Intensified Training

Standing before the Mass Grave, Liu Zhi watched the corpses trying to crawl out from underground, a sudden realization striking him. He knew what the Mass Grave was for.

As his thoughts wandered, several corpses had already forced their way out.

These were all ordinary skeletons, dry, brittle-looking bone frames with a dull yellow hue.

After emerging, they didn't leave the Mass Grave, instead aimlessly wandering nearby.

Liu Zhi noticed that black miasma was being injected into their bodies from beneath their feet.

After a moment's thought, Liu Zhi walked towards the Mass Grave. He saw arms still covered in rotting flesh struggling to climb out from within.

These must be the zombies or ghouls mentioned earlier.

As he approached the Mass Grave, a control panel suddenly popped up before Liu Zhi's eyes. This panel was specifically for the Mass Grave and could only be activated by standing in a certain spot before it; it would disappear once he moved away.

Here, Liu Zhi saw a character creation interface, displaying four different types of undead.

[Bone Shard Crawler: Only the upper body remains, a skeleton with no real use, typically serving as a sacrifice or material to repair other skeletons.]

[Wandering Skeleton: A soulless skeleton, sustained purely by miasma. They instinctively wander the Mass Grave, only completing tasks when commanded. Without orders, they return to their original wandering spots.]

[Ghoul: A wandering corpse. Because its muscles haven't completely rotted, it's less prone to disintegration than a wandering skeleton, making it suitable for heavy labor.]

[Skeleton Soldier: A skeleton slowly developing sentience. They kill their own kind to strengthen themselves and possess a certain combat capability.]

Looking at the descriptions of these four types of undead, Liu Zhi had a general understanding of the Mass Grave. It served to provide skeletons and ghouls as materials and labor. What one ultimately achieved would depend on their own research and ingenuity.

The wandering skeletons and skeleton soldiers appeared quite similar at first glance. The only difference was that the skeleton soldiers were carrying bones from other wandering skeletons or bone shard crawlers.

Liu Zhi observed many skeleton soldiers gripping the spine of a bone shard crawler, holding it like a flail.

Liu Zhi casually summoned a few skeleton soldiers and had them fight each other. He found with some helplessness that their combat skill was mediocre. They completely neglected defense, directly smashing at each other with their makeshift weapons.

Their weapons were also forcibly torn from other skeletons and would shatter after a couple of hits, offering no significant advantage. The only benefit was that such weapons were readily available.

Liu Zhi pondered this and realized that the skeleton soldiers recruited here were essentially just a basic template. After summoning, weapons and equipment would still need to be provided by the necromancer.

"This is acceptable. I'll prepare some obsidian spears later to re-equip them. Skeleton soldiers are quite agile, making them good choices for javelin throwers or spearmen," Liu Zhi muttered to himself. He was about to have the Mass Grave generate a batch of skeleton soldiers to bolster his undead forces.

Just then, he noticed a small plus sign below the four types of undead.

Liu Zhi clicked it, and a new option appeared on the character creation interface, resembling a grave mound. When he focused his attention on it, he saw a writhing skeleton within.

He then discovered that he could seemingly infuse things into this skeleton.

For example, he could directly give the skeleton a weapon or armor, so it would be equipped upon emergence.

Or he could grant the skeleton a certain amount of miasma, making it naturally stronger than others.

But the most important thing was that Liu Zhi noticed he could spend skill points to infuse any skill he knew into the skeleton.

For instance, he had spent 30 experience points to learn Level 1 [Sailor's Basic Swordsmanship]. If he was willing to spend another 30 experience points, this skeleton would also master Level 1 [Sailor's Basic Swordsmanship].

This sparked a possibility in Liu Zhi's mind.

He selected a skeleton that hadn't yet emerged and spent 60 experience points to upgrade both [Sailor's Basic Swordsmanship] and [Sailing Skill] to Level 1.

As expected, a new prompt appeared.

[Prompt: Skeleton meets the criteria for Sub-Class - Sailor. Train as Skeleton Sailor?]

"Yes."

Liu Zhi made his choice.

Under his command, a new skeleton crawled out from beneath the grave mound. Simultaneously, a new fixed image appeared in the selection interface.

Liu Zhi carefully examined the skeleton, finding no significant visual difference from others, except that its arm bones were noticeably thicker and bore some rust.

[Skeleton Sailor: A skeleton transformed from a deceased Sailor. Retains knowledge of Sailor's Basic Swordsmanship and Sailing Skill. Suited for combat on water. Each recruitment costs 60 experience.]

Seeing this, Liu Zhi was somewhat tempted. He glanced at the other two sword skills he knew and his remaining experience. Gritting his teeth, he clicked the selection bar again.

However, this time the expenditure did not yield a new unit type. The two newly created skeletons were still skeleton soldiers, but one mastered Level 1 [Z-Secret Sword] and the other Level 1 [Indigo Chasing Wind Swordplay]. They might be able to utilize these sword skills in combat, but otherwise, they were still just unspecialized skeleton soldiers.

"Forget it. I thought there was a chance to train new troop types," Liu Zhi sighed. He then began to examine the process of creating ghouls. However, unlike the plentiful skeletons, there weren't many corpses suitable for ghoul transformation.

Liu Zhi searched for a long time, finding only two experimental subjects. He eventually transformed one into a Ghoul Sailor, thus confirming a new troop type. He had wanted to transform the other into a sword-type unit, but he found ghouls too slow. Both sword skills would be wasted on them, so he abandoned the idea.

However, this did reveal the true utility of the Mass Grave to Liu Zhi. It seemed that in the future, besides combat troops, many other sub-classes could be trained here.

This was good news for Liu Zhi, as he no longer had to worry about his Underworld being empty.