Chapter 9:
Our shrine opened as a ceremony to celebrate our very first harvest on Eden. Our harvest festival didn't have to be authentic because we were the only people celebrating the correct God so we could trendset things however we pleased. The end result was everyone trying out distilled potatoes, grapes, rice, wheat and God knows what other junk we had set aside from our first harvest for the party, getting roaring drunk, and dancing around a gigantic bonfire afforded to us by our virtually limitless backyard woodlands. I exchanged a kiss with every wife when I switched partners to them in our circle dance and before I switched away, which made me thank God for alcohol based on a completely different reason. That's right, I arranged to get little girls drunk so that I could take advantage of their fogged minds and strike at their bodies. I now understood why this was the master plan of about 90% of men on Earth.
Kagome did a great job dancing on stage and beating our ceremonial drum, and then the girls from the studio took her place to keep the dance going, adding their own repertoire of songs one after another. I got to see a live performance of Fire Bomber, Houkago Teatime, μ's, Deedlit on the lute, Sora a capello, Mirajane on acoustic guitar, Wendy and Sherria's sky sisters, Lucy's Lyra, Urara's Yuuki no Door and Rin's Neko Neko song.
Bad or good, we were all too drunk to tell, so we gave a roar of approval after every performance.
Did you know? Fresh vegetables taste much better than the things you find in the supermarket. Because we didn't have to transport our food thousands of miles and warehouse them for weeks before eating, because we were locals who raised our crops merely a summoned monster's flight away, there were no preservatives to spoil the taste. No refrigeration to mess with the internal liquid structures. No pasteurization of our dairy. Everything tasted as God intended without any need for compromise. Because the world was divied up for just 101 lovers who were all fine with living under the same roof.
The day of our harvest festival was the tastiest meal I had ever eaten. It tasted like a hundred girls' lips and maybe some pasta and lasagna liberally dipped in tomato sauce somewhere in there.
There weren't any fruits to distribute because orchards took decades to grow, but we had at least planted the seeds for them. With lifespans such as ours, even orchards could be looked forward to 'shortly,' so no one really minded.
There was also cotton but that was stored for the use of our clothiers. Reina did however eerily strike a bale of cotton with a hoe over and over and then toss pieces of the shattered crop into a nearby river.
She had been cured of the Hinamizawa syndrome, right?
Sugar was another big reveal. A lot of the younger girls were pouring it into their alcohol like no tomorrow, to the point that it only tasted like sugar. Well, it was fine so long as they got drunk and let down their guard around me.
At night we gathered around the fire, laid back onto the ground, held hands in a giant circle and looked up at the stars. We started singing Christmas carols, Cruel Angel's Thesis, Only My Railgun and Touch -- anything at least a third of us could remember together. It was the most reverent prayer we could give to God who had given us all life and brought us all together. We also gave thanks to the land for supporting us, the sun for its photosynthesis, the water for irrigation, the heavy elements made in distant stars that fueled our hemoglobin and anything else our drunken minds happened to be reminded of.
Then we all fell asleep in a drunken stupor after putting the fire out. The temperature was always nice in Paradise so it wasn't difficult. The only real problem was the fierce melee for the spots to my left and right which seemed to fill up with beautiful clingy girls at ever faster rates of change. I must have slept with at least eighty different girls that night, though to be honest I was so busy enjoying their soft bodies against me that I never really slept. Alcohol was a hell of a drug.
I decided people were in a good enough mood the next morning that it would be okay to announce my 100 days of 100 dates plan. I warned them not to expect too much from me, like that I'd live up to their memories of the past, but thought it would be nice if we could all relax and deepen our love now that the food crisis was well and finished.
"A round of applause for Kotori and Deedlit, everyone, who raised these crops, these endless rows of crops, these endless varieties of crops, the tastiest crops in history, all on their own." I toasted my nature-dwelling, nature-loving, natural beauties. Everyone duly clapped.
"A round of applause for Riko Izayoi, who has been feeding us all this time, asking for nothing in return, even though we owe her everything." I raised my glass again, and a furious cheer rose up to fill the heavens.
"It was nothing." Riko blushed, her eyes misting over. "I couldn't let everyone starve, could I?"
"Riko, I love you. Will you marry me? Or even better, will you bear my children?" I knelt down, took her hand between mine, kissed it, and then looked up with puppy dog eyes into hers.
"Ri-ko! Ri-ko! Ri-ko!" The crowd started clapping and cheering in unison, waiting for her response.
"I love you too." Riko blushed, her words completely drowned out by the crowd's noise, but her eyes glimmered and danced as they looked into mine, so I knew how she felt even without the words.
"A round of applause for Sakura Kinomoto, who for the past year has done 99% of everything because she's God made flesh!" I stood up and raised my glass to toast the next heroine of our party, still holding Riko's hand because I felt our moment together was too special to end so soon.
The cheer, if anything, was even louder. Probably due to the changes of clothes most of all.
"And a round of applause for Orihime, whose curse rejecting saved us all from an immediate and absurd death, thanks to Mavis' dark aura of destruction not radiating outwards." I raised my glass again.
"Sorry everyone," Mavis waved at the crowd contritely. Nervous laughter broke out, and then a strong and sustained applause for Orihime took center stage.
"I'm thankful to everyone here. You're all the lights of my life. Even before we reached Eden, you were the lights of my life, the reason I went on living. And after I died, you were the only reason I wanted to come back to life. I hated the world. No really, I did. I hated it and everything in it. But I loved you. You were never of this world. You all lived on a higher plane, a world of possibility that could have been if only we were like you, if only we would learn from you, if only we aspired to be like you. All of you, I know this sounds corny, but I'm going to say every single one of your names: Nozomi, Urara, Honoka, Mai, HaruHaru, Riko, Asuna, Keiko, Suguha, Rin Natsume, Haruka Saigusa, Kud, Azusa, Yui, Kagome, Aoba, Tessa, Kaname, Mira, Rose, Elize, Leia, Sophie, Cheria, Rydia, Rosa, Tifa, Aerith, Rinoa, Yuna, MOMO, Aruru, Eruru, Nekone, Kuon, Nayuki, Nagisa, Misuzu, Kotori, Wendy, Sherria, Lucy, Mavis, Levy, Juvia, Lisanna, Mirajane, Makina, Nanoha, Fate, Sakura Haruno, Rin Nohara, Chtolly, Sagiri, Emily, Deed, Kobato, Sora, Miu, Sakura Kinomoto, Lafiel, Myusel, Sara, Nemu, Yume, Himeno, Sakura Yoshino, Aisia, Koko, Yukino, Sayaka, Isara, Yoru, Asa, Sae, Reina, Usagi, Shana, Mikan, Yuuhi, Kobeni, Illya, Rin Tohsaka, Orihime, Nico, Chiwa, Sakura Mamiya, Hozumi, Mylene, Lyria, Kokona, Meiko, Ai, Nadeko, Kirino, Mikoto, Louise, Wakaba, Iris, Mitsuki -- thank you so much for being here. You mean the world to me. You are the world to me. Thank you for loving me. Thank you for standing by me, even though as you can see I'm no use at all to anyone. Thank you for accepting me. Thank you for affirming me. Thank God for each and every one of you."
I stopped, wondering what I could say, how I could possibly express, how I could convey how much more my feelings were for them than the average guy's for an average girl. I tried to keep my voice cheerful and raised my glass again. "A toast to Mumei, who today, for the first time ever, got to eat a bellyful of rice."
The crowd cheered and clapped again.
"A toast to everyone here who is healthy and alive who otherwise shouldn't be, and a toast to everyone who healed them so that we could be celebrating here together, all 101 of us, still together, a year after we arrived." I raised my glass again, this time my throat really clutching up.
"A toast to Sailor Moon, whose Silver Crystal has granted us our very own Silver Millennium, so that I can keep loving you for as long as every one of you truly deserves." I couldn't get the words out very well because I was too busy crying.
"Please. . .take care of me. . .keep taking care of me. . .as we greet this new year. Watch over me like the rising sun. . . just like I'd do anything for any of you. I'd cut my bleeding heart out and lay it at your feet if only I thought it would help. But even that wouldn't express what you guys mean to me." I didn't know if anyone was clapping or not, I didn't even know if I was able to say what my mouth was trying to say anymore.
"Ahh. . .shoot. Sorry. This is a happy day." I wiped my eyes and nose, my voice trembling. "I'm going to take a break." And then I walked away from the crowd, straight to the nearest river, and doused my head underwater. No one likes emo creeps. No one wants to hear stuff like that. What are you saying, me? I'm not supposed to be on suicide watch here.
I spent about ten minutes stopping my tears, washing my face, and watching the ever flowing stream go by. Then I turned around to see if I could get back to camp more quietly and innocuously than I had left.
Every single one of my wives was watching me quietly with a look of shared concern. They had lined up in row after row, in a long, deep semicircle, and stood still the entire solemn moment.
Then, as if by telepathic resonance (wait, couldn't Himeno's magic connect hearts?), they all bowed together and said: "Akemashite omedetou. Yoroshiku onegaishimasu!"
