036 Hope for the Territory’s Upgrade

Karen (Lord)
Territory Owned: Unnamed
Territory Level: 1
Territory Energy: 440 (Gained 50 from slaying a Tier Two magical beast, 10 from killing Perik, 270 from selling 27 Whisper of the Dead, 100 over five days, plus 10 left over from last time!)
Territory Buildings: Small Graveyard (1), Small Mausoleum (3)
Corpses Available for Conversion: 101 (human)
Undead Possessed: Rotting Goblin {Tier One Trash} (4), Goblin Skeleton {Tier One Trash} (8), Rotting Goblin Mage {Tier One Elite} (1), Skeletal Goblin Hunter (Green Cap) {Tier One Excellent} (1)
…
Such was the state of Karen's territory after emptying out the graves of Dole Village.
For Karen, the focus was on the 440 points of territory energy and the 101 human corpses.
As for the yet-unnamed territory, Karen glanced at the title and ignored it. What truly weighed on his mind was how he ought to spend his territory energy—should he convert undead, or should he try his luck and gamble for something better?
Of course, his hesitation did not last long. After all, he had not lost his wits; he knew very clearly what he truly needed most right now.
"As for territory energy, I've now discovered a new source of income through Whisper of the Dead. That should be sufficient for a while—at least, there shouldn't be any issues before the territory advances to Tier Two. Right now, the most pressing matter is to raise the level and strength of the territory. Strength is the root of all things!"
With his priorities set, Karen immediately began converting undead.
While doing so, Karen took special care to examine the 101 corpses he had exhumed, hoping to find something out of the ordinary. He was eager to see if he might obtain an undead as special as the green-capped one—or at the very least, one like Green himself.
As it turned out, there were none—absolutely none!
The quality of these corpses was even lower than that of the goblins, for those goblins had mostly been handpicked Tier One warriors by Green during their lifetimes. Though goblins, the quality of their corpses surpassed that of these humans, who in life had mostly been Tier Zero.
Karen even began to worry that the undead produced from these human corpses might not even reach Tier One in strength.
And, as it turned out, his concerns were well-founded. Once he got to work, Karen discovered that converting these corpses was quite different from converting goblins.

For the goblins, there had only been a single conversion option, costing 20 points of territory energy. But the human corpses offered three tiers of conversion: 5, 10, and 15.
These represented, respectively, Tier Zero Trash, Tier Zero Normal, and Tier Zero Elite.
Indeed, there is always a trade-off. Corpses that were so easily acquired could not be converted directly into Tier One undead.
Yet for Karen, this was not necessarily a bad thing—especially when, after converting a "Tier Zero Trash" Decayed Skeleton, Karen was practically beaming with joy.
Of course, it was not the undead's attributes that pleased him; in fact, the Decayed Skeleton's stats were so abysmal as to be laughable.
…
Decayed Skeleton
Type: Bone
Power: Tier Zero (Trash) (0/5)
Abilities: None
Description: The weakest, most pitiful undead—so feeble that even a child with a bit of courage could defeat it!
…
A truly despair-inducing set of stats, yet Karen still grinned from ear to ear.
The reason? Upon creating this undead, the upgrade progress for the Small Graveyard increased from 17/100 to 18/100. This meant that even converting "Tier Zero Trash" undead would grant experience to the Small Graveyard.
"In that case, if I don't worry about keeping these undead, I could raise the Small Graveyard's level today!"
Though he said as much, Karen did not actually do so. It seemed wasteful.
With the hope of leveling up so close, Karen saw no reason to squander dozens of corpses. After all, he had gone to great lengths to orchestrate things just to get Old Jack out of the way and obtain these corpses.
To waste them now would be foolish, especially since it might not be so easy to find another opportunity like this when Old Jack returned.
Moreover, even though these undead were of "Tier Zero Trash" quality, they were not without potential for advancement. In fact, their progress was relatively easy—just five points of energy would be enough to upgrade them.
And since each Small Mausoleum produced one point of energy per day, in just five days, their strength would rise to "Tier Zero Normal." Reaching "Tier Zero Elite" would take only a month.
With Whisper of the Dead as a new source of territory energy, as long as everything was managed properly, Karen would soon have more than enough territory energy—there was simply no need to be wasteful.
After careful consideration, Karen ultimately spent 300 points of territory energy to construct six new Small Mausoleums, then used the remaining 140 points to convert 28 Decayed Skeletons.

…
Karen (Lord)
Territory Owned: Unnamed
Territory Level: 1
Territory Energy: 0
Territory Buildings: Small Graveyard (1) (45/100), Small Mausoleum (9)
Corpses Available for Conversion: 73 (human)
Undead Possessed:
Decayed Skeleton (28)
Rotting Goblin {Tier One Trash} (4)
Goblin Skeleton {Tier One Trash} (8)
Rotting Goblin Mage {Tier One Elite} (1)
Skeletal Goblin Hunter (Green Cap) {Tier One Excellent} (1)
…
After admiring the state of his territory with all his energy spent, Karen, now back to square one, returned to the village under Green Cap's reluctant gaze.
Unbeknownst to Karen, while he was busy tending to his territory, a new round of political strife—sparked by his recent actions—was unfolding in the distant Moon-Worship City.
Though Karen had done a decent job covering up Perik's demise, making it appear as though Perik had launched a sneak attack and died in an ensuing struggle, Moon-Worship City was not convinced. They refused to accept this version of events, and upon returning, Glenn and his companions immediately changed their testimony, insisting that they were unaware of any conflict between Karen and Perik—by the time they realized anything was amiss, both of them were already lying in a pool of blood.
In handling this incident, the authorities of Moon-Worship City were surprisingly forceful—some even demanded that Old Jack must bring Karen to the city for a face-to-face confrontation with Glenn and his companions…