There was an expansion of fertile land under the sparkling artificial sun.
It was the laws of nature that life would be born and would grow.
It was not different here. Countless plants sprouted, grew, and bore fruit.
It was a scene that one felt warm about just by looking at it. The golden waves of wheat swayed like waves in the wind, and the corns in full ear were shyly wrapped in green leaves. Strawberries and grapes, which would surely smell so sweet in one's mouth with a bite, also showed off their beauty with their own colors.
It was beautiful. It was a scene that made one feel the greatness of life and nature, except for a bit of a sense of strangeness.
"Don't you think our little master is so mean this time like he was last time?"
Scathach, the Immortal Witch and the owner of the Garden of Life in charge of healing the 12 Spirits of the House of Mammon, frowned.
The Garden of Life was full of death.
Nearly 50 skeleton soldiers were absorbed in farming with their own farming tools.
As they were new to the garden, many of them weren't familiar with farming, but they made up for their clumsy skills through their meticulous and repetitive actions peculiar to the undead.
The way that the undead in the realm of death cultivated plants caused Scathach to feel an instinctive sense of strangeness. Moreover, there were more than 50 skeletons in the garden. Similar things were going on in all four circular rooms on the first floor.
In some rooms, they grew fruit intensively, and in other rooms, they grew preference items such as sugar cane, cacao, and tobacco. The most impressive among them was the room where they grew medicinal materials such as hemp and poppy.
The beautiful garden where Scathach healed the visitors' mind and body did not exist anymore. Instead, there were only rice paddies and fields filled with the smell of manure from all directions.
Yong-ho, who returned from the human world, increased the number of skeletons a lot.
Skeleton workers, who could be called the lowest dungeon spirit, were very cheap.
A dragon's single finger bone, which cost less than pure dragon bones, could buy tens of skeleton workers.
Yong-ho purchased a total of 200 skeleton workers.
There were very few masters of houses who bought as many skeleton workers as he.
When Yong-ho recalled Skull when he arrived at the House of Mammon, it was natural that he thought so.
Skeleton workers performed very badly.
They were weak and slow. Of course, they were good at repetitive work almost without taking any break, but their efficiency was so low that it was hard to regard it as their strength. Besides, their learning ability was also limited.
Given these factors, it was questionable whether the unit price of skeletons was really cheap.
Nonetheless, Yong-ho purchased skeleton workers in large quantities, for he had some measures to deal with them unlike an ordinary master of a house.
"Oops… sorry. I was nodding off. What did you say?"
Yong-ho, with his whole body buried in the blue liquid, spoke slowly with his eyes half-closed.
He had shadows under his eyes.
On the day he bought the skeleton workers, Yong-ho promoted all of them to skeleton soldiers.
They were literally tremendous construction workers. However, with the money to buy two hundred skeleton workers, he took advantage of gaining two hundred skeleton soldiers.
It was a really profitable business, given that he would promote them to skeleton warriors or higher beings later.
It was good to have an elite force, but it was also necessary to have as many skeletons as possible. Yong-ho learned and felt a lot while fighting Embrio. From now on, he intended to use the power of evolution more aggressively.
Scathach let out a long sigh again, after all. Instead of blaming Yong-ho, who looked worn out with fatigue, she turned her eyes at the dragon soldiers that made her feel uncomfortable. She frowned at them again.
Unlike typical skeletons, the dragon soldiers were farming by twos and threes in a field. They were seven, all told, but each of them was strong enough to be equivalent to five or six skeleton knights. To convert them into skeleton soldiers, they were worth more than a few hundred.
It was really eerie and terrifying to see them, about 2 meters tall, squatting on the field and hoeing clumsily.
It was unthinkable for them to be engaged in such manual labor. As dragon soldiers, they were supposed to be proud of themselves. As an undead, they wouldn't disobey their owner's orders, but they could throw tantrums and complain while working.
However, the dragon soldiers were busy hoeing hard.
It was because another powerful being that could smash their pride at once was also squatting and honing like them.
"Skull Skull."
Dragon Bone Knight.
Its existence itself was different from general dragon soldiers.
It was huge. It even gave the aura of grandeur beyond just being huge.
Its color was pure white itself. Since it was made from the hardest and sharpest fangs of the dragon's bones, it was slender and sturdy.
Its anti-magic resistance was also excellent. It would obviously ignore any typical mana.
The purple flame burning in its head, reminiscent of a humanoid or dragon, caused wonder and fear at the same time.
It was a great warrior that could confront a Death Knight, arguably the pinnacle of the skeleton warrior series.
"Skullkull."
After murmuring something like 'The sun is so warm, so it's good for me rolling on the floor,' Dragon Bone Knight got down to hoeing hard again.
Scathach murmured, "Come on, it went too far."
She felt like that because she witnessed the whole process of Skull being reborn as a Dragon Bone Knight.
Yong-ho really invested a lot in Skull.
So, his efforts to create a dragon soldier to be used for evolving Skull were unusual from the beginning.
First of all, he selected the best quality of the dragon's teeth as materials.
Then he went through one more process instead of simply using the scroll of summoning a dragon soldier as he did for other dragon soldiers. It was Tigrius's combination magic.
Tigrius, who was summoned from the House of Randolt, used the scroll of summoning a dragon soldier and that of summoning a skeleton mage at the same time.
And he combined the two magics with the power of combination magic.
Of course, it wasn't easy. Yong-ho didn't use the magic by himself. It was the magic contained in the scroll. Moreover, Tigrius's power itself was weakened after he became Yong-ho's dungeon spirit.
Nonetheless, Tigrius finally succeeded. Although he wasted the scroll of summoning a dragon soldier and the scroll of summoning a skeleton mage, his efforts paid off anyway.
Thus, a dragon soldier with the power of a skeleton mage was born.
This time, Ophelia did her bit. To prevent an emergency, she weakened the ego of the dragon soldier with mental magic. She badly complained about having to kiss a skeleton, but the price she paid for that was very cheap compared to the results. Of course, this was what Yong-ho thought to himself.
Finally, Yong-ho activated a combination magic evolution.
He was satisfied with the outcome. Just looking at it, he felt like his belly was full even without eating anything. Skull now had the physical strength that surpasses a dragon soldier and the magic ability that surpasses typical combat wizards. The small number of magic that Skull could use was somewhat its weakness, but it was still more than enough to be used in battle.
Skull had been reborn as a deceptive all-weather wizard warrior with strong attack power, high defensive abilities that could ignore typical magic but use its own attack magic.
Despite that, Skull was hoeing humbly in the field. No matter how powerful it was reborn, Skull was still a skull.
Scathach clicked her tongue then turned to Yong-ho again. He was half asleep at the moment.
She asked, "I know you overworked yourself these days. Then you didn't sleep at all last night? Tell me honestly. You didn't sleep properly for the past several days, right?"
Yong-ho flinched at her questioning. Then Lucia cut in as if she had been waiting for this chance until now.
[You're right!]
[Scathach, just listen to me!]
[You've got to spread this gossip everywhere!]
[I've got one thing to tell you.]
[Whispering.]
[Whispers.]
"Oh my God! How indecent!"
Scathach screamed with both hands on her cheeks.
But Yong-ho shouted, "Lucia, you didn't hear anything except for the whispering, right? I just kept working! That's all!"
[Really?]
[Are you sure you just worked, doing nothing else?]
[You disconnected the communication link with me, who's cute, pretty, poor, and miserable, and just kept working for several days?]
[Are you sure?]
[Really?]
As if she was really disappointed in him for the past few days, Lucia pressured him a lot. Burying himself in the blue liquid, he cleared his throat and said, "Well, let me exercise the right to remain silent."
He felt it fortunate that Ophelia was not here at the moment. Catalina was asleep, wrapped in blue liquid across from him. If she had been awake and seen this, she would have been very embarrassed.
Scathach burst into laughter. After soothing Lucia with kind words, she said, "You've got nothing to be ashamed of. It's natural, and you're the King of Greed anyway."
Then she lifted his blue watery eyes and looked a little further away.
She continued, "I want to make more money. I want to have a woman. I want to be strong. I want to grow a dungeon. I want to evolve dungeon spirits. All this is 'greed.' There is no such thing as a high or low greed because it's hope and wish. It's what everybody really wants."
Staring in the air, she turned her eyes back at him and earnestly said like his mother, "Greed itself is not bad because it is the driving force of our life and development. So, just desire it as much as you want. Just keep wishing for it. Don't be shy. Your strong wish will be your strength in no time."
She made a beautiful and brilliant smile. Yong-ho, who unwittingly looked at her, enchanted with her charming smile, seemed to understand why she had the power of "life".
'Come to think of it...'
There was something that came to his mind.