Overlord - The Beast of the Apocalypse

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Chapter 4

Sharil POV

I dropped from the roof of the small castle down onto the parapet, under the cover of the night sky. My job this time was simple, kill the noble and all of his guards. I was told only that the noble was an obstacle. I did not know why the noble was an obstacle, nor did I care.

This was a job. Nothing more, nothing less. Septimus had informed me that the Overlord himself would be coming here, tomorrow morning. He said that he would verify my information personally. I do not know what this great Terror is, but he must be very important, if the Overlord himself, is coming. The Overlord has never left the Demon Continent since he had risen to power, at least that was what the legends say. So obviously this terror must be very important, if it is going to force the Overlord to leave his fortress and travel to the human lands.

Whatever. I'm not being paid to wonder about my employers motives. I kill and steal for a price. I do not need to know what my employers motives are. That is one of the cardinal rules in buisness. You do what you are paid to do and don't ask questions.

I stood up drawing my two long knives with a flick of my wrist. It was time to kill, and earn my pay. I walked through the doors and down the hallway. Torches flickered on the wall, casting shadows everywhere. This was where I was at my best. As a Shadwalker, I could walk through the shadows, and become intangible at will, at any time, but at night I could do it all effortlessly, it was as natural as breathing.

I glided through the hallway, making absolutely no sound. I was a ghost, an apparition, a harbringer of death. All of my targets had died without exception. I had never failed. I would never fail. I would succeed or die trying.

A guard rounded the corner and stopped with his mouth open. Shocked at seeing someone in the hallway. Before he could utter a word I was gone, the shadows sucked me into the wall and spat me back out beside him. He blinked and before he could move I was behind him, my knife slicing his throat open.

I dropped his body and ran down the hall. Another guard appeared and my body disappeared into the floor, only to reappear from the ceiling. I slammed both of my knives into his eyes, as I flipped over his body. I yanked them back out a moment before turning intangible, as arrows tore through my body. I solidified again, and began killing the archers in a blur of metal and blood.

Once they were dead I dropped into the shadows and came out in the noble's bedroom. Unlike smart people, his bedroom was not warded against any magical movement, so I had absolutely no problem.

The noble was hiding behind his guards with fear in his eyes. I knew what he was seeing. Many people had seen it before him, and none of them had survived. I was clothed in a black jumpsuit that covered everything up to my eyes. The only visible thing was my souless eyes, giving my targets a look at death incarnate.

The guards charged at me, but it didn't matter. I made a few quick swings with my daggers and they dropped dead. The noble tried to run, but there was nowhere to go. He crouched in the corner, begging and sobbing for his life.

Pathetic. If you are going to die, then die proud and fighting. Don't cry and snivel like the despicable coward you are.

I stabbed the knife into his heart before turning and walking into the shadows. I reappear on ground outside the castle. This was just another ordinary day in my life. Nothing special had occurred.

I walked back to my room in a local tavern. I am going to have a visitor tomorrow morning, and I need to be ready for him. People say "God help me, if I disappoint him" but not even a God would be able to save you if you disappoint the Overlord.

Overlord POV

I watched as Septimus, Shakira, Minerva, Dimitri, Niverna, and Diablo entered the teleportation room. Sebastian had already entered with me, so we had just been waiting for the others. Niverna and Diablo were in charge of guarding the teleportation room until we returned, just in case someone traced our magic pathway.

Niverna was capable of devestating magical attacks, that could encompass massive areas. While Diablo was a living incarnation of death, he could absorb all life at will with a touch, making him the perfect close-combat expert. With Niverna taking care of any non-living threats, Diablo could destroy everyone else.

I always have a back-up plan, and this time Niverna and Diablo were it. I had prepared several slave crests for Shakira, Minerva, and Dimitri, during the night. We would need them so that they could pass as slaves in the Moravian Empire.

Each seal was a complex magic circle made of wax. You were supposed to place it over the slaves heart and simply add a drop of your blood, which would burn the crest into their skin, like a brand. This would allow you to gain control of the slave's actions, with a set of commands or instructions. Once the slave was under your control, they would be forced to obey whatever command you give them, as well as automatically rendering them inable to physically harm you.

This didn't matter for my Pillars since they were more loyal to me than any slave crest could make them, but for appearence's sake they needed to be identified as slaves. It didn't take long to apply the slave crests to their chests. They all understood the necessity, and agreed with my method.

Septimus and Sebastian did not recieve crests because one would be hiding in the shadows, and the other could pass as a human butler. With that our preperations were finished. Sebastian had had some of his operatives prepare a carriage for us, which we would take upon our arrival.

I led the way into the middle of the giant magic circle, that was engraved upon the floor. I waited until everyone who was coming had followed before activating the portal spell.

Dark energy swirled around us, tearing open a hole in space itself. We dropped through only to immediately emerge in the middle of a large empty room. Well empty of everything except a group of people wearing black hooded cloaks.

I guess that these are Septimus's operatives. Rather cliche, isn't it? With all of those hooded robes. Whatever. I do not care about unnecessary appearences.

"Septimus. Take care of any remaining issues, and lead us to the carriage. We will be posing as a rich merchant's son from a foreign country, and his demon slave bodyguards. Once in the Capital, we will buy various objects to keep up appearences. It should not take us too long to find out whether or not the seal is present. We will meet with Sharil in the Capital."

"Very Well."

Septimus went to talk with the hooded people, while Sebastian led us to the carriage. It was an extravagant thing, painted with bright colors, and guilded with silver and gold. Personally, I would have prefferred a small, useful cart, but since I was posing as a merchant, appearence was a necessity.

We had appeared about an hours ride from the Capital of the Moravian Empire so until the carriage reached the Capital, we would just have to wait inside. Oh, well. If there was one thing I excelled at, it was waiting. I had waited almost a million years for this day, what was another hour. I had slowly spread my influence across the world, right under the Gods noses, after building myself an impenetrable fortress, and an enormous army.

Most people would think that it would have only taken a couple thousand years, but those people are not like me. I am an existence that rivals the Gods. Just as elves view time differently from humans, so do Gods view time differently from all other beings. Ten thousand years is the equivalent of a day in the eyes of a God.

We are truly immortal, so time itself has no meaning. We are all willing to wait as long as it takes before making a move. Time only effects the mortals, so we have no care for it. A second or an eternity, to us it is all the same.

Oh. The trip is already over. Well, that was fast. I didn't expect for it to be that short. I glanced around to see how everyone else was doing. It was necessary that they were all functioning at full capacity, so that they could concentrate on their roles.

Hmm. Minerva is continuously tapping her fingers on her arm. She was never very good at waiting, she is more of the 'Just hurry up and let me kill them already' type of person.

Dimitri is looking out the window and muttering something about all the new specimins and how many experiments he could conduct with them.

Shakira is just sitting still, with her trademark expressionless face on. She was always the quiet type, and she deals with waiting with the same stoic face that she uses when killing enemies. Some people would call her emotionless, but I know that she is not like me. She feels emotions, she just decides not to share them with the world.

Sebastian is driving the carriage so I do not know what he is doing, but he is always in perfect condition so I don't need to worry about him. I don't need to worry about Septimus because he is an undead lich, so he will never become tired. His stamina is endless, and his emotions are forcefully muted because they are unnecessary for an undead, so he is always alert.

I stretched my arms as the carriage rolled up to the gates of the Capital. If all went according to plan then I would be done within a couple of days.

The carriage rolled into the city before Sebastian made several sharp turns and stopped in front of a large tavern. Judging from the extravagant clothing people were wearing as they entered, it was a high-end tavern that catered to the rich.

I groaned for a second before cracking my neck. For my plan to work I would need to pretend to be a superficial arrogant b*stard. In reality I was a complex arrogant b*stard, and the superficial part was going to be really annoying.

I glared at everyone else in the carriage before saying.

"Absolutely Everything I do now, is the work of the fictional character who I am impersonating. DO NOT TALK ABOUT WHAT I AM ABOUT TO DO.............EVER!"

Thravis - The Merchant (Fictional Character POV)

With that I jumped out of the carriage and plastered a giant smile on my face.

"Ah. It is so good to finally be back in civilization. Come my pets. Let us secure lodging."

I waved at my Demon slaves, before sauntering into the tavern. I glanced around identifying the different types of people in the room, before gliding up to the bar.

"Hello young lady. Would you please give me a glass of your best wine, and arrange a room for the night?"

The bartender was a relatively young girl by human standards, she was probably about 17. I smirked inwardly as she blushed. Poor innocent maiden, to be decieved so easily by my false charm.

"Of-f course Sir. T-That will be 2 silver a night, and the wine will be 50 coppers."

"Here is three silvers. Keep the change for yourself."

I tossed three silver coins on the table turning as my demon slaves entered causing the entire tavern to become deadly silent. Hmm. I should probably break the tension before anyone does anything unnecessary.

"Ah. My pets, you have arrived. This lovely young lady will show you to my room. Be a dear and take my luggage up there will you."

I reached out and patted Minerva on the side of her cheek. Honestly the look in her eyes was so completely bewildered, it was hilarious. Or it would have been if it weren't so painfully obvious that she had absolutely no idea how to act, when faced with my strange personality. I sent her a stern mental command to remedy that.

'Reply 'Yes Master' then comply with my requests. Do it now.'

Minerva jerked her head before lowering it. "Yes, Master."

She turned and walked off, followed by Shakira and Dimitri. I turned and sauntered back to the bar, talking loudly so that my words could be heard by everyone here. This was a high-class tavern and the rumours would have spread throughout the city in an hour. Having a merchant with demon slaves, is a rare occassion and not one to be missed.

Now slavery itself is not rare, but having demon slaves would be taken as a sign of wealth and power. Even the weakest demons on the Demon Continent were at least as strong as a B rank adventurer, and humanoid demons, like the ones I possessed were at least S ranked, if not higher.

The ranking system for adventurers was: F - E - D - C - B - A - S - SS - SSS - X -. This system had F as a weak human, and X was only a legend, obtaining it meant that you were of equal power with the lesser gods.

Most adventurers never made it past B rank. Professional Adventurers were A rank, and usually headed up groups of lower ranked adventurers to take on quests or jobs. S ranked adventurers were rather rare and ran guilds and led armies. SS ranked adventurers were usually classified as Heroes, and were very rare. SSS ranked were legendary and tended to avoid all other people. They would travel the world and do whatever the hell they wanted, or retire and live in peace in a kingdom of their chosing.

The Adventurers Guild was like an international mercenary company. They would take any job as long as it satisfied two conditions. First, you had to pay for the job, and second, the job could not involve adventurers fighting other adventurers.

Incidentally my 'demon slaves' were probably around X rank, since they were my Pillars, but they were masking their power so that they appeared to be S ranked demons.

This would tell people a lot about my money and power. Since I could afford three S ranked demon slaves, an unheard of luxury, they would assume I had an enormous amount of money and power. After all, to be able to hire someone to capture and bring back demons of this rank, would take a lot of money and connections.

Anyway. I decided to break the remaining tension with a few unnecessary comments.

"Nice girls really. But they do tend to lack a good amount of knowledge and the ability to have civilized behavior. They are horrid demons after all. But I don't regret buying them. They have saved my life several times already. Of course I know that without the slave crest they would rip me to shreds, but since they are unable to do that, they simply obey my commands. It was worth the 70 mithril coins it took to purchase them. Although I sometimes wonder why I bothered buying the male."

I heard a number of quiet gasps as I casually mentioned the enormous amount of 70 mithril coins. It was enough to hire an entire legion of mercenaries, to guard you for the next 10 years.(About 7 million dollars)

(Think of Coppers as dimes. Silvers as 10 dollar bills. Gold coins as 1,000 dollar bills. Mithril coins being about a 100,000 dollars a pop. And Black Mithril as a 10 million dollars a piece. Obviously Gold Mithril Coins were legendary, at 100 million dollars a coin.)

(Thravis just spent 5 dollars on a glass of wine, and twenty dollars for a room for the night.)

People were looking at me with a significantly larger amount of respect as I downed my glass of wine and walked upstairs to my room where my demon slaves were waiting.

Overlord POV (Thravis is a fake personality that Overlord created to interact with the human world. I made it two seperate POV's to show the difference in their thought patterns. Thravis is able to fake emotions, and act like a foolish young man, while Overlord is incapable of doing that. Thravis seems to be a seperate entity, but is just a different part of Overlord's mind.)

I walked into the room where everyone was waiting and shut the door before casting a barrier around the room. WIth this no one would be able to hear, see, or enter the room until the barrier was broken or removed.

I gagged violently as soon as the barrier was erected. Ugh. Absolutely disgusting. I know that I have to become the character I create to interact with the human world, but that was just disgusting.

It was like watching while your body went and acted like a complete fool. Hmph. If anything at least no god would ever suspect Thravis of being me. Not even the most mentally retarded god would act like I just did.

I glanced up to see Minerva trying to hide a grin, and Dimitri choking back laughter. Shakira and Sebastian were stoic and buisness like as usual, not showing any of their feelings.

I stood and pointed at Minerva and Dimitri.

"DO NOT SAY A WORD! I WARNED YOU BEFOREHAND. IF YOU REPEAT ANYTHING THAT JUST HAPPENED I WILL KILL YOU MYSELF."

I swear. I would almost rather rip my heart out and cook it on a skewer, than play that freaking character again.

Shudder. Oh, well. The end justifies the means. That's right. Just keep repeating that. Over, and over, and over, and over and over.

Ugh. Well now all that's left is to make contact with Sharil, maintain my cover, and find out whether or not Harak is sealed under this city.

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