After a week, the second princess was more in love with me than she ever was. When she entered a room, even wearing those big fancy dresses that hid most of her body, her hips swayed without her consciously doing it and it drew everyone's attention. She also had a smile permanently plastered on her face. When she received news that one of her cousins had died in a jousting accident, she cried and never lost the smile.
“I'm so terribly sorry.” She hugged her cousin, tears in her eyes, and she was still happy. “We will feel his loss for years to come.”
“Why are you smiling?” Her cousin asked, almost with hatred on her face.
“Even this tragedy can't hamper my happiness.” The princess said and wiped at her eyes. “Love and happiness really does conquer all!”
“Are you mad?” Her cousin asked. “This is a time for sadness!”
“I can't help it.” The princess said. “If you knew what I and the hero...”
“Ahem. (cough) Please accept my deepest and sincerest apologies for the loss of your son.” I said. “I think the princess needs some time alone to reflect on this properly.”
The grieving woman nodded and took me into a hug, which was kind of rare for a woman of nobility to do. “Thank you for looking out for her, even if you've made her so happy that she's not seeing things straight right now.”
“Don't worry. When this finally hits her, she'll be even more devastated than you are.” I said as she let me go.
“I really will.” The princess said, her wet face making her smile even more pronounced. “I loved Raman dearly. He was always kind and we even spent some alone time together.” She said, then her face flushed red and she giggled. “It was nothing like alone time with Damon.”
The grieving woman opened her mouth to comment, then she gave me a look. It was a look that I had seen on several faces already, after they had talked to the princess. I wasn't sure what she had been telling people; but, even just that short phrase made the grieving woman push her grief aside enough to be curious about me.
“Please excuse us.” I said and took the princess' hand and led her away. “I thought we agreed that you wouldn't say anything.”
“Pillow promises don't count.” The second princess said, then she giggled. “Beatrice was enthralled when I showed her...”
“Showed her?” I asked and she giggled again.
“I tried to tell her and she didn't understand.” The princess shrugged. “Her man servant was more than willing to assist.”
It was my turn to open my mouth to comment, then I sighed and shook my head. I should have known that she wouldn't keep it to herself and it was my own fault for having as much fun as I did. Well, it didn't matter, since I was leaving in three weeks anyway. I just hoped that I wasn't approached by anyone to demonstrate my 'abilities'.
I left her with her older sister and went back to the main fortress and met with the blacksmith. I was just in time, because he had just finished loading up a cart with everything that I had wanted him to make. I rode with him and his three assistants over to the Enchanting Guild and when they saw me, they all bowed, thanked me, and ushered us directly into the Elder Enchanter's office.
“Hero.” The wizened old man said and stood up. “I am so very glad you have come to visit.”
“Oh? I take it you've completed the tasks already?” I asked.
The old man laughed and waved to the side of the room. It had racks that held parts of my armor and the weapons and items I had wanted him to change the enchantments on.
“The third day. I did it on the third day!” The wizened old man said with a laugh. “I even took a day to test the techniques on a scrap piece of armor, and now the scrap is worth a hundred gold! Ha ha!”
“I'm glad you're enjoying unimaginable power so much.” I said with a grin and he laughed again.
“I assume these are the things you want altered?” He asked and I explained what I wanted, with the help of the blacksmith, since he had made the parts and knew what order to do them in to duplicate what I had on my real armor. I didn't need the full enchantments, since that wasn't what I was going for. It only had to look, feel, and appear to be my full mithril set. The same with the weapons.
“Is that all?” The enchanter said and held a hand out to the real items and then held a hand out to the fake ones. “Apprentice, you know the runes to use.”
Someone stepped into the room and quickly carved out runes onto the inside of the duplicate pieces. My real set started to glow as each rune was added to the fakes, then something like a rainbow came from them and hit the old wizened man's outstretched hand. He glowed for a moment, then the rainbow shot out his other hand and hit the cart of fakes. Everything shook slightly, for nearly ten minutes, then suddenly I had two full sets of duplicate armor, weapons, and items.
“Wow.” I said and looked between them. “That really was easy.”
The wizened old man laughed. “As long as nothing damages the fakes, they will remain identical to the originals and appear to be direct copies.”
“None of the enchantments are real, right?” I asked.
“They are real on the originals. You can use the duplicates as if they were the originals, as long as you have the originals in your inventory.”
I laughed. “That's absolutely perfect. Thank you.”
The wizened old man's face went from happy to sad. “I suppose you want to reclaim the ancient tome.”
“What tome?” I asked and stored the originals and put them into my inventory, then I equipped every fake and felt the enchantments affect me.
The old man gave me a skeptical look as I thanked the blacksmith and his apprentices. We both watched them leave with the empty cart.
“I'll be staying in the capital for another three weeks.” I said to the old man. “I'd tell you to copy out as much as you can...”
“...but, it won't let the knowledge be taken so easily.” The wizened old man said.
“How many tries...”
“Eighteen.” The old man said. “Even magically imbued paper dissolves after a few minutes.”
I stood there for nearly ten minutes in my powerful fake armor and waited.
The old man stared at me the entire time and then he couldn't remain silent. “Why are you standing there waiting?”
“I'm giving the blacksmith time to get back to the fortress before I tell you the secret.”
“What secret?” He asked, genuinely curious.
“About how to copy the things out of the book.”
The wizened old man strode over to me and somehow, a dozen other people appeared around him. “How much do you want?” He asked. “We will pay any price for the secret.”
“Only having one copy of the book is a disgrace to all enchanters.” One of the other men said.
“What if I asked for one of your daughters?” I asked jokingly, just to see how much they would actually pay. Three of the men raised their hands and the wizened old man squinted his eyes at me.
“Are you serious or are you gauging the depth of our commitment?” The old man asked.
“The gauge part.” I said. “I can't marry anyone because I'm leaving.”
“You said three weeks, correct?” The old man asked and I nodded. “Then you can have my granddaughter.”
“Excuse me?”
“She just turned eighteen and hasn't been touched.” The old man said. “Lay with her, give her a child, marry her, do whatever you want with her. Except kill her. That would defeat the purpose of giving her to you.”
“You're serious?”
The old man nodded. “My married daughter is much too old for you... although, I suppose I could kill her husband if you prefer to lay with older women.”
I held up my hands in surrender. “No, that's okay.”
The old man touched something on his wrist. “Bring me Milland.”
“Wait, she's here?” I asked, surprised.
“I live on the top floor with the rest of my family.” The wizened old man said. “She will be right here.”
“But...” I stopped talking when the door opened and the prettiest young woman and her quite pretty mother came in. I was ten years older than the daughter and by the looks of it, fifteen or more years younger than the mother. She was still quite good looking and they didn't have a lot of beauty products to hide things like back on Earth.
“You're the great Hero!” The mother gasped when she saw me. “Father, why didn't you say so?” She asked and fluffed out her daughter's hair and tugged her simple dress to make it straighter than it was, then she smoothed it out and stood behind her daughter. “I, and my family, would be deeply honored to have you take my daughter.”
I looked at the daughter in question and I saw hope, admiration, and not even a lick of denial or regret. “You do realize that I'll be leaving soon.”
“Yes, and I hope you will give me the chance to bear your child.” The young woman said. “Even if the child never grows up to be a Hero, I will love them all the same.”
“You're assuming it'll work.” I said and her face went red.
“Please try as many times as you can in the time we have left.” She said and her blush filled her face. “I want to repay the Enchanters Guild for everything they've done for my family, and to repay you for saving us all. Without you, our entire world would have been doomed.”
I looked at the wizened old man and he nodded, so I looked back at what was supposed to be a joke. “I guess I can't refuse the plea of such a beautiful woman.”
“Oh, gods!” The mother gasped and covered her mouth as tears came to her eyes. “I'm so happy!”
The young woman stepped forward and looked up at me. “Please love me as only a hero can.”
Of course, that brought the image of the second princess into my mind, since she had said practically the same thing before our first time. I felt a little guilty about doing this, then remembered how the royal family handled things like that.
“Do you have a bed nearby?” I asked and the mother let out an excited squeak.
“This way! This way!” The mother said and ushered us towards the door. “I never imagined you would want to stay in the guild to do it! This is such an honor!”
“Hero.” The wizened old man said and I turned towards him. “The secret.”
I walked over to him and thought about teasing him a little, then I smiled and took out a two foot by one foot piece of inch thick steel. I set it down on the floor and the solid thump sound made the enchanters jump in surprise.
“This is a copy of the very first page of the book.” I said and the old man dropped to his knees and stared at it. The engravings were a little crude and the metal was a bit warped from the carving process. “It needs to be an inch thick or the magic can't be contained. Believe me, I tried. This is the bare minimum for it to work. The metal slab is this size because the carvings in metal needed more room.”
“This is... how did you even come up with it?” The old man asked, awed at the solution.
“I pretty much tried everything else for about five years.” I said with a chuckle and the old man stared at me instead of the copied page. “By the way, it will take the blacksmith a long time to make enough slabs to copy the entire book. About a year, actually. If he can get his hands on the metal.”
“He will have it.” The old man said, then he frowned. “Wait, if you are leaving in three weeks, then the tome...”
“What tome?” I asked and walked over to the pair of pretty women that were waiting to take me to a bedchamber. I was apparently going to make the next generation of Hero. I didn't notice the mother's wrist glowing or what the old man said to her. I only saw her jump a little and then a huge smile spread across her face. He gave her good news, or so she said, which I found later was actually me.
The wizened old man didn't want to miss the opportunity of having two chances that a Hero's child might be born to the Enchanter's Guild. I could make up excuses and I could claim that I was tricked, ambushed, and assaulted; but, I'll be damned if I didn't have the best time of my life.
Unlike the princess, both women picked up the things I was doing to them like they had always done them, and they made sure that I was as happy as they were for teaching them such things. Of course, they promised on their lives that they would keep these secret rituals to the members of the guild and wouldn't spread them around. They knew how precious information was and how to keep it secret.
To everyone's surprise, I ended up staying for an entire week. I needed to make sure they knew how to do things properly, after all. I would never know that after I left this world, they both would have sons bearing my name.
After that, the mother and daughter pair used their new skills, and heightened sexiness from recently bearing children, to pretty much enslave the rest of the guild. The best part? The guild was more than happy to let them. They didn't care who ran the place, as long as they got to do their work.
The wizened old man would die as the richest man on the planet less than ten years later.
After a week, the second princess was more in love with me than she ever was. When she entered a room, even wearing those big fancy dresses that hid most of her body, her hips swayed without her consciously doing it and it drew everyone's attention. She also had a smile permanently plastered on her face. When she received news that one of her cousins had died in a jousting accident, she cried and never lost the smile.
“I'm so terribly sorry.” She hugged her cousin, tears in her eyes, and she was still happy. “We will feel his loss for years to come.”
“Why are you smiling?” Her cousin asked, almost with hatred on her face.
“Even this tragedy can't hamper my happiness.” The princess said and wiped at her eyes. “Love and happiness really does conquer all!”
“Are you mad?” Her cousin asked. “This is a time for sadness!”
“I can't help it.” The princess said. “If you knew what I and the hero...”
“Ahem. (cough) Please accept my deepest and sincerest apologies for the loss of your son.” I said. “I think the princess needs some time alone to reflect on this properly.”
The grieving woman nodded and took me into a hug, which was kind of rare for a woman of nobility to do. “Thank you for looking out for her, even if you've made her so happy that she's not seeing things straight right now.”
“Don't worry. When this finally hits her, she'll be even more devastated than you are.” I said as she let me go.
“I really will.” The princess said, her wet face making her smile even more pronounced. “I loved Raman dearly. He was always kind and we even spent some alone time together.” She said, then her face flushed red and she giggled. “It was nothing like alone time with Damon.”
The grieving woman opened her mouth to comment, then she gave me a look. It was a look that I had seen on several faces already, after they had talked to the princess. I wasn't sure what she had been telling people; but, even just that short phrase made the grieving woman push her grief aside enough to be curious about me.
“Please excuse us.” I said and took the princess' hand and led her away. “I thought we agreed that you wouldn't say anything.”
“Pillow promises don't count.” The second princess said, then she giggled. “Beatrice was enthralled when I showed her...”
“Showed her?” I asked and she giggled again.
“I tried to tell her and she didn't understand.” The princess shrugged. “Her man servant was more than willing to assist.”
It was my turn to open my mouth to comment, then I sighed and shook my head. I should have known that she wouldn't keep it to herself and it was my own fault for having as much fun as I did. Well, it didn't matter, since I was leaving in three weeks anyway. I just hoped that I wasn't approached by anyone to demonstrate my 'abilities'.
I left her with her older sister and went back to the main fortress and met with the blacksmith. I was just in time, because he had just finished loading up a cart with everything that I had wanted him to make. I rode with him and his three assistants over to the Enchanting Guild and when they saw me, they all bowed, thanked me, and ushered us directly into the Elder Enchanter's office.
“Hero.” The wizened old man said and stood up. “I am so very glad you have come to visit.”
“Oh? I take it you've completed the tasks already?” I asked.
The old man laughed and waved to the side of the room. It had racks that held parts of my armor and the weapons and items I had wanted him to change the enchantments on.
“The third day. I did it on the third day!” The wizened old man said with a laugh. “I even took a day to test the techniques on a scrap piece of armor, and now the scrap is worth a hundred gold! Ha ha!”
“I'm glad you're enjoying unimaginable power so much.” I said with a grin and he laughed again.
“I assume these are the things you want altered?” He asked and I explained what I wanted, with the help of the blacksmith, since he had made the parts and knew what order to do them in to duplicate what I had on my real armor. I didn't need the full enchantments, since that wasn't what I was going for. It only had to look, feel, and appear to be my full mithril set. The same with the weapons.
“Is that all?” The enchanter said and held a hand out to the real items and then held a hand out to the fake ones. “Apprentice, you know the runes to use.”
Someone stepped into the room and quickly carved out runes onto the inside of the duplicate pieces. My real set started to glow as each rune was added to the fakes, then something like a rainbow came from them and hit the old wizened man's outstretched hand. He glowed for a moment, then the rainbow shot out his other hand and hit the cart of fakes. Everything shook slightly, for nearly ten minutes, then suddenly I had two full sets of duplicate armor, weapons, and items.
“Wow.” I said and looked between them. “That really was easy.”
The wizened old man laughed. “As long as nothing damages the fakes, they will remain identical to the originals and appear to be direct copies.”
“None of the enchantments are real, right?” I asked.
“They are real on the originals. You can use the duplicates as if they were the originals, as long as you have the originals in your inventory.”
I laughed. “That's absolutely perfect. Thank you.”
The wizened old man's face went from happy to sad. “I suppose you want to reclaim the ancient tome.”
“What tome?” I asked and stored the originals and put them into my inventory, then I equipped every fake and felt the enchantments affect me.
The old man gave me a skeptical look as I thanked the blacksmith and his apprentices. We both watched them leave with the empty cart.
“I'll be staying in the capital for another three weeks.” I said to the old man. “I'd tell you to copy out as much as you can...”
“...but, it won't let the knowledge be taken so easily.” The wizened old man said.
“How many tries...”
“Eighteen.” The old man said. “Even magically imbued paper dissolves after a few minutes.”
I stood there for nearly ten minutes in my powerful fake armor and waited.
The old man stared at me the entire time and then he couldn't remain silent. “Why are you standing there waiting?”
“I'm giving the blacksmith time to get back to the fortress before I tell you the secret.”
“What secret?” He asked, genuinely curious.
“About how to copy the things out of the book.”
The wizened old man strode over to me and somehow, a dozen other people appeared around him. “How much do you want?” He asked. “We will pay any price for the secret.”
“Only having one copy of the book is a disgrace to all enchanters.” One of the other men said.
“What if I asked for one of your daughters?” I asked jokingly, just to see how much they would actually pay. Three of the men raised their hands and the wizened old man squinted his eyes at me.
“Are you serious or are you gauging the depth of our commitment?” The old man asked.
“The gauge part.” I said. “I can't marry anyone because I'm leaving.”
“You said three weeks, correct?” The old man asked and I nodded. “Then you can have my granddaughter.”
“Excuse me?”
“She just turned eighteen and hasn't been touched.” The old man said. “Lay with her, give her a child, marry her, do whatever you want with her. Except kill her. That would defeat the purpose of giving her to you.”
“You're serious?”
The old man nodded. “My married daughter is much too old for you... although, I suppose I could kill her husband if you prefer to lay with older women.”
I held up my hands in surrender. “No, that's okay.”
The old man touched something on his wrist. “Bring me Milland.”
“Wait, she's here?” I asked, surprised.
“I live on the top floor with the rest of my family.” The wizened old man said. “She will be right here.”
“But...” I stopped talking when the door opened and the prettiest young woman and her quite pretty mother came in. I was ten years older than the daughter and by the looks of it, fifteen or more years younger than the mother. She was still quite good looking and they didn't have a lot of beauty products to hide things like back on Earth.
“You're the great Hero!” The mother gasped when she saw me. “Father, why didn't you say so?” She asked and fluffed out her daughter's hair and tugged her simple dress to make it straighter than it was, then she smoothed it out and stood behind her daughter. “I, and my family, would be deeply honored to have you take my daughter.”
I looked at the daughter in question and I saw hope, admiration, and not even a lick of denial or regret. “You do realize that I'll be leaving soon.”
“Yes, and I hope you will give me the chance to bear your child.” The young woman said. “Even if the child never grows up to be a Hero, I will love them all the same.”
“You're assuming it'll work.” I said and her face went red.
“Please try as many times as you can in the time we have left.” She said and her blush filled her face. “I want to repay the Enchanters Guild for everything they've done for my family, and to repay you for saving us all. Without you, our entire world would have been doomed.”
I looked at the wizened old man and he nodded, so I looked back at what was supposed to be a joke. “I guess I can't refuse the plea of such a beautiful woman.”
“Oh, gods!” The mother gasped and covered her mouth as tears came to her eyes. “I'm so happy!”
The young woman stepped forward and looked up at me. “Please love me as only a hero can.”
Of course, that brought the image of the second princess into my mind, since she had said practically the same thing before our first time. I felt a little guilty about doing this, then remembered how the royal family handled things like that.
“Do you have a bed nearby?” I asked and the mother let out an excited squeak.
“This way! This way!” The mother said and ushered us towards the door. “I never imagined you would want to stay in the guild to do it! This is such an honor!”
“Hero.” The wizened old man said and I turned towards him. “The secret.”
I walked over to him and thought about teasing him a little, then I smiled and took out a two foot by one foot piece of inch thick steel. I set it down on the floor and the solid thump sound made the enchanters jump in surprise.
“This is a copy of the very first page of the book.” I said and the old man dropped to his knees and stared at it. The engravings were a little crude and the metal was a bit warped from the carving process. “It needs to be an inch thick or the magic can't be contained. Believe me, I tried. This is the bare minimum for it to work. The metal slab is this size because the carvings in metal needed more room.”
“This is... how did you even come up with it?” The old man asked, awed at the solution.
“I pretty much tried everything else for about five years.” I said with a chuckle and the old man stared at me instead of the copied page. “By the way, it will take the blacksmith a long time to make enough slabs to copy the entire book. About a year, actually. If he can get his hands on the metal.”
“He will have it.” The old man said, then he frowned. “Wait, if you are leaving in three weeks, then the tome...”
“What tome?” I asked and walked over to the pair of pretty women that were waiting to take me to a bedchamber. I was apparently going to make the next generation of Hero. I didn't notice the mother's wrist glowing or what the old man said to her. I only saw her jump a little and then a huge smile spread across her face. He gave her good news, or so she said, which I found later was actually me.
The wizened old man didn't want to miss the opportunity of having two chances that a Hero's child might be born to the Enchanter's Guild. I could make up excuses and I could claim that I was tricked, ambushed, and assaulted; but, I'll be damned if I didn't have the best time of my life.
Unlike the princess, both women picked up the things I was doing to them like they had always done them, and they made sure that I was as happy as they were for teaching them such things. Of course, they promised on their lives that they would keep these secret rituals to the members of the guild and wouldn't spread them around. They knew how precious information was and how to keep it secret.
To everyone's surprise, I ended up staying for an entire week. I needed to make sure they knew how to do things properly, after all. I would never know that after I left this world, they both would have sons bearing my name.
After that, the mother and daughter pair used their new skills, and heightened sexiness from recently bearing children, to pretty much enslave the rest of the guild. The best part? The guild was more than happy to let them. They didn't care who ran the place, as long as they got to do their work.
The wizened old man would die as the richest man on the planet less than ten years later.
