He looks like a shadow of his former self, Ainz thought as Nigun was brought to the Throne Room.
The man seemed to have aged a decade in the few days since he had last seen him.
Nigun had a nervous, starving look in his sunken eyes, his gaze darting around the room, as if looking for potential threats.
When his gaze finally stopped on Ainz, Nigun was taken by fear and fell to the ground, trembling.
The other 3 men who followed him inside were no better; judging by their expressions, it seemed like not pissing themselves was already a great accomplishment on their part.
How much did Neuronist and Demiurge torture them to reduce them to this in just a few days?
Feeling glad that they were his subordinates and not his enemies, Ainz raised his hand to stop Albedo, who seemed ready to kill the men for their disrespect, and signaled to a Death Priest in the room to deal with them.
Standing at 1.8m, the Death Priest wore a decrepit black chasuble that gave it a sinister appearance.
Far from the benign appearance of a priest, this undead was one that would inspire fear rather than reverence.
It approached the men and cast [Lion's Heart] on them, a spell that protected the target against fear effects, even the ones originating from the target's own fears.
Once it was finished, the Death Priest returned to a corner of the room where other undead stood silently.
There were many types of undead there: Death Knights, Death Warriors, Death Assassins, Death Archers, Death Priests, Death Wizards, Jack the Rippers, Corpse Colectors, Soul Eaters… and finally 7 Elder Liches who were busy recording everything they saw, so they could later report it to the Floor Guardians of their floors.
These were all undead that Ainz had created in the last few days as he tested his ability.
Through these tests, he reached the conclusion that he could create permanent undead of up to level 40 using human corpses. Anything stronger than that and the undead would vanish after 100 minutes like normal.
While disappointed about this limitation, Ainz still felt glad that he now had a way to consistently strengthen Nazarick.
Even if they wouldn't help much in terms of defenses due to their low levels, he was already finding some uses for them administratively.
The 7 Elder Liches were a prime example. They were as intelligent as a regular human, if not smarter, so having them act like the eyes and ears for the Floor Guardians and Vice-Floor Guardians in the Throne room made it easier for him to communicate his decisions to all of them.
In the future, he hoped to give enough Elder Liches for each guardian to have one on each floor.
His build in Yggdrasil was always focused on his ability to create and control the undead, so he was happy to find this new application of his abilities.
And this was also one of the reasons why he had summoned Nigun and the other 3.
They had something that could potentially make this ability of his more powerful, and he had to confirm it before he used that thing.
Ainz looked briefly at the Skill Upgrade Card in his inventory before turning his attention to the humans, who were now subserviently kneeling on the ground.
"Nigun Grid Luin," Ainz read the name floating above Nigun's head.
"Y-yes!" The man trembled as he lifted his head to look into his eyes.
"It says here," Ainz pointed at the Demiurge's report in his hand, "That you claim the special group, Black Scripture, is transporting a divine relic capable of taking control over the entity known as Coffing Dragon Lord. Is that true?" He asked in a calm tone.
"It is, my lord!" The man screeched.
"My lord? You recognize me as your lord?"
"Of course, Ainz-sama! If you accept me, I'll serve you with all my soul." Nigun planted his forehead on the ground with great enthusiasm.
"Oh? Very well. And what about you three?"
"We pledge our loyalty to you, my Lord!" The three men spoke in unison. They seemed like desperate people who had just found a way to save themselves.
"Very well, I accept your services." Ainz looked at the new names under his subordinates' section and saw their loyalty.
41%, 42%, 45%, and finally 50%. It looks subpar when compared with the NPCs, but for people whom I barely met, it's already pretty good.
Maybe that's the power of torture in action.
I should send them to Eris; she should be able to improve their condition.
"As for this Coffin Dragon Lord, is it an undead dragon?" This was an important point for him.
"It is indeed the case, Ainz-sama. The Coffin Dragon Lord is a dragon who used a powerful spell to turn into an undead many years ago." Nigun answered, his tone turning calmer as he was no longer under the threat of torture.
"Hum… Are you aware that the undead are immune to mind control?"
"I'm aware, but Downfall of Castle and Country is a divine relic left behind by the Six Great Gods that can bypass that!" Nigun's eyes gained a feverish light as he spoke about it, and the other men also stood in reverence at the mention of their gods.
It seems all of them are religious fanatics.
They look a bit like the NPCs when talking about the members of Ainz Ooal Gown.
Maybe this item being able to bypass mind control immunity is only a piece of propaganda from the higher-ups in the Theocracy, but I can't quite take a risk here.
Anyway, further questions on this topic would be meaningless since I don't trust their judgment, so I might as well move on to the next.
"I see. That sounds very impressive indeed." There was no need to question their faith at this point.
"I heard you're all talent holders, so tell me, what are your talents?"
…
After a brief conversation, Ainz understood what each of their talents did.
It could be said that the Slaine Theocracy knew how to manage its troops.
As a group that focused on fighting with summons, 3 of them had talents related to this.
Nigun's talent gave a small boost to all stats of a creature he summoned.
One other member had a similar talent, but his only boosted the attack stats, while the other boosted only the defenses.
The last member had a more niche talent that made his body more aerodynamic, which he only found useful when running.
From the information Ainz received, there was about one talent holder for every two hundred people, with the ratio higher in professions such as adventurers.
Even so, the majority of talents were like the last member, lacking practical application in their lives, and even some decent talents may not ever be used due to limitations on its user.
A talent for enhancing summoned beings would never shine in the hands of someone without potential for being a summoner, for example.
Talents were essentially random, so one needed to be very lucky to have a talent that synergized well with their build.
For the Sunlight Scripture to have 3 people with talents related to summoning only showed that the Slaine Theocracy put a lot of effort into finding compatible people for this unit.
Talents were powers that didn't exist in Yggdrasil, so Ainz had been curious about their application, and after seeing Nigun and the other showcase them, he couldn't help but want them for himself.
Maybe it's worth a try.
Ainz then produced a ring from his inventory and put it on.
The ring was encrusted with 3 small blue gems and seemed quite valuable.
In Yggdrasil, spells ranged from tiers 1 to 10.
As they leveled up in magic classes, players would gain access to spells of higher tiers every 7 levels.
And after level 70, a player could begin to learn Super-tier spells.
Super-tier spells were some of the strongest abilities in Yggdrasil, allowing for effects far stronger than regular spells.
And even among these powerful spells, [Wish Upon a Star] was a special existence.
One needed to be at least level 95 to learn it, and its effect was so powerful that it required the player to sacrifice their experience in order to use it.
After casting it, random options would appear for the caster to choose, giving a lot of versatility in its application.
The number of options and how good they were depended on how much experience was offered, ranging from 10% of the experience bar all the way to 5 whole levels.
The ring in Ainz's hand was called Shooting Star, an extremely rare item.
Before coming to the New World, Ainz Ooal Gown only had two of these rings, but after receiving the Territory Reward for Nazarick, Ainz now owned three of them.
Each ring allowed the user to use the Super-Tier spell [Wish Upon a Star] three times without expending experience, and all the wishes would be at full power, equivalent to one he had sacrificed 5 levels to cast.
Strong as it was, Ainz was not looking for any of the options he had seen in the game. Good as they may be, they would not be useful right now.
No. He was using this item while betting that the spell would go through a change, much like his undead creation skill had.
He looked towards the 4 men and activated the item.
From his finger, a blinding blue light erupted, filling the whole room in an instant.
All other lights dimmed under this radiance, giving the illusion that night had fallen on the Throne Room.
The blue light rose to the ceiling, which had now turned into a night sky. There, it transformed into thousands of tiny stars and began to move around like a meteor shower.
I see.
Information filled Ainz's head, making him immediately grasp how to use this spell.
He thought about what he wanted to do, and the stars responded, falling from the sky towards him, before turning into streams of energy and entering his body.
"Ainz-sama!" He heard Albedo screaming in panic, afraid that he might have been harmed.
"It's okay, Albedo. Don't worry." Ainz raised his hand to stop her and noticed it was emitting a blue glow.
How peculiar.
Ainz curiously looked at himself, noticing that as the starlight coursed through his bones, his whole body began to emit this blue glow.
His eyes, now transformed into two blue torches, focused on the four men below, seeing through their bodies to find a small flickering flame inside their heads.
Inside the flames, he saw small objects that he recognized as their talents.
He reached out with his hand through the air, grabbing the one inside of Nigun.
There was a slight resistance, but, powered by the starlight, Ainz had no trouble yanking the object and then looked at it in his palm.
It was a nine-edged crystal, with each edge representing one of the stats the talent would enhance.
He then looked back at Nigun, seeing that the flame had been reignited in his head and his talent was regenerating.
Ainz instinctively understood that a talent was something innately created as a person was born, and it couldn't be permanently removed from them, not even using [Wish Upon a Star], but he could graft it in himself with no problem.
He then grabbed the other three's talents, quickly finding two double-edged crystals and a sphere made of wind.
The starlight inside his body dimmed considerably after he did that, reducing its power to about 30% of its original level.
Finding there was little time left, he first placed the sphere on his forehead, letting it sink into his head and merge with his soul.
Then he prepared to do the same with the other three, but stopped after seeing that they seemed to be undergoing some changes.
Nigun's talent was pulling the other two towards itself.
The two double-edged crystals responded happily by moving in its direction, and under Ainz's surprised gaze, the three talents merged.
The result was still a nine-edged crystal, but now four of its edges were considerably larger than the others, making it look somewhat unbalanced.
Ainz could feel some dissatisfaction emanating from this crystal, as well as a sense of incompleteness.
He could ignore it and simply merge with it as it was, but he thought it would be a bit of a waste.
So as he held the crystal in his palm, Ainz began pouring the remaining starlight into it.
Under the influx of power, the remaining 5 edges began to grow at a visible pace until they reached the same size as the other four.
After reaching this state, the crystal began rejecting the starlight he poured into it.
Is this the limit? Very well.
Ainz finally merged with the talent, and as he did, the light that had been covering his body finally went off.
With it, he felt a sudden exhaustion take over him and fell onto the throne.
"What's wrong, Ainz-sama!?" Albedo and Nyx ran to him after seeing him like this, but he barely registered their voices.
His undead body was incapable of feeling exhaustion, which meant the exhaustion was purely mental. Using [Wish Upon a Star] at full power had proven more tiring than he expected, but it was worth it.
"Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!" He laughed maniacally as he saw the new inscription on his skill's list.
[Enhanced Summoning]
All creatures summoned by the user will have a boost of 25% to all their stats.