Valkyrie's Shadow

Afterword

Well, this afterword conveniently falls on the last day of the year…how strange. Happy holidays to everyone and thank you for your continued interest in Valkyrie’s Shadow!

Legacy of the Plains is a much ‘smaller’ volume both by word count and in terms of its ‘scale’. That being said, it has a far more ‘personal’ feeling to it and sets the stage for many things to come. I hope everyone enjoyed it!

Like the Overlord novels and previous volumes of Valkyrie’s Shadow, Legacy of the Plains is divided into ‘housekeeping’ acts and ‘adventure’ acts. The ‘adventure’ this time is with Ainz Ooal Gown, which is something I think readers have long been looking forward to.

This one is a bit easier to track, as it ends with the beginning of Volume 12. Legacy of the Plains spans roughly two months, beginning with Ludmila’s self-imposed seclusion of several weeks. It is now Lower Earth Month in New World terms – roughly November in the northern hemisphere. Canonically, E-Rantel appears to be at around the same latitude as the levant or south-central China, so snow is rare at lower altitudes. It’s getting cold in Warden’s Vale, though!

The volume begins with a character from Overlord canon: Andrei, the trusty vassal of Torkel Völkchenheim. He and the Elder Lich Sanju have a bit of a mystery on their hands.

As readers of Overlord canon know, the Sorcerous Kingdom uses mind control magic to investigate crimes. With this piece of knowledge in mind, it feels that many go on to believe that no one can get away with any crimes in the Sorcerous Kingdom. But, well, mind control doesn’t provide an answer for everything, as demonstrated in the first act where the clever use of First-tier magic leaves the local authorities stumped.

Though the region that Overlord takes place in is relatively tiny, it is still bigger than the light novels make it seem. You have medieval-style administrations, simplistic bookkeeping, and minimal access to instant communication. The distance that one travels for one hour in a car takes 2-4 days for these people by wagon or foot. When you have hundreds of thousands of people spread out in rural areas, keeping track of everything becomes a nightmare.

Administrations can only work with the information that they have, and the information that they need does not exist. Divination magic doesn’t work because divination magic requires the caster to know what they’re looking for in the first place.

The ‘crime’ side of the story is something of a supplementary exploration of how a little bit of magic can wreak a lot of havoc, and how difficult it is for the authorities to deal with people like Succulent. Even with the resources available to the Sorcerous Kingdom. Fortunately for all involved, it is an exercise being conducted to figure out how to deal with these types of problems.

On the administrative side, we have the Völkchenheim administration’s efforts to bring the Sorcerous Kingdom’s new ways to the fore. It is not as simple as Undead + fields + ??? = Profit! There are cultural and religious obstacles, as well as the existing distributions of land preventing optimal use of Undead labour. There are also the various administrative inefficiencies inherited from the regular workings of a Human administration that throw a wrench in the works of the Sorcerous Kingdom’s rigid top-down management.

Ludmila’s perspective is rather scathing when it comes to Torkel’s progress, so for much of the volume, readers may carry a bad impression of the young Count. By the end, however, things are shown to not be as bad as they seem – it is simply Ludmila’s tendency to focus on problems that colours her perspective. Torkel survives to see his grandchildren in Overlord canon, so I’m sure he’ll be fine.

Saying that going from Human to Undead is a big change may be a bit of an understatement. Winter’s Crown leaves Ludmila with many questions and concerns over her new existence, and they don’t disappear overnight. Mechanically speaking, being Undead in the New World seems like it has more pros than cons. Overlord being a power fantasy with an Undead protagonist certainly has a great deal to do with this.

For the once-Human Ludmila Zahradnik, however, it brings more worry than comfort. She doesn’t revel in her newly-acquired ‘power’, nor does she rejoice in immortality. In her mind, she has potentially become a monster and the lack of a definitive answer to this question only makes things worse. She fears losing everything that she holds dear and concepts like eternity haven’t truly sunk in yet.

Fortunately, a friendly – or not-so-friendly – Narberal comes to the rescue. These two are on the same page, yet not at the same time, which is always amusing to write and read. Most people view Narberal as a walking ball of scorn, but this side of her is only ever levelled at those that aren’t on Nazarick’s side. Her sense of superiority as a denizen of Nazarick is still conveyed to outsiders who are on the same side, but is also a straightforward and earnest type of character.

Narberal throws Ludmila several lifelines in her generally prideful manner, and in the end, she tells her what she needs to hear. Is it friendship? I’m not sure, but if Narberal made any friends with outsiders, this would probably be what it looks like. Some have noticed that a few of her quirks come from the Overlord spinoffs.

Looking back on the second act, it has a lot of things going on. It opens with the seeds of the Sorcerous Kingdom’s rise as an economic and industrial powerhouse being planted by Liane Wagner. Liane is a very different sort of Noble than the austere, Theocracy-schooled Ludmila Zahradnik and Clara Corelyn. We get inklings of this in dialogue, but we get our first few povs of our ambitious, playful, and slightly evil city aristocrat in the Legacy of the Plains.

In Birthright, she is shown to be judgemental and world-wise. These aspects of her character also make her decisive and a force for change. This change is not a shift to good or evil, but a drive towards progress. In her mind, their region of the world is an insignificant backwater, and she fully means to push it to the forefront of civilization.

Liane has what we might call an excellent household, which is something many stories sort of gloss over when it comes to characterising the nobility. The Lord or Lady might ultimately be in charge, but they are surrounded by a robust support network that is much like an extended family that follows them from generation to generation.

Humans are social creatures, and a noble family and their household very much impress themselves on one another. Liane servants are also the people who grew up with her: friends, almost-parental figures and reliable experts in their respective fields. They carry the pride and traditions of House Wagner every bit as much as she does.

With dwarven steel, Runecraft™, Undead labour and the innovations of House Wagner, we get a good look at these initial stirrings. People who are familiar with our own history probably know what comes next, though it will be in a fantastic flavour befitting Overlord. This sort of research and development is something that takes time, so the advance of Liane’s revolution and its effects will be sprinkled throughout the story from this point forward.

From a minor pov in Winter’s Crown, the frightened Quagoa is now a Merchant on the rise. Is it luck? Skill? I am not quite sure.

Windows on non-human life happen fairly often in Valkyrie’s Shadow, but the largest Demihuman one was rather unfortunate. This time, we have a character that’s riding on the train and not standing on the tracks. In the span of a couple of months, Zu Chiru has gone from on Quagoa amongst many dumped into an unfamiliar and hostile(to them) environment to a moleman of substantial means(to them). He remains a sort of quintessential tribal Demihuman while he makes progress as a Merchant and learns about Human society and tries to figure out how to fit the pieces of his old reality with his new one.

This time around, Ilyshn’ish ends up as his ‘assistant’ and the old relationship between the Quagoa and their former Frost Dragon masters is ‘flipped’. The Frost Dragon Bard is anything but subservient, though she has become accustomed to getting along with mortals. While Zu Chiru is a bit of a doormat when it comes to Ilyshn’ish, her charisma, ambition and Draconic pride work in his favour by mere association. As some people might have noticed, Ilyshn’ish has always had a ‘fixer’ aspect to her personality, and this comes to the fore as she acts to make Zu Chiru’s situation ‘better’.

After a month of working around the Duchy of E-Rantel, the Midnight Mole Merchant Company will be headed to the Baharuth Empire. As arranged by Liane Wagner, Ilyshn’ish will be along for the ride as well.

The Theocracy Paladins mentioned some time ago have finally made their appearance, though their portrayal may have come as a surprise. To many, the Slane Theocracy is a land composed of 10000% zealotry, and it often feels that the mere existence of religion in a character’s life comes with expectations of Deus Vult.

Religious characters in Overlord follow a more trpg-style depiction of faith in a fantasy world, and the various scenes of religious characters in canon generally fall within the spectrum of normal people. Religion is one aspect of their lives rather than being the only aspect of it. It is true that the Faith of the Six is human-centric, but it is not exactly Human supremacist in our modern sense.

“Today, we give thanks to the gods that human beings like ourselves are still alive.”

– Pontifex Maximus of the Slane Theocracy

Overlord Volume 10, Intermission

“…Humanity is weak, and it uses any and all means to defend itself. Anyone who doesn’t know that is an utter and complete fool.”

– Nigun, Commander of the Sunlight Scripture

Overlord Volume 1, Chapter 4, Part 3

The survival of the Human species is the paramount objective of the Faith of the Six. Its faithful understand that Humans are a weak species and believe that it is by the grace of their gods that they survive at all. The Slane Theocracy champions the cause of humanity, taking up the mantle of custodian of the fledgling Human nations in their vicinity(whether they like it or not).

That being said, this ‘benevolence’ does not necessarily mean that they are a ‘good’ country(by western standards). In a world where many species are outright superior to one’s own and also happen to consider Humans as chattel and food, their defence of humanity often comes in the form of preemptive violence, forcefully keeping the species in the vicinity stuck in a primitive, tribal state. A sufficient level of advancement in a Demihuman community brings that hammer of the Theocracy down upon them.

The ideology represented by this interventionist policy is something that permeates all levels of the Theocracy’s society. The people of the theocracy believe that humanity must use any and all means to defend itself and that the enemies of humanity must be destroyed to ensure humanity’s survival.

While this is a reprehensible outlook in our present-day world, it is the reality of theirs. According to Maruyama, if the Theocracy did not exist to intervene on behalf of the other Human nations in the region, those nations would have been destroyed.

Thirty-six Paladins arrive in the Sorcerous Kingdom, most possessing decades of experience working to support Humanity both within and beyond the Theocracy’s borders. While they are all devout servants of their gods, their experience has tempered their views and actions with the understanding that applying their warhammers to every problem is not always the best solution. They have been selected for good reason, as an incident in the Sorcerous Kingdom could very well mean the end of everything.

This act is very much a Clara act, where the Theocracy Paladins go to a foreign land yet find many familiar things. The people worship the same gods, speak the same language and follow many of the same customs, yet are very different in several notable ways. In the safe and prosperous setting of Corelyn County, they are received with generous hospitality and are allowed the opportunity to slowly acclimate themselves to life in the Sorcerous Kingdom. Little did they know that an epiphany awaited them at the end of their journey.

Now settled, they have assumed their duties as temple guards, serving the faithful in what capacity they can. Not only do they serve as temple staff, but are laying the foundations for a new Paladin Order in the Sorcerous Kingdom. I wonder what they will call it…

Ainz Ooal Gown makes his first long appearance in the second half of Legacy of the Plains, where we follow Ainz, Shalltear and Ludmila on a ‘vacation’ in the Katze Plains. After some ulterior motives and various misunderstandings play out, the Undead trio embarks on a journey of discovery.

It can be said that the relationships that Ainz finds himself in with non-Nazarick characters can be lumped into a handful of categories. Most have the stereotypical reaction to the Undead, followed by a life of fear and anxiety. If someone is particularly smart or capable, they will end up thinking themselves into a corner or become stupid or both. Jircniv and his supporting cast from the Empire are an example of this, as are Renner and Raeven.

Once in a while, you get a character that gets over their fear of Ainz and is either drawn in by his candid nature or awed by his power or apparent kingliness. These characters branch out to either becoming something uncomfortable for Ainz(Fluder, Neia, Nfirea) or people that become ‘useful’ and quickly fade away.

There are also those people with whom mutual respect is developed(or can), but then they die before the relationship can be developed. Gazef, Calca and Zanac are the ones that I can think of at the moment of writing this.

This is a purposeful irony woven into the overarching story of Overlord: friends are what Ainz values the most, yet he is never allowed to have them. The closest candidates for friendship get killed off.

Ludmila Zahradnik’s relationship with Ainz is a variation of the above. She is instilled with rigid respect for hierarchy, yet also develops personal respect for not just her sovereign, but many of Nazarick’s denizens. And then she is killed off. Several times. She eventually gets back up again on her own, so you might say that she has survived this filtering process.

As one of the Undead, she naturally has no fear of the Undead…but she ends up being affected in the same way that many Undead are by Ainz’s presence. It comes in the form of horni like Shalltear and Evileye, much to Ludmila’s dismay. Not only does she feel this way around Ainz, but she firmly believes that Ainz is Surshana, the most powerful of the Six Great Gods that she worships. Despite this lofty bar existing from the outset, Ainz finds that her perception of a ‘descended god’ is not as crazy as he feared that it might be.

He finds that Ludmila is a loyal subject who is more than willing to candidly discuss all sorts of things with him. She is also one who genuinely acts to further the goals of his Sorcerous Kingdom. He may also be the subject of various calcium-laced fantasies. Despite all of this, however, the end result is that he still hasn’t found a friend. At least he’s happy that Shalltear has gained a reliable companion.

The Ghost Ship and its Elder Lich captain make their appearance in this volume, but Captain Iškur is not a pirate no matter how the Vampire Brides try to dress him up as one. Elder Liches all start as ‘Elder Liches’, all stemming from the same Yggdrasil ‘concept’ incorporated in their genesis. As such, their personalities can only ‘drift’ as far as their experiences change them.

Captain Iškur’s personality is held up in contrast to both the Elder Liches of the Sorcerous Kingdom and the members of his cabal. He is about as outgoing as one might expect an Elder Lich in his situation to be, and he doesn’t ooze evil from every pore. When dealing with other Undead, he’s quite affable.

There is very little to draw off of when it comes to the activities of Captain Iškur and Ruin’s Wake. In canon, they are rumoured to exist but there are no reports of attacks on the surrounding nations. In Mass for the Dead, the Elder Lich captain is killed by Kralgra, Igvarge’s Mithril-rank Adventurer team, but Kralgra is also killed in the process. The Ghost Ship later finds itself on Nazarick’s side. With this in mind, I made Captain Iškur close to Level 30 to match the strength of a being capable of wiping out an entire team of Mithril-rank Adventurers who regularly fight the Undead and are prepared in advance for a fight against an Elder Lich.

In Valkyrie’s Shadow,Ruin’s Wake patrols the Katze Plains while Captain Iškur tries to come up with ways to reliably bring in resources for the Katze Cabal. After a century of failure, his luck turns for the better when the Katze Plains comes under the dominion of the Sorcerous Kingdom.

With Captain Iškur and Ruin’s Wake come some more ‘natural’ Undead perspectives, as well as the reintroduction to Corpus of the Abyss: an organisation that was first introduced in the Overlord bonus volume as part of the canon setting that existed before Suzuki Satoru’s arrival over Inveria.

The ‘history’ of Overlord has a number of seemingly conflicting accounts of history. I suspect some of this is due to how the light novels saw a lot of copy-paste from the web novel, and some inconsistencies slipped by the editor. It is what we have to work with, however, and the post-web novel writing continues to present new inconsistencies. With this being the case, it seems that the history of the region covered by the light novel is not as it seems…

We are presented with the first historical narrative presenting humanity as being in a state of near-extinction, pushed to the far northwestern corner of the continent. The reason is presented as Humans being at a great disadvantage to other species, and they are often viewed as prey. This notion, however, slowly falls apart as you discover that there are places where Humans coexist with other species. The falsehood is blown wide open to readers in the bonus volume when we discover that there are prosperous Human and multiracial nations so far away from the Theocracy that they’ve never even heard of it.

Katze has its own set of canonical inconsistencies, in particular the fact that nations that came into existence less than two centuries ago are making ancestral claims to a region that has construction hundreds of years old. There are several other bits of lore that pop up in later volumes, so I hope the unveiling of this mystery down the line is a satisfactory one.

At its core, the overarching conflict of Valkyrie’s Shadow has always been something like a domestic one…though that’s probably not the right way to put it. Nazarick is both the benefactor and the biggest threat to the Sorcerous Kingdom. Whether it is the whimsical bumbling of Ainz as the Sorcerer King, the malevolent nature of the NPCs that find themselves in positions of authority and influence, or the fact that many things simply don’t translate well to the New World, the challenges faced by our main cast are as often caused as they are solved by Nazarick’s power.

There is a larger conflict that has been brewing from the beginning, however: the ‘game’ that Clara Corelyn refers to at the end of this volume. Whether at home or abroad, the Sorcerous Kingdom has actors who employ chaos and destruction in order to achieve its ends. Clara, on the other hand, intends to use orderly and constructive means. This interplay between two ‘forces’ working for the same side is the driving conflict of Valkyrie’s Shadow as a whole. Everyone knows that Nazarick wins in the end, but how they win is the story told here.

Ainz has been bumbling around for a while with things unfamiliar to him, but his first major arc in Valkyrie’s Shadow starts him off with the stuff that he knows best. Confronted by the mystery of Ludmila’s Racial Class Levels, character build and surrounded by endless amounts of mindless Undead, he is free to experiment as he pleases. I’ve felt that this sort of mechanical exposition has been long overdue for Valkyrie’s Shadow, and Ainz is the perfect character to do it with. Hopefully what was covered sheds some light on how background mechanics and storytelling relate to one another, both in this fanfiction and in the canon material.

Personally, I prefer leaving the nuts and bolts of things like game mechanics out of narration, hoping that people can figure things out as the story goes on. Once in a while, however, I feel that things are too vague and interpretations of the writing when it comes to mechanics start landing way off of the mark and these misconceptions begin to interfere with how the story is received. Maru has been patient when it comes to this sort of thing, though you could often see him venting over it in social media when he was actively posting.

Beyond all of the stuff covered in Act 4 of Legacy of the Plains, there is one more ‘basic’ aspect of the Overlord mechanics portrayed in Valkyrie’s Shadow that feels very difficult to get across in writing. This is partially because most people aren’t familiar with the systems involved, but it’s mainly because it requires one to spew forth numbers and rules explanations. What I am referring to in this particular case are ‘Classes’.

Class levels are divided into two main types in Overlord: Racial Classes and Job Classes. This division is simple enough to understand – Racials are levels that signify your ‘natural’ growth as a member of non-Humanoid species, while Jobs are vocational advancement.

Past this point, however, I feel that things become vague and confusing because it’s left to narration to describe what people with certain job and racial classes can do. Additional confusion is added because readers often relate characters to themselves or what they understand about how people work in reality.

Class systems, however, dictate what people can do. Very often in Overlord, a reader is left wondering ‘well why didn’t they do this’ or ‘how come they don’t know who is wearing that mask, everything else about them is the same!’ This is often background mechanics dictating outcomes. It is akin to failing a skill check in a ttrpg and the DM can’t be arsed to narrate a proper explanation in-setting.

The more organically written these systems are, the more difficult they are to detect and break apart for analysis. Very good writers in this genre can make it seem like everything is perfectly natural and makes sense. Maruyama goes out of his way to create vagaries in the narration to indicate that the systems exist, usually in the form of slightly interesting or humorous anomalies. Sometimes, he just says things straight out as an aside to an action or event.

This usually happens for a Yggdrasil entity or from their pov because things just are to them. There is, for instance, no way to organically describe why Solution can use scrolls that usually require magic casting classes.

Under normal circumstances, using the magic of the scroll would require levels in the appropriate job class. In other words, one would need cleric-type class levels to use clerical spells, which were divine magic. However, certain thief-type classes had the ability to emulate a class and use magical devices by “deceiving” them, such as with a scroll.

As an assassin, Solution had levels in several thief-type classes. Thus, she was able to use this scroll of [Heal], which she would not be able to use otherwise.

– Overlord, Volume 5, Chapter 3, Part 2

The background mechanical reason is that her build includes a Rogue archetype that has UMD(Use Magic Device), which is a skill in d20 games that does exactly as this passage describes…but screw trying to figure out a smooth and organic way to deliver an in-setting explanation of UMD without taking up several scenes to clearly define the skill. By portraying it as a ‘game’ explanation, he saves space and time. Such is the beauty of Isekai, I suppose.

At this point, some readers who are now aware that she can do this will start thinking ‘well, that seems awesome, why doesn’t everyone learn that?’. The thing is that they can’t. If you do not have a Job Class with access to UMD, you can never learn UMD. So I hope you’re a Rogue or Bard or some magic user that has UMD as a class skill.

Every other class skill works the same way. In Valkyrie’s Shadow, one of the earliest examples of this is when Ludmila finds out that her family has been ‘cheated’ by Merchants for generations. None of them had any idea that they were being cheated because they did not possess Job Classes with that type of appraisal skill. Nor did they hire any Merchants to work for them due to their stubborn DIY attitude. It happens again when Liane tries teasing Ludmila by asking her how much she thought the Arche cup was worth, but Ludmila notices something wrong with it through her Truesight and uses her persuasive skills to find a way out of directly answering.

Anyhow…for this segment, I’d like to cover how Job Classes are ‘balanced’ relative to one another. I say this loosely because some classes are just imba compared to others.

We will use basic ‘warrior’ archetypes for this explanation, which I hope will do the trick.

Above, you see the breakdown of a Fighter, which is one of the most common basic warrior-type Job Classes in Overlord. It has all the basics that every other warrior class has, plus the flexibility that comes with being a generic warrior-type. Being generic does not mean that it is weak: simply lacking in thematic definition and high in customizability.

Every class has an attribute array(stats). Instead of the traditional attribute advancement in most d20 games(rolling dice, adding points at certain levels), Overlord effectively uses a variant ruleset where attribute growth is baked into class advancement. Every level that you gain contributes to this growth in that level’s way.

The Fighter’s martial flexibility is represented in the myriad of paths that they may take as they gain experience and level. Weapon focus, combat style and figuring out a broad array of associated Martial Arts are a few of the things that they can make active choices over.

These choices factor into prestige class advancement. A Fighter that focuses on being a ‘tank’ will eventually qualify for the Guardian prestige class. One who focuses on the use of a certain type of weapon will eventually qualify for the Weapon Master prestige class. I think this is simple enough to understand even by those unfamiliar with the genre: your choices dictate your advancement, but your choices are limited by your current classes. You have to go waaaay out of your way to pick up an unassociated class.

The ‘Noncombat’ side of things is where most of the confusion occurs. This section represents the skills and knowledge that a Fighter can pick up on the side, be it a hobby or something supplemental to their vocation. An Adventurer, for instance, might pick up limited survival skills, learn how to negotiate with clients, bargain with merchants or pick up monster lore.

A lot of this side of things goes under the radar because as readers, it is something that we can do without limitations. To us, it is not a part of the ‘action’ that we expect from a Fighter, either. But it is a huge part of their lives. People spend more time outside of combat than in it. Those without Fighter and thus the associated flexibility, like Rangers, can go hang out in the woods like Pavel Baraja. Speaking of which…

To compare, we have the basic Ranger. As one can see, the Ranger has the same basic ‘warrior’ traits and its own attribute array, much like the Fighter.

The difference between the two classes is apparent, as the Fighter’s broad flexibility has almost entirely vanished. On the right side where a Fighter’s flexible noncombat options are, a Ranger is locked into survival skills and specialised training against specific target types. These ‘packages’ are powerful, but sacrifice the flexibility that one might wish for outside of combat.

Survival skills are as you see listed above, but one will also note that there are skills that can be found in classes other than Ranger. Stealth, Traps and Poison can also be found in the ‘Thief’ package of Rogues and Bards, and the Survival package lacks many things found in the Thief one, such as Appraise Item, Lockpicking and UMD. The Thief package is similarly missing many things from the Survival package.

Favoured enemy bonuses are tongue-in-cheek called the ‘power of racism’ by some d20 players. This bonus is described quite a few times in Valkyrie’s Shadow. It is the reason why Ludmila is so good at fighting Demihumans, understanding them, and scaring the shit out of them by merely existing. Her ‘favoured enemy’ as a Ranger was Demihumans.

In Act 2 of Legacy of the Plains, Liane notes that Ludmila is not creating mass panic in the Demihuman Quarter. The reason for this was because she lost her Ranger Class Levels and thus the Favoured Enemy Bonuses attached to them. Her Ranger levels were converted into Revenant levels, but it wasn’t a 1:1 conversion.

Favoured Enemy Bonuses are not exclusively hatred for a certain type of enemy: they are merely a supernatural form of expertise that manifests all sorts of bonuses against a designated creature type. An Urban Ranger working in a city militia would specialise in Humans because they have to deal with Humans all day. A Hunter would specialise in fighting Beasts, and this specialisation would in turn unlock the Beast Tamer Prestige Class.

The left side is partially occupied by Ranged Weapon Specialization, which is inherent to every Ranger. Their projectiles hit harder, and they have Skills and Martial Arts that only those with this specialisation have. The remaining portion of the class is the same flexible ‘Additional Martial Specialisation’ that Fighters have, but it is less pronounced than that of a Fighter.

Most Rangers will focus on ranged combat to build on their already existing ranged weapon specialisation. Pavel Baraja is an example of one such Ranger. Combined with favoured enemy bonuses, a Ranger can become infamous against their foes, just as he was. Despite his focus on archery, Pavel Baraja was also no slouch in close combat, capable of beating Orlando Campano – a Sword Master of Roble’s Nine Colours – in pure melee.

Ludmila opted to use this optional martial specialisation to further her skills in melee combat. Either way, Rangers are not just a Fighter with a ‘nature’ theme: when it comes to battle, they are the best skirmishers around. If an enemy is caught in their favoured terrain or is on their list of Favoured Enemies(or both), they’re in big trouble.

And yes, favoured terrain bonuses also exist – you see Neia’s activate in Volume 12.

A new volume for a new year. In the west, the Holy Kingdom of Roble is under attack by Jaldabaoth’s Demihuman coalition. Valkyrie’s Shadow, however, moves east: to the Empire. Empire in Chains is an exploration of the Baharuth Empire and the state of its affairs following Jircniv’s capitulation to Ainz Ooal Gown. I hope I continue to entertain...

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