>>5625639You open your eyes, and are about to chastise your demonic ally for invading your thoughts again… Only to see the green-skinned, tattooed devil-woman hovering in open, misty ‘air’ before you. You look down, and find yourself once more in your own default form—your dream-form.
“Go-time?” Irinnile asks.
“Yes,” you agree.
Irinnile leads you through the palace—or, rather, its shadow-archetype, a dark and somehow dingy place, silent like an empty shrine. Grey, spectral shapes, those of guards and staff still awake, drift by ephemerally, their footfalls muffled to your astral ears. Only when you drift by the quarters of the sleeping servants do you hear the quiet rhythm of voices, the occasional burst of laughter or panicked cry. A dull orange-white glow peers out from under their doors—the light of dreams, which you could enter, influence, as you plan to affect those of their sleeping king.
Your earlier use of <Guidance> grants you rough geographic knowledge of the Paladin King. Irinnile, your guide in this warped mirror-realm, helps triangulate it in reference to the subtly-shifted dimensions of the architecture here, moulded and reshaped by popular unconscious perception. Important or oft-frequented chambers are larger-than-life, dull hallways and rarely-visited wings are vague and foreshortened.
“Trippy, huh?” Irinnile chirps, cheerfully.
“Hm.”
“Still sour at me?” she pouts. “Come ooon, be cool! How about, like, a quick little handy to make it up to ya’?”
You glare at her, ignoring the suggestive motion of her cupped hand until she stops and sighs.
“Eyes on the prize?”
“Yes.”
You soon approach that prize: the private quarters of Paladin King Archos. There is the say glow of dreamlight emanating from between the two great doors to his overlarge sleeping-chamber, symbol of mammalian decadence. But there is also something… Else. A different, bluish sort of glow. You and irinniel exchange a glance.
“Wards?” you ask.
Irinnile nods, cringing, and gingerly presses upon the door with one finger. She yelps at a quasi-electric spark which snaps at her offending digit, and draws back her hand, suckling upon the afflicted finger for a moment as she considers her options.
“I guess it’s, like, no big SHOCKER that th’ Kinga a’ the Pallypals is hidden behind anti-demon wards, ‘specially with all the hubbub about demon cults and Southern demonists ‘n all that shit, huh?”
You seethe silently. Why did you not consider that? Was this all wasted effort? Maybe you should just return to your own body, or pay a visit to Ekaterine…
“Hey now, my blue0balled baby boy, lets’ not get all defeatist YET!” Irinnile says, reaching up to squeeze your cheeks.
You resist the urge to bite her, and wait to hear your options.
Hands on hips, one thrust out to the side, the succubus outlines her analysis of the situation:
