“What do you mean to do?” King Serendell asked.
“A handful of things, but nothing to reveal my Transcendence to anyone outside this room and those who become involved with me. On that note,” I snapped my finger and froze everything else except Maya and King Serendell, “I need to speak to you directly.”
“To me, specifically? What about?”
“Rhianon.”
“What has Rhodri filled your head with? I expect that brat Eirlys had a hand in it, too.”
“You will start referring to her as Rhianon.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Despite the few things I’ve shown you, you still doubt me.”
“Of course I doubt you. Think of things from my point of view. You are a child of eighteen years and daughter of a count demanding a meeting with every monarch on Arcadia. You have some impressive abilities, I admit, but why should I believe any of this Transcendent nonsense.”
From my seat, I teleported to his side, took his arm, and whisked us away, high enough above Arcadia that he could see the entire planet below us. We were far enough into space that we were in the moon’s orbit, so I had to cover us both in mana to keeps us safe from the radiation and lack of pressure in space.
“What? Is that-?”
“Gaia. We’re directly above Arcadia. Directly above the World Tower, specifically, though even that doesn’t reach into space. Look around. You’ll see the star the planet orbits as well as the other planets closer and further than Gaia. The moon is right over there.” I pointed to my left and he gasped. We were eye level with the moon, and it was slowly headed toward us.
He was shocked into silence.
“Still not enough?” I held my hands in front of me. “Look below at the planet and observe.” I slowly pulled my hands apart and the view of the planet zoomed out until we could see the entire solar system.
And then I kept zooming us out until there was nothing but a dense collection of stars amidst pure blackness.
“You can see the entire macrocosm now. Our backs are against the very edge of this world. Reach behind you and you’ll feel the barrier. Don’t worry, it won’t harm you.”
He did just that and gasped. “Unbelievable. The universe is that mass of light, and we are at the edge of creation?”
“Yes and no. That mass of light is indeed the universe contained inside this world, and Gaia is a single planet deep within those stars. But this is not the edge of creation. This is merely the edge of this macrocosm, which appears as a ball of light in the sky around the World Tree in Eden.”
“So then, our world exists inside Eden?”
“Yes.” I tapped the barrier, and everything outside the barrier became visible. We were high in the sky floating far enough away to see a large portion of the World Tree.”
“Yggdrasil,” I said. “This is the World Tree at the heart of my nation, Alexandria. As far as the eye can see is Alexandria. Eden is massive on a scale that you cannot imagine. As massive as Elysium, which exists directly below Eden. It’s the world of the dead.
“Elysium? Your supposed name is strikingly similar to that.”
“Elysia, yes. Lady Luna, my godmother and King at the time when I created the system and the afterlife for mortals, named the system and the afterlife after me. The system was created primarily for the afterlife, but the entirety of Eden adopted it, and the mortal worlds like this one were included in the system. Elysium is the grand macrocosm that houses the dead from every mortal world, and it is ungodly enormous.”
“You said it houses the dead from every mortal world. What of the Transcendents?”
“When a Transcendent dies, their soul is absorbed by the world tree and made anew. They become an entirely different person, something like reincarnation, but not quite that nice.”
“I think I have a grasp on things now.”
“Then you believe me?”
He nodded his head. “This is far more miraculous than I could have imagined.”
“Good.” I teleported us back to the room, placing him squarely in his seat, and then I returned to my seat. “So, about Rhianon.”
“That’s my only son. You are aware now, yes? That that child was not born female. I finally got a son, and that son claimed to be a girl. The official story is that I had a daughter and named the child Rhodri out of a fit of rage, then gave up trying to have a son.”
“Yes. I’m aware of all that.”
“You expect me to simply accept that my son is not my son, but my fifth daughter?” I could see the tears in his eyes.
“Listen. It’s not an easy thing to accept, but I can show you proof that Rhia is female. Anomalies happen. Female souls can be born in a male body, and male souls can be born in a female body. And those two aren’t the only possibilities.”
He looked away and sighed. “If you are telling me this, then I shall believe it. Next time I speak with… Rhianon, I will discuss her name and gender with her. Thank you for opening my eyes, Lady Elysia.”
“You’re quite welcome, but do call me Elise. I don’t want the world at large to know about Transcendents or my true identity. I mean to live here as Elise.”
“Eli, how did you convince him?” Maya asked, giving me a rather curious look.
“I showed him the world and beyond. I can show you as well if you’d like.”
She smiled and nodded. “I very much would.” I noticed her tail was wagging.
Just like regular cats, catpeople wag their tails quite wildly. Wolves and wolfpeople are also similar. It’s adorable when Maya or Luma or Cel or Chris does that. Hehe.
I could help but let out a giggle, and she pouted. “What are you laughing about?!”
“You’re wagging your tail, and it’s very cute.” I caught her tail and pulled it up to my face and rubbed it against my cheek.
That reddened her face so much it looked like a ripe tomato. “Eli! You shouldn’t do that in public!”
“Hehe. What does this mean here? My first wife is also a cat person, and she loves when I do this. Back home, it was a way of saying ‘I love you’.”
“It’s the same here, but not in front of others!”
I glanced at King Serendell, who was looking away. “Pay no mind to me. I have seen and heard nothing whatsoever.” I could tell he was holding back a laugh.
“Uh huh.” I stole a kiss on Maya’s cheek then snapped my fingers to unfreeze the rest of the room. “Welcome back everyone else. I just had a conversation with King Serendell.”
“Indeed,” he said. “I believe her now.”
The other monarchs looked at me in disbelief.
“Lady Elysia, how did you convince him of all people?” King Gallia asked.
“I showed him some things. And don’t call me Elysia. I’m keeping Transcendents and my identity secret.”
“I see. Very well.”
“Anyway. Main topic. There are a few things I want to implement. First, abolish slavery.”
Half of them looked at me as if I were crazy, but I ignored that.
“Why do you want to abolish slavery?” Mabel asked.
I looked at Maya. “Which countries have slavery and which outlawed it?”
“Weltwald, Serendell, and Wavecrest have slavery. Nacht and Gallia have outlawed it. There are also many nations overseas that have slavery, more than not.”
“I see,” I said with sigh. “I have a lot of work ahead of me in this world.” I eyed Mabel and the other two monarchs who have slavery in their nations. “Abolish it.”
“I have been working toward that the past ten years,” Mabel said. “My nobles are pushing back with threat of succession. I’m winning them over little by little, but it’s likely going to take several more years.”
“Serendell?”
“My word is absolute in my nation. No noble dares disobey a royal decree. I shall see it abolished within the month.”
“A month sounds reasonable. Issuing the decree is the easy part. Placing the freed slaves is the difficult part.”
“Indeed, but it shall be done.”
“One of you were already trying to abolish it, and one of you is opening accepting it. What about you, Wavecrest?”
“I am against abolishing slavery.”
I narrowed my eyes at him.
“King Wavecrest, I implore you to reconsider,” Maya said.
“Absolutely not.”
I snapped my finger and placed an illusion that made the room fade away and only our chairs remained. Below us was the World Tree. We were quite high, enough to see the entire tree, the entirety of Alexandria, and the neighboring countries.
“What is this?”
“My home. Eden. Observe.” The land became colored according to nation. “The red nation to the west,” I pointed at it, “is completely destroyed.”
“What happened?” Mabel asked.
“A group of nobles from that nation had the bright idea of kidnapping me when I was a child.”
“YOU, were kidnapped?” Velarus asked.
“And sold into slavery. They knew exactly who they had kidnapped, and meant to use me as a bargaining chip. But nobody except my family knew that the King was my godmother. My mother prayed to cast the world-tier origin magic spell, Eye of Providence. And because she prayed for it, Lady Luna heard it. My mother whose public name was Xera Alexandria, my uncle whose public name was Xanith Alexandria, and my aunt whose public name was Xana Alexandria, came for me.”
“I feel a great deal of anger swell up every time I think of somebody kidnapping you and worse selling you into slavery,” Alice said.
“I’d like to think you would have jumped into action as fast as my Transcendent guardians.” I gave her a warm smile. “So they came for me, thanks to Eye of Providence, they quite literally b-lined to me, right through the roof. Aunt Xana cast Scale of Judgment, another world-tier origin spell, on that building and then executed everyone that didn’t pass the scale’s judgment.”
“On the spot?” King Gallia asked.
“On the spot. Uncle Xanith teleported me and the other children and adult slaves with him back to our palace in Alexandria, where they would be set up with proper lives and care. My mother went to the royalty of that nation and meant to question them, but Lady Luna was there, standing over their dead bodies.”
“‘You’re here?’ my mother had asked. ‘Yes, and I will handle things from here. You and Xana return to Alexandria and be with Elysia.’ And after that, Lady Luna cast Scale of Judgment on the entire nation and teleported every soul that passed judgment out of the nation. Then, she cast Disintegration on the nation, leaving nothing but a perfectly flat scorched earth in her wake. That nation was erased from existence. Its name, its peoples’ names, the very landscape... gone.”
I snapped my fingers and dispelled the illusion, then eyed Wavecrest for a moment, frightening him with my death glare.
“Do you understand now? I was subjected to slavery in my youth. I know what its like. I will not tolerate another soul being treated like that.”
“I still refuse,” Wavecrest said. “I see no reason why my country should-”
“You seem to be under the misunderstanding that this is a request,” I said.
“Wavecrest, I suggest you do as she says,” Serendell said.
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
“You don’t want to make a Transcendent your enemy,” Velarus said, “much less the King of the World.”
“King Wavecrest,” Maya said. “I’ve witnessed her power on the frontlines.”
Mabel gasped. “You’ve been there? When?”
“Twice last week. Eli took Lena and I the first time, and just me the second time. She wiped out an entire battlefront in seconds. And she just killed an intelligent phantom beast with power at S20, that’s twenty times SSS, mind you. She launched that monster into space on the back of explosion magic powerful enough that it could have razed the entire continent, barring maybe the World Tower.”
“Wavecrest, even I believe this woman,” Serendell said. “Is that not enough to convince you?”
“It matters not,” I said. “He can either abolish slavery willingly now or lose his throne when I clear the World Tower and publicly announce my true identity.”
“You would declare war on a nation?”
“No. War would imply you can fight back. That won’t happen. Your soldiers will not suffer your foolishness. Rather than that, I’ll simply remove you from the throne and install another. Perhaps your son or brother? I don’t know their names. Or perhaps Lady Charlotte?”
“I will not stand for this!”
I sighed and rubbed my temples. “Why is there always one stupid royal?” I stood up, grabbed him by the arm, and teleported out of the room.
“Unhand me, you-”
His words fell silent mid-sentence when I interrupted him. “Be quiet and watch.” The world was still frozen, and the moon was in the sky, halted. I created four catalysts with rainbow mana and teleported them to the moon, on top of each other, where they exploded brilliantly and split the moon into several pieces.
“You… destroyed the moon?” Wavecrest said. His face was a mix of shock and disbelief.”
Then, I held my hand out and acted as though I were grabbing a knob, then turned it counterclockwise. As I turned it, the moon’s pieces returned to their proper place, and soon it was whole again.
“And now it’s back in one piece.”
“Any further arguments?”
He reluctantly shook his head, and I returned us to the meeting room where he quickly agreed to abolish slavery in his nation.
“Okay, now that the top of slavery is handled,” I said, “there is another topic I wish to discuss. This one is merely me informing you what I’m doing.”
“What’s that, love?”
I looked at her and smiled. “I will cast three world-tier spells. The first is Foundation. That creates a mana font that one can channel mana into and store it. It can be linked to other world magic when cast as a field and power that magic indefinitely, until it runs out. I’ll place that font in the central region, under the World Tower where the main system facility lies.”
“You mean to enter the World Tower?” King Gallia asked.
“I do. I only need to access the path on the first floor. Instead of going up, I’ll go down. The monsters on the first floor are barely worth a breath of air, so it won’t be a bother.”
“A breath of air?” Serendell said. “Those monsters are S and above! The floor boss is SSS. The best forces in the world can barely clear the first few floors.”
“Those monsters are also unintelligent and controlled by the AI of the tower. They’re hardly a threat. I could train even a single SSS combatant to solo up until around S3.” I glanced at Mabel, then Velarus.
“Actually, we have gone up to floor 10 together before.”
“Not bad,” I said. “Anyway, I’ll place the font in the basement. It won’t be my first trip there, so it’s whatever. After that, I’ll cast two spells as a field around Arcadia.”
“The entire continent?” Wavecrest asked.
“I literally just blew up the moon and fixed it in front of you. A couple area spells aren’t much to ask for compared to that.”
“You blew up the moon?” Alice asked with a sigh. “The ridiculous things you do to get a point across…”
I smirked and continued. “The first field spell is the Scales of Justice. Basically, it’s crime detection magic. All within the area of effect will be monitored by the system and if determined to be a threat or even a petty thief, those actions will be forwarded to the relevant royals inbox. Which reminds me, the lot of you don’t have the system enabled in active mode, only passive mode. So I’ll have to turn that on for you and whomever else you need to have access. I imagine your guard captains and such?”
“That sounds too incredible to be true,” King Gallia said.
“You’ll see soon enough. The last spell is Aegis. There are many different prefixes, such as Grand Aegis, Divine Aegis, World Aegis, and more, but those are simply to differentiate. The spell creates a shield around the area of effect. The way I’m using it is to compliment the Scales of Justice. They will have the same area of effect. One will detect crime and threats, the other will detect enemies that enter the area of effect by any means. This means threats inside and outside will be detected. I would normally have aegis simply be a barrier to stop threats from entering outright, but while I’m staying in the shadows I will only have it detect those threats.”
“What in the world…” Maya said. “You’re basically implementing invisible protection across the entire continent.”
“Yes. Anything of sufficient power that becomes a threat will be dealt with by the Rogue. Aside from the performance I gave defeating that monster earlier, Elise Aindrea has no other feats that go beyond SSS. I’ll keep it that way for now.”
“You certainly have surprised us, I’ll admit that,” Serendell said.
“Well… anyway,” I said. “I’m going to go get started on the world magic. Do you all want to be integrated into the system now? You can also choose to not accept that. I’ll still be informed of everything, so I can simply send letters to report things.”
“I’ll accept the system,” Velarus said. Mabel and Serendell immediately said yes as well. After a short big of contemplation, the King and Queen of Gallia and King Wavecrest also agreed. Lanti requested it as well. Maya chose to remain as is for now.
“Elysium.” The system menu appeared before me where the others could see it. “Switch everyone in this room except Maya to System Active. Leave Maya on System Passive.”
“Command Acknowledged,” the system responded in a robotic female voice. A moment later, the system menu appeared in front of everyone except Maya and Alice, the latter of which already had it active. “Command Complete.”
“You want to go with me?” I asked, as I was getting ready for my trip to the World Tower.
“Yes! I want to see how I stack up against the first floor.”
I gave it some thought for a moment, but stopped without deciding. I couldn’t say no to her with so much excitement on her face. “It’s gonna cost ya.”
“Huh? Cost me what?”
“One kiss!”
She suddenly had a dirty look on her face.
“Uhh… just a kiss. Anything more …mmpf-”
She pushed me back onto the bed, climbing on top of me and silencing me with her mouth. After a moment, she rose up and pulled her blazer off.
“Well, when you put it like that.”
“Hehe, you asked for something dangerous. I’ll give you that and much more.”
I smiled softly at her. “I’m always ready for everything you want to give me. And I’ll give you just as much, maybe more… hehe.”
A while later, we were dressed and ready to go. I called for Serah and Stella telepathically, knowing they would want to come.
“Is there somebody to take care of Sophie while we’re gone?”
They nodded. “Lena is with her right now.”
I hesitated and looked at Maya.
“You really like her, huh?”
“Honestly I don’t know how I fell so hard for you, her, and the elf girls so fast. I want nothing less than to claim all four of you as my own.” I looked up at Serah and Stella. “And I feel something about the two of you as well. I’m not certain what yet.”
They exchanged glances then looked back at me and Serah said, “Whatever you want, Princess, we will give you.”
I smiled, but said, “I’m not sure what I feel. Maybe it’s platonic, maybe it’s romantic. Maybe it’s familial. I don’t know. Even if it is romantic, we’re cousins, you know.”
“That’s not illegal,” Serah said.
“Besides, if it were, you could just make it legal, Princess,” Stella added.
I giggled. “I suppose so. There were twins back home similar to you two. I had a crush on them, but it never got explored. They were my attendants and kept a healthy distance otherwise. They were the most loyal pair I could imagine, just like you are. They have different surnames, but they are my cousins, too.”
“We wait patiently while you figure out your feelings, Princess,” Serah said.
I looked back and Maya and saw her holding a hand to her mouth giggling at us. “HEY!”
“That was cute.”
“Yeah, yeah.” I held my hand out to her, and she not only took it but interlocked her fingers with mine. “Still?”
She shook her head. “I just wanted to do this.”
I smiled softly and held my hand out for the twins. Each grabbed my arm and I whisked us away to the entrance of the World Tower.
The three girls looked up trying to see the top of the tower, but it seemed to fade into oblivion.
“How could I see the top of the tower from outside when you took me high in the sky, but it just fades into nothingness here?”
“The tower is far bigger than it seems from the outside. It’s taller than mountains from the outside, but here it’s unfathomable. Space is different inside the barrier.”
“This is a product of your Transcendent power?”
“Yes. I created the World Tower to be a training ground for mortals once they reach S and above level power.”
“What do you mean reach S and above?”
“Mana capacity isn’t static. You can increase it over time. The more you have, the more it takes to increase it. That’s what the tower is for. At the bottom, the enemies are in the S to SSS range, which threats going up to around S4 by floor 10. By floor 20, you’ll see S10 level threats. Floor 50, you’ll see around S30. But past Floor 50, it goes up floor by floor, rather than every few floors. On Floor 100, it’s S1,000. On Floor 200 It’s S10,000.”
“How many floors are there?”
“10,000. The difficulty there scales up well into S-millions.”
She looked at me with surprise, though the twins didn’t. They already knew. “How in the world are mortals ever expected to get that high?”
“They’re not. The tower is meant to provide a training ground for even the most powerful mortals, not for them to clear it, so it goes up to levels far beyond what any mortal has ever reached. Though there have been a few in history that have climbed over floor 500, there’s been none to go past floor 600.”
“And you said you’re going to clear it?”
“I did. I’ll clear it in about three to five minutes.”
“Just how much mana do you have?”
I didn’t answer, just gave her a smile.
“That smile is worth a thousand words.”
“Shall we?”
She nodded and I pushed the massive doors open. Inside was another set of doors that wouldn’t open until the first was shut, so I pushed the doors closed again and then opened the inner doors. The first floor was ours to behold, and the girls were in awe.
The inside of the tower was as big as the entire continent with an ocean around it seemingly going on forever. There were large monsters all over the place, most of them passive. Looking up one could see a sky complete with a sun-like light.
“It’s like an entire ecosystem is in here.”
“That’s correct,” I said. “Each floor is its own little world. There are many different biomes, too. Each floor has a biome of its own. Floor 1 is a jungle, Floor 2 is a plain with small forests. Floor 3 is a desert, Floor 4 is a frozen wasteland, Floor 5 is a fiery hellscape, and so on.”
“That sounds incredible. But how could anyone ever get through all of that and go into the hundreds?”
“When one comes here to train, they quickly will find out that it’s not an easy feat to climb floors. Even if you can defeat the enemies, you also have to survive the biomes. Survival training is key. It takes years for most to get to their highest point in the tower, but you don’t age inside the tower. Nor do you age inside the barrier outside the tower. When we leave, it will appear as if it were no more than a couple of seconds after we arrived.”
“And you’re saying you could clear the tower in a few minutes?”
I nodded. “It would be challenging even for me to do it that fast, but only because there are so many floors, and they get exponentially larger toward the top. Even flying at light speed, it would take several seconds to b-line across the higher floors.”
She looked at me with a blank expression. “Did you just say light speed?”
“Yep. I’d be going faster than that, of course.”
“But that’s impossible. When one travels faster than light, they travel at relative speed.”
“That’s only true for beings bound by the same dimensions as light. Remember, Transcendent. I can transcend the dimensions mortals are bound by. Anyway, I need to go to the basement, so we need to clear the boss. I don’t want to toy around, so…”
I drew Kuro with my left hand and poured an immense amount of Radiance into the blade while stepping forward. I twisted to my right and held my blade ready to slash horizontally. Without speaking a word, I swung my blade and discharged and enormous wave of mana that rocketed across the landscape and mowed down everything in its path, including the floor boss on the far side.
“There’s just… a straight path through to the other side. And is that a stairway that just appeared?” Maya asked.
“Yes. We’ll be taking those stairs down. Here, take my arm, I’ll teleport us to the stairs.”
“Couldn’t you have teleported us straight into the basement?”
“That would require overpowering the tower’s barriers. Teleportation is restricted in the tower. You can teleport short distances such as using it in combat. But if the boss is alive, you can’t teleport from here to the boss. I could if I overpowered the tower, but I’d rather not do that. It’s a hassle, and I’d have to fix it afterward. It’s much easier to just obliterate the boss and go down normally. The boss will respawn when we leave.”
“Fair enough.” Maya took my hand while the twins grabbed my arm.
I teleported us to the stairwell, which was visible from the other side of an Arcadia sized landmass, so it was incredibly large up close.
“Use mana to descend. Below the floor, the stair well isn’t surrounded by a wall. We can just fly from there.”
“This makes me really appreciate that you and Lena helped me learn how to fly.”
“It’s a great ability.” I jumped down the staircase and flew my way down the spiral until the walls stopped. The other four were following closely.
The basement was a large open space with no threats, just a barrier around the entire place, including the stairwell where it connected to the first floor. Only people with permission could see through the barrier, otherwise it appeared as part of the stairwell with the only path going up.
Whose permission you might ask? Mine. The tower basement was much like a private living space. In the center was a control panel and a font connected to the World Tree to provide the mana necessary to run the system.
“There’s already a font?” Maya asked as we landed in front of the control panel.
“That one is to power the system. I’ll be making a separate one for the area spells I mentioned. <
I cast Foundation to install another font next to the existing one and then filled it completely with mana.
“That should last a hundred years.”
After that, I accessed the control panel and brought up a hologram of the planet.
“I’ll place the spells from here.” With my hand hovering over Arcadia on the hologram, I cast my spells. <
I pulled my hand back and two circular barriers were left behind, perfectly overlapping each other. Scales of Justice was silver and Aegis was white.
“All set. The new font will power these spells.
“You said a hundred years? How much mana is that?”
“The font I created holds mana equal to S120. It’ll take about S70 to power Scales of Justice and S50 to power Aegis in detect mode. I decided to set it to report anything entering Arcadia above S3.”
I glanced at the font for the system. “Lady Luna is giving mana to the World Tree, but it’ll take years to fill it up completely with how much is required to run the system across Eden and the countless worlds. I’ll fill this up real quick so she has even slightly less work to do.”
I placed my hand on the main font and channeled mana into it. Since I was only filling up a single font, it didn’t take but a few seconds.
“How much did you put in?” Maya asked.
“S50,000.”
She didn’t seem surprised anymore. “That’s a lot.”
“Yeah it’s no small number. I see you’re getting used to the extremities around a Transcendent.”
“I kinda have to since I’m dating one.” She quickly stole a kiss on my cheek.
I smiled, then frowned. “Maya listen. I will eventually have to go back home. At first, I meant to stay in exile, but with many of the royals missing, I’ll have to go back eventually.”
“They’re missing?”
“Lady Luna gave me a hint. My first wife isn’t maintaining the World Tree, nor is anyone else. That gives me the feeling they aren’t there. After Lady Luna said that, the thought crossed my mind that maybe they are here. But even they shouldn’t know which world I went to, though I wouldn’t put it past my queen to figure it out.”
“And if they are here?”
“I’d introduce you to them.” I took her hand and held it tight. “Another thought crossed my mind. Three possibilities.”
She was listening intently, not replying so as to not interrupt.
“Two possibilities are maybe you’re my first wife. The first is you know and haven’t told me, but I very much doubt you would withhold that from me if you were her after I told you who I am. The second is that you don’t know, and you’re simply living out a mortal life. Either one would make sense with how quickly we fell for each other. The third possibility is that you’re simply not her.”
“You think I might be your first wife, Maya Velinova?” She had a lot of hesitance written on her face. “If… if I am, I don’t know that I am.”
“I could find out by peering into your soul all the way to your soul world where your soul core lies. But whether you are and don’t know, or you aren’t, I don’t need to know either way. In front of me is my lovely girlfriend, Maya Rosenwald, whom I love very much. If you are her, we fell in love all over again. If you are not, we fell in love anyway.”
“I love you, too.” She hugged me tightly. The twins smiled at us.
“I also wonder if anyone else is here, but… if anyone of my Transcendent family came here, they came here without my knowing. I’m content to keep it that way and let them tell me. Maybe my mind will change later, but for now this is perfectly fine. I’m enjoying life here with you and everyone else.”
“I’ve been so much happier with you around.”
“But Maya, the thing I wanted to ask. When I inevitably go home, do you want to come with me?”
“I could?”
“It’s never been done before, but I am King. I’ll make it happen if you want it.”
“Would that make me Transcendent? I’d still be a mortal, right? Even if I go to Eden.”
“You would become Transcendent. But you would have to sincerely want it.”
“I want to go anywhere you go.”
I held her tight. “I love you so much.”
Revision: 2025-5-11