Lifre let out a long sigh, happy to see that the urgent problem of the underground insect army had been dealt with after a few more rounds of fire from both the king of beasts and Thessa Grid. Naturally, there were still far more creatures inhabiting this world, but this would be enough to buy this construction team a bit of safety. With any luck, by the next time a monster hoard appeared, the city above would have been completed.
“Thanks for the save.” Lifre grinned up towards the halfling duo, before looking at the seven lions that she had summoned. After such an arduous battle, these divine beasts were in a miserable state, their bodies covered in golden wounds. Some of them looked almost ethereal, as if they were going to fade away at any moment. “Oh, and thanks to you guys, too.”
The leading lion furrowed his brow, looking at Lifre in surprise at her tone. She did not show any of the same respect she had displayed when asking for their help, and instead sounded almost dismissive. However, before it could say anything to scold her for such insolence, its body broke apart into specks of light.
Lifre nodded her head in satisfaction, happy to know that it had worked out. What happened in the outside world wasn’t recorded within the stories of the creatures she summoned. As such, they would never remember this battle, nor how they had aided her. When she once again summoned the tale of the King of Beasts, it would be as if this whole event had never happened.
Thessa and Theon watched as the divine beasts faded into nothing, golden lights streaming back to the library above the surface. A moment later, Lifre’s own armor and sword melted away. “We’re just happy to help.” Thessa said with a small smile.
Unlike most gods, she had no interest in establishing her own world or using her strengths to become rich and famous. From the very beginning, she had only wanted to use her divine power to help others, whether her brother or the people around her. Meanwhile, Theon recognized the abilities of himself and his sister, and decided that they were best utilized as defenders. This was why they could often be found among the highest floors of Fyor.
Lifre nodded her head, already aware of the nature of these two. They were quite popular as the main characters in several stories written by their fans in Fyor. “In that case…” Lifre’s body lifted up, moving to leave the chasm that had been created. “Let’s get out of here and close this up. Can’t have it messing up the foundation or anything.” Now that she had summoned the architects of her library, Lifre was bound to be staying here until the city was completed…
After Aznod and Tsubaki prepared the meal for us, Accalia and the others began to explain some of the areas that they had discovered while I was immersed in my training. Admittedly, most of the rooms were rather normal, just with special twists like the functions of the training room. For instance, Ryone had discovered that everyone had a gaming room in their palace, featuring state of the art equipment. Not only could you connect to your Virtual self through it, you could project a fully realistic hologram of your surroundings, simulating a virtual experience while offline. This was mostly useful when someone wanted to hold conference calls and needed everyone to gather, but it was still a nice touch.
Who would complain about a few extra features? Other rooms throughout Olympus had similar quirks. After some exploring, Ashley discovered that the throne room had a hidden projector to display various news networks.
As Tsubaki led me on a tour of her own palace, I couldn’t help but glance around. “By the way… where are Dana and Lifre?” It had been a while since I saw the two of them. Dana, I could understand if she was repairing the Sky Citadel, but Lifre? That wasn’t really her area of expertise.
Tsubaki tilted her head in thought at my question. “Lifre said that she was going to go on an adventure. However, I do not know precisely where she chose to do so. As for Dana… she said that she wanted to work on her Sky Chariot project. Although Olympus has both flight and combat capabilities, she doesn’t want to give up on this project.”
Clara grinned broadly as she stood before a burning star, as if the intense heat didn’t both her in the slightest. It had taken some work to convince Dana to allow her to get this familiar. Now that she almost had it, she was ecstatic. I choose you, Sirius!
Clara held her hands forward, forming a gate at the heart of the star and thrusting her spiritual energy into it. As the flames of the star burned her soul, she let out a laugh, silenced by the vacuum of space. Oh, this will be SO worth it! She shouted in her mind, feeling her soul plunging into the gate.
Moments later, the star shook, before rapidly collapsing in on itself until it was no larger than her fist. Above Clara’s head, her health bar flashed, dropping down to roughly a third thanks to the damage her spirit had sustained. Despite that, her eyes were wide and happy, drawing her new familiar over to herself. Now, let’s get you evolving.
Closing her eyes, Clara focused on the connection she had to Ryone as the Apostle of Magic. Mana and spiritual energy flooded from her body, causing her complexion to go pale. Even so, she didn’t stop, feeling her health drop further and further. First, one pebble formed around the star, and then a second, and finally a third. Each pebble represented a full planet after being enlarged, and also a rank increase for the familiar.
After the third planet, Clara felt that she was able to make it grow. However, she did not choose to do so yet, and instead absorbed the familiar into herself. Rapidly evolving a celestial body familiar had caused a considerable amount of damage, and cost far too much energy. There was something else that she had to do before she could bring it out and allow it to grow to its full size.
Hey, bossss!! Clara called out in her mind, tearing open a gate through the void. She could feel the sensors of Olympus sweeping over her, identifying her as Dana before allowing her entry. While the Keeper was registering her initial call, Clara rushed to the nearest elevator. “Hermes, take me to the Keeper, please and thank you!”
There was a moment’s delay, before a blue light flashed over her body. Without waiting for Hermes to guide her, she rushed out of the elevator, almost colliding with the Keeper and Tsubaki. “Ah, there you are!” She said with a wild grin.
The Keeper blinked down at Clara, glancing at her hair. “You are… Clara, correct?” He asked, as if unsure which of the familiars she was.
“That’s right! I’ve got a favor to ask! Well, I doubt it’ll really be that much of a problem for you. Barely an inconvenience really, but it’ll help us with a lot of stuff in the future!” Clara spoke out, causing Tsubaki’s brow to twitch. Still, the Keeper looked down at her curiously.
“What is the favor?”
Hearing his question, Clara beamed a bright smile. “I need ore veins for my new familiar! Mage Heart, Blood Heart, Dimensium, all of it! From my understanding, it won’t cost you any extra points to attach ore veins to a planet now that you’ve already bought them right?”
The Keeper seemed rather surprised by her request, before nodding. “That’s right. Setting up the mineral nodes for you isn’t an issue. Though, I’m curious why you’re so… energetic about it?”
Clara giggled, shaking her head. “This is the personality that I told my main self I’d be going with! If I make a promise like that, I’m all in! Oh, and can you make sure the nodes respawn? I don’t want to have to come and bug you again if we eventually run out.”
That made the Keeper hesitate briefly, before nodding his head. “This isn’t a civilian world, and I assume that you just want to use it for your research, correct?”
“Yup!” Clara nodded quickly. “This is going to be our new workshop. I’ve got a bunch of ideas I want to try out, but can’t without a lot of open space. And the respawning resources will make sure that I don’t have to tap into our budget and can do it all myself.”
There was a bit more to it than that, of course. For instance, if she needed rare herbs or monster materials, she would still need to use Dana’s research budget. However, being able to supply all of her own mineral resources would make it so that she could automate the vast majority of the process. Especially once the Mage Heart and Blood Heart veins were established, as those could be used to fuel not only the workshop, but the entire familiar’s gigantification.
The Keeper thought about that, before nodding his head. “Give me just a minute.” He spoke with a smile, before the light seemed to fade from his eyes. Clara could tell that he had gone back to the Admin Room, and Tsubaki let out a low sigh.
“Did you really have to rush in here like that?” She asked, shaking her head. Clara simply chuckled in response.
“Like I said, I gotta stick to my role, Tsuba! I’m the loud, energetic, optimist. Or were you enjoying your quiet time with your Keeper.” She gave a small wink at that, Tsubaki’s eyes going wide.
“It was nothing like that.” Tsubaki said, glancing off to the side. Though, her tails were a bit more honest, waving happily behind her. Clara grinned, knowing that Tsubaki enjoyed those rare moments when she could be alone with the Keeper. It was almost built into her training to want to be with him at all times.
“Oh, I know.” She nodded her head. “Don’t worry, once I get this upgrade, I’ll get out of your hair and let you get back to the tour. Oh, also! There’s a Trial of Blood simulator in your palace.”
Tsubaki’s eyes went wide at that, quickly looking at Clara. “How do you know that?”
The black-haired elf gave a mysterious smile. “I’m the one that asked him to put it in. You’ll have to find where he put it, but it should be able to simulate the effects of a Trial of Blood.” After she said that, she immediately closed her mouth, feeling the presence of the Keeper changing once again.
“Sorry, it took me a moment to locate your familiar.” The Keeper apologized with a smile. “It should have all of the basic resource nodes set up, all with a similar respawn timer as Mage Heart. I went ahead and set up veins in all three of your planets and spread them out, since I wasn’t sure which one you wanted to use.”
“You’re the best!” Clara exclaimed happily, jumping in joy. She ran up to him, and hugged his arm for a moment before turning to run away again. “I’ve got to go set up an automated mining system now!”
After leaving that message behind, Clara ran to the elevator. “Take me away, Hermes! I’ve got a revolution to start!”
Clara’s mind was already filled to the brim with different machines that Dana had learned about over the years. Survey drones and auto-miners, smelteries and processing plants. Once she had the two energy crystals mining, she wouldn’t have to worry much about pollution, given that ki was a rather clean burning fuel source.
The biggest hurdle that she’d have to face was the fact that she was only one person… so it would take quite a bit of time to do all the manual labor to get everything built. Automate everything as fast as possible!
