A month of sitting around and training was actually pretty good for me, now that I think about it, I thought, poking my sore shoulder. I grimanced. Hm… Though the General could’ve been slightly nicer.
I looked over at Mia, who gave me a smug look since she wasn’t aching in the least. I scowled. “You and your damned 6k Endurance. Unfair.”
“Don’t be so sure when I’m around, you little demon,” I said before throwing her into the air and on top of Treia.
Treia yelped at the sudden Mia on her chest before shaking her head at me. “Well, I guess I have to participate as well.” She tickled Mia as well, who rolled off of her in a half-hearted attempt to get away. Triea simply rolled over as well, laughing as Mia squirmed around, giggling all the while.
I watched them for a few moments before a voice groaned in my head. Jason, Ms. I-Like-Beating-Jason-Up is outside the door. Can I throw a [Shard of Oblivion] at her?
Sighing, I simply pulled a platinum wrench out of my Storage (Don’t ask where I got it from. Treia- er, I have my ways) and threw it at the door.
The door burst open and Maya was about to yell something when she was interrupted by the flying wrench, which hit her in the temple with a resounding dong! She blinked before falling backwards, groaning. I hopped off the bed and leaned over her as the bump on her head was already beginning to heal.
“I thought that you’d start to expect things like this after a month,” I sighed, taking the wrench off her chest. “Knock before entering my room.”
She groaned. “You… imbecile. The Queen is… summoning you, you ass.”
“Am I an imbecile or an ass?” I asked curiously. “I wanna know-”
“Go away while I figure out how to toss you around our next spar.”
Shrugging, I stood up and rolled my shoulders. “Well, I’ve been summoned.”
She’s just going to make you parade around with her on your shoulders or something of that caliber. She’s a completely delusional Queen, thanks to your spoiling her.
“Pshh, me? Spoiling her? Never…”
Over the past month, I’d been training with Maya in her training regimen known as “Operation : Thrash Andromeda, Jason”. She did actually teach me stuff when she felt like it, like putting me and Mia to work with a team of people that she chose to eliminate low Level groups of beasts that were putting the average elf in danger, which helped but she made me work to earn these teachings, which had caused me to simply be smacked around like a plastic doll in a playhouse. She’d sometimes appear randomly and just drop-kick me into a wall or slam a chunk of earth onto my head. It’s gotten to the point where I borrowed a few of Treia’s random platinum things and do-dads to smack the woman with, since it was my only defense. I could’ve sworn she enjoyed smacking me around.
I’d asked Treia once why she had them, and she’d just said, “Don’t worry about it…”
I was sure she had something of the same problem with her mother. Her mom was, outwardly, a completely normal person who cared about her two daughters. However, the journal she’d given to me that was full of Runes, told another story. According to the sheer amount of Runes that were meant to incinerate living beings by using their own Mana to power the scripts, she was a sadist, in a way. I could vividly imagine her mom popping out of nowhere and launching a fireball packed with more Mana than Treia’s Mana Capacity at one of her daughters while yelling “Dodge this!”
I frowned. In short, her mom was a sophisticated noble on the outside, but a nutjob on the inside.
Anyways, speaking of nobles, the Queen had, as predicted, gotten to a point where her mental state was of a child the age of 8 or 9 when she wasn’t doing anything of importance. She’d constantly cling to me and beg me to carry her while I went through the Palace at maximum speed, bouncing off walls like some sort of hyperactive squirrel as she laughed in delight. Other times, she’d just want to sit on my shoulders so she could pretend to be six feet tall and order me around. Then there were the times I’d cook in the kitchens for her so she could eat a variety of foods.
In short, she was adorable, and the rest of the citizens of the Palace thought so as well, so nobody stopped her. In a way, everyone was spoiling her. However, “Party-pooper” Maya, as Julia called her, never failed to poop the party. She’d drag the two of us to the throne room and berate us for the disturbances we caused.
Not that it did anything.
“You definitely spoil her. Not as much as you spoil Mia, but pretty close,” Treia stated, lifting Mia into the air as if to prove a point.
Mia gave me a smug look.
I rolled my eyes and turned around. “Look, she’s clearly happier than before, right? I want to keep it that way for as long as I’m here. Anyways, I’ll be back.”
I stepped over the still groaning general and made my way towards the throne room, writing down Runes on a scrap paper. I passed the dining hall at some point, where I could hear the table being set up with clunks and bangs.
Frowning, I made my way down the hall and opened the door to the throne room. Immediately, a small form slammed into me and bounced off, hitting the ground in front of me. I looked down at the dazed girl as the Prince ran after her. When he saw me, he scowled.
“What’re you doing here?” he snapped. “No one asked for your help!”
I frowned, “I wasn’t called here?”
The small Queen shook her head and shot up to her feet, turning around to glare at the Prince, who’s name I couldn’t bother to remember. “He’s trying to make me partapate in a meeting with some weird King and Queen complaining about some Princess!” she shouted, running behind me.
“You mean participate, right?” I asked Julia, looking down at her.
She hit me lightly. “I don’t care! I don’t wanna!”
“Would this King and Queen happen to come from the Human’s Kingdom?” I asked nervously.
The Prince gave me a suspicious look. “Have you done something? Why would you know that?”
I laughed nervously, faintly remembering the small fiasco of the very not-subtle exit from the academy. “Nope. How could I have done something?”
Julia poked my ribcage with strength that a person her size should not have. Then again, Mia existed-
“You did something dumb, didn’t you? What dumb thing did you do?” the small girl demanded. “Tell me, tell me!”
As usual, I was slightly taken aback by her directness, which was a bit unbecoming of a Queen. It would’ve been adorable if my side didn’t feel like I was hit with a sledgehammer on a nail.
“Right, so, uh, Treia and I aren’t supposed to be here in the slightest-”
“AHA!” The Prince exclaimed. “So you did kidnap her!”
I frowned at him. “Of course not. My original plan was to leave her at the Academy. But she decided to follow me instead. Why would I kidnap her? I’d already be dead if I’d kidnapped her-”
I froze in place as some strange sensation seemed to fog my mind ever so slightly. The moment the sensation was present, it was immediately knocked back by a familiar presence.
I looked down at Julia, who looked like a very guilty child.
“I advise not delving into my head. I don’t doubt your strength in that type of stuff, but a certain Serpent does not like it. And her mental power far outstrips mine, somehow.”
Julia nodded before shaking her head. “You were telling the truth though. Why’d you run away, though? Because you like causing problems for everyone around you?”
“Partially, yes.” The Prince snorted at this before clearing his throat. “But mostly because we snuck into the school’s Dungeon to find that it was minimally {Corrupted}, then I was accused of trying to steal the core.”
Dead silence reverberated throughout the room. I blinked, confused.
“I didn’t steal the core though. I just wanted to talk to the Dungeon Core, otherwise known as Rebecca, though that was a name I gave her without telling her, I think.”
“And the Dungeon didn’t just kill you the moment you stepped into the Core’s room?”
I shrugged. “Of course not. Is it supposed to?”
Julia jumped onto my back and hit me over the head, causing the floor beneath me to crack and me to nearly black out. “Yes! It is! How are you even remotely alive right now!?”
“OW! Quit hitting me! I’m gonna die if you keep that up!” I shouted at her, pulling her off my shoulders before she could hit me again and holding her out in front of me as she pouted. “Anyways, to say the least, the Dungeon seemed to like me, though I can’t tell you if it was just me or it was Systie who kept it from killing me. Prolly, Sys.”
In my head, Systie grumbled,
I shook my head. “Anyways, it doesn’t matter if I’m alive or not. The only problem is that you kinda have to deal with the Queen and King.”
“The Queen’s kinda scary though…” Julia grumbled.
“Agreed. However though-”
Julia interrupted me, though she finished my sentence. “I can’t meet them like this!”
She flailed around in my arms as if that would explain something before letting out a long sigh. I set her down and crouched in front of her. She blew air into her cheeks while looking at me.
“Then what’re you’re going do then?” I asked her.
“If I can’t meet them, then you meet them,” she said proudly.
“Why am I getting the sudden urge to drag you to this meeting? It is happening in the dining hall, right?”
She frowned. “Well…”
“Don’t tell me you don’t want to eat.”
She poked my cheek. “Fine! I’ll go, you meanie!”
~~~
“I don’t wanna be here,” Julia grumbled, clinging to my cloak. “I’m scared.”
Mia poked Julia’s cheek, annoyed.
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Treia mumbled, “How do you know exactly what they’re going to do? I mean, you’re right, but you haven’t known them for that long. How do you just sum up their personalities like that?”
I frowned at her. “They’re the most basic people I’ve ever met. And that’s saying something, since Mr. Prince over there is nearly as basic as you can get. An asshat who gets jealous over the most trivial of things.”
I sighed and patted the Queen’s head. “Anyways you shouldn’t worry too much about the-”
Before I finished my sentence, the door to the dining hall exploded, quite literally. A chunk of the door flew at me, but I simply grabbed it out of the air with a Tendril and blocked the rest with it. I then set it down and frowned at the Queen who was quite clearly glaring at me.
“You! I knew it! What do you think you’re doing with-”
“Oh, shut your trap, old lady,” I snorted. “You’re the most unconvincing person ever. If you were really angry, I’d already be strung up by my legs with my head rolling on the floor.”
She stared at me for a few seconds before sighing. “How do you see through me like that?”
“Simple. You do things over-dramatically. If you were serious, you’d get straight to the point without thinking about it. You’re probably exactly like Treia’s mother, just without the hellfire.”
The Queen shrugged. “Fair enough comparison. Now, who is that small girl behind you?”
Julia looked at the Queen with disdain, clearly not wanting to answer. Her pointed ears twitched as she looked up at me.
I sighed. “Put a few puzzle pieces together.”
For a few moments, the Queen was silent, which meant she was thinking hard. Then she snapped her fingers with enough force to shake the chandelier above us. “Aha! You’re Julia! I’m going to assume Mr. Abyssal here messed something up and reversed your age somehow. Knowing his stupidity, it’s probably something that can’t easily be repeated.”
The Queen then began to laugh loudly, as one would expect. Treia looked at her aunt with a flat expression while she bent over laughing her lungs out. The King, who was behind her, looked immensely uncomfortable during this and clearly would have rather been anywhere else.
Five minutes later, the door was fixed and we were all around the table, sitting in chairs with the exception of Mia, who was sitting on my lap. She had a string of noodles going into her mouth as she glared at Treia’s aunt, who she’d never really liked for some reason.
I simply used Mia’s fork to put the rest of the noodles into her mouth before tapping her ice horn. She looked up at me with a frown.
I nearly spit out my drink but settled on choking instead. Once I swallowed it, I just barely managed to not shout “WHAT?!”
Systie, who was now nestled in my hair as usual, chimed in.
Mia smacked my cheek, as she usually did when I said something that offended her.
I rolled my eyes.
<...Still rude.>
With a frown, I looked up to see Treia giving us a disappointed look. I tilted my head slightly and she let out a silent sigh, shaking her head. I looked up slightly and Systie shook herself, confused as well.
I then looked at Julia, who glared at her food as if had personally affronted her. When she noticed me glance at her, she pouted while the Queen savored her food.
As the silence went on, I slowly grew more and more uncomfortable, with Mia physically reflecting this as she constantly looked up at me nervously while slowing down her eating. I pat her horn before looking towards the clearly nervous King as he side-eyed his wife as if baffled she hadn’t spoken at all yet. To be fair, I was also ballfled as well.
I tuned out their arguing, since I knew that trying to stop them would just end up with the two of them getting even louder. Apparently, however, their babbling showed on my face, causing Treia to roll her eyes at me. I glared at her and she pointedly looked away, looking towards a pastry that I identified as a Void-imbued cupcake. How those cooks managed to get their hands on Void Mana baffled me, but Treia clearly enjoyed it as she visibly had to keep herself from shoving the entire thing down her throat.
I rolled my eyes at her as she glanced back at me. I then noticed Treia’s aunt watching us very closely and I swallowed my food quickly. I felt a foot tap my shin and looked over to Julia, who seemed to be in a very meek position, not sure what to do as her child's mind raced.
Finally, she opened her mouth but the Queen (Who’s name I should probably commit to remembering) waved her hand.
“Yes, yes, I know I’m here unannounced, but who made this food? What is the recipe? Is there a copy of the book with the recipes?” She shot out questions before the first could even be answered.
I very carefully didn’t react to the question, but Treia couldn’t keep herself from sighing. “Auntie, I couldn’t imagine who could possibly have the recipes. Maybe someone who has the insatiable urge to cook to get himself out of trouble.”
The Queen’s head slowly turned to me and I stuffed my mouth with spaghetti, suddenly feeling very hungry. Sometimes, the Queen really did scare me (for the record, I never said that).
I gave her an innocent look before offering Mia some of my spaghetti, which she ate off my fork.
The Queen sighed. “Whatever. Anyways, we should get onto more important matters.”
I swallowed my food and stood up. “Welp, this is where I leave. Now see ya- OWOWOW! My horn!”
Before I could take another step, the Queen had pulled off my cloak and grabbed my left horn while glaring at me.
“The important matter being you, damned Abyssal Idiot,” she hissed.
I gave her a meek look as I slowly pried her fingers off my horn. Once I escaped, I hopped back, rubbing my horn. “One : OW! Two: Also ow! And three: What now?”
She brought her hand down on my other horn, causing a reverberating pain that even Mia flinched at. Systie had already popped out of existence and was settled… somewhere in my head. “First of all: What the hell were you thinking sneaking into a Dungeon with my niece?”
“Peer pressure, to put it simply. I was gonna go alone, but she was all like, ‘No, Jason, take me with you-’”
Treia threw her fork at me. “I was not!”
Mia let out a yip as she caught the fork for me. She threw the fork back, which Treia barely dodged and caught.
“As Mia said, you were. And she has a better memory than me.”
Treia sputtered for a few moments before huffing. “Well, maybe I was, but don’t act like I was the culprit! Systie is the one who wanted to do it and you readily agreed with her.”
Don’t bring me into the conversation! Systie butt in, appearing next to Treia and ramming her in the side of the head. It was supposed to be me and Jason. Maybe Mia. You’re the lost puppy when Jason isn’t around you!
“Excuse me?”
“She has a point,” I muttered.
“Don’t agree with her!”
***
At some point, the Queen had stopped trying to hit Jason and was instead just watching her niece and her significant other argue along with the System’s eyeball. There was the occasional enraged hiss from Mia, the Serpent, but she otherwise didn’t butt in. The Queen sighed before looking at the small Queen Julia, who was clearly interested in what was happening before her.
When Julia noticed the Queen watching her, she asked, “What exactly is happening?”
The Queen shrugged before walking back to her seat. “From what I can tell, they’re having a disagreement. It doesn’t happen often, but, when it does, it’s very interesting to watch.”
“It’s happened… before?”
“Yes, my child-”
Before she could react, a spoon struck the side of the Queen’s head and bounced back towards Julia, who let out an annoyed hmph.
Fair enough. She’s still the same Julia, even if she decreased in size. Anyhow… The Queen looked back at her niece, who was still arguing with Jason. I’ll just let them settle this themselves.
***
After me and Treia grew tired of arguing, her aunt finally spoke.
“Since you’re finally done complaining about one another-” she said with a smirk. “-can you explain what you’re on another continent for? And how did you get here in a day?”
Both me and Treia pointed at Mia, who blinked in confusion. She swallowed her food and pointed at herself, clearly not noticing the conversation’s topic.
The Queen narrowed her eyes. “The annoying snake got you across an ocean in a day? How?”
I shrugged. “Once she has enough time to speed up, she can go pretty fast.”
Treia added, “Really fast, actually. I kinda blacked out on the way here. From what I remember though, she was moving quite a bit faster than the speed of sound.”
I frowned at her. “You know what the speed of sound is, but not exponentials? How in various circles of hell-”
Treia threw the spoon at me again. “I didn’t have time to pay attention in school!”
“How in the hell are you in that academy then?”
“You-”
The Queen cleared her throat and we went silent.
“Let’s say I believe you. Why are you here?”
“{Corrupted} Dungeon,” we both said at the same time.
“Of course. That was the oh-so-important Quest you two refused to talk to me about. Why didn’t I expect that? Why do you think you’re prepared to go to the Dungeon?”
I looked at Treia for a moment. “We’re not.”
Treia nodded. “The plan was to get me to Level 100 before-”
The Queen seemed to choke on what I assumed was wine as Treia said this, while the King merely shook his head.
“What? Are you saying you’re already close to Tier 4?” The Queen asked, baffled.
Treia frowned, her spines lifting themselves up. “I’m Level 80. Nearly there.”
“80? Since when?! Last I remember, you were Level 50 or something-”
Treia was silent as she gave me an exasperated look as if I did something wrong. I shrugged and pat Mia’s horns. The said Serpent leaned into my hand, purring.
Do snakes purr? Eh, I can’t remember. It’s adorable to watch, so I’ll keep doing it until she’s tired of it.
Systie rolled around on my head as the Queen seemed to have a silent existential crisis, clearly bored with this predicament.
For once, I want to fight something, Systie mumbled. Sitting around in a palace is boring.
Julia nodded and looked up at the eyeball. “That’s an understatement. I hate this stuffy place. It’s so big, yet so restraining. By the way, who even built this? I can’t imagine Dryads would’ve agreed to grow like this.”
Dryads, huh? Tree people from mythology. Greek myths, I think? I know some other cultures have them, but the Greek ones are more memorable.
A sudden thought occurred to me. “Do you mean those weird girls dressed in leaves who seem really surprised when I look at them?” I frowned. “Now that I say that aloud, that really does confirm what they are.”
Julia looked at me in bewilderment. “You can see them?! It took me thirty years to even catch a glimpse of them out of the corner of my eye. You have to fill your entire body with Mana to even see them…”
She then pouted. “Wait. You’re cheating; you’re an Elemental. Of course you can see them.”
With a pensive look, I asked Systie, “Does that mean, theoretically, I could cut my arm off and regrow it like Mia can grow back her jaw?”
If you anywhere near enough Mana, then yeah. Currently, you could grow back, at most, your big toe or a few fingers. Can’t say the same about Treia, though. She has a unique constitution for a Voidling.
Julia stared at Systie. “Voidling? The extinct Race?”
Systie rolled her eye. They’re not extinct. They were sure as hell alive and kicking about… uh… how many years ago now? Systie thought for a few moments. Wait, how long ago was the Era of Undead now?
Having come out of her head, Treia’s aunt said, “That was nearly three million years ago. How old are you?”
Systie suddenly flew off my head. Three MILLION? How?! I can remember it clear as day! The Voidlings were the major factor in helping defeat the Undead Kings! Well, so were the Abyssals, but mostly Voidlings. Even that strange Human King married a Voidling. Genesis, I think her name was-
“Wait, Genesis was a Voidling?” Treia asked, baffled. “I’d always learned that she was a Void Mage with unimaginable power.”
What type of bullshit have Humans been spouting over the years now?! I literally spent nearly a thousand years correcting their history after last time! And that was a period of half a million years of incorrect history. I swear, once I’m back with my idiotic counterpart, I’m seriously going to make is so they have to record history in a god damn-
I poked Systie and she went silent, still fuming.
“Anyways, the basic idea is that Treia Levels up and we whoop the Dungeon’s ass. Simple as that,” I said. “I’m probably going to come up with a plan at some point, but it’d probably be easier with Char and Leah.”
“You think Leah will be helpful in making a plan?” Treia inquired. “She's literally you, but female.”
“I didn’t say Leah would help with the plan. She’d probably end up ignoring it. She’s more of… moral support.”
Treia gave me a dangerous look and I cleared my throat. “Uh, not that she’s a better moral support than you or anything. Just a little extra. Char’s the one who’d probably listen to a plan, ignore it, then make her own. Dunno why I think of her like that, since, normally, she looks like she snuggles with a stuffed bear at night. I don’t know much about her class, but it has something to do with suppression.”
Treia’s aunt frowned. “The Valkyrie’s have a Suppressor in their ranks?”
“Used to. Her and Leah, uh, ‘peacefully resigned’ from the Valkyries.”
“Are you the one who punted Harmony all the way into a city, where she spent nearly a month in a coma? If so, then thanks for that.”
I frowned and looked at the Queen. “Okay, I guess.”
Before I could continue speaking, the door to the dining hall burst open and General Maya glared at me. I deflated, both relieved and filled with dread.