was never over for the undead, and when it would be, a new challenge would take its place.