Congratulations! Due to deception and your status as a demigod being close enough to a greater spirit your ruse has succeed and you’ve ordained your first priest!
Given the ritual you are emulating is shamanic in nature the ordained totem of the void dragon will be given small physical characteristics of the totem they are bound to. This is considered the blessing of the totem however there are other blessings you can bestow upon your chosen priest.
As the four eyed Void dragon you can seal off your sight from one eye to give the corresponding blessing to your first totem. In return you can see through your gifted eye as you please.
Left upper eye of the dragon: Sight into the flows of Soul energy.
Right upper eye of the dragon: Sight over the flows of mana.
Left lower eye of the dragon: Sight into the Ether realm.
Right lower eye of the dragon: Sight into the soul fluctuations of others.
I had to fight the manic smile that wanted to spread across my lips as I stared at the ethereal shadow cocoon that now wrapped around Kal-Gûl. With careful thought I decided and declared in my booming draconic voice as I brought my right hand up to the right side of my lowered head while my left moved into the cocoon in front of me. “I grant you my blessing and a boon for thy hardships.” I declared as I felt my upper right eye turn into a jewel as I removed it. The chitinous scales growing over the empty socket.
Then I brought it down into the cocoon and gently allowed the more ethereal construct than any matter seep into his right eye. “I grant you, my upper right eye, let it’s boon further thy growth as you are remade in the crucible of my blessing!” I finished grandly as I reached up with my hands in a Y sort of motion as the cocoon suddenly contracted and then blasted into a black pillar into the heavens above.
I smiled as the revealed Kal-Gûl stepped out of the shadowy cocoons remaining wisps of black smoke. His eyes shining, one an amethyst jewel almost and the other a near chilling blue. Much like the other totems he had taken on characteristics of the draconic form I now wore. Much like Dholzuk, Kal-Gûl had larger more bat like ears along with slight claw shape to their fingernails.
And much like Gromni his once more Caucasian original skin colour was now more a dark grey with patches of scales along his lower forearm and shins. However, most likely due to my gift of an eye his transformation didn’t end there.
His back appeared to be more scaled similar to his forearms and shins but they continued down from his back to his lower thighs along with a tail now slowly curling up and releasing before curling up in the opposite manner. Twin horns followed just above his ears and the barely perceptible ethereal wings that came into being just as he exited the shadows but then went along with the wisps of smoke.
I flapped my wings, manifestations from my travel form which I’d finally managed to unlock, dissipating all the smoke before spreading them once more along my hands. “Stand witness to Kal-Gûl the Exarch reborn as Kal-Gûl Zabrûm, Totem of the Void Dragon! And the birth of the Zabrûm tribe!” I declared while smiling with glee inwardly at such a success to my plans.
The others were all awed at the transformation Kal-Gûl had taken on himself as he himself marvelled at his new form. No longer looking like someone in his fifties or closing in on his sixties to a middle aged man of barely thirty six. My blessing and boon having somehow reversed the flow of time somewhat for Kal-Gûl.
I looked from Kal-Gûl over to the other totems and how they looked. Târz was an elder among the orcs, clearly at the sixty or seventy mark equivalent to a human. His eyes were slightly larger and clearly those of his totem along with the hawkish nose so unlike the almost gorilla like noses that was usual for orcs. In his long white hair were feathers interwoven along with claws enough to make up a full set on a normal Hafkfons talons. I figured his bonded animal had died and those were its claws.
A Hawkfon was to a griffon was similar in difference in species for a Lion and a Lynx, with the animals making it up being a Lynx and a Hawk though their colouring was much more uniform with both parts sharing the same colouration. I thought that when our eyes met and his clear large oddly beige coloured eyes so focused and full of life despite his age.
I noted that his wary look from before had turned to a sort of careful reverence now and inwardly smiled. The first phase of the plan was going smoother than I had anticipated.
This first phase was formulated last week giving use to all the information we had collected on the green skin tribes in Hardows ridge. This Spirit Walker that they were mostly talking about was the agent of Thesimus and was named Jonah Nazakir and quite frankly I’d been surprised when Morice had told me I would know the man.
I feared he was a survivor of the roadside incident that I’d caused shortly after leaving the Deepwoods, yet I couldn’t for the life of me remember what had happened then. That whole series of days from leaving the Deepwoods and entering Bedelev was a haze to me now. Then again for me six years had also passed for the passing one and a half month that the others had experienced.
Even without Verona’s warning I’d have investigated given the information Abhorash had brought back with him. However I doubt I’d have focused my gaze so intently on the ridge alongside Veta without the warning from Verona. I’d most likely have simply observed before the point I could act had passed me by. With the warning I’d also found a possible solution to my personnel problem by taking the guise of a greater spirit willing to sanction the Exiled as their own tribe.
With what I could provide to the other three tribes through trade of services, goods or even knowledge and the fruits of each of their labours would be of immense value to my future forces growth. With the full completion of three of the inner most districts at the Starlight outpost though I had to admit I do love how the name translated to the elder orc tongue was Ilzkâl Rogâtar which I kind of understood given the language was very similar to Tolkein’s Black speech of Mordor. This however did feel more like a language as it was mostly halting when it came to two letters together that cause completely different sounds other wise it had a sort of rhyming quality to it that I enjoyed when I learned it.
A loud screech made me look up to see a small harrow bat come charging towards me. It flew around me and made a lot of chirping sounds at me and when the meaning dawned on me by some sixth sense I’d begun to develop towards animals I smiled. Bringing my left hand up with one claw slightly extended to allow the bat to land and I chuckled at the ragged breathing and softer chirping that came from the cub when it got a chance to rest.
“Void Dragon, please spare her. She is but a cub she does not know how to act towards greater spirits!” Dholzuk’s cry made me look from the panting bat cub the size of a house cat to the frantic totem as he took a few steps before freezing as our eyes met. He swallowed but continued. “Please… Don’t hurt her.” He pleaded.
I smiled and looked towards the cub and emanated a soft growl which made the cub look excitedly from me to Dholzuk who looked like he was about to see me eat his animal companion. I laughed as I brought my hand down to Dholzuk so he could take the cub into his arms. “I can see why she asked me now. Your worry for the last of her descendants is admirable.” Dholzuk just stared up at me before looking down at the huge puppy eyes of the cub in his arms. “Yes you hold the last descendant of the Harrow bat who became your totem.” I finished the thought for him when I noted his mind had ground to a halt.
I looked from him to Tûhorn who was standing where she’d been put down looking a bit down. Then over towards Ar-Kaius Dead Sun. He stood there slightly bow legged and a backwards lean to his back that didn’t look comfortable at all. His height was around that of a standard orc at around the 1.9 meter mark, with long white hair with a a few everlasting icicles around a few locks like hair decorations, his pale blue skin tone and slightly pronounced chin told of his goblin and Troll heritage. In my senses I saw how he emanated a frosty aura that he was suppressing now, though even his own tribe members stood a bit farther from him too.
From Ar-Kaius I looked to Karzâg the Den mother. She was an odd mix of ogre pure-blood and goblin causing her to have this tan skin with a greenish hue if it wasn’t for the deformities of her leg, hip and spine she’d be the spitting image of a slightly hawk featured amazon warrior woman if I was to be completely honest with myself. Wild grey hair with black highlights in it along with a few feathers and a single bird skull. A skull of a bird I noted was notorious for being very hard to spot let alone catch, quick as sin and cleverer than a fox.
I figured it was a badge of honour of her prowess and I couldn’t help but wonder what she’d be capable of once healed.
“Dholzuk and Ar-Kaius approach me now.” I rumbled as I gestured where the two where to stand and waited for the two to tentatively approach me. Once they had I moved my two large hands and left the claw tip of my thumbs rest upon their foreheads with the claw extended to allow my index fingers claw to come to their mouths. “I wish to grant you my blessing but it will hurt.” I began looking both in the eyes as I spoke. “You can bite down on my claw and grip my fingers for support, save my thumb for I need to keep most of your bodies still to get through it. Are you ready and willing?” I finished and waited for both to look at one another and then nod back at me.
Then I began and reached my power into their bodies, using bone crafting to move the mass of bone in their bodies slowly and carefully to be as optimized for their musculature. Both had bitten down on my claws and gripped my index finger with a death grip as their eyes screamed for them.
Then as it was over and my hands came away from them they collapsed to their knees, panting for breath to fill near empty lungs. Both cursed quite vigorously before they stood and went silent as they looked at one another and then themselves. Quickly they began to move in ways that before must have hurt and before long they were laughing and crying in relief as they hugged one another.
They then turned and went to their own tribe mates who stared with awe and wonder at the transformation both had gone through. Now strong and tall with a perfectly proportional muscular and strong bodies both. I noted Tûhorns and Karzâgs envious looks and chuckled as I bid them approach next. Timidly the two approached looking a bit scared given the sounds the two others had let out while receiving my blessing had made.
Gently I picked them up and slowly I closed my wings around us, as I saw their worry begin to rise I leaned my head and blew on the smoky membrane of my wings. Slowly as the smoke dissipated what was revealed was a starry night sky. Each star of which was related to those that somehow worshipped me in one way or another. All of my minions that I’d raised had a star representing them even if they’d been destroyed, each stars shine a representation of either devotion or power. The effect this granted my wings was like windows into another world you could just fall into when fully revealed like this and I noted the wonder struck faces both made.
Slowly I leaned closer and whispered to the two. “I can make it less painful but it’ll take a little more time, are you all right with that?” I asked and both nodded as I moved my thumbs while they lay on my palms.
Gently I pushed my power into them, gently and slowly moving and aligning their bones in as smooth and as gentle a transition as possible. They gasped and groaned with discomfort but not from pain and as I finished the two lay there getting their breathing under control while watching my wings as the smoke slowly climbed up to obscure the night sky within.
Slowly leaning down I gave the two a sheepish grin. “I don’t suppose that great spirits have some sort of edifice erected to them or the like?” I asked as this was the one thing I didn’t know about and if I wanted to gain the tribe in as short a time as possible I’d need to construct the gate.
Both girls looked at one another and then smiled up at me. “Tribes often erect a totem pole or impresa of some sort. Why do you ask?” Karzâg answered me and asked in return.
“I wanted to build a statue here of me to serve as a gate to Ilzkâl Rogâtar for future trade between the Zabrûm, Iron-Jaws, Drazûl and Amûgdir tribes. Would that be too much?“ I asked back a little bashfully but I smiled at the thoughtful expression on both faces before Tûhorn spoke up slowly.
"Um, I think it would serve as a better way to defend them if no one can enter their tribal area without permission." The little blue girl said, her tusks now just tiny little upwards fangs coming out between her lips.
I smiled at the girl and gently placed both down as I unfurled my wings as the shadowy smoke had fully crawled up the membrane and the slow movement of my wings allowed it to continue to cling to it. As soon as my wings parted I noted the worried expression of Kal-Gûl turn to genuine amazed happiness as his daughter ran into his outstretched arms. I looked towards Tûhorn and noticed her forlorn look towards Dholzuk who was still marvelling at his changes with his collogues without paying much attention to the girl.
Slowly I reverted back to my elven form and using a clever trick I’d learned through use of spatial rings was fully dressed again when I exited the small black smoke column that I had envelop me when I changed forms.
Gently I walked up to and placed my hand on the girls shoulder who flinched a bit at first but relaxed at my gentle smile. “Child why do you look so forlorn?” I asked as something about the girl was pulling at me. It was much the same as when I’d seen Akasha back in Bedelev, like something about sensing a shared fate or some whim, it was strange and hard to describe in any true understandable manner other than some type of bonding instinct. Like I could feel if someone would be tied to me in some destined manner, a similar but different feeling had also came to me when I met Morice now that I think about it. Similar with though to a lesser degree to those homeless orphans I’d taken in as operatives in training.
Tûhorn decided not to answer me and instead looked down sadly. Playing a hunch I mentally commanded the first and would be commander of one of the knightly orders of animated knights I'd made come to me. The Ossuarry owls would serve as harrowing skirmishers, rangers, scouts, sharpshooters and long range assassins when needs for them occurred. I wouldn’t make the same mistake as I had done in Bedelev, I wouldn’t allow animated armours to go straight into combat after making them. I would finish their making and have them at least get twenty levels under their belts before ever going for any sort of mission.
I’d at least make sure they could kill generic civilians before leaving the forge as it were.
As the captain of the owls came to me I reached out my hand and the armour moved one hand up to its face to pry out of the black socket with only a blue dot for a pupil pulling out a mana crystal that could fill the socket perfectly. The blackness of before receding from the crystal as it left the socket. I noted the fascinated look on Tûhorn and smiled as I handed her the oval crystal.
She accepted it and looked at it with wonder. “Can you do magic?” I asked and she looked up at me and tentatively nodded and I smiled at her. “Try channelling your mana into that.” I told her and watched as she focused and continued to mentally strain and test out different things before the pale blue became a deeper blue until it was a solid Ice blue from the near white blue of mana. I marvelled as I bent down to be face to face with Tûhorn and we both stared in fascination.
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“What did you do?” I asked her curiously and she shyly moved one hand out and conjured up a snowball and I smiled widely. “Amazing.” I half gasped in excitement and I noted the genuine pride that seemed to swell within the girl at hearing some praise for her abilities.
I reached out with my hand and she gave me back the crystal. I stood up and with a playful look I invited her to watch as I put the gem back into its socket. I took a step back and the two of us watched as the black began to fill up the socket again until the icy blue spot was all that was left as the whole thing started to act as the armours eyes once more.
Then suddenly the owl armour shuddered and icy blue, purple and pure white lights began to shine from underneath the scales of the scale surcoat that the armour wore before a soft icy mist of black, white and icy blue began to leak out from the scales that somehow blended in a manner that made me think it was a limited but effective camouflage in snowy environments.
I looked from what I now considered as the completed prototype of the Ossuarry Owl order of animated armours and down at Tûhorn. “Child where are your parents?” I asked gently and the sudden hurt look that came upon her face made me realise she was an orphan. Slowly I bent down to one knee and placed a hand against her shoulder. “Child would you accept becoming my second daughter?” I asked and I watched the girl freeze at the question.
A war waged clearly in her eyes as I noted the small wetting of her eyes as the offer sank into her mind. Before I could act she was hugging me tightly and I simply chuckled. “I’ll take that as a yes then?” I asked and she nodded her head as she pushed it into the base of my neck.
Looking over I saw Dholzuk and all the others staring at me and I raised an eyebrow at them. “What? Aren’t I allowed to adopt a child of the tribes due to being a dragon?” I asked and they all looked at one another before most of them shrugged like they expected a dragon to be a bit eccentric. I’d let them continue to think that for now.
Manifesting just my travel forms wings I held one wing out to create a shadow gate inside of the shadow clinging to the membrane. With Abhorash once again connected to the whole with a scale of my own being the last material used for his armour. With that addition to his armour, magic is pretty much the only thing that can harm him with any ease. However his abilities are rather focused on melee combat and messing with the mana around him. Meaning the only tactic that might work would be mages sniping at him out of his auras range.
With a mental thought he stood and walked into the gate along with the Ossuary Owl and the other which I’d dubbed the Onyx Ospreys. They would serve as scouts, assassins, saboteurs, stealth operations, seekers and stealthy bodyguard duty. With a knightly version of the Karuta armour from Japan's lamellar type armours.
The Greenskins all wondered as my forces just walked into my outstretched wing’s shadowy membrane before gasping as Vashanesh along with thirty Servitor Skeletons, three overseer skeletons, six Goliath Servitor Skeletons carrying materials in the huge baskets incorporated into their backs and two of my newest greater minions, the Craftmasters walked out of my wing. Ptah and Seker both named after the Egyptian crafting gods and mimicked them only as undead vampiric skeletal variants. Bone made marble like skin clad most of their bodies in a sculpture like one of the great statues like the thinker was brought to life with only their heads the difference.
Ptah’s was a vampiric skeleton with stretched skin over it allowing for facial expression with the near clay like consistency of the parts used to emote on his skull, more mummy with thin skin than a skeleton really. With a cylinder coming down from his chin like ancient pharaohs with a Nemes upon the top of his head and wearing what any could see as fine robes for a mage or Kaftan with more of an Egyptian flare.
Seker on the other hand was actually something of an experiment. His bones had been made with a three millimetre thick coating of a mixture of Blue steel, Thawite and tungsten on all of his bones. This gave his body a shape similar to Ptah’s but a silvery deep blue colour to his body but it would allow him to work a forge without allowing his bones to burn up with Blue steel and Thawite being ice oriented materials and Tungsten has a very high melting point to start with.
There was a small circular pit at the Starling outposts cavern marking the left over damage from the process of forging the alloy that cooled rapidly upon being moved out of the ridiculous heat needed to melt it. Then as we coated the bones we had to have a small needle point for forcing a single connection with another bone that was used to funnel in replacement bone to replace what was burnt or melted away in the short while it took the metal to cool enough while being capable of being moulded like clay for a full day after it cooled.
It had granted him a high affinity for frost magic and he had been using it in experiments on how to utilize his abilities for different forging processes. Either through some new manner of quenching, heat stabilization or adding in some type of power during the forging process.
With a mana crystal brain and heart of just normal pure mana like Ptah but Seker had embelishments on the circular armour piece that held oval crystals which allowed to owner to draw upon the elemental aspects of mana, one for soul energy, one for each crystal aspected with earth, lightning, light, shadow, air, water, life and death. One of his eyes was a black sclera with a red point as his eye was fire aspected mana crystal and the other was handed to me and I asked Tûhorn to infuse the eye again to which she readily agreed though clearly nervous at these clearly dead men arriving.
With the eye replaced with a frost aligned eye as the last one, Seker took his place behind Vashanesh as the three intelligent undead bowed before me. “We great thee, our lord.” They all said in unison in a sort of harmony of voices with how the papery raspy voice of Vashanesh created an under tone to Ptah’s etheral whisper of a voice, sounding like it was a whisper but from lungs powerful enough that a whisper is just slightly bellow a normal conversational tone. Seker however had his voice change lightly making the frosty crackle that was lower than the fire like crackle that made up the second voice that he emanated, it was like the voices embodying fire and frost spoke in harmonious unison now.
I gave them a low nod of my head in acknowledgement and spoke commandingly. “Build the gate to Ilzkâl Rogâtar, I will provide the spark to power it but remember the restriction runes.” I commanded and watched while my wings slid back into my shoulder blades and they moved to the fountain in the centre of the square and got to work. They had already built the statue that would eventually serve as my gate which essentially cost me a medium possessed undead for two way movements between gates to a greater possessed undead needed to create a sort of arrival station gate capable of connecting to multiple gates in their radius.
I walked to the green skins that had moved a bit away from the clearly undead servants I’d just summoned. I smiled placatingly and spoke calmly and softly. “I took upon myself the class of necromancer due to my affinity and sovereignty over death. Those are lesser spirits I’ve come into contact with during my travels that I have granted bodies through those abilities. However we have a grave matter to discuss relating to the tribes.” I said and my voice turned grave.
Once I was sure that I had their attention I pulled the Zugorite out of my storage ring and used mana to keep it afloat. I didn’t want to touch the thing after I’d figured out what it’s source was. “Do you know what this is?” I asked with clear distaste on my face at the sight of it.
Borgu the Mystic snorted and shook his head, allowing his large head and beard of white grey hair to flutter with how vigorously he shook his head. “Do not tell me you wish us to use those rocks too?” He growled and tightened his one hand on his staff.
I smiled at him. “In fact it was the opposite and the chief reason I contacted all of you. You, who have declined any offer of these stones brought to you.” I paused for effect as I looked each of them in the eye before I continued. “They are tainted by demons, its subtle and would take generations for it to fully take its intended effect but demons are nothing but patient. This is a threat to not only the tribes but to us spirits as well.” I finished and watched the horror in their eyes grow and grow at the implications in my words.
With a flick of my hand I made the Zugorite disappear into my storage ring and waited to allow the green skins to gather their thoughts and confer with one another. I looked over at the quickly coming together pieces of the dragon statue of myself with banners for each of the wings membranes. Each banner shimmered and changed to the different banners for each of the tribes all except the ones that were on opposite sides of the wing formed gateway that the statue/gateway made. On the left was the banner of the newly formed Zabrûm tribe, currently a small visual representation of Ilzkâl Rogâtar embraced by representations of my wings. If they decided to change it then I would allow them to, this was just what I’d figured as a placeholder for now since I was kind of liking the tribal straight and curved, clearly roughly painted symbols that each tribe made, it gave the whole thing a primal sort of quality I enjoyed.
The right one however was a rough sketch of Ilzkâl Rogâtar with a skull with vampiric fangs yet without the lower jaw hovering above with a rough outline of a hooded robe around it. It would serve as the sigil for the outpost as it served much more as a research and development base than any true military base. It certainly did have a military presence as I’d already created a lot of minions of my own. The servitor skeletons and their larger variant were all under Vashanesh as both Seker and Ptah didn’t have a high enough necromancer class to raise minions and assistants of their own just yet.
I looked over to Seker and thought on his purpose and classes. He currently had Blacksmith, artificer and apprentice mage. He would learn how to imbue his assistants with spirits specifically created for that purpose. Those spirits were inside double terminated crystals with a slight outer shell or cage of bone to hold it with a skeletal animal head above. Seker had six the size of those tall yet slim soda cans currently hanging on his left waist with a Felanid, Anubian, Falcon, Goat, Snake and Human skulls capping off these canopic soul jars.
Each filled with cleansed and ready souls to be imbued into a construct of some sort to serve one purpose or another. Each one filled with differing types of artisans for easier use.
The Felanid crystal had those artisans like leatherworkers, papermakers, cobblers, weavers and tailors.
The Anubian for armorsmiths, weaponsmiths, blacksmiths, linen-armourers, smiths and foundrymen.
The Falcon was for those like gemcutters, engravers, cartographers, jewelers and artificers.
The Goat held woodworkers, carpenters, bowyers, fletchers, arrowsmiths, shipwrights, and oilmakers.
The Snake alchemists, apothecaries, brewers, herbalists and glass workers.
Human one holding architects, cartographers, engineers, masons, siege engineers and builders.
With that still in mind I looked over at Ptah, he had similar canopic soul jars on his waist though he did have slightly different heads on some of them. We’d sorted all the souls I had access to through the many soul gems I had and made soul jars with different heads for different types of souls, I had decided on wolves for melee oriented warrior types and tigers for those at range. Where Ptah differed from Seker with his selected soul jars was that while he did have a Falcon, Goat, Snake and Human ones he also had a pair of jars with Raven and Vulture skulls.
The Raven skull held those with a propensity for librarians, scribes, calligraphers, archivists, enchanters, necromancers and transmuters.
The Vulture one on the other hand held differing types of mages and wizards of one type or another.
“Is the demonic taint the only threat?” Borgu the Mystic said behind me and I turned to look at him. I noted the old one armed orc looked both tired and worried. I sighed as I looked past him at the others and shook my head.
“This spirit walker… he is a servant of a trickster god, his herald in fact.” I said with calm tones, seeing the worry for their people grow in their eyes. “You can see now why I chose to reveal myself with so many threats to those that have venerated the natural spirits longer than anyone else.” I said as I brought a hand down on Borgu’s shoulder before I moved my hand to grip the nub that was at the end of his severed arm, severed at the elbow as it was.
I slowly moved his other hand to work as a reference while the old mystic peered at me curiously, once he realized I was setting it up like I was looking at both of his open palms he grew wide eyed. I brought out a trio of metal ingot shaped bones, the way we stored it now instead of in individual bones given our ability to shape them like clay almost.
I slowly began to recreate a new hand for Borgu, connecting it to his skin and even into his bone which made him groan a little before I was done. Stepping back I looked at him marvelling at the bone replica of his hand that moved as he wished. He looked up at me in question and I smiled. “Those that have served the spirits for as long as you deserve a reward even if you didn’t choose a totem, your path has been harmonious with them. Despite my sovereignty over the spirits of the dead I still value life just as much and I felt you needed something to help you through the trying times to come.” I said softly the words I’d decided to say to the man well before this meeting took place.
My aim was to ingratiate myself as a benevolent greater spirit of death to them while warning them of the two dangerous influences to the tribes while disguising my own hopefully growing influence. Looking up to the wonder filled eyes of the others I moved on to finish the meeting for now. “Please go back and warn those in positions of power in your tribes, they must know of the dangers to come but you mustn't show that you know this to the other tribes. We must act carefully so that we can minimize the loss of life from any action we will take to weather the dangers to come.
Kal-Gûl, Karzâg and Mozû would you be so kind as to go and gather the Zabrûm tribe while I work my magic to open the path to Ilzkâl Rogâtar.” I finished with a smile to the three of the newest tribe of the bunch.
The orcs, trolls, goblins and ogres in front of me nodded and left their separate ways all except Tûhorn who stood next to me. I looked down at the puppy dog look she gave me and I chuckled a little before I ruffled her thick tangled hair causing her to giggle. “Has the network reached here?” I asked Vashanesh in English as I turned to him.
Vashanesh quick on the uptake as always responded in kind, there were a lot of things my children didn’t know and I’d keep it that way. “Not yet, I’m afraid Lady Weaver has yet to create enough nodes to allow for communication back to Starlight properly from here. As you know we are running short on bone however we have found the stockpiles of old bones from throwaway materials of the cities butchers and we are currently processing the rather larger quantity of homeless and criminal corpses you’ve had the knights, agents and minions out getting every night now.”
His voice showed a hint of annoyance in it, he didn’t enjoy it when I was in work mode as it caused me to micro manage a little bit.
“I had hoped to put Tûhorn here through a bath before but apparently I can’t just leave and then come back with the connection this time empowered by myself, we should be able to reach Starlight.
That and the fact I’m counting on the major gate back in Starlight will allow the connection to a subservient gate at the edge of its range with the temporary power boost until the network is up and running. We’ll have to figure out a middling spatial rings worth of starter equipment and unraised minions to set up a minor gate like this and a larger ring for the start of an outposts and a greater gate.” I finished with a thought which caused Vashanesh to pause a bit in thought.
Probably the only redeeming quality to my ramblings at times was when I worked a thought out to a practical use at times. I was still working through mana crystals holding a skill or spell in stasis for later release. Could allow me to raise the gates without even having to visit each location before a gate is made. For now each gate needed to be raised by myself at its creation.
After the creation of the greater gate as the first one we figured out how to carve each individual part needed for each golem with all capable of being connected through magnetism. That allowed for some rather agile joints allowing the golems to move around with greater ease.
The lesser gates all connected only to and from a greater gate within its range. A rather considerable range of almost a full one thousand kilometres. That way if I placed each greater gate within the range of another I could quite possibly move a considerable amount of materiel and personnel through them from one end of the continent to the other.
On the other hand for that to work we needed to seed a considerable amount of undead we’d named nodes. Small crystals similar to the canopic soul jars except they had functional bat wings and their main body was about the size of a half litre bottle. Their sole function was to extend the range of communication I could maintain mind to mind with my minions. An added benefit was that if I focused enough I could sense through these nodes with my own mana sense but I could only do that with one at a time.
Of course they were both time and energy consuming to just create them and each only allowed for a radius of twenty kilometers at maximum between them. Each working like a sort of camera satellite requiring them to take time to fly not only into position but the correct height to fully allow each to connect together. Luckily each of them was simply an act of artifice instead of having to require a minion slot and due to that I intended to extend this network throughout Imerith.
If I had to I’d make my own satellite network for my operations. It would work better than the current fast communications of orbs, especially if I kept the near mind to mind ability to communicate. It would allow me to send reinforcements immediately in case of any emergencies as well as allow for faster moving of agents if new information comes to light that requires fast action.
Thankfully we had found small veins of Iron, copper, a bit of gold and coal along with tiny deposits of Mytrhil, tempest bronze, red steel and dark iron. It allowed us to stock more material to train minions in both smithing and smelting the metals into ingots for later use. Despite the luck of our bulk purchases not having raised any flags we were dipping quite a bit into the coffers to bring Starlight up to where it was now. With quite a lot of extra materials already stock piled we were only really missing already made ready bones. We made them ready by moulding them together into the shape of those metal ingots we'd purchased.
Thankfully when Namiar came back with the delegation of the Changeling Society they would willingly come under me. Otherwise I’d have to use other methods to get them to submit.