“I wonder what level I am now.”

Time passed, and I had managed to seduce Seventh as well. Seventh was a very tall woman, but not full like Sixth. I would even call her willowy and thin. She had an elf-like aura that made her feel fragile. That said, she was gentle and had a love of baubles and trinkets. She liked to dress up, unlike her sisters, and in particular, she liked wearing belts. Well, calling them belts wasn’t quite right. It was more like rings.

There were a dozen or so rings that sat around her hips. They were always spinning, and I wondered how they didn’t fall off her body even though they almost seemed to float around her. They sort of looked like some kind of alien device. The worst part is that even if she stripped off her clothing, she would still wear the rings. It made having sex with her interesting, but we managed. I could even use the rings to get some good traction when I was going in from behind.

It wasn’t just Seven, but also her assortment of maids and servants who were just as plentiful as the others. I had played with all of them, and it kept my days extremely busy. Time seemed to move on as I alternated from visiting the library, taking baths, and banging hundreds of beautiful women. That alone was enough to fill up a lifetime. I had tasted the flowers of all of these beauties, and now after all of that, I was wondering how long I had come along. My goal was to reach level 15. Only then would I be on the same level as Procreation.

“Why don’t we see?” Eighth offered. “The hall of records exists here.”

“The… hall of records?”

“Well, it’s technically not in the celestial palace, but it crosses with it.”

The old me might have been confused about what that meant, but I had read enough in the library to generally understand it. Space didn’t exist on a 3D plane in the heavenly world. Since that was the case, there was a room in the celestial palace that connected to the hall of records, but the hall of records wasn’t in the celestial palace. Calling it a portal wasn’t quite right either.

Although I could visit the hall of records, I wouldn’t see any other gods in the hall of records save for those who came to it from the celestial palace, even if we happened to stand on the same point. The easiest way to explain it would be that we exist slightly out of phase with others. That is also how the other gods and goddesses existed within this palace, but I never encountered them. I was starting to just get to the point where I could kind of feel others around me. Thankfully, they couldn’t see me any more than I could see them, so all of my hanky panky with the girls would have gone completely unnoticed by them unless they went out of their way to peak on me.

As for doing such a phase shift myself, it wasn’t just a matter of power, but also time and experience. No humanoid god or goddess could achieve this, because none of us had existed long enough. Only concepts that predated humans had been around enough to understand the trick. Simply put, I was a million years too young to do such a thing. As for the girls, they could do it, but they couldn’t bring me with them. So, the idea of permanently hiding from Beloved in a pocket of space was impossible.

“Alright, let’s go.” I declared.

I was open to experiencing a new place. I had been in the celestial palace for who knows how long, and it was nice to have a new experience. To date, neither Artemis nor Fourth returned yet. As for Beloved, they also hadn’t left, but I had thankfully never encountered them. I now had a close relationship with all of the higher numbers. As they explained to me, the others had a closer relationship to Beloved than them and would be hard to win over. Fifth would be the next easiest girl.

I had met her before though, and she felt a bit volatile. All of them did, except for Fourth. The four smaller numbers seemed much different than the four larger numbers. That’s when a face suddenly occurred to me that I had forgotten about.

“What happened to Tenth anyway?”

“Eh? You said you weren’t interested in her.” Ninth spoke up. “So, I got rid of her.”

I stiffened. “Got… rid of?”

“She was being insistent,” Eighth spoke up. “Like, really annoying about it. We were afraid she’d tell Beloved you were still here.”

“So, we put in a request to have her ejected from the group.” Ninth finished. “The closer sisters never really cared about her. It was always us who kept her as a number. So, without our support, Beloved accepted our motion.”

“I-is that really okay?” I asked. “Weren’t you close?”

“We were, but we’re closer to you…” Ninth grabbed one of my arms.

“We just want Hakaru to be happy, did we make a mistake?” Eight asked tearfully.

Women, whether they were on earth or in heaven, were totally scary! Based on just a few words of my own, they had decided on their own to turn on a friend. However, with their beautiful faces looking up at me with praise, I definitely couldn’t condemn them. After all, they did ensure that I wouldn’t end up having to sleep with a loli. That alone was worth some celebration. I patted both girls on the head, and they preened under the attention.

“It’s not that bad,” Sixth spoke up. “She’s still in the celestial palace. “She just got kicked from our hall. She found a new room and has been there pouting ever since. We’re here.”

She ended her words by stopping in front of a door. I opened it up to see a room of infinite whiteness. I didn’t need to shield my eyes for them to adapt to this glow. I merely stepped into the room directly with confidence. As I surveyed the white, I could see stone tablets. Like looking up at a sky at night stargazing, the longer I looked, the more I could see in the infinite room.

“What is the hall of records?” I finally asked.

“These are the holy edicts. Uh… they’re records on the status of gods. Here… Artemis!” Sixth called out a familiar name.

The dots began to shift, and one dot suddenly came out from the infinite distance and approached us with extreme speed. It stopped right in front of us noiselessly, showing a large stone tablet. I looked at it.

“Artemis, Goddess of the hunt. Goddess of the moon. Goddess of Virginity.” I read a long list including her status, her level, and even her location. “So, it’s like a heavenly Facebook? Why so many names?”

“Haven’t we said? Gods and goddesses exist to fulfill a concept, but concepts can be complicated. This can make a goddess attach to many different concepts at once.”

“Oh? So, like the way NTR is also the goddess Netori, Netorase, and Netorare.”

“Yes, exactly like that.” Sixth nodded.

I was still looking at the stone when it suddenly flew off. Four new stones took its place a few moments later. A glance informed me that it was NTR, Netori, Netorase, and Netorare. The room had heard me say the other names and had thought I was calling them. There was a strange shield around NTR, and the entire surface of the stone was blank.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“It seems like someone put a spell over NTR.” Ninth frowned. “This might be why she wasn’t able to reform herself easily.”

“Was this done by Marriage?” I asked.

“No…” Ninth shook her head. “This energy, it came from someone who exudes a male aura.”

“Procreation…” I said, my voice lowering.

I had originally thought that Marriage had maliciously destroyed and split NTR up. Now, I realized that it had been Procreation who had ultimately cracked her into three. I wasn’t sure why, but I’m sure he was planning to gain power from it. This made me even angrier as I remembered vividly why I was doing all of this. One could say that the faults in NTR’s psyche had already been there before setting her up to break apart, but I now knew Procreation was the one who took the hammer to it as if that guy wasn’t bad enough.

“Anyway, call your name!” Sixth cut in excitedly.

“R-right… Hakaru!” A new stone appeared in front of me.

“Hakaru, God of Harems. Level 13!” I felt a surge of excitement hearing that.

The girls around me were level 15. Only Fourth was a level 16 goddess. I had originally been surprised because it meant that none of them were on the council, but I supposed that made sense. They had tons of free time, where Fourth was busy nonstop. My goal was extremely close. Just two more levels to go. After all this time, I was doing it. It was one thing working hard to achieve something. It was another to see tangible proof that you had obtained your dream. The girls all let out cries of excitement.

“Good job.”

“As expected of my man.”

“You’re doing great.”

“Mm…”

“NTR is level 13.” I sighed.

I had already reached the level of the goddess who I was chasing. By all rights, I was finally at her level. I was stronger than NTR was when she started me on the path toward becoming a god. More than that, it had only been around ten years. That speed of rising could be considered astronomical. That’s when a thought came to me.

“Any god can see these records?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Then… Procreation could look them up too.”

“Ah! That’s true…”

“Is there no way we can hide this? He can’t learn of my existence.”

Right now, he wasn’t looking for me. I should have been born by now, but I wasn’t someone who would have even been on his radar. However, he might care about a rising harem god who is taking the power he had accumulated from pretending to be a god that doesn’t fit his true nature. If he ever did discover me, it would be bad. It wouldn’t just be bad for me now, but the me of the past. If he found out the human he was dealing with in the future became a god, it could disrupt all of time and space. Thus, I asked such a question, feeling a bit desperate.

“That is something we might be able to do if we work together. You’re lucky you’ve encountered 4 level 15 goddesses.” Eighth smirked.

I was only vaguely familiar with what they did. It was a lot like casting a spell, with a bit of ceremony thrown in. The entire thing took a few hours to finished. By the end, the tablet was wrapped in a light a lot like the one I had seen with NTR.

“If someone level 15 or lower tries to call your tablet, it won’t respond, at least for now,” Sixth explained.

“That was exhausting…” Seventh sighed in a tired voice.

“Hakaru needs to reward us for working hard for him.” Ninth declared.

“In the butt?” Eighth asked.

“Hakaru… you have to give us all more orgasms,” Sixth said, and then blushed.

“Hehe… look at Sixth acting so bold.” Eighth teased.

“Ah! I was just saying what everyone else was thinking!” She cried out.

The atmosphere was extremely calm and collected. Everything was finally going smoothly. I had a group of beautiful women. I had more women to gain, and the time and ability to win their hearts. The girls cuddled excitedly around me as we left the hall of records. When we stepped out the door though, we all froze.

Standing in front of the five of us were five other women. That was Second, Third, Fourth, and Fifth. The one who caught me most by surprise was Fourth, who I hadn’t known had returned yet. She had her head down, looking browbeaten. Directly in front of them was a woman I had never seen before. She was so beautiful; it was nearly blinding. I could barely look away. She was hands down, the most attractive girl I had ever seen. She had white hair that ran down her back, and she dressed in something bright and colorful, but elegant and powerful. She was truly indescribable.

“B-B-Beloved…” Sixth gasped the name first.

“First…” Eighth echoed her.

She had an expression on her face of boiling anger. “It’s time to talk. Now!”