On another day, after successfully incorporating many other groups of wanderers and greatly increasing his personal Warband, Erik took a considerably smaller party out of the camp.

Only Scaldar, Skadi and a large group of zombie-like Thralls accompanied Erik for today’s activity.

“We’ll need somewhere secluded, out of sight. Who cares if anyone knows, but interruptions must be prevented at all costs. We all follow the Dark Ones and using their immortal minions is a sign of great prowess and achievement, but if the summoner is distracted at any point during the ritual, the consequences can be disastrous!” – Scaldar incessantly repeated the same warning he’d been peppering Erik with for over a week.

“I know, I know. But we both know that should only count for regular warlocks, which we all know I am not.” –Erik answered with an equally overused response.

 Checking the Spell slots on his status screen, it now showed four spells. The Summon spell Erik used to teleport Skadi had seen a lot of use already, but three others were newly added after much deliberation.

A spell to either rust or sharpen weapons affiliated to the Lore of Metal. Its use is self-explanatory. When embroiled in combat, Erik could use the spell to dull the weapons of his enemies or grant allies a keen edge on theirs. In gaming terms, a spell that combined buffing damage for allies while debuffing enemies.

The next spell is the deadly Lore of Fire spell, Burning Head. It summons the likeness of a giant, burning skull in the desired direction and orientation and sends it screaming in a straight line, burning everything in its path. A true damage spell akin to the Vortex of Blades Scaldar cast during the Sack of Sainte Denis.

Finally, the second spell Erik unlocked and the subject of today’s excursion is the “Forge Daemonic Contract” spell. After studying the ins and outs of Daemonology to gain a basic understanding of the skill, it was time to begin forming his Daemonic Horde.

Looking over the quietly shuffling Thralls, Skadi hesitated before speaking her mind.

“I know you’ve already practiced by summoning the more basic Daemonic Beasts like Flesh Hounds and Chaos Harpies, but are you sure you can now make the leap to a Bloodletter Commander? You only have limited chances with just this many sacrifices and I am not assured these… hollow souls can tempt them.”

It looked like she wanted to say more, but Erik tiredly responded.

“Hah, you of all people should know the quality of souls is not a problem either. When I kill someone, their souls all become ‘deliciously appetising’, as you put it yourself. Only exceptional souls have the strength to stand out and be counted separately, but I am saving those up for whatever Greater Daemon would fancy them or for a suitable exchange.

And I’ve got hundreds of Daemonic Beasts at my beck and call already with the only ‘cost’ being the flesh of slain enemies. And the deal I’ll offer the Commanders will be lucrative to both parties and all it will cost me are souls I wouldn’t have claimed otherwise anyway plus the initial investment of these broken, walking and breathing tools of Thralls.”

Finally they arrived at a small forest where Erik had conducted his previous summonings. The Thralls had their hands tied in front of them with a thick rope in-between and tied at both ends to strong and ancient trees. Broken as they were, Erik didn’t take any chances. Who knew how they’d react when the screaming started?

The next three hours were spent carefully laying out the runes carved on pieces of durable, black slate. The carved rocks were prepared well in advance and kept in Erik’s Inventory during transport and would form the cornerstone for the coming ritual.

“Unte follows Mirh, goes in front of Lphoght which is sandwiched between Lphight and Lpheght…” – Erik softly mumbles to himself as he carefully lays out the intricate pattern on the ground, taking extra care to consciously prevent accidental Magic discharge.

If he wasn’t careful, the Summoning Circle could turn into a transfer gate, sending Erik tumbling into the Chaos Wastes. A fate desired by some, perhaps, but Erik decidedly liked his current way of life and had no desire to trade it for the complete madness and absurdity of the Beyond.

After placing the final stone Skadi sighed in relief, arching her back and stretching.

“Haaahn! That was tiring! Glad that’s over with, we can now begin the Powering part followed by the actual Ritual!”

Erik had watched attentively, paying special attention to the fabric of her closefitting clothes as it stretched taut over her breasts and increasingly round belly. At first he declined her help in placing the stones, but the headstrong woman didn’t take no for an answer. All Erik could do was pay extra attention and accept the help.

With all the Runes now in place, Erik took out a plain iron dagger and led the first string of random Thralls to the intricate circle. The Axe or Messer might work better, but it would also lock the entire Ritual to either Daemons of Khorne or Daemons of Slaanesh due to the weapons’ affiliation to them. And Erik wanted to grab at least one Commander level Daemon from each of the Four Gods.

Once all of them had been docilely sat down, at least one at each Rune, Scaldar and Skadi began softly humming an incantation, shortly followed by Erik who slowly approached the first Thrall.

“Ing gor Ni Kraghk Hin Nor Vrrigh Gro shijiet Pequr gof…”

*Schlick!

*Spurt!

And the first sacrifice fell face down, watering the rune with fresh, steaming blood. A deep red spark flew from the sharp edges of the slate whenever the blood seeped deeper into the carving, a kiss of fell wind disturbing the reddened snow covered ground.

Erik approached the next stone, not the one right next to the first but actually on the complete opposite side of the formation. Another determined swipe from the sharp blade accompanied by the Daemonic chanting heralded a second sacrifice to fuel the Circle.

With each additional sacrifice the wind picked up until a continuous gale flowed into the clearing from all sides, infused with flashes of red, purple, green and blue. And the three people continued to chant, louder and louder as to be heard over the howling of the Winds.

Finally, the last piece of ‘fuel’ was slain and the runic formation fully charged. It was now time to perform the actual summonings, for which specific sacrifices had been prepared.

Simple minded yet strong and burly men were picked to entice a powerful Bloodletter of Khorne.

A mix of innocents and defiled to tempt a Daemonette of Slaanesh.

Disease ridden and shit covered Thralls to lure a Plaguebearer of Nurgle.

Perhaps the most challenging sacrifices to find were ones that would please the Pink Horrors of Tzeentch, for intelligent Thralls either didn’t last long or were taken out of the lowest rungs to fulfil better roles. In the end, they had to make do with the most recently caught bunch which still had some spark of life within them.

Then, with everything done and prepared, Erik stopped chanting as he began summoning the Daemons.

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After efficiently slaying eight sacrifices, fully draining them of blood and stacking their skulls at the centre of the formation, Erik felt a tug.

Similar to feeling the bite of a fish on a fishing pole, it seems a Daemon had found and accepted the offering presented.

As the sacrifices piled up, Erik had felt a pressure build from the inside and after confirming another tug, he released that gathered power and let the Daemon materialise in front of him.

Coloured a bright red, standing well over eight feet, at least 2,5 meters tall crowned with a set of enormous, onyx black horns with glowing eyes the colour of molten gold, the Bloodletter stood before Erik. Loosely holding its giant, equally red flaming sword, the Khornite Daemon tentatively stuck out its long, purple, reptilian tongue as if tasting the Norscan air.

Then its eyes shot towards Erik and without so much as a word, it screamed manically and immediately attacked.

Erik was ready, knowing full well that a summoned Daemon’s first impulse would be to free itself of the Summoning Ritual’s binding by killing the summoner, thus allowing it to roam free in the Mortal world.

Glaive poised, Erik met the Daemon’s sword high in the air. Immediately, Erik turned his head to the side and narrowly avoided the spiked tongue. Pushing hard against the tangled weapons, Erik hastily created some space between them to prevent a second tongue-lash.

‘I need a different shape for my polearm… This shape is fine for horseback, but I want something with a bit more utility while on foot… Maybe something to catch other weapons with or more easily move them aside?’

Even while feeling pressured for the first time since meeting Luthor Harkon, Erik immediately realised a flaw in his current equipment.

‘No matter, right now I need to subdue this thing!’

Erik immediately resumed his attack, putting pressure on the powerful Daemon. By barraging it with cuts, strikes and jabs Erik made the Bloodletter step back bit by bit, forcing its bestial hooves backwards over the corpses used to summon it.

Irritated, the Bloodletter let loose another howl and jumped straight at Erik, disregarding the possibility of impalement and trying to catch Erik off-guard. Too bad, Erik’s eyes are too fast and he was ready.

It would be a lie to say Erik planned this, but he had in fact been waiting for the Daemon to make a fully committed attack like this.

Deftly twirling the heavy, full metal Glaive Erik struck the Daemon’s head, sending it flying into the wall of Magical energy swirling around them.

Immediately following up on the successful strike, Erik taking away the flaming sword before impaling the Daemon with its own weapon through the chest, pinning it to the ground but not killing it.

“Now, we will have a little TALK!” – Erik said to the roaring monster.

It didn’t seem to care about its bodily harm, for all Erik knew it didn’t even feel it, but the reality of having been bested in melee had done some severe psychological damage to the creature.

“I’ll make this quick so I can be on my way. You’re a Commander level Bloodletter? Just answer me with a simple yes or no!”

“Gruaaaagh! Hriiiiiih! YESSS!”

“Good, now we’re talking! Okay, here’s my deal to you. I will be fighting a LOT in the future, like a LOT-a lot. You can be a part of all that carnage and bloodletting.

We make a contract. I can summon you and your underlings whenever I want to, you can kill my enemies to your heart’s content and keep half the total amount of souls reaped during those battles.

Do you accept? Yes or no?”

Interest flared in the Daemon’s eyes, as well as greed and an insatiable hunger. It nodded and gestured for Erik to remove the blade.

“Oh no no no, not like this! You will say these exact words in this exact order: I agree to the Contract suggested by Erik, my summoner, and vow by my name to honour its terms.”

Finally, after some more rummaging and forcing the Daemon to repeat the oath in its entirety in one go as to prevent any possibility of loopholes, Erik felt the Contract fall into place.

“Thank you, pleasure doing business with you! I’ll call you when I need you!” –And he promptly severed the Daemon’s head from its muscled neck, sending it back into the Chaos Wastes.