-[Act 2 * Part 7]-

“To glory or death!” Elnora cried as she drove the horde of monsters towards the imperial palace. The succubus was perched atop the shoulder of a mountain giant and waved her halberd as she rallied her troops for one last push against the routing imperial defenders.

Beckoned by her call the battle crazed monsters rampaged through the burning city streets. With brute force and sheer numbers they overwhelmed the increasingly isolated formations of the imperial troops wherever they found them. No quarter was given and no mercy was shown as they pushed on, towards the palace gates.

As the invaders drew closer to their goal, they found the drawbridge of the palace gate to be raised and their approach to the walls denied by a deep moat. A final, desperate line of defenders clustered between the monsters and their target. A ragged band of soldiers and militiamen had sought to rally at the gate, but now found themselves boxed in between the angry horde and the moat that separated the street and the palace walls. It was here that they resolved to make their final stand—spears, pikes and swords braced towards the approaching mass of monsters. It was their last hurrah for their beloved Empire Solar and even in the face of certain death these men did not falter. They sobbed and lamented their fate, but stood fast against the rampant horde, bolstered by their faith in Maiden Solar.

The soldiers received supporting fire from the archers stationed in the towers above the gatehouse. From their elevated position they rained down volley after volley of arrows upon the charging monsters. But even this storm of missiles did little to curb the bloodlust of the invaders. Heaps of dead minions already littered the ground in front of the gatehouse, but the horde kept on advancing.

With the inevitability of a coming tide, the monsters clashed with the thin ranks of soldiers and militiamen. The imperial defenders were quickly overwhelmed by the rampaging mass of fangs, claws and hooved feet. Once forced down on the ground they were torn to shreds, as at this point most of the dark lord’s forces had been reduced to their most feral state. The green tide of goblins, orcs and trolls had long since broken, lost or discarded their weapons in the frantic melee and now engaged their foes in what could only be described as a blood-brawl.

Witchdoctors, shamans and beast-sorcerers threw spells at the soldiers in the towers above the gatehouse. Their potent magic chipped away at the stone parapets and was successful in keeping most of the archers from firing back with any degree of accuracy. But the wall itself yet stood as an impassable obstacle to the monstrous horde.

Looking to deliver the final blow to Empire Solar, Elnora spurred her titanic mount towards the raised drawbridge. The mountain giant stood only half as tall as the palace walls, but he cleared the moat in one long leap and latched onto the wooden drawbridge with both hands. Elnora barely managed to hold onto the brutish beast as it shook back and forth in an effort to break free the bridge from its chains.

Having endured the giant’s wrath for a few precious seconds, the drawbridge finally gave in. The victorious giant tore the bridge from the wall and snapped the chains that held it in place. He then climbed down into the moat and lowered the whole thing atop of himself so that the rest of the monsters could access the gatehouse.

“Forward!” Elnora commanded as she climbed onto the bridge. “Bring down the gates and the palace will fall!”

At her command a band of trolls began pushing their way through the sea of dead and dying monsters. Their task was to leverage their considerable strength against the gates that stood between them and the courtyard of the palace. Her forces were armed with chain bound hooks and a hundred beasts to pull on them. The gates would soon fall, and then the palace would follow, just as Elnora had envisioned it. But the trolls would never get to play their assigned part as the imperial defenders moved to counter their inexorable advance.

To Elnora’s surprise the palace garrison raised the gates and sallied out in one last attempt at breaking the morale of the horde. A shining mass of armor-clad warriors came charging through the gatehouse under the banners of their precious Maiden Solar. Their shimmering flags—burning with holy light—immediately forced back the monstrous trolls, who were especially vulnerable to such magic enchantment. The ugly beasts scattered in panic, some jumping to their deaths into the moat below.

For a brief moment Elnora was left all by herself to fend against the line of charging imperial knights. Her face burned in the golden splendor of the sanctified banners, but after her encounter with Maiden Solar during the battle for the dungeon core the succubus had built up a tolerance for the holy element. Elnora stubbornly braced her blood drenched halberd and dove right into the tightly packed ranks of her enemies. She expressed her defiance with a war cry that gave pause to the imperial defenders, who had not expected such determined resistance so soon.

With a flurry of blows and thrusts the she-demon managed to hold back the imperial troops for a while. But she now found herself holding just a tiny sliver of the bridge, just on the edge of the city street. It was here that they managed to envelop her. While some of the soldiers stayed back to pin down the she-demon, the rest sought to chase after the scattering horde in an effort to cull their ranks, as had clearly been their plan all along.

The sudden charge of the imperial soldiers had come as a surprise even to Elnora. While she had no doubt in her imminent victory in spite of it, this one last act of suicidal defiance was sure to cause her a lot of trouble. If she did not get things under control quickly, it would reflect poorly on her performance.

“I should have stayed further back,” she lamented. “The damned beasts need to be driven, not lead! Curse you all!”

Elnora’s wrath was directed not only at the imperial defenders, but also at her own panicked minions. Their sudden rout had left her surrounded on three sides. She sought to keep her enemies away by swinging wide with her halberd, but all that she managed to achieve was to draw in even more of the holy warriors.

As more soldiers sallied forth from the palace, Elnora was slowly being forced back towards the street. She knew that she could not lose the bridge, as the defenders were sure to try and destroy it in an effort to halt their advance. It was at this moment that she felt a powerful presence materialize behind her. The succubus was about to swing her halberd around to strike at it when a friendly voice spoke to her.

Scarlet’s shield maiden had joined the battle for the bridge in aid to Basil’s young apprentice.

“I’ve got your back,” the red paladin said. She positioned herself to guard the rear and flanks of the succubus. Armed with a sword and shield she was better able to defend against several attackers at once.

Working together the two women managed to check the advance of the imperial troops. Now that Elnora no longer had to focus on defense, she ventured forth into battle. One after another the low-level guardians of the imperial palace were cut apart by her wicked weapon. The bridge soon became cluttered with their corpses.

Still, even in the face of this overwhelming show of force, the imperial defenders kept up their attack. It seemed as though no matter how many soldiers she cut down, a band of new and more frenzied men immediately took their place. Their mad rush into the jaws of death culminated in a measure of success when one of her thrusts with the halberd penetrated the chest plate of a paladin and impaled him up to the axe head of her weapon. But, instead of falling aside like so many others had before him, the man grabbed hold of the weapon and leveraged his weight on it. With her weapon pinned down and enemies surrounding her on all sides, Elnora was forced to relinquish it.

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Having lost her weapon the succubus once more found herself on the back foot. Even with one of Scarlet’s famed shield maidens at her side, she could not hold on to the bridge in the face of the suicidal charge of the imperial soldiers. Elnora’s expression burned with righteous fury that could rival the shine of the blessed banners, as her black halberd—still lodged in the chest of the mortally wounded paladin—was being carried back towards the gates along with its victim. No longer able to fight with conventional means, she was forced to either surrender the bridge or… she could activate the one ability that she knew she could use to take back the initiative. It was her trump card in this fight and now, at the gates of the imperial palace, she felt justified in using it.

Elnora touched the soul stone on her forehead and activated the special ability of the enchanted head gear: “[Greater Charm]!”

The soul stone flickered as the magic took hold. A strange silence settled over the battlefield as the slaughter ceased.

The soldiers around Elnora appeared to have fallen under a stupefying daze. Their motions turned sluggish and the previously voracious defenders now all looked to the succubus standing among them with lustful eyes. They even removed their helmets so as to better witness her splendor. The effects of the spell had been so overwhelming that these once loyal imperial soldiers, who had sworn to oppose her very nature, now looked to the bedazzling she-demon with puppy-eyed worship.

Soldiers in their dozens fell to their knees before the succubus as she gracefully stepped over the corpses of their fallen comrades on her way to retrieving her misplaced weapon. So incredible was the effect of a [Greater Charm] spell on these low-level kith that even the paladin who had sought to disarm her with his dying breath now pulled the weapon from his chest and offered it to his newfound master with a smile on his face. As the blood pooled at his feet, the newly converted paladin pushed through the pain to kneel down respectfully before the succubus as he delivered the black halberd back into her hands.

In their eyes she glowed like the holiest of angels, so the charmed soldiers immediately complied when Elnora ordered them to kneel. They lusted for her attention and rejoiced with glee as her piercing gaze crossed their closely packed ranks. Soldiers, knights and paladins—all expected her to surprise them in the most wondrous of ways.

Elnora did not make them wait long. Halberd in hand, she activated a combat ability: “{Cleave}!”

In one long horizontal swing she had decapitated the front most line of her worshippers. Blood rained down upon the bridge as the succubus reaped her way across the field of kneeling men. Their love-crazed expressions did not falter, even as she raised her weapon for swing after bloody swing.

When Elnora had cleaved her way across the bridge, she found the charmed standard bearers still holding onto their blessed icons of their precious Maiden Solar. At her command they threw the holy banners into the moat and then followed their battle brothers into the oblivion as the halberd rose and the halberd fell.

With the blessed icons now out of the way, the horde of trolls, orcs and goblins finally rallied back to their commander. At her commanded they warmed over the bridge and through the open gate into the palace grounds beyond. A mass of monstrous infantry poured forth and overwhelmed the remaining defenders.

It was at this moment that Elnora looked back to assess the situation only to find her advisor, the shield maiden, staring at her with lust-stricken eyes. The armor-clad woman appeared ignorant of the battle still unfolding around them as she basked in the splendor of her newfound obsession.

Elnora realized the effect that her [Greater Charm] spell had had on the dark lord’s minion and moved to correct that mistake. “Come forward,” she said and waved for the woman to approach her.

The shield maiden complied without hesitation. Her expression grew ever more ecstatic the closer she drew to her new master.

Maybe it was her bloodlust or perhaps her mind was simply clouded by the adrenalin pumping through her veins, but Elnora felt like partaking in her state of absolute domination for a moment longer. This intoxicating power over someone else—it spoke to her deepest instincts as a succubus and now, at the precipice of her victory, she desired to taste it more vividly than ever before.

Elnora took hold of the shield maiden as she entered her reach. She then kissed the paladin with such passion that the sword slipped from the enamored woman’s grasp. The succubus did not, however, overindulge in celebration of her victory and pulled away from their mutual embrace.

“I release you,” she said and touched the forehead of the shield maiden, imparting a spell: “[Dispel].”

As Elnora removed the effects of her domination, the minion in her hands seemed to awaken. Her previously blissful expression turned to confusion and then horror as the woman realized what she had just done.

The shield maiden reached down to pick up her sword. There she remained, kneeling before the succubus with her head bowed.

“I apologize, Lady Elnora,” she said. “I should not have fallen under the effects of your spell like that. I was unprepared. It will not happen again.”

Even though Scarlet’s shield maidens were on average several power levels stronger than Elnora, the [Greater Charm] spell, which only worked on human and demi-human races, was powerful enough to have a chance at overwhelming them. But, since it was an illusion spell of the sixth tier, and had only been made available to Elnora through the use of her enchanted equipment, the succubus had use up most of her already limited mana pool to cast it just once.

“You are not to blame for this,” Elnora said as she offered her hand to the kneeling woman. “It was my fault in not warning you.”

The shield maiden looked up at the succubus and mustered a shy smile.

“I don’t regret casting the spell,” Elnora told her as she helped the paladin to her feet, “and I won’t apologize for what I did.”

The shield maiden nodded. “Thank you, Lady Elnora.”

The succubus gestured towards the open age and dispelled the aura of awkwardness with a war cry. She drove her soldiers onwards: “To glory or death!”

With the palace gate secured by her forces, Elnora made her way into the courtyard beyond. She had expected to find a scene of battle, but when the succubus passed through the portal of the gatehouse she found her forces line up on both sides, kneeling before the white marble steps of the palace complex. As she looked up, she found the reason why—her master, Basil von Doom. The dungeon keeper watched over his victorious minions form above.

The scene was deathly silent as the dark lord’s forces waited on the succubus as she climbed the steps on her way to the dungeon keeper. When she arrived before him, Basil ordered Elnora to kneel and the succubus complied.

“I knew that I could rely on you to break into to the palace,” he announced loud enough for the gathered monster army to hear.

“You have carried out your purpose on this world,” the dungeon keeper said. Basil then placed the emperor’s crown on Elnora’s head. “With this I dub you an honorary member of House Doom. Carry the crown and the title with pride, Elnora von Doom. You have earned it.

“Now rise,” he said. “Rise and celebrate your victory.”

Wide eyed, Elnora found it impossible to relay her emotions with any degree of modesty, so she resolved to express them through her rigid posture as she stood at attention before the dungeon keeper.

Basil placed his hand on her shoulder and winked at her. He then turned the succubus around so that she was facing the horde of monsters below.

“Take it in,” he said as they watched the mass of angry critters and beasts roar and cheer with excitement at their victory over the civilized kith of this world. “This is your moment of triumph. There will be more to come, but for now embrace it as your highest achievement. You made me proud today.”

Hearing the dungeon keeper’s praise emboldened Elnora. She tried to reach for his hand on her shoulder, but Basil suddenly let go of her and stepped away. When she turned to look for him, Elnora found the dungeon keeper conversing with himself. She noted a modicum of concern in his expression.

***

As Basil stood atop of the stairs, sharing a moment of celebration with his eager apprentice, he felt a distant presence calling out to him. The dungeon keeper was surprised to find a telepathic communication being directed at him at this time. He knew that the [Message] spell would only ever be used by his minions to contact him in the case of a dire emergency, as it dulled the user’s senses while the connection was active.

“I am listening,” he said. “Speak quickly. I am in the middle of something important.”

“This is Schwartz,” a voice inside his head answered. “I apologize for the disturbance, My Lord, but there is an issue that demands your immediate attention back at the Mansion.”

At the Mansion? Basil thought. What could possibly have happened that it would require my presence?

“We have encountered an unforeseen consequence of the recent attack on the dungeon core,” Schwartz explained. “As of this moment, Drum the Devourer is being held hostage...”

Hostage? Basil wondered.

“By who?” he asked.

Schwartz cleared his throat before answering. “It’s… Aidan and Nadia, My Lord. Or, rather, their shadow clones. They have… escaped their imprisonment and are acting hostile towards our forces.

“What are your orders?”

Basil carefully considered the possible implications of the situation before giving his answer.

“Stall for time,” he ordered. “Keeping Drum safe is your priority. I will join you shortly.”

“Understood.”

He returned to Elnora. The joyful expression of the succubus soured the moment she recognized Basil’s burdened state of mind.

“What’s wrong?” she asked with genuine concern in her voice.

“We have to return to the Mansion,” Basil said. “There has been an incident.”