A chuckle filled the air as a female stepped out into the open, “I’m surprised you noticed me.”
Ieros sighed inwardly, just women after women after women, what was it with this world and women? It was almost as if there was some outside power that was manipulating events to bring these women before him. But it would not let this power succeed, it is the Surveyor, the Shard of Darkness. It shall not be manipulated by the likes of this… thing. But as she stood before him, he noticed something very strange, the energy that was emanating from her was not that of a human. It was something that felt familiar to him and yet wasn’t the same feeling that Darkness had when it first beheld Night. Was this one of her spawn?
No, she wasn’t one of her direct lineages, although she was related to Night. She was a succubus, one of the children of Night’s daughter, Lust. But there were traces of something else, something that was currently beyond the Surveyor’s scope of knowledge. The father wasn’t a creature that inhabited Agleon, it was a denizen of another world, quite interesting but it doesn’t matter. He will come to know of this race, it was only a matter of time.
His attention was returned to her when she asked, “Hey! Are you okay?”
He nodded once again, keeping silent. He knew what succubi were like and was determined not to give her the chance to seduce him. Even one such as he would have trouble resisting the beauty of a succubus. There also seemed to be some aphrodisiac in the air but luckily, this was easily countered by increasing the curse’s effect to overtake his nose, thus eliminating the chance that his vessel may come under her control.
A bit put off that he did not respond verbally, the woman then asked, “Are you mute?”
Ieros said nothing, merely returning his attention to the darkened horizon, a slight orange glow highlighting the border between the night sky and the horizon. She was silent, frowning at being ignored. She was about to say something when she noticed the ominous way the shadows were moving, the air suddenly cold as they began to take the forms of various creatures, dancing around Ieros. She then saw one gigantic one take its place by Ieros’s side, the giant humanoid figure giving her a small glance before turning its gaze to the horizon.
As she beheld this bizarre spectacle, her ears caught the faint melody of a song, a song that the shadow creatures appeared to be dancing to. Suddenly a chill ran through her body, reminding her that it was uncomfortably cold up here on what should have been a warm summer night. But she just couldn’t seem to tear herself away from this strange sight, it had hypnotized her. Then after what seemed to be an eternity, she saw the shadow creatures then return to ordinary shadows, the mage now stirring. He, still ignoring her, summoned a door which had blackness within. He stepped through, the door disappearing once he had done so, leaving her alone. The sun had now fully set and the moon was now a fourth of its way through the sky, shedding its light onto the darkened city of Amartia.
She then breathed out, spreading her wings and flying up as close as she could to the night sky. She then gazed up into its dark depths, the presence of her grandmother calming her. She then thought back to when he had first looked at her, a dark void within the emptiness of his hood, just like a night without stars. She had been paralyzed by that gaze, feeling as if she was falling into a pit of absolute black as she stared into the depths of his hood. She felt cold looking within, terribly cold in that darkness which was devoid of anything living. She suddenly looked away from the night sky, for a moment feeling the same sensation as she had felt when looking into the darkness of his hood.
After a few moments, she laughed at herself, it wasn’t like her to be fixated on a guy like this. She was one who made men fall in love with her, not the other way around. She shook her head and then returned inside the palace, slipping through an empty window. She then disappeared into the winding halls of the palace, the moans of people indulging themselves in pleasure greeting her ears. She soon joined them, she was feeling a little peckish anyway.
The same sound was heard by the ambassadors who were having a hard time sleeping as a result. Ieros, aware of this, cast a noise barrier around their rooms, making it so that they were now isolated from the distracting moans. A bit surprised at the sudden silence, the ambassadors decided not to question it and went to sleep. Meanwhile, Ieros rested his body, the Surveyor spreading its influence to the surrounding landscape, its powers enhanced by nightfall. Suddenly, as it rapidly spread itself throughout the network of shadows, it suddenly encountered a presence far to the southeast.
There was another great power that lay there, one that was gradually growing in strength. Ieros surrounded this power and then after examining it, decided to promptly destroy it, crushing the powerful orc lord and his army. His army of shadows rose and began to slaughter them with ease as the orcs were unable to retaliate against their intangible flesh. Of course, the shadows couldn’t physically harm them either but they could attack their very lifeforce, if the body’s lifeforce was damaged, it reflected upon the body. For example, if a shadow blade was to slash through one’s arm, everything from the cut to the hand is then dead as energy no longer flows through.
That limb is then rendered useless for the duration of the fight and if the person survives, then for the rest of their lives. It what one could call the ultimate weapon, as it cannot be stopped by any means unless one is armored with the essence of Light. Then the shadow blade is unable to reach the target as it is disintegrated by Light’s power but mortals do not possess such armaments unless they have been personally blessed by Light. But the Dark Blade is not like the shadow blade at all, for it does harm the physical body as well as its life force, it is crystalline dark matter. Rather than cut, it eats any material before it, absorbing and converting the matter it “cuts”.
So it can “cut” through anything as it doesn’t split the atoms apart but rather creates a division by eating the material in between the two pieces of matter it “cuts”. Thus this is the true ultimate blade, the Dark Blade. Nothing can deny this blade, even the Shield of Light for this is crystalline dark matter, it has both the properties of Darkness and that of crystals, meaning that it both reflect and devour Light. With these two properties, this makes crystalline dark matter the ultimate form of Darkness.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
And it was this very blade which slew the Orc Lord, the Surveyor personally wielding the blade. Of course, before that, it had analyzed the orcs so that it could recreate them if necessary. It then wiped all traces of the battle and resulting damage to the forest clear, devouring the corpses and restoring the forest to its former state. Satisfied with its work, it then returned to Ieros’s vessel. It had already checked to see if anyone knew of the orc army but no one did so it was safe to kill them all. This was necessary, an orc army would certainly be a big enough nuisance to disturb the negotiations and it would prefer the negotiations to proceed as fast as possible.
But from the Orc Lord’s memories, his army was but the spearhead of an even larger horde, slightly worrying but the main army should not reach here before the negotiations are long finished. So it had nothing to worry about, if Amartia was to fall, let it fall. That was none of its concern anyways. It would have collected all the data it would have needed by then anyways and with observers, it would remember how Amartia would fall.
But it was still some ways off into the future, unless the main horde grows impatient, which was a high probability. Of course, it could just go over and slaughter the main horde too but that would mean preventing one of the greatest battles in history from taking place. This was a battle which held the fate of humanity and orcs on the line, should one fall, it would mean their enslavement and eventual extinction. It wanted this historic event to happen, and it had already got the ball rolling. The main horde would certainly be curious as to what slaughtered their expeditionary force and once they found out, they would invade with their full might.
Perhaps it would not participate in this war personally, that would be interfering too much. But it would also have to come up with a suitable excuse, perhaps the curse? That or it would intervene once it has decided how this world’s fate would go, to the enslavement and eventual annihilation of the human race or one where humanity advances to even greater heights using the orcs as manual laborers and such. Hmm, there is much to think about and much to simulate. It then spent the remainder of the night doing just that, finishing only half of the countless possibilities when morning came.
So far, out of the various futures that were possible, roughly half involved the orcs taking lead and in turn conquering all of Occasus, most of these futures ending in various civil wars which would lead to the decimation of their race. Then the Austerian Empire would take over and then rule. Of course, conquering all of Occasus was only possible due to the traits of the orc, being a warlike race who reproduced at a rate twice that of rabbits and grew up to maturity in five years. They were a race that seemed to be designed for war, possessing great strength, stamina, and endurance as well as numbers. You could compare them to the Crimex except they were constantly on the move, conquering nations and taking what resources they needed.
And it was exactly this which would be their downfall, they did not know how to be self-sufficient, they would turn on themselves when there was nothing else to eat. But a few million futures depicted a different scene, the orcs had become self-sufficient and were much like the humans, advancing their race to heights that not even humans had reached. All of this was due to the fact that the Orc Emperor had picked the right heir to his legacy. An orc that was exceedingly more intelligent than his fellows, one that would employ the humans correctly, using their higher intellect to plan for the building of the first orc cities, allowing the orcs to reach a higher level of education and thus ensuring that they would remain the dominant race in Occasus.
Yet the other half was an also interesting future, where humanity would continue its path of evolution to a higher race, eventually regaining the strength of their ancestors, the Premen. Using their long lost strength, they would eventually create an empire which would span across worlds, reviving technology of their ancient past to create the Gates, doorways to other worlds. Their armies would march through and conquer the other worlds, all in the name of their Emperor.
All of this was truly interesting, it couldn’t make a choice between them with the given amount of time. But then again, it didn’t have to, it was a fragment of Darkness, and not the human Ieros. It could do both, as it could travel through Time even if Time would not obey it. So it would merely let Nature take its course, to let the fates of Man and Orc to decide themselves. It then remembered End for a moment and sighed, her presence could ruin all of this.
It would have to subdue her in some way but her power could render nearly all of its barrier magic useless. It would have to sacrifice its own body to contain and then destroy her. Doing so would only leave a sliver of itself remaining and this sliver would require three millennia to regain a fifth of its original strength. It would have to make preparations now, to plant the seeds of fragments which would act as mortals. Of course, they would have no knowledge of it and thus would be like actual humans, the Surveyor collecting the data once their mortal lives come to an end.
Of course, all of this was educating guessing on its part, things could go very differently: End may successfully destroy both him and the world, she could also lose interest in destroying this world entirely or countless other options. But the one where he successfully contains and destroys her was the one of highest probability, 23%. That meant it wasn’t that trustworthy but there was still a good chance of it happening.
Its thoughts were disrupted by knocking on the door, it was time to become Ieros once more. So Ieros answered the door, the same maid nervously looking back at him.
She quickly bowed, “T-the K-King summons you t-to the D-Dining Hall.”
Ieros nodded, “Thank you for telling me. You may leave, there is no need for you to guide me.”
He then began to walk to the Dining Hall, the maid unsure whether to follow or leave. Eventually, she followed him, she had been ordered to guide Ieros and if she wasn’t found with him, that may lead to punishment. She feared that Ieros would get angry at her for following but to her relief, he said nothing. He once more entered the Dining Hall, everyone looking at him. He said nothing and took his seat, quietly asking one of the ambassadors if it was okay to eat. Once given the okay, he began to eat, each movement exact and efficient. He also used small gates in which to reach foods that were out his arm’s reach, tasting everything that was on the table. Everyone soon began to eat and resumed conversations that had been stopped when he had come in.