The Ruined Death Knight

"W-What did you just say...?" Bolrorg said with a stunned expression.

Staring at the blacksmith's reaction, blankly answered with his cold voice.

"What, you find it surprising, Bolrorg?" Danzel walked passed him and stared at the forge.

"Tell me, how many blacksmiths are here, in Vashara?"

Bolrorg frowned at this question.

"I am the only smith of this village...while I have a few apprentices. For the work you all looking for, I am the only one."

Nodding at his answer, Danzel pushed his hand inside the "hot" stones as if the flesh-melting heat was nothing to him.

Which stunned Bolrorg as he knew best what the heat in his smith was capable of.

"That's right, there is only one smith. And 500 of my creations are unequipped with neither weapon nor armor. And those numbers will only increase by the day, Bolrorg." Danzel said as he clenched his hand inside the forge and guided his mana into his arm.

His mana turned into fierce flames, generating a split wave of hot wind which made Bolrorg take a step back.

While staring at the fierce flames he created, Danzel continued.

"You are but a mortal, Bolrorg. Despite your promises, you will eventually succeed against your exhaustion until your body will eventually be unable to provide the services that I have in need. Something that my creations will never have to experience."

Pulling his hand out that was still in the fire, Danzel moved his head and looked with his ethereal eye at the blacksmith.

"Did you understand?"

'You monster...' Bolrorg cursed internally as he ground his teeth.

Though despite his anger, his head lowered down. unable to stand the gaze of the being in front of him anymore.

"I understand, O Harsch Death."

Hearing his answer, Danzel extinguish the flames from his hand and walked towards Bolrorg.

"Good, I will bring you a few examples of weapons and armor for you to replicate. I will also bring a few of my creations to learn your work, so you might as well bring your own apprentices if you want of course." He said in his cold voice.

Before he could pass the poor blacksmith though, Danzel raised his hand and lightly grabbed the old man's shoulder.

Albeit his light touch to Bolrorg was like a metal grip that if Danzel choose to, he could easily rip his shoulder like a piece of paper. Not only that, the grip was chilling cold, making the Bolrorg shiver from both fear and the cold.

"Also, it seems like you lack that "stone" fuel. So I will provide you with some more of it too. I have high hopes for your progress. Mortal~" Danzel said, near the end, his body turned into a black mist, and leaving the workshop.

Once he have left, Bolrorg was frozen in place despite him having left, his eyes aimlessly staring at the ground.

It was only a moment later that he regained his grip.

"Heugh!" Yelling out of fright, he stepped to the side and swung his hand at where Danzel was a moment ago. Tripping in the processes.

He is barely able to catch the edge of his tool bench and not fall to the ground.

"Ha~Hah~Hah~ M-Monster~!" Bolrorg said amidst heavy breaths and trembling legs.

Still feeling the cold touch on his shoulder.

***

With a dark mist traveling up to the mountain before stopping at a certain house,

The dark mist halted in front of the house and started manifesting a death knight watching down the village.

"Sigh, will that even work out?" Danzel mumbled out loud.

'The Anabast proved to be quick learners, but can the Draugrs be the same? No, even if it were the Anabast, would they be able to learn to smith?'

Feeling in deep thought, Danzel tried to remember how a certain dwarf was smithing.

Despite it being quite a few years ago and he only having briefly watched him at his work, he doubted that his undead could learn to smith anytime soon.

If even at all.

Shaking what he thought as useless thoughts to the side, he strengthen the connection of 100 random of his undead.

'Follow my will, and choose 10 among your group to learn the art of blacksmithing. The 10 chosen shall present themself tomorrow in front of me.' Danzel sends the command to the draugrs before withdrawing his attention from the connection that he held over his creations.

Danzel would have liked it if he put more of his Draugr's to learn blacksmithing, but he knew that there was a limit to how many Bolrorg could teach. He even thought that 10 was a bit too much.

But as it wasn't his problem, but Bolrorgs instead, he shrugged it off.

Turning his back from the sight of the Vashara village, Danzel walked towards the house that he claimed on his first "friendly" visit.

Standing in front of the door, Danzel's ethereal eyes flared up. And the next second, the door was pushed open with neither man nor his touch.

'Even pushing the door open is hard with my soul essence...' Danzel complained as he drew back the soul essence he used to push the door open.

Entering the house, Danzel quickly noticed dust on the floor and other furniture.

'It seems like no one of them has come in...' Danzel thought to himself as he walked inside the house.

He somewhat expected people to come here after he and Shiro left their village. But apparently, that wasn't the case.

"Hmm..."

Raising his hand ever so slightly, a wave of dead mana spread through the room before disappearing a moment later, destroying the dust around the house.

Though it wasn't an all-use cleaning method, it was good enough for Danzel.

Walking towards the only bed in the room, Danzel seated and brought out the book of Nersan'rah and his mana crystal. Slowly studying the book and fiddling around with the mana crystal.

At times he would only read for around 15 minutes before he tried applying the knowledge towards the mana crystal and at other times he would straight up readying for hours without any practice, just trying to understand the content as best as he could.

And after several of those attempts, to the point where it was already night, Danzel looked away from the book after a 3-hour reading session and stared at the mana crystal.

Lifting the mana crystal with his left arm, he started wrapping his own mana around the crystal and then he drew the mana of the crystal.

That was already difficult, but then he tried replacing the mana crystals mana with his own.

Although it sounded like drawing out water and putting juice in the same cup, it was nothing the like.

After all, once replaced, his mana wasn't willing to stick and merge with the mana of the mana crystal. After all, to the mana crystal, it was like foreign mana.

Like trying to mix oil and water, it was seemingly impossible.

And Danzel's job was to try to convince the water that the oil was literally the same substance.

It was a ridiculous endeavor to go about.

Danzel tried his best, only managing to extend the time he could hold his mana inside the mana crystal for a few more seconds that his previous attempt.

Albeit an improvement, it was a failure in the end.

"Sigh, is this what advance knowledge is?" Danzel crumpled in frustration as he put the mana crystal beside him.

He then lay his ethereal eyes towards the book to try out to find his mistake and how to fix it.

Reading the book in silence, his hand suddenly twitched and his ethereal eyes flared up for a split second.

Without moving his head, his gaze fell to his side.

Previously nothing beside him was now a woman with long black hair that matched her weird clothing (business suit), staring down at his book in silence.

"..."

*Bagh~

Closing the book in his hand, he changed his gaze in front of him, seeing how slowly two other figures appeared out of thin air.

"I-It all you fault! All your fault!!!"

He couldn't really see through their faces, but the blaming voice of an old woman made it easy for him to guess the figure next to her.

"It was because of you! Because of you!" A male voice full of hate started yelling at the older woman towards him.

Blaming him as if they were cursing him with a voice full of hate.

"..." Staring at those two, Danzel put his book and the crystal back inside his maa storage ring and rose up from the bed.

"Don't you have anything else to say?" Danzel said in his cold voice.

"Because of you! You ruined it!"

"It's all your fault! You-"

Before the male voice could finish what he was about to say, Danzel seemingly disappeared from where he was and reappeared in front of those two. Simple use of his speed.

"Don't you have anything else to say?" He said with a chilling voice as he stared at those two with his ethereal dark green eyes.

Raising his hand, both the older woman and the man tried to step back.

But before Danzel's hands could even reach them, he controlled his soul essence with much effort and created two copies of his hands with the use of soul essence and grabbed the neck of those two.

He then dragged those two back directly to his hands, replacing the grip from his ethereal hands with his physical ones. A technique that largely relied on the knowledge of [Grasp of the Undying].

"I have long grown tired of hearing you two." Danzel said with an empty voice as his gaze alternated between the two.

He didn't pay attention to whatever the two were saying anymore, instead.

He was more interested in what those "Illusion" were made out of.

And as his gate lay longer on them, he soon came to the realization.

That those illusions.

Were made from soul essence.