Chapter Text
Yaana has her head pressed tight to her knees with her legs pulled up on the couch while Julius quietly comforts her when she enters Julius’ suite. She gives her a concerned glance before focusing on Hyrince in question. He sighs tiredly, “Just met someone today when Ethelyn escorted us to do healing and all that for karma points she couldn't heal and save. We got word they died a couple hours later.”
Yaana had looked up when Hyrince started talking to her, eyes full of tears and she asks with a broken tone when he's done, “Why? Why does life have to be so unfair? Why do people have to die?
She looks at her with a serious expression, "The world would be hell if no one ever died Yaana.”
The girl flinches, “What? No it wouldn't!” She shakes her head hard, expression turning defiant, “I don't know how your family in your first life can hold the Grim Reaper in such high regard! Death is cruel, if it didn't exist-”
She tilts her head, “And what happens when Death is gone? What state of enduring agony will that leave the children of tragedy in for the rest of eternity? What degrading body will that leave the victims of disease or age in for the rest of time, slowly losing its ability to function until not only can it not move in the slightest but even inevitably suffering permanent asphyxiation? What sort of famish will that leave those who can no longer die of hunger in a world that can't sustain everyone that's ever existed? Or even the more straightforward fact that if Death doesn't exist, there's also no end for those tired of life after decades, centuries, millennia. Or even what will happen to them when the universe itself ends. Death does not cause any of these tragedies. Death is the Final Mercy at the end of it all. Death is that which takes them all and releases them from their suffering. That among other reasons is why my family held the Grim Reaper in such higher regard. That is why Death isn't cruel. That is why it's the Final Mercy."
Yaana's defiance had faltered and crumbled as she went on, turning back to something more broken, “So what, we're supposed to just step aside and accept it?”
She sighs gently, “No, not exactly.” She chuckles a little, “It's not precisely mentioned in the Potter family saying Kieron explained when you asked about all the skulls and skeletal and all that, but I'd like to remind you that it does call them your oldest friend. Unless it's some sort of mercy death for someone suffering and too far gone, what friend wants you to die sooner instead of later?”
Yaana blinks, thrown by the question, “I- What?”
She shakes her head, “The Potter's belief is that yes, death is inevitable and there are absolutely things one should not do, lines that shouldn't be crossed when it comes to living longer, but it's- Well, we don't exactly worship the Reaper, but there is a notion to be something worth claiming. That the life you lived, the person you are, the culmination of all that you are is your offering to them. Live your life to its fullest, put up a reasonable fight. Be someone worth the Reaper’s warm respect when it inevitably greets you.”
While Yaana tightens her arms around her legs while she processes that Julius tilts his head, some curiosity in his expression, “But I mean, if the Reaper is your oldest friend don't you kinda already get that?”
She snorts in amusement, “Friends can have falling out all the time depending on the actions of one another, and just because someone is or was a friend, whichever the case, it doesn't mean you're close friends. Some are hardly more than acquaintances. Which inevitably brings up the part about him not judging you, but what we mean by that is more that they may be disapproving if you were cruel or something, but they aren't exactly going to look down on you for things you may be ashamed of. Disapprove of those things as well for shame like sacrificing someone else to live, but certainly not things like someone having to… sell their services as it were to have money for food, or shame at having the misfortune to be related to terrible people. The Reaper wouldn't have a single grain of warmth and respect for someone who was a terrible person in life, but it's more like having to tensely put up with an old friend you were estranged from for reasons for a little while when it's your time to greet the Reaper.”
Julius nods slowly as he absorbs that, and a silence settles while the two actual kids digest what she's said. Hyrince flashes her a grateful smile, probably pleased at kinda tugging Yaana out of her despair.
She smiles back briefly but doesn't break the quiet, more than happy to settle on one of the couches and wait for the other two to be ready to talk more, be they about other things or a continuation of the discussion.
She sighs in satisfaction. Why wouldn't she though? She'd finally managed to rework Wakaba's Skill Elimination to a Targeted Skill Elimination ability. She almost absently hands it off to Sariel and the System even as she uses it on herself to finally be rid of those disgusting purposeful soul damaging Skills she'd gotten from absorbing the Queen Taratect. Specifically level three Heretic Attack and level ten Heretic Magic. Kin Control isn't as bad since it doesn't damage souls to begin with much less on purpose, but she's not particularly fond of that one either so she rather happily uses Targeted Skill Elimination on it as well.
Given it's basically impossible to remove the System from this world since it's become somewhat reliant on it, when she reworks it and frees Sariel, she'll need to fully remove Heretic Attack, Heresy Magic, as well as Abyss Magic. She doesn't have that last Skill thankfully, but it also destroys souls, even if unlike the other two rather than just destroying them it rips them apart and feeds their energy into the System. She'll leave Heresy Resistance in though. There are more things than the Skills Wakaba placed into the System that can damage souls even if without those they're somewhat rare. If people want to snag it to protect themselves against anything that could, they're more than welcome to.
She will undoubtedly get rid of the Immortality Skill though, at least as a purchasable Skill. The Phoenix has it inherently and she can make sure it specifically has it, but even if no one has really managed to build up the points for it in the past, she'd rather just be rid of it entirely rather than risk it, especially with her manual Skill point generation technique. She may only be teaching it to Julius, Yaana, and Hyrince right now, but given she isn't inherently against it and never swore them to secrecy or something, it's entirely possible they'll teach others later and it'll just become a thing in general over time. So she'd rather get rid of the Immortality Skill before it potentially becomes a possibility to use Skill point generation to acquire it.
Even better, with how heavily soul focused so much of the System is and the requirements of gently removing any Skill from the soul a person is wanting to be rid of with Targeted Skill Elimination, she'd figured out some things she was still struggling with as far as the Central World's Targeted Daemon Summoning. With the way the Daemons essentially naturally become a dependant of any of the Primordials based on which of them the personality that starts to emerge as they gain individually is most similar to, it would essentially let anyone who knows it pick what kind of Daemon they want to call upon. And while obviously people would still have to get the information and learn it, she had zero intentions to keep it to herself.
It wasn't exactly a massive deal now- with not just Guy but all the Primordials becoming her subordinates to some extent -Rain and Mizery were technically still Guy's subordinates but he was her subordinate, so- as well as her having total global control, it was highly unlikely that summoned Daemons would cause trouble without good reason. But that's not a guarantee, since some moron among them could try to be sneaky, or grow arrogant enough to think they can challenge the Primordials or her. Guy may possibly be upset, given the number of his subordinates summoned will undoubtedly take a nosedive since they tend to be the most volatile. It's the pride and arrogance that all dependents of Guy have meeting with the general volatility and generally strife filled Daemon realm and their society as a whole.
She should probably warn Kieron's dependents that they'll probably see an uptick in summonings once her Targeted Daemon Summoning starts to spread after she releases it though. There had been that quietly passed along information within certain groups that Daemons that were dependents of the Black Primordial would help the abused as long as they weren't an abusive or terrible person themselves after all. And the main thing that had held most of them back from asking for help was the ever present risk of summoning a Daemon associated with a different Primordial. Once that risk is gone as the information on the Targeted Daemon Summoning starts to disseminate, there will undoubtedly be far more people willing to use a summoning to ask for help.
She'll need to let them know that while she's generally fine with them all doing their own thing and indulging in their hyperfocus with whatever their personal interest is, she fully expects them not to practically abandon any such summoners asking for help. Given they're Kieron's dependents, she doubts she actually explicitly needs to tell them that, but it never hurts to work on the safe side.
Maybe she'll organize Kieron's dependents into a task force explicitly dedicated to handling such things. After all, even if they catch up on the ‘back log’ as it were of people who desperately need help but don't really have someone in their lives they can turn to that can actually do something about it, it doesn't mean they won't have other summoners. It'd be the first time Kieron's dependents were actually pulled together and organized on any significant scale, but it's not like she's doing it on a whim or for no good reason.
Given the whole reason they're Kieron's dependents is because he's the one they had the most in common with personality wise, they shouldn't be against it or fight her on it. May even appreciate order being implemented when she organizes them together to more efficiently respond to such summonings and sort out who needs help and what help they need or who is terrible or abusive themselves.
If the Central World was gonna go and make her its Empress actually, she could even organize things so they aren't publicly wild cards who constantly cause chaos as a sort of smokescreen to what they've been doing to protect the people they have been from being tracked down or being retaliated against. Well, they'll undoubtedly hold onto parts of their reputation for misdirection purposes, but the parts they've played up specifically for the benefit of the people they've been helping won't be necessary. She can straight up give them authority to act legally to help people in terrible situations and punish the perpetrators or just as terrible summoners.
Actually moving back a bit, now that she thinks about it, Guy isn't guaranteed to be upset about his dependents not being summoned as often. It's more of a toss-up since on second thought, it's just as likely to be a blow to his pride as it is to be beneath said pride to care. Especially since she doesn't actually know if the Primordials care about how many of their dependents manage to get before any others to answer a summon.
Daemons in general undoubtedly will care, not explicitly due to how many of any particular Primordials dependents manage to get before the rest but more for the way it could affect their chances of getting to the Central World and trying to secure a means to a body. With the fact she and by extension, the Parallel Existence Rowena has taken to leaving there can just make bodies that can support them, it opens new opportunities for them.
Perhaps she'll offer the possibility to earn one to Kieron's dependents to increase the already high likelihood of them following her orders when she organizes them into that abuse response force.
Though in general she'll have to make some sort of system to file a request for one, probably with an included mind reading for the sake of denying any who would uncaringly harm people. While with the level of Thought Acceleration Rowena has access to she can get through any requests quickly, it'd still be slower in general even if artificially in how many are granted acceptance in a certain period of time to avoid flooding the Central World in general.
That does mean that there's a good chance those who refuse to accept the rejection will likely try to respond to summons and scheme to try and get a body on their own. She'll have to set up a force dedicated to cracking down on that, since while there could certainly hypothetically be extenuating circumstances, in general, anyone doing such clearly hasn't learned and corrected the ideas and behavior that saw their request for a body rejected in the first place.
Given they'll likely get bored, she'll probably have Carrara and Ultima assigned to that to some extent. Given how loyal they are, as long as she gives them rules about not being too out of touch and unavailable in case Xiǎo-lóng needs them for something and to mitigate any general damages and harm to any innocents nearby, she can probably trust them to manage how often they run off to blow off steam joining the group personally and how often they're just forwarding orders to subordinates without heading out. She'll have Rowena's Parallel Existence in the Central World keep an eye on them just to make sure, but that fervent loyalty means it's highly unlikely there will be any problems.
Things to look into. For now, she checks how much Sariel and the System had priced Targeted Skill Elimination at, perfectly pleased to see it at a fixed price and the minimal hundred Skill points. Not that she's all that surprised. Technically it benefits the System more if people have a method of essentially feeding it MA energy willingly without the attached string of having to lose all of their Skills. Plus, she hadn't changed her mind and attempted to give it the ability to get rid of Titles, since yes, technically that could also benefit the System given they're also MA energy that could be fed to it, but she's not the slightest bit fond of murderers or the like trying to wiggle away from their crimes by getting rid of any related Titles they may have gotten.
Like, as an example, no not everyone with the ‘Human Slayer’ Title are cold blooded murders, unlike the other ‘Slayer’ Titles that one triggers at the very first ‘kill’, and not only does it not bother with reasons for why it happened it also isn't even always due to a direct purposeful action. Someone who killed purely in self defense would have it just as undeniably as a serial killer. Sometimes healers who failed to save patients are labeled with it if the System decides they technically should have been able to save them based purely on general talent and healing level and available magic, completely disregarding valid reasons such as the possibility that they didn't know how to deal with something or they had a lot on their plate from multiple patients.
Hell, the Title will be given to newborns whose mother died in labor as the System deems it technically their fault, which was beyond fucked up since while yes, obviously they were in labor with the child, but there actually are known herb mixtures and the like to abort, so unless they had a controlling spouse or family, they chose to have labor. They chose to give birth to the baby. Yes, obviously there's always a chance it was due to controlling family of some variety or maybe they had their own medical reasons for being unable to take said abortion means, but that's still not the baby's fault in such cases. They didn't choose to be born. The baby in such instances was the only living being who never had a choice regarding their birth, and its fucked up to put the death on their infantile shoulders and make them carry that their entire lives. The point being, just because one has the Title, it doesn't make them a murderer.
Nor does having the ‘Human Slaughterer’ mean the holder is a terrible person either. There are law enforcement and soldiers who have certainly had to take enough lives in the course of their duties to have been given it. The ‘Human Calamity’ Title was much more likely to never find itself being given to someone like aforementioned soldiers and law enforcement given the number of deaths one has to be deemed the cause of, though it's technically a possibility, but it's far more likely that any Human with that Title is a mass murderer.
It doesn't really matter if they've killed enough people to get all the way to Human Calamity though. Her point was that no, the Title may not inherently mean someone is a cold blooded murderer, but there's also not a murderer without it. While it may be somewhat rare since it requires either someone with level nine of the Appraisal Skill or at least a stone imbued with its power, Appraisal has been used in the past to at least confirm murderers have killed someone even if it obviously doesn't confirm the circumstances surrounding the death. She's not going to let such people try to dodge the law by being rid of that piece of evidence.
Given the whole ‘basically have to just rework the System and change out its core from Sariel’ thing since this world has become semi-reliant on it though, she'll undoubtedly not only remove the way the System pushes the ‘Human Slaughterer' Title onto newborns whose mother died in child birth or Healers who couldn't save a patient for some reason, but also update it so it takes reasons into account so that only murderers get those Titles.
Especially since yes, soldiers and law enforcement can sometimes be required to take lives, but while she can absolutely see herself maybe making new Titles that such professions can get, maybe things related to years or dedication and all that to service. Partly because not all service of such people is in combat, some being more support which is just as important in a different but no less significant way, partly due to not wanting to lump those who did kill in the line of duty in with cold blooded murders, and partly because while some may have an easier time accepting the actions they needed to take, it does weight heavily on others and she doesn't want to shove it in such people's faces basically every day for the rest of their lives.
There are other things she'll need to fix about the System mind. Like the fact it's designed to make any medium of physical record keeping -be they physical mediums like books and paintings or digital mediums like the computers this world had before the MA energy mess- and cause them to degrade faster. Presumably it was put in since Wakaba agreed to save this world from that MA energy crisis to prevent future generations from accessing the records of how to use MA energy but failing to heed any warnings and making the situation worse. Wakaba wasn't a kind woman in the slightest, but she had agreed to assist with the problem and failure to prevent it from worsening would arguably fall into the category of failing to uphold her end of her and Güliedistodiez's agreement.
It didn't do anything about oral passing of records of course, but the original generation of people who drove their world to ruin had certainly seen the consequences of their folly and weren't dumb enough to teach their children and grandchildren about it. With the focus on survival when the System first became a thing, it doesn't surprise her in the slightest that they failed to pass on other knowledge, like tech in general though. Additionally, what fragments were passed on… Well, it clearly wasn't very complete, or maybe it was the medium accelerated degradation contributing to the problem, but oral records passed down may not be under the influence of the System's degradation, but they're practically guaranteed to break down and get twisted over generations anyway.
To that extent, it doesn't exactly surprise her that they backslid, and lost their technology and the like. Once she's done reworking the System though, there's no reason for the medium degradation thing, so it's something she'll have to remove.
The only potential risk is if there's some sort of oral knowledge that's been passed down that has enough information for people to try to recreate the MA energy tapping technology, which isn't necessarily bad in general. If it's left to levels of things like the wards and magic items that passively drew on magic in her previous lives, even the cumulative draws on it world wide is practically a drop in the bucket for a planet as a whole that it can easily outpace with its passive magic generation.
It's just either tapping into it on a massive scale or numerous smaller but still large draws on it that's the problem. It was actually mostly the latter that screwed this planet actually. Specifically, that gene manipulation treatment that resulted in the Demons. It was costly for the planet to do even a single one, and it had not been done only a handful of times.
There were ways to prevent such imbecility however, so it wasn't a particularly large risk that would stop her from removing the medium degradation aspect.
She definitely had changes she needed to make for the new System, but honestly, she'd already put together the new runic script for the whole thing while she's been trying to work out how to deal with the MA energy deficiency. In comparison, it was actually pretty damn simple.
That was just because the planetary MA energy situation was a mite challenging though. The Nihility Collapse use plan looked like it was the best option though. She's been looking into other possibilities or additional methods of making it more likely to turn out well. Selina had gotten a vision about it not much longer after she made Fortuna that placed her odds at roughly fifty-fifty chances, which was still way better than the guaranteed failure of before, but given the last time she'd had a vision she'd had that temporary breakdown, the moment it triggered, she'd been watching like a hawk.
It's mostly important in the fact she saw it activated with Multidimensional Perception. Technically she should've been able to watch the Occlumency memories of the data from previous visions to learn what she did, but with the circumstances they'd all been… rather distracted and it hadn't occurred to any of them. Not even Rowena. It actually answered a couple questions that had been lingering though. Essentially, she's been getting visions of the absolute worst case scenario due to a combination of conscious inexperience and her subconscious picking out of the visions it was seeing of potential outcomes. Undoubtedly her subconscious picked those ones out of the ones it was seeing for her to consciously see as a warning.
That does mean that hypothetically, some of her other plans actually could've been refined to work, but she had no intention of looking into them and tormenting her wife with those visions again.
Especially since if this plan with Nihility Collapse only had a fifty percent chance of failure as its worst case, it was certainly a significantly better option compared to others she's come up with. She'll still look into it on the side as she works out the details in case there's an even better option.
Kieron has been much more relaxed since she sorted that part of Moirai's visions out though, having cheerfully pointed out that if her worst odds were fifty-fifty, then even if Moirai showed Selina it failing, with both the Probability Manipulation born Tilted Scales as well as Hero's Blessing born Fortune Favors the Bold and Hero's Fable, giving her a fifty percent chance on something like this means she's practically guaranteed to win that proverbial coin toss.
Selina was still more nervous about it, but that's to be expected, given she's the one who's seeing visions of her losing that coin flip what with her seeing worst case scenario visions with the current circumstances.
She'll still try to refine it to increase her odds while she's getting everything done rather than relying on Fortuna's Sub-Skills, especially since there are things beyond just the planet fixing she needs to do. The System needs its own rewriting and all that. Releasing Sariel. A couple other things she's been contemplating.
The job isn't done with the planet being fixed.
She's never been one to leave a job only partly complete.
She's watching in amusement as Julius and his brothers dart from one stall to another in excitement from where she's walking with what would probably seem like an incredibly odd group to anyone from their world. Not that she can necessarily blame them for finding it strange.
It's not every day that world would see higher ups from Nefas like Balto and Agner walking with the Renxandt Empire's current and former Monarchs and Imperial Court Wizard plus a King and one of his consorts carrying their year old baby. It'd probably be an even odder group if the Queen of Analeit had joined Meiges and Rohesia, but luckily the terrible woman had declined to come.
Hard to say if she just didn't want to have to be in her presence given she not only put a stop to her attempt to assassinate Rohesia but has also been steadily undermining and stripping her of her influence given she's a terrible woman, or if it was an unwillingness to be around Rohesia and the constant reminder of her failure to have her killed as well as Julius who isn't her child and has the Hero Title and the living blow to her pride he is, but she really doesn't care.
The afternoon escorting them around to see the sights and what's available in the markets of the Labyrinth after the official ceremonies regarding the gateways into it opening in Nafas, Renxandt, and Analeit was significantly more pleasant without her anyhow.
Julius and the older kids weren't the only ones excited about things. She'd had to hand off focusing on the group chat Shunsuke and the other reincarnated kids were blowing up to one of her Parallel Minds. She'd almost muted it for now before deciding against it in case they tried to ask her specifically something. It does make her glad she'd added the ability to send what was essentially photos from what you were seeing though. If Shunsuke was going to excitedly tell them all about it, it was better he could send them pictures.
From what she'd seen before she'd handed off paying attention to it to a Parallel Mind, the other reincarnated kids were torn between equally as excited and sort of jealous. They weren't being mean about it mind, they were being more hilariously dramatic in all honesty. Though, in all honesty, it would've surprised her if they had been mean about it. She'd spoken to Shunsuke about focusing on the desire for them all to be safe so his Divine Protection Skill would protect them, and it's very much already proven it absolutely works. Naofumi Kogure and Kouta Hayashi very much already benefited from it.
Naofumi's home village was attacked by monsters, and while it was absolutely tragic and undoubtedly traumatizing, everything just happened to line up so that rather than everyone dying, he was the sole survivor when he happened to get hidden from the monsters both visually and by scent as well as protected from the elements when a shelf just happened to collapse over where he'd ended up after his attempting to flee mother fell, protecting him from the impact itself but fumbling in a way that slid him across the ground and away from her seconds before a monster pounced.
The shelf didn't collapse onto him of course, it was halted when its top hit the opposite wall and it got lodged in place as it acted as temporary shelter. Right at its base had been a dirty laundry basket his mother had been going to handle that day, and it just happened to be pushed by the falling shelf in a way that it scattered its clothes all over him, keeping him warm and hiding his scent. It technically could've just been regular pure dumb luck, but they all knew it was far more likely it was Divine Protection’s doing. Especially since it didn't just keep him safe during the monster attack, it all lined up to protect him for the next twenty-nineish hours until he was found when people came to look for any survivors and survey the damage.
Kouta had also had a series of coincidences save him through sheer dumb luck that they all pretty much knew were actually Divine Protection’s doing. The level of luck required for anything but to have a block of knives pushed down a counter and off of it right above where the basket he's laying in but have them all just so happen to miss in a near perfect circle around him is too unlikely for them to consider anything else.
And at that, to have a law enforcement watchmen just happening to pass by and see the knives almost kill him through the window and burst in to find his abusive father choking his mother after having slammed her against the counter and caused the knife block to slide his way on the counter and promptly arrest him, removing both the source of the threat and of inevitable additional threats down the line. It all just lined up too perfectly for them to accept it as anything but the work of Divine Protection. Especially given that watchman never used that route and had only been there because a collapsing tree, a tipped over cart, and a bad mudslide from a hill had taken out three other routes and pushed him that way.
Sheer dumb luck does exist without something like Divine Protection directing it of course, but they all basically accepted it as fact that Shunsuke's Skill had saved them, and would undoubtedly continue to do its damndest to continue to protect them. Though she had had a firm talk with the kids that it wasn't all powerful, and there absolutely could come a day when it just can't, but that doesn't make it Shunsuke's fault they died if it occurs.
And also that they should hone their own abilities rather than just rely on Divine Protection. Especially since it may be something like the more work it has, the less it can focus on specific things, so if they learn enough to protect themselves then it'll lessen the burden on Divine Protection in general and let it focus on protecting them better since instead of a stupid long list of coincidences to save them, it only has to do things to push things in their favor when danger occurs.
The point was, while she'd made sure they'd understand such things, they're all very aware they're being protected by Shunsuke and his Skill, especially right now when there's little to nothing they can do to defend themselves even if it's just running away at the moment. So yes, it absolutely would have seriously surprised her if they got mean or just unpleasant about their jealousy regarding Shunsuke getting to see the Labyrinth and its markets and not them.
She's in the middle of explaining what magisteel, adamantite, and Hihi'irokane is to them after Leigar asked when someone calls out to her, “Empress Rimuru, expanding the Labyrinth's market, huh?”
She looks over, somewhat annoyed at the title, even if she can't exactly deny it anymore since she gained total global control, “Guy. You are still way too amused to call me that just so you know. And kinda? It's not exactly the goal, more of a side effect of aiming to increase availability of things over in the other world.”
Ronandt is looking at her with some surprise, “...Empress Rimuru? I mean, I know your name in your last life was Rimuru and that you led a nation, but…”
Guy laughs, “What else are you supposed to call the female ruler of the entire world but Empress?”
That only seems to surprise the man even more, “You rule the entire world over there? I didn't take you for a conquer, but I don't see how else…”
She waves her hand, “I didn't conquer them no.”
Before she can try to find a way to explain it briefly, Guy snorts, “That she did not. No, she just got so mad at a lunatic -an unfortunate powerful lunatic- that pulled some shit with people she cares for and was aiming to destroy the world and in the process of going after him made an absolute mockery of some of the most powerful people in the world -all of which are strong enough to take on armies on their own- who were in her way over a misunderstanding. And she basically unintentionally showed the entire thing to the entire world simultaneously due to some stuff I don't want to get into.”
“So conquer? No. She just unintentionally showed the entire world simultaneously that in the hypothetical of her being an enemy, even if the rest of the world mustered everything they had, they'd still lose in a landslide to her. So, more a combination of how much of a threat she was and the fact there genuinely were some pretty good benefits to joining the Jura-Tempest Federation under her rule like not having to worry about other powerful factions that had already joined Jura-Tempest for their own reasons. Doesn't hurt that she wasn't exactly stripping royalty and the like from their control over their area. They just shifted to local lords with additional nobility under them -the ones they had before-, provided they were properly taking care of their people and continued to do so.”
Leigar laughs heartily at that, “Yeah! That'd do it! No conquering required!”
Guy snorts, “Honestly, I'm surprised Nefas hasn't officially become a territory belonging to Jura-Tempest, but from what I've heard, it's mostly due to the fact they're always ruled by whoever that System on your planet names the Demon Lord, and the fact that whenever Rimuru pretty much inevitable technically dies and moves into her next life -even if Dimension Leap means she's perfectly capable of returning- it will name a new Demon Lord, and she has no real way of knowing what sort of person they'll be, so.”
Leigar raises his eyebrows briefly as he nods to the side slightly, “Well, she's not wrong. With the way it isn't like an inherited throne like Renxandt's or Analeit's, she doesn't have any information nor control on who will inherit after her. It could cause a whole hell of a lot of problems for her if they're like previous Demon Lords and Nefas is considered part of Jura-Tempest.”
Guy smiles lightly, “I didn't say it was a bad reason, I just said that's the reason I've heard is why.” He shakes his head to the side with a small smile, “Anyhow, I thought I heard you guys discussing Hihi'irokane when I was coming over. Does it actually have the power it usually does in that world with MA energy rather than magicules?”
As she starts to explain things to them, including Guy now, she fights down the urge to punch him in the face at the contemplative look on not only Balto and Agner's face, but even thoughtful looks on Largis’ and Meiges’ faces too.
She had no desire to expand Jura-Tempest, but she has a sinking feeling Guy just unintentionally set exactly that up. Considering they don't know the full story, maybe she can get away with just Nefas shifting their laws so she'll still be considered their ruler even after she dies and someone else inherits the Demon Lord Title? Meiges may have seen the Observation Orb recording of her dealing with Feldway and the Demon Lords, but he didn't have the full context and all that, nor did he have any of the nations that had already joined her as neighbors or anything. Largis may technically have the neighbor if Nefas officially becomes part of Jura-Tempest permanently, but he doesn't have the other information so.
There's not much she can do but cross her fingers and hope.
Julius all but bursts into his mom's suite where his dad was visiting her and Schlain -Shunsuke that is, who's expressed a desire to switch to his new name for the majority of them even if he's fine with his friends continuing to use his ‘Shun’ nickname- excitedly, all but scampering in right before her, “Guess what?! Mom said-”
He cuts himself off in surprise as he realizes what he just said, swinging his wide eyed gaze back to her before returning to his parents. Rohesia laughs brightly at his nearly panicked deer in headlights expression, “Given Shiraori has become something like a second mother to you, we've been wondering when that was going to happen. You calling her Mom that is.” She gives a graceful shrug, “Not like I'm protesting. Shiraori takes such good care of you I'm more than okay with it. If anything I'm quite pleased by it in fact. I couldn't ask for a better guardian and mentor for you.”
Julius opens and closes his mouth a couple times, trying to figure out what to say, then glances at her and turns red in embarrassment. She laughs as she ruffles her hair, “I'm certainly not going to take issue with it if that's what you're worried about Julius. Need I remind you I nearly emotionally adopted you practically the second we met and it only got delayed because Selina asked you about it then pointed out you have good parents? I have no qualms with going through with said emotional adoption and becoming a second mom to you.”
He nods slowly as he moves forward to settle on one of the couches, and Meiges smiles, before shifting the topic, undoubtedly so Julius can have time to wrap his head around it, “Anyhow, Lady Shiraori said..?”
Julius shakes himself out, regaining his excitement, “That she's satisfied with our progress with manual Skill point generation and leveling, which she was apparently more letting us experience and hone our ability with. But now she's decided me, Hyrince, and Yaana are good enough that she's going to level our magic regeneration Skills to the max level as well as our Stat boosting Skills so we're not waiting on the former to get to the latter before leveling further! Well, further for me, leveling in general for the other two. She's gonna take us out to get some leveling and some live combat experience while she supervises!”
Rohesia smiles indulgently at him, “Is that so?” She glances over at the shy Yaana and confident Hyrince who had been following behind her but in front of the amused Kieron and Selina that had followed them in and all settled down in the seating area, “And have you all thought of what Skills you'd like to focus on acquiring and leveling once you have both the highest tier of magic regeneration and a couple levels of boosted magic Stat points?”
Hyrince snorts, “Boosting up my shieldsmanship Skill first for me personally. And my swordsmanship since I'm not always going to be defending.”
Julius nods excitedly, “Mm! Not shieldsmanship for me, but swordsmanship for sure. Then probably focusing on my Light Magic, since Mom-,” He briefly makes a surprised face at it slipping out again, then shakes it off, “said I genuinely have a high affinity with Light Magic.”
Yaana fidgets a little shyly before quietly all but squeaking, “I, um, H-Healing Magic for me obviously. Some form of attack magic, p-probably Lightning Magic, since Miss Shiraori says I have a much higher affinity for that than Light Magic. I'll- I'll need to get some d-dagger levels at some point t-too. Miss Shiraori says I shouldn't need them in general s-since I'll be in a support role in the back, but that it's a-always better to be safe than s-sorry.”
Meiges nods his agreement, “That it is. When things go well you certainly shouldn't need them, but things aren't always going to go well. Better to have something you can defend yourself with if you need to.”
She hums, “Those are all well and good, but Julius and Yaana ought to increase their levels in Magic Power Operation sooner rather than later.”
Julius swings his gaze to her in surprise, “Eh? Why? We can already use magic, since that's what level one grants you, but it doesn't actually do anything at higher levels.”
She shakes her head with a smile, “That's not true. Level one grants the ability to use magic, yes, but it's locked in a rigid framework. Higher levels give you more flexibility in how much magic you can put into a spell and how large it must be. Get to a higher level and you can do things like maintain the firepower of a spell but simultaneously make it smaller to focus its power and make it all the more devastating on the desired target.”
Julius isn't the only one whose surprise increases at that, basically everyone but her soulmates gets more surprised at that actually. She shrugs lightly, “Or just generally boost its power. Put enough power into it and the seventh level Light Beam Spell will outclass a seventh level Divine Light Beam, so you can only imagine the power one could pack into that. I've been pushing you guys to get Miracle Magic and it is the best healing possible, but get Magic Power Operation high enough and even regular Healing Magic is almost as good. It's still weaker, but the gap is significantly smaller. Mind, it's a lot more costly than Miracle Magic and unlike the example with Light and Divine Light Magic, you can't really apply that to pushing Miracle Magic any further. It pretty much already works on anything that's not dead yet and is incapable of resurrection or something like that. Not that trespassing into such a realm is a good idea.”
Part of that was in the fact normalizing resurrection was a lot like opening Pandora's Box, but part of it was in fairness her own beliefs railing against such. She's somewhat surprised when that male voice pipes up again laughing happily before saying in an amused tone, “You're so much more strict than me Beloved. You aren't wrong that doing so recklessly would be akin to opening Pandora's Box, but you ought to loosen up a bit.”
The conversation continues around her even as she sees Kieron and Selina give little micro jerks as their eyes fly to her, and Kieron reaches out mentally, <What the hell was that?!>
She gives a mental shrug, <No clue. In general I'd think I was losing it or something, but it's a bit too inconsistent and rare for that.”
Her mind drifts over the handful of times that male voice echoing from the edges of her consciousness has spoken to her. Back when she had first been reborn as Toshiko and snapped ‘awake’ briefly as a baby when she was threatened, or maybe due to the chaos, after she dealt with Keiko, loving and soft “Sleep Beloved. You will wake if necessary, but otherwise you should not wake properly until later.”
During that car wreck that killed Kuroha, Tomomi, and Riko instantly and she'd been disoriented and not thinking straight in grief and tried to use Regrowth on them, and it had spoken up again, gentle and pained, “I'm sorry. Their souls are already out of your reach Beloved.” And again, a few seconds later after she couldn't bring herself to use Regrowth to save her own life and outlive them again, “It's okay Beloved. It's okay. Death only seems cruel to the survivors left behind. It may be deemed selfish by the living to refuse to keep going, but everyone is entitled to be selfish sometimes.”
Then when she had been about to start that last meeting as Rimuru, “It's time to go, Beloved.”
She can feel Rowena give the mental equivalent of a jolt of surprise, <What? I didn't- How could I not have picked up on that last one? I was already attached to your soul and when whoever is behind that voice, because it's very much external, reached out, I should have been able to hear it like I did this time!>
She gives another mental shrug, <Again. No clue. I suppose it's nice to have confirmation it's not in my head, as unlikely as it seemed given how infrequent it's been, but.> A third mental shrug, <I have no more answers then you do.>
Selina quietly murmurs, <Whatever- Whoever it is… They basically killed us in our third life, right? Since it seems like they were behind our souls being drawn away?>
She makes an agreeing hum and Kieron presses it, <How?>
She sighs, <How many times do I gotta say it? I have no clue. I know nothing more about that voice that's been following me through our lives than you do now. I never saw anything with Elemental Sight, and Multidimensional Perception never picked up on anything either. Well, not previously anyway. I think there was some sort of MA energy fluctuation when he spoke?>
Rowena makes an uncertain noise, <Possibly? It was so miniscule I can't tell if it was from that, a more natural fluctuation, or a miniscule reaction from your own soul rather than externally from the voice and what it was doing.>
Kieron very much doesn't seem happy in the slightest about the lack of information, but that's to be expected. It undoubtedly goes against all those ingrained habits and paranoia and training to have something easily slipping through defenses he thought were solid, even if the defenses in question were her own Occlumency. His voice sounds like it damn near pains when he says, <Well… I hate to admit it, but if it's been able to get into your mind practically from the get go and hasn't done anything, it's… probably not a threat.>
Not that she's surprised he says it like it pains him to do so. It absolutely goes against basically everything he knows to not only assume something isn't a threat with very little information, but let what could be a threat go without picking it apart until he knows everything about it.
Selina hums, <I may not be a former assassin and all that, but as a former cop I'm not that fond of it either Kieron, but there's basically nothing we can do about it. And besides, like you pointed out, whoever he is, he's had plenty of opportunity to do something untoward and he… hasn't. So he likely isn't a threat. Whoever he is…>
Kieron sighs, <I know, I know, I just- I'd be more comfortable if we knew more at least, you know?>
She snorts, <Yeah? Any ideas on how to find out more?>
Selina makes a sigh of her own, <I get it Kieron, I do, but she's not wrong there's very little we can-.>
Kieron's tone turns interested immediately, <Did you think of a way to maybe get information?>
Selina's voice is a bit shaky, <I- Y-Yeah. Yeah, I think I do know a way we could get more answers. I- …I could try to use Moirai, train it and see if I can't get answers from it…>
A heavy silence descends on them at that for a few moments before she quietly asks, <Selina… Are you sure?>
Their wife sighs, <I- Yes. I need to learn how to use it eventually anyway, and- and the current plan is our best option at the moment anyhow, so- so it's better to train it now when there's a higher likelihood of success I can try to push you towards. Or maybe even find an even better path with an even higher likelihood of success.>
Given they're still with Julius and Rohesia and all them and she'd rather not let them on regarding things, as difficult as it is, she fights off the urge to chew on her own lower lip in concern and keep the furrow out of her brows.
Selina isn't entirely wrong that now was a much better time to train it than before when the visions seemed to imply her plans were practically guaranteed to fail. Though with the understanding she was seeing the worst case, they weren't necessarily actually destined for failure, but the visions from Moirai Selina was seeing previously certainly gave that impression.
Still, it certainly doesn't feel great and worries her that her wife is going to try to train it and what she may be subjected to during it.
Her gaze drifts to her equally troubled husband and his jaw clenches slightly even as a firm look appears on his face. She knows without asking or reaching for his mind that he'll be keeping an even more careful than usual eye on their wife, both for Selina's own sake and to protect her if she has another mental snap.
She's chewing her lip in concern at where her wife was panting and shaking at her most recent vision while trying to train herself with Moirai. Neither she nor Kieron know if it's related to the fact she found a path that had at least half a chance of working out well, but while it took some doing, Selina had managed to work past that subconscious mental block and learn how to trigger visions.
She was still trying to get a handle on directing what those visions showed her, much less pushing them towards one fate or another. It's definitely not been… fun to say the least though.
Straightening up, she takes a deep breath, “Selina.” Her wife weakly lifts her head, “Maybe- Maybe I should use Parcae on you to numb you while you're training and seeing visions.”
Selina bites her lip, “I- But wouldn't- wouldn't that slowly genuinely numb me to you dying? Like, if we kept doing it, even without using Parcae eventually I'd reach the point where I just… don't feel anything if I see you dying? I don't- I don't want to stop caring whether you live or die.”
She sighs, “...It could if we aren't careful about it, but-”
Selina shakes her head firmly, “But nothing Shiraori. I don't like the visions where things go wrong, I hate them, even if they do serve as a warning system, but if it's the price to continue to care about my soulmates. …It's a price I'm willing to pay.”
She clenches her jaw as she looks away.
If her wife won't let her use Parcae on her, there's very little she can do. Beyond getting all the calculations and everything she's been working on out of the way.
If she's being honest, she's been dragging her feet wanting to prepare Julius in case things did go wrong ever since she found a way forward. It would be painfully easy to use Thought Acceleration and get it done basically instantly after all. Yet she hasn't done that, trying to prepare Julius as much as she possibly can before she does just in case. But he was pretty solid now, especially since along with all the gear and stuff she's given him, she'd finished manually leveling Stat boosting Skills for him and the other two and taken them out enough that even Julius has gotten nine levels with the Stat boosting Skills benefiting him.
That's not a whole lot in fairness, only netting nine hundred. He'd gotten more from her manually leveling the Skills and its bonus when they level. That netted them all six thousand one hundred and five Stat points in each Stat. Which certainly wasn't anything to scoff at, given that's about a quarter of the raw strength of a Queen Taratect.
That, and she was stalling a bit while trying to find other potential options.
But if she'd just do it and get the planet repairs and all that out of the way, whatever visions Moirai were showing her wife wouldn't be about her soul destruction at least. They'd be about whatever comes after. Perhaps a happy physically mortal life ending peacefully before they reincarnate again but eventually come back.
She pushes off the doorway she was leaning against when her wife buries her face back into the couch cushions.
She has calculations to finish after all.