by Tamryn Tamer
“Time to find the others,” Jericho said to himself as he rushed off.
Jinx had managed to capture Owl’s werewolf familiar and the spectral wolves managed to capture his wraith. As for his mind flayer, it seemed he didn’t want to fight against Mirage and surrendered peacefully. Everything seemed to be under control and while several homes were damaged or destroyed, they could repair them with a signature from Ariel and a large donation of gold from the treasury. He still couldn’t help but think he was forgetting something.
“Shit!” Jericho yelped as he regrew wings and launched himself back into the sky. He looked around and caught a series of dark spears being deflected by a large golden shield. “Shit, shit, shit!”
Jericho teleported over just in time to see Theia slam the Fallen warrior into the ground and follow up by crushing his ribs with a dive bomb maneuver.
“Stop!” Jericho yelled as Theia raised her halberd intending to slice off his head. “You can’t kill him!”
“What?” Theia looked at Jericho then back at the Fallen. “But I have to. And you promised we’d kill Fallen!”
“Theia,” Jericho shook his head. “That’s Owl’s familiar. We don’t kill familiars if we can help it. If you spare him, I’ll get you two Fallen heads later. So, technically if you kill him right now, you’re letting two fallen live.”
“Do you mean it?” Theia glared at him. “Because you haven’t killed any Fallen since Niraxi.”
“I promise,” Jericho assured his silver-haired Seraph. “If you capture him instead of kill him, I’ll kill two Fallen for you.”
“Okay then,” Theia said while removing her foot from the Fallen soldier. “You’re lucky my master wants you alive.”
“Fool,” the Fallen launched a spear at Theia only to have it eaten by a wall of darkness. “What?”
“You’re the fool,” Sable said disinterestedly while creating several rings of darkness around the Fallen. “I don’t need to tell you what happens if one of these rings touches you, do I?”
“No,” the Fallen growled.
“Okay,” Jericho said. “So, we have his familiars as prisoners. That should prevent him from attempting a siege anytime soon. Maybe. Let’s get back to the manor.”
Chapter 5
Consolidation
While Cynthia’s excitement over adding an underground dungeon to the manor concerned Jericho it was necessary for the time being. Due to the nature of the prisoners, Sable was acting as the warden and the spectral wolves as her guards. The spectral wolves could prevent the wraith from phasing through anything while also detecting illusions from the mind flayer. Sable would ensure the Fallen understood that any attempt at using dark magic to escape would be fatal.
“Use the remaining gold in the treasury to start repairs on the city,” Jericho turned to Luna. “Luna, bring me my list of dungeons we’ve yet to explore. I’m going to select a few and I want you to skip the content, clear the vaults.”
“The best items are on the bosses,” Terra said.
“I know,” Jericho said. “But between the recent upgrades and these repairs, we’re broke. We need gold fast and Luna can teleport in and out. She did it for years on her own.”
“It’s not as fun as doing them right,” Luna sighed dejectedly. She’d gotten used to running with parties and despite being useless in a fight she enjoyed the comradery. “But I suppose.”
“My guild is already filling the city,” Raven offered up. “We can sell what they looted from the battlefield. Diana will be here soon as well. As expected, a third force annihilated what was remaining of Kar Mograth.”
“He really went all out,” Jericho said. “The question is whether holding his familiars hostage is enough to keep Owl from attacking again.”
“No,” Raven said coldly. “Owl views his familiars as friends and associates, no different than us. We saw how freely he attacked us. They may try to negotiate a ransom first but in the event we don’t pay expect him to abandon them.”
“Mirage,” Jericho looked at his buxom shapeshifter. She was still avoiding eye contact since Jericho revealed he knew some of the things she’d been up to. “We need information. Spies won’t work. Owl and Plague will be on high alert. What do you recommend?”
“Darling,” Mirage stared at the floor. “I don’t think…”
“How about you look at me,” Jericho said patiently. Mirage glanced up and down several times before finally managing to maintain eye contact. “Yes, I know what you did. I’ve known for a while. I don’t think of you any different. Well, you’re a little less honest than I first thought but we’ll chalk that up to years of assassin work and betrayal combined with some abandonment issues. But I don’t think any less of you, you’re mine and you’re not going anywhere. Understand?”
“Yes darling,” Mirage blushed. She was still off balance but slightly calmer. “Normal spies won’t work but thieves, kidnappers, and enhanced interrogation techniques will. We have four prisoners…”
“We’re not torturing the familiars,” Jericho answered sternly.
“Alright,” Mirage nodded. “In which case, we’ll want to hire hero class mercenaries who specialize in assassination. All of them should be beautiful women with mastery of pickpocketing, lockpicking, alchemy, and inscription.”
“We don’t need assassins,” Kaos said. “They’re not going to work against other players.”
“We won’t be using them as assassins,” Mirage said confidently. “They will seduce members of Owl’s inner circle and pretend to become their followers. No immortal would ever suspect their follower is not truly their follower.”
The entire room fell silent as Jericho, Raven, and Kaos simultaneously froze at the realization that every one of their followers could potentially be spies. When players acquired familiars there was a binding ceremony ensuring that they were truly connected. For followers, they simply joined the player and the player took their word for it. Nobody would ever suspect a follower was lying about joining them.
“You can do that?” Carrot was the first to break the silence. Jericho’s eyes immediately fixed on the leather-clad beast girl’s red collar. He definitely wanted to look into that later, “You can hire mercenaries to pretend to be followers?”
“You can hire mercenaries to do anything,” Mirage answered. “Just ask those idiots in Greenridge.”
“Shit,” Jericho said. “You’re right. I just cut off Cash and Redwing because they spent their entire month’s allowance on a trio of hero class bunny girl mercenaries and are using them as live in companions.”
“If we end up joining Sin I want to put in a transfer,” Kaos whispered to Raven.
“No,” Raven smacked the orc’s chest. “And we’re not joining Sin.”
“Well, we need somewhere to set up shop now that Rend is destroyed,” Kaos shrugged. “And I think you could use a break.”
“He makes a compelling point,” Terra smiled as the petite dark elf. She’d been mentioning to Jericho for a while that the alliance should be under one banner. It seemed she intended to make her view public. “And we’re not really all that organized and technically you wouldn’t really be answering to anybody since we all kind of just do what we want.”
“Let’s put a pin in that,” Raven said looking back at Mirage. “Hero class mercenaries can cost upwards of half a million a month. Additionally, if guild members suddenly get followers it’ll look suspicious.”
“We won’t be targeting all of them,” Mirage answered. “Just get me ten million gold and I’ll take care of the rest.”
“Ten million,” Jericho’s body tensed. “Can’t we do it for less?”
“No darling,” Mirage answered. “There were several guilds at that battle and we’ll need multiple for each guild to utilize handoffs and drops to avoid detection. Unless you want to meet the spies in person and blow their cover.”
“I see what you mean,” Jericho sighed and looked at Jinx. “Jinx, do you think we can…”
“No!” Jinx slammed her fist on the table. “It’s my treasure! Thief! Burglar!”
“I thought as much,” Jericho did a mental audit of how much it’d cost to repair the city, maintain his household, and get the other things up and running and he wasn’t getting close to where he needed to be. “Raven, any ideas?”
“The fastest way to make consistent gold is crafting but Owl will be taking measures to damage my supply lines by harassing my material farmers,” Raven said. “If we could protect the supply lines or create new ones it’d be a start.”
“I might have a solution for that,” Talia smiled as she pulled Theia’s arm. “The Seraphim are known for being workhorses and their home is surrounded by resource-rich mountains.”
“We’re not going to send Theia off to the mines,” Jericho laughed. “And besides, it’d take weeks to transport materials between here and Whitespire.”
“No,” Talia pulled out a scroll. “It would take minutes.”
“Theia,” Jericho turned to his beautiful Seraph familiar. “Would the Seraphim be open to selling off their raw materials?”
“They would be open to trade,” Theia answered. “Whitespire has always suffered from a shortage of artisans. If we were to offer them completed goods in exchange for the raw materials, they may be open to an agreement. Assuming said agreement comes with a declaration of war against the Fallen meaning no member of this guild will ever be permitted a Fallen familiar.”
“So, mercantilism. I can work with that.” Raven smiled. “How much in resources are we talking about and what kind?”
“Metals, woods, fabrics, herbs,” Theia answered. “But most of our reserve is made up of orichalcum because so few artisans can work with it and it’s so abundant.”
“When you say most of your reserve,” Raven said trying not to get too excited. “Are we talking like one warehouse or five warehouses?”
“Raven, we can’t justify building warehouses to store orichalcum,” Theia laughed as Raven’s excitement faded away. “We’d have warehouses everywhere! I mean, where would we build our homes? That’s why we store all of our orichalcum in a giant hole in the ground. It’s about two miles deep but it’s only about halfway full. Whenever we need some we just fly down and get it.”
“A mile deep?” Raven fidgeted in her. “Yes, we can solve our gold problems if we can come to a trade agreement with the Seraphim.” Raven had a look similar to that of a dog staring at a plate of sausage. “Okay, how do we get to Whitespire?”
“Well,” Talia said. “Jericho will need to teleport there and then open the portal back to here. From there, I can pass through and make as many portal scrolls as I need. I will need quite a few rare resources to craft the portals though.”
“Get me a list of the resources and you’ll have them,” Raven said. She turned to Jericho, “The gold will be handled.”
“Hold it,” Terra glared at the salivating dark elf. “I think we need to unpin the guild situation.”
“Really?” Jericho laughed. He knew Terra crafted power but he was surprised by how hard she was pushing for it. “We can do that later.”
“Yes Terra,” Raven gritted her teeth. “We can do that later.”
“Terra’s correct,” Mirage agreed shocking everybody. “Any profit earned from this endeavor will be Endgame’s and we’ll get whatever she agrees to give us. If we absorb Endgame, the profit earned will be Sin’s and she’ll get whatever we agree to give her. Given the amount of gold we’re discussing we should handle this now.”
“You better be talking about handling those assholes,” Diana said as she barged into the war room covered in blood. “Those mother fuckers burnt Kar Mograth to the ground. There’s nothing left! Not even the main keep is intact. And they did it all while I was out raiding. Mother fuckers!”
“We’re discussing absorbing Endgame into Sin,” Terra said. “Why don’t you have a seat.”
“I’m not in the mood to sit,” Diana snapped angrily at Terra. “I’m in the mood to get revenge. Grim has four different cities they operate out of. Get your little fairy ready because she’s going to declare war on all of them and we’re going to burn them to the fucking ground.”
“My priority is protecting Dayrose,” Ariel chimed in. “I will not leave unless I’m positive it’s completely safe.”
“Goddammit!” Diana pulled out a chair and sat down. She placed her arms on the table and buried her face in them. “We have to do something. Everybody is counting on me to do something. We can’t let them get away with this.”
“We won’t,” Jericho stroked the red-scaled woman’s smooth head. “We’re going to get them back but first we need to make sure Dayrose is protected. And eventually, we may even be able to rebuild Kar Mograth. But first we need to have a plan on how to move forward.”
“Raven,” Terra stared at the pensive dark elf. “What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking I like being in charge,” Raven answered. “The idea of working for Jericho to make him richer and increase his harem size doesn’t appeal to me.”
“Who said anything about working for me?” Jericho laughed. “If you want to get technical, we’re all working for Ariel.”
“What?” The entire group turned to look at the majestic fairy. “I’m not in charge!”
“Guh,” Cynthia placed her head in her hands. “Ariella, you are the queen of Dayrose. You are the definition of in charge.”
“What?” Jinx roared. “She’s in charge? That’s ridiculous! I’m the strongest one here and I was Jericho’s first familiar! I should be in charge! Insects! Bugs!”
“Stop playing dumb. We all know you’re in charge,” Raven stared at Jericho unconvinced. “Your familiar might be the queen but you’re her master. It’s nothing against you Jericho, you know I like you. I just don’t like the idea of working for anybody but me.”
“So, there’s no world in which you’d join?” Jericho asked.
“Is there a world where you’d join Endgame instead?” Raven smiled.
“Fair,” Jericho laughed. “But let’s be honest. If I don’t do what you want, you’d kick me out of the guild and put a bounty on me. Do you really think there’s anything you could do to make me give you the boot?”
“We have giant arachnids living in our house for fuck's sake,” Terra laughed. “Do you really think he’ll complain if you do something crazy?”
“Are you attacking my babies,” the previously silent Mai said with an almost undetectable hint of animosity. She placed her hand on the hilt of her sword, “Choose your words wisely.”
“I have no problem with your babies,” Terra said. Which was surprisingly the truth since she benefitted from their tailoring abilities as much as all the other women. “I’m just making a point Mai.”
“They make a good point,” Kaos said. “And I’ve always liked Jericho. I would have left Endgame to join him ages ago if it weren’t for you.”
“I’m flattered that I inspire so much loyalty,” Raven rolled her eyes.
“Tiamat will join,” Diana interrupted with her head still buried in her arms. “If the offer is open. I’m sick of running a guild. I’m sick of the politics and the meetings. I’m sick of everybody complaining all of the time. I just want to go back to running dungeons. I hate being the leader. I just want to beat bosses and find cool things.”
“Shouldn’t you discuss that with your officers first?” Jericho asked the depressed Ela. “I mean, you’ve pointed out on many occasions they don’t like me.”
“Their complaints about you are regarding the fact that you use me and leverage your relationship to get Tiamat to do your dirty work,” Diana said assuredly. “If they were part of Sin then they can’t really complain about that. Besides, most of them only know you by your reputation. It’s not like you’ve ever made an effort to socialize with them.”
“Why don’t you take a moment to think about it?” Terra said. “You’re probably just frustrated…”
>
“No. I’m sure. In fact, just saying it out loud feels right. It feels like a huge weight has been lifted. Like when you quit a shitty job, you know?” Diana said confidently. “I’m going to let everybody know what’s going to happen. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure we have a smooth transfer. By the way, all of our resources were destroyed in the siege so don’t expect much right away.”
“Of course they were,” Jericho laughed. “I mean, if you’re sure about this Diana I’m fine with it. Terra?”
“I’m fine with it,” Terra looked back at Raven. “Why can’t you be that easy?”
“Because I like freedom,” Raven smiled. “I’m in no hurry to give mine up.”
“I’m going to go with Diana,” Mirage placed her hand on the Ela’s shoulder. “There are certain members of your guild which won’t be coming with you I’m afraid.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Diana asked suspiciously.
“You have spies dear,” Mirage said while stroking Diana’s red scaly arm. “I’ll identify them for you.”
“How do you know I have spies?” Diana looked at Jericho accusingly. “Do you have spies in my guild?”
“Not that I know of,” Jericho looked at Mirage. “Do we have spies in Tiamat?”
“No,” Mirage answered. “But Raven, Sapphire, and no doubt Plague all have spies in her guild. I will identify them and they will not be coming with.”
“My spies should be able to come,” Raven insisted.
“Naturally,” Mirage said. “But not in an official capacity. They’ll be removed with everybody else and resume their work in another guild. But it’s important the other spies see them removed.”
“You’re a little bit scary,” Raven grinned. “I’ll be sure to notify them.”
“You have spies in my guild?” Diana said bubbling with anger. “I thought we were friends! See! This is why I want no part in leading a guild! You’re all scummy and dishonest! Why can’t everybody just do dungeons and have fun! But no! It’s all power and control and messing up everybody else’s good time!”