The Nekoya is one of my favorite places to have dinner in peace, and, unfortunately, one of the many, albeit always well-intended, victims of my adopted sister, and fellow Campione, Aisha.
And Zelretch, who happily claimed the restaurant under his protection, during the days of the first owner. Bloody mingling, trolling, annoying, dimensional vampire.
Aisha is...a complete airhead the best of the days. She always does things with the best of intentions, she has a big heart, but the problem is that she has zero long-term vision, and considering how Aisha is unable to stay in the same spot more than a week, whenever she goes, chaos follows. Make it double when you take into consideration that Aisha can go back and forth in time, and into alternate dimensions.
For about a century, Aisha has not appeared in the world, and I was starting to get suspicious. The Lady of the Cave, as she was known on the Magic organizations all over the world, consider it something normal. Aisha can travel back and forth in time, so, she could be anywhere in the past, or even into an alternate dimension. I have been with her in several of those, entertaining exercises that they were.
The Nekoya was one of the well-intended shenanigans of Aisha.
Aisha witnessed the sacrifice of a heroine, in one of the many alternate piles of earth, a black-haired lass called Yomi and deciding that it was not fair, Aisha used her Authority, [Fairy Corridor], to bring the heroine to our world, and let her have a new, better, live here. She married a chef of Tokyo and built up a restaurant together.
The Nekoya western cuisine eatery.
Unfortunately, the door of the Restaurant became a divine artifact, and every seven days, the door manifests itself in several spots of the original world of the heroine known as Yomi. The door was a sub-product of [Fairy Corridor] and the Authority that Aisha picked up from a benevolent Chinese God. I did not agree with such a thing, but Aisha insisted that it brings good fortune to good people, so I let her be.
From time to time, I pay a visit to the Nekoya. It is easy for me to hijack the door when it is traveling through dimensions and make it look as if I was another of the many, and diverse, cast of individuals from Yomi's original world. The first time that I have dinner there, I am sure that I scared the shit out of the old archmage and young half-elf sorceress that were enjoying their own dinner, after all, I am a Campione, to their eyes, I was the closest thing to a god that they have ever seen, but as I just enjoyed my dinner, they let me be. I was hardly the only monster grabbing some R&R in the eatery.
My favorite among the dishes of the Restaurant is the beefsteak.
The actual chef, and owner of the Nekoya, is the grandson of Yomi, and the lad is a very good chef. It is almost hilarious how all customers had their own favorites and starts shipping wars for the food. In all the time that I have been dining in the restaurant; around the last decade or so; I have earned the friendship of some of the usual customers, and I have listened to some fascinating tales.
Curiously enough, I even meet dragons from that world. A couple of pretty ladies called Aka and Kuro, two of the several dragons that are the embodiment of the natural forces of the world. They fought against some kind of eldritch abomination in the past, and since then, they rule over the world as the unknown pillars of reality.
Aka loved the beef stew of the Nekoya, so much, that she branded the entire place as part of her hoard, meaning that anyone with two brain cells to rub together will leave the place well alone. Mind you, that most of the customers are always someone that stood above the average Joe. From the food hunter elf girl to the red dragon Aka, to the swordmaster Tatsugoro, to Gaganpo the Lizard Champion; all of them are notable individuals, be it for their fighting skills, noble origins, or mercantile skills, or because they are of a monster race, like the young siren and her boyfriend that came to eat hamburgers.
All in all, I have to admit that the Nekoya was way more benevolent and beneficial than I was expecting when I discovered the latest consequence of Aisha's shenanigans, especially, when I discovered that Zelretch, that accursed dimensional jumper, was also involved with the foundation of the place. In the end, it was just a good eatery, and it allowed me to enjoy a good dinner every seven days.
Being a Campione had its own cons. First of all, you can not walk anywhere without all the magic organizations of the world worrying about if you are about to blast anything to high heavens because of reasons. True enough, they have a lot of reasons to think that way. I am conscious enough of the many, many, flaws that Campione's have.
From the hubris of Sasha; before I beheaded him for trying to steal my soul weapon; to the eight-grade syndrome of Luo Hao, passing through the superhero antics of John Smith, and how Salvatore is a complete moron. I am not exempt from such flaws, far from it; I am also older than all of them combined, as I became a Campione in the year 389 when I slew my first [Heretic God] during the Barbarian Kingdom wars. In time, most of the rougher edges of my character had been tempered through tribulations, difficulties, betrayals, loss, and, in general, living the life of a Campione.
Or, so I like to think, pretty sure that any of the many enemies that I have butchered would have a completely different opinion.
Anyhow, the Nekoya was my last clue about what the heck was Aisha doing nowadays.
I have been entertained the last decade with the diverse supernatural problems that have been popping out lately, especially that Guinevere lass, so obsessed with King Arthur that it was not even funny anymore, and that has prevented me to have a look at a calendar and realize that Aisha has been out of sight for a century.
That was unusual.
Aisha's usual stakeouts were empty, none of the usual seers had anything to say about Aisha, and the last clue that I had was the Nekoya.
The chef of the Nekoya told me that Aisha entered the Nekoya around two weeks ago, with the Gold family lass, but she left the Nekoya with Pudin lass, very interested in the fairies of the other world. Puddin lass, aka Victoria Samanark, was a genius sorceress that lived on the Samanark Ducat, and after the arrival of the fairies at the Nekoya, Victoria paid the meals of the fairies.
After the first initial shock of seeing another dragon; Kuro, that worked as a waitress in the restaurant, along with the young lass of the other world's demon race that usually took that role; I just shrugged and went with the flow, I had a telepathic chat with the lass, to prevent any misunderstandings, and proceed to enjoy as many beefsteaks as possible before the arrival of the Fairies.
It took a while, so I chatted with the chef, have a beer with Gaganpo, the Lion King, and Tatsugoro, exchange alchemy recipes with Victoria, and finally, on my fourth serving of steak, the door opened and the Fairies make their entrance.
The queen of the Fairies was Tiania Silvario XVI, she floated into the restaurant with a small bunch of fairies. At first sight, they are the classical fairies, small, butterfly wings, cute as a button, etc.
"Greetings, fair folk", I saluted to the floating fairies that stared at me with a mixture of apprehension and curiosity. "Please join me at my table, I would like to speak with you".
No one in the restaurant, not even the blatant uber-dragon of death that posed as an elf waitress, did even spare a glance to me. In fact, the dragon had just served me another beefsteak as if my presence was just perfectly normal. I understood the reticence of the fairies. In her eyes, I am a walking sun of powerful magic, equaling the dragon serving the tables around, and their confusion was even bigger at the decorated gold staff at my side.
Part of the materials that formed my soul weapon was an obscure material called Tifaenium, which had a strong elf and fairy resonance, that's why they were confused and a bit apprehensive of my presence.
"My name is Tiana Silvario XVI, Queen of the Land of Flowers", presented herself the green-haired lass that was obviously the leader of the bunch.
"Well met, you Highness", I saluted back with a small reverence. I was a tall man, making the difference between the feet-tall ladies even more obvious. "I am Argent Shield, alchemist, and magician".
"May I inquire what business do you have with us?". Suspiciously asked the Queen, not beating around the bush.
"Nothing obscure", I raised my hand, bigger than any of them, in a defensive gesture.
"For what I am understood, my adoptive sister may have visited your land, and, if that's the case, I would like to know where on earth has she gone afterward".
"I love my sister, I really do, but her antics are exasperating the best of days", I sighed with true emotion behind the gesture. I liked Aisha, but more often than not, she was a headache, well-intended, always, but a headache nonetheless.
"Your adoptive sister?", pondered a bit, Tiana. "Ah, you are one of the siblings of lady Aisha!", realized Tiana widening her eyes.
"Aye, that's me". I chuckled. "Sorry for any problems that Aisha may have brought to your lands. She always means well, but her actions are always disproportionate".
"No, no, lady Aisha was a delight to have around", smiled Tiana, "her presence did good to our lands, and she regaled us with abundant tales of the strange gods of the homeland of the Restaurant".
"Uh", that made me blink in surprise. "Okay, is quite the surprise, usually Aisha's travels provoke quite the ruckus, but I am happy to see that it was not the case. So, would you kindly tell me where did she go after leaving your lands?".
"She walked into a different portal, and said something about bears?". Uncertainty filled the voice of Tiana.
"Of course", I sighed again. "Well, I thank you for your time, your Highness".
"No worries, it has been a pleasure to meet a sibling of lady Aisha".
For the rest of the dinner, I spoke with the fairies, laughing at Aisha's antics, and in general, having a nice time with the feet-sized floating ladies. I paid for my meals, and theirs, it was fair after all and walked to the door of the Restaurant.
The first time that I walked into the Restaurant, I talked with the owner about the door. It was a divine artifact of sorts, that moves around, helping people in its own ways, and that was all, it was completely harmless. Anyone stupid enough to try to take advantage of it will have to deal with two primordial dragons and some of the greatest heroes of the other world. Even heretic gods will think twice about fighting dragons that are on their level, and the Campiones knew of my mark, and Aisha's, and that is a big "Do not fuck with me" magical cartel hanging from the door.
Waving goodbye to the good people on the Nekoya, I stepped out of the magical door and found myself on a very dark dungeon.
Now, I entered into the Nekoya through Pandora's palace door, on the boundary between realms. Meaning that I should be back with Mama Pandora, and not into a dark, damp, and very disturbing dungeon.
The door behind me vanished, and I raised an eyebrow at the occurrence.
Were the powers of the door guiding me somewhere?. It was not the first time that [Fairy Corridor] sent me tumbling around dimensions, but this was something new. It was the first time that the door of the Nekoya sent me to another location than the one from where I entered the restaurant.
Gently nudging my sleeping Soul weapon, Leanna, she growled a bit but soon snapped in attention at the unknown location. Her innate magic as Soul weapon was called Runes, etchings on her weapon form that allow us to deploy several supernatural capabilities. One of the powers of such runes was the ability to "insert" us onto a world.
The rune's magic made the two of us part of this new world the moment we stepped in. According to the new identities, I was a reputed German alchemist, and Leanna was part of a royal family?. That's new. Usually, her options were a famous actress, writer, or singer, but nobility?. That's a new one. Even her seemed a bit taken aback.
The moment she took her physical form, her senses were overwhelmed by the horrid atmosphere of the dungeon. The assault on our senses was more than enough to make her go green in disgust, and with a grunt, she switch back into her weapon form and fly to my hand. The buzzing of her weapon body was all the proof I needed to know that she was cursing this place to the high heavens.
Not that I was not in the same boat. This place smelled like decay, like rot, like death, blood, pestilence, and several other, less than pleasant things. In the past, I have traversed similar locations. The hidden lairs of mad scientists, necromancers, and other individuals have pushed beyond the limits of morality and sanity, and have built nightmare lairs on the deepest corners of the earth.
But there was something different on this one.
My soul weapon, even with all her magical capabilities, is not as attuned to the mystic as I am. I am a Campione, and among my Authorities stood the [Will of Magic]. One of the Authorities that I got from Hermes-Trismegistus during the fall of Rome. With such Authority under my belt, I instantly recognized the dark magics running rampant on this accursed place. Something eldritch was being distilled on the very ground that we walked on. On the air, on the ground, on the stone and putrid vegetation around us, something ruinous was nestling and spreading.
Disgusting was one of the few words that I could use to describe what I was experiencing right now. However, standing in the middle of the dim lightroom like an idiot was not going to solve anything.
As soon as I went out of the room, opening a rugged wooden door that was already halfway rotten; my senses almost rebelled at me at the touch of the wood. With a small trickle of magic, I filtered the air that I was breathing. The very same air carried minuscule particles of mold, poison, and worse things. The entire dungeon was a death trap for the body, and for the mind, as the oppressive essence of the eldritch taste rooting the dungeon was constantly nagging at the edge of the mind, trying to erode my mental defenses and force me into a demented mess.
Warding my mind against such mental pollution; one of the first tricks that I learned as soon as I became a Campione; was something that I mastered long ago, my enemies soon taught me that the unguarded mind is like an open fortress. Rejecting such insidious corruption, I focused my mind, and continued exploring the strange, and increasingly annoying, dungeon. My soul weapon's mind was also protected, as per one of her runes, anything that benefits me will benefit her, and vice versa.
The dungeon did bring me memories of time past.
The stone crafting was quite antique, almost medieval in its shape and ruggedness. The elaborate arches of some of the doors that we pass on our way into the dungeon carried a strange symbol. A mixture of devil faces, family shields, and different symbols, that, for an occultist like me, carried a lot more significance than just decorative brands. The dampness of the dungeon also had the consequence of making the entire place very humid, and with humidity, I could see, and smell, mold everywhere. This place has not seen the business end of a mop forever.
Something that surprised me was the lack of any kind of advanced appliances, be it magical or modern. From what I am understood, the other world that was connected to the Nekoya, was mostly medieval, with magical appliances to substitute modern ones in several places, but here, I have seen nothing of the sort. No magical lights, no torches, nothing. It was a good thing that my weapon and I had perfect night vision. The constant darkness that crept from the roots of the dungeon was all the magic that I could feel.
A pillar of rubble; crowned with skulls and bones, still with rotten flesh on them, how charming; blocked our path. It was an easy task to flex one of the runes of my weapon and the rubble cleared itself up, restoring up the path, and allowing us to walk into a long hallway. The long pathway had a lot of broken furniture, shredded cloths; banners most likely; and statues being torn to pieces. In a corner, a surviving bookshelf stood, barely hanging on the mutilated corpse; reduced to bones; of something that I can only describe as the vandalized remains of an asylum inmate.
The paddled jacket of a mental asylum was unmistakable, I wore one of those in the past when the worst of my [Authorities] make me smell sounds and debate philosophy with all the colors in the luminous spectrum.
Transforming the doors of the shelves into the water, and tossing the water aside, along with any possible traps on the bookshelf, I perused the contents of the strange surviving piece of furniture. All of the books were written in ancient languages. Thanks to my Campione status, learning languages was easy as pie, but it has been a while since I put my hands in ancient Etruscan, Latin, Sanskrit, ancient Persian, and even first dynasty Egyptian hieroglyphs. Leaving apart the novelty of the ancient languages, the contents could not be more distressing, the entire books spoke about the arrival of ruinous darkness, a corruption born from the first night that seeped into the roots of an unborn noble house, and that, in time, will turn the surrounded lands into pits of darkness and mutation.
A phrase repeated a lot in all the text.
Ruin has come.
Battling eldritch beings was not something new, I even once smashed the face of something that could be called an eldritch god-like Cthulhu, but the information on the books spoke of something different. Whatever was nestled on the base of the manor, it attracted the occult like moths to the flame. An inordinate amount of strange abominations seek out of the spot, be it to feed on the corruption, or to serve it, who knows. The whispers that have been trying to infiltrate my mind were not very specific, just steroids for the darkest impulses in the deeper holes of the subconscious.
"This is absurd", I sighed deeply, and I felt my weapon's magic caress my shoulder and arms in silent support.
My soul weapon is the perfect partner for my crazy adventures, and, possibly, the only companion that will live as long as I could live. Leanna was bonded to me, body and soul.
As I slowly read part of the strange sorcery contained on one of the oldest of the books; a treaty of flesh craft in Greek; the door at the edge of the room blasted open, and an abomination made its entrance on the hall where I have been learning about where on Earth have I been sent by the magic of the door of the Nekoya.
Side note, I was already preemptively cursing Zelretch, these were the kind of shenanigans that I expected from the ancient vampire.
Monsters of all kinds are hardly a novelty for me, I am a Campione, I have battled gods, demons, and everything in between in my world and others, however, the sheer wrongness of the entity at the other side of the room was something that I haven't felt in quite some time, and it made me frown in disgust.
My weapon noticed it as well, she was an exceptional magician on her own, long ago bypassing the limitations of her runes, and it was easy for her to perceive the horror that has manifested in front of us.
The tall figure eclipsed the scarce light of the dungeon, but because its head was a caged skull enveloped in blue flames, illumination was not a problem. The twisted faces of its victims piled high inside the open, ancient, judge coat that the monster draped himself with.
It wore malice, hate, and greed like a cloak. If it wasn't for my own mental defenses, the negative and putrid aura of the thing would have made me scream in fear and terror.
Bluish specters accompanied the tall judge of sorts, disembodied heads, from where their spinal columns hanged grotesquely, floated from the insides of the coat, and after glowing in a discharge of putrescent blue magic, they took a physical, albeit wraith-like, forms. A strongly armored one-eyed warrior, a highwayman with a flintlock and a sharp dagger, and a battle nun of some sorts, carrying a blueish mace.
With an inhumane sound, the kind of reverberation that it would have been impossible to accomplish to any natural creature; at least, on a sane world; the hellish judge commanded the specters to attack us. Several other floating heads, with more fresh blood still on them, came out of the infinite, twisted and pulsating, red and blue innards of the hell judge. The heads, whose eyes glowed with the same blue that the flames of the monster, were possibly fresh specters to replenish any fallen summoning or floating shields for the judge.
Tapping the floor with the bottom of my gold staff, the runes of my weapon and my magic joined together. With a spark of lighting, the specters became impaled by ground spikes, piercing their spectral bodies and smashing through the flesh remnants of rotten flesh, bone, and coagulated blood that remained on their heads and spinal columns. Extending a hand, I made a gesture, and the earth spike mutated into green, acidic, slime columns. The corrosive effect of the altered spikes devoured in second the scarce fleshy remains of the specters.
Necromancy was the game of the blue flame skull, and one of the worst kinds.
Raising his arms, a new screech came from the judge, generating more and more spectral soldiers. Much to my horror, several copies of the same individuals erupted from the sludge of souls and red horror that formed the ground that the judge of hell seemed to manifest wherever he floated. It was not just a soul, it was the entrapped soul of the same individual, killed in the past, the future, and the present, and whose soul was, collected, I would dare to say, by this undead abomination.
Six one-eyed men-at-arms raised their shields, at the time that half a doze highwaymen and nuns raised their flintlocks and channeled a parody of the holy energies that a battle nun should be using. A simply telekinetic barrier was more than enough to stop the bullets, and the unholy energy frizzled against my magic resistance.
Sighing, and with my senses already protesting for the disgusting smells of the dungeon, I decided to end this quickly. My weapon and I joined together, in a burst of divine magic, enveloping us in powerful battle gear.
The technical name of such fusion was Soul Regalia, the basis of the powers that a soul weapon can do with its partners.
There were other techniques like melding with the weapon, but the Soul Regalia was perfect for us, magicians through and through.
Our armored form was quite the sight to behold. We have been often described as, quote, "the coolest, four-armed, medieval, technological, bastard child of Ironman and Doctor Strange", end quote.
In our Soul Regalia, we are a tall, automata-like humanoid sorcerer, with four arms and a gold, empty, face plaque that obscure our identity, along with a black, golden embroidered on the bottom, hooded cloak that hangs from our shoulders. I can not say why did we turn like that, supposedly, Soul Regalias did not change the bodies of the users in such a deep and complex way, but I am not complaining, I was more than fine with the transformation.
With time, effort, and a lot of training, we managed to remain in Soul Regalia form indefinitely. Usually, the drainage of magical and physical energies forced the soul weapon to revert the transformation, but due to my unique physiology, and my godly magical reserves, we can maintain the fusion for as long as we want.
A really useful trick for hostile environments, like the vacuum of outer space.
After boosting ourselves with the Soul Regalia, the hellish collector of souls was nothing than a nuisance, but I took my time to flay the undead creature. It was easy to deal with the specters, formidable rivals that they could be against average humans, and even some supernaturals. My curiosity demanded to see how, in the name of sanity, had managed this entity to collect and enslave the same soul, several times.
Madness does not even begin to describe that.
Telekinetically crushing the cage that the skull had on his head, I pulled and rip the skull out of the shoulders of the collector. The specters vanished as soon as the demented judge of hell collapsed, and only the souls that I captured on a magical lock remained floating around me. The soul of the one-eyed man-at-arms, the soul of a highwayman, and the soul of a sister of light?. A battle nun of sorts.
If it was not already clear enough, this was not my world, at all, neither is the world that connects with the Nekoya every seven days.
Taking a seat in the air, with the legs on a lotus position, one of my arms mixed the soul of the man-at-arms with his severed head with a nimbus of necrotic energy; I put another of my arms under my chin, on a thinking pose; and the other two dissected the skull, the cage, and the blue flame that enveloped the strange undead.
At the same time, the book that I was reading before I was interrupted by the strange undead monster, levitated in front of my gold mask.
Multitasking was incredibly easy for me, and I was more than accustom to my four arms, allowing me to do several things at once.
"I blame Zelrecth", I commented to my soul weapon.
"Agreed". Nodded her back empathically. The short answer of my soul weapon made me chuckle.
Leanna Nexus, that was the name of my soul weapon.
She came to life in the Soul Forge, a unique structure in an adjacent dimension. One of the soul weapon users of that dimension found me when Aisha dragged us there during one of their walks, and I was offered the chance to stay there, graduate as a soul weapon user, and perform missions for the Soul Academy, and the principal of said Academy. Quite the eccentric fellow, a bit too much death-themed for my tastes, but there is no account for taste after all.
Don't ask, I just rolled with the punches, and after half a decade, I graduated from the academy, earned a pretty nice diploma and Leanna became my soul weapon.
Some of the best years of my chaotic life, by the way.
All soul weapons like her are bounded to a partner as soon as possible. True enough, a soul weapon can live on its own pretty well, but once a soul weapon finds a good partner, then its powers multiply. Leanna was the perfect complement to me. Curiously enough, in the Soul Forge, every single modification to the soul weapon carried more than just a material advantage, skill, or supernatural power, it also imposed a certain mindset or quirk to the weapon.
For example, the ability to transmute non-organic elements that I have used against the specters was also the origin of the unique rune that, for a lack of a better term, inserted Leanna and me into the history of any world that we could visit.
Leanna was a tall woman of a dark elf appearance. Mocha-colored skin, long black hair, voluptuous womanly curves, long pointed ears, and purple eyes. Usually, she liked to walk around scantly clothed, with a purple corset, and an archmage cape, along with a mage staff that I gifted her for our first decade together.
It was quite curious how despite how she flaunted all of her magnificent feminine goods, Leanna, much like it happens to me, is affected by a lesser case of "resting bitch face", and we always look as if we are annoyed by something, or, in a permanent deadpan.
It has brought us more than one headache, and we tend to make all the wrong first impressions. It does not help that Leanna is naturally taciturn and stoic, speaking the bare minimum unless she is emotionally distressed.
On the other hand, she is a lovely cuddlebug, loves music, and is the best cook that I have ever meet.
The book went into my personal pocket dimension, and another came floating from the bookshelf. They did not contain any spells; they were full to the brim with occult knowledge but lacked the real instructions about how to perform a spell. On that line of thought, the spellcasters of this world had lots of surface similitudes with the ones of my own world.
They invoke the name, the titles, and the legends of superior entities, to fuel the spell and achieve the expected result.
Curiouser and Curioser.
After reading, experiencing, and manipulating the magic of this world, and the hellish judge, the more did my [Will of Magic] tuned itself to the mystical forces of this strange world. Much to my surprise, there was an odd element inside of the magic of the flaming skull monster. An element that I have only seen in the homeworld of Zelretch.
The element was called prana, raw magical energy, one of the sources of power for the magus of Zelretch's homeworld. For a Campione like me, the magical world of the homeworld of Zelretch was pure nonsense, still, it was not my circus, so they were not my monkeys.
What really annoyed me was the presence of the prana in the strange abomination, it should not be there unless someone from the world of Zelretch has gallivanted around and screwed up something…and knowing the kind of sheer hubris and idiocy that the magus of the said world exhibited as if it was a badge of honor, that theory may not be as ridiculous as I one could think.
I really should have now better. I was tempting fate, and Murphy was always watching.
After some time reading more books and experimenting with the remnants of the undead creature, I stored all the loot of the battle; included the enchanted skull of the Man-at-arms, whose soul was napping inside of his own skull, I will later have a chat with him before releasing his soul to whatever afterworld exists here, and lazily floated to the door from where the collector of souls had appeared.
Leanna took advantage of the situation to have a nap.
Leanna has elevated napping to a form of art. There was no problem with Leanna's nap. I was more than capable to maintain the Soul Regalia up and running, and still, be able to run several more mental tasks at the same time. I have always been one hell of a multitasker, a skill that has revealed itself to be vital for my long-term survival.
Much to my surprise, the hall at the other side of the door was practically identical to the one that I have just abandoned. The only difference was the dozen or so undead that shuffled around the hall. They did not spare me a second glance, as I floated past their sides.
The only one that seemingly reacted to my presence, was one of the smaller skeleton guards, better dressed than the others, that carried a cooper goblet that constantly spilled liquid necrotic energy. The skeleton even had a black bonnet. The bonnet-wearing skeleton groaned at me in salute and continued his patrol dragging a shuffling skeleton, with a heavy crossbow, alongside.
How polite, well, undead recognizes each other so it seems.
The necromancer behind all these skeletons was quite good. The undead soldiers were slow, but the bones carried enough necrotic energy, and something else; something different from the prana that I detected beforehand; that they will be quite resilient to any kind of harm. That modification had made this undead better than the average shuffling skeleton, or half-rotten corpses that form the vast majority of the undead armies that I have faced in the past.
The Authority that I obtained from a demented Heretic God was already purring at the obscure and twisted energy that reinforced the necromancer's creations. On the other hand, [Will of Magic] was having a field day. Not only for the new necromancy tricks to empower and create such goblet-carrying skeletons, but for the impressive mixture of prana, mana, whatever more is on the skeletons, and the unholy energies that still tried to attack my mind.
Without disturbing the random patrol patterns of the skeletons, I studied some of the broken statues, busts, banners, and several other paraphernalia that had survived the lack of maintenance of the dungeon. As far as dungeons go, this was one surprisingly well decorated, in fact, if the place was cleaned and refurbished, these would be quite the elegant halls. Underground halls, but it was not the first time that I saw subterranean halls on the older halls all over Europe and beyond.
Channeling the runes of Leanna, without disturbing her napping time, no blockade would hinder my pass, and I was able to open the closed fences and doors at the sides of the underground halls. I even found a treasure chest.
I chuckled at the absurdity of the situation, but surrounding the chest, a lot of broken trinkets and babbles laid in disheveled heaps, so, it seems that I have found a treasury?.
How nice.
Inside of the chest, that was trapped but it fell under the influence of the rune of Leanna, and it dismantled itself in a second, I found a very well folded banner, that made me gasp, once I recognized the emblem of an old Teuton Knights emblem, a very well crafted flintlock pistol, some gems, gold coins, and a gold and gem coated amulet in the shape of a symbol that I have never encountered before.
Perhaps a religion?. I do not recognize the symbol, and it was very different from the spiked curve of madness that plagued the symbology all over these walls.
Odd.
Due to my own circumstances, I am quite knowledgeable about religion and mysticism all over the human story, and the symbol on one of the amulets was unknown to me. That annoyed me, but at the same time, it was a breath of fresh air. It was the first time that something surprised me in a decade.
After depositing the new loot on my personal storage; one of these days I am going to finally make an inventory of everything I had inside; I floated back to the main hall. Subtly pushing one of the roaming undead from a corner, I found a pile of books and half-rotten scrolls sprawled without care. I must confess that I felt somewhat aggravated by the lack of care of such valuable tomes and scrolls. Only one of the tomes was legible enough, the rest were devoured by mold, humidity, or mistreatment.
The tome contained some interesting information; a long, if not a bit wordy and verbose, discussion about the pigmen that plagued the fields outside of these halls, the horrific pelagic creatures down the coves at the bottom of the cliffs where these halls are located, and the gardens. By Pandora, the gardens. The mere existence of the things that buzz and merry on the gardens disgusted me to the core.
This world is screw in so many ways that is not even remotely funny.
And then, the world decided to throw another curveball at me.
One of the doors at the side of the corridor went flying, rip out of its hinges by a powerful strike. Once the dust was settled, a trio of women entered first, guarding the entrance of a Japanese palanquin carried by a horned monster at the front and a werewolf at the back. The very decorated Japanese palanquin was open to the air, and over the very comfortable pillows, a blonde Japanese woman was viciously slamming her loins against the ass of a one-armed, veiled, dark-skinned woman that was crying in silent grief and pleasure.
Thinking fast, and processing an inordinate amount of data was some of my virtues; not to mention my many alternate dimensional shenanigans as a consequence of my sister's antics and Zelretch's shenanigans and increased my tolerance to the unusual; so nothing fazes me much anymore, or for long. Alas, even I had to raise an eyebrow at what I was watching.
I felt the awakened consciousness of Leanna, which was way more flabbergasted than I am, mostly because she knew the vast majority of the strange retinue, and such knowledge only made the picture even more absurd.
By her own words:
"Is that a futa Tsunade Senju raping a moors woman over a Japanese palanquin carried by a rat-ogre and a werewolf, and escorted by Uzumaki Kushina, Irene Belserion, and Pyrrha Nikos?".
I don't know any of the women; I take that they must be characters of the "anime shows" that Leanna has taken a liking on the last decades; but the front carrier was not rat-ogre, I really hate Skavens, and the horned being was not one of them, the werewolf was unknown if it is of the variants that I known, but apart from that:
"That seems to be the case, aye". I dryly replied back to her.
Thanks to the Soul Regalia we shared a mind, and telepathic communication was instantaneous. Through that very same link, I was more than capable to notice the disgust, and scorn, than the usual stoic Leanna, was feeling. Making an educated guess, I could deduct that "Tsunade" was a heroine of one of the shows, and that seeing, on the flesh, a heroine reduced to a hermaphrodite rapist was not a pleasant experience.
Oh, and a slaver too, how quaint.
All of them, except the Tsunade lass, had a magical brand on their very souls.
The brand was one of the most complex magic that I have ever seen, worst of all, it was a very advanced, cruel, and vicious, facsimile of the Command Seals that magus used for a certain ritual. The magic of Tsunade was impressive, powerful, no doubt about that, and her body was in a constant state of magical flux, meaning impossible strength, speed, resilience, stamina, and regeneration.
Tsunade saw me, and with a wicked smile, took her large male appendage out of the dark-skinned buttocks of her victim, adding an extra humiliating effect by cleansing her erect manhood with the ass cheeks of the abused dark-skinned woman. She turned to face us, flashing us in the process, and jumped at us from the palanquin, with the left leg up, ready for a devastating ax kick.
That was just rude, she could have the bloody decency of putting some pants on. This copy of the Japanese heroine was very crude and ill-mannered.
"N, meh", huffed Leanna at the sight of the penis of Tsunade flapping on the wind due to the high jump. "Argent bigger". True.
My actual physical body was not my original one.
When Leanna and I defeated a grotesque, but surprisingly mundane, monster called the Beast, still under the command of the Soul Academy, the reward was the incorporation of several minor advantages on Leanna's weapon form, and, the ability to flesh craft one of us into a completely new appearance.
Out of my own personal code, I was the one that submitted to the surgery, and Leanna was the one designing my new physical appearance. I was the one that forged her, so it was only fair to pay with the same coin. Leanna went above and beyond, she crafted me to be an Adonis of masculine perfection, red hair, golden eyes, and god-sized genitals.
The only downside is that she, subconsciously, set up my base features into a small "Resting face bitch" expression; the male echo of the one that Leanna sees in the mirror all the time, making us quite the couple of permanently deadpanning folks.
From an outsider's perspective, all of this was taking place in a blink.
For the average person, Tsunade was a blur of movement, but for me?. Not so much. From my perspective, Tsunade was moving in slow motion. Compared to the velocity of the godspeed realm, she was barely a galloping corgi in front of a cheetah, and I outran Savitar once. This porn parody of an anime heroine was not even close to those speeds, so, I had all the time in the world to analyze her magic, see the many, many, modifications that her body carried, and the spark of something parasitic, yet beyond my understanding, latching her very soul.
By Pandora, those are the best magical defenses that I have ever seen. No necromancy will ever affect her, her mid was shielded from all angles, she was anchored to this realm to the conceptual level, and her soul was surrounded by wards that nothing I could call, could pierce. Such a waste, such a bloody waste on a rude rapist.
"Give me some good loot, bitch!", screeched Tsunade, before her leg was covered in a black coating of sorts.
Haki. This blasted hermaphrodite knows Haki?. Either she has developed a facsimile through the observation of the original material where the idea of Haki came from, or, and that worried me more, she was traveled to a "One Piece" world and enslaved people there. I have the horrid sensation that the slavery option was the correct one.
Before the Haki empowered leg could connect with me, I blinked out of existence, and the kick failed completely, stomping a five meters crate on the floor, and shacking the entire structure.
Careful, you moron, why do you think I have not used city-destroying spells?. We are underground, I don't want to dig my way out of a collapsed building just because I could punch a mountain.
Speaking of mountain shattering punches, once I reappeared, Tsunade followed her kick with a brutal haymaker, that was easy to dodge, followed by a series of punches, and kicks, no doubt all of them infused with inhumane strength, but so robotic on their execution that it was clear that the woman was just going through the motions as if she was on auto-pilot.
Before Tsunade could even blink, two of my arms, coated in my own recreation of Haki; now, thanks to the [Will of Magic] and the demonstration of this rapist copy of the original heroine, way purer on its form; separated her head out of her shoulders. A palm thrust on the middle of her massive breasts sent the rest of the body flying back, and the last hand shove an iron spike through the revealed flesh of her neck and onto the brain.
With the head of Tsunade impaled in a spike; constantly channeling necrotic and electric shocks through the metal to destroy the neurons and collapse any possible regeneration attempts; I grabbed the body of Tsunade in a telekinetic grip, summoned a big balloon of vicious acid, and shove the beheaded body inside of the blob.
The spasms of the body told me that either the head or the body was still trying to regenerate, that's why I was going above and beyond with the acid and the corrosive spike; I put the acid into a spinning twirl.
I turned the floating blob of acid into an acidic washing machine, diluting the decapitated body into the acid until there was nothing left.
Staring through the golden surface of my mask into the white eyes of the head that I had on a spike, I snorted in barely contained disdain.
"Fools are eternal, indeed", I huffed, and Leanna chuckled.
Leanna and I deadpanned like pros, at the sudden cries and animal sounds of elation, sadness, relief, grief, pain, rage, joy, confusion, and liberation of the individuals that forced the retinue of the fool that I have killed.
"That's odd". We said at the same time.