(Skyla Scott / Nekzih Goldgnaw)

Skyla Scott or Nekzih Goldgnaw as she was now know by was terrified as she ran as fast as she could away from her botched quest. The quests info had been to rob the heartless baron blind but the name of the quest was the strangest bit, A heart for the heartless. That name alone had made her think she’d get to have a little cat and mouse with a dashingly handsome noble like many of those anime she had watched had. Of course the truth had to be so much farther from her expectation than anything she could have dreamt up.

Granted the man was handsome in the dark sort of manner which had made her a little excited when she saw him first. That is until he single-highhandedly stopped her and her entire group with a single word and then proceeded to interrogate her. She still remembered the notification she had gotten when she had tried to identify him and the promise to keep far away from him.

Reincarnator only Status.

Name: Felix Aesir of House Aesir

Race: Dökk Alfar (Godborn)

Class: Apprentice (lvl. 9), Baron (lvl. 3), Swordsman (lvl. 19), Squire (lvl. 16)

Professions: N/A

Titles: The Heartless Baron, Beloved of Mana, Deathless, Voidborn.

Those titles alone had made her bladder almost go out of control. To think something like him was anything like a reincarnator like herself was baffling. Then she thought of the title deathless and she stopped in her tracks. Does that mean he’ll remember every life he’s lived when he is reincarnated? That question came unbidden to her mind along with another realization, perhaps he was truly deathless and even if she managed to kill him, an act she was certainly not going to try, he’d just come back?

Looking over her shoulder she saw her group panting and sweating much like her after their flight. “Well that was a show~” A hearty voice with a genuine laugh afterwards sounded out behind her and she flinched before spinning around with a dagger in her hands.

The world had slowed to a crawl around her and before her was an elf with a simple white mask. No face drawn on the mask just purely white with crescent shapes for the eye holes. One facing up and the other facing down. The elf was wearing a smartly tailored suit that to her looked like a mixture of a butlers outfit mixed with one of those optical illusions. This was due to the pattern and shape of the suit seemed to change almost with each blink of her eyes. Sufficed to say it caused quite the headache to look at.

“Thesimus are you trying to get me killed? That was unlike any of the quests you’ve given me up to this point! He was terrifying and seemed to have quite the hate for you.” She growled angrily.

“Well I did mess with him for a month almost twenty two years ago… though he was human back then and didn’t have any of the titles he now has. Strange.” Thesimus said in a nonchalant manner as he placed a hand to his masked chin and cocked his head to the side.

A cold dread seeped into Nekzih’s mind as she felt like Thesimus had an ear to ear grin on his lips behind that mask of his. Then his words clicked in her head and she flinched back from the god. “Wait you mean he’s like me? But I thought I was a special case to get a character creator and stuff like that.”

“Oh you are, that body of his was especially made for him… or rather tailored to his bloodline. Very interesting wouldn’t you say?” He asked with a slight tipping of a suddenly appearing top hat.

“So old Voidstriders little group has decided to make their move with the last of the bloodline huh?” Thesimus began to chuckle lightly which then promptly devolved into a manic fit of laughter.

“Oh Aona you’ve just created your own worst nightmare with your little meddling. If you thought the Voidstrider was bad then this son of ol'void will be something wholly horrific to you.” That mutter from Thesimus made Nekzih decide to never ever, ever, make any sort of trouble for that man in any way possible. Hopefully he’d only stop in Veta for a day or two and then leave.

“Shame about his name though.” That mutter made her look up to the shining eyes of Thesimus through the eye holes in his mask.

“Name?” She asked, her eyebrow raised. She hated how Thesimus could use the simplest inflections of his voice to make her weakness manifest, her massive curiosity.

“Yes, that new body of his has a true name. Not that Felix Aesir nonsense you saw, heck that was all mostly a lie. His real name is Vlad von Carstein.” The smile could be clearly heard in Thesimus’s voice now and Nekzih had to frown a little. The name was a little familiar with her and she thought back on her time on earth and then she got it.

“Wait like the vampire from that total war game?” She asked a little confused as she then gradually got the story her friend who had been a massive vampire counts fanboy had told her about Vlad. “But didn’t that Vlad fail in the end?”

“Oh yes that Vlad did but do you think this one will? He spared your life for only two reasons I can perceive after all.” Thesimus said as he opened his arms as if to invite Nekzih to a great big hug.

“And those were?” She asked with a little trepidation.

“Well for one you are what is known as a herald of a god. If he kills you the god you herald has free reign to fuck with him, namely me.” Thesimus said as he theatrically bowed. “And the second I think is rather simple. Would you want your newly adopted daughter to see you slaughter people in front of her?”

Nekzih’s face scrunched up and then thought back on the carriage behind this Vlad and the other man. She vaguely recalled seeing the driver hold a spear defensively so then would this daughter of Vlad’s have been inside the carriage? Well it would make sense but then that posed another question why had he adopted a young girl in the first place. He seemed to be more the cold and calculating sort.

“You’re trying to figure it out aren’t you?” Thesimus said, the smirk on his face evident in his voice once more. “I won’t tell you until you think you have it but I will tell you one thing I’ll do as a service to my lovely herald~” Nekzih looked a little hesitant to listen further to anything Thesimus might say before he suddenly wrapped her up his arms.

“I’ll always leave his icon on your map as well as make a small black diamond shape on your map for any of his people. That way you’ll be able to avoid him or confront him at your leisure.” He said as his mask came so very close to her face and her cheeks burned a little at the sudden intimacy from the god. Then she felt his hand on her rear and she was about to protest before a finger came to her lips, from his third hand?! This third hand and another fourth, which had grabbed her rear, had come out of just a bit down and to the side on Thesimus’s back near his shoulder blades.

“Now my lovely little herald~ Give me some sugar?~” His voice had grown low and seductive as the mask slowly turned to vapor and their lips met.

The last thing she thought about as she melted into her god and lover was that a certain Vlad was to be avoided. Though perhaps she could redeem herself to him? Get off his shit list somehow?

(Kathryn Arthegn)

She cursed herself as she looked up at the sky and saw that it was well after lunch and she was still lost in the maze of the outer city. Veta had been carved into the outer and inner city with the more wealthy and higher standing people staying in the inner with the rest more or less relegated to the outer city. It had all been going so well.

Thordroki had been by her side as they left the pier district and went through the outer market district to watch the caravans come in from both the western regions as well as from the desert itself to sell their wares.

Then a huge crowd had swept her up and separated her from her bodyguard and all she could do was manage to duck into an alley before the sea of people took her to who knew were. She looked down at her hands and sighed with relief at the sight of the small ring with a tiny tiger’s eye embedded in it on her left little finger. Looking some more she found that the small steel ring on her other little finger was still there as well, which gained another sigh of relief as it would allow Thordroki or anyone from her fathers employ to track her down as long as she wore it.

She decided to continue walking through the maze of streets and alleys that comprised the densely populated outer city. The large structures even blocking out some of the light of day, the up to six story houses held either two families or four in the largest housing blocks case on each floor. Shadows dominated most of the cities alleys and as she pondered them she felt more and more nervous and scared. She swallowed as she began to try and just make her way to the gates leading to the inner city, there she’d be safe until Thordroki came to find her.

A loud crash behind her had her shrieking in terror and jumping almost off the ground. Only to turn around and seeing two cats staring at the box they’d somehow pushed over and then back up at her. She sucked her teeth and began to move again. It took her a while just to get her bearings before she headed to the main streets through the maze that was the cities alleyways.

Right as she could see the main street she saw a man step out of one of the alleys connecting to the one she walked.

He was pudgy but not fat, dirty and with thick unkempt greasy hair. His eyes like those of a pig looked at the main street and then back at her. The smile he got made her stop in her tracks. He was missing a few teeth but that only made the look of greed and ill intent that was on his pudgy face all the more intimidating. “Hey there, young lady.” He drawled and then she noted his teeth were dirty from some paste he’d applied to them.

She swallowed, was he took a step towards her. She was certain when she saw the small vial in his hands with bunched up green herbs being placed into the inner pocket of his dirty vest. She realized the man must be a drug user. Those herbs looked like one of the drugs used on the streets of many of the cities of the empire. She swallowed again, harder than before as her eyes darted all over.

“I don’t suppose you can lend us a few coins?” The man’s predatory tone made it rather clear that he wouldn’t stop at just a few coins.

Kathryn turned and ran to the next alleyway.

Her heart pounded like it wanted to escape from her chest as she held her dress up to allow her to run as fast as she was able. The man’s run was more of a fast waddle which raised her hope over escaping him. Right as she was about to make another turn into another alleyway the man’s hand gripped her arm but couldn’t hold onto her as she wrenched her arm back.

She escaped but the wrench of her arm made her smash into the wall of the alley and stagger and stumble forwards. Then she managed to get back into a run, jumping over the larger piles of trash laid out in the alley in her path.

Two more alleys and she came staggering over into it, dirty and disheveled. She wasn’t used to exerting her body and so her stamina was weak. Her breath came ragged and she stumbled as her foot caught on something. Looking over her shoulder she saw a man with black hair reaching down to his legs lying there motionless. Another stumble sent her crashing to the ground.

It was a woman, just sitting there still with equally black and long hair as the man had. She stared at the two unresponsive people for only a moment before she felt the pudgy fingers wrap around her hair and pull her roughly to the side. She cried out in pain as the man kicked her in the face, causing her to hit the wall opposite were she’d been sitting. Tears rolled down her face as she looked up at the man’s cruel face.

“You made me run all this way!” He snarled as he slapped her face hard enough to split her lip further and forced her back down onto the ground. “Don’t think I’ll make this easy on you now.” He said as he leaned down and gripped her hands in a strong grip and forced them onto the ground above her head. His face turned to a wild sneer as he realized he was strong enough to hold both of her hands in only one of his.

She struggled and screamed in terror as he roughly gripped one of her breasts and his sneer turned to a lustful one. Right as he was about to grip the top of her dress to rip it off, a loud caw rang through the alley and the man suddenly let her go. He screamed in horror as something black rocketed at his face and large wings extended from the shadow that beat at his head as he screamed.

Kathryn just stared dumbfounded for only a second before she realized her situation and scrambled to get away from the man. Looking at the man now reaching for the larger than average raven attacking his face she kicked his chest to make him fall back.

With renewed desperation she scrambled back to her feet but her long auburn hair was gripped from behind and she was pulled back down to the ground. Laying there she felt her breath catch in her throat from the pain spreading from between her shoulder blades. “You fucking whore!” The angry snarl made her look up into the hate filled eyes and scratched up face of the pudgy man.

The raven had made a number on his face but she couldn’t see it anywhere now. The man held a knife in his hands and was about to stab it down at her when she heard a welcomed shout but the words made her confused. “Get back here ya fuckin crow!” Thordroki came running into the alley following another raven that seemed to be cawing in a manner which made her think of mocking laughter.

The dwarf came to a halt as soon as he was fully in the alley staring at Kathryn laying on the ground disheveled and crying. “Uncle Thor!” She cried desperately and the man looked at her and then at the dwarf and looked shaken.

The Dwarf’s face was red with pure hatred and rage. “You get away from her.” He growled like a lioness defending her cup and before anyone could do anything the dwarf had sprinted the distance to the man. For such a small race he moved so fast it took barely two seconds to reach the pudgy man, but what hit him might as well have been an armored bull instead of a dwarf with the impact he received.

In a few short but brutal moments the pudgy man lay unconscious and broken on the ground with the dwarf breathing like a bellows standing above him. Thordroki turned around and looked at Kathryn with a worried expression and before he could take a step she crashed into him. Hugging him tightly and sobbing into his embrace. “There, there my girl. I’m here now.” He said consolingly as he hugged her tightly to himself.

It took the girl almost half an hour to get a grip on herself and before long the dwarf had begun to usher her forwards and back to her fathers estate in the inner city near the academic quarter. She looked back over her shoulder one last time.

There on top of the pudgy man’s extended belly sat two crows, black as sin with white markings on their faces making them look as if their skulls were exposed. Rubbing a little up against one another but staring at her with an uncanny look in their nearly glowing blue eyes. She smiled at the two, somehow knowing the two were responsible for her good fortune this day. She mouthed ‘thank you’ to them and the two, to her immense surprise, nodded right back at her.

After going through the inner gates she remembered what she’d thought of one of those very same ravens. If the two were familiars of someone she’d have to show her appreciation to the mage who had them. If they weren’t she’d try to find were they made their nest and try to repay them somehow.

(Ashes)

“What a pitiful human.” The mature and motherly voice Ashes had chosen for herself when they gained the ability to speak sent a visible shiver down Dust’s spine. If she could she’d smile, instead she pressed herself a little closer to Dust and in an almost purring tone spoke again.

“Dust~ you’re so brave. Flying right into this disgusting man’s face like that.” She said as seductively as she could to Dust and she saw the other raven almost melt for her.

She loved it, she’d chosen her voice because it allowed her to wrap Dust around her talon this easily. They were partners and who said the dead couldn’t have relationships? “Oh, it was nothing.” Dust said puffing out his chest and rubbing the back of his head with one wing. This only made a mischievous glint come into Ash’s azure eyes.

She pressed herself more against him and rested her head against his neck, letting out a very soft little caw. A mating call which only made Dust’s deep rumbling baritone voice crack as he tried to get a hold of himself. “Oh.. OH.”

“Am I interrupting?” The amused voice said behind Dust. The silvery tenor of the voice was one the two knew well and both turned their heads to look up at Vlad von Carstein. He stood there with a sly smirk on his face as he looked at the two lovebirds standing on the stomach of the pudgy man, who was slowly coming back to himself.

“Uh...” Dust elegantly began which only made Ashes huff a little and roll her eyes. The man really got embarrassed to easily.

Pushing him a little to the side she took a step forward and looked up at her amused master. “It went rather well master Aesir. We protected those two as you asked us to.” She reported and he nodded as he looked at the two lifeless bodies in the alley.

“I can go by your report and I can clearly see the paradox of their existence.” Vlad said as he crouched and looked into the vacant eyes of the woman. Using his index finger he moved her head around a little as he stared at her. “I still don’t understand how this happened. They are still alive but….” He paused and frowned.

“But what?” Dust asked as he looked at the man and woman and then back to the ravens master.

“They have no souls.” Vlad answered frowning.

“How is that possible? Shouldn’t the animus that keeps a body alive be a soul?” Ashes asked confused.

“Usually but.” Vlad began then noticed something next to the woman’s hip, lodged in the corner created by the woman’s hips against the wall and the wall itself. “What is this...” He said narrowing his gray eyes at the bottle he pulled out. Within was a nearly glittering violet substance that looked similar to colored wheat mixed with sugar.

“This… I’ll have to investigate what this is and if it has these effects on the living.” Vlad said as he stood and stared at the bottle in his hand. Ashes noted that he looked much deeper in thought than she felt he should be.

“Why do you need to do that?” Dust asked which made her so thankful the man was about as curious as she was but without the tact she had.

“Imagine if I put shades or wraiths into living bodies?” Vlad said and he got that mad alchemists grin that he sometimes got when he was performing experiments with his abilities. A shiver ran down her spine at the thought of their last… upgrades as Vlad put it.

She’d felt like fingers had been touching and practically groping her soul as he gave them empowered souls to elevate them higher than simple undead beasts that they had been before. That had also allowed them to learn how to mimic enough to create voices for themselves.

“Well then what should we do with these two in the meantime?” Dust asked before flapping a little as he still stood on the pudgy man’s stomach as the man began to rise up.

“If you want to you can eat his eyes.” Vlad said as he reached over and with the strength of his arm turned the man’s head a full 180 degrees. “Tsk, he was level 5? not even worth all that much.” He said in annoyance, the ravens only looked at one another.

Then Vlad suddenly began to sniff the air and looked at the pudgy man’s corpse with curiosity as he began to pat the man down and then pulled the vial out from the man’s vests inner pocket. It was a vial similar to the one he’d found from the woman but the top had a crack in it that allowed the strong smell of the plant within to leak out.

“Ah that’s a drug going around this city. They call it pleasure paste.” Ashes reported and at the utterly flabbergasted look on Vlad she decided to explain a bit more. “They take tiny mana crystals and this plant and then with just a bit of water they mash it together into a paste that they then usually apply to their gums. Apparently its very degenerative and addictive.”

Vlad looked horrified. “Barbarians.” He said in horror as he looked at the vial and then opened it to smell the plant once more. “This is quality weed, why don’t they just smoke it?” He then asked and both raven’s mouths cracked open and went slack.

“Wait you know what that is?” Ashes asked confused.

“Well yeah, I used to smoke this every weekend or so back before I came to Astarune. Hell I’ve been missing that relaxing sensation a good joint gives you, might let me actually get some sleep.” He said his voice growing tired as he spoke.

“What do you mean?” Dust asked, once again saving Ashes the trouble.

Vlad sighed a bit and sat down on the pudgy man’s belly, as if it was just a cushion for his pleasure. “Let’s just say every time I go to sleep I spend a month and a half training at the foot of the council of the dead. I haven’t really gotten any real sleep for the past eight days.” He groaned as he rubbed his face, the exhaustion he hid from his apprentice and daughter now evident on his face.

“You look exhausted.” Ashes said as she hopped on over to be next to Dust staring up at Vlad. “Can’t you ask them to give you some time to actually relax?” She then asked in worry.

“You try telling an alcohol addicted ornery ghoul no.” He said with an empty yet somehow pointed expression as he looked at both of the ravens.

“Ah.” The two said getting memories of O’Malley through their mental connection to Vlad.

“Well enough of that… Say?” Vlad began to look from both ravens to the two soulless bodies, a pondering look coming over his face. “How would you like to have secondary bodies?”

“Oh no.” Both ravens said and if they were alive all color would drain from their faces. Instead they turned around and scrambled to get into the air before cawing indignantly as Vlad gripped both of their legs to hold them in place.

“Oh please this shouldn’t hurt you in any way.” He said sighing as he held both ravens upside down and the two looked at him not at all amused.

“Ever felt your soul groped?” Ashes said grumbling and Vlad stopped and looked at them.

“Does it feel that bad?” He asked and the two ravens began to nod frantically.

Vlad sighed and placed the two down onto the ground again though the two ravens decided to fly into the air to perch on his shoulders. One for each side. “I guess I’ll fuck around with some of the necromantic skill spells then.” He said as he pulled a rather large soul orb out of thin air.

“Skill spells?” Dust asked and Vlad chuckled a little.

“Yeah apparently there are spells that can tie into and modify skills if you have enough affinity for the spells. And since I’m apparently some necromancy talent I can just barely do it right now. I’ll really have to work on getting my damn class up to level twenty five though so I can upgrade it to Necromancer Adept. Then we’ll really start seeing some weird shit.” He said with a manic grin on his face as he pulled at the souls in the orb and began to create a vortex of soul energy above the orb.

For the next hour he worked to create rather terrifying creatures. Draped in cloaks of shadow the pale ghost flesh shown on skeletal hands with long fingers and claws and only the lower part of a skull visible through the hoods on their cloaks. He’d created shade wraiths which he then moved on to make them forcefully posses the two soulless bodies.

“Wehw~” Vlad let out as sweat ran down his face as he sat down on the pudgy man’s belly once more. Ashes was thinking that his willingness to use the man as a seat was a bit morbid. Then she looked at the dirty street and the clothes he wore and sort of understood.

“This isn’t getting any easier.” He sighed again as his breath came ragged but not in the manner of being short of breath. More like he already had caught his breath after great exertion but his throat was still raw from the experience.

Looking from Vlad to the two convulsing bodies before them she cocked her head a little.

The bodies were changing, their skin turning to a very pale gray with black veins like muted marble. Their fingers lengthened as did their fingernails that thickened and turned black. Canines lengthened in the mouths set in silent screams while the bodies themselves twisted and turned to the very limits without breaking or popping something out of a joint. It was rather morbid to see, even to the dead.

“Marionettes?” Dust muttered as he looked at them with how they were twisting and turning.

“Huh?… well not a bad name for this type of living dead. Oh hey! They don’t even count as some of my undead limits… wait?” Vlad was saying with a wide grin before his eyes widened and he quickly jumped into the air taking the two ravens with him.

The bodies had locked their blackened eyes on him and lunged right away, silent growls evident on their faces. Landing on the ground he snapped his fingers and the body underneath the two silently snarling people blew outwards. Two thick spikes of bone impaled the Marionettes heads and the two seemed to not register they had died until after a few long moments of staring before they too slumped.

“Well that was unexpected.” Vlad said as he watched the shade wraiths peel themselves out of the bodies and dissipate into smoke in the air. He clicked his tongue in annoyance. “Guess we’ll have to gather these up to perform more experiments.” He said as he growled a little. Ashes was rather surprised he’d gotten so used to switching between the strength of a mortal at his level and his true strength so fast.

“Hmm well what do we do about these then?” Dust asked, sounding rather done with the whole mess. Ashes suspected he had a bad taste in his mouth over Vlads experiments though Ashes was interested in them… as long as she wasn’t being experimented on that is.

Ashes landed on the bone spike coming out of the woman’s head and looked down at her. “Hmm perhaps the vessel also needs something to tie you to it?” She asked as she looked from the spiked head to Vlad.

“Hmm perhaps… though wouldn’t these work well to disguise living armors?” Vlad then said after snapping his fingers. Narrowing her eyes she looked deeper into the world and noted the tether of mana connecting Vlad to the remains of the pudgy man’s body and she realized why he’d been sitting on him all that time. He had to be in physical contact with the body to prepare it for this purpose, if she could she’d smirk.

Both Vlad and Dust, who had landed on his shoulder again looked at her and then at one another. “She’s like an amused evil madona or something.” Vlad said.

“I’d rather say like a smug old vixen.” Dust responded and the two snickered at their jokes.

Ashes took on an annoyed tone to her voice. “And what if I am amused at figuring out how this was done? I mean after all I’m going to be watching over Akasha since you’re here too now… Dust.” She said narrowing her eyes at Dust, her tone taking on a command that broke no argument.

“Well, the dead being motherly, now I’ve seen everything.” Vlad said, chuckling in amusement as he looked at Ashes and reached one hand forwards to her to perch upon.

As she did so she went through the knowledge Vlad had passed on to her and Dust during their creation. They had gotten his memories, not the personal ones but those pertaining to knowledge and the like and she found one she thought might work.

“Ara~ Ara~ and if I am?” She said in that sickly sweet and soft tone that bordered on seductive as she placed her left wing against her chest.

Vlad and Dust stared at her for a long time before looking at one another and shared something in their look before both looked at her with stern expressions. “NEVER DO THAT AGAIN!” They both commanded sternly, though Vlad’s face was bright red.

She hadn’t realized it was so effective against the two of them. She’d have to file that away behind her ear as the expression went.