Gift of the Goddess

~~~

This chapter is part of a series. Please read the preceding chapters before starting this one.

~~~

Pamela didn't eat breakfast with us. Sondra said she'd grabbed some bread and cheese and was already gone.

"Lissa says the first wave will be here tomorrow,"

Pamela projected into my mind.

"We'll have our first battle sometime around midday."

I passed the info along to the others.

"Leedra, Myrna, and I will drop you off and then go work with Pamela to get the ramp redone the way she wants it," Rebekah said.

"Sounds good," I replied. "I'm sure Lissa will have me pounding levels into the troops."

"Literally," Fiera said, smirking. "Pamela had me working with the archers yesterday afternoon. I'll be doing more of that, I'm sure." She turned to Myrna and said, "We could use more arrows."

Myrna looked over at Leedra - who said, "I'll make more arrowheads before we start on the ramp."

Sondra got us fed and then told us to get going. Rebekah opened a portal to the temple and we all stepped through. Pamela was there. I left them to their plotting and plans. There was already a line of women waiting - with the archers at the front - so I got undressed and got busy.

For the first time, I noticed two women had a profession of 'healer'. They were both mid-40s for levels. Their age didn't look much less than that - but then this is a harsh world for women. I added another 20 levels to each of them and sent them on their way.

While I was eating lunch, Silena dropped by.

"Lissa wants you to quit using your Generous Lover ability," she said.

"Oh?"

"She wants you leveled back up so you can help with support - with Restoration - as well as your more limited fighting abilities."

"My only attack is Hera's Judgement. Hera's Mercy is defensive and Blink is more utility."

She nodded and said, "She says she hasn't had any visions. She just worries that you gave away too many levels and we need to build you back up."

"Even though that will take away from my efforts to level up the fighters?" I asked.

She nodded and said, "You've done more than enough, Basil. Just listen for once."

She leaned over, gave me a kiss, and then walked away.

I toggled off Generous Lover.

By the time Rebekah and the others came to get me for dinner, I was back over level 200 again.

The portal mage noticed immediately and nodded.

"I talked with Lissa," she said. "She agreed with me. Hopefully, by the time the fighting starts, we can get you halfway to 300."

She leaned over, gave me a kiss, grabbed my hand, and pulled me through the portal to home.

After dinner, the girls cycled through my bedroom again - only - this time - they made me share in the experience gains. By the time they all piled into bed with me, I'd gained another 30 levels.

"Can I give Fiera 20 levels - to get her over 200?" I asked Rebekah.

"If she wants to break 200, she can wake you up before breakfast and I'll let you use Generous Lover to fuck 20 levels into her," she replied.

Fiera nodded to her and then smiled at me like a fox studying a hen house.

"Basil?" Pamela said, as my eyes closed.

"Yes?" I replied.

"I like you a lot," she said. "Be careful tomorrow. Take care of yourself. I don't know what I'd do without you."

"Kiss him," Leedra purred at her.

The girls shoved her on top of me. I wrapped her in a cocoon made of arms and legs. She snorted at me, gave me a kiss, and laid her head on my chest.

~~~

"At least let me move first," Pamela growled, causing me to wake up.

The knife fighter was still lying on top of me. Behind her, Fiera was thrusting her hips - and bumping against Pamela's ass as she fucked herself on my cock.

[ Aura of Restoration ]

[ Aura of Cleansing ]

[ Aura of Rejuvenation ]

[ Place of Worship ]

[ Generous Lover ]

I reached down, grabbed Pamela by the ass-cheeks, and slid her up my body until I got my mouth on her sex. She grabbed onto the headboard and started moaning and writhing.

"Oh, fuck ...," she moaned. "Fuck, yes! Eat my twat, you monster!"

Between the two of them, I nutted in Fiera's cunt three times in quick succession and she was at 219 by the time the three of us got to breakfast. Pamela had gotten three orgasms (and levels) as well.

When Sondra dropped a big plate of breakfast in front of me, I grinned, glanced at Pamela, and told Leedra's mom, "I already ate."

When she looked at the knife fighter, my old classmate blushed harder than I'd ever seen. Sondra cackled with laughter.

She kissed Pamela on the cheek when she delivered her food.

"Come home safely to us tonight, children," Sondra ordered.

Lee looked around the room and nodded.

"Yes, sweetest of mothers," I replied. "Thank you for all that you do for us."

"This home is a dream," she said, "and you all fill my heart with gladness. I'm sure you will be fine but watch out for each other."

"We will, Mama," Leedra told her.

The girls dropped me at the temple and headed for the guard house. By lunchtime, I'd gained another 72 levels and was sitting at Level 283 - just short of 300.

Rebekah portaled in, grabbed me before I could dress, and took me to the guard house. I ate my lunch as Fiera knelt in front of me and sucked my cock. She couldn't get it to fit down her throat, but she sucked like crazy and I came quickly and she swallowed it all down. My first wife ordered me to use Aura of Rejuvenation and then had the flame ranger suck me off a second time.

I was at 293.

A grid of black squares sat in front of Rebekah's right eye - tiny portals. She had eyes everywhere.

"Two assassins coming over the backside of the mountain," she told Pamela.

A portal appeared. We could see the back of one of the assassins as they slowly snuck from cover to cover, coming down the mountain. Pamela pulled a knife, jumped through, grabbed the attacker, and yanked them back through the portal. A vine came out of a pouch at Myrna's belt and wrapped the fighter up. A second portal appeared and Pamela grabbed the other one. Myrna tied this one up as well.

Pamela and Fiera dragged the two men off to question them. When they returned, several minutes later, Pamela was wiping blood off of her knives.

"Keep an eye on the mountain," she told Rebekah, "but they were led to believe that they were the only ones coming from that direction."

"How big of an army are we looking at?" I asked.

"Expeditionary force," Pamela replied. "They plan to scout us and test us."

I had just notice a hawk, circling above us, when Fiera's bow appeared in her hands and she shot the thing out of the sky. Pamela nodded and told her to keep an eye out for more.

"We should be seeing them on the road soon," the Captain of the Guard told us.

"We ready on arrows?" Rebekah asked Myrna.

She looked a Leedra and nodded. "You gonna need more?"

"Yeah," the portal mage said.

She turned to Pamela.

"They're coming into view now."

We looked down at the valley road. They were coming from the direction of Eastplain. Rebekah's right eye played across her tiny spy-portals one more time and then the number of view-panels reduced from a couple dozen down to just four.

"Line your archers up, here, facing the ramp," Rebekah told Fiera.

The flame ranger moved to get her girls into position. Once they were there, Rebekah addressed them.

"A portal the size of a man's head will appear in front of you. They will see a black square and may react to it. Target one of their eyes and drive a shaft into their head. As soon as that one is dead, I'll bring up your next target. We will start at the back of their column and work our way forward. Hopefully, we'll be able to eliminate all of them this way - without risking damage - but plans usually change as soon as they are implemented."

"No shit," I mumbled.

"I will be standing behind you so that I can see when your assigned opponent is dead. If I'm delayed in getting you a new target, just get yourself ready to fire and wait until I get back to you."

The girls all nodded.

"Since Fiera is the highest level archer we have," she told them, "I will be prioritizing her on the tougher targets but - as I said - there may be complications."

The archers rolled their shoulders, shook out their arms, or did whatever they needed to do to prepare themselves.

Once they were ready, Rebekah counted down, "3, 2, 1, fire!" and bow after bow twanged, arrow after arrow flew through a portal and claimed a victim, the portal disappeared, and another appeared in its place.

There were no complications - at least none of significance. I figured we wouldn't be so lucky the next time - and there were a few targets that required more than one arrow - but the expeditionary force of around four dozen men - mostly swordsmen supporting a few more specialized combatants - were all dead in a little over a minute.

"Pamela?" Rebekah asked.

"Yes, sister," she said, grinning broadly.

"Do you have anybody who could drag those bodies back through a portal so we can clear the road and take advantage of some ill-gotten gains?"

"Yes," she practically crowed, "I most certainly do."

"Everybody else make room," Rebekah said.

A huge gateway appeared by her side.

Pamela led several of her warriors through the portal. Leedra, Myrna, and Fiera started to step towards the portal but Rebekah waved them back.

"I don't think anybody's there," she said, "but we're not risking you. Pamela can fight her way free but I don't want to have to worry about the rest of you - or about Basil running through the portal to try to save you. You've done a lot already and can help at range. Leave the hand-to-hand stuff for others."

"Yes, sister," Myrna said, nodding.

"Leedra?"

"Master?"

"You have any hovels you can shove into the furnace to get it fired up?" I asked.

Myrna said, "You could have her smash the bodies into paste and use them to fertilize the plots we intend to sow with grain next spring."

I glanced at Rebekah. She shrugged.

"How do you send off your warriors?" I asked them. "Into the afterlife?"

"Pyres for the honorable," Myrna said. "Thieves are left for the wolves and carrion eaters."

"If we sow the field with blood, will it attract predators that we don't want?" I asked.

"We could use it as bait for the wolves and wild cats and harvest any who come," Rebekah said.

"I would love a wolf-pelt for Papa," Leedra said.

I nodded and said, "Smash the bodies into paste and sow the fields with blood. We'll claim a couple wolf pelts and cat pelts and then hand the rest over to the tanners to be processed and sold - with the money going into the treasury."

I worried that Leedra's weak stomach would cause problems again but Myrna worked to keep her distracted with tasks. Soon enough, the two of them were carting the bloody slurry through a portal to the valley below. The cart, that the wood mage had made, started releasing its contents from holes in the bottom and, soon, the whole area was tinted red.

Lissa and the priestesses arrived as the girls returned from their grisly work. They looked over the haul as Pamela talked them through all that had transpired and how we'd cleaned up the road and eliminated the bodies.

"We'll need a bigger armory," Pamela told her. "This stuff will have us at capacity but we'll need more space soon."

Lissa nodded and said, "Let's prioritize that. I want the temple done soon but we can hold off until tomorrow to see what happens. I have not foreseen any other troop movements but I want to proceed with caution."

For the rest of the day, Leedra and Myrna worked on the ramp, the guard house (and entrance to the city), and the support buildings (including the armory) that went with it. Rebekah dropped me off at the temple to get back to work and then she joined the others to help move things around more quickly.

She was back to walking around with a grid of tiny portals in front of her right eye - as she kept an eye on all of the approaches to the plateau.

Fiera brought me lunch, sat with me while I ate, collected a kiss, and then took my dirty dishes away.

By the time we were ready to quit for the night, I'd added another 70 levels - and was more than midway to 400.

Lissa was my last "customer" for the afternoon. She walked up, told the girls who were in line to come back the next day, and began to undress.

[ Place of Worship ]

[ Experience Saver ]

[ Generous Lover ]

[ Aura of Restoration ]

[ Aura of Cleansing ]

[ Aura of Rejuvenation ]

She lay down on the altar and spread herself for me. I crawled between her thighs and got down to business.

"Sure you don't want me to bend you over this thing and take you from behind?" I asked, grinning.

She smirked at me and said, "The priest will come. I have foreseen it. It will be the one battle that you will fight in."

"Making some kind of statement?" I asked.

She nodded.

"Doesn't do any good to make an announcement if we're not leaving anybody to go back and spread the word," I said.

She shrugged - and then caught my face in her hands and pulled me down so that we could make out as I fucked her. She seemed to need fucking more than she needed conversation - so I shut my mouth and tried to help her out.

She shuddered through her second set of climax-chains (after I pumped my second load into her) just as Rebekah appeared.

"Those are easier to deal with than when you use Experience Saver and Dividends with Interest," the prophetess said.

I nodded and told her, "Yeah. It reduces the speed of the experience gains - but I don't have to keep using Rejuvenation to wake people up."

"Thanks for the fuck," she said, smiling.

"Anytime, hot stuff," I said, giving her a quick peck before hopping up and offering her a hand to get down.

She accepted my help and then started getting dressed.

"As far as I can tell," she said, "we'll have a couple days before the next troops arrive. I'd like to get the temple built, if possible."

"We have enough housing for now?" I asked.

"We need to give people time to move into the ones you've already built," she said, "before we have more of the old ones cleared out so that we can pull them down."

"Okay," I said.

I gave her a quick hug - and another kiss - and followed Rebekah through the portal.

"Leedra needs to spend the night in your bed," Rebekah whispered, as we arrived in the living room.

"What about you and Myrna?" I asked.

"We can wait," she said. "I'll care for my sister tonight. Pamela wants to have some time with Fiera."

I nodded and moved to my seat. Lee waved me to his left.

"Good day?" he asked.

"We killed a bunch of people and I got laid," I told him, grinning.

"Good day, then," he said, grinning back.

He groped his wife's ass when she brought a dish to the table and leaned between us. When she returned to the kitchen, he leaned over and whispered, "I had a good day too."

I was in the middle of getting a drink of berry juice and just about shot it all over the table. He smirked and patted my back as I tried to clear my airway of things that weren't supposed to travel in that direction.

After dinner, we retired to the hot tub. Rebekah pulled Myrna onto her lap and Pamela claimed Fiera's attention. Leedra looked at me, all doe-eyed, and I grinned at her and opened my arms to her. She was wrapped around my body (and mounted on my cock) in no time. I flooded her tight channel twice while we were in the water - and then twice more before we snuggled together and closed our eyes.

~~~

When we awoke, the next morning, she ran her fingers along my chin and smiled at me.

"I got a new ability at 400," she said.

"Oh?"

"I can sense were ores and gems are hiding," she told me, grinning broadly.

"Your dad would be so jealous," I whispered.

She nodded and said, "I want to tell him so badly."

"Can you take him back to the mine?" I asked.

She shook her head 'no' and said, "It's part of my pact with Hera."

"Okay, then," I said. "You'll just have to bring him back something nice."

"And a diamond for Mama," she said.

I nodded and said, "Yes."

She gave me a quick peck and then we got up and headed for breakfast.

"Lissa wants the temple done today," I told her, as we walked down the hallway hand-in-hand.

"Easy peasy," she said, giggling.

"Where did you learn that phrase?" I asked, unable to keep from grinning.

"Pamela," she said, grinning broadly.

I leaned over, kissed her, and squeezed a tit. She moaned into my mouth. She pretended that she was going to turn around and drag me back to the bedroom but I just chuckled at her and opened the door to the dining room.

We ate breakfast and then headed off to our tasks. We dropped Pamela and Fiera off at the guard house - which was now almost a small village by itself - and then the rest of us went to the central plaza.

I projected out our idea for how to rebuild the plaza area so that Lissa and the priestesses could see it - with two views. On the left was a blueprint of the temple and, on the right, a miniaturized model of the whole setup that slowly rotated - so that they could see how it all came together.

Towards the mountain side, would be the temple. It would be open to the sky in the middle - so that Hera could watch the proceedings. The outer ring would be covered - to provide shade as well as protection from the elements.

Lissa had seen the statue of me at the house and had requested that several of those also be available within the temple. Our design had eight of them - at midpoints along each wall - and at the corners. The corner ones were more secluded. The middle ones were for the more exhibitionist worshippers.

In addition to the central altar (which would feature the bed we were already using) there would be four "lesser" ones in the corners -so that Lissa and the girls could work at the same time as me. There were also a couple private rooms in the wings - for people that didn't want an audience but wanted to worship at the temple. Additionally, there were several public restrooms in there that would be available for visitors to use.

In front of the temple, we had designed a huge fountain that would be continuously fed by a supply-line that came directly from the mountain stream. The water pressure turned small waterwheels that caused various parts of the fountain and statuary to rotate - or changed the pattern of the jets that shot the spray into the air. Water from the fountain fed into the sewer system and would help keep it running smoothly.

Below (and in front) of the fountain, would be the public bath. Beneath the bath was a furnace system similar to the one at our house - where workers could get in, place flammable materials, and then light the whole thing to warm the pool. There was a water supply that could be used to fill (or flush) the pool. The other option - to keep it clean - was for me to visit it now and then.

Lissa was delighted with every part of our design and asked us to start on it right away. She, Kyla, and Silena left to take care of other tasks. I was given leave to skip my duties at the current temple - so that I could support the girls as they worked to build the new facilities.

Leedra pulled me in behind her and wrapped my arms around her ribs. She raised her hands into the air, and stone began moving, melting, and flowing. She had learned (from all of her work with the houses) to do the water and sewer lines first - and then build the rest after that.

By lunchtime, the basic structure was done and we had moved inside to start on the worship rooms, the offices, the bathrooms, and the statues. The interiors were completed after we finished eating. By that time, we had already sent the kitchen workers off with the dirty dishes - as well as our thanks to the chef.