It's been a bit over a month since I cosplayed as a tomato blender.

Things have settled down and I managed to find quite a bit of free time for myself. A lot of that was spend with my daughters, but I also spent a decent amount inside the dungeon.

Not to hunt, but on the bottom floor. I've managed to fix up the vampire data, so the next time one of my kind became pregnant, it wouldn't be a nine month long trauma.

As for testing it to make sure...I was hesitant.

It wasn't because I was against expanding my family. I just didn't have anyone to have a child with. This new life had been just as barren when it came to romantic relationships as my last. As much as I wanted to blame it on how busy I've been, I knew that the real reason was because I've made no attempt at finding someone.

Though, even if I had, I knew that it would be a long time before I had any more kids. I had a feeling I had gotten some mild PTSD from the last experience.

Every time I entertained the idea even the slightest, I always found an excuse to avoid it.

So in the end, there was no chance to test the changes.

Alicia and Fate would end up testing the adjustments to growth as they grew up and experienced puberty. I was ready to fine tune things if there ended up being any problems.

Technically speaking, Letty was physically able to test the changes to pregnancy but...she was far from being mentally mature enough I felt. Depending on how things went, she might not be ready for such an experience even more than Alicia and Fate.

In the end, all I could do was do my best to make sure there wasn't any oversight in my fixes and hope for the best when they came into play.

Maybe in the future, I'd also allow some of the custom skills I've created to be implemented beyond just myself. In particular, [blood magic]. So far it had been quite useful, though maybe a little too powerful. It did encourage blood lust, however if the more offensive uses of it was restricted to the higher ranks, it was possible that it would primarily turn into a tool to make day to day life easier rather than a method to kill.

That aside, I was still going to the bottom floor of the dungeon to continue studying the world's underlying system.

Half of it was to better understand how the code regarding each of the races worked. There was always a chance that there was one of the changes made by either Letty or me could have some unexpected repercussions, and I would rather discover it myself before someone else find out firsthand.

The other half, and much more important, was to come up with new defences I could use against whatever the next assassination attempt was.

I had already come up with a few generic skills to protect me, but I had no confidence that such skills would save my life if it ever came to it. There just was no way to test them, and the interactions with the system was dubious at best.

For example, [Anti-Death], one skill I had made months ago that prevented me from going below one HP or MP. The skill worked by simply brute forcing a correction to the value.

But I had no idea how the interactions with the greater system and world would actually be. I was reminded of a bug in one game where a skill would reduce your HP to one, but gain invulnerability to damage. The problem in that game was that the order in which the skill worked was exactly as worded. And while the game would attempt to change the character's state to invulnerable immediately after the HP dropped, there were certain circumstances where the way multiple elements stacked, placing an instance of damage in between these two events. The result was the character dying despite having successfully activated the invulnerability skill and gaining that invulnerability only after death.

Quite a useless skill really, and that was exactly the sort of thing I was worried about my own invulnerability skill.

The fact that I couldn't test it without risking my death as well meant that I had no way of knowing if it would even work in the first place. And even if it did, I had no idea how it would interact with things if I received damage after the skill triggered. And there were dozens of other scenarios I could think of where it might not work as intended.

In the end, I wanted a much better skill, something that would prevent me from even risking death in the first place.

So I studied the system and read through the virtually endless list of skills, looking for something that could do the job, or at least place me further away from death.

But of course, cheating death like that wasn't going to be easy, and so far I hadn't found anything good. Though it wasn't like I had that much hope in the first place.

While the system did enable those living under it to experience massive improvements to their suitability in even the harshest of conditions, there wasn't a single thing that prevented mortal wounds, or things that dealt with being at zero HP.

In other words, nothing that could cheat death. Even things like ghosts were actually alive according to how the system worked.

Though then again, considering that spirits were a legitimate intelligent (technically) race, it wasn't really a surprise that the system considered ghosts and phantoms, and even skeletons, to be equally alive.

Though the system didn't leave any inherent differences between monsters within the dungeon and those outside of them, I had a feeling that if I spent the time to investigate, I would find that the ones inside the dungeon didn't have any souls in them. The code itself seemed to be the same, but the system used to spawn monsters inside of the dungeon didn't have any parts to suggest that a soul was inserted into the body when they were created.

On the other hand, I hadn't found any system that governed the spawning of monsters outside of dungeons in general. Most likely, they were born naturally, in which case they followed the rules of the world like any other living being.

Though, this was quite a late realization that had no appreciable impact on me. Aside from confirming that the information wasn't of any help towards my own goal. It was nice to confirm how important it was to kill off all the monsters that made up the army that tried to attack our nation though. Letting even a single one to escape could have severe repercussions later down the line.

My eyes was once again attracted to the flashing notice in the corner of the screen I was working on.

[Apotheosis available. Apply forced transcendence?]

The damn thing refused to go away.

Though I did admit while not really knowing what this would mean, it could be the solution I was looking for. But on the other hand, a part of me instinctively thought that there was a finality to this decision, and whatever changes would be brought from it would be quite final.

Though frankly said, I was just scared. The very idea of this option terrified me to the point that I didn't want to even entertain the thought.

(This...will make me an actual god, right?)

The very thing I've been resisting on so many levels for so long. Though that resistance certainly has been waning of late, I still had the option of fading away into obscurity over time at the moment. I only had to endure things temporarily, then let everyone forget as the generations passed. As long as I got the long lived people to promise not to preach about me, or at least my appearance, it was possible for me to become a nobody and live my life like that some day.

Though, I did know that it was all a far stretch, I couldn't let go of the possibility.

This though, this would simply cut that possibility off entirely.

But on top of that, I simply didn't know what it would mean to become a god. Would I even be able to stay on the ground? Would I even be able to see my family face to face after I accepted this?

Too many unknowns, but even worse was the possibilities that came with this.

And so, I continued to pile on excuses as I forced my eyes away from that flashing icon.

*Sigh*

That aside, I couldn't help but find it so frustrating that someone was after my life for something so small. Sure, I had accomplished a lot thanks to the knowledge I had been able to keep, but it wasn't like this world was being watched over in the first place. And the chances of me going to another world without dying first was close to zero.

If they didn't care about this world to the point that they simply expected it to perish while nobody was looking, I didn't see why they would worry what I would to, even if I did some sort of megalomaniacal takeover or something.

Really, I just wanted to live a relaxed life doing what I wanted. Especially after messing up my previous life.

But somehow, everything went wrong right from the start, even if I didn't realize it at first.

Some god or gods wanted me dead for some reason. People were worshipping me as a helper, a saviour, as a god. I was a mom now too, with the responsibilities that went with that.

Someone I forgot long ago said that life was made up of coincidences, and it was up to the person to make something of it. I've certainly made something of that, but that carefree and relaxed life I originally wanted had grown so far away.

I stretched out a hand to the ceiling and closed my fist, before dropping it over my eyes to shade them from the ever present light that pervaded this room.

This...was not the life I wanted.

But if someone were to ask if I would do things differently...

...

..

.

(No. I don't think I would.)

While I had lost the opportunity to live the life I had wanted, in return I had gotten so much. Friends and allies. A place to be. Joy and happiness abound.

And of course, my family.

I wouldn't give up a single one of those things, even though they were all burdens and responsibilities in their own right.

And of course, to protect all that, I needed to first protect myself.

Things were going very well with this world lately, but everything could change with a drop of the hat. This world was designed inherently to be unstable, and it was very much a miracle that it had lasted as long as it had.

Heroes and Demon Lords? An eternal war? Races that did a bad job cooperating?

If the balance anywhere fell off, everything would've fallen into chaos soon after.

"Mmmmm!"

I stretched my body. I didn't know if this body of mine could suffer consequences from poor circulation, but this wasn't the time to test that out. I didn't know when those damn gods would make their next attempt against me.

For as long as I didn't have evidence that they gave up, I would need to be prepared.

Once I gave my shoulders a quick massage, I went right back to work.

 

In the end, I made no progress.

The sun was on its daily retreat from the front lines as I exited the dungeon.

While physically I was fine, having made sure to have a proper meal and everything, mentally I was exhausted. I've been at this for over a week, and the lack of progress was taking its toll.

But I would soon get home and get a recharge of my daughterium. They've been complaining at how much I've been hugging them lately, well, aside from Letty that was. But the fact that they didn't resist was enough to tell me they didn't really hate it.

Rather, it was only how much I was doing it that annoyed them.

Hopefully it wasn't a sign that they were going to start an independence streak or something. My poor heart wouldn't be able to take it.

Exiting the dungeon, I started to head over to do some of my regular checks. While a lot of things were moving quite smoothly lately, it was still far better for me to confirm things just in case. Nipping problems in the bud was far more effective than waiting to receive a report that things have gotten out of hand and needed my immediate attention.

It did mean that I had more work to do, but that sort of work these days was actually kinda nice. It felt great to see what I was doing have a positive effect on my surroundings, even if that work itself sometimes grew quite stressful in the moment.

Even things with the former hero's party members. Not once did they act up in any way, so lately I've been allowing them to move independently as long as they stayed with someone at all times. Usually that ended up being some of the dhampire mothers that were free that day.

Outside of the dungeon, there was collection of people gathered in a circle.

"Ah, Elder Scarlet! There's someone that's looking for you!"

A person from that group jogged over. A young demon, but I didn't know her name.

"This, umm, human said he came from far away to see you."

In the middle of the group was a large man, however, looking at how they were all acting it was apparent that he wasn't very talkative. He was merely attracting attention with his foreignness.

And together with this demon's awkward wording, I could really feel his foreignness. Or rather, it made me wonder if he really was human.

The man was huge in every sense of the word. He was taller than Harja, yet his proportions wouldn't lose to Alvaldi. A brick of a man and a minor giant. It made me question whether if he really was human, or a slightly stunted titan.

And of course, there was that white half robe he was wearing, or something. I wasn't quite sure what it was he was wearing. I've never seen anyone wear anything like that, and of course it didn't even look anywhere near suitable for travelling, so it made me wonder just how he came to this country.

(How did he come here anyways?)

Once that question came to mind, my guard went up slightly. This might've been the southern city, the closest to any other civilization, but the Hourai Commonwealth wasn't a place for people to casually travel to, even with the ceasefire treaty being all but sealed.

And especially for a person to come alone, no matter how good of a traveller or eccentric he was.

My guard went up a few more notches as I pulled one hand behind me just in case.

"Hello. I'm Scarlet, one of the elders of this fine nation."

I took a few steps forward, but stopped a good distance away.

"Finally. You were a right pain to find."

My ears perked up. I shouldn't have ever seen a man like him, yet some distant memory tickled my brain.

"You..."

I squinted my eyes in some vain attempt to recognize where it was I had seen or heard this man. But no matter how hard I searched my memory, I couldn't think of a single place in this world I could've met a man like this.

"This time, it'll be a million years until you see the reincarnation facility."

Mana swirled around the man's arm as he reached a hand out towards me. The density of the mana was far greater than what I had ever seen before, blocking out any possibility to see his hand. It was even visible through normal vision, the stuff was so dense.

And while that happened, everything clicked in my mind.

(The reincarnation facility!)

This man, I didn't see him anywhere in this world. That was because he wasn't from this world, but the one beyond it. He was that bouncer that guided people to those various doors!

(A god! A real fucking god!)

Or at least, the closest thing to a real god I had ever seen.

A sense of crisis greater than any I've ever experienced filled my body, and so I didn't hesitate. My scythe zoomed out of my pocket dimension and into my hand, and in one smooth motion the adamantium blade cut right through his arm.

Except, not a single bit of what I had expected happened.

That nearly indestructible adamantium blade was gone. Or rather, it had turned into a puddle as my swing caused it to touch that incredibly dense mana sheathing his forearm.

(Dammit!)

This guy had no weariness despite his killing intent, yet I was the one put on the back foot immediately!

Continuing my swing, but careful of the lack of counterbalance, I charged my orihalcum blade to the limit with my own mana and went for a low sweep, arcing the blade as fast as possible to give the man no time to react.

But to my horror, the blade simply passed through his knees as if there wasn't anything there. That what I was seeing was nothing but a hallucination or something.

The air blew away in all directions from the ferocity of my attack, and lightly kicking off the ground, I rode the shock wave to increase my distance. In the corner of my eye, I saw those from that earlier group get knocked down, but I was relieved that they didn't seem to have gotten hurt.

The large void I had created collapsed as air filled in that vacuum it tended to abhor, sending secondary shock waves like crackling thunder, yet the one in the middle of it all wasn't phased a bit by all the violence.

(Fuck fuck fuck!)

I had no idea how to fight this guy. His mana was so dense it simply melted adamantium, and even where he wasn't protecting himself, my attack simply passed right through as if he wasn't actually there! I didn't know how I could do anything to him. My attacks simply didn't work on some fundamental level.

The only thing left to try was...

(Biting him?)

It felt like a far stretch, and likely wouldn't fare any better than anything else.

But in the end I shook my head of that idea. It was absurd, but even worse, it was stupidly risky. Like putting all your money on the weekly lotto including taking out a mortgage in the hope of winning.

(No, that's just plain stupid.)

And besides, my winning condition was to survive, not to kill that man.

Changing tactics immediately, I grew out my wings and bent my knees to kick off the ground.

But before I could finish my motion, something filled my vision. Somehow, in between two indistinct moments, my vision was clear and I had space enough to see everything ahead of me, then my sight line was blocked by...

An oversized bicep?

Bewilderment aside, I couldn't let myself be distracted. In order to make my escape, I kicked off the ground to take flight.

But despite my effort, my legs didn't respond.

Or rather, only a few moments later did I notice, I couldn't even feel my legs.

(...Wha...?)

That bicep-like wall pulled away from me. What I saw connected to it was a forearm, and eventually a fist. They were covered in blood for some reason.

And in that fist, I saw chunks of flesh and bone. In particular was a large round muscle that continued to rhythmically beat as blood squirted all over the place.

"Hmph. Not even a vampire can survive without a heart. We should've done this in the first place, records be damned."

But the thing that I had noted most strongly, was that set of regularly shaped bones strung up in a line.

(That's...my spine. I...need that...bastard...)

I tried to reach out for it, but without any ability to put strength into my legs, even as I stretched out a hand to claim what was mine, I was moving further and further away from it, until I hit the ground.

The sun's daily assault was ending, and all traces of it was retreating from my sight.

But for some reason the beauty of the stars wouldn't enter my eyes.

Neither did the three moons. My precious, precious moons.

(Alicia, Fate, Letty...)

The most important words in the world, no matter how hard I tried, couldn't even escape my lips.

As strength faded from my body, so too could I feel my mana start to dissipate. Those spells I had maintained perpetually no longer so eternal.

Suddenly, with what little light that entered my eyes, a rush of darkness spilled forth along with a torrent of indistinct noise.

Weight pushed down on my body, as I felt like I was sinking.

Maybe, I really had deserved this condemnation by the gods.

Maybe, hell was real, and I was headed that way.

But, that didn't matter.

What mattered, was that I was leaving my daughters behind.

That, more than anything else, was a sin far too unforgivable for me.

...

..

.