Berty’s gaze sticks to me, and his big puppy dog eyes look down at me worriedly, even as we settle in and start eating. His worries for me don’t fade away.

I guess I shouldn’t expect him to see all of this as normal so soon, but sympathy is hardly what I want from him right now. I’m stronger than I was, I can handle it. I’ve survived everything so far, and I’m not ready to stop in my path just yet.

As much as I tell myself this… it’s nice to have people worried over me. Family who I know I can turn to and rely on.

“So, what are your ambitions?” Berty asks, relaxing into the chair and finally taking up a slice of pizza. The look of revulsion that passes over his expression lasts only a moment before he puts it back down again.

“This is good, what is it?” Vii asks, eagerly grabbing a second slice.

“Pizza.” I say.

“This isn’t pizza.” Berty says, “I’ll order up the real thing, and show you the difference. It would be too cruel to let Kyra deceive you with this lie.”

“Hey, if this isn’t pizza than what would you call it?” I ask.

“A monstrosity.” He declares firmly, while putting together an order online.

“So, what was your ambition?” He asks again, pushing the pizza further away. “You said that you have a small empire, but what does that mean, and where is it going?”

“When I have a better grasp on teleportation, I’ll be spreading into the warzones and chaos worlds.” I say, “For now, I’m playing politics with a bunch of nobles, and a certain ‘republic’ that I’ve yet to even come into conflict with. For now, we’re going to be playing silly games and fighting in duels to make decisions, but I intend to take over fully in a few years if I’m not entirely incompetent.”

“Okay, so what alliances do you have? What’s your current relationship with these nobles and the members of the republic? What’s your intended play?”

“Threaten them and kill them if they don’t back down.” I say, “I mean, that but less evil sounding.”

“That’s… do you have the strength to do that?”

“I will.” I reply. “I have a powerful benefactor looking to make me powerful enough to stand toe to toe with a god-like being. Specifically with the intent of killing them.”

“Well, that’s horrifying.” He says. “Are you sure you don’t want to come back here? There’s still some cruelty and suffering, but I’m sure it’ll be nicer for you. Politics here is more complicated than any of that, but much more preferable, if I say so myself.”

“Politics is complicated out in the universe too.” Vii says, leaning forwards to look around me. “It’s just that Kyra is really powerful and has the protection of someone even stronger. There’s lots of alliances and political manoeuvring between all sorts of factions, the Unified States doesn’t have too much going on, but the rebels and everyone else have lots of stuff that they’re up to.

“Most people are to scared of losing what they have to push as much as Kyra does. She’s special, and she’ll take the universe by storm.”

“I would rather take it by stormtroopers with advanced armour and weapons.” I say, “But whatever, I can’t just come back and hide here on Earth. Apparently that god I’m meant to kill is coming to crush this planet and presumably everything else in reality that isn’t part of his empire.

“It could be tomorrow or in a million years, but whatever the case, I’m not going to let that happen.”

“Fine, fine.” Berty rubs at his head. “This is all just so insane.”

“Want to try explaining it to mom and dad for me?” I ask, leaning back into the chair. “I have four lovers at the moment, too by the way. Make sure you get that part through as well.”

“An empire, a harem, and kids on the way.” Vii says, smiling as she hugs me. Today has had plenty of hugs, hasn’t it? “Anything less and you just wouldn’t be you anymore.”

“Right…” I nod slowly.

She’s not wrong, not at this point. There’s no turning away from this future now, and I want to see this through to the very end, and preferably on to eternity after.

“Well, might as well pull off the band-aid quickly.” Berty says, pulling out his phone and selecting a number.

“Wait, you can reach them?” I ask, a little surprised. It’s not uncommon for our parents to be out of town and well beyond the reach of phone service.

“I put a tracker on them after you left.” He says, waiting for them to pick up. “I made sure that they have a specialised satellite phone, it’ll be difficult for even them to make themselves unreachable now.

“Ah, yes. Hi dad.” He says, and I jump up from the chair and head out to the kitchen. “You should come back home. Kyra’s back, but only for a week. That… offer, it was… a lot has happened. You need to come home.”

“Kyra?” Vii asks, following me out of the loungeroom. “Are you okay? You left as soon as your parents answered.”

“Yes, it’s just… We have to get so much done. I don’t know why we need to involve them at all, just let them keep running around the world on their own, and we can deal with this on our own.”

Vii rests a hand on my shoulder and smiles.

“It’s okay, whatever you have to say to them.” She says. “Nothing can stand in our way. You can do whatever you want.”

“I know.” I say, slowly calming my breath and trying to get everything lined up in my mind. For some reason I can’t quite think straight anymore, the familiar building, and the sounds, and smells. I feel like I’m in the wrong place, wasting time doing the wrong things.

“Maybe we should’ve just stayed back home with Nel. We should be developing our mana forms and training our Skills, Earth really doesn’t have that much going for it in the first place.”

“But we’re here now.” Vii says. “Isn’t there anything you want to do while we’re here?”

“Anything…?” Through the fog, I can vaguely remember having travel plans once upon a time. Nothing much, just the usual sort of thing that you can expect from a teenager on the verge of earning their freedom.

I can leave things in Berty’s hands for a few days.

“How good is your flying?” I ask. “Do you think you could take us around the world, because I don’t think I can get you a passport.”

“I’m barely using any mana at all.” She chirps, waving her wings about without summoning any magic. “I could fly up and out to other worlds near here, if you really wanted to.”

“Maybe we can grab some tanks of air and take a moon walk…” I say, with a laugh trying to see the problem with that plan and failing. Mana is a hell of a drug and makes the impossible seem possible.

I jump as Berty enters the kitchen, but his phone is off already.

“Well, I got them to promise to come.” He says, staring firmly at the window behind me rather than meeting my eyes. “It’s just… I had to make up some stuff, and they’re coming here under the pretence that they’re coming for your wedding.”

“Ah. Well, that’s a thing.” I say, reaching into the fridge and pulling out a bottle of strawberry milk. Popping the cap, I drink straight from the bottle. “Then, could I ask for one more thing?”

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“Anything you need.” He says, smiling wide.

“Can you get a couple of air tanks that work in space? Not the suits, just the air, and like a hose to suck it from or something.”

“Huh?”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Eifel tower stands tall above the nightlife of Paris, and from it’s peak I can see it all spread out before me. The viewing platform beneath us is crowded with tourists, most of them paired off as couples, since the families would probably be here of a daytime instead.

Lights spread out all around us, shining up into the skies where the moon hovers beyond the reach of most who look.

“Quaint.” Vii says, nodding her head in slow judgment of the place. I don’t know what sort of places she’s been to before, but to call this quaint is a little much.

“If this is quaint to you, then how about you take me to your homeworld sometime.” I say, jabbing her in the side.

“That’s… not easy.” She says, “Maybe we can. Maybe.”

The lights that illuminate her face from below on this dark night, show a girl more frail than I usually see beside me. I’m not the only one struggling to be stronger than I am. Vii is doing her best to keep pace with me as I’m reaching to pull the gods out of the sky.

“It’s romantic, most would say.” I turn to her. “You know we haven’t had a proper argument yet. That speech you gave me in the baths, so long ago…”

“It was like a month ago.” Vii says, chuckling at me.

“Are we even a real pair of lovers if we haven’t had a proper fight yet?” I ask, “Come on, say something mean to me. This is the city of love and romance. Or maybe that’s Venice. Or… I don’t know, I’m not very cultured.”

“No, you’re not.” Vii pulls in close to my side. “You’re just a silly little brute, who solves every problem with your iron fist. There, how’s that?”

“You’re meant to say that you hate me.”

“I can’t say that!” She cries, and a few of the tourists below hear us and start taking notice. Not that I really care.

“But that means we haven’t had a fight yet.” I say.

“We can fight without saying we hate each other.” Vii says. “I don’t know… you stink, and your mother was a pig.”

“No, no, no. You should say is a pig, not was.”

“No, I mean she was a pig.” She says, completely straight faced. “You only knew your adoptive mother, your real mom was a pig. Wait, you don’t have pigs here, do you? Ah, it’s a big, stinky animal that loves to roll around in its own-”

“I get it.” I say between laughs, “Chip translated it just fine.”

“Oh, good.” Vii says nodding. “How was that?”

“Not nearly aggravating enough.” I say, leaning in for a kiss.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“So, if there’s no such thing as frost mana in this place, why is there so much ice here? Like, how does something like this happen without massive amounts of frost mana?” Vii asks, kicking about some of the snow.

Thankfully, we avoided all the blizzards on our way down here to the Antarctic, but even without that we have to re-establish some of our mana form to bear the cold. The ice cracks underneath us, but it’s not like it’ll break off into the ocean… probably.

“How is there dirt, or air, or any of the rest of it?” I ask, “As far as I know, it all just clumped together over lots and lots of years, because of gravity, or something like that. Don’t quote me on that.”

Vii snorts, poking at one of the penguins with her foot, it topples from her gentle push, waving it’s wings around wildly before rolling over and sliding away from us. The penguins here don’t really seem frightened of the two of us, they’re curious if anything.

“That was mean.” I say, kneeling to look one of the others in the eyes as it waddles closer. “What do you want little guy?”

“Squark!!” it screams in my face, pecking at my nose. I shake it off and stand back up, laughing at the dumb little bird.

Vii waves a wing and sends the bird tumbling backwards, but it quickly finds its feet again, just like the other.

“Why thank you, my faithful protector.” I say, pulling in close as the winds start to pick up. “Let’s keep going.”

“Where to next?”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“What’s this called?” Vii asks, dipping her chips into the gravy and taking a bite.

“Fish and chips.” I say, squeezing the lemon out onto the battered fish. I should probably know what type of fish it is, but I mean… it’s fish and chips, and I’m an uncultured brute.

“And what’s this called?” Vii asks, tapping the picnic blanket. “The thing that we’re sitting on.”

“Oh, that. It’s the great pyramid of Giza. Ancient people stacked a bunch of rocks together in a really smart way that I can’t really explain properly, and here we have it, still standing today.”

“How long?”

“A couple thousand years, at least.” I say, and Vii just shakes her head. “Still so new, and the paint is already worn off of it.”

“Hey, we don’t have any of those fancy magic palaces here.” I say, pointing a chip at her. “This is one of the great marvels of Earth you know, people come from the world over to look at it.”

“Well, it is big.” Vii says, chuckling at me as I struggle to defend it. “You’ll make bigger.”

“Yeah, but I’ll be cheating.” I say, “You try pilling up blocks this big without a touch of mana in you. It’s tough stuff you know.”

“I’m sure.” She says, crunching on a piece of fish. “No, it is actually impressive. All of it is, but it’s impressive in the way that it’s impressive for a fish to crawl on the land. It’s not very fast, and it doesn’t go very far, but it’s impressive that it managed to do it.”

“Thanks, I guess?” I say.

“It’s okay, I’m sure they’ll do much better under your rule.” She says, smiling bright as she tears the fish apart.

Did she always think like this?

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

“So, the white dress signifies purity?” Vii asks, looking at me dressed up in a proper wedding dress. Berty pointed us to this shop, and it seems that they were prepared for our arrival. The staff don’t even stare at Vii, but their shifting feet and intentionally distant gazes prove that they’re fighting temptation.

“Apparently.” I say, “White is purity, black is… corruption? Death?”

“That doesn’t make any sense.” Vii says, “Something untouched by everything, even the light, is black. White comes from all the different types of visible light packed together.”

“Yeah, but when working with materials, white is untainted by dyes or stains.” I say, “It’s more pure in that way.”

“Oh, I guess that makes sense too.” She says, still appraising the dress. “It’s pretty, but I’m not sure…”

“White doesn’t suit me?” I ask.

“No, it’s just the long, puffy part of the dress. I think something a little slimmer would be nicer.” She says.

“It’s a shame there’s nothing here that would fit you properly.” I say, sighing as I head back to the dressing room. “But it’s not like we’re getting married yet, it’s just a trick to get my parents back home.”

“Why shouldn’t we get married?” Vii asks, her face twitching nervously for a moment as her anxiety comes flooding back at full blast. She really is a strange girl at times, but charming in her own strange way.

“I think it would have to be all of us together… I guess we could set something up when we get back home, but I’d want it to be something from more than just my culture. What’s marriage like for your people?”

“Food. Lot’s of food.” Vii says. “And dancing, but I’m not very good at that.”

“You seemed to enjoy dancing under the water, and it’d be the same in space too actually. I know that Eshya’s been taking you aside to dance in the lake every now and again, too. We can set something up with that.”

“Yeah, maybe.” She chirps, flushing bright as she gazes into the distance. She really is adorable, but sometimes I feel like we’re rushing things. Maybe we should spend more time together first, maybe this will all fall apart in time.

I shake the thoughts away, and look at a few other dresses.

“We might be able to manage something for the young lady.” A suited man quickly bursts out, looking towards Vii. “We have a few dressmakers who have only just gotten back to us, and they’re quite capable, I assure you.”

“Oh, did you hear that?” I ask Vii. “Maybe if we can find something nice, we can put some mana in them and take them back home with us.”

“Cake.” Vii says. “We should get a wedding cake too.”

“Let’s just bring the recipe back and have our usual chef make it. I want to see what she can make.”

“Oh, yeah! That, definitely that!”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Floating through the darkness, carrying a couple of metal tanks filled with air, that look like modified scuba tanks, we race closer and closer to the moon. White dresses flutter around us, the wedding dresses that we bought from the store.

Closer and closer to the great big ball of cheese, we make landfall without any great spectacle. Moments like these, that ought to carry weight of their own, really do seem so much less in person. So many people watched on in wonder as the first man stepped on the moon.

Standing here, sucking on an oxygen tube, it just seems like a dusty rock. Mundane. Normal.

Vii meets my eyes, bouncing up high and fluttering about, before leaping at me and taking her turn with the oxygen. We have enough back ups to keep us safe in case any of them fail.

She turns me around and points up towards Earth, the green and blue marble flying through space at incredible speeds.

It’s so small and delicate.

I might just be able to shatter it if I put my all into the effort.

Vii pulls me aside and spins me around in a sudden dance, and I let go of the heavy thought.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Stats and Skills

~Mana Form:

Current mana density: 32,712 / 60,892 units

Current mana volume: 16,259 / 30,266 shards

Mana volume at crystallisation density (Max. mana volume):

Kyra: 30,266 shards

Kyra’s armour: 20,777 shards

Kyra’s throne: 1,109,298 shards

~Forms

Mana Canon

-Annihilation Heart (Adapted)

-Blood Fuel (20,000 mana shards)

-Bone Magic Storage (40,000 mana shards)

-Nail Shifters (50,000 mana shards)

Dancer

-Flash Nerves (8,000 mana shards)

-Quick Perception Mind (Adapted)

-Burst Reflex Muscles (35,000 mana shards)

-Layered space Muscles (80,000 mana shards)

Turtle

-Rebinding Tissue (Adapted)

-Catalyst Sweat Glands (140,000 mana shards)

-Repulsive Skin (80,000 mana shards)

-Prehensile hair (10,000 mana shards)

-Fatty Tissue Blood Storage (100,000 mana shards)

Investigator

-Wide eyes (5,000 mana shards)

-Wide ears (5,000 mana shards)

-Sharp nose (5,000 mana shards)

Misc.

-Clean bowels (Adapted)

~Favourited Skills:

-Tag and Film

-Trapping

-Stealth

-Mana surge movement

-Annihilation defence

-Annihilation flame burst

-Annihilation net

-Eyes of an Empire