How to Raise Your Skeletons

Lee Sunah slowly raised her sword. At that moment, an overwhelming mana pressed down on my shoulders.

“…!”

The power was immense. It felt like the slightest movement would result in her sword slicing my head clean off. But even more astonishing was her immense aura exerted over the ghoul and specter armies below the wall.

“Groar?”

“Kyiiieh…?”

The creatures that had been charging with great ferocity began to halt one by one like rabbits frozen before a tiger.

“Gwoah! Gwoooh!”

The ones at the front stumbled, causing chaos as the rear ranks collided with them.

—Rumble!

Dust rose into the air as their formation crumbled.

Ah, so this was what the presence of a ranker felt like.

“My control still needs work,” Lee Sunah said, clicking her tongue in mild disappointment. “I wanted my killing aura to only affect them.”

She lightly kicked off the ground and soared into the air, showing no hesitation despite the height of the wall. Her graceful movement through the sky was a work of art, her flowing hair adding to the scene.

“Watch closely, Skeleton Lord,” she said softly, her voice carrying through the wind. “My unique ability is called the Black Sword Flight Arts.”

In the next moment, she reversed her grip on the sword. Then…

—Whooosh!

Like a cannonball, she dove straight at the ground below, her body plunging with incredible speed.

—Fwoosh!

She rained down like a storm.

Black Sword Flight Arts.

Area-Wide Technique.

First Form: Thunder Annihilation.

Her sword pierced the ground, and at that moment…

—BOOM!

An ear-shattering explosion echoed through the sky.

At the same time, all the ghouls and specters were blasted into the air. It wasn’t of their own volition—they had been helplessly thrown up, like leaves in a storm.

Is that… an AOE crowd-control skill?

I was in awe. It was a sight straight out of a video game.

“Wow, our leader’s amazing! That was awesome!” Kang Jihoo, the vice leader, exclaimed in admiration.

It wasn’t just him—the soldiers defending the wall all turned their attention to Lee Sunah.

“Wh-Who is that?”

“Never seen her before.”

“What kind of soldier has that kind of insane skill?”

But the display was far from over.

—Shing!

Pulling her sword out of the ground, Lee Sunah now gripped it firmly in her right hand. She extended her left palm and aimed her sword at the enemies still suspended in the air.

“Hup!”

With a sharp breath, she unleashed a flurry of strikes.

Black Sword Flight Arts.

Area-Wide Technique.

Second Form: Black Wind Sword.

—Slash! Slash! Slash!

A torrent of sword slashes filled the air. As its name suggested, Black Wind Sword summoned a dark whirlwind that engulfed the battlefield.

“Gwooooh!”

“Kiiieee!”

She was at the caliber of being able to create a natural disaster with a single sword.

“Wow,” I couldn’t help but marvel at her. I never thought something like this could have been possible.

Now I understood why rankers were sometimes called natural disasters. And she was just the 509th rank. How much stronger could those ranked higher be?

—Rumble!

The scene outside the wall was a spectacle. The black storm tore through everything, decimating the ranks of the ghouls and specters like a blender.

Lee Sunah gracefully landed in front of me, as if she hadn’t just unleashed a devastating attack. “Haha, what do you think, Skeleton Lord?” She smiled. “Not bad, huh? Although it’s just a basic technique I use against weaker opponents, it’s still pretty decent, right?”

“Honestly, you seemed more like a mage than a swordswoman there.”

“Isn’t that how skills work?” she laughed.

Sure, skills worked like that, but still… I couldn’t help but wish I had skills like hers. Of course, my skeleton summoning was a top-tier skill too.

Lee Sunah lowered her sword again. “Anyway, we’re far from being done yet.”

“Still far from it, huh?”

“That was just the first wave. We haven’t even seen the true Immortal Legion yet.”

“Haah,” I sighed and nodded.

At the same time, I could understand why she had put on such a flashy display of power. The expressions of the soldiers had changed entirely.

“Woooaaahhh!”

“We can do it! We have a goddess of war with us!”

“Does this mean… we might survive? Even those immortal bastards have a weakness?”

The soldiers erupted into cheers, their morale surging. The once-defeated soldiers now had hope.

“Move quickly! We must prepare for battle!”

“Bring more fire and arrows!”

“I’ll carry the heavy stones!”

Even the soldiers, who had previously shrank in fear, found new energy and began moving with purpose.

[You have witnessed the Ghoul Legion.]

[You have witnessed the Specter Legion.]

Another wave of undead forces was approaching from afar. But this time, the soldiers’ eyes gleamed with hope.

“Now that the team leader has shown her power, how about we take a turn?” Kang Jihoo suggested, unsheathing his sword.

—Shing! Shing!

The other two members of the Black Sword Squad silently followed suit, drawing their weapons.

And so did I.

“I’ll fight too.” I swung my staff and summoned my skeletons.

[Using skill ‘Summon Great Skeleton’ (B-rank).]

[Consuming 50 energy.]

Excluding Demir, I summoned five skeletons.

“My lord, are those the enemies we must eliminate?”

“Purging evil is a duty for the forest elves.”

With trusty Sunny and Eldrin at my side, I was ready.

“Let’s wipe them out.”

The real battle was about to begin.

—Thunk!

Sunny’s spear pierced through the throat of a ghoul.

—Whoosh! Thunk! Thunk!

Eldrin’s arrows flew through the air, each finding their mark and skewering a ghoul through the forehead.

“Gwooooar!”

Even though they were undead, their screams were disturbingly human.

The specters didn’t fare much better.

—Fwoosh!

Boney 5’s powerful Fire Field (Lv.4) and Fireball (Lv. Max) incinerated the ghostly figures easily.

Hmm.

These creatures were weak—roughly C-rank or D-rank at best. Encountering just one of these would have been a severe challenge in the past. But now…

I’ve grown.

There was no sense of danger. I was cutting through them like slicing tofu.

The only problem is…

There were simply too many of them. No matter how many we killed, they kept coming like from a never-ending production line.

—Whoosh! Thud!

I swung a sword—just a common one a soldier had dropped—but it worked well enough.

A successor of All Techniques doesn’t blame his tools.

The old man once beat Gi Soyul half to death using nothing but a tree branch. I could certainly cut through ghouls with an ordinary sword if he could do that.

Next up, a spear.

With a swift motion, I caught a spear thrown from the wall and decapitated two ghouls at once.

Nice.

I was now putting what I’d learned from my training with All Techniques into practice—Rend (B-rank), Pierce (B-rank), Shoot (B-rank), Defend (B-rank). Each technique was honed to the best of my ability. For me, these enemies weren’t adversaries; they were practice dummies.

I have to relax my body.

One step at a time, I moved fluidly, cutting and thrusting with precision. Following the natural flow of my movements, I fought with ease.

“Gwaaaargh!”

“Yeah, yeah, time to die.”

—Thwick!

My spear pierced through the ghoul’s neck.

—Twist!

I twisted the blade, ensuring the kill.

—Swish!

Even when a ghoul’s claws came dangerously close to scratching me, Boney 5’s Air Shield (Lv. Max) automatically blocked the attack.

“Hahaha! Amazing, Skeleton Lord!” the vice leader, Kang Jihoo, chimed in beside me. “Is this what they mean by the necromancer class being overpowered? You’re fighting extremely well!”

“You’re also quite formidable yourself.”

“Haha, of course. I am an S-rank, after all. Anyway, we should start preparing soon.”

“Prepare?”

I turned my gaze to the horizon. The ghouls and specters were still pouring in, but I had been focused on something else since earlier.

There’s something…

A presence that felt unsettling. My Great Blue Heart Technique warned me to stay cautious.

“According to the information, the lich should appear soon. It’s the key figure in this dungeon.”

“The one that casts the gimmick limiting our numbers?”

“Yep. The dungeon should be complete once we defeat the lich and the death knights. Easy, right?”

I glanced at Kang Jihoo.

Something still felt off. I wanted to warn him, but without concrete evidence, I hesitated. With a ranker here, we should be fine… Right?

“Anyway, let’s finish off these minions quickly.”

“Yes, stay strong.”

With that, I moved forward again. Even the soldiers, throwing down obstacles from the wall, began to descend and join the fight.

The light rain began to pick up.

“…”

The droplets grew heavier, increasing with each passing moment. I briefly glanced at the rain as it washed the filth of the ghouls’ blood from my sword and spear.

No matter. Sunny and Eldrin swiftly cut down the monsters that approached me. I could afford a few moments of reflection amidst the chaos.

“Phew.”

But just as I started to relax…

“Look there!”

“S-Something’s coming!”

“Oh gods… That’s the real Immortal Legion…!”

The soldiers’ voices trembled with fear as they began to back away.

“The lich has arrived,” Lee Sunah muttered, rolling her neck to loosen up. She looked completely at ease, drenched only by the rain, showing no signs of fatigue.

[Warning! Warning! Warning!]

[The leader of the Immortal Legion, the ‘Lich,’ has appeared.]

[The soldiers are stricken with terror.]

[All stats decreased by 20%.]

“Hmm.”

I felt a sudden loss of strength. I was not terrified—probably because the dungeon identified me as a soldier in this scenario.

I swallowed.

The lich’s red eyes locked onto mine.

Something just didn’t feel right.

“Is the gimmick about to start?” I asked quietly.

The lich’s eyes grew even brighter red as time passed.

“Yes, the curse is starting,” Lee Sunah confirmed. “According to the information, we just need to wait it out. If there’s no necromancer present, we’ll die instantly. If there is, any excess beyond five participants will die at random.”

“That sounds like a terrifying curse.”

“But we meet the conditions, don’t we?” she smiled confidently.

That’s when it happened.

[The lich’s curse begins.]

—Shwaaah!

The rain intensified, pelting down like hail.

Was it finally starting?

—Ring!

[If there is no hunter with abilities related to necromancy present, all participants in the dungeon will die.]

[If a hunter with abilities related to necromancy is present, any participants exceeding five will die at random.]

Yeah, it matched what Lee Sunah had said. All we had left to do was to crush that lich’s head with a smile.

“…”

But I couldn’t take my eyes off the lich. Its lips hadn’t stopped moving since it arrived.

“Necromancer,” the lich whispered. “Trials must be set according to one’s potential. Your latent power is extraordinary.”

At that moment…

—Tzzz! Tzzz!

The message about the curse started to distort, as if with static interference.

“What the…?” The vice leader, Kang Jihoo, was baffled. “What is this?”

Lee Sunah also frowned.

[Reevaluating the necromancer’s level.]

[The curse has been upgraded.]

—Kaboom!

Lightning struck from the sky. And then…

From all directions, hundreds—no, thousands—of dark figures began to rise from the ground, cloaked in black energy.

[The dungeon’s difficulty has increased.]

[The level of the ‘Immortal Legion’ has increased.]

[Dullahan (A-rank) x 1,000 have been summoned.]

[Death Knight (S-rank) x 100 have been summoned.]

[Lich (S-rank) x 10 have been summoned.]

“…What the hell,” I cursed aloud.