“Ah, good work Master,” Gnarl said as soon as I arrived back at the tower. “It’s always nice to see the world slowly return to the hands of proper evil.”
I landed on my feet as the magic lowered me back to the floor. I glanced around and saw that scaffolding had finally been placed around the throne room and the general rubble had been cleared away. My throne even looks a bit nicer now, instead of a simple bare stone back the stone itself was a bit more ornate in its carving with some black spikes sticking out of the backrest’s sides and a red fabric covered part of the front of the seat’s backrest. It looked like the next level of the throne for the Overlord before you get to the different ones for the mistresses.
Must have fixed it up for me while I was busy fighting.
“Yes, rebuilding the tower has started rather well,” Gnarl said as I ascended my throne and took a seat. “Though if you want more decorations you’ll need a mistress to spend your hard-looted gold on baubles and knick-knacks. Mistresses like baubles and knick-knacks, I’ve found.”
“And the prisoner?” I asked.
“Unconscious,” Gnarl replied. “For one so able to kill the minions she is remarkably fragile. That blow to her noggin will keep her out of commission for a while but we should be able to keep her alive and contained indefinitely even without the blues to mess up her magic. Though I’m afraid we won’t be getting anything about the Storm King from her any time soon.”
I grunted, I had something different to pick her brain for anyway, “That’s fine. About the tribute of Klugetown, have the minions direct the slaves to store weapons and armor in one warehouse and wealth in another. Preferably near the gate.”
“Stocking up I see,” Gnarl grinned. “Very well, Master. Consider it already done.”
“Good, I’m going to take a break then collect more life force and train,” I leaned back on my throne and just did my best to relax and feel the magical energies of the Netherworld flow through me. Perhaps if I spend some time just getting a feel for them it would speed the recovery of the Netherworld and bring it back to full power. I could use the Halo spell.
Gnarl bowed then scurried off to get my orders done.
“Hail! The Overlord!” Quaver cheerfully exclaimed as I rested and enjoyed the heat of the Netherworld. I didn’t have a chance to interact with the jester minion much but he was amusing. “Now we minions brought a Master we’ve been missing and soon he will send the whole world pissing!”
Though his poetry left a lot to be desired sometimes.
My time in the Netherworld was spent well. My minion pool was well-stocked with brown life force and I took the time to practice using magic and swinging my ax. Granted, a couple of days wasn’t exactly much when it comes to fighting experience but getting to know my body a lot better helped immensely anyway.
I stepped down from the Nethergate into Klugetown after a flash of magical blue lightning from the gate announced my arrival. I glanced at the brown summoning pit for a moment but decided to not bring any minions out just yet. I needed to examine what was gathered from the town first.
I looked around the port and noticed two warehouses that had several minion guards outside their large entrance gates. One had a picture of a spear and shield and the other had a bag of what I assumed to be gold. I fought the urge to go to the warehouse full of promised wealth no matter how hard my greedy heart wailed and instead walked over to the new armory.
“Open the gate,” I ordered a minion guard who saluted and promptly followed my command.
“Yes master!”
The gate creaked open and I stepped into the well lit warehouse. It was surprisingly organized, though that might be the fault of the slaves bringing things in. Or Gnarl, he might be evil but he likes to keep things tidy.
On my right I saw barrels of weapons lined up against the wall, most of it wasn’t things you’d arm a proper military with but they were made of sharpened metal and thus better than a wooden club. Plus, minions weren’t picky. Next to the weapons were boxes of just about anything that could be placed on a minion’s head and provide some sort of protection. I was just glad most of it could be considered actual armor if squinted at long enough. To my left were more boxes, though it was a more smattering of things than the helmets. Metal bits with dubious looking leather straps, what was supposed to look like shirts of leather but were actually a bunch of leather straps and belts, bent metal that was meant to be bracers or leg armor.
“Yes, not the best quality armor for your minions,” Gnarl said. “But it should be good enough for now. Do remember that almost all of this is just what was immediately gathered from the town and not something properly produced by the locals. Proper armor and weapons take some time to make especially when the town isn’t set up to be a smithing hotspot, which is probably why so many Overlords just like to burn and go. No patience whatsoever.”
“How many minions can this warehouse fit?”
“Assuming nothing broke? About three hundred and forty, give or take.”
I summoned that amount from the minion gate then pointed at the warehouse, “Arm yourselves, do not break anything.”
“Yes master!”
“Yippie!”
“Pillage!”
“No pillage, stupid!”
“Forward!”
As I watched the minions arm themselves I couldn’t help but snort, it was a chaotic mess of jumping over each other or pushing others aside to grab something they liked. I looked around at the rest of the port as that was going on, my ship was officially recoloured and an image of my helmet was now covering the Storm King’s symbol. The dock workers were busy supplying my ship, I was almost ready to leave and finish this fight.
“Finished!” I heard a minion gleefully shout.
I turned around and saw that all of my minions were now armed and armored in some way. Many were chuckling and bouncing on their feet.
“Gnarl, any place to put the wealth in the tower?”
“Hmm, the gold, perhaps, could simply be placed in your Private Quarters. The Storm Bucks could be used as toilet paper for the minions… Hmm, no, just the precious metals and gems for now. There was actually a surprising amount of wealth gathered here and what’s in the warehouse isn’t even all of it, of course it was all from the storehouses of the corrupt and wealthy businessmen but they don’t have a need for it anymore now that you’re here. Much of the wealth is actually trading goods, exotic cloth or other rare goods and the like. This being an airship port and trading town and all that. Might be good for decorating once we have the tower all fixed up.”
I hummed and waved for a guard to open the gate. The warehouse was indeed filled with a truly grand amount of wealth taken from the town. A quick order to my minions and a very strong emphasis on not breaking a single bit of my new wealth and the warehouse was quickly emptied of the gold, silver, and gems, leaving only boxes of trading goods that I wasn’t going to fill my tower up with.
“Perhaps we could sell some of this to passing merchants, get some more money and not let this all go to waste,” I commented.
“Do you wish for me to take inventory of your newfound wealth and sell, say, half of it to whoever wants it?”
“Yes, gold or usable materials to make better minion equipment with.”
“Your will be done, Dark One.”
Once everything was sorted I sent all but fifty of my minions back into the gate, leaving me with a decent honor guard. I didn’t need an army everywhere I went and just in case something happened I won’t lose all my better-equipped minions. I wasted no time and boarded my ship which had finished being loaded with supplies as I talked with Gnarl. My minions quickly got to work taking whatever station they wanted, some even hung by some ropes and another took his place by a large drum that had been added. I stood behind the steering wheel and directed us out of the port, ready to take the fight to the Storm King.
Nothing happened for the next few hours as we sailed through the sky and I quickly grew bored of sailing an airship. I thought it’d have been more fun than this but all I’ve done is correct the course and watch the empty sky. Even my minions were getting restless.
“Master! I see big castle!” One minion suddenly yelled, energetically pointing a claw at something in the distance while hanging off the side of the ship while holding nothing but a rope to keep him on board.
I grabbed a spyglass from a minion that was acting as my personal servant for the trip and held it up to my eye. I saw a very stormy island with a castle sitting somewhere in the middle of it all. There was a very unnatural looking storm centered around the island, the circling clouds almost reminded me of the ritual I used to dominate Klugetown only with a lot more heavy rain, lightning and thunder. The entire island was shaped sort of like an oval, the landscape was rocky and hilly and reminded me of the typical terrain you’d find in Greece just on a smaller scale. There was also a large bay with a small port and shipyard connected by a road to the castle, the port was very busy with workers running around and airships docked and floating in the water waiting to be serviced.
I spied several cannons placed on cliffs around the island that pointed outward to the surrounding sea, providing coastal defense and making this harder. At least five sets of three and all of them rather large.
“Well, at least their homeland defense is better here than Klugetown,” Gnarl said. “You won’t be able to make a safe landing with those cannons armed and very dangerous, sire. You should eliminate some to make yourself a staging ground. Also, I think this storm around the island is magical in nature. Give me a moment…”
I directed the ship to circle the island once to get an idea of where to land as Gnarl muttered to himself. Once that was done I ordered to start the cannon fire at the defenses closest to the port and did my best to let the returning fire miss my ship. One shot came close, flying through the gap between the deck and the underside of the balloon. A minion yelled and pointed his saber dramatically at the island, the shot from the cannon he was directing at one of the cannon defenses next to the town got a lucky landing and blew up the gunpowder stored there. The resulting explosion killed the guards and disabled the cannons. The minions cheered at the carnage.
I directed the airship up a bit more as more cannonballs flew through the air at us. I hated missions like this and the constant rain, even if slightly blocked by the giant balloon over my head, didn’t help.
I brought the ship lower again and the entire port side of the airship fired their cannons, the minions cheering as some hit their mark and removed another set of cannons. That made two out of five cannon defenses gone and all of them from this area of the island. I could see a small beach next to a rocky path that led upward to the rest of the island. A potential staging ground.
Suddenly the sky lit up and a flash of blue lightning shot down from the sky, barely missing my ship and catching me off guard. I swore under my breath and quickly maneuvered the ship a bit further out from the island so I could see what just caused that.
“I think I just found the cause of this storm, Master,” Gnarl interjected as I began my search. “See those tall black obelisks?”
I did see them and directed the spyglass at the closest one. It was a very tall monument that tried to reach into the sky and was made of a black stone, with glowing blue runes in a straight line from bottom to top and small sparks of electricity coming from the pointed tip. One of the runes looked like the Storm King’s symbol. There were three of them surrounding the castle at high points, two on tall cliffs next to cannon batteries and one near the port on another tall cliff overlooking the bay that only looked to be reachable by a path that was connected to the city. Each was heavily guarded and formed a triangle of sorts around the island with the castle as its center.
Another lightning bolt tried to strike at me but it missed by a bit of a wide margin, it seems that those obelisks have a range limit. As I glanced around the island I saw one of the obelisks dim a bit and more magical lightning started to collect near its tip.
“I see!” Gnarl cheerfully said, I could almost see him throwing a finger in the air before rubbing his chin in thought. “Each obelisk only has one shot before it needs to recharge its magic but as you can see the third isn’t firing its own magic. That must mean that there needs to be at least one of them active to keep this perpetual storm rolling. Take out two of them and they can’t use those things offensively anymore!”
“But this is still a rather dangerous situation, sire. Perhaps it’s best if you stick to the ground where you can do the most damage with minimal risk to your Dark personage. It might be a bit of a walk but it’s better than drowning or being electrocuted to death by being a large flying target!”
“Yeah, I agree,” I said as I eyed the magical obelisks and shoved the spyglass into the arms of a minion. Maybe the Storm King found these things and decided to brand himself based on what they did.
I waited until another lightning blast was launched at us then directed the ship to the beach I spotted earlier. I wasn’t as good at landing this thing as I was flying it through empty air so the… docking was a bit rough. Still, the ship was safe on the beach and a ramp was dropped to the sand to allow us to disembark.
As I stepped onto the beach a rumbling near the end of the beach where the proper island began and the sand ended was heard and a brown-lit pit erupted from the ground. I raised my hand and called out all of the minions I equipped earlier. With my army summoned I began the march further into the island, the rain constantly striking my armor and being annoying.
I followed the path as it led me up a rocky hill. Once I reached the top I was able to see the port from my new vantage point. It took up the entirety of the bay and extended a bit out from it to make room for whatever the Storm King needed for his army. The port was walled with a palisade, keeping me from simply waltzing in from any place I chose. The only gate into the town was the one that was connected to the road that led to the castle.
The road split the port town in two distinct areas where the docks had a straight shot towards the castle. The two areas of the town were a bit chaotic in street design, nothing was necessarily a dead end but it was like looking at road spaghetti when the buildings were all close together. The only real neatness in town planning was the main road and the docks, showing what the Storm King thinks is the most important aspect of his temporary domain.
I looked at the castle itself, it wasn’t far from the port. The castle had a moat around it and a drawbridge that was currently up so I wasn’t able to assault it just yet. I wasn’t able to get any exact details from this distance but I was fairly certain I’d have to knock that drawbridge down before dealing with the defenders inside.
I turned to face the port town again and began jogging in its direction.
“You’ll have to get rid of the armada first, Master,” Gnarl said. “Don’t want them thinking they can just leave while you’re busy smiting them or just blow you up with their cannons!”
The minions followed me as I made my way to the gates of the town. I was hoping I could just get it over with, but I somehow doubted it’d be that easy. As the gate came up I could see that there were no actual gates on the frame, as if they were taken off for whatever reason. Oddly, I did see several metal rods with bluish writing like on the obelisks covering their length sticking out from the wooden frame
“Halt!” I heard a voice say, sounding like it came from a speaker. It was vaguely familiar…
I paused on the road, my minions halting their advance and eagerly waiting for me to give my orders.
“Another step and you’ll feel the wrath of the Storm King’s second-in-command!” I looked at the gate that had a small barricade blocking the road where a short blueish-gray creature with white hair along its spine was standing on top of and talking into a device that I recognized from the movie. Also the creature, but I never bothered to remember his name. He flinched when my gaze locked with his.
“B-Behold! The power of the Storm King!” He loudly announced and threw a finger into the air as three guards dropped what looked like a lightning rod behind the gate in the center of the road and just in front of the barricade, quickly getting out of the way after one fiddled with something on the rod’s base. Soon the rod was zapped by lightning and the balled tip of the rod buzzed with electricity before spitting bolts of it into the several metal rods implanted into the frame of the gate, forming a sort of electrical shield that prevented passage through it. The creature was getting more nervous the longer I stared at him.
“You shall not pass you strange and very t-terrifying armored creature that I will not be fighting! Your acts of defiance will be crushed by the evil foot of the Storm King!” Then he quickly threw the device he was talking into at one of the guards nearest him and bolted away from the area with great gusto. I grunted in annoyance.
“Well, you won’t be getting through that without becoming an extra-crispy Overlord,” Gnarl commented. “But I have a feeling that breaking that obelisk in the town will get rid of that blasted lightning shield. Find a way inside the city and take it out!”
I doubled back a bit and looked around for another entrance into the port town. As I crossed the rocky terrain and kept an eye on the wall of the port as I did I spied a small hole in the wall next to a large boulder, it was just large enough for a minion to run through. I spent the next few minutes looking for a safe spot, finding one hidden away from prying eyes amongst the tall rocks and hills. It was a slanted bit of rock that stuck out of a hill and created a sort of roof over my head with several rocks acting as walls.
I looked at the ground in the middle of the little area and reached out towards the Netherworld. My connection to it did grow as I had continued to just feel the energies of it through my body when I had the chance. As such I was rewarded with the ability to sprout small pieces of it (a separate thing from the spell I used to throw spear rocks at Tempest) from the ground as a shard of pure Netherworld rock. This shard was more magically charged and enabled me to use my magic in a different way to control a minion of my choosing, just like the second game.
I placed all but forty of my minions as guards for my body, the rest were dancing around the now taller pillar of Netherworld shard as one danced on its top. I stood in a less easily spotted location from the entrance to this area and charged my hand with magic. When the magic was ready it lifted me into the air with my arms outstretched to my sides and I felt my consciousness leave my body and slam itself into the eager mind of my minion.
“Oh, I can never get used to seeing this…” Gnarl bemoaned as I dropped from the shard and back to the ground. “Please hurry, sire, I don’t wish to see you like this for much longer.”
I just snorted and led my smaller group of minions towards the hole in the wall. Being this small after finally getting used to being so tall was a little jarring but the distance from my shelter to the hole in the wall wasn’t that great. I and the rest of the minions slipped through the hole, finding ourselves in a maze of towering boxes and barrels.
Not wanting to make too much noise we snuck past the boxes without destroying any. I did my best to try and stick to the edge of the palisade wall and any cover I could see but luck ran out when we came across a building that was right next to the wall and did not leave enough room to squeeze through the gaps. The building itself, much like the rest, looked like a bit more of a modern version of a building I’d see in one of those Pirates of the Caribbean movies.
With nothing else to do I looked at my minion and using my connection to them I silently ordered them to duck down. The building had a door close to a three-way intersection of smaller roads. I waited for a moment then quickly checked down the paved streets for any sign of enemies.
Spotting nothing the minions and I ran down the road then down another that led us into an opened door. The minions giggled and snickered as we inadvertently smashed the place apart with just our mere presence passing through before smashing a table to make a ramp so we could jump out a nearby window and run along the wall once more. I saw the port come up and we stopped behind a building near the edge of it.
“Hmm, the ships aren’t manned right now,” Gnarl observed. “Perhaps they’re all too busy guarding the town and other important places on the island.”
When I was sure the coast was clear the minions and I rushed to the nearest ship. It was a bit apart from the rest of the ships docked here but that seemed to be by the design of the pier. Once aboard I ordered the minions to take positions on the ship’s cannons. When they were all in position they all took aim at their own targets and readied for my order.
“Try to aim for the powder stores, you don’t want to be there for longer than necessary and have the entire town’s army on your head before you’re finished!”
“Fire!” I did my best to thunderously yell my order with the voice of a minion, it didn’t really work. With gleeful cheers the minions fired their cannons, the roars of the shots echoed through the town and slammed into the sides of the unprepared enemy ships. We managed to do this several times in a row before I could see the enemy response start scrambling towards us from the main road.
“That’s it, Lord! Crush those ships! Burn them into cinders and flotsam! Oh, those explosions are music to my ears!” Gnarl eagerly cheered. “After so long without doing Evil under a master this is getting me all fired up! Destroy that infernal obelisk and take over this town for your Dark Domain!”
The ships were already burning and exploding by the time I saw the first few soldiers come running to us so they were too late to stop me. With one final order the cannons of the ship aimed upwards and pointed at the obelisk sitting on the small hill on the other side of the town. I didn’t want to try and find a path through the city and try and assault the obelisk when it only had one entrance to its location. Well, not with my current forces as a posed minion anyway. With the crack of several rounds of cannon fire the obelisk eventually exploded into shards of dark stone that then caused a secondary magical explosion taking out the surrounding people.
Quickly abandoning the ship after dropping a lit torch near the barrels of powder the minions and I engaged some enemy soldiers on the pier. The enemy was a disorganized mess right now, there were no tactics being used unlike back in Klugetown. The empire in the game was a tougher nut to crack even though the individual units would have been weaker than the ones we were fighting.
If I had to guess, this was the short one’s fault.
The minions rushed forward with battle cries, stabbing any and all flesh they could find. The guards went down quickly and we didn’t stop to check if they were dead. When we were far away from the ship it suddenly exploded as the powder had finally caught from the fire of the dropped torch, taking that part of the pier and the bodies of the enemy soldiers with it.
The enemy was disoriented from the blast so I ordered the minions to take advantage of that and charge them down to cut a path out of the city. Just as I was almost certain we’d be able to take the whole town by ourselves I heard the now very familiar boom of cannon fire and the ground near us exploded into chunks. I was saved from injury but a couple of my minions died from that so I glanced at where I heard it come from.
A large cannon, almost more of a mortar really, sat near the main road and pointed in our direction. I didn’t want to deal with that so I did my best to wrap up the fighting and led us out of sight of that thing. Another shot echoed through the town and a building near us crumbled to the ground. I heard screams of pain then silence, there were people hiding away in some of the buildings it seemed. Well that was a good thing, I did need civilians working here. Nevertheless, we pressed on, killing enemy soldier after enemy soldier in the narrow streets.
“We could use that big, overcompensating cannon of theirs, Master,” Gnarl said. “Would be a neat little door knocker to open up that castle for an Evil visit huhahahaha!”
I lost another few minions to an ambush when some of the Storm Guards showed some tactical knowledge by dropping from the taller buildings and stepping on the heads of some minions when they landed. I managed to kill one as a minion, it was much harder than my actual body which wasn’t surprising.
The hole through the wall came into sight and we squeezed through without incident. I led us away from the town, keeping doubly sure that none could see us make our way across the terrain. I heard another lightning bolt go down and took a moment to check to see where it struck.
The town’s gate didn’t seem like it had the lightning field on it anymore. That being the case I glanced at the castle instead, my assumption was correct when I saw that the lightning now covered every inch of its walls. Meaning that I can’t just take the cannon from the enemy and assault the castle, looks like I’ll need to get rid of the other obelisks before the final assault.
“Joy,” I grumbled to myself as I made my way back to my body. Once I was close my magic cut me off from the minion’s body and I landed back down on the ground. I cracked my neck, even if I was floating in mid-air it was not good on my body.
“It’s not the worst situation, Dark One,” Gnarl commented. “Just think of it this way, you’ll have just that much more satisfaction bringing that overgrown monkey down!”
I just snorted in amusement and rested my ax over my shoulder as I contemplated my next move, “Guess it’s time to get to work…”