Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 88010 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 440(@200wpm)___ 352(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 88010 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 440(@200wpm)___ 352(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
“Then his departure is a banishment, and it will stand as punishment.”
Problem very neatly solved.
CHAPTER 18
Ornix
For the first time in what feels like a very long time, all is well.
The humans have been dealt with. Equinox is cut off from his magic and stuck in the world of the mundane. In his absence, my realm settles. I can almost feel the sigh of relief being breathed by every creature in creation. There is a peace I did not notice had been lost until it reasserted itself.
Severing the world and the realm was brutal, but necessary, and I have no regrets. I believe Melissa may soon fall pregnant. She has been bred many times, but the stress of her coming here and the ongoing drama with Nox no doubt caused more than a little discordance inside her. Now she can relax and begin to turn her mind and body to the potential of being a mother.
In this realm, pregnancy does not happen accidentally. A woman cannot be forced to bear young. She must be mentally and emotionally aligned to receive the seed. It may have seemed to her as though she had no choice, but the truth of the matter is she has ultimate control.
I should probably mention that, but it keeps slipping my mind. There are many wonders in our realm and that is merely one of them. I have so much to teach her, and I know that the magic in her is only starting to emerge. Wings are only the beginning of the wonders she will perform over time.
I should, perhaps, not have become so comfortable so soon, for my advisors come to me one day with deeply disturbing news.
“The kobolds are dead.”
“Hm?” I look up from my tome. “Some kobolds have been killed? That is the order of things, from time to time.”
“No, Ornix. Not some kobolds. All of them. Some dark force has moved through the forest and the kobolds have been slaughtered. Every last one. Man. Women. Children. They have spared nobody.”
No beast would do that. No horror would do that. There is only one creature any of us have ever encountered who eliminates entire species in their wake.
“Humans,” I say. “There are still humans in the realm.”
“Yes, sire. They may have been trapped here when the realm was sealed. We have been tracking them since we discovered the massacre. They have made camp over fifteen times since they arrived, and have now moved on to other regions. Nothing remains in their wake. They have killed every living thing. There are carcasses scattered across the forest and beyond, skinned, butchered, and left to rot. These creatures are animals of the worst kind.”
“There are still humans here?” Melissa pops through the wall at what feels like the worst possible time. Of course, she does not literally walk through the wall, she just seems to. She is everywhere, this mate of mine, driven by insatiable curiosity. I do not think there is a scrap of palace gossip she does not know.
“Yes. Do not act like you did not hear it all,” I rumble, pulling her into my lap. “Can you explain their behavior?”
Melissa frowns. “It sounds like they’re leveling.”
“What do you mean? Are you talking about the game again?”
“Yes. That’s what they’re doing. They’re leveling to get experience, materials, and gear. It’s normal to farm the forest when you first start. Once you finish the forest, you go to the Cauldron of Hades, probably via the gulch.”
It never ceases to amaze me what a grip on our geography she has.
“They will not survive the cauldron. There are even more dangerous beasts there.”
“Dangerous beasts that drop even more loot,” Melissa says. “They’ll run through the gulch, then head into the mountains before heading to Ireforge. They’ll probably try to trade there, with the Lava People.”
She speaks with so much authority on the subject. I find it adorable and intriguing, the way she knows my world in a way I have never perceived it.
“We have to find them and stop them leveling,” she says. “They will be coming for you, Ornix.”
I laugh at the notion of humans coming for me.
“Stop laughing. I’ve been in dozens of raids in which you were defeated. You don’t know how dangerous people are when they’re focused and in groups.”
She scowls at me, quite genuinely annoyed, and again I find it very appealing.
“You’re not listening,” she repeats. “They will come here and they will kill you. That’s how the game ends. And you can’t leave now. The portals won’t open. Nox has managed to leave you trapped like a rat in a box while his strongest players move through this realm like a mercenary force, growing in power and gear by the hour.”
Melissa
I see the moment I went too far. I hear it. It’s the rat in a box part. He doesn’t like that. He doesn’t want to hear it. He can’t hear it. There’s no world in which Ornix can imagine himself being bested by humans.