Chapter 147: The Walking Corpse (2)

Wu Qingsong killed all eight bandits, subsequently turning them into walking corpses as per the instructions on the fragmented scrolls.

This ordeal was a significant mental trial and torment for him, and the consecutive failures made him realize that necromancy wasn’t the effortless, cost-free solution he had imagined.

According to The Book of the Dead, the more potent the necromantic spell, the lower its success rate, and the more severe the backlash from any failure. This necessity compelled necromancers to spend considerable time in meditation, focusing on refining and enhancing their mental strength.

Without his undying body and soul, these failures alone would have necessitated a lengthy recovery.

He acknowledged his impatience.

The proper approach should have been to start gradually with skeletons, familiarizing himself with controlling undead creatures and refining soul shards, all while bolstering his mental power. Once he had sufficiently mastered skeleton control and fortified his mental strength, he could then progress to more advanced undead entities. Instead, he rushed through various curses, awakening dozens of skeletons, and then immediately proceeded to experiment with creating walking corpses. All within less than a month.

It was akin to a fast-food gamer, power-leveled to max by others, who then found themselves with poor gameplay skills and awareness, inadequate gear, and utterly clueless about the game’s lore and context, ultimately possessing nothing but a high level.

“Maybe is’t time to pause?” he told himself.

The Book of the Dead had many pages speaking on the philosophical matters of life and death. Was it merely a matter of belief or some scholar’s obsession? 

Without such foundational beliefs, Wu Qingsong considered that necromancers, unlike him, unable to swiftly recover from backlash, might eventually lose their sanity under the weight of their suffering.

Why had magic, theoretically capable of significantly enhancing productivity, become a taboo? Why, after the destruction of the Batiz civilization, did the elves not appropriate the achievements of necromancy for themselves but instead chose to obliterate it? Perhaps he should look for answers in the sections he had previously skipped.

He was convinced that there were no evil powers, only people who wield power maliciously. But, if the very source of that power was inherently unethical and destructive to moral compasses, could it then corrupt those who wield it?

He had no desire to tread the path of the Lich King, Arthas. Seeking power was one thing, but to be consumed by it was entirely another tragedy.

Thus, the eight memory-less zombies were cautiously concealed by him within the Elmons Mine, outfitted with the finest gear, and tasked with eradicating any remaining antpeople within.

Their capabilities proved sufficient for the confined mine spaces, effectively countering the antpeople’s last stand. After dispatching these enemies, they would carry the remains to a site near the mine’s exit. There, trusted houndmen like Angus would transport the bodies to the factory for dissection and processing.

Wu Qingsong quickly realized that the instincts within the zombies stemmed from both their physical bodies and soul fragments. 

The soul fragments he acquired in the mines undoubtedly came from miners killed by antpeople, making the zombies awakened with these fragments possess both the combat abilities of the bandits and the miners’ skills in digging and locating ores. In contrast, zombies created from hunter soul fragments found in the ruins of Orgrimmar excelled in combat but were lost when it came to mining.

Regrettably, they weren’t truly undead beings but rather undead puppets without the capacity for independent thought, and thus, without the ability to learn. They acted based on the body’s inherent instincts. 

When the soul fire within them began to wane, Wu Qingsong had to promptly replenish them with soul fragments to sustain their ability to move.

To maintain his increasingly large undead army, Wu Qingsong occasionally had to visit places of past killings to gather soul fragments. Most of the skeletons were commanded to hibernate in the mines to reduce the consumption of the soul fire.

“You really don’t have to go through so much trouble,” Xeila said to him one day. “By torturing and killing a strong beastman, you can extract a powerful and angry soul from its body. You just need to find a way to purify it, and you’ll have enough soul fragments to last a long time.”

“My people did it that way,” she explained to Wu Qingsong. “If you’re hesitant about targeting civilians and slaves, that’s okay. We can capture more bandits, torture and kill them, and extract powerful soul fragments from them.”

For someone with a past as a desert bandit to say such a thing left Wu Qingsong uncertain how to react. He could appreciate Xeila’s intention to help him and was thankful for it, but he firmly disagreed with her approach.

“I won’t do that,” he shook his head firmly. “I can judge and publicly execute them for their crimes, but I refuse to torture and cruelly kill them just to harvest their souls.”

“What’s the difference?” Xeila challenged. “Either way, they end up dead. Does the method or whether it’s done in public really matter? They’re doomed to die, so does the result change anything?”

“I’m not sure how to explain, but it really is different,” Wu Qingsong insisted.

He felt an increasing sense of disparity in values between himself and Xeila. Unlike with others, such as Ram, where their disagreements or debates were mostly due to differences in common sense leading to different views, not a fundamental difference in ethical or moral views. The differences in their upbringing meant they approached problems from vastly different angles, but they always managed to find some common ground.

Ling, Liuli, and even Feya’s worldviews were still being shaped, subtly influenced by their interactions with Wu Qingsong. Gradually, their perspectives began to converge naturally.

Interestingly, it’s Nina whose values most closely matched Wu Qingsong’s.

But Xeila’s experiences might have been too harsh, or perhaps her unique background and upbringing have led her to view life with a distinct indifference, normalize killing, and even harbor a thirst for bloodshed. This was the most significant difference between them.

Wu Qingsong wished to change her but quickly realized he had nowhere to begin, as those traits had nearly become her instincts. 

While Xeila clearly sought to fit into their group, making considerable efforts to do so, and seeing attempts from others to include her, she remained distinctly out of place.