Slowly shaking my head, I blinked a few times, trying to get rid of the spots shimmering in my eyes. These had to be wholly psychosomatic, the radiant attack that had scorched my simulacrum had been some two dozen kilometres away after all, but that didn’t change their presence.

Leaning back, I mentally went through the events, trying to get a grasp on the Valkyries' abilities and their tactics. Having just one flight of Nevermores, a single Chase of Wargs and my latest toy ambush the elves had been the right decision. I had no idea what those birdies could have done if I had sent more of our forces, though the likely answer was that they wouldn’t have done a damn thing. They had been hiding, keeping themselves concealed high up in the air, and only struck when they noticed a powerful, magical emanation, probably thinking it was me.

Standing up from my throne, I stepped onto a flight of stairs, using the shadows to swiftly navigate my tower, and moved into my workshop. There, I looked at a sculpture made of Ice, its form and features roughly modelled after my own and grinned. While there was still some more work to be done and I thought I might be able to make some improvements in the future, the experiment had been a complete success. Using a combination of Blood Magic, Astral Mediation and the observations I had made while crafting the constructs for the remnant spirits, I had managed to create these humanoid constructs, only that instead of allowing a Remnant Spirit to use them, I had linked myself into them, allowing me to remote-control them and use my magic through the Astral River while remaining safely on my throne.

That I could directly draw Astral Power from the Nexus and greatly reduce the ineffectiveness of casting through the Astral River thanks to that connection made the whole thing practical, allowing me to wield a substantial percentage of my power through the simulacrum though that knowledge only served to highlight just how powerful those Valkyries had been.

Shaking my head once more, I pulled a hair from my head, making sure that it remained filled with my Astral Power as I did, before placing it onto the frozen statue before me. Next, II pricked my finger with my Athame and let a drop of blood well up while infusing it with my Astral Power, before smearing that drop of blood onto the Ice, right across the hair I had just placed.

Focusing on the Astral Power that had formed the statue and my hair and Blood, I connected the three, briefly closing my eyes to link into the statue, which was now a simulacrum, ready to be controlled.

Nodding to myself, I stepped back, confident that I could use the simulacrum if there was another situation that required me to endanger myself, something I preferred to avoid, now that I had access to the Nexus. Having it simply allowed me to wield tremendous amounts of power and moving out of my tower, away from my throne that was the focal point of that power would be foolish.

With the new simulacrum prepared, I moved back to my throne, while a sliver of my awareness was split off, moving it to the entrance of the tower. Inside the tower, I hardly needed it so having it somewhere I could deploy it quickly seemed like a good idea.

Back on my throne, I focused on Lenore, who was flying above the valley, giving some of our Nevermores a few more lessons on aerial combat. They were learning, quickly, but they had only been birds for a couple of days, leaving them a little inexperienced.

“I need your advice, friend,” I told her, giving her a few moments before dumping the memories of the brief combat on her. As she was parsing them, I focused outwards, on that last curse I had cast on the Valkyries, trying to track their presence. I was quite confident that I had struck them, but there had been no notifications telling me that I had killed any of them, leaving me a little uncertain. But then, it hadn’t really been a killing curse, merely one that should strike at their minds and leave them confused, their communion and maybe even their communication with the divine broken. The idea was that the Dark Moon represented solitude and loneliness, giving me the idea that it might be able to stop them from seeking solace and power from their deity.

Closing my eyes, I immersed myself in the Astral River, seeking out traces of my own Astral Power and soon, I could feel a faint trace of my magic. Projecting my mind there and creating a shadowy construct of Darkness, using the form of a Raven, I manifested, taking in the environment.

By now, night had completely fallen, leaving the snowy slope I found myself on in a curious state of twilight, only a bit of moonlight reflecting from the pristine snow. Looking around, I noticed the crumbled form of a Valkyrie, groaning in pain and tainted with my Astral Power. Grinning, I moved the construct, letting the Raven hop across the snow to take a closer look.

The Valkyrie didn’t look too hot, her wing seemed to be broken and there was quite a bit of blood spilling from her mouth, making me think there were internal injuries. But what’s more, she looked as if she had been hit quite hard by the impact, the snow doing little to cushion her fall.

“You thought you could come here and stop me, did you?” I asked, projecting my voice out of the raven-shaped construct. Sadly, my conversation partner didn’t look like she could actually respond, or was even really conscious.

Not that I cared.

With a mental flicker, I used the Snow she was lying on to flip her over, causing a moan of pain as she landed on her broken wing. but the pain seemed to be enough to bring her to awareness. Her eyes flickered as she stared at the raven that had hopped onto her chest, what I knew to be deep purple, almost black, eyes staring back at her.

Faintly, I thought I could hear a prayer bubbling past the blood and spittle running from her mouth, a thought that amused me. Clearly, there was no god here, only me.

“Your Gods have forsaken you,” I mocked, enjoying the role of the villain quite a bit at that moment. The sneaky, underhanded nature of their actions was annoying me. Shadowing the elves and then striking from ambush didn’t feel heroic to me. They were supposed to be the good guys, defeating the evil me. Underhanded was supposed to be part of my portfolio.

But if I couldn’t hold a monopoly on underhanded, I would have to add something else to my tools. And given that I was the villain in this play Pantheon and I had written, Corruption sounded like such a great thing to add.

Reaching out, I called upon a few of my Wargs, sending them to collect this broken bird, even as I hopped onto her head, using the Blood on her lips as a link to channel a bit of Blood Magic into her system. Not enough to heal, far from it, just enough to keep her alive, at least until I decided what to do with her. To kill or to corrupt, such a difficult choice.

Before I could make a decision, Lenore pushed against my mind. Leaving the construct sitting on my new toy’s chest, I pulled most of my mind back to my body, looking at the bird sitting next to me.

“Your opinion?” I asked, curious what she’d think.

“A probing attack, the elves were both bait and distraction. A few scouts have returned and mentioned they have seen similar shapes in the distance but so far, none of those who have gone to take a closer look have returned. We should know more in a few hours,” she reported, my mood souring. So the elves hadn’t put all their eggs in a single basket but had split those eggs, trying to make sure something would get to me.

And most likely, there would be more Valkyries as well, waiting to take their shot at me.

“I see,” I agreed, before focusing my conscience back on the fallen Valkyrie, where the wargs had now started to approach, their presence making my fallen prey tremble in fear.

The wargs weren’t gentle with her but made sure not to cause any additional damage as they dragged her away. They were still about a day of travel away from the valley, giving me some time to make a decision regarding her. But there were other priorities before that.

“Have the Wargs and Nevermores focus on delaying the approaching enemies. I’ll be helping as much as I can, but the main objective is keeping them away until I can crack the Soul Prison.” I ordered Lenore, pushing the question regarding the fallen Valkyrie to the back of the queue. Maybe I could make use of her, but if not, she’d be a liability, one that I wouldn’t allow in my domain, no matter how interesting it would be to add a corrupted Valkyrie to the guardians of my tower.