At that moment the theater-sized screen that the entire feasting hall was staring at so intently suddenly crackled to life, revealing dozens of chillingly familiar figures gathered together in what looked more like a sterile concrete bunker than the grandiose chambers filled with all the trappings of wealth and power that Eric would have expected of the assembled powers of the united North American Counsel. Not that they weren’t dressed for corporate or legal battle, wearing a collage of business power suits and judge’s robes. Most of those Administrator classers that Eric understood to represent all of North America additionally wore the jaded countenances so common to politicians and nobility throughout the ages.

  Hroka, for his part, gave a relieved smile that all was as it should be at his end, clearly pleased with the empress’s nod. Or perhaps Eric should think of her as Lady Evelyn once more, now radiating the same innocent enthusiasm as the personal assistant to the Major that she had first appeared to be.

  The Inquisitor cleared his throat. “Lord and Ladies of the North American Counsel. Greetings. I am Major Hroka, Inquisitorial overseer for this regions of imperial space. As you all are no doubt aware, a formal request was made to investigate the possibility of a formal continental surrender to the empire, conceding rights to all unclaimed territories south of the Panama Canal, in return for protectorate status granted to all settled territorial claims.”

  He exchanged a quick glance with his coolly smiling assistant. “Regretfully, protectorate status cannot be granted for any of your territories at this time. Your world is still at the very beginning of its ascension. Once the majority of all territory has been claimed and cleansed upon all major continents and your world has been rendered completely stable, then you may formally join the empire, with all restrictions removed.”

  He paused a moment, before clearing his throat and continuing. “As to the other requests made, including the matters of Lord Song and Lord Augustus’s untimely deaths and to ascertain the propriety and necessity of Silvers being permitted unrestricted immigration across Terra’s terrestrial borders… it is these topics that we will now address.”

  He furrowed his brow, taking a quick final look around the grand hall for a reason that soon became apparent. “Regrettably, all personal emissaries or envoys representing the interests of the Terran Counsel have failed to fulfill their obligations of arranging a private meeting with myself and my cohorts. So I fear a more… informal approach will have to be taken.”

  This earned looks of alarm, surprise, and disapproval from the gathered assembly of Administrators peering down at Major Hroka, the chamber filling with their murmurs before those whispers became furious hisses when startled eyes locked onto none other than Eric’s form.

  “You were supposed to meet with our envoy, one Merc Smith. He was given System permission to cross all borders without restriction in order to present our case before you. I believe he was well known to at least one of your agents?” Declared a cool-eyed man with Salt and pepper hair and grey eyes who blanched in surprise when he caught sight of a grinning Eric.

  Eric’s eyes widened in sudden recognition. “Stetson, right? I remember that smug, corpo face! You were one of the assholes trying to arrange for my execution back in Freetown.” He flashed the man a shit-eating grin. “How’s it going, fuckwad?”

  The Administrators around Stetson scowled and huffed their displeasure while Arcadia’s Sylvan court snickered and laughed at the man’s expense.

  Stetson’s surprise quickly turned to outrage. “You!”

  Eric and Bunbun exchanged a look.

  Bunbun nodded. “Yup. You’re definitely you, Fearless Leader.”

  “You’re why we had to convene this meeting in the first place, you wretched anomaly!” Stetson roared, before his lips curved into a cold grin. “And I see you’re already in Inquisitorial custody. Things are finally coming to a head.”

  Eric flashed a cool smile of is own. “You’re right. They are.”

  ***

  “Play the recording, Caliban Caerulus,” Lady Evelyn instructed.

  Caliban dipped his head, suppressing his fluttering nerves so that absolutely no sign of his true mental state was revealed when he calmly inserted the stick drive Nikita had hoped the Inquisitor’s would take… yet it seemed that Evelyn had been two steps ahead of them all, Caliban gritting his teeth when the screen opposite the glaring counsel flared to life and he was immediately carried back into the nightmare past where he had first witnessed the recording of the scene playing out before him, to the accompaniment of the stink of burning flesh and the shrieks of a piteous bleached goblin kept in a liquid vat of torment, forced to pull forth memory’s past from the world’s dreams until death itself claimed its pitiable soul.

  It had been a hideous way to go. Yet the images revealed had been of such crystalline clarity that they were captured perfectly by the recording device that would have resulted in the removal of Caliban’s head, had a certain pair of vile Inquisitors, taking such twisted satisfaction in arranging for Eric’s fall right in front of their terrified captive witnesses, realized that their Blue Corp patsies hadn’t been quite as cowed and intimidated as Adolf and Nazen had thought.

  Not surprisingly, the goblins piteous shrieks and the Inquisitor’s cold smirks and plotting had been scrubbed entirely from the recording in the brief handful of seconds that Lady Evelyn had held it.

  In truth, Caliban would have been surprised if she had left proof of anything that would cause the loss of professional face to slip past her notice. Especially after Eric had handled everything so very, very thoroughly. Taking care of the corrupt Inquisitor problem ‘in house,’ so to speak.

  Yet still, even knowing how surprisingly well things had ended, a happy ending that Caliban knew damn well he had absolutely no right to expect… still, it chilled him to see his beloved Blue Palace in its original state.

  A magnificent bastion of soaring grandeur secured within the most exquisitely reinforced aluminum and topaz alloy that wasn’t just a strikingly beautiful Swiss Blue hue, but was stronger than steel, tungsten carbide, or any other industrial alloy known on this world, pre-apocalypse.

  He forced himself to look with reddened eyes as the nightmare scene replayed itself once more. He was surprised to find himself flinching just as badly as the Administrators witnessing the horror for the first time when an entire building’s worth of windows instantly shattered as the Blue Palace abruptly warped and bulged, as if dozens of explosives had been unleashed simultaneously from within the building itself.

  Countless wall panels erupted with a silent roar as the near indestructible framework of the once magnificent structure abruptly ballooned out before a shocking degree of pressure. Just a nanosecond later, the entire support structure of Alutopaz columns and crossbeams sturdy enough to be used for starship design were shredded as effortlessly as blasters tearing through spun sugar.

  In that instant, his beautiful building was doomed beyond repair.

  The prize jewel of Freetown proceeded to collapse.

  The horrified faces of dozens of citizens who had been innocently going about their lives in the top floors were painfully visible through the broken window panes as the entire structure began to crumple in on itself. It surprised Caliban that a fair number of the coolly observing counsel members actually flinched and turned away

  And then, a just a fraction of a second later, there was the blinding flash of light erupting from the 67th floor, a microsecond before a streak of shadow tore right through one of the windows like a missile in reverse.

  The recording juttered to a pause.

  Evelyn stared at the Administrators peering down at them from the massive projection with a cool, professional smile.

  “And here we witness the destruction of the beating heart of Freetown’s magnificence and glory.” She gave a sad shake of her head. “The loss of the original Blue Tower is a true shame. Yet if there is one silver lining, within those ruins lies the desperately searched-for secrets as to what precisely happened to Aurelius Imperius Augustus and Sapphira III.”

  She flashed them all a positively breathtaking smile.

  “I don’t suppose any of North America’s goblin-appointed administrative council would care to prognosticate as to the outcome of our investigation?”

  The nonplussed Administrators murmured for only a handful of moments before uniformly shaking their heads.

  “Probably for the best. Well then. Let’s see for ourselves, shall we?”

  A transfixed Caliban found himself pulled back into the moment, one with the conference room that he had made extensive use of, once upon a time.

  A room now occupied by figures that had any number of the onlookers furrowing their brows with confusion, though he did note that Stetson and the handful of fellow Administrators drafted from their New York roots flinched visibly when they caught sight of a handful of familiar thuggish faces amongst the grim looking crew.

  Stony the ogre, Flint the gnoll, along with his brother. A pair of orc Shamans and multiple goblin Assassins who had absolutely no right to be within Freetown, under any pretext.

  Then the increasingly irate whispers of the counsel froze when the theater-like depiction panned in a way that the original never had.

  Pulling everyone’s eye to the sight of multiple artificers channeling their potency into a containment system just barely keeping stable the crackling orb glowing such a fiery pink hue in the center of the chamber that could only be a Hyperion starship core.

  Just a few feet before that nightmare core was a shimmering world-gate. And peering through that gate with an unmistakable hate-filled sneer, was none other than the cold, pitiless features of Lord Augustine himself, seated upon a throne of jade and gold.

  “Everything is in place?”

  The man’s words seemed to vibrate through the air.

  “It is, Lord Augustine,” Stony declared.

  Augustine nodded. “Good. Then you have made sufficient amends to reclaim your lives. You will now all be permitted to take the portal, along with your associates. Each of you will be granted ten million credits and free passage out of this sector.”

  The would=be genocidal maniac then flashed a bleak smile.

  “And with the destabilization and loss of this ascending CESSPIT! Blue Faction will realize that there is a price to be paid… all of your foolish factions will realize that there is a price to be paid by any and all who would dare harbor a man guilty of murdering my son!”

  Caliban had time to see the man’s sneer turn to outrage at the sound of a crash from what might have been a shattered window pane before the force screen turned a blinding shade of white.

  Then there was utter silence.

  The entire North American Counsel, along with Elonia’s exceedingly well-mannered elven court, all gazed at the final scene in breathless silence.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  “And now we know the fate of one Aurelius Imperius Augustus and his crown jewel, Sapphira III.” Lady Evelyn’s hard smile didn’t reach her eyes as she took in the screen full of disbelieving eyes and dismayed countenances. “It fell. Not to the actions of any Terran faction or Contender...but due to the man’s own gross incompetence.” She glared at the crowd. “The sector lord that so many of you were so eager to ingratiate yourselves to, died by his own stupidity, in the middle of arranging for all of your deaths.”

  She turned to a stunned-looking Hroka. “Would you not agree, Major Hroka?”

  The man suppressed a shudder as he rapidly nodded his head. “Absolutely… Lady Evelyn. Your summary is entirely correct. Aurelius Augustus died by his own folly, his people killed by his own hand. All while attempting to destroy a protected world in the midst of its ascension, for no reason save simple petty spite.”

  Evelyn’s eyes flashed with dangerous heat. “And the punishment for such a heinous deed?”

  Hroka blinked, swallowed, and seemed to have to struggle to force himself to speak.

  But speak he did, his voice powerful and loud. “The immediate disbanding of the Augustus line. All privileges of wealth and nobility are hereby revoked. All wealth and assets are forfeited, and all those cursed with the blood of that tainted line flowing through their veins must present themselves for purging.” He swallowed. “Immediately.”

  Caliban winced internally, though he kept his features a perfect mask of neutral deference.

  Yet as much as a tiny part of him mourned the horrific fate of any children born into that clan, who had just been relegated from esteemed and beloved imperial elites to cast-off filth doomed to live in impoverished despair being given a forced lobotomies and made to live the most degrading and miserable of lives… did he not recall his business partner once letting slip that the entire Augustine line had burned away in hellfire on that one particularly awful day.

  There was no one left to bear the brunt of a political move that would strike fear into countless self-serving lickboots and connivers… so strike fear Lady Evelyn did.

  ***

  “It’s purging time!” Bunbun said with a happy little hop on her master’s shoulder.

  Eric’s eyes twinkled with happy mirth, savoring a fierce sense of vindication.

  After all the connivances of Nazem and Adolf, so eager to pin so many horrific crimes upon Eric’s lapels, to now have Evelyn Death herself, his personal mentor, so casually see what so many people ha tried so desperately to hide, that Aurelius was a psychopathic manipulator who died to his own stupidity, was shockingly refreshing.

  Even if they had left out the part where a giant sand wyrm snapped up the core right before touching the barrier between worlds and porting what was then its violently glowing self on top of a suddenly panicked and shrieking Lord Augustus.

  A fitting end for the fucking bastard, even if Eric did mourn the citizens just living their lives in their planetary capital. Yet the only other alternative would have entailed the absolute destruction of Freetown and Arcadia and perhaps his home in its entirety, due to the unstable nature of a rapidly ascending Earth.

  Eric pressed his lips together in a tight frown, demanding that his chest ease its desperate pounding.

  He took a deep breath, ignoring the increasingly panicked accusations and declarations of the Counsel squabbling on the monitor above him.

  The were safe.

  The had made it.

  That was all that mattered.

  One of the Administrators wearing a glossy teal dress, looking more like a fashion model than a conniving old hag, cleared her throat. “As grateful as we are not to be suffering under the folly of madmen who wish to strike at our world and senselessly slaughter innocents…” She coolly declared while glaring daggers right at Eric, “There is still the matter of Lord Song, with whom we had extensive contractual arrangements regarding the disposition of New York which the present trespassers have refused to honor.”

  Eric blinked at the sheer outrageousness of the woman’s gaslighting.

  Elonia’s nostrils flared at the smirking Administrator, now looking right at her.

  Eric felt a cold chill of apprehension. “Best not to acknowledge filth at all, sis,” he loudly declared. “Clearly, she’s a conniving rat using her bullshit class skills to throw you off balance or make some offhand concession that gives them the board in ways we can’t even fathom, since we’re not scheming Administrators.”

  Elonia’s eyes widened, an angry retort freezing on the tip of her tongue.

  The woman turned to glare right at Eric, eyes radiating pure fury. “How dare you! We are owed that land, interloper! By agreement and accord, all territory save for the city itself is to be under our rule, our administration! With full rights to—”

  “Nothing at all,” Evelyn said with a saccharin-sweet smile. “Lest you forget, the accord you reached binds only the party who made it. And as was made abundantly clear to both Major Hroka and I, Lord Song, Mord, and numerous other faction leaders are now dead. Defeated by Right of Conquest, which takes absolute precedence over all else.”

  The glaring councilmembers immediately broke into heated arguments, more than a few staring daggers Eric’s way.

  He smirked right back and gave them all the finger.

  “You vile abomination!” Hissed none other than a furious-lookng Administrator Vidrig, his blotched features and bloodshot eyes for some reason only catching Eric’s notice at that moment. Which was actually quite strange, since he had been even more fanatic in his desire to see Eric pay the ultimate price than Stetson who had always struck Eric as more a coldly practical businessman than a vindictive psychopath.

  Yet now that particular psychopath was glaring daggers Eric’s way, though perhaps he hadn’t expect Eric’s Perception to be so acute that he had so clearly heard the man cursing him under his breath.

  Vidrig’s features did take on a certain waxy pallor when Eric caught his gaze, flicked his finger across his throat, and winked.

  Bunbun chortled. “Should I hold up a clock and tell all those bitches that their time’s almost up?”

  Eric’s grin widened. “Fuck yeah. A big necromantic clock. We’ll have a bone spike for each hour, and stick the skulls of those sell-out fuckheads after every kill.”

  “Love it, Fearless Leader! Though we might need some extra spikes. Because I see no less than thirty councilmembers glaring at us right now who were gunning so hard for your death, just weeks ago!”

  Eric’s eyes widened. He ignored the horrified gasps and outraged shouts coming from the Administrators who had clearly heard every word, his cheekily smiling bunny now holding the entirety of his attention.

  “Wait, are you serious? I’ve gone from Bronze Equivalent to Rank 30 Silver in just a matter of weeks?!?”

  Bunbun cheerfully nodded. “Yup! But to be fair, it’s been a really hairy handful of weeks. It only feels like years of constant struggle because we’ve been saturated with the power and potency of so many delicious kills!”

  Eric shivered, shaking his head with a sense of wonder and heady joy, the desperate shouts and cries of the now panicked looking counsel… the excited cheers of the Sylvan assembly, Elonia’s people—his people—gazing at him with cheerful smiles and raised fists, as if watching their favorite actor put the smackdown on the villains in a campy thriller.

  Eric happily winked right back at them, savoring loyal fans and furious-looking foes as one truly sweet boon and compliment to the delicious thrum of power now coursing through his veins to push away all the silent screams he kept buried DEEP inside. And what a blessing it was that he needed sleep so rarely.

  Because who the fuck needed to worry about bullshit trauma, when they could punch through tanks with their fists, or shred tungsten vaults with their bare hands?

  “Certainly not you, Fearless Leader!” Bunbun quipped, reading his thoughts perfectly. “Now, I don’t know about you, but I think it’s time we made a clean sweep!”

  His beloved familiar then turned, locking eyes with a horrified-looking Vidrig who had clearly heard every word. “Starting with that asswipe.”

  Eric coldly nodded, smile stretching impossibly wide, even as he sensed the sheer malicious intent radiating from the man. Sensing as well the perilous threat he held.

  A trap, just waiting to be sprung.

  Goading the man.

  Bunbun stiffened, her paw touching his temple. “Eric, be careful! There’s something wrong… a twist we haven’t accounted for!”

  Eric smirked, nodding in silent agreement. “Of course there is. How the fuck could it be otherwise?”

  Vidrig’s eyes blazed with furious hate.

  Eric’s glare was one of cold contempt. “Congratulations, motherfucker. You get to be the first head I plop on my future bone clock!”

  “Eric!”

  “I know. And we both know what those fuckers are really after.”

  The man snarled, his dismay turning to a look of fierce vindication as the trap was sprung.

  Yet Eric couldn’t help but chuckle coldly, even as he tasted doom crashing down upon him.

  For he was the foil with an army at his command.

  Far better he be the one to bear the bite of his sire’s final poison thorn than to let it prick his sister.

  Vidrig’s gaze shifted slightly to address the Inquisitors, a sickly smile on his features like a man going to his own execution. “Tell me, just and honorable Inquisitors. Is it true that the use of higher order attacks on an ascending world is punishable by death, and that we are well within our means to use any and every means at our disposal to purge such threats from our planet?”

  Eric stiffened, not having expected such questions from the now coldly smirking man who’s glare promised Eric a miserable death. Vidrig’s jaded eyes were those of a man who clearly knew the nuances of a game rigged so badly against the common survivor. Information that ultimately hadn’t been denied humanity. Only those who weren’t already in the goblins’ pockets.

  “Such was the determination of the Terran Counsel at the behest of their former masters,” Eve pitilessly conceded.

  “Arcadia’s very existence is blasphemy! Home to millions of spirits aping life. Such abominations must be purged!” Hissed a certain blue-robed judge who had been so eager for Eric’s death, back in Freetown.

  The words sent chills down Eric’s spine, eyes widening at the hideously smug smile as Vidrig dipped his head. “I quite agree,” he said, revealing a prize that had Eric’ instincts screaming.

  A briefcase, of all things, even as the surprisingly sparse concrete bunker-like chamber that the entire North American Counsel had, for some reason, chosen as their domicile began to flare with flashing red lights.

  And that’s when Eric finally understood the horror about to unfold.

  Vidrig’s eyes flashed with bitter spite, pulling free a gold-rimmed card beside his steel briefcase radiating such a hideous weight.

  A weight that made a shocked Eric crash, knees first, to the marble tiles lining Elonia’s grand hall.

  “Eric!” Bunbun cried in shock and horror when Eric’s utterly invulnerable body sprayed blood from a dozen spurting wounds over the horrified crowd as he was slammed to the ground.

  Eric choked back a scream as unseen chains of steel and blood wrapped about his bones, pinning him where he lay in stunned disbelief as a White-Tier foe he knew damn well he could destroy with a flick of his finger sneered down at him with a horrid knowing.

  “Your tale ends here, foul wretch. You and your cursed sister both!” Vidrig roared.

  “An end to all of your twisted abominations!” Screamed the blue robed bitch beside him as well as the administrators behind them roared and jeered, eyes flashing with bitter hate. “For what you did to my family, for turning my own grandchildren against me, we’ll see you and all your kind burn in hellfire!”

  Administrator Vidrig’s lips curled in a feral grin as Eric felt the death’s arrow aim straight for his now pinned heart. The former business tycoon then coolly snapped open the steel briefcase that Eric knew damn well held a far more nefarious purpose as the brutalist concrete bunker and the blinking red lights finally made sense.

  And Elonia understood as well.

  “You fuckers are in the fucking NORAD bunker!” The horror in her voice was undeniable.

  “It’s good you understand that, you Hollywood harlot! You and your brother thought you could cross us with impunity? Well think again!” Vidrig snarled, once perfectly groomed salt and pepper hair now as wild looking as the tattered pinstripe suite he still wore, the dozens of Terran-born administrators doing absolutely nothing to stop him, some even roaring their approval when Vidrig dared to initiate that from which there could be no second chances. No forgiveness.

  Eric could only gaze on with horror, dizzy with agony and a spike of such hideous dread as his nemesis revealed the true purpose of that briefcase, finger pressing down on an unseen button that could only have one function as Eric quite holding back, infusing Burst of Strength with the essences of Wrath and Dominion, Essence infused Strength blasting well over 6000 as he unleashed power sufficient to tear through any imperial dreadnought.

  Eric’s roar tore through the hall, a sonic shockwave that would have shattered the bones of mortals, had his sister’s palatial hall not been so infused with the epic tale of their own peril and their desperate queen’s love.

  “Eric!”

  Yet even his sister’s panicked cry was drowned out by the awful messages twisting in Eric’s soul.

  6567 Strength infused with 7 Essence ranks FAILS to severe the CHAINS THAT BIND!

  Half-Step Gold’s death curse assures that your sire won’t be the only one to pay for his crimes!

  Eric’s ears rang with bitter, malevolent worlds that filled him with furious hate.

  “What’s yours is mine ALWAYS, vile get!”

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  1. Let your prospective neighbors know the importance of boundaries. – And if your new neighbors happen to be power-armored mercenaries eager to do renovations on your home, make them an offer they can’t refuse. – Like being raised from the dead to serve in your eternal army!

  2. Neighborhood Watch is mandatory. – And nothing says neighborhood watch like a 500-strong pack of enchanted velociraptors that will eat absolutely anything and anyone to clear out the riffraff!

  3. Don’t be afraid to do your part to renovate your neighborhood. – Or renovate that annoying goblin barrister with a perforated brain-case!

  4. If all else fails, and your neighbors refuse to do their part for the community… CONSIGN THEM TO OBLIVION and REFORGE the ENTIRE STATE into a mystical faerie realm filled with MILLIONS of reborn elves EAGER to do their part, including proper home maintenance and paying their taxes!

  Eric had to admit that playing the role of an avenging angel by his mother’s side had been a hell of a lot more fun than the last movie he had starred in.

  , and it meant coming back to Earth as a shivering half-naked survivor surrounded by desperate refugees and his interface screaming with alarms, warnings, and cries for help from all the factions he actually cared about.

  Eric, on the other hand, was armed with indestructible blue jeans, a sword, and a bitter fury that grew all the hotter, the more his foes threatened the world he loved.

  A reckoning was coming, and before it was through, Eric would be wading in rivers of blood.

  Before embracing the darkest of arts, and forcing his fallen foes to serve him for all time!