This Lich is a Better Landlord Chapter 90

As a Lich who no longer had worldly desires, conducting experiments was one of the few entertainment projects for Ambrose.

After all, money couldn't be earned every day. When there was no money to be made, he could only kill time by doing experiments. If the experiments were related to making money, then Ambrose would be even happier.

Theoretically, the power of the Golden Throne could allow Ambrose to possess endless wealth and power.

Combined with Ambrose's two Legendary Boons—Fabricated Soul and Material Property Modification—he could achieve a self-sufficient cycle. Given enough time, becoming the richest person on the continent was just around the corner.

But ideals are beautiful, while reality is slightly cruel.

It wasn't that the theory didn't work, but that the blank souls created by Fabricated Soul had IQs that were too low.

Lined up before Ambrose were five types of newly created "undead."

Regarding material conversion, under the condition of equal mass, the higher the density of the substance, the greater the amount of gold consumed when changing its properties.

The materials of the bodies for these five new "undead" were: book, leather, steel, sand, and gold. The weight was one kilogram for all, and the strength of the blank souls inserted was a relatively precise 100 Anima. This was a unit of soul strength Ambrose set himself. The soul of an ordinary human fluctuated roughly between 80 and 130 Anima. The blank souls Ambrose molded himself were relatively standard, minimizing experimental error.

When converting properties, the difference in gold consumption for different materials was huge. There was a hundredfold gap between the cheapest and the most expensive. The small skeleton smelted from one kilogram of gold consumed seventeen times its own weight in gold when modifying the material to the "corpse" property. Perhaps it was related to Ambrose's unfamiliarity with the operation, but this cost was undoubtedly unacceptable.

And the final experiment proved that regardless of the material used, the efficiency of faith recharge generated by the created undead puppets didn't differ much—they were all garbage.

Ambrose roughly estimated that after the Golden Throne made of one million gold coins was completely exhausted, it would take about several million standard-strength blank souls praying to restore it within a day.

However, blank souls had the possibility of evolution. The little guys just created had low IQs, but as long as Ambrose released the restrictions on the blank souls, they had a chance to become smarter. At that time, the efficiency of faith recharge would increase accordingly.

Moreover, undead were relatively easy to maintain. Usually, they just needed to sleep to automatically absorb dark mana to maintain activity, basically costing nothing.

That meant the more undead there were and the longer the time, Ambrose's gains would snowball more and more.

After all, undead were immortal. Unless there were combat losses, they would only increase in number.

Given Ambrose a long time, he really might achieve gold freedom this way.

The only limit was the cap of the Golden Throne. Ambrose guessed this throne also had a capacity limit, but it hadn't been tested yet. Anyway, it was definitely more than a few million. Legendary abilities also needed constant exploration and practice to be thoroughly mastered.

Basic data testing was complete. Finally, the issue returned to the quality of the undead puppets.

Although blank souls had high plasticity, no matter how they were adjusted, they couldn't reach the basic IQ of humans and needed time to grow.

Therefore, using gold to make puppets was a pure loss. Because gold had high density, the blank soul needed to consume more power when controlling the body, appearing small and clumsy. There were only some advantages in resistance. No combat power, no advantage in faith output, and super high cost—this material could be ruled out directly.

Maybe when Ambrose achieved gold freedom in the future, he could make two Golden Death Knights for fun.

On the contrary, the "undead puppet" made of sand gave Ambrose a little surprise. After the blank soul merged into the scattered sand, it was actually able to control every grain of sand. Without Ambrose's guidance, it learned a movement method like quicksand and also showed very good talent for mimicry.

The little guy looked at its siblings beside it, sometimes turning into the appearance of a book flipping pages, sometimes turning into the iron-head appearance rolling around.

Curiosity is the source of wisdom. Obviously, this little guy made of sand had a higher IQ than the other four. Although the faith recharge effect didn't meet expectations when ordered to pray, this little guy was malleable material.

As for the other four... sorry, need to cut costs now.

To test the influence of material form on blank souls, Ambrose tried water flow, iron sand, and gold sand scraped off with heartache.

Finally, an interesting conclusion was reached: a loose state of "corpse" seemed to truly strengthen the wisdom of the blank soul. Also using gold, creating a small skeleton appearance made it appear clumsy, but the gold sand form appeared livelier. Although it was still too heavy, its external sensing ability had indeed improved, and it also showed an innate mimicry ability.

This discovery was very interesting, but Ambrose couldn't come up with a reasonable explanation for the time being. He could only guess that the loose body structure increased the contact area of the blank soul with the outside world, allowing it to sense more information.

This guess might not be reliable and needed more practice. But the experimental result was so. The only problem was that flowing water was originally the best choice, but water would evaporate. Once it evaporated completely, this poor little guy would also completely perish.

So, after multiple trials, Ambrose finally confirmed two materials for new undead puppets.

One was broken glass, and the other was sifted sand.

The density of these two materials wasn't much different, and the conversion cost was within an acceptable range. Moreover, glass and sand were relatively stable and not prone to loss due to the environment. Ambrose made five of each and left them free-range in the castle like the Quicksilver Effigies, planning to observe their growth after a while.

Perhaps it was time to cultivate high-tier undead using conventional methods. Blackie and Husky happened to have been preserved by Ambrose. He would continue making bodies for them in a couple of days; at worst, he would spend some cost to swap bones for other materials.

High-tier undead with independent consciousness should provide much more faith recharge.

Experiments were endless, and gold coins were never enough. Ambrose organized the records of today's experiments, opened the Codex of the Undead, and sent a message to Withered Rose: [Lady Rose, do we need to adjust our deal? With the City of Alchemy gone, I'm afraid this place will be chaotic for a while.]

After waiting for a while, Withered Rose still hadn't replied. Ambrose checked the group chat and found it unexpectedly lively today.

[Crown of the Headless Knight: Are those elves really preparing to make a move?]

[Pale Little Skeleton: Heard they are. They've already started assembling troops. Good thing we came back early, or we might have run into the Elven army.]

[Crown of the Headless Knight: You were decisive, running immediately. Fortunately, fortunately.]

Ambrose watched with his features scrunching up. What are you two chatting in the group for? Showing off your love?

However, what were these two talking about?

Ambrose was preparing to look at the previous chat history when he suddenly noticed a new user.

[Hates Humans: Hehe, it's not just the elves. The Desert Dwarves are also preparing to move here. You know, recently Ryan has been beating the Desert Dwarves until they cry, and they've already lost several oases. The Desert Dwarves have been eyeing such a big territory as the City of Alchemy for a long time.]

Who was this user named [Hates Humans]?

Undead often slept for decades at a time. Ambrose hadn't seen this person speak since joining the Elegy Society. Since they suddenly appeared today, he should get to know them properly.

[Tiga Ultraman: Senior, hello. I am a newcomer. Are you also a Lich, Senior? I have a design proposal for alien skeleton modification here; I don't know if you are interested.]

[Hates Humans: Oh, a newcomer. Haven't seen a newcomer join for many years. But I'm not a Lich; I'm a Vampire. I don't use skeletons usually.]

Ambrose: ...

The name Vampire made Ambrose a bit uncomfortable. After all, the Codex of the Undead recorded too many "cases" related to vampires, all of which ended miserably because they fell in love with the food on their dinner table.

So much so that whenever Ambrose saw a vampire, he subconsciously felt the other party's fetishes were a bit problematic.

Perhaps because of the long silence, this vampire senior sent another message.

[Hates Humans: I am not the kind of vampire you are thinking of!]

[Tiga Ultraman: No, no, no, you misunderstand. I don't discriminate, really.]

[Hates Humans: Look at my name! Isn't it obvious enough?]

[Crown of the Headless Knight: Haha, besides humans, aren't there elves? The Codex has quite a few cases of vampires with orcs, or even Mind Flayers. You guys play wilder than druids.]

[Hates Humans: Get lost! You, who rides a Bone Dragon, have the nerve to talk about vampires?]

[Pale Little Skeleton: What? Got a problem with the Dragon race? Want me to bring my kin to visit your house for a few days?]

Seeing an argument about to break out, Ambrose felt a bit awkward. His silence had sparked a war.

At this moment, Withered Rose, who hadn't replied to the message, spoke in the group chat: [Did you guys just say the Elven race and Desert Dwarves are both moving troops? Are they all coming for the City of Alchemy?]

As expected of the Undead Queen; as soon as she spoke, the others immediately quieted down.

[Hates Humans: This is normal. The City of Alchemy occupies a large area of fertile land. Although the main city is gone, other areas still retain a complete alchemy industrial system. Who wouldn't want to grab it? Especially the Desert Dwarves; they were beaten by Ryan until they couldn't fight back. It's reasonable for them to want to change territory.]

Ambrose recalled the map of the various kingdoms. The City of Alchemy bordered Silvermoon High Court and the Golden Kingdom of Shadowern in the desert. Conversely, the strongest Ryan Empire was separated from the City of Alchemy by an entire desert.

Ryan probably also coveted the legacy of the City of Alchemy, but they were beyond their reach. They could only watch the Desert Dwarves take the territory and gain a chance to catch their breath.

Ambrose asked curiously again: [What is going on with Silvermoon High Court? The Elven race rarely initiates foreign wars, right? They've been frantically raising material prices recently, offending many people. Are they really not afraid of being ganged up on by the remaining kingdoms?]

[Withered Rose: I also received news about this. The Elven race has indeed assembled an army, and their behavior of raising material prices seems to have hidden circumstances, not purely to crash other kingdoms' economies. Silvermoon High Court has been entry-only and exit-forbidden for a while now, blocking all news. No one knows exactly what happened.]

Entry-only and exit-forbidden?

Ambrose vaguely remembered Isabel mentioning that her original teacher went to Silvermoon High Court and never came back, which was why she was targeted by the lord. Otherwise, with a formal alchemist as a teacher, an average lord wouldn't dare to mess around.

What the hell were those elves in Silvermoon High Court doing? They didn't screw up playing god like the City of Alchemy, did they?

But probably not. Alchemists courting death had no gods to manage them, but elves were different. The Elven Pantheon had a bunch of gods who took special care of their own; it was impossible to let them have any major accidents.

[Withered Rose: Little Brother Tiga, are you still planning to stay in the City of Alchemy? That place is about to become a battlefield. The Desert Dwarves won't give in for the sake of survival, and the Elven race has always been domineering. They will definitely fight a battle to decide how to carve up a kingdom.]

Withered Rose's words made Ambrose fall into deep thought. Although he had the power of the Golden Throne, making him no longer exist at the bottom of the Legends.

However, a war between two kingdoms wasn't something one or two Legends could sway. Staying here was indeed prone to attracting trouble.

But the question was, where could he move to?