Mist Empire’s Rise: Fake Noble to Fog Queen

Without Troy around, Luo Wei didn't dare to stay outside for long and hurriedly returned to the academy.

She wasn't sure if that person was targeting her dessert shop or searching for the person behind it. Many things were interconnected, and she feared they might trace everything back to her.

Back in her castle dormitory, Luo Wei pulled back the bedding and carved a magical transmission array on the bed board.

Siria was too far from Demon Island, and she wasn't sure if she could teleport directly there from here.

If possible, she would need to carve a few more arrays in the courtyard as well.

Luo Wei bent down and placed her palm in the center of the magical pattern. As light emerged, a damp sea breeze rushed up from beneath her palm, causing her hair to flutter messily.

Strange - hadn't she depleted all her magical power that afternoon? Why had it recovered so quickly?

It seemed her magical power had increased several times without her noticing.

Before she could think more about it, the activated magical pattern pulled her in, teleporting her to her desired destination.

Demon Island.

The sound of "clang clang" woodcutting echoed from the distant forest, along with voices of people engaged in animated discussion reverberating through the valley.

Luo Wei spread her wings and flew above the forest, discovering significant changes below.

On the small hillside where mercenaries had previously built leaf huts, about ten wooden houses now stood. Next to them was a whole row of prepared foundations, with processed timber stacked nearby, just waiting to be installed.

Her lumber mill wasn't built yet - all this timber had been manually cut and stripped by the islanders and the undead themselves.

The shift system was indeed efficient. In such a short time, the place had taken on the embryonic form of a village.

Further south, more voices could be heard.

Luo Wei flew in that direction and saw numerous triangular tents set up in a grassy clearing. Several campfires burned outside the tents, with clay pots for cooking porridge placed beside them.

Over seventy slaves were squatting on the grassland working. Surprisingly, they weren't cutting trees to build wooden houses but were constantly digging soil instead.

These slaves weren't in good physical condition and couldn't handle heavy work. Without proper tools for cutting trees, they couldn't process wooden boards either. So they had found an alternative approach - building houses with earth.

Luo Wei watched as they used stones to level the ground, then placed a rectangular bottomless frame on it. One person would pour soil inside while another would pound it with stones.

Once the soil was compressed, they would remove the wooden frame, leaving behind a solid mud brick that could be used for construction. The loose soil had been compressed into firm bricks ready for building.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

This method of house construction was actually much faster than building wooden houses.

Luo Wei remembered that the Hakka people of China used to build sturdy earthen houses this way.

After watching for a while, she noticed someone was missing.

Where was Zachary Bunian?

Unable to find him by looking around, Luo Wei began randomly searching through the wandering souls floating in the forest.

However, after flying through several patches of woods, she couldn't find a single wandering soul - had they all gone back to the cemetery to rest?

Thinking of the cemetery, she turned and flew toward the cliff in the mountains where she had previously designated the burial grounds for the undead.

Reaching the cemetery, Luo Wei furrowed her brows.

There were no undead here either. Where had all these lazy spirits gone?

Moreover, it had been over ten days since she left Santanle City.

She had tricked Zachary into going to Demon Island over ten days ago. Even if he had crawled here, he should have arrived by now. Why hadn't Patrick notified her?

Luo Wei tried calling Patrick's name in her mind. Though there was no response, she vaguely sensed which direction he was in.

He was by the sea - she could hear the sound of waves.

Following the sound, Luo Wei arrived at the southern coast, surprisingly finding herself at their previous landing spot.

Over twenty boats were stranded on the beach, and all the undead she couldn't find in the cemetery were here.

In the middle of the dense crowd of undead was an empty circle where several undead mages and more than a dozen living people stood.

Looking closer, Luo Wei recognized the red-bearded man surrounded by the dozen or so people - who else could it be but Zachary?

The person she had been searching for was actually being surrounded by the undead here.

Zachary Bunian stood with his arm oddly extended forward, his eyes bloodshot. The tide washed over his calves, but he remained motionless.

His followers behind him looked more haggard than each other, their eyes swollen with dark circles underneath, as if they hadn't slept for days.

Opposite them stood seven or eight undead mages led by Patrick, standing silently on the beach like quiet statues.

The two sides had been in a standoff for who knows how long - the black sand pushed up by the tides had nearly covered their ankles.

Luo Wei was surprised. Patrick had been a high-level mage in life, and in the hundreds of years since his death, he had cultivated to the level of a high-level archmage. Plus, he had seven powerful undead mages behind him - how had they not been able to subdue Zachary?

She became curious - what abilities did Zachary possess that made even Patrick hesitate to act?

They couldn't continue this stalemate forever. With so many undead standing guard here instead of working, when would her free state ever be built?

Luo Wei flew down to the ground, retracted her wings, and walked toward the beach.

The beach was covered with thick black grains, larger than normal sand, making a slight crunching sound when stepped on.

Zachary's ear twitched, his eyes quickly darting toward her before snapping back to Patrick, as if facing a great enemy.

In his view, Luo Wei posed less of a threat to him than a single finger of the undead mage before him.

The undead in the outer circle turned their heads, staring dumbly at Luo Wei with blue flames flickering in their eyes.

[Master...]

Dozens of undead voices echoed in Luo Wei's ears. She nodded to them, passed through the crowd of undead, and walked to Patrick's side.

"Mr. Bunian, what do you mean by this?"

"Raising your fists against my subordinates - that's not how one behaves as a guest anywhere in the world, is it?"

Luo Wei said with a smile, hands clasped in front of her.

Zachary kept his gaze fixed on Patrick but opened his dry, chapped lips to speak to her: "Miss Luo Wei, you'd better explain why your subordinates tried to capture me when we agreed this was just a delivery."

His expression was terrible, gloomy with anger at being deceived, green eyes burning with rage.

After spending his days hunting geese, he had been pecked by one - how could he swallow this insult?

Luo Wei let out a soft laugh: "Mr. Bunian, perhaps you've misunderstood something?"

"I never told them to capture you."

Zachary's posture shifted slightly, his moss-green eyes finally turning to her.

Could it really have been a misunderstanding? Had he not fallen into a trap after all?

Meeting Zachary's confused gaze, Luo Wei lifted her ch

in and said with a casual smile: "I merely told them to... take you prisoner, that's all."

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