It was time.
My eyes popped open.
I could feel the Curse percolating across the Marks of the six I’d spread out among the girls. No interference, no contamination, no infiltration, no corruption.
I teleported across to Garmaspire, flowing around the Interdiction zones in the way, ending up outside the warehouse. I entered through a side access that wasn’t used much, and skated on down to the main area, threading my way through the bins of clothing and the robots adding and removing boxes of apparel both plain and colorful to the recessed door that couldn’t even be seen from the side access, and stepped inside.
The Curses were blue and black, and starting to glow golden.
I was actually going to sit here and watch Hags like myself getting born. It felt kind of surreal.
I reinforced the Interdiction about this place, making any form of a planar breach nigh impossible short of the direct hand of a god, who shouldn’t even know this bunch of Nulls existed. Then, all I could do was stand there and wait as the Curse sucked in power to each of them, magical power which no human alive dared wield without threatening their soul, and with power older and vaster than any Warp God, put it to work according to its mandate.
Redemption of the Evil...
Everything was going fine, power was coursing into the not-at-all identical young women there. Yeah, okay, they could all wear one another’s clothes. But skin and hair colors were all greatly different, as were faces.
All had black nails and double canines, however. Annis Hagchild 4ever- ugh?
What?
I inhaled through six sets of lungs, and my eyes flashed open.
I was... oh shit...
Six tubes hissed at the motion, and began to empty as they registered full consciousness. Tubes sucked out liquid from lungs, but it didn’t matter, there was still going to be retching, choking, and rather violent defecation, all to be expected.
I stared as I went through it six times over.
The Markdoor was wide open, and I couldn’t close it. The six were circling around my primary self like stars on a crown.
Their Sama Rantha downloads had instantly harmonized with mine through the Markdoor, and they’d conveniently plugged into me for the latest updates and reality.
Oh. Oh, crap. Now I knew the real reason why Mom didn’t keep a Mark link with me. Because her mind would have been wearing my soul and skin, and who wanted to do that to her child? I had totally assumed the Markdoor staying shut was enough insulation, and the fact I wanted to be able to monitor the mental and spiritual development of the girls had been my entire impetus for doing this, as I didn’t want to risk any infection or corruption from outside sources.
The new six of me were down on hands and knees, puking and coughing up the last of the amniotic fluid they’d been born in.
They were basically Advanced clone-equivs of what I had been when I woke up almost four years ago. Same physical condition, same degree of Karma applied, same pre-programmed muscle memory and conditioning. Only they’d downloaded all of me through the Marklink, instead of just the Sama Rantha core files, and since I was right there, they were done first.
Golden light flared in blue on black, and Curses were completed. Two hundred and fifty more pairs of eyes flashed open in confusion simultaneously, hands popping up to press on the tubes.
“At ease, girls. You’ll be out of the tubes and puking in no time,” I assured them, Vajra voice making sure they heard and didn’t do anything drastic. “I’m going to call you all Sama for now, although you aren’t. I’ll explain what’s going on as soon as you get out of incubation and finish puking, shitting, and coughing out crap.”
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
They recognized the snark despite themselves. They weren’t afraid, of course... we were all Dauntless.
Machinery worked, fluid drained, urine was blown out violently by Vajra-active Hags, and soon the tubes opened so they could all step out, fall down, and hack and heave out all together, a-one and a-two...
“While you’re being marvelously uncomfortable with your new selves, I hereby inform you that you have all just been born, so today is your birthday. Congratulations. You are not a transmigrator, you are not transpossessed. You are a Rantha Hag, upgraded from a Rantha Hagchild by the power of the Curse to give you an instant Karma Equivalent of a Seven, which should vastly ease your ability to fit into the world you find yourselves in.
“Part of the process involves assigning base Feats and Masteries to ensure that you get your basic Vajra active, and your Visual File up and going. As a matter of fact, those should be listed out for you.”
I could feel their brains working by how their hacking and puking got a little distracted. A few breaths later, waves of Vajra force traveled down them, and all the goo, gunk, and filth was shoved off them by Vajras, and slowly and uncertainly, they all began to stand up.
Pair by pair, rank by rank, level by level, until everyone was looking at me there in the middle of them, mostly because I was the only one with clothes on.
“Welcome to life. You are all now Rantha Hags, descended from me. I went through a very weird and accelerated actual childbirth from your grandmother, whose situation you will learn in the future,” I went on as everyone looked at me and didn’t say anything.
“Everyone here is a Rantha Hag. We all have the same core memories, and core programming of being one Sama Rantha, a game character in a profound video game called the Power of Ten, which well and truly was made by an actual Archmage and had magical effects.
“The game character that is us was appropriated by a certain paladinic god we all know and respect, and used to change the fate of a Hagchild, called Sama Rantha. She, in turn, has used the Hag Curse to pass that coding and template on to us, and also subvert the Curse of the Hag.
“If you are wondering how that is possible, it is because all of you have souls that fell to Evil, and so the Curse is your punishment.”
They all blinked at the same time in shock.
“I know this is true, because I know all your original souls and what was done to them. Shortly, you will, too. In the meantime!” I looked around at everyone, pointed to a door at the end of the room. “Clothes, through that door! Everyone grab a Band, and the Sword and Shield Foci there. I regret that I couldn’t equip you all with QL 55 transcendent adamantine weapons, but I’m not that rich yet.”
Twelve score and more voices laughed out together, and glanced at one another in appreciation that didn’t care about the eeriness of it.
They were all actually half-sisters, and the Hag Sisterhood bond was in full effect.
We were family! It was such an overpowering sensation, looking at all of them and knowing they were all my daughters, that I rocked back on my feet.
I was Mom. Of course they trusted me!
Branded Rantha daughters flowed towards the door, seeing in one another the same control, the same Wave Skating Steps. It was almost Cadence, but not quite, more Vajra harmony riding the air.
I went down into the large empty modeling room below. It was meant for showing off new clothing designs for parties and crowds and stuff, and certainly could seat everyone needed. Now it had clothing and basic kit laid out, and Rantha Hags zipped through the obvious line, grabbing everything and finding a place to put it all on with easy grace and speed.
Yeah, I only had three color schemes, but that was enough to basically cover all the basic types required, and I certainly had the sizes down.
I also had mirrors set up so they could all look at themselves, raise them eyebrows at the lack of cleavage, and inspect the heavenly gams and derriere and proportions they got otherwise.
AND the remnant Curse Brand in all its blue-black glory, but that would be something we could also do something about. At least every remnant pattern was unique.
I waited patiently while they all got themselves dressed up, adjusted one another, and tried out new hairstyles on the spur of the moment, waves of different looks sweeping around the place. Some of them had natural off-human hair hues that only inspired delight and envy from others.
“Alright, if you could clear the tables away and find some seats while I get the rest of this basic introduction done, my darlings?” I called out. The snark was in, and they chortled despite themselves. In a breath, the empty tables were broken down and thrown/handed off to the sides neatly, and everyone sat down on the floor smoothly, perfectly placed and orderly, spaced to within an inch of perfection... and an inch above the floor, too.
“First item of business: Hello! I’m Sama Rantha II, your mother and the daughter of Sama Rantha, your grandmother, who is currently on heavy duty in Warp Space and can’t come in.”
“Hi, Mom!” they all promptly said cheerfully, waving at me, and I had to smile.