Redoubt outsider book 6, p.1
Redoubt (Outsider Book 6), page 1
Redoubt
Book Six of
the Outsider series.
by
Aiden Phoenix
Copyright © 2023 Aiden Phoenix
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. Except for the purposes of making reviews or other cases permitted by copyright law.
ISBN: 9798859014057
Cover created by Aiden Phoenix.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, locations, and events are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to any persons living or dead, locations, or events are coincidental and unintended by the author.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Epilogue
Welcome to Collisa!
Collisa is a new world brimming with opportunities for adventure and growth. It is also brimming with chances for romance and fun. This is the story of Dare and the life he builds for himself with the women he meets and falls in love with.
As you can guess, it is a harem tale, with all that includes. Be aware that it features varied and explicit erotic scenes between multiple partners. It is intended to be enjoyed by adults. All characters involved in adult scenes are over the age of 18.
Prologue
Silver
Dare pulled out all the stops cooking dinner for Lily.
The best cuts from an epind, the small, cow-like creature with incredibly succulent and delicious meat, which he'd slaughtered that very day for the freshest possible steaks. The finest quality root vegetables, winter greens, and dried fruits he could find. All the best spices he'd been able to buy or gather, the amounts carefully tweaked over several attempts until he had the most nuanced flavor possible.
Since he knew that the bunny girl, unsurprisingly, preferred greens and vegetables, he focused mostly on salads, vegetable dishes, and fruit desserts. Although she'd told him at one point that her warren gathered root vegetables for the winter months that they cooked into a stew, which he planned to make.
As for the epind steaks, well, he could admit those were mostly for him.
Not just him, though. Given how easy the cooking ability made things, so it not only took less time but required almost no supervision while the food was cooking, he was able to make enough portions for all his fiancees. The plan was to have a quiet, romantic candlelit dinner with just him and Lily, but he wanted to cook for his other beloved as well.
And, as more than one of them had pointed out, also have individual romantic dinners with all of them. Which, given how their harem had grown, would take over a week if he devoted one full evening to each of his fiancees.
Much as Dare wanted to spend quality time with them, and much as they all deserved the pampering and special attention, at the moment his time was limited. Thankfully they were all understanding of that and supportive of his efforts.
He had to finish preparing to petition for knighthood on the first of the year, less than a month away now. In that time he wanted to get at least one more level, ideally two to bring him up to 38, and at this point each level took about 10 days of determined monster slaying. He also needed to find two more party rated monsters, as well as killing the high level one he'd already found, to finish his Protector of Bastion achievement.
Dare also had to account for travel, being there for when Pella gave birth to their children, and any more unexpected blizzards that might keep him from going out. Or worse, trapping him in the midst of a storm like yesterday.
In fact, the only reason he'd had time to take a personal day to fix things around the manor, and have a proper romantic dinner with Lily, was because yesterday's blizzard had dumped enough snow to make travel a pain.
He was hoping that a few days of warmth would melt some of that snow, but in the meantime he'd made a sturdy pair of snowshoes to help him get around. Although it was going to slow his normally superhuman travel speeds.
On the plus side, Ireni had talked it over with Lily and Linia and agreed he should have the Home Ward. The two lower level women had a ways to travel themselves to reach spawn points to farm monsters at, but not nearly as far now that Lily was Level 20. On top of that with three people it was awkward since the artifact could only transport two, which would leave Lily to run home on her own.
She certainly could, since as a bunny girl she could run even faster than Dare and was much less slowed by snow. But they weren't in such a rush that they wanted her to travel alone.
As for Dare, having the Home Ward to take him back to Nirim Manor at the end of each day, at a speed of 120 miles an hour, was a huge boon. A lot of his time was spent scouting the mountains for party rated monsters, taking him great distances over rough terrain, and having an extra few hours to search was huge.
For tonight, though, all his focus was on his date with Lily.
With Leilanna's help he'd set up braziers around a picnic area in the garden, producing enough heat that even in what would be early December for Collisa, with over two feet of snow on the ground all around them, the area was toasty. Then he'd set up a table with a fancy tablecloth, put out the plates and silverware the way he'd seen Marona's maids set her table for high society, and lit a few candles for mood lighting.
As a final touch, he strewed petals from some frostflowers that he'd found a few days ago across the ground around the table. He also put some in a vase for a centerpiece, the delicate blue flowers blushing pink at the edges in the heat.
Dare honestly didn't know what he'd do without his lovers. Not only did they help him get the setting ready, but they also helped him clean up and shave as well. And finally they helped him figure out the fancy suit Marona had gifted him, as part of his wardrobe for his trip to Redoubt to petition for knighthood.
At least he'd cooked the dinner on his own. He had it set on a fancy serving table at the edge of the picnic area, kept warm by a fire from another of Leilanna's spells.
Now, with everything in place, he stood by the table and waited for Lily to join him. He had to wipe his palms on his pants a few times, and not just from the warmth of the braziers around him.
He had six beautiful fiancees, multiple lovers, and had been with many more exceptional women. But this sort of formal wooing was outside his experience, either on Collisa or from his past life on Earth.
Dare hoped he didn't screw it up. He could handle embarrassment, but Lily had dreamed of a storybook romance all her life and he wanted nothing more than to give it to her.
It didn't help his nerves that even surrounded by beautiful girls, the sweet, innocent, slightly nerdy bunny girl was one of the most ethereally lovely women he'd ever seen. To the point that he sometimes felt like he'd wandered into a dream when he looked at her.
Like right now, as he saw her glide into the garden down the cleared path.
Lily had her silver hair down in a flowing waterfall to her waist, blending in seamlessly with the matching off the shoulder evening gown she wore. Her delicate, milky pale features were hauntingly beautiful in the light of the braziers and numerous candles, her figure lush and graceful and perfect all at once.
She'd elected to leave off her large wire-frame glasses, and her big gray eyes sparkled with wonder as she took in the dinner setting, albeit a bit fuzzily. Her white-furred bunny ears looked sleek and velvety, and the back of her dress was cut to free her adorable white cottontail.
“Wow,” she breathed, stepping past the braziers. “You even put candles in the branches!”
Dare smiled and glanced up at the candles he'd fixed to the branches of the spreading sycamore overhead. “How could I not want to see your flawless beauty in the best lighting possible?”
Lily's pale skin showed a blush as he took her fur stole and guided her to her seat. “Wine?” he asked, pulling a bottle out of the snow where it had been chilling. She nodded, and he poured for them both.
She took a sip as she looked around, taking in the decorations. “So this is what a romantic dinner looks like. It's so much better than what I imagined from my books!”
That was generous of her to say, given how romantic stories tended to, well, romanticize things. He relaxed a bit as he rolled the food cart over to the table and lifted the covers off the trays.
“Oooh!” the bunny girl said as she offered her plate for him to fill. “There's barely any meat at all!”
Dare couldn't help but grin at that; between Zuri, Pella, Se'weir, Linia, and he could admit himself, their meals tended to be heavy on the meat. Especially since his hobgoblin fiancee was the one who did most of the cooking.
“I figured I'd try out some vegetable dishes I've been working on,” he said as he filled her plate.
Lily took a bite almost as soon as he was done; her table manners had always included more enthusiasm than refinement, a reminder that in spite of her elegant beauty she'd been raised in a warren.
She made a noise of enjoyment as she chewed. “Wow, this is so good! The others told me you were a great cook but this is the first chance I've had to try anything you've made.” She blushed a bit. “It makes me feel a bit embarrassed about the meals I cooked for you in Rosaceae's clearing.”
“Are you kidding, they were some of the best meals I've had,” he protested as he filled his own plate.
His date giggled. “Mother always used to say hunger is the best sauce, and you were pretty hungry for all those meals.” She reached across the table and patted his hand. “No need to be too polite, I realize my concept of spice was limited to what nature provided in the food itself. When you mostly eat fresh fruits and vegetables, and maybe some grains, you don't have too many opportunities to improve your cooking.”
“Well Se'weir says you've taken to the kitchen like a duck to water.”
“When I have time between leveling.” She focused on digging into her food, and for a few minutes they enjoyed the meal in relative silence.
“So I think I know what happened to Gurzan's Last Hold,” Lily eventually said as she lifted a forkful of salad to her mouth.
Dare paused cutting his steak, leaning forward in interest. “Oh yeah? I wasn't sure that knowledge even still existed.”
There'd been no filing system or organization to the sealed room full of dwarvish records they'd found, which made tracking the history a bit difficult. Although Ireni, bless her heart, was doing her best to organize it all.
It didn't help that they speculated that the books and scrolls they'd found, which had all rotted to dust over the ages even in the sealed records vault, were from the more recent periods of Gurzan's Last Hold's history.
She nodded eagerly. “I think it does! The dwarves kept a ceremonial set of plates where they recorded events of more religious significance. It was so important to them that they inscribed them on truesilver.”
Dare whistled at that. Truesilver was prized by the dwarves, but also by everyone else since it was 100 times more valuable than gold. Which was actually pretty convenient because in the monetary system of precious metals with copper, silver, gold, truesilver, and godmetal, each coin was worth 100 of the previous one.
Although gold was by far the most commonly used, since its value was right about in the range where a majority of purchases larger than a meal or a room for the night were made.
“So those plates might be worth as much as the entire rest of the records combined?” he asked as he lifted a bite of steak to his mouth.
Lily laughed. “In terms of more than just monetary value . . . the dwarves will prize these records most of all due to not just their historical but their religious significance.”
“So what happened to the city?”
She sobered. “Well the final entries in the truesilver plates don't say anything about it. But going back a few years, I found a mention that the dark elves they'd been warring with had fallen in league with an unknown dark power that was offensive to Thoronkir, dwarvish God of Delvers. With its aid the elves were able to bypass dwarvish defenses, appearing in what were thought to be safe tunnels to wreak havoc.”
After taking another bite of salad and chewing, she continued thoughtfully. “Actually, it's pretty interesting. The dark elves seem to have unlocked or created an entirely new class, at least for that time. The Phasewarper.”
Dare jumped slightly. He had perused all the possible classes and was at least superficially familiar with them. The Phasewarper was an odd class, with no offensive or defensive spells or abilities. It was almost entirely focused around teleportation and magical storage, as well as limited scrying. A bird's eye view of the world so the caster could have some small idea of where they were teleporting to.
Even so, it was considered a combat class in the same vein as support classes.
“So you think the dark elves had enough Phasewarpers to launch a surprise attack and send the dwarves fleeing, or wipe them out entirely?”
The bunny girl shrugged and adjusted her glasses as she took a sip of wine. “Like I said, the final entries don't mention trouble at all. Whatever happened must've happened quickly, but I still haven't found any direct reference to it.”
She made a face. “It doesn't help that the translation stones can't do anything with like a third of the words . . . we really need to find a dwarvish scholar.”
That was for sure. Although Dare didn't want to involve a dwarf until he figured out how he was going to gift the records to the dwarves, and thus reveal the existence of Gurzan's Last Hold, without the dwarves immediately laying claim to the underground city.
He didn't mind if they moved in, and even thought it would be beneficial to have a friendly neighbor to trade with and for mutual defense. But there was a Level 52+ dungeon in there he wanted to clear first if he could, and it would take a long time to even get to that level.
Although he couldn't put off giving the dwarves their prized history for too long; their gratitude could quickly turn to enmity if he handled this wrong.
“Speaking of which, how's the transcribing going?” They'd hired goblins from the Avenging Wolf village to copy the dwarvish runes down on blank books Zuri made using her ability to create one-use spell scrolls, with a few added steps.
The goblins were all literate, as most intelligent creatures on Collisa were since the class, ability, and information systems required reading. Even if they hadn't been, though, all that was required to copy runes was to make sure they'd made an exact copy.
The goblins they'd hired were surprisingly good at it, careful and patient and seemingly immune to boredom. Although it probably helped that Dare had given them a few translation stones to check their work, so they were no doubt also enjoying reading the dwarvish records as they worked.
Heck, they'd probably be experts on Gurzan's Last Hold before they were done.
He wished he had more time to read the records himself. As well as other books about Collisa's histories and stories. He still wanted to begin buying books and create an extensive library at Nirim Manor.
There seemed no end of things to do.
Lily spooned herself a portion of fried vegetables. “It's a slog, like we expected. Even doing their best the goblins can't make the runes anywhere near as small and closely spaced as they are on the plates and tablets, so it's taking a lot more paper. Each book takes days of steady work.
Not surprising. And most of the reason why books had been so expensive before the printing press and were valuable on Collisa . . . copying them was no small task.
Dare sort of doubted the gods would be pleased if he tried to introduce the printing press here. He was sure something that world-changing would immediately be banned, and he'd probably get Noticed 3 in the bargain.
Once his date pushed aside her plate he cleared them away and brought up the dessert tray, which included small cakes, fruit tarts, a trifle, and even ice cream; that had taken some work to figure out.
Although she seemed to have no complaints with any of the options, given how she enthusiastically took a generous helping of each.
Dessert was filled with light banter, and when they finally pushed away their plates Lily sighed contentedly and rubbed her tummy. “That was the best meal I've ever had, and I'm not just saying that.”
Dare smiled as he cleared the table, pleased. Then he offered her his elbow and led her over to a new fixture of the picnic area he'd just made today, with quite a bit of tinkering and a bunch of aid from Irawn, whose secondary class was Blacksmith, and one of the goblin villagers whose main class was Woodcarver.
“What is it?” the bunny girl asked, squinting at the tarp-covered shape. Given how she absently reached up to adjust glasses that weren't there before remembering, her squinting might not've been all for dramatic effect.
He gave her a playful look. “Well I figure since we spend so much time out here looking at the stars and enjoying each other's company, we should do it in comfort. Besides, it'll be fun for the kids.” He yanked the tarp away. “Ta-da!”
It was a bench swing, hanging on chains from an A-frame. An easy enough thing to make, but apparently it hadn't been thought of yet on Collisa. Although it represented another crafting pattern Dare had introduced to the system.
“What does ta-da mean?” she asked of the Earth phrase as she looked over the new piece of furniture.
