by A. J. Markam
A tentacle reared up over the edge of the pit and flailed towards my face –
And then the creatures in the pit tore Saykir apart.
His scream filled the cathedral. A tornado of black light roared up from his dismembered body, then collapsed back down into the stygian muck.
The symbiote around my neck evaporated into mist –
But the tentacle from the pit was about to get me.
“NO!” Alaria, Stig, and Dorp screamed as they yanked me backwards and fell on the ice behind me.
The tentacle slapped down where my head had been just a second before.
And then – no longer supported by the magic of the dark master they had just slain – the shadows retreated. The Old Gods were sucked to the bottom of the pit like a flushing toilet full of India ink, and winked out of existence in a cloud of smoke.
It was over.
Silence hung in the room for a split second –
And then a humongous roar went up from everyone in the room.
“YAAAAAAAAAAAAY!” a thousand pirates and frost elves screamed, hugging each other, jumping up and down.
‘20,000 XP’ floated up through the air, and a shaft of golden light enveloped me.
‘Level 14’ appeared, but I ignored it. Instead, I rolled over onto my back and looked at my three demons.
I smiled at them, my eyes misting up. “Thank y– ”
Alaria didn’t give me a chance to finish. She just launched herself on top of me and kissed me passionately, her body pressed hard against mine.
I wrapped my arms around her and kissed her back.
“Ugh,” Stig grunted.
Dorp didn’t mind. In fact, he couldn’t contain his glee. “Master is now the Slayer of Saykir, the Seducer of Frost Elves, the Liberator of Pirates, and the Emancipator of Abaddon!”
Stig looked at him in disdain.
“Fanboy,” he sniffed.
20
The entire city erupted in celebration.
The frost elves all put their clothes back on for it, but, oh well. You take what you can get.
They threw a feast for us in the main hall of what used to be Saykir’s castle, and me, Alaria, Stig, Dorp, and the pirates were the guests of honor. We sat at a gigantic table filled with platters of delicacies and a sweet blue wine that Stig couldn’t get enough of.
Alaria sat on my lap, caressing my hair and feeding me grapes between kisses. “We should sneak back to the ship and have a little celebration of our own with Tarka,” she whispered in my ear.
“Maybe later,” I said. For the time being, I’d had enough of kinky shenanigans.
Well… except maybe voyeurism. Out in the rest of the hall, the frost elves feasted drunkenly at smaller tables, frequently stopping to make out and grope each other. It was a pretty nice sight.
It struck me how Saykir had a paradise here (at least for straight guys and lesbians), then let it all slip through his fingers because of his own insecurities.
There was an object lesson in there somewhere.
…to be examined another day.
“Degenerates,” Krug muttered as he watched all the first- and second-base action going on between the female elves.
Which was an unusual reaction for a pirate. I’d have expected it more out of a Southern Baptist preacher.
But if what Alaria had said about the other demons not having genitals was true, then I guess watching hot chicks make out probably doesn’t do much for you.
Krug turned away from the bacchanalia and looked at me. “You still owe me a ship.”
“You’ll get it,” I told him, though I had no idea how. “Is it fine if we repair the Revenge?”
“Yes, though good luck with getting it airborne,” he growled.
A couple of seats to my left, Dorp was talking nonstop to every elven server unfortunate enough to pass by. “My master is the most famous warlock in the Twenty Kingdoms, and after today his legend will only increase! Listen to everything he’s done – ”
All the servers ran off as fast as they could.
“Fanboy,” Stig grumbled, then started on another bottle of wine.
“Dude, you’re burning up all your previous goodwill,” I said to Dorp in as nice a voice as possible. After all, he had been indispensable to our victory.
“I think I might have something that could help,” a familiar voice said.
We all turned around to see the High Priestess standing behind our row of chairs.
“Eluun!” I said happily.
“Hiiii, Eluun,” Alaria said. She turned and placed her elbows on the armrests of my chair, and folded her hands flirtatiously under her chin.
Hm…
The priestess blushed a deeper blue. “Hello, Alaria.”
Hmmm…
“What do you have that could help?” I asked.
She produced something from the long, open sleeve of her ceremonial robe.
A black leather ball-gag, like the kind they use in BDSM.
Alaria started laughing.
“With your permission?” Eluun asked.
“Uh… I guess?” I said, not quite sure what she was planning to do with it.
She turned to Dorp. “Do you know what this is?”
“No…” he said warily.
“This is the Sacred Mouthpiece of Kwiaytus. It allows the wearer to communicate telepathically will all frost elves – nay, all elves – throughout the entire realm, if only he is quiet and concentrates enough to transmit his message to others.”
“Ohhhhhhh,” Dorp said, now totally enthralled. He looked at her with hope in his eyes. “C-could I…?”
“Of course – it is a gift for you,” Eluun said, bowing slightly. “In light of the extraordinary role you played in the downfall of Saykir, Tyrant of the Northern Wastes. I hope you might use it to sing of your master’s praises to all who would hear. May I?”
“Please,” he said, and sat calmly in his seat as she placed the ball gag in his mouth, then latched the leather straps and buckles behind his head.
“Mmt moo mm moo?” he asked her, his thin lips fitting only half-way over the gag.
“Just close your eyes and think deeply… calmly… of the message you want to impart to all elves here and beyond. If you want, you could try sending a message about your master to the elves in this hall.”
“M-km,” Dorp nodded eagerly, then closed his eyes.
Eluun immediately sent up a flare of light from her hand that attracted the attention of every frost elf in the place.
Then Eluun gestured with her hands for everyone to stand and clap.
The entire hall jumped to their feet and erupted into applause and thunderous cries.
Dorp’s eyes flew open in ecstatic surprise. He looked back at Eluun a split second after she stopped hopping up and down. “Mt mrks!”
“Yes, it does,” she said encouragingly. “You should try broadcasting beyond the Northern Wastes to the other continents – although you should know, it takes a great deal of concentration and silence to reach that far.”
“Mkay!” he mmrphed, then looked at me happily. “Mtr, M mna mm mrm – ”
“Go get ‘em, Dorp,” I said, and flashed him a thumbs-up.
He happily settled back in his chair, closed his eyes, and assumed a position of deep meditation.
Thank you, I mouthed silently to Eluun.
You’re welcome, she mouthed back, then gestured with one hand. “Could I… speak with you?”
“Sure – can Alaria come, too?”
Eluun blushed again, then nodded. “Yes, of course.”
We both got up and followed Eluun to the back of the hall, away from the din.
“I’m sorry about deceiving your demon that way – ”
“DON’T be,” Alaria said. “THANK you.”
Eluun smiled. “The servers were avoiding him, and I noticed your pirates starting to get more and more on edge.”
I made a face. “Yeah… that tends to happen when you�
�re around Dorp for any substantial period of time.”
I felt a little bad about participating in the lie, too, but how do you deal with somebody who just won’t shut up, no matter how many times you ask/beg/threaten them? I figured it was a relatively harmless white lie that made everybody happy.
“When he finds out that it doesn’t really work,” Eluun said, “just tell him that the magic wore off.”
“Will do,” I said. “So – what’s up?”
Eluun’s face clouded over, and she stared at the floor. “I wanted to apologize to you both.”
“For what?”
A look of anguish passed over her features. “I… I am greatly ashamed that I stood by and let Saykir do such horrible things to you. I was complicit in his evil.”
“Hey,” I said, and put my hand on her arm. “It’s okay. You were afraid. And realistically, if you had stood up to him before, you probably would have died. The important thing is you fought with us when you did. If you hadn’t taken Varisa out, we all would have been goners. So thank you.”
Eluun smiled sadly, tears brimming in her eyes. “You are far too kind, but I – ”
Alaria stepped forward and hugged Eluun, pressing her body tightly against the elf’s. “You were there for us when we needed you. That’s all that counts.”
The High Priestess got a look of surprise on her face. Then she closed her eyes with a blissful smile and hugged Alaria back.
Hmmmmm…
When Alaria finally released her, Eluun smiled gratefully. “If there is anything I can do to repay you, just name it.”
“Well… Krug’s ship is basically toast,” I said.
“…bread?” Eluun asked, confused.
“Uh – destroyed, I mean. Is there any way you can repair it?”
“We are not shipwrights, but if he will guide us in what he needs, then yes, I believe it can be done,” she said. “I shall dedicate every elf in the kingdom to repairing it. We will even barter with the goblin king if need be to return you to the air.”
“Awesome,” I said, then frowned a little. “Do you really think the goblin king will go along with it?”
“Now that Saykir is dead… and if we promise to give him back the land that Saykir took… I think he will be most amenable to a treaty.”
Not bad. Not bad at all.
Eluun looked off to the side, then bowed slightly to us again.
“If you will excuse me, I must tend to something.” She smiled. “Thank you for your forgiveness.”
“There’s nothing to forgive, but you’re welcome,” I said.
Alaria and I both watched the High Priestess walk off, and my succubus made a guttural little unh sound in her throat. “Goddess, she’s hot, isn’t she?”
I looked at her in surprise. “You think she’s hot?”
“Don’t you? Look at that ass.” Alaria bit her lower lip as she stared after her. “I’d like to get a piece of that.”
“You know, she has a crush on you,” I said.
Alaria looked at me in surprise. “Really. She told you that?”
“Yup, in the Temple. She liked you back when you used to live here – and she still does.”
Alaria stared at the High Priestess as she talked to a small group of frost elves. “Huh…”
Suddenly a window appeared in my field of vision.
Message from Administrator:
Mandatory department-wide meeting in 15 minutes.
RSVP: Yes?
“Oh shit,” I growled.
“What?”
“I have to go do something,” I said, annoyed.
“Can I come with you?” she purred, tapping my nose flirtatiously.
“Unfortunately I have to do this alone.”
A look of wariness crossed her face. “Is everything alright?”
“Yeah, it’s fine. It’s just something I have to take care of.”
“You’re… coming back, aren’t you?”
I looked at her in surprise. “What? Of course I am!”
“Oh,” she said, and laughed in relief. “Alright.”
“You’re the one I have to worry about sneaking off,” I teased.
She smiled, then put her arms around my neck and got right up next to me. “Only after we have sex.”
“So I’m safe until we do that, huh?”
“Yes,” she whispered, and kissed me.
We made out for a while – until the window chimed again.
“Damn it,” I said, breaking off our kiss to hit Yes. “Wait for me, alright?”
“Of course,” she said as she turned to walk off. “Don’t be too long.”
I couldn’t resist – her ass just looked too inviting.
So I spanked her.
Whap!
“Oh!” she exclaimed in delight. “Well, well – somebody’s up to some new tricks.”
“We’ll have to try a few of them out when I get back. Just don’t sleep with too many frost elves in the meantime.”
She laughed and said mockingly, “I thought we were going to be monogamous.”
I grinned. “We’ll talk about that too. When I get back.”
She raised one eyebrow like Really?
“I’m looking forward to it,” she drawled, then turned and went back to the celebration.
I went around a corner and selected ‘Log Out’ from the menu, and the castle faded to black.
21
Damn I hate meetings.
My manager John Perkins stood in a big conference room packed full of a hundred people and gave an update on the immersion rig’s progress. Everybody munched on donuts and sipped coffee as they listened.
John even name-checked me during his speech.
“Our newest QC tech, Ian Hertzfelder, has really shone in this area. He spent his first week at Westek immersed in the game, and we continue to get great data from everything he does.”
He skipped the whole ‘we screwed up and he couldn’t log out’ aspect, but I can understand him not wanting to dwell on that part.
“Not to mention he’s been invaluable in QCing the adult portion of the 7.0 update,” John continued. “So let’s all give a big hand to Ian.”
I blushed about the ‘adult’ comment, wondering what everybody thought.
Most of the guys just looked super jealous as they clapped.
Bro-Dude from Sales gave me a HUGE thumbs-up and grinned like YEAAAAAH!
I just smiled tightly and nodded, and then John continued with his presentation.
I’d found out after they took me out of the rig that I was never meant to actually be testing the sex portion of the game, which was slated for release next year. It only happened because the malfunction that kept me in a coma for a week had somehow bled over into the adult testing portion of the servers.
So thank GOD for that malfunction.
When they found out what had happened, they talked about reversing everything so I couldn’t have sex anymore. Of course, I put my foot down and said, NO, I’m testing the adult portion of the game, too. Period. They owed me for putting me in a coma for a week, so they gave in.
Funny how accidentally getting put in comas gives you a ton of leverage.
The rest of the meeting was boring as hell, but something interesting happened afterwards.
A geeky guy walked over to me from a group of even geekier-looking guys picking over the donut table. He looked like an Indian version of the actor Jay Baruchel – tall, skinny, black unruly hair, thick plastic-rimmed glasses. He was dressed in khakis and a light blue oxford with a t-shirt beneath it.
“Hey… you’re Ian, right? The Level 14 Warlock who just beat Saykir?” he asked.
“Uh, yeah, I am,” I said, surprised he knew those details.
“Awesome. I wrote that one,” the guy said, and put out his hand. “I’m Satish.”
I shook his hand. “Holy shit – really.”
“Yeah. I gotta say, you beat him very… creatively.”
“That wasn’t the
way it was supposed to go down?”
“Phrasing,” one of the donut table nerds shouted, and the whole group snickered. Satish just rolled his eyes.
“Well, whatever way it happens is how it happens. But no, I kind of envisioned the scenario as you winning over Eluun and the rest of the frost elves to help you beat Saykir. I mean, you did that in the end anyway, but that wasn’t really the decisive factor in your victory. Cool psychological workaround.”
“Uh… thanks.”
I was really hoping this guy hadn’t seen any footage of me parading around with my wang out. I know it was Illusion Me – and if anybody had to see me naked, I’d prefer it be the supersized porn-star version – but still.
Satish shouldn’t have been able to see anything at all, since one of my conditions for continuing in the job was no video feeds. But I wanted to be sure.
“You weren’t… watching it, were you?”
He laughed. “No. I just get the event logs. Text and code, that’s all.”
Phew. Thank God.
“By the way,” I said, “all that stuff you wrote about Goddess Jaiya was awesome. How’d you come up with that?”
“Oh, all that’s real,” Satish said nonchalantly.
I stared at him. “Say what?”
“Well, obviously she’s not a goddess, but there’s a real-life Jaiya. She’s a sex therapist who came up with the whole Energetic, Sensual, Sexual, and Kinky classifications. I figured since it was an adult part of the game that I’d put in something useful. You know, something somebody could use on a date in the real world.”
“As if you ever WENT on dates in the real world,” the wisecracking geek called out.
“SHUT UP!” Satish yelled back, then smiled apologetically at me. “Freakin’ nerds.”
“Well, I thought it was awesome. One of the best parts of the adventure.”
“Thanks, I appreciate that.”
“Um… one piece of advice?”
“Yeah?”
“Maybe tone down the torture.”
“…torture?”
I raised my eyebrows. “From Saykir? That Venom symbiote thing?”
“The Lash of Ung’aroth, right – what happened?”
“I basically got waterboarded with it for a couple of hours.”