Hello there everyone and I'm back with Chapter 6 of "Age of Overlords". After the negotiations between Ainz Ooal Gown, Sigmar and Nagash has finished with the establishment of the balance of power between Nazarick, Azyr and Shyish, they are now holding an exchange program with each other in form of establishing their embassies and sending their ambassadors respectively.
On the other hand, binge watching the episodes of Overlord Season 4 was a blast to watch along with a catchy opening and ending songs, and I can't wait for upcoming Overlord movie which will adapt Volumes 12 and 13 of the Light Novel.
My responses to these Guest reviews that I can't normally reply on PM:
Guest: Yeah I agree with you about Greenskins getting the Stormcast Reforging Treatment like Worrglug Clawbasha from Chapter 5 of this story. Although it could piss off Gork and Mork who might take it personally like how Nagash took offense of Sigmar taking away the souls of the countless people meant for him.
Disclaimer: I do not own Warhammer Age of Sigmar or Overlord. Both franchises respectively belong to Games Workshop and Kugane Maruyama. Credits goes to GhazzgullThrakan, the original author of Age of Overlords who allowed me to adopt it.
Enjoy and don't forget to review. :D
Rest in Peace Jason David Frank (September 4, 1973 - November 19, 2022) the Legendary Power Ranger of Mighty Morphin, Zeo, Turbo and Dino Thunder. May the Power be with you.
Chapter 6: Assignments
Eight days after the Connection of Worlds, Mortal Realm of Shyish
"Mannfred, you're on the job," said Nagash in a dour tone. "Congratulations are in order, I guess."
The Supreme Lord of the Undead considered all choices available to be the bad ones, seeing as he couldn't let the Abbots stay here, with the upcoming invasion, and the vampires could be about as trusted to not mess things up as a ghoul could be trusted to not eat you if you didn't defend yourself. So he left it to his underlings to decide who will represent Shyish as an ambassador to Nazarick.
So that Nagash will keep taps on the New World and Ainz Ooal Gown's home.
It is an opportunity he won't let this slide. On the other hand, his soul was interesting when I saw through him... An ordinary mortal possessing a body of a very powerful Lich... How odd. He is still clung to his humanity., he thought as he wondered about Ainz retaining his human soul despite transcending his mortal body to become a Lich.
Although, it would still lead to some sort of mess due to the scheming and plotting between his top lieutenants in Shyish which would probably amuse Tzeentch and his followers. Only they dare not try anything funny behind Nagash's back or else they suffer the consequences of his wrath. As the insolent Lady Olynder, the Mortarch of Grief and Kurdoss Valentian The Craven King found out the hard way when they were alive before the Great Necromancer claimed their souls.
Seizing the opportunity before him, Mannfred von Carstein had pulled out every single dirty little secret, every favor and every trick and threat he knew of. With that, he managed to blackmail the hell out of the other Mortarchs with all he knew and oh, he knew what they knew. Fools got to know a lot around them, people never took them seriously nor paid attention to them until it was too late.
As a result, three quarters of the Lords assembled had to elect him to be the ambassador, lest things they'd prefer hidden come out into the light.
For all he cared, the God of Death was fine with it as long as Mannfred produced results from his new position as ambassador to Nazarick… and didn't fuck things up too badly like he did during the End Times that brought an end to The World That Was in the first place. But for that reason he'd have a few wraiths with blades ready to be shoved up his pale ass.
The Vampire Count smirked and pointed several times at Harkon gleefully, rubbing it in. "HA! IN YOUR FACE, HARKON! SUCK ON IT!"
To this, the other Vampire Lord grumbled in annoyance about how he had died in the discovery of the new realm and thus he should be more deserving of the position. Mannfred just laughed at him harder in response.
"Call your Knights of Templehof and get yourself a handful of troops, no more than a hundred. We want to present an image of strength, not start a full-blown war.", yet was the unspoken but universally heard word of Nagash. "And be sure to report their moves."
"By your command," said Mannfred as he made a formal bow in front of his lord. "You'll not regret making me ambassador, I swear it."
Nagash dryly commented, "Mannfred, I've been regretting making any of you an ambassador even before the specific appointment was made. Let's pray I can send someone competent and with good clout soon enough."
That is, after finishing Chaos off first… so quite a while.
At the hallways of the Great Tomb of Nazarick, New World
"~I'm assistant ambassador, nanana, nanana!~", sung Felix as he walked through the halls of the Great Tomb of Nazarick.
It was wonderful. Let's be honest: Felix being with his master on the battlefield and under Nagash's command, or anywhere close to it, was impending doom, and the worst kind at that. So being far away from the Lord of Undeath brought out a massive relief to the "young" vampire. It would be a nice insurance against silly, or read: anything related to his lord's stupidity and previous fuck-ups, deaths where he'd be impotent.
Quite an ultimate job security he had gained.
If only Gotrek were here. Although knowing him, the destruction of The World That Was might not have killed him at all. Perhaps he might be here on this new world somewhere., Felix thought about his Dwarf Slayer friend and his infamous tendency to not die despite the many dangers the dynamic duo had faced together and survived them in the past.
It was a huge source of grief and annoyance to Gotrek after all as the Slayer's Cult's modus operandi is to die gloriously in battle and regain their lost honor.
Whenever he has the opportunity, he would go out and explore this New World and find any clues to Gotrek's whereabouts, reuniting with the Dwarf Slayer once more. The Carstein vampire knew that Gotrek is the kind of guy who likes to make a huge ruckus with his charming Dwarf attitude and leaving behind a trail of dead bodies from powerful monsters and enemies trying to kill him and fail.
Of course, he might have to do some persuading with Mannfred to let Gotrek stick around once Felix found him eventually. There is of course the issue of Felix himself being a vampire as well. It might cause some problems when the Dwarf Slayer sees him as a Carstein vampire than a human he once knew.
Oh well, he will cross that bridge when he get there.
Wait a moment... He turned quickly and pointed his finger at the interloper, the one that had, apparently, been stalking him from behind in the hallways of Nazarick.
"A-HA!", said Felix triumphantly with a smirk.
After all, it had been the fourth attempt he had tried. He knew he was being tailed but didn't quite pull out the timing as to when the pursuer was the closest behind him in his tracks.
It turns out that it was the nutbuster maid, one of those Pleiades who are the battle maids in Nazarick from what he had learned, and they are stronger than they looked along with the fact that none of them were not human despite their appearances that fooled those unwary of their true nature. With her usual grin, golden eyes filled with malice and those silly braids of hers.
Cocking his head, Felix asked in curiosity. "Is there something I may be of help with?"
The maid made an impish smile-quite fitting, truth be told in response. She turned around Felix once before saying. "They say you guys are strong, VERY strong. So I was wondering whether or not I could get any glimpse of it."
Now the smile widened into a grin and the eyes were filled with viciousness. An expression returned by Felix whose vampire teeth can be displayed. "Oh yes? Something along the lines of a "friendly" sparring match where we are "accidentally" issued the real deal and we go a bit harder than usual? Something along those lines, my lady?", he said.
Both made a light chuckle as they nodded slightly.
Yes, indeed they have found Mood Kindred.
"So would you kindly follow me into the coliseum?", the redhead maid suggested.
"My, of course, it will be an utmost pleasure," responded Felix exultantly as he approached the maid and made a slight bow. "Now, I think I've been rather rude to you, as I haven't presented myself: I am Ser Felix von Carstein, at your service."
She made another light laugh and brought her hand to her chest. "My name is Lupusregina Beta, the pleasure is mine."
"Oh no, I must insist: the pleasure is all mine," he said as he brought his arms to a fold behind his back.
Now it was Lupusregina who was the one to cock her head. "For a knight you're a tad weird, don't know why but I somehow had the hunch you'd try and kiss my hand in an elaborate curtsey."
Felix shook his head while smiling apologetically to the redhead member of the Pleiades, his eyes locked on Lupusregina's. "Why should I? I think we will soon have a bit more contact than that and will start sharing and seeing quite interesting things of each other."
Knowing fully well what they meant, they now laughed with glee and anticipation. Lupusregina took the lead and Felix followed, a grin not unlike Lupusregina's. A feral and bloodthirsty grin, looking forward to the kill and the wanton bloodshed. In response, Felix made a barely audible growl of anticipation, wanting the same thing too as well.
Now, this was turning out to be interesting: gutting each other in a beautiful and savage slaughter, along with the fact she was a hot looker was quite a bonus, was fine in his books.
At least the vampire of the Carstein bloodline would partake in the fun with the Pleiades member as way to kill time and get to know each other better: by fighting.
Wait for me Gotrek. We will be together again soon. Just like the old times., he thought while following Lupusregina to the coliseum of Nazarick.
Meanwhile at the throne room of Nazarick
Today, Sebas Tian and Yuri Alpha would be departing towards Azyrheim, the capital city of Azyr where Sigmar is, while Demiurge would be the temporary ambassador to Shyish while Ainz Ooal Gown was preparing a suitable, read: a high level Lich, ambassador for the Mortal Realm of Death, The first two were surrounded by a group of Stormcasts in livery of crimson and gold. The latter stood a couple of paces away from his future host.
"Sebas, Yuri, honour Nazarick and learn as much as you can of these people," Said Ainz to Sebas Tian in a solemn tone. "I expect nothing less than, nor doubt you will do, your best."
"My lord, we won't fail you.", the butler and creation of Touch Me complied with a determined face.
Yuri Alpha silently nodded to the Supreme Being as she adjusted her spectacles, knowing the Pleaides will be in good hands under Aureole Omega.
The meeting kept dragging on as they wanted to make a minimum of pomp and fanfare. A bit of fancy speech here and there, a bit of feelings spilling over, after all, what would happen in those foreigner capitals?, and a lot of tension in the air. Which is natural considering there was half a million potential enemy soldiers from Nagash around.
Like, holy shit, there was no ending to them!, thought a terrified Suzuki Satoru about the armies of Nagash upon gazing his sight and senses on all of them. Even if most were fodder that just seemed wrong on a certain level!
Which brought him to the core point of the matter: he was terrified. Oh sure, one could say such emotion of fear was repressed by him being a Elder Lich after being sent to the New World instead of being logged from YGGDRASSIL, but honest to God? He was scared of what was going on, of how wildly out of hand things were going. Especially when he has the eyes and attention from the two factions led by Gods.
It was one thing being in a world where he had a modicum of control such as the New World where he and the entirety of Nazarick were sent to.
But here? It seemed things were on the verge of a rollercoaster with massive kegs of gunpowder strapped on.
One of the Floor Guardians had died during an invasion by the undead forces led by Arkhan the Black, and their God of Death, Nagash had brought Shalltear Bloodfallen back like it was a casual thing to do as part of the demonstration of his abilities. Ainz had to repeatedly make sure that there were no side effects on Shalltear's stats and body after her post-resurrection by the ruler of the Shyish.
The Elder Lich Player didn't want any nasty surprises on Shalltear left behind by Nagash and there will be hell to pay if he had.
The thought horrified and enraged Satoru to no end: the creations of his dear friends, murdered and mauled!
I need to protect them. I MUST protect them., the Supreme Being vowed to himself in thought as the Floor Guardians were all what's left to his friends' memory back when they used to play YGGDRASSIL together.
And he had come to the conclusion that he couldn't just go and sit like ducks anymore. Blocking the door? The bricks were literally blown away the moment they placed the last one. Magic? Barriers shattered, and traps and the like were nullified.
It was like the gate was flipping the bird to anyone intent on halting the traffic!
Which meant they'd be hit hard by what lay behind that door. And he didn't like what he had seen so far. Maybe this "Stormcast Eternal" may prove to be good and trustworthy allies, useful to keep Nazarick safe and this Sigmar guy sound like a reasonable dude with a cool hammer ala Thor the Thunderer after learning from his golden armored soldiers who were willing to explain to him about their God.
Hopefully, there would be an opportunity to meet the God-King of Azyr one day.
But as far as Satoru was concerned, Nagash, despite Arkhan's half-assed reassurance, was bad news, big time. He couldn't be in the dark anymore and didn't want to take any chances.
Ainz Ooal Gown needed to know everything possible.
Find any weakness and exploit it as much as he can until they broke down.
Plan out every countermeasures and contingencies just in case when things go south.
From now on, all of the Floor Guardians would be issued World Items to make them stronger too, that way they'd avoid that kind of situation again. Search teams would be sent in secret to find more of these "Realmgates" and the embassies would try to get as much information as possible in order to gain the upper hand and know everything about these Mortal Realms.
After all, knowledge is power and the Supreme Being intends to acquire it as soon as possible.
He will keep them safe, and for that, thought a very-terrified-by-the-prospect Ainz, he'd need to act decisively.
Nine days after the Connection, somewhere in Re-Estize Kingdom
After the hopefully-temporary departure of Lord Ainz Ooal Gown by faking an attack to cover for him, Narberal Gamma and the band of worms that called themselves the Swords of Darkness were making camp as two of them started arguing with each other. It was mildly irritating to say the least as a major understatement for the member of the Pleaides.
"Shouldn't we go and try to find him? Maybe he's still alive and has survived.", said Worm A. Pete, was it?
"Are you insane?! That thing could fight on equal ground with Momon and Nabe, we are no match for it!" Said Worm B… what was its name again?
"Surely we COULD do something!", began Worm C… okay, again she got nothing regarding names.
The Pleiades member was getting riled up from the peanut gallery of these low-class creatures in front of her. If she kept this up, she'd kill them, something that her Lord and Ruler of Nazarick had vehemently prohibited to her before he left to handle the invasion and thwart it personally.
Deep breaths, Narberal. Deep breaths., the female Doppelganger internally chanted to herself.
"For one: what could you do, to begin with? You can barely fight goblins, you maggots.", Narberal sneered with open disdain.
That to start, then went on to the fact that they had tried to make a request to the Adventurer's Guild, only to balk away from making said request due to the high price. Aapparently, according to their estimates, they needed a Mithril-ranked Adventurers team if two well equipped and very competent adventurers had been beaten with ease.
Pathetic, this was just plain and simply pathetic. Narberal thought as she made a notorious sigh of disappointment at the humans being so weak and disappointing. Which was misinterpreted by worm D, the effeminate worm.
"Don't worry, Lady Nabe, we will find a way to help Sir Momon!", it said while trying to make a comforting, and revolting to Narberal, smile, though the apprehension in its voice was anything but comforting. "Everything is going to work out just fine."
Worm D placed its hand over her left shoulder, touching it gently.
Her eye almost twitched and she barely repressed a yell of fury at these imbeciles.
"What do you think you can do, you little runts, filthy maggots barely worth ANYTHING!?", is what she would have said. But she held herself from lashing out and shrug off Worm D's hand on her shoulder.
Seriously, these four idiots thought they were in some way capable of helping a SUPREME BEING. For Ainz's bloody sake, how stupid and full of themselves could these fools be? She should crush them and tear them down for making such affirmations that demeaned her lord up to such a point.
But Supreme Being's direct order is absolute and that order is to keep them alive until he returns.
She internally chanted to herself again, Deep breaths, Narberal. Deep breaths.
The member of Pleiades wondered what she had done to deserve this punishment. Had she offended Lord Ainz in some way? She almost gasped with eyes widened in realization. What if she had? Horror almost surfaced into her stony face.
Nonono, it couldn't be. It just couldn't. Right?, Narberal hoped.
The following two days were spent on travelling towards E-Rantel. When they made it to that rathole, Narberal felt about to explode from the sheer bottled up frustration of the last days with them without Lord Ainz around for company. She just couldn't bear any more of their inbred idiocy.
Back there in the Adventurer's guild hall, they got the payment for the Silver-grade job that they had taken with Momon before he disappeared due to an attack by an unknown assailant. Which the black-haired Doppelganger staged that to cover for the Supreme Being. Even when coupled with the previous two missions, though of lower level, it wasn't enough to make up the cost of completing the contract.
Narberal rolled her eyes at that. Would they stop it already? And again, the effeminate Worm was still trying to "comfort" her. She was clutching her own hands, pressing them so hard she was almost sure she'd bleed her own fists soon enough.
Then she heard an old coot speak to one of the Adventurer's Guildhall's workers. Apparently a group of mighty savages had ravaged their village and burned it down to the ground. They didn't take anything of value, except human lives. Along the way to the city, another two villages had joined the travel and decided to pay the job together. It was classified as a Gold Class job because those enemies were believed to be strong.
Narberal stepped in and grabbed the paper.
"We are taking it," her stern voice left no room to discussion and her deadset eyes, piercing and cold like shards of eyes, helped a lot on silencing any complaint from the group. "We will do it."
The Worms gathered to see the reward from the paper before Worm A speaks again with a shocked look on his face. "Hey, do you think we could afford it with all this combined!?"
The guildhall worker made mental calculations from the Job Request and responded affirmatively.
This elicited cheers from the so-called Swords of Darkness as they all touched her shoulder in gesture of comfort/support/congratulation, whatever one wanted to call that brazen excuse for the defilement of her shoulder blade.
Just let me kill, hack and slaughter these fools! The Supreme Beings know damn well I need it!, Narberal internally hoped as she needed to divert her killing intent to these monsters mentioned in the Job Request to slay than lash out on the human Adventurers that her lord Ainz painstakingly went through the trouble to integrate himself with them.
Besides, these savages won't be much of a challenge and more of a stress relief for her anyways.
Three weeks after the Connection, E-Rantel's cemetery, Re-Estize Kingdom
Light burst into the dark room, blinding Clementine as her eyes were almost burnt down. Shriveling in fear, she curled into a fetal position, covering her face with her arms. Her whimpers fell onto deaf ears, for the pink-colored armored giant just grabbed her by the few strands of hair remaining on her head and dragged Clementine out through the corridors of her sect's former hiding spot.
Weeks, months, whatever had gone by since that night, had turned the hallways of that abandoned place into an abomination. These newcomers had transformed it into a den of depravity and excess. All for their god called Slaanesh. Each day they brought a whole batch. Ten, nine, a dozen or so. It didn't matter, they all ended becoming playthings for those large effeminate monsters in armor.
Screams of pain and pleasure filled the hallways in consonance with the depraved laughter.
Passing by a puddle of dubious color and origin, she saw her face. Clementine was emaciated, almost skeletal, and full of bruises and cuts around her formerly athletic body. Her skimpy armor whose plates of slain Adventurers were shattered with few pieces clung to her body. Eyebags circled her eyes, now glassy and virtually devoid of life. About two thirds of her teeth had been ripped out.
Her hair was barely a handful of loose and weak strands.
The rest of her body hadn't fared any better at all either. She was thoroughly malnourished, coughing a lot constantly due to dehydration, and the bruises and cuts on her face extended down her body all the way to there. The remembrance of those horrible sessions were… She couldn't think about it, just the thought urged her to vomit.
After a bit of walking, the former Black Scripture member was shoved onto the top of a stone slab with strange carvings on it. She didn't recognize them but her experience with Zurannon had taught Clementine enough to understand what were random drawings and what were blasphemous sigils and runes for a sacrificial ritual.
She was the lamb on the altar to be slaughtered and sacrificed to their God, Slaanesh.
Clementine was going to die.
"No...no!" Her voice cracked with broken tears and horror on her face.
Despite everything that had happened this time, Clementine still stubbornly clung to life, for she felt a sudden surge of fear. Gathering all her remaining strength, the blonde woman jerked and flailed. Her captor let her go on purpose as he didn't put up any effort to stop her from moving away from the altar. He wanted to play with her a bit more, although that much was unknown to the prisoner.
Scrambling on her four destitute limbs, Clementine tried to make it to the door under the amused stares of the four giants and the wizard. She barely heard one chuckle and commented, "Awww that's just precious darling!"
Her eyes were bloodshot, she panted with difficulty and tried to do her best to run but when she was a step away from the door, one of the warriors slammed his axe in front of her. Chunks of stone flew off and cut her cheeks from the sheer speed.
Blocked from her path to freedom away from this wretched defiled place.
Two of the warriors manhandled her and placed her again on the slab stone, sniggering maliciously.
"Please, no...no!", she began sobbing. "No, I swear I'll do whatever you want. Please don't!"
"Don't worry child, it will be just a new beginning for you," promised the depraved wizard with a rasping voice that could only be achieved if one regurgitated a thousand razors out of one's throat every morning.
They laughed even more from that comment as they dragged and threw Clementine onto the stone again. Bracelets of black iron and pink symbols materialized and shackled her, preventing her from any attempt to escape. Clementine tried to flail out in a futile attempt to free herself from their grip as hard as she can to no success at all.
The former Black Scripture member begged, sobbed and cried trying to appeal to whatever shred of humanity they did have left. But they all just giggled and smile at her pain anyway.
As the creepy wizard began his unholy ritual upon her, Clementine felt her whole body burn, crack and turn upside down. Her entire body felt as if it was being mauled beyond recognition all while it was being torn apart into a thousand cuts.
Screaming in pain, her consciousness disappeared into oblivion.
Author's Note: Okay, the sixth chapter of "Age of Overlords" is done and I hope you guys like it. Oh dear poor Clementine, I think her getting the bear hug from Ainz Ooal Gown would be merciful compared to the Slaaneshi warband's "hospitality" after crashing the party. Meanwhile, Felix is having some good time in Nazarick as part of Shyish's embassy while having the intent to find his old buddy, Gotrek.
The same Dwarf Slayer who stepped into the Realm of Chaos from the World-that-Was in the End Times and eventually found himself in the Mortal Realms in the Age of Sigmar lore.
On the other hand, Narberal Gamma really needs to chill and should be patient for Ainz to come back after the latter is done ending the invasion from Shyish and reached an agreement in the negotiations. As Ainz had sent Sebas and Yuri to Azyrheim and Demiurge to Shyish as his ambassadors to the two major factions in the Mortal Realms.
The Ten Knights of Templehof are the bodyguards of Mannfred von Carstein, fluffed out to be those very few who stood by his side during the long time he flew away from everyone in the Mortal Realms. They are vampires of around Levels 70-75, barring Felix, who's now level 64 after the resurrection and transformation into a Carstein vampire.
And obviously they're all weaker compared to Shalltear Bloodfallen and her fellow Floor Guardians of Nazarick who are all Level 100 including Ainz Ooal Gown himself.
Enjoy and don't forget to review. :D