It didn’t take long for everyone to arrive. When they did, it quickly became apparent exactly what the ‘surprise’ that Amelia had for Callie actually was. My girlfriend gaped at her mother in absolute shock as the older woman placed a stabilizing hand on her very pregnant stomach. “You…you’re-”

“Pregnant.” Said her mother cheerily. “Yes, that usually comes before children. I’m not sure you should be getting married if you don’t know where babies come from.” She turned to me, shooting me a wide smile. “Shane, it’s good to see you. Come here.” She widened her arms and pulled me into a big hug.

I laughed as I squeezed back, then pulled away. “It’s good to see you too Amelia. Is Alex with you?”

She chuckled. “He’s out front. Stella brought gifts, so he got roped into carrying things.”

“Why don’t they just put them in their space rings?” I asked with a laugh. Space rings weren’t common on Callus, but I was pretty sure most of the E-rankers had them. Alexander was the leader of a major force on this planet. As ‘The Nothing’ he was one of the big shots among the local WCP.

Amelia just shrugged. “Who knows. Maybe she was just messing with him. Some people consider things like that bad manners when delivering a gift.” Her eyes scanned the room, stopping on my mother. “And you must be Sasha.” She strode over, giving my mom a similarly effusive hug. “It’s so nice to put a face to the name. And such a pretty one. I see where Shane gets his looks.”

“From his father, mostly.” Mom said with a laugh. “But that’s nice of you to say. Calliope looks quite a bit like you too. Both so pretty.”

Zeke groaned. “This is torture. Are you both just going to pat each other on the back this whole trip for having good looking children? We’re Ascendants, we’re ALL good looking. Now where’s my hug?”

Laughing, Amelia stepped up and gave him a quick squeeze. “Good to see you Zeke. You seem different.”

“I finally made it to A-rank.” He shrugged. “Wasn’t a fun time, but I think it was worth the pain and effort. And you’re already G-rank? Impressive progress for such a short period of time.” I was surprised when I took the time to actually pay attention to her Impact, because he was right.

Granted, we’d all taken much less time than that to hit G-rank, but we weren’t the norm even among talents from powerful factions, much less a small backwater like Callus.

Amelia grinned smugly. “Seems that being the mother of a godslayer has its perks. I don’t get nearly as much renown as she does, but there’s definitely some rollover. Especially locally, a lot of the Nightstrike fans have been following your adventures, at least as far as the Moonsong Glade.”

My fiancee noticed my smirk and raised a brow at me. “That makes you way more self satisfied than it should. I know we’re getting married, but why are you so pleased with yourself.”

“Say Amelia?” I asked casually. “What are those old Nightstrike novelty mugs worth at this point?”

She burst out laughing, and Callie started complaining loudly about how embarrassing it was that I still had those mugs. Everyone else came in, Stella trying her best to ignore Zeke while standing as close to him as possible to make it clear she wanted him to start a conversation, Jessie introducing Bethy, Gabe, and the others to Ian, and Chelsea getting a big hug from Amelia in greeting.

I noticed one figure slip off, and after a brief wait, I followed Abel outside, where he leaned against the house, relaxing and closing his eyes as if he was trying to memorize the scent. “So you are happy to be home.” I accused.

“Tell no one.” He said, opening one eye. “But yeah. I don’t hate it. I’m planning to drop by and visit my brother in the next few days.” At my glower he just chuckled. “Don’t be like that. He might be an ass but he’s my blood. I’ve definitely missed the weaselly little bastard. Not to mention Alden.”

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

I nodded, leaning against the wall. “I’m surprised you’re taking time off, honestly.” I admitted. “You’ve never struck me as the type.”

He shook his head. “Reaching my Solid Path has put me way ahead of most. Plus I was getting to the point where I was starting to overtrain. I was getting to the point of combat satiation. A break will do me good.”

That wasn’t a term I knew. “Combat satiation?” I asked slowly. “What exactly is that?”

“You ever heard of semantic satiation?” He asked. I shook my head. “Well, semantic satiation is when you repeat a word over and over until it loses meaning. Combat satiation is when you start to see battle as a math problem. You do the moves so often that it loses all meaning beyond numbers and positioning. When battle just becomes a math problem you start to lose motivation.”

I nodded slowly. I got what he meant. When fighting, you always had to look out for attacks, plan your next move, and decide exactly what to do to win. But if you started viewing everything as numbers…it took the soul out of fighting.

I hadn’t ever heard it put quite like that, but it was a good way to think of things. “So even you have limits when it comes to training, huh?”

“Everyone has limits.” He said with a laugh. “Mine just aren’t physical, or even really mental. I love to fight, and like I told you before, it’s not a strain on me. That said, sometimes I need downtime so I don’t kill my passion. Too much of a good thing, you know. Not something I was aware of until now, but Paths make you look at things differently.”

That made sense. “So you’re planning to take some time off before you start the fight with the Volcanic Ape. Let your brain reset. I can see how that might help.”

“How about you?” He asked with a laugh. “You were so excited to come back. Running away already?”

I chuckled. “Nah. I'm just letting them talk. I'd prefer to do my greetings personally. More one on one. You know how it goes. We have all day anyway. Tomorrow we're heading out to the resort where everyone will be staying.”

When we'd contacted everyone back home about the wedding, Stella had extended us the use of the Unity's high ranking resort city. I had never even heard of it, but apparently the E-rankers on-world spent most of their time there, when they didn't have business to handle. The WCP had E-district, and the Unity had the resort, a place called Wintervale.

Unlike most Ascendant nonsense, Wintervale was a closely guarded secret among the top brass. It was located in the fucking polar ice caps, which explained why none of us had ever seen any sign of it. I'd even looked from space, but apparently we'd been in a bad spot to catch sight of it.

We were actually really lucky, because the invitee list was surprisingly long. Most of the guests were people who lived on Callus, but we had needed to invite basically every E-ranker on the planet because Amelia and the others still had to stick around and actually interact with these people, and we didn’t want to burn bridges.

Except Midknight, obviously. He wasn’t invited, and if we spotted him in the vicinity I suspected he would have a very bad day. Shadowthorn HAD been invited, but only because Callie wanted her half-brother Eric to be there, and he was too young to come alone. She had been informed that she should stay away from the bridal party and keep to herself.

“This is going to be a clusterfuck.” I went on with a small laugh. He cocked his head at me, waiting for me to say more. “We invited a ton of people. Some from nearby systems, some from galaxies away, and I still don’t know if they’ll all make it. Most of them are strong enough to be considered dangerous on this planet, and we’re sticking them all in a secret resort town together for a week.”

He just shrugged. “It’s a wedding.” He said, like that explained anything. And maybe it did. “An Ascendant wedding at that. Might as well have ordered insanity from the caterers. But let me ask you this, kid. Do you think it’ll be worth it? Are you worried enough to back out? Under all the bluster, are you hesitating for even a second to walk down that aisle?”

“No.” I responded immediately. “Not even for a second. Callie is…I was head over heels the second I saw her. And it’s not a pedestal thing either. If anything, her flaws make her more amazing to me. The way she worries over everyone and takes on way too much. How absurdly excited she gets over treasure. How grumpy she is in the morning.”

He snickered. “Yeah, she has her problems. Though you’re no walk in the park either.”

“Yeah no shit.” I snorted. “I’m an indecisive adrenaline seeking battle nut with more family issues than your average magazine series. My great grandmother is an evil goddess who probably wants to kill me if she knows I exist at all, and I appear to be basically cursed to suffer endless calamities because I have the blood of fully HALF of the existing gods running through my veins. Not to mention those gods are now at WAR.”

I was panting by the time I finished my rant, and he raised a brow at me in amusement. “You done?” He said after I stopped talking for a minute. “Because you know that shit isn’t your fault, right?”

“Yeah, but that doesn’t make it any less true.” I ground out. I hadn’t realized how much that had all been bothering me. I couldn’t bring it up to Callie because she’d just tell me I was being-

“You’re an idiot.” Said the firm voice of my fiancee from behind me. I blinked, turning to find her staring at me stonily, arms crossed. “For being worried, AND for not telling me about it. Double idiot. Idiot squared. You are an idiot to the idiot power. Do you honestly think any of that matters to me?”

I grimaced. “No, but-”

“Or do you think,” She went on icily. “That after all the nonsense we’ve been through, and after all the times we’ve both almost died. That I’m too much of a coward to marry the man I love because of a little danger?”

I turned slowly to stare her down. “I don’t think ‘evil homicidal goddess’ counts as a little danger.”

“Ah.” She said, her face morphing into an expression of understanding (my Danger Sense actually went off because that was such an obvious trap, thanks for nothing Danger Sense). “So I’m the kind of person who leaves when the going gets tough? I can’t stick it out if there’s any real trouble?”

Abel put a hand over his mouth, and stage whispered. “It’s a trap. Don’t answer.”

I ignored him. “No.” I finally said, letting my shoulders sag. “You know that’s not how I think of you. Just like you know I’m worried. You could sense that.”

“Well yeah.” She snorted. “But if I yelled at you for being an idiot inside your own head I’d never take a breath.” She winked, and I knew we were ok. She stepped up and put her arms around me, laying her head on my chest.

“That.” Came a voice from behind us. “Was the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.” We both froze, and turned in horror to find our smirking mothers watching us, one of them holding…oh dear gods. They’d gotten that on tape. I had a feeling I’d have to make some serious concessions for them not to play it at the wedding. Damn it, we couldn’t leave for the resort fast enough.