The Great Wyrm of Imporne

The next morning begins as you've come to expect, a wet feeling around your shaft announcing your head maid's work for the day has started. Still sensitive from the activities of the night before, you give her your cream with a sleepy moan as a knock comes at your door.

"Master? Mistress? The lady wishes to see you now. Please follow me in your true form when you are ready, but do not delay." After giving the lips on your cock a few moments to clean off any last bits of cum, you shift into your daemonic form and Zalreanne morphs her clothes into their more decent state. Outside, another robed and snivelling kobold bows on his hands and knees, head touching the floor at your appearance before he rises and gestures down the hallway you came in from. "Please, follow me. Remember that it is a great honour to be allowed to meet my lady. Do not anger her, or her servants will feel it for days."

The hallway opens up into the rough cave you descended yesterday. A tiny pinprick of light high above is the only indication that it opens to the sky. The kobold butler quickly ushers you through the wide cavern and down the massive tunnel opposite the door you came through. The ground all around is marred with huge grooves and shattered rocks. The unkempt passageway is far more awe-inspiring than the ornate hallways you stayed in, each smashed rock leaving you to contemplate the feats of strength required to carve this tunnel in the living rock.

After a kilometre or so of walking in silence, the huge tunnel widens into a large hemispherical cave. A dull golden glow from piles of treasure dotting the edge of your vision adds to the flickering red torchlight. The sheer scale of the loot becomes apparent as you approach. Painstakingly detailed tapestries hanging from the walls over piles of gold, gems, and objects wrought of the most priceless materials you have—and haven't—heard of. A large, reddish shape looms in the background, and a croaking, guttural sound booms through the cavern as the piles of coin begin to shift. The red glow of the torches grows brighter and brighter until you're **** to raise your hand to save your eyes from the blinding glare. When the flare subsides the crimson shape is gone: soft footsteps approach from where it laid only moments before.

A towering beauty steps into vision around one of the heaps of coins, easily over seven feet tall. She's nearly the spitting image of the statues and clearly related to Ikaria: her eyes are red and her hair is black with red highlights but her body is otherwise quite similar. Unlike her counterpart, the woman in front of you wears a long crimson skirt which drags against the floor, while her upper body is clad only in an ornate crimson bikini top with twisting branches and spirals of gold trim. Golden bangles and armbands adorning each of her two long arms, and her fingers end in sharp crimson nails.

"Greetings, Azazel. I have heard quite the buzz about you recently." Power radiates from her voice. As she speaks, she carefully steps around the treasure that lies haphazardly on the floor, then lounges on a pile of coins not too far away from you. Her presence itself seems to weigh down on you, and you instinctively sink into a deep bow.

"My lady Prometheia, I presume."

"You presume correctly, daemon." She gives the slightest nod. "And who is this?"

"I am called Zalreanne, my lady." The maid next to you sinks into a deep curtsy.

"Azazel's bedwarmer, I assume?"

"One of several," the lavender elf breaks into an uncharacteristic blush at your comment, although she nods in affirmation.

"Is she trained to attend to the fairer sex as well?" The dragon uncrosses her legs, and Zalreanne glances at you. You nod and pat her butt, so she walks towards the lady of Imporne, sensually swaying her hips while her outfit reverts into its indecent form. "Mmm, I can see you have some taste. Come, girl, have a seat on my lap." The dark elf's tall form looks tiny in the dragon woman's lap, and she quickly loses her composure as the clawed hands wander over her body, teasing her with expert skill. "Very nice. Now, as I was saying, my scouts tell me you have been quite busy lately. Not only have you been rising in the ranks at an unusual pace, but apparently you just defeated a lich who intended to usurp my throne?"

"It was my pleasure to be of assistance, my lady" You sink into another bow and speak in your most diplomatic tone.

She snorts. "Spare me the sycophantic half-truths. I am under no illusion that you did it for my benefit. I value honesty—if your kind is even capable of it. How did you manage to best a foe much stronger than yourself? And how did you manage to destroy him forever? So far as I know, it is rare indeed for monsters to vanish from the world permanently."

"Fine. Yeah, I killed the lich after he invaded my dungeon for refusing to work for him. I had a cursed necklace which cancelled magic and tricked him into wearing it."

"Oh?" The dragoness raised an eyebrow while she toys with the elf maid's modest assets. "A powerful artifact indeed. Where is it now?"

"Still in my dungeon, but its magic is essentially spent from containing the lich."

"And this artifact was capable of destroying him entirely?" Her eyes seem skeptical of this.

"No, that was me. I can convert certain things into pure mana, and it turns out if you bind your soul in a phylactery it's **** to that sort of thing."

"Interesting. Well, you seem to be resourceful and skilled, and no doubt will rise quickly through the ranks if I let you be. Tell me, why should I not put your little flame out—" every torch in the vicinity goes dark, the cavern now pitch black "—and spare myself the future trouble?" The darkness lingers for a moment, only Zal's soft moans penetrating the gloom, until the torches light once again.

"If you wanted to do that, you wouldn't have spent all this effort bringing me down here and meeting me. You would've just gone down to my dungeon and taken it over."

"Oh? Perhaps that is true. Then why did I not do so?" She lifts up the maid and places her on her feet, then puts her hands on the dark elf's shoulders. "Now pet, it's your turn to attend me." The ivory-haired ex-adventurer crawls under the dragon queen's long skirt, and Prometheia's face flushes slightly as the maid begins her duty.

"If I had to guess, partly because you're bored and I'm not a threat to you, and partly because you need me for something."

The tall woman grins and leans back, coins trickling down the heap of treasure as she does. "Indeed. Events are in motion which I cannot stop, but wish to alter. I require an outside actor, and you are the most suitable one I know, for several reasons." She closes her eyes for a second and enjoys the attentions of the elven maid.

"Say, was your friend the type to trick or betray people?" You close your eyes and mentally ask the necklace while the dragoness lets the pause hang in the air.

Insulted and indignant. "Romie was one of the most straightforward and honest people I knew! She was one of the few people I always trusted. Now go away, I was having a grand time in here before you interrupted me to insult my friend."

"Oh, did you not get enough sleep?" Prometheia's amused voice brings you back to the world. "How rude." Her wide smile and sarcastic tone belie her statement.

"Sorry, I just—" she raises an eyebrow and you gulp, remembering what she said earlier. "To be honest, this necklace of mine used to be the lich's phylactery, and it still contains a soul, someone I can talk to and ask for advice."

"You kept the lich trapped in limbo in a mana crystal? Interesting..." She strokes her chin as she ponders the possibility.

"It isn't the lich: he's long gone. To be honest, I have no idea who she is, although she claims to know you from long ago."

"Say, there is no way that... Athy? Would you mind terribly if I borrowed the necklace for a moment?"

"No offence, my lady, but if I took this off I doubt I'd ever get it back." The dragoness smirks.

"Well, you are not stupid, I can see that much. Very well, for your honesty you may keep the necklace. I suspect the woman trapped within the crystal is none other than Aethane, an old fae and friend of mine who disappeared long ago. There were rumours that she was trapped by a powerful mage, although they were always very vague. Tell her I said hi at least. Unfortunately I have no cure for her condition." You close your eyes to start focusing. "Tell her later, that is." Her annoyed voice snaps you back to reality. "Let us finish our conference first."

"Fine: you said you needed me for something? What can I do that someone as powerful as you can't?"

"Spare me the flattery. You can keep a somewhat low profile, something I am afraid is no longer in my capabilities. Tell me, what is the highest level adventurer you have ever met?"

"I'm not really sure—level forty-something I think, but some of the adventurers I met in my early days just had ???s so I don't know for sure what level they were."

"Level forty-something sounds right. Am I correct in guessing that you have never met an adventurer beyond level fifty?" You nod. "Well, needless to say that is not an accident. Adventurers beyond that level are incredibly rare, although they do exist. Most are not allowed to advance beyond level fifty: I believe they refer to it as a 'level cap.'"

"Okay, and?"

"And, while rare, it is possible for adventurers to pass once they do two things. First, they must acquire a Radiant Soul, an incredibly rare item. Second, they must undergo Synthesis." The way she pronounces that last word indicates it has some special meaning, but you simply raise your eyebrow in confusion. "You are unfamiliar with the term? I can assure you that you understand the concept, based on the wonderful specimen between my legs right now. Yes, I know about your abilities, and it's part of why I brought you here."

"Okay, so adventurers get some kind of super-rare rock and make a contract with me or something of the sort. So what?"

"Unfortunately, once they acquire the Radiant Soul, adventurers tend to go on a sort of rampage. I do not fully understand the process or what comes next. A Soul is rumoured to be in the region and the powers are gathering. I rather like the relative peace around Imporne, and have no intention of letting this damage it any more than it must. However, adventurers usually require a sponsor among our kind to succeed—typically due to the required Synthesis—and I am... indisposed, due to some of my rivals. I was hoping you would find an adventurer and help her claim the Soul."

"Her?" You smirk and raise an eyebrow.

"Please, daemon. This may be the first time we met, but I am not stupid. In any case, make sure it is someone you can control, lest they betray you once they acquire what they are looking for."

"And why should I care about some adventurers doing adventurer things and killing people? It isn't like I've never had my dungeon raided before."

"You have reached Elite Boss, correct?" You nod. "Then only beings above level fifty can claim your dungeon?" Another nod. "Well, remember that the only way for adventurers to reach that level is to acquire a Soul, and whatever they do once they have one tends to involve a lot of monsters permanently going missing. If you enjoy your continued existence you would be doing yourself a favour by intervening." She pauses to moan a bit and pat the lump moving under her skirt. "Besides, I am not asking that you do this purely out of the goodness or your heart, allegiance to me, or fear of the future. IKARIA!" Her voice booms through the cavern, no doubt heard by everyone in the dungeon and perhaps even some beyond.