Evolving Gale Chain Slash from a regular skill to the BOSS skill Death Cleave consumed a total of 14 free attribute points.
This also reduced Lucas's current free attribute points from the original 11 to a mere 1.
Casually allocating the remaining 1 free attribute point to Skyrend Slash, raising its level from 1 to 2, Lucas's mood gradually calmed down.
The strongest BOSS in history!
This was Lucas's goal.
To achieve this goal, he not only needed to enhance his class template and improve his four-dimensional attributes but also required a large number of free attribute points and skills.
Thus, his development direction needed some slight adjustments.
He still needed to recruit skeleton minions.
But only enough to suffice.
Aside from the skeleton minions he absolutely had to enslave, the rest would become experience points, class templates, and free attribute points for Lucas's further growth!
As mentioned earlier, elite-rank skeletons already possessed simple intelligence.
Having intelligence meant having memories.
As a warrior-rank entity, the Skeleton Commander that Lucas had slain not only possessed higher-level intelligence but also memories far surpassing those of elite skeletons.
After absorbing the Skeleton Commander's bones, Lucas gained a lot of information from it.
A significant portion of this information was exactly what Lucas urgently needed.
For example, the number and distribution of warrior-rank skeletons under the Skeleton King's command; for example, relevant information about the Skeleton King, the ruler of the Land of Buried Bones, and so on.
Overall, the number of warrior-rank skeletons under the Skeleton King's command was considerable.
Aside from the eight Skeleton Commanders leading the eight skeletal legions, there were even more warrior-rank skeletons residing in the Death Castle, the Skeleton King's lair.
Logically, as the orthodox evolutionary path for the skeleton race, Skeleton Commanders should be the most numerous among warrior-rank skeletons.
However, throughout the Land of Buried Bones, aside from the hidden Skeleton Commanders lurking in obscure corners, the Skeleton King's direct subordinates... numbered only these eight!
Because.
The Skeleton King itself... was also harvesting skeletons!
The eight Skeleton Commanders were the Skeleton King's vassals, assisting it in ruling this vast Land of Buried Bones.
These eight vassals were not fixed.
Once a new Skeleton Commander emerged in the Land of Buried Bones, it could challenge one of these eight vassals. The victor would become a new vassal under the Skeleton King; the defeated would be devoured by the Skeleton King.
Yes.
Skeleton Commanders were not qualified to devour warrior-rank skeletons.
What they could devour were only elite-rank skeletons and below.
Warrior-rank skeletons... only the Skeleton King could devour!
The skeleton race was inherently a race that harvested each other. As the ruler of the entire Land of Buried Bones, the Skeleton King naturally stood at the top of this harvesting chain. It disdained devouring skeletons that were too far below its rank, but it would not spare warrior-rank skeletons!
No one knew how long the Land of Buried Bones had existed.
Nor did anyone know how many warrior-rank skeletons the Skeleton King had devoured.
Perhaps,
from the moment the Skeleton King became the ruler of the Land of Buried Bones, this chain of mutual harvesting and devouring had been established, with the Skeleton King itself being the greatest beneficiary of this harvesting chain!
Of course, this was the usual scenario.
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The Land of Buried Bones was home to countless skeletons, and naturally, some with exceptional innate talent or higher intelligence would emerge. Upon evolving to the warrior rank, these skeletons might not challenge the eight vassals or join the Skeleton King's forces.
Their other option was to hide!
Growing in secret, waiting until they had enough strength to challenge the Skeleton King and seize control of the Land of Buried Bones; or hiding forever, never to be discovered.
Once they were discovered by the skeletal legions under the Skeleton King's command, a war would erupt!
As long as they lacked the strength to oppose the Skeleton King... their fate would still be to be devoured by the Skeleton King!
This was why, over the long passage of time, the orthodox evolutionary path of the skeleton race had only these eight warrior-rank Skeleton Commanders as vassals.
In comparison,
the number of warrior-rank skeletons that evolved through other, more difficult class advancements was slightly higher.
These skeletons posed no threat to the Skeleton King's rule and were the best assistants for the Skeleton King to strengthen its forces. Naturally, they were continuously collected and accumulated by the Skeleton King.
And in the memories of the Skeleton Commander...
these warrior-rank skeletons, varying in number but diverse in type, were mostly stationed in the Skeleton King's lair—the Death Castle!
"So it seems..."
"The difficulty of collecting warrior class templates... might be simpler than I imagined."
Piece by piece, Lucas sorted through the information obtained from the Skeleton Commander, the soul fire in his eye sockets flickering slightly.
He already had a plan.
If the plan succeeded, without having to face the terrifying Skeleton King, he could obtain enough warrior class templates to advance his rank from elite to warrior!
---
A few days later.
A skeletal legion totaling over four thousand skeletons was marching through the wilderness, heading toward the core of the Land of Buried Bones—the Death Castle where the Skeleton King resided.
A skeletal legion of over four thousand skeletons was roughly equivalent to the full strength of a legion under a Skeleton Commander's command.
Unlike the skeletal legions led by the Skeleton King's Skeleton Commanders, this legion had, aside from the necessary archers, skeleton mages, and skeleton warriors, an unusually large number of skeleton guards and skeleton sentinels!
As specialized skeletons focused on constitution growth, skeleton guards and sentinels in a skeletal legion typically served to protect the legion's general, such as a Skeleton General or Skeleton Commander.
But in this skeletal legion...
the number of skeleton guards and sentinels around the general was minimal. Instead, the outer layer of the legion was filled with skeleton guards and sentinels acting as shields.
It was as if the purpose of the skeleton guards and sentinels in this legion was not to protect the general but to protect the entire legion!
This was incomprehensible to the skeleton race.
Because the entire skeleton race existed to elevate higher-rank entities, not to have high-rank skeletons protect low-rank skeletons that lacked intelligence and self-awareness!
The skeletal legion marched swiftly.
Only when they were about ten kilometers away from the Death Castle did they come to a halt.
Ahead of them, an even larger skeletal legion appeared!
Not only that.
To the left and right of this peculiar skeletal legion... two even larger skeletal legions emerged!
They had walked into an ambush!
