For the Record

Well, no time like the present. And it’s not like I have to ask anyone. I can just ask him myself.

Omorth. Are you yourself? Do you remember anything?

Ah, I apparently startled him. That… might not be a great sign…

…

And then I feel confirmation from him.

Huh.

What is the last thing you remember? If you think of a specific image or thing hard enough, or just focus on it I think, I should be able to sense it.

Despite the unsettled feelings he radiates from the thought of me surveilling everything he does, after a moment I receive a short memory of trying and failing to hold back Aubrey’s attacks.

Which makes sense, considering how quickly he took down Izahne in one hit. She’s over level 400.

“He remembers,” I say weakly. “Good. He remembers.”

“Who remembers what?” Izahne asks. “You just said something about Omorth…”

“Yes, him. He’s back. He remembers. Himself, I mean. He’s still him.”

“He is?”

My second-first-wife radiates a happiness that doesn’t register on her face.

“You can just be happy, you know. I wanted to bring him back. I didn’t do it for anyone, although Pearl did push me to do it.”

My mind is finally starting to clear, so I roll to my feet from the thick pile of furs on the floor.

Maybe I should make Artemis a bedframe sometime. Not that it matters right now.

And I’m pretty sure that if I tried using more Spellspeech right now, I’d just pass out again.

A further spike of worry meets my most recent thoughts, but I just smile and scratch Artemis behind her ears instead of acknowledging it.

As I head for the doorway, I glance at Izahne for a moment. She briefly glances back before looking away.

Yeah, she’s still upset.

But that won’t stop me from gently brushing her with Consume anyway.

***

I’m relaxing in one of the pools when I feel a mental nudge from my fox wife.

…Accompanied by a short memory of a human in shiny armor demanding to see the demon queen.

And, I recognize him.

Unfortunately.

I sigh as I rise from the water, drawing my ash back to myself and moving the water dampening my body to my dimensional storage before returning it to the pool.

Apparently most can’t use their dimensional storage like that, but even if I stopped gaining levels from it, my old habit of exercising it at night has paid off. I’m a dimensional storage expert.

Alright, I project, Come get me. I’ll deal with him myself.

Or…

Better idea. Bring me to my castle, specifically the throne room. And then after a moment, take him there as well. Theatrics are important, right? They sent this idiot after me for entertainment. I guess I may as well give them a show.

While I’m in the process of restoring my clothing, Artemis appears in her customary flash of blue flames, before her face flashes to a bright red blush.

“Yeah, I know. Sorry. I was in the bath. It’s fine though, he’s not your problem. He’s mine. Also, I should probably make another portal link, maybe one from my home to yours? Is that alright?”

She tilts her head for a moment, and then nods and says, “Discuss?”

It’s a strange feeling to actually know what she’s trying to say, but it’s getting easier day by day.

She wants to discuss where to link them. And that’s fine.

It’s also so convenient that she can passively read my surface thoughts, because now she just nods in confirmation.

Good.

And without another word, we reappear in the throne room of my castle. I brush my bare feet across the place where Aubrey had cracked the other castle’s floor.

It’s nice to have my home intact, even if I could have repaired that one spot with two or three words.

Quickly striding up the stairs, I take my place on my throne, smoothly shifting into my old comfortable position, with one leg over the other and my head propped on my arm, elbow on the armrest.

I time my theatrics just right, because in a further flash of blue, my former maid and…

Well, the idiot. They both arrive. Artemis immediately disappears again, reappearing to my side and half a step behind.

“No. That’s stupid. This may be my home but you’re at least my equal. Here.”

I wave a hand and a second throne of pure ash appears next to mine.

“Take your place.”

She hesitates, but after I gently but firmly press my insistence through our bonds, she takes her place in the ashen throne to my right.

“{permanence},” I quietly intone, ensuring her seat will stay in place as long as I want it to.

…Now that I think of it, didn’t I do the same to the challenge room in the forest dungeon?

The shiny-armored human clears his throat loudly. “If you are finished playing musical chairs?”

“Oh shut up, this is more important than you can possibly imagine,” I say dismissively.

He grits his teeth and start turning red, and –

Wait, why did I know he was a ‘he’? That’s new.

“How DARE you!? The goddess resurrected me at great spiritual cost to herself, and you would –“

“Yeah, yeah. I know, Dipshit,” I interrupt as disdainfully as I possibly can. “Hello, hello again. You’re back. What do you want?”

“What I WANT is for you to respect me as the righteous TRUE HERO I am, and to surrender your power to me!” he bellows.

I theatrically yawn. “That’s not happening unless you can manage to take it from me. How exactly do you propose to do that? I’m immeasurably stronger than you.”

While the human shuffles in his knapsack – he really doesn’t know how dimensional storage works, does he? I disinterestedly inspect the fingernails on my free hand.

Oh, it looks like he finally found what he was looking for. And he holds it out toward me.

…

Some kind of wooden statuette?

Wait, I can feel some amount of mana from it…

“{appraise},” I intone. Yeah, apparently the Appraisal Skill just indirectly calls the spell. It’s kind of funny.

[Soul Trap (Lesser)]

“Dear, is a ‘Soul Trap’ dangerous?” I ask the goddess to my side.

“Maybe,” she answers with a shrug. “Doubt.”

“Sounds fun.”

Anyway, I use Telekinesis to yank it from his grasp for a closer look.

…And he scrambles after it, promptly falling flat on his face with the crash of his metal plate armor on stone. Did the other gods really want this to be a slapstick performance? I hope they did because that’s what he’s delivering.

“Not bad, but work on your landing,” I chide as I take the gadget in my hand.

…

Yeah, I’m pretty sure I know how this works.

…But I have a better way.

“{activate delay three seconds}.”

And I toss it back to him as he’s picking himself up from the floor. “Catch.”

…Which he does…

And then after a flash of sickly purple light that quickly drains into the statuette, his body flops lifelessly to the ground.

Well, I say lifelessly, but his body is definitely still alive. His soul is just in his precious gizmo now, unconscious and unaware.

“That was fun. We should do this more often – but we won’t. Good try, Dipshit. {permanence}.”

After a brief walk to the empty treasury to place the ‘TRUE HERO’s trapped soul in the darkest, dampest corner, we head outside to leave his body for the wildlife to consume.

It’s not like the death of his body will release his soul. It absolutely won’t, especially with Permanence cast on it.

I stretch my back in satisfaction. “You don’t need to get back to your uhhhh subjects or anything right now, do you?”

Artemis chuffs out a breath before hesitantly nodding.

“Oh well. Thanks for your help, if you want I could always help out with your audience stuff. Only if you want me to though.”

She blinks. I think that caught her off guard.

“Now?” she asks with a poorly hidden hint of excitement in her tone.

“Hmm,” I mumble as I mull it over. “Well, sure. Why not? What am I going to do today, take another bath? Bother Julis, or Pearl? Ask if Izahne is still upset? Oh, she will be. It hasn’t been nearly long enough yet, but don’t worry about it, I’ll figure something out. It’ll be fiiiiine.”

Artemis tips her head to the side, and another giggle escapes me at her mannerisms.

This could be fun.

…

Less than a minute later, I’m creating my own ashen throne next to hers on a large platform made of wood and bone before dignifiedly taking my place at her right.

After all, in this audience hall, I’m her queen.

I glance at my fox wife, who apparently has been watching me from the corner of her eye since we got here. Maybe she’s worried I’ll hurt her image of an overwhelmingly strong patron.

But she doesn’t need to worry. I have no idea how divine etiquette works for audiences, other than being as condescending as physically possible, but even I can handle this.

“Well?” I ask no one in particular. “Send in the next challenger. I’ll deal with them myself, as a tribute to my wife.”