Armipotent

?1371 Shadow Hound

Tang Shaoyang's plan has gone smoothly so far. He had not encountered a big resistance on his way to the sixth city. Six cities and six Harmony Temples were destroyed. No one from The Harmony Temple survived, and he had converted four Adventurer Guilds into his force as well. Their movement was unnoticed because no one from the Adventurer Guild or The Seven Gods Alliance came to stop him.

"That's it for today," Tang Shaoyang spoke to Ladirma and the four guides, "What we need to do is wait for The Harmony Temple to respond. I hope Rubia will come herself. It will save me trouble."

Tisha the female Frost Tigra blinked her eyes, looking at the surroundings. In one day, they destroyed six temples in the six cities. It was a one-day journey, something that The Orin Kingdom could not achieve by themselves. It was hard to believe, but she was there to witness everything.

Ladirma did not linger around as he turned around and left the half-ruined temple. He had become the leader of the adventurers that surrendered to them. Within just a day, they had an army of adventurers. While the adventurers might be lacking in discipline and other basic stuff for an army, it would not be easy to defeat this army.

Thanks to them, he was not the only Worm now. There were Worm2, Worm3, Worm4, and so on. He was not the lonely Worm1 anymore. It was a hassle to manage these people, but their presence comforted him.

"Commander! We are waiting for your next order!" A person in light armor and a spear on the back came over as Ladirma stepped out of the castle. The adventurers' army blockaded the temple, ensuring no one came to disturb the fight inside the castle. The man was Worm2, the man Ladirma chose to be second in command of the adventurer army. He was a former Guild Leader and a Demi-God Rank.

"There's no more order. You guys can take a rest and make sure to pay if you stay in the inn. If I know you don't pay, you will be dead to me!" Ladirma waved his hand at him as jumped over the wall. After the long march, it was a good time to get some drink before resting his exhausted body.

*** ***

"Can we stay in this castle?" The four beastmen stayed while Ladirma was leaving. The four were unfamiliar with the city even though this was one of The Orin Kingdom's cities in the past. A lot had changed since then, so they would rather stay in this familiar castle which remained the same. There was still room with cover even though the castle was half-ruin.

"You can do whatever you want. I will leave one of my summons behind, and I will return to my world after finishing my business here. I will be back in one or two days. If there's something urgent, you speak to my summon, and he will relay the message to me."

The business he talked about was the summoning spirit. The skeletons were moving the bodies into the center of the hall, piling the bodies for the summoning.

"Yes, I understand," Tisha nodded and pulled her three beastmen with her, leaving Tang Shaoyang and his skeletons in the ruined hall.

Tang Shaoyang emptied his inventory as well, but the bodies were still much fewer compared to when he annihilated the temple army. That meant the best he could get from summoning was Grade SSS Spirit. That was the positive side, but he might just get Grade S Spirit.

At this point, he did not use Grade S Spirit a lot. Most of the time, it was Grade SSS Spirit and above. He used Grade S Spirit to guard the portal, purely to make it up the number, not in active combat.

"Does not really matter, I guess. What I want is an army, anyway. Grade S Spirit army is quite terrifying," Tang Shaoyang proceeded with the summoning. The bodies puffed into black smoke as a figure slowly formed beyond the smoke.

The figure was three meters tall, and it stood on more, not a humanoid summon which was actually rare in the recent summon. Its red eyes gleamed in the black smoke as it slowly stepped out of the smoke, revealing itself. It was actually a pitch-black wolf with two small horns above its eyes. The horn was similar to the bison's horns.

[You have summoned Grade SS Spirit, Shadow Hound.]

It was a Grade SS Spirit which was not bad, and it was not a wolf, but a hound. Even though it looked no less scary than the wolf.

[You have summoned one of the nastiest bastards from the Orin Forest.] Rumru commented, [It's actually one of the Orin Forest's rulers before I came to stay there. They are so persistent and don't know when to give up. They keep harassing me instead of coexisting with me. Then I decide to annihilate their race from the forest.]

[But they are so annoying and hard to kill. They know they could not win the fight with me, so they will rely on ambush. They will ambush me from time to time, catching me off guard. If not for my wife, I don't think I can completely wipe them out of the forest. However, they moved in a pack, so I am not sure if a single Shadow Hound would be useful to you.]

"I will make a contract with you if you do one thing for me. I don't wish for resurrection, so don't bother to offer me the resurrection either," The Shadow Hound could speak.

"And what's that one thing?" If it was something troublesome and forced him to take a long route, then he would fight the Shadow Hound instead, forcing the dog into submission. If it was something easy, then he might as well do it. Resolving The Shadow Hound's regret and obtaining his loyalty might be good for the future when he resurrected the guy.

"Kill a Black Dragon for me. His name is Rumru, and he lives in The Orin Forest of Arkania Continent. He is quite famous so you can just ask random people, and they know that arrogant lizard."

The Shadow Hound brought an interesting name to Tang Shaoyang. It seemed that Shadow Hound was one of the Shadow Hounds that was killed by Rumru back then. His regret for dying to Rumru turned the dog into a spirit.

"If we talk about value. I don't think your contract is worth risking my life to kill a Dragon," Tang Shaoyang shook his head.

The Shadow Hound growled at him when it heard the words. It clearly hated that its value was compared to Rumru. Its dark fur stood up, releasing the dark energy. It looked ready to fight him anytime.

"But I have killed that Black Dragon you mentioned. You can form the contract with me right now," Tang Shaoyang grinned. He was not lying when he said he killed Rumru because that was what happened back then.

After The Bloodline Ritual, Rumru was already half-dead. Then Rumru asked Tang Shaoyang to kill him which Tang Shaoyang did. He technically killed Rumru with his hand, so he had fulfilled the condition.

"You dare lie to me, Human!" Of course, The Shadow Hound was not so stupid as to believe Tang Shaoyang. The Black Dragon was comparable to those Human Gods. The dog did not believe that the Black Dragon was killed already.

"How am I supposed to prove it to you?" He scratched his hair, "In fact, Rumru is one of my spirits. I can summon him…." That was a bad idea to summon Rumru here. It would destroy the castle and would cause chaos in the city.

"Let's make it simple then. You have two choices. You can make a contract with me right now, and you will find out that Rumru is already dead. Or we can fight right now. Does not really matter to me. Both will bring the same result."

The Shadow Hound fell silent and stared at Tang Shaoyang. It seemed like I was trying to assess how strong Tang Shaoyang was. However, spirits could not sense the living being's aura unless they shared senses with their Master. The Shadow Hound did not have a Master, so there was no way it could sense Tang Shaoyang's aura.

"I thought you were an expert spirit since you know the conditions to make a contract, but it looks like you are just a newbie spirit. You can't sense my aura if you try to determine how strong I am. You are a spirit, you don't have senses or the same instinct when you are alive."

The Shadow Hound growled and entered the shadow. One of the most annoying abilities he encountered so far is Shadow Elemental. He could not overpower Shadow, and he had nothing that could force The Shadow Hound to come out of the shadow either. The only thing he could do was to wait, waiting until the Shadow Hound pounced at him.

That was what he hated to fight with the shadow-type creature. He had to be passive which was not his fighting style, at all.