NOVEL NEXT Kharazan
6/11
I reclined in a comfortable chair in the guest quarters of Kharazan, enjoying a massage and blowjob from what I can only describe as Medihv’s harem. The Last Guardian, for whatever reason, had more than forty men and women ready to get wet and wild at a moment’s notice. Around a third were actually disguised demons, but as far as I could tell the demons were just as enthusiastically sexual as the rest. Seriously, why were there so many undead and demonic prostitutes here?
I tried talking to them, but they were practically oversexed caricatures. As the day went by and I met more of the spirits of Kharazan, I started to suspect that was more true than I’d initially thought. Moroes the Butler seemed like he was thinking straight, even if he was a bit psychotic. The party guests in the banquet were sharply divided between the last generation of Darkshire nobles and everyone else. The lower tier of servants were mostly mindless, cheerfully going about their business to ensure that the banquet continued smoothly 30 years after everyone died.
The theatre troupe in the amphitheater were unhealthily in character; Romulo and Julianne acted as if they really were the Romeo and Juliet knockoffs they appeared to be, and seemed puzzled when I suggested they might have other names. Same went for the entire cast of Wizard of Oz and Little Red Riding Hood. Of course, they were loosely aware of the fact they were just acting; Julianne flirted with me like any new capture, and Romulo didn’t care in the slightest. I hadn’t altered them mentally, so there would have been some angst if Romulo had in fact adopted the full personality of a certain Shakespearean leading man.
I brought in my undead and psychology experts, Abby and Natalie, to speculate. Their best guess was that the undead of the tower were trapped in a certain role, probably however Medihv perceived them in life, but without a consistent vision guiding them they had become more unhinged, extreme, and dangerous versions of that role that could kill intruders without breaking character. The ladies of the night he hired weren’t just willing sexual partners, they were eager for anything sexual while also attempting to kill any intruders they see.
On a positive note they had manifested all sorts of unusual abilities, my favorite being the disguised ghosts in the harem that gradually made those who they were focused on fall madly in love with them. Mind defense meant that they only affected me enough to make sex with them more satisfying, but even that had felt awfully potent. I had similar tools available, but if they could keep that aura up while possessing people I had a new constant companion. That meant one for me, ten for Vanessa, and two for a new project.
Tara informed me of an interesting trick she’d managed; undead could become Kyrians. These beings, also known as spirit healers, were the guides of the dead. They could wander within the borders of the shadowlands and direct the spirits of the dead either forward to judgment or back to their own bodies in a weakened state. Of course, if a few such beings happened to instead seduce and bind wandering souls, who could possibly object? The actual kyrians, obviously, but I don’t think they are all knowing, and if I happened to capture a few? So much the better.
Just in case, I was sending my new team of Helcular and two of the hos of Kharazan to ancient times; Soridormi reliably informs me that the bronze flight has little to no knowledge of or influence over the souls of the dead, and that whole timeline is there for experimentation as far as I’m concerned. In a perfect world, the trio might encounter a real Kyrian and then the real fun could start; I know very little about their command structure, but if I could get a necklace to whoever their leader is I’m sure the results would be far reaching.
The guests that Medihv actually knew the names of were like the Druidic shades; they were so solid that they could pass for living people. Reasonably powerful warriors and spellcasters, but they were somewhat unimpressive at this point; certainly they were more dangerous than Stormwind officer #273, but they weren’t so powerful as to make me excited. Man, if I’d taken this place over a month ago it would have been a huge deal.
Moroes, the butler, was carefully laying out all of the magical equipment he was aware of on the dining room table. It was quite a lot, unsurprisingly; it was a centuries old mage tower that had a strained relationship with conventional reality. The really interesting ones appeared to be outgrowths of Medivh's perception being imposed on the ghosts. For example, I don’t think most ruby slipper props are actually capable of teleporting someone home. I couldn’t actually tell you if the magical collar I found in the guest rooms that can reverse pain and turn it into toe curling pleasure was like that before the tower went mad, but it might have been. I picked out a pretty belt for Lividia, something that would bolster the power of her spells. It was more about giving her a present than powering her up, but since I suspected she’d put it on and literally never take it off except for sex, I thought it best to give her something practical. Moroes helped me make the selection, since he knew what was on offer far better than I did.
Speaking of the butler, he was completely immortal. Going with my working theory, Medihv likely saw the butler that helped raise him as a universal constant in his life. An integral part of Kharazan. Moroes himself had no insight; he just knew that if he happened to die he’d always wake up the next day ready to see to the management of the household. He was also an exceptional knife fighter, easily on par with Doris, though where he picked up that skill was a complete mystery even to him.
The last few noteworthy ghosts were Nielas Aran and quite a few “echoes” of Medivh. Nielas was simple enough; he was Medivh's dad and Aegwynn’s former lover. Extremely powerful and the former court wizard for Stormwind. In a world where I wasn’t cucking him, he’d be near the top of the list of mages I could possibly recruit. As it stood? He was only a bit more impressive than one of Doan’s students due to having actual battlefield experience, and could really afford to brush up on his skills. Of course, I also had no intention of keeping him as a man; I’d grown fond enough of Aegwynn that I didn’t particularly want anyone else she was romantically interested in around her. As such, I tidily wiped the incoherent ghost from existence, leaving behind the powerful but non-threatening Nia instead. She could be friends with Aegwynn, even her lover, but I think I’ve established that what jealousy I have is completely mollified when everyone involved is a hot woman that would fuck me on command.
The Echoes of Medivh weren’t really ghosts, exactly. Nor were they Medivh, exactly. They were extremely narrow minded simulacra of Medivh, each obsessively focused on one or another aspect of his life. One was brooding in some corner about how much it sucked to be possessed by a demon lord from birth, while another trapped people in the game room until they could beat him at wizard chess. They were powerful, almost as powerful as Nielas, but they didn’t have any particular desire to use that power outside of their special interest. At least by default; mind runes can fix all sorts of deficits. I took inspiration from their one note personalities and a one off joke from Hearthstone, and the assault team/musical group of Nia and the Medivas was created.
After that bit of fun, I started in on the notable non-undead members of the staff. There were more undead, but to be perfectly frank I didn’t particularly care about the mighty Attumen the Huntsman, who was a dead guy on a horse. I had other, far more relevant guys on horses to worry about.
The Dark Riders were Medivh’s personal antique road show, a group of merchants cursed to wander the world looking for noteworthy, unique, unidentified, and powerful magic items. The overwhelming majority of what they found was not particularly useful to me at first glance; lots of runes that moderately altered the effects of frostbolt or could be substituted for various spell reagents, for example. I’d need to bring in some blue dragons to do a full inventory, but only a few of the items here had the holy trinity of practical, powerful, and understandable.
The first of these was a huge felsteel scythe known as Ulthalesh, infused with hundreds of thousands of souls collected over millennia. Souls which, incidentally, were also captured since they were in Kharazan. Apparently the scythe historically had an unfortunate tendency to consume the soul of anyone who tried to use it, due to the rebellious nature of the spirits empowering it. Of course, if those spirits were one and all completely bound to my service, then the retinue had nothing to fear anymore. Whoever wielded this weapon would have the full cooperation of all of its former wielders and victims alike.
The commander of my forces in Valhalla had already called dibs on Apocalypse, which he’d brought to Azeroth in the first place. I did in fact read Kathra’Natir’s Christmas list, so I knew that this massive blade was an unparalleled channel for necrotic and shadow magic. It would be powerful in the hands of a death knight, or a theoretical “shadow Paladin,” but since Kathra’Natir had the skills and knowledge necessary to make full use of both its magical and physical virtues he got it, no questions asked. Who else was going to use it? Faerlina?
Up next on the docket was Lofn, the Maiden of Virtue, a titanic watcher whose steadfast dedication to proper conduct allowed her to channel the light. I used a necklace to shift her ideals for feminine behavior from “fairly prudish” to “being a Good Girl” in a far more sexualized manner. I didn’t want her stupid, and I didn’t see any appeal in turning her into a wanton slut, but there is a reason that stepford wives are a kink. I was perfectly happy with a giant woman advocating for the benefits of being a devoted wife. I was even open to creating an order of tradwife paladins, especially since the more conservative ladies of the centaur clans had proven so receptive to training in the ways of the Light.
Unfortunately, it appeared that the nether Dragon I was expecting to find in the observatory wasn’t here. Maybe he only showed up after the Dark Portal opened? It didn’t really matter, I’m up to my eyeballs in powerful dragons. Hell, I’d have an excess of powerful dragons even if I only counted the ones I have slept with. Plus, Arcanogos, AKA Nightbane, was still here.
One of the Elder sons of Malygos(a) and an old friend of Aegwynn, Arcanogos had an unfortunate case of being cursed to burn eternally by Medivh. He was justifiably unhappy with the situation, but far more lucid than he had been before capture. Of course, per recent company policy blue dragons were a monogender race, so that “he” needed to be amended right quick.
As it turns out, the universal pinup rule was without exceptions. Female undead dragons, including ones that were literally on fire, were transformed into giant scaly women with perfect 10 faces and figures. She had her wings, she even continued to prefer walking on all fours and looked quite awkward if she tried to stand up on her relatively stubby hindlegs, but she had the illusion of being a sexy woman crawling around on all fours despite that. She was powerful, she’d be useful, and she was going straight to the Nexus to catch up. I couldn’t figure out how to put out that fire, so out of mercy I gave her the pain reversal collar. A constant state of arousal is way better than eternal pain, right? Right?
That left the constructs, the mana wraiths, and the demons. The constructs were easy: they were literally just magic powered robots manning the tower. I could turn them into meatbags if I wanted, and could probably even make cyborgs with hybrid runes, but as individuals they didn’t bring much to the table except the possibility of robot maids. Which I took, turning them into small Titan watchers without altering their personalities at all. I mean, I didn’t do it personally, but I had an intern take care of it. Making the Curator of the menagerie look exactly like 2B from Neir: Automata was completely necessary, for reasons.
The mana wraiths were even worse, having personalities that amounted to “me hungry, want more mana,” so I had a team put together to turn them into high elves and send them to Anveena to feed their unearthly desire for mana. It was lucky that soul talent came with the clause about feeding vampires and the like; even if I managed to send enough people to drain mana from Anveena that it would have normally hurt her, she’d be fine.
There weren’t actually all that many demons, surprisingly. A satyr was slowly summoning imps into the library, but they were not considered welcome by the rest of the tower’s occupants. The real heavyweight present was Prince Malchezaar, a powerful and high ranking Man’ari Eredar within the Burning Legion. He was highly influential and answered directly to Kil'Jaeden, the right hand man of Sargeras, but his current assignment made it a little bit awkward to leverage that.
He was supposed to use the twisted space and weakened grasp of reality found within Karazhan to make an entry point for the Burning Legion, a beachhead that millions of demons could flood through to conquer all of Azeroth. It was a plausible thing he believed he could manage with enough trial and error, but it certainly wouldn’t be easy and he’d been at it for decades. I didn’t particularly want the Burning Legion on my doorstep, but if he returned Kil’Jaeden with a necklace in tow there wasn’t much chance that he’d be welcomed with open arms. The Legion didn’t have enough powerful Eredar Warlocks to start wasting them, but they wouldn’t let casual failure and cowardice go unpunished. He was pretty much stuck here until he could make a proper portal unless he wanted to be substantially demoted and given some demeaning task like being summoned to assist mortal warlocks.
I sat back with a satisfied expression. Karazhan wasn’t quite the prize it would have been a month or two ago, but I was still very happy with the results of Aegwynn’s upgrade. I would be transferring quite a few of my spellcasters here to set up shop and go through the library, and the magic items were currently being distributed to various retinue members registered with the Horde. We were so damn close to the fourth sub-mission; with the upgrades to Naxx getting installed tomorrow, we might have Xal’atath very soon.
“Sir.” My amulet buzzed to life, letting me hear Aelthalyste. “There’s a problem. A communication directed at the Halls of Origination indicates there may be an old god containment breach imminent.”
I leaned back with a sigh. “No rest for the wicked I guess.”