Volume 7, Chapter 12 – Changes Among the Undead

Graveyard Plane.

Before the self-proclaimed Undead Grand Duke discovered the “Graveyard” plane drifting through the Sea of Stars, the Graveyard Plane didn’t actually exist.

Later, the homeless undead followed their leader, the Undead Grand Duke Sargus, to this abandoned plane, and they named it the Graveyard Plane.

Undead, in the end, are a group of people who have lost things. And most undead, after being resurrected, also find it hard to maintain their sanity.

Some people say the undead are a bunch of evil existences. But in truth, every single one of the undead had lived a miserable life when they were alive.

Betrayed in life, deceived, abandoned. After death, the ones who retained hatred toward the living came back to life again. The undead may be immortal, but every single undead clings to their lowly existence by relying on that hatred they never want to forget.

They want revenge, they want to raise their butcher’s blades against those living who persecuted them.

For millions upon millions of years, this was how the undead of Graveyard lived. While recalling everything from their living days, they wandered through this plane of eternal night.

But this kind of life that would never change ended up changing. In order to fulfill the undead’s long-cherished wish, the Undead Grand Duke decisively launched a vast Undead Invasion War.

In that war, the Graveyard Plane fought one against seven. Not only did it heavily damage the two major factions, Stronghold and Kingdom, the leader, the Undead Grand Duke, also took head-on the attacks of the plane power from the various factions, and even directly beat the leader of Academy and Nature into serious injury.

With that single battle, the Graveyard, which had always been unknown before, displayed such power that the world turned pale at the sound of its name.

But…

In that battle, the Undead Grand Duke, like a father, personally stayed behind to cover the retreat so the main force could withdraw. It was also because of this that Graveyard wasn’t wiped out by the other factions.

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However, after losing the Undead Grand Duke, Graveyard became leaderless, and Graveyard’s only legitimate successor, the Frost Dragon Ysera, vanished without a trace.

So after returning to Graveyard, the undead higher-ups began arguing over who could become Graveyard’s leader. Later, two major factions even emerged.

One was the False Undead Grand Duke faction led by the outsider Duansheng Tingyu, and the other was the Undead Emperor led by Karl who died without a whole corpse.

The two factions argued endlessly over who exactly was Graveyard’s leader. But even though they were fighting, Graveyard’s higher-ups didn’t kill each other over it. Instead, with remarkable tacit understanding, it stayed a verbal fight.

However, this deadlocked situation ended quickly. The Headless Knight Fischerna, who had been left outside, found the Frost Dragon Ysera. And then, as the rightful heir of the Undead Grand Duke Sargus, Ysera naturally received the support of all the undead higher-ups.

The two factions fell apart on their own. But toward the two faction leaders, Duansheng Tingyu and Karl, Ysera didn’t blame them. On the contrary, after learning about their ability to rally Graveyard’s higher-ups, Ysera even put them to important use.

It could be said that only after Ysera returned did Graveyard, which had been heading toward decline, regain its vitality once again.

And Ysera, who inherited the position of the Undead Grand Duke, announced an order on her very first day in power.

“Put down your hatred. From this day on, the undead will no longer take revenge on the living.”

At the beginning, this order of Ysera’s caused dissatisfaction among most undead. But after Ysera explained that this was the wish left behind after the Undead Grand Duke Sargus passed away…

At that moment, every dissatisfied voice in Graveyard fell silent.

Undead Grand Duke Sargus, even if he had already died, his position in the hearts of the undead was something no one could replace.

As more and more undead began accepting Ysera’s command, more and more undead started trying to put down their hatred toward the living.

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And as they began putting down hatred, for some undead who truly did put it down, the obsession in their hearts dissipated. And as that obsession dissipated, the will that supported the undead in continuing to exist also disappeared along with it.

Yes.

When the undead put down their obsessions, and no longer had any attachments, they would truly die.

Other than those low-level undead with no intelligence, any undead with even a bit of intelligence began accepting Ysera’s command.

And as time passed, even some undead higher-ups gradually left as well.

It was too exhausting.

The undead lived far too exhausted.

When hatred that had lasted for millions of years was put down, those undead who no longer had any obsessions… also departed along with the putting down of those obsessions.

And among those undead higher-ups that Undead Grand Duke Sargus had once picked up one by one from piles of corpses in the beginning, some also passed away for this very reason.

In a dim room, Ysera, now the Undead Grand Duke, was standing alone.

And in front of where Ysera stood, a skeleton draped in tattered robes lay quietly on a cold stone bed.

“I’m leaving too…”

The skeleton spoke slowly, its voice extremely faint. The dim soul-fire in its eye sockets gently swayed, as if it could vanish at any moment.

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“Ysera. I’m going to follow the Grand Duke… there’s no need to be sad over my, Kersu’s, passing.”

Kersu, whose true identity was the Lich King who commanded the liches in Graveyard, had now put down his hatred, and his life had reached its final moment.

Looking at the extremely weak Kersu before her, Ysera only felt an overwhelming sorrow in her heart.

“Don’t be sad, Ysera.”

Even though he was extremely weak, the former Lich King still had observation sharper than ordinary people.

Sensing that Ysera seemed to be sad for him, Kersu let out a barely perceptible sigh.

“The undead were never meant to exist. But because of the Grand Duke… all of us gathered together because of that.”

“We who were cast aside by the world had a home of our own. We had brothers and sisters who belonged to us. But it wasn’t until the Grand Duke died… that we realized it after the fact.”

“Don’t be sad for me, Ysera. You are already our Graveyard’s leader, and what you carry on your shoulders is the Grand Duke’s will.”

After hearing Kersu’s words, Ysera bit her lip and nodded seriously.

“I know. I will inherit Father’s will. Graveyard won’t decline because of me, it will prosper because of me.”

After hearing Ysera’s words, Kersu seemed very comforted, and then his bony jaw lowered slightly, as if he wanted to say something.

But… at that moment, the soul-fire that had been swaying all along suddenly went out without any warning.

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Looking at Kersu, now returned to deathly silence, Ysera stood in place for a long time.

How many years ago, a young mage mocked by everyone for being dull met the person who changed his life.

At that time, behind that person always followed a girl with a gentle smile.

“I… I want to learn spells, can you teach me?”

“I don’t know spells.”

“I know I’m very stupid… but I still don’t believe learning magic absolutely needs talent.”

Later.

The youth died at the hands of classmates who were also learning magic.

And then, he was resurrected as undead.

“Do you want to learn magic? I can teach you now… oh right, what’s your name?”

“Kersu, my name is Kersu.”