I turned my consciousness back to Abby, and her mind crackled as if she was blushing.
“Want a tour?” I asked. “I’ve another slot for a champion, and it might be worth scouring the mountain’s peak for something useful.”
“I’d be honored.” Abby summoned her avatar, and the light-haired woman appeared on the newly clean surface of my First Floor.
Abby sat on the stair, her tension and fear starting to relax. Despite everything she’d told me about trust, she did trust me. Or she was willing to, at least.
I laughed at that from my jewel. “I have a gift for you, over by the plinth. I may need it later but carry it for me, will you?”
The pig-sticking dagger I’d designed for myself shifted from its original position and emerged from liquid obsidian beside Abby. She shifted, surprised, then took the weapon in her hand.
I glanced back at Puck, his consciousness still latent in one of my facets. He felt peaceful and I suppressed a laugh. If I was going to even be flirting with the idea of dominating Abby, he’d make things more difficult than they had to be. I resolved to summon him later.
Von Dominus materialized next to Abby’s avatar, and I possessed the elf. His skin was clean and his muscles fresh. My core seemed to both repair and bathe him whenever I returned him there. He still didn’t have a shirt, so I’d have to figure out how the clothes worked soon. Abby seemed to appreciate my avatar’s muscular torso, so maybe it could wait a little while.
As my eyes combed over the hooded cloak of my new acquaintance, I had to admit I wanted something like that for myself. If I wanted to intimidate adventurers and make a striking entrance against seasoned professionals, I was going to need to work on my presentation.
Still, baby steps. Slowly but surely, I would get there.
“Shall we?” I held out my hand, and Abby blushed all the more as she took it.
“The decoration is wonderful,” she said as we crossed the vast chamber. “Maybe a little dark for me, but the geometric patterns are quite something.”
The beautiful avatar’s eyes lingered on the patterns, watching the way they curled into each other. Rough representations, maybe, of winged bats, teeth, and curling demon claws, but I took a lot of pride in my work. If Abby’s admiration was any indication, it was paying off. She shook her head with wonder at the side altars, and I pointed out the vents, hiding my demonic Hellbats above.
“It works as its own kind of trap.” I grinned. “Adventurers may take their prizes, but they still have to fight for them. The promise of rewards will bring more visitors to my lair, but I suppose you already know all this? What did you use for bait in your dungeon?”
“I didn’t have a lot of traps,” she admitted. “I wanted my dungeon to reflect the beauty of Ciryli.” A note of pride crept into her tone. “Adventurers came not to die, but to appreciate the beauty of my halls. I was almost like a little temple of the storm goddess, and she protected me in turn.”
“What did your dungeon look like? I know it was beautiful, but was it on a mountain-top or perhaps deep within a catacomb?”
“It was a tower structure. Very high in the air. So high, the clouds brushed against my entrance.”
I raised an eyebrow at her suggestive word choice, suppressing a grin. “So, adventurers had to make quite the effort before finding your . . . entrance?”
Abby nodded happily but didn’t seem to catch my double meaning.
“How did you collect their essence, then?” I asked.
Abby smiled. “You might be powerful, Von Dominus, but I had my ways. Adventurers would gift me their Soul Essence in order to enter through my gates.”
“Since we’re keeping things informal, call me Dom.”
“As you wish,” she replied. “Dom.”
I smiled at her as I led her up the stairs to the antechamber. “So, you charged them a fee?”
She nodded. “A significant price, but a fair one.”
“How did you stop them if they just wanted to barge in?”
“I didn’t,” she said. “They respected the treaty. At least, all of them did until Karlyle.”
“You’ll have to take me to the Storm Realm one day,” I said as I stopped her on the final stair. “I’d love to see the Temple of Ciryli. I’d also love to see what became of your dungeon. Maybe I could even help you bring it back to life?”
“I don’t know how long it’s been since I was taken from there,” Abby said, her voice growing suddenly small. “Ciryli might even have replaced me by now.”
I chewed over that sentence. If cores were a way for the gods to leverage power over each other while also maintaining a balance between both the guilds and the monsters, then Abby had a fair point. Who was to say that Lilith didn’t already have other cores from my world back home, growing in similar power in the Infernally-infused corner of the Sinarius Realms?
“If that’s the case,” I said, bumping her shoulder playfully with mine, “I’ll find you something far more fitting. You can just build like I did, something a hundred times better than your original dungeon. If Ciryli thinks you’re replaceable, you’ll just have to prove her wrong, won’t you?”
Abby smiled at that. “You think just because you can break the rules, that suddenly the rest of us can do that? Start our own dungeons and take over the Sinarius Realms? Ciryli gave me my location; I am forbidden from building anywhere else.”
“And you’re just meant to curl up and die now? Ciryli was meant to protect you, but she didn’t. You don’t owe her anything at all.”
Abby didn’t have an answer to that, but as I led her into the antechamber, I saw a new spring in her step. The shyness was starting to flow away from her as though she
