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The Gamer Chapter 1444 – A little more things in advance
🕑 Added 2023-05-26 16:28:40 +0000 UTC“Two days, please,” John pleaded with Magoi. “Three?”
The High Fateweaver of Fusion let out a deep sigh. “You’re asking me to sacrifice an entire month of my life to this,” he reminded John. The reason why John didn’t get to grind as much as he might desire was half the difficulty of taking all three of his bodies out of Fusion’s operations and half Magoi being in his sunset years.
The first half could potentially be alleviated, by John just forcing the ministries to deal with his absence. There was an alternative solution of not taking all of his bodies with him when he was grinding, but such attempts had shattered on the time dilation so far. While the Creator Puppet and Ambassador Double could operate at infinite distance, to have layers of conscious work at a vastly different passage of time was too confusing even for him to handle. Time vertigo was disorienting beyond words.
The other was unsolvable. Magoi was old and lacked both the interest and ways to get the kind of power that would keep him from aging. The High Fateweaver had accepted that he was closer to death than he was away from it. To say he had given up on life was overstating it. Magoi had just decided that he had accomplished all he wanted in life and was now kicking back. Any efforts he still made mostly existed to set up his children for enduring success. Also, probably, to make sure he got grandkids.
Enjoying the rest of his life and spending a whole month locked away in a barrier just so John could grind were not exactly things that could run in parallel. Not a great many places he could head out to in an Illusion Barrier of his own making. Neither could he do much that he hadn’t done before. He had been a High Fateweaver for decades.
“It’ll probably be the last time,” John tried to convince the High Fateweaver. To create a sense of urgency, he leaned onto Magoi’s office table.
The headmaster’s office was a room of Victorian design. Large windows and leather chairs combined with heavy wooden furniture to all give the feeling John stood in a preserved academy building of that time. Magoi fit right into there, with his butler-esque outfit, and John, in his modern suit, was still not terribly out of place. Fashion hadn’t changed that much since then, when it came to male clothing.
“Probably,” Magoi repeated, amused. He wagged a gloved finger at him. “John, speak clearly.”
“If all goes well, Lee should be able to take over by next month, or at least reach a level of mastery that we can plan around her,” John explained. “She already has the power, on paper, she’ll just need the time to get used to it.”
“Right, your little power levelling marathon,” Magoi hummed.
By marathon, Magoi hopefully understood that the Gamer had unlocked a special way of grinding in Instant Dungeon available to low levels. John had been deliberately vague about how it really worked. Because the High Fateweaver was a smart man, wise to John’s exploits, he may have suspected the actual way it worked. Unless pressed on it, John would keep the truth to himself. It felt dirty to tell the man that he was keeping his daughter tied up in a specially designed metal contraption so she remained steady while he fucked her.
Which was about half of what he was doing to her right now.
“If this really is the last time,” Magoi began. “I can get you 27 days. I won’t be able to hold the 10 times over 3 days.”
John nodded, that still worked for him. “Thank you… maybe you should try some videogames during that time? Not like you got much else to do.”
“I’ll consider it.” Magoi chuckled.
______________________________________________________________________
“So, he said yes,” John, the real John, informed the room at large. He was at home, leaving Jack in charge of all the government things he needed to do today and Jake in charge of Lee. The conversation had just happened at the most opportune moment. It was difficult to catch Magoi in person these days and to write him a text message on this felt like it wouldn’t have worked.
The announcement came in the middle of him drifting around a curve and was generally not acknowledged. Everyone was way too busy staring at their own screen in the gaming room. Mario Kart remained one of the most popular harem games to this day. It had just the right balance of skill expression and RNG to stay interesting.
“Cool,” Metra acknowledged. A moment later, she shouted. “In your fucking face, Bae! I’m first.”
“I don’t care,” Beatrice responded.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought!” Metra rubbed it into the passive maid’s face.
Tilting her head and looking away, Beatrice did her best to seem unbothered. That the white-horned dragon maid even made an effort to look like she didn’t care spoke volumes about her annoyance.
It was rare to see the gaming room with its many PCs filled to the brim like this. After they had bought a load of additional Switches and hooked them up to the systems, however, it had become a bit more regular. All of the party games that they had played with split screens were now happening over there instead. Those that did not require split screens were still held over in the living room.
After John finished his own race, he typed the message out for Lydia. It would probably be difficult for her to attend a three-day grinding session. Doubly so because of the event that had caused John to urge for this extension in the first place. He wanted to be as strong as possible when arriving at the Divided Gates meeting – without resorting to Court Dust.
He had just sent the message when he noted Aclysia and Claire stepping up to him. They had a bit of tremble in their step and not in the usual, Master-worshipping way. Hands folded in front of their laps, they shifted their weight back and forth when he didn’t have a line of sight of their naked butts. Most unusual behaviour.
“Master, Claire and I have been contemplating the addition of a tunnel to the star fort that connects the base level entrance to my apartment. Specifically, the storage area. It would make it easier to haul the fresh meat into the facilities.”
There was clear logic to this and a goal. Still, there was something off here. “Is your inventory not big enough?” he asked. Since the size of the inventories scaled with the commonly raised Stats of the maids that had them (Aclysia, Beatrice, and Momo), there had not been an issue about transporting any house goods.
“It's in case anyone else, like my lowly self-“ Claire stopped there to shudder. “Hmmm, Master’s reprimanding gaze…” she whispered. “It’s… It’s in case someone else needs to deliver something, Master.”
“Or in case someone may need to fetch something for an outdoors event,” Aclysia continued.
John leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. His fingers danced on his upper arms. He stared at Claire and she squirmed. He stared at Aclysia and she trembled. Not entirely unusual reactions to his focused attention, but something was still off here. He turned his head to find that everyone else was distracted, not listening or not caring to listen. The maids had chosen an opportune moment for this conversation.
The moment to create this tunnel, however, was off. She should have needed this months ago, if she needed it all. John outright refused to believe that Aclysia was incapable of coordinating her pantry restock trips with Claire, nor would he believe for a second that she gave anyone free access to the pantry that he ate from. Every ingredient he ate at home was at least triple checked for its adequacy and lack of poison. It was one aspect of his paranoia that he was outsourcing.
“…Alright… you know how to edit the Guild Hall… just make sure the security is tight,” John relented. He wasn’t sure what was happening exactly, whether this was related to his upcoming birthday or if there was another reason to keep something hidden from him.
Aclysia and Claire both let out a slow, almost relieved breath. They bowed their heads in unison. “Thank you, Master.”
“Stay,” John ordered after the two maids straightened up. He rubbed his chin. A few moments’ consideration was given to what he should do before they went out and did whatever they wanted to do. To make them drop to their knees and pledge their loyalty all over again would be hot as all hell and might serve as a… ‘No,’ he stopped himself before he could get any further. ‘That’s the dom talking. This isn’t a bedroom thing.’
John rose from his chair and pulled them both in a hug. They reacted with excitement at first, then gradually melted into the romantic intent of the gesture. Hands stayed above the waist, even as they hugged back. They hummed, happily, pressing against his warm chest. Squeezing them a little tighter, he coaxed from them all the little noises that made his heart soar. Their short nailed fingers scratched over his back. Up and down, feeling his skin.
Head between theirs, he whispered, “This is our home. You’re not just keepers of mine. Do with it as you please. I love you both,” and pressed a kiss first on Aclysia’s, then on Claire’s cheek.
The two pale women practically turned into putty, just rubbing up against him while their mental connections radiated pink and the words, ‘Master deserves more, John deserves more, my John deserves more – the best, thebesthebesthebestlovehimlovehimsomuuuuch.’
John was a vain man, but he didn’t think he could be faulted for basking in the absolute depths of their love for a little bit. The vanilla scent rising from their bodies was wonderful and calming. They stayed like this until someone else in the room shouted and the next game round was about to begin. Then and only then did they separate.
What followed were three days of little of interest happening. They took the foot off the pedal a bit when it came to the power-fucking. Since they would have 27 of literally nothing else, John would have plenty of time to get all of them up to the appropriate level. One body would be Raiding, one would be pounding one of the three, and the last would be making sure he stayed up to date on his Class Challenges.
‘One day I will get that damn Elementalist one cleared,’ John thought. To this day, he could not get his thoughts synchronized with all of them simultaneously. It was, strictly, impossible to unify all six of his elementals in a single thought. He might as well have tried to get Locke, Voltaire, Plato, Kant, and Ozzy Osbourne to agree on the best economic system.
That continued frustration was alleviated by Lydia actually making time for the whole three days. A whole month with the queen before the Divided Gates meeting was doubly important. He got to see his Lydia and he got to plan more details of the proposal. Never would John say that the queen of his heart was a control freak, but she did rather enjoy when everything did go exactly as she said it would. A tad annoying because he was one for showmanship, which was best with genuine surprise. Alas, love required compromise.
The fact that he would be in two engagements not too soon had him all excited. Advantage of Lydia being so forthright with it all was that he had no reason to be nervous this time around. Perhaps it was also because it was past the first engagement.
John kept working away at his office job. The tide of legislative, judicial, and executive questions never ended. Officially, John was only responsible for one of those three branches on the federal level. Between him having to also oversee Collide’s affairs and the fact that the head of state always had soft power over everything, he was part of everything whether he liked it or not. There was always a judge, a prosecutor, a major or a lawmaker that wanted to get a good word in. They were sly about it, long having caught onto the fact that John stamped out corruption where he saw it.
Which meant that they weren’t letting him be privy to the real collusions going on.
Which in turn meant that John was faced with a few moral dilemmas. Was it best to partake in the corruption so he could curb its excesses? Should he have Scarlett design a very extensive and detailed spy network on his politicians? Or should he just let the corruption linger under the surface, only stamping it out when solid evidence came to light the regular way? It wasn’t easy. He had to compromise on some principles, because when reality clashed against theory, reality always got its way. Fusion was too large and had too many political actors now for there not to be cells of proverbial cancer in its system, sucking the nutrients out of the administrative body and harming the nation as a whole.
A little dirt was okay. It was inevitable. To root out any kind of corruption wholesale was to make perfect the enemy of the good. ‘Maybe I should have Nightingale and Lorelei set up in anti-corruption offices?’ the Gamer theorized, as the Friday workday came to its end. ‘Lorelei can’t be lied to by… I think everyone? Haven’t met someone yet who could. Nightingale is passionate and soft-spoken, so she’d make for a good face. Together they’d be able to run a pretty tight ship… but to put my own women in even more offices would rile up my enemies. The administration is already dominated by haremettes.’
John held the office of head of state. Momo was head of the administration. Beatrice was not only the head of the most important ministry of any state, but she was also, arguably, the most powerful financial minister on the globe. The more powerful the Token grew, the more powerful became the position that issued the number of new Tokens to be minted on any given day. While Aclysia had bowed out, she still held some sway in the offices and Claire was more and more taking a position as his secretary. Nathalia and Nightingale, as patron gods, had a tremendous amount of soft power. Abyssals instinctively had a reverence for the position, the same as most Catholics would respect the opinion of a cardinal. Metra was basically a general and Nia was actually a general. Rave didn’t hold any official position, but only a fool would suggest she wasn’t affiliated with the government. The amount of projects she got started and organized was staggering. Lorelei had a seat in the House of Exceptionals. That one was given to her by the Order, though, and theirs to reassign.
John expected William to take over as soon as he was done schooling his daughter in the proper way to run the Order of the Golden Rose. That would be a headache in the future, to have that pompous, entitled, arrogant paladin in his face all the time, holding long-winded speeches on every vote.
Yeah, that would be terrible.
Unrelated to his current train of thought too.
‘God, I wish I was a… king…’ the thought wormed its way to his consciousness, turning slower as he realized what he was thinking. ‘Fuck,’ he groaned and rubbed his forehead. No excuse to make that it was because of pleasure either. For once he was alone in his office. Everyone had something to do. Although the maids had offered to make time, insisted almost, he told them to tend to what they needed to do instead. Blowjobs were fantastic and so was keeping appreciation for blowjobs by not having them all the time.
Now he wished he had someone around to keep his mind off what he had just thought.
‘Is it really inevitable?’ he asked himself. He wasn’t sure if the pit in his stomach was the answer or the dread to finding out. His fingers drummed on the tabletop. ‘How would I even go about changing this into a kingdom? Why am I asking myself that? Am I afraid of the hypothetical because it seems all too real now?’ John hit the side of his head in frustration. ‘I wonder what Travolta would say if he could see me now… That’s a name that’s not been on my mind for a long time.’ John stood up, his mind still working through technomancy while he marched to the one day window and gazed outwards, past the balcony and into the plaza of the administrative area of the Guild Hall. ‘What would you have done with all of this power, Travolta?’
No answer. The dead didn’t speak. They never would. John’s mind raced through the beginnings of his journey all the way to the current. There was a lot of blood on his hands. By his action or as the consequence of something he had started, many had died. Hundreds. Thousands. It would be tens of thousands one day. Hundreds of thousands? Millions? The question wasn’t if it would happen, only when. He would live too long to not have that burden on his shoulders.
‘I better have a very good reason for what I do, as president or as king, if I want to live through the suffering I’ll bring to my enemies.’ He clenched his fist. ‘The only good war is a swift war. The only swift war is one brought by unquestionable victory.’
It was time to get stronger.
Comments
Fenbags
Big fan of the parallels of reading this simultaneously to the rewrite Fun, seeing John and Rave getting together then at the same time they get engaged now, a call back to Baldy. John coming to terms with the nature of the abyss is a nice constant.
Askance
The powers in the abyss would make economic theories and governments work that are not practical for us mere humans. The arguments would have even more dimensions!
