Apostles

The first week passed by quite quickly and peacefully since I had nothing important to do and I didn’t want to send anyone on a mission either. I wanted everyone to be present when the Necrons came for the corpses, even though it was possible that they wouldn’t show up. In the meantime, Lien’s belly has grown quite a bit.

The little girl we saved when we eradicated the Germs turned out to be quite adept at magic. Since she was still very young, I didn’t make her go through Leviathan’s test and allowed her to live with a couple who took her in.

At the same time, I didn’t like slackers and leechers so I thought of something that could put her to good use. Of course, it was fine for her at her age but being a good for nothing wouldn’t cut it in the future and my idea would also help her in getting stronger. I was pretty sure that she would accept my offer but first I had to talk about it with Lien.

Since it was harder for her to move around with her belly and she couldn’t jump around, she spent most of her time meditating or doing simple house chores. She was more than capable of erasing all her hardships with a bit of magic but she wanted to see what motherhood was like for herself.

As for me, I spent most of my time experimenting with magic, as usual. I also tested Lien’s theory of mana creation and it turned out to be a success. Of course, I kept it a secret from everyone but my wife. Sylvanus had been filling the atmosphere with mana that it created by itself for many years now, so I was a little worried about our situation.

I was quite sure that even if we left the Earth to die, that monster would sooner or later cause the downfall of many other planets. My theory wasn’t just a baseless assumption either since I could feel that its mana was spread far into space as well. At least, I believed I was catching up with that monster.

Stepping into our room, I noticed my wife sitting on the bed with her legs crossed and her eyes closed, meditating as usual. It was quite similar to sleeping so it was perfect when someone had nothing to do but didn’t want to laze around and do nothing. We could at least grow stronger.

Knocking on the door frame, I asked, “Sweetheart, do you have a moment?”

Opening her eyes, she looked at me and crept closer to the edge of the bed. Throwing her hair over her shoulders, she replied, “All I have is time.”

“Hehe, are you bored by any chance?” I mused, walking closer to her.

“Who wouldn’t be bored if they couldn’t do anything? You have no idea how annoying this is...” she sighed loudly, shaking her head. Hitting the bed with her small hands, she looked at me with her big eyes and said, “I want to do something!”

“It’s cute when you are throwing a tantrum,” I laughed, seeing the scene.

“So what did you want from me? Did you come to entertain me?” she raised her brows and licked her lips playfully, making me remember that I didn’t come to start flirting with her. Thought I couldn’t help but reconsider before I answered, seeing that she was a little serious about it.

Clearing my throat, I said, “We can do it after I’m done with this. So I have something to tell you and a question as well. I’ll start with the quicker. I hope that you don’t want to come with us on the 25th because-”

“No way,” she waved her hand. “Although the chance of something happening is close to nil, I would never endanger my children’s lives just so that I wouldn’t be bored. I had no intention of going in the first place, even if I want to.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” I sighed out of relief as I sat down next to her and put my arm around her back. Placing my hand on her belly, I scanned her body thoroughly.

“The next thing I want to tell you is that you could eat one of those apples that we’ve found in Hawaii. You’re strong enough to eat it now and although it’d restructure your body, I’m a hundred percent sure it wouldn’t affect our children in a bad way. If anything, maybe they’d inherently start developing mana cells in their body,” I said.

“Should I do it right away?” she raised her brows.

“Well, you could, but shouldn’t you question me or something? What if it was dangerous?” I couldn’t help but laugh, hearing her question.

“Why? You would never bring it up if you weren’t sure of it in the first place, and knowing you, you’ve already tested it on someone or something… so were the results satisfying?” she asked with a knowing smile.

“I guess you know me too well. As for the results, heh, you’ll have to see it for yourself~” I mused, deciding that I’d keep quiet about it.

Seeing her brows twitching, I almost started laughing but I knew she was annoyed by it so I held it back. Pretending to be calm, she just shrugged her shoulders and said, “I suppose that’s not the only reason you came here, so what else do you want?” she quickly changed the topic, knowing that she wouldn’t pull anything out of me.

“Do you remember the little girl who we saved when we attacked the Germs?”

“Of course, isn’t she living with Mael and Veronica? That was their name, right?” she furrowed her brows, barely remembering who they were. Well, they were just a simple couple with little talent in combat but their hearts were in the right place and their food was superb. They had a restaurant in Leviathan which we frequented whenever we wanted to eat out. In other words, when we were too lazy to cook and didn’t want to use magic to create food.

“Yes, it’s them. Unlike me, you can have twelve apostles and she’s very young but adept at magic. I reckon if you were to make her your second apostle, after me, her magical capabilities would increase by a large margin and you could also train and guide her personally. It’s just that your commandment would deeply affect her mind and after a year or two, she’d be willing to die for you without hesitation.”

“It is a good thing, in a way, but she was taken in by Mael and Veronica and has a future ahead of her, even if she doesn’t become your apostle. Personally, I don’t want to force a kid with a future into the kind of situation where she partly loses her will, her mind, and her ability to refuse something, as long as it is you who tells her. I mean, we aren’t raising and training slaves here. I’d be more willing to do that to someone who’s unwilling to live since it’d give them a reason to live, at least.”

“So my question is, should we ask her new parents and her about it or should we just let it go? There are plenty of broken people in the world who could become your apostles, after all,” I explained my idea to her.

After thinking about it for a moment, she looked at me and said, “I can see where you are coming from. Since her capabilities are good, she could reach a high level in a few years and by the time our children get to the age where they may want to see the world outside, I suppose we could even tell her to protect our children.”

“It’s a good opportunity but for the same reason you’re hesitating, I think that you should look around in harsh environments first. If you can find at least two to three people similar to her but without a reason to live, you should bring them to me, and forget about the girl. We have at least ten years to nurture my apostles. I’m sure we’re both clear about how much we could achieve in ten years,” she replied with a smile.

“I think that we should save and help people with no future instead since it’d be advantageous for both sides. On the other hand, unless there will be death-seeking people who will be daring enough to attack our children, my apostles would have a chance to become super strong and live a carefree life just because of their status. At most, you could ask the girl’s parents about how she’s doing and maybe bring this up if they said that she was sad or something,” she added.

“Alright then, I’ll go with what you said,” I clapped my hands as I jumped up from the bed.

“Hey, where are you going? Didn’t you forget something?” she asked, tugging on the back of my shirt.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I guess I became overly excited,” I laughed as I turned around and leaned down to kiss her.

“How shameless… now you want to kiss after forgetting about me?” she pouted, still sticking out her lips and receiving it happily.

After a good twenty seconds, I pulled back and stood up straight, running my eyes down on her long dark brown hair, stopping for a moment when our eyes met. Her dazzling green eyes and red lips were as beautiful as ever, making me want to continue where we left off a moment ago.

“Why are you giving me that look now? Do you want to continue?” she smiled at me, intentionally pulling her shirt to the side to let me see her cleavage.

Rubbing my eyes, I turned around and made my way towards the door as I said, “Once I’m done with my stuff, I’ll make sure to punish you for being so naughty.”

Ignoring my words, she started fondling her own breasts, “Ah- my breasts are so heavy… if only there were a pair of strong hands to massage it. Oh, and I’m looking forward to your ‘punishment’, dear.”

Stopping in the doorway, I glanced at her one last time and then left the house in a hurry. First of all, I visited the little girl’s family and talked to her new parents about the matter. I soon found out that her name was Lily and that she was a rather cheerful girl, though there were times when she cried, most likely when she remembered her late parents. That being the case, I decided that I wouldn’t bother her with my idea.

Although I wanted to continue with my stuff, I soon realised that it’d be hard when my commandment and my body were desiring my wife. Once in the mood, it was hard for me to focus on anything other than that and thanks to my commandment, my desire was much stronger than an ordinary guy’s. Returning to Lien’s side, I played around with her until we were both satisfied.

Her sex drive changed for the worse in her first trimester which despite being completely normal, sucked quite a lot for me. At the same time, I had no intention of forcing her and I didn’t want to use magic on her just so I could satisfy my desires. Luckily, after a week passed, even she started desiring it and as her second trimester was nearing, her libido once again became stronger. I just had to wait patiently for the right time, which turned out to be today, and probably the next few days…

I wanted to leave as soon as we had some fun but just as I expected, I couldn’t bear to simply stand up and leave her alone after doing the deed. Hugging her felt way too good so I cuddled her to sleep and left only after I set up over twenty defensive formations around the bed. I was most likely being overprotective but I didn’t care what others thought as long as she was safe. I would never leave anything important to luck if I had the chance.

I spent the rest of the day wandering around the world, looking for some apostles for Lien. Since it wasn’t a dangerous activity, she tagged along with me the next day and we continued looking for candidates together. After three days of careful looking, we returned with seven kids who were all around ten to fourteen years old and grew up in very harsh environments.

One of them was a boy from a village where they were under the protection of a monster as long as they sacrificed someone regularly. He was supposed to be the next sacrifice so I saved him and killed the monster as well. Naturally, I laid a Horrific Formation around their village so that they wouldn’t be bothered by monsters anymore.

There was also a pair of abandoned twin girls whom we found in the wilderness in Australia. My people were still working hard to build secure places on that continent but that didn’t mean that it was entirely safe. After all, it was a huge area with probably the largest monster population on it. There were still many other similar hunting groups like the one Ma’at grew up in.

Their circumstances were quite sad but thanks to their upbringing, they had great battle senses and were also adept at magic. Although they were exactly at the age where ‘everything was against them’, they weren’t like most kids at their age. They were happy just to live for one more day.

As for the remaining four kids, they were all orphans whom we brought over from smaller villages and cities where their lives were miserable. Two of them were kept as slaves in a big family that had too much power in the city. We may have destroyed them along the way…

That being the case, it was time to explain to them why I brought them with me and what were their options. I didn’t want to bring them to our house right away so I occupied one of the many empty houses in Leviathan and gifted it to them, though they had yet to learn about it.

Leading them to the dining room, I used my trait to make the table grow stronger and created a few more chairs out of nitrogen molecules. It was quite expensive on mana to transform such molecules into something like wood but considering the current size of my mana pool, it didn’t even cost a thousandth of a percent. It was hard to believe that two years ago it took so much out of me just to build a house for ourselves, even though I transformed materials that were similar in properties…

The kids were following us silently but maybe because all of them could catch a glimpse of me in action and see how I destroyed the ‘all-mighty’ families or monsters that made them live in terror, neither of them dared make a move without my command. Pointing at the chairs, I said, “You all can sit down, there is no need to be afraid of anyone here.”

Complying with my request, they didn’t mind each other and took the empty chairs one by one, except for one of the boys who lived a very miserable life and lived like a dog. Instead of the chair, he knelt down on the ground and waited with his head cast down.

Rubbing my eyes, I couldn’t help but sigh loudly and shake my head. When I saw that some people treated others like this, I couldn’t help but think that maybe I should destroy this planet with my own hands. My experiences seemed to prove that the trash-human was the majority and good people were the minority, so I still had to think about what I wanted to do with Leviathan in the future.

Appearing in front of the boy, Lien silently put her hands under his armpits and raised him up, placing him on the chair. We had about ten years to turn these kids into capable people who wouldn’t be bound by their dark past. Thinking about how we could change their lives for the better, I felt that it was much better to find them than to take in Lily.

Out of the seven kids, only one of them was a more assertive and talkative person, the boy who was supposed to be sacrificed to a monster. Except for the sacrifices in the village, the people there seemed to live a carefree life. Of course, I could imagine how they lived in terror from year to year, hoping that they wouldn’t be the next one to be sacrificed.

That boy was the first one to speak this time as well, even before we could say anything. “What’s going to happen to me now?” he asked, clenching his fists.

Hmm, he said ‘me’ in his question so he clearly doesn’t care about what’s going to happen to the others, I thought, glancing at the other kids. I understood that they didn’t even know each other and had no reason to care about one another, so I set that matter aside and replied.

“I’ll tell you a few things first so that you’ll understand your position and then leave the decision in your hands. First of all, this place is called Leviathan which is a country built by me, my dear wife, and our aides who help us in managing it. Most of my citizens could be considered elites in magic, though there are many who aren’t really strong and are just spending their time doing what they can. There are cooks, builders, engineers, etc…”

“Our country is entirely self-sufficient thanks to our magic-filled lands and we aren’t lacking in knowledge and entertainment either. You can freely learn everything I know about the elements and even most of the stuff about advanced magic is available.”

“I’ve established connections with many cities, clans, and sects that managed to create a footing in the world and became powerful thanks to our help, so we aren’t short of supporters either.”

“As for what we’re doing with this much power, we’re mainly helping out around the world by killing monsters and bad people. The people who kept some of you captive are similarly considered ‘bad people’. You lot can rest assured, you have nothing to be afraid of while being here.”

“Now that you understand what kind of place this is, are there any questions before I continue?” I asked, running my eyes over the kids. Some of them seemed to become quite interested after hearing my explanation but some others were still sitting there with lifeless eyes. It was a rather sad sight to behold.

Since neither of them asked anything, I continued, “I’ll be honest with you all. The reason I brought you here is that I’m looking for some dependable guards who Lien and I can raise. During your stay, I’ll take care of all of your needs but at the same time, you’ll have to work hard to become strong, strong enough so that the families and monsters that kept you in terror would be nothing but ants in your eyes.”

“Now that you’ve heard my reason, I’ll tell you what choices you have. The first one is that you refuse my offer and I’ll drop you out in one of the clans or cities that are affiliated with us. I’ll let you choose where you want to go and you’ll also receive a bit of money to start your life. You may be scared by the idea of living alone in an unknown place but we can help you with that. Still, we can only go so far.”

“The other option is that you become my wife’s apostles which is going to grant you a protective aura and raise your capabilities to a different level. You’ll also learn magic from the two of us which can make you stronger than most of the people in the world. Of course, you won’t be allowed to slack off or you won’t get anywhere. The ‘downside’ is that you’ll be mentally affected by Lien’s commandment and over time, you’ll find it impossible to reject her commands. That’s what happens to apostles if they don’t have a commandment of their own, though you probably don’t understand what the latter is, for now.”

“In short, you’ll have to become very powerful if you want to break free from her. Naturally, you won’t be asked to do anything weird other than to protect our children until they grow strong enough to protect themselves. I assume it’d take at least twenty years for them, even if they were to slack off from time to time. I’ll make sure to raise them properly, though, so hopefully, that’s not going to happen.”

Seeing that I turned quiet and waited for them to say something, one of the girls leaned forward and asked, “Am I going to be strong enough to kill monsters the way you did?”

“Haha, those will be just toys for you to play with, nothing more,” I laughed, seeing that they didn’t quite understand how powerful our people were.

“I’ll accept your offer in that case!” the girl and her elder sister next to her replied in a hurry. They were the sisters whom we found in Australia.

“Oh, that was quick… I’m glad to hear that,” I said with a smile.

“Uhm, I’d like to pick the first option. Please don’t get me wrong, I’m very grateful for your help and if you need my help in the future, I’d be more than willing but I’ve always dreamed of seeing the outside world and living a peaceful life. Now that there is a chance for me, I can’t help but reach towards it,” Tony, the boy who was supposed to be sacrificed said right away.

He was fourteen years old and also the most healthy person among them, both mentally and physically. He was also quite strong for his age so he definitely had a future ahead of him.

“Are you sure about that? You don’t have to decide right away,” I said, hoping that he would rethink it.

“I- I’ve made my decision,” he said with a nod of his head.

“Hmm, fine then. I’ll respect your decision. You can stay to listen if you want to but if you want to leave right away, I can take you quickly to someone who can help you.”

“I’d like to go then,” he said.

Nodding my head, I opened a portal in the middle of the room which led straight to the city hall. Since he could see what was on the other side, he didn’t hesitate to walk towards the portal and I also used that time to guide him in the right direction.

“Go to that lady on the other side, she’ll know what to do since I’ve instructed them earlier,” I pointed at one of the receptionists to which, he just nodded his head and then left as soon as he came, leaving only six kids in the room.

Remembering that I started training Lana and that I haven’t seen her yet today, I turned towards my wife and said, “Lien, could you continue in my place? I’ve just remembered that I still have to visit your mother and see how she’s doing with her training. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“Okay, dear. I’ll take care of things on this side,” she replied with a smile. Nodding my head, I teleported to Lana’s location and watched her cast a few spells I taught her. After giving her further instructions and learning materials, I left her alone and returned to the house with the kids.

I was a little surprised to see the twin girls and the other two girls sitting at the table half-naked, Lien behind their backs. Although I understood that they were sitting there naked in front of me and that I could see their blossoming chests, I simply didn’t care about them and sat down at the end of the table. In my eyes, they were just kids, and compared to my wife’s, they could be called flat anyway, even if they weren’t.

Not much to my surprise, they didn’t reciprocate my disinterest and shrieked loudly, quickly covering their chests. Hmm, I guess they’re conscious about it even if they grew up in harsh environments.

“Dear… you could be more considerate of them, even if you don’t care about their bodies,” Lien remarked, seeing me leaning on the table and looking at them with a bored expression.

“Mhm, I’m sorry if I startled you but you don’t have to worry. You’re still kids in my eyes,” I waved my hand, seeing the four girls staring at me with disbelief.

“But you don’t look that old either!” the elder sister of the twins from Australia cried out. She seemed to be quite lively all of a sudden. I couldn’t help but wonder what Lien did to them while I was gone. I could feel that the other two boys were in the living room and they also had Lien’s mana emantating from their bodies, so I presumed they had become her apostles already.

“Girl, let me enlighten you then. Even if I were to close my eyes and leave the house, I could still sense every nook and cranny of your body. You’ll be able to do the same in a few years if you take our training seriously, so you’ll understand what I’m saying,” I replied, pointing at her.

Looking at Lien with disbelief, she asked, “Is that really true?”

“Mhm. I’d call my husband many things but a liar. You really don’t have to mind him, he also won’t mind you. Of course, be careful with other boys,” she replied, waving her finger as she reasoned with her. It was a rather hilarious sight.

The twins had long black hair and blue eyes which was combined with pretty faces, so I was quite sure that they’d turn into striking beauties in the future. It’d have been quite fun if Lien accepted only girls as her apostles and gathered twelve beauties. Well, there were only two boys in the team so she still had the chance to accept only girls in the future.

After she finished explaining a few things about me to the girls, she gathered her mana to her fingertip and continued drawing on the elder sister’s back. The drawing soon took the shape of a dragon that coiled around an island, representing me and Leviathan. It was entirely up to the gods and goddesses to create their marks and she decided to make it look like that.

Her hand work was simply beautiful so it was worth becoming her apostle just for that mark alone… I had to admit that it looked way too cool. I could place only one mark since I couldn’t have more than one apostle and my mark was a simple dot. But the place where I put it on Lien’s body wasn’t ordinary.

Well, saying in her body would be more accurate, I couldn’t help but start grinning as I thought about its location. I did it during my first time with her, and how sweet it was! I also didn’t draw it with my hand but my little brother, so it was in no way ordinary!

About twenty minutes later, she finished drawing her soul mark on all of the girls and then told them that they could get dressed.

“From now on, you four can also consider yourselves my apostles and our children’s guardians. It’s unlikely to happen but if either of you gets in trouble in here, just tell them your identity. Once I teach you how to use the ‘Link’ that’s present between apostles and their masters, you’ll be able to contact me telepathically.”

“Ah, right, and there is one more thing. I’ll tell you in advance that the difference in power between us is large, which means that the power you’re going to receive from Link will put your mana veins and muscles under a lot of stress. Your body should start changing soon which may come with some pain and numbness but you don’t have to be afraid,” she said.

“That’s fine,” the younger sister replied.

“Alright. Could you girls introduce yourselves to my husband?” Lien asked, glancing at me.

“I’m Chloe,” the elder sister of the twins replied, followed by the younger one, “And I’m Zoe.”

Slightly raising her hand, the third girl with a shoulder-length, messy blonde hair said, “My name is Lea.” Her eyes were of the same green colour as my wife’s and she was also the oldest among the girls at the age of fourteen. A few years and the guys would fight to have her in the outside world…

The most silent of the four was the youngest and shortest among them, who had long red hair and warm brown eyes. She was also the last one to introduce herself, “My name is Rose and I’m twelve years old,” she mumbled in a low voice. After scanning her body, I knew that she’d stop growing in height once she reached a hundred and fifty-nine centimeters.

But at the same time, her chest would grow the most… which I once again found ridiculous. I was looking forward to seeing these girls growing up to be strong and independent. I decided that I’d make all of them extraordinary.

“Chloe and Zoe, Lea, and Rose. Alright, I’ll remember your names. What about the boys?” I asked Lien.

“Theo, Corey, you can come back now,” she called them over and then asked them to introduce themselves similarly. Both of the boys had dark brown hair, almost the same colour as mine but unlike my boring brown eyes, they were lucky enough to be born with fancy blue eyes.

Well, maybe my eyes weren’t a bad thing since Lien seemed to love them and often praised my ‘cute brown eyes’, telling me that it made me look so gentle. It was also true that if not for sensing her true intentions and emotions, I’d always think that she was making fun of me with those remarks.

I mean, I didn’t want to be cute… I was a guy.

Seeing that everyone would turn handsome and beautiful in the future, I couldn’t help but think about making myself super handsome with a bit of magic. Probably sensing my intentions, Lien frowned at me and reprimanded me through Link, “You… did you just feel dissatisfied with yourself? Don’t tell me that it’s about your looks?”

“How’d you know?” I asked.

“You looked quite envious for a moment and I couldn’t think of anything else but it turns out I was right! Listen here, I better not notice you thinking like that again because I’m going to kick your ass. How many times do I have to tell you that you’re handsome for me the way you are? Or are you thinking that my taste is bad? Or do you want strangers to appreciate you more?”

“Oh, woah, woah, okay! Calm down, honey,” I interrupted her, sensing that she still wanted to continue. “It’s neither, I just have my moments, you know?” I replied.

Looking at me with suspicion, she sighed loudly a second later and then leaned back in her chair. Well, it wasn’t like I felt ugly or dissatisfied with my looks or anything of the sort but sometimes when I thought about how I could change my body and become the most handsome guy on the planet, I had to admit I felt a little tempted.

I didn’t want to believe that I couldn’t make Lien amazed after changing my looks but she seemed to love my natural looks more than anything so I never changed anything. As for my little brother… maybe thanks to my commandment but it has grown to be the most optimal for my wife in every aspect, so there was no need to change that either.

I simply believed that if we had the power to change something, there was no need to be bound by excuses like ‘but that’s how I was born’.

Although we went through a whole conversation in our minds, in reality, not even two seconds passed so I focused back on the matter at hand and said, “Now then, boys and girls, I’ve got some great news for you. Or at least, I hope that you’ll like it.”

“You all can live alone in the future but for the time being, I think that it’s best if you all live together. I’ll bring you all over to another house in a moment which is much bigger than this and has two floors on top of the ground floor. The ground floor will be the boy’s where are two rooms connected with a bathroom and a toilet.”

“There is also a large kitchen and dining room like this one. As for the upper floors, there are two rooms, there are two rooms on every floor, similarly connected with its own bathroom and toilet, so you won’t have to worry about someone coming in on you.”

“The rooms are surrounded by a spell that you can switch on and off with a switch and it’ll turn the room soundproof. That’s so you can focus on your meditation and training whenever you feel the need. There is also a large yard with different environments in it. Lastly, in case you don’t want to or can’t cook, you can choose to visit a nearby restaurant and eat for free.”

“That’s all, do you like it?” I asked with a knowing smile, seeing their bewildered looks.

“What!? Are you seriously going to gift us a whole house?” Chole cried out in her surprise.

Following up my words, Lien smiled at her and replied, “Of course, what else were you expecting? It’s only natural that we’ll provide you with your necessities in return for your services. I can also tell you in advance that you’ll be free to do whatever you want during the weekends and in the evenings. My requirement is that you learn and train at least eight hours a day during weekdays. How you spend the rest of your time is up to you.”

“Can we train more if we want to?” Zoe asked shyly. Even if we didn’t ask them to train, they’d do it on their own. They grew up in the wild where they could rely only on their own strength, it was only natural that they wanted to become stronger.

“Haha, you can if you want to, it’s just that I’m not going to accompany you,” she replied.

“That’s fine,” Zoe replied cheerfully. While they were chatting about their own future and work plan, I used my soul force to scan their bodies and souls. The dragon tattoo was filled to the brim with Lien’s soul force which started seeping into the girls’ bodies, slowly filling up all their pores. Souls were exact copies of our bodies but they existed in a different realm. In that realm, only souls, and things that contained soul force existed.

Opening my eyes, I looked at the expressions on their faces and seeing their eyes sparkling as they were looking at Lien, I slowly started to understand how many possibilities the soul realm held. If my assumption was correct, by tomorrow, these kids would find it impossible to refuse Lien’s commands, which was quite fearsome, no matter how I looked at it.

Although if they didn’t accept it willingly, it was unlikely that her commandment could have seeped into their souls so easily, it didn’t mean that she couldn’t force it into others. I realised that maybe it was possible to sort of ‘enslave’ others through their souls, which would explain how Thanatos’ oath worked. Maybe he knew about this from his inheritance and utilized it to enslave all those god incarnations. Considering that I had to remove some unknown marks from their souls at the time to free them, it totally made sense.

What I found even stranger was that although I became Lien’s first apostle and she drew the same mark on my back, her soul force didn’t even budge and couldn’t enter my soul. It was probably because my soul was many times stronger than hers but if souls worked this way, I could easily enslave all the bad people to tell me everything they knew about their organisations.

After all, even if Ma’at could hear their thoughts, she couldn’t get more out of them than what they were thinking about. Realising that, I regretted killing all the Germs we captured but there was no helping it. When I turned Lien into my apostle, I didn’t have the power to observe this kind of thing so closely. When she turned me into her apostle, her mark didn’t even affect me so I once again couldn’t get anything out of it.

This was the first time that I could see how a commandment affected other people’s souls. Closing my eyes for a moment, I scanned all the people who lived in Leviathan and seeing the results, I was left flabbergasted. When I built Leviathan, I filled the whole place with my soul force and bound it to my soul. The effect was just as I expected, people grew attached to it but back then I didn’t know how exactly it worked. I just knew it worked based on previous experiments with monsters.

Now I understood why.

Every single person in Leviathan was constantly surrounded by my soul force which due to its power, slowly seeped into the outer layers of their souls. I always found it a bit strange that everyone was so respectful towards me and that whenever I praised someone or spent time with them, they seemed to be super happy about it. Considering it from a different perspective, babies started their life in their mother’s belly where they were surrounded by their mother’s warmth and ‘aura’.

Most of the time, the more time we spent with our loved ones, the more attached we became. Lien and I were in a similar situation. I couldn’t even imagine my life without her as I was now. Maybe because the residents spent a lot of time in a place which was filled with my soul force, they slowly grew attached to the place, and me.

The most terrifying about all this was that Sylvanus filled the whole planet with its mana and soul force and if souls worked the way I thought, maybe he could command the whole monster population and even humans to do what it wanted. And if that was the case, maybe it wasn’t sleeping or waiting for its body to magically grow. It was waiting patiently until every human turned into its slave.

Jumping up from the table, I told Lien that I had to check on something and left her with the kids. Those who lived in Leviathan had only my soul force in their bodies but once I teleported to a city in the outside world, I couldn’t help but curse, seeing that only toddlers didn’t have someone else’s soul force in their bodies. After careful comparison, I could declare confidently that they were affected by the same soul, which should be Sylvanus’.

Spending another ten minutes, I teleported around the planet and checked out many other cities and clans, only to see the same damned result everywhere. I realised that the whole doppelganger thing was just a cover for it to divert our attention from what it was doing. Still, it wasn’t a bad thing that we destroyed so many of them since those were the ‘chimneys’ that kept ‘polluting’ our planet with its soul force.

The good thing was that one person could be affected only by one soul, which I realised once I wrapped my soul force around one of the kids running on the streets and saw Sylvanus’ soul force leaving his body.

Although I felt prompted to go around the world and start ‘freeing’ people, I knew I had little chance to do it effectively. On the other side, I didn’t want Sylvanus to realise that I found out about its little secret. That being the case, it would be unwise to take action against it right away, and without a plan at that.

The good thing was that Sylvanus had to cover a huge area and even if its doppelgangers and those strange trees could release its mana and soul force, it was thinned out and needed a lot of time to take effect. I had no idea how old it was but considering that it was at least seventy years old, and it got to this stage only, I understood that it was hard to do this on a large scale.

I knew that it was at least seventy years old thanks to scanning thousands of old people and those above the age of seventy all had their souls ‘tainted’ to a very similar degree. The most serious case I found was a seventy-six years old granny, so Sylvanus should have started its world-domination plan somewhere around that time.

Even if it was older, it surely needed a lot of time to get enough power and knowledge about how to do this. It could be two hundred years old as well and with enough effort and experiments, it could have easily grown strong enough and learned of this method. The bad news was that I had to catch up to a monster that was possibly over a hundred years ahead of me.

The good news was that it seemed like I was doing well… but at the same time, I refused to believe that Sylvanus didn’t care about the fact that I was growing stronger and stronger right under its nose. If I was in its place, I’d have surely gotten rid of myself when I killed the first doppelganger.

There were a few problems, though. First of all, I still had to stay wary of the other four organisations and prepare for the surprise attack against the Necrons. Secondly, I sensed Leo’s presence in Australia and noticed that he was spying on us.

I hadn’t seen or heard of him ever since he told me about Light city and then left with a mess behind him, so now I also had to worry about that guy. And if these two problems weren’t big enough, now I realised Sylvanus’ plan. I never thought my day could be ruined so quickly just by thinking.

I think I should ask Dorje about him. Maybe he can tell me his commandment, or even better, his location. I should also set up an area that is free of all kinds of soul forces and see if Sylvanus’ soul force would leave its body. In case it’s a quick process, maybe it’d be worth setting up a Soul Barrier around the largest and most powerful cities and clans.

After thinking through my options carefully, I decided on what to do and went to the wilderness to catch the nearest monster, which turned out to be a White Tiger. Since I was in East India, it wasn’t surprising to run into one of the most powerful monsters on the planet. At the same time, I could test how a soul-force-free area would affect powerful monsters.

The beast was five meters tall white snow-white fur and long black stripes. Its paws were much bigger than my head and its physical power was way above what humans could achieve, even with physical enchantments. Only by using advanced magic and laws could we overcome such beasts. Sadly for the tiger, I was well-versed in magic.

It was in the middle of drinking from a river that came from a small waterfall a few meters away from it. The water was crystal clear and the surrounding forest was completely silent, as not even fly dared come near this beast. The poor thing couldn’t even sense my presence, so it was scared shitless when I intentionally stepped on a dried branch only a few meters behind its back.

The beast instantly jumped over to the other side of the river and turned to growl at me, still taking a step back. It probably understood that I was no ordinary opponent. Even I’d be freaked out if someone could sneak up on me and get so close without my notice. Being in the mood to play around with it, I appeared behind its back and then grabbed its tail.

By the time it turned around to swipe at me, I was once again behind its back, holding its tail. When it turned for about the tenth time, I finally let go of it and appeared on the other side of the river once again. These beasts were much smarter than the animals of the past. If you told them something while pointing with your finger, they could do what you wanted after about five tries, at most.

Realising that it wasn’t my opponent, it quickly turned around and decided to flee but I appeared in front of it once again and raised my hand.

“Stop!”

Behaving like a good pet, it sat down right away and stared at me silently. “You… I think I’ll keep you as my pet in the future. You’re really cute as well, aren’t you?” I couldn’t help but laugh as I walked up to it and scratched its chin. It was strange to look at a beast that was the size of a smaller house.

Just to make sure that I was stronger, it tried to bite my hand the first time I touched it but once my slap sent its teeth flying, it turned obedient once again. When I healed its teeth, it even licked my hand to show its gratefulness. Looking past its front legs, I noticed that its ‘jewel’ was missing so I knew it was a female. After thinking about it for a second, a name popped up in my mind.

“From now on, your name shall be Aria, and I’ll be your master, Seth,” I told the beast while pointing at the person being named. Seeing it nodding its head, I added, “You will have a good life if you follow my commands and you will be free to roam the wild even when I bring you with me.”

“Do you prefer hunting or me giving your food? One growl is the first, more is the second,” I said. Sadly, that much was too complex for it without any context so it just tilted its head to the side, clearly not understanding what I asked.

“It’s fine, I’ll ask again later,” I waved my hand to show it that it wasn’t that important.

After spending a bit more time in the wild and catching a weaker monkey-type monster as well, I brought both of them back to Leviathan and took them to the Great Forest in the southwestern corner. There were quite a lot of monsters and beasts in there but neither of them were a match for the tiger.

Once I created two separate sections in the forest for the monkey and the tiger, I created a huge Soul Barrier around them which would block my soul force from entering. I was looking forward to finding out how long it took to remove Sylvanus’ soul force from their bodies if there was no resupply.

“Seth, where are you right now?” just as I finished, Lien contacted me through Link.

“I’ve just left the Great Forest in Leviathan. Why?”

“I’m just wondering where you went since you didn’t say anything to me. When are you coming back?” she asked.

“I know, I’m sorry, but I’ll tell you everything when I get back  It shouldn’t take more than ten minutes…” I chuckled, feeling that she started missing me so soon.

After a short bit of silence, she couldn’t hold it any longer and whispered straight into my mind, “I love you.”

“I love you too~ Don’t worry, once I get home, I’ll hug and cuddle you plenty!” I replied, a big smile spreading on my face right away.

“I’ll be looking forward to it. Shall we watch a movie as well?” she chuckled.

“Okay, but I’m going now or I’ll never finish,” I mused happily.

Once she stopped talking to me, I teleported to Dorje’s house which was in a silent corner in the northern area of the city. He built his own house which was an old Japanese style building that was combined with a small onsen and a large willow tree in his yard. It looked really good and comfy.

After scanning the area and finding his soul, I contacted him with telepathy, “Hi, I’m Seth. Do you have a moment?”

Not even responding, a few seconds later he opened the front door and stood to the side to let me in. Closing the door behind me, he moved ahead and led me to his living room where there was a small table on the top of a tatami, in the middle of the room. Crossing his legs in his dark blue coloured slacks, he took his seat in front of the table.

Seeing a small slit in the middle of his forehead with nine dots above it, I couldn’t help but stare at it for a short while before finally looking away. I knew staring was rude but it looked so strange. To top it all off, that slit was empty but when he used his third-eye, it’d start shining with a blue light, which looked kind of creepy.

Pouring some hot tea to a clean cup, he glanced at me and asked, “How can I help you, my lord?”

“Well, how about calling me Seth first?” I couldn’t help but laugh awkwardly, still not used to being called that way.

“You saved my family and my life so I owe you mine. That being the case, you’re my lord,” he replied shortly. His voice and hands were steady as he spoke, clearly not bothered by his own statement. Of course, it wasn’t like he had a reason to complain. He got a house and could live peacefully. He just had to give me a list of names every month.

“Ah, whatever. If that’s what you want then you can call me Lord… Anyway, I came here to ask for your help. Can you tell me anything about a person named Leo, who was my classmate? He has short blonde hair and he’s about a hundred and seventy-five centimeters tall. He-”

“I know who you’re talking about,” he raised his hand, implying that I should stop describing him. Lowering it, he just shook his head and said, “Sadly, I can’t help you. I don’t know why but all I see is darkness when it comes to him. When I use my third eye, the whole world turns gray and everything disappears, leaving only souls.”

“Yours is huge and warm, just like the sun. There are many other great souls, though neither of the ones I can sense could be compared to yours. And at the same time, there are numerous souls that are great but are covered by a dark foil, hiding their truth from my eyes. I met this Leo when I still lived in Light city but I couldn’t see anything about him.”

“That’s quite sad,” I muttered. “What do you think? Is there a way to enhance your third eye, even if only for a short period of time? Could you see more that way?”

“There may be one but it’ll take some time. If you can help me create a Soul Gathering formation and bring souls of monsters or humans to it, I’ll be able to use them to enhance my third-eye,” he said, running his fingers through his long white beard. He looked quite a bit like a shaolin. I believed he called himself a buddhist but I wasn’t sure about it. It wasn’t like I was religious… as a god incarnation myself, it’d be quite ridiculous.

“Where should I do it?” I asked.

“You can do it behind my house. I’ll cremate their corpses so there is no need to bother with that. Just lay the corpses that you’re going to bring in the formation. And you should bring them here within six hours or their souls are going to dissipate,” he gave me a few simple instructions, and then pushed my cup towards me.

“Alright, I’ll get it done in a minute,” I replied with a nod and then picked up the cup to drink his tea.

Drinking half of it with one slurp, I asked him about his wife. “How’s your wife doing?”

“She’s meditating,” he replied. As far as I knew, she was similarly a Buddhist and both of them gave up on physical contact in their relationship. It was a nice thing but it surely wasn’t for me. I’d probably die if I couldn’t have sexy times with Lien, like seriously.

Knowing that he wasn’t a man of words, I didn’t want to intrude on him any longer and left to make that Soul Gathering formation. It required a large amount of soul force to create one, so only eight people could do it even in Leviathan. The sentinels, Lien, and me. Although there were quite a lot of people who had enough soul force to make it, their soul force wouldn’t be powerful enough to contain many other souls.

Once I was done with what he asked, I said my goodbyes and returned to my wife’s side. Thanks to earlier, I was starting to understand more and more how these traits and commandments worked. The beast tamer trait was a well-known and very powerful trait in Balan and for some reason, everyone in the White family was ‘born’ with it.

Now that I knew much more about souls and realised how much we could affect others with our own soul force, I understood that traits were just special soul techniques and that it was possible to recreate them. Just like commandments. I was quite sure that beast tamers also had to wrap their soul force around their targets and probably had to use some kind of soul mark to enslave monsters.

When I returned home, I found Lien sitting in the living room, stuffing herself with ice cream. Once I explained my findings to her, her answer was that I should test my theories on monsters.

“You’re one step behind. I’ve caught a white tiger and brought it back with me earlier today. It’s just that I decided to keep it as my pet, so I don’t want to draw soul marks on it, only if I know it’s safe and works. I’ll test it on other beasts for the time being,” I replied.

“I should have known,” she grumbled, sticking another spoonful of ice cream into her mouth.

“So… what about the kids we’ve brought in?” I asked, seeing her lazing around, doing nothing. I wasn’t bothered by it, I just knew it wasn’t like her to be like that.

“The boy that decided to leave Leviathan has decided to go to Moscow, so I dropped him off there. He was the weakest and least experienced among the kids but he is still someone who could be called a prodigy in Balan, so I guess he’ll be fine.”

“As for the kids that stayed, I used magic to make some delicious food for them and then left them in the house for the time being. I'll show them around tomorrow. They also seemed to be happy about it so all is fine," she said, and then continued devouring the small bucket of ice cream in her hands.

"Is that so? I'm glad to hear that," I smiled at her. “By the way, was the house to their liking?”

“Hah, you bet. Rose started crying when she saw her room and everyone was super happy. The boys were very silent the whole time but even they started jumping up and down on the bed when they entered their room. I guess their quick mental recovery also has to do with my soul mark,” she replied.

“Cool, and here I thought that maybe they’d find a single room too small. I mean I’d be fine even if I had to live with you in a single room but that doesn’t mean everyone thinks that way.”

“Of course, I wouldn’t live like that if we had kids…” I quickly added.

“I thought that much. I agree that if it was just the two of us, I’d be fine with what you described for a very simple reason,” she raised a finger, smiling mischievously.

“Oh? And what is that? Most people want some ‘free space’ and whatnot. Don’t you feel the same?” I raised my brows, knowing the answer all too well.

“Bah, I can consider you air at this point. There is nothing I don’t dare to do in front of you, and that’s why I wouldn’t mind a small house like that!” she laughed as she laid down on her back with her arms under her head and her legs up on the sofa.

“I know but I’m happy about it. It’s good to see that you feel so reserved around me, though sometimes you still seem to keep some distance?” I couldn’t help but question her.

“Hehe, what do you know? I must keep a little distance and be sexy from time to time if I want to keep you interested, don’t you agree?” she waved her finger.

Scratching my chin, I couldn’t refute her words so I just nodded my head. It was true that I could sense her feelings so even I liked walking around half-naked and doing things that she found sexy and turned her on. It was what livened up the relationship between the two of us, else things would turn dull after some time, and travelling around wouldn’t help too much either after some point.

“Well, jokes aside, I’m not surprised that they all looked so happy about the house. Most of them slept under the skies up till now so no matter how you think about it, this is a great step for all of them. And don’t forget that the house you gave them is actually larger than ours and have everything inside,” she said.

“You’re right,” I nodded, walking up to the sofa. Raising her legs into the air, I sat down and then put her legs on my thighs. Like some obedient kid, she watched silently as I pulled up her shirt and put my hand on her belly. After caressing her for a few seconds, she couldn’t hold it any longer and said, “What now? If I didn’t know any better, I’d think that you have ulterior motives.”

“I’m just thinking about something,” I muttered.

“Does it have to do with the apples you’ve got from Hawaii?” she raised her brows.

“Are you a witch?” I raised my hands helplessly, surprised to see that she found me out without me having to say anything.

“Mhm, I am,” she nodded.

“Haha, okay. Seriously talking, I’ve made some calculations and I think that its effects would be the best if you ate it today, which is the reason I didn’t bring it up before. Our kids would be born with much greater potential than common children but at the same time, I’m not sure if it’d be a good thing. It’s not like I want to tell them what to do even before they are born, and I don’t wish to train them like a maniac if they won’t be as interested in magic as you and me,” I said.

“Seth… it’s a nice way of thinking but if I may be so rude to say this, it’s pretty retarded. Leviathan is already way more than just a gathering place for geniuses and is getting more and more famous throughout the world. I reckon in a few years, most people will want to join our organisation and live here and get super strong like every other resident. This will be the new ‘premium’ place for humanity because that’s how humans work.”

“All the elitists will want to join and think highly of themselves once they do because nobody will think and recognise the fact that we aren’t taking in only geniuses. We simply find a way to make good use of all those hard-working but ‘useless’ people by making them do things they are good at. That is not something that is commonly done in the outside world, either because of greedy leaders or because of the lack of resources.”

“Now tell me, do you think our kids will grow up to be normal when they’re going to be the children of the person who owns the whole place, namely, you? If they go out, they’ll have to hide their identities, which isn’t normal. If they don’t hide it, they’ll be surrounded by people which is once again not something I would call normal. I want to think that the residents of Leviathan will handle them normally but let’s be honest, it’s more likely that they’re going to call them Young Master and other bullshit names, and they’re most likely going to enjoy special rights.”

“How are any of those normal? If you ask me, we might as well go and teach them all we can and give them the best of everything. It’s just that we’ll have to make sure to teach them how to handle their own inheritance and powers,” she replied.

“Well, you misunderstood me,” I couldn’t help but laugh once she finished talking. “I know that they won’t be normal but I’m afraid that if they are born with enhanced abilities and realise how much stronger they can become than the other residents, especially once they visit the world outside, we won’t be able to raise them properly. After all, I don’t know what kind of effects the apple is going to have on their mental capabilities.”

“What I’m sure of is that they won’t be normal in any aspect if you take the apple during your pregnancy, not even in growth rate. Imagine twice or thrice the amount of mana flowing through your brain and body at such a young age. They’ll experience way more things than normal kids and will develop much faster. We’ll have to stand on our toes and watch them carefully,” I shook my head, explaining the problem to her thoroughly.

“Oh. So that’s what this is all about,” she muttered, finding the problem more serious this time. “Now I understand why you are thinking about what to do… but I’m still saying that it’s okay!” she added right away with a bright smile on her face.

“Fine then, eat this in that case,” I shook my head and decided to leave the decision to her. Opening a small portal to a separate black hole that I created just for the apples, I took one of them out and put it on her chest. Rolling down from her hill, it stopped at her chin, knocking the ice cream spoon out of her mouth.

Without saying anything, she used telekinesis to move the ice cream to the small table in front of me and then picked up the apple and bit into it while eyeing me. Stuffing the apple back into my hands, she closed her eyes in a hurry and started circulating the fluid that came out of the apple.

“Control it, it contains a huge amount of energy so you can’t be careless,” I remarked, knowing that she wasn’t expecting it. Seeing her breathing turn steady, I used magic to cut the apple into ten small slices and waited until she finished integrating the first part into her body.

Once she opened her eyes to look for the apple, I fed her the next one and continued doing so whenever her body ran out of the fluid that was in the apple. It took about half an hour for her to ingest and process all of it and by the end, she grew to a height of two meters and all her weak points disappeared.

She looked like a killing machine. Naturally, neither of us wanted her to look that way so we spent the next hour rebuilding her original body, and integrating the changes into her cells. By the time her transformation finished, her cells were made of solid condensed mana, allowing her body to connect to mana directly. It made casting magic as easy as breathing, not to mention that we could freely utilize the mana in our environment instead of using our own.

“This feeling is amazing,” she remarked once she settled down, clearly amazed by the changes in her body.

“You’ll see how amazing it is as you get to know your body more and more,” I mused, remembering how many times I was surprised by myself after I ate the apple. I was nothing like my old self, even if I looked the same.

“I can tell even without doing anything. My perception of mana is so much better!” she said with a bright smile on her face, drawing long lines of condensed mana in the air with each movement of her finger. “It’s no wonder you could cast WORD magic so effortlessly, this is basically cheating!”

“Haha, it sure is, but we need the cheats if we want to beat our greatest enemy,” I laughed, glad to see that her improvement made her so happy.

“Yeah, but having this body won’t make us strong enough to beat our enemy. We need knowledge as well,” she said.

“Mhm. Do you need anything before or after I leave? I’ll start gathering people to return to the Germ’s island and wait for the Necrons, so I could go and get something for you from the cities nearby. Or I could do it now, so do you have any wishes, whims, or requests in mind?”

“I want something sweet. Chocolate!”

“Eh? I don’t even have to leave for that,” I replied as I used my trait to create some delicious chocolate for her. Once she laid her hands on it, she started devouring it with a blissful expression on her face.

Looking at her beautiful face, I couldn’t stop myself from leaning over and forcing my tongue into her mouth to get a taste of the chocolate. Surprised by my sudden move, she didn’t even move for a few seconds and just stared at me with her eyes wide open. Right when she was about to close them and start enjoying it thoroughly, I pulled back and took a step towards the door.

“You! What’s the meaning of this?” she growled, jumping up from the bed and grabbing my shirt. She even used magic to make her movements easy.

“Hmm~ what do you mean? Did you get excited by any chance?” I mused, pretending that I didn’t know.

Knowing that I still had to leave, she let go of my shirt and then sat back down, clenching her fists. It was only natural that she was aroused since I used pleasure touch on her during our kiss and almost sent her straight to heaven.

“I wonder how you’re going to prepare to receive me once I get home. Oh, and don’t worry about your belly, it’s cute. It’s not like you’re fat anywhere,” I said, seeing her glance at her own belly.

I heard that many women become depressed during their pregnancy and I could easily imagine that one of the reasons was their own belly. Everyone wanted to be beautiful, especially women, so seeing their protruding bellies in the mirror probably made them lose some of their self-confidence and made them feel sad. I believed that wouldn’t become a problem if I regularly praised her and made out with her, not minding her belly.

I refused to believe that she would feel depressed if I cared about her, and things were looking good since she was often smiling.

Leaving her alone, I left our house and contacted the residents with my soul force, “Listen here, everyone. I’ll need a few thousand people to come with me to the Germ’s island and await the Necrons’ arrival. You shall assemble on the Great Plains in ten minutes!”

Once I issued my command, I teleported to said place and sat down in the middle of the air.