Rise of the Blood Sovereign

[ The player is unable to make the human called 'Ilya' a servant as the difference in power is too large and the person has been dead for too long ]

"Well, it was worth a shot," Lyle said as he put on the archmage's robes on. He proceeded to dig a hole before burying the dead mage inside of it.

"If people find out he is dead, some might assume it was me who did it, since my strength is nowhere near what it once was, I need to lay low for some time and increase my power again," Lyle said as he wiped the sweat from his face.

Even though his stats were low, thanks to it still being nighttime, Lyle's strength was boosted and he could fight against stronger enemies without much trouble, of course, most beings in the world were now stronger than him.

"I wanted to go back right away, but I should wait, the road back is long and dangerous for the current me, I should increase my strength first before trying to find a caravan that is heading to Orsvald, that will be the best course of action right now."

"Hey, system, you said that monsters have become more powerful, right?" Lyle suddenly asked.

[ Correct. ]

"Hmm, I wonder if the weaklings in the forest have also become stronger, maybe I can use them to regain some of my strength," Lyle said before smiling dangerously. He went to a nearby tree and broke off a branch before using his nails to sharpen it.

His nails were quite sharp, even though he was only a level 1 being currently. They weren't sharper than blades, but he was still able to use them to sharpen wood, albeit with some difficulty.

"Tch, it took a while, but it's done," Lyle said as he stared at his hand, two of his fingers were bleeding, they were punctured by the wood during the sharpening process.

Lyle closed his eyes and used his ability, he focused on the blood that was flowing out from his fingers before the blood started coagulating and the bleeding stopped.

"Good, I can still do the same things as before, albeit with more difficulty."

"Now, let's find some monsters, the city will probably be under lockdown until tomorrow, I should try and kill as many monsters as I can before going back there," Lyle said as he went deeper inside the forest.

Lyle walked inside as he fiddled around with a ring that he was now wearing on his left index finger. It was the spatial ring that once belonged to Ilya.

"The old bastard had some good things inside the ring, but no weapons or armor, well I guess a mage really doesn't have any use for such things."

The inside of the spatial ring was a full 100 square meters ( 1076 square feet ) in size. It was a top-notch spatial ring that only those in the top ranks of the empire had. For Lyle, it was a reward for managing to kill the old archmage during the system's integration with the planet.

'This amount of gold coins will be enough for me to use for a long time, I can get some good gear in the city right after they open up, it's a shame I can't sell the staves, wands, and tomes of this guy, his research is also worthless to me.' Lyle thought as he glanced inside the ring.

There wasn't only gold inside, precious gems could also be found, but the things that were worth the most were the many staves, wands, tomes, and the research papers of the old mage. All of these items were things that an archmage personally collected and each was worth a small fortune, especially the research papers.

There were also bottles of antidotes and poison inside, which could prove incredibly useful for Lyle in the future. The poison was definitely what Ilya had personally created and they were incredibly deadly.

The research papers and tomes were all very useful to any mage, even archmages. The research papers were on the art of poison and spatial magic, two elements that were amongst the hardest to master, and finding any data about them was very difficult.

Lyle would be unable to try and sell them for a long time, however. If he was to show such items, even if he went to the most reputable auction houses in the empire, there was the possibility of a powerful figure to try and find out his identity before attempting to kill him in order to check what else he might have.

It would only be later when Lyle reached at least Tier III, which was the same as the Gold Knight realm in the empire, that he would be able to consider selling them.

When it came to tiers, it only took Lyle a short period of time to get used to the system's way of calling them. Tier I would be the same as a normal Knight, or as they were more commonly called, a Bronze Knight or Bronze Mage.

Silver Knight and Silver Mage would be the equivalent of Tier II, Gold Knight and Gold Mage Tier III, and Titled Knight or Archmage Tier IV. There were higher ranks of power in the world, and Lyle knew them, just like a Vampire Lord was usually a rank as well as a bloodline, it was the equivalent of Tier VI for the system.

Different races had different systems of power and what they called the corresponding ranks, but to the system, it was all divided into tiers.

Lyle had no idea how many tiers there were, but he didn't care, for now, he was a being that wasn't even Tier I, to think of more would be useless.

Lyle only walked about 2 minutes before he heard sounds in the distance. He quickly went down and started going forward while crouching as he stared in front of him.

Soon he was able to see what had made the sounds.

'Toskars.' Lyle thought to himself as he stared at the 3 monsters in front of him.

Each of the monsters was about 1.5 meters tall and had a head that was unusually large. The weird monsters stood on two legs, but they didn't have arms, instead of that, there were two weird, tentacle-looking things that came out from their shoulders.

Their heads were a mixture of a frog and a deer. They had no fur on their bodies as they were slimy all over. Their feet were similar to human feet but wider. Their small stomachs protruded out as the three monsters had finished eating. 𝚋𝚎ｄｎｏ𝚟𝚎ｌ.ｎ𝚎𝚝

Toskars were not powerful monsters, they were usually a danger to normal people as they loved to ambush their unsuspecting victims before strangling them with their vines.

Other than that, the monsters were quite weak, their large heads made it so they couldn't run fast and the two tentacles, although allowing for a wide array of attacks, were soft and easy to cut off.

'Toskars being here means that the river is nearby, or it could be the lake, no, the lake should be a bit deeper inside the forest, I am sure of that.' Lyle said before focusing on the three monsters.

'They're bigger than normal, and those tentacles, they have small spikes all over them, that is definitely not how a normal Toskar looks like.' Lyle thought before climbing on top of a nearby tree.

'Is this because of the system, have monsters already started changing so quickly?' Lyle thought before clenching the small wooden spear in his right hand. Toskars usually had normal tentacle-like arms that were soft and slimy, their height was usually about 1.2 meters.

'I can take care of one easily, even killing two is not a problem, but I'm not sure about three, I still know nothing about those spikes, if they are dangerous, then this might become dangerous, but I do doubt that, no matter how much a Toskar becomes powerful, they shouldn't have poison inside their bodies.'

'Their stomachs are bloated, that means they have finished feeding recently, hmm, I can sense blood coming from their feet and on the ground, leading to the right, that's probably where the unfortunate victim is located at.' Lyle quickly analyzed the situation as he stared around the Toskars.

'Their movement should be limited since they just fed, taking care of these three, shouldn't be a problem after all.' Lyle concluded before waiting for the Toskars to get closer.

He had intentionally gone up a tree that was on the way of the Toskars. They would have to pass next to the tree, and Lyle would take full advantage of that.

He grabbed another branch, but he didn't break it off the tree, not yet. The wind blew and the sound of the leaves moving around was heard in the forest as the three monsters made sounds as they seemingly talked with each other.

Suddenly, as they were walking underneath the tree where Lyle had climbed up on, they heard a snapping sound as a branch was broken. Looking up, the Toskars panicked as the silhouette of a person could be seen falling down on them.