77 – Jackpot
I slowly opened my eyes, feeling completely refreshed. The moment I did, the first thing that greeted my view was Rishia's sleeping face. The second thing was a fluffy white tail.
And when I turned my head to the side, the third was the view of a deep cleavage as well as Daji's amused face.
"Enjoy what you see, Naofumi?"
"Mm. Not bad." I nodded, appreciating the sight. "Mind if I?"
Daji blinked. "Mind if you- Kya?!"
I poked them and squeezed them a bit and nodded. "Yep. I can definitely see why guys would lose their heads over this. Pretty nice. Thanks."
Daji turned a bright red, instinctively clutching an arm around her chest. "You...?! That's- Ugh." Countless emotions crossed her face before she settled on a flustered amusement. "...And here I thought you lacked baser instincts. Was this all just a ploy...?"
"Nah." I gently shifted Rishia to the pillow so she could keep sleeping since she seemed exhausted. After that, I used [Portal Shield] to warp off the bed and onto my feet.
Daji gave me a blank stare. "...Did you truly just use your abilities to bend space simply to leave the bed?"
"It's efficient." I changed my outfit back to the usual fancy black robe with gold trim over a plain black shirt and jeans...
Hm.
I just realized that I'm wearing the same sorts of things Dad does. Mom always did complain about that...
"...I look so good in black though."
I held up my portal shield, using its glossy surface as a mirror before fixing my hair a bit. "...Note to self. Find a way to get some hair mousse. Maybe I can have Strange ship it over."
It would take a while since they were occupied with defeating a guy hellbent on wiping out half of their universe or something, but they should be freed up with all the intel I gifted.
Now, you might think that it would be a bad idea to give stuff like that to someone I barely knew, especially someone who was apparently powerful enough to no-sell an instadeath spell using his true name and didn't fear giving out his true name.
And I agreed.
But apparently, they were desperate. Plus, there was that old saying about how a friend in need is a friend indeed.
If the Three Stooges were right about me potentially running into like extradimensional entities on my way back home, I'd need all the help I could get.
Doctor Strange seemed like a good guy... and he also seemed to have a good opinion of Uncle Chris, so it should be fine.
But anyway.
I stretched and noticed that Daji was still staring at me. "Yeah?"
Daji laughed and said, "Nothing. You are just... very different from the sorts of men I have met before."
"I'm fairly certain that's true. Even so, please stop trying to seduce me. It's very weird since it just flat out reminds me of my mom traumatizing me with a very hands on demonstration."
I shivered at the unspeakable memories.
Daji laughed again, her violet eyes twinkling with amusement. "And if I happened to not want to seduce you but properly court you?"
"Wait until after we resolve this world's chaos. I'm putting romance on hold until then."
Daji feigned a disappointed sigh. "My. To think the day would come when a man spurned my advances..."
"Yeah, yeah..." I did a quick checklist of what I had to get squared away.
Mina and Nina were having a sleepover with Melty and Filo... considering that the latter two were relatively normal, it would be fine. My daughters needed more time with normal kids anyway.
Bahamut was still grounded... but he had just taken that time being grounded to get into sculpting.
I was... mildly concerned at that, but it was probably fine. It wasn't like he was making materia or anything.
Probably.
Hopefully.
...
Anyway.
Time to get everyone together and discuss next steps.
===
After warping all over the place (and dodging all the citizens of Libertas who kept trying to give me offerings), I managed to wrangle everyone together for breakfast.
And when I did, I realized just how many people had managed to join my entourage since I first arrived in this world.
First was obviously Sylvia and Lia.
Like always, they sat on my left and right, respectively.
Then there was Mein, seated across from me and looking like she was absolutely done with the world... and like she was having an internal argument with the Seven Star Staff.
On her left (my right) was S'yne, who was happily weaving together what looked like a dress made of pure clouds.
On Mein's right (my left) was Rishia, who was knitting a scarf while sneaking glances at me, a warm smile on her face.
On the left side of the table, sitting by herself was Daji, looking completely relaxed.
And on the side opposite of her were my kids Mina, Nina, and Bahamut, all chatting and catching up.
But that wasn't all too.
Standing by the doorway, and shifting awkwardly in place while wearing a plain blue sundress, Lucina fiddled with her long blue hair and said, "Is it... fine for me to be here?"
A young man with short blue hair stood next to Lucina, looking cautious, but also hopeful. Morgan, her son from... Well, unfortunate circumstances.
I waved towards the empty seats next to Daji and said, "Go ahead and sit down, Miss Lucina, Morgan. This conversation involves you guys too, so make yourself at home."
Lucina slowly nodded and then walked next to Daji. "Excuse me..."
"Be at ease." Daji let out an empathetic smile, her violet eyes flitting towards Morgan. "...I understand your fears. But they are unfounded here."
Lucina's breath hitched as she heard the sincerity in Daji's voice. Her eyes teared up a bit. But she nodded and sat down next to Daji.
Morgan did as well, cautiously observing everyone.
Hm...
'I should probably make a glossary of everyone.'
It was getting to the point where I was finding it hard to keep track of everyone...
But in any case.
After everyone was settled in, I quietly swapped to Laevateinn and waved my hand towards the food in the middle of the table, concentrating.
As I did, the roasted meats, freshly baked bread, fruits, and other foods started plating itself before landing in front of everyone at the table.
Mein gave me a blank stare and said, "Master Naofumi. I thought you were going with the 'not a god' stance on things..."
"Changed my mind." I shrugged. "Divinity is useful. Had a talk with an expert from my home's local plane of existence and I'll need to prep a lot of things to ensure I got home safely. I was thinking of just sneaking back, but since I want to head back with everyone, the local powers that be will probably get upset."
The conversation with Doctor Strange was *very* enlightening... even if I only remembered like, a quarter of it due to the fact that it took place in a dream.
You'd think that magic and my Legendary System would help square that away, but apparently dream stuff was inherently wishywashy.
If you wanted absolutely crystal clear intel from lucid dreams and the like, you would only get to keep like, 10% of what you experienced.
And while Doctor Strange managed to get a lot of intel out of our talk since he was the one who initiated the contact, I only got bits and pieces since, to me, it was just a lucid dream.
I'd have to patch that later... maybe study the topography of dreaming...
But more important projects at hand and all.
Lia's crimson eyes lit up and she quickly looked at me. "Does that mean you're going to actually start letting people pray to you? And give offerings?"
I shrugged. "Frankly, at the rate things are going with Libertas, they might accidentally create an idealized version of me as a proper divine being. That'd be annoying, so I might as well embrace it."
Lucina took a slice of bread and let out a soft chuckle. "That sounds like what happened with Lady Tiki. She kept insisting she was just a person, but Valm eventually idolized her as the voice of Naga." She paused, her hand shaking a bit with emotion. "...She wasn't. The voice of Naga, I mean. She was just a woman. And she died like everything else."
"Well, you don't have to worry about that for me, Miss Lucina. I've made preparations. It'll take a lot to kill me."
Bahamut paused in the middle of eating a makeshift sandwich. Then he gave me a blank look, staring at me with his blue eyes. "Father."
"Yes, Boy?"
"...Did you create a soul anchor on the moon?"
"What? Pft... you think I would risk something like that?" I chuckled. "I looped the end of my internal timeline instead. Did you know that you can do all sorts of fun shenanigans with time if you create a proper World Tree?"
I was inspired by the Time Stone Doctor Strange had used. While I definitely couldn't do the absolute bullshittery that it apparently enabled...
Like, honestly. Bending eternity on your knees and looping time to force an extradimensional conqueror to negotiate while willingly walking towards your death each time until he got sick of killing you...
Crazy stuff.
Also the reason I was 100000% not heading home until I was confident I hit at least solar system levels of power. And even then, I was absolutely planning to physically head back home across time and space instead of cheating with stuff like magic.
Physics were rigid.
Magic, divinity, and conceptual warfare was not.
Which meant if I restricted things to just raw physics and leveraging how existence worked, I'd win most times with sufficient resources.
Nina adjusted a pink feather hairpin on her blonde hair before looking over at me. "Father. Talk?"
I blinked, confused on what she meant. Then I realized that my daughter was politely reminding me to stay on topic.
Wow. Really outdid myself there. To think I had such a respectful and smart daughter...
But anyway.
"Right." I nodded and looked around at everyone. "So, I'm sure everyone here has a rough understanding of the waves, right?"
Mina stuck her hand up, causing her blue hair to scatter around her. "Yes, Papa! It's like... two big balls going BOOM! And then monsters squishing! And then when one ball breaks, the other gets stronger!"
I blinked. "...That's... pretty much it. I would have explained it differently, but that's right, Mina." I smiled. "Good job."
"Yay!" Mina high-fived Nina. "I'm smart!"
Nina smiled. "Of course, Mimi."
"Nana! Love you!" Mina giggled and hugged Nina.
Sylvia glanced over at me and said, "Master. Did you figure out a way to terminate the waves then?"
S'yne stopped in the middle of weaving her dress and glanced up at me. "...Mister Naofumi? Is that true?"
"Well. Kind of." I leaned against the table and laced my fingers together. "As far as I can tell, the main way to stop the waves for now is to destroy the other planet that's connecting with us. But that's wasteful, you see? So I have a better plan."
Mein looked nervous. "Oh no. Whenever Master Naofumi says he has a better plan, it involves another crazy feat..."
"Oh, it's not THAT crazy." I chuckled. "You see... I was just thinking. If the waves are from the planets hitting each other by overlapping... what if I just like... You know? Tweak the connection so that they aren't overlapping completely? Space IS big, after all."
Silence.
Everyone paused to process my suggestion.
Bahamut was the one who spoke up first. "Father. Are you suggesting that you want to weave spacetime together? Between the two dimensions?"
"Yep." I nodded. "Instead of a desperate fight for survival due to the clashing... why not just make us neighbors, right? And then once we are, we can start plotting a counterattack towards the guys up top."
S'yne stared at me and furrowed her brow. Then she slowly said, "That... could work. When the worlds I visited died, their sun crumbled and the planet slowly withered, but-"
"Wait." I held up my hand. "Back up. S'yne." My eyes twinkled. "I completely forgot until now. But you said that you met dead worlds, right?"
"U-Um... Y-Yes?" S'yne looked confused. "It was kind of sad. The sun vanished and then light faded away into darkness... why?"
Lia gasped and pointed at me. "Naofumi-dono! Are you going to relight the suns?!"
"Well." I chuckled. "...If there are vacant planets just waiting in the void somewhere... why not pick them up. Right?"
Mein gave me a blank stare. "...You are seriously not beating the god allegations any time soon, Master Naofumi..."
"And that's why I've given up on them. But that aside." I clapped my hands together. "Who wants to go on a fun vacation to some tropical islands to unwind? Since the next waves won't be for twenty days and since I've pretty much cleared out all the idiots currently living in this world except for that weird Japan place in the east, it would be nice to have some relaxation time, right?"
Rishia stopped her knitting and smiled. "Spending time in the sun and playing along the water seems nice." She gave me a demure look and then added, "A-And I can wear some pretty swimsuits too..."
Morgan nudged Lucina's side and said, "Mother. You said you missed the shores, right? Do you want to relax?"
Lucina hesitated. "...That does sound nice..."
"Great." I nodded. "Then pack your bags. I'll head to the place first with the other heroes and get you guys by the end of the day. Oh yeah, bring equipment too. Apparently, there's a lot of rare monsters that give a lot of experience, so it's a nice chance to get stronger."
Lia's crimson eyes flashed as she let out a dark grin. "Ooh... We can kill things too, Naofumi-dono? That's perfect."
Sylvia gave Lia a concerned look. "Lia..."
"What? Hunting is relaxing!"
Daji chimed in and said, "Oh, let your friend enjoy herself, my daughter. It's useful to vent your dark feelings every once in a while."
Sylvia looked skeptical. "...If you say so, Mother..."
"Anyway." I munched on some bread and said, "Next topic. Hypothetically... this is just hypothetically, mind you. Who would want to go on some planet hopping trips to beat baddies? Because, if I remember right, Miss Lucina here has a world being overrun by a fallen demonic dragon thing that sounds like it'd be GREAT for making equipment."
Lucina paused in the middle of sipping some juice and then looked at me with surprise. "...Did you just... imply that you want to turn the Fell Dragon Grima into weaponry?"
"Yes. Besides, Dad would kill me for not taking you home."
Lucina's eyes started to tear up. But then she laughed and brushed her tears away. "I... don't think there's a home left for me to go to. But... if you'd like. I would appreciate it."
I gave her a thumbs up. "Great. Then, gameplan settled. First, beach and relaxation. Next, worldhopping to the dead planets S'yne visisted. After that, tweaking the local timespace so the next wave just connects the two planets together after I tweak orbital mechanics. Good talk, team."