Lilith moved to stretch as she woke up but found herself restricted by Kali’s embrace. She froze, thinking back to how she had fallen asleep. She had nodded off in the middle of watching TV, and she certainly wasn’t snuggled up to Kali then.

She fell asleep on the other side of the bed, rolled over, and grabbed us. Mae said. I didn’t think it was a big enough deal to move us without permission or wake you up, so I just let it happen.

Oh. Thanks. Lilith responded, and began trying to extract herself without waking Kali up. It wasn’t that she was unhappy to wake up in the arms of a pretty girl, it was just that she felt like…well, like she hadn’t earned it. She wasn’t sure what earning it would entail, but she figured at the very least it would involve going on a couple of dates.

Kali’s grip tightened. “You’ve earned it.” She muttered sleepily. “Been a big help. And the dates were fun.”

“What do you mean?” Lilith responded, bewildered. She didn’t get a reply.

I believe she’s still asleep. Mae said. I haven’t noticed an increase in her heart rate, change in breathing, or anything that would indicate she’s woken up.

Giving up on that for the moment, she hopped over to the spare body and made her way over to the kitchen, where she began to fix breakfast. On an academic level, she knew that she didn’t really need to eat any more, but the day just didn’t feel right without breakfast.

Wait, did she ever find out if avatars needed to eat or sleep? She asked Mae, who dutifully answered.

From what Carmen’s shared with us, the answer is yes and no. If the avatar is currently being piloted, then yes, it does. Otherwise the body functions of an avatar seem to be placed on some sort of hold while it’s empty. It’s honestly somewhat baffling. It can still be hurt and killed, but other than that it’s like a corpse.

Oh, and don’t forget that that’s not your real body. You’re not even going to get the benefit of Assimilating the food if you do that. It’ll just sit there, undigested until someone pilots it long enough to fully process it.

Eh, I’ll take the time to fix up something I can eat with my real body then. Lilith responded, putting down the bowl she was about to fill with cereal and turning to the fridge. She got out some eggs and then rummaged around the cupboards for a frying pan.

“So, have a…pleasurable night?” Siph said, arching a brow suggestively.

Lilith glanced over her shoulder at her mother. “No, mom. Nothing like that happened. She just grabbed me in her sleep.”

“Shame. I want grandkids.” Siph replied, sitting down on a chair. “Can I have some eggs?”

Lilith sighed in exasperation, grabbing a few more eggs. “I don’t think it works that way. We’re both girls, remember?”

Siph chuckled. “Even if we discount this handy spell I have that’d let two girls have a kid, I’m sure if push came to shove you could make the necessary parts for a time.”

“What? You’re kidding me, right? There’s no way there’s a spell like that.”

“Sure is. Made sure to grab it from Tunem’s place when I had the chance. Figured it could come in handy for you, or your other mom and me. I’ve been given to understand they’re working on a version that works with two men, too, but that’s a bit more difficult, given men aren’t built to carry a child.”

“Wait, you and mom? What about dad?”

“He gets tired. I’m working on fixing that too, though.”

“Could just make him a girl for the night.” Kali prompted. “No refractory period then.”

“Jessica’s already brought it up. He wasn’t interested but we’re working on bringing him around.”

“Too much information, mom!” Lilith said, blushing. “I did not need to know that.” She paused, unsure of how to greet Kali. “Uh, hey.”

“Hey. Sorry about…you know. I swear I was asleep when it happened. I’ll take over making those eggs if you want to get back into your main body.”

Lilith gave the spatula to Kali, walked the avatar back to its resting place, and went back to the main body.

“Yeah, that’s what Mae said.” Lilith said, walking back into the kitchen. “By the way, has anyone ever told you that you talk in your sleep?”

Kali froze. “What did I say? Did I read your mind?”

“Yeah. I was thinking about how we kinda skipped a few steps, like going on a date, and you said that the dates were fun.”

“Um, we sat alone in my room watching TV for hours on end. I don’t know about you, but that’s a date in my book.” Kali replied, resuming stirring the eggs.

“Why bother with steps?” Siph asked. “If you both want it, go for it.”

“That’s the problem. I don’t know if I want it. I’m still trying to sort through my feelings. I’m still new to romance in general.”

“Oh, come on, if you were half as good-looking as you are now, I’m sure the girls would have been beating your door down with a stick.” Siph said.

“Do you even have a reference frame for how attractive humans are?”

“Sure do. Your other parents are fine, you’re gorgeous, and Judy looks good enough.”

“And everyone else?”

“Insignificant.” Siph waved a hand. “If they can’t see how great you are that’s their problem.”

Kali put a plate of eggs down in front of each of them and sat down. “Take your time thinking about it. I’m in no rush for any of this. We are in a rush to get you stronger, though.” She adopted a more serious expression. “So, today I need to officially make you my Champion, and then I think we should get your dungeon going. Don’t expect too much from being my Champion, though. I’m pretty strapped for Worship right now, what with the whole system swap going on, and although I’ve been snapping up all the spare Worship up ‘til now, that takes a while to filter in when it’s not directed to me. That should fix itself for both of us once we reveal ourselves to the world.”

There was silence at the table for a long moment, and Kali looked expectantly at Lilith. Finally, she spoke up. “What’s involved with being your Champion?”

Kali smiled. “Good job. You can never be too careful about this kind of stuff. Being my Champion isn’t going to force you to follow my commands or anything like that. It’ll allow us to telepathically communicate at all times, I’ll gain some experience in Higher Power whenever you gain experience or do tasks for me, and I’ll be able to bestow buffs upon you, as well as remove them, and Worship gained from you is increased. Nothing really binding, provided you don’t do it with someone shady.”

“Alright, fair enough. What’s the process?”

“Well, I opt to spend some Worship to do it, you get a prompt, you agree, done and done. It’ll be coming over shortly.”

Lilith pressed yes and waited. There was no flash of light, no sense of some greater power within her. Nothing but a window letting her know she had become Kali’s champion.

“Perfect. I’m going to give you your first Blessing now, hold on for a moment…” Kali said.

“Sarlienne?” Lilith asked.

“Well, I haven’t married yet, so I’m still using my original last name. I’m looking to change that, so I don’t use it much, though.” She said, winking at Lilith.

Does this mean you have family? Mae asked.

“Yep. Haven’t been able to meet them in person since I became an administrator, but my friend lets me go check on them from time to time. They’re still kicking.”

“How do you become an administrator?” Siph asked.

“Once your universe’s administrator gets enough in the way of resources, they can allocate a new plane to someone to manage, and eventually one of those people can be made their own separate administrator. It’s an optional thing, and if you do become your own administrator you can’t go back down to your old administrator’s worlds without jumping through some serious hoops. I’m not terribly upset about it, though. I knew what I was getting into.”

“And if you die?”

“If I die while I’m down there I’m just sent back up here after 5 years or whenever I’m revived with Worship, whatever’s first. If I’m revived with Worship, then my stats will return back to normal at the end of those five years. It’s not a big deal. Now, if someone somehow kills me in here, or if I die at someone else’s place, then I’ve only got Worship to bring me back. All Worship generated in my universe will stop going to wherever it would usually go and come to me instead. If it was addressed to someone, I get the extra boost that would come from that, so a lot of administrators like to have a lot of Higher Beings as a safety precaution. Nothing like being gone for a long time and coming back to find everything falling to pieces without you.”

Kali shrugged. “Doesn’t matter much to me, though. It’s not like people can come here without my permission, I’m only receiving visitors and going to people I trust, and the only people from my planes I’m letting in here are you and Siph, and I’m not in any danger from either of you. But this is a morbid topic, let’s talk dungeons.”

“Finish your food first. It’s gonna get cold.” Lilith said, taking her plate to the sink and washing it while Kali wolfed down her eggs.

A few minutes later, everyone finished eating and made their way back into Kali’s room, where they sat in a group of beanbag chairs to the side.

“So, dungeons.” Kali said, lounging in her chair. “People have come up with all sorts of explanations for them, but in my opinion they’re wrong. If you ask me, they’re simply there to make the inhabitants of the plane stronger. Nothing more, nothing less. And, as such, that’s why they’re in my universe. Well, Haven, anyway. I don’t plan on introducing them into other planes for a while. Want to get everything stable first.”

“Given that that’s the purpose of a dungeon, let’s talk about what your dungeon is going to be. What do you think we should do with it?”

“Why do people need to get stronger in the first place?” Lilith asked.

“Ah, right, good question. See, planes are constantly being generated. The catch is they’re not directly given to anyone when they pop into existence. So, if there’s ever a dispute, we have to fight it out, and a long time ago people decided it would be better if we fought using people from our universe and not the administrators themselves. So, stronger people, stronger administrator. And before you ask, we need the planes to support the expanding population of our other planes and for political clout.”

“I won’t bore you with the politics right now, it’s unimportant. I’ll tell you about them later if you want, though, since you’re liable to get tangled up in them, sorry. So, back to the question, what do you think we should do about it?”

Lilith thought about this for a moment. Obviously, there had to be some immediate benefit to making a dungeon, or Kali wouldn’t be this insistent about her making one. And, given her explanation on the purpose of dungeons, one answer immediately sprang to mind. “To help me level up?”

“Bingo. Well, equipment will be a side benefit and it’ll also serve as a test for my system integration, but the main reason is to help get you strong fast. And it’ll remain usable for whoever you want after we’re done with it here.”

“But it’s not a perfect solution. It’s got a few problems, the most glaring of which is your Dungeon Core. The Dungeon Core has to be within the dungeon at all times, and if someone gets their hands on it while it doesn’t have a master, they can become the Dungeon Master. That is obviously less than ideal, but I have a few solutions. The first is that we create another Parallel or even just a Mask dedicated to running the dungeon, make its avatar the Core, and trick the system into thinking you’re a separate person, letting you be your own Dungeon Master. The second is we use the spare avatar as the Core and trick the system into letting you be your own Dungeon Master. The third is making the avatar the Core and having me or Siph be the Dungeon Master. That’s a dicey option, though, since it puts you in a position of complete subservience to someone else, much like Alex, and there’s no benefit to it, so I really don’t recommend it.”

Lilith frowned, putting her fist under her chin as she thought about the options. Option three was out. Too many risks for no benefit. That just left options one and two. One sounded really nice but creating another Parallel to be nothing but a prisoner to a dungeon seemed…unethical. So, option two seemed like the best one, but it couldn’t hurt to hear what everyone else said, right?

“What do you two think of my options?" She asked.

“Option one.” Siph said instantly. “The more Parallels you have, the stronger you are and the more safety you have. I see no reason not to go with that. Option three is right out, I’m not going to control you like that and I’m certainly not going to let anyone else do so. Freedom is precious.”

“I have to agree.” Kali added. “Option three is too risky, and there’s no reason to go through the trouble of managing it with one of your current consciousnesses when you can just make another.”

Lilith shifted uncomfortably. “But…doesn’t creating a person for the sole purpose of doing one job for their entire life sound kind of…wrong?”

I can hear you. Mae said. For what it’s worth, I’m completely content with my life.

“But you were designed that way!” Lilith protested. “The feeling’s artificial!”

Excuse me? Mae replied incredulously. Your biology “designed” you to like women. Is that feeling artificial?

“That’s different!”

How?

“It…It just is!”

“You’re not really creating a person.” Kali soothed. “You’re just giving your desire to design a dungeon a wider set of emotions. It’d be like creating a mouse for the sole purpose of eating cheese all day. It gets to do what it loves all the time so it’s a win for the mouse and a win for the person who presumably has so much cheese it’s causing a problem.”

“No.” Lilith said firmly. “They think, therefore they are. It’s as simple as that. They’re people.”

“You don’t seem to have a problem keeping your Elder God personality locked away.” Siph interjected.

“She hasn’t even had a chance to think yet, so she hasn’t really existed yet. Besides, she’s too dangerous.”

Siph raised an eyebrow. “So, you’re not even going to give her the decency to make a case? Look, it’s not that I think you should ever let her out, it’s just that if you’re going to insist that all your personalities are people you can’t make exceptions.”

“But she’s just a potential at this point. She never actually came into being, no different than the potential personality we’re talking about. She’s just got words on the status screen.”

I would like to say that I much prefer this existence to no existence. I would prefer this existence over any other anyway, but the fact remains.

“No. We’re going with the second option. End of discussion. If I ever change my mind, we can make the personality then. We can’t unmake the personality.”

“Alright. We’ll go with that. Although, it sounds like you had made up your mind before even asking us, so why do so?” Kali said, then hurried on, not giving Lilith time to reply. “And if you would like, I can remove the Elder God personality. I had to put in something to make people less suspicious of you after reading The King in Yellow, but it’s served its purpose. If I’m being honest, I haven’t actually designed it. I never expected you to use it, so right now it’d just black you out while I actually made the thing.”

“That would be great.” Lilith said. “Now, where are we going to make this dungeon?”

“I made a side room just for this. We’ll do it over there.”

“You want it in your house.” Lilith deadpanned.

“Yup! Well, the Core room, anyway. Since this is my house, I was able to set up a really advanced portal that only allows people I want in, so not only is it the best security system you could ask for,” she walked up to Lilith, smiling brightly, “it also allows you free access to my home if you ever want it! Your very own set of house keys!”

Lilith blushed. “And where will the rest of the dungeon go?”

“A plane of its own. Like Tunem’s plane. It’s just a dud plane. Tons of them are made when other planes get created, so my faction’s got a bunch lying around. Any “demiplane” is actually just one of those, so don’t believe someone when they say they made one. I just let them think that because it’s easier.”

Lilith paused. “Dud? Faction?”

“Dud planes are those too small to be of any real use to anyone. Generally, it means a small amount of weak flora and fauna, next to no space for significant expansion, and no outstanding resources. Most people don’t bother with them because they’re more trouble to set up than they’re worth, but they’re basically all I can get so I’ve had to make do. As for the faction, it’s just a group of administrators who pool their strength when getting planes. It’s just me, my old administrator, and a few other friends in the one I’m in, so we’re not particularly large, but my old administrator and our friends are tough enough that they can muscle their way into getting a big plane every now and then. At the very least, you’re going to meet my old administrator soon. She said she’d show up to give more advice once I swap the systems over, so you can look forward to that.”

“But that’s enough of that. Let me show you the way to the room!”

Fighterman481

Well folks, we're back to 3000ish words again. This chapter went in a direction I honestly was not expecting it to go. I was sort of expecting to get the dungeon actually started and things just sort of happened.

For once I don't think I have any bookkeeping, so I'll get right into it.

I think it's fair to assume that a spell that would let same-sex couples have children would exist by this point, given that same-sex relationships are a non-issue in Haven's society. Ignoring the fact that not all races have a (relatively) even male to female ratio like humans do, the mixing of all those cultures and the fact that their society just couldn't afford to ostracize people when their numbers were so low after the war, it just became normalized.

If anyone's wondering, the best workaround for two men at the moment is a spell that creates a fertilized egg from the two of them and plants it in a surrogate mother. There is one that gives them the required equipment to carry it themselves, but it's pretty unsafe for the baby, given a single effect removal would effectively kill it (and probably do some serious damage to the dad), and those are decently common in Haven society.

If you're wondering if we're going to see female Mark (Lilith's dad), for now the answer is that it's highly unlikely. On-screen, that is. Off-screen it's going to happen. Siph and Jessica will probably hit him with 'it'll help you understand Lilith better' and eventually he'll cave. He's always been one to follow Jessica's lead, and now that Siph's in the mix he probably won't be able to resist them for too long.

Which isn't to say that he's got no say in anything, he just likes making his partners happy.

Also, I'm curious to hear everyone's opinion, do you count what Lilith and Kali have done together as dates? I do, but I've been on a grand total of 2 dates, both of which were arranged by others, so I've got no experience here and could be totally wrong.

So, administrator stuff. Honestly, I wasn't going to touch this for a long time.

And then I gave Kali a last name.

And I think that naturally makes me wonder where she got it from. So they talked family. But given I'd already decided that Kali wasn't born an administrator (well, to be honest, the vast majority aren't. There were like 5 who were and they're just as confused as everyone else), so they talked about that, and then when you wonder why people need to get stronger we get back into inter-administrator politics.

Also, not everyone calls what Kali is an administrator. Some straight up call it god, some call it manager, point is there's no unified name, but generally everyone knows what they're talking about so they haven't bothered to come up with one yet.

As for options one, two, and three, there was no chance three was ever going to happen. Personally, I think option one is the best choice, but that's not what Lilith would do, really. That left only option two, but I also felt like Lilith isn't at the point where she wouldn't seek the approval of everyone else (and that's really what she was doing there when she asked for their opinions) in some way.

Is she right that she's "creating" life? I don't...think so. This is a huge gray area that I don't think I'm properly equipped to delve into and come out with an answer I feel is entirely correct. It's more along the lines of making a highly sophisticated AI, but I'm also of the opinion that there's nothing stopping an AI from being "as sentient" as a human being, given both operate based on electrical signals, it's just a difference of medium and the fact that someone custom-built every facet of the AI. To me, the deciding point comes down to the fact that this hypothetical Parallel is, at the end of the day, Lilith, and wouldn't be able to exist as anything more. Were Kali to somehow pull the plug on all magic, all the Parallels would vanish, leaving only Lilith.

Now, don't get me wrong, they're every bit as "real" as Lilith, and I'm not trying to imply otherwise, I just don't think making a new one is as big of a deal as she's making it out to be. I mean, it's still a big deal, it's just...I think Mae put it best. She would prefer her current existence over no existence, and as long as Parallels aren't being made lightly, I see no reason it would be inherently bad to make one. It's not like anyone can call her out for playing god when god is literally right there egging her on, so that argument's null and void.

And the Elder God personality I struggled with a little, before deciding this was what I'd do. In a way, Kali has ended up being a conduit for my feelings on things that happened earlier on in the series, and so I decided to just go with this. For a while I had removed the Elder God Mask entirely, but eventually I settled on keeping it in and never using it (for the time being, anyway), so I just had Kali do the same.

What do you all think? I'm really curious as to everyone's opinions on this topic, so I'd love to hear what everyone thinks. But, I've talked enough, next week is back to Carmen, see you all then!