The next few days are spent in a frenzy of experiments. Apparently, you can give zombies as many cores as you can fit. You can also give them new arms, but that doesn't really help them and just gets in the way because they lack the mental capacity to properly control them. The string and web runes do almost the same thing, and I can't figure out what the difference is, but I swear there is one; I just can't find out what it is. Mana also slows the decomposition rate, so the bodies are decaying just takes longer for some reason. I've been directing so many bodies recently that I've gained a new skill, medical knowledge, I guess it's because almost nothing I've cut open was alive. Maybe I should fix that? No, not yet. I've fortified my wing of the hospital and have brought most of the medical supplies into my area. I have covered zombies guarding the entrances. But it's a poor fortification with just the supplies here.
I should get building supplies. I can't stay here forever, but I need to at least properly fortify in case of a raid. I have ten zombies. I leave five here and take five with me. I first move to a clothing store and take backpacks and take the clothes left. I know that the hardware stores also have backpacks, but I'll take as many as I can to gain leverage and material. I get to the hardware store, and almost everything that can be used as a weapon is in low supply, but not gone. I gather all I can, and with the wood here and the tires, I build a makeshift two-tire cart. There is an excess of wood, but that's not surprising. We just conquered our northern neighbor when the calamity hit, and we were chopping down their trees even when we were only occupying their territory. I'm ninety percent sure our empire was committing war crimes. I make two more carts, put as much as I can on both with some bodies hidden in the mix. We run into a small pack of wovles, but a giant zombie with a sledgehammer can do really good work in fights. I grab them as well to see how far I can go.
I've made another book, the first I'll use for the basics of magic, but this one I'll use for necromancy and anatomy; it will most likely never be used in combat. With the supplies from the hardware store, I also made a brush, so I don't need to keep making spells with my fingers. But with the cancellation rune, I can use blood for every part of the books.
It's time to start the first dissection. I have plenty of humans, I'm in a hospital, but the wolves that I don't. I had one singled out and strangled instead of being hit with a sledgehammer. I start with the first incision, the moment I do, I notice it's harder than human flesh. I cut from the tip of the sternum to right above its pelvis. Using its own blood, I sketch the body with the brush, the flesh different from what I was expecting; it looks normal, nothing that should make it as strong as it is. I move the organs around, trying to keep them about where they should be while still finding all of them. The heart is where I find something truly interesting. Around it is a ring, and it's not a blood vessel or an organ, something disconnected but still there and made of flesh, but why? What is the evolutionary advantage of that? Other than that and a few signs, it's still growing. There's nothing special, but it's much stronger than a normal wolf. The muscle I've cut into to see doesn't suggest the power it has. Still, I've written down all I know in the necromancy grimoire; it's not as much as I would like, but it's something.
I smoke its meat and tan its leather, but with one of the other wolves, I cut it open and find the heart. Everything seems to be the same in this one, even the ring around the heart. I carve the runes into this one to see if they work, and they pass with flying colors. My necromancy skill improves at least. But something is weird. Why are there only wolves in this area? No other monsters like at the apartment, no orcs or goblins, why just wolves? It's worrying what is here that causes everything but these wolves to run. Lesser and young, the words the system used to describe them. their the size of an adult wolf of my world, so what would an adult of them look like? After all, every pack needs a leader, and that role is not performed by the strongest but the eldest. Well, this time I think they might be the same thing.
Two days later, I'm woken up, I'm proven right by a howl that pierces the night, and my brain feels like it's ripping me apart. After about three minutes, it stops. I can hear it, though it's close. I sneak into one of the rooms and look outside. The wolf is three stories tall, the cars are pushed out of the way like they don't even exist. Nothing I've ever encountered has ever felt like this. The aura of monstrosity it gives off is brilliant, almost beautiful; the blood covering it is perfect and highlights its crimson eyes. It's truly magnificent, but I must retreat downstairs. But I've made a goal to kill it and make it mine, but to do that, I need something near its level, a normal zombie would never do, but there is something that could, in the right circumstance, the very thing the most famous necromancer in history Frankenstein made by combing parts of dead bodies your not just creating a normal zombie but a flesh golem. That's my plan, a flesh golem made by combining multiple whole bodies into a massive size.