Carl sat on one of the stools at the workbench. "This is pretty cool, sweetie." He flipped to another page. "You did all this today?"

"I did!" Mina said with a bright smile. She sliced off another small portion from her steak and brought it to her mouth. "This is quite good," she said with her mouth full.

He'd stood around in frustration for some time upon returning to the workshop. The anger and fury he felt towards Tomas demanded action, but the freaking game just seemed too real. He wanted to punch, to kick, to beat the fucking kid until he regretted being born for what he'd done, but he couldn't. The realism of how the kid's face had been turning colors from lack of air, those wide, terrified eyes…

It was somehow too much for Carl in the moment. He was furious, but he couldn't quite bring himself to stomp a hole in some kid's head, knowing that it'd have a vaguely realistic splattering effect with brains and other gross stuff.

Game was way too freaking realistic with all the content censoring disabled.

Vol was on the case though, and Carl trusted her to put her power-gamer skills to use in doing what he was maybe a little too old and noobish to do himself in this new era of modern game ultraviolence.

Mina had emerged—fully clothed—from the bathroom shortly after his return, her hair still damp from showering. She'd run over to give him a big, overjoyed hug that made him feel a million times better about everything in his life, and now they were checking out her newest car designs.

Carl checked over the latest diagram, which was some kinda steam engine-y thing with tons of squiggly markings all over that looked like spell runes. "Not to be a downer, but isn't the same thing gonna happen if you're using magic again for the engine?"

"I believe I can insulate the glyphs to prevent them from being affected in the same manner," she said. "And if not, I've a scheme for eliminating the problem at its source."

He gave her a concerned look. "I don't know, Mina. I don't want something like what happened a few days ago to happen ever again."

"Yes, we're in vigorous agreement on that account," she said with a cute grimace. "But I'm completely certain there's no cause for worry." She shoveled a small forkful of peas into her mouth.

"Why's that?"

"Because Vol's promised to assist me," Mina said after she'd finished chewing. "Though it galls me to admit it, I imagine she'll prove quite capable of mitigating whatever risks I may face."

Huh, didn't really expect her idea of a pep talk to pay off. She's such a great friend. "That's awfully nice of her." He smiled at the blonde girl. "I'm really glad you're feeling better, Mina."

"I'm… I'm sorry it's taken so long," she said, averting her eyes. "I've burdened you, and—"

"No," Carl said firmly, firing off a quick Dad's Serious Now. "You're not a burden, Mina. Don't ever think that."

Her fork and knife came to rest on her plate on the workbench, and she turned her head down to look at it. "I… I know you've a need to go back, Carl. To return to…" Her lips trembled. "To see your family. Your true family. I'm simply an anchor—"

Carl stood up and pulled her head to his chest, hugging her around her shoulders. "Don't say that, Mina," he said softly. "I miss them all a lot, but I said I was gonna be here for you, and I meant it, okay?"

Mina sniffled.

He felt her nod against him after a moment and released his hold, ruffling her hair a little as he took his seat again. "You just focus on winning this race, okay?" he said while keeping an encouraging smile on his face.

She nodded again, smiling back weakly. "Thank you," she whispered.

They sat in silence for a few minutes, during which Mina reached up to adjust her hair into the hair tie, eventually returning to and finishing her meal.

"What have you been doing while I was…" Mina began, trailing off awkwardly.

"Mostly just hanging out with Vol, I guess," Carl said as he thought back. "Went fishing over in D-three a couple days ago. Did some dungeoneering. Uh… Spent most of yesterday getting ready to wreck your sister's party—already told you about that. Went back to get my boots today," he said, lifting up one foot. "You really undersold me on how awesome these things are."

She looked down, seeming to see them for the first time. "You…" She looked back up at him in confusion. "But how were you able to travel there and back so swiftly?"

"Took the dungeon there this morning, then Vol brought me back with her teleport skill."

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

"I see," Mina said. "And this dungeon, while we're speaking about it, is yours?"

"Yup. Got it while you were offline before we came here."

"Ah. Yes, I understand." She leaned against the workbench a little. "And have you any idea why it might be preventing me from leaving my workshop?"

Carl frowned. "Huh?"

"I attempted to step outside, and the dungeon refused to allow it. I found myself once more on the second level as I stepped through the door to the street."

Carl's frown deepened. "Core, what's going on here?"

"˙ǝɹnsɐǝɹʇ sʇᴉ ʇɔǝʇoɹd ʇsnɯ uoǝƃunp ∀" said the weird core.

He sighed. "No, I wanna talk to the other core. The moderator one."

"˙sʇɥƃnoɥʇ ɹno ǝɹɐɥs ʎɐɯ ǝʍ os 'ɹǝʌǝʍoɥ 'uoǝƃunp ǝɯɐs ǝɥʇ ɟo sǝɹoɔ ǝɹɐ ǝM ˙pǝᴉdnɔɔo sᴉ ɐsoᴉpoqnS"

Thing's almost as annoying as my core to talk to, but in a totally different way. Feels like I'm trying to get to the manager at a store. Back when stores were more of a thing.

Mina was frowning cutely, probably while she tried to get a handle on understanding the weird core's weird way of talking.

"Alright, so you guys haven't been letting Mina leave when she wants?" He picked the core up off his shoulder so he could frown at it more directly.

"˙pǝɯɹɐɥ ɹo uǝʞɐʇ ƃuᴉǝq ɯoɹɟ ɹǝɥ pǝʇuǝʌǝɹd ǝM ˙ǝɹnsɐǝɹʇ ɹnoʎ sᴉ ǝɥS"

"Okay, but if she wants to leave, you gotta let her leave," Carl said.

The core was silent for a few seconds. "˙ƃuᴉʌɐǝl ʎq ɟlǝsɹǝɥ ɯɹɐɥ oʇ ʇɥƃnos ǝɥS" it said at last.

Carl's frown changed targets. "Mina?"

She fidgeted, refusing to meet his eyes in exactly the same way that both Sammy and Bobby did whenever they knew they were in Big Trouble.

Enough was enough. Carl powered up to Dad Mode Five in order to activate his improved Dad Sense and get a handle on what was going on. "Is this about your sister?"

She nodded slightly after a long delay.

He reached out and squeezed her nearest hand with his. "It's okay, Mina. She's not gonna do anything to you as long as I'm around. And Vol's here too. She said she'd help, didn't she?"

Another small nod.

"We went and f—messed up your mom's castle pretty good today too, so she's probably not gonna bother you for a while either," he said. Gonna take her forever to put all the turrets and stuff back up, not to mention patching up all the holes Vol made with her railgun skill. His hands moved to pick up his sunglasses. "Wore the sunglasses you made all day too. They're really great. Thanks, Mina."

She looked up, and her eyes fixed on the glasses. "They've truly been a help?"

Carl nodded and set them back on the workbench. "Yup. Wear 'em every time I go out. Went fishing with 'em the other day too. They're perfect."

She smiled a little. Then she tilted her head. "A moment. You… You mentioned my mother's castle?"

He chuckled. "Yeah, we really put a hurting on it. Vol had this great idea, so we grabbed up all the cars we could find into our inventories and stood on a roof at the edge of the city near the base of the hill. Spent a couple hours launching cars up at it." He mimed throwing a football. "She said she nailed your mom with one at the end, but we didn't go check or anything. Kinda wish we'd stayed to camp her for a while, but we ran out of cars anyway. Then we bumped into that Tomas kid." His hand clenched, and he wished yet again that he hadn't been so weirded out at the time so he could've put the fucking kid's head through a wall, or thrown him up at the castle, or any number of other things that Carl Maximus Weathers might do.

"I, uh…" He looked down and chewed the corner of his lip for a second. "I was gonna do something, but I got… Well, Vol said she was gonna teach him a lesson, so probably you're never gonna hear from him again either."

Mina stared at him in silence, stunned. "You…hurled cars at the castle? From within the city?"

"Well, I don't wanna sound like I'm bragging, but I have ten million Strength," Carl said smugly.

For a moment, Mina gave him a blank look.

Just a second.

She recovered very quickly, an impressed expression crossing her face. "That's incredible, Carl," she said in a tone that in any other situation he would've accepted to mean it really was incredible but in this exact moment he knew meant that she was just humoring him when he'd thought he was saying something cool because apparently he was in a game where ten million freaking Strength didn't actually mean anything, even to Mina, who he, as a dad, wanted to impress, and he couldn't believe that Bobby had ever told him that a hundred thousand Strength seemed like a lot, because wouldn't that also make her a noob, and oh no, his daughter was a noob.

Carl groaned and put a hand to his face, suddenly feeling older than the oldest dirt that had ever existed, probably even older than that, really, since dirt wasn't actually gonna be that old, which meant what he was really feeling like was probably some kinda cosmic dust or something, like maybe some of the actual particles that had been around since the Big Bang—though all particles had been around since the Big Bang, obviously, since that was how matter worked, but he just needed to try and find some way to describe to himself exactly how old he was feeling at this exact time when he'd failed to impress the one person in the game he really should've been able to impress since dads always wanted their kids to feel impressed by them.

He felt a hand on his knee and opened his eyes.

Mina was leaning forward slightly with an earnest expression. "But you were capable of tossing steamcars up at the castle, were you not? It's a feat not many could achieve, Carl. I'm certain of it!"

Instantly, Carl felt himself being rejuvenated by the thoughtfulness of the girl he'd originally cared for because she reminded him of his daughters but now was sort of wishing actually was one of his daughters because of how adorable, and sweet, and considerate she was. He smiled. "Yeah, you're right. Thanks, Mina."

She grinned and leaned back on the workbench again. "I'd like to hear more about your trip today, if you've no qualms sharing the details. And your boots are quite fashionable. Ingrid's outdone herself."

He flexed his toes inside his boots, feeling like…

Well, he couldn't describe it any better than Vol did, even though it didn't make sense.

They were just that comfortable.

"Well," Carl began, "first when we got there, I saw Percevale again—and Rosa too, I think—doing another god tier acting thing…"