Lord of Beasts

Following the castle's takeover, Kilian used the new Olaf as his intermediary to control the 4,000 remaining guards and dispatch them to gather the needed resources. But although 70% of Ostria's resources now lay in his hands, Kilian focused on the zuri, dra shards, and natal conductors.

Still, as he witnessed the incoming cargos from the top of the castle, Kilian couldn't help but smirk. In terms of zuri quantity alone, Olaf impressed him. A mere viscount, and yet he possessed more than 600 kg of zuri. The entirety of Orloth didn't have more than 700 tonnes, with the average count owning 500 kg, the average marquis, 900 kq, and the average duke, 2 tonnes.

The King of Olroth, Erik von Draken, owned 25 tonnes. Meanwhile, Klaus, the Duke of Kars, owned 100 tonnes. Olroth's military revolved around zuri and dra shards. Whoever could monopolize those resources could run amok within the country. If Olaf wasn't such a wastrel, based on his zuri alone, his military forces would undoubtedly stand on another level.

As for the rest, Kilian counted 367 low-grade Dra Shards, each with 75 dra on average, and 4,126 Natal Conductors. Those numbers remained within his expectations, and he directly got to work.

---[Name: Kilian][Race: Human Fehl Mutant][Age: 18][Magus Rank: top-level Lesser Emissary][Battle Prowess: top-level High Emissary][Dra Reserves: 11,000][Knowledge Points: 55,543][Implants: 0][Mutation: Stage II Eye of Fehl][Innate Abilities: Eye of Distortion, Eye of Revelation][Unique Disciplines: Lv. 3 Fleshcrafting<>Lv. 3 Transmutation]---

Since Kilian automatically gained 30% kp from those he killed, following the battle, his kp count rose exponentially. And following the eye's rise to the second level, Kilian's Dimensional Rift ability evolved into its true form: the Eye of Distortion.

Presently, it not only enabled him to open spatial rifts but to twist space to create Aversion Fields. Of course, at his current level, many limitations shackled him. First, he couldn't open a rift into a place he neither visited nor could sense. Any attempt at doing so would result in random teleportation. Second, currently, he couldn't open more than two rifts per day. Third, he couldn't bring more than one person with him.

As for his second ability - dark grey rather than crimson - it currently allowed Kilian to get random glimpses into the future, execute every move to perfection, and analyze the nature as well as all the flaws of a structure, battle stance, spell or ability. On the one hand, this ability would allow him to eradicate all errors from his works, on the other hand, his learning pace, battle skills, and creations would rise to brand-new heights.

For the following hours, Kilian relentlessly worked on the production of nano-spiders, pumping his dra to go as fast as he possibly could. Yet, the completion of 2,950 nano-spiders still took him 17 hours. Added to his previous 50, he now had 3,000. Of course, a massive quantity of zuri, dra shards and natal conductors went into that work. Kilian exhausted 110 kg of zuri, 76 dra shards, and 2,950 natal conductors.

He also created a dark-blue watch able to cast energy shields.

Obviously, he could have carried on. But for a simple reason, he didn't: Ostria couldn't afford to wait any longer.

Kilian might not care for the victims' lives, but if he allowed Ostria to turn into a dead city, no amount of news manipulation could prevent the capital from realizing the truth. Using the mother spider in his brain to control the 3,000 spiders, Kilian brought them all out of the Hellforge. As usual, Jezebel awaited him.

"Casualties?"

"Since the beasts' appearance, around 60,000 people perished, with about 3,000 fehl beasts now rampaging across Ostria. Naturally, of the slums' 30,000 iniquitous, not a single one remains," Jezebel replied while lounging on a blue velvet tufted sofa. Thanks to a minor mirage of hers, the fehl beasts avoided the viscount's castle, rampaging only in the city proper.

Kilian didn't doubt that Jezebel could quell the disturbance with a finger snap. However, exhausting her powers for such a minor task absolutely wasn't worth it. In fact, though nigh impossible, Kilian somewhat wished she'd never have to bare her claws for his sake.

Nodding in acknowledgment, Kilian thrice clapped, the door flew open, and Olaf dived in, directly kneeling before Kilian.

"Lord, how may I serve you?" Following his makeover, the new Olaf believed that his existence's highest purpose was to execute all of Kilian's orders to the letter. Nothing else mattered.

"Lead a detachment of 500 men to act as baits for the 1,000 beasts and lure them all toward the castle. With this watch, your spells and the soldiers' artillery, drawing the beasts in shouldn't be too difficult. I will handle the rest," Kilian ordered and tossed the watch toward Olaf. Receiving it, he bowed in agreement.

"As you command, my lord!" Without delay, Olaf stood up and rushed toward the barracks, gathering his 4,000 remaining men, and handpicking the 500 most apt at completing the assigned task. Meanwhile, Jezebel waved her hand, dispelling the mirage that lured the beasts away.

Stepping toward the sofa, Kilian sat beside her and closed his eyes.

"Isn't 500 too much?" Jezebel couldn't help but ask. At the end of the day, Olaf aside, those were men destined to die. It would be a miracle if more than 10% survived. That being the case, why not reduce the numbers to a more tolerable loss? However, Kilian shook his head in disagreement.

"Our advantage and disadvantage is that the beasts can work as groups. Though broken in smaller groups, a force of 3,000 fehl beasts is no laughing matter. With my current strength, I can't just charge them all by myself. But as we've seen in the clash with Lena, they're prone to a reckless use of their dra.

After uniting 1,000, we not only need enough men to act as bait but enough sacrifices to exhaust their strength and last until they reach our gates. The shield can only endure for a short time, making 500 is the right middle. Less and they won't last long enough. But fret not, for them, death is a new beginning," Kilian cooly replied.

Meanwhile, Olaf led the 500 soldiers into the suicide mission. Opening fire on several groups of rampaging beasts, he drew their frenzied but united attention, and used the watch to surround his forces in an energy shield as they retreated to the castle.

The beasts' feral roars echoed with flurries of second circle spells that raced across the air to slam into the shield. While the shield could withstand the assault of a High Emissary, quantity could sometimes overwhelm quality, and following 15 minutes of retreat, the shield collapsed—broken by a kaleidoscopic salvo of dazzling spells.

As soon as it crumbled, 80 men followed it into oblivion, leaving the remaining 420 to rush back to the castle. But how could the beasts allow them to? Although they'd exhausted their dra, the 1,000 beasts' physical strength made a mockery of those trained soldiers, and by the time they reached the castle walls, less than 10 remained.

The rest left a bloody trail on the road.

Kilian stood on top of the castle walls with 1,000 nano-spiders swirling around his form. Using the height to his advantage, he fired the spiders from 50 meters of altitude, turning them into flaming projectiles that nailed each and every one of the fehl beasts.

Without delay, Kilian used the mother spider to release legions of nanobots within the beasts' neural systems, and take control of them all. He then led the 1,000 creatures in an explosive counterattack that ended with him taming the entirety of Ostria's 3,000 fehl beasts.