Chapter 47 - A Lich's Curse

Desperate cries for help went unanswered.

Because it was only when his friends were off on their own pursuits, the house completely empty, and Eric pushing his focus to the utmost, that the bone bow finally revealed itself to be the necromantic tool that it was.

A weapon that was eager to finally find and claim a host, after being separated from its master during the earliest days of the invasion. It was a truth Eric sensed even as he cried out in the extremis of his pain, struggling desperately for mastery over his own mind and body, before the bow consumed him utterly.

Wheezing for air that just wouldn’t come.

Drowning in the blackness so eager to consume him for all time.

Before the tiny flickering light in the deepest reaches of his soul blazed to brilliant fiery life as the howl that had once carried him into the fiery pits of orcish hell for the sake of his sister had him lurching from his stupor with a desperate, furious scream.

His heart was racing in dizzy panic as he gazed at the gleaming white bone bow that had almost claimed his soul.

“The hell you will!” Eric shouted, clenching the haft with the bitter fury of a man who would seize his prize at any cost, now so clearly visualizing the dark writhing specter shrieking and twisting into oblivion as Eric’s tightly clenched fists pounded it into submission.

“You are mine! Now, and forevermore!” Eric roared, visualizing the screaming dark spirit of hate and malice that so echoed its former master shredding to ethereal wisps as the flames of Wrath consumed it in an unquenchable blaze.

Burning endlessly, eternally, until no trace of the specter that had once dominated the bow remained. Only the liquid black potency that was the bow itself, eagerly shaping itself along the blazing lanes of essence resonating through the spiritual remains of the subjugated artifact. Lines of Dominion forged from Wrath and Flame began to forge itself in the shape of a bow as Eric wheezed for breath, heart pounding as he desperately fought for his own life, having pushed himself far beyond what even he should have been capable of, as a yet another long-dormant corner of his potential flickered to life at last.

You have successfully survived a battle of wills against an Eldritch Artifact!

Willpower has increased by 1 point as your passions blaze to new heights!

Your battle of wills has honed your focus, drive, and ability to master the dead like never before!

Flesh Sculptor is Rank 5!

Flesh Sculptor is Rank 6!

Now even an Eldritch Bone Bow will bend to your will!

You have unlocked a new skill along the Path of Dominion.

Through sheer brute force and a desperate desire for mastery over your own soul, you have unlocked the skill: Spirit Mastery! - You now know the rudiments of mastering spirits, a crucial step to one day forging an undead legion of your own!

Spirit Mastery has leveled up!

Spirit Mastery has leveled up!

…

You have paid a price far deeper than you realize, burning your own life-force to forge your Soul into a weapon even the darkest of Revenants would fear.

Spirit Mastery is now Rank 6!

Spirit Mastery is now Rank 7!

Rituals of Summoning and Binding is now Rank 9!

You have unlocked a hidden Essence nestled within the depths of your soul!

Perhaps it was hiding from a demented pod that had been so eager to steal all that you ever were, or could ever be.

Perhaps you tore it free of the dying remnants of the wraith who is no more.

Perhaps it was always there, needing only the catalyst of ultimate struggle to awaken!

Whatever the origins, your soul now embraces the eternal yoke of Dominion, forever your blessing and burden. For yours is the boon of mastery and control.

Whether nations, interfaces, or the will of undead legions, all will one day bend to your will!

You have claimed the Essence of Dominion! (Rank 1, White Tier. Modifies all attempts to dominate or control.) Major synergism detected with Blood Mastery, Spirit Mastery, Flesh Sculptor, & Rituals of Summoning and Binding!

Congratulations! Regardless of your lack of a formal class, the System recognizes you as an Apprentice Necromancer! (Note. A Tier 1 or better Pod must be accessed and a Necromantic Combat Class or Profession formally chosen before any ascendancy perks may be granted!)

Eric took long, shuddering breaths as the messages played across his interface, not knowing whether to laugh or cry at how close he had come to dying, to being claimed by the dying echoes of a furious revenant he could sense screaming upon the ether even now.

Only now did he recall all the glaring clues he should have cued in on.

Visions of living nightmares locked within the bow that had been covered in the runes of the fallen. Hideous flashes of undead horrors scurrying through the Underrealm, eager to claim him as a vessel of their lord.

And what chilled him to the quick was how he had been so entranced by the bow that he had completely dismissed all the visions of countless souls locked in endless torment, thanks to the puppet master responsible for that city of the dead he had seen in those visions.

Yet when he summoned his bow, forcing himself to gaze upon those all too clearly remembered eldritch bones…

There was nothing.

Just smooth bone dyed a hypnotic pattern of deepest red with fiery orange highlights and silver sigils he was almost certain symbolized overbearing strength, or control. Or more specifically… Dominion.

He was relieved to see that the bow looking nothing like it had before, finding the coloring truly beautiful, merely regretting that its pearlescent sheen would make it difficult to use from cover.

Then his eyes widened as it grew matte black before his eyes.

He would have laughed for wonder, sensing that he had bound this weapon more deeply to his soul than any other prize he had dared to claim, were he not in such excruciating pain.

He groaned as he moved his trembling, exhausted body, surprised to feel himself so depleted, so utterly drained, before wincing with shock and just a bit of horror as he saw the final messages blazing across his interface, filled instant regret for the unforgivable risks he took, despite the boon he had received. Because even with his victory, he had paid a very steep price indeed, for the handful of skill ranks he had earned in a single night.

He had just lost half a year of his life.

You have fully depleted all 9th level potency! (Core infusion potency sequestered!)

You have lost 186 Days and 7 hours of your life! This loss cannot be recovered by Arcane Magics!

Eric groaned. “What the fucking fuck. I lose even when I win!” He shook his head, knowing he should be grateful that he was even alive. And he was. He truly, truly was. Though he knew he needed to fill up his experience bar just as damn fast as he could. Even without worrying about core infusion. Just having a reserve for the next time he ran into some necromantic complication that would tap into his life force… that experience point buffer was damn important.

As Morlekai himself had put it, would allow necromancers and blood mages of all stripes to thrive as never before, even if they only chose it as a Profession, those who dared quantify it via the System at all. No matter how shitty their basic Conscript class happened to be. So long as it had an experience point buffer to channel the darkest magics through? It was pure gold.

So hunting some Underrealm critters immediately moved to the top of his to-do list.

But not right now, he thought with an exhausted smile.

Now? Depleted in both Soul Reserves and Stamina, and he suspected empty of Arcane and Spirit reserves as well, still stinging from the loss of over half a year of his life, he wanted nothing more than to slip under his covers and sleep the sleep of the exhausted.

And he was determined to do just that,

Before his eyes bulged with a hiss, feeling a cold clammy hand against his heart, hearing the scratch of bone-white claws on the door below.

“Open up, Eric Silver.”

It was a hideous voice, like the howling wind of a winter storm.

“Open up, for I know your name.”

Or perhaps the sound of leafless branches scratching against an old window pane at the witching hour. Jolting one out of warm sleep into the frigid night air, with a summons that must be obeyed.

“Open up, Eric Silver. For you have claimed that which is mine!”

Eric felt a lurch in his gut, chilled to the quick.

He knew that voice.

Or at least, he thought he did. For all that it was a cold, dry husk of the warm bemused voice of just hours… or was it days? Before.

A voice that even now whispered through the air, worming its way into his soul.

Mental Resistance minimizes compulsion!

Willpower check made!

Eric jerked back with a frightened cry when he saw none other than the desiccated husk of Velvet, sparse brown hair blowing in an unseen breeze, floating in the air before Eric's third-story bedroom, now scratching at his window, locking upon Eric’s startled gaze with vile green eyes that seemed to draw him in like a vortex as he desperately fought against the lure of the desiccated corpse that would claim him forevermore.

“Open the window, Eric Silver, and invite me in.”

“Yeah, hard pass on that one, asshole!” Eric roared, drawing the bow now bound to his soul.

The creature hissed, revealing blackened fangs and a forked tongue as it scrabbled at the window that it failed to break, and Eric could sense the faint pressure of a bloodward being stretched to its limit.

“Let me in!”

Eric swallowed under the soul-crushing weight of death radiating from the ghastly horror scratching at his window, and violently shook his head. “The hell I will, motherfucker!”

The creature's hypnotic green eyes turned red with hate. "Your resistance means nothing. I will tear free your eyes and break every bone in your body before sucking out all your marrow, for daring to claim that which is mine!”

Velvet’s fingertips burst as the twisted revenant scratched the air, Eric’s eyes widening when he saw Morlekai’s crimson ward finally rupture, ears ringing with a sound echoing not through the air but through the ether itself.

He could only pray that Morlekai understood what had happened, and that he was okay.

For there was now nothing between Eric and the horror gazing at him with a too-wide smile filled with shark-like teeth covered in coagulated blood and darker things still, that continued widening all the way to Velvet's ears, as the doppelganger oozed itself through the shattered window.

For all that it hissed its forked tongue as if fighting against a crushing weight, ancient dried blood leaking from all its orifices as it snarled its hate. “I will take my bow, and I will take your life!”

And for a dizzying second Eric dared to smile, for all that he felt crushed by the killing aura of the creature he faced. Because he understood two very important truths.

One, Morlekai was no novice bloodmage, if his enchantments were actually slowing down the horror scrabbling towards him.

Two, perhaps there was hope for Velvet after all.

“You’re not Velvet!” Eric snarled with bleak satisfaction as he slowly drew to full extension the bone bow he held in his hand, bone arrow knocked and aimed right for the skull of his foe.

This desperate declaration earned hissing laughter as the horror’s tongue unwound to whip through the air like a saber, slashing through furniture as if it were a blade in truth. And still, somehow, the thing could talk.

“Such pathetic attempts at resistance. Do you truly think your defiant bleats will stop me, fleshbag? And how can I not be dear, dear Velvet? I wear his body, do I not? Proof even against the weight of a bloodmage’s curse! Do you really think a bone arrow can hurt me? One of my own arrows, fool? Think again!”

And much to Eric's horror, the unbound arrow in his hand morphed into a bone-white serpent, hissing under the power of the horror laughing at him even now as it lashed out with a tongue Eric desperately jerked his head back from, thinking he had avoided it, only for searing pain and blood to erupt from his chin.

He choked back a cry as the arrow tore into his flesh, relaxing his three-fingered grip only enough for it to fall free of his bow, the writhing thing slipping free to clatter to the ground.

Heart pounding with something he refused to call terror, he quickly jerked his gaze back to his deadly cackling foe, knowing that the tongue whipping through the air, slicing his chair to kindling, could just as easily lop off his head.

He had to keep his focus on that horror, even as he sensed the arrow slithering on the ground, a heartbeat away from plunging into his foot, and drilling into his body as deep as it could go.

“I know there is no way in hell you can be Velvet. Because if you were, you’d already be running for your life, asshole!”

The revenant’s features twisted with mocking contempt.

Before it hissed and flinched back in surprise as the room filled with blazing white light when fiery hot death streaked through the air.

You have successfully summoned soul-bound essence-infused arrow!

Tearing completely through the revenant who shrieked so loudly that every window and mirror in Eric's room shattered. He lost all sense of hearing as the nightmare horror twisted and writhed from the great big smoking wound in its gut, the arrow having torn right through an unarmored torso only a fraction as thick and meaty as the orc's had been, and without the heavy shirts of iron mail. Tearing right through the house entirely, with a speed and power beyond every bow or crossbow he had ever shot before.

A coldly smiling Eric then drew string to cheek once more, his bow tracking the now desperately scrabbling horror leaping for his throat just as he resummoned his furiously blazing arrow and released it in the blink of an eye.

Striking the revenant right in the ruined crater of its nose.

And this time, the superheated arrow stayed lodged in the skull of the spasming revenant for a heartbeat before 4000 degree temperatures caused the creature’s skull to explode, covering a startled Eric with fragments of bone and steaming hot splatters of brain.

Congratulations! You have killed a Lesser Revenant!

For all that it is but a shadow of the lich that had long since passed, these vile predators find new life through fresh victims that dare to touch artifacts imprinted with their master’s own soul! In this way, liches may recover from death’s hoary clutches, when sufficient revenants feed upon sufficient victims to fully regain their master’s lost power and reform anew!

By slaying this revenant, you have assured that the lich it was spawned from will only recover in a weakened state, assuming it recovers at all! But you may rest assured that should its deathless eyes ever gain the spark of cognizance once more, you will be the first of many targets it will seek to kill.

Experience Earned! Congratulations! You have gained the permanent enmity of Olzgoth, the Undead Lord of a Thousand Eyes!

You have once more achieved two-thirds of the threshold needed to reach level 10 and continue infusing your core!

And as much as Eric wanted to groan anew, he at least had the sense to pop his soul-linked furiously blazing arrow back into storage before collapsing to the bed with a groan as his ears popped… before his nose made it clear that racing through the house at a frantic pace with a pot full of soaking noodles was a perfectly appropriate action when he caught sight of the flames scattered throughout his room, praying he could put everything out in time.

And by some miracle, he did.

Even if dinner was ruined, that bath and wash water were empty, and his room looked like a zombie apocalypse had a food fight.

At least the house wasn’t burning down.

But the way a certain blood mage was glaring at him when Eric haltingly explained what had happened while the man’s succubus of a sister howled with laughter at the brains splattered all over Eric’s room, made it clear that it was going to be a very long day.

Especially when a snickering Alice made it painfully clear that a furious Morlekai had apparently been interrupted by shattered house wards at a very delicate moment with a certain greenmage.

“What the fuck just happened here, Eric?”

Eric, still riding a potent mix of adrenaline, triumph, and terror, took a moment to formulate a succinct reply.

“Yeah, that bone bow you saw me messing with earlier? Velvet told me he bought it off of a bunch of desperate adventurers who had been fleeing for their lives from a crypt that’s actually some sort of underground necropolis. Complete with undead skeletal sentinels. Not sure how connected it is to this stretch of the Underrealm, but sure as shit, the bow was haunted, and tried to take me over. Then, when it failed to, a Revenant controlled by a lich that’s now sworn eternal enmity to me tried to take my head.”

Morlekai's flinty hard gaze met Eric's own. "And it didn't occur to you that a bow radiating the torment of a dozen sacrifices was maybe not the best curio to pick up from your favorite fucking archery store?"

“And how the fuck are you still the adorkable Eric we know and love?” asked Alice, eyes filled with warmth and worry despite the hard smile, her oak wand crackling with death in her perfectly manicured hand.

Eric shook his head. "Honestly, now that I think about it, I think I was in a bit of a daze when I made my, ahem...purchase. And hell, Morlekai, you saw me shoot that thing. Not just when I pulled it out, but over how many hours?"

“A full day, Eric,” Morlekai pronounced like a sentence. “You were obsessed.”

“Which means nothing,” Alice murmured. “He’s always obsessed.”

“True.”

Eric smirked. “Yes, I was trying to boost my skill rank and get a familiarity bonus so I could forge a soul-link at half off the standard retail Soul Reserve and Experience point cost. And you guys know I’m all about the super sale. And since the System automatically gave me the True Strike skill Perk to match my crossbow, since I hit the key level while being forced by the System to accept Core Infusion at the absolute worst time, I figured I might as well see if I could blend that with everything else I was doing.”

Alice furrowed her brow. “What’s he talking about, Morlekai?”

Morlekai sighed. “He’s right, the greater the metaphysical sympathies between you and a given artifact, the easier it is to blood-bond.” His gaze then hardened. “And it seems our boy scout here is one of the very few who can actually claim System Perks beyond a standard weapon affinity.”

Alice’s eyes crackled with sudden heat. “Wait, you’re saying if I had mastered my wand a bit more before binding it, the price might not have been so fucking steep? That might have been nice to know fucking months ago, Morlekai!”

Her brother raised a bemused eyebrow. “And how did practicing with it go before you literally bound it to your soul?”

Alice had the grace to blush and look away. “Not too fucking great.”

“And now you can shoot lightning bolts that blasted all three of the orcs I had out, including frying the loose head,” Eric noted with a smile. “You showed me up so bad your brother was laughing, Alice. And I nearly got killed, fucking with the wrong bow. While that wand is now a part of you, making you a mage, no matter how few arcane academies this world has. So whose to say you didn’t make a far better call than I did?”

Alice smirked at that. “That’s definitely our Eric. No one else would try so hard with his gentle smile to make me feel better, when we all know that hitting on me is the last thing on his mind.”

“Hardly,” Eric winked. “I just don’t want Louie hitting on me. Hard.”

Alice chuckled throatily at that, flashing him a sultry smile. “Careful, boy scout, or I might just make a man out of you yet.”

Eric smirked, barely resisting saying “too late,” since his deflowering wasn’t really something he wanted to think about. Even if he had enjoyed the hell out of at the time, he hadn’t exactly been sober, and the fuckers had happily put it in the premier, leaving just enough out that everyone could pretend that he and a certain star-struck actress five years his senior had just been ‘acting.’

It was a really strange thing, he thought, to feel both taken advantage of, and like an epic badass at the same time. And he would have happily settled for badass, if his mother’s cool gaze hadn’t made him think that the whole reason he had been set up wasn’t so much for the sake of the movie she was obsessed with, but so that he would never look purer than his sister in the eyes of anyone.

So he settled for not really thinking about it at all. Because really, whose first time hadn’t been something they’d do over if they could?

So Eric settled for summoning his bone bow, trying very hard not to smile at the flinch the siblings gave him, before Morlekai’s glare turned to a thoughtful frown. “It looks different. Quite a bit different. I take it the Soul-bond took?”

Eric nodded. “It did. Even though it almost cost me everything… I bound it with blood and fire. Now its will is just an extension of my own.”

His friend’s gaze hardened. “Do you truly know what you are saying, Eric?”

Eric nodded, refusing to look away from his friend's too-searching gaze. "You better believe I do."

Alice whistled. “Shit, Morlekai. You can sense it radiating off of him. He walks our master’s path, now.”

Morlekai’s eyes widened. “He’s going to want to speak to him.”

Alice’s gaze turned pitying. “I know.”

Eric blinked. "Wait, who's going to want to speak with me? Why? Because I bent some bow to my will? Get it? Bent. I'm bending it to my will," He said, slowly extending the powerful war bow to maximum draw. "Oh, come on, laugh. It was funny."

Alice exchanged a worried look with her brother. “Are you sure he’s not possessed? His humor’s worse than ever.”

Morlekai slowly nodded. “It’s definitely a bad sign.”

Eric sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. "Really?"

The head of their informal little family smirked. “Get your ass in the game, Eric. We got some idiot adventurers to question.”

Alice clenched her pretty jaw. “Which is scary as shit, because we have no idea how they compare to us. I might be level 11, but there’s no telling what level they are, or if they were able to evolve their class beyond Conscript.”

Eric blinked at this. “Wait, so you chose leveling over core infusion?”

This earned a surprised chuckle. "Well of course, Eric. I'm not stupid."

Eric opened his mouth at that, but no words came out.

She gave him a pitying smile. “Eric, neither Morlekai and I are, well, standard builds. We’re fucking lucky this system didn’t try to crush every practitioner practicing unorthodox arts out of existence, but I’m guessing there’s some edict against it. Cultural preservation or some shit like that, our master says. But sure as shit, I’m not going to try risking compressing or saturating my core like I’m some elite scion of whatever race set this madness up. Not when I already have an extremely powerful Profession that’s basically as strong as my weak-ass combat class, and as you know, I put all my points in the Mana Pool side of my Arcane Potential anyway. So this build actually works for me, like I’m a mage-light. Not quite walking a mage’s path, but with my blood-bound wand and ability to instantly feed off my kills? I’m damned close. Hell, with my growing mastery over the crimson arts, even if I’m not quite so gifted as brother dearest, I’d say I’m better off than most of those wand-slingers anyway.”

Morlekai nodded. “Alice strides a hybrid path, as do I. She’s not attempting to be an elite human warrior. And with no elven blood flowing through our veins… the odds of us actually being granted an elementalist class as we are now, without extensive knowledge and resources, is extremely...”

Alice squeezed his arm with an angry glare. “Challenging, my brother means to say. But since I have absolutely no problem taking my time, next time we can interface with a non-corrupted pod, like the one Freetown was built around, I can see what my options are. Best of all, if our fuckin’ too long-delayed heist works out, we’ll finally have the gold to purchase all the strategy guides to the whole fucking System that we need if we and the rest of our clan are going to have any hope of being anything other than basic fighter noobs in a world that, for all we know, will eventually be filled with Elite tier alien invaders. Then, I’ll know exactly what skills and stats I gotta develop to play the badass sorceress of my dreams.”

Eric flashed a weak smile. “You know what? That actually makes sense.”

“Damn right it does. And it’s not like I had much of a fucking choice, with my Interface screaming at me to make a decision right when I was blasting a Greater Lizard almost as big as the one we fought together with enough voltage to finally stop the fucker’s heart," she said, suddenly standing way too close to him with those soulful eyes and pouting, ruby red lips, sending tingles down his spine when her husky breath, smelling of nicotine and desire, washed over him.

Eric was frozen, caught between exquisitely painful desire and sudden alarm, before realizing she was...sniffing him. Before stepping back with a smile, adjusting her clearly too tight holster.

“Eric, you naughty little boy. You chose to infuse your core, didn’t you?”

Eric smiled weakly. “Um...maybe?”

She flashed an arch smile. “And just how much have you infused it?”

Eric winced. “Um… 0.01%? Rounding up.”

She roared with laughter. “Oh you poor, poor baby. I’m surprised you’re even alive, seeing as you walk a path just as crooked as my brother and I. Good thing you can stop whenever you like.”

He blinked. “Really?”

“Of course. But the minute you enter a pod, whatever percentage you gained, you're stuck with. Which means that if you don't get a class option better than the one you would have gotten anyway, you were just wasting your time. Or at least, that's what I was told. Our master was curious to see if any of us actually had the stones to walk the path you’re now daring, so told us what little he had gleaned from the other covens in Freetown. But Morlekai’s sure he was just testing us.”

Morlekai, however, was gazing with a frown at the shattered hole in the wall of his house. At least they didn’t have to worry about the external environment. Then Eric smiled. Realizing that with the daily mist showers and ceiling glow moss that really was beginning to shine far brighter during what he thought of as the day, it seemed that Morlekai’s girlfriend and her fellow Greenmages really were turning this realm into something remarkable. Hell, the cavern floor was now covered with lush green grass, thickest near the lake, and they had chickens and milking goats aplenty now.

As Eric observed firsthand, minutes later, once Morlekai made it clear that there was a certain mystery they were damn well getting to the bottom of. And they were going as a group, fully kitted up, as a sign of strength.

Of course they stopped by the de facto frat house of former college students that Drake’s girlfriends called home, a bleary-eyed but now fully kitted Drake as well as a coldly smiling Louie also by their side.

“What’s the plan, boss?” asked Drake, holding his bardiche in a casual grip while trying to scratch a spot on his back through his armor with his other hand.

“Whether or not those adventurers are stronger than us, at least in terms of levels, there are questions they damn well better be willing to answer. And if it keeps things friendly, I’m not above paying a bit of silver to make that happen,” Morlekai said with a hard smile, flipping coins in the air as he made his way to the town proper. The increasingly prosperous-looking citizens, almost everyone now wearing decent clean clothes as well as being well-fed, thanks to their now considerable reserves of smoked meat, were still quick to give Morlekai and his crew wide-eyed looks and deferential bows, almost as if Morlekai, and not Mayor Stibbs, was their true leader. But since he didn’t bother to manage anything, perhaps Morlekai was seen more as the aloof noble and Mayor Stibbs the approachable administrator.

Certainly when they approached the tavern, somehow having gained a full floor when Eric hadn’t been looking, Din was all smiles and nods when he gave them the key to the adventurer’s rooms. “I’ll have Elsie bring up our best wine and some fresh bread rolls, by way of apology for the interruption, and to smooth things over,” Din quickly said.

Eric’s eyes continued to widen, however, when they hit the fourth floor, the wallpaper a soothing shade of ivory when he looked up, the flight of stairs made of finely polished hardwood when he gazed at his feet.

Eric couldn't help frowning. This sure as hell wasn't the rickety clapboard mess he had been expecting, and he couldn’t help but recall Drake’s offhand comments, when they went for his suit fitting. “Are you sure this entire town isn’t somehow leveling up, Morlekai? I mean, what level would it have to be for clapboard ramshackle taverns to suddenly become four-story structures made of mortared stone blocks and milled lumber?”

Morlekai turned and gave Eric a bemused stare. “How the hell would I know that, Eric? I own no territory, I have no administerial profession. As for the bread? Last run, we had a farmer who used to own a mill. He hustled a mule from somewhere, and we now have access to quite a bit of flour. Thank god my girl’s good at preservation, because, end of world or no, coffee and fresh bread is the only way to start the day.”

Alice ribbed her brother. “You’re girl, Morlekai? You sure you’re not slipping, bro?”

Her brother flashed a tight smile as he knocked on the door. “I love her at least enough to assure myself buttered rolls every morning. Have you had freshly baked bread covered in fresh goat’s butter and strawberry preserves outside of Paris before, Alice?”

Alice chuckled throatily. “No wonder they say food is the way to win a man’s heart.” She flashed both Louie and Eric evil smiles. “I always found that sex worked best for me.”

“That’s because your mother was a succubus,” Morlekai said with a smile.

His sister glared. “And yours was a vampire.”

“Touche,” he smirked, knocking on the door.

Eric blinked, momentarily dumbstruck, while Drake chuckled softly behind him. “Wait, but, how does that exactly… I mean, I know we've joked around, but it’s only been a few months since the world shifted… right?”

Louie looked at him like he was an idiot.

"Not now, buddy. Focus on the mission," said Drake with a soft whisper and a hard squeeze to Eric's shoulder as the door opened of its own accord, revealing a scene straight out of a horror movie.