'That greedy sinister skeleton! Even after becoming a skeleton, its nature as a sly fiend is still there!' the system complained as it loudly cursed the skeleton for being greedy, making Oya quite speechless.
"What happened?" she asked.
'This snake went directly ahead of others to attack the fiend inside and eat its flesh, absorb its death energy concentrated in its body, before anyone else could come and share this huge meal with it! this sly snake! Go, go and enter the fog, let's share this greedy snake in its meal!'
"…"
Oya didn't follow the orders of the greedy shameless system, as she wanted to see what the snake would end up to. 'Will you leave it and have all the energy like this? This snake is really greedy and it's about to consume the fiend inside and take all the energy for itself!'
"…"
She kept her silence, after all the snake was one of her own strengths now. she waited for hours, ignoring the blabbery of the system. She kept watching even when the army of the skeleton arrived and entered the death zone. The fight lasted for ten more hours, and after everything ended, a village appeared with no single remains of the fiend anywhere to be seen.
However the snake had undergone massive changes! Its body became formed of thick bones, and it had double heads now and two tails, like it completely absorbed the fiend and integrated its body inside it.
"Interesting!"
'This is shameless! That bastard won't gain a single energy support from me!'
The system was still feeling sore regarding what the snake did, however Oya completely ignored the system threats, as she said to the snake:
"Have you eaten the fiend?"
"It's beneficial to my growth, I hope you aren't mad at me."
"Hahaha, I want you to do the same with each fiend, can you do that?"
The snake's bony eyes shone brightly with green fire as it instantly said:
"Thanks to my esteemed lady for her generosity and benevolence."
She only smiled, before heading towards the village and conquered it, while the snake moved rapidly towards the next village to kill the fiend there. by the presence of such a strong skeleton on her side, dealing with these annoying death zones started to be a piece of cake!
She even considered dividing up the forces into two, one small force supporting the snake, and the other main force dealing with the village in the regular way, supporting her annoying system.
As she finished transforming the village into a city, she moved on the back of her phoenix, while saying to the system:
"Divide the forces, small portion to support the snake, and the others let them follow me."
She had now covered the three villages she found so far, and she needed to first clear all the skeletons standing in her way to reach the next village.
The distance between fogged villages would take up to two days to cover, and her snake would follow her after finishing with its fiend, and she was pretty confident that her ability to clear the monsters would be hastened.
"Sigh, if it could only summon other skeletons," she muttered, while thinking about this option, or a bonus in case of the snake.
'If it continues to absorb the fiends, it will soon be able to do that.'
The system gave her an answer, making her resolve about the decision to let the snake take the death energy for itself grew stronger. "Great, I will keep hunting down fiends in this way then, one for you and one for him."
'…'
The system was still mad at it, and she didn't care about that. She knew the system was as shameless and greedy as the snake.
The next day she kept summoning her skeletons, her system kept upgrading the skeletons into death knights and liches, while her snake came to support her, making the fight much easier!
It now had three heads and three tails, using a special ability which caused corrosive fog to spread in an AOE area, hastening the speed of her clearing out monsters, and increasing the efficiency of the summoning skills of her, her death knights, and her liches.
The number of liches and death knights now reached an astonishing figure, being alone able to handle any battle without the need for her; however she never stopped helping though.
She put the distant and grand goal in front of her eyes; to clear the central zone and completely free this universe from the intervention of any monster or fiend.
To do that, she needed each ounce of strength available to her. She knew her enemy would be hard to deal with, and so she needed to be well prepared.
Despite having the word of the Apidon city governor and other city governors to help, she knew she couldn't fully depend entirely on them. if they were this strong, then why didn't they manage to clear the whole world on their own from before?
She also wanted to return to her own world, clear all the demon seeds inside the NPCs in all domains, and completely control the universal city.
Doing so would result in clearing the whole world, preparing it for Ibro's return. She didn't want him to come to find a shattered world, needing his intervention.
Instead, she wanted him to come and find a world ready to be used as a base for future battles against the monsters and fiends.
The pace of clearing out fogged villages increased from two days to reach them and one day to completely kill the fiend to only one day to reach them and half a day to clear them.
And the branch of her army led by her snake, which now had nine heads and tails, was doing much better than hers! That snake was really a monster of its own, and its strength escalated after absorbing three fiends at a time.
'The next upgrade of it will enable it to summon skeletons,' the system suddenly said when she passed over its area of activity, marveling at the brutality and viciousness of it. she smiled, as she waited for such a scene to happen.
After another week, her snake had already reached twelve heads and tails, making it look really like a hideous mythic monster she once read about.
When it reached this degree, it came on its own to Oya, as it said the moment it reached her place:
"Esteemed lady, I've reached the pinnacle of my evolution, and I need to sharpen my energy by summoning skeletons to serve you. So, I ask you to summon one more snake, as this would be a great boost to your strength."
"Don't worry, I have already summoned nine," she chuckled as she pointed to the front of the army, where nine snakes with one head and tail each were wreaking havoc in the monster upfront. "I will send one with you, support it and make it level up fast," she said, as she decided to summon many snakes and upgrade them gradually.
After all, a general needed soldiers to command!
"Show me what kind of skeletons you can summon," she demanded and the snake didn't delay and summoned instantly a large number of skeletons reaching one hundred thousands of smaller snakes like it.
She examined them for a while before muttering: "Interesting, I believe they all will be like you in the future, right?"
"My esteemed lady is correct indeed," the snake replied, and that was the possible outcome of these snakes, provided that they killed enough monsters and absorbed the death energy off their bodies.
"Great, keep forming your army then and upgrade it in battles. Just act as their leader for now," she said, upgrading him to a higher rank.
"Thanks esteemed lady for her generosity," the snake replied in its sly courtesy, which greatly irritated her system, which kept its tongue from saying anything while the snake was around.
The next thing was that the snake took one of the snakes here, went back to continue clearing up its region, while Oya opened the map and did some random math. "So in the end I could end up with fifty snakes like this one, plus five hundred normal snakes and endless armies of smaller snakes."
She muttered while she kept smiling in pride and happiness. After all these snakes were now part of her own strength.
The system just sighed, and said nothing. It knew it now had more competitors, and if it opened its mouth and said anything to irritate Oya, then his small meal might get smaller, or even stopped.
Oya then kept attacking the villages for weeks, clearing up one by one, while turning them into great cities. The work to inhabit these cities and arrange stuff over them was handed over to Ruliv, and such a task made his position soar to new heights, even rivaling that of the Apidon city.
And such acts didn't appeal to those in power for centuries in the Apidon city; and as usual… greed and envy were the two worst traits of any human.