A light groan escaped my lips as I opened my eyes, momentarily at a loss for where I was. I could feel something soft beneath me, so it definitely wasn’t still on that moon. Of course, those thoughts lasted for barely a moment before I quickly brought a hand up to my head, feeling a splitting pain that seemed to want to hammer its way out of my skull.

Wakey wakey, sunshine.

I saw the message appear in front of me, though I really wanted nothing more than to immediately dismiss it. Sadly, it did not follow my wishes this time, and persistently remained. It was at this moment when I realized my location, back on my bed in the Ariadne. However, I was… not alone.

I could feel the presences of both of my wives next to me, each one casually draping a leg over me. Okay… I can accept how we all got back to the ship… but why are we all naked!?

I thought it’d be more fun this way?

Well it’s not! I retorted, shaking my head. Celeste, can you hear me? I needed to make sure whether or not the connection between myself and the AI had been restored.

“I’m here, John.” She answered. “Still waiting on that soul, by the way. After Malthan dropped you three off, it didn’t take long to finish up with the couple ships left behind by the empire. We’ve just been waiting for you and the other two to wake up.”

How long were we out?

“Oh… about five hours now? But, you should check your messages. Someone kept blocking my connection with you whenever a new one appeared, but you should have a few that popped up.” I could tell that she was annoyed for forcibly being kicked out of my head. Nonetheless, I did indeed open up the messages I had missed, curious what I would find.

You have leveled all the way up.

Quest Complete!

Beyond Infinity

Rank ★★★★★★★★★★★ Extermination

The Champion of War, the God himself in disguise, has been slain through your efforts!

Reward: The Eye of Time

Quest Accepted!

One Small Step For John

Unranked Delivery

In your final steps to Godhood, your beloved patron has tasked you with going through the highlights of your journey, and seeing how your actions have altered fate.

Next Stop: The Closest Mirror

Reward: One Giant Leap for John-Kind

Well, that first message was certainly… not what I was expecting. Part of me wondered just what ‘all the way up’ meant, so I opened my character sheet.

Name

John Hulett

Race

Wood Elf

Titles

Vengeful Heart, Amateur Brain Surgeon, Spider Slaughterer, Starship Captain, Creator of Baishiro, Universe Ruler

Fame

100,000,000

Level 999

99%

Class

Druid

Advanced Class

Xeno-Shifter

Deity

Malthan

Health

2000/2000

Health Regen

0

Mana

4500/4500

Mana Regen

9000

Strength

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100

Wisdom

300

Agility

74

Intelligence

450

Dexterity

70

Charisma

35

Vitality

200

Luck

25

Points Remaining

3955

Universe 60%

...Really?

Hey, levels don’t really matter anymore for you three, right? Now that the three of you are the big bads of the timeline, why not let you enjoy the little bonus that comes with it?

Now I started to wonder what would happen if someone reached level one thousand on their own. Would they just naturally ascend to being a god, or would there be some hard limit? Either way, my internal questioning was interrupted by a groan coming from my left. It seemed that it was Sharon’s turn to wake up.

“John…? Where are… ugh…” She brought her hand to her head as she began talking, likely suffering from the same pain as I had when I woke up.

“We’re back in the ship. Everything’s been taken care of, I guess? Check to see if you missed any messages while you were out.” I gave her the quickest possible rundown, glancing over to making sure that she was okay. As soon as I did, however, my vision seemed to flash with a golden light.

I saw Sharon, back when she was still human. Living alone in a giant house. She seemed to go through a fairly normal day-to-day, until suddenly things began to change. Her body split in two, one continuing its normal routine while the other answered the door to accept a new delivery, the silvery capsule that I recognized as a Seed.

From there, the images seemed to deviate far more, splitting up in a number of different directions. Some of them became elves like the Sharon before me, some of them stayed humans, and one even turned into a catgirl. However, most of them suffered the same fate… For the images that had split off to receive the Seed and begin playing NeoLife, they almost all died from a massive black dragon rampaging in the area she lived.

As for the ones that had not entered NeoLife, they still lived relatively calm lives for the next few months, before chaos began to ensue. It was hard to get a clear picture of what was happening, but goblins and slimes had begun appearing around her, and people using magic. Most of the different versions of her had been killed by that point. The only ones that had been left unharmed were either lucky ones that met powerful strangers, or those that stayed forever within NeoLife, hiding there from the ‘real world’.

After I saw the deaths of countless different versions of Sharon, my vision flashed with gold again, and I saw her staring up at me from the bed, a confused expression on her face. “John… what was that?” I noticed that her right eye had turned golden, shining slightly as it looked at me.

“Uhm… Quest rewards?” I answered, still not completely sure myself. To me, the strangest thing wasn’t those visions, but my near absence from them entirely. The only time I ever appeared was when she happened to choose a wood elf, and we briefly met during training. Still, I rolled over and looked at Yin, wanting to get whatever this was over with.

Again, there was a flash of golden light. This time, however, the visions were much… simpler. Yin had begun her life as a lovebird, after all. There were a few different versions, but most of them simply ended up being eaten by giant snakes or larger predators. Only one managed to attach itself to someone through the same method Yin and I met, but even that one was killed soon after.

Malthan… just what is this? I asked inwardly, though I already had a fair guess.

Welcome, new god-to-be, to the Eye of Truth! This illustrious new power has been embedded within your body, and cannot be removed! So don’t bother trying! Until you ascend to godhood, you will see the previous versions of everyone you know! Of course, this only applies to those who you have had an actual influence on, but given the circumstances that is still quite a lot!

Then… why were there so many versions of Sharon that didn’t have the Seeds, and NeoLife?

Ah, that? It’s quite simple, really! The race of the previous ascendant determines where the Seeds will appear in the next world. You and Sharon both chose elf-related species, so next time we get to see some more elf action! Think of it as a tutorial period to give one species a bit of an advantage before all hell breaks loose.

Okay, not exactly what I had in mind. Part of me wondered what would happen if an evolved monster became the god. Would the Seeds simply appear on the world the monster was born on?

...Not feeling like answering this time, huh? I roused Yin from her sleep, and had Sharon explain things as I went towards the bathroom. I had a quest to continue, after all… and a pretty good idea why it wanted me to find a mirror, after what Malthan said.

Sure enough, as soon as I looked into the mirror, my vision flashed gold once again. Though, unlike when I was watching Sharon’s past lives, mine seemed to be split right from the start. On the one side, I had the me who lived alone in nice house, playing games for a living.

The other side was where things seemed to get weird. In it, I wasn’t living alone at all. My parents were there, as well as a redheaded woman I had never seen before. Judging by my interactions with her, we were fairly close. Girlfriend? No, it doesn’t make sense for us to be living with my parents.

The images began splitting again with the arrival of the Seeds. In the scenarios where I was alone, I would choose a variety of different races, seemingly picking at random. Yet, in the other versions, we would always pick the same race. A pair of high elves. The woman always became a crafter, while I would vary between wizard, fighter, or druid.

After mana flooded the real world, things naturally began changing. In the scenarios where I was alone without NeoLife, I tended to die by some monster within the first few months. The other times when I was alone, I would join an organization and fight to protect people, until I was left behind by the ships leaving the planet to abandon the world and most of its population. After that… well, naturally I died by some abyssal horrors.

In the other versions of history, things were different. My family had always stuck together, whether we were with or without the Seeds. Sometimes we died due to a random monster, but other times we would make it through. Most often than not in these versions, we managed to get our own ship to leave Earth, going and living among the elves.

Still, death was inevitable. I saw myself being killed time and again, either by monsters, men, or time itself. Only when I had fully witnessed my past lives did I come back to myself, just to find myself sweating above the bathroom sink, staring into the mirror. Malthan…

Hmm?

Did I ever have a sister? Given the apparent relationship between myself and the woman I saw in my timelines, we had to have been family. And… I seemed happier in those worlds. Though, maybe I shouldn’t say that since every time I met Celeste in those timelines, we ended up dating. That’s going to make things awkward later…

You really expect me to know the family situation of every single creature over countless different timelines? I mean, really? How am I supposed to know that?

He had a point, though I couldn’t help but feel like he was hiding something. Yet, part of me did not envy those timelines. Yes, I had lived together with my family for so long, but I hadn’t met any of the people that were now close to me. Whether it was Tokemi, Yin, Yang, Yo, even Sharon. None of them played a big role in any of those timelines.

With a sigh, I exited the bathroom, only to be greeted by a surprised looking Yin, and an annoyed looking Sharon. “This is Malthan’s fault, isn’t it?” Sharon asked, sending a glare upwards, as if hoping it would reach him.

“Well, according to what he said before, this is supposed to be some kind of tradition? So… yes, it’s his fault.” I nodded my head, unable to find an excuse to defend him. “I take it you both got the ‘rewards’ and the new quest?” When I asked that, they both nodded their heads.

“It’s… strange.” Yin admitted. “What now?”

“Well, first there are people that we need to talk to about this.” Namely one young time-fox-girl who is going to be very upset when she heard the news. I was not looking forward to this conversation.