Asteria

At last, she was coming! I’m not sure how I knew, but I could tell that my counterpart in this world was on that helicopter.

“She’s coming!” I said to the others.

When the goddess had visited me to ask me if I was willing to leave my world to train the angel of another world, I’d hesitated only a few minutes before agreeing. I hated to leave Seraphiel again, but I simply wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I let billions of people die. Besides, the goddess promised me I would return to Verden at the same minute that I left.

I didn’t know Seraphiel, Uriel, and Sariel were supposed to come with me. I’d been extremely shocked when I saw a vision of them jumping through a portal to the other world right when I also made my own jump. The worst thing was that we’d all landed in different places in this world.

Now that we’d reunited, Seraphiel made a tremendous fuss over me until I gestured to them to walk a few meters away from their three counterparts from this world. Then we went into a huddle to talk, and I put a sound shield over us.

“Asteria, how could you leave me without even saying a word?” Seraphiel’s golden eyes were narrowed and the corners of his lips were turned down. The tone of his voice made me feel like I was being stabbed straight in the heart.

I winced.

Uriel said soothingly, “Seraph, don’t scold her. You know she couldn’t really refuse when the goddess herself asked her to do something.”

Seraphiel didn’t say anything, but he did sigh and stop glaring at me accusingly.

“Guys, why are you here?” I asked. We didn’t have much time before the helicopter landed, so I’d have to explain to Seraphiel later. Right now, it was more important that I find out why they were here.

“The goddess asked me if I wanted to serve as your protector,” said Sariel. He gave me a wide open-mouthed smile, showing all his teeth. “I assume the others have the same mission, so be a good little girl and let the goddess’ chosen heroes guard you.”

“Eh?!” The goddess had asked them to become my guardians?

Seraphiel and Uriel both patted me on the head. Why were people always doing that?

“Don’t forget, this world’s at war,” said Sariel.

Oh dear, did this mean that I was in grave danger? I should put my automatic spell defenses back in place as soon as I could.

“We should keep a low profile,” said Uriel.

Of course, it was a good thing that I didn’t have to leave Seraphiel behind, but what about Uriel and his family? I cleared my throat and gave Uriel an uncertain look. “... Your wife will kill me if she finds out you ran off with another woman.”

Uriel smirked at me. “What she doesn’t know won’t hurt her, and the goddess said we would return to the exact time we’d left.”

That was true, but that wasn’t the only thing I was worried about. I asked, “Yes, but won’t you miss your twins?”

Uriel’s kids were two years old now, and I knew he doted on them.

“I won’t miss a thing since no time would have passed while I’m away. It will be like I never left,” said Uriel.

Well, if he wasn’t worried, then I shouldn’t fuss over it.

“Okay, but before the helicopter arrives, I have one very important question to ask you all,” I said. I lowered my voice to a whisper and darted a look at the three S-class EL’s doppelgangers. “Is it true that it’s impossible to resist the urge to screw yourself?”

“What did you say?” Seraphiel’s voice was a full octave higher than normal.

“I’ve read a story that claims that when you meet yourself, possibly due to time travel shenanigans, you’ll be overcome with an extremely strong, or possible totally irresistible urge to fu-”

Sariel coughed loudly and said, “No, that’s not true. I don’t feel a thing.”

Seraphiel clicked his tongue. “Never. Just the thought of it is extremely disgusting.”

“Ely? Do you have self-esteem issues?” I asked.

“Hmph!” said Seraphiel.

We all waited for Uriel’s answer, but he just turned away from us and covered his mouth with a hand. Was he smiling?

“Uriel, you…” Sariel gave him a shocked look.

This was only a small sample size, but the results were interesting: indifference, disgust, and attraction. I really didn’t know how I would feel when I met my alternate world counterpart.

“They’re here,” I said when I saw the helicopter was about to land. “Please let me do the talking unless I ask for help, okay?”

The three ELs nodded.

Of course, I didn’t know for sure what the angel of this world was like, but I was fairly certain she wouldn’t be too suspicious of me. The goddess would’ve told her I was coming, so all I would need to do was to prove that I was who I said I was.

When the goddess had spoken to me, I’d offered to cleanse this world myself, which wouldn’t be that hard, since the Iah spawn were all dead in this world, and the anima pool was still intact.

The problem was that if I did everything myself, this world would be left without a trained angel after I left. It’s not like I would be okay with being summoned every single time that the goddess needed help with the mopping up.

I looked at my three companions and hoped that we wouldn’t have too much trouble with the virus this time.

I said, “One last thing. I cured you all back in our world, but this world’s Iah virus is still active. You three aren’t immune to it, so this time, don’t mess up and get eaten again!”

It needed to be said, but I hoped I hadn’t raised some sort of flag.

Asteria: It's just a harmless pillar of light, I swear!

LinMeili

• According to Robert A. Heinlein's short story "'—All You Zombies—'" (not an error, it seems that the title really does have triple quotation marks), when you meet your double you will experience an irresistible urge to screw yourself.
• Poor Seraphiel was abandoned again! I can't even blame him for being upset this time.
• On the other hand, it's not like Asteria could have refused…
• Who do you think is on the helicopter? How do you like the story so far?
• Please let me know if there are any errors.
• Thanks for reading!

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