*1346.13.25*
“So, you’ve finally decided to remake your bracers, eh?” Avi asked as she leaned over his shoulder to look at the just-finished bracers.
“Yeah, it’s about time I did,” he said, remembering the damn Old Fart. “Though, I wonder if any of my stuff survived? And if so, what happened to it,” he said, thinking aloud.
“Probably turned into legacy items for his family, clan, or sect,” Avi said with a shrug. “Doesn’t really matter, because you can make much more impressive stuff nowadays.”
“True,” he said, nodding. “But it would be nice to retrieve anything that survived, and those bracers were made out of adamantium, after all. So, even if the enchantments weren’t the best, it would still be nice to retrieve them.”
“So, are you finally starting to plan more for our trip to Zhizun Zhanshi?” she asked a bit more seriously.
“Yeah,” he said, nodding once more. “Jae-Eun is sure to sponsor me, so that part is at least out of the way. The next problem is to find out who exactly might be supporting the Heavenly Fire Lotus Clan, and how powerful they are.
“I still can’t quite believe that a middling clan like theirs just so happened to stumble upon my clan’s workings and had the ability to track us down. Not only that, but had the ability to send such a powerful force after us. I’m sure that the three sects under the Heavenly Fire Lotus Clan are hurting after their losses.
“Though, with how many of my family and other people they took, they might have been thinking that it might have been worth it, especially with Tillia thrown into the mix,” he said, suppressing his battle intent once more at the thought of his family being made into slaves. Especially Tillia.
“Don’t worry, you’ll find them,” Avi said consolingly. “Not only that, but you’ll get them all back. With how well the orbital station is progressing, I should have it up and running at full power within a year,” she said with a wicked grin.
“Just make sure that it stays in the shadow of the moon it’s behind. I don’t want anyone spotting it before it’s ready,” Joram said, smiling the entire time. “But when it is, we’ll be sure to give those assholes a surprise they’ll never forget,” he finished, his smile becoming vicious at the end.
Avi smiled appreciatively at that, glad that Joram wasn’t planning on holding back.
“So,” he said, changing the subject. “How’s the progress on the coral? Found anything that’ll absorb that vortex energy yet?”
“I’ve narrowed it down to a few candidates that I’m hopeful for,” she said, shifting gears to keep up with him. “The problem hasn’t so much been their ability to absorb the vortex energy so much as their longevity afterwards.
“It’s a bit weird. Some seem to age much faster than they should, while others seem to regress to the point where they vanish. So, I’m trying out a few things, hoping that I’ll find something suitable soon.”
“Sounds good,” Joram said, nodding yet again. “If you can find more of that black metal, I’d like to try to start making some defensive gear with it. Possibly some offensive gear, though I’ve only got a few ideas for now.
“That said, I’ve already gone and picked up a few dozen requests from the Quest Hall and sent everyone a message about this break’s field trip. Yes, I was hesitant in doing another one, but with how quiet things have been, I’m a bit more confident that we should be OK. And, surprisingly, everyone is able to attend, though I had to promise to get Gabrielle over to see her family for a bit afterwards.”
“Sounds reasonable,” Avi said, remembering what had happened last time. “Will we be heading to the same area as last time?”
“A bit further east this time,” he said, nodding like a damn bobble head. “Everyone has progressed very well over the past half-year, so I’m looking forward to seeing how they perform with slightly tougher magical beasts,” he said, looking thoughtful.
“Well, I have too, so I’m looking forward to it as well,” Avi said with a grin while lifting her right arm to flex, which got a smile from Joram. “I’m already at the peak of Tier 2 in both mana and psionics. I should be ready to try to create my own Psijic Star soon, too,” she said as her grin grew larger.
“That…” Joram said, looking a bit apprehensive at the thought. “Are you sure? It wasn’t exactly fun, or easy. Or pleasant in any way, shape, or form.”
“Well, just so long as I assimilate the Heavenly Lightning Jade Dragon’s blood along with the Phoenix feather, I should be good,” she said confidently, more confidently than she actually felt due to having been there for Joram’s mishap.
“Then, would you like to try that before or after this trip?” he asked, likely thinking of how it would affect their trip, or her second year at the academy if she missed the first few weeks, or months, of classes.
“I’ll get on it right away,” she said decisively. “I have made improvements over the past year and a half with containment and suppression, so I shouldn’t have too much of an issue with all that.”
“I’ll still be checking in on you regularly,” he said, looking concerned.
“I wouldn’t expect anything less,” she said, giving him a wink. “But I suspect that you’ll have your hands full in my absence,” she finished with another wicked grin, this one slightly more mischievous in nature.
“Ah,” he said, his expression deadpanning as he realized just how… interesting things might get without her there to play subtle interference with his many suitors, his fiancée, and (tentative) wife.
She still hadn’t forgotten what Faenwyn had done, nor had Faenwyn. It had been all sorts of amusing and entertaining watching her since summer vacation. How awkward she’d become around Joram as she tried to get closer to him with that tsundere personality of hers.
“Yeah, hmm,” Joram said, trying to figure out what to do.
“Don’t worry about it too much. I’m sure that things will flow how they’re meant to flow,” Avi said, waving it off. “You’re all much closer to each other now. Not only that, but everyone else has gotten to know each other better, and grown closer to one another.
“So, there shouldn’t be anything to worry about on that front. Though, I have noticed how Jezira has been hanging around much more~~,” she said, now teasing Joram. “I had originally thought that you’d be making a harem with one of each of the races, but it seems as though you like succubae a bit more,” she finished, running a teasing finger across the back of his shoulders.
“Ha. Ha. Ha,” he said, exaggerating a bit too much. “I’m pretty sure that it’s just because she’s Kassandra’s babysitter, much like Aya is for Jae-Eun,” he said, dismissing what she’d said.
“Yes, and Aya’s been much friendlier with you, too,” she countered, enjoying how uncomfortably awkward he was with all of that.
She suspected that Aya more saw him as a younger brother, but you never really knew what another woman was thinking deep down. As for Jezira, well… she was a succubus, and they very much tended to instinctually attach themselves to the strongest man that they could find, often resulting in large harems of succubae attached to one individual.
Reflecting on the marriage practices of this world, a man- or woman- could have as many spouses as they wished- so long as they could provide individual rooms in the same house for each of them after the first spouse. As for concubines, well, so long as one could provide a large enough residence to house them all in, then one could have as large a harem of concubines as one wished.
They separated wives and concubines here, leading to a slightly different definition of the word. Wives, or husbands, were indeed separated from their concubines. Which, really, seemed odd to her, but given the difference in legal rights for each group, she supposed that it would make sense that there’d be a physical separation between the groups.
“Please don’t add to my worries,” he said as his head dropped to his desk. “You know just how many marriage and other proposals I’ve received over these past few months,” he said, referring to the veritable mountain of confession and proposal letters he’d received, and had promptly dumped into a bin in a corner of his office.
She was reasonably sure that he’d read through each and every one of them, though. He just wasn’t callous enough to just toss them immediately upon receiving them. Which both endeared him to her and annoyed her slightly. Yes, she’d given him permission to be with anyone he thought would be marriage material… but.
“No thoughts about expanding…?” she asked lightly, noticing the subtle shiver run down his back at her words.
“Are you trying to kill me?” he asked, turning his head so that he could look at her from the corner of his eye. “Physically, I’d be fine with another hundred women added to the… roster,” he said, frowning at the word. “Emotionally and socially, I’m still straining to deal with the current group.”
“I know,” she said, leaning down to hug him. “I’m mostly just teasing,” she said, feeling a bit bad about having done so.
“Mostly?” he asked, looking annoyed as he obviously enjoyed the hug from behind.
“Well, I do have legitimate concerns over how many women will attach themselves to you,” she said, feeling slightly uncomfortable at the vocal admission.
“Well, the most they’ll get is employment as maids or something,” he said, probably referring to the popular trope where an interested woman would offer to be the man’s maid just so that she could at least see him on a regular basis.
“Well, given how large a house you’ll need, you’ll certainly need a lot of help,” she said, specifically referring to household help, like said maids, and butlers.
“Ah, life is too complicated at times,” he said with a sigh. “Why can’t it be easy like figuring out the Languages of Mana?” he asked, sounding a bit depressed.
“Have you made more progress on that?” she asked, perking up a bit at the thought.
“More, yes,” he said, the right side of his face still on his desk. “I have indeed figured out that there are multiple languages for Mana. The problem is resolving what goes where.
“I think that I mentioned at some point that Tier 1 Mana is sort of you jack-of-all-trades stuff. It can do everything the others can, but isn’t particularly good at any of them. While Tier 2 Mana is good with things physical. Like manifesting things, or making them more solid; that kind of stuff. Tier 3 Mana, however, if better with things… intangible. Like enchantments, arrays, spells that don’t produce physical phenomena, and the like.
“I’ll need to get into Tier 7 before I can get any proper research confirmed regarding its specialty, but I do suspect that it’ll be better at conceptual Laws like Chaos, Order, Life, Death, Creation, Destruction, Mind, and all of that.
“But, I have made some very good progress with Tiers 1 and 2. Fortunately, most of what’s been discovered over the millennia has been centred around those two types of Mana. Which means that I’m very close to having deciphered the Language of Tier 1 Mana, while I’m getting a few good breakthroughs with Tier 2’s Language.”
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“So, that means…” she asked, not wanting to jump to conclusions that she very much wanted to jump to.
“That any enchantment that I make, or spell that I use, using those Languages, will probably be exponentially better than what’s out there right now. Heck, using those Languages as a base, I’m wondering if there’s an equivalent for Psionics,” he said, practically blowing her mind with the possibilities that lay ahead of them.
“Wait. Don’t you already know the Language of Psionics?” she asked, now questioning the wealth of information that Altaea had left for them.
“Yeah, I should have said ‘Psijics’ instead,” he said, frowning slightly. “The combination, or rather, fusion of those two energies has created something new that I’m still fumbling around with. Sure, I’ve been ‘translating’ everything psionic so that I can use Psijic energy to reproduce everything, but the further along I go, the more I’m realizing that it should also have its own set of laws that it works under; its own Language, as it were.”
As she mulled over those words, Avi telekinetically pulled over a chair to sit on as she finally released Joram.
“That’s… a lot,” she said, then shook her head. “I was kind of hoping that Psijic energy would be a, more-or-less, ‘plug-and-play’ type energy. Just use it for either spells or powers, you know?”
“Yeah, me too,” he said, then shrugged as he sat up. “But the way it behaves has me thinking otherwise. So, I’ll need much more brainpower to work through everything if I hope to unravel that mystery any time this century.
“Which is why I’ve reassigned M7 to working the Language of Psijic,” he said, creating a proper noun for the energy. “Well, not entirely. M7 will also be working on translating [Schism] at the same time, as once that Power is translated, I should be able to get many more Minds up and running to help with everything.”
“Good call,” Avi said with a smile. “And once I’ve got my own Psijic Star up and running, I’ll be able to assign a Mind or two to help,” she said, very much looking forward to that day.
“Just… be careful,” he said, looking more worried than she remembered him being in a long time. “The process is… violent. Just try to follow what I’ve recorded as best you can, OK?”
“I will,” she said, her chest warming at how much he worried for her. “You just keep those gals in line, and it’ll be like a normal Christmas vacation,” she said with a smile and a pat on his shoulder.
“Ah, right. Merry Christmas,” he said, leaning forward to give her a hug. “I completely forgot what day it was.”
“It’s fine,” she said into his neck as she held onto him. “Just make it memorable, OK?”
“Yeah,” he murmured into her shoulder happily.
* * * * *
“You’re sure it’s a good idea to go out again,” Jezira asked, referring to Joram’s invitation for them to attend another “training camp”.
“Given how secure his shelter is, I’m sure that we’ll be fine,” Kassandra replied, as she packed for the trip.
“I was just asking,” Jezira said, raising her hands defensively. “I’m more than happy to attend with you,” she said as another one of the maids peeked into the room the two of them were in.
“We should come too,” Vylryss said as Nemora peeked in beside her. “There’ll be plenty to do with so many people together and constantly busy,” she said, giving a reasonable argument to their tagging along.
Kassandra regarded her twin maids, wondering if they’d become enamoured with Joram just as much as Jezira seemed to be. Not that she could blame them, especially due to their natures as succubae. But.
“He’ll be my husband,” she said, cutting straight to the heart of the matter. “But we’ll certainly need maids, so maybe it would be all right if you came along to help out,” she said, remembering how she’d missed having the twins around to help with things last time. “But, while we’re out on our quests, you’ll need to remain in the shelter. No arguments,” she finished, pinning them with a stern look.
“Promise!” they both said at the same time, almost sounding as though only one person had spoken.
“Good,” she said, finishing packing away her clothing into her storage ring as she played with her “study group” ring. “Just make sure to not bother Joram, he’s very shy and I don’t want anything going wrong this trip.”
“Promise~!” they once again said in unison, though sounding as though they fully intended on breaking that particular promise.
Kassandra just sighed. It was very hard to keep a succubus away from a strong person, let alone one who was still growing.
Then she put that worry out of her mind, knowing full-well that Joram was more than capable of handling a pair of overly enthusiastic girls.
“Hurry and pack up, as we’ll be leaving in twenty minutes,” she said, then shooed them away.
Vylryss and Nemora quickly scurried away as Jezira gave her an appraising look.
“You’re not worried about them?”
“I’m more worried about the Belladonnas trying to do something again,” she said with a helpless shrug. “Not that we’d be able to do much if they decided to attack again.”
“True,” Jezira said, looking thoughtful. “Because of their losses last time, they’ll either send a full Tier 7 Mage, or cancel the contract. But I’m afraid that they’ll choose to go with the first option, as having a stain like that on their record isn’t something they’ll likely tolerate.”
“I was thinking the same,” she said, a bit worried. “But we can’t live our lives fearing something that may never come to pass.”
“We cannot live our lives recklessly, either. That there’s a very real possibility that they’ll send a 7th Tier asset at us should at least give us pause,” Jezira said, trying to be tactful.
“We’ll just have to deal with what comes,” Kassandra said, then waved Jezira to silence when it looked like she was about to start up again. “We’re going. So, prepare as best you can.”
Jezira nodded, then left her room, presumably to go pack. So, Kassandra sat at the end of her bed and started playing with her tail as she thought.
“Could it be this time…?” she quietly murmured with a small smile, then grinned.
* * * * *
Gabrielle was having a bit of a time deciding what to bring.
She’d already packed her viridian silk garments, both over and under varieties, a few changes of normal clothing, as well as several textbooks from both this past year and the upcoming year.
“Should I…?” she muttered, looking at a few fancier sets of clothing, unsure of how useful they’d be.
Well, she knew what she wanted them for. But would she get the opportunity to have a quiet moment alone with Joram? She was still a bit unsure of sharing Joram with everyone else, but she’d also grown much closer with everyone else. She even found that she’d been entertaining the idea of becoming one of his wives, which had shocked her the first few times it had happened. But lately?
Lately, she’d been more… relaxed in her thoughts, in what she’d been imagining for her future.
Shaking her head, Gabrielle finished packing and got her shoes on.
“It’ll be a good retreat,” she told herself as she locked the door behind her as she left. “I’m looking forward to learning so much more,” she said happily as she head to Alicia’s house, smiling all the while.
* * * * *
“Young miss?”
“Mmm?” Faenwyn looked up at her attendant, Lucia, curiously.
“Are you ready? The meeting time is very close,” she said, glancing around her room as though looking for anything that she might need to take with her.
“Ah, yes, I’ve finished packing,” she said, clearing her throat. “We’ll be away for three weeks again, so please take care of the place while I’m gone.”
Instead of agreeing like Lucia always did, she instead frowned slightly before speaking again.
“I think that it would be wise that I attend as well this time,” she said, more firmly than Faenwyn recalled her ever being.
“What? Why?” she asked, taken off guard by her usually mild and meek attendant.
“Young miss,” Lucia said, giving her a disapproving look. “From what happened last time, it would be a dereliction of duty to allow you to be alone with Mr Aneath again,” she said, giving her a weird look.
She was about to question Lucia about where all this was coming from, but then remembered her “talk” with Joram, and what had come from that… then blushed.
Firming her jaw, she stood a bit straighter and addressed Lucia.
“There’s nothing to be worried about. It’s just a questing mission with studying in between. Nothing at all to get worked up over,” she said, trying very hard to call upon her many diplomacy and negotiation lessons as she spoke.
“And that’s why you smell more like him now?” Lucia asked with a raised eyebrow, making her feel as though she’d been doused in cold water.
“What? That’s preposterous,” she said, but then stopped when Lucia was having none of it.
“You’ve Shared, haven’t you?” Lucia stated more than asked, dropping her stomach into her boots. “Have you told your parents yet?”
“… no…”
“…”
Faenwyn squirmed in place for a while before she finally broke.
“I had to! You have no idea how fierce the competition is between us all!” she practically yelled, though her tight throat made it more of a squeak.
“Why is it a competition?” Lucia asked, giving her an odd look. “If he really likes someone, wouldn’t he just take them?”
“He’s not like us,” she said, lacing her fingers together as she began to fidget. “He’s so… awkward with women. If I hadn’t acted, then I’m not sure that I could have, you know, gotten anywhere…” she trailed off, realizing how silly she must sound.
“I haven’t spent any time around him, so I wouldn’t know,” Lucia said, looking stern. “The only thing I have to go off of is what you come home saying, as well as the abundant rumours around campus,” she finished, not sounding terribly pleased with her lack of impartial knowledge.
“Is that why you want to come?” she asked, hoping that it was just that.
“Partially,” she said, shaking her head, shifter her own long silver hair as she did. “But I also have to determine if he’s a suitable mate for the young miss. Your parents aren’t terribly pleased with what you’ve been up to,” Lucia said, leaving the rest up to Faenwyn to fill in.
“I have nothing to be ashamed of!” she said indignantly, her tail going straight.
“Besides unofficially marrying a human?” Lucia asked dryly, making her blush furiously.
“I’ve also progressed very well with my cultivation bases under his tutelage!” she exclaimed, now desperate to show that choosing Joram had been the right choice. “I’m now Rank 4! I’ve also broken through the to the first Tier as a Mentalist! Rank 3!”
Lucia blinked at that.
“You’ve decided to pursue Mental Strength as well?” she asked, shocked.
“Indeed I have,” she replied, proud of her decision. “Joram has shown me just how useful Mental Strength is, and I fully agree with him,” she finished by crossing her arms over her chest.
Lucia seemed to take that in and mull it over for a bit before she spoke once more.
“All the more reason for me to attend you on this ‘field trip’,” Lucia finished, nodding at her.
“… Fine.”
“Good, because we need to leave or we’ll be late,” Lucia said with a smile as she opened the door for her.
* * * * *
“We’ll have even fiercer competition this time,” Mo Yu said as she helped Bai Lian finish packing her things.
“Un,” Bai Lian affirmed as she tried to determine which outfits would be best to bring with them.
“We’ll have to made sure that none of the others bother the young master too much this time,” she continued, getting another ‘Un’ from Bai Lian that made her pause.
“Are you feeling all right?” she asked, now concerned for her junior sister.
“It’s…” Bai Lian started, then paused as she searched for the right words. “It’s just that you’re all so beautiful!” she finished in a rush, not daring to look at her.
“What are you talking about?” she asked, wondering where that had come from.
“I’m not as… well endowed as everyone else…” Bai Lian said, looking down at her chest as she spoke.
Mo Yu was at a loss for words. What does that have to do with anything? She wondered as she stared at her somewhat dejected junior sister.
So, she asked.
“Where is this coming from?”
“Well, you see,” then Bai Lian went on to explain how she noticed that the ones who were the most… enthusiastic at getting Joram’s attention were the more… busty of the study group, while the ones who weren’t as busty didn’t seem to be as “ahead” as the rest of them.
“Bai Lian?”
“Yes?”
“That has nothing to do with how the young master treats everyone,” she said kindly, taking Bai Lian’s hands in her own.
In response, Bai Lian just stared at her- Mo Yu’s- chest.
Suppressing a sigh, Mo Yu continued.
“Haven’t you noticed that Renna and Jae-Eun aren’t very busty at all? Doesn’t the young master treat them like everyone else?”
“What about Alyraele and Sophia? They’re closer to my size, yet they’ve not gotten very far.”
“That’s because Sophia doesn’t yet understand her own heart. She’s still figuring things out for herself. While Alyraele is more traditional in her approach. She may be uncertain about things because she’s still considering her family along with her own feelings,” Mo Yu patiently explained. “Even Daleira is taking things slowly, and she’s one of the ‘busty’ ones.”
Bai Lian nodded at that, still not quite looking as though she’d been convinced.
“What’s made you think these things?” she coaxed, nudging her slightly as she helped fold some of her clothing.
“It… well… I’ve noticed that the young master tends to glance at everyone’s… breasts…” Bai Lian managed to mumble out, staring at her feet the whole time.
Mo Yu waited for something else for a couple of minutes, but Bai Lian didn’t share any more.
“That’s it?” she asked, not quite believing what she’d heard.
Bai Lian finally looked up at her, glaring.
“What do you mean, ‘that’s it?’?” she demanded, now looking a little bit more than a little bit angry. “He glances at all of your chests 82% more than the rest of ours,” she said, pulling out a term that Joram had taught them regarding ‘percentages’.
Mo Yu was silent for a while after that. Not because she’d taken the weird statistic as defeat, but because she was trying to figure out how to word her response so that it wouldn’t hurt her junior sister’s feelings.
“Bai Lian,” she started, taking her junior’s hands in hers again. “You do realize that that’s perfectly normal for any young man, right? Have you failed to notice how he’ll glance at your bottom as you walk?”
“What?”
“I would venture to say that he appreciates every part of a woman, not just her breasts,” Mo Yu said wryly, going so far as to poke Bai Lian’s hip as she spoke.
“Then…?”
“I’d say not to worry,” she replied firmly. “You’re also quite beautiful. Not only that, but you were the first one he brought back,” she said, emphasizing that fact to boost her confidence more.
Bai Lian began nodding, then looked back at the clothing she’d prepared.
“I’ll need something to accentuate my bottom then,” she eventually said, nodding to herself as she blushed slightly.
Relieved, Mo Yu began helping Bai Lian prepare fitting outfits.
* * * * *
Joram shivered a bit, then sneezed, then scratched at his suddenly itchy ears.
“You OK?” Wentian asked, giving him a weird look.
“Ah, I suddenly feel a bit nervous,” he said, looking around.
“You’ll be fine,” Wentian said, shrugging it off. “Besides, you’re harder to kill than a cockroach. What’s there to fear?”
Joram looked at Wentian for a moment before shaking his head.
There were, after all, worse things than death out there.