10

Chapter 10 Cleaning House

Thankfully the rest of the ocean monument didn't have any new surprises. The rest of the central ziggurat was mined out without any real incident. After the elder guardian the few normal guardian attacks were easily fended off.

Each wing contained was eventually cleared as well. They each housed their own guardian spawner protected by another elder guardian. I was much more careful this time. I also cheated outragously.

I didn't even fight. After trapping it I dropped a pillar of magma and waited until it cooked. Sure, it was slow, but so much safer.

In the end the monument was gone. Aside from my own stone fortifications all that was left were twenty-three massive prismarine pillars that the monument had rested on. They extended far past visual range and I had no desire to try and harvest them.

I had dropped a sea lantern to see how far they stretched and the light vanished before it stopped. The glow had also hinted as enormous shapes down there that I absolutely did not want to meet. No, I was done here.

Going up was simple. I made a large stone and glass waterproof room and emptied it of water. Once I got the proportions right it shot to the surface.

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Experimenting with necromancy would be so much more disgusting without my powers. Everything involved with it required lots of body parts. The rituals were almost all variations of creating undead creatures.

There were an incredible number of factors and I know I had only scratched the surface of what was possible. The different types were all fairly balanced against each other as well. I also could create Wither skeletons or a Wither. Really sad about the last one.

They could be commanded easily, but the problem with them was how simple-minded they were. They could execute simple commands, but couldn't remember anything complex or make any actual decisions.

Still, it was more than enough to provide me with immense aid with a little work. It took three skeletons working together, but I manage to automate potion brewing. They could only make a single potion and only as long as the ingredients lasted, but it was still very useful for me.

It didn't take much more work to likewise automate most of my farms. It took hundreds of skeletons, but I now have a nice steady stream of resources. I took a day just to build a large storage facility.

To make storage easier I also created another container. The crate was basically the biggest chest I can make. It had a whopping two hundred and forty slots. With any luck it'll last me for quite some time.

The skeletons were used for two reasons. One, they were the fastest undead I can create. And two I have no desire to pick out rotting flesh from my food. Even if I can't really die from poisoning it'll ruin the taste.

Mummies are on the opposite end of the spectrum. A variant of zombies they are very strong, but very slow. I bet most people would use them for guards, but I have a much better job for them.

I'm actually building myself a galley. A trireme like one I was able to inspect back when I first was looking to rent a ship. Sadly, I still don't have either weir wood or ironwood. Still my ability to seamlessly join together blocks of wood means it's going to be much sturdier than normal.

Of course it won't be maneuverable. They're too dumb to pull off complex rowing instructions. Maybe something bigger would work. Being slow and clumsy doesn't really matter to something like a small island.

I could probably make it out of metal then. Maybe something like a carrier from my past life? I'd need at last steam engines then. I doubt oars will do much. Of course I need another blacksmith for that. Something to look for when I head to Braavos.

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Before heading out I decide to start exploring my own island. It's criminal how I know more about the ocean floor than I do about what is directly beneath me. And necromancy should provide me with the safety net I need to be relatively safe.

I consider several undead, but mummies seem the best bet. It's bound to be cramped down there and they're strength will help in close quarters. I make several squads of mummies to help me, although I'm only bringing one down at first. The rest will protect the tower. There is no way I'm getting trapped down there. It's just too bad I can't store them in my Inventory.

The first mummy is the only one with a shield. His role is simple. Survive. He's the meat shield. The second one has a spear to stab past the first one. I outfitted the rest of them for a variety of roles and they were all carrying all kinds of gear.

When we first started down the staircase in the guard tower I noticed details that I hadn't the first time. There was some kind of pipe running along the stairwell. It was inside the central support column and was only really apparent in places where the stone had broken off.

I wouldn't have thought anything about the pipe except it was slightly cracked. Inside you could see a dull red glow. I immediately recognized it. Redstone. What was redstone doing here?

Active redstone was way to dangerous to ignore. I quickly traced the pipe and located a daylight sensor on top of the roof.

Thinking about it I bet the sensor turns on a redstone lamp set next to a spider spawners. It'd be the easiest way to achieve that's been happening. Staring at it I have a horrible idea.

I quickly order my mummies to guard the staircase. Then I cover the sensor with a roof. After a few moments I can hear the sounds of combat. Ok. So that part worked.

Next I place a sea lantern on top. In the game only sunlight works on these, but this place is more realistic. I listen carefully and feel like grinning when the sounds die down. Looks like I was right. Time to collect me some spider spawners.

I was wrong. So so wrong.

There was no lamp. There was a door. An iron door I opened.

Then I was fighting for my life. I have to admit I was impressed. The corridor had turned at the door and it was positioned so that when opened the door would block the hall, leaving only the route to the surface. Elegant.

I'd be a lot more impressed with the maze makers if I wasn't currently fighting for my life.

I lost the mummies almost instantly. They were already slow and couldn't kill them fast enough. The webbing they laid down just made it that much worse. The spiders swarmed all over them.

Still, they bought me enough time. I had just enough time to place a few blocks to narrow the corridor before they reached me. From there I just had to last long enough for the numbers to thin. I pulled out two swords and started hacking away.

It only took a few minutes but it seemed an eternity. An eternity of snapping fangs and bodies crawling over each other to get to me.

When the horde did thin I immediately charged forward. There were still spiders, but only a few but I ignored them. I held a shield out in front to protect me and was swinging shears around to clear out the webbing.

When I passed the door I almost laughed. It wasn't very large, but it was deep. I could see it extended twenty feet down and all of it was filled with webbing. Even as I watched more spiders were crawling their way upwards.

The webbing made it hard to make out, but I could see a column in the center where the spiders seemed to be coming from. I laughed when I realized the layout was identical to my bone generator, except inverted. Those had to be the spawners.

I've come too far to go back now. Besides I had already done the hard part of clearing out the horde.

I jumped down, frantically swinging two shears. I plummeted past the climbing spiders and landed on the column. As I suspected they were spawners. I leaned down and started storing them. At this point as long as I don't die the trip was worth it.

A flick of a torch and the whole pit starts burning. Webbing is ridiculously flammable. The few spiders that attack me were easily dispatched.

I retreated after that. I want a lot more mummies with me next time I try to explore. I also note the spiders shredded their equipment. They need stronger armor. I need another blacksmith. So many issues.

I also realize that if I strike closer to dawn there wouldn't be as many spiders piled up. I wait until the next morning to strike. I also don't bother fighting.

I narrow the route with blocks, creating a series of choke points. Then I use one of my mini arrow storm turrets to mow down the spiders. Once there was no longer a wall of bodies in the way I charged. A fire arrow set the pit in fire and hurt any spiders there if not outright killed them. Then it was just down to simple collection.

I don't clear out all of the towers. I stop after three and build myself a spider harvester. It was much like my bone pit. It was horribly expensive in comparison though. Not like that really mattered at this point.

A decent size, very tall room with a column of spawners in the center. I had ten of my twenty spawners here and used blocks to make the column reach the ceiling. The floor and walls were all magma in order to burn off any webbing.

The ceiling were all arrowstorm turrets facing downwards. A literal wall of arrows would fire fairly continuously, killing any spiders that appeared. Hoppers under the magma slab floor would collect everything.

The only downside was that the chests tended to fill with arrows fairly quickly. Makes me wonder if I should start selling arrows at some point. Actually, seeing as how the arrows are identical I might do just that. Just need to find me someone who specialized in arrows. I wonder if there is such thing as a masterwork arrow?

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With backup troops, potions and magic it was past time to fix a problem. My first base in the nether still contained a walled off section inhabited by zombies.

I had no intention of approaching one of the giant zombies myself. One of the times I had run into one it had shattered a stone wall I placed before I made it out of sight and it forgot about me. No, a skeleton would feed the zombies golden apples.

I wasn't taking any chances though. A mini arrow storm without the infinity enchantments would be backing him up. Each of the two tubes was loaded with tipped arrows. Weakness, slow, blind, weight and other negative effects were going to be used.

Potion brewing was more logical here and every potion could be inverted. I also only had a limited number of the tipped arrows. Thanks to how many steps it took to create them I had to make them myself.

For once it went smoothly.

I lure a few of the zombies over, shoot them all with debuffs and run away. The skeletons try to feed golden apples to the zombies. I heard the sizzling sound that meant it was working. Then it was just a waiting game.

I couldn't just hide either. Scattered all over the place were zombie pigmen. They all aggroed when I shot the first giant zombie. I also needed to clear them out since they would attack once the giants were cured.

It wasn't hard to wipe out the zombies. My mummies and skeleton archers easily mowed them down. I just had to keep watch for surprises. The one time I slipped a ghast killed over a dozen mummies.

Still, it worked. In the end I had two cured giant villagers. They were a colossal disappointment. All that work and they were just villagers that took up more space. Worse they weren't useful!

They spoke with me since I knew Old Tongue, but they wouldn't obey me. They might have, if they didn't forget about me as soon as I stopped talking. They didn't even do anything. They just wandered around aimlessly. Worse they were helpless. When anything attacked them they just ran.

Well that was a horrible waste of time. Screw this, if I can't have actual giants I guess it's time to make giant golems.

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Golems were another thing that had been unlocked with necromancy, sort of. Unlike in the game it was not a straight forward process to create one. Nope. I had build a Golem Crafting Station, what was just a slab of four blocks of obsidian, redstone and diamond. Then I had to make the golem at the new structure.

Sure the body was the same. Again, sort of.

For the body I couldn't use iron. Instead I had the option to use blocks of rotting flesh, bone or dragon bone. Obviously I don't have dragon bone. So I tried flesh. At least it was the same four block configuration.

Then I had to make the head. Not just a pumpkin. No I needed a jack o'lantern made with a redstone torch, more redstone dust, and a skull. It wasn't even any smarter than a normal golem. And as for combat? Well, I already had mummies and I was curious as to how they compared.

The golem lost. It wasn't even that close. The mummy tore it apart. They seemed to have about the same strength but it had more armor and health. The golem wasn't any faster either.

I tried a bone golem as well just to be thorough. It was still weaker than the mummy it had something that was interesting. Item graft. Simply put the golem integrate a tool or weapon into itself. The item wouldn't wear out either.

I was eventually planning on replacing all of my farming skeletons with bone golems. The problem was they were nine feet tall. I'd have to literally rebuild almost everything to make enough room for them.

I had the option to make a centaur golem instead. It only cost four additional blocks and was actually faster. Still not as fast as a horse, but much faster than a normal golem. It was also even taller, standing twelve feet high. Currently I'm not really seeing any use for them.

The last option was for giant golems. Standing twenty feet high they would work very well as shock troops. Their main limitation is that they need a giant golem head to build. And of course a giant golem head requires a skull of a giant.

All this flashes through my mind as I think about my current problem. Giant villagers are pretty much useless to me right now. They can't make anything I can't and they don't really seem to do anything useful. Staring at the wandering giant villagers I have a random thought. After all they are acting just like villagers. I wonder how far that extends?

It doesn't take long. A few hours at most to build a fake village and trade with the giants. Sadly, it was for nothing. They don't remember me or even each other. I suppose breeding my own villagers was just too much to hope for. Looks like I need actual giants if I want to breed them.

The fact they were friendly made it easy to decapitate them. Just wall them in tightly and then start chopping. As tightly bound as they were they died long before breaking free. I wasn't taking any chances on not getting a skull. I don't really need giants right now, but the option is always nice.

Killing the giant zombies without trapping them had them just dropping a block of rotting flesh. As annoying and expensive as it was, I was forced to cure each of them before killing them. They were just too strong to trap otherwise.

Eventually I cleared out all five levels of the mining dungeon. Sadly there wasn't any kind of spawner. I was also disappointed to find that no other giant zombies, villager or otherwise, spawned no matter how long I was down there. I guess it was too much to hope for my own supply of giant skulls.

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I swing by Lorath and I'm pleased to see they have sea traffic. They even have their own flag still. Looks like I didn't ruin the city after all. Not many people seem happy to see me, but no one attacks me and that's the important part.

I travel to the place where I had placed my portal and mark it. I take the time to let the prince know I've claimed territory. It's not in the city, but it still seems like the polite thing to do.

I don't hold back much. I build a castle. Large central keep, curtain wall, corner towers and a moat. The works.

Most of it is empty. More for show than anything. I'm making a statement. This is my land. Don't bother me. It's reinforced by the staff.

I expand the wall. It's not a curtain wall anymore. Instead its like a long, flat guard tower that wraps around the keep. Arrow slits start about ten feet up and continue to the top. There are hundreds of arrow slits and skeleton archers behind each one.

The archers are all armored. No use panicking people. They all have one job, shoot everyone in the moat.

The moat was inspired by a movie image of Camelot, not sure which movie. The castle looked like it was sitting on a lake. So my moat was wide. Fifty meters, over half a football field wide. Not as big but I got bored.

Once the castle was done I rebuilt my portal room. Golems were stationed to fight next to the portal. Mummies might be better overall, but golems weren't vulnerable to fire. Skeleton archers and several traps made sure nothing could escape.

Preparations complete I invaded the Nether fortress. A squad of golems marched ahead of me and several more followed behind. With that many troops, it was a cakewalk.

The creatures assaulted my vanguard, giving me time to setup my arrow storm turret. I fortified the area with additional walls and cover before directing the golems to spread out and kill everything.

It was chaos. The creatures weren't organized and were easily pushed back. Anytime my golems were in danger I popped out my turret and provided cover fire. The few blazes were all distracted by my golems and never saw me coming.

In no time at all I had secured the fortress and now had two blaze spawners. Looks like my potion bottleneck is at an end.