Volume 9: From Green Leaves to the Undead Chapter 13: The Heroic Call to Arms

After swiftly seizing two public villages, Li Bin finally received news from the system regarding the resurrection of one of his heroes. The first to return was San Nei, Li Bin’s primary strategist. Although he had lost one level due to his death in the recent battle, the experience gained had propelled him to level 11, qualifying him for the first advancement quest of the Skeleton Mage class.

However, to assist Li Bin in developing their territory, San Nei set aside all personal tasks and sought out Li Bin immediately upon his resurrection.

By the time the rest of Li Bin’s heroes had been revived, he and San Nei had already consolidated the situation across the northern part of the continent. Inside the town hall of the largest public city currently held in the north, Li Bin met with all his resurrected heroes. He greeted them one by one and distributed the rewards obtained from the recent mission.

Meanwhile, San Nei was silently setting up a sizable sand table to the side. It depicted the topography of the entire continent, with the most detailed sections focusing on their occupied northern lands, as well as Li Bin’s original territory and Disya’s domain.

Once all the heroes were seated, Li Bin pointed to the sand table and began discussing their gains over the past few days. During this time, Li Bin had traversed every corner of the northern continent. Because Aska’s massive explosion had obliterated all private cities—leaving players and heroes alike dead and forced to respawn elsewhere—they had easily captured the public cities, which had only suffered a one-level penalty.

Li Bin now held 11 public cities in the northern continent alone. Most of the private city hearts that had belonged to the Green Leaf Alliance had reverted to Nature-aligned city hearts. For the lower-level ones, Li Bin had already contacted the Joshua Trading Company to trade them for administrative heroes, but he had other plans for the high-level city hearts.

As he spoke, Li Bin produced the Hero Recruitment Orders he had recently acquired. Beside him, San Nei explained their plan: Li Bin would use these three orders to recruit administrative heroes with professions such as architects or mechanics, a choice that would bring significant benefits to both his old and new territories.

Hearing Li Bin’s proposal, Jessica immediately chimed in, "It would be best to get a planter as well; that would be very beneficial for our territory in the south."

Li Bin smiled at Jessica and replied, "That is exactly why I waited until you all were resurrected. There are many administrative heroes to choose from, and I need your informed opinions."

With that, Li Bin handed the three recruitment orders to San Nei. It was decided that San Nei would filter out the candidates best suited for the development of Li Bin’s territory, explain their attributes to the group, and then everyone would collectively decide whether to force the recruitment of that hero.

The first candidate chosen by everyone was an Undead administrative hero named Joachim. This Wraith, clad in a hooded purple robe with black trim and embroidered with Gothic-style inverted crosses on the cuffs and back, had a face obscured by a dense, pitch-black mist, with two piercing red eyes. The group chose him for one primary reason: he was a specialized alchemist with the unique skill "Dark Refiner." He could "negativize" all resources—including city resources, various ores, and even food—by marking them with a negative imprint, which significantly increased their utility. Furthermore, his Dark Alchemy had reached an advanced level, allowing him to use certain treasures as templates to craft items below level 7.

However, when it came to the second candidate, the heroes were divided. The two candidates San Nei had shortlisted were Kaka Yudas, a non-combatant of the Spirit-Mechanical race and a biological accessory technician—a bald, beardless old man with a hunchback, a grumpy temperament, and a cowardly nature—and Harald Great-Hammer, an elite dwarven non-combatant and blacksmith—a burly fellow with reddish-brown hair, a bushy beard, a bulbous red nose, a pipe clamped in his teeth, and thick, sturdy limbs; he was short-tempered and alcoholic, but obedient as long as his supply of liquor was maintained.

Kaka’s skills included Basic Accessory Crafting and Basic Accessory Dismantling, as well as Basic Treasure Knowledge. Harald’s skills focused on Basic Weapon Forging, Basic Armor Crafting, and Basic War Machine Part Manufacturing.

San Nei’s reasoning for these two was simple: since the heroes’ attributes had improved, they should also look to improve the attributes of their troops.

Yet, San Nei had not specified which one to choose. Kaka’s skills were excellent, but each soldier could carry a maximum of only three accessories, whereas the high-quality weapons and armor crafted by Harald provided immediate, tangible boosts to combat power. This left Li Bin’s heroes at an impasse: the melee heroes supported Harald, while the ranged and magical heroes favored Kaka. Finally, Li Bin cut off their bickering, deciding to table the issue and having San Nei present the next candidate.

The heroes reluctantly turned their attention back to San Nei, waiting to see if he could find them someone better. If not, Jessica had already declared her intention to force the recruitment of both.

Ultimately, Jessica’s wish went unfulfilled, as San Nei pulled up the profile of another hero from the recruitment orders and placed it before them, saying, "I believe we need this one."

The group looked at the data: "Shi Morgen, male, Soul-Eating Withered Tree Warden, City Governor. City development speed increased by 15%, worker efficiency increased by 10%, tax revenue increased by 10%, and mining efficiency within the city's control range increased by 10%."

His unique skills included: "Blood Vine Entanglement" (all physical Undead units under his command deal damage with a vine-entangling effect) and "Vine Armor" (a commander’s order that reduces physical and non-fire elemental magic damage taken by units, at the cost of reduced movement speed).

San Nei slammed his hand on the table and declared, "We must choose him. He is the only City Governor candidate I have seen. One of our main cities will be managed and defended by him in the future. Wait—my god—look at what I’ve found!"

The group quickly looked at San Nei, only to see him holding the profile of a Lich, but at the bottom of the document, the word "Player" was clearly written.