5/26 Night
I sat back and looked over the list. I felt reasonably good about it. It wasn't perfect, but a little bit of extra organization could go a long way. I also hadn't realized how few healers I had that were available for general use. Sure I had Calia, Anduin, Sally, Sadie, and Moira who were all powerful priests, but I didn't feel great about putting Anduin anywhere near combat at his age, I'd prefer to let Calia stay with her family most of the time, and the other three have full time jobs surrounded by people.
Anduin and Calia practically solved themselves; they could be healers on standby, working in shifts. It meant that Calia would need to come to Bough Shadow or some other similar prearranged location for several hours a day, but that wasn't really a problem. She could bring her kid if she wanted. Anduin also had a fairly important extra trait: he's been captured for a while, and is a champion in Heroes of the Storm.
Anduin, kid or no, could hopefully teach his unique abilities to other priests. It was at least worth checking; even something simple like the no mana cost light bolts he used as a basic attack could be useful, especially if paired with his ability to heal his allies passively when attacking. I had no real proof that these abilities were transferable, but even if they weren't I'm sure he could heal quite well.
I would have him tutor Talaada for at least an hour or so a day. She had soul talent for the light, but she was still a bit anemic when it came to using magic because she was spending so much time on everything else. Self development is important; that's a lesson I had needed to learn too.
Speaking of learning how to use the light, Lividia teleported onto the seat next to me, dressed in a set of red and white robes. She was smiling smugly. "My king, today I learned how to destroy my enemies."
"Oh? How's that?"
She looked around for a moment before focusing on a heavy stick next to the bonfire, set aside to add more fuel later. After a couple seconds of focus, a musical tone rang out as it was snapped in half. It was adorable; my own smites had been around that powerful when I'd first learned them, and I could tell that she had used a lot of energy, for her.
"Nice! Smite is a useful spell. I'm proud of you. You'll be on power words soon, then?"
"I'm hoping I'll get to learn stronger offensive spells, but Sally claims they are 'too complex.' Bah. So. Who can I kill tonight?"
"Huh? What do you mean?"
"I've been cooped up all day like a good girl and I have a new tool of destruction. Also, I have a staff to master. I want to know who you will let me kill for practice. Even if they kill me, I'll be fine. You'll resurrect me immediately. So. Who do you want me to try to destroy?"
My consort made some compelling points. My first thought was to send her out on a mission, but nothing really sprang out as appropriate for indiscriminate destruction. So, I consulted my list of acceptable targets for genocide and found the Scourge. I checked in with Melisara and asked for directions to any pockets of weak undead she knew about. There were plenty; we settled upon an old farmhouse occupied by undead gnolls. Even here, gnoll slaughter calls to me.
••••••••••
Lividia landed and summoned her staff. It felt warm in her hands, as eager to begin as she was. She continued her approach on foot, not quite sure how spellcasting with the staff would change things, but excited to find out. Her king was watching from a distance, with Noboru circling above. They weren't sure if she would lose the staff if she died, so they wanted to be sure they could retrieve it.
She saw the first gnoll, a female. Like all female undead, she had drastically changed appearance to look more like Lividia, the feminine ideal, upon being reanimated. A nearly human face, prominent tits and ass, all that kind of thing. Her king informed her that the universe itself was changing undead girls to be more fuckable, just for him. As all things should be, naturally. She wondered how many of his strange rituals he would need to do before all people begged to serve him naturally, as opposed to having to be taught to do so by magic. It seemed like an inevitable future to Lividia.
Ah well. This one was not ready to serve in that way, so instead she would serve as target practice. Lividia leveled the staff at the gnoll and cast the strongest smite she could, to make sure it died quickly. The burst of light energy flowed out of Lividia and knocked the zombie's head clean off, only to be replenished over a few seconds by the staff. The comforting warmth of the staff flowed into her arm, into her whole body. She savored the feeling, the realization that she held infinite power. Then it stopped being comforting. There was too much. Searing. Overwhelming. More light inside of her than she could hold. Quite abruptly, she was once again next to her king.
••••••••••
I can't say I was surprised by the firecracker flash of holy fire that consumed Lividia, and my horror at seeing her reduced to ash was drastically reduced by the fact that she was already sitting on the thick branch next to me. With Light's Wrath, too. I turned to her. "So, did you learn anything?"
She returned the staff to the shared inventory. "It's quite a lot of power. I think it was upset that I stopped at just one."
Huh. "Do you think you could handle it better next time?"
She scoffed. "Obviously I was just caught off guard. That staff will be nothing but an extension of me within the week." Sure, Lividia. Sure.
"Well put on your Night Elf face if you want to keep hanging out; we are going to Darnassus and I need two people."
••••••••••
I walked into the front gates of Darnassus with my girlfriend and two sexy ghost girls. The ghosts, Melisara and Vara, were hiding inside each of us. Darnassus was very much awake at night, and we stopped and got some street food and enjoyed the sights. The night elves didn't have a consistent block of time when they all slept, but during the night they were mostly awake. The stars reflected in the pristine lake at the center of the city, giving a sense of the night sky being below as well as above us.
I'd done a bit of mental math and realized I needed to do this minor mission quickly. I wanted to use the Price on Love on Sylvanas, and I needed to use it before she was captured. Which meant that I needed to get it. I looked over the minor mission.
Convince Sylvanna Forestmoon and Lotherias, both of Darnassus, to cooperate on a joint project of some sort.
Rewards: A Price on Love, Imriss gains the ability to cast the spell "invisibility" on himself at will
I didn't know who either of those women were, but if I could capture either of them via possession based love confession, it shouldn't be too hard to get things started. They didn't need to finish a project, just agree to some kind of collaboration. I don't think Kam has done anything at all related to the Thandol Span, for example. Thankfully, my target tracker led me straight to them.
Lotherias was a little bit closer to the front gate, and they were both in the same part of town; the Craftsman's Terrace. She was in a communal shop full of Leatherworkers trading tips, though she seemed to be off in a corner working on a project alone. Not particularly open to being interrupted, you might say.
https://imgur.com/a/XlBdMrw
I walked up and tapped her on the shoulder, letting Melisara flow into her through the skin contact.
••••••••••
This one was mission critical, and given the mixed environment it was far more important to be quick than provide a useful example to the students. Melisara took a look around to determine what she had to work with and what was in the way. She could work at the speed of thought, but she still needed to see what needed to be done first.
Irritation at the interruption, stress at the rush order. The irritation with Erich would need to go. She quashed that down immediately. She couldn't totally overwhelm the girl's mind; it had to be the elf declaring love. Replacing Lotherias's will and emotions entirely would certainly work, but she didn't want to exhaust herself and leave the next one to an amateur like Vara. It would be the backup plan.
"What is it?" Still tense, but not angry. She finished the stitch she was working on before looking up, which gave Melisara more time. She could look around and make a few more changes. Lotherias had recently broken up with her boyfriend; he wanted to settle down and have kids, and she wanted to continue living life as she had for more than a thousand years while he had been in the Emerald Dream. She didn't even like kids! That could be Melisara's way in.
She didn't want kids, but she did like sex. She'd been throwing herself into work, but she was sexually frustrated, a feeling that the banshee worked through. Melisara planted a face in her mind, and stitched it onto her fantasies of an uncomplicated relationship. The fantasies became memories of a new relationship with Erius. As long as Melisara maintained it, plus maybe a few hours after, it would be true to her. Lividia was explained away as his other lover, and jealousy was downplayed as much as possible. After all, she didn't want anything serious, and she was always busy.
The only objective was to get her to say she loved him, and mean it. All the rest was a means to an end. She ramped up the affection, and quickly sent Erich a note describing the plan.
••••••••••
She gave me an exhausted smile when she looked up and saw me, and a combination of communication talent and the note from Melisara told me my next few moves. I handed her some hot tea from the inventory. She drank it pretty quickly, though she didn't love the taste. "Something else next time, please. But thanks. I was pretty thirsty. You mind if I keep working? I'm swamped."
"I just wanted to visit. There was something I wanted to talk to you about. Something business related, but obviously you're already in the middle of something. In the morning?"
"Yeah. Sure." She leaned over and gave me a peck on the cheek. "Maybe we can do some other stuff after I finish this, eh?"
"Maybe. Alright. I'll leave you to it; I love you."
"I love you too." She said it thoughtlessly, but Melisara made sure she meant it. I could tell because of the small changes. She had already been in great shape, like 99% of night elves I've met, but she straightened up and focused. The exhaustion melted away, and the stress of crunch time became easier to handle with Stress Resistance. I squeezed her shoulder and Melisara shifted back into my own body, and the necklace around Lotherias's neck vanished. One down.
••••••••••
We ran into a little bit more trouble with Sylvanna, mostly in that she was working the floor of the shop she worked at, and had customers to attend to. Her manager was in the back, however, working in her own lab. Isolated, and with an open window for ventilation. A few quick blinks got me into the room with her, and shadowmeld let me remain unseen until she was particularly distracted.
Melisara went with a full possession on this one; the banshee would be out of commission for the rest of the night, but we could just order Sylvanna to do something once we captured her boss. Ainethil was a highly in demand alchemist and business owner; having her in the retinue would be a huge boon, even without the mission.
We left Vara in Ainethil's head so that she could contact us with the necklace. It also gave her practice being a passenger, and she could switch over to Sylvanna later. For now, we've done enough prep. Lividia and I did a circuit of the lake in the middle of the city before heading to bed. We'd be back in the morning.