It was days since Jericho had dropped the revelation of his origins on her, almost randomly after they indulged in an act of intimacy. Hestia had two days to come to terms with it, but she still struggled with it. It was just so…
Less than a year ago, she was one of the few gods left in Heaven, stuck overlooking countless souls as she rubber-stamped them to be reincarnated. She knew first hand just how overworked the gods left in Heaven were and how they jealousy looked down at the ones on vacation. Before, each soul would be judged and punished or rewarded for their deeds in life. Now, with a skeleton crew in Heaven, all souls just got reincarnated or tormented when a petty god was in need of some stress relief. It wasn't right, but it happened more than a little.
Still, to take a soul and change it...Hestia wished she could say she was surprised by it, but she wasn't. If anything, it was more surprising that what was done to Jericho wasn't done to more souls -- altered in ways to break the carefully crafted game the gods on the lower world enjoyed. A spiteful move that would entertain the ones that looked on from above. Two birds with one stone.
Jericho's altered falna. That Skill Gamer Body. Those weren't the results of a mistake on her end. Jericho's soul and body were changed in a fundamental way that Hestia didn't fully understand. Nor did she have any idea which god could have done it -- there were only a couple dozen gods left in Heaven, and she could easily see every single one of them doing something like this if the idea struck them.
"Haa…" Hestia sighed, her shoulders slumping as she felt the beginnings of a headache. She thought about what he said nearly nonstop for days now, trying to think of something to do about it. But, she couldn't. If she had access to her arcanum, then it would be a different story, but she didn't. All she could do was plan for the future, support her child, and make sure the worst-case scenarios never came to pass.
Which was why Hestia found herself walking down the familiar hallways that lead to Hephustus's office. She needed advice more than anything. Jericho was advancing at an incredible pace. She didn't know much about normal adventurers, but it was easy to see that Jericho's growth was abnormal. It wouldn't be long before the Guild took notice of it, or worse, the gods.
With a plan in action, Hestia knocked on the door to her friend's office-
"You can come in if you're not here for money," Hephustus welcomed her, somehow knowing that it was her. Pouting, Hestia threw open the door, striding into her office with her arms crossed.
"I don't need money!" Hestia half yelled at her friend, who simply stamped a piece of paper with her seal. That much was true. Jericho was bringing in a lot of money now. Yesterday, he brought home thirty thousand valis, and that was apparently after he split the spoils with his supporter evenly. Their nest egg grew until it no longer fit in her hiding place.
"Then what can I do for you?" Hephaestus asked, glancing up as she stamped her seal again.
Hestia uncrossed her arms, recalling why she was here. She crossed the distance after closing the door behind her, taking a seat in a soft leather chair. Hestia took in a deep breath before she bowed her head until her forehead was nearly touching her knees. "I need your advice!"
Hephaestus sighed, the leather creaked as she leaned back in her chair. "About what?" Hephaestus asked, sounding more exasperated than annoyed. Hestia could hardly blame her for it -- this was the second time in as many days that she came for advice from her friend. "And stop bowing, please. I'm going to strangle Takemikazuchi when I see him for teaching you that…"
Hestia refused to raise her head. Of all the favors Hestia had ever asked, this was possibly the greatest one so far. And the most important. "Hephaestus...is there a way I can make my child's status look like something else?" Hestia asked, still bowing.
It wouldn't be long before Jericho tried to go down the eighth floor, or deeper. At the rate he was going, it would be less than a week before he was on the tenth floor. Soon, the Guild was going to start noticing something. At first, they would probably think that he was getting help from another adventurer, but as soon as they realized that Jericho was strong enough to do it himself, the Guild would accuse her of hiding his true level or something.
The only way they could refute the charge would be to show them Jericho's status. And that would be the final nail in the coffin. Jericho would be treated like a toy, or stripped of his falna and exiled from the city. She would be sent back up to Heaven, even if it wasn't her fault. They needed a way to make Jericho's status to look normal.
"Hestia...what's going on with that child of yours? Why would you need to hide his status? You've already hidden it from sight, haven't you?" Hephaestus questioned, her tone still sounding exasperated, but it couldn't hide the suspicious undertone.
"...Jericho has a Skill that makes his growth...explosive. He's already on the seventh floor," she informed, and that seemed to catch Hephaestus off guard.
"How- I, no, don't tell me," Hephaestus said, sounding like she really, really wanted to know. A lesser goddess, like Loki, would have demanded to know in exchange for help, but Hephustus was better than that. By miles and miles. "What exactly do you want? To make it where this Skill doesn't show up?"
If only it was that simple, "I...need to make his stats look a certain way too." Hestia added hesitantly, trusting her friend, but there was so much at stake.
"..." Hephaestus fell silent, her mind undoubtedly mulling over what could possibly make her request such a thing. An explanation weighed heavily on her tongue -- she could blame it all on some god up in Heaven that was trying to have a bit of fun at their expense, but Hestia couldn't bring herself to say the words. Maybe Hephustus had enough clout that she could protect them from any consequences of Jericho's falna. Maybe, the gods would understand that they hadn't done anything wrong. Maybe, maybe, maybe.
Hestia wasn't going to risk Jericho's future, his life, on maybes.
"I don't know if something like that is possible," Hephustus admitted, "...but...Hestia, you do realize you'll be lying to the Guild?" Hephaestus said, having more or less guessed what Hestia planned. "You're not going to get off with a slap on the wrist if you get caught."
"I'm absolutely positive," Hestia said, speaking with as much conviction that she could muster even as she continued to bow her head. This could blow up in her face if the Guild ever found out. Orario was a city filled with sharks with the Guild keeping the peace only because the strongest familias allowed them to. Any reprisals would be harsh, to say the least.
"Fine…" Hephaestus said after a moment, "just stop bowing to me." Unlike before, Hestia didn't launch herself at her friend to give her the hug of a lifetime. A weight seemed to be lifted off her shoulders, only when it was gone did she realize it had been crushing her. Instead, a small sigh of relief escaped her as she raised her head. "I have to go to Hermes' familia for this. Their captain has the Mystery development ability, so if it can be made then she can make it. Though, knowing Hermes, he's going to charge out the nose for it."
"I'll pay you back!" Hestia swore, "no matter how long it takes, I'll pay back every single valis!"
Hephaestus let out a small laugh, "it'll take you a couple of decades to do it working at the potato stand." She commented, earning a small wince from Hestia.
"That's fine," Hestia nodded, undeterred. Hermes was the kind of guy that would triple his prices and say he was giving you a friend's discount, worse, he would figure out she wanted the item to trick the Guild, so he was already going to jack up his prices. The jerk.
"Hestia…" Hephaestus opened her mouth to continue, but she paused for a moment. After letting out a sigh of defeat, she continued. "Then why don't you work for me then?"
"Huh?" Hestia blurted, broken from her musing just how deep her debt was going to be.
"Come work for me. A position opened up for a clerk in one of my stores for my level 2 blacksmiths. It's commission-based, so you'll be able to pay off whatever Hermes charges a lot faster if you work hard." Hephaestus offered, a sharp look in her eye. A look that Hestia learned to recognize during the weeks she stayed with her friend. The Look that said 'or else.'
"R-really?" Hestia asked, the offer catching her off guard. "But I thought you were done helping me?" She questioned, unable to stop herself. Before she started coming to Hephaestus for advice, their last meeting hadn't been pleasant. For her, at least. Mostly because it ended with her getting kicked out.
"That was when all you did was sit around and read all day. I've heard good things about the potato food stall you've been working at and I know you're taking running a familia seriously -- you wouldn't be here if you weren't." Hephaestus answered, crossing her arms, giving her a serious look. "But, I have to ask -- is he really worth this, Hestia? If this blows up in your face, then Loki will probably exile you from the city. Or send you back to Heaven if she's in a bad mood."
Others might disagree with Loki, but in the end, their voices didn't matter. In this city, strength was what mattered. Freya and Loki -- their word was law.
"He is," Hestia confirmed with a nod of her head. That was all she had to say. The serious expression on Hephaestus' face melted away, replaced by faint amusement.
"I didn't expect anything different. Though, if I didn't know you any better, I'd say you have a crush on your child-" Hephaestus cut herself off when she must have noticed how quickly Hestia's face turned bright red. "What? Wait, do you-"
"Thank you for your help!" Hestia shouted, jumping to her feet and all but running to the door. "Bye!"
"Wait-"
"BYE!" Hestia practically screamed, interrupting Hephaestus as she threw open the door.
"Hestia!" Hephaestus shouted as Hestia broke out into a Sprint, leaving her friend in the dust.
"TELL ME HOW MUCH IT IS WHEN YOU FIND OUT! BYE HEPHUSTEUS! LOVE YOU!" Hestia screamed as she fled the building. She ignored Hephustus' shouts for her to stop, but she didn't until she was in the elevator and going down. Her face burned, so she buried it in her hands, letting the elevator carry her down.
Maybe...she could have handled that a bit better…
"Haa...I hope Jericho's doing better than me…"
…
I hate getting poisoned. I know that should be a given, but I've never been poisoned before. Well, not counting food poisoning, but that just proved my point since I absolutely loathed having food poisoning. Now that I had suffered real poisoning, I could honestly say that I didn't care for it very much.
Sweat poured off me, my body feeling incredibly hot as I glanced up at a few moths hanging above. They were the size of a seagull, the wings a light purple while the fuzzy stuff at the top of their thorax a darker purple. With every flap of their wings, purple powder fell on top of me, seeping into my skin, further poisoning me.
I jumped into the air, swinging wildly at them. Between my reach and their limited mobility, I sliced through one of them, severing its wings. After stomping on it, I jumped up again and lucked out by getting both of them. They had no defensive abilities beyond flying above you, and after awhile the poison kicked in so other monsters could finish you off.
"Mr. Jericho, here's an antidote," Lili said, offering me a vial filled with a dark purple vial. I wasted no time snatching it from her hands, popping the cork and draining it in one go. Almost instantly, I felt better.
"Thanks, are you feeling okay?" I asked, keeping a watchful eye on the tunnels to our sides. I saw Lili nod out of the corner of my eye before she spoke.
"Lili is fine, her coat protected her from the poison powder," she commented as she began to harvest monster stones. I nodded, keeping a lookout while she worked. There were quite a few corpses, so it would take a few minutes. Which made it the perfect time to catch a breather. "Lili has another mandible," she spoke up, holding it out. "This makes sixty-three."
"Sweet," I said with a nod, watching Lili stuff the monster drop into her bag. The things really were rare, for the most part. I hadn't been keeping track, but it was something like every fifteen dropped one. "Thirty-seven left to go."
"Does Mr. Jericho wish to keep going today?" Lili asked, looking up at me. A sheen of sweat coated her face, and I noticed that it was taking her a little longer to retrieve the stones than normal. Something I noticed was that just because I was carrying her, that didn't mean she was having a relaxing time. Holding onto me proved to be much more tiring than simply walking around. From the looks of it, she was asking since she hoped the answer would be yes.
I checked the time to see it was only an hour before we usually left anyway. Well...might as well, I guess. Not to mention, we already blew through our antidotes.
"Yeah, might as well. Are you done?" I asked, watching her pick up a pair of purple wings that disappeared into her bag. Lili turned around to give me a nod, smiling brightly despite her tired appearance. She usually looked wiped by the end of the day, but if she was asking to call it quits early then there had to be an actual problem. Maybe she was getting overworked?
I did spend something like twelve hours a day down here, whereas most adventurers called it a day after five or so unless they were going deep into the Dungeon.
"Lili is finished! Thank you for understanding Mr. Jericho," Lili said, bowing so low that I'm honestly shocked that she somehow didn't fall over with that stupidly massive bag on her back. "Lili will understand if you want to punish her for being so lazy-"
"No, that's fine, no punishments or anything like that," I hastily cut her off. It still creeped me out when she said stuff like that with her usual chipper tone. "Just don't worry about it, okay? I've been pushing you pretty hard every day without a break so don't worry about it."
"Thank you Mr. Jericho," Lili said, rising back up. I looked at her, my mouth open to say...something. What exactly, I didn't know, but I thought better of it. Words didn't matter to her, only actions did.
"Do you want me to carry your bag?" I offered, starting to walk back towards the exit. Thanks to the maps of the upper floors Eina provided, I already had this floor mapped out. Next to me, Lili shook her head.
"No thank you, Mr. Jericho. Lili can at least do this much," Lili said as we made our way out of the Dungeon.
Our way back was far less eventful than our start of the day. When you knew your way, and the Dungeon didn't bother throwing too much at you as you left, it took about fifteen minutes to reach the Guildhall from the seventh floor. Barely anything at all. Before long, we stood in front of a teller as Lili unloaded our earnings for the day.
"Your total is...fifty-three thousand valis," he said, passing over several heavy bags of gold through the slot. The guy looked up at me, his expression blank, but I didn't miss how he glanced between me and Lili. Though, I paid it no mind because…
I thought our earnings would be higher today. The seventh floor really ramped up the spawn rates compared to the upper floors, and the monster stones were worth more. Over the past ten hours or so, I killed a whole lot of monsters -- easily blowing past my bare minimum of one thousand exp.
I took the bags of gold and turned to Lili. She tried to not stare at them as she fiddled with her straps, a sinking suspicion forming in my gut. Lili...was stealing from me, wasn't she?
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A/N— I'll try to post daily. Powerstones and comments would help, it would mean alot and give me the motivation to continue the story. In fact two chapters a day wouldn't be impossible either.
I'll post an extra chapter every 500ps power stones, no limit!
Thank you for reading, hope you enjoyed.
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