Slayer Gothic - Wishverse 2

Part 9

Caritas. LA.

The Order of Taraka was known by some to be an ancient society made up of deadly and feared assassins and bounty hunters. Some of them were humans while others were demons, as well as a few even stranger creatures. Its members had no earthly desires other than to collect their bounties. Each of them worked alone and with their own methods, though most of them preferred to assume a disguise to observe and stalk their victims until it was time to strike. If one assassin was killed, then another would take their place until the target had been eliminated.

However, while a person might think that the powerful organisation of killers for hire might be totally made up from assassins this simply wasn't the case. The Order had informers all over the world, as well as a number of representatives who would work to ensure that The Order of Taraka always had a number of fresh bounties coming in. One of those representatives, who most often went by the name of Mr Grey, was currently meeting with a client at a neutral site called Caritas.

Not that the client was in any danger, as long as they didn't have a bounty on their heads, but this didn't mean that the choice of venue wasn't a wise one as the two humans, well they both looked human, would draw no attention to themselves as long as they remained surrounded by so many demons. Plus with all the background chatter and the signing, it would be very hard for them to be overheard.

"Who is the target?" asked Mr Grey.

Across from the representative sat a young-looking human male who had clearly gone to some effort to disguise himself, not that this bothered the representative at all. After so many years spent serving the Order of Taraka, he was well used to keeping details of his client totally confidential, and he wouldn't pry into the identity of this man as long as he paid his fees.

A rough file, nothing more than a collection of loose papers in a folder, was slid across the table. Mr Grey opened it and saw that the target was a woman called Professor Maggie Walsh a Psychology professor at the University of California, Sunnydale, but it would later be revealed to the Order that she was the leader of the government-controlled Initiative, a military project intent on capturing, studying, and modifying the behaviour of various demonic creatures that they kept as captives.

Not that this would stop The Order of Taraka from carrying out this contract as long as they got paid well enough for it. They'd even killed a President of the United States once, in a place called Dallas in Texas, and the Order had been able to pin the blame on someone else, as such taking out the head of an important government project wasn't such a big deal for them.

Unknown to many, even those within the Initiative, Walsh was also involved in Project 314, a secret program within the Initiative that is creating a hybrid demon-humanoid-mechanoid (a Demonoid) known as Adam. Various creatures captured by the Initiative would be dissected to provide the parts for Adam.

Killing Maggie Walsh should prevent that creature from ever coming into existence, or at least this was the hope of the young man who was hiring the assassins. Indeed Adam would never come into existence if Walsh was killed and someone else placed in charge of the group known as the Initiative as that new leader would have different goals and methods.

"Now what about the payment?" enquired Mr Grey.

A briefcase came up from under the table and once opened the contents were shown to the Order's representative, and the man in the grey suit allowed himself a small smile. This young man, who was paying for the Order's services in bars of gold, had to be very wealthy, and if pleased with the work of the assassins he might hire them again. Repeat business was important for the Order.

"We won't see each other again unless you contact us," said Mr Grey as he took the suitcase "It's best that you not be connected to this killing in any way, and it will happen soon, with payment like this you can afford our best".

With that, the representative of the Order tipped his grey hat at his client and then made his way out of the nightclub.

(Line Break)

Cave. Outside of Sunnydale.

Weeks had passed me by for me and my group, and days were spent between balancing college classes, transporting asari from one universe to another, patrolling this town, as well as dealing with the odd freak that would pop up and annoy me before getting its head chopped off. Since I had a lot of knowledge about the threats seen on both the Buffy and Angel shows, and because I was armed with superior weapons, I was able to deal with these distractions very quickly.

Now that we had a few days off from college, more than normal due to the sudden death of one of my professors, I'd figured that it was time for my harem and me to do some more exploring, and to gather materials useful to the group. That second part was why we'd come to the caves outside of town, that I had been able to locate thanks to the use of the Item Finder that I'd brought from the Pokegirl world. The device was really proving to have been a wise investment.

The current objective of the group, which right now was made up of myself, Buffy, Harriet and Tara, were two objects known as the Orbs of Nezzla'Khan, they were a pair of magical crystal orbs guarded by Nezzla Demons. They granted superhuman strength and physical invulnerability to whoever carried them. However, the orbs themselves were easy to break, and once they were broken, their magical effects would be reversed. Also, they might not shield against magical attacks, but in this part of the multiverse, there weren't many magic users who could do the kind of magical attacks that I needed to worry about, and when the group was in other universes we'd have other methods of protection.

I'd done the research already, and while I'd not gone after the Orbs until now this was a good time because thanks to some experimenting I knew for sure that the magical items of this world could be disenchanted and the enchantments cast on new items using an Arcane Enchanter from the world of Elder Scrolls. While a single pair of these Orbs would be useful to me, I'd prefer it if we had the same enchantments for all my companions.

Not long after we entered the cave there was a growling sound from behind me and I turned to see a rather large demon, of the brown and scaly variety with not much of a neck, the thing was now advancing on me, and this didn't concern me as it was all part of my plan to get my hands on the orbs.

"Hi!" I said to the monster "You'd be a Nezzla demon then?".

The creature growled and it swung at me clumsily, a move that I easily dodged. This creature might be tough and strong, as the accounts in the books warned, but it was a dull-witted monster, with no real intelligence and it was slow to move. As such we were all about to keep our distances from the demon as I distracted it.

"I'll take that as a yes," I said while avoiding more clumsy blows.

Given that it did match the description of that demon species in a book I'd recently read I figured that I had the right demon. Plus it had come through the force field, and only a Nezzla demon was supposed to be able to do that.

"Look, I'm really sorry to bother you, but I do need your help," I told the demon "I'm going to take the Orbs of Nezzla'khan and I'm really not gonna take no for an answer".

By this point, Harriet had successfully carried her part of the plan. She stood back with Tara, and both of them had their wands ready in case this turned into a proper fight. Not that this seemed likely by now as Harriet had taken control of the demon's mind using a spell that would see her locked up back in her world, assuming that Wizarding laws covered demons. Given their bigotry, I doubted that they would.

"You will bring us the Orbs" she ordered.

For a moment the demon just stood there. It seemed to stop for a moment, maybe in an attempt to think or to try to resist, and a few seconds later, it went through the barrier. After some waiting, I heard someone approaching. I then saw a Nezzla demon, maybe the same one as before, I simply could not tell, and it had a small wooden box in its hands.

"Open the box" the Chosen One commanded.

It held the box out to Harriet and the sides of the container glowed for a moment as the demon opened the box. Inside were two small orbs, both marked with symbols. I had to wonder if The Orbs of Nezzla'khan were a metaphor for male genitalia or at least part of the male genitalia. The berries, not the twig, not that this really mattered it was the power of the Orbs I desired not the physical objects.

"Thank you," I told the demon.

After reaching into the box I lifted the orbs out of their container so that I was now holding one in each hand. The demon simply stood there and looked at Harriet.

"What now?" she wondered.

I was holding the Orbs but I didn't feel any different, and it wasn't as if the demon would be able to verbally explain how to use them. Then a bright purple light exploded from the two globes and surrounded me. I yelped in surprise and then cried out as I felt power fill me. Already I could understand why Warren Meers hogged them in the show.

"Like we planned. Send the demon away," I told Harriet

The demon grunted before it lumbered back through the barrier, its weak mind had been unable to resist the magic of Harriet Potter, and I no desire to kill the creature since it had done what I wanted it to.

"Well that was easy" commented Buffy.

Indeed it had been.

"Rights let's go disenchant these babies," I said, "Then we need to work on getting enough souls gems and souls to copy the enchantment".

I already had a few ideas about how to do that.

(Line Break)

Hogwarts. Wizarding World.

As expected it had become too dangerous to keep shipping asari from the Citadel to Deep Space Nine, as such I'd left the Outrider at the Starfleet operated space station so it could be upgraded while my harem and I went back to do some exploring over the weekend. While Harriet knew this school well, and I'd gotten a quick look around at parts of it, most of my girls hadn't seen the school and since Harriet wanted me to help recruit a few of her friends, I'd decided to bring the group here.

The airship I'd gotten from the Pokegirl world gracefully landed on the Black Lake, the body of the water which was home to the Giant Squid and some merpeople. Since a boat made use of this lake during the Triwizard Tournament I figured that it should be safe for me to land this magical flying boat here as well. So far the Giant Squid hadn't attacked so it seemed that I'd been right.

Not that I was actually sailing the ship as I'd been focusing my efforts on using the magical device that an Archmage from the Pokegirl world had made for me to make possible portals large enough for an entire starship to move through. Granted it wouldn't allow me to move a large starship, but a freighter was more than enough for my needs.

Soon I would need the ability to open portals much larger than normal. Once the Jovis arrived at Deep Space Nine I had plans to move that vessel to the Wishverse so that it could stay in orbit and be used to beam us of the planet if needs be and even to other parts of the world. It could serve as a much more secure base than anywhere on the planet.

The device that made this possible was a large clear crystal on a golden stand that acted much like the crystal on top of the staff that I sometimes used to make portals big enough for the airship. Only this device was much heavier and required time to recharge as it was powered by magical energy gathered from the local environment. Magic existed everywhere, I'd been ensured of this, there was just more of it in some places so the portal spell amplifier would recharge much faster in some places than it others.

This would never strand us anywhere as I could always open smaller portals if needs be, and Fred was finally getting somewhere with the Sliding Devices. Having so many girls with a variety of skills within the harem was proving to be a very good thing as they'd been able to help figure out as much as her counterpart had done for the other Slayer Gothic.

As for why I'd brought us to the school, that didn't just have to do with getting some of my harem of a tour of the place, I'd also come here to do a little business, and to help Harriet entice her friends to join us. Right now the mobile stall we'd used in the past to sell goods from across the multiverse, was getting moved down the ramp and moved a little way from the shore of the lake.

In moments it would be set up and the students of the school, and perhaps some of the staff, would be able to purchase goods from different worlds. The stall was mostly filled with things that were interesting, but mostly harmless, such as health potions, bloom-powder (always a bit hit with teenage girls) as well as books, maps of far off places, and magical devices that would amuse people. There were enchanted items that enhanced the wearers, however, these were weak versions of such things.

These things would be sold for the local currency, that I didn't really need, and this didn't really matter as the selling of these items was more of an excuse to come to the school than anything else. I'd arranged this visit in advance with the school's Headmaster, who was even now supervising his many students as they all tried to buy something from my stall if only for the novelty of it.

Since my main objective here was to recruit Harriet's friends, who were already chatting with my wand-waving companion, I went over to them, but not before arranging a quick tour of the school for those in my group who wanted a look around.

"So will you come with us?" I heard Harriet ask.

I was planning on taking my harem, and the crew I'd left on Deep Space Nine, to a special place in Skyrim that would not only be amazing to see but would also provide us with needed materials.

"You should" I advised the young witches, "it would be a good chance to see what becoming part of my harem would allow, and you could bring back some interesting stuff that the whole school could study".

Harriet wanted her friends to join my harem, and I'd figured that a free trip to another world would tempt them in a way no amount words ever could.

"There's no commitment required," I told the three magic-users "This is a free trip, and the only commands you have to follow are to ensure your safety".

I saw no need to pressure these wand-wavers since my harem and crew, two groups I wished to keep separate, were both growing in number.

"My Mum and Dad told me they'd disown me I joined a harem," said Ginny "but I don't see any harm in just going on a trip".

Luna agreed soon enough.

"We can't just leave school" Hermione Granger protested.

I'd already mentioned to Dumbledore about taking a few students, ones aged 17 or higher, to another world as an educational trip, and since they didn't need adult permission once they'd reached the age of seventeen, they'd only needed to have run it by the Headmaster, and this was something I'd already done.

"Of course you can," said Dumbledore as he came over to us "An expedition such as this is a once in a lifetime opportunity, more than that really. Think of what you might learn, and what you could bring back, as long as you are careful".

The Headmaster had a way of talking to people that worked well. All three of the witches, Hermione, Luna and Ginny soon agreed to come along for a couple of days. As for where we were going, we wouldn't be leaving just yet as I had some people and things to collect before we went to Skyrim.

(Line Break)

Blackreach. Skyrim.

My first impressions of Blackreach was that the place had a certain beauty about it that was unlike anywhere else that I'd ever been before, and I had been to many exotic places since becoming the Slayer, or at least a Slayer. Some of those experiences involved magical worlds, yet none of them had the sense of mystery this place had already given me.

What little light there was down here emanated from the giant fungi that had some sort of bioluminescence effect going on, as well as a large and dim sphere that must have served as a fake sun at some point, but it had grown dim, perhaps it mimicked the sun above and lowered its level of light so as to mimic nighttime, if so then it should greater brighter while we were here.

Over in the distance, I could see a dark and towering structure, which I knew had been a stronghold of sorts for the Dwemer (the dwarves) in the past. While the possibility of looting the underground settlement held a lot of appeal to me, finding Dwemer artefacts wasn't the main reason as to why my harem and my crew, as well as myself, had ventured down here.

The group I'd brought here via a portal was a large one, and while we had no ship of any kind with us, we were hardly lacking for supplies and a base of operations within Blackreach would soon be found. We'd need one, as well as the supplies, as I'd brought a lot of people with me.

Aside from myself, I'd brought along, Buffy, Tara, Harriet, Luna, Hermione, Ginny, Fred, Kaylee, Ahsoka, Morrigan, Arya, Lenore, as well as my asari commando team for the group's protection, and the quarian sisters to work the equipment, that included a portable replicator, that we'd brought along to aid us our investigation of this place.

We did not immediately begin our investigation as once we had realised the sheer scope of Blackreach, it became clear that we could be here for some time and that we'd have to come back later unless we could find somewhere secure to sleep.

"Let's check out that building" I decided.

Once Harriet had used magic to opened the way into dwarven style house, I sent in the asari commandos before stepping inside, and I could only do that when the asari who was in charge of the alien troops become satisfied that we weren't walking into an ambush of some kind.

My hope was that this building could be a decent command centre if made safe. The ruined Dwemer building had looked small on the outside, and the inside was no different, but with the use of magic that could be changed. We had a few wand-wavers with us and they had the means to make an internal space larger than the external space, and we also had tents we could set up outside or inside the small house that were massive on the inside.

Upon looking around I saw what appeared to be a quaint hovel, and anything within that was of Dwemer make had to be centuries old and yet it was a good state despite all the time that had passed. I could see the bowls on the shelves still all intact, and shelves that looked as sturdy as they must have done hundreds of years ago. I didn't doubt that these items would be worth something in other dimensions if only because people would buy because they'd come from another universe.

It was such a shame that I'd never be able to see the Dwemer civilisation at its height, I could only imagine what life must have been like for the dwarves, and who knew what wonders they'd made that were now lost to time, or buried somewhere deep underground.

Looking at the non-dwarven stuff I saw that there were the remains of a blanket on the bed, and scraps of cloth scatted about the place as well the rotten remains of a book. Only the ingredients for alchemy and enchantment remained, having been preserved with some sort of magic I guessed.

There was a skeleton in here that had two Dwemer arrows stuck within its ribs, yet the door had been locked, the man, if this was a man, must have been able to stay alive long enough to seal himself in this small building. Impressive considering that he'd had two arrows stuck in his chest.

A journal was clutched in its body fingertips, which Buffy noticed and tried to remove when she did the skeleton's hand crumpled into dust, she just brushed the dust off and then handed me the journal so that I could read it. The Wishverse Buffy was far comfortable with doing such things than her canon counterpart, who would have refused to even touch the body I felt sure.

Given the good state of the journal, it was safe to assume that some sort of preservation magic had also been cast upon it. Clearly there was a lot more to the local magic than throwing fireballs around and summoning the Daedra.

"His name was Sinderion," I told the group "and he came here looking for Crimson Nirnroot".

4E 58 Second Seed, Middas

I've spent a large portion of my life unravelling the mystery of the nirnroot and yet I still feel unfulfilled. The trilling sound this strange herb emits seems to taunt me, to push me even harder to discover its secrets. Even after a generous and indomitable traveller became a field collector in my stead, and provided me with five scores of the nirnroot, I was only able to muster what I consider a mediocre alchemical creation at best. This only served to strengthen my hunger and whet my appetite for the solution.

It wasn't until over fifty years later that the answer to my prayers was carried into my basement workshop at the West Weald Inn. The first thing I heard was the familiar tone - that unmistakable warble unique to the nirnroot. But when I turned around, my heart leapt and a chill ran down my spine. This was indeed a nirnroot but of a variety the likes of which I have never seen. The herb was awash in a spectacular array of red hues, each leaf seemingly emblazoned with innumerable variations of crimson. I couldn't move - I was completely transfixed. Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined a species of nirnroot with such a unique property.

After an awkward silence, I finally managed to stammer out a few questions to the traveller who'd brought me this treasure. He told me his name was Obeth Arnesian, a treasure-seeker from Skyrim. Apparently, he'd been exploring a vast subterranean network of grand caverns called Blackreach and had stumbled across what he dismissed as "a noisy red weed." His expedition was largely unsuccessful and he didn't want to leave the caves empty-handed, so Obeth picked one of the crimson nirnroot to bring home. He said that it took some time, but eventually he was pointed my way and that perhaps I'd pay a fair price for it.

Before I could gather my wits and ask anything else, Obeth offered to sell me the crimson nirnroot sample, a map showing me how to find Blackreach and the strange key needed to breach its outer defences. It took me mere moments to decide. Obeth left Skingrad a thousand septims richer, but I would have easily paid ten times that amount to obtain the sample alone.

It took a year of planning, but I was able to pack up and sell my workshop and make my way into Skyrim. Before delving headfirst into Blackreach, I knew I needed to set up a new laboratory, but wished to do so in seclusion. After making inquiries at the College of Winterhold, of which I was an honorary member, I was directed to speak to Avrusa Sarethi, a student of botanical alchemy who had a small farm near the city of Riften. By bartering my knowledge of nirnroot cultivation, I was able to secure Sarethi Farm as a launching point for my field research. I kept the knowledge of the crimson nirnroot a secret from Avrusa, but imparted everything else I knew to her in exchange for her hospitality.

A few months passed, but I was finally ready to enter Blackreach. I used the Runed Lexicon that Obeth had provided and descended into the depths. My goal was to gather enough crimson nirnroot to produce my greatest alchemical creation to date - I was certain it would take at least thirty of them to provide the necessary catalyst.

This brings me to the present. My initial research seems to indicate that the crimson nirnroot has a similar affinity for moisture as the garden variety, but also maintains some sort of symbiotic relationship with the enormous fungi that inhabit Blackreach.

It is my guess that the fungi itself is the source of water, absorbing it from the moist subterranean air like a sponge. This provides the ideal environment for the nirnroot to grow. Unfortunately, the crimson nirnroot appears to have a vastly shortened lifespan, and they are in no way plentiful down here. Gathering thirty of them will be quite the challenge, but hopefully, the denizens of Blackreach will allow me to gather my samples unhindered.

"Alas they didn't," I said once I'd finished reading out loud "Poor man he was so close to getting what he wanted".

Morrigan, who like some of the other was packing up everything worth taking into one of our bigger on the inside bags, looked over to me.

"Once I return to the college I can finish this Sinderion's work and publish the results" she offered.

I had no doubt that the Witch of the Wilds would take most of the credit for the discovery, and that was fine with me, but first of all, we needed to find the Crimson Nirnroot.

"This building isn't a good base of operations" one of the asari was now saying "It's out in the open, there's only one way in or out, and it's cramped. We need to set up our base camp somewhere else".

While I had been thinking about using it as a base with magic making it more suitable, I decided to follow the expert's advice. The asari commando likely had hundreds of years of experience on me and so I'd be foolish to ignore her on such matters. With that in mind, the group got moving towards the large fortress that we could see from here.

(Line Break)

Blackreach Skyrim.

We left the hovel with many of us having much fuller pouches of holding, having taken everything worth taking from that building, including an attunement sphere, and continued through Blackreach. As we carefully moved about Morrigan collected the red coloured nirnroot for her research.

At one point one of the asari scouts, who was making use of sophisticated night-vision goggles, located a single Falmer that had been resting lazily at the bottom of an underground staircase and I hardly thought twice before ordering her to terminate the creature as I knew them to be horrid things that would slaughter us all if it could. Once they had been Snow Elves, a sentient race, but now they were little better than demons.

For the most part, we kept to the roads while exploring this amazing place, and we made sure to steer clear of the Dwarven Centurion that was stationed near a small lake. It looked inactive, but I didn't want to risk waking it up as while I could defeat such a foe the battle by using my aura power, or we could shoot it, that would draw the attention of even more falmer to us.

Not that we could avoid those little monsters forever, the asari commandos had to put down some Falmer which we found patrolling the outside of the Dwemer ruins, that caused some attention to become focused on us, and the next thing we knew we were in combat with more of the horrible things. I'd wanted to avoid bloodshed so as to ease Hermione, Luna and Ginny into this life, but that proved to be impossible.

On the plus side, I did discover that the souls of the Falmer could be stored in a Grand Soul Gem, which was strange as the souls of mortals, like humans, elves and so on, needed black soul gems normally. The former Snow Elves must have de-evolved to the point that they couldn't be considered people anymore, at least in a spiritual sense. While sad this benefited me as I could use their souls to power to enchantments needed to give myself and my harem both super strength as well as invulnerability.

When we got inside the fortress we were attacked by some crazy people as well as more of the falmar, who had rapidly become my least favourite species in the whole multiverse. This was really saying something given what I killed on patrols.

As for the non-famlar, whether they were simply mad or for some strange reason were worshipping the underground elves, I had no idea. But they were armed, and clearly appeared to be a threat, so we killed them without remorse, I'd have to talk to Harriet's friends later and explain why we had to take down all these threats, they would have killed us all given the chance.

My intention was to clear out this entire fortress and perhaps most of Blackreach so that my group could spend days done here if needs be, so we had time to explore and to exploit this place for all it was worth. I could have gone and brought the things we desire from this word from merchants, but this way was much more fun.

(Line Break)

Blackreach. Skyrim.

Ore Veins

# of Corundum 14

# of Ebony 6

# of Geode 34

# of Gold 3

# of Moonstone 2

# of Orichalcum 3

# of Quicksilver 3

# of Silver 3

I looked down the list and found that I was rather impressed by the sheer amount of mineral wealth to be found down here. Some of the geode veins had provided a fortune in soul gems, all of which I was sure would be used well by my group. Mining the ores and soul gems, that existed naturally down here, had been made easy thanks to the equipment we'd brought here.

While we'd not gathered much in the way of materials when it came to metals, Lenore didn't need that much for the making of more magical items as I always made sure to keep her well-stocked, and if needs be I just go buy what she needed from somewhere out there in the multiverse.

Aside from the minerals, we'd acquired a lot of dwarven artefacts, only some of which I understood the purpose of, such as plates, bowls, and pots of different sizes, knives, forks and spoons, cups and vases, and they were all made from a strange metal the tricorders didn't recognise and could not be replicated.

"We've gotten plenty of Crimson Nirnroot, and some other stuff" Tara reported to me "More than enough to brew up all kinds of potions. I'll put together a full list for you when we get home".

I was pleased to hear this, and I was pleased by how well things had gone down here once the asari commandos had finished clearing the space around the fortress of hostiles. Without any further shooting or monsters around I'd been able to show Harriet's friend the fun side of what group got up to, such as the exploring of places few ever got to see, and of course the looting. Getting to take home treasures from across the multiverse is very cool.

"Before we leave we need to clear up any evidence of our presence here," I said to one of the asari "The Dragonborn might pass through Blackreach on their way to claim the Elder Scroll that's over in the tower and I don't want to get in their way or present them with a mystery that could distract them".

The Dragonborn may have already been here I didn't know. What I did know for sure was the Alduin hadn't been defeated, the World-Eater was taking his sweet time in doing his job, but I had no idea how old that news was because time didn't flow in the same rate in different dimensions. At least not always. Some dimensions seemed to, or maybe the differences were too minor to be noticeable.

"It won't take us too long to tidy up," one of the asari women said to me.

All we'd have to do is back up everything into the bags and boxes we'd brought with us. All of which were much bigger on the inside and light enough to carry thanks to the magic we had access to.

"Once we've packed up everything here," I said to Hermoine, Luna, Harriet and Ginny, who were hanging out together within the old dwarven fortress "We'll be going back to the hotel for a few hours. After that, I can take you back to the school, or we can detour to visit one of the court mages they have in this world, from them I can buy some magical items and spellbooks for you to take home".

A shopping trip would be a good way to end this introduction to travelling with me, and it would give them a chance to see a bit more of this world before returning to school. Once there I would give them some time to think about joining my group. Plus I wouldn't mind picking up some spells books for the magic-using members of my harem.