The Golem Mage

All this while, he had always believed he was the real cheat when it came to growth and leveling up, but after seeing how much the Zergs improved simply by consuming the corpse of a stronger Zerg, even he had to admit this race was terrifying.

Fighting an army that could grow stronger in the middle of battle like this was never a good sign, and the transformations didn’t stop there, many of them were evolving into new classes Alec hadn’t seen before—the Hunter Zergs and the Crawler Zergs.

Though these two new classes seemed weaker than the main three mid-rank Zerg types, Alec noticed that they looked more like a continuation of the lower-tier Zerg forms.

From that, he came to a conclusion, that maybe these were the forms the weaker ones eventually became if they couldn’t evolve into one of the three true mid-rank Zerg classes.

And he could already tell that the ones changing now were part of the group that had fed on the flesh of his barbarian soldiers who had fallen from the wall to their deaths, this was the reason Alec felt true fear for the first time in war, he has always dominated and was the cause of fear until this moment, a zerg army without no fear of dying and ever growing was a dreadful experience for him.

He couldn’t stop their evolution, they seemed able to grow stronger as long as they devoured the remains of a stronger being, and they didn’t even need much time to do it, then there was the other problem—the fact that they had already encircled him.

Though it looked like they were waiting, but that alone wasn’t good for Alec, and that was because he couldn’t go out to hunt beasts to increase his points, nor would any beast feel those terrifying auras and willingly walk toward its own death.

He couldn’t help wondering if he was the only one who had caught the Queen’s interest to such a degree that so many high-rank Zergs in the Tier 6 battlefield had been redirected toward him.

If that was true, then it meant one thing, there was definitely something different about the army he was facing compared to the other lords.

_ _

And that was just the truth, as for the other Tier 6 lords, none of them had to face such a terrifying swarm of Zergs like the one Alec was dealing with.

In fact, five Tier 6 Zergs were usually the limit for any swarm sent against a Tier 6 lord, it just so happened that Alec has a Level 2 town, which meant his cube emitted far stronger energy waves, drawing the Zerg forces toward him, especially when there were not many nearby lords to take a portion they just diverted to his because of the pull.

Unfortunately for him, if he had only been barely holding on, the way the other Level 2 city lord was doing with his army that he brought with him, then things might have gone more smoothly.

But that wasn’t the case. Alec and his group had killed far more enemies than even the combined kill count of many of the newer lords did, and that just happened to catch the attention of the Zerg Queen presiding over all the Tier battles.

The fact that she had sent out a Brood Lord, one of the most fanatically loyal guards who would normally never want to leave her side, showed just how furious she was.

Still, seeing that they weren’t about to make their move anytime soon, Alec decided to get busy, as for the bodies of the Zergs still lying atop the gate, the ones the remaining swarm hadn’t been able to drag away, he had the Barbarian soldiers gathered them and brought them beneath the cube.

Once they were in place, Alec converted their remains into energy points, which he ended up gaining about a million points, for a brief moment, he couldn’t help thinking how much better it would have been if he had gotten all the bodies that his army had been responsible for killing.

But now wasn’t the time to dwell on that, and he knew it.

What mattered most now was strengthening his defenses, because even though the stone walls had held firm, after just that single wave of attacks, cracks had already begun spreading across sections of the city wall.

He could keep pretending that the walls were good enough as they were, but something in him warned that if he let himself be foolish enough to believe he didn’t need upgrades, he wouldn’t survive what was coming next.

Based on the Brood Lord’s statement, Alec knew the next wave of Zergs would make the first one look like a pale imitation, if he was truly about to face a far more dangerous force, then deep in his heart he knew one thing for certain, he could not expect the same results if he failed to improve his defenses as well.

“Upgrade the walls to the third level,” Alec said, as a whopping 800,000 Energy was instantly withdrawn from his balance.

Immediately, the walls—still marked by the countless bone blades that had been driven into them, began to change, the embedded blades were violently forced out, and a surge of energy rose from the ground around the entire perimeter.

The walls expanded higher and thicker, taking on a darker sheen, as if they had been forged from some rare black metal, along the tops of the walls, golden patches appeared, complementing the newly dark structure and giving it a far more imposing and majestic look.

But Alec still wasn’t done, though he didn’t have enough energy to raise his temporary City Heart to Level 2 yet, but he still had more than enough to replenish his army.

He had lost many of them in the battle to protect the city. Before, he might have seen them as little more than NPCs, but after that fight, he had thrown away whatever prejudice he once held and come to value his troops for what they truly were.

So he paid the fee to restore his forces back to the full limit of 500, the moment the payment was made, new barbarians came roaring out of the army barracks.

Connor immediately appeared before them and began issuing orders after they greeted Alec and showed their respect.

With Connor taking charge, it wasn’t hard to get the barbarians organized, they quickly split apart and returned to assigned positions of those that had died before them.

At that moment, Alec silently thanked the stars that he had listened to Arthur’s advice, because he knew without a doubt that there was no way he would ever have been able to coordinate the army units the way their heroes could while also keeping his attention fixed on the Zerg swarm.

Just then, a series of bang, bang sounds began reverberating through the air, causing Alec to turn toward the Zergs again, what he saw sent chills down his spine.

A full army of Tier 6 Zergs in the hundreds, and among them were twenty Tier 7 Zergs of different types... along with one Tier 8.

“Fuck,” Alec muttered as his Inspect Skill kept blaring while he checked them one after another.