This Lich Requests More Remuneration
Chapter 304 - 282: Breaking the Sound Barrier

Chapter 304: Chapter 282: Breaking the Sound Barrier

Amberser rummaged through the group of adventurers and obtained over three thousand Gold Coins, a set of Hell Knight Armor that was seventy percent new, an Elmwood Staff, and a few other miscellaneous items.

Amberser estimated that this haul could be worth sixty to seventy thousand Gold Coins, with the most valuable item being the full set of Hell Knight Armor. It wasn’t just an ordinary antique; it had historical value and was actual, wearable armor. Moreover, its historical background wasn’t just any epic, but a mythic epic about a Fallen Angel.

A set of armor that had been to Hell, a traitor’s armor—it could fetch far more than sixty or seventy thousand Gold Coins to the right collector. Selling it for several hundred thousand wouldn’t be surprising.

These adventurers were really wealthy. However, after being looted by Amberser like this, who knows if they could still pay the tavern bill? Likely, many of them would end up being captured and enslaved to pay off their debts.

So sometimes one should avoid rash actions. Causing a scene without knowing who the opponent is and leaving no room for negotiation forces the other party into a corner where flipping the table is the only option. And the result of a surprise is losing everything.

Just when Amberser was about to return satisfied with the spoils of war, he suddenly felt a strange change in his private space.

After relocating, Amberser hurriedly opened up his space to take a look and found that the black heavy armor of the Hell Knight was glowing.

A dark red, blistering hot glow, like the flames of Hellfire.

Driven by curiosity, Amberser went over and saw a phantom made of flames appear on the armor.

It was an old Tiflin with a weathered face, opening his mouth to spew Hellfire at Amberser.

Amberser waved his hand, easily dispersing the flames, then flicked his fingertips, shooting out three red Magic Missiles that blasted the armor away.

Though blasted away, the Hell Knight Armor seemed to take little damage. The fiery phantom sank into the armor, moving as if a living person was wearing it, and began charging toward Amberser with large strides.

Amberser chuckled, making no move as the flaming armor was frozen in place, with even the raging flames encased in the stillness of time.

This was Amberser’s private space, where he could freely control the flow of time.

Amberser walked slowly to the immobilized armor and said with some surprise, "Hellfire, a vengeful spirit... It’s quite a rare combination."

The phantom of the Tiflin bore some resemblance to the unfortunate leader of the adventure party. Amberser deduced it might be something like a family spirit, albeit one filled with deep resentment.

"Being a traitor, the resentment lingers. After death, it clung to the armor, and because it’s the descendants who’ve been using the armor, the spirit caused them no harm. But when someone stole the armor, this guy started causing trouble... that’s about it, I guess."

While reasoning, Amberser reached out and grabbed the frozen spirit.

With a flick of his fingers, he pulled out a fiery red thread, and with adept movements like unravelling a cocoon, he turned the Hellish spirit into a bundle of yarn.

After deconstructing the spirit, Amberser learned of its past from its memories.

It was much as he had speculated: the traitor, having deceived his way into much wealth and grandeur, was overcome with fear of falling into Hell and facing the lord he had betrayed. In his profound terror, he became a vengeful spirit.

The spirit attached itself to the armor, passed down through sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons.

Until this generation, they left the Kingdom of Impure Hymns and came to the desert to form an adventuring party.

From the spirit’s memory, Amberser uncovered another interesting detail. The descendants of the Hell Knights who once betrayed the angel Zariel were being hunted down.

Even though most of those from the past were dead, their descendants were still facing retribution. This was why the group of Tiflins left their homeland and fled to the desert for a living.

Having once been nobles with a decent legacy, the leader formed a sizable adventuring party and achieved some success—until the unfortunate encounter with Amberser.

"Interesting. Why would the Kingdom of Impure Hymns be hunting down descendants of the ancient Hell Knights? The kingdom is making deals with Hell... no way, are these descendants of the Hell Knights intended as gifts for Zariel, offering the progeny of traitors in exchange for Zariel’s support?"

Amberser thought his guess was very likely to be correct.

After all, Zariel had become much stronger since falling and controlling a kingdom was not very difficult for her.

However, it seemed the Tiflins hadn’t cooperated too deeply with the fallen angel, otherwise, the deities above would have intervened long ago.

"Sigh, the maniacs of Alchemy City wanted to ascend to godhood and failed, Silvermoon Tribunal tried to rise with the elves and then blew it, the Tiflins cooperated with Hell only to face imminent doom—it seems that every kingdom wanting to court disaster ultimately approaches its downfall... Makes no sense, why is it that Laine, after courting disaster for so long, still remains so strong?"

Amberser could only resent the gods for their injustice; they should bless a Lich like him who brought benefits to the world, not religious zealots who are more terrifying than cultists.

After grumbling for a while, Amberser picked up the resentful spirit thread in his hand and started to weave it again.

This was an excellent resentful spirit, with a very strong soul. As long as he erased some memories, removed a bit of emotion, added some functionality, and imprinted his own brand... the original Hell resentful spirit was transformed by Amberser into a very special Undead.

Amberser stuffed the Undead into the original Hell Knight Armor, and flames suddenly roared into life, the armor splitting into dozens of pieces flying towards Amberser.

These pieces accurately fitted onto Amberser’s skeleton, dressing him in the Hell Knight Armor.

Not only that, but after the armor was donned, both of Amberser’s legs and arms began to shoot out copious Hellfire, the powerful jets pushing his body to rise slowly.

Amberser cast Featherfall Spell on himself so that his body became light as a feather, and propelled by the jets of flame, he flew back to Dew City from his private space.

He shot out of the alley and into the night sky, leaving behind a beautiful arc of flame. Amberser flew straight out of Dew City to avoid explaining to the city guard Lizardmen why he was violating the flying ban.

In the high sky, Amberser felt the air streaming past and roughly estimated his flying speed to be about two hundred kilometers per hour.

Not fast, but much faster than the sixty to seventy kilometers per hour of the Flight Spell.

"Could it be combined with the Jet Engine, then? And paired with my Mithril body, perhaps I might attempt breaking the sound barrier."

Amberser flew from night into day, occasionally stopping to adjust and redo his work, and by the time the sun came up, he had switched to the latest version of the Mithril Mech.

The Mithril body was covered in an additional layer of thick, black armor, as if wearing two sets of armors.

Though a bit bulky, it worked well.

Flight Spell, Featherfall Spell, and then the Jet Engine... He added everything possible, and then Amberser ignited his entire body while simultaneously activating the Jet Engine on his back.

Amberser shot straight into the sky, the speed so fast it almost flung his soul out.

After a tremendous boom, Amberser realized he had broken the sound barrier.

However, the Jet Engine, a modification of the Magic Conduction Cannon, was still not very stable, blowing up with a bang after reaching a thousand meters in altitude.

Amberser tumbled several times before finally stabilizing his body.

Such stunts could only be pulled off with a Lich’s immortal body. If it had been a living person, the explosion would have been sufficient to knock a sturdy Orc unconscious, and then they would have plummeted to the ground and turned into a heap of mush.

"I still need to carve out some time to study the Jet Engine. I’d rather lower its power than increase its stability, as long as it doesn’t explode. With my armor, it should be able to break the sound barrier reliably."

Speed is always an important attribute that cannot be ignored.

The last time he managed to simplify a group of Legendary Paladins was because his Jet Engine was much faster than the Flight Spell.

Without it, he would definitely have been finely chopped into bone powder by a group of Paladins.

If Amberser could maintain this speed steadily, he would be invincible in aerial combat in the future.

The swordlight of the Silvermoon Knights might not even catch up; from then on, only he would be hitting others, and nobody else would be able to touch him.

Amberser could easily bomb several cities in Laine in one day, dropping a few Starbursts here and showing up half an hour later to drop more Starbursts somewhere else.

A Legendary Mage with powerful mobility and magic, as formidable as a squad of Mages—a terrifying thought indeed.

Just as he was envisioning a wonderful future, Amberser noticed something even more delightful appearing before him.

The God of Alchemy descended right beside him, handing over four boxes the size of fingertips.

"I have already stripped off the divine duties. Take these," said the deity.

"Why are there four?" Amberser asked curiously, as it had been agreed that one would be left for the God of Alchemy.

The God of Alchemy said, "None of these divine duties suit me. So, you need to trade something else for them. Give me all the technical details of the equipment that broke the sound barrier; I have a premonition that alchemy is about to make a breakthrough."