The Gamer Chapter 1238 – Prologue – To the Victor goes the Maid (Patreon)

“Hey, John?” Momo asked.

“Hm?” the Gamer hummed in response.

“Remember what we did before we fought Arkeidos?” He nodded affirmingly. “And before we gathered everyone? Before we conquered half of the Iron Domain? Before we even landed in it? Before we talked to Lorelei about what words would be best? Most importantly, before Moira called to let you know Lorelei was coming over?”

“Right,” John immediately knew what she was aiming at. “This isn’t the proper moment to get you your facesitting time though.”

The Gamer had managed to sneak his way out of the party. Following Maximillian’s proposal, the couple had become the heart of the party. After fighting his way through to give his congratulations, John had decided that this was as good a time as any for him and his haremettes to get out of there and finally take care of what they wanted done the most.

“Just making sure you remember,” Momo pointed out, her wings fluttering softly as she walked alongside him. Whether her excitement was regarding the opportunity to envelop his head with her pale white thighs or because they were getting a new maid added to their not-so-little group was easily guessed. One was an easily won privilege, the other a rare occurrence.

Although the people that had joined them in the fight had done it in part for Claire, only John and the harem had truly fought for her. For everyone else, her capture was more the inciting incident that had then pulled them in. It felt appropriate that they did this in their own circle.

Most of their circle. The elementals were still missing. In four days he would be given back 10% of his mana regeneration, which would allow him to keep one or two of them around again, depending on how he managed the costs. Every day after that, he’d be given back another 10%. After 13 days, his mana regeneration would be back to normal.

Stirwin had been manually dismissed. Usually, John revived his dead elementals with his own mana, but the Celestial Devourer would have to rely on the energies of his home plane this time around. Instead, John had used what mana he regenerated to summon Undine at one point. Even with the maximum MP stored up, he couldn’t keep her around for more than two hours.

That was worthwhile to give Undine a break though. Quivering and stressed, she had spent the first ten minutes of them being together just cuddled up to him. The good news was that the Mother of Water appeared to be distracted with something else. Because it was still her plane of existence, practically everything was hostile to Undine and the best she could do was hide. John kept summoning her once a day to give her breaks and to keep checking on her. So far, at least, she had only been ostracized. A much better fate than the alternative.

As for those that were around: they were going to the puppet room, as John had understandably dubbed the part of the Palace where he kept his golem bodies. It was also where Momo had decided to keep Claire’s core for the time being. Of his two additional body options, John had neither available. While he could have paid for an Extension, as it also had a percentage-based cost, that effect was on cooldown for another 25 days. He could only pick a new one a month after slotting in the last one. This could have been circumnavigated if they had found the remains of the old one, but no such luck. The Creator Puppet was out simply because it had a flat cost that John could not pay at the moment.

Regardless of that, the room was still dedicated to the crafting of bodies and was therefore the appropriate space to put Claire to a new form. Now that the Iron Domain was officially left behind, there was nothing preventing them from finally seeing this through.

“Alright, let’s hope all of this works,” John mumbled as he picked up the red spherical object, lying on top of a workbench. Claire’s core was the size of a golf ball, making it a little larger than the Artificial Crystals used for the purely synthetic counterparts of the Natural Spirits. Even with that in mind, John found it fascinating that a sapient soul could be condensed into such a small physical shape. Red, with black veins running through it, it looked like a small piece of art.

John extended his will towards the core, as he had done before. This time, his probing was answered by an excited backflow of magic. ‘Master? MASTER!’ Claire’s ecstatic voice echoed in his mind. ‘Master, Master, Master, I knew you’d come for me, knew that you’d be victorious, knew that you would kill the Emperor.’

‘Arkeidos is indeed dead,’ John told her and felt grim satisfaction pulse in his hand. The red of the sphere in his hand turned into a bloody crimson. ‘I hope the wait wasn’t too bad?’

‘I was… sleeping until your mana nudged me awake just now, Master. Can I see you? Can I touch you? Please, please, let me touch you, Master!’ Her voice was sliding into a manic tone that, against common wisdom, made John’s dick twitch in his pants.

‘You’re in my world now,’ he informed her. ‘I would’ve given you the choice one more time but…’

‘I didn’t need to be asked! I want to be with you, I want to be with you, I need to be with you!’


There was no doubt about what she wanted, so John was moving his finger to tap the button. The patch announcement didn’t surprise him. Sole reason to hesitate would have been that, with Claire taking the slot, a different solution would have to be found for Delicia. That was a bridge he would cross when it came to it. For the alchemist, other solutions could be found. For Claire: she was his.

He tapped the button and the mental connection that had been born only from contact immediately hooked into his mindscape. The emotions he felt a moment ago turned into a storm of extreme adoration and slumbering danger. Claire was so deeply in love with him already that it was almost scary and the years of her previous life still bore their marks on her soul.

John did not mind either and embraced her probing thoughts. A shower of kisses descended on his mind. He fed her the memories of what had happened, while placing her core in a basket filled with metal scrap that had been prepared days ago. Then, nothing had happened. Now, the closest slivers of copper and iron were binding to the surface of the core. Quickly they became animated, allowing Claire to expand her will. A tiny version of the vampire soon sat in the basket, voraciously chomping her way through progressively sturdier metals. Desperately, she chased her regular size so she could be in proper contact with him again. Her mind only detached from his to connect with that of the other three maids and Metra, get to know the three she didn’t and exchange vital information about the human body with Aclysia.

The Gamer, meanwhile, was presented with a number of important windows.


‘Alright, Claire, I need you to keep telling me what your favourite choice would be.’

‘I’ll be whatever you want me to be, Master!’ Claire responded enthusiastically. She chuckled when she felt his reprimand coming up. ‘Sorry, sorry, sorry, yes, I’ll pick whatever I want the most. What I want the most for me is what you want the most for me, right? Because you are the greatest of all conquerors.’

“Keep calling me Master,” he instructed the vampire, now speaking out loud. He walked over and scratched the head of the now hand-sized redhead. She stopped mid nibbling to giggle with downright manic excitement at that little contact. Tempted as he was to coax more of that delightful sound from her, he prioritized the choices.

There was a wave of need from her, definitely reminiscent of Aclysia during her less reasonable moments. If John had less experience with taming crazy girls, he would have been unnerved by this. With his proclivities, Claire was not the first and she almost certainly wouldn’t be the last.

Looking around, as if to distract herself, the tiny vampire in her maid-esque dress now physically looked to the three maids that she had only seen previously. ‘White,’ the word echoed through their mental connection. Claire ran a hand through her hair, clearly displeased that she was not fitting in with the crowd. A mental effort was made to change her hair colour.

‘That won’t be possible,’ he informed her. ‘Now that you’re part of my system, shapeshifting is limited to clothes and human disguises.’

‘Master, I can’t stick out like this! A maid must be uniform with her fellow servants!’

John could hear her appropriate Aclysia’s lingo already. What had started when the three of them had spent a few days together was rapidly advancing now that there was a soul-route to exchange intel. Since this was a process to eliminate her Ironborn vocabulary, John was more than fine with this.

“Can’t wait to talk to ya,” Rave said, while she and everyone else circled around the gradually growing newcomer. There weren’t a lot of chances for interaction, but it was just a start anyway. Claire was going nowhere they weren’t.

John concentrated on the Perks.


There was no need to mess with what she got going on and the ability to absorb lifeforce to increase Consumption would be pretty useful to catch her up with the rest of the harem. While the Dhampir did sound useful, Claire could already move through the sun courtesy of her metal body. She hated it, but she could. If Dhampir had removed the weakening effect of daylight on her spells, that would have been worthwhile.


Nightfall was probably the most useful. Thralls was out from the get go. John already knew that The Masquerade would get chosen though. Only reason why he didn’t have a begging voice in his head right now was that Claire probably hadn’t figured out yet how to look through his eyes. When he carefully presented the view to her, she rapidly clung onto it.

‘So, this is how you see the world, Master.’ John could practically feel Claire getting more comfortable inside his soul. ‘I would stay here forever if I could. You have such a beautiful mind.’

One step away, Momo let out a playful retch. While he was thoroughly enjoying the constant stream of, sometimes obsessive, compliments, the sassy maid was trying to pretend that she was getting physically sick from it. Of course, they both knew that she loved him anyway. She was just an adorable brat about it. John appreciated both sides and everything in between.

‘Let’s not get too distracted yet,’ John told her and nudged her attention to the contents of his field of view. Then he realized his bigger error. ‘Right… you can’t read these letters. Alright, let me read this out to you.’

John had only read out the first choice when Claire made the predictable announcement. “MASQUERADE!” she shouted out loud. By this point, she was the size of a child’s doll.

Because the other two Perks had nothing that worthwhile, John skipped the process of affirmation. That and because she was obsessively chanting the various attributes the other maids had in common inside her head.

One tap of the button later, Claire’s hair shifted colour. The crimson red was replaced with the silvery white typical of John’s maids. It became a little shorter as well, ending at chin length, and had a decorative bit of chaos to it, especially towards the tips. Her skin turned from extremely white to a more common shade of pink, still very much on the pale side. Ironically, this left the vampire with more colour than the fairy. Then again, it did fit Momo’s monochrome theme to be the whitest of the bunch. Otherwise, nothing immediately changed, although any adjustments under the dress were hidden both by that dress and her current minute size. Remarkably, her red eyes stayed. Apparently, those could not be adjusted. When she changed to her redheaded human disguise for a quick test, they did switch to the green all of the Artificial Spirits, save for Momo, had.

Because the green was not uniform among the maids, Claire was not that bothered by not sharing it in her white-haired form.


“Mesmerizing,” Claire requested after John had read everything out to her. “Do you not like the choice?” she asked. Although they had moved to communicating out loud, she did still feel his every emotion.

“I have an aversion to mind controlling abilities,” he confessed.

“I think I could serve you best with it, Master.”

John nodded. None of the three choices were outstanding. Mesmerizing had the advantage of being universally usable, even if he didn’t like most of the viable use cases. “Just promise me not to use it leisurely.”

“Promise, Master,” Claire responded. “Don’t worry too much, I’m smart. Well, I’m also a total mess, but I’m smart. Matter of fact, I feel smarter than ever.”

“That’s the game system splitting your Spellpower into your Mental Stats,” John informed her. “Funny interaction, that.”

“I have no idea what it means, but I definitely believe you!” Claire smiled. She was gradually becoming more of her charismatic self. Her physical form getting more stable and the continued realization that she really was alive and safe must have helped with letting the obsessively loving instincts simmer down a little bit.


As per usual with these, all three were extraordinarily powerful. Vampire Slasher offered immense power in drawn-out engagements, adding bonus damage to every hit. Sanguine Household added mobility by turning into a swarm of bats, survivability by having back-up familiars, a general damage boost, and spies. Princess of the Night had the least direct power, but the conditional of turning either one prominent or several regular enemies was not to be underestimated. Improving the power of her mesmerizing gaze also had a number of benefits.

“Any preferences?” John asked Claire.

“Hmm,” the now toddler-sized vampire responded with a hum. “I can only tell you that I like Vampire Slasher the least. Call me lazy, because I am, but I just don’t like stabbing people personally that much.”

Nodding and rubbing his chin, John answered, “If it’s the same to you, I’d like to take Sanguine Household. It keeps you safe.”

“I like being safe. I can spend more time with you when I’m alive,” Claire babbled and looked around the others. “Really looking forward to knowing more about all of you! Anyone who loves Master must be a great person.”

“Eh, some of us are,” Lee joked.

Lydia crossed her arms. “Would you elaborate which of us you think inferior to the others?”

“Don’t you worry,” Claire chimed back in, while raising the next piece of magical metal to her mouth, “you’re all better than me anyway.”

“Fuck you, I’m the worst!” Eliana insisted.

“Hey!” John raised his voice in a sharper fashion than usual, causing all heads to turn in his direction. “You’re my loves and I won’t have you engage in a race to the bottom.” He looked at each of them in turn, but lingered particularly long on the self-deprecating members of his harem. “Know your place: by my side. I wouldn’t have anything but outstanding women around me.”

The words came through as intended. Various reactions at different levels of intensity filled the room with giggles and the shifting of clothes by the proud, the submissive, and the shy women. Claire herself chomped down on metal with renewed voracity. The need to get to her true size was clear to everyone around.

Loudly, Rave clapped her hands. “Alright, we all got our first view of Claire here,” the Gamer’s girlfriend said. “Let’s give them some space. Tiger, we’ll be back in the apartment.”

John found it quite interesting what Rave implied with that there. Then again, it was quite likely that things would get steamy the moment Claire had the opportunity. Whatever happened, he wouldn’t complain. “I’ll join you later,” he promised. The harem quickly flowed out of the room. “Just three more choices,” he assured her.

Mouth fulf of metal, Claire nodded. She had crossed the point where she could fit whole chunks into her mouth, so the recovery was getting along ever quicker.


That choice was easy as far as John was concerned, mostly because they had already invested into her familiars. Night Terror was a very physical combat role and John had enough of those. Midnight Intrigant was interesting, mostly due to the memory extraction. Interesting was all it was in John’s eyes. Vampire Maiden offered the opportunity for Claire to be a one-woman vanguard, scouting out entire complexes on her own.

Claire agreed, so that choice was made.


The problem with these three choices was that Death Nail was absurdly powerful. 200% of her Max Mana was absolutely possible, since she could use Sanguine to aid her in casting. Sanguine could be built up in advance by her drinking the blood of her allies. All that was required there was a particular Stat balance. Because Sanguine scaled with HP and MP, getting her Endurance up would let them tilt the balance just enough that she could cast it at the start of every fight.

That would leave her immediately tapped, sure, but the sheer value of having an on-demand damage echo was incredible. Bloodsense and Ghostly Mist were just utility.

Death Nail was selected and the last of the Integration Choices opened up.


While Ghostly Mist may have had the biggest utility of the three, John went with Voracity. Claire deserved to taste all of the foods she had never gotten the chance to in life.


“There’s a lot here that we still have to fill out,” John hummed and watched the vampire woman shift from one leg to the other. As much as he desired to tease her, there was something else that needed to be done now that she was standing before him. He took her face between his hands and pulled her into a deep kiss.

Instantly, she wrapped her arms around his back. All of her pressed against him. Raising one of her legs, she pressed her thigh against his hip. He could feel all the meatiness there, separated from him by their clothes. His tongue explored the inside of her mouth. It was their second ever kiss. John was not tired of the lips of any of his haremettes, how could he be even remotely satisfied with the pinkish red of her full mouth? Gently, he probed the sharpness of her teeth and greedily tasted her. There was a hint of iron there, either due to her vampiric nature or because this body was so new.

Interestingly, despite not having any Perks in that direction, Claire felt like a human on every level. Perhaps Natural Spirits had such benefits without the need for enabling mechanics.

When John pulled back from the kiss, Claire at first refused to let him go. A deep-seated need for more of his touch wrestled with her desire to be a good maid. The latter won out eventually. Still nuzzled against him, she looked up with her adoring red eyes. “I can feel you still communicating with Aclysia,” he told her, his tone amused.

“I’m learning what you like, my perfect Master,” she moaned. “I want to please you. I want to be pleased by you. I want to submit.”

“You will,” he assured her. “I just want to clarify two things first. This old outfit of yours does not fit you anymore. You’ll get the same outfit that Aclysia and Beatrice wear.”

“Thank you!” she shouted manically. Clearing her throat, she repeated, in a more ladylike tone, “Thank you, Master. I love that outfit and I’ll love to serve you.”

John grinned, greatly enjoying a new partner that was this incredibly eager to oblige his wishes. He saw and felt her clothes grow thinner by the second. She had just learned that this dress would be replaced and probably already knew that the standard attire inside the Palace was supposed to be nothing. “Secondly, I want to give you a choice. Either you can have a normal first time with me or I can immediately increase your Libido – your sex drive – to that befitting a member of my ha-“

“Do that!” Claire interrupted him with overbearing readiness. “I’m a perfect fit for your harem! Make me a perfect fit!”

Deeply satisfied with that answer, John pressed the plus next to her Libido. All of the points she had gotten by eating the enriched materials provided for her quadrupled her Libido in an instant. The effect was immediate. Claire, already more than willing to take this to the next step, turned red with desire. Slowly, deliberately, she sank to the floor. Always, she maintained eye contact. Her eyes were rimmed by thick, black lashes. Nude, she knelt before him.

And started begging.