Dark Born
Copyright© 2025 by Es_Orik
Chapter 26: Quests & New Problems
Science Fantasy Sex Story: Chapter 26: Quests & New Problems - A young man is transported to a new world as the Dark Lord, witness his rise from an ordinary college student to a being capable of causing the greatest evil.
Caution: This Science Fantasy Sex Story contains strong sexual content, including Ma/Fa Fa/Fa Mult Teenagers Consensual Romantic Lesbian Heterosexual Fiction High Fantasy Restart Magic Sharing Harem Cream Pie
-Chapter 25 concluded the first arc, and I hope you all enjoyed it. I initially planned 5 arcs for BOOK 1, but I’ll be keeping it around 3 not to inflate the story too much.
The first arc is called the ‘The Kingdom Conspiracy Arc’, and it was designed to introduce Adam as a character, set up the world around him, and the relationships he builds. He doesn’t yet have a clear end goal besides going home, but that will change in the later arcs, because that’s not a goal for a Dark Lord.
The arc leaves a lot of mysteries unsolved, like what the church plans, what the Queen’s goals are, what the appearance of the demon-kin means personally for Adam, and most importantly, what the entity, Zelphyr, wants. Future arcs should answer a lot of those questions, and by the end of book 1, he’ll become a full-fledged Dark Lord.
Also remember, this world is vast. They’re twelve kingdoms on the continent, and he’s currently in one of them; Astoria. There’s still a wide world to explore, more people to meet, dangerous enemies to gain, and monsters to face. Keep in mind; Elsa, a Gold-Rank knight, would only be a second tier adventurer, meaning there are first tier and s-tier adventurers lurking about somewhere. There’s also the Tower of Heaven, which he has yet to climb.
There’s a whole lot to explore, and all I can say is that it’s going to be very exciting.
The next arc is called the ‘The Kingdom Tournament Arc.’ Certain elements I deliberately left out of the first arc to fully immerse you in the conspiracy will now be introduced, including actual adventuring and collecting artifacts. The tournament arc will also contain more battles and sex, but in a way that doesn’t detract from the overall story.
I planned to take a small writing break here, but considering the fact that I’ve already kept you waiting for months, I’m just going to jump right into it.
So, here’s the start of Arc 2, hope you all enjoy it...
Adam walked down the street, staring down at the job request in his hand. He had read it when he snatched it from the board, and he continued to read it even now, still amused by it. The request was to find a missing cat, and there was a crude sketch of the creature on the paper. It amused Adam even more than the courier runs and the herb-gathering errands he had done; those were the kind of quests available for lower tier adventurers, and the Adventurer’s Guild still believed him to be one. Instead of getting frustrated or annoyed by something he couldn’t change, Adam found the whole thing a bit amusing. He just had to suck it up for a while until he had done enough in their eyes to advance from the ninth tier, and the last two weeks had been for just that.
In those two weeks, there had been no new problems from the secret group that seemed to run a lot of things in the kingdom, and also no further encounter with Zelphyr. Whether the primordial was unable to make contact again because of the ancient law that repelled him from this world, or simply because there was nothing left to say, Adam didn’t know, but it had been total silence for the past two weeks. All he had was the revelations the primordial had left behind still echoing in his thoughts; the truth of his appearance in this world, his resurrection, his purpose as a vessel for the entity.
There was nothing Adam could do to change any of that, so he’d decided to focus only on the things he could control. Zelphyr wanted him to grow stronger. Why? Adam didn’t know for sure, but that had always been his intention anyway. Nothing about that had changed. And learning that Earth wasn’t truly his world—while it had caused some distress at first—had fully settled in now, and it didn’t change much of anything either, not really. His sister was there, even if he couldn’t return for whatever reason, he still wanted to see her again, to talk to her. And the only path that might make that possible was to raise his tier high enough to climb the Tower of Heaven. So, the past two weeks had been all about adventuring, training ... then more adventuring.
Aside from trying to raise his tier, it also helped him earn. The pay from low-tier jobs was meager, but it was something. It had helped acquire better gear for adventuring, he still needed a bit more, but he was unwilling to ask for a handout. He also still intended to rebuild the inn, so he needed to earn money as quickly as he could.
Adam folded the paper quickly, then tucked it into the inner pocket of the long dark coat he wore. The garment was light, but strips of chain had been sewn into the lining at vital spots. It wouldn’t stop a clean, committed strike, but it would protect him from the shallow cuts that came with near misses and quick evasions. Adam had decided against traditional armor. It was uncomfortable to wear, stiffened his movement, clinked too loudly, and most importantly, it was too fucking expensive. He hadn’t realized just how expensive proper armor was until he’d started pricing it. Whew...
His hands fell away from his pocket and he drew in a breath, then turned off the main street toward a narrower lane, the air beginning to grow damp as the scent of refuse and stagnant water crept in. Adam knew his way around the city now, and he’d seen a map beforehand, so he knew where this led. He followed without hesitation.
He reached the end of the alley, and there, set into a low arch of brick, thick iron bars sealed the sewer’s mouth. The sewers, it was where the cat had last been seen. Of all fucking places. He stopped before it, clenching his jaw in preparation for the stench that was probably about to attack him, then he pulled one of the bars to open the gate.
Without further delay, he stepped past the threshold.
Instantly, the noise of the street faded, replaced by the sound of dripping water somewhere in the far distance. The tunnel stretched ahead, with almost no light filtering into the space. Adam stood still for a long moment, letting his eyes adjust to the dimness, then he started moving forward. A thin current of water ran along the center of the sewer channel, carrying things he didn’t even want to imagine, and choking the air with a foul stench. But it didn’t stop him. His jaw just tightened hard, and he pushed on.
The darkness deepened the farther he went in, every footstep echoing softly as it slapped against the stone. The brick walls around were slick with moisture, and he could still hear water dripping in uneven intervals from somewhere above, each drop striking stone with a sharp tick ... tick ... tick. It almost felt as though he was in a horror movie, especially with how confined the space was, but his nerves were steady and calm.
“Where the hell are you?” Adam muttered under his breath.
The request had said the cat was last seen chasing something near the sewer. He had expected claw marks, fur, something obvious. Instead, there was nothing but damp stone and a vile smell. He crouched briefly, searching the ground. There were no tracks, no prints. No sign that anything small had passed through here recently, except maybe for rats; he found their dropping, and they must’ve been the size of small dogs.
Adam straightened up slowly, and that was when he heard it, a strange sound. At first, he thought it was just the wind funneling through tunnels. A low hum, distant and distorted. But then it shifted, rising and falling in cadence. He realized then that it wasn’t the wind, it was voices, many of them, singing ... or rather, humming.
He went still for a brief moment, listening. The sound wasn’t coming from ahead along the main tunnel, it echoed from somewhere off to the right, down a narrower side passage half-hidden behind a sagging support arch. He hesitated for only a second.
Curiosity had always been one of his flaws...
Adam moved slowly toward the side passage, slowing his breathing. The sound grew louder as he approached, the air strangely warmer down this corridor. A faint light flickered against the wall ahead, and his curiosity deepened even more. What the hell was happening there? Adam edged closer, then slowed to a near stop as the passage opened into a wider chamber. Swiftly, he pressed himself against the wall and leaned just enough to peer around the curve, careful not to make any sound.
The chamber was circular, and the ceiling rose higher here, higher than the sewer tunnels. He saw dozens of candles burning in clusters around a crude symbol painted in dark red across the floor, and around the symbol stood figures, a lot of them. They wore deep red cloaks, heavy fabric that reached down to their feet, with hoods that concealed their faces completely and cast their features in shadows. Some held small iron lanterns that gave off the same dim glow Adam had noticed from the corridor, while others had their hands raised toward the center of the symbol, humming the strange sound.
It was a fucking cult...
Adam had wondered if there were people in the kingdom who didn’t follow the church’s doctrine or worship the Divine, but he’d been thinking along the lines of atheist or agnostics, like on Earth, not this, he hadn’t expected a fucking cult to exist. A part of him wanted to know about their beliefs, what the symbols meant, and what they planned to achieve from this ... ritual? He wanted to know everything. He’d never encountered something like this before, not even on Earth. He was utterly intrigued.
He counted quickly. There were about fifteen of them in the chamber. Then, at the center of the symbol, he noticed something, something small. He narrowed his eyes, seeing the white fur first, then the tail. It was the cat ... of course it was here. The small creature was tied down to the ground with rope, distressed, but still alive.
Adam let out a deep sigh, his intrigue taking a back seat as more serious thoughts settled. He continued watching the cult, considering his options. Leaving wasn’t one of them, partly because abandoning the job would slow his climb through the tiers, and he couldn’t afford delays. The other reason was a lot simpler, he didn’t want to see the cat carved up on the painted floor. It wasn’t compassion, not really. He didn’t think he had a capacity for that anymore. He just didn’t want to see the creature slaughtered.
He thought about shadow-warping straight to the center of the chamber, grabbing the cat, and vanishing before the cultists even understood what had happened. But he’d never warped while carrying another living being. He didn’t know what the strain would do to him, or to the animal. The last thing he needed was to materialize with himself and the cat grotesquely fused together because he had misjudged the risk.
That left only the straightforward approach. Fifteen people, close quarters, and limited visibility. He didn’t know their capabilities, or if any of them had magic, but the environment worked in his favor at least. There was plenty of shadows around.
Adam exhaled, then rolled his shoulder. So much for a simple missing-cat errand, but he couldn’t be too annoyed, if anything, there was a slight excitement in his chest.
It was an opportunity to know how much stronger he’d gotten...
Adam stepped away from the wall, standing in the entrance with hands folded behind his back, then cleared his throat loudly to announce his presence. Immediately, the humming ceased and they all turned in his direction. Even without seeing their faces, their shock was evident. A few of them stumbled back at the sudden appearance of the stranger in their midst, while others let out sharp, startled gasps.
“Intruder!” a male voice shouted loudly.
“Who ... who are you?” another of the cultist demanded after regaining his calm and use of his mouth. The voice was also male, and deep. “You cannot be here.”
Given he seemed more composed, Adam designated the second speaker as their leader and focused his attention on him. He wanted to try talking before anything else.
“Who I am isn’t important,” Adam said, his tone level. “And I’m not here to stop whatever this is.” His gaze flicked briefly down to the bound animal at the center of the symbol before returning to the hooded figure. “I came only for the cat. I’ll take it and leave. You can continue your ... gathering. You may even pretend I was never here.”
At his words, murmurs and the shuffling of boots rippled through the room.
“Were you sent by them?” The man demanded again.
Adam stayed calm. “I wasn’t sent by anyone.”
“You have seen the rite,” another voice said, firmer, no longer filled with fear. It was a figure near the front, and he stepped forward. “You will lead them here.”
Who was the “them” they were referring to? The church? Adam’s eyes narrowed slightly. He could understand if it was them. The church was a powerful force, perhaps even the most powerful in the kingdom. They probably crushed all dissenting messages.
“I’ve seen candles and robes. It’s hardly something worth reporting.”
Silence followed, and Adam watched. He already had a sense how this was going to go after the man had said he would lead them here. No way they would let him leave after that. Unsurprisingly, he heard the sound of steel. The man he’d designated as their leader drew a dagger from under his cloak. It was a curved, ceremonial blade, and all around, others shifted. He noticed now that other cloaks hid similar weapons.
Adam released a deep sigh and his hands dropped to his sides. “I have no desire to harm any of you, but that will change if you make it necessary, and I won’t show any mercy,” he said calmly, not in a threatening manner, just informing them of what lay in their future if they were foolish. “I’ll ask again, allow me to take the cat and leave.”
“You cannot leave,” the dagger-bearer insisted. His voice had steadied.
The bloodthirsty part of Adam was quite happy to hear that...
He didn’t wait for the man to take another step. He darted forward in a flash, like a coiled spring finally released. The dagger-bearer had no time to flinch. Adam closed the distance, catching the man’s wrist before the blade could rise, and with a sharp twist, bones cracked. The dagger slipped from his numb fingers, and Adam seized the weapon midair, driving it deep into the man’s throat with surgical precision. The leader’s mouth opened in a silent cry as blood sprayed, then he dropped to the ground with a soft thud.
For a heartbeat, there was stunned silence, then chaos erupted.
Several of the cultists stumbled backward, tripping over candles and one another as a sudden panic seized them. A few dropped their lanterns, turned, and bolted for the side passages, their red cloaks flapping wildly as they fled into the dark. Others, either braver or more foolish, drew their blades and surged forward with determination.
Adam realized right then that they weren’t fighters. Their stances were wide and awkward, their grips trembling, they were driven by desperation rather than skill. And judging by the fact that none of them were blasting him with a fireball, they likely didn’t have magic either. These were mundane, regular people who probably had families and ran businesses while playing cultist in their spare time. They were no threat to him. But sparing them wasn’t a thought that crossed his mind. It was far too late for that.
Adam met the first two rushing at him without breaking stride. He slipped left to dodge an overhead slash, caught the man by the cloak, and drove him face-first into the brick wall. The sound of skull crashing into stone echoed dully. The second man lunged from the right with both hands on his dagger, stabbing straight for Adam’s ribs. Adam pivoted on his heel, let the blade skate harmlessly along the chain-lined coat, then drove his knee up into the man’s solar plexus. Air exploded from the cultist’s lungs in a wet wheeze, and Adam finished him off with a heavy blow to the side of the jaw that twisted his neck. Both bodies hit the ground within seconds of each other, lifeless.
The remaining cultists who hadn’t fled hesitated, their weapons half-raised. Then one dropped his weapon entirely and scurried away. That set off a chain reaction as the others did as well. Within moments, the chamber was empty. Adam stood in the center, surrounded by fallen bodies and flickering candlelight, scanning for leftover threats.
Then something moved quietly behind him.
The last cultist. He was smaller than the others, his hood fallen back to reveal a very young face. He couldn’t be older than fifteen. He had circled wide during the chaos, clutching his dagger, positioning himself right at Adam’s blind spot. The boy raised the blade high, racing forward, ready to plunge the dagger deep into the back of Adam’s neck. Adam saw it coming, hesitated a brief moment, then he prepared to counter.
But before the strike could land, something strange happened.
The shadows at Adam’s feet surged upward, darkness peeling off the stone floor and condensing into a perfect silhouette of himself—the same height, same build, coat flaring exactly as his did, but every inch of it was pure, depthless black. The clone didn’t speak. It simply turned and caught the boy’s wrist, stopping the attack.
The boy froze, his eyes wide with absolute terror and confusion. He didn’t seem to understand what had just happened, only that his wrist was now locked in the grip of something unnatural, something that looked like Adam ... but wasn’t Adam. Its face had no features, no eyes, no mouth. Just the outline of Adam’s shape, like a dark mannequin, except the edges smoked like dry ice, thin tendrils of blackness curling off it.
The boy’s breathing became shallow and frantic, his wide eyes shifting between the real Adam standing a few steps away and the silent black figure restraining him.
Adam was shocked as well. He blinked once. Well ... that’s new.
He hadn’t consciously summoned anything, he didn’t even know he could. One second he’d been preparing to turn and intercept the strike himself, and the next second his own shadow had moved, rising off the ground and forming into this ... thing. The shadow clone tightened its grip slightly and a strangled sound squeezed out of the boy’s throat, half sob, half scream. The curved dagger trembled in his hand, then slipped from his fingers and clattered against the stone floor.
Adam tilted his head, momentarily forgetting the boy and studying the construct with open curiosity. It wasn’t dissipating. It remained so perfectly still, a dark mirror of himself, and he could feel it, not like a separate mind, but like an extension of his intent, a muscle, or an extra finger, he hadn’t known he possessed until this exact second.
“Interesting,” Adam murmured thoughtfully to himself.
“P ... please,” the boy stammered, panic completely replacing whatever courage had pushed him to attack earlier. “I—I didn’t mean ... Please, mercy.”
Adam raised a hand. “Quiet,” he said softly. The word wasn’t loud, but the boy’s mouth snapped shut as though an invisible hand had suddenly clamped over it.
His gaze didn’t move away once from the clone. How had he summoned it? His thoughts raced back to the moment of the attack, to the dagger that had been meant for the back of his neck. He had been fully prepared to kill the boy. If the dagger had come down, Adam would have evaded and killed him. But the weapon never came down. He, or rather his clone, had stopped it. It didn’t attack or counter, it just stopped the attack. Had he been subconsciously hesitant to kill the boy after seeing how young he was?
Adam released a long, deep breath, then finally focused on the young cultist. The boy was staring at him in fear, almost in tears now. The excitement from the fight had already faded, replaced by mild irritation. Killing people who had chosen to rush at him was one thing. Executing a terrified teenager begging for his life was another.
He stepped closer and the boy flinched as he approached, wanting to shrink back, but the shadow clone still held him firmly in place. Adam crouched slightly and picked the fallen dagger off the floor. The boy’s eyes widened even more.
“Relax,” Adam said in a flat voice.
He flipped the dagger once in his hand, then casually tossed it across the chamber where it skidded across the floor and vanished into the darkness near the wall. The boy stared, confused. Adam then straightened and glanced at the shadow clone.
He breathed deeply, focusing. “Release him.”
Nothing happened at first, then after a moment, the black silhouette released the boy’s wrist. There was no hesitation. The instant the boy was free, he stumbled, nearly tripping over his own feet as he spun around and bolted toward the nearest tunnel. Adam watched him for a while, wondering if he should have threatened him into silence about what he’d witnessed before letting him leave, or at least ask more about the cult. But it was too late for that now, the emergence of this new ability had stolen his focus.
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