Primordial Villain with a Slave Harem

Chapter 1511  Ceasing Hostilities

The color drained from Velaraʼs face.

The fury didnʼt vanish, it was still there, burning behind her eyes, screaming to be let out. But the Goddessʼs decree was louder. Every word of it. ”Find a path where my faithful can endure.” ”You will have served me better than any martyrdom ever could.”

If she drove him away from the table, there was no table. If there was no table, there was no coexistence. If there was no coexistence, every cathedral in every city he conquered would face potential ruin.

The Arch Priestess who had regenerated severed limbs and tanked a fire detonation and cleansed venom from her blood swallowed her pride so hard Quinlan could hear it.

”…I apologize,” she forced through her teeth. ”For raising my voice.”

Each word sounded like it was being extracted with pliers.

Quinlan smiled behind the helmet. ”Hmm… So be it. Apology accepted.”

Black Fang sent him a look so dark it couldʼve curdled milk. Sheʼd had her katana drawn, the kill a heartbeat away, and he had dangled it in front of her only to close the door.

ʼYou robbed me,ʼ her eyes said.

”I have a feeling youʼll get your fill of powerful enemies to fight very soon, Miss Terror. Furthermore, I think not all Arch Priests will be as receptive as this one. They are the blind faithfuls of ʼher,ʼ after all. Maybe you will get to kill one of them in the future.”

The words came out ominous, sounding more like a promise than a hopeful guess.

Black Fangʼs purple eyes searched him before she scoffed and sheathed the katana.

Quinlan watched her for a moment before his attention shifted.

Heʼd been running on adrenaline and combat focus since the Warp Gate. Fighting, casting, analyzing, adapting. Every second had been consumed by the next threat, the next decision, the next angle of attack.

Now, in the brief stillness after the decree, he actually looked at Black Fang.

Her dark combat robes were ruined. The fabric had burned away in patches from diving through his fire sphere, and the Aegis of Purityʼs blast had torn what remained into ribbons that hung from her frame. Beneath the shredded cloth, her skin told the story of the fight. Burns ran up her forearms where golden light had leaked past her deflection. Charred patches marked her shoulders and collarbone where his own flames had caught her mid-dive. A raw, blistered streak crossed her ribs where the Aegis had connected.

She stood straight. She breathed evenly. The katana was sheathed and her posture betrayed nothing.

But the damage was real, and it was extensive.

Black Fangʼs build had never prioritized survival. Agility first, Strength second, everything else sacrificed for the kill. Her Health pool sat at 2010 - a number most melee fighters her level would call suicidal. Quinlan was already above 3200, and he was a hybrid fighter at level 51. Black Fangʼs answer to durability had always been simple: be fast enough that nothing touches you.

She had 342 Agility, but only 201 Vitality.

When the Aegis hit everyone in range regardless of speed, her body had no cushion to fall back on. ”Are you okay?” Quinlan asked.

The question came out quieter than he intended.

Black Fangʼs purple eyes snapped to him. The temperature between them dropped.

”Do not treat me like one of your fragile wives,” she decreed, cold and immediate. ”I suffered combat injuries. That is all. Iʼll live.”

His dark helmet receded without a motion from him, the plates folding back and contracting into the collar of his armor as Synchra did her best to help her master communicate what he wanted to communicate.

His face was exposed now. The concern on it was visible.

”I meant no offense, no condescension. Youʼre a warrior who has earned my respect many times over.”

He held her gaze.

”But I can still be worried for your safety, canʼt I? I can still feel an ache in my heart when youʼre injured, canʼt I?”

Black Fang observed him.

Her purple eyes moved across his face, reading it the way she read battlefields. Searching for the angle, the agenda, the hidden strike behind the words.

A breath left her and she looked away.

Quinlan didnʼt push it.

”Itʼs not every day you break the worldʼs conventions and attack a holy priestess only to get the kill denied. I get it.”

”…” Black Fang said nothing for a moment. Then she looked back at him.

”So you donʼt like seeing me in pain. Heal me, then.”

The expectation in her eyes was pointed.

Quinlanʼs gaze narrowed instantly.

He knew exactly what this woman was doing. The Healer class, the one heʼd wanted since he first arrived in Thalorind, the one the Goddess had denied him repeatedly... Black Fang knew about it. She knew it was a sore spot. She knew he couldnʼt heal her.

Sheʼd just poked the bruise on purpose.

A grin flickered across Black Fangʼs face. Brief. Barely there. A crack in the mask that lasted half a second before the stone expression slammed back into place.

Quinlanʼs eyes widened and he latched onto it right away. ”Wait. Youʼre grinning.”

”No.” She looked away.

”Yes, you are. I just saw it. The great Black Fang, the Venomborne Terror, just grinned at me like a girl who told a joke and thought it was funny.”

He reached for her chin, fingers moving to turn her face back toward him.

”Iʼll break your hand,” she growled.

”Itʼs already in pretty bad shape. Do your worst.”

Black Fang stared at him.

Her mouth opened. Closed. For once in her life, the Venomborne Terror had no retort prepared.

She pulled a healing potion from her spatial ring and drank it in one swift motion, turning away from him as she did. The red liquid did its work, closing the worst of the surface burns and taking the rawness out of the charred skin, but the deeper damage lingered. Potions could only do so much against holy fire and the aftermath of a Primordialʼs flames.

Quinlan chuckled at her stubbornness and reached into his own spatial ring.

A coat emerged. Dark, heavy, lined with fur. He stepped forward and draped it over her shoulders, pulling it closed over the ruined robes and burned skin with a care that didnʼt match the battlefield they were standing on.

”I might not be able to heal you, but let me do this much. This is a special coat, itʼs not going to irritate your wounds when coming in contact with them.”

”…”

She wore the coat the way she wore blood: without acknowledgment. Her eyes fixed on the cathedral with an expression that dared anyone to comment.

Velara commented.

”The most wanted woman in the human kingdom,” the Arch Priestess said from the top of the steps, her voice carrying the brittle edge of a woman whose patience had been sanded down to nothing, ”and the Primordial Villain. Flirting. On the Goddessʼs sacred doorstep. While the city burns around you. The city you invaded.”

She pressed a hand to her face.

”My faith tests me.”

Quinlan adjusted the coat around Black Fangʼs shoulders. His hands moved carefully, pulling the collar away from the raw skin at her neck, folding the fabric so it sat across her burned forearms without pressing against the blisters. He tugged it snug at the front and checked that the fur lining wasnʼt catching on the charred remains of her robes.

Black Fang endured this in perfect silence, staring at a fixed point on the cathedral wall with the intensity of a woman who was absolutely not being fussed over.

Quinlan grinned and looked up at the Arch Priestess.

”Truly one of her chosen. You can whine just as well as she can.”

Velaraʼs expression shattered into bewilderment for the second time in five minutes.

”Stop making wild assumptions as if youʼve personally interacted with the Goddess-”

She caught herself.

The decree. The Goddessʼs own words, delivered directly into her mind. ”The one who stands before you is known to me.” The casual way heʼd called her ”Bratty Goddess” and looked at the sky and said he loved her. The specific, intimate details of his complaints that no one could fabricate.

He had interacted with her. Personally. Was such a blasphemous event possible?

Quinlanʼs grin deepened.

”Letʼs get down to business, then, shall we? I demand the unconditional surrender of this cathedral, a full handover of your clerical authority within Whisperfield, and the transfer of all church assets, personnel, and holdings in this city to my jurisdiction.”

”Hah?”

The negotiations have begun!