Most of the zombie soldiers that advanced toward them were of the draconian race, but some were ethereals.
"What do you mean? We are fighting our dead comrades?!" Pagram, one of the commanders Jeanny had saved, asked. He was also positioned above the main gates with Jeanny.
"Dead comrades and enemies. The enemy is using a legendary artifact called the Necronomicon," Jeanny answered. She received the report about the artifact from Domon.
Domon couldn't understand half the thing Carnelia said. He simply repeated what she said word by word to Jeanny via messages.
"This artifact lets the user bring the dead back as undead," Jeanny continued. "All natives that are killed by the user or his subordinates can be turned into undead using that artifact. His fallen native subordinates can also be the targets of the book. These targets are valid as long as they didn't die for more than three days."
"That is completely cheating!" Paytowin exclaimed. "That means he not only will not lose any number of his troops but will even increase that number after absorbing the enemy's fallen troops into his army."
"The Necronomicon can only bring back the dead one time. If we kill the undead army, the artifact won't be able to revive them again. These dead soldiers are immune to all recovery effects. They can't be healed, so any damage they received is permanent," Jeanny explained. "But even so, yeah, that artifact is seriously cheating. Especially in the hand of a sovereign. All his native troops can be said to have a double life and he can reuse the fallen enemy soldiers killed by his troops."
"No wonder Aurebor waited for Liguritudum to arrive before they go on a full offense," Megan said. "They wanted the Liguritudum army to join the fight so the fallen Hydrurond soldiers can be considered their kills as well."
"Another thing we need to know," Jeanny said. "The fact that this undead army is here meant Master's summoner class is already a first-class special class, the necromancer lord. The Necronomicon is restricted to the Summoner class, but the Summoner class can only utilize a small portion of that artifact's power. Only the necromancer lord can use the Necronomicon to its fullest extent.
"A summoner won't be able to use the Necronomicon's raise dead ability. The Necromancer, a normal special class, can use this ability but the raised dead will only last for twenty-four hours. The dead raised by a High Necromancer, a second-class special class, can last for three days. But for a necromancer lord, the dead raised by this class will only die when they are killed for the second time."
"They don't have a duration…," Megan said.
"Yes… Except when the user of the artifact put the dead under that condition," Jeanny pointed at the incoming dead army which was covered by the eerie purple glow. "That purple glow is the sign of another one of the Necronomicon's abilities, Army of Darkness. It enhanced all the dead controlled by the artifact. The dead army received a 200% boost to their attributes, 10% to damage, and 30% to movement speed. These dead soldiers are also now immune to all mental status effects. The drawback is once this skill is activated, the revived dead will only last for twelve hours. After that, they will die even if their HP is still full."
"This means the enemy is intent on winning this battle within twelve hours," Arthur conjectured.
"How arrogant!" Megan exclaimed. "Even with his dead army, they won't breach our defensive wall."
"You are right," Jeanny said. "Without siege weapons, I don't see how they can…"
She stopped speaking.
"What's the matter," Megan asked.
"Oh no… They don't need to bring siege weapons," Jeanny said with a trembling voice. She now remembered the battle against the World Ruler when she was defending the Wicked Witches' headquarters.
As if to emphasize her fear, familiar towering structures appeared at the backline of the enemy.
"How… How can they have the resources to build so many…?" Jeanny uttered.
"What's that?" Megan asked.
The darkness caused her unable to clearly see the structures which had suddenly materialized out of nowhere, but Jeanny recognized those shadows. They were the same massive arrow towers used by World Ruler during Wicked Witches' battle. At that time, World Ruler summoned only four. This time, there were more than twenty of this structure. They were arranged in a very long line following the enemy army's line formation. This line formation could hit half of the capital at the same time.
To make matter worse, another group of massive structures appeared. The people on the wall also couldn't see these new structures clearly, but those with far vision skills could roughly make out the outline of the structure and saw that they looked like catapults.
They were indeed catapults, or more precisely, Flame Catapults. They were produced by World Maker. The stones thrown from these catapults automatically caught fire, increasing their damage and adding an explosion that delivered AOE damage upon impact. Targets hit by the explosion had a chance to receive Burn status.
There were also more than twenty of these flame catapults.
These flame catapults initiated the opening strike. The stones placed on their firing arms caught fire. The light from these flames illuminated the catapults and let everyone on the wall see what they were dealing with. These flaming stones were then thrown, creating arcs of light that scraped the dark sky.
"Brace for impact…!!" Jeanny yelled.
Those with defensive skills used the skills. Some of the flaming stones hit the wall, causing vibration all over its defensive rune diagram.
Some went past above the wall and hit the houses behind the wall. Luckily, civilians were already evacuated to the deeper part of the capital. But some soldiers and players were there. They were inside the wall, so they thought they were safe. The flaming stones that hit them reminded them that the war had already started.
With the opening strike from the flame catapults, the dead army increased their pace from walking to running. They were now rushing toward the wall. Following their rush, the arrow towers also moved forward. The ranged units inside the arrow opened fire to cover the zombie army's advance.
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