“Daddy! Stop sleeping and come play!”

He blinked his eyes wearily, blearily, and tried to focus on the face of his daughter as she used her small hands to roll his head to the left and right in an effort to wake him up.

“Don’t, he’ll get mad…” his oldest daughter warned dryly from the doorway, making him frown a bit.

Frown for the warning, that is. Why had she said that?

“But there’s lots of new snow outside, and I want to play!” his little one said dramatically, likely copying her favourite princess at the moment.

“We need to eat breakfast first,” he said, making her practically jump in surprise.

“Silly Daddy,” she said, shaking her little head and making her long locks of dark brown hair sway. “It’s already afternoon!”

That made him blink again, then once more as memories started flooding back, causing the dream- or whatever it was- to start fading fast.

He took one last desperate look at his daughters as they looked back at him sadly, then waved their little hands at him before the scene vanished, causing his heart to break.

“Stop!” he called out as he sat up, his left arm stretched out as though he could catch the fleeing dream.

It took him a while to gather himself after that. To put everything away again. To stop the tear glands that just weren’t listening to him like they should.

As he gathered himself, he noticed that [Schism] had somehow lapsed. Or maybe he’d been fully unconscious and it had stopped on its own. He didn’t know, but thought that the latter was more likely given the… dream.

While all that was going on, he peripherally noticed Erys sitting off to the side, which didn’t entirely surprise him. What did, however, was the presence of the others in the room.

Asami and Myra were sitting on one couch, while Avi had taken- or more likely made- a large comfortable-looking chair angled so that she could both watch him and the others in the room.

‘You good?’ Avi sent, likely knowing that he was finally ready to “talk”.

‘No, but I’ll be fine,’ he replied honestly, not really caring to lie about it with her.

Well, mostly. He wasn’t sure when he was going to be “fine” again. But he’d make do.

Given how connected they were, he knew that Avi knew that he was lying about that part at least, but she seemed to throw him a bone with her next words.

‘That’s good,’ she sent, sounding remarkably casual about it. ‘But we’ll have to go over what’s been going on the past couple of days,’ she finished, making him blink a few times.

Days? He wondered silently, then got a nod from Asami when she looked over at him. Damn.

“So, what happened?” Erys asked, then studiously ignored the looks that she got from the other three women present.

“Levelling… sickness,” he said, then shrugged because that was about as accurate as he could describe it in as few words as possible.

He then held up a hand when it looked like she wanted to press the issue, cutting her off before she could start.

“Coles Notes, please,” he more said than asked as he looked over to Avi who just nodded.

“You would mark today as ‘Day 056’,” Avi started, making him glad that it hadn’t been the two weeks that his first levelling coma had come with. Which also made the others look at her funny.

“When you fell unconscious, your [Fission]s failed, so I had to quickly step in for Kinkade and finish the apartment buildings for the new kids,” she said, likely referring to the batch of slaves he’d bought earlier… the other day.

“That was fine, as it gave me a bit of practice,” Avi grinned, then shook her head. “Well, I could only do one that day. Nor could I finish everything that needed to be installed, but now that you’re back, you can get on that.

“Anyways. The new kids seem to be integrating well, especially with how friendly the Kirkwallites… Kirkwallers…”

“Kirkwallians,” Asami interjected, which earned her an appreciative nod from Avi.

“The Kirkwallian women have been a tremendous help with everything, let alone the first two groups who stepped up to help everyone,” Avi said, smiling and nodding as she said that.

“Day 55 came with a more carnivorous diet than some probably would have liked, but Shae’ra managed to get enough crops ripened and matured to balance out the meat by that evening.

“As for today, well, it’s been more of the same. Though, I’m sure everyone will be glad that you’re back and ready to get things finished, settled, or finalized for them,” Avi finished by sending a quick info-packet through the Network that outlined the things that needed to be attended to.

“So…” Myra said a minute later, breaking everyone out of their thoughts. Or, at least breaking him out of his thoughts.

“Hmm?” he hmm’d as he looked over to her again, really noticing that she was dressed in the same style as he’d been making for the younglings.

“Was… was this due to your new Class? Or was it another case of you pushing past another Bottleneck?” Myra asked, oddly intense as she leaned forward slightly.

Which set off no few warning bells in his head. He very much remembered the lectures he’d gotten for having foolishly broken past the Strength Bottleneck without knowing what he was really doing.

“No, just the Class stat boosts,” he said as reassuringly as he could manage. “Though, I’m not sure why I would fall unconscious for a few days because of some Mental Stats…” he said, then quickly glanced at his Status. Specifically, his Attributes.

Attributes:

STR: 45

SPD: 45

CON: 50

INT: 96

SPR: 106

CHA: 57

LCK: ???

Mod:

40

40

45

91

101

52

???

Rank:

S

S

SS

SSS

Ex

SS

???

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

He looked at the new column on the right, wondering why it had been added. Was it there to give him an idea of what his stats translated to in terms of a threat-level or something? If so, the “Ex” worried him a bit. Then he noticed that he had 28 Free Attribute Points that he could assign. But he decided to leave that for later due to Asami’s eyes looking like they’d fall out of her head.

“What?” he asked, but before anyone could answer, Avi pulled them into his Realm.

“What?” he asked again, this time at a loss for why Avi had transferred them all there.

“The walls have ears,” she replied in English, making him blink before nodding. He really hadn’t considered that possibility, likely due to his head still being mostly technology-oriented still. Even after everything that had happened. Nor had he thought to do any form of scan to look for any sort of spying device, spell, or such.

For their part, the other women’s reactions were much calmer than he thought they should be, but then remembered that he’d been unconscious for a few days. Which meant that Avi could have already shown the others his Realm….

“You’re still ridiculous,” Asami said, finally answering his question with one of her ridiculous statements, then she stuck her tongue out at him for having that thought.

“Anyways,” he said, shrugging uncomfortably, though not knowing exactly why he was uncomfortable. “My new class basically makes me better at what I can already do. So, getting things finished, or whatever, will be easy enough from here-on-out,” he said, referring to the apartment projects while also thinking about the Tower, let alone setting up the coastal defenses that he’d promised Bryana he’d take care of.

Which got him a look from Asami and a normal nod from Avi. Which prompted him to share with them the progress he’d made with the Queen of Murym regarding the land rights and such. Which got a couple of heads shaking while Asami looked slightly resigned for some reason.

“Anyways, I’ll be pretty busy going forward, but at least there’ll be more of me to go around,” he said with a grin that caused Myra to blush slightly while the others looked more excited than anything else. Well, not Arise, but she always looked as though she was annoyed about something.

With a bit more catching up on the minutiae of how the slaves- soon-to-be-free-people- were doing, how they were integrating, and all of that, everyone went back to what they were doing after a few more assurances that he was fine. Really.

Then it was just him, Avi, and Erys standing in an open field in his Realm, leaving him to wonder if he should start building something there as well. Like a small villa or something. Maybe a garden too? Yeah, that’d be nice, he thought, then got a startled look from Avi before she seemed to shrug whatever it was that had startled her away.

“I’ll head back now,” Avi said, giving him a quick squeeze of the shoulder with her left hand before shifting away, leaving him with Erys.

An Erys that still looked to be fascinated by his Realm. Heck, just a few months ago, he’d have also been beyond thrilled to explore one of those “small worlds” he’d read about. Or demiplane, as he was more used to calling them due to his gaming background.

It was already quite large given that he was using [Genesys: True] to expand it every day. Well, not the past few days, but that was fine. With another few thoughts, he used [Fission], then [Schism], making sure to have his five extra selves, though he did grin at their insistence on him calling them by their chosen pseudonyms. Or maybe “alias” would work better? They weren’t, after all, going to be writing anything. At least, that he knew of.

Anyways, with Kinkade, Dax, Aegis, Cyd, and Bob ready to go and get working on their individual assignments- and after agreeing on a duty rotation to keep everyone from getting too bored- they all used [Schism] on themselves and shifted away.

It was a bit confusing, even for him, though. They were all him, not other people. But it was just easier for him to really wrap his head around it all doing it like that. Which was likely why they- he- had come up with that naming system. Which, really, was better than just calling them J2 through J6. Which also served to make it feel less… weird with himself.

Shaking his head, he turned back to a slightly drooling Erys who had a far away look in her eyes. Knowing that he might regret it, he used [Read Thoughts] to glean a bit of what she was thinking from the top, as it were. Which definitely confirmed his suspicions regarding her thoughts. And also managed to make him blush more than a bit.

That woman needs to get laid, the thought, then shook his head because he was now the only one she’d go for.

“Let’s get going,” he said, slightly more gruffly than he’d planned to.

Erys blinked then turned to him with a smile that certainly confirmed that he was the only male that she was thinking about.

Wondering how to deal with that, he shifted back to his office in Myriad Wonders with Erys.

* * *

“Do you think that Mr Smith will come by today?” her Queen asked, looking a little too hopeful. In her opinion, anyways.

“I’m sure that he will request an audience should he need to discuss anything with you, Your Majesty,” Brittany replied as formally and delicately as she could given her Queen’s fascination with Mr Smith.

“Hmm,” her Queen hummed as she sat at her desk, thinking.

Suppressing a sigh, Brittany contemplated saying a few things that would likely strain their friendship given just how… smitten Bryana seemed to be with Mr Smith. She then discarded them all in favour of keeping her friendship with her best friend healthy.

“If you have something to discuss with Mr Smith,” she said, then nearly sighed again with just how bright Bryana’s eyes got at the mention of his name. “I’m sure that you could summon him,” she finished, nearly face-palming when Bryana looked as though she hadn’t truly considered that option yet.

“I could, couldn’t I…?” Bryana asked rhetorically as she tapped her lips with the end of her writing pen.

If it weren’t for the- quite frankly- copious number of magic items that Bryana wore that warded against any sort of mental influence from a Skill or a spell, Brittany would have sworn with her life on the line that Mr Smith had somehow bewitched Bryana. Even then, she wondered if that weren’t the case, especially since Mr Smith was accompanied by an Elder Dragon.

Who knew what those ancient being were capable of?

So, Brittany remained silent as she watched her Queen and childhood friend navigate the turbulent waters of… infatuation? Certainly not love. No. She was sure that it hadn’t gotten quite that far yet.

Well, she hoped that it hadn’t gotten that far yet.

Sure, Mr Smith was practically a paragon of physical perfection with how he looked as though a sculptor had created the perfect muscled [Hero] from the tales of old. Even his full beard, while looking to be the same age as them, was something quite respectable. Admirable, even.

But. They knew practically nothing about Mr Smith beyond what they’d seen and what he, himself, had told them.

So, she’d taken matters into her own hands. As both the Royal Secretary and the Queen’s best friend. Given how quickly their best spy could travel, she was sure that they’d arrive in Kirkwall within the next day or two. From there, they would proceed to investigate Mr Smith and would hopefully get more answers to that walking mystery.

For now, she’d just have to carefully- oh, so carefully- try to keep her Queen from doing anything too… silly.

Still, given just how readily the Elder Dragon, Ina’Vaxchisa’Erys, listened to Mr Smith- let alone how she looked at him!- she wondered if Bryana would be all right not being his only paramour….

If it was her, she’d be more worried that her lover wouldn’t be able to keep up with more than one woman….

Her eyes widened at that thought as her face warmed up just a bit too much for her comfort. She quickly looked over at Bryana and saw that she was still lost in thought and heaved a quiet sigh of relief. Now feeling as though she’d somehow cheated her best friend, she quickly cleared all of those lascivious thoughts away and focussed on her secretarial duties.

No time to worry about something that wouldn’t likely come for many years to come, after all. At the very least. No time for any of that yet. Too much to do, especially with how malcontent some of the nobles were with the executions the other day. No matter how clearly the evidence was presented, let alone what the laws demanded for such a crime.

Now suppressing a sigh, Brittany squared her shoulders and got back to work.

* * *

Aegis- as he was calling himself- looked around, very pleased with himself.

He’d already gotten most of what he’d needed “built” and placed in the warehouse he’d made on the west coast, on the edge of the Great Forest. Well, “most” only included the various satellites that he’d need for the defense project he’d snagged. The harder part was getting everything up into orbit without attracting more attention than he was comfortable with.

Which meant that the new Skill he’d received with [World Architect] would be very useful. [Teleport: 3]. Now, it didn’t sound terribly impressive. Just the 3rd version of that spell/Skill. But.

[Teleport: 1] allowed a person to teleport anywhere they’ve either been, or that they’ve seen. Descriptions made it a dicey Skill to use, but had an OK success rate… if the descriptions were exceptionally good, that is.

[Teleport: 2] allowed you to bring others along for the ride. [Teleport: 3] allowed you to make an area that teleported people or stuff. A teleport circle, if you will.

[Teleport: 4] allowed you to make a [Gate], which was crazy useful. The 5th iteration just got OP, in his opinion. It allowed you to teleport anything that you could see. Within certain boundaries. But still. Ridiculous.

Anyways, if you got a higher iteration of [Teleport], you could do anything the lower iterations that Skill/spell could do.

So. He looked over at the rows and rows crated satellites and smiled. Because he could just [Teleport] each of them where he needed them.

But, why hadn’t he yet?

Physics, that’s why. He still needed to be sure of the exact gravity of Iria, then calculate the distance needed to keep the satellites in a stable orbit, let alone keeping them in a geosynchronous orbit. Which, really, wouldn’t take all that long. He was just procrastinating, really.

Why?

Then he’d need to really get to work, that’s why. Because the satellites were just the first step in securing the shores. After that, he’d need to get the infrastructure for the defense towers set up, make sure the satellites could communicate properly with said towers. Make sure that everything had enough power to be useful, let alone self-sustaining.

He’d also need to tweak just about every parameter of the software that came with it all, which would take him quite some time, even with his [Schism] going and each of his Minds using [Interface] so that he could directly connect to the computer system without needing to use something as inefficient as a keyboard and mouse or something.

Still, it would take a while to get it done. Which once more made him glad that he’d- Joram- told the Queen that it would take a couple of months to do. Especially since each tower would basically need its own fusion reactor to power it.

He laughed then, remembering just how badly humanity- back on Earth- had yearned for that technology. Maybe if he got back to Earth one day, he’d get a job somewhere that allowed him to “research” fusion reactors and throw everyone a bone or ten.

Aegis shook his head, ridding himself of thoughts of Earth. They wouldn’t be useful with the task at hand, so they were just a nuisance. Now, once more focussed on the task at hand, he pulled out his old graphing calculator and started punching in numbers faster than it could respond.

With a sigh, he put it away again and created a whiteboard along the side of the very long warehouse, a pack of whiteboard markers, and got to work.