Rise of the Cosmic_Emperor

"What is that?" Hal asked and he eyed the vial on the table and could also feel a sort of familiarity with it.

"It's blood. The blood of Beldar the Dystopian)" Tanya said with a serious expression.

(You might remember Beldar to be the Dystopian who wished to make money by supplying body strengthening techniques that turned cultivators into mutated monsters. Chapter 310)

Hal of course remembered Beldar and he also understood what Tanya meant when she referred to using it as an obscure energy source.

That said, he did not act knowledgeable and patiently listened to Tanya's explanation.

"Despite his death, there is powerful nefarious energy within his blood that I have been experimenting with since you brought it to me back then.

I drew the glamour rune with this blood in mind and it is why the rune has a bit of a similarity with spells and is also technically a combination of the two (Spells and Runes).

Anyway, using this to power the rune will surely get it past any of the anti-Rune measures that have been put in place." she said at waved towards Hal who reached forward and took the vial.

There was something funny to Hal about the way Tanya was looking at to glass vial as though it was a shady and dangerous thing while he felt it was quite tame.

That said, despite the look in her eyes, there was a lot of determination as Tanha was more than ready to do as much as she could and as much as she needed to do to achieve her goals.

Once Hal took the vial and lifted it to observe it from all angles, Tanya took out a small stack of rune sheets on which she had drawn her glamour runes and she passed them to him,

"They don't last forever and are finite resources which means you need to be careful and responsible in how you use them," she said.

"Sure" Hal answered and took the stack of rune sheets to send them into his inventory even though it seemed to Tanya that he was sending them into his spatial ring.

"When you arrive at the Arkene Duchy capital, head over to Rose Petal Restaurant, it's a branch and main chair of my communication network in the Duchy. 

Ask for Aliya, she heads the restaurant, and she will tell all you need to know and help you into their palace to be selected to be one of the Duchess' attendants."

"Okay," Hal said as nonchalantly as he possibly could.

Tanya paused and then just decided to move on considering that this was just how he was and it was quite unlikely that he was particularly worried despite the dangers.

"That will only get you close to the Empress though and ultimately only get you the piece that she has with her," Tanya said.

"Don't worry, I'll get the two" Hal said with a confident smile.

He was thinking beyond just the pleasure of another mature woman who was the wife of a Duke and was actually thinking about how well this worked for his conquest in general.

Thanks to Tanya and under the visage of doing a mission for her, he had the opportunity to go deep into the heart of a Duchy and very likely take it over.

There were so many advantages but there was a bit of a Time constraint.

The monument of Ordinances would be opening in about two weeks and whatever he did and planned to do, he must wrap up within that time frame so that he could enter the monument and solve the other issues he had.

Problem with wrapping up quickly though was that he was going in with minimal information...

The only thing that he knew for sure is that the Duchess (by marriage) loved to have pretty boys working as her attendants.

That information basically just painted her as a nympho who got her kinks from staring at faces. 

Were those enough for her...

Without their family jewels, were there other services the young male attendants could provide her that she was satisfied with?

Also, what reason was there for this kink, and how exactly was their relationship that the Duke was okay with his wife's kinks.

So many questions...

"The Arkene Duchy is much farther from the Imperial city than Doxon, Dreg, or Silva, and the fastest you will get there with an express Teleportation circle is four days. 

I am sure you will want to enter the monument of Ordinances and if that is the case, you won't have much time" Tanya said.

"So, do you want to postpone? Do you want to wait until after my trip to the monument" Hal asked with a sigh.

In the past two weeks, while the Guild war had been going on, a public announcement (or a fairly public announcement) had been made to all who were eligible to enter the monument that they would be declaring war on all Dystopians who happened to be in the monument.

It was an order by the Emperor that they all prepared to enter the monument not only to comprehend an Ordinance but to kill as many Dystopians as they could.

Now, it is worth noting that it is not only youngsters that will be entering the monument but it would be anyone who did not yet have an Ordinance or already had one and was going in to try for another one to try for that Elusive Abstract Ordinance.

Anyway, when the announcement had been made, Hal had not really paid it any attention as he was not exactly planning to waste his time in the monument following the order of some Emperor whose rule he did not care for and for whom, didn't have loyalty or respect.

The part of it all that did pique his interest was that, in preparation for the war to go down in the monument, many were flooding auction houses and Trade Union to get what they needed and they were mostly flooding a particular trade union; The Paladin Trade Union.

Since his return, Hal had not yet met with Lucile but he had heard tales of how much bigger the union now was as well as the fact that she had done just as she always wanted and now had a branch of the Union in every one of the twelve Duchys as well as the Imperial city.

The fact that he had a stake in the Union was one of the reasons Hal did not really care about monetary rewards from Tanya.

Booming as the Trade union presently was as well as the amount of wealth that his women had been able to cart out of this Tomb made it so that Hal was quite wealthy already.

And that was not including the amount he still had in his inventory.

Money was not really an issue for him.

Anyway,

Tanya opened her mouth to speak but Hal quickly interrupted,

"No, no need to answer. I'll get the pieces for you now" he told her.

He had things he was planning to do after his time in the monument and he was not really sure he would have the time at that moment to run around and get Orb pieces for her... At least not immediately.

"Okay then, that's good. There is a departing Teleportation circle in the Palace and it will get you to the Arkene Duchy in four days. Lena will show you the way" Tanya said and Hal looked back at Lena just in time to see her perk to what Tanya just said.

"Great, we can have some quality time," Hal said with a smile and despite the bit of redness on her cheeks, Lena ignored him and bowed to Tanya,

"As you wish, your highness," she said and Hal chuckled.

***

Despite what he said and what he had insinuated with his words, Hal was completely silent all through their trip to the Express Teleportation circle.

While Lena would never admit it, she was getting frustrated by his silence, and every time she looked at him by her side, Hal's eyes were always facing forward and the only thing that gave it all away as an act was the slight smile on his lips.

"Hmph," Lena eventually said and looked away from him.

Hal looked at her with what looked to be a concern as he asked,

"Is anything the matter?" 

He sounded so polite and gentlemanly (Nothing like how he usually was around her) and it only served to aggravate her more.

She didn't answer him though and just increased her pace as her leading of Hal to the express teleportation circle was a mixture of speed walking and use of short-distance teleportation circles.

And then they arrived at what was a beautiful teleportation building that had its attending Runemasters who looked at Hal with caution.

"This is only open to members of the Imperial Family," one of them said and he had the poise of a guard and was clearly a runemaster well trained in combat.

"The Princess sent him," Lena said and showed them a seal.

The Runemaster/guard stepped aside and Hal gave them coordinates of his destination as the capital of the Arkene Duchy.

When they put in the coordinates and it was time to step on, Lena turned around as though to walk away but Hal grabbed her hand and pulled her close until her breasts were pressed against his chest and he kissed her.

"Mmm" Lena was completely taken by surprise but it did not take long for her to melt into it.

She felt her inner thighs moisten when Hal reached down and grabbed her ass cheek.

When Hal pulled away from her with a smirk, he stepped on the circle,

"See you," He said and was teleported away in barely a second.

The Attending Runemasters all looked at Lena and she adjusted her gown and cleared her throat with her cheeks burning with a mixture and embarrassment,

"K-Keep up the good work," she told them and turned around to walk away as fast as she could...

... With the Runemasters looking between her and the Teleportation circle Hal just vanished on.