Amazon Apocalypse 2: Chapter 89 (Epilogue) (Patreon)

At first glance, the city ruled by Elder Thalassa seemed prosperous. But that wealth came at the whim of an iron gauntlet, for within her domain, Thalassa's rule was absolute.

From the smallest farm to the largest workshop, everything within her city was owned and under her control. Trusted agents managed her assets on her behalf, but at the end of the day, from the wealthiest nobles to the poorest commoners, no one under her watch owned more than the clothes on their backs.

This method of rule had its flaws. After all, a man or woman would never work as hard for another as they would for themselves. But sufficient applications of carrots and sticks got things working in an orderly way that Elder Thalassa deemed pleasing. Far more orderly than the chaotic and disorganized manner in which the Samhain main family managed their assets.

"There would have been no Shadefall rebellion under my watch..." Elder Thalassa muttered to herself as she stared out over her city.

"T-the wine, Elder," said a nervous servant. "It's the same batch that we served Matriarch Kyrina when she last visited."

Elder Thalassa picked up the glass, swirled it once, then took a small sip. A moment later, she spat it right out.

"Not this drivel! The good wine." Elder Thalassa set the glass back down on the table and waved the servant away.

Her mood ruined, she stalked through the halls. Everything had to be perfect for the very special guest who was due to arrive in just a few hours.

"You!" She spotted one of her servants. "Find some nightshade blooms. Morgathor will prefer those. And switch out red drapes in his room for purple. The Serpent [C1] Lodge prefers a certain aesthetic. One we will strive to match to make our guests as comfortable as possible."

The servant quickly scurried off to do as she commanded. Elder Thalassa continued her inspection of the living quarters in her fortress, even going so far as to straighten portraits with her own hands when she spotted any too crooked. After that, she went to the kitchen to ensure dinner would be of the highest quality.

With her leadership philosophy, getting things done often demanded her physical presence to ensure everything was happening exactly as she desired. Any underling she granted too much power invariably ended up cheating her or doing things wrong at some point, so she could do little other than see to things personally as much as time allowed.

She spent the next hour ensuring the proper array of intricate tapestries were on display, each displaying her many victories and those of her direct ancestors. There were a few still up representing victories of the Samhain main family from her last guest, and those had to be removed and replaced with something more appropriate.

"Milady..." a nervous servant began. Her hair was drawn back, and though she was a far larger woman than Elder Thalassa, she shrunk in on herself in the face of the powerful C-Grade elder's power.

"Not now..." Elder Thalassa hissed. "There's much to do before Morgathor arrives..."

"But milady..." The servant winced as Elder Thalassa whirled on her with an angry look, but she forced herself to continue. "That's just it. Morgathor is already here."

"What? He wasn't due to teleport in for hours!"

The servant took a step backward and held up her hands. "He must have arrived early."

Elder Thalassa cursed, then waved to the tapestries. "See to this. Any mistakes and I'll have your hide for a new purse."

The servant looked at the tapestries in bewilderment, not sure what she was supposed to do with them. But it was too late to ask questions. Elder Thalassa disappeared down the hall in the blink of an eye.

She stopped only once before a large mirror, looking herself over briefly. Gray-streaked hair was not considered ideal on most worlds, and more than once Elder Thalassa had considered dyeing it back to the darker color it had been in her youth. But she'd heard a rumor that wizards and their ilk often preferred a more mature look.

After all, most spellcaster specialists were helpless at the lower ranks. It took far longer to learn to cast spells than it did to learn how to swing a sword, and that difference manifested itself in leveling speed through F and particularly E ranks.

While racial upgrades always extended lifespans, they didn't completely reverse the clock. Someone who reached E-Grade as a gray-bearded old man would still be sporting a gray beard when the transformation was finished, though with a lot more vigor than before. The same was true of D-Grade and C-Grade.

As a result, youthful-looking spellcasters were rare, speaking either of tremendous talent, tremendous backing, or tremendous recklessness.

Morgathor had possessed none of those in his youth, though he was certainly well connected now. Every member of the Serpent Lodge was a force of devilish magic that could curse a city to disease and despair. Thalassa didn't look down on spellcasters like her younger and more foolish relatives might. No, she'd seen firsthand how dangerous they could be. And how useful, if bargained with.

After brushing herself off and throwing on something more formal for her guest, she rushed to meet him. He'd already made his way through her castle and had made himself at home in her library.

Thalassa didn't mind though. Before her dealings with the Serpent Lodge, she'd owned no more than a single shelf of books. The hundreds she acquired after that had been largely to impress the very man now sitting in her library.

"I see you've been studying the ancient history of Algamar. That world had such a tragic fate..." Morgathor said as she entered. He didn't look up from the book he was holding.

"I... ahem... yes, I've been studying that one quite thoroughly." Thalassa smiled from the doorway. In an instant, she’d discarded the appearance of the iron-fisted ruler she’d been moments before in exchange for something a little more intimate. "Wine? Do you want wine? I'll have some servants bring some wine. We can move to my lounge to chat, that might be more comfortable."

Thalassa hastily glanced around for some servants, but there were none to be found.

"No need for servants. And here is fine for me." Morgathor sat down on a nearby chair and twirled his fingers. A glass of wine appeared in his hand, conjured directly without him needing to physically reach for it in his bag of holding.

He had long hair and wore a long purple robe. Both hung loose and were completely impractical for combat, in Thalassa's opinion. While Amazonians also favored long hair, they had a million ways to keep it out of the way during the fight, but Morgathor didn't even make the attempt. He looked frail, and yet Thalassa knew he could flatten the entire castle with a few words. It always made Thalassa feel strange, but such was the way of things with spellcasters.

"You like it, I hope?" Thalassa pressed. "The book, I mean."

Morgathor shrugged without looking up. "Not really. I think this is the abridged edition republished by the empire that colonized Algamar's former territories. They massacred the surviving locals and had to make some historical alterations to justify it. Of course, they could have been right, and my own sources might be biased. Hard to say without visiting Algamar and searching the ruins myself. Perhaps I'll find the time to write my own book on the subject one of these days."

Thalassa smiled, forcing the corners of her mouth to reach either ear. "If you do, your book will have a favored position on my shelf."

Slowly, she made her way to the chair Morgathor was sitting in and squeezed in beside him. She wasn't shy about placing her arm around his shoulders.

They weren’t exactly lovers, but the two of them had a mutually beneficial relationship. One that could see great benefits to both parties if well-tended.

"It's good to have you back. It's been what, three years since you last visited me?" Thalassa leaned in close to read what had caught so much of Morgathor's attention. The page just looked like a bunch of cramped, useless scribbles to her.

"That long already? Time sure flies..." Morgathor muttered as he flipped another page.

"I must ask, how's our boy? I miss him so. Is he still in D-Grade?" Thalassa asked.

"What? Him? Oh no, he reached C-Grade a while ago. You can ask him yourself, he'll come over either tonight or tomorrow. His power is still a bit hollow until he gets his proficiencies back up to match his new level, so he'll have to stay at level 100 for a few years. He's a bit overconfident and liable to look down on his enemies, but as long as we correct that he should be a fine wizard." Morgathor waved his hand dismissively as he kept reading.

"Good. Very good." Thalassa combed fingers through Morgathor's hair. "Because I have a plan for that boy. It's past time he gain some gifts from his mother's side of the family."

"I thought you didn't want him. That was the whole reason he had to come with me?" Morgathor flipped another page.

"Not quite." Thalassa shrugged. "Our relationship with the males of our kind is... complicated. Barring special cases like the main family, the Amazonian racial trait is only passed on in its entirety to our daughters, so our sons often inherit their father's traits. It renders them unsuitable for our training strategies. He was a fine boy growing up in a System-designated child shard, but once he was able to level it was best he leave with you. He would have only ever been a mediocre warrior under my watch."

"But now you want him back. After the Serpent Lodge has put so much work into him. My comrades won’t be pleased,” Morgathor replied, a trace of displeasure in his voice.

"It's for his own good, I promise," Thalassa assured. "I have a master plan. The Samhain main family is unworthy of their position of prominence. Kyrina was never supposed to rule the Samhain Clan, that she was ever able to do so was a mistake, but me and the other elders allowed it to happen. Her frequent absence allowed the various factions under them to rule as we pleased. But now she intends to change that by passing on rule over these lands to her daughter Cyra."

"It sounds to me like things are simply returning to normal." Morgathor shrugged.

"Normal does not mean better." Thalassa shook her head. "And worse, Cyra proved far more adept than she should have been at bringing order to Shadefall. I expected that city to be a bottomless pit of clan funds for years, but rumor is it is already producing enchanted weapons again. No, I need to accelerate our plans. And our secret lovechild is just the young man for the job."

Morgathor let out a low murmur, one that neither agreed nor disagreed. "What is it you have in mind?"

"Kyrina's daughters are the key. Myrina would be the ideal target. As our son is C-Grade and she is D-Grade, defeating her should be easy. Well, there's a minor off-worlder who might be trouble, but either of us should be able to take care of him easily."

"All well and good, but our boy is a resource of the Serpent Lodge now. What's in it for us?" Morgathor asked.

"Well, I can think of something in it for you..." Thalassa purred.

Morgathor closed his book, turned, and raised an eyebrow. "I was thinking something more material."

"Fine." Thalassa sighed. "We will transform the Samhain Clan's territories into a resource harvesting outpost for your experiments, would that satisfy you?"

Morgathor shook his head. "That's not enough. How about you give the Serpent Lodge some of your kinswomen? We are in the process of creating death knights to fill out their ranks. We've been killing warriors of the Sandswept Plains, but Amazonian corpses should do just as well."

Thalassa chewed on her lip for a moment. "Deal. You will have both bodies and resources in exchange for bringing in the Serpent Lodge. With your support, no one short of the Ancestors themselves can hope to intervene. And with how the Shadefall Rebellion went, I imagine they're all off on System Quests."

"We're at war with two neighboring multiverses now, and all high-tier warriors are needed on the front lines. The actions of little people like us will continue to go unnoticed," Morgathor agreed.

"Now that we've settled that"—Thalassa smiled wide and brushed her fingers along Morgathor's bearded chin—"it seems we have the castle all to ourselves until our son arrives. However shall we pass the time?

Morgathor gestured to his book. "You have plenty in your library."

Thalassa rolled her eyes. "I was thinking of something a little more intimate..."

Morgathor finally closed his book. "I could perhaps indulge. After all, it's been..." The wizard frowned.

"Twenty years?" Thalassa guessed, smile on her face. "When we made our son? You know, the last time I lured you into my lair?"

The wizard combed his beard. "You know, I think you're right. But are you sure this sort of thing is alright? Don't you Amazonians have that whole duel thing you're supposed to go through? That's the whole basis of how you plan to use our son to take over the main family, after all."

Thalassa laughed. "While it's true I'm quick to remind the Samhain main family about the importance of our traditions... what they don't know won't hurt them."

<Note>

Thank you all for reading!

Spellheart 10 is up next, but I'll be doing a bit of outlining and work on Amazon Apocalypse 3 right after this. Stay tuned for my usual "What do you want to see in Amazon Apocalypse 3" post! That'll be the time to make suggestions that might actually get incorporated into the outline.

I hope you enjoyed Amazon Apocalypse book 2! This was a big one. Probably the largest harem novel I'll ever write.

Anyway, I've just finished chapter 20 of Spellheart 10, so we might be able to go to 5 chapters a week relatively quickly, assuming I can edit them faster than I post them while maintaining this pace. That'll be easier once this book is finally out.

I hope to see you guys again for Amazon Apocalypse 3 in roughly 3 months or so!