Until death?

by Andur

  Nicosar's broken horn didn't heal because he has mixed blood.

  Now that I think about it, how did it get broken in the first place? Couldn't Nicosar just have healed himself?

  “Don't do that, the healers said it wouldn't grow correctly if you disturbed it!” Celes snatches my hand. “Haaaah. You have no idea how annoying it is.”

  “Just make that -no pain- thing of yours then.” She is much too concerned about me.

  “Don't want to. It works by cutting my nerves and healing them afterwards. It would be a pain if they healed on their own in the wrong way. This isn't a really good long term solution.” -Me

  “Then deal with it like an adult.” -Celes

  “Though your horn surely isn't why you called us all to remain here for an important discussion. I have to manage the other part of the continent you know? There aren't less idiots there. So if it's nothing important, I would like to do some real work.” Arthur crosses his arms before his chest. Seems like he is a little stressed at the moment.

  “Oh, sorry I just wanted to inform you about the end of the world.” I nod and smile, while everyone looks at me with shocked faces.

  “From the begining please?” -Nicosar

  “When I was unconscious, Seria paid me a visit. She told me that she has a little rebellion going against the Council. You remember? The rulers of the multiverse. Because of certain circumstances, they can't visit this world. It lies within a void zone, that's a space where god's can't leave and enter as they please. It seems that Tjenemit, one of the Council members, managed to get information about a summoning circle for him to this world. The stupid Meltheims found it and believed the promises that came with it. Seria is unable to come here in person, because it would give Tjenemit immediate access, if he followed her. But it seems like she is preparing to fight him here, as soon as he is summoned. If she is serious with her rebellion, it's a good chance for her to catch a Council-member on his own and without assistance of the others. So she isn't opposed to let him be summoned.” I take a deep breath and look at the others.

  “But... but.... That will be Armageddon!” Celes screams at me.

  “Can you explain why Seria should want to rebel against the Council. I still don't get the whole power issue outside my own world.” Arthur asks with a pale face, so Celes and I take another hour to explain the real issue of existence and reincarnation.

  “So the Council dictates what every god is allowed to do? Aaand they punished you, because you killed each other?” Katrine asks with a surprised look. Both Celes and I nod.

  “But you see, we were stuck with each other for over a thousand years. If we were allowed to abandon our jobs, anyone of us could have just left and gone somewhere else. The current system is partly at fault for our fight.” -Celes

  “To think that being a god is just a job for my daughter ....” Katrine shakes her head and massages her temples.

  “Well Seria will fight Tjenemit here. And that will be most likely cause serious destruction.” I sum it up.

  “What scale are we talking about?” -Arthur

  “When Angrod and I got personal, we wrecked a world. So no point in hiding anywhere.” Celes grumbles.

  “I don't think Seria would do that if she thought, the destruction would be so big. We should still consider evacuating as much of the north as we can around the City of Seria. Just in case everything goes well.” -Me

  “We should evacuate the north, just in case everything goes well....” Ireth whispers to herself.

  “Maybe we can stop the summoning?” Nicosar asks hopefully.

  I shrug my shoulders. “Maybe, but Seria was pretty sure, I wouldn't manage it. At least we still have a few years to put our stuff in order.” I straighten my suit.

  “How long exactly?” Ireth asks.

  “At least three years if I interpret the newest readings correctly. In five years the summoning should be done for sure. It's hard to tell without any data directly from the source.” -Me

  “So we will have three to five years. At least that's enough time to prepare.” Arthur talks to himself.

  “I will have my project finished in three years too. It will be a close call, but in three years we will have a weapon which is able to break the shield. So it will be nice if you could plan an offensive for that time Arthur.” -Me

  “Hoh, breaking the shield? Would you explain that.” -Arthur

  “I would rather not. I have it sealed up inside my facility and all my employees took a magical oath to keep the secret. It's not that I don't trust anyone of you, but it's better if everything is uncovered at the last moment. I want to keep this secret because the Meltheims have already proven that they are capable of setting up disturbances for us. Even though they are hiding behind a shield.” I jump out of the throne.

  “If you want to make it a surprise that badly, then I hope it will be a really good surprise.” -Arthur

  “Don't worry, I think it will be quite a show.” I grin at Arthur. “I will now go and read a good book, I have found a pretty smart author.”

  “No you can't! You need to come with me.” Celes suddenly grabs my arm and pulls me off.

  “What, where are we going?” -Me

  “Surprise!”

  Celes leads me outside the palace, where Rose is waiting with the car. But no matter how often I ask, she won't answer my questions.

  Minutes later, we stop on the Cygnus property and I am led inside. After a few corners, we arrive at a somewhat big room, where a few familiar faces shoot confetti at me. The whole room is styled out for a party.

  “Congratulations on becoming king!” Celes gives me a box of chocolate. Oohhohoho.... I could make a habit out of becoming king.

  The Cygnus siblings, Tanja, Gabriel, Iris, Sven and Sandra congratulate me too. Everyone of the special class has paid a visit.

  Everyone is giving me chocolate and congratulating me? Has Celes told them about my weak point?

  “They all wanted to get on your good side, after they saw the coronation.” Celes whispers to me.

  “Hey, Hey, Angrod can you teach me that soul-thing of yours. I have to learn it! You can still interrogate the bastard after you killed him! Can you? I have to learn that!” Tanja looks at me with sparkling eyes.

  “Huh, maybe I will teach you the training basics during class, but I takes a lot of time to master it.” I answer.

  “Really? Yay! You know, I always hated that torture stuff to get information! All the blood and body-parts, it's too dirty in my opinion. If I could learn that, everything would be much cleaner!” Tanja nods to herself while talking aloud.

  What the hell did her parents teach to her!?

  I start to eat chocolate, while I have a nice conversation with the others. It's nice that my coronation didn't change all that much in our relationship. At least I hope that's the case.

  42 - A picnic in the woods?

  I feel like I am a pet! Yes, if I think about it, our relationship is like I am the pet and Celes is the owner. When I do a pleasing trick I get fed and otherwise I have to stand on guard.

  It's infuriating! I am the king of a country! Somehow I have to get the upper hand in our relationship. If I could just remember one weakness of hers from our past life.

  Just a single weakness would be enough, but nothing comes to my mind. I remember that she always jumped at every plea of our children.

  When I wanted her to do something, I always used our children as middlemen. Ugh, nothing like that available now...... and I am not sure if having children in our current relationship would be a good idea.

  And we will get married in a few months! Our parents are already making preparations and are sending out invitations. It looks like they want to throw a party for the whole world!

  Huh, I guess they -are- throwing a party for the whole world! Stricc and Tirna will be officially one country after our marriage.

  Every weekend Celes drags me off to an event. She always chooses loud places with many peopl
e. I really hate those, you can't talk to each other and in the end you just sit side by side and watch the performance. Maybe I should try to go on the offensive? It would surely surprise her if I would take her out on a date by myself?

  If I would do something like that, it would surely catch her off guard and maybe I can find a weakness. But where should I bring her to? Hmmmm.....

  ****

  Where should I take him to? Maybe the national flower garden or the new theatre? I can't decide what I like better. No point in asking the hermit, he would surely visit a library if he could choose.

  I am in my room and planning our trip for today. There are still some points on my list, which have to be accomplished.

  Muahaha. I could do this and that. And afterwards.... I just have to make sure that he can't escape.

  “Celes.” A voice behind me shocks me and I cover my list.

  “What are you hiding? It's that perverted list of yours isn't it? Have you thought up a few new idiotic points for it?” The hermit asks from behind me.

  “It's not perverted! It's a guide to a decent life! And what are you doing inside here? How did you even get in here? I was sure I locked the door!” I ask flabbergasted.

  “I just teleported here. Oh, and you locked the door? Where you about to release some urges?” He asks with a smirk on his face.

  “Noooo? And don't you have any common decency? Just waltzing inside a lady's room? At least knock first!” I am angry. He acts like this place belongs to him.

  “Hoh, Sorry. I didn't think that you would have anything to hide. But if you need some time for yourself first, then my surprise can wait.” He looks at me with an interrogative expression.

  Since when did the stupid hermit do anything for me on his own? That's suspicious! On the other hand, he gave me the ring. So he has his generous moments.....

  “Umm. No I have nothing planned? Though we have a date today you know? Not a chance that you could distract me from it.” -Me

  “Then we can take look at the surprise, care to join me?” He offers his arm to invite me. Something is definitely wrong.

  After wavering for a moment, I grab his arm and stand up.

  “Then let's go.”

  The surroundings distort and are replaced by a wide grassy plateau. A valley stretches out in front of us and at the bottom is a forest with a lake. “Huh? Did you just teleport us?”

  “Geez, and there I thought the picnic would be a surprise.” He sits down on the blanket under us and starts to unpack a huge basket with food. “I told Rose to prepare something really good after I found this place. We are in the southern area, which is mostly uninhabited. It took me a few days to clean this mountain valley from all the monsters, so we could have a nice evening here. It's really cool when the sun sets and the whole sky is painted in red. Why are you feeling my forehead?”

  “I just wanted to make sure you don't have a fever.” I sit down beside him and help to unpack. “So if I understand it correctly you took care of today's date?”

  “Huh, why not? You are planning all the others. And you always bring us to noisy places with many people. So I thought I would take you somewhere quiet for once. Otherwise talking would be just a huge pain.” -Angrod

  Huh? He wants to talk to me? The other places were too noisy? So he didn't like the dates I organized? I am not sure if I should hit or kiss him.

  “Here that stuff is really good, you have to try it.” He holds a piece of meat into my face and I open my mouth, so he can feed it to me.

  “It's good did Rose make that?” I ask. “I think so, she is really talented with cold food.” He smiles at me.

  What's up with this pink atmosphere? Is the hermit sick? Or could he really be trying on his own? Oh my, didn't I want this all the time? Why can't I just believe him? Um, I will just believe in his good intentions! Yes. That's the right choice!

  We sit down together to eat the wonderful food.

  “I chose this place because we will have a nice sunset soon.” He continues to explain.

  “W... wait, does that mean you just teleported us to another time zone? How far can you teleport with two people? It's incredible hard to teleport short distances alone and you just took me with you like nothing!” I am shocked.

  “Huh? It's not that hard, really. Other magicians just teach that teleportation is an incredible complex and dangerous field. But it's not that hard to master if you have reincarnation. I trained long range teleportation before I became a god. It's a handy skill because many worlds don't have a good transportation system. I killed myself a few times in the process, but who cares if you just come back to life anyway. That was when I had a deep depression and concentrated just on honing my skills.” -Angrod

  Ugh. So he killed himself while training teleportation alone. How did you learn to take someone with you? Did you just grab some innocent person from the street and started teleporting around the world? I don't want to think about it.

  It's okay! He may have some really dangerous impulses, but even he wouldn't just start to experiment on random people. Probably he took some guy, who really pissed him off. Yeah that's it.

  “Here, I have another present for you.” He grabs a small box and gives it to me. I open it and there are two nice silver earrings inside. Their style matches my ring, which assists me in casting spells.

  “They are a set with your ring. The ring could only save up a few selected spells on his own. Those earrings supply additional memory, so you can save three times as many spells now. If you don't copy any overly complicated spells, it should be enough for thirty smaller spells. And you can activate the spells by a thought now. It will take some time to learn how to handle it, but it should be much more convenient to use the ring now.” He explains to me in a happy and anticipating voice.

  I blush. Somehow my face feels hot. He really is thinking about me! He wouldn't develop something like that otherwise. He has no use for it. I smile and hug him. “That's such a nice present.”

  He goes stiff when I hug him. Oh, he is still such an innocent boy! Maybe I should? Using the moment I give him a long kiss. He falls backwards and I sit on top of him.

  Then I smile at him. “Ohohoh, it's unfortunate. But we will have to wait with the aftermath until we are married.” I inform him with a smug grin.

  Suddenly his face twists into a devilish grin. “Now I remember! Weren't you actually quite ticklish?” He grabs my belly and..

  “HahaahAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHANOOOHAHAHSTOPPPHAHAHAHAHA”

  *WHACK!*

  Uugh. Stupid hermit! Why do you have to destroy the mood! I just struck him unconscious. Serves you right! If I wouldn't be somewhere in the woods because of you, I would just leave you here and walk home by myself!

  But that reminds me of another item on my list. I pull him upright and lean him against one of the stones. Then I sit on his lap and lean against him.

  Aaaah. That's a nice comfortable position. Much better than the stupid hard earth! I watch the sunset and eat the food until he wakes up.

  “You shouldn't have hit that hard!” He complains.

  “Serves you right! But I forgave you because the sunset is really beautiful.” I answer.

  “I can't feel my feet....” -Angrod

  “Deal with it!” Men don't need feet. They should be happy to be a body pillow!

  “Hrm. If my queen is happy. And I remembered that you are quite ticklish, I guess today wasn't that bad.” He hugs me from behind.