AN:Sorry about releasing this late had some things come up, just in case I will release this with the chapter meant for tommorow as I am a bit busy. Hopefully things clear up next week but we will see now hope you enjoy.

Oak bark ointment for cuts

Witch Hazel ointment for skin problems

Willow bark tea for fever

Blue Curl for scrapes

Dried Yarrow and Ointment for quick relief for cuts and bruises

Chamomile Tea for your digestive problems

“Various balms for your wounds and ailments, come purchase cures for your needs!”

“I offer various doses for however much you need, have herbs yourself I also can prepare tinctures from your own herbs”

Yep my journey as a merchant doctor is currently occurring, on more serious matters my scouts are observing for anything or anyone special or suspicious coming to market, as anyone heading for the mortis fields will probably have to come through Trosafen and then Vocaten this is an ok plan in my view. Could be a waste of time but leaving on market day would be too suspicious and having some funds never hurts. A few come by and take a look, a few of the adventurers especially take a look and I get a few sales for the cut ointments. Some older men and women buy my chamomile tea and a few get the willow bark tea.

A rather good sale all in all for me and I am somewhat glad I stayed, I dropped off hints that I will be leaving soon to go to Vocaten and some shifty looking folk eventually left and started gathering on a more covered spot along the road there. Looks like I have candidates for the eternal work crews, good for them that I prefer my crew intact. But that only applies to their bones and my guards are most itching for a fight, their crafted pseudo souls are filled with blood thirst from lack of action and the need to nourish themselves once more as they can be only barely satisfied with what I give them. The difference between fresh and dried is always apparent in food.

As the day ends and my wares/services are no longer needed along with having bought my needed goods I set off some time before dinner along the path to Vocaten. Meanwhile I have sent off some of my guards to deal with the messengers and lookout bandits before dealing with the main pack. These simple bandits will never know what it was that ended their lives as their souls are set free and drained of energy. The bodies will grow cold and the flesh dissolve from their bones as my spectres claim their feast, of course with some time on their hand the spectres have a little preparation first before eating. As the chosen victims start being driven insane from despair by my spectres they dig in, souls full of despair have a certain taste that these ones are fond of. I prefer ones with more positive feelings, it gives a different euphoria that I prefer if I can kill them without them noticing but no need to worry about these one’s preferences.

Of course eating the whole soul would be a difficult task but the fragments left as they die is enough. I have had this batch for a very long time, one of my original creations before I became a fellow at the old academy. They are on the cusp of gaining a true soul, the pseudo soul cores I created them with have grown rich with necromantic energy, soul energy, and death mana. Unlike natural spectres and the creations of lesser necromancers mine were made from scratch of pure energy and mana. While not as strong initially after gorging on enough beings they have grown to mithril grade strength and they do not even possess proper sentience, this does not mean they are stupid however. The primal hunting and instinctual mind they possess is on par with any veteran elite along with their ethereal nature makes any unprepared foe simply another body on the ground. Not to mention my how to say, special tricks to them make them deadlier that other spirits.

As I slowly make my way to the now clean skeletons on the ground they number about a dozen in total, exactly how would they have split the loot between a dozen people without rioting. Still these fools had some guts to try to rob people in earnest, now I have myself a work crew to use. I would suspect bait for a trap but there has been nothing to trip my anti-scrying wards or the hint of anyone suspicious has been seen by my scouts. Well back to work with arranging my new troops from the bones I have in front of me. After a bit of marionette work dragging these into an even more secure area I start marking the bones with my specialized runes. I could simply flood these with necromantic energy and create basic skeletons but that would be pointless for me. I need somewhat competent workers that can understand more complex directions.

After careful applications of energy to morph the bones to become more durable and creating runes to attach to the many bones of these soon to be skeleton workers. These are runes to imprint movement patterns, rather than let them fumble around I force these bones to follow set patterns. Very much mechanical but in the end I can set them to work without the worry that they cannot figure out how to do something. As only low tier undead they have no intelligence but that is fine, as a side benefit I also implant combat movements into these as a precaution. Nothing fancy but just the basic imperial soldier academy swordsmanship from home, should be enough to outclass any standard foot soldier that has not tasted true battle. At this level they are false low-intermediate grade warrior, a match for any basic trained soldier in one on one combat but anyone with sufficient combat experience can take them down with some injury.

Hmm that took a few hours, been awhile since I had to manually do this sort of work. Too bad none of these mooks had any magic potential else I could have made me a Bonesetter who would carve the initial runes for me even if it is lower quality. Still getting some middle grade undead is a job for later, I can afford some more finesse after getting set up. Obviously letting these guys go around is a bit of a stupid maneuver, but this is where some of the runes I carved get to work. I hold out my hand to my gathered troop and will one of my runes to activate, the skeleton troop gathered in front of me morph into floating teeth that I gather into a pouch on my belt. A little trick that took me a while to learn but well worth the price I paid at the conclave meeting I got this from, logistics of moving troops are a very important and annoying detail.

These guys can’t be set forth in the midst of combat easily as of right now, the cost of making that high quality of a rune would be a pain for such weaklings. Still simple transport is a thing, and who would suspect a doctor with a bag of teeth. Literally no one would blink their eye at it, teeth pulling and replacement are a part of the job and making false teeth sets for richer customers is not unheard of. Well I should get some food, that much hands on work is making me hungry even if eating food is essentially a habit at this point, it is simpler to eat food then long term nourishment by necromantic energy. Tomorrow will be another day forward and one step closer to my goal of taking the agros de mortis for myself under careful stewardship of course. Then I can get to seeing whether all my past work was worth the effort, if no one comes for the fields then I can change that as having no one to test my work on is boring.