Harem Assassins : King Sekton's Harem Planet, Book 2: A Space Opera Harem Adventure Baron Sord (good books to read for adults .txt) 📖

On Hade’s warship, violent death was a constant theme.

Floating above the crew was a large 3D holographic video of the Titanosaurus Rex being defeated by the new and improved King Sekton Darkstar. The video was being captured and transmitted from the Zalaxian jungle via a lone reconnaissance dronebot hidden in the jungle trees and observing from a safe distance. The bot had been placed there recently by Hade’s spy.

Hade’s massive warship was drifting in space a million kilometers from the surface of Zalaxia — three times the distance from Earth to the Moon. This distance created a signal delay of approximately 3 seconds between the sending of comm signals from the Zalaxian surface until their arrival at Hade’s warship.

Despite the distance, Hade’s warship was shifted for stealth, making it invisible across the entire electromagnetic scanning spectrum. It would remain undetectable as long as it remained outside the Zalaxian atmosphere. Reason being, much like Earth, Zalaxia’s atmosphere extended several hundred thousand kilometers out from its surface, getting increasingly thinner with distance. A large Nova-Class warship like Hade’s would make significant disturbances in even the thinnest atmosphere, and these disturbances were easily detectable by Zalaxian Star Defense satellites and ground scanners. At a distance of a million kilometers, Hade knew his warship was floating outside Zalaxia’s extended atmosphere. His ship was as close to undetectable as any starcraft could get. He would never make the fool’s mistake of believing a shifted warship was completely undetectable, even in the total vacuum of deep space. There were always methods for finding what you were looking for.

As the transmitted video of Tim Pittwell’s fight with the Titanosaurus Rex came to a close, Hade stomped and scraped his titanium hooves sparking against his metal dais. One fore-hoof gouged a groove so deep, it sent molten orange droplets spattering and dancing across the surface of the dais.

“This is your fault, Nyfe!” Hade roared, pointing a murderous finger at his technical advisor Vok Nyfe. Hade’s finger truly was murderous. Depending on his mood, he could either fire a deadly energy bolt from any of his finger’s internal barrels, or launch each finger as explosive guided mini-rockets. “Your Technomantic Mass Exchanger was a complete waste, Nyfe! That experimental Stygian-made Emotional Manipulator you built into it fared no better! I paid a fortune for your useless gadgets! A fortune! Now they’re both gone! Good coin wasted for nothing! This new King Sekton made a joke of your techno-wizardry today, Nyfe! A pathetic joke!”

Hade didn’t know the acting king’s true name was Tim Pittwell, or that Tim was an Earthling engineer. In fact, Hade had never even heard of Earth, not until after Blorgofortholorf the Phallodome Failure had sent out a distress call from that distant system.

Prior to receiving the distress call, Hade had only known that Baron Crewd had sent Blorgofortholorf out to obtain one of the many missing and lesser king’s rings. Crewd would have sent Hade, but Hade had been too busy here in the Zalaxian solar system overseeing preparations for Crewd’s upcoming assault on Zalaxia. It was no surprise to Hade that Blorgofortholorf had failed his mission to secure a single ring. That temperamental toadstool never did anything right.

But that was of no import to Hade now.

Now, two rings were within Hade’s reach.

That was important.

According to Hade’s spy — the spy working the jungle outpost located planet-side — one ring worn by the acting king was the missing and lesser king’s ring that Blorgofortholorf had failed to secure. The second was the genuine True Ring that granted the wearer official title to the Zalaxian throne. Both rings were worn by the soon-to-be-crowned acting King of Zalaxia, who was currently taking refuge and cowering in fear at the outpost.

Cowering, Hade thought with disgust, because a true man would have wrestled that Titanosaur into submission himself, not had his women subdue it for him.

No matter.

It meant the Coward King would be that much easier to defeat.

The sooner the better.

Getting both rings to Baron Crewd von Bludlust before an official coronation was the only thing that mattered to Hade now. His fate depended on it. If Crewd lost faith in him, he would have Hade disassembled, and his cybernetic mind — including all backup copies — would be deleted from every server in the universe. Crewd was the only entity in this dimension with the power to permanently erase Hade from existence, and had threatened as much if Hade failed.

“You’re worthless, Nyfe!” Hade screamed at his mysterious technical officer. “Enlarging that Titanosaur accomplished nothing! Sending him to the king’s outpost also accomplished nothing! It didn’t soften the target one bit! It’s as hard as it was before I wasted a fortune paying for your worthless mass exchanger! Tell me why I shouldn’t slay you where you stand!”

Vok Nyfe stood dormant on a small levitating disc held aloft by plasma generator vents glowing under its frame. The disc floated above the workstation pit where Hade’s mutant bridge crew manned their posts.

A black cloak of ragged cloth was draped over Nyfe’s slender cybernetic form. One slender mechanical hand held a long metal staff resting on the disc. The staff was in a constant state of transformation, an ever-moving mechanical puzzle of geometric gears, needles, spheres, pyramids, and blades that clicked quietly as the shiny metal staff transitioned between infinitely varied non-repeating mechanical forms. Although the staff appeared to transform almost liquidly, closer inspection showed that every movement followed an oddly logical process.

“Say something, Nyfe!” Hade raged. “Say something or I’ll feed you to my hounds!”

The Killhounds launched into another explosive salvo of brutal barks, straining at their spiked chains like they might break them and go vaulting across the gap to maul Nyfe where he stood on his levitating disc.

Some of the pirate crew in the workstation pit directly below the Killhounds — the Hyenoks and Gluglons in particular — were scared enough to visibly cower where they sat. If the Killhounds dropped into the pit