Chapter 318: And All The Dead Died (Patreon)

Jabberwoc

Crimson Jabberwoc, Master of Despair and Death and the second strongest A rank of the true Undead Empire, ruler over all undead in the Prime Material, didn’t know how the woman in front of him had found his hidden demiplane, but that was less of an issue than how she was sitting right in front of him, on his own throne, in his own throne room.

“You know, back when I was a G rank, even before I was reincarnated as a monster, my teacher told me the story of your rise.” The Mistress of Oaths and Deception, the former C rank with the highest known A rank kill count in history, who’d now obviously advanced to B rank, smiled at him. “Sure, she was mostly using it as a joke, poking at a major insecurity I had at the time for her own amusement, but your story has always stuck with me and it is a genuine pleasure to meet you.”

Jabberwoc didn’t say anything, feeling more fear than he had in hundreds of millions of years. His energy held in place by the woman’s aura, he physically couldn’t.

“The power of undeath is quite interesting.” The Mistress of Oaths and Deception rose from the throne and walked down toward him. “The way it twists karma, the way it forms inherent bonds between true undead lifeforms like yourself and the necromantic monsters you create with your magic, the way its presence alters a universe’s natural energy.

“Just to start to truly study such an energy through scientific observation requires a control over faith energy at the divine level, a control over natural energy at a level only a handful of beings in all known universes have ever reached, and multiple Law Dragon level Laws of the death, life, space, and time elements.”

Her smile grew a bit wider as she stopped three meters in front of him, her expression somehow lighting up the dim room full of bones and making Jabberwoc completely uninterested in why none of his servants were in the room.

“My husband has been having fun experimenting with several ideas of how to use the power of undeath over the last dozen or so years, and his most successful experiment so far has been combining the power of undeath with royal lightning.

“Have you ever heard of royal lightning, Mr. Crimson?”

She released her control over his energy enough that he could talk through mana emissions.

“No.” Jabberwoc couldn’t not answer someone so beautiful, even if part of his mind was telling him he usually preferred women without skin.

“Well, it is quite interesting on its own.” The mistress continued to smile at him, taking one step closer. “As you are likely aware, lightning in its less mystical applications is the element of change, the transition of matter to energy or other types of matter, the alteration of matter’s state, etc, and in more magical applications it is the element which represents energy, pure mana untouched by life or soul. Then, in the metaphysical representation of the elements, lightning represents rulership, control over others, be that as a master over slaves, a teacher over pupils, or, most representative, a ruler over subjects.

“Royal lightning then is a type of lightning which represents all three aspects of the element at once, pure energy primed to transition matter and souls to alternative states mixed with natural energy gained from a ruler’s Territory.

“On its own, it can be deadly, transform common stone into pure elements such as gold or silver, and even heal, all depending on the wielder’s intent.”

The mistress took another step closer.

“When mixed with the power of undeath, however, and primed with a bit of light and darkness element blessing and curse magic, it can gain some really interesting effects.” She took another step closer. “For instance, with a curse of primal energy absorption, a curse of bond propagation, and a blessing of cleansing, combined with a specialized spell array, you can get what my husband calls Universal Undeath Cleansing Chain Lightning.”

The Mistress of Oaths and Deception took another step closer and waved her right hand, an illusion of a small battlefield on what looked to be an F rank planet appearing next to her, where seven lowly G rank zombies were stupidly trying to attack the Heavenly Spark Soul King.

“Just one spark, and a universe will be cleansed.”

In the illusion, the Heavenly Spark Soul King completely ignored the zombies trying to bite him, their teeth and claws unable to do any damage whatsoever, as he created a large complicated array in the air. And, over the next couple seconds, lightning, the power of undeath, and several other energies Jabberwoc couldn’t easily identify combined together into a single tiny azure ball which landed on the Heavenly Spark Soul King’s right index finger.

The Heavenly Spark Soul King then pointed that finger at one of the zombies and lightning flashed, the azure energy flowing from the Heavenly Spark Soul King to the zombie, and, in less than a second, the zombie was cleansed of all its power of undeath, all its primal energy, and even its soul, turning the zombie’s body back into a human, dead but no longer undead.

And the spell didn’t stop there, lightning flashing between the cleansed zombie and the nearest of the six remaining zombies, where the same thing happened again. The second zombie was killed. The lightning grew more powerful. And the spell jumped to the nearest zombie again.

This happened over and over and, after the fifth zombie, the lightning split, jumping to both remaining zombies at the same time, and, when both of those zombies were cleansed, the lightning jumped further, the illusion moving to show a new group of undead over a kilometer away suddenly having two of its zombies cleansed.

The Mistress of Oaths and Deception then sped up the time of her illusion, the several hours it took the lightning to jump to every undead on the planet condensed to about ten seconds. And then the lightning jumped to two other planets, losing barely any power, and the cleansing continued.

Stronger and stronger undead began to die quicker and quicker, the lightning growing rapidly more powerful with time, and, over the span of a few more hours, three entire B rank undead empires were entirely annihilated, their B rank leaders included. And by that point the lightning was attacking thousands of undead at once, both raised undead like zombies and skeleton soldiers along with natural born undead like nightwalkers and shades.

“Would you put this on for me, please?” Without him noticing, the Mistress of Oaths and Deception had pulled a golden necklace out of somewhere, a necklace with a large azure crystal pendant hanging from its bottom, and she was holding it out to him.

And, as she was so attractive and he so wanted to please her, Jabberwoc took the necklace and put it over his own skeletal neck.

“Thank you, Mr. Crimson.”

The Mistress of Oaths and Deception then disappeared and Jabberwoc could suddenly think again, quickly realizing the woman had used some kind of ridiculously powerful charm magic on him after somehow taking over his energy, abusing just how twisted his soul had become thanks to the power of undeath.

Before he could reach up and take the necklace off his neck, however, several trillion bolts of lightning flew in through the seemingly deactivated defenses of the demiplane and hit him all at once, carrying with them the power of quadrillions of undead souls and massive amounts of excess primal energy, his senses even able to catch four other A rank souls in the mix, all the other A rank undead in the Prime Material. And there was nothing he could do.

The lightning hit, his soul was cleansed, and all the remaining energy from the attack, all the power of every undead in the entire Prime Material, all flowed into the necklace around his neck, where it was compressed, stored, and slowly processed into an even higher level of power.

Then the Mistress of Oaths and Deception appeared, picked up the necklace, and vanished from the demiplane again, no god in the Prime Material aware she’d been there.

***

Ryan - A Few Minutes Before

Ryan Marinello Ca, now a C rank after receiving a god’s training for thousands of years, watched as the lightning killed all the undead on the battlefield, thankfully avoiding his teacher’s soul fragment still attached to his soul, and then he just stared in wonder as the powerful attack disappeared through some application of space magic he couldn’t understand.

“What just happened?” he asked through his bond with his teacher, the soul fragment of Var Quon, Undead God of the River of Oaths.

His teacher was slow to respond, however, and, when the god did eventually speak after several seconds, there was a different note to his telepathic voice, a hint of fear Ryan had never felt from the man. “I don’t know. And that worries me.”

***

Uvandra

Uvandra of Dova, hidden agent of the Mistress of Oaths and Deception in the Prime Material and oathbound servant to someone the Mistress of Oaths and Deception trusted, smiled as she finally solved one of the most important mysteries of her life, the identity of the master she’d sworn a blood oath to.

“The Heavenly Spark Soul King said no to undeath and all the dead died.” The woman on the screen, pretty with ghostlike indigo hair and light blue reptilian eyes, smiled as she floated in space, thirty-six powerful spirits around her, each shaped like some sort of mythical creature. “The Heavenly Spark Soul King said primordial gods cannot take my sister, and I was revived, more powerful than when I was murdered.”

Uvandra’s master smiled. “My name is Diana Alvaro, now reborn as a monstrous spirit the System has titled the Draconic Spirit Queen, and, as my sister-in-law has returned to me the position of President of the United Federation of Planets, it is my role to address all subordinate forces of the Primordial Humans yet to surrender.

“You have three years until the deadline is up and, with the undead pulling back from the endless battle out of fear of my brother, only a few days of continued System access from fighting extradimensional forces.”

The Draconic Spirit Queen summoned a blade out of some spatial storage device, a black and white ghostly sword which screamed power even through the illusionary screen Uvandra was watching. “Your gods’ days are numbered. The question is if you want to follow them to oblivion.”

The Draconic Spirit Queen smile changed from challenging to warmth. “For those not serving the Primordial Humans, however, the Territory of the Undead in the Prime Material has all shifted ownership.

“Feel free to move there and benefit from the automatic tripling of your affinities with all Laws.”

The announcement Uvandra’d watched over fifty times ended yet again and she couldn’t help but grow even more excited.

She was still only D rank, having worked to gain System rewards to try and maximize her power with each rank advancement, but she was close to advancing to C rank, and she’d received a quest from the Mistress of Oaths and Deception over the System to meet the requirements for gaining a divine class from the woman herself, one she had almost completed.

She just had to maintain her disguise as a simple servant of one of the Primordial Human’s more prominent B rank lawyers for a few more days and the requirements would be complete.