Champion of the Goddess Pt. 04

Yes, I said Sky metal armor worth over 61,000 gold pieces for the heavy armor and metal alone in that armor. With enchantments in it. You are talking close to 120,000 gold pieces to craft it at the DIE store.

They should just let you keep the armor unless they have a collector in mind. Showing it is proof of who he is. We can get it repainted and put it to use. The sky metal rock, ask for 60,000 and go no lower than 55,000. It is worth more but better to offload it and we are not hurting for coins.

Bounty on the dragon should be 12,000-15,000. The hides will be what the market can bear, no less than 10,000 with another 10,000 for the nightmare hide. Because they can plane shift, that hide is rare.

No lines of credit if you can help it. Do not forget the jewelry box. There may be a reward for that as well or another quest hook. Hard to say."

They started up the road, "Raven scout road. The alchemy shop you are looking at close to 200,000 with all the blood, dragon, and giant parts we collected. Probably a little more but not more than 240,000 gold pieces. If you end up with a line of credit then hit the local magic shop and get the portable hole, two offensive wands for each caster.

The ice storm and lightning bolt wands for me caster level 9. The clerics should each get offensive weapon upgrades holy or bane is also a good choice. Blossom is taking over the quest from Bella. That means more healing wands.

You need to get us more details on this quest. Two cure medium wands and 7 cure light wands per cleric, minimum of 2 clerics. One can be a battle cleric. This is for topping people off after battle. Two of those light wands to our rogue.

Something for restorations. Utility wands to identify and detect magic or better yet a set of glasses that can do both.

Fifty healing potions. Once those group things are done divide out what is left among the party into even shares."

Rose asked, "Why are offensive caster wands considered group things?"

Raven smiled, "Because they can soften up a mass of targets and save the group's ass. Particularly the ass of the fighter or paladin who goes rushing into a group of archers and an anti-paladin."

The ladies laughed and Rose smiled, "Alright I will buy that argument after your lightning bolts saved us that one night."

Bella smiled, "I am always throwing a lot of healing into you Rose."

He looked at Rose, "Don't forget the series of fireballs, frigid rays, and the magic missile distraction on your anti-paladin and his group. Here are some suggestions. Rose and Mary should try to find a minor displace cloak with a major displacement on it. That way for really tough fights you can set the miss chance to one in two. Provided they do not have true seeing.

While having a miss chance of one in five without it activated. Buy yourself a fucking better shield Rose. That one has seen way better days. I am surprised the holy symbol still works on it."

She nodded.

Raven smiled, "I hope all of the Clerics have spent a feat in simple weapons, Hint, hint. The bows are great. Spells are awesome. A weapon for melee. Morningstar or flails are my favorites for clerics. That and maces because of the infamous mace of disruption when you know you are going for the undead.

Orchid and Blossom I would see about getting a really good staff while you have the coin. Keep charging up that staff of fire. See me and I will help when I can while we are at the inn. Upgrade your bracers of protection and resistance items. Those cloaks I mentioned to the fighter and Rogue are going to be rare if found at all. Might have to be custom ordered at the DIE store."

He thought, "I am setting up others to have items crafted and I have something else for you to consider. I will be searching for death ward items."

She laughed, "You are serious about all of this?!"

He thought back, "A displacement cloak upgraded with a minor displacement on it will cost 80,000 gold pieces for those who pursue and takes two days in the DIE store. I am HELPING you and them by burning off all this excess coin while we are here. Deathward, the deathless variety, is only a plus one upgrade on armor.

I do not think you want us to spend the time to do armor upgrades. If they were on headbands, vests, leather dusters would be kind of cool. The question is how would you price it?"

He heard her groan, "It is designed for armor and you want to move it onto something else. On a use per day once a day for seven minutes. You are talking 27,000 to craft at the die store and two days. That would be like the spell and not like deathless. That only works one in four times."

He thought back, "That sucks. I guess armor upgrades are in order. We will just have to take the days needed to craft it all out."

She groaned out, "Alright we will do the deathless version. But I want it set for so many minutes and not always on."

He thought back, "How about seven times a day for one minute? Hardly worth the effort once a day. For something that works 25% of the time."

She laughed, "Twice a day for three minutes."

He chuckled, "Three times a day for two minutes."

She laughed, "Alright that would be doable. It is not seven."

He thought, "On armor, it is on ALL the time, there is no time limit. Consider THAT when you are pricing them because you are taking the ability from always on to a small number of uses in a day to save YOU time, not us. That is cutting the prices WAY down.

Leather duster would look a little weird with a cloak unless the cloak went transparent, was three inches long, or rolled up like an old fashioned blind. I think Dusters are out for this life."

He heard her laugh, "I could do a chord or resistance item if you really want this duster. 12,000 Gold pieces to craft because of that limitation I am forcing."

He thought, "No, not this life. I think I will go vest for deathless in a deep burgundy. The burgundy would look good against the black. I can get a set of those bracers the tin cans use so my ladies can fuck me at night easily."

He heard her laughing loudly. "You have that in the armor change now."

He thought back, "True, nearly forgot about that discussion...that happened almost a year ago. First-night births again?"

She thought back, "Not quite a year but I know you were implying about your time with me in the dream state. The fourth night actually. I had you on a different time schedule due to the shortened run."

Blossom looked at him, "What is different about how you have the horses today?"

He looked at her, "The ones we are selling right away. The ones we will sell are in the string you and I have. Including all of the old ponies at the end of Mary's string."

She nodded, "You sorted them out."

He nodded, "I did."

He thought, "We will have 5 nights at the inn so I can get them all pregnant again."

Myssara laughed, "That is what I expect you to have done to all the ladies within your party by then."

He sighed, "Myssara expects me to have all the female party members pregnant before we leave, except the halflings."

Mary looked at him, "I know we have that female paladin who is on the lookout for us, I wonder who the surprise might be?"

He shrugged, "Raven scout road. I figure we will throw her for a loop and pick up 4 more females."

The ladies laughed. He heard Myssara in his head, "You would think of that. But why?"

He thought, "In honor of the ten children I gave you in one shot."

She laughed, "Parties can only be 9 in size maximum."

He thought back, "We had 30 with that caravan with no issue. We put a couple in a wagon and we are just another protection detail. Besides free will."

He heard Mother laughing and Myssara sighed, "The problem is he has a target-rich environment."

He thought, "Then I should make my presence known and knock them all up."

He heard her groan and Mother laugh.

He looked at the ladies, "I might need a room to myself and you ladies standing guard as the line forms."

Mary looked up at him, "What is going on?"

He smiled, "I joked about adding 4 instead of 2. She told me it was a target-rich environment. I told her I should make my presence known and knock them all up."

The ladies laughed and Mary shook her head. "We will try to avoid making our presence known. I am not sure we should add anyone."

He smiled, "You talk with her about that. We are down to 6 after this."

The ladies giggled. After 5 hours the raven came back, "12 humans on horseback." He dismissed the bird. "Camouflage."

He sent his bow back to its normal state.

He looked at the ladies, "Fourth-night births. We got a dozen riders approaching, probably a patrol. The fifth night is for getting you all pregnant again."

They laughed. "Blossom, you should ride point at this point."

She shook her head, "7 across, we got all these horses."

He sighed, "Your call. Do not be surprised when they come to me."

She looked at Raven, "Because you are the only male?"

He nodded, "It will throw them off and they will look for the most masculine one, or the biggest badass."

She nodded, "Anything else?"

He smiled, "This road will have traffic going in both directions which means we would be in two lines with you running your string ahead of the rest of us. Else we will be running into people."

She sighed, "You win."

He shook his head. "You asked, the decision is yours."

She looked at them, "Do it."

He held up a fist, "Orchid and Rose next." They headed up, with Mary and Raven following.

Blossom had Vain driving the wagon. She was in a foul mood as nobody would talk to her because of her attitude. They held off on dividing anything else out until they got to town, not that she would be with them given he knew of her moving worlds.

He turned to Mary, "We are the furthest out of sight."

She nodded. They just got stretched out when the hand signal to stop came up. A rider came down the side looking at all of the horses and he went back up to the front.

He came back down, "Turn over the excess horses."

He handed the string to Mary. "Let me find out what is going on with these fools."

He thought, "I will not let these guys push our group around."

He heard her sigh, "What are you going to do?"

He thought, "Whatever I have to."

He heard Myssara moan.

He rode up front. Blossom looked at him, "They seem to think they can seize horses."

He looked at him, "Who is your local ruler?"

He looked at me, "Duke Roseland."

Raven asked, "Is he a devout follower of the goddess and does he know what you are doing out here? I guarantee I can get an audience with him if I wanted one."

He looked at Raven, "To the best of my knowledge he is and what we do to keep our troops mounted is well below his level of concern."

He looked at Blossom, "Boot dagger, three trees up, right into that bush."

He put up gravity bow and He heard Myssara, "What are you doing?"

He thought, "Starting rumors."

She threw it. A Rabbit came out and three quail. He drew back and blew all 3 quail out of the sky into feathers. He let the rabbit get further away. Then blasted it. He looked at the man. His men had all drawn swords at this point. He looked back at him, "You are going to continue on and pretend you never saw me. Camouflage."

His bow changed back. He looked at him and summoned his bird right on the head of his horse with just a thought and sent this message through to him, "The Raven does not suffer the evil or the foolish. He is the Raven."

He turned his horse back around and dismissed his bird.

He went back, "I think you better go and have a chat with your boss."

He took the string from Mary, "What are you doing?"

He smiled, "Role-playing."

He heard Mother laughing. Myssara sighed, "You are not supposed to expose yourself in town!"

He thought, "We are not in town yet, first off. If this guard is wise nobody will know. At the very least an air mystery will float around town that The Raven is nearby."

Mother laughed, "I like it and he is true he has not entered the town yet so he did not break my rule."

The patrol continued on. He looked at Mary, "We will ride ahead and see what Blossom thinks."

He rode forward and he looked at Blossom who was still sitting there. She still had her mouth hanging open. He stopped as Mary came back smiling with Blossom's dagger.

Mary looked at him, "One of the guys in the back went to get that rabbit. He brought it back up." He nodded as she laughed. "The rabbit was shot through the ass and out the mouth. All that was left of it was a fur-coated arrow, turned inside out! That was insane!"

He shook his head, "That was a roleplaying opportunity. That guard does not want me in front of his Duke; so, he saw nothing. His men will spread rumors that Raven is the area. In order to avoid the wrath of the captain or sergeant whatever he was, they will not give an accurate description of me. It creates more roleplaying opportunities for us all."

Blossom laughed, "What did Myssara say?"

He smiled, "She told me I was not supposed to expose myself in town and I reminded her we are not in town yet."

Blossom laughed, "She took that well?"

He smiled, "Mother found it hilarious because it was her directive not to expose myself in town deliberately unless the situation dictated it. We should get these to the stable and sell the extras quickly!"

They rode ahead. Blossom followed, still shaking her head when Mary rode up and talked with her. They got into town They sold off 4 ponies and 56 horses for the moment. That left us with 4 ponies and 26 horses.

Raven looked at the stable owner, "We will be stabling several. Horses."

He looked at Raven, "First supply of horses I have had in a while. Been a shortage." The stable owner saw the rest of the group ride in and he looked at Raven, "You going to be selling more?"

Raven nodded, "Very likely but we have to get a couple more to join our group before then and our leader has to decide how fast we need to travel. That will tell us how many we can cut back to."

He nodded, "Fucking griffons been a pain in the ass."

Raven shrugged, "No griffons but we took down a few bounties that our leader needs to collect on. A Green Dragon and the leader of the Black Arm gang."

They got the horses bedded down. He walked with Blossom, "You alright?"

She nodded. "Mary told me of some of your role-playing exploits. That was nowhere near over the top as some of the shit you have pulled."

He smiled, "We need the merchant room for a week."

She looked at him, "We will not be here that long."

He nodded, "But we can pass the room off to some unlucky couple when we do leave."

She smiled, "Reputation."

He nodded. "You got it."

They approached the door when a red-headed Paladin walked toward them. She looked at him, "Did you have sweet dreams?"

He picked her up off her feet and kissed her and licked her neck all the way up to her ear, "You found me, wayward Paladin."

She shivered and breathed hard, "Why did you lick my neck?"

He gave her a nice long kiss while the ladies watched, "Because you had too much armor between my mouth and your pussy."

She giggled as did the ladies behind him. He looked at her, "Introduce yourself?"

She looked over and her face was as red as her hair at the audience. She looked at them, "Nina. Paladin to the Goddess Myssara."

The ladies took turns kissing her. He looked at her, "Rainer, or if you are more daring, lover."

She smiled, "Alright, lover."

The ladies laughed and they walked inside and saw 3 guys attempting to accost a woman at the bar. He walked forward as she pushed them back for who knows how many times. She looked over, "RAVEN!"

She rushed him. He thought, "Someone did not get the memo."

He heard Mother laugh and Myssara groan. He threw his arms around her, "Hello Lirana. What happened to your mission?"

She whispered, "He lasted all of 2 days. He could not deal with being woken up at all hours by a crying child, changing a diaper, or anything. He felt cheated some because he did not get me pregnant before we went in.

Myssara told me you knew. I figured she told you that we broke up. I could not handle being a single parent. I missed the action. I tried for another 2-3 days and I gave up when she told me about you arriving here. That you had a spot in party opening and I told her to bring me here."

He hugged her tightly. "She did not inform me of what happened to you, but she is allowed to mislead. We have a spot within the party but no companion slots."

She smiled and whispered, "I know."

She kissed him again. Blossom looked up, "Someone you know I take it?"

He nodded, "The last one I expected."

Mary nodded, "Same."

He looked down and Mary smiled.

He thought, "Embrace it or deny it? What does the Goddess wish to do with her little setup gone sideways?"

Mysarra groaned, "Embrace it."

He heard Mother laughing. He looked at the 3 men still standing there.

He looked at Lirana, "Grab us a booth. Blossom is getting us that merchant room. These are the other ladies. The Paladin met us just outside the door. Everyone else I have bedded. I have not bedded you in a while."

She smiled, "That will change."

He asked her, "Did you get it tightened up after Flar?"

She laughed, "I never thought to ask."

He thought, "She does not need a hymen but tighten her back up for me."

He heard Mother laugh and Myssara laughed, "Yes, I will be talking with her."

Lirana made sucking in sound and she looked at him. "You had her take care of it."

He nodded, "No hymen. Just tightened back up."

She laughed and found them a booth. The corner one cleared out for her. He walked by the 3 men and said sternly, "You did not hear wrong."

He got to the table and the 3 of them were gone. She sighed, "I was fighting off their roaming hands for 2 days."

He smiled, "Nobody was supposed to know who I was here."

She opened her mouth, "Oh shit."

Raven nodded, "I was told to go ahead and embrace it."

Raven sat in the corner of the booth with a nocked arrow in his bow. Blossom sat on the end, "I am getting questioned left and right about you now."

Raven looked at her, "Just tell them to talk to me."

She chuckled, "I did."

Raven looked at the bartender, "I would like drinks for all of us midday meals plus an extra, a small cup with uncooked meat in it and another cup with water. Bring me 6 meads and the ladies whatever they want to drink."

He nodded, The food arrived. He looked at them, "The extra meal is for me. Something tells me I am going to need the energy."

The serving girl looked at him, "What do you want me to do with the meat and water?"

He looked at her, "Set it on the edge of the table. Closest to the bar."

She set it down and he summoned his raven on the edge of the cup. "Eat my friend. I will take another round over here, 6 more meads!"

Everyone stared at the Raven and the girl finally made it to the bar and the barkeeper jumped into action. She brought over the drinks and the bird finished eating. He looked at her, "Take the empty cup but leave his water."

He thought to the bird, "Find a perch above the back of the bar and alert to any danger. Stay close."

The bird flew over and found a space between some bottles.

The girl looked at Raven, "You are really the Raven?"

He looked at her, "Yes, I am THE Raven you have been hearing so much about."