A Drow's Dilemma Ep. 66: Overkill

Author's Note:

A Drow's Dilemma began as a one-on-one roleplaying project and has been converted into a chapter-by-chapter format for weekly posting with the permission and assistance from my partner. It will contain a considerable amount of sexual themes such as femdom, lesbian, straight, 'reverse' rape, BDSM, group sex, romance, and other themes. The main goal of the story, however, is to tell an epic tale of adventures, gods and goddesses, fae, and nymphomaniacs. This episode and every episode to come will be available for free on Literotica for the foreseeable future. All characters that engage in sexual or suggestive situations are mentally and sexually mature: the human equivalent of 18 for their race.

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Episode 66: Overkill

Upon Faust stumbling into her domain and dropping unconscious, R.I.S.A. did little but to drop him in a large, reasonably comfortable cell with no doors or windows, and an anti-magic field. Because obviously. She then closed the portal very abruptly. She had been as stealthy as she could, making the door to her realm on Ashyr's order, so with any luck nobody with magic would have been able to sense it. Then again, the roar was a pretty obvious indication that not everything was as it should be.

The noise hadn't been anywhere near loud enough to damage even extremely sensitive ears, but still the drow looked exceedingly uncomfortable. "Fucking ow" Ashyr swore even after the room had gone silent. She did not try to stand up after being partially felled by whatever had happened when Faust was pushed into the other dimension. Instead, she just flopped down to the floor with her head still in her hands.

Meanhwhile, Althaia rushed up to Goelon, and hit him with a potent healing spell. Sighing, the ghost turned back into Caleldir's normal self. "I did not expect him to be quite that powerful," Caleldir said ruefully. "On a different topic, I think that I do not 'die' at all when I turn ghosty. Rather, I think that I just get really close to death, and my latent abilities take over to prevent me from actually dying."

"Fascinating." Althaia said dryly. "Now, if you remember what that tiefling looked like, I suggest that you turn yourself into him with that disguise ring I gave you. Not that the ring is supposed to be able to mimic individual people, so much as being able to change race and gender and approximate features, but it should do well enough to trick the servants and guards no doubt rushing here after that scream." With that, the nymph went over to the two drow, making sure that nothing was damaged on them.

"Oh! That ring." Caleldir muttered. Closing his eyes, he activated it. He grew a bit, turning into a tiefling that was roughly similar to Faust in appearance. A close look would give the ruse away, but it was a decent approximation. "How will this do?" Caleldir asked in a voice that sounded like Faust with a cold.

"I think it will almost do?" Althaia shrugged. "I may have to just slam anyone who notices anything with charm magic."

Selene didn't seem to be doing much better than Ashyr. But at least she had something more informative to add than the obvious admission that that had been painful. "That felt... like some sort of magical backlash." She informed the party as she laboriously got back to her feet (batting Althaia away from helping her up.) "You... you three didn't feel that, did you?" The mage noted as she swept her unusually red eyes across Caleldir, Althaia, and Carlotta who had just joined them in the living room.

"No." Carlotta admitted. She cast an uncomfortable gaze toward the place Faust had disappeared.

"It must have been an enchantment effect." Caleldir replied. "My magic resistance is poorer than a drow's except for enchantments." Which he was flat-out immune to. "Althaia... I think she is just really resistant to everything."

The nymph gave the rest of the group a thumb's up. "Both divine and unearthly grace combined in one form! I shrug off nigh upon everything!" She channeled some bolstering magic to the two drow. The drow seemed to recover at least a little bit. There was still a look of discomfort on their faces - like that of sunblindness, but without the sun.

"Doesn't explain why it didn't affect me..." Carlotta observed. As a young(ish) human female, she was bar far the weakest of the current party and had to such resistances. Which everyone else would be painfully aware of already, including herself. Yeah, there was a reason why Carlotta chose to adventure with people who weren't them, no matter how fond of Ashyr and Caleldir she was.

Caleldir glanced over at Carlotta, then frowned. "Huh... you are right. If it were an enchantment, it should have affected you. Wait... what if it was alignment based?" He shrugged. "In the end, I have no idea. It was what it was. Hopefully, it will not happen again."

The younger drow frowned. It was a subject to be explored later, though, for the alarm began to sound throughout the castle, and then echoed throughout the rest of the city. Metallic feet thumped down the hallway outside of the room at an even, disciplined cadence. There were other rumblings as well, from somewhere in the middle of Port Afron.

"D'ya think I should let the army loose?" Ashyr asked through clenched teeth. Her head obviously still pained her to a great degree. Selene seemed to be similarly suffering, but at least the mage managed to get back to her feet. Selene was a little more accustomed to magical backlash, after all. "Or trust that shit-awful disguise?" She waved a hand at Caleldir in tiefling form. "We only have a little bit more time before the diversion happens."

He looked down at his disguise, and sighed. "This ring cannot be used this way. It is for generic disguises, not specific ones. That is what the mask is for, but that is cursed. Althaia is probably the only one able to use it, and it would take too long anyway." He returned to his normal form. "The attacks on the walls should come any minute now. I say we strike!"

Ashyr got to her feet and pulled out the little figurine of R.I.S.A. "We'll give you to the count of one hundred." The ranger informed the paladin. "Then I unleash the army."

"Excellent!" Althaia declared. "Carlotta, avert your eyes, lest ye go blind!" Her clothing melted away as she unleashed her full blinding ability. She then set out of the room on a hard run around the castle.

"This feels like cheating, somehow." Caleldir muttered. "Well, it is now or never."

"And she was so focused on an honorable battle." Selene commented with a wry smile.

Caleldir turned to Selene. "Presumably, the guards and servants here are not powerful enough to give her a fair fight. Any that are may be able to shake off the blindness. Except for the really, really (un)lucky ones who shake it off anyway. Presumably, those ones she will just non lethally subdue. Unless her paladin sight decides that they are really awful people."

A second later, Demetus floated through the wall. His face was stuck between a look of complete bafflement and a goofy grin. Without a word, his ghostly form flopped to the floor. It was unclear whether he had vision or not, since he neither looked at nor acknowledged Caleldir or the rest of the party.

Ashyr stood beside Caleldir and casually slipped her hand into his as she counted the allotted time.

"Okay, R.I.S.A. Time for our army," she said when the time was up. Then she activated the portal.

The A.I. seized control of the citadel; part of her possessed the very structure. [I can open up to five doors in any direction up to one hundred feet from your location,] her voice echoed through the room. [I am also now in control of all the doors, locks, and built-in defensive equipment in the castle. I will delay and harry your foes, but I can only put half my attention on the outside world. Holding Faust is a bit more of a hassle than I thought it would be.]

The demonic roar punctuated her words. This time, it wasn't so much of frustration that that of a... challenge. A presence began to press against the passage between the party's dimension and R.I.S.A's, something the A.I. would be able to feel acutely. Inside the cell she had made for Faust, the tiefling awoke suddenly and violently. He screamed back at the bestial roar.

The drow clutched their heads again. It didn't seem as bad as the last time, but they were still clearly uncomfortable. "Run, hurry. Get them out and close it, fast!" Selene ordered in a brisk, pained tone. As ordered, people began to run full speed out of the portal and into Faust's chambers, then spilled out into the hallway.

Inside the pocket dimension, R.I.S.A. began to worry a little. Not so much for herself, since there she was not just figuratively, but literally a goddess (a sane version of her younger sister, in fact) and in no danger from anything short of another god or god-tier mage. Instead, she was worried for the others in her realm. For Tsabdrin and his dinosaurs, and for everyone else.

The A.I. appeared next to the other drow ranger. [I cannot hold this new prisoner as well as I hoped I could,] she said regretfully. [He may get out before I can craft a better prison for him. I am afraid I have to eject you. Do you want me to put you in the same place as your sister and cousin, or somewhere nearby?]

Once everyone evacuated, R.I.S.A. snapped the portals shut, keeping Faust firmly inside. The angry roar increased in volume for a moment. Then, for the second time, it left the party in silence.

In a more spectral, transparent form than normal, R.I.S.A. appeared in Faust's cell. [I ask that you calm yourself, tiefling.] She told him sedately. [No matter how you shout, you are not getting out of here. There is not even a here to get out of, properly speaking. You are on my personal demi-plane, and even if you were a mage with the ability to Plane-Shift, I have you in a dead magic zone. So please, sit down. I am here to answer your questions, and ask you a few. But please be polite.]

"Whatever that was... don't do it again." Faust warned the apparition, his eyes wild, his mane and face drenched with sweat, his chest heaving with heavy breath. Then his golden eyes rolled up into his skull and he was unconscious again.

[Whatever... what was?] R.I.S.A. said questioningly. Perhaps he hated portals? It could be an aspect of his fiendish nature. She sighed. [If it is portals he hates, I may have to create a new demi-plane to put him on. Great. Or, perhaps it would be easier just to put an aura of Silence around him?] Muttering, the A.I. set back to work.

Outside the portal, Ashyr urged her army to go throughout the castle and take it - but be gentle with the inhabitants, as they were probably very recently blinded. Druid and mercenary alike seemed eager enough to do as she asked. She was about to go after them, with Carlotta and Selene at her side, when a voice from the other room made them pause.

"Ashyr? R.I.S.A had to force me out," came Tsabdrin's voice from back inside the bedroom where he had requested to be placed. He came around the corner with his empty hands up in a placating gesture. "Don't be mad, but my allosauruses are back." Because there was no way he was going to hide them now. He might as well own up to it. Two lizard like heads peered curiously around the corner. They hissed and grumbled at what they saw until Tsabdrin placed a comforting hand on each of their heads.

Caleldir blinked. "Huh. I did not see that coming. At least not this fast. I thought Althaia would wait a few more weeks before doing that."

An indignant look crossed Selene's features. "Althaia would go directly against Ashyr's wishes?" the mage asked angrily.

"Shh, Selene. Althaia is not my subordinate, and she is not drow. She doesn't have to listen to me when it comes to males of Duskhaven." Ashyr reminded her female cousin.

Caleldir agreed with Ashyr. "For all her aura of Law, the nymph follows her own rules above all others. Sadly, she follows orders only if she agrees with them. Which she usually does, but still. I do not think any of us could lay claim to properly controlling her. At least she is as predictably altruistic as she is horny."

Ashyr turned to Tsabdrin. "You look better." She observed. It was true; he stood a little taller, and his cobalt eyes weren't strained or sad anymore. "You have your armor? Let me help you put it on."

While the rangers worked together to get Tsabdrin battle-ready, Carlotta looked confused. "Who's... Aren't you guys fighting the Duskhaven men?" She asked Caleldir and Selene.

"It is complex, but Selene's brother Tsabdrin here was rather mistreated by the others, and so has defected to us. He also seems to have been largely non complicit with the others' more egregious treachery. He also has two dinosaurs, which is awesome," Caleldir explained.

"Yeah, your companions are pretty badass," Ashyr admitted. "How do you have two, though? I can barely manage Bard." The wolf had been let out with the rest of the army, of course. As she spoke, she began to exit the room and walk towards the front end of the castle. She seemed in no particular hurry; there were no sounds of battle, and a couple sounds of victory. Althaia had proven to be an excellent - if unconventional - weapon.

Tsabdin followed after her, his allosaurs trailing behind him. "It is just the one. The female is mine, and the male is her mate. They have a bond like a ranger. She helps me keep him from murdering everyone." He actually grinned at this, for once an expression without worry or sorrow.

Ashyr grinned back at him. "Cool. Let's go meet up with our streaker. We need to figure out the next step."

Following Ashyr's lead, Caleldir strode through the castle. "It seems that Althaia had the right idea. In the end, we did not need R.I.S.A. to take control of the castle; Althaia did it all on her lonesome by flashing everyone." Sometimes his life felt like one of those bawdy tavern songs. Except somehow stranger and less believable. He spoke, of course, in Undercommon, so that those not already aware of R.I.S.A. would not hear him talk about her.

Althaia found that there was no one in the castle who could resist her literally blinding beauty. But there were several who managed to get word out about the nature of this strange assault to their eyes. With alarming speed, the city knew of the danger. It was unlikely that that trick would work for very much longer - certainly not against those participating in the counter-attack. The sounds of the gathering army rumbled across the city.

Althaia conjured back up her armor and stifled her aura. She was standing demurely by the front entrance when Gurzan ran up to her. "That was fun," she giggled. "I wager few will forget that!"

"I imagine," Gurzan said dryly. "We need to take out that mage. Once we do so, I can summon an aerial army to reinforce us."

Althaia shrugged. "Most magic rolls off of me. Let us find your mage."

"You should have taken out the mage first." Urag rumbled at Althaia in his usual, slow, deep voice. He approached her just after Gurzan had; he figured if the other orc managed to talk to her so calmly, then she had stifled her aura. "He knows there is trouble." And had previously demonstrated his ability to casually kill weaker people with one horrid spell.

"At least there will be no line of sight," observed Dria, who walked up just a moment later. Between the hundred of them, the small army had managed to secure the outer walls of the castle grounds. Currently, they were magically bolstering the stone walls while a crowd of enemies began to hammer on the gates. The leader of the druids sighed and looked up at the overcast sky. "Assuming he can't fly."

"Well, we took things as we found them," Althaia shrugged. "We captured Faust, and once we did that stealth was effectively over. We will just have to attack the mage head-on. But we probably should not make any real moves until Caleldir and the drow catch up."

Caleldir and the rest of the party had hurried to the front where they figured, correctly, Althaia would be. "I am not sure that that particular trick is normal in war," he told the nymph.

She giggled. "A shame. If more wars were fought through extreme sexiness, this would be a happier world."

Ashyr gave the nymph a grin. Then she nudged Tsabdrin in the ribs, switched to undercommon, and told him "She struck everyone blind by streaking." Just in case it wasn't clear enough already.

Tsabdrin gave his cousin a flat look, which turned into a crooked grin as he found himself unable to keep a straight face.

"I was aware," he informed her in the same language.

Caleldir blinked. "Err... Okay. Well, I assume that our next move is to take out the Mage and the Engineer? Once they are subdued, the city will be ours. I suggest that our group - the one with spell resistance and experience fighting overpowered enemies - go after the Mage, and the others make a move on the Engineer."

"That sounds reasonable," Gurzan agreed. "Message me when you are in contact with the Mage. Once he (or she?) is distracted, I can call in aerial reinforcements to help against whatever strange things the Engineer has planned. The old wife and family are coming tonight, after all."

"The woman herself?" Caleldir said in surprise. He shook his head. "Good to hear. Now, we just need to find out where those two are. Perhaps we should ask one of these poor blinded souls?"

"There are ballistae that we need to take out as well before anyone should do an aerial assault." Dria reminded Gurzan. As she said this, she embraced a slightly embarrassed Carlotta with a relieved look on her face. "They managed to shoot down a couple of our winged scouts the other day. I imagine any beast that looks out of the ordinary will be treated similarly." The leader of the druids explained sadly.

"My people can smash those weapons. Yours can take down their maker," Urag said.

"Yes," Dria agreed. "I think we can take down one engineer. As long as he doesn't have portable devices that can instantly kill our weaker people. Anyway, I had a small group gather up the blind. They should be in the dungeons at we speak. I figured it was a convenient place to put them in case they took offense to their castle being taken by a nudist." The last part was said with a small, amused smile directed towards Althaia.

"Sounds good." Ashyr nodded. "Lets see our prisoners of war, then."

"I should probably remove the blindness from the noncombatants," Althaia noted.

With that, Ashyr led them back into the castle and back towards the door down into the dungeons. There was a guard there, but Ashyr recognized him as one of the mercenaries from their group. With a nod, he let Ashyr, Carlotta, Selene, Althaia, Caleldir, Gurzan, and Dria pass. Down the stairs they went until they encountered another person, a druid, sitting just outside the room with the cells. He was in the process of trying to comfort a young woman in a maid's uniform. Most of the rest of the blinded people were sitting around the cleaner portion of the room, though a couple of presumably belligerent people were complaining within closed cells.

Althaia ran over to the maid. "Sorry about blinding you," she said sweetly. "You are in luck, though. Normally it would be hard to cure, but I can do it nearly effortlessly." Putting her palm over the woman's eyes, her hand glowed softly for a second. She then removed her hand and the woman would regain her sight.

"Now, as for the rest of you," she said. "I will cure all of you eventually, once the city is ours, but I can only cure a few right now. Whoever is able to tell us about and where are Faust's lieutenants, this 'mage' and 'engineer' we have been hearing about, will have first priority. The rest of you will simply have to be content to spend a day or two in the dark."