Chapter 20

Once the battle had ended in their victory, Axel ordered the worshipers to return to camp and rebuild. If ever another threat came from the dungeon, they should be there ready to face it.

Still, a significant number of worshipers opted to come with him and Rayner to Ridgehill needing a break from the fighting. Ellen and Kata were among those who joined them.

When they got close to Ridgehill, the order of the army camps had gone through a visible change. The camp was structured much the way the one at the dungeon was, organized not by nationality or religion but by function.

The flags and symbols of the three armies were displayed proudly all over the camp. Soldiers from different armies mixed and drank with each other, looking tired but in good spirits.

The gates opened for them as they got close and like when they first arrived at Ridgehill, crowds lined the street. They cheered their names, and he saw Evans’ and Barny’s guardsmen keeping order as their carriage took them to Grace’s brothel.

Axel looked to Rayner as if he had an answer but his friend shrugged, just as confused as him.

They got out of the carriage, tipped the driver handsomely with their recently filled coin pouches and entered the brothel. He and Grace had much to discuss.

But first, another crowd waited for them, a noticeably more pleasing one. The whores of the brothel swarmed them, showering the boys with full-breasted hugs and perfumed kisses. It was almost enough to make him forget his task, but he had more restraint than that.

Politely as he could, Axel and Rayner made their escape into Grace’s office. She sat behind her desk ready to meet them.

“I have a lot of questions Grace,” Axel said, rudeness not quite escaping his tone.

“And I will answer all of them. Please have a seat and a drink.”

“None for him but we will have something to eat,” Rayner said.

Axel didn’t like having his drinking controlled but had enough fighting for a lifetime and so he let it go. “Why is everyone cheering us?”

“You two saved the day, again,” Grace said. Axel waited for more detail. “I told them everything.”

“We work with you to keep our secrets.”

“Actually, the contract says she is to provide us information and keep our business to herself,” Rayner said.

“The difference is?” Axel said.

“Not a difference, a loophole. She can give away information not expressly forbidden by us if it gets her information.”

Axel glared at Grace. “So, you followed the letter of our contract but not the spirit.”

“How did you even know what we were doing?” Rayner said.

“Mari told me.”

Both boys winced but Rayner broke the bad news. “Mari is dead. We’re sorry.”

Grace blinked. “She’s not dead. How else did I get the information? That girl has survived war zones, remember? She escaped the attack and followed you silently.”

“Why didn’t she let us know she was OK?” Axel asked, shocked.

“Her presumed death provided good motivation for you, Axel.”

“That’s messed up.”

The smile on Grace’s face faltered. “Yes, it is.”

“Why should we trust you with the God Rock, with anything? Is this really an equal relationship or are we just your patrons?”

“I wish I could explain everything to your satisfaction but I need the God Rock for that. For now, all I have to say in my defense is that even though you now have reason to distrust me, ask yourselves, have I truly wronged you?”

Grace made sure they met her eyes. “Food, shelter, information, even weapons are provided and though I outed your heroics, I did it to improve your status. Because I assure you, others are going to investigate the events taking place as a matter of course and notice the gaps in the paper-thin stories and covers you’ve created. If I did nothing, you two would have pretended to be nobodies as you were murdered. We are talking about the fate of armies and nations boys! This is serious!”

The boys were taken aback by her passion. While Axel knew some of it was feigned to cover for her lack of answers about them being her patrons and potentially under her thumb, everything else she said checked out.

They were taking their secrecy too far, and they were going to be figured out by interested parties. Too many people knew what they did. The militia, the worshipers of the dungeon camp, and the very brothel whores they lived with.

Nodding to Rayner, Axel took out the God Rock and handed it to Grace who took it reverently. She held it like a baby, forgetting they were there. They took that to mean the meeting was over and left the Madam.

Later in his room, as he slept, he awoke to a sensation of pleasure covering his body like a blanket. Moaning, he got up from his bed.

Nothing seemed amiss. He returned to sleep only for the same sensation to come upon him again, this time surging inside him.

Axel flung the covers off and went to see the staff about the issue. When he opened the door and stepped through it, instead of all hallway, he appeared in another dimly lit room.

Rayner was there as well in his nightclothes. The room looked like a bigger version of his own with the same plush furniture and scented candles along the walls. A dark pink color theme gave the room a dark, girlish feel.

Then a woman appeared on the large bed, lying on it as if she were always and forever doing so. Her nightgown fit her so finely that it brought attention to her motherly hips and breasts.

Shoulders rising and breasts swaying as she did so, she motioned for them to take a place on the bed.

Axel struggled to speak through the sensation growing inside him. “You are a goddess.”

“Thank you,” she said in a voice of powerful bells.

“No, I know what is going on. You are a real goddess. I remember this feeling from the Forest God of the Corpsewood.”

She shrugged a slender shoulder, her gown revealing more skin before the gown righted itself. She then leaned toward him, gown not quite leaving her chest bare. “I hope I don’t feel anything so boorish as a mushroom god.”

“No, it’s only the pressure your mana gives off that is the same.”

“Axel, how is she here?” Rayner said in a low voice, trying to keep what he said between them though the goddess surely heard.

That got his attention. Their titles meant an event like this could not happen. Before with the Forest God, they had willingly entered that mind space or wherever they went to speak to the god. Somehow this goddess had forcibly brought them into her space.

He began to sweat and Rayner’s eyes darted around the room looking for a weapon.

The goddess pouted her dark pink lips at their reaction. “You see a girl like me and reach for your weapons. How sad. I’m not sure why I haven’t been able to influence you two directly but to calm you, I will say that I am still unable to. I appeared here by your consent. Grace says you have questions for me?”

“Grace sent you?” Axel said. Had Grace betrayed them to this goddess?

“So distrustful,” she said, wagging a slender finger. “No, I am only here to explain myself, not to smite you. I don’t smite.” She said it as if the idea disgusted her.

“Can you start by telling us what you are the god of? Unless you are a petty god like the mushroom.”

“I was a petty god, representing many things. The skills I granted my worshipers centered around fertility, labor, and commerce.”

Axel put together the aspects and knew what they all had in common. “You are a goddess for whores.”

She smiled, not taking any insult. “A whore goddess. The connection with the God Rock to put it simply, leveled me up.” She splayed her arms wide so they can take in her body’s soft inviting flesh.

“Why couldn’t Grace tell us this and how can you help Ridgehill? Is this all just a power play?” Rayner said.

“Life is a power play, young man. If you don’t know that then you don’t have enough power.”

“That’s an interesting view of life.”

“And a correct one. Now let me answer your questions. To start, I am the one who gave Fred Copper the quest and directed him to you. When you two first entered the brothel, I knew you were special and hoped you would protect my worshipers. But as I learned more of your strength, I aimed for more. I had Grace set you on the path to the God Rock.”

“Well I feel used,” Axel said.

“Almost like a whore,” the goddess joked, bell voice laughing. “As to how I will save Ridgehill. I can’t. That’s not what I do. I can give pleasure for value and spit out life at the end but not save a town or a country. Thankfully you two did that.”

“Glad this worked out so well for you,” Axel said, growing increasingly frustrated at learning the extent of her manipulations.

“Do we at least get a reward for completing the quest?”

She shifted on the bed so that her thighs bared. The nightgown that used to extend to her ankles had shortened.

Rayner blushed, and she laughed her bell-like laugh. “No, I think you want more than that. You two had a plan to create a god, yes?”

“Yes, yes we do,” Rayner said.

“Then have your reward.” Then the goddess left and the miasma ball rested on the bed in her place.

They stared at if for minutes. Then they poked and prodded at it not knowing what else to do.

Then Axel put his mana into it and the miasma burst out. They jumped back and a whirling cloud of miasma condensed into a human shape just like with the Purple Man.

Soon the shape of a woman appeared, as shapely as the whore goddess had been but it reeked of savagery and violence.

“Axel we don’t want another whore goddess or a Purple Man. We have to shape it into something we want!” Rayner had to yell as the sound of the forming goddess made it hard to hear.

Axel used his mana that was still connected to the miasma and tried to shape it more into something else but had no idea what. They had come up with ways to create a god but had no idea what they wanted from it.

In the absence of a clear picture, the miasma started taking shape from information gleamed from his mana.

The results were terrible.

Axel’s mana revealed his most unpleasant memories, memories he’d tried to suppress but stayed on the surface of his thoughts, regardless.

He saw his parents arguing over the debt and sending him away, leaving him alone. He remembered his first job for the thugs where he intimidated a poor mother and daughter into giving up their grocery money. He saw himself beating on some fool who looked at him the wrong way, using the man to send a message not to mess with him, all to protect himself from attacks by others.

Seeing the disastrous effects Axel’s influence had on the miasma, Rayner grabbed Axel so he could help decide what this goddess would be. Because right now, the purple woman created from miasma screamed like glass and dug her fingers into her own flesh to rip it apart so her body could form anew.

But Rayner underwent the same experience as Axel who got to see his friend’s memories.

Rayner receiving an award in grade school. Rayner receiving all the awards in high school. Rayner being told he could do more, that he had to do more. Rayner not making any difference no matter how many people cheered his efforts.

A howl came from the forming goddess and spikes of dark purple shot from its body until every inch of her purple body was covered like a porcupine.

Axel’s mana and control neared depletion.

The whore goddess knew this would happen. That’s why she left. But why?

All Axel knew is that when he saw and felt what was born from his and Rayner’s experiences and choices, he just knew, knew they’d chosen wrong.

Waving to the lady at the bar of Grace’s brothel, Leyla stepped upstairs to meet the two young men responsible for creating the militia and so much of the other events taking place in Alta. Coalition Intelligence was surely lacking to have not gotten wind of them earlier.

Knocking on their door, she stepped back and waited, leaning on the wall, tired.

She wore no armor. As comfortable as it could be, wearing it all the time took its toll and her body needed to relax from all the stress accumulated over the past few days.

Imprisoning the kobolds had strained Ridgehill’s resources to breaking and winter was approaching. Vera’s imprisonment meant Leyla had to handle such worries.

Only the nightly visits of General Parlar’s former mistress, Yurisa, kept her spirits up. The woman gave great ... massages.

A rustling came from the room and some piece of sturdy furniture broke. Leyla heard screaming until it was muffled. Then a well-muscled youth opened the door, then quickly closed it, using his large body to stop her from coming inside.

She wasn’t here to spy on their kinky play. They were staying at a brothel not a temple of Hessa. Prudishness made little sense.

Leyla told him as much. “Don’t mind me. You can continue after I say my piece. Do you know who I am?”

“I’m sorry, no,” he said.

“Leyla, Commander of the Coalition army in Alta.”

“Oh, I’m Rayner. I work here with Axel.”

“I’ll be quick and you two can go back to your fun. I want you to take a direct role in future events, no more of this skulking around and giving credit to those who don’t deserve it. Unless you are hiding something?”

“No!”

Clearly a lie. “Good. I am putting together a force to investigate the region of Alka. It is my belief that the reason the Inimi invaded was to secure or study the special properties of that region.”