The Ruined Death Knight-Novel

"To think that my mana pool that seemed almost infinite would have been spent in such a short amount of time." Danzel mumbled to himself as he gazed at his surroundings.

Wherever he looked, they were either bloodied corpses of the knights or the mutants that were slain. Among those corpses were also his undead that had fallen in battle.

After jumping with Skull Claw together in the backlines, it didn´t take much effort to stop the magic caster from operating the teleportation portal.

Once his [Soul Reaping Wind] met with the accurate magic caster, they could only shout in pain before falling down dead to the ground.

At that point those two begone their own slaughter in the enemy's back.

The masked magic caster who flew in the air did prove to be of nuisance to both of them, but even they were shot down by Sarah the elven archers.

And since her arrows were many times faster than their flying speed and their reaction alone, that brought them into an awkward situation.

Below them was both a Death Hound which bit on the mutants together with its master that had an incredible scary aura leave his body. Both eying them like some starved hyenas who stared at some wagyu steak.

Though their fear didn´t affect their performance in battle as they have trained against that, they would have been stupid to go in the range of those two.

Alas, the archers in the far were killing them with each arrow that was shot, forcing them to go descended and hopefully use the mutants as meat shields.

And one could clearly see by their corpses on the ground that this didn´t go as well as they had hoped.

Walking towards the corpses of the masked magic caster, Danzel decided to store each body inside his storage ring for potential magic items.

`Though I don´t have much hope for that.´ Danzel thought as to how Skull Claw bit one of them and he slashed them. At this point, their robes should be rags.

As for other items, if they truly were any, he would rather check later than have any of the others claim his spoils by the excuse of stealing the Dynasty war spoils.

`You can guys can pick whoever weapons and armor you like the most.´ Danzel sends his command to the Draugrs.

Having raised some mid-fight, only 37 Draugrs remained, most of them being of the corpses of the knights that of mutants.

Though Danzel would have liked to raise purely only mutants as undead since they had better bodies, he still went for the knights as the bodies of the mutants were heavily damaged and would affect the performance of the newly raised undead.

If he had both the mana and the time, he wouldn´t have minded using [Restore Undying Body] on the corpses and then raising them as undead. Alas, that wasn´t the case.

Moving past his undead, the knights moved to the side and stared at him with disdain and fear. But Danzel ignored all of them.

Right behind his back was Skull Claw following after his steps and the Draugr followed behind her.

Once Danzel stopped in front of Wilhelm, they also stopped.

"Sir Wilhelm, the enemy has been exterminated. What will we do now? Will, we retreat or stay?" Danzel asked with his cold voice

Wilhelm in question was woken up from his stubbornness, as he replied to the dark knight's question.

"We will stay here, Necromancer Abdiel. After a short break, I will start casting my spells once more. As I will be vulnerable when casting, I will rely on your protection..." Wilhelm said.

Danzel in response only nodded his head at him before walking with his undead to the side.

"You can sit down now." Danzel said to Skull Claw, who as result did as her master said.

Seating to the ground, Danzel touched the cracks on Skull Claw's ribs.

"Unfortunately, you will have to deal with those alone for now." Danzel mumbled before sending his Draugr a command.

`Spread in the surroundings and watch out for a potential ambush.´

Hearing their lieges will and command, the Draugr nodded before spreading and watching vigilantly at their surroundings.

`Although sending them out wasn´t necessary, having them all gathered around me is quite awkward.´ Danzel thought secretly before putting his focus back on Skull Claw.

To be more specific, he focused his gaze on her status screen.

They were in total 3 things that he didn´t know about her status.

And those were [Mount of Dead Warrior], [Death Howl], and [Dying Hunter´s Mark].

When he started reading them one by one, he found out that [Mount of Dead Warrior] was the reason why his killing intent was increased the moment he mounted Skull Claw.

It seemed to be a new talent that she gained upon her evolution. According to the description, the master that was picked by the [Undead Servant] talent would have his killing intent amplified when the master mounts her by a total of 10%.

Considering that it didn´t affect one's mind and that Danzel had [Sin of Wrath], such an effect was quite nice to have as a passive.

[Death Howl] in comparison was a skill, but it was also a passive effect, which resulted in her howl strengthening her survival instincts and amplifying the effect of fear on her enemies. Though the former sounded like a buff, it wasn't in some situations. If a group had its own survival in mind, it will disrupt teamwork. Where fear would lead them to panic, resulting in chaos amongst groups if the effect is activated fully.

Considering how much she howled in the battle against the mutants, Danzel couldn´t help but grin bitterly at the fact that Skull Claw friendly fired the knights with her howls. Though since he wore a helmet and had a skull for a face, one couldn´t possibly see his bitter smile.

The last skill he read was the most interesting out of all of them in his opinion.

As [Dying Hunter´s Mark] was actually his first ever seen permanent curse spell he saw.

Wherever he searched for a book that had the topic of curses in it back when he was dealing with the shadow merchant Hanson, there was as good as no information except the fact that they were famous for being permanent.

His [Curse of Scourge] and [Curse of Exhaustion] both had a limited range and a duration time.

So seeing Skull Claw possessing such a spell, he felt somewhat jealous.

In truth, [Dying Hunter´s Mark] was a buff that is put on one's body. If an enemy was hit with that body part that the spell was put on, the curse will activate and put a permanent curse on the enemy which made the one who caster the curse always be able to track the cursed one.

A particular annoying skill if one wanted to run away.

`It seems that Skull Claw doesn´t have any long-ranged attacks after all. She is more focused on melee combat it seems.´ Danzel thought before drawing his hand off her ribs.

"I guess it´s time to check my spoils..." Danzel mumbled to himself before opening his status window.

With the blue floating window appearing in front of him, Danzel gazed at the very bottom where his spoils were.

...

[XP: 4 865 300]

Staring at the XP that he gained, Danzel had to take a second look just to confirm that what he was seeing wasn´t an illusion.

`It shouldn´t be that high...´ Danzel thought to himself.

It wasn´t that he wasn´t happy with the amount of XP that he swooped in one go.

On average the mutants were giving him around 40 000 to 50 000 XP.

For killing someone of the 3rd-tier, this amount of XP wasn´t that great. But the XP was still quite a hefty amount for just a single skill.

Considering that he had to train for a whole of 4 hours to receive 40 000 XP, it was nice saving so much XP by just killing those mutants.

But even then, that didn´t explain why he had so much XP left.

Counting the XP that gained from doing all the contracts and the slaughter of those mutants, he should have around 900 000 XP less than now.

Then it hit him.

`[Rune of Harvest]...it has to be either Agares or Azrael that deliver such amount of XP.´

And as if proofing his suspicions, out of nowhere he just gained a total of 7 000 XP.

"There must have been a slaughter somewhere." Danzel though.

`I gained such benefits by only having 2 harvesters. If they were more of them then how much XP would I gain?´

Just thinking of gaining hundreds of XP by doing literally nothing but a grin to himself.

"I will have to see how to equip Vanessa and Sartan with it, but that can wait. For now, I should focus on those gains."

Having once more such a great amount of XP in his hands, Danzel couldn´t help but get excited.

Be it increasing his [Black Guard] level or bringing his new skills into the 3rd-tier, Danzel couldn´t help but already fantasy about what to spend his pocket money on.

But before he could do such, the remaining group of knights came toward him with hostile faces.

"You Vile Necromancer! Release our comrades from your reign! You have already abused their rest long enough with your magic!" The one who was leading the group of knights shouted while pointing at Danzel.

Danzel who was in a good mood till now became frustrated at the knights who came seeking trouble. He was so annoyed in fact that for a split second, his bloodlust washed over all the knights.