Undead Mage: I Have a Skeleton Clone-Chapter 543 - 385: Skeleton Centurion, the Great Crisis of the Corpse Hills!

If this is successful, it will greatly enhance my power and give me a significant advantage in the Corpse Hills.

With this mix of puzzlement and anticipation, Fang Zhou led his skeleton squad to meet the enemy head-on. He ordered Tidamia, Sain, Verus, and the other mutated Skeleton Warriors to spearhead the assault and draw the enemy’s attention. He and the remaining Skeleton Warriors followed closely behind, forming a tight formation.

However, after the first clash, Fang Zhou was somewhat disappointed. The ordinary Skeleton Warriors in this rare skeleton squad were clearly several levels weaker in combat power than his own skeleton servants. Perhaps their Four-dimensional Attributes were not much different, but Fang Zhou’s Skeleton Monarch skill provided a substantial all-around enhancement to his servants. This made Fang Zhou’s skeleton servants much stronger in every aspect compared to these ordinary Skeleton Warriors.

This was to say nothing of Olaf and the host of mutated skeletons in Fang Zhou’s squad. Their combat power far exceeded that of ordinary Skeleton Warriors. Olaf, as one of the elites, was not only massive but also possessed extremely formidable attack power and defense power, capable of taking on dozens of ordinary Skeleton Warriors by himself. Tidamia, Sain, Verus, Yongen, and the other mutated Skeleton Warriors each had their own specialties. Some were skilled in close combat while others excelled in ranged attacks, making their overall combat power extremely balanced.

What disappointed Fang Zhou even more was that the strength of this Skeleton Centurion was utterly unremarkable. Its strength couldn’t compare to the terrifying combat power of the Corpse Clone, which had undergone multiple evolutions and mastered a series of universal Black Iron-tier Combat Professional skills; it wasn’t even on par with Olaf. In Fang Zhou’s Perception, the Skeleton Centurion’s combat power was far inferior to even the weakest of his warriors, the Beheading Giant Sword Skeleton Warrior, Tidamia.

It’s as if all the Centurion’s abilities were focused on controlling and commanding Skeleton Warriors, not on individual combat.

Even a lion uses its full strength to hunt a rabbit. Despite feeling somewhat let down, Fang Zhou still gave it his all.

Led by Fang Zhou, Olaf, and the host of mutated Skeleton Warriors, the two groups of skeletons soon clashed head-on. At the onset of the battle, Fang Zhou’s skeleton servants demonstrated overwhelming superiority. Tidamia swung his massive Beheading Giant Sword, severing the bones of several Skeleton Warriors and sending bone fragments flying. Verus unleashed a volley of arrows infused with Death Energy, pinning enemy Skeleton Warriors to the ground one by one as the energy rapidly corroded their bones. Sain wielded his heavy Tower Shield, blocking the enemy’s ranged attacks and creating more offensive opportunities for his allies. Olaf, with his huge stature and powerful attacks, became a core force on the battlefield, sending several Skeleton Warriors flying with a single swing of his axe.

Fang Zhou’s mutated Skeleton Warriors not only possessed formidable combat strength but also coordinated flawlessly, forming an efficient combat system. The ordinary Skeleton Warriors were almost powerless before them and were quickly suppressed.

Fang Zhou focused his main efforts on the Skeleton Centurion, ordering Tidamia and Verus to concentrate their fire on it in an attempt to defeat it quickly. Although the Skeleton Centurion was average in individual combat, its command ability was not to be underestimated. It swiftly commanded the surrounding Skeleton Warriors to form a defensive line, trying to withstand Fang Zhou’s onslaught.

However, relying on their higher combat power and more seamless cooperation, Fang Zhou’s skeleton servants gradually broke through the enemy’s defense. Yongen’s dual blades sliced through the Skeleton Centurion’s longsword, Verus’s sharp arrow pierced its breastbone, Sain’s Tower Shield shattered its body, and Olaf sent it flying with a swing of his axe.

Ultimately, this skeleton squad of over a hundred swiftly collapsed under the combined assault of Fang Zhou and his skeleton servants. Fang Zhou’s team suffered only a little over ten casualties among his skeleton servants. He hardly cared for these expendable resources.

After the battle, Fang Zhou grabbed the Skeleton Centurion, which had been battered into little more than a bone stick, and activated his Skeleton Monarch skill. According to his past experience, the Skeleton Monarch skill was the supreme nemesis for Skeleton-Series undead creatures. As long as these undead creatures lost their ability to resist, they couldn’t effectively oppose the Soul Link from the Skeleton Monarch and would utterly surrender.

However, what followed was beyond Fang Zhou’s expectations. When the Soul Link generated by the Skeleton Monarch skill touched the Skeleton Centurion’s Soul Fire, the once-flourishing flame instantly shattered. Fang Zhou’s plan to enslave it had naturally failed.

Fang Zhou couldn’t help but be a bit surprised. But shortly after, his Soul Link captured some memories from the Soul Fire fragments of the now-dead Skeleton Centurion, and his expression turned even more grave.

It turned out that the Skeleton Centurion’s ability to command skeletons did not come from its own mutation. It was a power granted by a Skeleton Lord—a being it remembered as supremely powerful, majestic, and terrifying—through a Skeleton Soldier Talisman. This Skeleton Centurion had offered its Soul Fire to the Skeleton Lord as a pledge of loyalty, receiving the talisman in return, which allowed it to command over a hundred ordinary Skeleton Warriors.

From these fragmented memories, Fang Zhou learned that there were no fewer than one hundred such Skeleton Centurions with Skeleton Soldier Talismans in this more perilous region of the Corpse Hills. This meant that skeleton squads of the size he had just eliminated were dotted throughout this area, at least a hundred of them. Even more frightening, these hundred skeleton squads, totaling over ten thousand Skeleton Warriors, all served an unknown Skeleton Lord. They had been subjugated through the use of these Skeleton Soldier Talismans.

Fang Zhou’s expression was extremely serious. Although the information he gathered from the Skeleton Centurion’s Soul Fire was fragmented and incomplete, it was enough to see the tip of the iceberg. The power and prestige of this Skeleton Lord were something Fang Zhou could no longer ignore. In fact, this Skeleton Lord was the most terrifying undead creature he had encountered in his half-year of exploring and hunting in the Undead Realm.

A strong sense of urgency surged within Fang Zhou. The situation in the Corpse Hills is far more complex and dangerous than I imagined. The Skeleton Lord’s existence not only meant the undead in this region were highly organized, but it also foreshadowed a formidable enemy lurking in the shadows, ready to launch a deadly attack at any moment.

The only silver lining was that, according to the Centurion’s few remaining memories, the Skeleton Lord was still at the Black Iron Tier. However, after an unknown period of tempering and refinement, it had undergone numerous evolutions. Despite its innate racial limitations preventing it from breaking through the bottleneck to advance to Bronze, almost no other undead creature at the Black Iron Tier could compare to it.

Considering all this information, my desire for battle is boiling over. For ordinary skeletons, even for this Lord who could be called a genius among them, the Skeleton Race’s talent is capped at the upper Black Iron level. This inherent gap means the Skeleton Lord could spend its entire existence unable to break the bottleneck and advance to Bronze. Therefore, it had to find an alternative path, expanding its influence by enslaving skeletons and creating Skeleton Soldier Talismans. Moreover, I’m certain this Skeleton Lord must have also received the blessing of the Undead Blood Moon. That’s the only way it could possess an ability that even I envy.

In the Skeleton Centurion’s memories, the hierarchy was clear. The Centurion was subservient to a Skeleton Chiliarch, and the Skeleton Chiliarch was subservient to the Skeleton Lord. The Skeleton Lord itself was entrenched in the White Bone Castle, silently accumulating power and waiting for the day it could finally break through its bottleneck, advance to Bronze, and shatter its racial limits.