by G. Akella
Then, General Daggon Ark whipped out his sword and slashed himself on the wrist, then fell to one knee. The legionnaires banged their shields in unison, and the Netherworld's knights threw up their weapons in a triumphant salute. The Winged Demon stepped forward, wielding a colossal charcoal-black sword that had appeared in his hand out of nowhere, and brought it down on the kneeling general with the flat of the blade.
An exultant roar went up over the plain, booming. Thousands of demons roaring, the sound clogging Max's ears through and through. It all resembled some kind of wild knighting ceremony, though he could only guess what had actually happened here. The general rose to his feet, cast his gaze at his elated army, then bellowed something in an unknown tongue, and raised his weapon overhead. The next second, his figure became engulfed in bright scarlet flames that instantly spread to the rest of his demons, still roaring their rapture. There was a deafening crash, and in the blink of an eye the valley was empty. It was as if the demons had dissolved in the flames—all but the black monstrosity that had become of his friend mere moments ago.
"Ro... Roman... Is that still you?" Alyona spoke warily, breaking the silence hanging over the valley.
Having dismounted her moose, she walked ten paces forward, stopping a few yards away from the winged monster. Max followed his woman without hesitation. Upon hearing the voices, the demon turned around slowly, taking in the perfectly still squad. His eyes were a dazzling blue, and they soon stopped at Alyona. The demon gave a barely perceptible nod, and bared his huge, snow-white fangs in a scowl.
"Is that him smiling?" Masyanya giggled nervously in the channel.
"That kind of smile would work as a damn fine laxative back where we come from," Bonbon said cautiously. "One-hundred-percent effectiveness, I'd wager."
As if recognizing the joke, the monster's smile seemed to grow wider. Then the body became transparent, and the next moment the Black Demon was gone, leaving behind an unconscious Roman lying prone on the trampled grass.
"Oh, what the hell!" Alyona cried, running over to her lifeless brother.
The razorback bolted after her at once, ramming Max painfully in the shoulder. With a shake of the head, the warrior followed after them.
Chapter 4
"Get off me, Gloom!" I shoved away the boar muzzle blocking out the sky, got up on my feet, and took a look at the crowd surrounding me.
Everyone was where they were supposed to be, so nothing terrible had happened. As to why they all seemed a bit shell-shocked, well, I'd like to see my expression after witnessing someone morph into hell knows what before my very eyes.
"I didn't make any trouble, did I?" I inquired, dusting the dirt stuck to my cuirass. "Where are the demons, and what actually happened just now?"
"Oh, nothing special," Vaessa answered for everyone, sarcastic as ever. "You merely turned into an Elder Demon, accepted their general's pledge, and released them. Home, I'm guessing. Run-of-the-mill stuff. Barely worth mentioning."
"Mocking me, are you?"
"Not at all. Still trying to ascertain whether that was really you, and how it was all possible in the first place?"
"That was Lilit," Saverus interjected, who'd been standing off to the side. "The same aura imprint, and the same influence of the force. Some of the Seven Lords can temporarily inhabit sentients they favor. And the Lord of Lust and Illusion, as we all know, happens to favor your prince, esteemed magus." The mage glanced at me, gave a light shrug, and turned back to Vaessa. "So, you're actually right, what we've witnessed truly isn't extraordinary, discounting the fact that this was the second revelation of the most fickle and capricious of the Seven to the same sentient..."
"Lust, is it?" Alyona said tauntingly in a private channel. "I leave you alone for a few months, Kozhevnikov, and not only have you managed to elope with hell knows whom, you're rocking a little black book of contacts of a very particular persuasion. And one very characteristic of your non-virtual self. Of course, your weren't thinking with your big head when getting married for the first time, so I'm hardly surprised."
"Oh, look who's talking," I scoffed, throwing up my hand to cut off burgeoning chatter, then nodded at Saverus.
"He's got it all right. I don't remember anything myself, so any questions you have, direct them all to Lilit. The next time she turns up, have a Q&A session for all I care. But for now, we're moving out. We have another eight miles to go today."
"Wait!" Donut pleaded as the people were beginning to disperse, then fixed Vaessa with a questioning look. "If that oath was pledged by the commander of the Netherworld's allied legions, does that mean the demons are gone? Like, completely gone?! The borders are clear?"
"I'd say so," I replied for the magus. "Only the undead along the borders of Erantia and the Orcish Steppe most likely remain. Since they have no connection to the demons."
I hopped onto Gloom's back, and pressed my heels into his sides, riding past the still-standing assassin. Alas, the undead weren't demons. Meaning, we weren't going to get far with negotiation...
Is there anything you want to tell me? I asked my wife as soon as our squad moved out in the temple's direction.
Is there anything you want to hear? Lita replied, sounding a little strange. Mother left, she's got business elsewhere. But I don't suppose you're too upset by that.
Do I have it right that she just used me to gain control over twelve Netherworld legions, and she didn't even bother thanking me?
I was just feigning outrage, truth be told. I wasn't mad in the slightest. After all, if this was what Lilit had wanted me for in the first place, so be it. Besides, what would I do with sixty thousand demons? I didn't have a princedom down in the Netherworld to settle them in.
Mother may have mastered the art of illusion, but she would never stoop to such primitive methods, Lita replied after a ten-second silence. That old clown and his legions swore an oath to me—Lilit simply acted as an intermediary.
What?!
That piece of news came at such a shock that I found myself struggling for breath, let alone words.
The legions belong to me now, my wife explained patiently. Mother opened a path for them to the Great Veld of Illusion. They will remain there, in her lands, awaiting my liberation.
But why would she give them to you when she could have easily taken them for herself?! I exclaimed mentally, still failing to digest the new information. Or are twelve legions are a trifle by the Netherworld's standards?
No, that is a very serious force, but it's not so simple. Velial would immediately sense such a boost of power in any of the Seven, and Lilit's relationship with him is complicated enough as it is...
But the oath is sworn to you, and not her, I continued her thought.You're not one of the Seven, and from what you said before, the Veld of Illusion can conceal tremendous numbers, as much as half of Karn's population. All right, so your mother is in command of the demons until you take over, but don't you think that—
No, I don't, Jaelitte cut me off, seeing where I was going. The legions are nothing without an Elder Demon behind them. So, neither my death nor your defeat are in her interest. She's never been as strong as she is now, and yet she's still no match for the Overlord. Anyway, she's still on our side, if that's what you're asking. It's all about practicality with her...
Well, that would be nice, I sighed with relief. I'll look at it as dowry.
What's a dowry? my spouse inquired at once.
Where I come from, some parents allocated some property to their daughter when she got married, I explained. And there was a period in history where the size of dowry largely determined the popularity of potential brides. Meaning, she could be a bow-legged monstrosity or dumb as a nail, but all that was overlooked on account of—
How dare you! Jaelitte gasped. The nerve to—
What nerve? I fired back indignantly, barely holding back laughter. That has nothing to do with me! I married for love! This was your mother's doing, not mine. Anyway, you should glad! A bride
's dowry was typically boring stuff like cattle, appliances or linens, whereas you came with a whopping twelve assault legions!
But didn't you just say that the worse the bride, the richer the dowry? my wife asked insinuatingly.
I never said that! I suddenly felt less-than-willing to continue this conversation. All I said was that with a large enough dowry, nobody looked at the bride. But my bride has got everything! She's brilliant and beautiful, and comes with a truly epic dowry!
Nice save! Jaelitte chuckled and fell silent.
I fixed the sword at my waist, and gazed out at the rolling hills just ahead. With regard to my wife, there were numerous angles here from which one could look at, numerous things to consider. In terms of appearance, I'd be hard-pressed to find anyone more beautiful. However, the fact that she was essentially her mother's daughter... Even fifty legions might not be enough of a compensation for some. But anyway, let's not count unhatched chickens just yet. I still needed to rescue my darling wife first, before indulging in fantasies.
We reached the ruined temple of the Goddess of Vengeance in the afternoon of the next day. However, you could hardly call it a temple. The gate aperture, overlaid with the purplish effervescent film of an instance portal, stood at the end of a huge square platform walled in behind three-foot-thick stone. At the center of it stood an altar—a massive flat structure covered with runes, and surrounded by twelve wooden super-thick columns, dilapidated and blackened with time. Ranging from five to fifteen feet in length, they formed a circle roughly one hundred feet in diameter, and probably at some point served as the temple's foundation. It must have been some kind of force to tear the temple down, considering the columns hadn't crumbled to dust in the millennia that followed, but I didn't care about the mystery one bit. Let ufologists concern themselves with all that useless stuff, just as they used to in that other world.
The wall surrounding the debris was made of smooth gray stone, and breached in six places. While the squad took its time pitching camp, Max and his people went through the breaches and tried to set the molten piece of green glass the devs had dubbed Emerald Tear onto the rune-covered altar. Unsurprisingly, the System hadn't reacted in any way, the goddess hadn't appeared, and no apricot trees sprung up from the ground—the instance would need to be cleared before the quest could be completed. The instance would allow a party of ten, and without level limits. The only requirement to enter was the presence of a quest item on any member of the party, and, obviously, the quest itself. Nine people already had the quest, and I would follow them as the tenth. The priest class' best health buff wasn't half as good as my princely boost of twenty percent to maximum health. Add to that my damage output, rank of knight-captain, and a plethora of other bonuses, and finding an argument against me rounding out the party became rather difficult. After all, a party in a dungeon had to rely only on clan bonuses and those of individuals physically present. But even if that weren't the case, I still wouldn't have let them go alone. I had briefly considered the option of sending Kan or Vaessa, but Donut and that Amerikan veteran quickly explained why I mustn't do that under any circumstances. Apparently, if a NPC entered a quest dungeon with such as this one, and the NPC's level exceeded the average level of the players in their group, the mobs would scale to the level of the NPC even on the first clearing. Whereas in my case, seeing as I was still a player in the eyes of the System, the level of the mobs would be based on the average level of the squad. I was level 255, Max was 191, and everyone else was 165. Assuming that Donut and Alex knew their stuff, simple math would suggest that the mobs inside would be level 177, meaning one swing of my sword should suffice to waste most of them. Now let's hope it actually works out that way. I was pretty glad that I hadn't encountered these purple dungeons before, seeing as I hadn't run with a group of players until very recently, but was only surrounded by locals, most of which were way higher level than me.
"All right, folks, all to the exit!" Donut yelled, having taken on the duties of squad commander.
Nobody questioned my ultimate leadership, but it only made sense for the most experienced player to cal the shots. Alex was the only one who could compete with Donut on that front, but he didn't have the quest, so the rogue was it by default.
"All right, listen up. None of us here have ever set foot in a quest dungeon like this one, so what I'm about to tell you is based on information gleaned from forums and other such sites," Donut began, looking around at the ten gathered by the temple gates. "I've already consulted with Alex, and he fully agreed with my assessment." The assassin gestured at the Amerikan standing off to the side, then at the film shimmering purple at the temple entrance—from this angle you could clearly see wormwood bushes and a dozen crumbling columns sticking out of the ground. "We have it at ninety percent certainty that this is a one-boss instance. A few packs of elites likely roam the territory, with the main bastard sitting somewhere amid those decrepit columns. He might not appear until we reach the altar—that's one possibility, at least. But there's a good chance we'll get attacked immediately, so let's start buffing. We stay in humanoid form for now, and shift only if strictly needed. Our collective damage output is nothing to sneeze at, so use food and alchemy for defense only. Given the situation, it makes sense to go the extra mile to protect our own asses."
"You mean we have to eat snake again?" Luffy rolled his eyes with a heavy sigh.
"Snake steak," Alyona corrected him with a smile. "And you really shouldn't complain. If it were up to me, we'd all be on a strict snake steak diet."
"He's gotten spoiled, that's what it is," Bonbon supported my sister, giving the mage a hard look. "Here we are, feeding him all these delicacies, and he's turning up his nose."
"Oh, you be quiet!" Luffy snapped back. "You gorge on everything that moves. And if it doesn't move, you move it and then gorge on it. You'd call maggots a delicacy, freaking foodie that you are!"
"Pipe down!" Donut barked, holding back a smile. "Buff up to the max—I will be checking buffs personally!"
"Even anti-aura aura?"
"Yes, Alyona, even that," the rogue nodded. "Get everyone buffed up, and start handing out food."
Catching my bemused gaze, he explained. Cehlar's Mercy was a druid aura with a ten-yard range that mitigated any hostile aura impacting the party by fifty percent, and up to eighty percent for the druid themself.
"He's going to tell you all about the slugs now," Alyona smiled, handing me a warm chunk of meat wrapped up in a burdock.
"What's there to tell?" Donut shrugged. "You didn't know at the time—it could have happened to anyone."
"Does anyone still have that magic herb with the flavor of garlic?" Bonbon inquired, looking around at his friends. "I'm out of mustard."
"Magic herb?" Masyanya sized Donut up and down, eyes squinting menacingly. You smoked it all during one of your binges! Bloody addicts! So, we'll all have to do without it now. Smoke some mustard instead!"
"But I'm out of mustard..." the bald man spread his arms guiltily.
"Tough cookies, then," the young woman shrugged, taking her ration from Alyona, and headed off to her croc, apparently disinterested in continuing the discussion.
"Be ready in five," Donut commanded, watching her walk way. Then he sighed, and took a seat on the grass.
The steak we were feasting on presently had been as thick as an arm in life, and tasted similar to the eels my father and I used to fish at the Vistula Lagoon, though that was probably due to mental association. I had never tried snake before, but snakes and eels were similar in appearance, hence my consciousness making the analogy. Alyona was right—the meat was indeed quite tasty, and the added ten percent bonus to maximum constitution was the proverbial cherry on top. I washed down the steak with three alchemical potions the taste of which I would sooner forget, if only I could, then stepped through the purple membrane of the portal—before Donut gave the command to. I was higher level and better geared than the rest of them, so I should survive any initial
trouble while my backup arrived.
"Mm-hmm," the second to step through the portal, Bonbon surveyed sceptically our surroundings, which hadn't changed one bit, then touched Donut's shoulder and motioned at the columns standing some forty yards away. "Are you sure we've entered a dungeon?"
"We have," the rogue nodded. "The grass is a shade darker, and the gates..."
I followed his eyes. And indeed, the gate aperture displayed only distant hills and a herd of spiral-horned bulls, but no traces of the squad camped on the other side.
"Creepy," Rexar said, lowering his bow. He had been the last to step through the portal. "I gather we probably shouldn't go back the same way?"
"The finish line is on the other end," Luffy frowned. "Only I don't see anyone welcoming us..."
As if hearing his words, the air above the grass in front of stirred into motion. Within moments, it formed ten dark gray vortexes, which promptly materialized into battle-ready elite warriors of the Darkaan empire.
"Kill them!" bellowed one of the warriors, clad in a full suit of plate, and the whole squad charged us on his command.
All ten were level 180, and with two hundred thousand HP. Humanoid, but definitely not human. Two wore closed helms, and the rest had faces ranging between reptilian and something resembling a chipmunk.
"PvP boss! The mirror kind!" Donut yelled, slipping into invis. "Krian! Rexar! Get on the mages! The rest of you, crowd control the healers, then focus fire on the ranger!"
Time slowed to a crawl, as it usually did in battle. Shoving me aside forcefully, Bonbon gunned out in front with his shield raised—and just in time to intercept the Darkaanese warrior's Charge.
Shifting into combat form, I threw a Silence on the lizard with his staff thrown up, then Jumped to the second mage. Ice Blade!
"Keep up crowd control, rotate cooldowns! Bonbon, cover our healers!"
Ice Blade crit and procced Freeze, and the Darkaanese caster crumbled to the ground in large icy chunks before he knew what had happened. I felt as though someone had poured a bucket of water into my ears—the din of iron clanging, bow-strings snapping, arrows thudding into shields, the assassin's abrupt orders. The sounds seemed distant somehow, as if coming from another planet. An arrow plunged into my hip, followed by a Fireball. What he hell?! The other mage was supposed to be Silenced! I spun around, then hopped to the side to avoid a spotted feline lunging at me. Another arrow—this time into my other hip—and a scowling muzzle flashed before my eyes, jaws snapping as Ruination wedged into the panther's ribcage. The dying beast's paw swiped forcefully at my helm. I kicked the carcass aside, only to catch another Fireball right in the chest. Bitch! Struggling for breath, I broke a healing potion on my belt, then threw Earth Shackles on the pesky mage, and dashed his way, teeth clenched.
