Chapter 402: Raiding Skeleton Outposts

With the door opening by itself, the tension was immediately heightened. This was felt by everyone present. Even the previously confident magician couldn't help but crease their brows. 

True confidence was opening your door knowing there was an attack, not in surrender, but afraid that the idiots attacking would wreck your nice door. For some reason, every adventurer present felt that the undead was taking them lightly.

"Stay sharp" One of the party leaders muttered audibly to his party members.

"We might be strangers but let's try and get some teamwork, ok!?!" Another shouted.

"""Yeah!""" Everyone agreed.

"Ok, those with shields upfront, swordsman close behind, finally magicians at the back!" The other person continued. Surprisingly enough, there was no dispute about following the orders.

The people here were not needlessly proud, they were young and reckless but they appeared to have a good head on their shoulders. If they were cunning enough to plot against one another, they were smart enough to have their priorities straight.

The adventurers re-arranged themselves accordingly when a young man at the back suddenly spoke up.

"Wait! I can use the sense spell!" He shouted from the back. Everyone else seemed to instantly become elated, this was a good magician! Some party leaders were even eyeing him as a potential adventurer to poach.

The C-class magician who said he had a great plan came up to the front. Two adventurers wearing knightly armor quickly stood in front of him to protect him. The magician could now use sense past the portcullis with peace of heart. 

"Da- Damn!" The magician said, widening their eyes. Suddenly an attack came hurling at them.

"Arrows!" The knights promptly grew closer to one another and braced themselves. The magician behind them was to be kept 100% safe!

The arrows pelted the shields, causing the knights to grunt. This was a surprisingly strong attack all things considered.

"Th- This is the rumored freak skeleton!" The human adventurers were not great at naming it seemed, but no one thought of a better name than freak skeleton and it got around all the same.

The magician's sense spell was no longer needed with the skeletons showing themselves, but he didn't step back.

"That must be the arrow arm!" They shouted having been done their homework. The freak skeletons could be siphoned into subcategories or more like nicknames. The arrow arms were freak skeletons with an arm integrated into a bow.

The magician then muttered some chants and quickly cast the sense spell. The location of the arrow arm skeleton was highlighted in his mind thanks to the power of the wind. He pointed his elegant-looking black gold staff towards a wall inside the fortified room.

"Move aside!" The knights made an opening and a blade of wind cut forward sharply. As soon as it landed on the wall, the blade of wind created a large gash. This caused the wall to collapse and reveal the arrow arm in full.

At this point, the shield warriors and swordsman then all took the lead and ran past him.

"Wait-! The ceiling!" The magician then shouted, having cast the sense spell again.

"""ROAR!!!""" Skeletons fell from the roof roaring viciously. The warriors were stunned on the spot by the skill.

"Tsk!" The magicians behind the warriors hastily cast a variety of elemental shields. The skeletons fell right on it and stuck to it like monster bugs on a shield.

The adventurers persevered past the macabre sense of fear the skeletons instilled and quickly launched a counterattack. This involved lots of sword-swinging and spell-slinging, but they eventually got everything under control.

"Phew…" The battle was over.

"he, I thought you had a plan" One of the magician's party members said putting down their sword exhausted.

"Well…" The magician's mouth curved into a smile, "Maybe we just didn't need it" He said in response.

They took some serious damage with only 2 parties remaining intact. There were about 13 actual adventurers left, some in mourning and others looking forward to the treasure. With his plan, the numbers might have looked a bit better.

The room was fortified with earthen walls, but now it was full of dirt and earth wantonly scattered about. That was because neither side held back in battle, it had just been a test of combat power between both sides. 

Now it was finally time to collect and distribute the spoils.

"These bones are rather sturdy…. Metallic almost…" Someone said looking poking at one of the scattered limbs.

Another adventurer grabbed the bow arm of the arrow arm as they dubbed it and tested the string's tensile strength and other small details.

"It lost a few strands…" Bowstrings were usually made up of multiple strands. For this bow, some of them had been broken in combat but if those were replaced it could still fetch a decent price.

[Broken Bow Arm (Armament Skeleton)]

In the distance, Ed was observing the actions of the adventurers with some hesitation.

'Should I kill them?' Reforming the skeletons would be much harder if they started breaking them apart. But after some meticulous thinking, Ed fell on something.

'I guess I'll let them go' He hadn't made many raid forts, this one was the first outpost. That meant Survivor and the others were murdered.

'Luckily I happened to pass by' He would obviously spawn where he last left his body so the trip to this fort was something he did of his own volition.

But back to the topic at hand, letting the adventurers go was for the best. Since he made few outposts, their fame was likely low. The parts mixed in the system were also good quality materials, but he could only get more interesting and better mixes if more adventurers came in. It was just in his best interest.

[...]

The dungeon had recently told him not to let go of any intruders, yet Ed had already failed to remember. Similarly, the 3 dots alert was also quickly forgotten by Ed. Well, it was more like it never even entered his mind. Ed just started to make his way back to the main outpost, the place where he would grow his legion.

'They were supposed to gather more skeletons for me' He would be able to make a lot of armament skeletons then.

'Wait, that reminds me… weren't those regular skeletons roaring?' Ed thought, reminding himself to check the skills of the armament skeletons when he had the chance. It had to be some sort of leadership skill.

'Maybe one that inspires other skeletons' Ed muttered inwardly as he continued to adeptly make his way around.

Knowing the crypt like the back of his hands, Ed had just about made it to his destination.

"AAAARGH!!!" Ed suddenly heard the cry of a man and his senses were instantly heightened. There were adventurers attacking!

He quickly ran down the last few corridors and turned towards the fortified room's entry hall. There he saw a man crushed onto a wall.

"ROOOOOOAAARRR!!!" The juggernaut that was Hulk had just turned the man into a paste before letting out a vicious roar and charging out towards another party of adventurers.

Meanwhile, other skeletons were also getting some real work in. Blaze was turning people into human torches and Trench was giving people an early grave.

The likes of Scavenger and Zephyr were darting about quickly stabbing and poking at the adventurers in intense conflicts. All the skeletons were working together to eliminate what appeared to be less than 40 or so adventurers.

'Wow' Ed was really quite amazed by the size of the party. It turned out the popularity of the dungeon had grown past his expectations. It also highlighted an issue though.

'There are really a lot of humans huh' The maps he learned from the book he assimilated painted wide expanses and flourishing kingdoms but for there to be so many adventurers in a single area… it was simply unexpected.

The raids against him made sense to him, but such numbers to raid a simple fort he made...

'They could be coming from other places but it's just likely not worth the effort' Ed thought as he spectated the battle which was reaching its climax. The humans were being eliminated and as soon as some of them tried to flee, they were met by an exterior army of regular white skeletons.

They weren't enough to kill anyone, but they slowed the running enemies just enough to be killed from behind. The skeletons Ed had created were growing rather rapidly.

'I should upgrade them some more' If he was a father, he was a distant father. Though often present, he was still somehow absent. With his distance, he couldn't claim they were learning from him yet... 

'I still feel somewhat proud' But the bloody scene of crushed bodies and torched corpses quickly brought Ed back to reality. Hulk was now red hulk thanks to the splattered blood.

'Do I need to install showers here?' Ed jested before making his presence known to the skeletons. They all stopped what they were doing and bowed with great respect.

'Hmmm… I should be more careful now' Ed thought to himself realizing that he had somehow missed this powerful force of adventurers. It was now more clear than ever what he had to do.

'Time to make many more skeletons' The dungeon was too large for him to comb through it alone. He would need many new friends to help manage it. 

Ed's imagination was quickly taking flight and all sorts of new skeletons entered and left his mind. The vision of the dungeon being slowly turned into a hub of people made Ed flash a daring smile.

'I can't wait to see what they'll bring me in the future' The adventurers were probably not expecting that they were the ones being farmed by Ed.