I returned my consciousness to my jewel, to the strangely comforting darkness of the pouch. I took a moment to reacquaint myself with the feeling of shorter-ranged senses, and then I dissolved Von Dominus and absorbed his essence. I felt Bertha move and shift before I was bouncing off her thighs as she exited the grotto.
“We’re heading to the mountaintop,” I said. “Anything we can’t kill, we’ll try to avoid. Let’s get there in one piece.”
With my two minions as an escort, I began the ascent to Shadow Crag’s peak.
My army was small, that was true, but it was the beginning of an empire.
Chapter Eleven
Bertha and Puck climbed the road toward the peak with my core safely tucked inside the half-troll’s pouch. Aside from the odd bump against her thigh, or Puck trying to make wisecracks, it was uneventful.
We encountered only a few monsters on the journey, and they were easily driven away by a snarl and a swipe from Bertha. Garbled sounds, the beat of the troll’s heart, and the constant thumping of my jewel inside her pouch didn’t give me any indication of what the creatures looked like. I could have extended my senses and examined them more closely, but my mind was elsewhere.
Right now, my priority was to finally set down my gem somewhere permanent. I aimed to dissuade creatures like the trolls or imps from taking my gem by consolidating both my essence and my power. If the creatures on our path were that easily scared away, they weren’t a direct threat or immediately useful. The threat of Gavin, however, wasn’t far behind. If Bertha’s way of speaking about him was any indication, he’d be a far more difficult fight than even Jeff.
When I’d finished outlining my plans, I turned my attention outward. My senses were getting a little stronger, and it seemed like I could actually use the bodies of my minions to get a better understanding of my surroundings. The vibrations of Bertha’s footfalls told me the pathway was much as it had been when my elf had climbed the mountain trail; it was loose slate, crumbling stone, and dust. When Puck drew closer, the manic beating of his furious wings made Bertha flinch slightly. This close to her body, I could feel every movement and slight shift, despite not being able to see through the fragmented, fractal-like vision of my gem’s surface.
We arrived at the mountaintop, and Bertha pulled me free of the pouch at my direction. I focused on the area to behold the top of the mountain. My vision was still short-ranged, but I could at least gaze across its peak while Bertha held me in her palm and panned across the landscape. It was a mostly flat section of obsidian with a smattering of other minerals in unnatural formations.
The beginning of my empire. The beginning of my bastion. All in honor of Lilith.
Well, at least until I found some way to conquer her and gain her powers for myself, but that was long-term.
As much as I enjoyed the sight of the mountain’s zenith, I felt distracted. In the half-troll’s hand, the Infernal Essence swirling inside her body was potent and powerful, not like the jagged and broken terrain composing the mountain.
I couldn’t really make out the details of the Infernal Essence living inside her. It seemed ephemeral, almost resisting closer inspection, but I focused further, and my magical sense enhanced the image. The Infernal Essence was distinct from the rest of the troll’s body, almost like a symbiote had latched onto her molecular makeup.
The essences carried a distinct marker, too, as though their creator had stamped a signature upon their atoms. I wasn’t sure how I knew, yet I could tell these foreign minerals were sprouted from another core, a long time ago.
When I pointed my attention beyond Bertha, I realized a similar substance existed on the mountaintop. It had merged with the very mountain itself, turning into a mingling of obsidian and something very different. Something unnatural. Something magical.
“This is a hallowed place,” Puck commented, and I guessed he also possessed some kind of arcane sense allowing him to see the substance.
“I feel it, too,” I transmitted to him, slipping again into our almost-comfortable form of telepathy for the first time in hours. “Did something else used to be here?”
“Possibly,” Bertha replied. “It has been a very long time since anyone wished to step foot on Zagorath’s peak. It is said to be cursed.”
“Cursed?” the imp questioned. “It is a place of power. Who would say it’s cursed?”
“Someone who doesn’t want anyone coming here,” I said, my silent words cutting through the ether. Lilith had wanted me to start my dungeon on top of this mountain, and I wondered what she knew that my champions and I didn’t.
Something rushed above me, and I extended my senses upward. I could detect a collection of large monsters flying in the air while their wings disturbed and pushed the air downward. Indistinct, dark shapes flickered at the edge of my vision, somehow tethered to the top of the mountain.
“Tell me what you see,” I willed my minions.
“Chained Varidus,” Bertha answered. “Their nest sits just behind the peak, but they won’t be any trouble unless antagonized. They cannot reach us because of the bonds tying them to their nest.”
I couldn’t tell whether the bonds were organic or if someone had fastened them there intentionally. They were almost like anti-aircraft weapons, defending the top of the mountain from any kind of threat. I briefly entertained a vision of dragons bearing down on the mountaintop with adventurers upon their backs while a horde of howling bat-demons attacked the riders.
Maybe a vision of a future event? I could certainly appreciate such a demonic horde slaying my dragon-riding foes.
Or—perhaps these varidus could be co-opted as defenses for my own dungeon?
They might prove useful should anyone try and assault my dungeon after I planted it. I wasn’t sure how I’d
