Building the Strongest Undead Empire from Scratch

"Are you humans?" Alex asked uncertainly.

"Your Majesty, we have offered our souls to the queen and joined as members of the undead race," the Acolytes replied respectfully.

Since they were human, this was good news. Not only dwarves could mine and forge equipment—humans could too. If they could forge equipment, then mining was certainly within their capabilities.

Right now, Alex was short on iron ingots, but mining posed a significant challenge. She had neither the ore nor a furnace. What was she going to do, bake them with her laser eyes?

The Acolytes' Shadow Form skill could be used not only for scouting but also for escaping when gathering resources became dangerous. It seemed that the skeletons could be relieved from resource gathering duties, as their efficiency was quite low. However, for now, that wasn't feasible due to the limited number of Acolytes.

Alex reviewed her remaining resources and was pleasantly surprised to find she could upgrade her Barracks again.

[Undead Crystal: lv11 (Unique Barracks)]

[Level 11 Barracks can summon: skeletons, zombies, specters, death conquerors, gargoyles, bone dragons, ghost dragons, zombie titans, necromancers, liches—ten major troops (random thirty), with an extremely low chance of summoning a Race King. Summoned troops start at base level 3.]

[Unlock special fixed unit: Acolyte]

[Upgrade Barracks Requirements: 22k magic crystals, 220 Essence Shards.]

There wasn't much change, just an improvement in the base level of summoned troops. The summoning didn't extend to all undead races, indicating that some troops were still locked. Alex hoped the last two troops wouldn't be Destroyers and Ghouls.

Alex needed to keep some resources in reserve; she couldn't afford to use up all her resources at once.

"Let's leave it at that for now..."

Upgrading the Barracks required a significant amount of resources, and the current benefits were minimal.

Meanwhile, Samson had returned to his own castle, lamenting the loss of his snow maidens.

After managing his resources, Samson kept his castle at level 9, wary of upgrading his town while his iron ingots were still insufficient. But these were minor issues compared to the significant boost in combat ability he gained from acquiring the frost armor set. With this set, a level 1 Commanding Samson felt he could defeat a level 2 Commanding.

Especially that vampire Lord, only at level 2 Commanding, didn't seem very powerful. "I could crush his testicles with one hand!" he boasted.

As for the undead Lord, Samson shuddered; he knew he couldn't defeat that one.

Samson immediately shared his encounter with the two Lords in the Alliance chat group.

[Ice Queen]: "I encountered those two Lords on the snowy mountain and engaged them in combat. Their strength is definitely top-tier. One is a vampire Lord, and the other an undead Lord. Like us, they can summon their own troops through special methods."

[Vine Fairy]: "Wow, you're so strong! Did you take them both down?"

Samson nearly choked on his drink when he saw this message. He couldn't very well admit he was nearly the one defeated, could he?

Choosing to ignore Vine Fairy's question about the battle, he continued.

[Ice Queen]: "We three met in a cave and immediately started a melee with our troops. The battle awakened the cave's leader, a level 6 Commanding Frost Werewolf. We had to cooperate to defeat it.

Because I wield ice magic and had the geographical advantage on the snowy mountain, I took the lead and ultimately killed the Frost Werewolf, which dropped a full set of armor. The other two Lords acknowledged my strength and willingly gave the equipment to me."

[Earth Lord]: "Strong. You'll definitely be top-tier in the next leaderboard update."

The conversation continued sporadically, with Cain silently monitoring the chat.

"Undead and vampires?" Cain murmured.

The strongest Lords relied not only on troops summoned from Barracks but also had the ability to summon independently. Both undead and vampires nearly had immortality, not much weaker than their elemental spirits, which were affected by terrain and thus had unstable combat power.

For example, Cain's flame spirits and Samson's snow maidens could perform about 1.5 times better in their respective home terrains of volcanoes and snowy mountains. But swapping their locations would be lethal for both, reducing their power significantly.

The undead category was vast, and Samson hadn't specified which type the undead Lord commanded. Cain, always striving to grow stronger, was surrounded by few and weak Lords. Although he knew he was top-tier, he was curious about the gap between him and other top-tier Lords.

Cain's castle had also successfully upgraded to a town today. He discovered a group of goblins transporting iron ore outside the volcano, led by a Hobgoblin. Not knowing their destination but having stumbled upon them, Cain attacked, seizing the iron ore.

Though Cain lacked a furnace, the volcano itself served the purpose. He threw all the iron ore into the scorching lava, quickly melting the impurities. Before the iron completely melted, flame spirits scooped it out. The iron, still mixed with impurities, was taken back to the castle where the system disassembled it into individual iron ingots.

Cain had built the Portal of Transit, realizing that allied Lords of towns could traverse distances instantly. However, among his allies, only his own castle had upgraded to a town level.

...

As evening approached, Sophie's ten thousand pieces of equipment, forged day and night, were finally ready. Alex hurriedly listed them on the market, as these items couldn't just sit idle. However, sales were slow, with only a few pieces sold every few minutes.

She could only hope they would all be traded by morning.

The necromancers had finished summoning from the seven thousand beast corpses left from the beast tide, transforming Alex's undead army, which had multiplied two or three times in number.

Her undead forces now exceeded 30K. If assembled, they would present an overwhelming force, terrifying any Lord who witnessed it.

However, despite their numbers, their overall strength was still weak. A Emperor level expert could easily overpower 30K undead.

But Alex firmly believed that quantity could lead to a qualitative change.

Now that the summoning process was complete, it was time to disassemble the beast corpses around the castle. The constant temperature around Alex's location was about 75°F, a very comfortable climate. If the beast corpses were left out much longer, they would rot and stink up the place.

Alex disassembled the seven thousand beast corpses, obtaining 100,000 portions of food, 7,140 magic crystals, and 890 Essence Shards.

She gave some animal hides and standard equipment to Chi-Chi, who sent a 500-word email thanking Alex, which we'll skip over here.

These items currently held no allure for Alex, but the rewards from two waves of beast tides were indeed substantial. She now had over 100,000 portions of food, more than she knew what to do with. After a beast tide, which Lord would lack food?

Sitting in her castle, Alex pondered her next moves. Conquest was a long way off; upgrading was the immediate priority.

Less than two hours remained on the leaderboard, and the rewards from the beast tide were likely to be distributed tonight. Alex guessed that the rankings would refresh one last time before the end, and the final rewards would be determined based on those rankings.

Alex sat quietly in her bedroom, watching the seconds tick down on the leaderboard.

Finally, the system notification sounded!

[Dear Lords, the leaderboard will refresh in the final minute. Lords ranked in the top 1000 will receive additional rewards.]