Table of Contents
Arc VI – Taking the Show on the Road
Chapter 61 – Trade Chat III
Chapter 62 – Return to Fathon
Chapter 63 – I Deserved That
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Chapter 64 – Blood Rites
Chapter 65 – Raiding the Renegades
Chapter 66 – Bloodmaul and Shyrl
Chapter 67 – Hunting the Dead
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Chapter 68 – The Vault
Chapter 69 – Hammer of Death
Chapter 70 – Blacklake
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Chapter 71 – Wild Oats
Chapter 72 – Away from Human Lands
Arc VI – Taking the Show on the Road
Chapter 61 – Trade Chat III
Anonymous3, Cookie, RedJenny, Halla, Johnist, Darkmore, Darkmore’s Knight, Fallen One, l33tPally, Might_Makes_Right, Scholar, Firemane, Freed_Drow, Living Dead Girl, Reaper, Light’s Chosen, Sangria Dreams, Leliana, CmdrCullen, Darkspawn Slayer, and Z.Void are in the chat.
Freed_Drow: Holy shit! Have you seen the vid streams from that big battle in Duskhaven? Intense!
RedJenny: Seen a few, yeah. I was in the thick of it, though, and I can tell you that things were crazier in person.
Leliana: Had to have been, for everyone to forget about a dragon during the middle of the fight.
Might_Makes_Right: Well, there was already a huge running battle going on, and people got distracted enough by the dragon ripping open a portal in the sky.
Living Dead Girl: Yeah, and then everyone was watching as that Zayn and his harem came down from the portal, like they had just used the dragon as a damn taxi.
Darkmore: Well, we wanted to cause a big distraction, and get everyone’s eyes on us.
Reaper: Wait, that whole scene was a distraction? What else were you doing?
Firemane: Hidden quest related to the event. One of the four families related to the ones who captured Mirelth is now extinct.
CmdrCullen: Damn. Wait, you’re not one of the Aria folks, are you?
Firemane: No, but I had a pleasant rivalry with their Johnist over in WoD. We were one of the top explorer guilds.
Johnist: And I still beat you to a few key secrets, no?
Firemane: Hush you. Anyways, we needed a distraction to get some of the guards and players out of the way. So I called a friend, who had helped research the family.
Scholar: And I spoke to a friend in Aria.
Darkmore: Who spoke to me. After the dragon agreed to get us through the dome, it was easy enough to get all eyes on me, and concentrate the fighting in the square.
Cookie: Which allowed the dragon to sneak up on people and lay waste to them, right?
Sangria Dreams: Damn. How do you come up with these plans?
Darkmore: Well, I always liked reading and watching stuff on military battles. Tip for anyone who might start leading troops in AAO, read your Sun Tzu and Clausewitz.
Fallen One: So, second Demon’s Duel, and the game is only a couple months old! What did you get for winning this time?
Z.Void: *sobs*
Darkmore: AHEM!
Z.Void: *sighs*
Z.Void is now Darkmore’s Bitch.
Darkmores’s Bitch: You happy now, Master?
Darkmore: Barely. I’ll punish you for that, later.
Darkmore’s Knight: Really, you’d think after the first time she’d learn.
Fallen One: Wow. So other than making the Chainbreaker your bitch, what did you get?
Darkmore: Well, I guess it isn’t really a secret. I wanted to discourage people from doing these Demon’s Duels without good cause, so I gave her a ten-part penalty. First, I locked her character so that it couldn’t be deleted, traded, or sold until Icestorm stops running the game. Second, I forced her to use her access as Guildmaster to transfer all the Scions’ stuff to Aria. Any property they had, any gold or items in their guild bank, everything they built is now mine. Third, I had her use her access as Guildmaster to delete the guild. Fourth, I had her transfer all her personal property and funds to me, including what was in her private bank. Fifth, I stripped her of her subclass and profession, and gave her new ones. She is now a Level 40 Hellfire Mistress (Flame Sorceress) / Bard with the Courtesan profession. Sixth, she is now my slave, and is prohibited from wearing any clothes while in safe areas. All her clothing immediately unequips when she enters a safe zone, and reequips when she leaves the safe zone or when combat begins. Seventh, she has forcibly gained the Devoted and Masochist titles. Eighth, she is subject to a specialized charm effect, which makes her extremely… excited while in my presence. Ninth, she is to spend the next four months (game time) confined to my lands in Wyrmwood, where she will be the Village Whore. Tenth, any member of Aria of the Twilight, and any slave, thrall, or summon belonging to me may order her as if they were me, provided their orders do not contradict mine.
Fallen One: Holy fuck.
Cookie: Only you…
Reaper: Hell with that! Why would anyone continue playing the character after that kind of punishment got laid on them?
Johnist: Because of the first restriction. You can only have one character in AAO. So if you can’t delete, trade, or sell the character, ever, then your choice is to submit, or leave the game, forever.
Reaper: I thought Demon’s Duels didn’t let you fuck with their Struggle.net accounts?
Scholar: They don’t. However, everything Zayn did affected only server-side data, and never mentions Zephara’s Struggle.net account or anything about her in real life. This is, most likely, the worst punishment that he could give her within the rules of the game.
Darkmore: Well, there were a couple things I could have added, but I decided to stop there.
Darkmore’s Bitch: WHAT? What else could you do to shame me?
Darkmore: You’re not feeling a compulsion to spread your legs for all the horses, dogs, and livestock in town, are you?
Darkmore’s Bitch: Oh fuck me.
Darkmore: When we get back, yes.
Darkmore’s Bitch: DAMNIT!
l33tPally: Wait a minute, what are those titles she got? Why would you give an enemy titles?
Darkmore’s Knight: Because those titles have certain effects.
Darkmore: Let the whore explain it herself.
Darkmore’s Bitch: *sigh* Devoted makes me feel satisfaction when doing as Master commands. I also gain +10% to all tests when following his orders. Masochist gives me the ‘Hurts So Good’ quality, and makes me feel pleasure from pain.
Might_Makes_Right: And this is why you don’t toss a Demon’s Duel around, just because you have the coin for it, huh?
Darkmore: Exactly. Regular duels are just fine for solving disputes. If you call a Demon’s Duel, you had best be damn sure that you can win, otherwise your life will be hell from then on.
Light’s Chosen: Then why
did you call that first one, against Kali?
Darkmore: Because sometimes, you don’t just need a conflict resolved. Sometimes you need a problem eliminated. Kali was intent on creating a zombie apocalypse in the game to get her name out there. She had already basically taken over the drow lands, as far as players are concerned. A normal duel or simple PK wouldn’t do anything to stop her.
Light’s Chosen: Shades of Torgan, even as Darkmore?
Darkmore: Hah! No, this was all for me. I’ve been working on establishing Aria’s presence in the Wyrmwood, and while I’ve enslaved a bunch of people (mostly NPCs, a couple players) to do that, I haven’t tried to do anything stupid, like unleash the apocalypse. The people I’ve forcibly enslaved were all fighting against me, and trying to ruin the game for everyone else because I’m trying to get my name known just doesn’t do it for me.
Darkspawn Slayer: So, how big is this slave harem you’ve got going, anyways?
Darkmore’s Knight: Hah!
Cookie: Yeah, what is it up to, now?
Darkmore: Well, I actually managed to collar ten more slaves before the fight with Zephara, but three of those were some of the few surviving NPC Scions who died shortly afterwards. So my number of slaves? That’s up to thirty-six. Most of those I wouldn’t consider part of the ‘harem’. Most of them are set as guards for my castle. If you’re talking about the girls I sleep with regularly, then it would be my four girls, including DK over there, the familiar I seduced, one of my thralls, and my new bitch. So seven in total.
Firemane: Wow. You’ve been busy.
Darkmore: Oh, and a couple of my guild members take it in turns to dare themselves to take a ride, isn’t that right, Cookie?
Cookie: *blush*
Johnist: HAH! You can always tell when one of the ladies either took the dare, or lost a bet, by the way they waddle around the next day!
Light’s Chosen: What, really?
Darkmore’s Knight: Let’s just say he had a moment of childishness during character creation, and put one of the sliders all the way up.
Darkmore: I haven’t heard you complaining.
Darkmore’s Knight: he-he!
Darkmore’s Bitch: It can’t be worse than those three days from hell… right?
Cookie: Well, your stamina is based off your CON. And he’s got enough to double as a tank, even though he’s a caster.
Darkmore: Don’t worry, pet. You’ll have my attention all night.
Darkmore’s Bitch: Damnit.
Fallen One: So, Aria of the Twilight is basically the predominant darkside guild in the game, then?
Darkmore: Don’t know, haven’t checked. We’re not looking to dominate the game, or anything. But most of us were Lords of Light back in WoD, so we’ve got a lot of skill and experience on our side. We’re certainly the most well-established guild in Wyrmwood, but server-wide? Don’t know.
Firemane: No plans to expand, then?
Darkmore: Actually, yeah, we’ve been talking about setting up affiliate guilds under an alliance system in other lands. That way, we get around some of the legalities, in game, with me being a Noble in Wyrmwood now.
Scholar: Clever way to do it. You’d cause waves if a noble of Wyrmwood started creating a guild in, say, the dwarven kingdom, but if they are simply associates…
Darkmore: Yep. And I was actually going to pitch it to Firemane here, before she brought it up. We’d like Night’s Requiem to be our first affiliate. Johnist has pretty high praise for you guys, and I’ve seen the streams from your attack on the guild leader. You do good work.
Firemane: Oh, wow. I’ll have to talk with the others, you know? I might be the guild leader, but we’re more of a team.
Darkmore: No worries. Send a message to Lexichan if you need to work out the details. But if you do accept, welcome to the Shadow Alliance.
Light’s Chosen: Why ‘Shadow Alliance’?
Darkmore: Because we’re all grey to black here. We might save the world, but that isn’t going to be for goodness and light, but more for the fact that the world is where we keep our stuff, y’know? Likewise, we’re not going to burn the place down, because where would we keep our stuff then? But we’re not going to be bound by the same rules the Lightsiders are. We will lie. We will cheat. We will steal. We will kill. Whatever we want, so long as it doesn’t burn the world down or cause too many problems for the guild.
Scholar: And if someone objects?
Darkmore: They’re welcome to do so, but understand that trying to fight us means we’re not going to have any restrictions on what we do to you. Those who come to us with peace, we will be peaceful. Start shit, and you best bring a bucket, because we’ll rain shit down on you like a monsoon. We don’t have to have any of that annoying ‘restraint’ we showed as the Lords of Light.
Firemane: And these affiliates, are they covered, too?
Darkmore: Yes. An attack on one is an attack on all. Someone attacks a member of Aria, and EVERYONE gets to play. Whether they’re in the guild, or just part of the alliance. Someone starts a fight with an alliance member, they can choose to handle it themselves, or let it be open season for the alliance. And once the shitstorm starts, it doesn’t stop until the person attacked feels retribution has been sufficient, or until the enemy sues for peace.
Darkmore’s Knight: And if you try and push things too far, just remember what happened to Kali and Darkmore’s Bitch here.
Chapter 62 – Return to Fathon
It had been a month since the battle for Duskhaven. When Mirelth’s curse was lifted, those turned into the living dead by her spell regained their ‘living’ status, and were able to leave the city once more. The King, naturally, was grateful to be back amongst the living, but was more than a bit peeved at how the Travelers had behaved while trapped in the city. Rumors that it was a Traveler that had released Mirelth spread through the city, resulting in all Travelers being banned from the capitol unless they had a special passport.
Needless to say, a black market sprang up, smuggling Travelers into and out of the city when they needed to complete quests, or see trainers. The Adventurer’s Guild, which had been based in the center of the market district, shuttered that property and opened a new building outside the city walls. Several craftsmen followed suit, and soon there was a small town’s worth of buildings gathered a couple miles from the city, outside the King’s decree.
After I announced it on the forums, interest in the Shadow Alliance grew quite a bit. After talking it over with people, we decided to go with one guild based in each kingdom for the alliance, at least at first. Aria of the Twilight would represent Wyrmwood, and Night’s Requiem would do for Ograin. But there were plenty of other countries out there, and I wasn’t going to just add guilds to the alliance without vetting them, first.
So that was one of the reasons we were traveling through Ograin again. I left Zephara to be trained by Iqnora in the ways of magic, since she’d been going down the ‘batshit crazy’ path before. Iqnora was happy to do it when I asked her, especially when I promised that Zephara would be making sure she wasn’t ‘lonely’ on those long nights while I was traveling. Zephara, on the other hand, was simply happy to be doing something other than ‘village whore’. The experience she got from that wasn’t as much as questing or killing monsters, but she still gained a few levels over the last month. I still didn’t let her wear clothes in safe zones, however.
Our destination for this next round of vetting the potential allies was the Horde Tribeslands. There wasn’t a set Ork or Goblin Kingdom, but the Tribeslands held many different ork and goblin clans, which all competed with eachother, and often raided surrounding countries. Ograin sat between Wyrmwood and the Tribeslands, so we decided to pass through Fathon on our way, partly for nostalgia, and partly to see if anything new was going on.
For your Charisma passing 500, you gain a perk based on your playstyle:
Blessed Lover
Sharess smiles upon you, and your relentless pursuit to spreading her
teachings to as many beds as you can. Laying with you can remove all diseases, and debilitating effects (Paralyzed, Crippled, Cursed, etc.), including restoring lost body parts. Your lovers gain +10 to all stats for 6 hours. Your Fruitful Passion spell now grants the target a permanent +10 to all stats, in addition to its normal effects. This effect only occurs once per person.
Clearing out dungeons on the way got us to level 50 finally, and my Charisma hit 500 base points, giving me the Blessed Lover perk. Basically, sex with me removes diseases and curses, and even giving people back missing limbs, as well as a decent buff. I decided I wouldn’t mention the new side effect of Fruitful Passion. Being a Stud Horse was bad enough, y’know?
There were sixteen of us as we came within sight of Fathon. Sure, I could have gotten us there instantly with the dark portal, I didn’t want to get in the habit of simply warping everywhere. Traveling brought its own rewards. In addition to the levels and treasure the dungeons brought us (not to mention the increase in skills), there were other rewards to be had. A crew of bandits, likely trying to take over the territory I freed up the last time I passed this way, attacked us, and were beaten soundly.
Rules-Free VRMMO Life: Volume VI: Taking the Show on the Road Page 1