Chapter 459: Midflight Ruminations

Two days after the attack on Cold Brook and the Behemoth was carrying Jadis and the rest of Fortune’s Favored back to Eldingholt. Along with one additional passenger.

“This is unbelievable,” Vera breathed out in a mix of excitement and wonder. “I can’t believe we’re actually flying right now. Do you travel like this all the time?”

“Not really,” Thea replied to her mother’s question with a loving smile. “We, ah, only just s—started to fly like this, um, last w—week.”

“Well, it’s amazing,” Vera said with a delighted laugh as she watched a flock of birds pass by the right side of the airship. “I never would have imagined such wonders. Sabina, you are amazing!”

“Thank you!” Sabina called out distractedly from the back of the wagon compartment where she was sketching out a new enchantment idea. “It was Jadis’ idea, though, so you should be saying she’s amazing because she is!”

“I just gave Sabby the idea,” Jay said quietly to Vera when she looked back at her. “She did all the actual work.”

“Well, you’re still amazing,” Vera said with a smile before looking at her daughter. “And I’m glad you and my Thea found each other.”

“Ah, mom…” Thea blushed in response to her mother’s words.

“No hugging when I’m between you two, please,” Aila cleared her throat. “I’m driving this wonder.”

Vera laughed, then leaned over and gave Aila a kiss on the cheek.

“I’m glad Thea found you, too.”

While Vera continued to find motherly ways to embarrass both her daughter and… sort of daughter in law? Jadis wasn’t so sure about how that familial relationship was supposed to be addressed. In any case, she took the quiet time the trip in the airship afforded her to go over what her immediate next steps would be once they arrived back in the capital. Such thoughts naturally had her mind going over what had led her to this point over the past couple of days.

All the surviving villagers had been safely escorted from Cold Brook to Falk’s Reach where Count Falk, the local lord, resided. The count had been, to Jadis’ surprise, an extremely competent and confident man who had made no fuss about immediately finding quarters for all of the villagers to live in for the duration. He had even opened up his own mansion to house some of the villagers when room ran out elsewhere in the small town. Count Falk had then personally led a company of his soldiers to Cold Brook to assess the situation and search for more Demons.

Jadis had grown so used to idiot nobles that she had never expected to see an actually good leader among their ranks. But, she reminded herself, the empire was vast and had been around for literally thousands of years. Any nation that had survived for so long, regardless of Demonic invasions, had to have some good leaders running the government. It was just her misfortune that she was spending so much time with the bad ones.

When Jadis and her companions had left Falk’s Reach with Vera, she had made an offer to Mayor Gereon that also extended to all of the displaced villagers. If any of them wanted to start a new life in the capital, she would offer free transport for them via the Behemoth. Further, if any were looking for work, they were guaranteed a position in the Fortune’s Favored company. It wasn’t only mercenaries she was looking to hire, after all. The company would soon be focusing heavily on airship production, so the more trustworthy workers she could hire, the better.

No one had taken Jadis up on the offer at the time, but she had promised to return to Falk’s Reach in ten days to check on who might have changed their minds.

Jadis had also extended her offer of employment to Meli, though it had been summarily declined. The Dryad had traveled with her and the villagers all the way to Falk’s Reach, perhaps out of a sense of duty, but she had not stayed for long. As soon as she had seen to it that all the villagers were safe, Meli had left the town to head back to the forest and her grove.

“Are you sure you don’t want to come with us?” Jadis remembered asking the thin Dryad. “Maybe we can help you find a new place for your grove.”

Meli had given her a sad, confused look. Though, after a moment, she had straightened her back and shook her head.

“I… I am not yet done there. I must go back. I… ah. See you later.”

With that, Meli had sprinted off into the farmland and disappeared from sight.

Jadis hoped that they would in fact see each other again. While they had definitely gotten off on the worst foot imaginable, Meli had proven herself to be not only a valuable ally, but a good person. She had been given multiple opportunities to cut her losses and run from danger but had chosen instead to stay and fight. She had even stuck around to help clean up the aftermath, when she most certainly had no obligation to. There were thorns on the Dryad, but they surrounded a kind soul. She didn’t know if or when they would meet again, but Jadis hoped that when they did, she would have some way to return the favor to Meli for all she had done.

Thoughts of Meli caused Jadis’s mind to drift towards Tegwyn. Checking on the man, Syd could see that Teg was still fast asleep in the back of the wagon. While he had put up a strong front for as long as possible, the Dryad had collapsed from exhaustion once all the villagers had been made safe. He had truly exerted himself to the limit in his efforts to protect Vera. Jadis knew that, theoretically, there had to be bad Dryads out in the world somewhere. But so far, she hadn’t met one yet. And Tegwyn was definitely one of the best.

At least Tegwyn’s efforts had come with some reward, Jadis mused. Beyond the obvious aspect of having saved Vera’s life, along with the lives of many other villagers who would have been attacked if he hadn’t drawn the cultists’ attention, Tegwyn had also gained a level from all the fighting. Jadis had never asked Teg how high his CLR was, but he had volunteered the information the previous night spent in Falk’s Reach. His Combined Level Rating was seventy-seven with his latest growth. She had suspected he was already an elite when it came to his level, but it was nice to have the confirmation, as well as his trust.

Tegwyn hadn’t been the only one to level, either. Jadis had levelled up quite a bit, while Thea had also gained a level, as had Eir.

Eir had gained a single level in her Beloved Cleric of Lyssandria class, bringing her total CLR up to thirty-nine. Since the jump had been twenty-seven to twenty-eight, she had received two free attribute points to put wherever she liked. Both points had gone into Eir’s Focus stat, since she was determined to get that attribute to fifty before she put points anywhere else. More magic reserves meant more healing, since her Divine stat was already massive thanks to Jadis.

Thea had gained two levels total, one in her primary class and one in her secondary class. Imperial Soldier had gone from thirty-one to thirty-two, which meant two more free attribute points to distribute. Thea had put both into Resilience, since of her two main defensive stats, it had fallen greatly behind. Shieldsworn Guard had gone from twenty-six to twenty-seven, so she had earned a new skill for that class. The first of her two options had been a decent boost to both her Endurance and her Resilience, Shieldsworn’s Warding.

The passive skill was a good choice, since it was a nice eight-point boost to Thea’s total attributes and would increase two stats that she really needed. The other skill she had been offered was far more niche and was honestly something of a surprise.

Thea had not been trained in mounted combat during her time in the imperial army. However, she had been riding into combat on top of Tegwyn a fair bit as of late. It could even be argued she had been riding on top of Jadis into combat, too. Sort of. Her spear and shield were well-suited to mounted combat, especially since she didn’t have any other shield-wielding allies to join in a shield wall with anymore. While Jadis didn’t expect Thea would be frequently riding on Teg’s back in the future, having a skill that made mounted combat more effective for the guardswoman seemed like a good addition to her arsenal.

Thea had agreed with Jadis’ sentiment, as had everyone else during their late-night skill discussion. So, she had chosen Mounted Melee Combat Mastery I for her new skill. Since that had been her choice, Jadis planned on investigating some options for mounts that Thea might be able to ride in the future. Horses, or even the Stone Crusher Goats were options that might suit the shieldsworn, but since Fortune’s Favored was going to be traveling by airship, a big bulky animal that couldn’t fly wasn’t the best idea. Jadis hoped she might be able to find a flying mount for Thea, though such beasts were rare and in high demand.

She did know a certain Hero who had his own flying mount, though. Jadis figured it was at least worth writing a letter to Wilhelm about. The man could have some advice on where she and Thea might look for such a mount, if nothing else.

There was one other bit of excitement stemming from Thea’s two new levels, of course. Her CLR had reached fifty-nine, which meant she was only a single level away from unlocking her tertiary class. No one could guess what kind of class it might be, but Jadis was betting her influence was going to be at work and Thea was going to get one seriously badass class.

Finally, there was Jadis and her new levels.

Jadis had seen explosive growth from the battle, mostly due to her tertiary class being level one going into the fight. Both Mirror Knight and Perverted Ritualist of D had gained a single level, but Progenitor of the Succubi had gone up by five whole levels. Jadis supposed it was due to all the bonus experience she had gained from slaying high threat Demons, since the class was decidedly not combat oriented and wouldn’t have gained any benefit from all the fighting otherwise.

Perverted Ritualist of D had at first seemed like the easiest level up to deal with. Since it had gone from twenty-seven to twenty-eight, it was just a couple of free attribute points for her to assign. Jadis had almost immediately put them into her Eldritch stat as usual, but had hesitated when she remembered that she still needed more Focus so that she would have enough magic points to cast her Progenitor class’s first spell. Eldritch Blessing of the Progenitor required five hundred magic to cast, and Jadis’ maximum was four hundred and ten. Putting the two points into Focus would help take her in the right direction of getting to the minimum amount of magic reserves she needed to cast the new spell. Besides which, Jadis had been neglecting her Focus stat. Sure, she could always replenish her magic reserves with a little bit of Nephilim Wellspring action, but that wasn’t always an option, especially if she was in the middle of a fight. It wasn’t as though the enemy would just let her take a break in their battle to get a drink of her own cum from a canteen. Gaining a bigger reserve of magic would mean more spells cast before she needed replenishment. Jadis didn’t have that many spells to cast in battle, so it wasn’t a huge concern, but she didn’t think that situation would go on forever. Her combat style relied predominantly on brute force, but more and more of her options were leaning towards casting spells the higher her level went, especially with her tertiary class. Jadis wanted to actually be able to cast those spells when she needed them, even if they weren’t the first tool she reached for in her toolbox.

The decision of whether or not to put her two free points into Eldritch of Focus wasn’t just hers, though. Putting points into Eldritch affected all of her lovers just as much as her, since two points in her most important attribute was the equivalent of one point in all of their most important attributes. Jadis couldn’t just take that potential for growth away from them, not without some discussion at least.

In the end, the others had come to the agreement that Focus was the best option for Jadis to take, at least for the moment. None of them wanted to hamstring Jadis’ Progenitor class, especially since the spell was something that would have direct impact on her children. Besides which, as Aila had pointed out, it was better to put the relatively small increases to her stats that came from free attribute points into Focus rather than using options like passive skills to get her to the number she needed. If she received the choice between a passive that increased her Focus or something better, she wouldn’t feel bad about missing her chance to increase her magic reserves if she was already increasing them via her free stat point allocation.

Of course, if she got a really amazing passive skill that increased her Focus, she’d just take that. But since that wasn’t on the list of new skills available to her at the moment, such a choice would have to wait for another day.

With consensus achieved, Jadis put the two points into Focus, bringing it up from eleven to thirteen and giving her twenty more magic reserve points to add to her pool.

Mirror Knight had reached an odd level, thirty-five, so Jadis had received two new skills to choose from. Both were excellent options and she had a hard time deciding which one to take, even after a long discussion with her companions.

The main point of contention when it came to Crack the Glass was whether or not the weak point could be hit by the same body to trigger Mirrored Strikes or not. Ordinarily, Jadis needed to use at least two of her selves to trigger the effects of the ability. However, since the spell was creating a weak spot, Jadis was leaning towards the idea that the spell would allow her to hit the same spot multiple times with just one of her selves and still trigger the Mirrored Strikes effect. Both Aila and Sorcha argued that the wording was just ambiguous enough that she couldn’t rely on that idea being the case, but even if it wasn’t, Jadis still considered the spell to be a great option. Guaranteeing a weak spot for ten whole seconds was definitely useful, since there had been many situations in the past where Jadis had struck an enemy and not been able to strike a second time with another of her selves within the one second window she normally had. The only downside Jadis saw to the skill was the fact that it required her to hit the same exact spot, not just the target in general. She supposed that would up the difficulty, but it wasn’t that bad a deal in her opinion. Even if she missed and hit the enemy somewhere else on their body and didn’t trigger the targeted Mirrored Strikes, she would still be beating the crap out of the enemy with her obscene Strength.

Having a huge boost to her defenses depending on how low her health got was an obviously beneficial skill. Jadis had to admit that she had a bad habit of getting into situations where her health would be taken down to ridiculously low numbers. A skill that would help her survivability in those situations was nothing to sneeze at. If she had had Knight’s Peril while being roasted by the cinderman in Meli’s grove, she might have taken a lot less damage overall.

Ultimately, Jadis couldn’t deny her nature. Defenses were nice, but she was a first strike kind of lady. She wanted a skill that would enhance her ability to wreak destruction upon her foes. After all, she wouldn’t have to worry about her defenses lasting if the enemy was dead in seconds. She chose Crack the Glass.

Having gained five levels in her tertiary class, Jadis had three free attribute points to allocate as well as four skill options to choose from to fill two available slots. Since it had been part of the discussion for her Ritualist points, Jadis put the three free points into Focus as well, bringing the attribute’s total up to sixteen. Still not enough to cast her Eldritch Blessing spell, but three steps closer. Her skill options had taken more debate to decide on, but they hadn’t been too difficult to choose.

As soon as Jadis had read the Breeding Time skill out loud, Eir had practically begged her to take the skill. Well, actually, Kerr had laughed her ass off for several minutes while Sorcha and Bridget both loudly complained about how utterly ridiculous Jadis’ class skills tended to be. However, as soon as things had quieted down, Eir had asked her to consider taking Breeding Time.

It was an admittedly selfish request. Eir wanted to bear Jadis’ children above all else, so any skill or spell that increased the odds of her getting her wish was a priority to the elf. Not that Eir had phrased things that way. She was too selfless and giving to consciously force her own wants and desires onto anyone else. But that didn’t mean she didn’t harbor those longing feelings deep inside herself.

Jadis took the skill without argument. For everything Eir did for her, she was more than willing to sacrifice an open slot for a skill that would make Eir happy. Besides, knowing when the best time to knock up her lovers sounded like a fun ability to have. Unfortunately, after taking the skill, there was no noticeable difference to Eir that she could see, so Jadis assumed that meant the timing wasn’t right yet. That knowledge wouldn’t stop her from trying for a baby again when they got back to Eldingholt, but it was nice to know they had some means of predicting the best moment for some reproductive lovemaking, rather than the regular kind.

Among the remaining three spells, Jadis quickly eliminated Pregnancy Sense as an option. She didn’t need to have a spell on hand to confirm if her lovers were pregnant. They could always turn to Bertha if needed or find another caster with a similar ability. In fact, Eir was surprised that Jadis got a spell of that nature at all, since it was the kind of magic typically only seen among Divine classes. Likely the nature of Jadis’ Progenitor class was allowing some unusual overlap.

The remaining two options were both great. One was a spell that would guarantee a huge amount of protection for her lovers for a day at a cast, while the other was a massive forty-point boost to her overall stats. The choice was hard, but there were two deciding factors that led Jadis to choose Ardor of the Succubi over Protection of the Progenitor.

The first reason was that Protection of the Progenitor only worked on Jadis’ lovers who were pregnant. She didn’t expect that her lovers would always be carrying her children within their bellies. Pregnancy was a temporary condition, after all, unless they chose to leave their pregnancies on magical pause indefinitely. Jadis didn’t think that was something likely to happen, so that meant the spell would be rendered unusable once her lovers were no longer pregnant. It was a great idea to keep her mates and unborn children safe, but not a practical one.

The second reason was the naming convention of Ardor of the Succubi.

In the past, all the attribute boosting passive skills Jadis had ever seen, either for herself or for her lovers, had always followed the format of “class name” followed by “descriptor” of some kind. Sometimes it was a more generic “category name” like “laborer” or “knight” but it was still the same format. Ardor of the Succubi was not only reversed in its order, but it was also using the name of the new species that Jadis and Alex had created together rather than the class name of Progenitor. The fact that the naming convention had been changed for this one passive skill was like throwing up a huge sign that read “pick me” over it in flashing neon letters.

Jadis wasn’t sure, but her theory was that because the class was a Progenitor class, she wasn’t just getting skill options related to being a “progenitor” per se, but she was actually getting skills that related to the species she had helped bring into the world. She could be wrong, of course, but she had a gut feeling that wasn’t coming from either Lyssandria or D or any other divinities that she was right. If nothing else, she knew that the skills she chose early on affected the ones she got later. If she wanted to see what lay down the path of Succubi-related skills, she needed to take one in order to guide her system towards those kinds of skills. Ardor of the Succubi seemed like a good place to start down that interesting and unexplored road.

Jadis’ reverie was interrupted by the sound of Severina’s voice calling through one of the open panels on the side of the Behemoth.

“We’re nearing Eldingholt,” the Seraphim said as she flew along next to the airship. “I’m going to fly ahead and find a suitable place to land closer to the walls than where we departed. I may find a good place to land inside the city, but don’t pass the walls until you hear back from me.”

“Understood,” Syd said as she leaned her head out the window to let the wind whip through her hair. “Give me a kiss for luck?”

“I’m wearing my helmet,” Severina pointed out.

Jadis could practically see the scowl on Sev’s face through the woman’s visor, which only made her grin wider.

“Then I’ll kiss you!”

Severina said nothing, then flew in slighting closer so that her head was in reach of Syd.

“It’s easier to just let you have your way, isn’t it?”

“Yup!”

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