The Lord of the Rings: Lords of Middle-earth.

Chapter 889 The Mutated Skeleton

After hearing that Nyx had arranged for Lance to be stationed in Pingnan City, Roland made no further comment. After all, Nyx had already made the arrangements, and Roland didn't intend to worry about it. Moreover, although Baron Lance's abilities were mediocre, he still had the strength to govern a region!

……

"So where did these undead come from?" Lance frowned, the chaos before him making him grimace. Although the undead hadn't conquered the town, the collapsed wooden and stone walls and dilapidated houses spoke volumes about its desolation and ruin. Large numbers of people, their faces filled with sorrow, rummaged through the ruins, their numb figures like walking corpses. Anyone who didn't know better would think that an undead army had breached the city and turned these people into zombies!
"What's the situation?" Lance asked anxiously, without wasting any words.

As Roland's number one enemy, Queen Nyx's guardian, Nyx family defender, chief knight of the duchy, and leader of the Cross Bauhinia Knights, Knight Commander Lavian was the general Nyx specially sent to resolve this matter. His deputy was Mogus, the rock hero sent by Duke Joelsteria! At this moment, he was standing next to Lance, looking at Lance with a serious expression.

"The situation isn't good! There's a curse present! But it's not the Ancient Tomb Corpse Demon! This undead is very strange!" Ravian shook his head. He had seen what the plague curse brought by the Ancient Tomb Corpse Demon looked like! But judging from the current situation, it was definitely not something that a piece of trash like the Ancient Tomb Corpse Demon could have done!

“There’s a faint dragon power in this curse! I can’t be wrong! After all, there are quite a few dragons in the kingdom!” A hint of surprise appeared in Ravian’s eyes.

"So what you mean?" Lance frowned as well. Dragon power and such things don't just appear in nature! Unless...

"There can't possibly be a second kind of evil dragon, right?" Lance said wearily, his eyes closed. Vili was far more terrifying than he had imagined! Vili hadn't even revealed his most terrifying curse power yet!

"Probably not! Cases like Weiss are rare, and the purple chains of the McDougal family are also an exception... There are almost no wild dragons in Middle-earth right now!" Ravian pondered for a moment and said.

"A wyvern? Or a demonic dragon? This dragon power is definitely from the dragon race! The fact that dragon power appears in the curse is probably not right!" Lance picked up a smear of scorched earth from the ground, his eyes filled with anxiety. The kingdom's control over this wasteland was very low, so low that no one dared to say it was safe. At most, the patrols of dragon knights and dragon riders could only find traces of large-scale magical beast groups. High-level magical beasts or some other monsters were really trying to hide. Throwing them into the vast Lagrange Plains was truly like looking for a needle in a haystack!

"The situation is out of our control! Call for help! We need at least one priest to come and take a look!" Knight Commander Lavian shook his head and sighed. If it were just a simple necromancy curse, it would be fine, but the presence of dragon power in it is a problem! Fortunately, the Kingdom of Lagrang has many dragon species, and everyone has frequent contact with dragons, so they were able to detect this diluted dragon power. Otherwise, the consequences would have been unimaginable!

"Well, that's all we can do! Let's gather the army and assemble the people! Let's get through this period first!" Lance frowned. If it weren't for the long distance, he would have already evacuated the town's population. Unfortunately, because Roland was in a hurry to open up the connection between the east and west of the kingdom, he didn't let the city spread out steadily, resulting in insufficient facilities in the towns along the way. Under these circumstances, there was simply no place to evacuate the population of a town!
“Let His Majesty Mogus prepare! We need to be wary of the undead attacking at night! At least... before the clergy arrive!” Lance patted Ravian on the shoulder.

"Don't worry! As long as the kingdom's soldiers haven't fallen, no civilians will sacrifice themselves!" Ravian nodded firmly. ...

“Your Majesty Mogus? What are you looking at?” Ravian found Mogus kneeling on one knee with his back to him.

"I'm sorry... I didn't mean to..." Lavian walked over and saw the former Pingnan City Lord lying on a stretcher covered with a white sheet. His neck had been completely torn open by something, exposing his trachea and blood vessels. His entire neck was a bloody mess!
"It's alright!" Mogus slowly covered his face with a white cloth, concealing his mangled remains.

“Ryukin Vladivostok! He was once hailed by the family as the Golden Age… His abilities were no less than those of Vladivostok! He was also a key figure in the family’s development, but he excelled in military affairs… That’s why the Duke sent him to garrison Pingnan City. I still remember the excitement and pride this boy felt when he set off as the governor of Pingnan… In such a short time, he has passed away!” Mogus looked at the cold body of Ryukin Vladivostok lying there. This descendant, hailed by the family as the Golden Age, should have been the pillar of the family’s future, but instead, he collapsed here in vain!
"Did you notice anything?" Lavian noticed Mogus's low spirits and quickly changed the subject.

“Something’s not right, something’s not right with these undead! Skeletons shouldn’t have this kind of speed! The fatal wound came from the high-speed claw strikes! But look, these skeletons’ claws…” Mogus picked up the collected undead remains and pointed them out. After all, both of them were high-level professionals. Let alone these things being dead and chopped up, even if they were alive, the two of them could chop them up again! So the two of them started whispering around the claws.

"Is this a skeleton? Why are its claws hooked? How did its ribs close up and turn into bone armor?" Lavian admitted that he was ignorant and had never seen this thing before. Even the undead should respect the laws of nature. There's no reason for a human skeleton to turn into a beast skeleton. Even if it transforms, it should be a super undead creature made up of countless skeleton fragments, like a bone dragon. The worst skeleton soldiers don't even deserve to be called that!
“Something is affecting them; all these skeletons are like this! This abnormal mutation must be caused by a high-level undead!” Mogus asserted.

"We must eliminate the source! Otherwise, how many corpses are sleeping underground..." A hint of fear flashed in Lavian's eyes. Simple skeleton soldiers are just experience points and filler monsters! A swift infantryman carrying a spiked hammer could go out and smash a dozen or so without even breaking a sweat, but now these mutated skeletons with claws and bone armor to resist attacks can hold off ordinary soldiers one-on-one and can instantly kill ordinary soldiers in a group fight!
“Yeah! What if a lich or something came along and cast a Bloodlust aura on them!” Mogus didn’t continue speaking but exchanged a glance with Lance. Both of them saw the fear in each other’s eyes. (Wind Skeleton: Are you guys thinking about me?)

"Hopefully our knights can hold off the enemy!" Ravian sighed. This place has already experienced two undead sieges. The Lord of Liujin City died in the second wave of attacks, and no one can guarantee that there won't be a third wave of attacks.

"Don't worry! They will! The dragon riders are still here!" Mogus pointed to the arrow tower on the city wall, where dragons were comfortably sunbathing. However, the arrow tower was rather small for their size.

"I hope so!" Ravian looked at the five dragon knights accompanying him, feeling a sense of unease and worry.

I've been stuck on this paper for two days, and I still have to work on recruitment... Sigh, I'm already prepared to be unemployed after graduation, everyone.