[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"origin-black-dragon-necromancer":3,"chapter-black-dragon-necromancer-black-dragon-necromancer-chapter-140":6},{"origin":4,"title":5},"chinese","Black Dragon Necromancer",{"chapter":7,"nextChapterSlug":19,"prevChapterSlug":20,"totalChapters":21,"novelImage":22},{"id":8,"novel_id":9,"title":10,"slug":11,"index":12,"content":13,"wordcount":14,"created_at":15,"updated_at":15,"volume":16,"translator":17,"content_hash":18},2312900,4521,"Chapter 140: The Poison Fang in the Shadows","black-dragon-necromancer-chapter-140",140,"\u003Cp>At the reconstruction site of Norasien Port, hammering never ceased day or night.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Gisk stood at the edge of the dock, staring for a long time at the wooden piles blackened by abyssal seawater.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>His fur still bore salt stains and blood from the Starfall Strait; his left ear was missing a small chunk, bitten off three months ago by a serpent demon in Crystal Horn Bay. A Chailangren  without scars was shameful. He wasn’t afraid of shame. He cared about something else.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Nine months. He’d fought nine months in the Abyssal Marshes of Plane 1872. Over thirty thousand brothers dead, and they hadn’t even touched the walls of Suspension Ridge City.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Every time they neared breaking the line, demons would surge from some unexpected direction, as if they’d known his plans all along. Now he suspected it wasn’t the demons who were too clever—it was someone beside him.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Where’s Sulede?” Gisk growled.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>A gray dwarf craftsman pointed toward a command post deep in the harbor, built from an old ship. Gisk strode over and pushed open the door—Sulede was crouched over an unfurled map, marking it with charcoal. At the sound of footsteps, he looked up; his silver-white hair glowed like a handful of snow in the dim yellow light.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Back?” Sulede’s tone was as flat as asking about the weather.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Gisk dropped heavily onto a wooden crate, unfastened his chipped curved blade, and threw it onto the table. The blade clattered against the wood with a dull thud. “Nine months. Ten thousand men’s supplies—you gave me enough for six thousand. Do you know how many men I lost?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Sulede set down the charcoal stick and leaned back in his chair. He didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he pushed the unfurled map toward Gisk.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Count it yourself.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The map was covered in charcoal marks: circles for villages needing garrisons, crosses for locations attacked, triangles for rebel strongholds. Dense and unbroken, stretching from the Dragon Spine Mountains to the Bohe Plains.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Some marks bore numbers—casualty counts. Others bore only one word: “Empty.” Meaning the village had no one left.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Sulede rolled the map shut, tied it with a leather cord, and returned it to the drawer. His movements were slow, as if waiting for Gisk to absorb the information.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“The only troops I can mobilize are three understrength garrison battalions and twenty thousand goblin mobile corps. You know goblins—they’re good for ambushes, but open-field battles? They’d run from a pack of rabbits.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Silence.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Gisk stared at his chipped blade. Dried black blood still clung to the edge—could’ve been demon blood, could’ve been his brothers’. He remembered the face of that young Chailangren —what was his name? Had followed him for four years, and he still couldn’t recall it.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The boy charged too far ahead. A serpent demon slipped around the flank and sliced off half his skull. He fell with his eyes still open.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Over thirty thousand brothers. He couldn’t name a single one.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“I know what you’re thinking,” Sulede said from across the table, no comfort, only statement. “You lost thirty thousand men. You feel cheated. But the Duke’s domain has no extra soldiers to give you.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Either keep dragging your remaining men through the Abyss until the last one dies beneath Suspension Ridge City—or come back and kill every bastard who’s set fire to our homes.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Gisk lifted his head.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Sulede finally looked at him. Deep purple shadows hung beneath his pale eyes—the kind from days without sleep.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Choose for yourself.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Gisk fell silent for a long time. Then he spat on the floor and cursed: “Damn it.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He didn’t say “yes,” or “alright.” But he re-fastened his chipped blade to his waist.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Sulede pulled a parchment from the drawer and slid it across to Gisk.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“In the Graywater Delta, Karava’s doing his thing—he needs a batch of Koutao fishman souls. Take your men, capture them. And let those blind bandits know the Duke’s Chailangren  aren’t all dead yet.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Gisk picked up the parchment, scanned its dense demands, and frowned. “Koutao fishman souls? Can those things even be used as souls? Those lunatics build gods themselves—what value could their souls possibly have?”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Karava wants them,” Sulede said. “You don’t need to care about the rest.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Gisk didn’t ask further. He folded the parchment, shoved it into his coat, grabbed his blade, and strode out. At the door, he paused—didn’t turn back.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Sulede.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Hmm.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Next time your supplies are short, tell me ahead of time. Don’t wait until I’ve lost men before you say anything.”\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The door closed.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Sulede stared at the closed door, silent for a moment. His fingers still rested on the drawer—the one holding the map. He didn’t open it. Just pressed down.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Long after, he picked up the charcoal stick again. The paper was blank, untouched. He simply held the stick, sitting still.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The night over Graywater Delta held no moon.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava crouched on a black, jagged rock jutting from the swamp’s edge, his hood pulled low, revealing only a pale jawline. He waited. Three nights already.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Thirty meters ahead lay a pile of half-submerged rocks, half-drowned in rotting water. In the center, a narrow fissure barely wide enough for a calf-sized creature to squeeze through.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The fissure’s edges were smooth, worn by repeated passage. Shattered shells and desiccated fishman corpses littered the ground. The air reeked of sharp decay, mixed with the swamp’s sulfur stench.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He’d observed long enough. The den held a young bone-spined toad, under two meters long, its dorsal spines still soft, tips tinged bluish-white.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>It was weak—lowest in the toad hierarchy, forced to scavenge scraps left by other predators. By day, it hid in the crevice, never emerging. By night, it crept only near its den, always trembling, flinching at the slightest breeze.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>That was Karava’s target.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He’d crouched around it for ten days, learning the basic rules of the toad hierarchy. These Abyss creatures differed from material plane beasts—they had no souls.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Not “corrupted souls.” No souls at all. They lived by Abyss-given instincts: hunting, killing, devouring their own kind—but forever stuck beyond an invisible threshold.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava learned this in the Duke’s lab. Sakavi, studying necromancy, had experimented on various demons, concluding: for a demon to break free of instinct and gain true self-awareness, it must devour a complete soul.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Animal souls could barely push them to Gao Jie. Beast souls might carry them to Da Shi. To rise further—to reach Chuanqi, gain independent wisdom and will—they needed the souls of sentient beings.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>In Graywater Delta, the bone-spined toads that lived over a century and grew longer than six meters had each devoured more than one sentient soul. Where those souls came from, Karava didn’t care to know.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>But this young toad had never touched even an animal soul. It was too weak—too insignificant to compete, forced to scavenge at the margins. And precisely because of that, it was easiest to control.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava carefully withdrew a fist-sized crystal ball from a leather pouch at his waist.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Inside the ball, a gray-white, slowly writhing mist was sealed—a Koutao fishman soul, naturally modified. He’d hired several daring adventurers to ambush the ruins near the swamp’s edge for three days to obtain it.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He buried the ball in a shallow puddle beside the rocks, covering it lightly with twigs and mud, leaving only a corner exposed. Then he tossed a dead swamp lizard beside it.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Then he retreated behind the rock and waited.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The first night, nothing happened. The young toad poked its head from the crevice, sniffed the air, dragged away the lizard.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>It noticed the crystal ball, paused at the puddle’s edge, its cloudy eyes swiveling, as if hesitating—then it retreated into the crevice.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava didn’t move.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The second night, the toad emerged again. This time, it ignored the food, heading straight for the puddle. It licked the crystal ball’s surface, sensing the alien presence.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Its eyes glowed brighter—green luminescence intensified. It lay beside the ball for a long time, unwilling to leave.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava still didn’t move.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The third night, the moon vanished behind clouds.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava rose from behind the rock, walked to the puddle, dug out the crystal ball, and held it in his palm. He made no attempt to hide. The toad half-emerged from the crevice, its cloudy eyes fixed on the ball in his hand.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava placed the ball on the ground and stepped back three paces.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The toad crawled out. Its movements were faster than before, even frantic, undignified.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>It opened its mouth—a gash stretching to its chest, lined with tiny barbs. A long, purplish-black tongue shot out, wrapped the ball, and retracted. Swallowed it whole.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava didn’t move.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The toad’s body stiffened instantly. Its limbs convulsed. Its dorsal spines trembled violently, emitting a fine, metallic scraping sound.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The green luminescence in its eye sockets flashed wildly, flickering like a bulb about to burn out. It opened its mouth to spit acid—but its throat was blocked. It tried to flick its tongue—but its muscles were frozen.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava crouched, extended his pale hand, and pressed it onto the toad’s head. The scales were cold, slick—like touching a stone just pulled from water.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Obey,” he whispered.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The toad’s eyes flashed wildly. Karava felt a faint psychic pulse from his palm—not language, but something more primal: fear, rage, hunger.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The Koutao fishman soul was struggling deep within its mind, battling its instincts. The toad wanted to devour it. The soul wanted to possess its body. Neither would yield.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava closed his eyes, sent a thread of his own mental energy through his palm—no more than a thread, just enough to tip the balance.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The toad’s eyes stopped flashing.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The green luminescence stabilized, settling into a rhythmic pulse—like a heartbeat. One. Two. Three.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The toad lowered its head, resting its jaw in the mud, like a submissive slave.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava stood. His right hand trembled slightly. Controlling a soul-devouring process drained more mental energy than he’d expected. A trickle of black blood seeped from his lip—he wiped it with the back of his hand, glanced at it, as if confirming he was still alive.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The toad still lay on the ground, its green eyes fixed on him. Karava reached out, tapped its head lightly—not caressing, but confirming—confirming it was still there.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>“Go,” he said.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>The toad slowly crawled back into the crevice. Its movements were faster, steadier now—the Koutao fishman soul was fusing with its body. It would grow stronger, smarter, more ambitious.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>It would begin hunting in the swamp, devouring smaller demons, accumulating power. In months, perhaps a year, it would grow harder scales, longer spines. Then it would challenge stronger rivals, climbing upward.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava didn’t need it to become powerful. He only needed it to survive long enough, climb high enough—to enter the vision of the ancient beast that dwelled deep in the swamp’s heart. High enough to become a pawn in that game.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He turned and left. After walking a distance, he stopped beside a shallow pool of rotting water, crouched, and washed the mud from his hands. The water reflected his face—beneath the hood, pale as a corpse.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>Karava rose, pulled his hood back down. The reflection shattered beneath his boot.\u003C\u002Fp>\n\u003Cp>He didn’t look back. Behind him, in the darkness of Graywater Delta, something was slowly waking.\u003C\u002Fp>",1879,"2026-06-20T13:10:04.638Z",1,"Qwen3-Next 80B","7d3b99370a0eeeb6d7edf9f9d8225bc1d5b884ce41b1dca49e4f7d1dc3fa6474","black-dragon-necromancer-chapter-141","black-dragon-necromancer-chapter-139",145,"https:\u002F\u002Fnovelzhen.com\u002Fimages\u002Fcovers\u002Fblack-dragon-necromancer-cover.jpg"]