Dark Fate, Chapter 51 (Patreon)

Hey, before the chapter, just want you to know that Book 5 of Dark Fate is now LIVE on Amazon! https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08Z4B26YB

Chapter 51 – Recharge

“Oh, Master! It’s so good!” “Don’t stop, Master!”

I was indulging myself once again. Or, more accurately, regaining my stamina and mana after some intense work. Being a Greater Incubus meant that sending women into ecstasy regenerated my MP and HP at an increased rate.

We were out back, by the pool, and I was letting Zoe and Ezraekiel do most of the work, for the moment. The Lamia in her elven form was currently bouncing her hips on my cock, enjoying herself as she pleasured me. The Vampire, on the other hand, was currently seated on my face, and was getting a thorough education in what an incubus with the [Carnal Arts] skill could do with his tongue. Both seemed quite pleased with the arrangement, for the moment.

And I needed the recharge. The girls and I had spent most of the morning clearing out a dungeon, and we were all tired. Oh, it wasn’t that the monsters were terribly difficult. It was just a slime dungeon, after all, and the monsters’ levels started at level 15, with the boss at 20. Small fry for us, now.

We had all leveled up a few times since the encounter with the Puppet Master and James over two months ago. That fight alone had kicked us up a level. Since then, when we didn’t have cases with the APD, we were spending our time fighting through dungeons.

Unfortunately, we were starting to reach a plateau on that. The XP had been coming in good, the first couple weeks, but the dungeons were not growing at the same rate that we were, and it wasn’t long before we were outpacing them. We had just gotten to Level 22, after two months of grinding, but the last level had taken us almost two weeks. Only the bosses of the different dungeons offered us any real XP, now.

Simply put, if we were going to keep ahead of the rest of the pack, we were going to have to find stronger foes. And that wasn’t going to happen in Atlanta, because they had finally figured out how to ward the city so that monsters wouldn’t randomly spawn in the city. Worse, the Adventurers Guild, which had started up after someone got the idea from a guy in Miami starting his own guild, was working to prevent deaths in the dungeons, by making sure registered adventurers were organized into parties and properly equipped, which was further slowing the growth of the local dungeons.

“Mister Green, I—OH GOD, WHY CAN’T YOU GET A ROOM? THIS IS THE LIVING ROOM!”

I sighed, and tapped Ezraekiel on her ass, to signal her to move. The Vampire pouted, but did as she was told. Looking over to the side, I saw Ezrae’s sister, Zarina. She was the only person here who called me Mister Green when there weren’t visitors around, because she was the only person other than myself living in my mansion that wasn’t one of my slaves.

So, she could offer opinions about me having an afternoon threesome in the living room with two of my harem girls. Of course, there were limits, since she was basically being paid with room and board (and the protection that offered), as well as a small stipend, for her services as an enchanter. I’d signed a contract with her, and everything, so she couldn’t just run off or betray me. It wasn’t quite as secure as enslaving her, but I had promised her sister that I wouldn’t collar her sister by force.

“So, Zarina, what brings you out of the lab? I thought you’d still be at work?”

Zarina still looked uncomfortable, despite her sister no longer sitting on my face. “Can you stop fucking and put some clothes on, at least?”

Ah, she didn’t want to watch Zoe fucking herself on me. “Well, I’m not finished yet, so unless you want to take her place, I’ll continue fucking my property as I wish on my property.” Still, no reason I couldn’t throw her a bone. “Zoe, hurry it up. Ezrae, help her out.”

As the lamia switched from grinding and stroking herself on me to pounding her hips down as she threw her head back in pleasure, I felt the vampire’s tongue caressing my balls, working to get me over the edge faster. Zarina was visibly fighting with herself, trying to maintain eye contact with me, despite the expression I was wearing, and what else was going on. “So, you were saying?”

Zarina grit her teeth. “Fine. I managed to work out the formula from the enchanting guide you purchased. I was able to create some single-use teleport talismans. They can only bring you back to this compound, and they’ll only take you, and anything you’re carrying.”

I smiled, and not just from the wonderful sensations I was feeling below my waistline. This was just the kind of thing we needed if we were going to go out exploring. A way to get back if we were in trouble or needed back here in a hurry. “Excellent. Effective range?”

“About three hundred miles. But I wouldn’t try it inside a dungeon. The excess mana would probably screw with the spell, either blocking it or sending it off course.”

OK, so it wasn’t a perfect solution, but it was a step in the right direction. “That’s fine. This will be useful for us, regardless. Now that you’ve figured it out, I’d like at least one for everyone here, with back. Then, I want a different version that could teleport a group. Or at least open a portal that we could send a group through.”

“In case you find new allies, or need to get the police officers you might be working with out of the way?”

“Exactly. If you can get that one setting people down outside the gate, that would probably be best. Finally, I want something that can allow us to dip out of dungeons if we need to. Doesn’t need to be long range. Just enough to get us out of the dungeon. Perhaps something we can set the recall point to a certain spot before going into the dungeon?”

Zarina frowned, and her eyes drifted from mine, focusing on a point on the wall as she started working through the problem. She was driven, when she had a problem to solve, which I could appreciate. She just needed to get used to her new situation, and the way the world had changed.

That was part of why I had assigned her this project. There were teleport devices available in the System Shop, for a price. But making her buckle down and figure out the solution, before putting it into practice, I hoped would make Zarina start focusing on her role as a crafter, and start creating, rather than just making something designed by someone else. As the serial killer I faced a few months ago showed, creation could lead to unexpected results, like that unique potion containing the Curse of the Black Knight. I wanted her to be able to make things like that for me, if she could.

Slowly, she nodded. “It should be possible, but I’d need to study the formulas more. The shorter the distance, the less the effect of a dungeon’s mana should affect things. But that won’t help any if you are stuck someplace where teleportation magic is blocked.”

I groaned as Zoe plunged down hard, her muscles tightening around me as she screamed in pleasure. I shuddered, as my own release came, emptying into the blue-skinned beauty riding me. Slowly, Zoe pulled herself off of me, and I felt her nether lips replaced by Ezraekiel’s, as she took me into her mouth to clean me off.

With a sigh of contentment, I looked back to Zarina. “Nothing we can do about that. Not without enough power to overwhelm whatever might be stopping teleportation. And if it is a System restriction, then there wouldn’t be anything we could do at all except find a way to drop the restriction.”

Zarina was blushing, and most definitely not looking my way right now. “Um, ah. Yes. Yes. That’s right. I don’t know of any formulas that can circumvent the System. At least, not with the information I have access to.”

“That’s fine. I’m sure you have plenty of work to do, so I won’t keep you. Thank you for the good work, Zarina.” At this dismissal, Zarina promptly scurried from the room. Apparently, the sight of her sister cleaning me made her need some time to compose herself.

When she was gone, I tapped Ezraekiel on the head, and she pulled off. As I stood to reclaim my clothes from where I’d tossed them, the vampire looked up at me. “Master, why do you have my sister researching teleportation items? Couldn’t you just use some kind of spell?”

Looking over to her as I bent down to pick up my pants, I grinned. “Of course, I could. But in the first Tier, those magics are pretty much exclusively in the realm of items or rituals. Oh, there are some spells that can teleport you short distances, designed to be used in combat, or to get around obstacles, but hopscotching across the city would get tiring, and a tank would be more subtle, to anyone who could sense magic.”

“So, it is something that can be done, but not easily, until you get stronger?”

“Exactly. And to get stronger, I need to expand my reach, and get out into the world, to find stronger foes. But I still have responsibilities back here, so finding a way to return in a hurry if I need to is important.”

Zoe pressed herself against my back. “How far do you think you will have to go, Master? It will get so lonely without you here, if you’re gone for long.”

I chuckled, and turned to face her. “I don’t know, pet. The areas around here should be good, at first, but after a while, I’ll probably have to start going further and further. Have to be ready when the aliens show up.”

Ezraekiel stepped forward, handing me my shirt. “So, Aliens are really coming to invade, and take over the planet?”

“Yes, they are, unless my going back in time has changed things on a more fundamental level than I know. The first groups won’t be that strong. Still in the 30s, as far as levels go, but that’s it. They should basically be scavengers, looking to make a quick score before more powerful forces come to push them out. Slavers and pirates, for the most part, but some people from species that like eating sentients will come for the ‘food’.”

Ezraekiel’s eyes went wide. “They’re coming to eat people? How could they?”

I chuckled. “You’re a vampire, Ezrae, and I’m an incubus. We both feed on people. Zoe’s a lamia, and has literally eaten someone before, and she’s a former human. Do you really think that aliens who live in a universe of ‘might makes right’ will care about little things like the morality of eating prey?”

Shaking my head, I continued, “No, the aliens that should be coming first basically live in a world of predators and prey. There is no galactic federation of planets or anything like that to maintain peace and order, so everyone has to fight to survive. There won’t be any courts humans could go to keep an alien empire from enslaving and killing us, if we can’t fight them off ourselves.

“But, on the other hand, that gives us our best opportunity for survival.” Seeing the two girls’ confused expressions, I grinned. “The first group will be weaker, like I said. And they won’t be organized, or working together. That means that, if we’re strong enough, we can overcome some of these minor foes, and get a massive head start on our tech, to catch up and make a better defense by the time the real invaders show up.”

As I started pulling on my clothes, Zoe breathed in, and then asked, “Master, what happened the last time?”

I sighed. “Everyone was too caught up in their own affairs. The governments were barely hanging on, and everyone was desperately trying to find a way to just adapt our current tech to the System, so no one had any time for advancements. We had no warning, so ships would come and scoop up whole groups. They survived, and told their friends, and soon there were ships all over.

“At that point, the aliens, under a ‘Boss of Bosses’, tried to take over. All he managed was destroying what little order remained, and the world devolved into warbands. I’d spent the last ten years fighting different aliens and warbands, unifying Georgia and the surrounding area under my banner.”

“This time, however—” I cut off as Talia came in. “What is it?”

“Master, a representative of the Adventurers’ Guild came. There is a problem up in Kennesaw. They would like to hire you to check it out.”

I took a breath, and grinned. “Well, I had been looking to get out of the city for a bit, and find some new challenges. Looks like I got my wish.”