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Story Codes: Fantasy, Magic, Violence

For a list of all The Rogue’s Harem, other World of Erasthay stories, maps, and glossaryclick here

Comments are very welcome. I would like all criticism, positive and negative, so long as it’s
constructive, and feedback is very appreciated.

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Click here for Chapter 22.

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Note: Thanks to WRC 264 for beta reading this!

Sven Falk

The vault opened on creaking hinges. Both Theophil and Carsina stared in awe at the dark room. My own stomach swelled in knots. This was it. It wouldn’t be long before we had the location of the Altar of Souls and…

I glanced at Kora. She held the ruby that held Vebrin’s foul soul. A look of such hope crossed my sister’s face. She gazed upon salvation, freedom from the burden about her neck. She didn’t know what the cost would be.

Lights flickered to life inside. Crystals set into the ceiling shone a radiance on him. Ava, with a hesitant step, entered the vault. I followed her, Zanyia heeling me, Ealaín right behind us. I frowned as I entered, looking around the room at…

Suits of armor. Exotic armor. Armor made out of strange designs. Plate armor that looked made of rubies and sapphires, the way that the vault door looked made of diamond-impregnated steel. Another had a gleam of yellow, like the helidors imbued in its steel had the sun’s glow trapped in them. There was a harness of leather straps and another suit of armor made of black leather that…

I shook my head, the black of the leather so dark it almost swallowed the light, becoming almost a negative space that almost arrested my gaze. I could just stare at it.

Carsina gasped nearby while the rest entered the room. Greta let out a squeak and Nathalie groaned. Ealaín’s armor clinked as she drifted towards the glowing suit, admiring it with her gaze. I wanted to keep looking at the black leather but… but…

“Where’s the map?” I asked.

“Not a map, the key,” growled Theophil. Then he let out a harrumphing grump. “You don’t need me for this.”

I caught his gaze, his muscular arms folded before him. “What?”

“Carsina can explain it.” A smile crossed his lips. “Unless you want me to enjoy your women.”

I frowned at that, but he strode out of the vault. Whatever excitement he felt was gone. Vanished.

“What did that mean?” Aingeal asked.

“These are Powered Armor,” Carsina said in awe. “They’re forged by Krab himself. These are what he created for the gods to wear and they’re… here. I’ve dreamed of seeing them before. It is the highest goal of the Esoteric Crafts, a skill no mortal has ever mastered.”

“Why would Theophil think I’d want him to enjoy my women?” I asked, trying not to stare at the black armor.

“Because it requires the Blessing of Surrender to bond the armor with the wearer,” Carsina said. “I’d have to have sex with any who would don them. Well, any priest or priestess would. So if you want him enjoying your women. Or you.”

I gave her a hard look.

“These are so… interesting, Master,” Zanyia said. She crouched before the harness, her ears twitching with such excitement.

“They are, Master,” Nathalie said. My fourteen-year-old sex slave stood before the ruby suit of armor, her hand reaching out to touch the deep-crimson surface. She traced the stylized pattern of flames worked into the armor.

“Yes,” I said, moving closer to the leather armor. It did swallow the light. It was darker than everything around it. I stood before it, looking at the dimensions of it, my critical eye studying it. I hadn’t worn leather armor since training in the Fencing College of Az, but… “It’s a good thing you’re sexy, Carsina.”

“I am?” she said, moving up alongside me. She pushed up her glasses on her nose. “And why is that?”

My dick swelling hard, I said, “Because I need—”

“This is it!” Ava said, standing over a hammer made of diamond. Scintillating light reflected off of it. “This is what I need.”

She grabbed it.

The brilliance inside the hammer flared to life. I flinched before it as the air hummed and vibrated. I felt something shift around us, like the foundations of reality had changed ever so slightly for me. Ava groaned from the light as it flooded through the room.

It grew brighter and brighter. I raised my arm to ward my eyes. The light surged with such intensity. It shone through my skin, my bones dark lines around cherry-red flesh. I flinched away, closing my eyes. But it shone through my skull. It radiated through my mind.

“This is it!” Ava cried out as the room quaked.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Prince Meinard

Soldiers died.

Blood sprayed through the air as the monstrous horrors of Vebrin surged into Az’s militia. I strolled in the wake, making myself cold, beating down any queasiness. I had strode through battlefields before in this very body. I witnessed men hacked down to fall in expanding puddles of crimson, twitching and moaning as their life poured out of them.

But this…

The Hunger slithered into a squad of men. The segmented body dripped tar that coated the ground in its wake. Its mandibles ripped through steel plate and into the flesh of Az’s defenders with ease. Men screamed as it ripped off legs. It scuttled through their midst as they hacked at it with ineffective strokes of swords or thrust with spears, points skittering off the chitinous thing.

It wrapped around one man, pouring its oily tar across shining armor. The man screamed as the Hunger’s mandibles pierced into his skull. I clenched my iron fist and made myself colder than winter. Colder than death. These men had to die for Kivoneth to survive.

Flames burst around the Hunger. It became a blazing, undulating bonfire. The fire raced down its oily trail, burning around the feet of the squad. Men fell to the ground, the tar coating their armor blazing. Smoke rose out of joints of their armor as they cooked alive inside.

I was grateful I couldn’t smell.

Masonry crashed to the ground to my left. Men screamed as a building collapsed onto them, burying another group of soldiers in heavy stone. A cloud of dust burst from it, rolling across the ground. The Formless oozed out of the rubble, the beige, viscous thing moving along by thrusting out flowing appendages to seize the ground and pull it, moving towards more carnage.

The Colony dissolved into a cloud of brown, buzzing insects, sweeping into another group of Soldiers. They screamed. One guardsman burst out of the roil, his face covered in swelling bites dotting his face. He collapsed after two steps, gurgling, foam frothing at his mouth.

I shook my head. Why did they need me? Why hadn’t they gone after Sven and his women before? Why did they bother using the naga to retrieve the amulet when they could do this? A hundred soldiers already dead and more dying in moments. The Hunter ripped through more soldiers, the emaciated, bear-like thing drenched in viscera.

Why did they need me here at all?

They could depopulate a city on their own and—

Chords of music filled the air. Zithers and lyres, mandolins and flutes. Voices sang as the bards from the College of Az appeared, a motley group of men and women playing their instruments, forming a concert of reverberating power. Their harmony assaulted the monsters.

The Formless contracted in on itself. The buzzing insects of the Colony fell out of the air to quiver on the ground around the groaning, spasming, dying men stung over and over by their venomous bite. The flames wreathing the Hunger snuffed out while the Hunter bellowed and thrashed.

The bards music filled the town while the fencers flowed in around them, the deadliest fighters.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ava

My womb quivered as the hammer blazed with light. I shuddered, feeling my soul bond with the arcane device. Such joy burst inside of me as I felt the power sweeping through the diamond. It stored this energy in its matrix, awaiting my arrival.

Power flowed through the room. It resonated with the armor. As the light faded so I could see again, I witnessed my family standing before them. Greta swayed in front of the sapphire-impregnated plate, one hand touching the banded skirt, the segments shaped like undulating waves. Ealaín shook her head before the suit that glowed with its own warmth. My husband stood strong beside the umbral leather.

“These armor were placed here for us,” I said in realization, my eyes sweeping around the room. I could feel each and every suit of armor through the hammer. Felt them quivering, waiting to be donned by those I love.

“What?” Carsina asked as she rose from the ground. She pushed up her glasses. “What do you mean by that, your Highness? These were forged by Krab. They are for gods, or at least demigods.”

“No, they were put here for us.” I focused on her. “You said it yourself, this vault awaited my arrival. I’m the imbuer to open it. Look at them. They all drifted to the suit of armor that was meant for them.”

“It calls to me,” Ealaín whispered, her hands reaching for the buckles of her mundane armor.

“Then I guess we should get started,” Carsina said, her hands reaching for the ties of her leather jerkin. “Sven, you can go first. I’ve been waiting for this all day.”

“It’s not necessary,” I said in realization. “The armor has already surrendered to them and merely awaits their donning.”

“That’s not possible,” Carsina said. “The armors need the ritual to attune them.”

“Well, it is possible because they’ve all had sex with me.” I held up the hammer, feeling the armor through them. “Don yours, Sven.”

He touched his dark suit.

To be continued…

Click here for Chapter 24.

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