Path of Evil Ch. 05 Pt. 01

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Securing a township and building a militia.
2.1k words
4.64
5.9k
5

Part 11 of the 11 part series

Updated 06/07/2023
Created 03/04/2014
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This was inspired by the Path of Evil Module for NWN2—little besides character names and abilities are used.

*****

The story thus far: Thurlith has gotten rid of the village's abusive guardians, which earned him no friends, as the villagers are terrified of what will happen without their guardians. With Jorra...busy recruiting the tavern wench, he turned his attention to the 'leaders' of the village.

The leaders were a motley bunch of old men and women, distinguishable from their colleagues only due to the fact that their hair, what remained of it, was white. They were clustered at the far end of the square, as far away from Thurlith as they could be, without being inside the building whose walls they were clustered against. The tavern keeper was near the front, she knew more, but was less afraid then the others. Perhaps because she was crueler, perhaps because she knew that if he wanted to kill them there was nothing she could do about it.

"Threats."

"What?" One of the older men quavered.

"I was informed that those...individuals...protected this village. What threats did they protect you from?"

"There are things in the woods, but mainly the goblins from under the mountain. Before the warriors came they robbed us blind, kidnapped and sold our people all sorts of things, then the warriors came and we had five years of peace."

"Goblins? You sold yourselves to petty sadists to avoid facing down goblins?" Thurlith asked incredulously. At their blank stares, he realized that, yes, they had, in fact, sold themselves for protection from goblins. "Very well. Where is this mountain? Describe the terrain, the entrances and exits, all the basics."

"The mountain is there." The old man pointed at a hill overlooking the town. "We don't know anything else about it, except that's where they came from and that's where they went."

"Fine. Before I explain what will happen next, I should explain why I'm in charge."

"Because you're strong." The tavern-keeper suggested, attempting, in what she clearly though was a subtle fashion to manipulate him.

"Yes and no. More importantly, because you are subjects of the Lord of the Keep. That is me. I've dealt with the demons, vampires and drow who attempted to claim it and now it is mine, as are you. Therefore I must make you strong as I will not be the lord of weaklings and I must keep you alive, as I will not be the lord of corpses."

"Get your young people together and get your blacksmith to arm them. I want your new militia here at dawn. I'll scout the caverns and we'll eliminate the goblin threat tomorrow." He turned away, ignoring the startled attempts to muster a protest, then he paused. "Oh, and I suggest you give my traveling companion everything she desires and don't...interfere in her...affairs. If you're sensible."

The tavern-keeper said something that sounded suspiciously like 'no shit.' Thurlith did not ask her to repeat herself more audibly. After all, she'd seen Jorra drain a woman to dust, leaving behind nothing but a pile of crappy equipment. Speaking of which, "Feel free to equip one of them with that poor woman's armor and weapons, assuming one of you gathers their nerve sufficiently to go get them."

Thurlith stalked out of the village, his every movement conveying contempt for them, which he did not, in fact feel. He had been weak, but had become strong. His subjects would become strong as well, but for that they needed motivation. Contempt would help them acquire that motivation, as would an example.

Thurlith was no ranger and was city bred and born. But magic could counter for most of his lack of skill, silencing his steps and making him invisible. A quick review of the outside of the hill revealed half a dozen tunnels that he could see. There had to be more he didn't catch, but that wasn't a problem, not with his plan. A muttered spell later and he could see the hundred or so lives in the caves under the hill. The question of who had constructed a network of tunnels in the soft dirt of the hill was an interesting one that might be worthy of some study, but not at this moment. Now he had vermin to exterminate. He would have preferred to recruit them. Unfortunately, that would interfere with his gaining the loyalty of the villagers and their extermination would send the message he wanted to send to those who threatened what was his.

He could have gone back to the village, but Jorra was busy and he wanted to see what she would, and could, do with the tavern wench on her own. Besides he had things to do. A strong hand ripped a branch from a nearby Ash tree, snapped it in half and carved a rune into each one, then poured power into them. They were simple artifacts, but would do for his purposes.

A nap, protected by his wards was sufficient to get him back up to speed. When he woke, he collapsed all but the most traversed entrance. It wasn't complicated, a touch and a word rotted through the supports for three of the entrances and the two natural ones he summoned an earth elemental to deal with, then ordered the elemental to watch the remaining entrance, before he returned to the village at dawn. There were maybe a dozen scrawny (at least by the standards of the villagers, they were still about as big as he was) people waiting in the square, wearing rags and wielding pitchforks that had been turned into spears. Two of them were not scrawny, but rather big, well-fed and wearing clothes that weren't rags, and what parts of the dead warrior's armor they could fit over their larger frames. The woman had the dead woman's sword, the man had a woodsman's axe, but his muscles could probably drive it through plate armor.

They looked like siblings, or maybe lovers, the whole village had a big and blonde look that made it hard to tell family from friend. But those two were the only real volunteers. Everyone else had been press-ganged into this militia. So be it. The slums of Neverwinter had produced thousands of draftees for the city's armies and they had produced him.

"Good enough. Come along." Thurlith said without further ado, turning to lead them away.

They shuffled after him, through what should have been a field, but had become a muddy meadow due to lack of people to make it productive. He took them to the largest entry, the majority of the militia trailing behind him at a difference that balanced their desire to be part of the herd and their desire to remain away from Thurlith. The two true volunteers stuck close. They were braver than their fellows, but not brave enough to attempt to strike up conversation with him. "Form a line on either side of me, be ready to hold if anything comes out. You have spears and reach on anything that comes out."

They were more afraid of him than anything else and so formed up. He noted that the volunteers stuck together, the man on his right, the woman on the man's right. The draftee stuck next to him on the left put too much space between himself and Thurlith to be safe. A hand yanked the scrawny youth into line and the others, reluctantly followed suit. Thurlith tossed one of the branches forward and spoke the activation word. Smoke poured from it like from a bonfire. The other branch he slammed into the ground hard enough to embed a quarter of its length in dirt before speaking the activation word. A relatively gentle breeze sprang up, blowing the wrong way. He twisted the make-shift staff and the wind blew the smoke into the tunnels.

Then he waited in silence. Smoke began to trickle from the hidden entrances, one by one, as it reached them. Thurlith dispatched the earth elemental, which scared the living shit out of his militiamen. One of the volunteers recognized what was happening and, after several minutes hesitation asked for permission to begin fortifying their position. Thurlith smiled and gave her a nod. She snapped orders and the draftees leapt to obey, digging a trench with makeshift tools, cutting and placing stakes, as she and her companion set snares in the surrounding woods, in case any of the goblins tried to flank them.

They did not. Eventually smoke began to billow back out as well, indicating the entire cavern was filled with the choking stuff. Just when Thurlith was beginning to believe that they had either found a way out, or all died without fighting, there was a single rush later in the morning, but the goblins had almost choked to death by the time they reached the entrance from wherever they'd been trying to hide from the smoke. Most of them died before ever reaching Thurlith's line. The rest were stalled by the stakes while his awkward would-be soldiers skewered them. It took no special skill.

Finally he removed the staves and burnt them to ash with a touch, reclaiming their remaining power and carefully not leaving behind anything that might be used to gain a handhold on his power. A few words and he could see that no one under the hill was alive any longer. He told them this and informed them that he would be returning to the village. To his pleasure, the woman who'd asked if they could fortify their position suggested they remain in place until the smoke cleared.

"Of course. Afterwards, clear out the tunnels, loot everything worth having, for the village. Keep weapons and armor for the militia, but everything else will be sold or used. This village is in desperate need of coin and goods. I will not rule over paupers. Watch out for traps. I will not rule over corpses either."

"Yes, sir." She replied, ducking her head awkwardly.

"And start training your people. This is your militia now. I'll provide more support later, but when I finish my business in Narito, I will want to see what you've learned."

"Yes, sir." She wasn't awed, but she was nervous. Good enough.

He headed back to the town, carrying the corpse of the biggest of the goblins. He dumped it in the center of the square and gave a little speech about the success of their valiant militia in defeating the goblin threat, with minor emphasis on his own involvement and major emphasis on the fact that they could have done this at any time, if they'd simply had the will. Then, without a further word, he wandered into the tavern to collect Jorra.

The succubus was still upstairs in the room the tavern-keeper had reluctantly given her. The tavern-keeper who now accosted Thurlith, demanding to know when she would get 'that bitch of a waitress back.' Her fear was mostly gone. She thought him either a noble adventurer, or some madman with a code, requiring him to fight only the mighty, for that was how he proved his strength. He was closer to the latter than he would care to admit, but he was not mad, yet.

"Given that you were going to let them put out her eye, I think you have lost any claim to her you might have had."

"The hell I did! She seduced my husband. And was duly sentenced to my service for the rest of her life for it." The tavern-keeper said, fury in every line of her plump body.

"Fair enough." She began to relax. "I pardon her." He brushed past her.

She actually grabbed his arm in a fit of madness. "You can't—"

Thurlith spun, using her hand as a pivot and caught her by the throat, pulling her in close so he could whisper. "Oh, but I can. I follow the law, but I am the Lord of the Keep, which gives me the power of the pardon, as well as the power of execution. I have shown you one. Would you like to see the other?"

She shuddered and shook her head.

"Good girl. If you would have further revenge, well, you will have to prove yourself worthy of it. Grow strong, in whatever fashion you are able, wealth, influence, knowledge...I think wisdom will elude you, but I have been wrong before. Grow strong and make your case and perhaps I will reconsider. Or not." Thurlith released her and strode past, to the succubus's room.

Thurlith opened the door and saw Jorra, in all her naked, red-skinned glory, though missing her wings, the better to sit in a normal chair, with the tavern wench sitting opposite her, no longer badly abused, in no way injured, in fact, glowing with energy, sat opposite her, equally naked. A table full of half-eaten food filled the space between them, as did intense attraction and latent amusement.

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11 Comments
AnonymousAnonymousalmost 8 years ago
disappointed

I'm a bit disappointed that we don't see more of this story. It really good. Would not mind to see more of this one. Not many driver story's really, especially done like this.

ZeoUnitZeoUnitover 8 years ago
So far so good

Are there any chance you will continue with your story ? It looks really interesting. Really want to see what happened with driver later in the story and how things would go.

Hope you didn't drop the story and stop updating :(

AnonymousAnonymousover 8 years ago
Fuck it the ship is sinking

Like all fires this one burned hot but like all fires this one is now nothing more then cold ash (in simple terms dat shit be dead yoo! find another story to read Literotica community like path of a necromancer)...or ..oor some dope motherfucker make their own version in a similar world with RPG like progressive characters and base progression and hierarchy

AnonymousAnonymousalmost 9 years ago
WTH!?!??!?!

WHY IS IT THAT THERE IS NO MORE UPDATES OF THIS STORY?!?!! IM DYING TO SEE MORE OF THAT DRIDER CAPTAIN!!!!

SO MANY POSSIBILITIES FOR HIM TO USE HER SEX OR NO SEX...

AnonymousAnonymousalmost 9 years ago
any chance for more

are there any chance we would get to see more of this story ??

definitively want to see more of the drider chick in action. 8Q.....

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