Bandit Lord - (New World Book 3)

  Bandit Lord

  New World - Book 3

  by

  K. R. Zax

  Copyright © 2021 by K. R. Zax

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and events are all product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to real individuals are purely coincidental.

  Table of contents:

  Map

  Chapter 1.

  Chapter 2.

  Chapter 3.

  Chapter 4.

  Chapter 5.

  Chapter 6.

  Chapter 7.

  Chapter 8.

  Chapter 9.

  Chapter 10.

  Chapter 11.

  Chapter 12.

  Chapter 13.

  Chapter 14.

  Chapter 15.

  Chapter 16.

  Chapter 17.

  Chapter 18.

  Chapter 19.

  Chapter 20.

  Chapter 21.

  Chapter 22.

  Chapter 23.

  Chapter 24.

  Chapter 25.

  Chapter 26.

  Chapter 1.

  Boom! Boom-boom-boom.

  Boom! Boom-boom-boom.

  We were on top of a small hill, from which we saw the ruins of Ragan and the dragon’s rampage a couple of weeks ago.

  Boom! Boom-boom-boom.

  Now I was looking at almost two hundred Earth Mages building my new city, while pondering whether should I change its name.

  “Marquess Miller,” one of the Earth Mages called out to me when he reached the top of the hill. “Could you please order your undead to stop with that noise? Some of us find it irritating to work under such conditions.”

  Really? Is complaining all you do as you suck the money out of my pockets?

  I glanced at my Darkness Trolls, who were beating some big drums in a simple rhythm. They certainly played a part in this performance.

  I clearly remember watching a few TV shows where people worked in sync under the beat of a drum.

  Why is this guy complaining?

  Ah, yes. I forgot to get a whip. It certainly would’ve come in handy right now.

  “Lina,” I called my kitty and handed her the golden cup I was holding. Then I took a silver one from my Storage and waited for Evrlir to fill it with wine.

  “Shut up, you piece of shit!” I yelled as I threw the silver cup at the Earth Mage, spilling the wine on his gray robe. Then I leaned back in my luxurious chair and took the golden cup back from Lina.

  I don’t like to throw gold. That is almost like committing a sin. So weird.

  Maybe I should buy some ordinary clay cups for throwing at people, since we can still consider silver as a luxury.

  Unfortunately, I can’t do that.

  This bastard should just shut his mouth and feel honored that I hit him with something expensive.

  After all, I am a young lord. It would be bad for my image if people saw me using an ordinary mug.

  “I am paying you a fucking fortune and you dare complain about my music tastes? Disgraceful! Perhaps I should just go to Hasburg or Gerland and hire some Earth Mages there.”

  “No!” Zeman, the one in charge of the Earth Mages cried and then kicked the complaining mage, pushing him down the hill. “Do you want to ruin my beautiful project? Go back to work, you piece of shit!”

  Zeman was the guy I had to talk to when I hired the Earth Mages. Believe it or not, this guy was the head architect. When I spoke about building a new castle, he said that it would take about two months to make the plans if he did it himself, and even more if I wanted to hire some of the other mages.

  He was the best of the best. The ideal person to make me a castle since he already had experience making them for other nobles across the Empire.

  And his office was very spacious, filled with little miniatures of the projects he’s done over the years. The level of artistry he put into his work was astounding.

  But the most impressive of all was the miniature of a city, placed further away from the ones he showed me. When I asked him where did he build that one, he told me he didn’t. That one was just something he made in a moment of inspiration, but he knew it would be impossible to make it because it would cost a fortune.

  Literally millions of gold coins were necessary for that one, since we are talking about an entire city made from scratch. And no one was crazy enough to pay for an entire city.

  “Roxy.” I pointed to the ground, and she crawled in front of my chair so I could put my legs on her back.

  Since I am crazy enough to build an entire city, I should act like a madman as well.

  “My lord, I think you are exaggerating.” Lillian pointed at the two zombie Wyverns that were sitting on the right and left side, each holding one of their wings over us to make a pleasant shade. Oh, and there were also several Trolls holding my banners behind me. “You look like an evil ruler.”

  “Thank you.” Man, she is so sweet sometimes. I should compliment her more in the future. “You also look nice.”

  “Hehe, Alex is so funny. Don’t you think so, Lilly?” Saril was also sitting in my chair, right behind me so that I could rest my head on her enormous chest. “Um, I hope my new dress will be ready soon, it’s getting chilly.”

  “Forgive me,” Akifa apologized once again. “When the Lord told me to put a pillow on his chair, how was I supposed to know that he wanted an ordinary one?”

  Yes, my devoted undead mage grabbed Saril, tore her dress off and toss her on the chair to serve as my pillow when I asked her for one.

  Well, she grew up in one of the southern kingdoms. Perhaps nobles use naked women as pillows down there.

  I should visit those kingdoms sometime.

  “Don’t worry about it,” I told her before turning to Zeman. “So, how much until they finish with the streets?”

  “They should be done by tomorrow at noon.” The architect said after looking at the maquette that was spread across a couple of tables. “We have already finished with the sewage system, and the streets only need a few touches… We also made the foundation and basement section for your castle, and after we built it completely, we will start with the other buildings. Ah, to think that you would make such tall buildings for the common people! I like your vision, Marquess! With enough time, we could make a city even greater than the capital!”

  “Hey! I am selling those! And the plain ones are for renting.” I protested.

  All the buildings will be mine, so I can put whatever price I wish. Oh, and the settlers will have enough space to build their villages outside the city walls since my zombies cleared the entire place from monsters.

  That is right, big luxury apartments with a marvelous view should sell well. And I will earn even more if I can master my Earth magic and do the finishing touches myself.

  But this much work almost emptied my pockets. Even with all the zombies hunting monsters all around the region, I still am way too short of money.

  “My lord, Norlan made another batch of mana recovery potions.” Nistry came from the direction of the houses I built the other day.

  It was just Earth Walls and a simple roof, so calling that thing a house might be a bit too much. Anyway, we needed a place for us and the workers. I couldn’t afford to travel every day to the capital with so many people, because my mana would run out fast.

  Guess it was a good thing that I had an alchemist now, so I could save some money on potions.

  “Thank you,” I said when Nistry took a box with bottles from her Storage Ring.

  After making the Storage Item for Aliona, I made several more for my girls as well.

  There were thirty bottles of mana
potions in the box. So this will be a long day for me.

  Just like the last few.

  “You don’t have to do it,” Lillian said tentatively, almost pitifully. “You can leave it for another day.”

  “No, I can’t dilly-dally.” Like a man going to his own funeral, I put the box inside my Shadow Storage and followed Zeman. We went down to the outskirts of the construction site, where my zombies collected a sizable amount of rocks.

  “Sorry, Marquess,” Zeman apologized like always.

  “Forget it, no one of you has the amount of mana that I do.” Which was correct, but they had a better grasp of Earth Magic, which was something that I lacked for now.

  Still, it was a good thing to save money if I do some of the work.

  I had to pay almost 2000 gold coins to the Earth Mages every day. And provide them with mana potions and other daily necessities.

  And if there was something I could do to save me some money, I am all for it. Although, I need to act like a piece of shit noble, so that they would think that the only reason I helped was because I wanted to show off my great mana capacity.

  I am a Marquess, for god’s sake! I can’t act cheap here. Certainly not after deciding to build an entire city.

  The rocks in front of me melted slowly and formed into a big, square mass. Thanks to the dragon I killed, I now had my Earth Magic at B-rank.

  Sure, a high rank means nothing if I don’t have the knowledge to do complicated things, but with an S-rank mana, I could do a lot of simple tasks. Like building the wall.

  Yesterday I finished the side facing the sea. The wall was some four miles long, and thirty yards high, with several towers and a big gate.

  I worked like a desperate slave for three days, and every time, I stayed long into the night. But I was able to save over 5000 gold coins that way.

  The good thing about Earth Magic is that I can build a small section of the wall at a time. And in the end, it will all look like it was made from one piece of stone.

  These rocks and dirt were like ordinary clay in front of my magic.

  Hmm, I wonder if there was something useful I could make to earn more money? Some sort of souvenirs, maybe?

  “Lord!”

  Bloody hell…

  “What?” I snapped at Akifa when she came running. “Don’t tell me you found another dragon? I swear I will spank you publicly if you brought me another of those ruin-crashers here.”

  “Lord, the zombies found some orcs in the forest.” She sounded like it was a serious issue.

  “Orcs? So?” What was she talking about? Of course there would be orcs in the forests. They were one of the common monster species out there.

  “Lord, they found the orcs close to this place.” She was persistent now, like I should know what she was talking about. “In the area that was already cleared from monsters. It is like they just appeared out of nowhere!”

  “How can…” Wait, could it be… “A dungeon? You found me a dungeon?”

  Oh, God. If she found a dungeon in my territory, that means that I have another source of income. Dungeons were almost like gold mines in this world.

  “I believe that might be the case. I have already sent a thousand zombies to investigate the area.” Akifa confirmed as the rest of the girls arrived with their weapons in hand. Sure, these battle junkies were eager to explore the forest after having nothing to do for days.

  “Well, guess I will take a break.” I informed the disappointed architect. The guy wanted this city to be built as soon as possible. Even more than I did. It was his dream project, after all.

  I opened a portal, and we crossed a distance of approximately five miles in a matter of seconds, arriving on top of a hill where a bunch of dead orcs were collected, forming several small piles all around us.

  “The terrain is awful.” Lina commented as she and the other girls looked around. There was only one path leading to the top, and the rest of the hill was covered in sharp rocks, sticking out of the ground in unusual formations.

  Ah, there were also a lot of broken trees… Could this be the place where the dragon used his Earth Magic? Is he related to the dungeon somehow?

  “Where did the zombies found those orcs?”

  “Most of them were close to this place,” Akifa told me after she stared at some of my undead. “And some of them were discovered further to the east. There is also a canyon in that direction.”

  “A canyon?” Interesting. “What about the dungeon? Did they find it?”

  “No, my Lord. They are all over the place and still have found no trace of the dungeon.” Akifa seemed confused as she stared at the other zombies, unable to get any useful information out of them.

  “Let’s go see the canyon.” I said, and we all went to the east. In about twenty minutes we arrived at a place with a few orc corpses piled at the edge of a cliff. When we looked down, all we could see was a mass of green vegetation in all directions, like watching a lake of leaves spreading before us.

  “It doesn’t appear to be too deep.” I commented, sending several Virsk birds down to investigate. But as much as I looked, I couldn’t see anything of importance through the eyes of my undead drones. There weren’t any monsters down there.

  “There is a trail here.” Lina told the other girls excitedly. “Let’s explore it!”

  Sure enough, we all went down the narrow pass. Could it be that the dungeon was somewhere down there? And if the orcs came out of a dungeon, did some other type of monsters do the same?

  “Wait.” I stopped when we were halfway down. “A bird found something strange.”

  “Strange how?” Lillian asked me, but I wasn’t sure exactly.

  “It’s shiny, there is too much light, and it is affecting the zombie’s eyes.”

  I opened a portal, and we all went to inspect what my zombie found.

  “Beautiful.” Nastia said as she looked around. The forest here seemed old. The trees were enormous and we could see their roots going in all directions, even entangling themselves with other trees.

  “There!” The elf, Iime, pointed further ahead, and we rushed in that direction.

  “Wow,” Lina exclaimed in amazement at the sight, like everyone else.

  In the middle of this thick forest, there was a clearing with an enormous chunk of crystal buried in its center, reflecting the few rays of sunlight in all directions.

  No, it wasn’t buried – that thing grew straight out of the ground!

  The dungeon. We found it.

  Chapter 2.

  “It’s so hard,” I murmured, and a metallic sound resonated through the forest after I hit the surface of the crystal with my Trinity-Axe.

  “Magic weapons cannot affect the dungeon.” Lillian was covering her ears. The sound was too much for her, it seems. “Anyway, this dungeon appears to be old. But not too much, maybe a thousand years? Two thousand?”

  “How do you know that?” Was she an expert on dungeons?

  “My lord,” Milia started explaining what was common knowledge here. “A new dungeon is usually about three meters tall, and it has a brownish color. This one is almost as big as a castle and it has a light blue color. In comparison, the oldest known dungeons that are still active, are as big as some of the mountains north of Tsarigrad, and the crystal appears to be completely transparent.”

  “Whatever,” I said while approaching the cave-like entrance. “Let’s inspect this thing and see what monsters can we find? I hope is something that will sell at a nice price.” Surprisingly, the interior of the dungeon was illuminated with a pale, ghostly light that was coming from the walls. Right now it appeared as if we were in a classic cave, so we walked further inside to see how far did it go.

  “Darling, shouldn’t you send the zombies first?”

  “No.” Huh, Lina was getting lazy recently. “Where is the fun if I send my zombies to investigate everything? I was getting bored lately, so I would like to do some killing.”

  “My lord,” Nistry interj
ected. “It has been almost two weeks since you killed a monster. And it was a dragon at that.”

  “You’ll never get that collar if you keep applying your common sense to me.” I warned the fox girl, who sometimes eyed the collars I gave to some of my other wives.

  After some time, we arrived at the end of the tunnel and saw a beautiful forest in front of us.

  It was completely different from the one outside the dungeon. More green and vibrant somehow.

  There was also a bright blue sky above our heads, but I could not see the sun anywhere up there.

  “I smell orcs.” Lina said and pointed in one direction. So I send a bird to investigate. It would be a problem if the girls rushed there, only to find a huge settlement.

  “Shouldn’t there be rabbits and slimes on the first floor? Maybe goblins? You know? Something easy?”

  That was how games worked. You first have the small fry, and the deeper you go, the monsters become stronger.

  “In a new dungeon, yes.” Lillian informed me. “But it the mature ones you start with orcs, kobolds or lizardmen.”

  “Is that so?” Huh, even dungeons didn’t want to bother themselves with the trashes. I am starting to like this place more and more.

  “OK, there are about a hundred orcs down there, so you should be fine with that number.” I informed the girls, and they rushed happily to kill some monsters. Ha! And they say I am the only one who is bloodthirsty.

  “What? You don’t want to join them?” I asked Nistry, who stayed behind and didn’t seem to want to go right now.

  “Well, a hundred orcs shouldn’t be too troublesome to deal with. Not now that we have our new equipment.”

  She was right about that. Every girl had a new set of armor and a variety of enchanted accessories to boost their strength and magic attacks.

  Nistry, for example, had a bikini armor with a little skirt, arm-guards, shoulder protectors, boots and an enchanted circlet on her head. Dragon materials and mithril were used to make a considerable amount of their equipment.

  “So, I thought I could make you company here, my lord.” She then pulled up the back of her skirt. “I noticed you glancing at my butt from time to time. Go ahead, enjoy yourself before the others are back.”