Part 15: Chapter 9.1: Taking Care of Business

Chapter 9.1: Taking Care of Business



“So, you’d claim that pumpkins are edible and not just a source of contracts with edritch deities?”

“Er… yes. These wild patches of pumpkin are very hardy and mealy. We elves don’t really debase ourselves by eating such bare food, but goblins and whatever other ruffians under you care might… sire”.

“So why aren’t they growing them themselves? Surely it’s not the first time that gnomes or goblins found pumpkins!”

“Our best guess, m’lord, is that you subjects are, well, too dense to do it. Goblins really don’t understand agriculture, and drunk gnomes mistake pumpkin patches for women, so the gnome women keep burning the plots down”

“Stupid, you say? Well, that’s a believable explanation. Carry on, then!”



Safe from such boring yet unavoidable activities like keeping his troops alive, King Lich V could go back to studying the mounds of magical tomes and scrolls that infested the top of his tower. Recently he had rediscovered one old, very useful spell. “John’s Table Fixer”, also known by its more noble name of “Reconstruction”, was one of the greatest spell in the arsenal of any necromancer that didn’t have easy access to new corpses or felt a connection with his skeletons.

Simply put, the spell fixed inanimate objects together. It was a relatively easy spell, surely not as complicated as the ones used to treat living things, but that was the beauty of it. Skeletons, even walking and aggressive ones, were more akin to mobile tables than real beings and such could be fixed easily. This spell removed the necessity of having living thinking subjects who’d fix the bones with straps and foul smelling glues.



„Send word to the King. We can‘t hold here. The jungle is horrible enough but between Amberon shooting magic bolts at us and that Dremer gate, we can‘t hold this position!“



“So, the old ghost is banished? That is not good. I was hoping he would help us with the anchor problem, what with being incorporeal and such. Get me some good news!”



Trolls crashing through the walls of the northern elven citadel were the good news he desired. Sure, one of the trolls took to wearing the garrison commander as a codpiece, but the invasion went without a hitch, otherwise. Having thus proven themselves in field of battle, the trolls had been tasked with taking Amberon’s capital.

“End this war with extreme prejudice and high impact violence!”



Not all news in the realm were about destruction, however. For example, the humans of Golddale built a mill, since eating fish and porridge all the time was getting a little stale. While goblins didn’t really bake bread and only burned meat on an occasion, gnomes would grind grain by putting them between two rock slabs, sitting on it and twisting in place. This was stupid and inefficient, so the humans used wind to do their work. Many mills had been destroyed in kings absence, but now, under protection of King Lich, they could enjoy the comforts of milling again.

Already they were making plans for something called “seafood flatbread”.



With a mighty kick, the door to the King’s hall flew open, nearly missing a goblin attendant. In stepped a mighty barbarian warrior, who, after kicking the attendant, went straight before the King. There he stood, two meters of scarred bronze skin and muscle, all clad in furs, leathers and chainmail, with a massive sword slung over his back.

“Dead King of Beasts! I speak for Krolm! My name is not important for if my deeds have not carried the message of my likeness to your ears, that would only waste our time! Hear me, lord, and hear the quest of my god!”

King Lich shifted in his throne
“I’m listening”

“Then hear and take heed! Grum-gog, the vile diety of dirty weaklings, lice ridden cowards and green skinned fools, is sending his vile followers into your realm! Krolm finds it offensive! King! Destroy the infidels, gain favor of Krolm and, as befitting any barbarian warrior, a bag of gold! Refuse and face his wrath!“

“It is a tempting proposition. I agree to the challenge…”



“…and here are the heads of the infidels. We put them on spikes just for you. Naturally, they’re going to get burned once we’re done with our reward”

The barbarian looked upon the heads of dead goblins and smiled.

“Very well, oh king. Here are your just rewards” he said, chucking asizable sack of gold at the king’s feet “Till battle brings us together again!”



A few jagged spires rose out of the ground, constructed from the same obsidian stuff that all Arethi structures were made of.

“So, this is your Hall of Alchemy? What does it do?”

“Here we render rare herbs and plants of arcane quality as well as blood of children of certain races into various magical potions, salves, as well as a few other uses”.

“Oh?” the lich gave an inquisitive look, as much as that’s possible when having no flesh on your face “what other uses?”

The elf started to sweat and loosened his collar

“Well, my liege, it’s just trifles… You know, cosmetics, armor polish… Elf stuff”

“Somehow I think you’re lying. And I definitely know that I haven’t had the chance to perform an elf vivisection… yet”

“Oh dear…” elf’s shoulders dropped and he could no longer look the king in the eye “After the women left, we started feeling… urges. And for a Taishar knight to lay with another… well… that’s… that’s…. something we need to find a cure”

“So you elves are trying to cure yourself from being catamites? Well, that’s rich”.



Leaving the elf sobbing in a corner, King Lich V returned to his castle where his special project was in motion, a creation of a new spell! Fortunately or not, this was a very petty spell indeed that hinged upon one principle: anything summon able is really expendable.

And so it was a mish mash of several spells, including summoning, teleportation, as well some unfinished scraps of spells that were supposedly mean for searches and mind control. The spell had many components, but the gist was this: instead of summoning critters from unknown places, this spell would go out into the world, find certain beasts, and then transport them to a select location, all while under a mind control spell.

That would show those serpents.

That would show them to mess with Golddale Duck.



At the same time as King Lich V was making plans to kill serpents that might have never been near Golddale, trolls were slowly, but surely shattering the magically sealed walls of Amberon’s citadel. Green muscles rippled as clubs as huge as treetruns swung against bricks, rock and mortar (and whatever else the elves used in construction). Black shards of fortifications flew about. Slowly, Amberon’s doom was approaching.



Madness still raged in the south. Sol de Torvega and Miralbus the Hat, seemingly oblivious to the world falling to pieces around them, declared war on each other instead of focusing their efforts on a common foe.



A barbarian woman barged into the hall, only taking a small detour to kick the goblin steward.

“King of Bones!” She said, standing in front of the throne, her hand on the pommel of her huge sword “Hear the word of Krolm! You have showed your devotion by slaying the unbelievers! Now you can make good on it and build a temple to Krolm! Strong, large temple fortress were warriors would train, weapons and armor would be made, and stories would shared, wenches…”

“Ah, allow me, the king, to interrupt you here, in my hall. I’m afraid I’ll have to turn down your request. You see, holy grounds are quite rare in this far off, frozen place, quite rare indeed. And I already have plans for the one that we have.”

“So you are turning down Krolm’s favor and strength?”

“Let’s say…. I’m postponing it, for now”.



Back in the front against Dremer that was actually moving somewhere, black magic battered the shell of the Dremer castle. It burned and buckled, pustules rising and exploding all over its surface. Foul ichor couldn’t help it regrow, for werewolves were swarming all over the battlements, ripping apart huge veins and rupturing organs full of horrible alien phlegm. It wasn’t long before the castle collapsed on itself and burned away.



With castle down, King Lich elected to summon a band of imps, to scout around, maybe pull some Dremer attention away from werewolves and get some imps killed.
The results were…disheartening. Most lands between Amberon’s capital of Lintirn and Miralbus’ realm were tainted and occupied by Dremer invaders.

What’s worse, some lands seemed blackened, ashen... destroyed.



But war rages on and for King Lich, that mean dredging more spells from tomes, scrolls, tablets, patches of human skin, and carvings on wooded fertility statues.

“Woodhaven’s traverse” was mad e by a mage who had a forest witch mistress and who really hated going through the woods with all their mud, creeks and mosquitoes. So he worked and worked on a spell that would let him walk in stride and magic would take care of him not getting stuck, spraining and ankle or getting bitten.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t save from falling down a cliff, which is precisely what happened.





Amberon, sensing his doom approaching, made peace with Sol and sought to do the same with King Lich.

“No, no, no, no, no. Your incompetence was a thorn in my side for too long. See you when the walls crumble!” the lich laughed and with a flick of his wrist, severed the magical connection used for negotiations.



“I remember the time when ‘dead rising from the ground’ were a portent of the end of the world, and not just peasants running rampant and stupid” said Lucius while watching the local guard’s feeble attempts to drive back skeletons.

“Well, that’s what you get for not inflicting backbreaking labor on their children.” Avgustus said with a sneer that always found a way to his face when he talked about people of base birth” Soon they start to feel that there’s some additional step between being a child and man, they spout nonsense about exploring themselves and maturing as personalities, and unique experiences… some even take to nihilism and worship of dark forces, congregating in cementaries, drinking wine, and doing dark ceremonies”

“Please, Avgustus, they have no inkling of magic, the wine is horrible and the dead are rising to escape their brooding and horrible cementaries”

“How would you know something like that, Lucius?” asked the werewolf noble, raising one impressive furry eyebrow.

“Why, I just love how the black clothing makes their pale skin even paler, and a young waif laying on a tomb at full moon is so… arousing.”

“You know, the more I talk to you, the more I understand why your previous friends cast you out”.



“See?” the lich said to Melchior while watching a barbarian cleave a rock in two “I had ways to remain in Krolm’s good graces. After all, we’ll destroy any foul champion that Grum-Gog sends us. As far as I’m concerned, goblins don’t deserve a deity”

“Oh, why thank you” he added when the barbarian gave him the runes of Wrath that he extracted from the rock. Other boulders seemed to try and shy away from Krolm’s messenger when he left.



“You know, Miralbus, we probably wouldn’t need this alliance if you just stopped trying to go to war against Sol”.

“But the furry abomination must be stopped! I bet he is in league with the Dremer! I’m sure his father would have been!”

“Nobody is in league with Dremer, except for some black mages, maybe. Now, you, with your madness, might be on of their best allies”



Speaking of madness, the elves were showing King Lich around their newly constructed tax offices. Elves, used to non-Euclidean geometry, colors out of space and other anomalies, were perfectly suited to oversee Ardanian taxes. They also came pretty close to understanding economy in general, a feat easily available to someone who can visualize a five-dimensional cube.

This didn’t explain why they needed flaying stations and leeching posts in their tax offices, but King Lich, except from taxes by the royal decree of himself, didn’t worry about things like that too much.



Ladiss the Whispering stood up from a forest clearing still smoldering from a blast of Dremer magic and dusted himself off before throwing the Dremer gate a defiant stare:

“You think you can take me? You need a sodding army if you gonna take me!”



The goblin steward made a dull *thump* when he landed after a kick delivered by a giant barbarian with obsidian skin

“Fleshless king, hear Krolm’s challenge” he bellowed “You would presume to insult Krolm by not building his temple, but Krolm sees your might and gives you an opportunity to repay him! Slay these infidel scum and show us your devotion!”

King Lich straightened himself in his throne

“Ah, now your god makes a suitable request! Very well, he can consider the infidels dead!”



But before any more goblins could be killed, King Lich returned to his magical studies and one very important spell. “Katoman’s Travel Helper” was made because Katoman was a very fat, hedonistic mage who couldn’t even rely on flight spells. Never the less, his lifestyle demanded constant conquests to replenish his coffers and his army required his constant presence, something he was unwilling to provide while marching was involved. So he made one of the first teleportation spells.

Other mages used this spell to transport detachments of their armies because they weighted about the same as old Katoman.



Finally, the walls of Lintirn fell under the unrelenting blows of the trolls. The green monsters poured in the streets, trampling fleeing elves underfoot and swatting militia away with the swings of their clubs.

The great black door of Amberon’s Hall buckled and caved, and fell inside with a horrible clatter, nearly crushing the few remaining knights guarding their mage. Trolls burst in, swinging their clubs at anyone smaller than themselves. But Amberon wasn’t going to give up. Crackling with arcane energies, purple lighning dancing on his ornate black armor, he rose from his throne and prepared to launch spells that would spell doom for his attacker.

But a magical bolt flew in through the doorway and stuck him square in the chest. He was blown back into the throne while another figure entered the hall. Quietly crossing the carnage that had engulfed the throne room, King Lich V was making his way towards the elven mage.

“You! Abomination! How dare…”

“Enough!” said the lich, launching another bolt at the slumping form. “Enough of your speeches, your petty demands, your Truth and your stupid bony face. Your rule ends now!” the lich hissed while lifting the elf by the throat.

“Your soul is mine!”