The OP Lich is a Returnee, Chapter 167

Chapter 167 – Visitors

“It is good to see you again, your Majesty,” Commandant Marius Tremblay said, as he bowed in my throne room. The French soldier had not come alone, of course. There were five others with him: two angels wearing modified French Army uniforms, two phoenixes, and a handsome, if ordinary-looking, man in civilian clothes.

“Welcome to my abode, Commandant Tremblay. But when I contacted you about the enchanted items for our Phoenix Matriarchs, here, I did not expect you to come to me, or bring so many. Has something happened that I am not aware of?”

“Not as such, your Majesty. However, your message coincided with a directive from our commanders. Given what has been shared about the Nameless Ones, they thought it best that we strengthen ties between all the newborn heroes, or at least introduce everyone. The Nereid Pair, as you called them, are still working to learn how to control and suppress their powers, from what their commander told us, so they aren’t traveling away from their base at the moment, but we did get to have a sit-down with them. Since your message came just after we got back we figured we’d come to Japan next, meet the local heroes, and then see about going to China to see if we could meet with the Emperor. The Australians told us that the Troll Patriarch was still working on controlling their new nature, so they’re limiting contact with him, but we were going to meet with the Chilean heroes after that.”

I looked to my side, where my disciples were standing. “Ya, if you could mention to your people that the Heroes of Light and Fire wish to have a civil meeting with the Hero of Shadow?” The Chinese agent nodded, but said nothing. Turning back to the French delegation, my eyes fell on the civilian. He looked to be a newly-awakened Shadowbringer, or Shadow Witch, but I had not seen him before. “The others I recognize, of course, but who might this be?”

“Ah,” Tremblay said, “allow me to introduce you to Matthieu Delafosse, Sergent-Chef Delafosse’s husband. He wished to meet you, and we thought it best to have him on hand, in case there were any, ahem, requirements to complete the enchantment, like there were with the other items you lent us.”

“Ah, yes. The Wolfcollars and Elfrings. You still have them, I take it?”

“Yes, your Majesty. Matthieu, if you would?”

The civilian unslung the bag over his shoulder, and pulled out the collars and rings. He bowed, mimicking Tremblay’s earlier movements, before approaching my throne. “Thank you for your consideration, your Majesty. For me and my Lydia. Unfortunately, there were some, um, issues with making them work, so we could not make use of them. But I wish to thank you for the offer, all the same.”

The phoenix Delafosse chuckled through her telepathy. “What my Matthieu means to say is that he was too ‘gifted’ to accomplish the goal. A pleasurable thing when I was human, but as a bird? There was light scorching as my healing kicked in, which made the whole business impossible.”

Matthieu, for his part, was clearly torn between smugness and embarrassment, but everyone else had a good chuckle at that. “Well, there are worse problems for a man to have, I’m sure. I do hope you had someone put some healing magic on that, though?”

“Ahem,” he coughed. “Yes, well, the Army did have a healer on standby, since they did not know what would happen. Embarrassing as it was, I am just glad there was no permanent damage, to either of us.”

I smiled at him as I took the Wolfcollars and Elfrings back, and placed them in my storage dimension, before retrieving the items that I’d made for them, and handing them to him. “Well risking one’s manhood for his lady love deserves to be rewarded, I think. These collars are for our two phoenixes. Do not attempt to analyze the spellwork upon them, or allow anyone else to do so. Such an act will trigger a curse that hits with my full power, as it stands now, aging everything within range ten thousand years, and alerting me to the situation, so that I can clean up whatever is left. Only those who wear the collars and the matching rings will be safe.”

I could see that everyone was suitably cowed by the idea of just how much destruction would be caused by that curse activating, so I continued. “When you place the collars on the necks of our Heroes of Fire, they will size to fit perfectly, but a second curse activates, so that they can never be removed while the wearer lives. In exchange, they will gain the ability to obtain a human form, based on the form their soul remembers before their transformation. I’ve also included a smaller version of the ‘closet’ on my own ankh, allowing you to store three outfits each.

“As with my ankh, you can touch the collar to switch what you are wearing with an outfit in the ‘closet’ automatically, including everything you might be carrying, if you so wish. When you transform from human to phoenix forms, the outfit you are wearing will store itself, if there is room, and, when you change back to human form, you can dress yourself automatically with an outfit from your collar.”

“Yes!” shrieked Capitaine Vidal, who then looked a bit embarrassed at the outburst. “Um, well, I was worried that every time we changed form we’d have to strip, or lose the clothes, and then have to get dressed or fight in the nude if we changed back. I don’t have such exhibitionist tendencies, you see.”

Commandant Tremblay cleared his throat, and said, “What about the rings, your Majesty?”

“The rings are a little gift. One should go to Monsieur Matthieu, of course, but the other can go to whoever you like. However, once worn, the rings cannot be removed, save by removing the finger along with it, until the wearer’s death. The wearers of the rings gain a rather significant resistance to fire. Not ‘swim through lava’ levels, but enough that a phoenix would need to be very intentional in order to burn them. So, no worries for your not-so-little friend, Matthieu.” He bowed as the other chuckled, and I continued, “The items also allow all the wearers to be connected telepathically, as our two phoenixes are, with a range that will stretch anywhere on Earth.”

“Matthieu, hurry up and put that collar on me,” Segeant-Chef Delafosse said. “I would like to have a normal dinner tonight. Raw meat might be what a phoenix normally eats, but I’d like steak tonight. And then your sausage. A girl has needs, after all.”

“My birdbrained wife, everyone,” Matthieu said, laughing as he quickly pulled his hand back to avoid the semi-playful bite from his wife. Still, that didn’t stop him from putting the first of the collars around her neck. As expected, the golden band shrunk to fit snugly, but not so tightly as to chafe.

“Now, let us see…” Delafosse’s mental voice trailed off as she worked on how to trigger the change. A moment later, red flames rose from her feet to the feathered crest of her head, hiding her from view for a moment, before they snuffed out, leaving her, as she had been before her ascension. Well, almost. I noticed that her hair, which had been a more normal color before, now had hues of red and orange, like flames. Or, more precisely, like the feathers she had in her other form. Interestingly enough, I also spied a neatly trimmed landing strip between her legs before the woman pounced on her husband and showed him just how happy she was to have lips to kiss someone with again, rather than a beak.

Interestingly, the various tattoos and scars she’d had were still present. I’d expected the brand against radiation to be there, since that had been designed to mark not just her flesh, but her soul, and the soul’s recollection is what made this new body for her. That just meant that her other markings had also sunk in, so that her soul just knew that they should be there. And it would explain the new hair, since Fire was now very much a part of her nature.

“Sergeant-Chef, while I’m sure the other men here don’t mind the show, perhaps you might release the poor man, so that he can give your companion her collar, and put on his ring, if he so chooses? Oh, and you may consider wearing some clothes, unless you like teasing poor Commandant Tremblay.”

“Oh. Oh! Sorry! I was just, um, overcome with happiness?” At least the woman had the sense to look embarrassed about the display, as her husband handed the bag to her, and she began pulling out some clothes to put on. Nothing fancy, just a pair of sweat pants and a t-shirt. No undergarments. Probably didn’t know how much she’d change, so loose-fitting clothes were the order of the day, at least until they got to their hotel.

Everyone else just looked away, or, more accurately, looked at Matthieu, as he slid one of the rings on his finger. Then, as Vidal leaned her neck forward, he slipped her collar on her neck. There was another rolling burst of flame, and a naked Vidal stood there, unchanged save for hair that matched her other form’s plumage. Unlike Delafosse, however, she quickly set about getting dressed before saying anything.

Once everyone was wearing clothes again, I smiled. “Excellent. Now, as I said, that last ring is for you to give out as you choose, Capitaine Vidal. Just remember that whoever you give it to will be part of the same mental ‘group chat’ as the Delafosses, so they should expect some level of intimacy, and probably some level of ‘sharing’, as emotions and thoughts blend together.”

Vidal blushed at that, but said, “Actually, we’ve been… talking. Seeing as how we’re all bound together so closely, we decided that, if we were able to get our human forms again, we would see about doing everything together. Which means that the fourth person, if we find one, would have to be on board with that from the beginning. In addition to having a larger commitment than you might normally expect going into a relationship.”

“I am pleased that you are facing this great change as adults, without trying to deny that the wind is blowing or that water is wet.” I turned my gaze from the new throuple to the blond-haired, blue-eyed angels standing next to Tremblay. “And what of the Seraphim? Have you come to terms with the depth of your connection? And have you managed to merge once more? Or are you still struggling with the weight and girth of those decisions?”

Lieutenant Soyer groaned at that joke, but her cheeks were almost beet red. “We have talked, at length, about it, yes, your Majesty. Especially after the first couple times we experienced some of the bleed-over effects. We’re not certain how far we’ll take things, but, for now, we’re keeping together, so we don’t accidentally do something foolish, like wreck a car because our other half is enjoying some personal time.”

Sous-lieutenant Moreau cut in, to save her (or himself) the further embarrassment of that line of questioning. “We’ve also managed to fly for short spans. A kilometer or two at a time, but we’re steadily getting better at it, I think. Still have a ways to go compared to the Capitaine and Sergeant-Chef, though. We haven’t spoken about it directly, but we agree that it is too soon to try returning to the merged state, yet.”

“For only having a scant few weeks to train, that is quite good. You are not a phoenix, after all, born to fly, where walking is not their true nature. I expect that they will find they have to relearn how to do some things in their human bodies, like running and dancing. Not as bad as learning a new skill, but the body no longer remembers, and needs to have those memories ground in again.”

“So, plenty of PT for everyone, then,” Commandant Tremblay nodded, to the disappointed groans of all four heroes.