Master Of None

Chapter 2365: 2365. Grave Stone?

Once Walker knew that the young adventurer group was doing fine, he gave Alice a nod. She knew what he had planned to do since they were nearing the area that the undead ruins were. She knew that Walker wanted to get a closer look at the land around it and discover what had changed.

He had the best mana sense that was within the group. It only made the most sense that he would be the one checking things out. Plus, there were multiple scouts and other hidden figures with the group already. They would be taking care of anything that could cause problems while he scouted ahead alone.

While Walker used the shadow wrapping skill to do this, he left the grove of trees and felt the change immediately.

The distant tower which had been somewhat ominous was left half the size. The remaining had crumbled inward and around but that rubble was unseen from where Walker stood. What he felt though, that was interesting.

The manas were flowing naturally, he could sense all the elemental manas he had sensed before. But he could also sense that the undead were still strong in the area. The uniqueness of undead mana was enough for Walker to know that there was a significant amount of it.

The land itself had also changed. He could see that there were more freestanding eroded stones. Definity part of ruins, but not of the undead ruins which had once been the immortal chasing raceʼs city turned undead city.

While in the elemental planes, Walker had learned a lot about manas. He had learned that they mixed and created entirely unique elemental planes or even just crossroads of elemental planes which might disappear at any second.

One such unique mana was undead. Not truly death and not life itself. Walker had always thought that undead might be a form of mana that was a mix of dark mana and death mana. But he also could understand if undead was a mixture of life and death. The only issue was that he could not understand either mana enough to understand if it was the truth that they made up undead mana.

Regardless, Walker could still sense more clearly that the stones and the ground itself radiated undead mana to a degree. Whether it had been the experiments over the course of many years by the immortal chasing race or not, this entire area was still able to make the dead rise again as skeletons, zombies, and whatever else they could become.

This was what lead him to look at the stones eroding in the ground more carefully. Stones that were not shaped with edges worn away by time the last time he had visited the area. It was an unusual gray color that was different from the rocks on the ground and what normally remained here as part of the earth.

ʼGray grave stone

This is a stone that was carved and once held runes to trap mana within. The various runes faded and broke over time causing them to absorb manas in strange ways. As this become the case and extended even longer, the degraded runes were able to absorb more unique manas until undead mana was trapped.

Experimentation that followed on the lands influenced them even more greatly causing them to fully become different forms of stone which allow for the undead to be attracted to them. This also allows for the dead bodies or dead beings nearby to be affected by the undead mana and change in to undead after a certain time. This is even possible with skeletons that lack other manas within the bones.

The uses for gray grave stone are only applicable if there is the ability to even craft it. Having the affinity or the ability to control undead mana is very rare and requires extreme care due to the negative side effects that it can leave on a body. Some graveside craftsmen have even become undead themselves due to train mistakes while…ʼ

The gray grave stone was an interesting piece of stone. It could have formed over a longer period of time due to the experimentation of the immortal chasing race. What was even more astonishing was the fact that it had not always been a gray grave stone. It had once been rune covered stones which degraded their runes in such a way that undead mana had been pulled in to the stones…ʼ

The addition of the undead experimentation and just been the added bonus to the transformation and solidification of the stone itself. Meaning that the immortal chasing race had once used this stone as something else before their city began to crumble and the world began to shrink due to the changes in mana.

This was something Walker knew about. The immortal chasing race was around experimenting and causing harm before the ancient world had lost the flow of mana and development. So they might have even known about things like dungeons if Walker were to get more information from whatever crumbled and isolated history was trapped down underground.

Another small fact that really caught Walkerʼs attention was the graveside craftsman, a class he had never heard of or a system that he had never heard of before the world returned to its proper flow.

If there were unique craftsmen like that, then there was a high chance that there could be many more related classes which needed to come to this area to begin their future. Whether that was a good thing or a bad thing was up for debate. Especially since the undead were a touchy subject already.

On one hand, intelligent undead had a very risky reputation now that the immortal king had caused so much trouble. Just that alone would make anyone who crafted undead mana or used undead mana to be isolated. Let alone, if they became undead because of their class and retained their intelligence.

The thing was, they could maintain intelligence and even grow to become a race. The vampires could be called half undead in a way since they did not die normally. But they were also their own race and had their own rules to sustain themselves. Making them alive, just very different because of their race.

So that left the question of whether undead could even become properly intelligent to become a race one day. Would it be possible that those who suffered from becoming some form of undead could hold their intelligence at all? The internal struggle left Walker with a lot that he wanted to study. Unfortunately, he had to keep looking around the area for threats and changs. Just the gray grave stone would be a large aspect that the map makers needed to add since it was a larger area around the undead ruins.

There was a little interference with Walkerʼs mana too. Not a direct, but small interference because the undead mana was clearly stronger here. If he were to try and use healing mana it might be harder. Challenging healers who came here to guard their partyʼs safety.

He also noticed that some plants they had grown in relation to the undead were here. The skeleton lily and the ghost bonnet were two plants that had been grown by Genesis in their experimental greenhouses. They were very tough to grow and had been found in ruins as seeds stored for the future. Here, they were already growing and in much larger ways due to the undead mana. Something that the herbalists did not have access to create or bring to the plants in Genesis.

It could help enlighten the herbalists while allowing for a place to come to harvest them. Walker would have to make sure that the appropriate all around appraisals were done to be compared with the weaker and slower growing versions within their greenhouses. It could shed a lot of light on how to maintain and use these plants in the future.

It could also be a precursor to knowing what monsters might be able to appear here. It was surety that there would be some which needed these sorts of plants and other plants to survive. Now that they were here, they could awaken or be able to readjust from the monsters that had degraded over many years in the nearby areas.

It would even be more interesting if the undead monsters could feed on these plants and herbs growing with undead mana. Would that have the potential to lead to intelligent undead?

Walkerʼs thoughts nearly overtook him when he noticed the shambling figure behind a large outcropping of gray grave stone. Its movements were jerky, but its body was not as rotted as it could be. ”A newer zombie undead…” He looked at it and used the all around appraisal without hesitation.

.…

….

….

If you are not reading this at , then sorry the content youʼre reading is stolen!

Please say no to piracy! Donʼt take part in crime! Donʼt patronize thieves!

Repent now and go here, http://wbnv.in/a/ccfhAus

Drop those golden tickets!