Transmigrated as a Ghost

Marcus half listened to a report Relia was giving him while keeping an eye on his surroundings.

It had been nearly four days now since the war had begun, and a great deal had already happened.

Obviously, Lyra had slain two of the strongest Umbrashnuls, having taken out the fifth and thirteenth names on the list they had been given.

However, while they were posted at the largest front, there were other battles spread out through the section of the Darklands.

These places were where the strongest forces of the Draayer empire were concentrated to make sure that none of the Umbrashnuls made it behind them.

They had set up an impressive defensive network that had been in the works for seven years.

"We've encountered nine other of the high-level enemies, but these six still remain unaccounted for." Relia said, pointing to each of the names of the top Umbrashnuls that had yet to make an appearance.

Naturally, their king was among the ones that had not made their presence known so far during the war.

He was by far the strongest and most dangerous, but he had to be prepared to react to the Draayer Empress.

If either of them appeared on a battlefield they wielded enough strength to immediately turn the tide.

So whenever one of them showed up, the other had to follow to either fight against their rival, or cause as much damage as possible somewhere else.

At least, that was how things worked before.

Now though, Marcus was also another capable fighter that could fight against the Umbrashnul Kind.

Although, he was the only one. Lyra, Roxene, and Quillon were not allowed to fight the man.

He was in possession of several powerful skills that would be detrimental to them. Only Marcus had the necessary abilities to counter the Umbrashnul King.

"That's the end of the good news, now for the bad. One of my mistress's closest blood kin have been slain by the mercenaries that the Umbrashnuls have hired. They were spread out through the multiple battlefields, but they are all congregated together now. It caught many of my comrades off guard and they ended up slain. We've pushed them back for now, but it has weakened one of our positions."

Relia then told Marcus that around seventy percent of the forces stationed with them were going to be moved.

Despite their base being arguably the most important, it was being given the weakest defenses. Relia herself was by far the strongest vampire present, with no one else over level fifty-five being stationed at the fortress.

Of course, this had always been the plan, it was just being accelerated a bit to match the enemy's movements.

The Empress wanted to make the location that Marcus and his companions were stationed an appealing target.

So long as she kept the other chokepoints well defended, the Umbrashnuls would be inclined to attack with their greatest strength to push through the normally impossible to break fortress.

This would hopefully lead to funneling the strongest Umbrashnuls straight to Marcus, Lyra, Roxene, and Quillon, so that they could kill them.

"That's fine. Not like we were counting on them anyway. I won't go out my way to kill the regular soldiers, but I'll throw up walls of light or other magical defenses if the Umbrashnuls try to breach the fortress by just using superior numbers. They won't have a chance to get through unless their strongest lead the way." Marcus replied with disinterest.

He would not say he was the type that always needed to be doing something, but just sitting around watching two forces endlessly throw themselves against each other without really making much progress was boring.

Some of the Umbrashnuls had been detained and put in a specially prepared dungeon under the fortress, but that was the only way the vampires could make gains in the fighting.

They could not kill their opponents, so the only option was to capture them once they had been thoroughly weakened.

The same held true for the Umbrashnuls, and Marcus had seen a few vampires that had burst into mist after having their bodies destroyed sucked into some sort of bottle made out of glossy black substance.

Still, each side's capture methods only worked on the weaker combatants.

Even if someone like Relia was forced to turn into mist, if the Umbrashnuls tried to capture her with one of their magic tools, the bottle would burst long before it could contain her.

"And your certain that you just want us to remain here? They already lost two of their top fighters, so they most know that people that can kill them are stationed at this base. It might be better for us to go on our own and hunt down their strongest combatants wherever they appear." Marcus suggested.

He would rather start running around the endless tunnels of the Darklands than continue to sit on his a*s doing nothing. Just like Lyra, he wanted to finish this up quickly and get on with his life.

"That is certainly a strategy that the Empress has considered, but for now you all are to remain here. Only if the Umbrashnuls do not take the bait in attacking here will we change up our plans."

Relia's response was what Marcus had been expecting. But he still sighed when he heard it.

A part of him almost considered just firing light magic into the ranks of the Umbrashnuls just to draw out their leaders.

Yet, he knew that he would not do such a thing.

He would end up killing tens of thousands of them in a one-sided slaughter.

That just did not sit right with him when these people were not really his enemies.

Him fighting for the Draayer Empire was just him repaying a debt. Otherwise, he would have no stakes in this war at all and would have avoided getting involved.

'It would have been so much easier if the Umbrashnuls were clearly in the wrong, or horrid monsters that had no sapience. As it is, they're just two differing nations that want what's best for their own people.'

The longer the war went on, the more Marcus wanted nothing to do with it.

Fortunately, it was not too much longer before a distraction presented itself.

Despite the fact that it was an obvious trap, a new war party was being led into the chamber.

The forces this time vastly exceeded the numbers of the last battle.

Marcus did not count them all, but he could tell that there were likely around twenty-five thousand Umbrashnuls.

Considering their total population, this was likely the bulk of their army, and it was led by five of the top Umbrashnuls that had not been seen on any of the other battlefields. The only one not present was the king.

'I guess that they could not resist the opportunity to break the vampire's most prominent stronghold. They know that if they get past this area, they'll gain access to the bulk of the Draayer Empire's territory and can cause as much havoc as they want.' Marcus thought, analyzing what he figured the Umbrashnuls' strategy was.

In a lot of ways, it made sense.

Their leaders likely realized what the Draayer Vampires were doing by luring them here.

This is where they had set up the fighters that could actually kill them after all.

Still, it represented the best option to win.

If they focused their strongest force against the diminished vampires, they might be able to kill Marcus and his companions.

After that, the Draayer Empire would have no effective means to stop them.

The war might turn into one of attrition, but it was one where the vampires would eventually lose without a means to dispatch their enemies.

"Should I go and get Lyra?" Quillon asked.

"No, let her rest a bit longer. I think that the three of us can handle this. Two of us will take pairs, while the last one can have the strongest Umbrashnul present. Does that sound fair?"

Roxene and Quillon nodded, and then the three of them decided how they were going to spit things up.

Naturally, they all would have preferred to take on the stronger single foe.

To decide on who was going where, they drew lots.

"Looks like I won." Quillon said, the slightest of a smug grin on his face.

Marcus looked at the blank strip of paper he had drawn and incinerated it.

Had he wanted to, he could have used his skills to cheat, but the same went for Roxene and Quillon.

They had all played fairly and he had lost. Though, that did not mean he was not upset about it.

'I'll be getting the king whenever he arrives anyway. That should be an interesting fight if nothing else.'

With their opponents decided the three of them prepared to make their way to the front lines.

Except, before they left, Marcus pulled an adamantine bracer out of his item box and tossed it towards Quillon.

"What's this?" Quillon asked.

"Just a little present I had a few of my Doppelgangers work on while we waited. I sent them back to my forge in Borealia with a Dark Portal. It's far from my best work, but it should help out. It's enchanted with a few light magic spells, but they take some time to recharge once expended, so use them wisely. I figured you could use something else besides just having your sword enchanted with light energy."

"Thanks."

Quillon's reply was short, but he was obviously happy to have the magic tool as another means of attack.

Once he had it equipped, the three of them set off. It was finally time for them to participate in the war.

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