Dark Elves III

I was not expecting things to go the way they have right now… wow. There's no way, no way I'm getting an entire race of elves to join my empire… this is a farce… has to be… way too easy…

They seemed to grudgingly agree, not really sure what to expect other than what was told and what their king had seen in the little tablet before his eyes. "Rescue my daughter, and… I… will swear our people to your empire. Show us that you believe our lives are worth protecting." That made Selene raise an eyebrow and smirk a little. It actually worked. This seemed too good to be true. The only thing she needed to do was get a few strike teams split from Bryn's forces to head a little southwest to search the remains of the forest.

"Done." Selene snapped her fingers as ornithopters fanned out just outside the forest and one spy satellite started scanning the area, checking for any slaver camps that could still be nearby. Three showed up on her Hud. One of them had a tent that had thermal scans of chained up captives ready to be sold… to an overtaken city. "Bryn, I'm peeling away a few teams from your army for something, okay? They'll be back in a little bit after a special mission" she called over coms.

"Oh, don't worry about it. We have most of the city now beyond a few hold outs that have no idea we can break through their barricades. Sorry to say… we've wiped out a good amount of the citizens here…" Brynhildr responded.

"How many? Wasn't the population close to two hundred fifty thousand?" Selene asked while king Weren wondered why she was silent but didn't question her.

"Yes… that's what we thought it was… and my army has wiped out… around half of that…" Bryn sighed out. The empress didn't want to show it to anyone near her, but that damned near made the city deserted given the other half might have been just slaves.

"And I take it the remainder were either slaves or people who willingly surrendered, or were not slavers?"

"That's correct. Selene… look, I know I shouldn't say this but-"

"But you are anyways, and I don't really want you to hold back regardless. You're going to tell me the city won't survive this."

"Yes. Even if we hadn't annihilated half the population, ruining the main source of trade here will make the economy here collapse. There's nothing to keep it going from what the Captains you provided me with have informed. I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I understand, you did a great job. We'll find homes for the refugees, maybe work out something else for Paldos City to somehow rise from the ashes later on. We're clearing out a disease right now, the wound has to heal after you did all that work." Bryn sighed in relief and nodded on the other side, though the dev didn't see it.

"Alright, we'll continue on, should be done with the incursion within the hour."

"Good. Then you'll be back at the castle to train your new Pegasus. See you then." The coms line ended as she re-tasked three fire teams into a QRF and sent them to the slaver camps that did not have a decent size of captives inside. The last one they would head in and handle themselves, give Morlan and Elsei a chance at some decent exercise. The empress stood up and motioned for her team to start leaving, with the king confused.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"To go get your daughter back. Shouldn't take much time." The guards all wondered if the whole plan was for the empress to get her back with just her team. They were right. None of them had seen what the military models had done to Paldos City like the king had. The Honor Guard models were going to get their chance to finally fight.

"Is this wise? Shouldn't we get… more soldiers? I mean… an empress walking into a slaver camp…" Morlan asked.

"Nope, I'm not here to be babysit. We can handle this. You scared?" Selene turned on her heel and walked backwards toward the helibot waiting for them, a playful smirk on her mouth and a glint in her eyes. He let out a small chuckle. Hrist was happy to get the chance to end the lives of the slavers.

"Not at all. I'm just saying… there are probably a lot of them." The Valkyrja cracked her knuckles as they got into the helibot, not even saying a word.

Twenty Minutes Later

A slaver dumped out a pot of his excrement from the small tent he had and stretched his back. He had some fun with one of the new captives last night, with no real energy to do much other than sleep. It wasn't as if they didn't do a lot a few days ago, cutting rope to the right size and setting up traps. These dark elves were so stupid, with the traps hidden with a little magic that their druidic abilities couldn't detect. Tier magic was a wonder to him, the magician in the camp earning his pay many times over. A little illusory magic and suddenly they had the princess of the knife ears in their pocket!

Two of his friends were sitting playing cards near a campfire, boiling some stew. He could see through the flaps of the large tent all of the soon to be slaves chained to the massive poll in the middle holding it up, all looking a little haggard. The captives were asleep or had dull looking eyes, broken by being held for sale for longer than the newest group to be added into the mix. The only one not allowed to be touched was the princess, given her virginity would sell for a very high price.

He looked at one of them, licking his lips, before the men at the campfire all stood up and heard something coming their way. "What's that?" one asked with a slurred accent.

"Dunno. Grab your blades boys." They all slowly got prepared as over in the distance three humans walked towards them with a high elf, their weapons out. At the front of them was a woman in golden armor and long red hair, her small entourage seeming pitiful. "Lookie here! We got ourselves some adventurers! This one is a pretty looker. Hey there sweetheart! How about you have a little go with-"

Silence and shock from the remainder of slavers as she was suddenly past him, her sword out and his head missing from his neck. The speed in which she moved was incredible, crossing close to one hundred meters in less than a second.

Morlan charged forward, moving as fast as he could while Elsei was quite a bit faster, her elven agility giving her a leg up as the Honor Guard came up from behind. The mechanical soldiers were ordered to circle around, providing a complete pincer maneuver. The kidnapping bastards would never stand a chance. The ex-hero of Artinia swept the legs out from one slaver and backhanded another with his shield, kicking a third into the campfire as he screamed from the heat and boiling stew. Elsei slammed her halberd through the chest of one of the men, lifting him up surprisingly and bringing the body down on one of his friends, using the weight to add even more damage. Despite being lithe and agile, she wasn't exactly weak and able to use their mass against them.

The Honor Guard were cleaning up, no damage incurred of any kind as they just caught slavers running and screaming for their lives. It was divine justice being laid down upon their heads by all of eight beings against close to two thousand. One slaver had his chest blown out the other side by a cannon shot by one of the Mediums, with the soldier continuing on as if it was just another day protecting its empress. Not one of the men would live to see another sunrise. There was a view of three men flying into the air by Hrist going through the group to reach another behind the tents, knocking them around like bowling pins.

While Morlan and Elsei had gotten close to thirty kills, both were absolutely amazed at what Selene and Hrist were doing, practically handling the whole place by themselves. The warrior had never really seen the empress go all out, hiding behind that identity of Ilana when he had met her. The speed, the strength of her hits… she couldn't be human, she had to be another Valkyrja. A firebomb was thrown at Hrist, who completely ignored it and stomped through the flames looking like death itself coming for the attacker. Soon the entire camp was silent, with almost none left alive to Elsei's contentment. At one point Selene used {Molecular Reformation} on a group of slavers stupid enough to not run, trying to ambush her and failing miserably.

The tent flaps were fully pushed open by the royal protection squad as the small group entered, breaking chains of the soon to be slaves and waited for the helibot to land. Once the captives were freed and slowly led onto the transport, they quickly headed back to the grand tree to drop them off. Selene cast a [Grand Heal] to bring them all back to full health, mending any and all wounds. None of them wanted to speak to the humans, some scowling at them as they had just transferred from one slaver group to another in their eyes.

The princess seemed to have a cold stare at the empress, her silver eyes always watching her while they flew, with half of her right eye covered by her long white hair. A very elaborate tiara sat on her forehead, damaged it seemed from a previous fight in capturing her. Her dress was still mostly undamaged, though it looked like a toga with a bikini top to cover the one breast that the dress didn't keep hidden, the whole ensemble being asymmetrical in design. Why she wore that into a fight, or ambush in this case, was beyond Selene.

What they didn't expect was to be brought back to the waiting arms of their people, happy that they could somehow make it back to see their loved ones. Weren hugged his daughter close, still looking at the empress every few seconds. "Thank you… I… I am a man of my word, though it pains me to say we are now a part of your empire." Silara pulled away from him, confused as to what he had just said. He started to explain things to her as Selene just stood there and cleared her throat.

"I'll come by in a few days to work out the laws and requirements to be integrated into my empire as well as signing the official documents. Don't worry, just the standard stuff of thou shalt not kill, no stealing, etc. etc. I'll leave you to focus on receiving your daughter right now, deal with explaining to your people the changes and assuage their fears. Welcome to the Clockwork Empire Weren. I promise it isn't as bad as you think." Silara started to argue with her father as he tried to calm her down, however her eyes kept swapping between the king and Morlan as they tried to turn around and leave.

"We surrendered to the humans? The filthy low born?" Silara said out loud as she stared at the backs of the group.

"Silara! Please! These aren't the same humans we've been fighting!" Weren tried to explain to her as Selene turned back around and looked at the princess. She seemed extremely arrogant, even with being rescued. "Don't act that way!"

"Why shouldn't I? They'll just act the same way to us in kind." The empress slowly walked back with annoyance but held her tongue and picked her words carefully.

"I believe you have a misunderstanding of who we are. You're currently speaking to the ruler of the empire that sent an army to wipe out the slaver city that was kidnapping your people and sell them int labor or worse. I would suggest that you at least try and keep an open mind about us, given the fact your father was so quick to join your forest into my borders."

"Hmph." Selene sighed and brought a hand up to her forehead, shaking her head slightly.

"I understand you have a hatred for humans due to the way they've treated you but acting this way towards everyone shows very little experience on your part about what lies beyond your forest. The world is a lot larger than you think it is, acting as if every human out there is the same shows you just follow stereotypes and not notice that everyone is different, probably even goblins and orcs even."

Silara seemed to glare at her, before her eyes glanced back at her father who nodded furiously. "You aren't going to treat us like second class citizens?" she asked calmly.

"I don't believe we have that classification in my empire to be exact, so no, we aren't. Even if we did, it would be news to me and promptly eliminated to get rid of entitlement." The princess walked forward a few steps and stood in front of Selene, eyeing her up and down. There was pure silence in the throne room for what seemed like an eternity as the dev simply waited for another slur to come out of her mouth.

"We've never trusted humans, you always go back on your word every time we try."

"That was more likely Artinia, correct? I can guarantee we're quite a bit different. But I take it you won't accept words from just a little human." Selene sighed and looked at her entourage. "I was actually expecting your people to act very much like a word Raima told me never to use. I'm doing my best not to try and insult you."

"What did you think we would act like?" Weren asked behind his daughter.

"Um… like… sadistic mean elves that torture captives and have spikes everywhere, worship some spider god and do evil magic things."

"Oh, Drow." Silara seemed to be quite angry at hearing that word come from her father's lips. "No, those are still around though."

"Those, not they?" Selene asked. Silara and Weren both looked away with anger written on their faces.

"We don't consider them worth calling sapient. They rely more on their guttural instincts and darker emotions than any we have seen… besides Artinia…"

"I see, so that's why you don't like being lumped in with their kind. I'm glad I could be educated in that regard. One step closer, appreciate the information." Silara cocked an eyebrow at the empress, seeming genuinely surprised that a human was listening and trying her best to see them as people, not evil beings that need to be killed. "So, Drow still exist? Hmm… might have to keep an eye out for any odd cave networks… they're hostile towards your kind as well, right?"

"Very much so."

Huh, wait! I remember reading about this somewhere… these dark elves are followers of… what the hell was her name… Eili something… maybe not the same deity now obviously but still… good Drow! I actually found some. But… they must have been at war with Artinia for… sheesh… racism and caution probably run a little deep right now…

Selene checked her clock in her Hud and realized she was pressed for time. "Uh, my apologies, we'll have to get the official documents written up another day, I uh… kind of have a schedule to keep up with right now. Just… well, worry about rebuilding what you can, we'll come back to hash out the details of the annexing. We'll uh… also see about re growing parts of the forest, seems some of it was cut back. Princess, I hope there may be some way to change your mind as well as the rest of your people, there's nothing to be afraid of this time. I know you won't trust in those words, but at least have some hope that there are humans out there that don't act like primitives."

"We'll await your return" Weren said with a slight bow, which still seemed to confuse the hell out of the dev. Silara just looked at her as they walked towards the arched opening to the throne room, still cautious of what had happened. Her people now belonged to the Clockwork Empire, and as far as she was concerned, the dark elves were citizens now. As the group headed out of the grand tree and back to the helibot, Morlan leaned in while the remainder of the dark elves watched them, not yet told what had just transpired. Were all of them like this?

"What just happened?" he asked, completely dumbfounded at the personalities of the dark elves.

"I really don't know. Seriously, I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth here, usually things like that should take months of negotiation I would think. I'm more worried that the people in the empire are going to treat them poorly and further damage relations. I'm going to need to make a very quick announcement, set some guidelines as well, given that everyone is going to think of them as some creature coming from the caves to eat their babies." Both of them looked at Elsei who seemed to still be unimpressed. "Elsei, you said you don't have a problem with dark elves, does that include Drow?"

"That does not include Drow. That was… unexpected. Our kindred that split away and went underground are as you would think they are, vicious and vile. The ones that live above in forests we have no qualms about, despite some objections from the elders of all elves."

"So, the old geezers don't like that the dark elves are being treated with at least some respect?"

"The Drow split from our kind long ago, causing catastrophic damage throughout history. To suddenly allow a faction of them to live above ground, to forget what they did to us and others… some cannot let go of the past, forever having long memories of what they did." The empress thought for a moment.

"Placing the blame on the children of their enemy isn't right. People change, views change."

Evolution probably has changed them from the original Drow to now… that's also why they had some light tan skin tones all the way down to pure obsidian… I doubt all of the dark elves act the same way though, but it did seem like they were at least interested in being more social with the outside world, just hated how humans treated them.

The flight was quick and boring, coming back to the castle and landing without any issue. There was enough time to change into a goth Victorian jacket dress with pants and boots before Selene had to head to the blacksmith guild to speak with Giles about the new forges. Elsei decided to stay behind and was allowed to read in the grand library, with Jeeves making a pot of tea for her. Morlan and Hrist went along to escort the empress through the inner workings that Giles was explaining, with Morlan especially being interested.

"You've had an interest in smithing?" Selene asked him. Giles was curious to see one of the heroes of Artinia enjoying the craft. The warrior smiled and crossed his arms as the guild master watched him.

"I've always held a fascination of the metals and craftsmanship used in providing my equipment to me. Knowing more about it makes me a better soldier, able to take care of it with less effort."

"Hah! It seems you speak like a true Rikter, using that head of yours!" Giles laughed out. Once the showing of the modular forges was finished, they headed to Giles's office, with the door to the storage room open and an apprentice cleaning up some red mess inside. The dev stopped and seemed to cock her head backwards along with her torso pulling back a bit, her legs still coming to a complete stop, so she was slightly off balance; she furrowed her brow as she looked inside. Giles turned around and noticed she was there, his eyes widening in worry.

"Something fall down?" she asked the apprentice. He looked up and almost soiled himself, dropping the mop and jumping an inch. Giles glanced over his shoulder and did a quick double take, his eyes turning into saucers as he flipped around and seemed to waddle quickly towards her.

"U-uh nothing! Nothing happened! Just… just a little mess! No one hurt, no deaths at all lass! Come come, this way!" he blubbered out as he ran to grab the empress's hand and lead her back, one of the very few who were allowed to do that without the honor guard knocking them back. Selene looked at Giles inquisitively as she felt something was off.

"Giles… what happened?" she asked.

"Just a mess, nothing to be concerned with…" She sat down and crossed her arms, staring at him as he laughed nervously. As he sat down at his desk and looked at her, he could tell she was frowning and cocked an eyebrow at his lie, his smile dropping to an open frown of worry. The guild master closed his eyes and called for strength and a miracle from every god he could think of as he explained two different stories, none of which sounded real. She just kept looking at him in silence. Suddenly, as if he couldn't take it anymore, he told her that three of his students had attempted to scry her castle, to see if they couldn't catch her in undress somewhere, all in a mashed-up sentence.

"Ah. So that was why I saw that effect above me. I see…"

"B-but it wasn't anyone else's fault! I swear! We were in no way a part of this! I've already informed all the other apprentices to-" he stammered out as he gestured his hands wildly in front of him, trying to assuage the fear from the empress that everything was under control.

"Easy, easy. So, it was just three of them? No one else connected to it? I did warn everyone with those posters Abby and Stafinson helped write up that no one should use scrying magic without authorization after all. This was why." Selene sighed and covered her face with one hand, closing her eyes and shaking her head softly. "My my, this goes well beyond the kids trying to peek through a window at a woman showering… how the hell did one of them know how to perform scrying magic?" she seemed to ask herself more than anyone else. [Planar Eye] was an 8th tier spell from Yggdrasil, beyond the abilities of anyone here, most certainly for three students. They must have been using a slew of minor magic items to just try and peek at her, which failed.

I'd rather not be fap material when I should have privacy.

"There were bits of some glass all over the ground lass. They might have bought a whole bunch of stuff from some trader just to catch a view of your… unmentionables…" he coughed out as he tried to avert his gaze to some papers on his desk. That told her that the magical item used was something like a crystal ball in some capacity, to allow all three to see what was going on. That seemed like a gross thought… all three of them in the storage room just to catch a glimpse of her naked…

"Well that's it then. I put these security measures in place for a reason after all." The blacksmith looked up from his papers, embarrassed that he had to explain this to her about three of his apprentices being perverts.

"Are you… are you branding them in any way or… will you bring them back to life…?" he asked her tentatively as if she was about to explode in his face.

"What do you mean 'brand' them?" she asked.

"Brand their names as a shamed lineage. The insane king of Artinia did it all the time, ruining the family and making it almost impossible to get any jobs."

"What? Why? No, god no, those were the sons of unknowing parents. That's just… too harsh. That's going overboard. As for resurrection… that depends on if the parents are informed and pay for the act, double the amount in this case to give recompense for their actions." Giles nodded in understanding. He'd send notice of the ill-fated actions that the students had performed, not the full details however, to the families of the three no longer among the living. If they cared, the students would be resurrected… by her directly. She wanted to glare at the apprentices and have a very stern chat with them. "Now, where are the documents to officially get these forges authorized by me."

Giles handed her papers hidden in a desk drawer for her to peruse and verify she was signing off on the modular forges to be bought and sold. How they worked was surprisingly simple, with a cart simply bringing in the required material and the pieces fitting together like an IKEA furniture piece. This could potentially be expanded to the carpentry guild as well for regular furniture, doors… potentially wagons and stagecoaches even. This in turn could potentially move them much closer to future eras far quicker.

The dev signed the documents and pulled out an official seal stamp from her inventory, looking like the main clock positioned in the middle of each town and city in the empire. Some wax and a small press to close the document, the deed was done. "Alright. Ownership of the patents have now been acknowledged, I'm sorry to cut this short but I have to be at the academy in… crap… ten minutes." Giles gave her a quick hug before the group left, Hrist seeming to be a little unhappy as they headed out. In her eyes, the apprentices that had tried to spy on her empress should be left to rot in shallow graves.