Preparation

When Liu Zhi returned from the Nether Palace, several skeletons were already following behind him. All of them were newly recruited Skeleton Soldiers, and two of them had mastered Z-Secret Sword and Indigo Chasing Wind Swordplay.

He had specifically brought those two out so that the Corpse Soul Naga could see whether they had room to grow in swordsmanship.

The rest were ordinary Skeleton Soldiers. However, all the weapons in their hands had been thrown away. Liu Zhi planned to forge new weapons for them. The era of using other people's bone clubs as weapons was over.

Aside from changing their equipment, Liu Zhi had brought them out to test how he could use up his limited mana each day.

Compared to the Corpse Soul Naga, who consumed at least five points of mana every day, the Skeleton Soldiers used far less.

Entering and leaving the Nether Palace cost the Skeleton Soldiers the same one point of mana as it did the Corpse Soul Naga. Once they were in the real world, however, the Skeleton Soldiers only needed one point of mana per day to remain there indefinitely. They did not need to return to the Nether Palace from time to time to replenish their yin energy.

By that calculation, Liu Zhi currently had sixty-six points of mana in total, automatically replenished after his daily meditation.

At the same time, he needed to inject thirty points of mana into the Nether Palace at noon every day, while keeping at least five points in reserve for the Corpse Soul Naga.

That left ten points of mana to deal with other troubles. Thus, if Liu Zhi did not intend to send any Skeleton Soldiers back to the Nether Palace, he could have a force of at most twenty-one Skeleton Soldiers at once.

"If they have suitable weapons, this force will be enough. But if I want to strengthen these Skeleton Soldiers, my mana is still somewhat lacking."

After making his assessment, Liu Zhi could not help but feel a headache coming on.

By then, he understood that he was only a half-trained Necromancer. There were too many things he had not had time to learn. For example, he did not know any meditation method that could increase his mana. No matter how hard he meditated each day, all he could do was replenish his mana.

He had also failed to master even the most basic method of strengthening Skeleton Soldiers. He did not know how to make their bones harder.

Nor had he learned how to make Skeleton Soldiers more agile. It could be said that the Skeleton Soldiers currently under his command were roughly equal to ordinary people in combat strength.

That was precisely why Liu Zhi was reluctant to develop these Skeleton Soldiers to their full potential. He had not assigned every Skeleton Soldier either Z-Secret Sword or Indigo Chasing Wind Swordplay.

Although doing so did not consume much experience, with each Skeleton Soldier requiring only around three hundred points, it was still experience. Liu Zhi's experience had been pieced together with the lives of one Fishman after another. He did not want to spend it all on the Skeleton Soldiers in one stroke.

Without any orthodox method of strengthening them, Liu Zhi began handling the Skeleton Soldiers using some of his own methods.

He gathered vines from nearby, dried them in the sun, then tore them into strips and wrapped them around the Skeleton Soldiers' bones.

At the same time, he began making various weapons for the Skeleton Soldiers.

Just as he had expected, spears were a good choice for the Skeleton Soldiers. Liu Zhi also used large stones and vines to make them flail hammers.

These flail hammers, made from stones weighing around ten pounds, could be used to smash enemies or thrown. For Skeleton Soldiers that were not particularly afraid of being controlled by spear thrusts, they were the best weapons.

Liu Zhi had taken these weapons into the Nether Palace to test them. Most skeletons shattered after a single blow and would never last until the second. Thus, Liu Zhi believed that even if he encountered a living person, he still had a chance of winning with weapons like these.

While Liu Zhi strengthened his force, the Corpse Soul Naga also roamed around inside the Golden City.

After the Skeleton Soldiers began protecting Liu Zhi, the Corpse Soul Naga had more free time. Liu Zhi sent her out to search for enemies that might be hiding near the Golden City.

At the very least, Liu Zhi needed to know where the enemies were coming from and how they planned to get past the giant snakes guarding the outside.

The Corpse Soul Naga was quite capable. On the tenth day after killing that eagle, she finally made a complete circuit of the Golden City and reached a conclusion: the enemies had already appeared on the nearby cliffs. They would not descend from the cliffs, however, because they were extremely high, and one wrong step meant certain death. Instead, like Liu Zhi, the enemies would come through the underground river by traveling upstream.

The only difference was that they needed to lure all the giant snakes away before sending people inside.

Liu Zhi was willing to believe the Corpse Soul Naga's assessment.

If the enemies were all traveling upstream through the river, then their choice of timing would be extremely important.

At the very least, they could not come after the daily rainstorm. That was when the giant snakes fed.

No matter who appeared in the river then, they would only end up as food for the giant snakes.

Moreover, they had a long distance to travel, so they could only lure the giant snakes away in the afternoon. They would then proceed carefully, and judging by their speed, should arrive at the Golden City around dawn.

After making his assessment, Liu Zhi acted swiftly.

He was no longer alone. He immediately stationed several Skeleton Soldiers by the river to keep watch.

They would ignore the giant snakes each day, but if any humans traveled upstream along the river, they were to signal and kill them immediately.

To ensure that the enemies received a devastating opening blow, Liu Zhi simply stationed the Skeleton Soldier who could use Indigo Chasing Wind Swordplay there.

Meanwhile, his Nether Palace was also training large numbers of Skeleton Soldiers.

When the battle came, he could directly force them into the enemy ranks.

However, the Mass Grave did not produce many Skeleton Soldiers each week, only five to seven at a time. The other skeletons either failed to meet the standard for Skeleton Soldiers or were reduced to nothing but upper bodies that could only crawl along the ground—the Shattered Bone Crawlers.

Thus, the Skeleton Soldiers Liu Zhi could currently deploy still did not make up a full roster. He hoped the enemies would come as late as possible. The later they came, the more time he would have to prepare.

However, by then, the people of the Serpent Attack Tribe had already gathered outside the river channel.

They were a tribe that had fought giant snakes since childhood and knew the creatures' habits extremely well. After tracking them all this way, they had long since planned how to lure the giant snakes away and infiltrate the Golden City.

This was the first team, sent to scout the path and carry out an assassination. The people of the Serpent Attack Tribe had not waited for the other tribes to arrive before preparing to act on their own.

These dark-skinned natives had painted themselves white. They stood silently beside the river and waited until they saw the giant snakes lured away by vibrations on the surface of the water. Only then did they sling their weapons over their backs, leap into the water, and slowly travel upstream.