“Hah…. hah… this isn’t so hard.” A human spoke up within a deep forest, clenching his fists. He could feel the new power spreading through him, the golden light that had become his soul. For most people, this pain would have crushed them. Evidence of this was the thin trail of red dripping from the corner of his mouth.

“Three steps to ascension, was it? Well, I’ve climbed the first step.” A wicked grin covered the man’s face, his bright yellow eyes piercing the night. The blood not only showed the level of pain this man had undergone, but also the fact that he had skipped the elevation of his body to the Perfect Self.

He clenched his fists tight, staring off into the horizon. Already, he was planning his next step along the path of godhood.

“Mister Kyr, I’m back!” Lydia called out, sliding her bag off of her shoulder and setting it on a small table inside the dining room. After ten years had passed, the young lycan woman had grown into a beautiful young maiden. Her figure had developed, her hair grown out and kept in a ponytail, and her smile… well, it seemed to be permanently carved into her features.

“Hmm?” She blinked a bit, noticing that Clover wasn’t home. “I wonder if he went out to hunt. Elijah, are you able to sense anything?”

A young man walked into the room, his hair a glowing blonde. He had golden bands suspended in the air around his wrists and ankles, and wore a deep blue shirt with jeans. “I can’t feel him. Let me check.” He lifted his right hand up, the golden band floating forward. “Repeat for me the scenes of the past.”

After he said that, the space within the ring seemed to distort, becoming a window through time. Elijah was able to see Clover coming home, and going about his day normally. Thankfully, the view seemed to focus on him, following him through the house. However, a few hours prior, he seemed to think of something.

Suddenly, he lifted his head and spoke. “Lydia, I’m going to head out for a little bit. I need to meet up with some old friends, so I’m taking Val with me. If I’m not back by the time you get home, well… you’ve always been a better cook than me, anyways. See you when I get back!”

Ever since Lydia had come up with this convenient little spell for Elijah, it had become their new way to leave messages for one another. When Lydia asked why Clover wanted to do things like that, he had simply smiled, saying that it sounded like a fun idea.

“Hmph… I’m not a kid anymore, Mister Kyr.” Lydia puffed her cheeks out slightly as she said that. She knew by now that he would be safe, he had already proven himself time and again with that.

Clover Kyr sat atop a tall mountain, smiling softly towards the grassy landscape that spread out before him. Standing next to him was the armored maiden Val, whose face seemed to be entirely expressionless. Ever since Val had been ‘reborn’, her growth had been… rushed would be the best term.

While her body had physically developed to the point where she looked as she ‘once did’, her mind was vastly different. They played it off as a simple injury to his familiar, one which had left her permanently damaged. But the truth was that she simply did not have any hope of ‘recovery’ in the first place.

So, while Clover enjoyed the scenery, Val simply… stood there. No joy or irritation could be found in her gaze. She was unfeeling, obedient to Clover simply because of the nature of their relationship. In a sense, she was closer to a machine.

Clover let out a content sigh, slowly standing up and patting off his pants. “Let’s get back, Val. I’m sure Lydia will be missing us by now.” As he spoke, he began walking through the air, each step causing him to accelerate.

Val watched him leave, and then looked back behind her at the carnage that lay behind the mountain. The beast tide that had been beaten, shattered by Clover, bodies lying in jagged chunks. They were only an hour from the city, at which point it was no telling how many people would be killed.

She thought about that, about how they had charged out here to face them alone, and simply shook her head. Logically, she knew that these beasts were likely drawn by a primal instinct, recognizing the suppressed power within Clover. Rather than leaving the city for good, however, he simply chose to fight these monster swarms as they formed. To her, such a situation was irrational.

Regardless… she had her orders, and so she turned to follow her foolish master. Once she had left the scene, the bodies of the monsters began to break apart, forming countless specks of dust that faded into the wind.

“Yeah, I got it.” I closed the chat window with an amused smile, shaking my head. Ryone was laying down on the couch, her head in my lap as she looked up at me.

“Sarah again?” She asked with a knowing smile.

“That’s right.” This time, it had actually been Sarah that had reached out to me, instead of the other way around. “She saw my game on the market, and wanted to ask if we’d be able to give her a copy.”

“Asking a bit much, isn’t she?” Ryone asked, her smile turning playful. “An eight thousand point world in exchange for a twelve thousand point one? Though, I suppose…”

“Right?” I nodded. “She has a God of Games, just like we do. We don’t actually have to spend the points to buy it for her. And, it’ll clear our debt… so I was thinking about heading over there some time with Aurivy to give her a copy of the core information.”

“Being able to repay our debt without actually spending anything would be quite nice.” She agreed readily. “I say go for it. We’ve already released the base elemental seed system, so it’s only a matter of time until ‘spinoff’ games are created.”

“I told her that we’d be over in a few days. I just have some things I want to take care of here, first.” I reached down to stroke Ryone’s hair as I spoke, the action causing a smile to bloom on the elf’s face.

“I take it you liked spending time with Tsubaki again?” She asked, a mischievous glint in her eyes that caused me to laugh.

“It was nice. She changed a lot more than I expected. I think being properly challenged and having Dana around has really helped her come out of her shell.”

“Though she still didn’t tell you about how she wrecked your citadel.”

I froze at that, my hand still in Ryone’s hair. “How she what?” I knew that the citadel looked a bit off when I got there, but I knew it wouldn’t be too bad for Tsubaki not to bring it up.

Ryone covered her mouth. “Oops~.” She let out a playful giggle. “When the two of them were first experimenting with fourth tier magic. That’s why they made that facility, after all.”

I took a deep breath, briefly closing my eyes. “Well… it was fixed. That’s what’s important. Now, at least I know what she was so worried about. And why you insisted on me meeting her face to face.”

Within the dark room of the Core of Shadows, the name they had given the first layer of their Shadow Fyor, Thelsa pushed open a door and walked in with sagging steps. Her eyes, red with exhaustion, scanned the area for somewhere to simply collapse. As Petra was sitting in the chair, Thelsa moved for the couch instead.

Seeing her ‘big sister’ collapse haphazardly on the couch, Petra let out a light laugh. In her hand, she was playing with the golden AC unit. “Tough day at work, Thelsa?” She asked, turning her head to regard Thelsa.

“Why did I let you girls talk me into this…” Thelsa groaned. “The assassin and martial artist trainers are up and ready, now. It wasn’t easy finding ways to set up assassin training without killing the other shadows…”

“Two at once?” Petra looked on in surprise. “That would explain your exhaustion… I think those were the last of your classes, weren’t they?”

“Nuh-uh.” Thelsa brought one hand up to wipe along her face, cleansing it of sweat. “Still need the elemental monk and elementalist. Then I’ll have everyone. Also, made a bunch of basic shadows today. Will see how they turn out.”

“Mhm.” Petra nodded her head, stowing away the AC unit as she stood, walking over towards Thelsa. “You get some rest for now, you seem worn out. I’ll go make some more shadows for you for a while.” There was an innocent smile on Petra’s face as she offered that. With her ability, she had a limited control over this shadow realm, but she had recently learned how to create those basic shadows by studying Thelsa in action.

Thelsa, meanwhile, eyed her warily, before her desire to sleep overcame her curiosity. “Okay, but no funny business.”

“I promise~!” Petra nodded her head, thinking internally. Totally serious, nothing funny about a legion of trained shadow assassins.

As she thought that, Petra hummed happily to herself, moving over to push open the door of the room. Only to be caught by Maria on her way out. “Got a plan, munchkin?” Maria asked with a knowing grin.

“Maaaybe~.” Petra responded by sticking out her tongue. Out of all of Thelsa’s shadows, she and Maria got along the best. “Want in?”

“Totally.” The warrior shadow laughed, pushing off from the wall and following Petra.

The crystalline form of Tower sat within a large, stone room. Ever since his little ‘adventure’ with the other gods, he had begun to truly understand the potential scope of his power. Due to this realization, he had shifted his workshop, his personal dungeon. He didn’t want anyone to find him easily, so he went where nobody would think to look… the moon.

After the incident had ended, it had taken a few weeks for his divinity to return to normal levels. Ever since then, he had only felt a trickle of the power he had obtained in that brief moment. But, at his core, he knew… he knew that he would need that power again.

Since then, he had been experimenting. Creating monsters using different methods in the hope that one would be able to ‘pray’ to him and feed back a small amount of divinity. Thus far, his experiments were less than successful. Monsters he created himself could not in turn fuel him with their prayers, and grant a net gain in energy.

This led him to think of alternative solutions. Dungeons were revered by adventurers and merchants alike, but such reverence paled in comparison. What he needed was a world, a planet where the people knew him and exalted him.

Of course, he couldn’t just claim one of the existing worlds for that purpose. That would be going against Mother’s wishes, after all. No, he needed to find his own world. Or… perhaps, instead of finding one…

A thought flashed through Tower’s mind, and he vanished from within his moon base. There was still one way that he could potentially gain extra energy, but it would require a considerable investment. If he simply needed a planet, why not become one himself?