I relocated ten feet behind the charging attackers, who Sama had long noticed and didn't even break stride for. She just kind of seemed to flow right and left at the same time, stabbing and hacking and slicing strokes didn't find her, and-

The crunching and crashing of armored bodies slamming to flagstones, steel knurling under fists, palms, and kicks, bones breaking, meat pulping, heads rebounding off posts and columns, and metal and wood cracking and splintering wildly filled the air for about two seconds in an impossibly-fast blur of motion in all directions.

No wasted movement, no wasted space, total inertial control, lightfoot keeping her elevated too long for gravity, rebounds all part of the attack when desired, and when not, dumping all the kinetic energy into one direction.

The last screaming armored Angrusi slammed into a stone building foundation with a crunch and a crack, shards of broken swords and shields clattered and spun to a halt on the ground, and Sama's feet came down gracefully on the head of a big and brutal man's helm with a final creak and crunch of protest as helm, skull, and the cobblestones underneath gave way beneath her.

Well, she was walking through the Angrusi part of town leisurely. She looked unarmored, which was a lie with her simple Bracers quite intact there, and she basically had foundational Mystic training too, which meant she was always armored. She didn't go for the full skinplate suit often, and she didn't need it.

I tugged my hand, and two silent fellows crashed out of windows, the crossbows in their hands discharging uselessly into the ground as they slammed to the stones. The faintest of white lights faded about Sama's black nails, Mercy from the Sword in dagger form sheathed behind her narrow waist feeding through to her normal blows via the Tats hidden under her Gloves.

These unfortunate lads had a hard lesson dealt to them, but it was such light exercise that she didn't even bother to kill them, although nobody would have said anything if she did.

I glided back down next to her, while heads peeked out from behind shutters, some glaring, many grateful, others uncaring of the violence. "There is a patrol halfway up the block peeking this way. I think they are debating whether they've been bribed enough to try and arrest you." My Voice carried, and heads ducked back around the corner over there.

"They haven't been," she replied in a Warlord's Voice, and we both heard the quick shuffle of feet deciding that resuming their patrol route in the other direction was a really good idea.

I eyed the unconscious fools narrowly. "Red with Blue stains," I noted for her. "Massive racists, sexists, tribalists, and fascists, by the hues," I analyzed. "Hell has a fine batch of idiots coming to them from here. Why am I along now?"

She smiled winsomely, kicking one brawny fellow in the shoulder epaulet. "Note the symbol?" "Blitzengard, naturally. I assume you are on great terms with them, of course?" They were anti-mage, repressed their women, thought they were the purest bloodline in the world, believed they were meant to dominate Siricil over the other Great Tribes, abhorred arcanists, and considered non-humans only fit to be slaves. All the while believing themselves the favored people of the Patron Immortal of Siricil, the war goddess Tenya, who they claimed was born an Angrusi.

"Naturally. I've mauled hundreds of them over the years, and refused to take any as students, either. They love to challenge my students, of course, and there's been occasional losses among my students because of that… and a LOT of dead Angrusi. That number ticks up significantly whenever we hear of the Blitzengard making trouble in Siricil, of course."

"Oh, like right now." I waited for the other shoe to drop.

"But now, now I've got access to a PoT gamer Powered, not just her Sim." Her knuckles popped like rocks cracking as she flexed her hands. "These bastards betray basically everything Tenya is about, while loudly braying the opposite. I'm not the least bit fond of Her, but these bastards offend me on just about every imaginable level. So, I'd like to start a bit of a habit here."

"Do go on," I said patiently.

"Gender-swap the lot of them, and Cursemark them as traitors to Tenya, would you?" she asked impishly.

I pursed my lips and looked at the nine unconscious sots scattered about. Mercy had made sure none of what surely would have been lethal injuries actually did more than superficial damage, but they still got to experience the shock of being killed brutally fast.

"That is wonderfully cruel and imaginative," I conceded, and began to Upcast the Polymorph Other. A permanent gender change was a specific form of a V when applied to others, and could easily be extended to others in Ritual format.

Funf's TK dragged them closer together in bumpity-bump style over the cobblestones as I wove the spell, Rapid Ritual speeding through the tedious ten-minute formal form of this as the empty slots of their Y chromosome were filled in and became an X, taking only a minute to do what needed to be done.

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Armor shifted and warped, and their clothing with it as square and muscular bodies gained new curves, lost weight, and the brawny men became fairly masculine and handsome women in great physical shape all together.

The Cursemark down the side of their faces proclaiming them traitors to the faith of Tenya would put the lie to any and all of their beliefs. There was no way that Tenya Herself was going to lift the Mark, because it was absolutely true and they were unrepentant blasphemers and heretics, tainting Her church's teachings to their own benefit.

They were also going to find it impossible to lift with mortal magic, given my Caster Level and Girding, and the fact I'd Upcast it to an IX+1.

"Excellent!" Sama smiled cheerfully, looking around at the unconscious armored women, who were going to have horrible surprises when they looked in the mirror and found themselves only worth staying at home and birthing babies now, by their own beliefs… and Tenya's Mark indicating She was not happy with them at all.

"You mentioned that you had Sims you let go through time, tracking and charting history," she went on, continuing on her way towards the heart of the Angrusi district with no worries whatsoever. I glided alongside her quietly, even Dread's long taps almost inaudible on the stones as dusk was stealing over everything.

"I did. I staggered them every one hundred years, once I completed the loop and took a quick series of Timejumps using the Rune of Time on my own," I told her. It was a lot of Sims, sure, but the fun thing was, I could make each one in that time without any problems, since the time didn't accumulate here.

Boring and repetitive, but totally worthwhile.

"Is there one in Siricil?"

"There's been one in Siricil since before it was founded. Everyone knows her. She's the most highly-ranked elf in the whole Empire."

There was only the slightest surprised break in her Waveskating Step, which was idly covering twice the distance of her stride with every pace. "The Archivist?" she asked in disbelief. "Your Sim is the Archivist?!"

"Yes. Quite ingenious thinking, I hope you appreciate it." I only smiled mentally, but she still felt it.

"She's been in control of the Imperial Bureaucracy for most of the last thousand years!" she half-laughed, smothering the urge to guffaw.

"And when she wasn't, the Empire tottered on edge of ruin, nobles and the wealthy ran rampant and wild, emperors and senators were overthrown, and she was reinstated. It is amazing how much influence you have when you walk away and suddenly there are no copies of who owns what, what laws are still on the books, and who did what when where and how," I agreed demurely.

"She founded the Imperial Clerks and has been training them for centuries!" Sama snickered. "How many of them are her agents?"

"Enough of them that she is likely the foremost spymaster in two Empires. Delphan nobles send their clerks to Siricil to be trained there on the sly, too, there's even a special curriculum for them. They've been trying to woo her away from Siricil for centuries. But she's probably the single greatest reason Siricil hasn't fallen like the empires before them, and a lot of people have tried to kill her over the centuries because of it."

"You held Tenya's pet empire together?" Sama sounded mock-scandalized.

"Archi realized it wasn't going to survive to my day in anything like the form we know it to be unless she did something to stabilize the internal politics and fight off the endemic corruption. So she took up organizing the government under Cezar Junio and kept at it right through to the current day and age. Since she can renew the magicks on herself and Sims don't age, a simple Veiling and Alter Self combined to make her seem alive have kept her around and her nature concealed to everyone who investigates.

"Naturally they all think she's reaching the maximum end of her lifespan now."

"Yes," Sama agreed, giving me a shrewd glance. "And they are wondering who her successor is going to be, if there is going to be one, who could possibly replace her, how much chaos is coming when she passes on, and how they can profit from it before everything heads into the shitter." Her lips worked like chewing a particularly fond bone, just delighting in this awesome idea. "I've never actually met her, given the very protective legion of clerks between her and most who seek to bother her. Even knowing her on a personal basis is considered a great honor in the Empire, and all of the Senators turn out for her quarterly tax reports."

"The same Senators who try to assassinate her at least every other month to keep their pilfering of Imperial funds hidden. But as you say, there's a legion of 'clerks' there."

She could hear the quote marks. "Some clerks more clerky than others, I gather…"

"Well, she's considered a member of the Cyapri Elves by default, and there's none left older than her to say otherwise, so she's a great and revered elder of the clan. It's probably no surprise that some Emeraltan Rangers are specially trained to assist and guard her, and some retire to the job. They are whimsically known as 'Tax Auditors' within the bureaucracy."

Sama couldn't hold in the laughter. "Oh my gods! Those are some of the most hated people in the Empire, especially by the Angrusi!" she spluttered, having to cover her mouth to keep from guffawing. "Even Magni doesn't get in the way of an Auditor team!"

"Well, of course not. He earns at least ten thousand gold when they move on anyone, and it all goes straight into the imperial coffers. Been audited yourself?" I asked archly.

"Twice, but they were bottom-feeding scum looking for bribes to get out of our business. By the time Briggs was done with them, the Empire ended up owing us several times their annual pay, and I understand they were sent off to the Pearl Islands, who are VERY inventive about book-keeping there. It's kind of a funeral ground for tax officials."

"You must have very good tax returns, then!" I complimented her.

She just grunted at that. "Magni gets his due, and not one copper more. He's always looking for more to fund the war machine, and we've enough mercantile interests he keeps on trying to soak us with everyone else, thinking we won't notice." Her eyes narrowed shrewdly. "She's not in the Markspace, and a Sim shouldn't be able to support a Markspace, right?"

"Some of my Sims gained souls and are alive now in every sense of the word. Those are the ones who empower their Markspace, and have for the past four thousand years."

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