My Anime Shopping Tree & My Cold Prodigy Wife!

Author’s Note: The Final Arc and Schedule Update

Hello everyone! We are finally approaching the conclusion of this journey. As many of you have guessed, the final arc will center on the Fire Fly Corporation.

While they have operated largely from the shadows until now, they stand as the series' greatest galactic antagonist. For those needing a refresher: The Fire Fly Corporation began as a humble NGO founded by three men, ostensibly to support impoverished children across India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Myanmar, and other Asian nations. However, behind the façade of nutrition programs, they were monsters creating monsters.

Using children as test subjects for organ regeneration, they sacrificed countless souls to achieve their goals. It was during this era that a defecting researcher—the mother of James Khan (King Liam Bathelham)—injected the first successful serum into her deceased son, making him the first human to gain superpowers.

Since then, the NGO has evolved into a galactic mega-corporation. They have become colonizers, invading the galaxy not just for resources to fuel their fleet, but to harvest the super-abilities found on other worlds. I wrote them to subvert the classic trope: instead of aliens invading Earth, this is humanity colonizing the stars through corruption and manipulation.

The stage is now set for the final battle: The Fire Fly Corporation and the Seventh Circle vs. The Humanity of Riverio.

With the end in sight, I also have an announcement regarding the release schedule. Starting February 4, 2026, I will be shifting from 8 chapters a day to 4.

Life is becoming quite busy! I am currently outlining my next novel, working toward becoming a full-stack web developer, and managing my day job. Most importantly, I want to dedicate more time to my little family—my lovely wife and our baby boy.

To my small but loyal reader group: I know this novel has its flaws and hasn't reached a massive audience, but I am writing this for you. I do not write for money or fame; I write because there are still people willing to read my story, glitches and all.

Thank you for sticking with me.

The guests, who were currently busy screaming and diving under tables, stopped for a split second to watch. It was impressive. It was terrifying. It was the kind of magic that usually ended battles before they even started. The fire engulfed the drones, swallowing them in an inferno of red and orange destruction.

"Ha!" Faria shouted, dusting off her hands. "Problem solved. Now, someone sweep up the ash."

But the ash didn't come.

The fire raged for a moment, and then, something strange happened. The flames didn't touch the metal. Instead, a shimmering, translucent blue grid appeared around the drones. It looked like a honeycomb made of light. The fire hit the grid and just... vanished.

It didn't deflect. It didn't bounce off. It was absorbed. The blue light pulsed, getting brighter for a second as it ate the magic, and then the fire was gone. Just like that. The drones stood there, completely unharmed. Their metal plating wasn't even warm. They looked shiny, new, and extremely unimpressed.

Faria stared at them, her mouth open. "What? That’s impossible. That fire burns hotter than a volcano’s armpit! Why aren't they melting?"

Lloyd, who was standing a few feet away, felt a cold knot tighten in his stomach. He knew exactly why they weren't melting. He had seen that blue light before, a lifetime ago.

"Anti-magic fields," Lloyd muttered to himself, his eyes narrowing. "Of course. Firefly wouldn't invade a magic world without bringing an umbrella."

The lead drone, the one that had spoken earlier, turned its red optical sensors toward Faria.

"Magic signature detected," the drone’s synthetic voice boomed. "Threat level: Nuisance. Initiating counter-measures."

The panels on the sides of the drones slid open with a sharp clack-clack sound. Barrels extended. These weren't wands. They weren't staffs. They were rotary machine guns, the kind that could spit out enough lead to turn a solid brick wall into a cloud of dust in three seconds.

"Oh, that’s not good," Lloyd said.

The barrels began to spin. Whirrrrrrrr.

The sound was high-pitched, like a dentist’s drill from hell. Faria stood there, frozen. She had never seen a gun before. To her, it just looked like a weird metal tube. She didn't understand the concept of ballistics. She didn't understand that she was standing in front of a firing squad that didn't know the meaning of mercy.

Princess Amina, standing next to Faria, summoned a wall of sand, but her face was pale. She sensed it too. The magic in the room felt heavy, sluggish. The drones were emitting a dampening field.

"Move!" Lloyd shouted, but his voice was lost in the mechanical scream of the spinning barrels.

The drones ignored Lloyd’s evasive flicker. Their logic circuits identified a more efficient way to neutralize the target: the high-value biological assets standing behind him. The barrels shifted away from Lloyd and locked onto the Council of Queens. At Faria, who had attacked them. At Amina, who was standing next to her. And at Mina, who was near the exit with the baby.

Lloyd’s brain went into overdrive. He calculated the distance. Fifty feet. He calculated the spin-up time of the guns. Zero point five seconds. He calculated the running speed of a human. Too slow.

He couldn't run. He couldn't shout. He had to be there. Right now.

The world seemed to slow down. He could see the first muzzle flash beginning to ignite in the barrel of the lead drone. He could see the confusion on Faria’s face. He could see the fear in Mina’s eyes across the room.

"Not today," Lloyd hissed.

He didn't take a step. He didn't run. He reached into his core, bypassing the magic that the drones were dampening, and grabbed onto something else. Something older. Something that didn't care about anti-magic fields because it wasn't magic. It was physics. It was space.

He activated [Void Steps].

The air around him fractured. It didn't glow or sparkle. It just broke, like a mirror being smashed by a hammer. For a microsecond, Lloyd didn't exist in the physical space of the ballroom. He was everywhere and nowhere. He was a glitch in the server of reality.

ZAP.

There was a sound like a thunderclap inside a vacuum. One moment, Lloyd was by the pillar. The next moment, he was standing directly in front of Faria and Amina, his back to them, facing the wall of machines.

He had closed the distance in literally zero time. His coat tails were still settling from the sudden displacement of air.

"Lloyd?" Faria gasped, stumbling back. "How did you—"

Chapter : 1790

"Get down," Lloyd said. His voice wasn't loud, but it was absolute. It was the voice of a man who was done playing games.

The drones’ guns were fully spun up. The muzzle flashes were bright, blinding white stars. The bullets were coming. Thousands of them. A wall of metal moving faster than sound.

Lloyd didn't flinch. He didn't try to dodge. He slammed his hands together, interlacing his fingers.

"If you want a fight," Lloyd growled, "I'll give you a war."

He didn't summon a spirit. Spirits were made of mana, and mana was useless right now. He needed something solid. Something real. Something that could stop a high-velocity projectile through sheer density and stubbornness.

He tapped into his bloodline. The Ferrum legacy. [Steel Blood].

"Manifest," Lloyd commanded.

The air around him turned black. It wasn't shadow. It was metal.

From the empty air, steel erupted.

It didn't grow like a plant or flow like water. It snapped into existence with the violence of a car crash. Thousands of heavy, midnight-black chains burst from the void around Lloyd. They were thick, heavy, and cold, smelling of oil and iron.

"Weave!" Lloyd shouted, his mind acting as the loom.

The chains moved with a life of their own. They swirled around him, moving faster than the eye could track. They lashed together, interlocking, braiding over and over again. Within a fraction of a second, they formed a dense, rotating barrier.

It wasn't just a wall. It was a dome. A perfect, hemispherical bunker made of woven steel chains, completely encasing Lloyd and his wives.

CLANG-CLANG-CLANG-CLANG-CLANG!

The sound was deafening. It was like being inside a bell that was being hit by a freight train. The bullets slammed into the steel dome with terrifying force. Sparks flew everywhere, creating a shower of golden light that illuminated the terrified faces of the guests.

The sheer kinetic energy of the impact was staggering. The floor beneath Lloyd’s feet cracked, spiderwebs of fractures spreading out into the marble. He gritted his teeth, feeling the vibrations travel up his arms and into his bones. It felt like holding back a landslide with his bare hands.

"What is this?" Amina shouted over the noise, covering her ears. "What are those things?"

"They're rude houseguests," Lloyd yelled back, his voice strained. "Very loud, very persistent, and they didn't bring a gift."

The dome held. The [Steel Blood] chains were reinforced by Lloyd’s Void energy, making them harder than normal steel. But they weren't invincible. Lloyd could see dents forming on the outside. He could see chips of metal flying off as the relentless stream of bullets chewed away at his defense.

"Lloyd!" Faria cried out, clutching his arm. "My fire didn't work! Why didn't it work?"

"Because they're cheating," Lloyd said through gritted teeth. "They have shields that eat magic."

He looked around the inside of his steel cage. It was dark, lit only by the sparks flying from the outside. He needed to think. He needed a plan.

The drones were firing standard ballistic rounds. That was good. It meant they were conserving their energy weapons. But it also meant they had plenty of ammo. If they kept this up, they would eventually chew through the chains. Or worse, the sheer impact would turn the dome into a heated oven.

"Status report," Lloyd muttered.

He activated his [All-Seeing Eye]. His vision shifted. The steel chains became transparent wireframes. He looked through them, staring at the drones outside.

He saw the blue shimmering fields around them. Anti-Magic Lattices. They were generating a frequency that disrupted the formation of mana. That’s why Faria’s fire had fizzled out. Any spell cast at them would be destabilized before it could do any damage.

"Clever little tin cans," Lloyd thought. "You brought the perfect counter to a fantasy world."

But Lloyd wasn't from a fantasy world. Not originally.

He watched the drones. They were firing in a coordinated pattern. Two were suppressing him, while the other three were flanking, moving to get a better angle. They were learning. Adapting.

"They're not just shooting," Lloyd realized. "They're analyzing. They're testing the density of the metal. They're looking for a weak point."

He had to act. He couldn't just sit here and be a turtle. Turtles ended up as soup.

"Listen to me," Lloyd said, turning to his wives. "Stay here. Do not leave this dome. Do not try to cast spells. Do not try to negotiate. Just sit tight and look pretty."

"And where are you going?" Amina demanded, her eyes flashing. "You're not going out there!"