Skreek lay on the dirt at my feet, his spear nearby.
Elyndra was leaning against the same tree I was, her spear being used as support, while Halvard and Roderik stood beside Dominic, who kept watch over us.
The rest of the fight had been an uphill battle.
Without their leader, the adventurers had fought harder. I had expected them to break, but it seemed that wasn’t the case.
If anything, they became more fierce, more fanatical.
The name—Morveth—was repeated again and again, even as they died.
My party had suffered some minor injuries, none as bad as the cracked ribs I had suffered.
I was mostly healed at this point, but I was tired. I could fall asleep where I stood.
Something told me if I ever ran out of stamina, my regeneration would stop functioning. Something to note for later.
[The Herald has slain C?sar Baumhauer (Lv. 15)! — +325 Soul Essence]
[The Herald has slain Emanuel Steinberger (Lv. 18)! — +436 Soul Essence]
[Skill Level Up! — Swordsmanship has reached Level 9!]
[Skill Level Up! — Berserker’s Fury has reached Level 2!]
[Elyndra has slain Sofie Kepler (Lv. 14)! — +292 Soul Essence]
[Elyndra has slain Philipp Neubauer (Lv. 14)! — +292 Soul Essence]
[Skreek has slain Rolf Lerche (Lv. 17)! — +397 Soul Essence]
[Falkar has slain Matteo Kuhn (Lv. 16)! — +360 Soul Essence]
[Skreek has slain Theres Sacher (Lv. 16)! — +360 Soul Essence]
[Roderik has slain Madia Bierbaum (Lv. 13)! — +326 Soul Essence]
[Roderik has slain Vivienne Bierbaum (Lv. 14)! — +292 Soul Essence]
[Weapons Gained — 3x Steel Long Sword, 2x Steel Short Sword, 1x Hammer of Wrath, 2x Ashwood Longbow, 1x Wooden Staff, 1x Steel Spear]
[Armor Gained — 5x Wolfhide Leather Armor, 2x Steel Armor, 1x Silken Robe.]
[Accessories Gained — 1x Necklace of (Minor) Fire Resistance, 1x Pendant of (Moderate) Lightning Resistance]
That was… a lot.
The pendant had come from the mountain man, which explained why he had survived that blast of lightning. The necklace came from one of the ranged units.
Most of the basic equipment was kind of useless, although I supposed with the market active, I could sell it all.
The steel spear I traded out to Skreek to replace his old iron one, which I gave to Elyndra to replace her bronze one.
The accessories I was unsure of what to do with at the moment.
It did let me know that the adventurers were starting to come with magical equipment, though.
The pendant would probably be handy if we had to fight anyone with a weapon similar to my own, or casters like that woman I had seen earlier.
“Alright,” I said after a few moments of resting. “We should head back. I’m sure the others will be back soon.”
The monsters nodded, and we gathered our things and began making our way back.
A quick glance at my Soul Essence as we began walking filled me with excitement.
Over seven thousand. I had plans for what to do with that when I got back.
We were the last group to return, and by the time we got back, the sun was beginning to set, casting the village in darkness aside from a couple of fires where my other monsters were already prepping food.
While Elyndra stuck by my side, the others went off and did their own thing once we were back.
I heaved a sigh of relief. Today had been a long day, but we had made some good gains in return.
A glance at the monster list showed me that a bunch of my monsters were ready to be evolved.
Including Arathog.
That filled me with even more excitement. My first Epic-level monster was now ready to be evolved. I could only imagine the power he would gain.
I headed right for the Core Room, stopping only briefly to let Analth know we were back. She seemed quite pleased with herself, and the monsters I had sent with her seemed almost… fearful of her.
I could only imagine what kind of hunting they had done.
As I reached the Core Room, I pulled up the list of monsters and began looking through evolutions.
Arathog only had one available to him: Hellblade.
It fit him perfectly, I thought, and it would buff his stats quite a bit, being a Rare class.
One thing made me pause, though I had expected it.
Evolutions had a cost for monsters above standard rarity.
[Evolve Epic Monster?]
[Time: 12:00:00h]
[Cost: 1000 Soul Essence]
It was pricey, but if Elyndra was any indication, I knew it’d be worth it in the end. And with it already being pretty late in the day, a twelve-hour timer wasn’t the end of the world.
Next was Zareth and Mulvak.
Zareth had refused any weapons or armor I had tried to give him, yet he was still surviving. So obviously, he specialized in unarmed fighting, which made his evolution choices make sense.
- Mauler
- Harrier
- Ashhide
The Mauler was basically what he had been doing—rushing in and hitting things until they stopped moving.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
The Harrier apparently darted around in combat, making quick hit-and-run attacks.
Then there was the Ashhide. It had the most unique-sounding name, but when I read its description, it sounded like it was just a tank—one that could use its own body to generate heat that damaged opponents attacking it.
All three were considered Common classes, and all three sounded neat.
I decided to go with the Ashhide. I didn’t have too many tanks, and it would be nice to have some more.
Mulvak was much like Tirven and only had the option to pick Phalanx. I assumed that was good. If it was anything like the formation it was named after, the more, the better.
Maya, like Kareth, had two assassin-themed classes available to her: Nightblade and Venomshade. I chose Venomshade, as it was considered a Rare class, whereas the Nightblade was only Uncommon.
Xele had also reached level 10, and her only evolution was called Phalangite. If my history was correct, it was just a fancier name for a unit in a phalanx, but I wasn’t going to complain. It was a Rare class.
With the evolutions chosen, I looked at my remaining Soul Essence: 5,788. A lot to play with, then.
I could summon another Epic-level monster, but something in me wanted to try some of the terrain-changing options—and I had access to some of the more advanced ones.
Volcanic or Dreadwastes.
The Volcanic terrain was pretty obvious in what it did; it made volcanoes appear and turned the land around them into a burning wasteland, granting a fire affinity to the monsters within.
I remembered briefly that monsters could evolve based on their terrain… so what would happen if I changed a section of land into Volcanic terrain and then had monsters live there? Would they gain flame-based evolutions?
Would I also start fighting flame-based monsters—and possibly become able to tame them? The questions were many, the answers few.
The Dreadwastes, on the other hand, were simply labeled as a “barren wasteland with a high density of Soul Essence.”
So… did that imply more undead and stronger monsters? How would it affect evolutions, then?
It was something to think on for a later date, but for now, I decided on making one of my domains Volcanic instead of Forest.
It didn’t take me long to think about where to put it.
I didn’t want it right next to my home, but I also wanted it in a spot we could reach easily to help defend against attacks from the west.
So I put it in the second slot to the west.
[Convert Forest to Volcanic terrain for 5000 Soul Essence?]
[Yes | No]
“Yes,” I said aloud as I pressed the button. The Soul Essence drained from the Core, and a timer popped up, making me smile.
[02:00:00h]
So it would take two hours, then. I guessed that was to give monsters and adventurers time to clear out or something.
I’d check it out in the morning.
The next thing I did was upgrade two of my huts to level-two huts, giving the creatures living in them more space to work with. Then I built a training yard, placing it near the Town Hall.
With the construction and evolutions finished, I smiled and nodded before stepping back out.
The huts I had leveled up had grown bigger and gained an extra floor, it looked like. I wondered briefly how that must have appeared to anyone who had been out here, but no one was running about in a panic.
A large fire in the center of the village glowed, a deer—or something like it—roasting on a spit.
Several of my monsters lounged around it, talking to one another or watching the food eagerly.
Analth herself was leaning against one of the huts, watching the others with an amused smile as I approached her.
“Lord Herald,” she smiled at me. “You’ve done some more building.”
I nodded, watching her gaze travel to where the training yard had been built.
“I figured it was time to get proper training grounds for the monsters to practice at,” I shrugged, before pressing on to why I had sought her out. “Analth… we ran into more adventurers… from that guild.”
She froze for a moment before meeting my gaze with a fierce look.
“Tell me everything,” she said.
I told her what had happened—who we had faced, how many. And I told her what they had chanted as they fought. As soon as I mentioned the name Morveth, she growled.
“So it is them,” she muttered.
When I raised a brow at her, she sighed and continued.
“The guild you faced is well known across the world. They are called the Chains of Morveth.”
I frowned at that.
“Chains of Morveth?” I questioned. She nodded and continued.
“Morveth was a god of this world a long time ago,” she explained. “Once one of the greater gods, he was cast out by the others and bound in chains. Not because the other gods were evil… but because he began to take justice too far.”
I blinked, looking down and frowning further, waiting for her to continue.
“You see, to Morveth, monsters—and anyone who allies with them—are a cancer to be purged from this world,” she continued. “His followers took that to the extreme and began going on witch hunts. Summoners suffered the most, as they were seen as consorting with monsters. For a long time, summoning magic was outlawed anywhere belief in Morveth was practiced.”
“Eventually, the followers of the other gods banded together and shut it down. But a singular guild dedicated to his worship remained—the Chains of Morveth.”
“It’s meant to be a symbol of the god himself,” I observed, and she nodded.
“That’s right,” she confirmed. “And to them, Heralds are a blight upon this world that should be erased from existence. Even the Herald of Peace that existed six decades ago was eliminated because he consorted with monsters.”
“Wait, so Heralds aren’t always monsters like myself?” I asked, and she shook her head.
“No, sometimes Heralds are just ordinary people,” she explained. “And like you, not all Heralds revel in the death of the mortal races, even when the instincts of monsters are to kill them.”
“Interesting,” I muttered, scratching my chin. This gave me a lot to think about. “Is it… Analth, is it possible for monsters and mortals to coexist?”
She didn’t answer for a long moment before finally nodding.
“I think it is,” she said nonchalantly. “After all, I did it for over a century. But… as the world stands right now, it would be nigh impossible for mortals and monsters to coexist.”
I nodded again, thinking hard on this. It was possible for us to coexist, then. It would just be difficult… requiring a rewrite of the world’s structure. It gave me a long-term goal in the end—something to strive toward.
My thoughts drifted to that group of adventurers I had chosen to save… and to my sister, who could possibly be in this world too.
Had my sister been summoned as a Herald like myself? Was she alone out there somewhere, like I had been at first, fighting to keep herself alive? Or had she been summoned as something else?
“Analth… you said before that when it was announced I had been summoned to this world… it was also announced that a hero had been summoned,” I began cautiously. “Is it… is it possible that the Hero could have come from the same world as myself?”
She nodded almost immediately. “I’d say it’s less possible and more almost a certainty, with how closely the two notifications came up.”
My heart skipped a beat in my chest, and I had to stop myself from collapsing.
So it was almost a certainty, then.
Almost entirely possible that my sister was here… and she was a Hero, destined to take down the Herald.
I could hear Analth saying my name—my real name—so I must have looked bad, but I couldn’t think at the moment. There was a ringing in my ears.
My sister.
My sweet, kind, loving sister was summoned here to kill me.
To make sure I never grew too powerful, to make sure I didn’t bring about the cataclysm of this world.
What the hell kind of bullshit is that?
[Current Day: 10]
[Soul Essence: 488]
[Kingdom Core: Level 3]
[Domain Size: 6 Sectors]
[Active Quest: — None —]