Conquest Of The Fallen: Dark Dominions

"GOOD EVENING, CORYNTHIA!"

"YEAH!!!" Students shrieked in zest, stamping so hard the stone rang.

"Welcome," Dr. Shetty continued, "to the 704th Annual Spring Games. We begin this season's event with the quest for glory. A hunt. The rules remain the same. All Arcs shall enter into the Nameless Woods with a single weapon handed out to one of its three champions.

In the woods, they shall face beasts to conquer, puzzles to unravel, and monsters to slay.

Each faction: Raven, Phoenix, Griffin, and Pegasus, must endeavor to secure the pride of the Hunt: the white stag's antlers and plant their flag in its lair. The first candidate to achieve this wins for his or her faction. May Athena guide the hunt. And without much fuss, great Corynthia, LET US WELCOME our first champions.

The winners of the Great Hunt of last season's Games: GRIFFIN ARC, presents its champions: PERCIVAL VAN IMPERIA. . ."

"RARRRGGGHHHHH!"

DUM! DUM! DUM!

The screaming, jumping, and shrieking nearly drowned out Nicara's voice. As the Headmistress announced, the applause seemed to reach even higher with each shouted name. When Dr. Shetty called on Bolta, the entire seating place of the Blue Faction rose up to their feet and chanted like it was Zeus himself before them, and not his daughter.

The twelve champions of the Hunt were given time to stand before their factions and soak as much fame and praise—whatever helped to help them plant that winning fucking flag.

Nicara held out her palm, raised.

And the amphitheater went quiet as a sepulchre.

She brought it down, and the cheers broke like Bolta's fierce blue lightning in the dusk sky.

"Yeah! Fuck 'em other Arcs!"

Chapter Discover:

"Oi! Make us proud."

"Jam our flag up their loser arses!"

Giant viewing screens shimmered high into the air above the sands of the arena, where students could watch the Hunt close-up. The twelve champions walked out to the quest log, the bay for entry into the Nameless Woods. A patch of beautiful, dangerous forest that had been used in the Games as far back as Nicara herself could remember. A mighty voice like a Titan's roared.

"LET THE GREAT HUNT BEGIN!"

The first champion ran forward. Casperus Pickens, eager for glory. Without warning, he slammed right into the wards on the edge of the woods. It sent him plunging back, sailing fifty feet into the air and plunging into a bale of hay, headfirst. And he was bald.

"Ooh!" The crowd fell back in silence.

And then one person cackled. Another stifled a giggle. And then it was a full-blown laughter. The students roared and clutched their stomachs, much to the dismay of those in Raven Arc. Casperus pulled his head out of the dirt and moved back to rejoin the other champions. The first obstacle was the wards.

And he had failed in correctly unveiling it. Bawdy laughter reached up to the twilight sky and the amber beauty of the islandic sunset. Casperus of [Raven Arc] lowered his head. But it didn't stop his other teammates from shooting him a look. Rosa's eyes formed slits. "Really, Casper?

You didn't think it'd be that easy, did you?" The ruckus from the spectators roared higher, and someone on the gold side of the Griffin tossed the bald First Year a half-eaten sausage.

"Sculpture fucker!" The Griffin member cussed, and the amphitheater broke into more laughter.

Clearly no one had forgotten the issue last moon at the Guild, during one of Coach Hanzo Tanaka's training briefs, when the clean-shaven young man had been caught fondling the ripe alabaster tits of Catharyn the Great's statue. In his defense, the sculpt of the faerie Silver Knight was far sexier than the real woman warrior might've been. Or perhaps, it was the real deal.

This was just before the sewer pipes that burst out of the ground and Casperus was swallowed by the basilisk.

"Perv!"

"Baldie!"

Casperus knew they didn't mean it. But he was amped back up when Israfel, the [Hellion] who'd saved him from being sludge in a serpent's throat, gave him a nod to steer his courage. Casperus's closest teammate, Ravenna admitted to him his slight and the part he must play if they were to lead. "I'm sorry Casper, but you can't lead our Arc into the woods. Let Rosamunde run point on this.

You are half-wraith, aren't you? I'm sure there'll be some adversary we'd need you for. But in the meantime, your job is to be our Argus."

"Your eyes?" Casperus said.

Ravenna nodded.

Rafel removed his gaze off the affairs of Raven Arc, and the other factions, to focus on his. He stood a step in front of his teammates: Olivar and Gretchen. Clearly, he'd been chosen as lead hunter. The horns had gone off a while back when the beloved Headmistress had dropped her hand.

But as a consequence of Casperus funny headbump with the wards, the other champions were waiting for someone else to go first.

No one wanted to look a fool, especially not in front of a hundred watching witches.

For the boys, a healthy dose of ego kept them rooted.

Rafel stepped out to the fringe of the woods first. Just beyond the northward high gates of the amphitheater, the serene forest where the mythic white stag lay stretched. "DARK ARTS! FLAME OF ABADDON!" Rafel roared. The crowd fell silent and fell in for a closer look at the large viewing screens, facing each leveled corner of the factions.

Four gigantic holograms floating in the air, powered by the academy's mana fount to give the best theatre view.

At Rafel's bulleting voice, a spray of dark flames, red fire robed in vespers, shot out for the wards. The infernal stream expanded as it went out, so that by the time it rained down on the invisible blockade, the roaring fires were large and powerful and consuming. It poured like lava from Rafel's cosmic fingertips. His hands glowed in heat, much like a Hindu fire bender.

"SKY ARTS! THUNDER OF AZUL!"

Another voice joined the assault. It was Bolta. She raised her hand high into the air. Many boys in the bleachers focused more on the sway of her boobs. The heavens gathered and pure white lightning split the fogged nimbus. The burst of thunder sliced down in a jagged arc to join Israfel's pouring [Helflame].

In the face of Bolta's thunder and Israfel's fire, the wards obstacle stood no chance.

Everyone saw the spelled walls crackle and break away, shimmering into magical light.

[DING!]

[5 POINTS for PHOENIX and PEGASUS Arc!]

This announcement appeared on the leaderboard, and the reds and blues cheered for their champions.

Rafel watched his name go up to the first position on the list of twelve participants, each letter cloaked in gold. Bolta's name was the second, in silver. He heard Erika hiss to her own team as he took the first step through the crumbled wards, through the black gates of the colosseum and onto the moist dirt of the hunting forest.

"Shit. We need to cap the next points."

Her fellow mates, Percival and Brunhilda nodded. But Rafel was already off and didn't care to listen in on the rest of the conversation. He had a Sun Trophy to win.

With Phoenix Arc in the lead—even if neither of the champions located the lair of the White Stag—the other factions whistled on for their representatives to get a win. But Israfel was determined to remain on the top of the board. He unfurled a map from his satchel; while others had asked for spears and longswords as their only entitled weapons, he'd gone for a map.

Gretchen saw this and tried to hide her smile.

He handed out the map to her.

"You have the best foresight here, Miss Manderley, as a pureblood vampiress. Which direction do you think we should take?" Gretchen looked out at the other teams quickly vanishing through the woods: tall pines and vibrant green claiming their adventurer tunics. But Rafel pulled her face back to him. "—I'm asking you, Gretchen. Fuck what the other Arcs are doing. They don't got a map.

And they certainly don't got you."

Gretchen didn't even know which part of his words to concentrate on. If she was into boys, she might...

"West." She said. "We should head west."

And they did.

In the first ten minutes, they hiked up a small hill full of blooming moonflowers. They creeped under a domain of sleeping wolfbats. And they watched from the tops of a mahogany tree branch as a Bengal tiger tried to sniff them out in the underbrush. Besting all these forms of awaiting threats gave the Phoenix Arc eight more points on the leaderboard.

Rafel kept his position while Gretchen and Olivar went up to fourth and sixth respectively.

Bolta was coming up heavy in second place. It just dinged on the screens that the daughter of Zeus had killed that Bengal tiger.

The Pegasus Arc were more than happy to win a solid five points for this.

Olivar had voted to kill the beast back when they hid right on top of it, but Rafel didn't see the need for action. He had being in enough forests to know the wild sent out the lesser terrors first. A lot more danger was coming. He could feel it in the air. And he wanted his mana core, and that of his teammates to be at one hundred when the time came to use it.

Not just for a fucking cat he could kick dead.

Besides, he liked tigers.

Rafel, Olivar, and Gretchen: champions of Phoenix Arc had just conquered a prowling bear in a cave by exsanguination; Gretchen was more than happy to drain the beast, when they exited the cave at a crack between two huge boulders. Rafel had just raised his right hand to clear the spread of willow leaf beads dropping down the crevice when he spotted her.

The three champions were rooted to the spot.

They stared at her.

Struck. Awed. Dumbfounded. At the one obstacle that might do them in.

Before them, under a waterfall was a most beautiful woman. Rafel recognized her gold brown hair. It was their Professor of [Potions and Poisons]. The baroness and wildling. Lady Ivoria Sephora Grimm. And she stood naked and sexy as fuck in front of them.

Delicious cold water showered her in crystal pebbles from above. It warmed on her ivory skin, and steam wafted up the hollows of all that made her a woman.

And what a woman she was?

"She's. . .she's so beautiful." Olivar stuttered. He licked his lips. "My God! I just want to touch her."

Rafel himself was speechless. He was wondering if the viewing screens back at the amphitheater showed this particular scene of the Hunt. It did. Lady Ivoria herself had been approached by the gamesmaster and agreed to feature in the Hunt as a temptress to sway the champions from their path.

In this case, the Phoenix Arc. It was working. It was fucking working.

The Reds didn't even cheer for their champions to move along. Everyone wanted to see.

Lady Ivoria turned and the three champions by the boulder spying on her froze. They gasped at the hypnotic picture of her body.

Her breasts were cream and swell globes. Roes on a hill. Her skin was fair and exotic. Her legs long and toes curled on the plateau on which she bathed. The waterfall painted a mural of nature magic behind her. And the soft strokes which met her body from the aquifer roof above ran down in trickles, between those divine valleys to trimmed curls.

No water in sight could satiate Olivar's thirst. His jaw scraped the cave's floor.

Gretchen rasped breathless.

"Uh, guys, I think this is the perfect time to tell you that I'm lesbian."

The boys weren't listening.

And when Lady Ivoria crooked her finger invitingly, the three champions floated across for her. Who the fuck cared that Gretchen was a girl? And on the tiered seats of the amphitheater, far, far off from the nameless woods, all the students leaned in to the giant screens—to observe more closely. Many a teenager—boy and girl—did reach down, under their seats, and spread their legs.