Chương 1231: 1261 - Ingrid's Challenge

Stunned, Leon couldn't form any words to respond to Theron. He stared at the man, utterly flabbergasted that vassalization came so easily to him.

'Then again, he said it's been a thousand years of defending his territory on his own without his patron, or something like that…'

"That's…" Leon hesitantly began as the silence dragged on.

"That's quite the offer."

"I suppose it is," said Theron with a closed-lip grin.

"My territory is valuable, as am I, myself. Valuable enough that, on my own, I have been exhausted keeping my territory secure. This journey here was the first time I've been secure enough to leave my borders since the death of Prontis, and… you know what happened…" With a slow head nod, Leon replied, "I've… encountered other events of a similar nature ever since reaching the Nexus a century and a half ago.

Nearly always against those with Inherited Bloodlines, but given the reasoning in the Canticles of Hormizd, I can't say that I'm surprised they include vampires, too. I haven't participated in enough of the politics in the Nexus to say this authoritatively, but I can at least say that it feels like these kinds of attacks are ramping up."

"I agree," added Gwarim.

"Attacks on river gates, everything in Khosrow's Fane… Do you believe these are related, Leon?" Pursing his lips, Leon turned the question over in his mind a few times. Given the scale of the battle at Iaivi Fortress and the viciousness with which Jors-kil's garrison was treated, he wondered how much of that was sadism and how much was passionate revenge. He knew that it didn't take much to turn men into beasts when given power over those they hated.

More than that, he was reminded of the Wailing Dirge and the similar creature he'd fought at Kavad's Lance. He couldn't say definitively how old either of them had been, but those could've been some of the first paint strokes in this tapestry.

'Or they could be unrelated,' he reminded himself cynically.

'… Though Triyr did use something much like the Wailing Dirge…' With only a hint of frustration, he said, "I don't know anything. Not yet. There are some pieces that look like they could fit into the same puzzle, but without more pieces, I can't say for sure. What I do know, though, is that even if attacks aren't ramping up and all of this has been normal, it still leaves those of us who don't fit within Khosrow's Law in the lurch. And what can we do then except band together and fight back, or die?"

He met Theron's gaze, and after a beat, he conjured the spells Xaphan had made for him, along with another couple of scrolls, containing the ritual's instructions.

"This will change you from vampire back to human," Leon said with a mild frown.

"I'd be most glad to have a friendly Lord within Rhea once I start rebuilding my Clan's holdings out there. If you're willing to offer me your fealty, I'll accept it and provide what protection I can offer." With a shaking hand, Theron took what Leon offered, scanning the large sheets of spell paper with wide eyes, looking like he could hardly believe what he was seeing.

"My contracted demon may be needed for some part of it. We can perform the ritual in Storm Herald whenever you're ready." [He'd better be ready soon,] Xaphan grumbled. [I don't like being kept waiting.] [I'd have thought that tens of thousands of years of imprisonment might have increased your patience, my friend,] responded Leon, his words only a light needle compared to the more biting response he was tempted to make. [It did,] Xaphan hissed.

"Allow me a day," said Theron, almost choking up from emotion. His eyes hadn't left the spells since taking them, and though he was taking pains not to damage the paper, he was still holding it with as much of a death grip as he could manage otherwise.

"When you arrive," Leon continued, "we can also negotiate your fealty. I hope you understand why I may not be entirely thrilled with Khosrow's Law, so having any Strategoi is… Well, even if it's only a nominal change in title, we should discuss." Theron hardly reacted, merely nodding his head in agreement while Gwarim grinned and chuckled. As silence stretched between them, Theron rose to his feet, double and triple-checked that he had everything Leon had given him, and then said, "If you two will excuse me…

I need to prepare myself… Leon, tomorrow."

"Tomorrow," Leon repeated, and with that, Theron rushed away as quickly as propriety allowed, leaving Leon and Gwarim alone.

"Heh," said Gwarim.

"I wasn't expecting all that, Leon. But if I were you, I'd think about putting some kind of protocol in place for dealing with Strategoi or other Lords you might encounter in Rhea."

"I see your wisdom," Leon replied.

"How much do you know of that Great Strand?"

"Not much," the larger man admitted as he leaned back with his hands behind his head. He cast his gaze out over the expansive breadth of Belicenion beneath them—since the Sun King's men were still processing their arrival, they hadn't been allowed to venture down to Belicenion proper, yet, and so had met in a small courtyard specifically meant to cater to waiting Lords, affording them privacy and comfort until they were cleared to head down to the surface—and sighed.

"Rhea is one of the more chaotic Great Strands. I can think of only a handful of Lords who've ever held territory there for long, and most of them are gone. Of that handful, only Theron remains." Pausing, Gwarim turned his gaze back to Leon and leaned forward.

"Keep an eye out, Leon. I'd offer you more help, but my territory in the universe is far from Rhea. Rhea itself is made up of billions of planes. Only several thousand are of much importance and relevance to a Nexus Lord, but that is still an immense amount of territory that a mage can get lost in. That a mage can build his own Kingdom in and be left alone. Not all mages venture to the Nexus after achieving Apotheosis, and there may be quite a few powerful ones attracted to Rhea simply for its relative anarchy."

"I've made plenty of preparations, Gwarim," said Leon with a reassuring grin.

"Very well, very well," Gwarim replied with a laugh.

"I only said what I did because Rhea is dangerous and will be difficult to hold for someone only at the level of a Despot."

"I might have some help on that front," Leon responded.

"When I spoke with Anax Jericho back on Voidshore, he mentioned having some trouble coming from Rhea. I'm sure he'd be willing to help out if it meant having a stable border." Gwarim hummed in thought as he stroked his beard.

"Maybe. One can never know when it comes to men like Jericho. He's seen a few Reconstitutions, and has seen much more than either of us has. I'd even suggest that he made mention of his troubles in Rhea to see if you might involve yourself."

"Maybe…" Leon whispered.

"I suppose I'll find out in time. By then, I hope to be quite a bit stronger than I am now." Gwarim burst out laughing, but before he could respond, Leon felt a message come in from Elise. Apparently, the Sun King's officials had finally gotten around to accepting their delegation. Leon bid his farewells to a not-at-all bitter Gwarim, who guessed he might still have to wait a day or more, given how slowly processing was going, and made his return to Storm Herald.

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"Another thirteenth-tier…" Elise whispered, her emerald eyes not wavering from the teams down below who were having their equipment inspected, though Leon could tell she wasn't actually watching them.

"How confident are you?"

"What need is there for confidence?" asked Cassandra as she draped an arm around Elise.

"He's already beaten one; what's one more?"

"Don't get arrogant," Valeria countered.

"Better to assume danger than safety." [Many times have frightened or overconfident predators attempted to eat me,] Maia added, [and many times have I feasted upon them as punishment.]"He'll be fine," Cassandra insisted.

"Tell you the truth, I haven't been that impressed with the Lords we've seen so far. Too pampered, too soft. I'm sure this 'Mikaela' will be the same, if she has to resort to the weapon between her legs instead of the one in her hands."

"She'll still outpower me," Leon pointed out.

"You'll win," Cassandra stated as a fact.

"I know. I've seen the future."

"You've seen the future and didn't tell us?" cried Elise in faux outrage.

"It came to me in a dream," Cassandra responded, crossing her arms and looking playfully smug. Hardly missing a beat, Leon returned the conversation to the point at hand.

"I think it's Vrothgar that she's most upset with. I get the idea that she wants me to hold Mikaela off while she beats down her husband."

"If I were her, I'd also want to rip that bitch's face off," Elise casually said.

"That too," Leon agreed.

"But she's more of the opinion that thirteenth-tier might be a bit beyond her reach. And that's not even touching on Mikaela's supposed connection with Gale Queen Esmerelda… I'm certainly not looking to attract the attention of an Elemental King over this, but…" [You will,] Maia said. [Over this, or something else. In this, you're not going to leave Ingrid alone. And if it's for something else, it'll be over something just as foolish and honorable.]"And hot," Cassandra added with a scalding look, her ruby eyes telling Leon all about what she wanted to do without saying another word.

"Stop undressing me with your eyes," Leon unseriously demanded.

"All right," Cassandra responded.

"I'll undress you with my hands, instead."

"You will?" Leon asked as he squared up against her, a challenging grin spreading across his face.

"Won't that be a neat trick; how do you plan on pulling it off?" Cassandra giggled even as her eyes narrowed, and she matched his posture.

"I promise you'll like it…" she said, her voice low and sultry. Before anything could happen, a powerful presence came barreling into the hangar where the teams were holding their inspections, almost knocking over one of the Sun King's inspectors. Not caring at all, the figure blazed through the hangar and leaped up to join Leon and his family on the mezzanine that, under combat conditions, would've been used to ferry fighters and Ulta suits to and from storage.

If he hadn't recognized the figure, Leon would've acted, but instead he relaxed and gave Ingrid an incredulous look.

"Bit of a dramatic entrance, wasn't that?" He gave the people below a pointed look, noting that his chariots had been buffeted and several of his athletes and the inspectors had been knocked down.

"Apologies," Ingrid replied with a genuinely apologetic look on her face.

"Did something warrant such an entrance?" Elise asked as Leon waved away Anzu, Anna, and a host of Tempest Knights who had rushed in after Ingrid's entrance tripped several alarms. Ingrid's face contorted as she struggled to put her blatant anger into words. Finally, after several interminably long seconds, she said, "That fucking bitch! She's goading me into action!"

"Mikaela?" asked Leon in a deliberately soft tone as Ingrid's outburst had attracted much attention from the still-upset inspectors and athletes below. Fortunately, none of them were injured, and it seemed that their equipment was all right; otherwise, he would've been more upset.

"She went on a pleasure cruise, my husband right beside her, along with all of my officers who defected with him! In the open air! And they went cruising exactly below my fucking ark!" Leon could sense the air around them becoming more charged as unbridled wrath had Ingrid's aura roiling and churning, filling the air with her power. She wanted to break something; that much was obvious.

"What are you going to do about it?" Valeria asked challengingly. Ingrid glared at her, then turned her gaze back to Leon.

"Everything I have to give, I'll give. My fealty, my body, my fucking life! I just ask you to come with me and kick that cunt right in her oversized tits!"

"Sure," Leon said without hesitation. His reply was so quick that the surprise seemed to overpower Ingrid's raging fury for a moment.

"I already told you that I'd have your back. Even more so after your previous offer…" Like Theron, she'd also offered her fealty, which Leon had decided to accept.

"No bodies or lives required," he finished with a cheeky wink. For a second—or an eternity, Leon almost couldn't tell the difference—she stared at him in shock. Then she closed her eyes and began to laugh maniacally.

"Yes, yes, YES!" she cried out.

"Let's go!"

"Wait," Leon said, halting her just before she launched herself off the mezzanine.

"I need to know what your intentions are. I'll admit that I'm more reticent to help you out if you're looking to kill anyone. But a duel to submission to satisfy honor? That I'm more than willing to help." Smiling, Ingrid explained what she'd seen, and Leon had to admit that he started to regret immediately deciding to aid the madwoman…

Mikaela's pleasure cruise hadn't ended yet, which made Leon realize just how quickly Ingrid saw them below her ark and then bolted off to Storm Herald. That meant that everyone who was on the deck was still there, including Vrothgar, several officers standing with him, and the woman who could only be Mikaela herself. The homewrecking Basilissa was stunning in a purely aesthetic sense, and it was clear that being stunning was her intention.

Long silver-blond hair done up in noble ringlets that fell about her face and down her back, an ethereal face, striking blue eyes, and skin so white that Leon almost suspected her of vampirism. However, she wore such a wide smile that it made hiding any fangs all but impossible.

Her body was just as Ingrid had led him to believe: seemingly sculpted for pleasure above everything, with a thin waist, soft thighs, a rear end that could smother three men at a time, and such an expansive chest that Leon didn't think she'd seen her own feet since she was a child.

All of this was deliberately shown off with a dark blue backless dress that was struggling more mightily to hold her chest in place than any garment Leon had ever seen—it either had to be enchanted or physically adhered to sensitive areas to not just fall off her body.

Furthermore, long slits on both sides of the dress went all the way up to her hips, and seemed physically tied to her undergarments to keep from blowing around and revealing absolutely everything, while the rest of the dress' fabric clung to her legs and rear as if they, too, had been stuck to her skin with a powerful adhesive. She was gorgeous, but only a candle next to the raging suns that were Leon's wives, and she paled in comparison to Miuna and many of her attendants, too.

But none of that detracted from what was her objective beauty. Rather, it was the unrestrained aura, haughty smile, iron grip on Vrothgar's arm, and the way she occasionally cast her gaze upward that really soured her appearance in Leon's eyes.

What was more surprising, however, was that she wasn't the only person on the cruising pleasure ark that possessed an aura that Leon couldn't parse, there were at least three others just on the deck who were at least thirteenth-tier, if not higher, and that wasn't even touching on the dozens of other high-tier mages on the deck as well, including a dozen Strategoi and four Despots.

"That's a lot of Lords," Leon observed.

"Getting cold feet?" Ingrid asked as she and Leon sped downward. They were alone, Ingrid not wanting to involve anyone else in her personal drama. Despite both of their delegations still in-processing, they'd had to bully their way through the checkpoints, and now not only had to wear tracking badges but also had a small ark above them following them at a distance. A small price to pay for speed, as far as Leon was concerned.

And speed was certainly something they had, as they plummeted from the arkyard like lightning bolts, their auras spilling out to deliberately draw attention. Lords and Belicenian officials alike watched with growing concern as they sped toward the ground—or rather, the pleasure ark. As they drew nearer with terrific speed, Leon relished seeing panic start to spread among some of the weaker Lords on the deck, including Vrothgar and his party.

Vrothgar himself couldn't move, however, since Mikaela had an iron grip on his arm.

'There has to be some kind of history here that Ingrid hasn't told me,' thought Leon as he processed the sheer malignant smugness in Mikaela's smile as she watched them crash downward.

'Either that or Mikaela's the biggest bitch in the whole damned universe…' Leon and Ingrid slowed enough to not break through the deck of the ark just before they landed, but they still hit the beautiful wood hard, shaking the entire ark and sending the less sure-footed sprawling across the deck.

"MIKAELA-OF-THE-DANCING-TREE!" Ingrid roared as red-gold lightning blazed over her body.

"VROTHGAR, YOU FICKLE-HEARTED LIMP DICK! YOU HAVE BOTH GRAVELY DISHONORED ME, AND I WILL BE AVENGED! PRE—" Ingrid wasn't even able to finish before an aura of dreadful magnitude slammed down onto them both, sending them crashing into the deck even as the rest of the party remained unaffected.

"My," a sickly sweet voice said, sounding like it was coming from everywhere and yet just over Leon's shoulder at the same time, "what, oh what, is all this racket about? Mikaela, dear cousin, would you enlighten me?" From one of the doors appeared another woman as if she'd been waiting there, and given the smugness radiating from her, Leon suspected that was the case. There wasn't much he could do, however, as the aura of the woman who could only be Esmerelda, the Gale Queen, had him practically kissing the floor.

"Of course, cousin," Mikaela replied…