The supposedly powerful Dominator sat waiting, worried, trying to decide which spell to ready in his mind. He could start with Dominate Mind, and potentially damage Dice’s mind right away. He had no idea if she could resist it, and if she could resist it, what form that resistance might take. Dominate Mind might immediately incapacite her so he could move in for the kill, or it might actually put her under his control? What would that even mean? He could Dominate Will, but he knew even less about what that would do than Dominate Mind. He hadn’t gotten much more time with the grimoire, he had been busy with Dice nearly every moment of each cycle, but even if he had time, he was hesitant to know more about his Class. What if his Class offered him even worse spells? What further temptation would there be for him?

His mind had wandered, and so he marshaled it back to the immediate threat. He could lure her in and use Dominator’s Gaze, then.. do what? It wouldn’t entirely incapacitate her, but it would make his other spells better right? It gave her a strong dose of his influence. He would still need to Dominate Mind or Dominate Will in the end, but at least they would likely work right? Could he rely on the fact she wanted one last go with him, or should he try to immediately cast a spell? If she noticed he was concentrating and not speaking, she might attack immediately. It seemed best to lure her in, and get her close enough to actually cast a spell. His primary two spells Dominate mind and Dominate Will required a touch to work. If he could control Dice, would he need Dice to address his problems with Karmis? Having a Blade Fighter would be helpful, at least she could distract Wersa or Karmis for him. His plan solidified in his head. He had to lure Dice in, use Gaze or at least get into range to touch her, and give himself the best chance at his other spells working. Everything was risky, but at least this plan provided him a potential extra tool to use against his other two problems. He began to fill the spell-templates in his mind with the power of his Path. He continued to wait and worry.

***

It was difficult to cast a new spell in the best of circumstances. The Dominator’s Gaze he was preparing wasn’t a full spell template, but rather the activation of a passive spell that ran in the background of his mind at all times. It should be, theoretically, easier since it wasn’t really a fully casted spell. He needed to simply increase the intensity of his passive Influence spell, focus it through his eyes, and unleash, or at least that was his best guess. He hoped it would be that simple.

Right now, he found it difficult to do anything with his mind. It was surprisingly hard to even activate a spell while you were inside of someone’s ‘place’. As she twisted underneath him, grasping at his arms, their hips bouncing in tandem, he found himself rather contemplative about what had transpired.

She had approached him, knowing his direction thanks to Karmis, and he called out to her, waiting in the shadow of a tree. The light was much brighter now, more than half-way back to its usual brightness. He had made sure to have something to dive behind if she attacked right away, but she hadn’t. She had simply said that Karmis was still angry, angry at them both, and that were to move further away and do some scouting. He agreed, and they left. It had been a clam, casual exchange. She didn’t seem sad or very perturbed. He supposed this meant she had killed a lot of people at Karmis’s behest, even people she liked.

After a sixteenth or so, they stopped at his request, for a rest. True to form Dice was on him immediately, pulling at his clothes. He had obliged, thinking it would easier to do what he needed to do if they were in mid-session, but now he found it a lot harder. Thankfully, her clothes and blades were more than a span from them, so she could immediately stab him, but then again he couldn’t really convince himself she didn’t have a blade hidden somewhere. On the other hand, there was at least one place he was sure was empty except for what he was putting there.

This had been uneventful really. He had no trouble performing, like he had with Karmis. Despite his life being on the line here, Dice was her usual self, and so he.. well, he hadn’t relaxed, but he had let nature take its course. If he weren’t risking his life, this might have just another cycle of training with Dice. He had to remind himself he couldn’t procrastinate here, it was her or him. The choice obvious, but still he found it hard to activate his Gaze. Maybe after he.. finished, he could pull it off, but it was just as likely she would strike while he was distracted right? He needed to think of something to clear his mind. Something gross enough that he involuntarily empty his mind and give him a chance at activating the spell. What about.. Wersa? Naked? Ugh! It was now or never!

As his mind rejected the image and began to clear, his hands came up to grip Dice’s head, drawing her into looking him in the eye. He stopped his movement on top of her. He felt the intensity of his Influence increase, he focused it to his eyes. Dice open her mouth to speak, to probably tell him to keep going. The panic of possibly dying shot through him as he noticed Dice begin to reach for something beside them. He unleashed, activating his Dominator Gaze for the first time.

His vision grew dark, like night had returned suddenly, but this new change was different from the gloom of the night, because everything took on a new hue, an almost lightless, midnight blue. Dice’s head rocked back, she had caught an eye full of his Gaze. Her pupils dilated, and her movement stopped. He waited a moment, wondering what he had done exactly, but eventually her body twisted underneath him and she gasped, sucking in air. She relaxed a moment after, a happy look on her face signifying contentment. Had she? Really? Her relaxed look continued, and she began to stare almost sightlessly through him.

Suddenly, he felt something stir in his own heart. This weakling, had used him! Wanted to kill him! He was a Dominator! He couldn’t allow this to stand! He would break them all! He felt himself harden inside of her again. Baring clenched teeth, he decided what fate this woman would receive for daring to oppose him.

Hot rage ran rampant through his being for a moment, eventually though it gave way to a freezing cold. His mind closed shut, like rusty beast trap. He needed to dominate this woman further, and use her against her party. He needed to eliminate the threat to himself.

He prepared the easier of the two spells, Dominate Mind. Dice was starting mumble to herself, still clearly incoherent, when he cast his first true Domination spell.

It took what felt like an eternity, but the spell template was finally fully ready in his mind, and he directed it towards Dice through his hands touching her heard. After a moment, he could feel it land, and wrap itself around her mind.. His vision exploded.

***

He knew Dice, in a way she didn’t even know herself. He knew her from the outside in. He had known her body from before, but now he felt his own mind invade hers. He felt surprisingly little resistance. His influence free floated all throughout the image he built for himself of her psyche, light clouds of pure mental power. He couldn’t see her mind, like it was a real thing, but he could imagine it through what he felt, and in doing so, he could alter it. He noticed she was under some serious strain having him there, in her mind, but he felt nothing like resistance. In retrospect, he shouldn’t have expected Dice to have much mental resistance, considering how easily Karmis controlled her.

After getting the lay of the land, he began to experiment. Could he read her memories? Not really. Whenever he tried to change something or interject his own thoughts in Dice’s mental space, random memories would fire, but he had no control over them and only had random glimpses of what did flash through her mind. Maybe with time, he could get specific memories with the right catalyst, but he didn’t need her memories right now. He needed control, Domination. After touching and probing everything in her mind, he finally found what he was looking for, a region that seemed to affect her physical actions. He kept probing, finding that intensity of his probe changed the intensity of the action, and that angle of his approached changed what part of her moved. In the back of his mind, he was still monitoring her physical actions as he laid atop her. He was able to verify his experiments pretty quickly. He didn’t have much fine control, but he understood how it worked.

His next experiment was trying to figure out how to move both of them at the same time. Dice wouldn’t be much use to him if he could only control her while his body was dead to the world. After another long moment, pushing against what felt like pressure, he was able to reach backwards, and move his body away from Dice, and stand it up. He then, ever so slowly, and with many mistakes, managed to stand Dice up. He felt like a puppeteer, and Dice moved a bit like one, as he got better at controlling her actions. He was able to make her walk, jump, and run a small circle around him. Without really thinking about it, he had her kneel to him in supplication.

He shuddered and caught himself, refocusing on what he wanted to do. This.. power was intoxicating. He had hardly ever felt so good, as he did now. He could feel Dice, still dazed, and in some mental pain, try to move her own body, and fail. Before she was fully aware he decided to practice some more with his control, and through some effort, was able to get her dressed again.

Eventually, though he could feel her rally in her own mind, pushing against him weakly. He felt no threat, he was quite secure in the landscape of her mind, but she tried anyway to move her body. He could feel her panic, and she pushed against him with all her might, but nothing she did moved him or her body. The Influence all around him made him far stronger than her. He knew he should be feeling at least pity here, but all he felt was cold. This woman was going to use and then murder him, he reminded himself. She continued to push against and him, and he continued to stand firm. He felt as though there were something he was suppose to do here, some way of finessing this battle to its completion with minimal cost to both sides, but he had no idea how to do that. The less damage he did to her the better use she would be later. He knew how to defend the territory he had taken, which constituted most of the space in her mind, but he didn’t really know how to win the war peaceably. The description of the spell had made it as though there was a way to simply control without issue, so long as the level of influence was high enough, but it hadn’t given him instructions on mental battles. As he thought through his options, coldly and calculatingly, her mental attacks grew increasingly frantic.

With one final attempt, she seemed to collapse into herself, and he felt her psyche break upon the wall of his mind, like a beast egg thrown to the ground. She was broken now. He could feel she was lacking something that she had before. He felt a huge surge of advancement in his Path! He had totally dominated this Blade Fighter, who was arrogant enough to try to use him and kill him. Dice was his now! A possession, more a thing, than a person. He pulled away from her mind, not fully, but still leaving himself a connection, and returned to his own mind. He felt, without really knowing why, that she was no longer Dice really. That she wouldn’t ever recover.

He wanted to mourn her, despite what she was going to do him, but that cold feeling that had followed the rage, still held sway over his mind. He needed to know how much control over her he had if he still wanted to make use of her. If he had to puppeteer her body, she would be of limited use. He knew despite his success with Dice, he had not used his spell correctly. She would be more puppet than person now, not really able to fool anyone who knew her.

He looked at her through his own eyes, assessing any outward changes. She had something of a vacant look in her eye, but otherwise seemed to be able to stand on her own.

He sent a direction to what remained of her mind through his link to her.

Jump.

She flew into the air, jumping well above his head.

Sit.

After landing, she quiet sat on the ground.

Smile.

A smile crossed her face, and she looked up at him.

So he wouldn’t need to move her body himself. There was enough left of her to move herself, with his direction.

Attack the tree behind you with your blades!

While still looking at him, she plucked two blades from her hidden pockets and tossed them at the tree behind her. They each stuck into the tree up to the hilt. The tree was very hard, it would take considerable power to sink two such blades into it easily. She could definitely kill for him. How complex could the order he gave her be? Did he have time to find out?

The time it had taken to get them here, and take over her mind, was surprisingly fast. The subjective time spent in her mind had felt like half a work cycle, but he could tell it hadn’t been long in the outside world because the light had only gotten a little bit brighter.

She could kill for him now, but how could he use that to his advantage? She couldn’t kill Wersa in a fight. Even with the speed of her blades, Wersa would need to only block shots at her face and charge. Dice might be able to dodge her for a while, but eventually she would die due to a lack of endurance. His only advantage, if he hurried, was Karmis and Wersa would be asleep when they got there. He could try to have Dice kill them both in their sleep, but he didn’t know what sort of spells Karmis had active. Their tents were made of spelled material. Dice’s blades might not go through them easily, and damaging them would wake both Karmis and Wersa. It was unlikely she could unleash two blade attacks simultaneously strong enough to kill both threats in their sleep. In either case, one would wake and probably be able to kill Dice and himself. Ina would be helpful, but he didn't really want to risk her on anything that wasn't sound.

He decided to see if Dice could answer questions in her state, as he needed more information.

What spells does Karmis have active when she sleeps?

Ah, duhn, nuh.” She spoke, her voice sounding utterly dead and devoid of emotion.

This was a breakthrough! Whatever was left of her mind, could still access her memories to some extent. He decided to experiment.

Speak through our mental connection, and not outloud.

Could you kill Karmis in her sleep?

He felt a ‘no’, come across their link.

Why?

He realized she wasn’t really speaking through their connection, it wasn’t at all like his bond with Ina, it was more like she was showing him the answers to his questions through shared memories.

Dice showed him a moment when Karmis had said her tent would only allow people she wanted in. He considered this piece of information. He was probably the only one out here, other than Karmis, that had ever been in Karmis’ tent. She had apparently added to the list of people able to enter, to allow her the chance to seduce him earlier. Was it likely she would remove his ability to enter her tent if she thought him a dead man? Could he rely on that? If she was exhausted after the long night, why would she bother removing a dead man from her permissions list? It would take time and effort, and even a bit of the power of her Path, to alter a spelled item like that. He suddenly felt confident that, it was not Dice that would have to kill Karmis, but himself. It was the only way. He surprised himself by sparing no thought to mercy. The a cold feeling still grasped his heart. He needed to survive. He asked Dice another question over their link.

Could I kill Karmis in her sleep, assuming I had access to her tent?

She showed him a memory of one of her first outings with Karmis where they slept in the same room. Karmis warned Dice to never approach her with a blade or anything other weapon, even accidentally, while she slept. She had a trinket that would wake her and cast a protective spell. Karmis did not want Dice to waste its charge accidentally by triggering it.

Such a thing must have cost a fortune in his estimate. The tower sold things like that only on the top most floors, a place he had never been. What was he in the face of such an expenditure of gold? He wasn’t doubting himself, the cold feeling that gripped him, wouldn’t let him, but he needed some other avenue of attack.

He looked at Dice and the answer became obvious. A feeling of thrill, of almost pleasure, rose up out of the cold fog of his soul. He would just have to Dominate Karmis.