Misadventures Incorporated

Chapter 350 - Hubris VII

“The lion has already played his hand?” Claire repeated the goddess’ words with a tilt of the head.

Flux nodded. “He will endeavour to meet you face to face. Do beware so that you might avoid his mark.”

She turned around as soon as she said her piece. Waving a hand, she opened a massive portal, with its destination beyond the sky. There were glimmering stars, clouds of cosmic dust, and gargantuan planets. Their ring-bearing, water-clad bodies sat in close enough proximity that Claire could just barely make out their continents. It was a curious sight, almost as curious as the ever-expanding universe that lay beyond the verdant canvas.

The goddess approached the portal with graceful steps. She nearly put half a foot through its door, but it closed before she could enter.

Pausing briefly, she spun again and regarded the perpetrator, her eyes curiously fixed on her ever-blank expression. Flux could easily see right through it, but even so, Claire endeavoured to maintain her facade. She would never improve if she ran from the goddess’ challenge.

“I already met him,” said the mortal. “About a week ago.” She continued after a moment of silence. “Did you not see him? I thought you were always watching.”

“I am in most scenarios,” said the goddess. “But even I must occasionally avert my gaze, regardless of my intentions.”

“Creep.”

“Perhaps it has not yet dawned upon your simple mind, or perhaps you have simply been too heavily influenced by the degenerates that lurk within the Cadrian court, but there are reasons beyond violent attraction for which one might watch another.” The goddess pursed her lips. “Where did you encounter the god of the hunt?”

“In a dungeon,” said the lyrkress. “The one where I met the raccoon.”

“And how did you react?”

“Normally?” Claire tilted her head. “Until my body decided to attack him on its own.”

“Then you must not have been mistaken.” Her answer appeared to trouble the goddess, who furrowed her brow and crafted a box. After filling the console with inputs, she watched as it spewed line after line after egregiously long line. Her gaze only sharpened with each that she read, and she even clenched her teeth as the output scrolled to its end. “My calculations should have been correct.”

“I believe we have been outmaneuvered.” Turning her eyes to the source of the voice, Claire found a distant cloud torn open. The hole was tiny at first, barely noticeable within the cumulus fortress, but it soon grew to a size through which her true form could fit.

A pair of deities came through the portal, one an older gentleman in a suit, the other a mechanical spider. The words had come from the former god while the latter impressed herself upon the stage with a brilliant, mocking smile.

“Good evening, Claire, I see that my trials have done wonders for your progression,” she said. “Oh, and hi to you too, Flux. It's nice to see that you're just as grumpy as you are every other day.” Her confidence persisted until the qilin turned her eyes in her direction. But even then, it was soon returned; her trembling lasted for a few moments at most.

“Why is she here?” Flux turned her glare to the dragon.

“I’d have loved to turn her away, but this isn’t the time to be fighting amongst ourselves.” The human-shaped lizard crossed his arms and flicked his chainlink tail. “You’ve heard the gist of it already. We've been had.”

“You will need to elaborate.”

“One of his servants found a way around your surveillance,” said Vella. “This is why I warned you about being thorough.”

Flux bit her lower lip. “Please excuse me. I must speak with Griselda.” She opened another portal and entered the space beyond it, looking much more flustered than Claire had ever remembered.

The abandoned qiligon was left with the dragon and the spider, both of whom turned their attention to her. They opened their mouths at the same time, but Vella quickly backed down and deferred to the other god. The unexpected behaviour certainly drew Claire’s attention, but only until Builledracht began to speak.

“I know you probably aren’t looking to become a true dragon, especially with only one mortal form left,” he said. “But I’d appreciate it if you could reproduce in either case.”

Claire blinked, unsure of how to respond.

“I’d be rather surprised if your children didn’t check most, if not all of the boxes,” he said. “Though I do suppose it depends on your partner.”

“You’re starting to sound like Alfred,” said Claire.

“His interests lie in the process. I only care for the result. We’re completely different,” insisted the dragon. “And I’m not forcing you. You’re free to ignore me if you want, but I do admit, I’ll at least be a little disappointed.”

“I don’t think it’ll happen,” said Claire. She knew that her body had apparently acquired the capacity, following her second ascension, but her personal stance remained unchanged. All the associated urges she felt had come from external sources.

“That’s simply because you have never experienced a heat cycle,” explained the dragon, as if reading her mind. “Knowing Flux, she likely configured your internals to behave more like a qilin’s, which would then imply a cycle with an interval in the three-year range. But even with her meddling, we can’t be certain. it’s always difficult to say with halfbreeds and chimeras, especially new species like yourself. If you do find yourself experiencing the violent urges that we dragons do, then I’d like for you to come to one of my temples. I’ll elaborate then on the traditional remedies we use to suppress them.”

“You are, of course, free to visit me instead,” said Vella, with a devilish smile.

There was a moment of silence, accompanied by a pair of stares.

“Well, anyway, while I’d hate to leave you alone with this… degenerate, I’ll have to take my leave as well. I doubt Flux and Griselda will be getting too far without my input.” He opened up a portal to the moon’s domain and stepped through, craning his head around just as it started to close. “One last thing, do endeavour to avoid the spider’s affections. While she is unable to reproduce, on account of her immortality, I fear that she may affect your tastes if you allow her to do as she pleases, and I, for one, would certainly not be pleased for a draconic beast to exhibit arachnid behaviours.”

“I won’t. I’d rather die than listen to her.”

“Good,” said the dragon.

The world warped as soon as the portal closed behind him. The clouds fizzled out, and the sky was replaced by Vella’s usual cathedral. The mechanical arachne was already seated, casually placed upon the massive throne tailor-made to match her frame.

“Surely death must be a bit of an exaggeration?” questioned the spider. “Did you not just answer my call?”

“Not intentionally,” said the lyrkress.

“I would have been more willing to believe the claim if you hadn’t completed seven different challenges.”

“What else was I supposed to do?” Claire rolled her eyes. “Did you want me to sit around for two full days?” It was a bluff, of course. With the abilities she had gained, following the elf’s defeat, she could have left at any time. But evidently, the mechanical spider was too dumb to notice. She only averted her eyes, as would a guilty party.

“Will you not take my trial and duel me on even terms?”

“I don’t pick fights I can’t win,” said Claire.

Vella sighed. “You and your father both.”

“Do not compare me to my father.”

“Why not? The only thing that sets you apart is your competency.”

Claire smiled, brilliantly. “Oh, Vella! If you wanted more offerings, you could have just asked! I’d love to share my cooking with you.”

The goddess grimaced, visibly, but she quickly fixed her expression and forced a professional smile. “S-so all of this offering business aside, there is something that I would like to address, a minor point of dissatisfaction.”

Claire tilted her head.

“Can you stop feeding my weapons to your stupid lizard!?” The dam finally broke. The mask she tried so desperately to maintain cracked wide open and revealed the stupid potato that lay beneath it. She was the most unfortunate sort, already pre-boiled in saltless water with mash as the only decent future ahead,

Hardly reacting to the outburst at all, the qiligon only shifted the angle of her neck. “I buried the last one.”

“He dug it back up and ate it!” cried the spider.

Claire blinked. Thrice.

“Here, just look!” Vella summoned a box, and after taking a few seconds to pluck away at its interface, spun it around so it faced the moose.

A familiar scene was displayed on the projection. It showed a cabin in the woods, with a small patch of raised soil just outside its doorway. There were three lizards by the mound, each digging away with all the vigour of an elderly snail. The visual log was clearly sped up, but it still took about a minute for the lizard to complete his excavation.

Two of the three ikaretts vanished as the task came to an end, while the last opened his mouth wide and shoved it down his throat; he couldn’t quite get the angle right, and frankly, it was longer than he was. Perhaps that was why his shape changed in light of the item’s deletion. He was like a snake that had overeaten; one could very clearly make out the pile bunker through his bloated form.

“See!?” cried the spider, teary-eyed.

“I see what he did,” said Claire. “But I don’t see how it’s my problem. Stop giving me things I don’t want.”

“What the hell!? Do you know how badly everyone else wants my weapons!? Why can’t you just accept my gift!? You accepted Starrgort, didn’t you!?”

“That was a one-time thing. I won’t be using him again. And I’m never using your stupid pole on a stick.”

“Oh, come on! Please just try it! I spent hours, hours, tuning it to perfection. Can’t you at least give it a swing!?”

“Do I need to repeat myself? Stop. Giving. Me. Things. I. Don’t. Want.”

“It’s not about what you want, it’s about what you need,” said the goddess, quietly. “Well, either way, you should still be able to use it thanks to the feature I installed during his ascension.”

“I refuse.”

“Oh, but you have no choice!” The goddess smiled. “I only gave it to you because it’s the only thing that’ll let you worm your way out of certain death.” She took a moment to correct her tone and expression. “I shall be watching, Daughter of Virillius. Prove your mettle. Do not disappoint me.”

Claire narrowed her eyes. She didn’t even try to mask or hide her displeasure. “You do realize, Goddess, that it’s too late for you to salvage your dignity?”

“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about!” cried the spider.

“That line only works if you’re cute. And you, goddess, are not.”

“The nerve of this mortal, I swear!” groaned the goddess. “Why couldn’t you have just been a man? This would’ve been so much easier.”

“I sincerely doubt that.”

“We can put that to the test,” said the goddess. “Archimess still owes me a favour, and I know for a fact that he has mastered the procedure.”

Claire stared at the goddess with her face perfectly blank. “You’re disgusting.”

“Oh, would you look at that? Little Miss Augustus is backing down from a challenge!” said the spider, with the world’s most self-satisfied grin.

“This is why you have no friends.”

“I-I have plenty of friends. Y-you literally met them just the other day. There’s Victor, Korrork, Shaw—”

“Prisoners don’t count.”

The spider keeled over. It was a death blow, straight into her chest with the knife already twisted.

“Now if you’ll excuse me,” said the mortal. “I have better things to do. Goodbye.” Ignoring the pathetic excuse of a deity, Claire grabbed the key hidden in her chest and, with a hearty twist, escaped the goddess’ realm.

She expected to return to the void, but it was morning by the time she opened her eyes. The sun was already inching its way above the horizon, its dazzling light shining through the tent’s entrance.

On any other day, Claire would have occupied herself with some sort of physical activity, but she wasn’t in the mood. Wandering over to the campfire instead, she traded nods with Lana, who immediately rose from her seat and wandered into the tent. There would be at least half an hour before breakfast, and a brief nap was still better than none at all.

The lyrkress got to work as soon as she was left alone, with the work in question, of course, referring to the creation of a splendid offering. The campfire had already gone out, so she started by picking up a few half-burnt sticks and rubbing them together until they sparked to life. She opened up a portal to Vel’khan once the flame was steady and grabbed a few items out of the kitchen.

She knew better than to waste their supplies, especially when they were still being raided on occasion, so she engaged her authority skill and summoned one of the dishes whose ingredients came raw. The elf hot pot, which was marked with five glowing stars, was inordinately expensive. It consumed a whole seven million mana to craft, but Claire didn’t mind. Her recovery rate was high enough to replenish her entire pool in about an hour.

Of course, she was not so foolish as to cook the hotpot as it was intended. She immediately fed the eponymous container and its accompanying broth to Boris, who had remained by the campfire even after she went to bed. The lizard happily gobbled it up, leaving her with just the meats and vegetables meant to be boiled within it.

She threw them into her skillet, leaving them on the open flame until they suddenly caught fire. A skilled chef, of course, would have taken them off before they turned to ash, but she let them burn while she shaped a mound of dirt into a makeshift altar.

“O Vella, goddess of inappropriate leg-spreading and mental dysfunction.” She started speaking the so-called prayer whilst she dumped the pan’s contents onto the tiny pedestal. “I would like to bestow you an offering, a precious meal carefully prepared by the fairest maiden in all the Cadrian lands. I ask for nothing in return but for you to leave me alone. Forever.”

For a moment, it looked like the offering would be automatically accepted, but it suddenly stopped glowing before it could disappear. The goddess in question had interfered with the usual system and denied the odiferous but clearly delicious present.

An ordinary mortal would have acknowledged the deity’s refusal and repurposed the food, but Claire was no ordinary mortal. She fiddled with her vectors, opened a small hole in spacetime, and sent the whole altar through.

A scream came from the other side right as she closed the portal—a scream that only encouraged a smile.

It was entirely deserved. Such was the price for describing the lyrkress as her father’s daughter.