Another World: When a Necromancer Possesses the Banner of Ten Thousand Souls

"The breakthrough still lies in the summoned creatures." A glint flashed in Li Xingyao's eyes. The existing skeleton warriors had a simple structure, possessing only melee capabilities. Could... they be modified? For example, could they be equipped with ranged weapons?

He immediately dismissed the idea as soon as it crossed his mind. With his current knowledge and understanding of the undead, it was utterly absurd. Or… perhaps he should seek out and summon undead units that already possessed ranged attack capabilities? That was the orthodox thinking of a necromancer!

Suddenly, he felt a pang of hunger. Li Xingyao got up, walked quickly to the control panel embedded in the wall in the corner of the training room, and started the standard nutrition meal delivery program.

A slight hum of machinery sounded, and a moment later, a bland, tasteless synthetic nutritional meal and a glass of electrolyte water appeared at the retrieval point. He picked them up and ate them listlessly, but his thoughts had already pierced through the barriers of space, soaring towards that eternally desolate land.

After the meal, Li Xingyao did not meditate to recover or train his skills as usual. He sat cross-legged in the center of the training room, adjusted his breathing, cleared his mind of all distractions, and his mental energy instantly sank into the depths of his consciousness.

"Buzz..."

A familiar, deep resonance resonated on his spiritual level, and the space before him seemed as if a pebble had been thrown into a calm pond, creating invisible ripples. After countless communications over this period, entering the world of death was now second nature to him.

Consciousness was drawn by an invisible force, instantly piercing through the stable passage formed by the eerie blue flame in the center of the undead space, and once again descending into that vast and boundless land of death that filled all living beings with despair.

Consciousness "suspended" in a void. Before him lay an unchanging, leaden-gray sky, heavy and low, exuding a chilling stillness. The air was filled with dust, decaying bones, and the stench of decay that had seeped into the soul, accumulated over countless years.

Li Xingyao's "consciousness" hovered on the relatively safe edge of this world of death. Below, there was still that familiar, seemingly endless sea of ​​skeletons.

Countless gray-white skulls, like carelessly discarded trash, wandered aimlessly, bumping into each other and rubbing against one another. The teeth-grinding "creaking" sounds of their joints grinding together created a never-ending, unsettling background noise of death.

The world of the dead is dangerous for necromancers, but the level of the undead in this area is relatively low and the field of vision is relatively open. Li Xingyao assessed the danger level as "controllable".

His sharp "gaze" swept across the area, his mental energy extending cautiously like an invisible radar beam, filtering out the worthless ordinary skeletons and zombies. His objective was exceptionally clear: to find special undead units with ranged attack capabilities!

Just then, in a relatively sparse area in the distance, several unusual figures entered his perception range!

Their appearance is still that of a skeleton, but their skeletal structure is clearly different from that of ordinary skeleton warriors! They are more slender and longer, especially the arm bones connecting the shoulder blades, which are disproportionately long, nearly one-third longer than those of ordinary skeleton warriors!

This gives them an eerie, throwing-oriented appearance. Most striking are the weapons they grip tightly—no longer rusted swords and blades, but crude spears pieced together from pale, boneless bones!

The spears were rough, covered with bone spikes and signs of splicing, their ends sharpened to an exceptionally sharp point, gleaming with a ghastly, dangerous luster. Deep within their eye sockets, the eerie blue sparks of their souls shone much brighter than those of ordinary skeleton warriors, as if they possessed a more advanced form of intelligence.

Skeleton spearmen!

Li Xingyao's heart skipped a beat, and a strong sense of excitement instantly dispelled the previous gloom!

Without the slightest hesitation, he instantly locked onto the closest target that appeared to be in the best condition, while simultaneously communicating with the Myriad Soul Banner with all his might! Gentle and pure soul power flowed from the banner, quickly and perfectly merging with his own spiritual power, becoming inseparable.

call!

With a thought, approximately 40 points of star energy were instantly drained from the body, and the soul power stored in the Myriad Soul Banner was also reduced by about 30 points! The consumption was significantly higher than when summoning an ordinary skeleton warrior! A grayish-white stream of light, thicker and more solid than when summoning a skeleton warrior, seemed to transcend the barriers of space and flashed across the real space of the training room!

"Crack!" A crisp sound, like a bone breaking, rang out in the silent training room!

A skeleton warrior wielding a ferocious bone spear appeared instantly on the ground in front of Li Xingyao!

This newly summoned undead creature, the Skeleton Spearman, is nearly 1.8 meters tall, with a slender and elongated skeleton, as if meticulously carved from ivory, its surface gleaming with a cold, hard enamel sheen, clearly of higher quality than the bones of ordinary skeleton warriors.

The most striking features are undoubtedly its disproportionately large arm bones and the two-meter-long bone spear it grips tightly in its hand! The spear is rough, covered with bone spikes and wear marks, yet it exudes a primitive, savage, and ferocious killing aura.

It stood quietly, its empty eye sockets turned toward Li Xingyao, silently awaiting its master's command.

"Good!" A gleam of surprise flashed in Li Xingyao's eyes, his heart pounding with excitement. He immediately issued a clear and direct command through the mental link: "Target, alloy target ahead, throw it with full force!"

The instructions are concise and the intent is clear.

The skeletal spearman didn't hesitate. A sudden surge of ghostly blue soulfire erupted from its empty eye sockets! Its bony feet slammed into the alloy mesh floor, producing a soft "crack" sound!

The entire skeleton tilts backward dramatically in a posture far more fluid than that of an ordinary skeleton warrior, twisting its waist and hips, and swinging its extra-long arm bones! It is full of a sense of power ready to be unleashed!

"Ugh—!"

A chilling shriek suddenly tore through the air! The pale white bone spear transformed into a blinding bolt of lightning, carrying immense force, instantly traversing a distance of more than ten meters, and stabbing fiercely into the alloy target!

"boom!!!"

A deafening roar, far more muffled and heavy than the sound of an arrow of death striking, exploded in the closed training room! Like a heavy hammer slamming into an anvil!

The alloy target shook violently! At the point of impact, the dark, special coating designed to absorb the shock was dented. The nearby screen flickered wildly, the value representing the physical impact soaring until it finally settled on a number that made Li Xingyao's heart stop:

[320 points (piercing)]!

Pure physical piercing damage! Far more powerful than his Death Arrow! And this is just a single-target attack! Yet the Star Power consumed is almost the same as summoning a regular skeleton warrior! A huge cost-performance advantage!

After the skeleton spearman completed the throwing motion, his body leaned back slightly due to the huge reaction force, and he was in a very brief, stiff state of about half a second before returning to a stable standing posture, only his hands were now empty.

"It has a low attack frequency, needs a short buffer after each attack, and only has one weapon, which is gone once it's thrown away..." Li Xingyao quickly analyzed. "However, it is stronger than ordinary skeleton warriors, wields a spear, and has a longer attack range than skeletons with swords."

He wasn't a perfectionist; it's normal for low-level undead to have limitations. The key is how to compensate for them through unit combinations and tactical command. "You can completely make up for your shortcomings by coordinating different unit types to form combat combinations."

Li Xingyao sensed the size of the undead space. As the star energy level increased, this mysterious space was also slowly and steadily expanding, and it had now reached approximately eighteen square meters.

This means he can accommodate more summons! "Currently, the space can still summon at least four more spear throwers like these. The specific ratio adjustment can be decided after a practical test at the school training grounds tomorrow."

Li Xingyao couldn't wait to summon the second one. He focused his mind again, communicating with the spirit world, preparing to return to the world of the dead to summon his next target.

However, just as his consciousness pierced the barrier between the undead realm and the world of the dead, re-descending above the Sea of ​​Skeletons, locking onto the next skeleton spear thrower, and preparing to unleash the summoning—

A sudden change has occurred!

"roar--!!!"

A terrifying roar, so deep it seemed to come from the deepest part of the earth, from the depths of the netherworld, exploded without warning within Li Xingyao's core consciousness! This roar did not travel through the air, but acted directly on the soul!

It was filled with primal violence, endless hunger, and a pure desire for destruction! An indescribable and irresistible terrifying pressure, like a world-ending tsunami, instantly swept through the area of ​​consciousness where Li Xingyao was located!

It was ten or even a hundred times more terrifying than any undead he had ever sensed before! It was an absolute crushing defeat in terms of rank!

Li Xingyao's consciousness suddenly froze! It was as if he had been gripped tightly by an invisible, sky-covering giant hand! An instinctive tremor from the deepest part of his soul caused his thoughts to freeze instantly, making it almost impossible for him to think effectively!

With his last ounce of willpower, he forcefully mustered his trembling mental energy and "looked" toward the source of that terrifying pressure.

Deeper within the Sea of ​​Skulls, at the edge of the core area shrouded in an even denser, ink-black mist, a colossal, suffocating figure slowly rose to its feet!

It was an unimaginable skeletal behemoth! Its shape vaguely resembled the outline of some kind of giant ape, but its entire body was composed of bare white bones!

Its height definitely exceeded ten meters, and its skeleton was as thick as the trunk of an ancient tree, with each rib resembling a giant ivory tusk! Most terrifying of all were its empty eye sockets, within which burned two enormous, boiling, blood-red soul flames, like furnaces!

The terrifying mental pressure emanating from those two soul flames, carrying the aura of burning away all living beings, made Li Xingyao's consciousness like a candle in the wind, ready to be extinguished at any moment!