Vaal was feasting on bacteria spawned from a slain Deviljho. Perhaps, if he hadn’t been clever about it, he might have had the slightest challenge, but he had simply waited until the Effluvium had infected the beast’s organs and brain. The Dragon Energy suffusing its body was an interesting mental puzzle, but he had surpassed even that, until the Deviljho’s body was a breeding ground for his little friends. He was the very oldest and strongest of his kind, Tempered beyond belief, and progenitor and overlord over his smaller kindred. All Elders who approached his territory felt his power, felt the overwhelming strength he wielded, and knew to avoid him. Even the Slayers had given up, content to scurry around his domain and not to anger him.

 So why, oh why, was he detecting the energies of a youngling in his territory? Too young to have her own territory, or to challenge him even with the reckless confidence of youth. Perhaps they were foraging for food? Well, if that was the situation, he supposed he could allow it. But, in that case, why weren’t they coming to ask his permission? And another thing, he could also feel the slightly off sensation the Slayers gave him as they transversed his territory, beneath the pungent distraction of his younger fellow. And this was also not the only oddity he detected: he sniffed, attempting to remember this particular sensation… what was it… He recoiled. Abomination! Those vile, black things had invaded his territory several centuries before, and while he had destroyed them easily enough, their essence had slipped through his grasp, leaving nothing to fertilize his kingdom. It was enough of a pain the last time they had attacked, killing his larder without returning anything! They had to go.

His mind made up, he called all the residents of his kingdom to him. Lesser Girros scoured the lands, while their winged compatriots searched for any sign of trespassers, and Vaal himself began to spread his senses throughout the kingdom of death in which he ruled, his effluvium feeding him the traces of the Slayers and Abominations both. Soon, he had found them: Four Slayer younglings and the Abominations locked in combat. Finally, Vaal reflected, the Slayers doing something good for a change. And the little brat that had invaded his kingdom’s scent was all over the four, and… Ah. It was a Chameleos. She had a human form as well, an impressive feat for one not yet 240 cycles of the moon.

She smelled of confidence, of surety that the Slayers would triumph over the Abominations, making no move to help them. They seemed to just be spectating, confident in their concealment. Such concealment was nothing to one who had essentially become the Vale, the Effluvium being such an integral part of them that he could tell the smallest minutiae of anything it touched, if their focus was on that particular thing at a time, even being able to totally rebuild their bodies from nothing if they had enough Effluvium. And here, in the heart of the Vale, where everything was coated in Effluvium for hundreds of miles around, he was invincible. The Chameleos brat didn’t seem to know that though, given how she wasn’t making any attempt to retreat and instead dallying. Interesting, the Ancient thought. Very, very interesting.  He would lend a hand, if only because of his hate for the wretched abominations, and his own burning curiosity, but after? They would need to leave after answering his questions, if only because the Effluvium he cultivated and required for sustenance was lethal for their kind. He started small, sending a swarm of his lesser reanimated Girros to attack, and then, once all eyes were on the newcomers, he struck.

Lesser members of his kind may have been content to simply let the passive effects of the effluvium to work, but Vaal had a different plan in mind. He hadn’t had the opportunity to do this the last time he’d faced the Abominations, but as they were distracted dealing with the Slayers and his minions, he attempted to force Effluvium inside the bodies of the tar skinned creatures. It worked… kind of? He could feel the Effluvium inside their bodies reproducing and growing, but when he tried to puppet them, he felt the creatures fighting back against his control. No dice.  Damn it all. Was there nothing the Abominations brought to the table other than destruction? 

Enraged by this newfound revelation, he decided to show himself. His actual body was a short flight away from their current location, but perhaps…

He gathered all the corpses in the area, using Effluvium to reanimate old rotted flesh and sinew. Soon, the very Vale itself revolted against the invaders. The Effluvium switched from a slow sustainable growth, to a frenzied series of explosions that spread Effluvium everywhere, accompanied by all of the mostly intact corpses waking up and charging the Abominations, as a trio of undead Legiana pounced on a pair of enemy fliers. This sudden burst of Effluvium would make the area barren for a cycle or so, with all the dead corpses, the bedrock of his kingdom, being devoured by the burst of effluvium. It was at least preferable to the last time, where he’d had to spend several moon cycles’s worth of accumulation to annihilate an army of them. 

The Abominations were wiped out once he had gotten to their location, and three of the Slayers had passed out while the last was quite close. He couldn’t have them dying, so he used the Effluvium to keep them alive but unconscious. It was always so much better when he could question them individually. Then, the other elder showed herself, in her natural form this time. Good, she at least knew that she could fight better as a dragon. “Hey! Stay away from my friends!” she yelled in the language of man, her wings flaring up in a threat display. This was getting odder and odder. An Elder who had no knowledge of him, and yet, she had mastered the human language, and gained a human form. All that aside, she had challenged him, intentionally or not, and he would have to respond.

He charged, wishing to dominate this pup so that she would know her place. The little thing went invisible, but that was no object, as the Effluvium fed him data of where she was in real time. She first sent a glob of her poison at him, but he simply did nothing and allowed it to strike him, coming out completely unharmed. “Really, little brat.” He roared in Old Draconian. “Did you think such paltry venom could do something to me? I have been in countless battles, and your power has been honed by no one. You do not know how to fight like a Dragon.” The smaller dragon replied “I have no idea what you’re saying, corpse breath, but if you try to hurt my friends, I’m bringing the hurt to you!” Still in the human language. It appeared that she truly knew nothing about her own kind. She attempted to dodge his strike by rearing up and crush him with a body slam, but he grabbed her by the raised claws and smashed her to the corpse-covered ground. He then sent a concentrated blast of effluvium straight onto her head, as he absorbed the surrounding gas to fuel his brutal onslaught. Eventually, the Effluvium infected the little thing’s organs and he used that to knock the brat out.

He then had his smaller minions pick up the Slayers and drag them to the deepest part of his kingdom, ordering any Effluvium to become dormant the moment it touched any of his prisoners. He himself picked up his younger compatriot. He would not have them die, if only because Vaal didn’t feel they had unbalanced his kingdom, and he did not believe there to have been any true attempts at his life. The fact that they seemed opposed to the Abominations didn’t hurt.

After this, he took his sweet time picking out which one to interrogate first. After a moment of deliberation, he chose the one that had lasted the longest, one with hair the color of fire. A female, but also one without that loudmouth personality. Those ones are always so loud. I don’t like to start out with them, they are just so much of a pain, Vaal reflected. 

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He had an adult Girros sit on her first and prepare their venom fangs, as a trio of their smaller compatriots restrained her arms and additional undead pinned the rest while he buried the Chameleos under a mountain of corpses. Then, he woke her up, by devouring the Effluvium keeping her unconscious. A few seconds later, she woke up, and screamed. He had a smaller Girros place its fangs on her throat, just to shut her up. She did, her chest heaving and her breath coming faster.

“I, uh, don’t suppose we can talk this out?” She chuckled nervously

Vaal snorted. “We can absolutely talk this out. Starting with, why have you barged into, in human reckonings, my backyard, then trampled all over my garden and generally been a rude little prick. Not to speak of your Chameleos friend. She seems to know nothing of her kind-”

“Wait, you can talk!?” She gasped. Vaal sighed. He could tell, this was going to be a long, long day.

“Yes, I can talk. Now shut up and let me speak. So, the basic questions on me just so we can get to my questions: Yes, I am sentient, yes, I am over a few millennia old. Yes, I have a name, its Vaal, yes, I am a necromancer, and the entire body of Gaia’s Serpent is my territory. Now, what were you doing in, to use a human term, my house?”

Eventually, he dragged out all the information the brat, who called herself Summer, was willing to give him. Vaal sighed. She said that her grandfather had found the Chameleos as an egg and took care of it from its beginnings.  He then moved on to the brash male. This one was in no need of an explanation, he’d just given up what he knew at once. After that, he moved onto the male with hair like the sun. He was swift to give up the information as well, once he had promised not to harm the black-haired female. Vaal figured out that he was attracted to the black haired one, and promised to help them get together if the male, known as “Tai,” gave him all the information he could. He never could tell what the Slayers found attractive in each other, but he seemed to be very happy. Speaking of the black haired one, she proved to be a very, very prideful creature. He had the information out of her in no time though: he knew how to deal with those of her personality.

(Flashback.)

“I’ll never spill the beans, you sorry old fishbone!” The black haired creature screeched at first. 

“Don’t worry… we have our ways of making you talk.” Vaal called up his secret weapon: an old Felyne and her disciples. Then, once everyone had their eyes on what he would do(the one called “summer” squealed like mad, and with such a loud voice his ears felt like they were dying) he  had his head torturer begin her work, along with her assistants. Soon, the bold woman had given up resistance.

“Stop! Please, stop!” Raven hollered as the rest of her team looked on bemused. “Never! Unless you give me what I want!” Vaal cackled. 

“I’ll talk, I’ll talk! Just stop..hehehe… tickling!” she screamed as the Grimalkynes continued. He had an agreement with the Plunderers: Help him out occasionally, and he’d pay them with some fresh meat and they would live under his protection. Right now, this specific band of Grimalkynes had trained to torture the information out of Slayers without actally harming them: they was using four feather dusters they’ed traded for some Legiana meat. Best trade he’d ever made: the squeals the Slayers made when he had his compatriots tickle them always livened up his day. “I don’t know… what information do you have?”

(Flashback ends.)

Suffice it to say, that was very, very fun. And now, time for his junior’s turn. He woke the brat up, and the moment she awakened, she immediately went invisible. “Not exactly the most intelligent, are you?” he muttered. He could see the corpses displaced by her scrabbling, he wasn’t stupid, despite all the comments saying he’d had his brain rotted from his fellows. Then, Vaal had Effluvium start to clog the air she attempted to breathe until she gasped for breath and decloaked. “I, uh, know how this looks, but-”

“But what? You barge into my home, threaten me, say that, essentially, you are challenging me for my life and territory, and then have the sheer gall to-”

“Whut? I never threatened you!”

Vaal snorted. “You sure as hell did. In Draconic, flaring one’s wings is an invitation to a fight to the death. The only reason why your corpse has not yet been added to the bones that make up my kingdom is because I do not believe that was your intent, seeing that you would have no knowledge of the insult. But, I do think retribution is in order, for ignorance is no excuse. For the crime of disturbing the delicate balance of my kingdom, threatening me in the case of the black haired one, and being a general disturbance, I sentence you to one hour of Double Torture. Head Torturer, you may begin.``

The small feline and its friends prepared dozens of incredibly strong woven ropes, making very, very sure to thoroughly tie up the Chameleos and co., and then prepared two separate mixtures. He then had them pour the first mixture down his captive’s throats. Of course, he did not forget his promise to the yellow-haired one, ensuring that the dosage he received was less powerful, so that he would not be affected.

“W-what did you-” REIPPPP. Ah. Such a delightful sound. The first mixture was a special mushroom stew that made people release tremendous amounts of gas. In baby words, it would make people fart. A lot. Another side effect was that it would cause them to blurt out all their embarrassing secrets. Oh, ho, ho, he loved this part.

“Tai!” screamed Summer. “Remember that time I cut your pants off? Yeah, that wasn’t an accident!” RRRR IIIPPP.

“Summer! Remember that time I staggered drunk into the girl’s bath? Yeah, I wasn’t drunk! Glynda’s tits are massive!” PRRRIP. 

He didn’t understand half of the stuff, but that didn’t matter. It was the reactions to them: the blushes, the scandalized looks, all of it. Then, Vaal sprung the second part of his plan. “The antidote to my truth serum is in these bowls. But I should mention, they have some side effects!”

The Grimalkynes untied their hands just enough to let the five eat, but not enough that they could shovel down the cauldrons. The one with hair like Nargacuga fur noticed first.

“GAH! So spicy!” she yelled in between coughs from the spice. “And its lingering, to-Oh guy-ieeesss” this… Raven purred. Oh, ho ho, this one is going to be good, Vaal was on the edges of his claws from excitement… “I was the one to steal all the snacks from the fridge and spike them with laxatives! Muahahaha! Your faces were hilarious!” PRRRIIIP. “Wha… That was you!?” all of the others screamed out. The Chameleos was more resistant, but eventually, she too divulged her sin: “Guys? You know that one time where someone stole all your  clothes in that hot bath and everyone had to walk back with nothing but a towel on? That was me!” RRRIIPP. They then alternated from telling various embarrassing secrets he could use to blackmail them later on, or taking sips of the really, really spicy stuff, as they felt their tongues burning off. Of course, a reduced dosage for the sun haired one, so that he would finish first. Not like he needed it to: Tai, as he seemed to call himself, wolfed down the stuff, and surprisingly, the fire-haired one finished second. Now for the third part… “Now that two contestants have finished, we are moving on to the third and final torture! Feeding Torture!” He had the Grimalkynes thoroughly restrain  the three remaining ones, while the victors were released. Then the Grimalkynes poured a third mixture down the throats of the losers. “The ones who have finished last will be punished… WIth laxatives! But don’t worry: your current winners will be given a cure, and they will have to decide who to use it on!” The Grimalkynes handed a final bowl to the two winners.