It was a very strange experience, passing a tendril of [Fog Form] through a straw made out of Ria’s body, but it was better than being destroyed by the impossibly strong Ki inside the stone that made up the mountain.

If not for the blood fucking with the Ki inside the rock, Sylver doubted he would have been able to step 1 foot into the tunnels.

It was possibly even stronger than the barrier that surrounded the whole area. Still, nothing that couldn’t be bypassed by a magic and Ki negating metal golem.

Just like the previous tunnel, this one was lined with solid gold, with the only difference being that there was some sort of fabric pressed up against the walls and ceiling, that stopped the blood from leaking in.

It felt sticky when Sylver touched it, but it wasn’t very strong. The floor had raised wooden boards, with what little blood managed to seep in flowing underneath them.

Before Sylver could start celebrating, or even enjoy how close he was to finishing this, he heard the last thing he wanted to hear.

A man’s voice very loudly asking “Who’s there?”

It’s possible Sylver was just too exhausted from being in the dragon’s presence, but instead of rushing towards the source of the sound, Sylver chose to approach the encounter from a different angle.

“I have urgent news for the emperor!” Sylver screamed towards the direction the voice had come from, which just so happened to be the direction the room inside the emperor’s palace was.

Just as Sylver finished reaching into his robe, he felt an odd softness near the back of his head, as 4 blades appeared in a square around his throat.

There were 4 men wearing white bathrobes, wielding identical one-handed short swords, and expertly holding them a hairs width away from Sylver’s throat.

“My name is Sylver Sezari, I have urgent news for the emperor,” Sylver said almost in a whimper.

“Speak,” the man standing directly behind Sylver said.

Sylver made a showing of swallowing before he spoke in an ever so slightly nervous voice.

“There’s a group coming to kill the emperor. 3 men, a boy, and 13 witches. The witches used their magic to bind their lives to the emperor’s. If all 13 of them die, he will too. I made an antidote, but I have to be the one who gives it to him,” Sylver explained quickly, but not so quickly that he was stumbling over his words.

The man standing behind Sylver moved his sword closer to his neck, and Sylver was one gulp away from having the spot where a normal human would have a carotid artery, sliced open.

“How did you get in here?” the man on Sylver’s right asked, while he put a bit more of his weight on his right foot.

“I have a skill that-”

[A skill similar to [Appraisal] has been successfully blocked!]

As far as executions went, this was one of the best Sylver had ever experienced. He didn’t normally rank the methods through which people killed him, but this was a very close contender for one of the top 5.

He felt nothing, as all four swords slashed through his neck, and decapitated him. It was a perfect cut, simply perfect.

It was so fast, he almost forgot to use the 6th effect [Undead Mastery] provided.

The guard that the system deemed to have delivered the final blow raised his head the slightest amount, as he read through Sylver’s fake [Defeated!] notification.

“Level 168, not human, 3 mage classes, highest attribute is Intelligence,” the guard read out loud.

“Send someone down to see if the entrance is still locked. And then-”

These guards were experts at cutting people’s heads off, but they were shit when it came to knowing that you shouldn’t lower your guard while standing near a necromancer’s corpse.

In their defense, there’s a good chance they never so much as heard of an undead, let alone seen one, so it wouldn’t be right to judge them too harshly for that.

Sylver combined [Dead Dominion] with [Deadly Darkness] and ended up with blades made out of his shadow, slathered with Ki nullifying blood. Sylver’s timing was off, by about one-tenth of a second, as he made the blood underneath the wooden boards splash upwards a bit too soon.

Luckily for him, these 4 were expecting an attack from the direction Sylver had come, as opposed to the floor spitting blood at them, while the walls manifested razor-sharp swords, that hit them in the back of the neck.

[Human (Path Of The Sweeping River) Defeated!]

[Due to defeating an enemy 130 levels above you, additional experience will be awarded!]

[Swamp Lord] has reached level 59!

+5AP

[Human (Sword Of The Stalling River) Defeated!]

[Due to defeating an enemy 110 levels above you, additional experience will be awarded!]

[Swamp Lord] has reached level 60!

+5AP

[Swamp Lord] has reached level 61!

+5AP

[Human (Path Of The Dividing Blade) Defeated!]

[Due to defeating an enemy 110 levels above you, additional experience will be awarded!]

[Swamp Lord] has reached level 62!

+5AP

[Human (Path Of The Piercing Wind) Defeated!]

[Due to defeating an enemy 110 levels above you, additional experience will be awarded!]

[Swamp Lord] has reached level 63!

+5AP

[1 perk available for [Swamp Lord]]

Sylver spent a few seconds just laying on the floor. All 4 corpses remained upright, as Sylver tried to wrap his head around what just happened.

He had been ready for a fight, maybe not a proper fight, but these people were just shy of being level 300, Sylver expected something.

Sylver grabbed the closest body by the leg, as his robe reached for his head, and put it back onto his neck. Sylver spread his cloud of HP-absorbing smog toward the other 3 men, as he waited for the skin on his decapitated neck to fuse back together.

[Draining Blight (VI) Proficiency increased to 72%!]

[Vigorous Conditioning (V) Proficiency increased to 59%!]

Sylver felt an unpleasant stiffness spreading down his spine, but it was a small price to pay for surviving a beheading. He had hoped to convince the emperor to eat the red apple, but apparently, Sylver's presence was too suspicious for these men to accept him at his word.

He lifted his arms and made the blood pooling above the sealed-up ceiling, burst through the sticky fabric. Sylver pulled as much blood as he could gather towards him and made two thick walls out of it.

One behind him, and one in front of him.

As he walked upwards, toward the emperor, Sylver gathered more and more blood, until he reached his limit. He couldn’t store any away in his [Bound Bones] storage, so he did what he had originally planned.

One by one, a shade appeared behind Sylver and quickly walked through the wall of blood. Slathered in the Ki negating liquid, the shade remained where it was, as the next was summoned.

Sylver left a trail of bloodied shades behind him as he walked.

The tunnel wasn’t very tall, Sylver could touch the ceiling with his hand, so the shades got a bit clumped together as they eventually started following him. Sylver walked for a while, and every shade that wasn’t too big for the small tunnel had been summoned and covered in blood.

Finally, he reached the end of the tunnel and was greeted by a very small golden door. Sylver would just barely be able to fit himself through it, but even a normal-sized man would have to crouch and crawl.

Ria made short work of it, and Sylver was now inside the palace.

Or rather, he was inside a room that he had to assume was the emperor’s personal bedroom. The enormous bed in the middle was the main reason he had assumed this.

There was only one door, aside from the secret entrance through which Sylver had entered.

Apart from the bed, which had a golden headboard, and everything else, even the sheets, the room was mostly empty. There weren’t any windows or tables, the only thing in this room was a solid gold bed, and what looked to be a very fancy umbrella stand right next to the bed.

After a half second of inspection, Sylver realized the umbrella stand was actually a sword stand.

He waited for the blood inside the tunnel to flow into the room, where Sylver promptly floated it towards the ceiling, while Ria went ahead and started working on opening the door.

Sylver, Ria, and the shades, all froze as they heard a very loud crackling sound, followed by the floor shaking so hard the solid gold bed slid around on the polished floor.

They all waited for a few seconds, and then Ria opened the door, and Sylver silently sent Spring out to map out their surroundings. With a faint smile at the edge of his mouth, Sylver fully opened the door, and with his bloodied shades in tow, and a big blob of blood floating above his head, walked through the empty corridors.

Sylver fixed his hair as much as he could, straightened his robe out, and as he leaned against the gold-lined pillar, waited for all of his shades to finish coming to him.

Aurick was the only one in the group who was unharmed.

Everyone else was soaked from head to toe in blood, covered in minor wounds, and only 5 witches remained.

“Seems like I missed all the fun,” Sylver said with a grin.

He would later learn that he had spent over half an hour silently staring in awe at the dragon’s magic, before Ria couldn’t take it anymore, and told Sylver to say something.

Sylver was fairly certain that if Hound hadn’t been held back by Owl, he would have attacked Sylver there and then.

“The emperor is this way,” Aurick said in a tired tone of voice with a gesture towards the gem-studded double doors, behind which the emperor’s throne room was.

Sylver and the others managed to take 5 whole steps towards the double doors when they heard a painfully loud clack. It was the sound of stone hitting stone.

Sylver leaned his head out of the way and was narrowly missed by the bright green arrow.

In front of him were roughly 100 bright green stone statues, all armed with swords, shields, spears, and bows.

[??? – ??? – 500]

[HP: 500,000 – 100%]

[MP: 0 – 0%]

[Stamina: 250,000 – 100%]

[Corpse – None]

[Soul – Unique]

Sylver used [Arcane Insight] on 10 more statues before he got the gist of the situation. All of them were level 500. All 111 green jade stone golems.

“I stand corrected,” Sylver said, as he summoned his ax into his hand, and the blood-covered shades started to move towards a defensive position, “this is where the fun begins.”

Out of everyone present, only Lion shared Sylver's enthusiasm.