The mana available to me was intoxicating, decadently enticing, wanting to be used and I wanted to use it to cause destruction to the elves who had pressed me into such a desperate corner. The sheer amount made my head spin. 47 times more mana than I usually had at my disposal, and it seemed that I used less when using magic.

Just for the short moment, I had used the wings so far, I felt like the regeneration rate had gone up as well. For me to fill up what was prior mana pool would most likely only be a bit more than an hour.

It was a heady feeling, nevertheless, I had some vermin to get rid off first. Vermin that had just started to make their move. Ayda’s weapon was approaching with great haste, so I responded by conjuring a stonewall in front of me, before turning around.

Arrows were heading in my direction, so I gathered the wind that had just started to die down after my previous use of it, and sent a gust straight at the arrows. The arrows were knocked to the side.

I needed to deal with the small pests before I dealt with the big one, so I immediately rushed the melee warriors. The spears got levelled against me, the shields braced, all to receive my charge. I was not about to oblige them.

With a surge of mana that would have emptied my entire pool just moments before, slab stone sprang into the existence instantly amongst them and exploded. I kept the slab short, so as not to accidentally kill some of them, yet the explosion was at full power, ripping through their legs, sending them flying. In one case I saw a foot being blown off flying off to the side to land amongst the spectators.

A ball of fire came rushing in my direction, too close for me to react or protect against it normally. Immediately the flaming wings folded in front of me. Because they were made from pure flames, they did not have weight and thus I did not feel when the fireball hit my wings. What I did notice, however, was the wings flaring up at the impact, as they absorbed the fireball.

With a thought, the wings went back to their position behind me, making me look like a fiery angel or demon, depending on your point of view. The melee warriors were down, and not a threat any longer. To ensure that, I made straps of rock manifest above them, keeping them immobilized.

Having dealt with them, I immediately turned my attention to the healers. Seeing them being afraid of approaching the melee warriors who needed their help, I decided to help them on the way, with a burst of wind that pushed them forward.

A sharp pain entered my back, aiming straight for my heart. Immediately, I summoned a thick crust of stone around my heart. It hurt like crazy, and I severed some arteries. Nevertheless, it stopped the invading weapon from piercing my heart.

I sent a strand of each kind of magic to the weapon to figure out what it was, and when it reacted with only the wood magic, I guessed that it was Ayda who had stabbed me in the back. This was further confirmed when the weapon started to change, growing inside me, trying to rip me apart.

Without hesitation, I poured my own magic into the weapon, preventing the change. Even though she was only a half realm further ahead of me, it still meant she had 63 mana pools compared to my 47, to draw on. If this became a contest of endurance, I would lose. So I had to do what I could to even out the contest with the different kinds of magic I had at my disposal.

While maintaining the gridlock on Ayda’s weapon, I raised a wall of stone in front of me, to block a fireball and some arrows heading in my direction. I also sent my wings of fire down on the wooden weapon. If she had to repair the damage those caused, as well as contesting against my wood magic, it might just be doable for me to win against her. I also took the chance to reestablish the link with her weapon, so as not to get backstabbed again.

Since I had managed to stop the attack on my heart, banished the stone around my heart, and at once started repairing the damage I had caused. With the healing magic, I started pushing out the tip of Ayda’s weapon.

After just a handful of seconds, she gave up on her attack and I managed to get the weapon dislodged. Which was not a moment too soon, because the enemy mages and ranged fighters had been busy getting into position.

No sooner had I gotten rid of Ayda’s weapon than they struck. Simultaneously I was struck by three arrows, a few throwing knives, two fireballs, a stone spike, and a pair of roots tried to spear me.

Since none of the arrows or the knives were aimed at vital areas, I ignored them. My wings flashed out to deal with the fireballs as I had done earlier. By expending more mana than the mage that had created the stone spike, I took control over it and transformed it into a column instead, appearing beneath my foot and lifting me out the strike zone of the roots.

To repay them, I sent a fireball, with a hidden surprise, at one of the fire mages. It was a relatively weak fireball, and I saw a contemptuous sneer on the face of the mage. With a small wave of his hand, he dispelled the fireball, but the look on his face changed in rapid succession from contempt, to surprise, then to fear. The small boulder I had hidden within the fireball slammed into the mage who led out a horrified and pained shriek.

At the same time as I had sent my hidden gift to the mage, I had jumped towards the ranged fighters. They turned tail at once, and I spent a little magic to trip them up with stone magic, before knocking them out and tying them down. At the same time, I sent weak fireballs at the three mages and Ayda. None of them contained anything extra, but nevertheless, the elves were very careful.

I had to fend off several counterattacks, the most annoying of which were Ayda, who at first relied on her weapon. Unfortunately, as time went by, she seemed to figure out that I always knew when and where she attacked with it, so she shifted to throwing stone and wood magic at me.

Any wounds I took were quickly healed, arrows, and other foreign objects lodged in my body were removed with a combination of healing and some other form of magic, depending on the object.

Ayda was clearly getting frustrated. She would have to rely on her healers to heal every little wound, but I was able to do it on my own. Furthermore, they were running out of steam, and so were the other mages. Meaning I managed to knock them out one by one. If any was grievously wounded, I took the time and energy to make sure they were stable.

Eight minutes after my Ascension, it was down to me and Ayda, and she was not looking happy. I was not happy either, because I was running low on mana. My wings had served their purpose so they had been extinguished. Even with only having the healing magic running to remove my fatigue, I was down to around a dozen mana pools. I was not sure what Ayda was down to, but her mana consumption had to be lower than mine, and even if it was not, she had more mana than me.

“Why don’t you just surrender?” I asked slightly out of breath, as I had knocked out the last healer. “It’s not like I’m asking for anything unreasonable, like you know, becoming a slave.”

“Fuck you, abomination,” was her reply. “You’re one of the servants of the Traitors. You should die, but I can’t do that here.”

“Not from a lack of breaking my heart, though,” I replied with a smirk. I was stalling while I prepared some surprises for her. Sure I could do them instantaneously now, but it would require a lot more mana than if I slowly did what I wanted.

“Your kind should be hunted down and killed.”

“My kind?”

“Priests of the servants.”

“Ah, this is where your intellect matches your hair colour, my dear little elven harlot,” I replied indicating her blonde hair. Her confusion was complete. So was her anger. With a sigh, I continued, “I’m not a servant of the Gods, I piss on them. They kidnapped me, messed with my mind, and their priests are about as honourable as a politician.”

“You’re talking gibberish,” she grumbled and with little effort on her part, her weapon shot out towards me, aiming to pierce me on my right side. With the trajectory and speed, there was only one obvious option, dodging to the left.

Of course, I did not take that because it was most likely a trap. So I feinted left but instead threw myself forward into a tumble, coming up just a step in front of her. Behind me, I could hear the sound of roots ripping through the earth. Without a single look back, I released the magic I had built up. Wind came from behind, pushing her down and forward, towards me. Stone columns on the left, wooden roots on the right kept her boxed in, with only one exit. The one that led to me.

Her weapon started transforming, instantly dropping over seventy percent of its length. Nevertheless, from her facial expressions, I could see that I surprised her with what I did next. I let go off both my weapons and stepped forward hugging her. Of course, it was not because I was suicidal, but because I had one more surprise for her.

Her body seized up, as my mana poured into her body and locked down both her movement and her mana. Just like that priest and the Cardinal had done to me, I was now doing it to her. She was totally immobilized, except that she could breathe and talk.

It was something I had been training with Ethan during the last month in the downtime. It worked well on those that were not Ascended, however, as soon as it was someone who was Ascended, you needed physical contact to do it. Furthermore, if they knew what they were doing, they could easily break out of it.

My hope was that she had not experienced this kind of attack before, letting me get a cheap win. Her frustrated shout seemed to confirm my hopes, “What did you do to me?”

“I control your body and magic right now. I could make you do some deplorable things like fucking all my troopers, would you like to do that?”

“If you, I’ll—” she started to threaten, but I just cut off her ability to speak. I could feel her body and mana trying to struggle against my paralysation, however, she did not know what she was doing, so I could still maintain it.

“Be a good little girl and be quiet,” I said in a scolding tone that one might use to admonish a child. I had stopped hugging her, but I still maintained a hand on her shoulder. “There. Much better. You’re such a well-behaved little girl, I ought to award you. What do you think?”

Her eyes got wide when she found herself nodding. I gave her a grin. “Do you surrender?”

I was about to make her nod when the officiating giant said, “If you control her to surrender, it’s the same as you surrendering.”

I sent him an irritated glare, nevertheless, I abandoned the attempt to force a surrender like that. Instead, I allowed her to speak again. Imperiously I asked her again, “Do you surrender, or do I need to start hurting you?”

“Do your worst,” she said through gritted teeth.

I schooled my expression, keeping it neutral, even if I wanted nothing more than to close my eyes and sigh. I also made sure to seem as dispassionate as possible, showing no emotion. Just a completely blank expression.

“Is one of those fine women in your retinue your daughter or granddaughter I wonder?”

“Don’t you dare touch them! They’re already defeated,” she shouted.

“You should ask the priestess Axina what happened to her daughter when she resisted,” I said, still making sure not to show anything on my face. “I raped her daughter for several glasses, and now her daughter is my obedient little slut who does whatever I say.”

“Don’t you—”

I was tired of her protests so I cut off her ability to speak. “If you try to tell me once more what I can or can’t do, I will let my men rape all the women in your family. Do you understand? You may answer.”

Once more she regained the ability to speak. She did not speak at once, just staring at me, which I just returned, again showing the total emotionless expression. I gestured for one of the knives laying on the ground to come flying into my hand. Since she did not want to surrender, I would just have to make her.

“Remember, you got the power to stop this at any time. Just surrender,” I said and started cutting off her leather armour. The spectating elves went crazy. They shouted and threatened me. Some even started to move as if to interfere with my actions, but the giants stopped them.

When her blouse got cut open, it just intensified. She stared back at me, I could feel when she tried to struggle against the hold, but I still managed to keep her powers contained. I had also dropped the connection with my wood mage and made one with her instead.

It was the first time I had made a connection with an involuntary target, but it worked. Though the connection felt fragile. I was certain that if I broke physical contact with her, so would the connection to her mana pool. Nevertheless, since I was connected, I drained her mana pool, refilling my own.

“Nice tits for a great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandmother,” I said as her breasts were exposed for the world to see. They really were magnificent. She looked like she was in her early twenties, not over 5,000 years old. Her face got a murderous look, well more murderous than before anyway, at my comment. “Oh, did I forget a few greats? I’m sorry. I wonder what wonders your pants hold.”

“Grandmother, just surrender!” one of the healers called out from where he was confined. “It’s better than suffering at the hands of that brute. Please don’t make him defile you.”

“See, even your family think you should surrender,” I said.

She spat me in my face. “Go ahead and do it, I don’t think you got the guts. That so-called slut of yours, Anders told me that you didn’t rape her, it was all staged.”

My eyes narrowed. I was going to kill that bastard. I turned to the giants. “If I knock her out, will I win?”

“No, there needs to be a verbal surrender,” was the reply I knew I would get.

I sighed. “You’re right Ayda, I won’t rape you. I never raped anyone. Nor will I ever do it. What I will do is go get twenty-five sets of collars and manacles. I’ll start by enslaving your family, one by one. If you don’t surrender before they are all collared, then I’m going to collar you.”

“You’re not allowed to do that!” she shrieked.

“I couldn’t order that as a victory condition, but this is a fight. After it started, everything goes, except killing,” I replied. “You just have to surrender. That is all you have to do. I wonder if I enslave you, do I enslave the entire wood elven nation?”

I turned to Ethan. “Bring some collars.”

“Yes, Milord,” was his immediate reply.

However, he was stopped by a giant. “We cannot allow this to happen.”

“Then accept that I’ve won. You won’t allow me to kill her, you won’t allow me to enslave her, and you won’t accept that I’ve won,” I replied with anger.

“You must make her submit with honour,” the giant scoffed.

“This is fucking ridiculous!” I roared. “Fine then, come here bitch.”

I dragged her over to the four mages. I pointed at them, “Choose one of them.”

“What are you going to do to them? Threaten them to death?” she sneered back.

“No, I’m going to cripple their magic, forever make it impossible for them to cast spells.”

She started laughing at that. Between peals of laughter, she responded to my threat, “Go ahead, try and do it. No one can do that. Not even the Gods.”

“Your gods are pussies. Choose one, and then we’ll see if you’re laughing,” I replied. I had to ensure that I kept a hand on her, to not lose my hold of her soul and body. After half a minute of her not choosing anyone, I got tired of the charades and picked one on my own. I chose the guy I had almost crushed to death with a boulder.

Since he was a fire mage, I dropped my connection to Mary, so as not to double up on powers. The number of connections I could handle was still too limited. Of course, Ayda was right, as far as I knew. I had no way of crippling someone’s ability to use magic. However, I was certain that I could fake it.

I stepped on his hand to establish the connection. He was a rating 10, so he had plenty of mana, but he was not Ascended. I created a barrier of my mana around his mana pool, making it emulate the normal barrier. At least how it looked, I could not replicate its effect passively, it was something I had to actively do.

Next, I removed all his restraints and healed him. He woke up with a shock, looked around confused. When he saw his queen, his great-great-something-grandmother, with her great titties on display, he became furious. He tried to incinerate me, however, quashed his attempt at using mana, making it seem like he was unable.

He looked confused at his hands. I looked at the bitch. “See I told you so.”

“You’re touching him, just like you’re touching me. I can’t use my magic either,” she said with a scoff, but it was not as self-assured as her earlier assertion.

“Fine,” I grumbled, stepping off his hand and used stone magic to make a wave of stone rushing along the ground, carrying him with it. “Come on, pathetic little elf. Only you can stop this bitch here from being molested.”

Just to illustrate my point, I started mauling her breasts, making her scream out in indignation. I quickly stopped that. The elf looked mad as hell, he shouted at me, threatened to burn me and my entire family. Yet nothing happened. No matter how much he tried, I suppressed his attempts at using mana. For him, it would feel like he had never had magic.

He then tried to rush me, but a pair of stone shoes stopped that nonsense. He was rooted in place. With anguish, he cried out, “Mother, something’s wrong. My magic is gone.”

Ayda became completely still. Not her movements, those were already stilled, but she stopped struggling for a whole five seconds. Then it came back with a vengeance. If I had not kept her drained of mana, she would have broken free.

I moved towards the next mage, dragging the still paralyzed Ayda with me. This time I choose the stone mage. Just as I was about to repeat the procedure, Ayda shouted, “I surrender.”

“The blood debt has been resolved, if in less than honourable means,” the giant said. Smiling, I released Ayda and the rest of the magic I kept going. All except my healing magic, I still used that to keep me fresh. I started severing connections and reestablishing them as needed. The most important one was the link to Emma. It felt wrong not to have a connection to her. Just the mere presence of the connection had a calming effect on me.

I started making my way over to the spot where my people had gathered. As I made my way through the glade, the leather harness and my weapons came sailing through the air, following after me, as if I was the Pied Piper leading them somewhere. I ignored what was going on amongst the giants and elves, though I could not help but overhear some of the conversations.

“My magic!” the fire mage shouted. “It’s back.”

“It was never gone, he tricked you,” one of the oldest giants grumbled. “So dishonest that one.”

Another one, who was only a couple of metres shorter, shook his head. “His actions were forced by the dishonourable behaviour of the elf. She was clearly beaten. If it had been a battlefield she would be dead. Yet she did not admit defeat. A coward with no honour.”

“Mind your tongue,” one of the elves shouted. “That’s our Queen you’re talking about.”

“Settle down, no starting fights with the giants or fairies,” I heard Ayda shout.

“How about we teach the humans some humility?” someone suggested. From the roaring approvals, it seemed to be a popular proposal.

“Please try, and watch me as I enslave your queen. I could always use someone to clean the stable,” I called over my shoulder. I heard a few of the giants move closer to the elves. I really hoped they would keep their word and ensure that the stakes would be upheld. According to Yathanae, they would. It was their thing.

I stopped in front of my core group, giving them a big smile. “That little problem has been taken care of, I guess we’ve nothing to worry about now.”

For some reason, most of them seemed to avert their eyes, or kept their eyes focused stubbornly on my face. My brows furrowed in confusion. Only Yathanae did not seem to be acting strangely. Finally, Shenerah said, “Could you please put some pants on, Milord?”

Looking down, I realized I had forgotten about my nakedness. When they had shredded the front of my body to pieces with the small stone spikes, my pants had been ruined as well. I had fought the rest of the fight stark naked.

I looked back up, shrugged. “I’m not ashamed of anything, go ahead and look. I don’t mind. I’m sure that Yathanae wouldn’t mind putting on a show if you’re interested. Again.”

“Eww, no thanks. Once was enough,” she complained. “They knocked out my mother when Queen Ayda revealed that you had not raped me. How did Anders know?”

“I don’t know, don’t care. The bastard will pay for it though,” I said, gritting my teeth.

Yathanae stepped forward and hugged me. “Don’t worry about him now, seeing you fight like that has made me horny. I think I should reward you for the show you put on.”

“I like the way you think,” I replied with a broad smile as she grabbed my hand and led me towards our tent.