I did the 2nd rank to follow the same route as you completed, but as i saw that numbers just kept increasing I had to forfeit.

I'm glad you did the hard work. Otherwise I would've myself once I gathered enough strength to do so.

Well, I wish such a ritual was in the first game as well - in my walkthrough of KB Legends with a Mage using Undead army I have found only one small stack of Black Knights, two stacks of Cursed Ghosts (one Horde though, but it was in Necrocom) and no Ancient Vampires at all... The ability to upgrade the basic troops to these should have been implemented there too. Who knows, maybe in the Gold Edition?