I teleported back to the ark entrance, still lost in my thoughts. Erryn had admitted that she didn't understand people, but I had to admit I was just as clueless as she was. Starting from the day I was born, when I'd failed to see how badly my own mother was terrified of me. Utterly misunderstanding Lord Reid. Blaming Camus for sundering his family when the one of them that needed help the most was him. Missing all the hints Cluma had flung into my face. Desperately trying to 'save' the twins when they were glad of what was happening to them.

People were complicated.

When I walked through the door and into a scene of Cluma naked, lying on her stomach while Lily rolled a large ball of slime up and down her back, I couldn't even muster the willpower to be surprised.

"Hi. I'm back. Thanks for waiting."

"Oh, welcome back," said Lily, not stopping whatever it was she was doing.

"Hi," purred Cluma. "We definitely need to visit Synklisi regularly. Second best massage ever."

That caused Lily to stop. "Second best?"

Cluma just giggled, but the fact she was still capable of coherent speech was enough of a clue to let me know that the tail brushing I'd given her had been better.

I flopped down onto my back next to her. I needed to sleep. To just not do anything for a few days. Did this world have actual libraries? Not what they called a 'library' with a bunch of desks and crystals, but one with paper books, that had actual stories in? Dawnhold certainly didn't, but I had freedom to explore anywhere in the world now. Curling up with a few days' worth of reading material wouldn't go amiss.

"What's wrong?" asked Lily, peering down at me. "If you want a massage too, you need to take that armour off."

"No thanks," I answered. "It's just that I've realised how right your mother was. About everything. People are weird."

"What happened with the twins? Couldn't you solve their problem?" asked Cluma.

"They didn't want me to. In their eyes, it wasn't a problem at all, and I'd completely failed to consider that anyone could think that. For having so many sensory skills, it's amazing how blind I am."

"Of course mother's right," muttered Lily, ever the mummy's girl. Or mummy's slime. "Anyway, if you're finished here, we should go. Thanks to you stealing our dragon, we're going to have to walk back to Synklisi."

"Speak for yourself. Me and Cluma can teleport." Could I teleport Lily too? On the one hand, with her being a mana-eating monster, draining her of mana sounded like a terminally bad idea. On the other, given that we shared a portion of our souls, she might be uniquely receptive to my mana. Best not to risk it. I was done with the dangerous experiments.

"Don't be mean," said Cluma. "If she has to walk back, we can at least keep her company."

"Yeah, I agree," I said, still not moving from the floor. "We can give [Weft Walk] a go."

Cluma pulled herself to her feet and started redressing in her armour, not even bothering to duck around a corner or something. She was still every bit as comfortable naked now as she was at eight years old, when she first moved in with us and I needed to learn to navigate our shack with my eyes closed. Stupid Earth baggage. And yet I'd got used to it so quickly. Maybe the twins were onto something, wanting to forget.

Then I frowned as I got a full frontal view of her chest.

"What's that scar?" I asked. In the centre of her chest, above her breasts, was an irregularly shaped patch of unnaturally white skin. It certainly hadn't been there the last time I'd seen her with her clothes off. "Why haven't you had it healed? When did that even happen?"

Had it come from when she'd run the dungeon on her own? Did she decide to keep one of the sage's burns as a battle-scar, to match Camus? That would... be pretty bad-arse, actually. Father and daughter matching scars.

In response, she frowned right back. "Don't look at me like that. You gave it to me!"

What? I scarred her? When? How?

She sighed as she pulled on her armoured bodysuit, covering up the mark. "Don't look so confused. It's not a scar. More like a giant anti-freckle. It came with the black hair and violet eyes."

Oh. It really was my fault, then. And she hadn't even felt the need to complain about it to me. I suppose it wasn't as visible as her other changes, but still... Why hadn't she mentioned it?

Or stated a different way; why had I assumed that the changes I could see were the only ones?

"Any other effects you've noticed?" I asked. "I've already established how blind I am, so might as well carry on the theme."

"No, there's nothing else. And its only some colour changes. It's not important."

"Effects from what?" asked Liv, but I ignored her, closing my eyes as I drifted off in thought. Right at the forefront of the list of people I didn't understand, I think I needed to include myself. For a brief moment there, I thought I'd need to take responsibility for harming Cluma again, and the resulting feelings were... complicated.

"Yes," I said, smiling to myself. It was going to happen at some point, so I might as well embrace it. Perhaps I wasn't in the best mental condition right now, but I really didn't care. Heck, I think it had long since been obvious that having forty-something years of memories didn't mean I had the maturity of an adult. When it came to adulting, I was a complete failure.

"Huh?" she asked, pausing in the process of hooking on her breastplate.

"I promised to give you an answer within two years. It was a bit earlier than expected, but that was it. I said yes."

Cluma froze. Even her ears ceased twitching, and her tail went rigid.

"But... But..." she managed after twenty seconds of pause. "Didn't you... Aren't you...?"

"Yeah, it's still weird," I said, taking pity on her and interrupting her stammering. "But as I just said, people are weird. It's what we do."

"That's... not the same sort of weird, is it?"

"Are you going to accept my answer, or try to talk me out of it?" I complained.

Cluma remained unmoving for a few seconds more, before letting go of her breastplate in mid-air. She managed to dive on top of me and launch straight into a hug, somehow wriggling her arms underneath me, before it even hit the ground.

"Did I miss something?" asked Lily. "I feel like I'm missing some context here."

"The context is that I'm a dense idiot," I said as Cluma's breastplate thudded into the metal floor. I'd have hugged back, but thanks to my prone position, she'd managed to pin my arms to my side. "And I always will be an idiot. I'm going to need to rely on you to stop me doing anything too stupid, so if you want to back out, now's your chance," I added to Cluma.

"Nu-uh," she said.

"That makes even less sense!" complained Lily.

"I know. Don't worry, it doesn't have to."

The normal method of detaching a parasitic Cluma was via headpats, but now my arms were pinned. Was I stuck forever, trapped in an eternal hug? I suppose I could use [Redistribute] if the situation became critical, and I risked starving to death. The thought made me giggle.

"Are you sure you're okay?" asked Lily. "You seem... drunk?"

Cluma flashed a look of alarm before climbing off me.

"Can't be—I haven't had any alcohol in days," I said. "I'm just... I dunno. Maybe it's ennui? Something I considered one of the most important things I needed to do, that's been nagging at my mind for most of winter, turned out to be completely pointless."

"Lily's right. You're definitely acting strange," said Cluma.

I sighed and climbed to my feet.

"Am I? Maybe I've been acting strange my entire life, and now I'm acting normal. Anyway, let's get going. Is there even enough time to get back to Synklisi before nightfall? Lily may not need to sleep, but I damn well do."

The pair of girls gave me worried looks, but Cluma retrieved her breastplate, and the two of them followed me out anyway. The door closed behind us with a clang, and I felt the recoil as my link to the lump of flesh I'd left at the System control crystal snapped, costing me three points of health. I couldn't even keep the link, let alone use [Redistribute]. I was locked out of the ark once more.

[Weft Walk] turned out not to work on Lily, the skill completely refusing to connect with her. Not a complete surprise, given that she was a monster, but it meant we had a long run ahead of us. Thankfully, me and Cluma could sprint without tiring, while Lily could... be a slime. I don't think there was any word for her high-speed method of movement, which consisted of using her slime to slingshot her core forward at high speed, which pulled the slime behind it, in complete disregard for how physics was supposed to work. Could she pull herself up by her own shoelaces too? She'd have to wear some shoes first, but it made about the same amount of sense.

Despite our reasonable speed, there was no way we'd make it to Synklisi before night fell. "Are there any settlements nearby we can stop at?" I asked. The last time I'd made this journey, I'd had a thousand dwarfs with me, and hadn't even tried to organise anything myself. I'd teleported back to the Emerald Caverns and called for backup.

And, had I not been used to naked people at that point, the thousand naked dwarfs would have disembarrassed me of my Earth baggage very quickly.

"No idea. I've hardly left Synklisi before," answered Lily. Cluma was equally clueless.

"Want me to jump to Synklisi and find out?" I asked. "Or I can buy some camping supplies?" Assuming any shops were still open. It was already late. Something else I should start keeping in my [Item Box] if I was going to be travelling by means other than teleportation or portal.

"Nah, let me," said Lily, doing her core-launch trick again but this time aiming straight upwards. She sailed high enough into the air that I couldn't see her against the sky, before falling back down and splattering against the ground.

"Are you okay?" asked Cluma. "That looked painful!"

"I'm a slime. That's supposed to happen," said the puddle, before contracting and turning back into a Lily. "There's a farming village a few kilometres over there," she added, pointing.

"A farming village isn't likely to have an inn," I pointed out.

"Better than nothing. There're no towns in sight, and you can always teleport later."

It turned out to be a beastkin village, the majority being rabbitkin. I couldn't recall seeing one of them before, and their huge ears looked completely impractical. I was glad Cluma hadn't stuck any of them onto me.

As to how I knew the majority of the village were rabbitkin, despite the late hour and the way that the houses weren't transparent, it was because five dozen or so people were lined up in front of us, wielding pitchforks and scythes, all of which were aimed at us. Or at least, at Lily. Travelling with a monster had its disadvantages.

A line of villagers ready to defend themselves against slimes brought back memories. I couldn't say I ever expected to be at the other end of the pitchforks, though.

"Sorry to scare you," I called. "This is Lily. She's friendly."

"That's a monster!" shouted a particularly elderly rabbitkin. The village elder, perhaps?

"Can you tell them she's safe?" I asked Cluma quietly. "They're more likely to believe you than me."

She briefly looked like she wanted to ask a question, her mouth even mouthing a few unintelligible words, before she stopped and turned back to the village. "It's okay, she's not going to hurt you. She's friendly."

I watched the ripple of relief spread across the villagers as they relaxed. Cluma didn't look at all perturbed by how the villagers' reactions had differed so vastly between me and her. And the twins wanted to be a part of that...

Some more apologies and some negotiation later, and the three of us were camping out in a spare shack. I had plenty of food in my [Item Box], and even some magic crystals, so the shelter was all we really needed. If only I'd got around to stashing the mattress I'd promised myself, it would have been perfect.

"What do you think of this world?" I asked Cluma, as the two of us lay down, Cluma attached to me like a limpet, while Lily blobbed in a corner. It wasn't as if Lily needed to sleep. She could have gone on without us throughout the night, but for some reason her and Cluma insisted on travelling together. What did they get up to while I was away?

"Huh? What sort of question is that?"

"A pertinent one. I've spent the entirety of my new life comparing this world to Earth, and after being blind-sided by the twins earlier, I was thinking that perhaps it's time I stopped."

"It's got my friends in, so obviously this world is the best world," she answered matter-of-factly.

Of course. That was a very Cluma answer.

"What about you, Lily?" I asked.

"What is this? Some sort of mid-life crisis?"

"Hah, possibly. Youngest mid-life crisis ever. But I'd still appreciate an answer." How does she even know what a mid-life crisis is? That bookcase of hers has a lot to answer for.

"This is the world that mother made. Of course I love it!"

Obviously. Both such simple answers, in such a complicated world. And Lily wasn't even brainwashed.

"Yeah, I love this world too," I agreed. "I love my family. I love my friends. I love Cluma. And even Lily is tolerable."

"Oi!"

I laughed as a slime tendril prodded me in the side, then closed my eyes and did my best to put aside the thoughts that were playing over and over in my head, of a pair of baby harpies, embracing their chains. It was so tempting to explain. To not accept their decision and tell them why they were wrong. To share my experiences, of all the times I'd watched people's memories tampered with or thoughts manipulated. To share what I could see with [Soul Perception]. But that wasn't fair. They had the right to decide for themselves. My opinions were just that: opinions.

I fell into a disturbed sleep, dreaming strange dreams of a big group of monsters turning up at my home one day, apologising for Erryn's mistake and explaining that they needed to take back my [Unbound Soul] trait.

The next day we finished our return to Synklisi, causing a minor panic as we walked in with Lily and attracting more ire from Dru'hazzak as a result. Cluma was laughing her head off, and then gave the vexed demon a nice big hug to apologise. I teleported us back home, postponing our shopping trip to some other day. Or week. Or maybe season. Could I just climb into bed and not get out till summer?

"Did you mean what you said yesterday?" asked Cluma, as I dropped her off at her home. "You didn't seem quite yourself..."

I looked at the small amount of Cluma that was visible under all the black leather, which was more than enough to see the worry in her face.

"I can't promise I'll be ready to join you this summer, but yes, I meant every word."

Cluma smiled a smile every bit as wide as when she'd received her enchanted clothing and earring at her birthday party. An infectious smile so big that it needed to expand onto my face too in order to fit.

After a set of such crushing goodbye hugs that I was glad I was wearing armour, and maybe another quick peck to her forehead, I teleported back to the village.

"Welcome home," called mum from our living room, somehow picking up on my appearance in my bedroom.

I'd spend a few days doing nothing, except maybe investigating how Remous was getting on with his still designs, and then it would be time to travel the world on a grand adventure. Or at least, as much of an adventure as we could have when I could teleport back home each evening. When we could teleport back home, I should say. I'd never had a girlfriend before, in either world. Thankfully, Cluma had never had a boyfriend either, so we could figure things out together. Possibly while up to our armpits in monster guts. I wonder how many dungeons we'll manage to clear together?

Which reminds me; I really should let mum know. "Mum?" I called, refusing to get up from my bed. "Me and Cluma are dating."

"Oh, finally!" exclaimed mum. "Dense as the pair of you are, your dad and I were worried we'd need to stage an intervention."

Seriously? Them too? Was it that obvious to everyone other than me?