This Lich Requests More Remuneration

Chapter 74 - 74 74 You Know Too Much

?Chapter 74: Chapter 74 You Know Too Much Chapter 74: Chapter 74 You Know Too Much “Digging up a Lich’s Life Casket must be left to the professionals.”

“When it comes to dealing with the Undead, Alchemy City simply cannot compare to the Laine Empire.”

“The Paladins made a few rounds inside the castle and quickly noticed that there was something wrong with an altar—the corpses on it hadn’t been moved for a long time.”

“The leading Paladin gave an order, and upon dismantling the base of the altar, they indeed found a delicately crafted Life Casket, its rich undead aura appearing authentic,”
but the leading Paladin sneered and said, “Keep digging.”

The newcomers didn’t understand why, but they obeyed and continued, quickly unearthing another identical Life Casket beneath the base.

“Humph, it’s an old trick. These Undead really lack imagination,” the leading Paladin said smugly.

Just as he was about to call it a day, a rookie Paladin suddenly spoke up: “Captain, wait, the soil underneath looks disturbed as well.”

Leading Paladin: “Hm? Dig further!”

Sure enough, another Life Casket was quickly uncovered.

“This Lich has some tricks up his sleeve,” the leading Paladin remarked. “Knowing to play mind games, no wonder so many of our comrades have been fooled by him. But no matter how cunning…”

“Captain, it seems there’s still more…”

A somewhat embarrassed silence fell among the Paladins, and without needing orders, they continued digging. This time, to their greater astonishment, they found a Life Casket on each side of the same spot.

Faced with five gleaming Life Caskets, the leading Paladin’s scalp tingled.

He spoke with a trembling voice, “Life Caskets require a large number of souls as raw material, and even forgeries must contain souls… How many people has this Lich killed?”

Generally, the base requirement for a Lich’s Life Casket is a thousand human souls, with no upper limit.

These souls are key to protecting the core of the Lich and a source of their power.

Though slaves are cheap on the continent, five thousand people… What kind of maniacal undead is this?!

At that moment, a Paladin, whose voice was trembling, said: “Captain, do you think… all five Life Caskets could be fakes?”

The sweat on the captain’s forehead was profuse, his voice turning hoarse.

“Quick, cast Evil Detection, sweep the entire castle, do not skimp on the Divine Arts, we must check every corner carefully.”

The Paladins, with uneasy hearts, started searching everywhere, and what they found was unprecedented: more Life Caskets turned up, one after another—embedded in the ceiling, behind bookshelves, beneath flower pots, in preservative fluid containers, behind hangings, inside coffins… A horrifying number of Life Caskets were found, a total of eighty-eight.

Eighty-eight Life Caskets, calculated at a thousand lives per casket, meant this Lich had killed nearly a hundred thousand people!

This staggering number drove many of the younger ones to recite scriptures fervently, hoping to quell the fear and anger inside. The leading Paladin leaned against the wall, his hands and feet cold, having just found another new Life Casket in the corner.

Madness, utter madness. How many Life Caskets did this Lich make, and how many were still unearthed?

When James Watson, the follower of the Lord of the Dawn, saw the piles of Life Caskets, even he couldn’t help but utter a curse.

“They actually tolerated a Lich who massacred a hundred thousand people to exist here. The decay and darkness of Alchemy City are worse than I imagined!”

The wars recently waged by the Laine Empire did not kill this many. This Lich was truly sinful to the greatest degree, deserving to be struck down by divine punishment.

However, James Watson, as the Empire’s Supreme Decree who had seen many inhumane cases, quickly calmed himself down.

The number of Life Caskets seemed off. James vaguely remembered the Lich hadn’t been resurrected for long. If he had slaughtered a hundred thousand people in a short time, the local population would have been decimated a long time ago, turned into dead land. Moreover, Alchemy City wouldn’t stand by if he killed a hundred thousand people. Did they no longer care about ruling?

Feeling something was amiss, James Watson picked up a Life Casket. The palm of his hand shone with holy light, clashing with the dark magic power on the Life Casket. With a soft crack, the Life Casket was riddled with cracks, then James easily opened it.

Indeed, it was empty inside.

“The materials are definitely souls, and not weak ones at that, I’m afraid it’s more than a thousand souls. No, wait, is this the structure of space magic?”

James Watson looked at the broken magic array inside the Life Casket, able to discern only hints of space magic. But since he was not proficient in that kind of magic, he could only understand the gist of it.

Even though he could tell it was a type of spatial magic, James Watson still couldn’t figure out what it meant.

An empty Life Casket with an expanded capacity magic array, what was the point of that, too much money?

Although he couldn’t understand it, James Watson didn’t give up. He ordered the Paladins to thoroughly search the area, insisting on finding all the Life Caskets even if it meant digging three feet into the ground.

Meanwhile, the airship had already entered Alchemy City.

As Amberser entered this grand city of knowledge, the ancient magical patterns on the city walls began to shine. The Undead Queen, who had come under the guise of a visit, was respectfully asked to leave the city, and all the Magipuppet Automatons within the city were mobilized to patrol every corner.

Amberser couldn’t see this grand scene because as soon as he entered the city, he was brought to the Council Tower and presented with a pile of documents.

Gustavo Flint told him that these were the operation procedures of the Wishing Machine and asked him to study them carefully in order to familiarize himself with the process, so he could start making wishes once he was done reading.

Although Amberser knew it was a trap, he also knew that there was genuine information within that pile of documents.

As a scholar who had left his name in Alchemy City, they didn’t dare deceive him with fakes alone—there had to be a mix of truth and lies, something that seemed plausible.

Gustavo Flint probably didn’t realize that Amberser had already seen the rough structure of the sewers and guessed the truth about the Wishing Machine. Therefore, there must be valid information in these documents that could lead Amberser closer to the truth.

Amberser couldn’t wait to find out how the Wishing Ritual worked, where its weak points were, what went wrong that led to the destruction of Alchemy City, and how his own head had come to fall off.

Upon opening the documents, Amberser revealed a smile. He hadn’t guessed wrong— these alchemists had included some content about the Wishing Ritual amidst a mass of intentionally misleading information. However, with prior knowledge of the outcome, they still couldn’t deceive him.

While Amberser was diligently researching, Gustavo Flint began to grow impatient.

The agreement was that it would take no more than two hours to find the Life Casket, but it had almost been four hours. The Paladins were being too unreliable in their work. Although the Life Casket wasn’t the key to the entire plan and could be disregarded if necessary, having one less card to play against Amberser made Gustavo Flint uneasy.

In the end, Gustavo Flint still didn’t receive the Life Casket, because Amberser was the first to come out of the library with those documents.

Amberser smiled at Gustavo Flint and said, “I have memorized it. Now, may I make a wish?”

Gustavo Flint frowned and said, “So soon? Are you sure you’ve remembered it all? There can be no mistakes in this process.”

“Don’t worry, both you and I understand the importance of precision in alchemy. I wouldn’t joke with my own life. Oh, I just remembered, I’m a Lich, I won’t die as long as the Life Casket is safe.”

This last sentence of Amberser’s was like stepping on Gustavo Flint’s toes and grinding down hard, almost making him jump. However, the old actor managed to maintain his composure and said to Amberser, “Very well, since you can’t wait any longer, I will take you to witness the greatest masterpiece of Alchemy City.”

Gustavo Flint led Amberser to a massive teleportation magic array, which appeared to be a Continental Transmission Array capable of spanning tens of thousands of kilometers.

But Amberser knew well that this was just a ruse—the Teleportation Circle would send him directly into the sewers.

Therefore, just as the Teleportation Circle was about to activate, Amberser used Traceless Step and leaped out of the circle at the last moment.

Gustavo Flint, with a look of astonishment on his face, vanished into the circle, and he himself was sent into the sewers.

The alchemists in charge of the Teleportation Circle were too slow to react: How had the Lich suddenly run out?

Before they could take action, Amberser said, “Ah, my apologies, I suddenly felt a bit of an urge and needed to use the restroom.”

The alchemists outside the Magic Array were completely bewildered, with one foolish enough to ask, “Don’t the Undead lack that function?”

No sooner had the words been spoken, than a huge fireball exploded from Amberser’s fingertips, blasting the body of that alchemist to smithereens, while the raging flames also shattered the massive Teleportation Circle, cutting off Gustavo Flint’s chance of return.

It was only then that Amberser blew out the small flame on his fingertip and said to the dead alchemist, “You knew too much.”