Chapter 6: Magic Consultation

Eliot Igor, Patriarch of the Igor Family and former Lord of Eagle’s Rest Castle, stood alongside Victor Laurie, the Chief Mage of the Igor Family. Together, they ascended a small hill near the camp and gazed into the distance. It was already midnight, the stars and moon shining brightly.

Dozens of makeshift tents dotted the grassy field, spreading like overgrown white mushrooms. Wooden wagons were parked between the tents, and campfires flickered here and there. Sleepless convoy members sat around the flames, chatting idly—likely recounting their encounter with the zombie horde earlier that day.

Xiahou Yan squinted, doing a mental tally. Though he couldn’t pinpoint the exact number, there were visibly fewer carriages than when they first departed from Eagle’s Rest Castle. This meant that even if they managed to escape the infected zone, a significant portion of the supplies meant for establishing their new territory had already been lost to the horde. Suppressing his anxiety about the future, he lifted his gaze further outward and spotted a pitch-black pine forest at the edge of the camp. Under the cover of night, birds occasionally startled and took flight from the woods, casting an eerie and desolate pall over the scene.

"That’s the only forest in this infected zone, and it has no name," Master Laurie explained, noticing the Lord’s gaze. He sounded like an overly enthusiastic tour guide. "Zombies despise the aura of life emitted by plants, so they don’t dare approach the forest. That’s exactly why we chose to make camp near the woods."

Zombies afraid of plants? For some reason, Xiahou Yan found this setup vaguely familiar... However, he also knew that despite the camp’s current peace and tranquility, venturing just a few miles away from this forest toward the outskirts of the infected zone would immediately pit them against massive hordes of ravenous zombies. This temporary camp was like the eye of a hurricane, providing a rare sanctuary amidst the perilous infected zone.

"Master Laurie," he began leisurely, looking up at the bright moon suspended in the night sky. "I have a serious question for you."

"Please go ahead, my Lord..." Master Laurie nodded, looking somewhat apprehensive.

"Why..." Xiahou Yan took a deep breath, gritting his teeth, "...are you looking for Yellow Books to read in the middle of the night?"

Master Laurie stared wide-eyed, stuttering for a long time like a rooster grabbed by the neck before finally squeezing out, "Those aren’t Yellow Books, they’re... erotic novels..."

"Is there a difference?" Xiahou Yan sneered.

Master Laurie opened his mouth but ultimately hung his head in remorse. "The nights are long; it’s hard not to feel lonely..."

"Our convoy literally just slammed into a zombie horde today!" Xiahou Yan growled. "We lost over twenty Guards, countless citizens, and supplies. Now we’re trapped in the middle of the infected zone with no way out, and you can’t sleep, so you’re out looking for Yellow Books?!"

Master Laurie wrung his hands like a child caught doing something wrong, offering a sheepish smile.

"Anyway..." Xiahou Yan took a few deep breaths, suppressing the urge to slap the idiotic old man to death. He sneered, "...I came to you because I have serious business regarding Magic to ask you about."

"I’ll tell you everything I know!" Relieved as if granted amnesty, Master Laurie slapped his bony chest, making a series of THWACK THWACK sounds.

Xiahou Yan considered his wording before asking tentatively, "Do you know about Forbidden Magic?"

"My Lord!" Upon hearing the term ’Forbidden Magic,’ Master Laurie frantically waved his hands. "I! I haven’t touched that stuff in decades! Don’t—don’t misunderstand! I’m completely innocent!"

Xiahou Yan was baffled. He hadn’t even said anything yet, so why was the old man acting so incredibly guilty?

"Cut the nonsense, I’m just asking you one thing—" he glared at his Chief Mage, cutting off the man’s self-defense. "As a Mage, exactly how much do you know about Forbidden Magic!"

Master Laurie glanced around stealthily before lowering his voice to answer, "Well, I know a lit... a little..."

"Then do you know the Resurrection Technique from Undead Magic?" Xiahou Yan crossed his arms, casting a sidelong glance at the old man beside him.

At that term, Master Laurie foolishly dug at his ear, squinting to confirm. "The Resurrection Technique? The one ranked third among the Ten Great Forbidden Spells recognized by the Magic Association?"

Xiahou Yan’s intuition told him that the title ’Ten Great Forbidden Spells’ sounded somewhat dangerous, but he still had to nod and admit, "The ’Resurrection Technique’ that turns corpses into zombies—that’s the one you’re talking about, right?"

Suddenly, Master Laurie reached out in a panic, CLAPPING his hand over the Lord’s mouth. He whispered rapidly, "Lord Eliot! You can’t just speak recklessly about the Forbidden Spells! Not only is casting such Magic a capital offense punishable by burning at the stake, but according to the Magic Association’s regulations, you and I, as Mages, are even forbidden from verbally discussing this topic!"

Xiahou Yan slapped Master Laurie’s hand away and snapped, "I didn’t even graduate and get my Magic License, so the Association’s rules don’t apply to me!"

Master Laurie looked at the Lord with a deeply wronged expression, his unspoken meaning clear: *My Lord, you might not have graduated from the Mage Academy, but I, Victor Laurie, am a certified, orthodox Mage under the Association’s jurisdiction... If you want to spout nonsense, could you please leave me out of it?*

"Master Laurie, I just want to confirm one thing!" Xiahou Yan grabbed Master Laurie’s sleeve and lowered his voice near the man’s ear. "Is there any possibility that a zombie revived by the Resurrection Technique could retain the memories, thoughts, or emotions it had while alive?"

"Huh?" Master Laurie eyed his Lord as if looking at a complete idiot. "You said it yourself, the things revived by the Resurrection Technique are ’zombies’! Zombies! Do you even know what a zombie is?"

Xiahou Yan really wanted to answer: *Aren’t zombies those creatures that invade people’s gardens and eat their brains...* But thanks to the professional restraint expected of a Transmigrator, he remained silent.

"Zombies! Do! Not! Have! Their! Own! Minds!" Master Laurie emphasized each word. "Did you see those zombies in the horde today? In theory, aside from obeying the caster’s commands, a zombie revived by the Resurrection Technique should be absolutely no different from those brainless monsters!"

Xiahou Yan pondered the Master’s statement for a moment before asking, "Then how... do you explain this phenomenon?"

*What phenomenon?* Master Laurie desperately wanted to ask, but Xiahou Yan had already raised his hand, pointing a finger into the near distance. Following the Lord’s gesture, the Master ended up seeing the second unexpected figure of the night.

"Good evening, Master Laurie." Alice Comstock stood gracefully at the foot of the hill, smiling as she bowed to the Master.

Master Laurie’s mouth hung wide open. He stared blankly at the female Swordsman before him, his eyes bulging as round as a goldfish’s.

The Master suspected he might be experiencing symptoms of senile dementia. Something had to be wrong with his memory, because just earlier that day, he had seen Alice get her throat slashed by a zombie’s claws! In fact, it was Master Laurie himself who had cast an Absorption Technique to snatch Alice’s corpse back from the zombie horde! What the hell was going on?!

"Master Laurie," Xiahou Yan poked the Master’s back expressionlessly. "I used the Resurrection Technique on Alice’s corpse just now, and the Magic seemed somewhat effective—but as you can see, her current state doesn’t exactly match the zombies you described, does it?"

Master Laurie’s throat let out a CLUCK like a choking rooster. He turned his head stiffly, staring dumbly at the Lord. Xiahou Yan felt that the old man’s current state resembled a zombie far more than Alice did.

"What are your thoughts?" he earnestly consulted Master Laurie.

Master Laurie stayed frozen for about another half-minute before finally regaining his ability to speak. The nearly eighty-year-old Mage looked up at the night sky above, thick tears swirling in his elderly eyes. "My thought is... it would have been great if I hadn’t come out looking for Yellow Books tonight..."