Monarch of Profound Toxin

"Well, would you look at that!" Eik exclaimed and clapped happily. "My son is a downright artist!"

"He's better than any of the kids in my class, dad!" Bin said, hopping around the table where Goo was drawing. It was his most recent hobby and, up until this point, the most long-lived of them.

"Hey, show me your arm for a second, kiddo," Eik said. Goo didn't even look up from his project as he lifted one arm and let his father pull the sleeve up to his elbow. He was clutching three differently colored crayons in his tiny hand, getting three times the work done at once. Smart boy.

Eik wasn't capable of controlling the Profound Toxin that made up his son's body at all. With the casting of Original Life, he had essentially completely separated himself from it and relinquished it to his son's soul—or however the hell that worked.

But there was something he had found he was still capable of. Influencing the subtle movements of the Ak'ki that etched messages into the skin of Awakened when informing them of changes in their magical conditions. In the beginning, Eik and Ihasu had had the exceptionally early Awakened boy walk around with a wooden plaque like nearly all others on Earth but had quickly dropped the idea.

For one, there was no reason to draw attention to the fact that this being, who looked no older than a child who had just started his first year of school, had already gone through an empowering process which should have happened at at least twice his age. It wouldn't do any good to have people ask questions about that. Curious people with too much power or too much money tended to be a little too willing to get their noses in deeper than was appropriate, so they would rather he didn't carry around the very object most common between Awakened.

Not to mention the fact that he, as far as they could tell, was completely incapable of feeling pain. Even now, as the glowing text practically sizzled on his skin, the remarkably straight lines of color he was drawing on the paper didn't even stray in the slightest, the boy seemingly not even realizing what was happening.

Eik read the messages.

[Acquired Learn — Lv. 91]

[Acquired Learn — Lv. 92]

"Damn, this kid is…"

"Amazing," Chop finished for him when Eik trailed off. "The boy's literally gaining levels from anything he does. Here he is, about as far from danger and peril as one can be, and yet he just hit Level 92. Why, if I wasn't a bigger man, I would say I was jealous."

Eik laughed. "You wouldn't be the first to feel that way, you old fart. And as far as I can tell, with every level he gains, his ability to learn grows ever greater. It's a monstrous thing he's capable of, to be frank. And I'm sure he would grow faster if I allowed him to run out and fight."

Chop gazed fondly at the little boy, a soft smile grazing his lips. "He is so like how my Tournon used to be, back when he was a little boy. So absorbed in his own world that there was hardly the time to pay attention to anybody around him."

"Your son sounds like he was a good lad."

"Oh, he was," Chop mumbled, almost to himself, his eyes looking at something far, far away—or rather, far, far in the past. "He really was. Both he and my daughter had hearts of solid gold. A hundred times kinder and more compassionate than I am or ever have been. They must have gotten it from their mother—the loveliest woman I have ever met—because I certainly made my fair share of mistakes."

Eik looked away then, seeing no reason to watch as the old man shed tears for the lives that were so suddenly ripped away. "I'm sorry for your loss."

As if sensing the emotional turmoil, Goo pulled his arm back and placed a small hand on Chop's thin fingers, causing him to twitch in surprise. Bin also moved closer and leaned her head against his thin shoulder. With a sniffle, the X-ranker wiped his eyes with the back of his other hand and caressed the little boy's arm. "You had better make sure to protect these annoying, damned, sweet kids, all right?" he told Eik, voice trembling.

Eik heart warmed and he answered through a smile. "I'll move the world for them."

"Yeah, good," the old geezer said and put his arm around Bin. "And if that isn't enough, you call me and I'll destroy the whole damn thing if I have to."

Stolen novel; please report.

"I'll keep that in mind."

Ihasu came in from the backyard, holding a bundle of herbs whose viability she was testing in Earth's environment. Judging by the deep, red color of it and the healthy spryness with which they stood on end in her hand, they were doing just fine in their garden.

It was a hobby she was enjoying when she wasn't working as a fracture specialist or studying those esoteric disciplines of dimensional magic, such as math. She would raid her father's garden ever few weeks for new samples and replant them in their herb garden out back in Forest. Not all had successfully taken, but she was seeing surprisingly many strong growths.

"What are you all doing there together?"

"Grandpa Chop was crying so we were trying to make him feel better!" Bin answered truthfully, eliciting another few quick wipes of his eyes from Chop.

He rubbed her back softly. "And you did a wonderful job at it!" he praised.

"I'm happy to hear that you did so well, Bin and Goo," Ihasu said without making a big deal out of the situation. She was well aware of the old X-ranker's family history and had cried openly herself when he had told her. "Who's hungry?"

"Me!" Bin exclaimed and jumped to her feet, legging it into the kitchen.

But despite reaching her top speed before reaching the kitchen, she was passed by something moving several times faster as it practically flew through the air to land on the kitchen counter. "Me!" came the almost bestial roar of eagerness as Goo touched down, his big toe smooshing the corner of the cube of butter his mom had just taken out.

Eik was there in the blink of an eye, a firm grasp on the back of the collar of the boy's shirt before he could cause anymore chaos. "Stop being such an animal, Goo!" he scolded. "Mom's told you a million times not to walk around on the counter! You can sit on it with pants on, but not stand! Is that understood?"

The boy thrust his jaw forward as he tried to get a look at what was for lunch but did mumble a response. "Yes."

Eik sighed and set him down on the floor only for the little scamp to immediately and effortlessly pull himself bodily up to look at all the goods laid out, supported only by a single hand.

Whether it was a leftover from his brief period spent as a cat or something else, Eik had found that the best way to get his son to calm down when overstimulated was to haul him into the air by the scruff of his neck—or rather, his shirt— like a kitten and took look him directly in the eyes when telling him something. The kid almost always listened enough to at least answer when spoken to like that.

Eik would never have done that if his son had been a regular, unawakened boy, but in this case this kind of treatment carried no risk. The little troublemaker had already killed his fair share of people anyway. That fact could be easy to forget when he was sitting quietly at the living room table and drawing houses with mom, dad, and big sis out in the garden, with a single tree and a sun in the upper corner.

"What are we having?" Bin asked.

"Remember the meat dad brought home yesterday? The really juicy stuff?"

"Yeah!"

"Well, he told me he would fry that up with some potatoes and a nice gravy," Ihasu told her daughter.

"I did?" Eik asked and caught his future wife's smile. "Yes, I did! You can help me by cutting the potatoes Bin. Small cubes, please."

"Yes!" she shouted and went to get a cutting board.

"And… me?" Goo asked, pointing to himself.

"Goo, you watch that chunk of meat there and make sure it doesn't run anywhere!"

The boy dropped back onto the floor and patted over to the other side of the counter and hauled himself up again, this time much closer to the plate with the raw meat. With the sober intensity of a warden watching a break-out prone death row prisoner, Goo stared at that chunk like it was his life's mission.

"Good boy," Eik praised and struggled to light a fire for the pan. "Where is my sister when I need her anyway?"

"She said she had one meeting after the other today. From morning until the middle of the evening, basically," Ihasu told him.

"Let's invite her over for dessert! And my grandpas as well! And uncle Andi! And uncle Bobby! Oh, and Philip from school!" Bin suggested energetically.

"Hold on," Eik broke in before she could list more names. "Philip from school? Who's Philip? And how old is he? And what's he to you?" A stone of worry suddenly settled heavily in his stomach.

"It's a boy from school. He's as many years old as me."

"And, uuh… why, exactly, do you want him to come over?" Eik asked, resisting the urge to bite his nails.

She looked at him uncomprehendingly. "Because I like him."

"You like—" Eik gasped, losing both his breath and balance halfway through. "I-I don't quite think I understand. You're just my little girl, how can you like a boy?"

"Eik…" Ihasu said from the living room. He could hear her eyes rolling. "Chop, say something to him. He's having a breakdown."

"Don't look at me," the old man said. "When my daughter first brought a boy home, I cried in my bed for two and a half days."

"Ugh, you're both impossible. Bin, we'll invite Philip and his parents as well, okay?"

"Yay!"

"Oi, Ihasu. Wait a damned second! I haven't finished processing this!" Eik hissed.

"You won't finish doing that until she's already moved out."

"Mo-Moved… out?"

"Ugh… Tell me, then, would you rather have her like some boy you haven't even met before?"

His eyes flitted briefly to his daughter's beaming, innocent smile, panic giving way to ice cold malevolence. "You know what? You couldn't be more right. Bin, forget the potatoes and go and invite Philip and his parents over for a big lunch. I'll send guys to invite everybody else," he said, Living Manifestations already pouring out of him, leaping through the open window and going in all directions to issue the invitations. "Ihasu, can you take over here for a while?"

"Sure. Where are you going?"

"To buy more of everything. Come on, Goo," he called as he threw on his jacket, the boy hopping down and running to put his own jacket on. "We have to make sure the handsome Philip knows exactly what he's walking into."

Ihasu sighed.