Chapter 121

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Chapter 121

Chapter 121

Blood and viscera tore through Kathrine’s abdomen and white sparks of high-speed shrapnel blasted towards Allie’s face with a high-pitched screeching sound that dulled the senses. Allie’s eyes went wide, Kathrine let out a horrified scream, the heavily armed guards jolted forward with shouts of alarm, and more of the flaring metals continued to blast out of the exploding thrall to head towards the three royals.

*THUMP*

*THUMP*

*THUMP*

The world turned into shades of gray, black, and red; slowing momentarily and then speeding back up within the course of a few seconds.

The metals whipped forward and shredded Allie’s face, neck, and brain - sending gray matter peeling out the back of her skull and letting her body slump to the floor. Riven saw himself scream out and rush towards her only to get blasted himself, being ripped apart a thousand times over by a swarm of small burning metals that eviscerated his body and tore the head cleanly off Kathrine’s riddled body.

They were all so close to the thrall that’d ruptured and there’d been so little time to react... it was inevitable. The guards hadn’t been able to take more than two steps forward even despite super-human speed before all three of the vampiric nobility were utterly torn apart in a storm of white fire, glowing metal and body parts that refused to heal. The nearest guard to them stumbled to a stuttering stop, gawking and dropping his halberd in utter dismay at witnessing the carnage before them. Athela screamed, Azmoth looked on in shock, and Fay put her hands up over her mouth in horror right before all three demons were ripped from this plane of existence and vanished into portals leading into the nether realms.

And thus, Riven watched himself die over and over again - the image replaying in front of him.

Riven’s eyes dilated and the world around him abruptly calmed on the fifth replay, slowing down just when three shimmering fragments of metal were within an inch of Allie’s face. The land around them was still tinged in shades of black, red, and gray, and the familiar out-of-body experience halted space all around him as cold, resonating energy rippled across his skin.

His ethereal body, a replica of his own but without physical representation stood staring at the scene before them - blinking red eyes and looking down at a hand created from gray wisps of mist.

[Malignant Prophecy has activated.

Desired Action: High Tier Manipulation. Current Willpower stat: -380. Sufficient Willpower to perform desired action. Performing this act will put your malignant prophecy on cooldown for significant amounts of time. Do you wish to proceed?]

*THUMP*

*THUMP*

“Yes.”

[Desired action: Save yourself, Allie, and Kathrine from impending death. Malignant Prophecy’s two options are as follows:

Option 1: Create an exact replica of miniature rifts in space to match incoming projectiles by. At least 137 individual miniature rifts must be properly timed and created to divert all vital strikes. Up to 320 individual miniature rifts can be created at short distances and at enough of a narrow space-time before your mana runs out. Chance for success: High.Option 2: You must force Core of Original Sin - Gluttony, to awaken early. This will empower you enough to survive and devour incoming projectiles, but it will greatly damage your soul’s Blood Sub-pillar to the point of non-use. Chance for success: High.]

[Desired action has been selected: Option 1: Create an exact replica of miniature rifts in space to match incoming projectiles by. At least 137 individual miniature rifts must be properly timed and created to divert all vital strikes. Up to 320 individual miniature rifts can be created at short distances and at enough of a narrow space-time before your mana runs out. Chance for success: High.]

Immediately time unfroze and the colors of the world went back to more normal hues.

Blood and viscera tore through Kathrine’s abdomen and white sparks of high-speed shrapnel made from silver blasted towards Allie’s face with a high-pitched screeching sound that dulled the senses. Allie’s eyes went wide, Kathrine let out a horrified scream, the heavily armed guards jolted forward with shouts of alarm, and more of the flaring metals continued to blast out of the exploding thrall to head towards the three royals.

A half-second later and flaming white-hot shrapnel was within a centimeter of Allie’s head, and less than a millisecond after that a small black rift opened up in between her and the incoming missile that would mark her death.

“Oh come now.” Blusoth teased, nudging past Jalel to step away with a paused, backwards glance. “I wonder what the queen would think if she noticed you failed to mention the shard held within Riven’s soul. Perhaps, if you pamper me enough with bribes, the money may make me forget that little bit of... oversight. However, should you fail to do so, it may very well be that I accidentally let it slip. Who knows. Anyways, have a jolly time with the show! I’ll see you around, cousin!”

Blusoth sneered and continued his step, walking away and across the platform to where some of his concubines awaited his return, and Jalel’s heartbeat raced as he silently pondered on what to do. Did he kill Blusoth to try and silence him? If so, how would he do it? Could he even do it if he wanted to? And if not, how much money was Blusoth going to milk out of him before Jalel was a broken beggar of a man?

And what was even worse, was that Blusoth and possibly other nobles of the court now had knowledge of Riven’s shard. Of his building core of Gluttony. How had they found out!? That piece of Gluttony was his, NOT Blusoth’s! Jalel had been the one to find it, and he’d be the one to claim it! Jalel’s forehead popped with a vein as internal rage boiled up to the surface, and he silently swore to himself as he concocted a new plan to get him out of this mess.

***

Two days had passed and the meeting with the rat man Snagger was coming up very soon. Gurth’Rok and the greenskins had been placed as overseers of the enslaved adult elves and areas of land for farming had been designated in the fields adjacent to the Elysium Altar, with the elves being particularly good at growing crops due to their affinities and plant-based magic. The elf children had been sent to the tower at the center of Brightsville where they were enrolled in re-education programs under the thumb of their new undead teachers. Their entire force had been fed easily enough by buying various foodstuffs from the altar’s central spire - the general system store, or from Negrada. They'd used half of Riven’s accumulated money, but this also allowed them to stock up on enough food to last their entire small nation - slaves included - for at least half a year.

The Yellow Skull Tribe as well as the adult elves had been placed under direct supervision by Riven while Allie maintained control of the undead part of their faction. Allie was assimilating smaller groups of humans either by force or by coercion in the northern reaches of the city, and the Thane Necropolis now controlled the entire eastern, north-eastern, southern, and central grounds of the city with only northwestern and western reaches being controlled by other, smaller groups. The western reach was now controlled by the convicts in the prison, who’d enslaved most other small groups in the area and were living like kings while abusing their lessers - and the northwest part of the city was still being battled over by numerous gangs in the suburbs that refused to bow to anyone or anything. They were high on the newfound power their classes gave them, obsessed with the new inhuman powers the system brought, and were determined to remain free of others despite the Allie's announcement declaring Brightsville as under the control of the Thane Necropolis in the cortex forums.

Meanwhile meetings with The Blood Moon Requiem had indefinitely been put on hold, and Riven was half tempted to banish them from the face of their planet despite pleas and apologies offered by Kathrine or her subordinates. He didn’t necessarily blame Kathrine and he also wanted to know more about his parents, which were both reasons why he hadn’t outright dismissed their trading commune from the altar, but nevertheless he and Allie had almost been killed that night.

And his malignancy points, of which he still didn’t now the true value of detriment of, had built because of it. Whatever it was, his body had ached and occasionally spasmed for more than a day after doing what he’d done to avoid death. Allie had theorized this was in large part because of how he’d split his ‘Riftwalk’ spell into numerous and very small versions of itself, which had likely damaged his mana channels due to the overdrive of power he’d experienced, but he wasn’t entirely convinced that was the case.

But now he was finally recovered, and standing outside the chapel next to Jose’s tombstone in the late hours of dusk, Riven was about to conjure his guild hall.

[Guild Hall: Stone Manor

*Plant this at a chosen location to create your pre-made guild hall. This is a packaged, one time use item*

Homeward Teleportation: Very long channel time15 attendant spots available, 600 Elysium Coins per month per active attendant are taxed by the system administrator3 mile exploration radius for attendants before forced retrieval back to guild hallCore Sturdiness: ModerateDefensive wards: NoneOther features: Library, kitchen, dungeon, cellar, armory]

His demons were obviously there. Azmoth was stoically standing by, playing around with his large magma-imbued hammer but being very careful not to damage anything in the area under strict orders from Riven. Fay was somehow telepathically talking to her brother in the outer realms, letting him know that they’d contact him soon for a guild hall contract. Dr. Brass, Gurth’Rok, and Genua were all present. Dr. Brass was excitedly shifting back and forth, knowing full well that his impending turn into a vampire was going to be done tonight, and was animatedly talking to Athela about it on the sidelines. Genua wore a heavy iron collar and shackles, was chained to a nearby tree, and was glaring up at the others with ill-hidden rage. Gurth’Rok was merely here to talk to Riven about how things were going on integrating the greenskins into the city, but had told Riven he’d wait until the manor was summoned and explored before going into any details as they weren’t urgent.

“Hurry it up!” Athela called from the back. “Dr. Brass is talking my ear off! It’s torturous!”

Riven chuckled and looked over his shoulder to where the old man quickly scowled Athela’s way. “Alright! Alright, hold on.”

The rod he held in his hands was quite similar in design but different in color to the altar rod he’d used to create the enormous structure not far off from their current location. Only a few miles away through the silver, death-attuned fields to the south, over the hundreds of tents and small wooden houses being built by the orcs and goblins, over the pens and farmland occupied by the enslaved woodland elves, the unholy altar and its halo of green flames was easily seen in the distance. The rod was blue and gray, with a simple power stone in the pommel and a sharp pointed end to jab the thing into the ground.

Which he promptly did, and a notification screen appeared soon thereafter.

[Do you wish to activate the item ‘Guild Hall: Stone Manor’? Doing so will lay claim to the guild hall that forms: allowing you to access the guild hall functions, enlist attendants through contract, and assign it to a guild. This guild hall will take up approximately 7000 square feet of land, and is approximately 60 feet tall at its highest point.]

Pictures and visions of the guild hall displayed next. It was a rather luxurious-looking stone mansion, 3 stories high, and was very similar to Victorian-style architecture with a rectangular build. It had a wide tower climbing up over the front entrance, stone gargoyles holding up the balconies, and a wide metal gate around the front courtyard with gardens in the back. Inside, red carpets lined hallways with empty picture frames on the walls. There was an indoor pool with a skylight, a large dining room and kitchen, dozens of empty rooms for living in or storage areas, a library at the top of the central tower and a large meeting area for social gatherings in the front that wasn’t necessarily a ball-room but had the same feel.

Visualizing where he wanted the guild hall in his mind. He made sure that the willow tree over Jose’s grave - now changed into an unholy-oriented tree species that stood up straighter with slightly glowing neon-teal leaves - was placed in the center of the garden out back, and incorporated the chapel’s garden into it while building the manor adjacent to the old chapel so that they’d be able to touch up the ruined building and make it an extension of their guild hall later on.

[Activating ‘Guild Hall: Stone Manor’. Please hold.]