One Hundred: The Tower of Bones

In a single night, Flor—the young fool who had traded away two-thirds of his family fortune for the mineral rights to Goblin Forest—became the laughingstock of Silver Sand City.

After that one act, his standing within the merchant guild plummeted to absolute zero.

Even the ever-attentive steward who had long cared for him with painstaking devotion was utterly disappointed in him after learning of his profligacy.

Yet, to everyone’s surprise, after a bout of sobbing, Flor actually pulled himself together. Wiping away his tears, he told the people around him that he was going to negotiate with that necromancer and reclaim what was rightfully his.

No one around him tried to dissuade him from this naive notion, as though they were simply waiting to watch the joke unfold.

Even the steward who had always been so attentive to him offered no objection this time. It seemed that, given the present circumstances, rather than letting Flor remain in Silver Sand and continue to make a nuisance of himself, it would be better to send him for a stroll through Goblin Forest.

Even if he were to come back with his nose bloodied, that would still be better than staying in Silver Sand City and misbehaving further. If Flor had another fit of idiocy and squandered the last of his assets, then everything would truly be over.

And so, on the fifth day after Karen took control of Goblin Forest, Flor entered the forest with several guards at his side.

Before Flor went in, Karen’s side welcomed two groups of visitors in succession.

The first group was Cliff’s men, who had come to deliver Whispers of the Dead to Karen.

Over those five days since Karen seized Goblin Forest, Cliff had used merchants and money to gather seven thousand Whispers of the Dead for him.

Another seventy thousand points of territorial energy had come in, bringing Karen’s total territorial energy to three hundred thousand.

Besides Cliff’s people, the other group was Old Jack’s woodsmen.

They had also brought Karen a batch of supplies, though because the Whispers of the Dead in Moon-Worship City had already been harvested several times, the woodsmen had not managed to bring him very many of them. Still, they had not come empty-handed; they had brought Karen a shipment of corpses.

In total, there were one hundred and twenty second-tier corpses and eight third-tier corpses.

How should it be said? It was not a small number, but Karen was still somewhat disappointed, because Old Jack had not delivered the promised ghost channel.

According to the woodsmen responsible for transporting the supplies, it would still take some time before the ghost channel could be handed over to Karen.

Karen did not say much about it. After all, from the very beginning, he had never placed all his hopes on Old Jack.

If Old Jack could deliver the ghost channel, that would be best. If not, Karen had other ways.

Not long after Cliff and Old Jack’s men had delivered the supplies, the Bone Tower that Karen had begun constructing two days earlier was finally completed.

The finished Bone Tower was unlike the Chinese-style towers Karen had in mind.

It was cylindrical and only three stories high, its entire body a chill bone-white, about nine meters tall. Each floor covered roughly one hundred square meters, not very large. But whatever the case, with the Bone Tower completed, Karen at last had a proper foothold in his territory.

And with the Bone Tower finished, its full attributes finally appeared before Karen.

But at that moment, Karen scarcely looked at its attributes at all. Instead, he went straight to the requirements for upgrading it.

To upgrade it to level two required fifteen thousand territorial energy, plus two hundred second-tier corpses.

A lot, but still within Karen’s means. After a moment of hesitation, he finally raised the Bone Tower’s level.

The Bone Tower’s upgrade from level one to level two was not nearly as troublesome as before, and did not require waiting two days. In almost an instant, the level rose, and the Bone Tower also grew from three floors to four. Only then did Karen turn his attention to its attributes.

...

Bone Tower

Building Level: 2

Building Description: A defensive, residential structure with a certain degree of protection and some special functions.

Building Effects: Basic Defense Lv2, Basic Training Amplification Lv2

Basic Defense Lv2: The Bone Tower can nullify attacks from below the second tier and can unleash three random area spells per day, with power roughly equivalent to outstanding fourth-tier level.

Defense Attack Range: 1,000 meters

Basic Training Amplification Lv2: Remaining in the Bone Tower automatically grants 30 personal energy points per hour!

Maximum Occupancy: 50 people/undead

Upgrade Requirement: 100,000 territorial energy, 100 third-tier corpses!

...

Looking at the Bone Tower’s attributes, how should it be said? It was fairly decent.

It not only had a measure of defensive power, but could even automatically increase personal energy. A yield of 690 territorial energy per day was already considerable, and this was only level two; it could still be improved further.

And while Karen was upgrading his Bone Tower to level two, on the other side, Flor finally entered Goblin Forest under the protection of more than a dozen goblin guards.

Yet Flor seemed to be no ordinary victim of misfortune. Not long after he had entered the forest, another tragedy befell him.

Among the guards who had been protecting him all along, three suddenly drew their blades and began to slash at the goblins beside them.

Those three were clearly stronger than the guards at Flor’s side, and with the advantage of surprise, in just a few minutes the twelve guards around Flor had been cut down to the last man.

“Sorry, young master. Someone paid a very large sum for your life.”

After dealing with the guards, the three traitors carried their blades and closed in on Flor.

Flor had never seen anything like this before. Terrified, his legs gave out and he dropped straight to his knees.

“Don’t kill me, don’t kill me. I have money, I can give you more money—please, don’t kill me!”

Hearing this, mocking smiles spread across the faces of the three guards.

“You have money? Are you really sure you still have money?

The estate your dead father left you—you squandered two-thirds of it on Lord Wenge, and the rest probably doesn’t even belong to you anymore. Right now, you can’t even afford the price of your own life, so you’d better die obediently!”

As they spoke, the three guards moved to strike.

Yet at the very instant they attacked, Flor, who had been trembling all this time, activated a magic scroll hidden beneath his abdomen. At the same moment, dozens of black tree vines burst from the ground and tightly bound the three guards...