As the words ‘Our souls bonded’ echoed across the battlefield, Alrune began to materialize, drawing on my stamina, my life energy, and her mana. The kobolds were the first to stop. Mid-charge, mid-snarl, they froze as if time itself had seized them by the throat.

  When the words ‘But let the bond materialize’ followed, the two drake lieutenants locked in place as well, their wings half-spread, eyes wide with something close to instinctive fear. Some of the kobolds that stood further away turned to run.

  Then came ‘Just for one strike’.

  The angel’s eyes snapped toward the emerging Valkyrie.

  “You call, I respond!”

  The angel moved.

  Burning through the last of its strength, it hurled itself forward, its gaze locked onto a single threat, closing half the distance before the first strike landed.

  This one was mine.

  For the first time, I held nothing back, gave it everything I had — and it was still utterly insufficient. The blow scraped across divine flesh, leaving little more than a shallow mark. I was about to get worried when...

  Then Alrune struck.

  The difference was obscene. My attack felt as though it had been delivered by a child swinging a wooden sword. Her blade erased the angel in a single, merciless arc — body, light, and defiance cut away without resistance.

  The moment the angel began to dissolve into particles of light, I could no longer hold myself up, my legs felt like they were made of lead. I dropped to one knee, using the sheath as support to keep from collapsing completely.

  My breathing was ragged.

  Alrune reacted instantly, dematerializing at once. Her voice echoed in my head, filled with worry and care.

  “Are you okay, Vic?”

  “I will be. No worries,” I said between breaths. “I just need a good night’s sleep and some time for my life energy and stamina to recover. Sadly, we won’t be able to run this more than once a day. I can’t handle the cost yet.”

  “You want to do this again?”

  “I have to. I need a wing for you — from that human-shaped pigeon.”

  “We can wait—”

  “Shhh. I have a chance to get you more than just a core, and I will take it. Please don’t stop me.”

  She sighed, her voice soft and tender.

  “Idiot… Love you.”

  I smiled and let myself fall back onto my ass, slowly sheathing the sword as I examined the mess we’d made.

  First was my cut. It annihilated everything in its path within the boundary force-field — except for the angel itself. The destruction stopped only where the angel had stood, leaving a clean, untouched strip of ground behind it while everything to either side was gouged apart.

  Then I looked at Alrune’s cut.

  It was several times wider, and what truly shocked me was the boundary force-field itself. The supposedly indestructible barrier had a crack running the entire length of her strike.

  I chuckled, shaking my head as I pointed at it.

  “Wasn’t that thing meant to be indestructible?”

  “Well, it’s not destroyed,” she replied lightly. “I just scratched it a little. Real talk — when I saw you put everything into that attack, I couldn’t bring myself to hold back. I had to follow suit and give it everything I had.”

  “Won’t that crack cause issues?”

  “No. It will repair itself in several hours. Unless someone shows up with similar firepower in the next two hours, everything will be fine.”

  “Good.” I hesitated, then added, “Seeing you and that pigeon… I got curious. What color are your wings?”

  “When I was born, they were snow-white — just like its wings. My hair was platinum blonde, and my eyes were azure blue. The moment I fell, my wings and hair turned jet black, and my eyes blood-red.”

  “What happened when you fell?”

  She sighed loudly in my head.

  “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” I said quickly, not wanting to push.

  “No, I have to,” she replied. “It’s more than fair, considering what you’ve already told me. And you deserve to know, out of respect for our relationship.”

  She paused, and when she spoke again, her voice lacked all of its usual playfulness.

  “You know Valkyries are a very female-dominant species. Females are powerful, winged beings with unimaginable strength. Males, on the other hand, possess only eternal youth, inexhaustible stamina, and extreme libido.”

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  She let that sit before continuing.

  “Extreme to the point that if they go without sex for too long, they can die. Because of that, males are treated as sex toys without rights. They can be used regardless of their will. They have no right to refuse. Even killing one during the act is considered little more than a minor misdemeanor.”

  She paused as if gathering strength to continue.

  “I was born as part of a set of twins. My brother was male. I protected him his entire life. I made sure no Valkyrie ever touched him.”

  Her voice tightened.

  “And this is the reason I didn’t want to tell you until now. I was afraid you would find me disgusting.”

  She took a few steadying breaths before continuing.

  “I know this will be a taboo for you, but understand that I am a Valkyrie. When his libido began to act up, he suffered excruciating pain. He would have died. So I stepped in. I calmed his libido with my own body — to keep him alive. To keep him from suffering.”

  Her voice didn’t waver.

  “We lived like that for centuries. Then one day, when I returned home, I found my superior in bed with him.”

  She stopped.

  “He wasn’t moving.”

  I could hear the jagged edges of her pain in every syllable.

  “She stood up and chuckled. ‘Oops. I pressed his neck too hard. Sorry.’”

  Silence.

  “That was the moment I drew my sword and cut her head off.”

  A beat.

  “That was the moment I fell.”

  My eyes burned, tears spilling down my face as I imagined the pain she had endured. Just the thought of it tightened around my heart until it hurt to breathe. I wanted to reach out to her, to pull her close. I wanted to tell her so many things — but not a single word would come.

  She, on the other hand, spoke only one.

  “Thank you.”

  I sat there in silence, my grip tightening on the cane before I even realized it, trying to come to terms with everything I had just heard. Eventually, I took a slow, deep breath and forced myself to stand. I needed to stay whole for her, just as she had for me. As I looked around, I noticed there were well over a hundred floating loot bubbles drifting in front of me.

  “Let’s check what we got!”

  “Maybe we already have that pigeon wing!” Spoke Alrune, her voice still lacking the usual luster.

  “That would be nice.”

  I collected everything. Sadly, there was no pigeon wing — but both drakes dropped a dragon claw. So it was still a good haul, just not what I came here for. I slowly left the dungeon and, leaning heavily on my cane, stepped out onto the bustling afternoon street of Basthad.

  I made my way back to the inn. There was no way I was going to the mansion in this state without servants already running the household. That would have been far too much. Despite going to sleep with the chickens, I woke up later than usual. Once I was up, I felt fine — my life energy and stamina had fully recovered. Mana wasn’t even worth mentioning; Alrune had so much of it that we hadn’t even made a dent.

  I headed to the servants’ guildhall. The moment I stepped inside, the difference from every other guild I’d visited was unmistakable.

  The dungeon delvers’ guild felt like an office.

  The bounty hunters’ guild felt like a pigsty.

  The real estate guild was ostentatious to the point of parody.

  This place felt homey.

  Not naturally so.

  It was deliberate. Engineered. Every detail carefully chosen to create that impression.

  The guildhall resembled a grand entrance hall more than a workplace. Maids moved quietly through the space, guiding visitors, attending to those waiting on sofas, offering tea and small snacks to keep the atmosphere calm. I even saw one gently steer an angry customer toward a back room, clearly intent on preserving the peace.

  “Greetings, Mister! How can we help you?” Spoke one of the maids that walked up to me.

  “I came to hire servants for my mansion!”

  She quickly measured me with her eyes and nodded. “Do you want a subscription or to hand pick your people?”

  “Subscription would be fine!”

  “Please follow me!”

  She led me across the hall toward a door on the side, opened it for me, and pointed inside.

  “Our agent will take care of your needs here!”

  “Thank you!” I said and smiled at her back as I entered.

  The room I walked into looked more like a small saloon than an office. The agent sat comfortably on the sofa with a tea placed in front of him on the table. He pointed to the sofa across the table and spoke.

  “Welcome, Mister. Have a seat! How can I assist you?”

  I quickly sat down and explained. “I would like to hire servants for my mansion!”

  The man nodded. “Can I see the deed of ownership and some ID, please?”

  I nodded and showed him my guild IDs and a deed.

  “Perfect! Until not long ago, we were providing services to this address,” the man said, tapping on his tablet. “They employed one cook, two kitchen helpers, two gardeners, four maids, and a main butler responsible for organization, budgeting, shopping, and maintaining the standard barrier around the mansion. Would this arrangement be fine with you?”

  “Sounds good enough!”

  “Fine, just a few little things to fine-tune your experience. Regarding the garden, any preference, you want it more functional or more aesthetic?”

  “I don’t mind aesthetic, I don’t mind the cook using part of it.”

  “Perfect! That leaves things as they were. Next, your food preference. What do you like to eat?”

  “I really enjoy monster meat and normal meat, ideally with veggies.”

  “OK, good meat, no fancy cooking! Noted. Any additional services? Security, private healer, doctor… horizontal refreshment?”

  I shook my head. “Nothing!”

  “Do you have any specific preference regarding your staff? Like good looking, young, female, or something?”

  “No!”

  “Good, that settles it. It is going to be two gold pieces a month! We require two months of service to be paid in advance upon signing the contract.”

  I nodded and we signed the contract. After that I paid the four gold, gave the backup key to the agent and left the guild.

  On the way to confront the dungeon, I contacted the twins to arrange lunch the following day. I didn’t actually need any bounty hunter jobs, but I’d already grown used to our lunches — and I knew I’d miss them otherwise.

  As for the dungeon, no luck once again — I ended up limping to the inn empty-handed. I didn’t even managed to leave the inn in the morning before a courier delivered a notification informing me that my servants were ready and already in place. I was free to move into the mansion — they were expecting me. I checked out of the inn, packed everything into my inventory, and headed for the Cock-a-doodle-doo Rooster.

  The twins were already waiting for me there. Cora looked as composed as ever. Juliet looked like she’d slept even less than the last time we met — but she was smiling anyway.

  I sat down, and we started talking shop. We discussed the investigators and how they were giving Juliet a hard time, how they’d even begun pestering the Bounty Hunters’ Guild with random, nonsensical requests, and how confirmations had come in from nearby cities and the academy that none of them were experiencing disappearing dungeons.

  Then we shifted to Cora and her own issues with rowdy bounty hunters. She told us about having to kick one out after he tried to get handsy with her. He’d failed spectacularly and ended up with a broken arm, his face planted firmly in the dirt in front of the guild. The mental image of the asshole face-first in the ground made me smile.

  I found myself smiling just talking shop with two, not thinking about anything serious or deep. Just enjoying the flow of the conversation.