3.44: EXPLOSIONS!!!
“What do you mean you can't tell me about your skills?”
After closely studying my gorgeous fiancée's new body, I was eager to see what some of her new capabilities were… But instead of showing me anything, she insisted on keeping everything secret. I suddenly recalled that Bray had messaged the rest of my clan and told them to withhold any new abilities from me so they could potentially surprise me when I partook in the PvP challenge we were setting up. While I didn't like the idea of not knowing anything about my future wife's power-up, I understood the reasoning all the same.
“OK. You're right. You're right. Just promise me that once I kick your ass in this challenge you'll show me everything, K?”
Emelia's face broke into a wide grin as she rolled her eyes.
“We'll see how easily you kick my ass, my love… You, Hana, and Areandra did an excellent job with this form. Tier 7 enchantments are… to say they are overpowered is a bit of an understatement. You'll just have to see how overpowered when we finally start this PvP challenge.”
Hana got our attention by stepping forward and giving everyone an almost excited look.
“We are actually putting the finishing touches on everything for the challenge right now. Scythe helped me get the death enchantments set up a few hours ago. Now all that's left is for us to figure out how we're going to go about setting up some kind of portal to any of the angel cities. Gehenna offered some assistance in that regard, but we still need to figure out how to go about doing it without triggering any of them to potentially destroy their own Realmstones before we get the chance to establish the portal.”
“So… I was actually thinking about that when I was logged out earlier. Something Gehenna said to me earlier gave me an idea of how we might go about setting up something Angelspawn players can use. Instead of using a portal that is almost directly connected to the city, we just need to set up something in a neutral area close by and then use the quest system to draw players to it. Players want to complete quests… Especially the ones that offer the chance to earn awesome gear and tons of XP. We won't even have to do much beyond enticing players with a little ‘advertising’ and then getting them to accept the quest.”
“Advertising?”
“What better way to draw in players than by giving them a chance to 'destroy the evil demon overlord and her minions who are responsible for destroying the angel city Realmstones?'”
Gehenna's face couldn't hide her grin as she heard my idea of using the angel's own cowardice against them. The others seemed to share her enthusiasm, and they too wore excited smiles on their faces.
“If you like, Allie, I can teleport everyone to a suitable location that might work for your idea.”
“Sounds good, Gehenna. Although, we need to finish the 2nd half of my power-up plan and then you and I need to have a little chat first. Anyone else have anything pressing before we move on?”
When no one said anything, I nodded and looked over at Hana. I could tell that everyone except her and Areandra had no clue what was going on, and their confused expressions made me chuckle slightly.
“So… in addition to coming up with the idea for Em’s body, I think I devised a method to supercharge my own power. I’m not sure it will be as strong as some people’s ridiculously overpowered passive abilities, but it should make it so I’m not always having to unleash nearly all my power with the limiter during every fight. Well… that’s the idea anyways. I have no clue if this will even work the way I want it to. Also… now I’m kinda nervous about doing it since that whole 'tearing my chest out' thing happened with Em’s transformation. I’m not necessarily worried about me though… OK… Lemme just explain. So, my idea was to take the Bond of Corruption I share with Emelia, Nialla, Jade, Tifa, Tesrif, Judas, and Scythe and sort of copy a portion of their stats and add them to my own. I don’t think it will be much more than like 1 or 2%, at least that’s what my demon enchanter said… but even that should be enough to give me an edge in combat. Obviously the more people I gain this bond with, the more my own stats will go up… so… us doing all this recruiting is actually going to help in more ways than we initially thought.”
Emelia shot me a smirk and let out a soft chuckle through her nose.
“So are you telling me you have a justifiable reason to expand your harem of sexy women?”
I shot her a wry look and gave her a cocked grin.
“I mean… yes? But I don’t plan to recruit only women. There are a few decent male gamers around.”
I snorted in laughter as I thought about the irony of my statement, considering that gaming was primarily a male dominated activity. While the gaming industry as a whole has progressed by leaps and bounds, to this day there are still guys who will always view female gamers as inferior. That’s just one of the reasons I was so happy to surround myself with people who knew thinking like that was antiquated and back-asswards.
“Allexus is omnisexual… so I suppose I can forgo my own personal preferences when it comes to recruiting new members. As long as someone is a good fit for our clan, I don’t care what their gender is. The more good people we have, the stronger our clan will be, and the more of them that I corrupt, the stronger I will be. So… Hana, Areandra… you two ready?”
They both nodded and Hana pulled out the siphon shard that I had filled with the power from Jade and Tifa’s corruption. I did like I had before and corrupted this one with my [Corrupting Touch] and then handed it back to the Avatar of Efficiency. In a manner that was almost identical to what she had done with Emelia, she extended both of her hands towards me with her palms facing away from her, and I felt a rush of warmth pour outwards from her hands. Every cell in my body seemed to be heating up all at once, and it reached the point where it almost felt painful, and I quickly shot my eyes to Judas and Emelia to see if they were being affected at all. Em wasn’t showing any signs that anything was happening to her, but Judas was surrounded in a shifting black aura like someone had highlighted his body with a sharpie. I looked forward to Hana, and saw that she too, had the same aura. Even Areandra had the same strange flowing blackness surrounding her body, but hers was much fainter than the demon woman she stood next to. I was actually surprised to not see one around Gehenna, but I figured that was likely one of the things she had wanted to talk to me about.
I didn’t know how it was possible, but somehow the heat in my body intensified even further; but it never reached the point where it was painful or even uncomfortable. As the feeling warped and changed, it suddenly felt like every single part of me was being caressed and stimulated by a lover’s touch. I couldn’t fight back the gasp of pleasure as a wave of ecstasy coursed through me from head to toe. It felt as if I was basking in the warm afterglow of a thousand orgasms, and my eyes rolled back in my head as the pleasure only ramped up even more. Instead of my body feeling limp, however, I felt a power within me unlike anything I had felt before. A supernova of energy and pressure was welling up deep within my body, and I moaned loudly as it swelled more and more. I heard Gehenna shouting something, but I was too far gone in the throes of passion to understand anything. A bubble of black flames suddenly filled the room, and the only thing that I could see of the other people was the gorgeous Korean woman standing in front of me with her arms still outstretched. Everything felt as if it was suddenly shaking violently as even more intense pleasure raced up and down my body like lightning.
Then, all at once, everything exploded.
I felt an explosion of pleasure blast out of me from every cell in my body. I felt an explosion of power radiate outwards like a bomb had just detonated. I felt an explosion of stone, metal, and fire engulf the area around me until all I could see was ash and smoke. As everything crashed and burned around me, I found myself hovering in place, held aloft by a wave of shifting darkness. I heard another rumbling sound and then the haze that was obscuring everything quickly cleared. I looked around at the room where I had been, and saw the cratered ruins of what used to be part of my castle. I saw that Hana had shifted and rearranged the castle so that the ruined section had been removed, much like a surgeon cutting out a tumor. I gave her a sheepish look as I smiled at her and the rest of my clan members standing behind her.
“So… uh… That happened.”
The others chuckled softly, but they still looked around at the surrounding area with complete shock. Emelia stepped forward, and as she moved towards me, I noticed that instead of walking, her feet hovered about 8 inches off the ground. A light trail of ice formed beneath her dangling feet on the ground as she moved forward, but it melted quickly as if it had never been there only a few seconds after she had passed.
“Did it work?”
I didn’t even need to open my character menu to know that it had. The power coursing through my body was… indescribable. I felt like I could tear apart entire worlds with my bare hands; like everyone and everything around me was just specks of sand compared to the might I now possessed. I felt… like a fucking god. As I finished looking down at my body with amazement, I flicked my eyes upwards towards my fiancée and then in the next breath I was standing next to her. I hadn’t even felt myself move, and from the look of absolute shock on everyone else’s face, they hadn’t seen me move either. I reached up and grabbed onto my floating future wife’s hips and then pulled her down into me. She cocked an eyebrow, but allowed me to press my body against hers.
“Em… It more than worked. I feel… godlike.”
Gehenna stepped forward and I shifted my weight and turned as I held up an arm to invite her to join our embrace. She hesitated for only a second before moving to my side and wrapping both me and Emelia in a tight hug. After a moment she pulled away, and Em followed suit. The current demon empress gave me a slightly concerned look and I cocked my head to the side.
“Allie, the power flowing off of you is unlike anything I have felt before. The angels and whoever has it out for you are right to fear you…”
Gehenna glanced back and looked at the small gathering of clan members before turning back to me.
“May I speak with you in private. Well… you and Emelia. I feel now more than ever it is imperative that we discuss something that I’m sure you already sensed.”
I nodded and turned to my friends.
“Hana, Areandra, I cannot thank you enough for figuring out Em’s new form and my own power-up. You ladies are proving just how invaluable you are to me and the clan.”
They both gave me huge smiles and Hana bowed her head slightly.
“Unless you plan to blow up any more of the castle, Allexus, I think I’m going to log off for the night. I’m eager to discuss my thoughts on moving forward the next time I see you. Will you be online tomorrow?”
I nodded and returned her grin.
“Yeah, not sure when, but I’ll shoot you a message when I plan to log in.”
“Sounds good. Emelia, Areandra, Judas, Gehenna… have a good night.”
Hana’s form suddenly disappeared and I watched as the others slowly walked back towards the castle. They all looked at the ruined section of the room we were standing in as they made their way inside. When it was just me and my two demon wives, I turned back towards Gehenna and let out a slow sigh.
“Alright, my love. I’m guessing that whatever you’re going to tell me has something to do with the fact that my corruption didn’t take effect on you. So… What’s up?”
“You are correct, Allie. I could actually feel your Bond of Corruption attempting to take hold, but I couldn’t bring myself to allow it to happen. I’m… still nervous about handing over my title to you. I’m not saying I’m not going to… I just want to make sure you are completely ready when I do.”
When Gehenna saw the look of confusion written on Em’s face, she quickly explained everything that she had had to see and deal with in regards to the game making moves against me. Emelia soon had a look of concern that mirrored the demon empress’s, and she furrowed her brow as she considered everything that Gehenna had said.
“While I understand your reasoning for not wanting to give all that power and responsibility to Allie when you could use it to protect her, wouldn’t it make more sense for her to use that power to protect herself, instead? The game is obviously going to come after her… and you can’t protect her every minute she’s logged in. It makes far more sense to give Allie the means to deal with whatever the game can throw at her, and then use your own tremendous power to back her up instead of handling everything yourself. That is part of the reason you wanted to join the clan... yes?”
Gehenna looked thoughtful for a moment and then smiled softly at Em as she nodded.
“You are as wise as you are beautiful, Emelia. It is no wonder the system already sees you as the Empress Consort.”
She let out a long sigh and turned towards me. I saw a thousand emotions swirl across her face and moved to take her hands into mine.
“Hey, it will be alright, Gehenna. I can handle whatever comes at me. And with you and Em by my side… I will be unstoppable.”
The beautiful demon woman’s golden eyes stared into mine and she held my gaze for what felt like a full minute before she spoke.
“Alright, Allie…Let’s do this thing.”