She was looking at the Volcano ahead of her. It was close, so close. Not much further now. Back in town, when she arrived, she had nicked a tourist guide brochure. Given it was still night time, that wasn't particularly hard to take from a stand full of them, giving them out to tourists to encourage more and more tourism.
The land around it was covered in ash.
Yang gulped.
It was an active volcano, then.
No matter. She's not a little girl anymore, she wasn't afraid. She was going to go in, find reds, and if anything bad happens, the reds and browns will protect her. She could protect herself too, of course. She had learned some magic other than the fireball spell that came with the Tower Heart. Not many new spells, as they were hard to learn when she was young and lack the appropriate foundation. Spell Totems were a very nice shortcut in that regard. She could fight too, with her large great sword. She could brawl pretty good as well, although Gnarl had called it "not Overlord-like". Shows what he knows about fun.
There was a giant entrance, like a tunnel, into the depths of the large mountainous volcano.
She ventured forth. The heat was almost unbearable, to both her, and her armorless Minions. Still, she would let such a little thing stop her. She soon came across two splitting paths. One went upwards, to the top of the volcano, the other lead downwards towards the volcano's core.
Down she went. It was likely the Reds were there if they are here at all, Yang thought.
After five more minutes of walking, Yang encountered some strange red beetle-like creatures that spat fire at her. Not expecting it, it had hit her, although her armor protected her. Infuriated, the Minions rushed the beetle and made short work of it. They presented the beetle's red Life Force as a gift to her.
"That was a Magma beetle, Sire!", Gnarl helpfully informed her telepathically through the bond she shared with the Tower Heart. The Tower Heart allowed her Advisor to contact her telepathically through great distances, although she can always have the Tower Heart refuse such contact.
"If the Magma beetles find this area pleasant to live in, there's a good chance that the Reds would as well.", Gnarl explained, "You must hurry, Master, find the Red Minions and recovered their hive!"
"I'm going, I'm going", Yang grumpily responded.
Indeed not long after, they found the first sign of Minion activity. They found a lone Red Minion wandering around, exploring the volcano or maybe in search of something.
She gathered her willpower, and flung it at the Red to get its attention. She didn't take control of him, like she had her other Minions. She had 10 Minions already under her control, she couldn't control more at the same time without verbal commands. 10 Minions stretched her willpower to its limits. More training, time, or magical artifacts could help to lessen the issue.
The Red turned at her. They were separated by a deep chasm, at the bottom of which was only magma.
"Overlord!", the Red Minion happily exclaimed, happy to finally see another Master after so long without one.
Her Brown Minions cheered as well. They seemed happy to meet their red-skinned brothers.
"Reds! Like Reds! Reds means tasty warm food, and lots of fighting fun!", one of her Brown Minions exclaimed.
"Can you lead me to the rest of your tribe, and your hive, Red Minion?", Yang asked, "And I need a path across this chasm too", she added.
The Red Minion energetically nodded his head.
"Me can! Overlord go right! Path goes loopty loop around, then me lead Overlord!"
That was very helpful, thankfully. Yang nodded at the Red Minion, and followed his instructions.
When ten minutes later she only now began to see the loop around, she realized that she underestimated how long the path was. Oh well, now she knew.
Another 15 minutes later, she made it to the Red Minion, who had, thankfully, waited for her patiently.
"Overlord be very careful!", The Minion warned, "Big Mean Lizard sleeps deep in volcano. No want to wake up!"
Yang hoped to the Gods, and even to the Third Overlord trapped in Hell, that the Minion wasn't talking about some sort of a Dragon. She DID NOT want to get eaten by a Dragon at the start of her journey, thank you very much.
Luck shined on her, and she, her guide, and her followers all made it safely to the Minion camp which happened to be in a cave like hole inside one of the walls. In a pool of magma, there it was, the Red Minion hide rested.
Yang's first thought was that it looked ugly. It looked as if someone decided to merge an octopus and a human heart. Yang thought about it and shuddered. It was probably what happened, she decided, knowing the history of her predecessors.
Yang mentally commanded the Tower Heart to create a Tower Gate near the entrance to the volcano. She didn't want any rumbling sound or magic to wake up whatever the Lizard was, and she suspected it was nearby.
She looked around the camp, and saw 20 Red Minions, and…
Are…Are those…?
They were!
"Artifacts!", Yang happily exclaimed at the same time as she heard Gnarl gleefully say much of the same.
Indeed, before her were three magical artifacts, long forgotten relics of the Overlords of Old. Did anyone remember their legacy? Perhaps only someone very old.
The Reds explained to her that they had gathered all artifacts of the previous Overlords they found in Vacuo's deserts. That, she figured, did not mean there weren't any more in Vacuo hidden somewhere, but she'd have better luck looking elsewhere for now.
She ordered, verbally, 10 of the Red Minions to pick up their hive, three Reds to pick up one of the artifacts, two Reds and one Brown to pick up the second artifact, and another three Browns to pick up the last one.
She happily looked over the artifacts.
One of them looked like a small pillar made out of something that looked like maybe hardened clay, or maybe some old light brown stone. The pillar was, for the lack of better word, veiny, with the veins forming an image of something that looked like a door, and from it the veins went to the middle forming a diamond shape, inside of which it shaped itself into a heart. The veins were red, and the pillar itself grew with blood red magical aura.
"It's a Health Pillar, Lord", Gnarl explained, "It will allow you to take more hits before you die".
Helpful, and something Yang was very grateful to have. She did not want to die young. Or at all, now that she thought about it. She'll have to remember to look into whatever or not there are ways to become immortal later on.
The second artifact looked to be made from the same material, although, thankfully without veins. The scribbles on it roughly formed many faces of the minions, with yellow gemstones were the eyes would be. It glowed with brown aura.
"That would be a Minion Pillar, Sire", Gnarl informed her, "It will strengthen your willpower and allow you to control more Minions with your mind. If I am correct, this should bring your total control count at a 15 Minions"
That too was very helpful.
The third artifact was something she recognized without Gnarl's input. It was a spell totem, although the yellow glowing aura was doing a very good job at blinding, and obscuring some of the spell totem's features. She thought it kinda resembled a phoenix or some other kind of bird.
"We can only find out what kind of spell is inside it after we get it back to the castle and connect it to the Tower Heart, Sire. Oh, please, do hurry up, Lord, I am eager to see what's inside."
And so was she. She gave the orders to move out, and slowly but surely they made their way back to the entrance, where a Tower Gate waited for them. The Minions placed the artifacts and the hive on the Tower Gate, and they quickly disappeared. So did the Red Minions who were eager to go and settle into their new home.
"It was a shield spell, Sire!," Gnarl interrupted her musing, "It should protect by reducing the damage taken!"
Sorta like Aura, Yang thought to herself. She unlocked hers recently enough, it was her present for turning fifteen. Dad thought it would help her in Signal. It will help her in Evil instead.
She wasn't all that good at using it yet, or at all really, but with a bit of effort she managed to turn the aura shielding abilities on. Next she willed her new Shield Spell to live, and just like that, a transparent sphere appeared around her, with her being inside of it. She felt the shield start to slowly drain her mana.
She commanded one of her Minions to throw a stone at her, which he did with only a moment of hesitation. She felt it impact the shield and bounce off, barely even feeling the sting of pain.
Interesting. It didn't even impact her aura. It seems that if she had both on, the shield's protection would take priority, then the damage it couldn't protect would be absorbed by her aura.
She turned the shield off.
She felt tired after this small adventure. She could return to the castle, she had a pretty nice room in there, but she wanted to end it how it began. In an unknown but exciting territory.
So, she decided, she'll seek out a village nearby. With any luck she can have the Minions do some manual labor to pay off the room. Of course, once the sentimentality wore off, she'd probably start spending her nights back in the castle.
She summoned a few Red Minions back from the castle, five to be exact, and marched on, her fifteen Minions closely following her.
She had recalled seeing a village on the way here, and so she decided to go there. The journey back through the hot desert seemed far more bearable now, as if the Reds were absorbing the majority of the heat for themselves.
The trek to the village was going to be a long one, at least an hour for sure. It had taken way longer to get here after all. Two thirds of the way there she saw smoke coming out of where the village would be. As she neared she heard the sounds of violence, fighting, and tears.
When she reached the village, the cause of the distress seemed clear. They were being overrun by the forces of Grimm. She could see about twenty Beowolves, and even one Ursa.
This was bad. She heard, in her head, Gnarl advising her to not engage. She ignored him, as she clenched her fist, rage filling up her body.
This was a massacre. She couldn't let this stand!
For a moment, she wasn't the Dark and Powerful Overlord, but merely a fifteen year old girl with resurfacing childhood dreams of being a huntress.
"Kill the Beowolves", she commanded her Brown Minions, "Reds provide support with your fire attacks" she finished her instructions.
As she heard the objections in her head from Gnarl, she followed up with "I'll take down the damn Ursa myself!"
With eager cries of "For the Overlord!" the Minions rushed into battle. They did not fight fair, they ganged up on an enemy, while Reds used their fireball attacks to set the enemy ablaze, quickly take it down, and move on. Soon, the Grimm caught on, when three of their own had died, and ten Browns had to hold back and defeat seventeen Beowolves. Still with the help of support fire from the Reds the victory seemed very much possible indeed.
Yang had no time to observe this further and turned her attention to the big Ursa. This was bad. From what little she knew about Grimm types as she hadn't gone to learn about them at Signal, this looked to be an Ursa Major. This was going to be tough.
She got the beast's attention by throwing a fireball at his unarmored chest. To Yang's dismay despite the scorch marks, the beast seemed more annoyed than hurt. He roared and rushed at her. He wasn't very fast, and even in her armor she could dodge him without much difficulty. As he got close and attempted to swipe at her face with his left claw, she turned her body left, so the claw would miss her and grabbing her great sword with both hands, she used it to slash at the Ursa's hand.
Her hit managed to land on an unarmored part of the beast's hand, and it roared in pain. Unfortunately for Yang, he used the same hand to backhand her causing her to fly away from the force of the impact, and losing her weapon in her flight.
As she laid there on the ground she was thankful she had managed to launch her Shield Spell in time, and that she had activated her aura before going to battle. The middle of her armor seemed dented which put some restrictions on her breathing. None of her bones seemed to be broken, though, so she counted that as a relief. The damn Ursa was tough.
She slowly got up to her feet, and saw that the Ursa was currently busy ripping her great sword to shreds.
"Fuck", Yang cursed.
Things just got that much harder. That's fine, though, she's a tough girl, she can do hard.
And it just so happens that she had a plan. She extended her arm and pointed it towards the largest piece of her not-so-great-anymore sword that the Grimm held in its hands, while she pointed her other hand to the Grimm. Using her left hand, she launched another fireball at it, and when it roared in annoyance, she used her Telekinesis spell that she had learned in her Magic studies from Gnarl to lift the biggest piece of the sword and launch it into the open mouth of the Ursa.
From the horribly pained sound it made, Yang wagered her strategy worked out.
The Ursa then turned to her, with an angrier expression than before, mouth unable to close due to the sword piece stuck from its palate and going out of the mouth.
"Not good", Yang angrily murmured to herself, "still alive. And I can't count on my Minions either"
"Run, Sire! Retreat", Gnarl warned her.
"Shut up!", Yang retorted and ordered the Tower Heart to close the telepathic connection. She was going to win, and save those people. She couldn't afford any distractions.
The Ursa once again ran at her.
Yang had a plan.
A very stupid plan.
She was so not looking forward to getting lectured by Gnarl for this.
She let the Ursa get close to her, and ducked under his right paw swipe while turning one of her hands behind her. She launched a fireball with propelled her forwards into the Ursa's guard. She let the force of her momentum flow into her fist, as she struck the Ursa in the chest.
The Ursa growled in displeasure as it was toppled to its back.
The risky part was over. Now the finisher.
She punched the sword piece over and over again, driving it deeper and deeper into the Ursa's head. Soon after it stropped struggling, and disappeared into dark dust, which formed itself into brown Life Force.
She breathed a sigh of relief.
She had won.
She looked around the battlefield to see the results of the Minions battle.
She grimaced, and tears threatened to rise up in her eyes.
From the total of the fifteen Minions she had brought, only seven survived. Five Reds and two Browns. She could still see the corpses of the other eight brown Minions. She could also see twenty brown Life Force orbs and no beowolves which means that, at least, their sacrifice wasn't in vain.
Gnarl had, of course, told her in her Evil Studies lessons that the Minions were more than happy and willing to die for their Overlord, and her questioning of the Minions themselves seemed to confirm it. Gnarl had told her that an Overlord shouldn't be overly bothered by the death of his Minions, unless there were still enemies around to threaten the Overlord. She knew that the Overlords have used their Minions as sacrifices to enchant their weapons and armor.
Still…they were with her from the start of her journey, hell, from the start of when she first met them. She journeyed, suffered, and even sometimes ate with them. And now they're dead. She wanted to cry.
She steeled herself. She had to make sure it wasn't all in vain. That the village survived as did its villagers.
She had the rest of the Minions gather up the littered Life Force and bring it to her to absorb. With this she could, at least, make new Minions to replace the ones she lost.
She looked in the direction of the village and went inside. She went into the Town Square and that's where she saw the rest of the, alive, townsfolk gathered. On her way there she saw many not anymore alive bodies, and the sight sickened her.
"The Grimm are dead", she announced, "This village is saved".
Amid the cries of thanks, and the people shedding tears of happiness, one man approached her.
"I am Mahogany Timber, and I am chief of this here village. Or what's left of it. Tell me, young warrior, are you a huntsman sent by Vacou to help us?"
"No", Yang spat out, "if they knew you were attacked, then seemingly they weren't bothered. I am not a Huntsman, from Vacuo or anywhere else"
The Chief of the village, a man perhaps in his thirties, had a frown on his face. Still, his face relaxed and formed a small smile
"We are lucky then, that you found us in our time of need. Tell me, hero, what can we call you?"
"Ya-Overlord. I am known simply as the Overlord", Yang replied, almost giving her real name away.
Although seemingly confused at her odd 'name' he didn't comment on it. Yang did have one question, though.
"Does this happen often?"
"The Grimm attacks? More often than we'd like, but not to this scale. Usually we fight them back with a few dozen losses, everyone here has some weapons and ammo, although that doesn't do much good against an armor of beowolf.", the Chief answered her, his voice sad, but resigned.
"And the Hunstmen? Vacuo?"
"They never care", the Chief said bitterly, "if a village dies, it's just another 'sad example of Grimm destroying settlements outside of walls of the Kingdoms"
The Chief's face was full of anger, and it is the very same anger Yang could feel rising up in her as well.
"But we still must pay taxes, trade with them, follow their laws. And they don't even bother to protect us.", the chief then sighed again, and said, "but let's not ruin this moment with bitter feelings of anger. Let us celebrate your heroic rescue and the fact that we are still alive"
Yang didn't even hear him. Her vision had gone blood red from anger, the injustice of it all. She raised her left hand, gauntlet's orange fire glowing brightly with her anger, and demanded the Tower Heart to send a Minion Gate here.
Minion gates were much like the Tower Gate, Gnarl had once explained to her. Except where the Tower Gate connected via the Tower Heart to her castle, the Minion gate connected to a Minion hive, and there were four gates for four hives. As long as the hive was in her possession, the gate would have no trouble working.
The Tower Heart gladly complied, and moments later with a bit of rumbling, a brown Minion Gate had emerged. Yang used the twenty one orbs of Life Force she had gained from the Beowolves and the Ursa to summon forth twenty one more Brown Minions.
She looked the Chief in the eye.
"These Minions will protect you. I will personally ensure every single one of them, and every single one of you, are armed with weapons and armor from my Forge.", Yang said, anger still clear in her voice. "If the Kingdom of Vacuo won't protect you, I will", Yang continued in an authoritative tone. "You will not suffer another Grimm attack on my watch, I can promise that".
The Chief didn't take long to think about it before answering.
"I assume that means that we are under your control now?", he asked before continuing, "I have no problem with that, already you helped us much more than the Kingdoms have in a long time, and if your promises are true, we'll certainly be better off. I will talk to the rest of the people and we will put it up to a vote."
The Chief went away back to the crowd before Yang could say anything.
As her anger slowly faded, the Chief's words confused her. She certainly didn't mean she wanted to occupy them. She just wanted to help, to make sure that this never happened again.
She then remembered another lesson from Gnarl, and with this she removed the block between their connection, that an Overlord naturally sought to claim territory, and wise Overlords also sought to protect their subjects, Minions more suitable to that end than regular humans who take a long time to be even worth considering as guards. Like Gnarl had said, "Gratitude comes with it's own rewards." Some Overlords, of course, oppressed her subjects, but she didn't want that.
Perhaps this wouldn't be too bad. Could be even fun.
A referendum was held, one which she overwhelmingly won. Seems like her act of heroism won her a lot of brownie points.
"Congratulations, Master, you have acquired your first village. This is the start of your Evil Empire, and the point from where your Evil will expand", she heard Gnarl say. She politely thanked him mentally.
Half an hour passed since she was elected the leader of this village, and she finally came up with the name for it. She had asked Gnarl a brief history run down on the history behind the names of the other Kingdoms, and found that they were all named by an old, now dead language, the words serving to describe the Kingdom. Atlas represented the fact that the Kingdom was above all others in its geographical position. Vacuo represented that there wasn't really anything in Vacuo, which she could confirm as true, and so on.
After asking Gnarl to translate some words, she settled on this, and she wrote it on the piece of paper on her desk.
The Unholy Ultimus Empire.
Quite literally it meant 'The Unholy Final Empire'.
She felt it was fitting. It was the Final Empire, and it shall be the last one standing. It seemed suitably Evil. And it represented her desire to fix what she saw wrong with this world, from the Grimm, to the Kingdoms. As is her destiny, she shall rule them all.
Gnarl encouraged such ambition, but warned to not get ahead of herself. He also suggested the 'Unholy' bit of the name.
She scribbled down her first orders on the same page. The page read "From this day forth, We shall be known as the Unholy Ultimus Empire, and following the naming traditions, this shall be Our Capital, named Ultimus. I, The Overlord, shall be the First Emperor of the Unholy Ultimus Empire, and Mahogany Timber shall remain the controlling authority of this great capital unless his words were to go in to opposition to my on"
It felt fitting that an Empire should have an Emperor, unlike the Kingdoms that were without a King. She also took Gnarl's lessons on delegating tasks to heart, and as such made sure that the Chief could do most of the work needed.
She did a lot today, and it was a great day.
Looking around her, and seeing no one there, she cut off her connection to Gnarl, and started to grieve for her lost Minions.