Void and the Seven Deadly Sins

Staring down at the juvenile orc tangled in bedsheets atop a stained straw mattress, Void began mentally cataloguing the youngling's symptoms.

Sweating: a clear sign of fever. Shivering too, despite burning up. Lips cracked by dehydration. A coarse bandage–discolored from a weeping wound–wrapped one scrawny calf. Likely the source of infection.

“What happened here?” He asked the towering block of gnarled tusks and green-skinned muscle who was monitoring him with undisguised suspicion.

The patient’s father had the bulk of three human warriors–heck, he looked like he’d eaten the aforementioned warriors. Large, even for one of his species, the looming orc would have intimidated a seasoned member of the Queensguard with his scarred visage, unruly mane of midnight hair, and bone jewelry. His boiled leather jerkin creaked as he crossed tree trunk arms over an equally trunklike chest.

“Dog bite. Played with mutts in the street. Got rough. Got bit.” He doled out words as though they were gems to be hoarded. Never taking his beady black eyes off Void. “Dog dead. You heal.”

Those last words came out as a demand rather than a request.

Despite being two heads shorter and significantly leaner than the belligerent orc, Void wasn’t concerned. Very little could threaten him, overgrown thugs least of all.

“Where’s the beast now?” He asked, hovering a hand above the wounded limb and expanding his senses.

“Soup pot.”

A shame. Examining the animal would have provided insight. But soup was soup in a bustling city such as this, and citizens of the Abyssal Alliance weren’t picky about their meat.

Closing his eyes, Void allowed the boundless emptiness in his core to brush the sick child, only the barest touch, enough to gain insight into the affliction plaguing him.

Infection and disease. The mouth-foaming sickness. A fatal rot that attacked the victim’s internal organs.

Void could sense the malady, virulently spreading with deadly intent. He concentrated, isolating every minuscule particle and speck of the disease, preparing to feed it to the bottomless chasm within himself when the orc spoke again.

“You mage, human? Don’t look like mage. Too skinny.”

“I’m not a magic user.” Void sighed, perturbed by the interruption. “My method of healing is unique. It doesn’t require stored mana.”

“Why trust you then? Mage companion has much magic.” The brute groped the air over his chest before squeezing an imaginary backside. “Huge tits. Fat ass. More power.”

Void’s so-called ‘mage companion’ stood unobtrusively to one side, observing the proceedings with a neutral expression, hands demurely clasped in front of her waist.

Eleanor did indeed possess the exceedingly grandiose feminine assets that denoted a powerful female spellcaster. The **** swell of her bust, butressed hips, and hugely expansive rear on an otherwise athletic frame were tell-tale signs of a woman storing an impressive amount of mana in her breathtaking body.

A body which was presently attired in form-fitting adventurer’s armour made from shiny black leather, criss-crossed with straps, buckles, and small pouches which concealed some nasty surprises. A wicked blade was slung on her back, the hilt poking above one shoulder. Her snowy white hair was tied in a high bun, out of the way.

Eleanor looked more like a shadowy assassin–sheathed in an outfit that clung and glistened like dark oil–than the devoted servant she truly was.

All those supple, hyper-voluptuous curves so boldly on display never failed to distract Void. The ghost of a smirk quirked the corners of her ruby lips, telling him she knew exactly what effect she was having.

“Power comes in different shapes and sizes.” He grumbled, turning back to the matter at hand. “My presence here is testament to that fact. The local shamans couldn’t heal your son–”

“Not mine.” The imposing orc spat. “Sister’s runt.”

“–Your nephew,” Void amended smoothly, “so you sought me out. A foreign healer with no sign of magic but a reputation for curing the impossible.”

“What is point?”

“My point is this. Your posturing means nothing to me. I have no status in this forsaken queendom beyond the coin in my purse and my healing abilities. Now step back and let me work if you care for the child.”

He squared up to the hulking green goliath, meeting its piggish glare with a disinterested air.

“You **** to coin, like whore. Humans in Abyssal lands no good. Always trouble.”

“Gold is gold, no matter who pays the bill.” Void stated emphatically. “We’re not all bad. Watch closely.”

Once again extending his power into the feverish youngling, he focused on the pervasive sickness, his power touching the innumerable pinpricks of infection, and, with a thought, subsumed them into his nullifying core.

There was no incantation or weaving of sigils, zero sparkly light effects, or deafening crack of reality being reordered. The sickness was simply there in one moment, then gone in a fraction of a heartbeat.

It was done.

The fever broke instantly. With basic care, the juvenile would recover. Now the real work began. Void rolled up his sleeves.

Time to put on a show and get paid.

The tavern door swung shut behind them with a dull, wet thud. The timber was swollen with decades of spilled beer and splashed mud, the hinges groaning. Void led Eleanor out into the bustling thoroughfare, where she drew in the pungent air, thick with spices, wood-smoke, and animal dung.

That last odor was questionable. In a place like this, she wouldn’t be shocked to discover the citizens shitting in the gutters.

The streets of Gharath-Dur never truly slept. Even now, in the lull between afternoon and dusk, the city roiled with activity like a kicked ant mound.

A one-eyed goblin costermonger hawked his roasted beetle kebabs, the iron grill crackling with a fire enchantment that occasionally misfired, scorching holes in his tunic. A troop of harpy couriers soared overhead, scrolls clutched in talons, squawking furiously at each other as they dipped and wove between towers of obsidian and bronze.

At ground level, chaos ruled.

A tide of species and classes moved in eddies—orcish butchers in blood-slick aprons, robed naga scholars whispering among themselves, goblin children darting beneath wagon wheels. The gutters overflowed with rainwater and waste, mixing into a rainbow sheen that shimmered with ambient magic.

And cutting through it all like a blade through fog, stalked Void.

Eleanor followed a pace behind, as always. Her soft calfskin boots dodged mud puddles, and her presence was unmistakable—a mature, stately beauty who couldn’t avoid swaying and jiggling with every step. She ignored the hungry stares of passing merchants and mercenaries. Not because she didn’t notice them, but because Void didn’t.

Void moved through the crowd with unerring certainty, never brushing a shoulder, never sparing a glance at the dizzying parade of life around him.

“He appeared impressed, master.” She remarked when they paused at a busy intersection. “Though his gratitude was grudging. His nephew would have perished if not for your intervention.”

“The child lives, and he paid. That’s enough for me.” He muttered, watching the traffic stream by. “I can’t imagine we’ll lack for clients in this mess. Just look at the state of affairs around here.”

Laboring lizardfolk slaves ferried a mana-bloated human male on an ornately decorated palanquin. The mage, bedecked in expensive silks and glittering gemstones, appeared so corpulent he probably couldn’t walk unassisted. Layers of magic-suffused blubber connected his flapping jowls to a grotesque torso of gelatinous composition, obscuring any hint of a neck.

“That’s Sorcerer Bartimus,” a nearby kobold whispered to their friend. “My Da reckons he’s capable of casting high magus-level spells, him bein’ so fat and all.”

Eleanor guessed this Bartimus would be one of the many unscrupulous spellcasters who abandoned the stuffy strictures of the northern Queendoms to pursue darker arts in the Abyssal Alliance.

“I believe you are correct, master.”

Succubi whores lounged on wrought-iron balconies. Their overly buxom, red-skinned figures were barely covered by wispy lingerie. The horned demoness’ infernal allure was enhanced by their innate illusion magic, catcalling and winking eyes that shimmered like amethysts.

“Heya, cutie! Looking for a good time?” Shouted a particularly top-heavy specimen spilling out of an undersized corset and thong. Eleanor winced, but Void kept walking. “My sisters and I wouldn’t mind sharing a hunky human like you. Special discount. How ‘bout it?”

That earned not even a twitch from his unreadable eyes. His dark cloak flared with each purposeful step, a stark contrast to the glitz and grime of Gharath-Dur. He was a ghost among beasts and monsters, a shadow with purpose.

Eleanor admired him quietly, as she always did. In a city so loud, Void’s silence was a form of strength.

“Most men would preen,” she murmured under her breath, smiling faintly. “Not him. Not my master.”

She could still feel the moment the child's fevered body stopped convulsing, eyes fluttering open with a clarity that was almost divine. An illness that had baffled shamans and apothecaries alike had vanished under Void’s hand in a blink. But it was never really his hand, was it?

No. It was him. That space within. That bottomless, invisible Null into which he poured the world's pain.

The rest was a performance for the onlookers. The whispered incantations, the pressing of palms, the wafting of incense—it was theatre. Giving the audience what they expected to see.

Hiding her beloved master’s true power.

What mattered was what lay beneath. Void could strip maladies from a body. He could pull rot from deep wounds, poison from blood, curses from spirit. Not pushing healing into the world, but taking the damage into himself, swallowing it down into that silent, hidden place within his core.

That power was deeper than mere magic.

To her, it was sacred.

Dangerous.

Eleanor’s gaze lingered on his back. Broad, steady. Noble, though he’d cast away the title that once marked him so. She had watched him walk away from estates and servants, from coin and comfort. She’d followed him when no one else dared to. It was not duty that compelled her—it was something older. Something purer.

Devotion, yes. But not the kind that flowered in springtime or sparkled in poetry. Hers was devotion like granite—unmoving, ancient, and shaped by fire.

That, and a raw desire for the much younger man. A fiery lust for his heroic physique and panty-melting good looks. She knew what lurked beneath those dark, brooding eyes and how to incite it to acts of carnal abandon.

But then, lust was ever the poisoned chalice from which she supped.

A mild burning sensation above her pelvis served as both warning and reminder of that fact.

Certain… observances had to be honored. Rituals fulfilled. The unholy blessing which extended her human lifespan–granting the vigor and fairness of youth–came at a cost.

“Are you well, master?” She inquired innocently, stepping up to take his arm, pressing it against her mountainous chest. “This morning has been taxing. I worry you might overexert yourself. Please, let us return to our lodgings, where you may take nourishment and rest. There, I can tend to your recuperation… in private.”

“Recuperation, huh?” Void chuckled quietly, playfully bumping her hip. “Is that what we’re calling it today? Alright. I have mana to feed you.”

Suddenly flushed, she loosened the clasp at her collar as they passed a drunken troll pissing against a wall scrawled with infernal graffiti. He snarled something in his guttural dialect but quickly looked away when Void’s shadow fell over him.

Oh, yes, Eleanor thought. He could do more than heal. Much more.

And someday, very soon, she feared he would have to.

Hello, Dearest Reader. This is the start of another commission, which is far more ambitious than my usual silly schlock. It's got world-building, politics, a magic system (if loosely defined), multiple species, special abilities, and more besides! Have I bitten off more than I can chew? You tell me. Anyway, I'm excited to post this one, feeling happy with how the first instalment turned out. If you like it and can't wait to read all 11k words of the first part, join my Patreon for early access via my members-only Discord. Otherwise, please let me know your thoughts. Cheers and happy reading!