There were no lights in the room ahead. The light seemed to radiate a few feet from me, and as I walked forward, it moved with me. Not ten paces in, a new light shone down to the side of the hall. Like a spotlight, it illuminated a few people, each absolutely lifelike, but somehow faintly transparent. Illusions, no doubt.
I beheld a scene of a little girl with pale skin and black hair surrounded by thugs. The meager rags she wore as clothes were covered in filth and stains. Her hair was matted and ratty, her feet covered in scabs and small cuts common to those with no shoes. One thug held a knife to her throat, but she stood there, defiant, not a tear to be seen in her eye, not a whimper escaping her lips. Those were not the eyes of a victim cowed, but of a captive filled with hate and vengeance, a promise of a reckoning yet to come. A backhand to the face knocked her off her feet, but, shakily and with great effort, she regained her footing to stand tall once again, her expression calm but her eyes betraying her true emotions. She would rip them all limb from bloody limb given half the chance.
The thug with the knife drew the blade across her throat, but not skilled or tender enough that it did not nick her in a few places. They laughed as they tormented her, but she stood her ground, defiant to the end. A drop of blood fell from the blade to land in her shadow, the sound of it hitting seemingly echoing through the halls. With my keen perception, I saw the drop of blood absorbed, not into the ground, but into her shadow itself. As if it were an offering received favorably, a shadowy figure rose from the ground, forming a twisted specter of umbral smoke and bone, one with clawed hands and horns coming out of his skull. Only tendrils of shadow existed below its waist, and it hovered in the air silently.
The thugs did not even seem to notice until a clawed hand suddenly ripped the throat out of one of them. Their laughter stopped as they froze, each not knowing what had happened. Before any could bolt away, the specter continued to lash out, felling each of them in the blink of an eye.
The girl did not move, but she calmly looked upon the specter before her as a smile illuminated her face, not one of mundane joy, but one of eerie satisfaction and desire. The specter hovered before her, not even an arm’s length away, but she did not flinch.
“Brave for one so little, standing your ground when hopelessly outmatched. Your stalwart resilience shed light on their cowardice, and thus their craven nature betrayed their reasoning, sending them to scurry like worthless vermin. Serve me, and I will grant power unto you, and the world will tremble at your passing.”
The specter spoke in a soothing voice, calm and inviting, while its voice echoed in grating cries of anguish throughout the halls as I looked on in intrigue. But the girl did not mind; she only nodded. The specter circled behind her, embracing her in its arms. Its jaw unhinged unnaturally wide as if to swallow her head whole, and then it bit into her. But the girl remained unharmed, the specter simply phasing into her body and merging with her form.
The scene faded, the light dimmed back to normal blackness, and I pressed on, feeling a little unsettled. A few paces away, a new scene appeared. The same girl appeared, but older, and moderately cleaner. Whereas before she may have been seven or eight years old, now she possessed the form that suggested eleven or twelve years of age. I observed a village in flames behind her as she fled into a forest dark and dreary. The armed men putting the town to the sword did not follow, and as she fled, the forest grew darker still.
Not a minute later, the same girl found herself surrounded by wolves, their hackles raised as they circled her, looking for an opening. She stood her ground calmly, glaring at them as she recovered her breath from the run. One cautiously approached her, ready to lunge for her throat or leap away at a moment’s notice. Her placidity gave way to determined resolve, her expression hardening as she stood there with arms akimbo in deep disapproval of the pack’s actions. She leaned down over the snarling wolf, and even though it growled at her menacingly, she stood firm.
Then, as if it had caught the scent of death itself, the wolf yipped and cowered in a submissive posture before scurrying away with its tail between its legs. The remainder of the pack faltered in confusion, before they too felt the same effect and likewise vacated the area. The girl pressed on, not slowing her march as more terrifying beasts lingered in the shadows, stalking her every move. But none dared approach, and the scene seemed to skip to where she left the forest, undaunted and unharmed. Then that scene too faded, and I likewise continued on.
More scenes of the girl appeared as I pressed on. She got older each time, so they were presumably sequential. I witnessed her sparring with someone much older, perhaps her mentor, and he battered her around the training yard, but she never complained or quit. This played out several times as the seasons changed. Her muscles filled out more each time, her speed and poise improved, and soon she was holding her own. The scene finished with a nod from her mentor as he gave her a real sword of fine quality, if not ornate design. They bowed to one another, and she left.
The same girl, perhaps 16 now, knee deep in monster guts as she waded through giant worm creatures that just kept coming despite the carnage she wreaked. She had some cheap armor now, but it appeared rather battered and gory from her struggle with the worms. The girl, now a woman perhaps in her early twenties, in some dark and ancient temple, donning the armor I now knew her to wear. The woman, clad in armor macabre, casting aside the sword given to her by her mentor, drawing her signature zweihänder from the skull of the ancient remains of some colossal beast in the depths of the earth. The woman, astride a dragon of gleaming and metallic yellow scales with black edges as she bombarded the artillery positions below. The woman, battered and broken, her body leaning against a tree, unmoving, as a shadowy specter with a skeletal body, clawed hands, and horns on its head, cradled her in its arms.
The hall continued for a long way, but no new scenes presented themselves despite the ample space. Perhaps her story had drawn to an end, or perhaps it had only just begun, for what scenes I had witnessed only occupied a small fraction of the hall.
I walked for what felt like hours, but I drew no nearer the end. I turned back to see if anything behind me may indicate what I needed to do, but dark shadows coiling around pillars and wafting through the air obstructed my view. When I turned forward again, I nearly jumped backwards as I found myself before a massive wooden desk. Mahogany, if I were to guess, given its reddish-brown hue and the dearth of imperfections to the grain.
At the desk sat a proportionally large skeleton so oddly dressed. Perhaps three or four times larger than a normal man, the large skeleton wore a button-up shirt of sky blue, a zesty yellow tie with little black hydra silhouettes on it, a fake and long white beard as clearly evidenced by the string going around his head, and on his head he wore the cheese hat as seen at the festival. He even wore a pocket protector with four different pens in it. His desk was full of stacks of paperwork, each neatly arranged in an orderly grid, and without bothering to look at me, he took a page from a large stack, looked it over despite not having any eyes, and then slapped down a stamp on it before placing it on another stack.
“I know what you’re thinking.” His mouth did not move as he spoke, but his voice still carried to me just fine. It was the same voice as the specter, calm and reassuring, but echoing cries of pain and fear as it reverberated through the halls. “I look ridiculous, don’t I?” Not once did he bother to look at me, for he continued to process the paperwork as he waited for a response.
“It is as you say,” I replied.
“How politically polite of you,” he replied dryly. “But you also fear me because I look so ridiculous. You probably expected me to be macabre in appearance, just like my little Skull is fond of. You don’t know what to expect from me, do you?”
“I do not, nor do I know why I am here.”
“Hmmph,” he replied as he stamped down extra hard on the page before him. “You took my favored daughter, the apple of my eye, my most cherished flower, and gallivanted off on a reckless attack without full knowledge of enemy capabilities and with no means of reinforcements to bail you out.” His voice rose in volume and authority as he spoke, the room trembling with every word uttered. “And now she lies broken, dying, because you failed to protect her, and you barge here into my halls and just saunter up to me, expecting me to do something about it!” Anger roiled through his words, but he still did not look at me. He processed paperwork faster and faster, his stamp becoming a blur as it smashed down furiously on each page.
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
I could feel my body trembling. Angering a god was not on my to-do list, and here I was, being taken to task for my shortsighted endeavors. I dared not avert my gaze, and though my instincts howled at me, demanding that I run away screaming, I stood my ground.
“Yes,” I replied quietly, barely more than a whisper, but the full amount of what I could muster.
He set his stamp aside as he stopped grabbing more papers to process. “You know what I think of your little stunt?”
He leaned over the desk at me, his body stretching unnaturally as his face lowered to be right in front of me. I was not sure if it was rhetorical, but after a pause and an expectant look that I somehow discerned despite the lack of facial features, I felt compelled to reply.
“No.”
That time I spoke with a little more confidence. To back out now was to be destroyed. Gulthar, the god of Fear, despises the craven, and to insult him by showing cowardice in his own home would be a sin. Knowing that was one thing, but acting accordingly took every fiber of my self-control to maintain discipline in the face of such adversity.
“I think it was fucking epic.”
I blinked as he reeled back to his desk. He let out a deep belly laugh as he slapped his hand down on his desk a few times. Papers flew everywhere, but a stern glance for him had them favoring returning to whence they came rather than obeying the laws of physics. He continued to laugh for a while before he could compose himself once more.
“1,218. That is how many people there pissed their pants in fear. 27. That is how many fainted. 65,212. That is how many people were afraid of the two of you as you performed your bombing run.” He leaned back, grabbing a pipe from seemingly nowhere, taking a puff from it before tossing it over his shoulder where shadows swallowed it up. “Ah, I haven’t had a rush like that in years.” He leaned towards me again. “Sure earthquakes and stuff scare people and on a larger scale, but they don’t quite pack the punch of a giant monster rampaging nearby, where a simple whim could cause it to bring devastation your way.”
He cleared his throat, despite not having one, then took out some reading glasses and donned them. He grabbed a little card on his desk and prattled off to me in an impassionate voice.
“You have been found to be in violation of 34-019B, reckless endangerment of a champion of a god. You have been found to be in violation of 34-018A, grievous bodily harm to the champion of a god through negligence. You have been found in violation of 15-100, entering the domain of a god from an unauthorized location.”
He rattled on for some time, clearly not very interested in what he had to say. Before he finally arrived at the last part.
“Your punishment will be determined by the god against whom the crimes have been committed. Any attempt to circumvent punishment will result in further divine retribution. You must sign the provided form to acknowledge that you have been informed of your transgressions.
“Yadda, yadda, yadda,” he said as he handed me a form to sign. It contained a bunch of legalese about what he had talked about, but it did not list my punishment. I signed it and he snatched it back from me, placing the document in a pile while seemingly satisfied. He removed his glasses, and together with the card, threw them over his shoulder much like the pipe before.
“Are you ready for your punishment?”
He somehow grinned even wider despite no movement to his jaw and possessing no facial features. It was more that I could feel his expressions and emotions and his presence loomed larger.
“I am.”
I didn’t like the present circumstances, but I had to face the music, so to speak. There was not even a trial, just an assumption of guilt and some paperwork.
“Very well.” He cleared his non-existent throat again. “You are tasked with keeping Skull company, to be her companion, to help foster her growth, and to protect her as she continues to serve me. She will follow you wherever you go, and through you, she will sow terror and fear until such time that I call her home or release you from your punishment. Also, you must perform one labor for me in the future when I deem you strong enough to complete it. Do you accept the punishment as described to you?”
It didn’t seem that bad, but I felt sure that if I looked deep into the details, I would find a devil or two. There had to be a catch or something I was missing, but nothing could be done about it, so I would just have to take it in stride. Not one in a position to talk back to a god, I give my response in a succinct manner “I do.” The deal felt slimier than a used-wagon salesman, but with no other divine powers coming to my defense, I would have to grin and bear it.
“Very good.” He leaned down to me again, his hand placed up to my ear as he whispered into my ear conspiratorially. “Also, you should probably heal her posthaste before she succumbs to her injuries. It would be bad form for you to fail in this task almost instantly.”
“Uh, how would I do that? I don’t have any good healing Skills for other people or any potent healing potions on me.”
“You have the blood of dragons in your veins. You are not some [Drake], [Wyvern], or other such paltry beast, but a [Dragon Emperor]. That is not a lesser dragon, but a top tier [Dragon] Blessing. A single drop of your blood into her mouth, combined with my divinity, should do the trick. We gods are not supposed to interfere directly, but I can… ‘amplify’… your blood to make it potent and stable. Also, entirely strip her of her armor and clothes immediately after administering your blood. She will be totally pissed if it gets damaged as a result of you not doing so. She will be in her right and true state of mind, just… uninhibited.”
I turned to face him, not sure as to the full implications to his words, but he simply winked at me. Not that he had eyes or glowing light in his eye sockets to follow, but rather that the bone of his skull reformed to temporarily close over his socket. He then leaned back to his desk to sit upright.
“Any questions?”
“I do have one question. What is with all the paperwork?”
“You come into the halls of the Dark god of Fear and Courage to ask why he processes paperwork?”
“Well, that was not my original reason for being here, but I am curious.”
“Hmmph. Not a bad question. Since you and Skull are here together, this realm and my appearance are a mix of what you each would fear. Skull’s greatest fear is being chained to a desk and forced to fill out paperwork. I am already reprimanding her in another instance of this hall. She knows full well that if she dies again before her time, that will be exactly what is in store for her. It is only by my grace and divine power that her soul does not pass to the hereafter. And you two better get a move-on, because divine power doesn't grow on trees. Now scram, before you two drain me dry with your dawdling.”
And with that, it was if some giant, invisible hand grabbed me by the scruff of my neck and dragged me backwards out of his hall. I accelerated faster and faster until the hall became a blur, passing once more briefly to The Void before returning to reality.
Not wasting any time, I removed Skull’s helmet. I cut my finger and let a drop of blood fall into her mouth, my wound healing over before the blood even completed its journey. Taking the word of a god at face value and not wanting to piss Skull off, I immediately began stripping her. She mentioned going to orgies, so she probably was not that shy. Either way, I did my best to show respect and preserve her dignity.
I laid her body on the ground on some bedding I pulled out of my pocket dimension. I used my Skills to flatten the earth and to create a dome of stone around us with an air hole near the top. I placed illuminators on the walls, and, satisfied that we had some privacy, I turned away as her body healed. I could hear her bones snapping back into place, which sent a shudder of sympathetic memory through my body.
When she woke, she spun me around to face her. She pounced me, easily overpowering me with superior strength as provided by her Blessing. Her eyes glowed golden with elongated pupils, just like mine as a dragon. She pinned me down, her body pressing against me as her mouth lunged for my neck. I couldn’t stop her if I tried, and I felt hot lips press onto my neck as she kissed me passionately.
“I want you,” she whispered sweetly into my ear.
Now I understood the words of Gulthar, in why I should strip her naked, of how she and I would be companions. Given that I had prior approval from Chooka and that I viewed Skull as a beautiful and desirable woman, I saw no reason to deny her request.
She was aggressive and passionate, truly bereft of inhibitions, much as Gulthar had promised. Spirited and brimming with stamina, it took many hours and several bouts to sate her lust. I had only wished that the circumstances had been different, for it all felt a little forced upon her. I knew not if she truly consented, but considering she was the one pinning me down and having her way with me, I am not sure who would be the victim here if this were not consensual.
After completing the consummation of our companionship, she snuggled up to me and fell asleep. I must admit that I too felt exhausted, not only from our most recent activities, but also from having healed my body a dozen or more times over from death’s door. And so we both slept as the world outside continued. Surely the war would manage itself for a time with the two of us absent for a spell.