Standing upon the prow of the Veil of Twilight, I smiled as I looked out over Lithaes. It had
only been a month or two, but clearly the lands had not changed that much.
Several members of the guild rose up to meet us, flying either under their own
power or with the aid of spells or items, and landed upon the deck. Chief among
them, naturally, was Lexichan, who looked a little annoyed.
“Oh, Zaaaaayn. What did I tell you about starting
world-changing events without talking to me first? I let you out of my sight
for just a little while, and what do you do, but get all the gods in an uproar!
Honestly! What the hell were you thinking? Do you know how much work I’ve had
to do to keep things stable after you went and started messing around with that
Daughter of Pelor? And then you went and stripped a god of their divinity and
gave it to a demon lord! Do you have any idea what kind of craziness that is
causing around here?”
OK, so maybe she was more than a little annoyed. “Lexichan,
come on! How was I supposed to know accidentally sending the scene of me
deflowering Pelor’s daughter would cause such a fuss? Besides, it totally wasn’t
my fault! I was trying to entertain the crowd after I won the tournament!”
“As if you couldn’t have found another way! But no, someone
waved a hot piece of tail in front of you, and you started thinking with your
dick instead of your head! You know that Pelor’s declared war on you, and
through you, all of Aria, right? And just what were you going to do about that,
hmm?”
“Hey, you know Pelor’s one of those light side gods that already
hated us for being scary evil creatures that didn’t play by their rules. He was
always going to be an enemy of Aria. So nothing really changed, to be honest.
On the other hand, we do have a strong ally in the newest Goddess to take the
stage, so there is that.”
“Hmph! And just what possessed you to go and try some ritual
that would strip a goddess of their divinity? Did you have even the slightest
clue what that would do to this place?”
I sighed, and said, “Ri’ilka, get up here! I order you to
transfer ownership of your slaves to the Aria of the Twilight guild as a whole.”
The elf moved jerkily, as though he was trying to resist the compulsion of the
slave collar. It was useless, of course, but it was still a sign of
disobedience, which would need to be punished.
The planeswalker stopped in front of Lexichan, and, through
gritted teeth, said, “I, Ri’ilka Soulfist, do hereby give up ownership of my
slaves to the Aria of the Twilight guild as a whole.” He then gasped, as though
a weight had lifted from him, now that there wasn’t a compulsion for him to
fight against.
Looking to Lexichan, I said, “Ri’ilka here thought he could
charm me into gaining his freedom. Unfortunately for him, he did not know with
whom he was dealing. But his pet brought up a ritual that was risky, but had
benefits. Malcanthet, on the other hand, knew a better version of the ritual, and
I wished to weaken Sezphy’s followers before I visited Ograin again.” I paused,
and said, “Oh, and I hearby transfer ownership of Ri’ilka to the Aria of the
Twilight guild as a whole.”
With that done, I said, “So anyways, blame the lamia for the
ritual magic idea. She seems to be a wealth of knowledge, so I’d station her
down with the enchanters, and see what happens. The Centaur will be attached to
groups who are seeking combat, and need a bit of extra muscle, or for those
needing bodyguards for some reason. Send the child to the nursery with the
others. She can help the ones in charge with their work as she gets her
education. And as for Ri’ilka? We’ll see where he’s needed most. For the
moment, my orders from before still stand, so he can’t go planeswalking away
from this.”
Lexichan nodded as she inspected the four new slaves. “All
right, these three adults will be useful, and the ladies down in the nursery
will be glad to have another hand to keep an eye on the youngsters, even if she’s
a youngster herself. So, I assume you realize that we don’t exactly have a dock
on our little lake that can fit this beast, right?”
Ah, I hadn’t considered that. Shaking my head, I said, “We’ll
set something up later. For now, we can just put the ship in the shallows, as
close to the shore as we can get without causing trouble, and we’ll fly it out
later. The Veil of Twilight will be
how we get to Ograin when we go and visit the lightsiders to tell them how upset
they made us with their theocracy.”
Lexichan sighed. “So you still intend to go and start
another fight with the lightsiders? I agree that they have been getting pretty
bold lately, but you could be starting another war. The King would not be happy
with you for that.”
I grinned at her. “I’m not going to start a war. That would
be something that Sir Zayn Darkmore, Lord of Lithaes and Knight of the Wyrmwood
would do. But as Zayn Darkmore, Chosen of Sharess, Consort of the Dragon Queen,
and Consort of Malcanthet, I may visit to tell people just how upset I am at
the treatment of those who share the same faith and allegiances.”
“Ugh, I should have known you wouldn’t back down. You do
know that one little ship, no matter how impressive, isn’t going to do much
against the forces they can bring to bear? How do you plan to get through their
defenses?”
“Simple, really. As the representative of a Goddess, then
attacking me first would be a declaration of war on Sharess. Once we’re in
range of the city, then Twilight’s Caress will take care of any nasty plans
they might have. I’m kindof eager to see what that baby can do.”
I paused, and then said, “Of course, I don’t have just that
to rely on. I am aware that several deities wish to speak with me, and so I’ll
be visiting shrines to them in order to see if I can’t pull away some of the
divine backing the Theocracy has. With Sezphy diminished and stripped of her
divinity, the leading part of the Theocracy has been hobbled severely. So the more
gods we pull away or convince to remain neutral, the less opposition we’ll
face.”
“All right. Say this all goes down like you hope, and we
kick the Theocracy in the teeth hard enough that they go down. What happens to
Ograin then? Send the whole country up in flames again? Take over? Install a puppet
government? Tell me you’ve at least given some thought to what will happen
after that, and aren’t just leaving me to pick up the pieces, AGAIN!”
“Oh, come on, Lexichan. You can’t still be mad about the Sack
of Ebonham…”
“And the Burning of Silvercreek Wharf! And the Purge of
Bloodmoon Cove! Oh, don’t forget the War of Keththyr Succession you got us
embroiled in! Or the Destruction of Duskbarrow! Oh, and do I really need to
mention the Desolation of Darkwallow?”
“Those were all years ago, in another world! And all of
those worked out for the best, right? We went in, kicked ass, and then let the
people make the choices on what happened next on their own. Sure, the Bandit
Lord of Duskbarrow came back as the Lich King of Darkwallow, but who could have
guessed that the guy would have had a necromancer as a friend? We had good
reasons for going into all of those fights, and you know it!”
“Yes, and you know why we didn’t get destroyed by any backlash
coming from those actions?”
I held up my hands, signaling defeat. “It was because you’re
awesome, and much better at managing things like that than I am. But fine, I
did come up with an idea that I think would be fun to see if it would work. You
see, looking at Caledon’s system gave me ideas about what we could do for
Ograin. What do you think about taking the Princess back to her people, and
making her the Slave Queen of Ograin?”
Lexichan blinked at me, dumbfounded, and then smiled slowly.
“So, making it that the ruler of Ograin must be enslaved to the Lord of
Lithaes, and write it into the fabric of the kingdom? That will be difficult to
do. The political opposition to something like that…”
“Has already been cleared out, thanks to the Theocracy
purging the nobles that dared to try and retain their power in the face of all
the holy words going around. You know as well as I do that the nobility of Ograin
has been all but wiped out. They won’t be able to resist the new shape of the
kingdom. The Theocracy has been stomping down on people right and left. Seeing
the return of their Princess would make it easy for us to do some propaganda
and turn this into a ‘liberation’ from the tyranny of the Theocracy, returning
power to where it always belonged.”
“All right, and how will you get around the whole fact that
the new Queen will be your slave? There are going to be people that refuse to
bow to a slave when they’re free.”
“Well, that is what the Shadow Alliance is for. The members
of Night’s Requiem can ferret out the troublemakers and end them from the shadows,
or find ways to convince them to consider other options than rebelling against
the Queen. They’ll be the secret police of Ograin, with license to do as they
please in the name of ‘national security’.”
Lexichan sighed. “Well, at least you’ve put some thought
into this. But you know that there will still be opposition, right? Eventually,
someone is going to lead a revolt, and it will have to be put down. Lightsiders
are always doing that.”
I nodded. “Of course. But if we can make life under the
Slave Queen seem better than the Theocracy or life before the war, then we can
keep the trouble down, somewhat. The majority of the people will not care who
leads them, so long as their daily lives aren’t affected, after all. The craftsmen
and merchants will care only about their work and their coin. The people of the
slums will be looking for their next meal. We can work it so that we are seen
as heroes for what we do for the country.”
“Fine, fine. I’ll start making preparations with the guild and
the Alliance to prepare for the first true Alliance raid in Age of Anarchy
Online. I can’t believe we’re actually doing something like this, but whatever.
So, what do you intend to do, now that you’re back in the material plane?”
I considered the order I would do things, and said, “Well,
first I’ll need to reach out to Sharess, and then Mirelth. Lolth is an obvious
one to contact, as well, since she is one of the goddesses that asked me to
visit her temple. There are some other deities that have reached out to me, and
it may require some travel to get to their shrines, but I think I know where to
find at least a few of them, and where I can get scrolls to at least get me to
other places, if the members of the Guild haven’t found them, yet.”
Lexichan’s eyes narrowed. “I notice that the ones you named
were all female. Let me guess, all the dieties you plan on ‘visiting’ are female,
and you’re hoping you can pull off some kind of big, James Bond scheme where
you sleep with them and suddenly they’re all just bubbly inside and helping you
with your plans, aren’t you?” When I didn’t say anything immediately, the drow
ranger sighed, and said, “Zayn, I swear, you’re going to be the death of me. Just
please try not to go and kill or piss off anyone important, will you? At least
not until we have finished Ograin?”
“Come on, Lexichan. How often have I gone out trying to piss
off important people?”
“That’s what worries me.”
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Rules-Free VRMMO Life (Dark Fantasy GameLit):
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City of Champions Online (Superhero GameLit):
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Lewd Dungeon (Dungeon Core GameLit):
Book 1 - Welcome to the Apocalypse https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BB34DHF
Omnibus 1 - Books 1-4 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07FBPF6HR
The Kalipshae Affair (A First Contact Short Story): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0739V6R6T
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