Chapter 23: Ch. 22 – The Dumpling Guild & Class Evolution

“[Necrotic Subjugation].”

As the words left Valerica’s mouth, the Earl began to turn a shade of purple. Lilac spread throughout his skin, climbing up his fingers and painting his nails. If his new coloring wasn’t the product of suffocation, he’d look kind of pretty.

“[Veil of Light],” he mumbled through staccato breaths. An orb of light shielded him, momentarily alleviating his coloration. Unfortunately for him, the respite was fleeting. Valerica giggled and snapped her fingers, and the orb burst like a feeble soap bubble.

He groaned audibly, the curse once again falling upon him.

“Interesting, that should have worked,” he choked out, his neutral, inquisitive nature persisting even during an increasingly fatal experience, “would you please stop it? I - I’d prefer not to die today.”

Valerica inspected her nails, paying no mind to the Earl squirming next to her.

“Are you going to patiently listen to my initiate’s demands?”

Pretentious even as he approached death, the Earl mumbled, “I do not care for the demands of a low-life necromancer. I will listen to you, not her.”

“Bad answer.”

His lilac shade rapidly darkened to black. He wrapped his fingers around his neck in agony, but it was too late. His head collapsed onto the table.

“Is he dead?” Momo shrieked.

“Not quite. Just having a very bad nap.”

“You don’t have to do this,” Momo mumbled, “it’s fine if he doesn’t respect me, as long as he respects you.”

Valerica frowned, “that is nonsense, Momo. You are an extension of me. If you think so lowly of yourself, how does that reflect on me? On my leadership?”

Momo’s eyebrows shot up, “but that’s different, isn’t it? You’ve earned all of your prestige…”

“So have you, my dear! Now act like it.”

With a sway of her hand, the Earl’s head snapped back up. The coloration in his face drained back to pale white, and he gasped for breath.

“Momo, please give the Earl a list of our demands.”

Momo’s heartbeat racketed in her neck. Even despite Valerica’s orders, her mouth was unwilling to open. The image of being turned to pudding by the Earl’s staff was stuck like glue to her mind.

Inhaling sharply, Momo changed tact. She began repeating positive affirmations in her head:

This man is not so scary.

This man is just some guy.

This man might have killed a giant zombie glomboid.

But I ripped off a powerful wizard.

And scammed a teenage boy into a monthly subscription plan.

I am cool. I am collected. I am Momo. Momo the Dealmaker.

Momo the Ripper-Offer.

She got a little carried away, starting to hum a tune to her own theme song. Her therapist was right, positive affirmations were the shit. She had to try them more often.

“Are you quite done singing?” the Earl interjected. After a few moments of sputtering and drooling, he was finally able to breathe again.

“Oh, sorry,” she said, blushing, “yes, yes I am. I have a list of demands for you, Earl.”

“Get on with it then,” he rolled his bloodshot eyes.

Momo cleared her throat, summoning her [Burgeoning Confidence II]. Here goes nothing.

“On the condition that we let you live, we will install one of our necromages in your court so they can monitor things, and make sure Morgana’s Dawn stays out of the King’s purview. Secondly, we will require that 15 percent of Bruda’s taxes be paid directly to Morgana’s Dawn.”

“15 percent? Please, that is ridiculous–”

“Yes, 15 percent. And as we are not money-grubbing landlords, we will pay this back by opening up a new School of Dance.”

The Earl looked at her in bewilderment, “a… School of Dance?”

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Devola raised her dead head by just a little, letting out an excited affirmation before flopping her skull back down. Momo admired her commitment to the role.

Momo had proposed the School of Dance idea to Devola yesterday on their walk back. By opening a dance school in Bruda, they could recruit from Bruda’s student population through innocuous means. The children may arrive as dancers, but if they began to develop other ‘interests’ while enrolled, who was to blame them?

It also solved the problem of getting Devola out of Valerica’s hair, which Valerica very quickly and happily agreed to. She had even spun Momo around the room a few times out of sheer gratitude.

“Finally, uh…” Momo racked her head for any more demands, “we would like you to approve Morgana’s Dawn request for guild membership.”

“You must be joking,” he sighed, “the King’s Guild Office would not only immediately reject that request, but send an army of knights to your door.”

“That’s why we’ll be calling it something innocent and respectable,” Momo said, proud of her quick thinking, “like… the Knitter’s Guild for Accomplished Knitters.”

“Already taken.”

Momo frowned, “how about the Soupmaker’s Guild for Broth Lovers?”

“Nope. They celebrated their sixtieth guild anniversary just last weekend. I attended. It was a lovely dinner.”

Momo groaned. Then an idea came to her.

“The Dumpling Maker’s Guild… for esteemed makers of dumplings.”

“What in the fresh nether is a dumpling?”

Momo pointed to the food on the plate in front of him, “it’s pure deliciousness, is what it is.”

“Fine. I can’t promise it won’t be rejected. They will be similarly confused.”

“We will include a full description of what a dumpling is, and the dumpling making process,” Momo put her hands on her hips, “I will leave no question unanswered.”

“Gods, fine,” he relented, throwing his hands up. He sighed, looking at his fallen, slumped over comrades, “I suppose you leave me no choice. You have slain the remainder of my court, so I will be needing new employees.”

He turned to Valerica, “if I agree to your demands, I ask just one thing in return.”

“You are making a terrible habit of asking when you should be listening,” Valerica tilted her head, raising her fingers in a veiled threat to purple him again.

The threat didn’t stop him, and he fervently asked, “you must tell me what you are. My curiosity burns to know it. Are you using a power enhancement potion? A special blessing from Morgana? If you were simply an expert necromancer, my [Resistance to Death Magic] would have allowed me to cancel your [Necrotic Subjugation].”

“Can you not guess?” she yawned, “does my name not haunt the dreams of the [Holy Mages]?”

He froze. For the first time, fear seemed to creep into his disposition. A fear that didn’t even appear while being necrotically waterboarded.

“No, it couldn’t be. Your kind was wiped out.”

“That’s what daddy Jarva likes to tell you all at bedtime, isn’t it?” Valerica grinned.

“Show me,” he said, eyes filling with hungry curiosity, “show me the limits of your excalibur power. I must see it. I crave to see it.”

“Stop slobbering all over Momo’s perfectly nice dumplings,” Valerica dismissed him, and then turned to her skeletons, “minions, I believe the Earl was just leaving. You can escort him out impolitely.”

“No! I must witness your power! I must!” he cried out, his usual neutrality transforming into pure madness. He shot a [Holy Beam] out of his staff, attempting to provoke her. The beam hit Valerica with the force of a horsefly, bouncing off her chest and cratering through the wall.

“Ugh, and Rorlik just got done with the renovations,” Valerica grumbled, light streaming into the room. All around the table, the necromages began to lose focus on their acting, hissing and groaning at the presence of sunlight.

“It was a pleasure doing business with you,” Momo hurriedly added, watching as the skeletons heaved him upwards by the shoulders. He wriggled in their grasp, but another casting of Valerica’s [Necrotic Subjugation] held him down.

“I will be back for you!” he yelled out as he was taken to the eastern tower.

“We’ll be in touch!” Momo yelled back.

As the Earl’s cries faded into the background, a stack of parchment papers shot through the hole in the wall, landing perfectly in Momo’s hands.

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