“I need to consult the others about this...” Aryo said, her head still bowed in honor of the other goddess present. “If you will excuse me...”  she left summoned a runic portal in the wall, it cast the entire room in a purple light.  Glancing back at her daughter and then at Dan one last time she turned away and walked through the portal.  Leaving a surprisingly silent room behind, the only sound was of a certain goddess of nature eating cold cookies that she had liberated from the fridge.

“You know, at first I was sceptical,”  she said pointing the half eaten cookie at Dan.  “For a while there I felt I might have gotten the short end of the stick there, but I must say you are indeed delivering on your end of the bargain.”  she laughed.

“What can I say, I am a naturally interesting person.”  he smiled weakly, he didn't really like where this was going, trials and the like had never been a thing he liked, in fact he hated waiting around with anything hanging over his head and no way to speed up the process. It had been like that while his father was in the hospital, just waiting to die.  He knew it was a little selfish of him but he had at the time just wished his father would pass away, seeing as he was in so much pain and there was no way he would ever survive this.

Why prolong the suffering?

“So it would seem...”  Ashy chuckled.

“If you don't mind my asking, how did you get to know Dan Milady?”  Abyzou asked, her words to the other goddess were now less threatening. There was however still a tad bit of defensiveness in her voice, no it wasn't that, it was more of a possessiveness, she was declaring Dan to be her own and she didn't want this other goddess to make any move on him.

Honestly speaking Dan couldn't really blame her, after all the shit she went through, it was understandable that she would cling to a good thing.

“You don't have to call me Milady,  we are all part of the same family now.” Ashy said with a smile, hopping up onto the counter and kicking her legs ever so slightly. “And to answer your question, well lets just say I am the reason he came back from that fight with the Gallu.”

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The second these words came out Amani bowed fully on the floor, her knees tucked under her and her head pressed on the ground. “I cannot thank you enough, I am forever in your debt, without Dan I - I-”  

“There is no need to thank me.”  Ashy smiled, but there was no stopping Amani now.

“Thank you, thank you, without Dan I-”  her body started shaking as tears welled up in her, Dan seeing this walled over and gave her a hug, lifting the Djinn up and pulling her in close, slowly rocking her back and forth.  He knew memories of this moment still plagued her dreams, and likely would for years to come.  The others bowed in thanks as well, not quite as deeply as Amani but just as heartfelt.  Even Bastet bowed, Dan took note of this so he could tease the goddess later.

“Stop it, Stop it is done and I said there was no need of thanks.” Ashy said, she squirmed a little. “I am not used to all this, company.”  she said more to herself than to the other people present.  

“So, you are Asherah, goddess of nature.”  Abyzou said, looking at the woman in front of her, unsure of weather to be awed or disappointed. Amani looked up her eyes widening and she opened her mouth to speak but before she could Ashy cut her off.

“I know what you are going to say, and no I refused to be called your mother, I had no hand in you becoming your current form, you came into yourself by yourself, it is wholly and solely your achievement.”  she held up a hand pointing at the Djinn. “I refuse to take that achievement away from you, it is an incredible feat becoming sentient by yourself, you are one of maybe a thousand such creatures that have done that, I may have created the spirit you used to be, but that was the old you, it was like you're precursor, what you are now is a new being born from that spirit.”

“So then should I call you grandmother?”  Amani asked with a mischievous smile.

“That-”  Ashy paused, her left eye twitching. “That is even worse...”  she sighed, “Just call me Asherah, that is what Dan calls me, so it is good enough.”  she nodded.

“So what do we do now?”  Dan asked.

“Now we wait, we wait for the others to come to a consensus, and if we are lucky you will have pissed off some deities from other dimensions, and if we are really lucky one of those deities will be Luroa.” she chuckled to herself, in a slightly maniacal manner.

“How exactly would that be lucky?” Dan asked, yep it would seem as though his initial feelings on the matter were correct, there was no way this was going to be any good.

“That bitch needs to be taken down a notch.”  Ashy replied, a grim look of determination in her eyes. “I must thank you Dan, I haven't had this much excitement in millenia... ” now that one he believed.

“Your welcome I guess...” he replied with a weary smile. He didn't know if this was the type of excitement that he wanted to be a part of. He sighed and sunk into the futon, there was nothing for it, it would seem as though he had to wait, and just keep waiting, already he could feel the massive weight of the stress of it all crashing down on him, this was why he hated waiting, better to just be over with it.