RD 3 Ch 53 - END

"Yes, Daddy," Gloria said into the phone, bobbing her head, the picture of a filial daughter. "Bran took wonderful care of me. There was a little danger, but nothing that we couldn't handle. I know it was a lot longer than we expected, but as soon as we can, we're going to come visit you. Where are you? You moved into the fort?" 

I stood beside her, listening to the conversation as a small swarm of helicopters appeared above the trees, their blades beating a deep rhythm in the air. They began to hover over the clearing, one by one, before they dropped down rope ladders. 

"See you soon," Gloria said, before hanging up the phone and turning to me. 

Even without us giving direct orders, the Mul Branova were all jumping up and catching the rope ladders. With the strength and dexterity expected from a highly trained military team, they began to climb up. Like two dozen monkeys, Antonio and his people joined them in climbing. They filled out six helicopters that then tore away from the greater group. 

Circe had already left us in the dust, and Vincent had called his own ride. So, last helicopter, this one sporting two propellers, came in closer for me. 

"And what's that one?" I frowned at the larger helicopter. 

"It's the one they used to transport Thorin. They thought you might need it too." Gloria answered, not meeting my eyes.

This helicopter had a bay door that opened in the back, and a heavily reinforced ladder made of steel cables unfurled from it.

I caught the ladder, deciding to go up first in case this went horribly wrong. Hand over hand, I pulled myself up the rope. The helicopter dipped before its propellers strained and it leveled back out. I went slowly, not wanting to crash our transportation into the forest.

My titan physique had ranked up and I was noticeably heavier.

When I reached the top and threw myself into the bay of the helicopter, the thing wobbled uncomfortably.

Simone, Nix, Gloria, and Merlin made their way inside behind me. 

I glanced at Merlin. "Sticking around?" I asked with a raised eyebrow, this whole time, I’d half expected her to just blink out of existence as she teleported away. 

"I don't see why not," she said. "After all, if what you said is correct, in two weeks this is all going to shit. Might as well find someone who's prepared."

"You don't have a mage tower somewhere?" Simone asked, her eyes big, wide, and innocent. 

Merlin cleared her throat into her hand. "I have a small bunker. But it's mostly for me to toy around with a few hobbies where no one is going to be concerned when I blow up my alchemy lab. It's not really set up to be a long-term home. Besides, if I ever want to go there, all I'll have to do is teleport."

"It'll take you a while to bring your range that far, won't it?" I asked, having seen her use the ability before. 

"It's faster outside of an instance. Perhaps the controlled space makes it more difficult. I'm unsure. In truth, you seem to know more about system abilities than the rest of us. Perhaps you can tell me?" 

I shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine. Sometimes it's best not to question everything, and just let the system do what it wants." 

Merlin grunted in what I believe was agreement as the helicopter leaned forward, hurrying to catch up with the others. 

"Speaking of preparing," I glanced at everyone present.

First, I pointed at Gloria. "I'll go meet your father, and at least get marginally caught up. But I'm going to leave it to you to finalize anything that needs done. Offer up my inscription skills, however, I won't be able to put that much work in before the Rapture. Some of it will have to wait until later. I don't think I can spend more than a couple days before the Heros Clan throws a fit and demands my presence." 

Gloria nodded, before my attention shifted to Simone.

"Simone, you need to fold in the rest of the Mul Branova. I'm not going to initiate them with the Crook. In two weeks time, they will be initiated anyway. So for those that are there, I'll awaken bloodlines and we'll work on some basic combat drills. Get them into the group like you have the others. I'd like them to get the new devotee class, if at all possible. It’s simply too good to not try and get more."

"Warming up to the idea of having worshippers?" Simone asked with a giant smile.

"More like it'll give them a better shot than most." I answered, my goal wasn’t followers, it was people who could stand strong against what was to come. For an SS ranked class, the New Devotee of Bran was fairly simple to get.

"About the crook," Simone hesitated, "did you notice after they all resisted the possession and brought a piece of your soul into theirs, that the compulsion wasn't working?" She asked.

My brows pinched down as I thought over my interactions with the Mul Branova and shook my head. "That shouldn't be possible. The corrupted artifacts are a system item.”

“But we were in a space that defied even the system." Simone shrugged, but the smile didn't leave her face. Instead, it only grew wider. "Perhaps something wonky happened in there.”

“We can test that later. For now we need to focus.” I shifted to Nyx. "I'm going to leave it to you to reach out to the Heros Clan and try and mollify them, if only slightly," I said. "I will get over there within the next several days. If they need more time than that to get everything set up, I'm more than happy to wait." 

Nyx bobbed her head. "I can work with the Clan.”

“I also need you to start looking into the Borson Clan. If any of them are still poking around, find them. I don’t want to start throwing my weight around, but I’ll do it if they need to be taught a lesson about my personal boundaries. Chances are, they have at least a few agents present." 

Nyx had a serious expression on her face as she bobbed her head. Meanwhile, her snakes seemed to be overly excited, clapping their heads together.

Merlin was standing beside her, staring at the snakes with a giant frown on her face. "Do they always do that?" She asked.

"Sometimes they get a little excited," Nyx grabbed several of them, trying to wrangle them into behaving. They fought her tooth and nail, one managed to escape and rub its head against me like a content kitten.

"And what about me? Are you going to give me a task, too?" Merlin turned away from Nyx and regarded me seriously, which was impressive given the hair-snake rubbing against my cheek. 

"I'd be a fool not to use you if you're willing," I answered. "Right now, it seems the fort has expanded, and I'm not sure what the Nesters’ initial supply looks like right now. However, there’s no such thing as over preparing. I'd ask you to use your teleportation and some spatial rings to essentially buy out as many supplies as we can." The two SS ranked rings would make wonderful stockpiles for the fortress.

It seemed like a silly job for someone as powerful as Merlin, but we both understood how important those supplies would be and how easy it would be to run out.

She nodded along, not perturbed at all with being asked to run errands.

"All right." I clapped my hands together as we began to descend upon the fort below. “It’s time to get things done.”

"Gosh, that thing has really grown into a giant, hasn't it?" Gloria commented as the fort grew in our field of vision. The original fort was behind the wall I had once inscribed. However, now there was a second wall ringing the exterior and nearly doubling the space inside. 

"It seems the plans expanded while we weren't here," I chuckled. "Hopefully it's not too much for you," I teased Gloria, knowing that challenging the woman was probably the best way to encourage her. She was not one to back down or lose. 

Gloria crossed her arms as the helicopter landed and the hatch opened. The long coat she always had over her shoulders flapped in the wind as she stood as if she was above it all. 

In front of us, Mul Branova and Nesters spread out for the welcome committee. Carmen was among them. He gave me an easy wave and quickly beckoned for his daughter to come to him. The stern man I remembered from my past life disappeared as he excitedly embraced Gloria much more like an eager father than a mob boss. It was somewhat unbecoming for his role, but it was fair considering she had been gone for over a year where we couldn't get word back. 

To my surprise, there was another parent present. My mother and Thorin stood to the side. The large man had his arms crossed. My mother, on the other hand, was standing with an arm on Thorin. There was an unrestrained smile on her face. 

I stepped down to greet her with my own smile. "Mother! Th-Father!" It was still awkward to refer to the man who'd once ripped my heart out in my past life as father, but I managed.

"It seems you made it out of there in one piece." My mother looked me up and down. She was never the person to initiate a hug, however, I could sense she wanted one. Stepping up, I wrapped her in a hug, squeezing her from the shoulder rather than the chest awkwardly. 

"It's good to be back. Circe gave me a few updates, mostly that you two have been causing trouble and that your relationship with our extended family will need some work. Your extended family," I put emphasis on that and glanced at Thorin to make it clear who I was talking about, "have been looking for you.”

“Nothing I can't handle." My mother quickly dismissed my words with a wave of her hand. "What's important right now is that you're back, right?" She said sharply. 

Thorin was quick to agree, "Yep, right. Welcome back, son." He slapped a heavy hand at my shoulder that vibrated all the way down to my feet. 

Internally I cursed, because just from that friendly slap, it was evident that much of the distance I had gained between my father and myself's strengths had disappeared while I was gone.

Those were supposed to be my instances to farm!

I knew that while I was out Circe had been shoving them into every instance she could locate. That meant my mother, too, had likely grown significantly. 

"Are you still using that sloppy sword technique? Perhaps it's time you learned something that has more finesse." My mother instructed.

I let out a heavy sigh. For a second, I thought we might be in a different place than a year ago. But my mother were somehow still parenting me, and the first thing she did was issue critiques. 

"Yep, I think it's useful. But, I don't think we'll be fighting in airplanes again soon. However, there might be something to be gleaned from another style. The next few weeks are going to be," I paused, "hellishly busy. As soon as things settle down, I'll let you give me a few pointers." 

I then turned to Carmen, seeing he was done hugging his daughter. I dipped my head in his direction. "Greetings. Not to be presumptuous, but as soon as we can, I'd like to dive back into everything we missed. If that's alright, sir." 

Carmen chuckled. "I'm in a good mood. I think I'll let about anything slide today. Dinner first. Then I'll pull out a bottle of the good stuff, and we can talk after." He said, glancing around at the leadership present. “Everyone's invited. After all, we're welcoming them home.”

***

Even before we managed to sit down for dinner, Simone had been busy shopping and buying matching lingerie. Apparently she had taken stocking up on necessities to be a wider range of goods than I had initially intended.

Gloria had people reporting to her on the status of the fort, and Nyx was shielding the phone receiver. I could hear Zeus' voice from another room. 

I knew that it was going to be an incredibly busy two weeks. What was coming could not be stopped, and every step we took now could matter and affect the outcome. I had come back into this life for this moment, and I was not going to let myself or those around me down. I needed to prepare them as much as possible for this first demon war.

My eyes drifted to the window. The current peaceful landscape of Vain City suddenly overlapped with a crumbling city, red sky, and a myriad of hellish creatures flying through the air. I blinked, and it was back to normal. A peaceful city that still had two weeks of rest. 

I took a deep breath and focused back on getting ready for dinner. We needed to reconnect with those in our larger organization and check on the progress of our plans. 

We would push forward, and we would get everything done in two weeks. I would accept no other outcome. Despite the lost time, everything would get put in place. I had planned for more time, but what we had would have to be enough. There were simply too many lives depending on me.

One after another, ideas I had were organized into what was the highest priority and what I'd have to let go by the wayside. I'd see how the chips fell. I could use my past life as an experience, but already the vault had thrown yet another ripple into the life I had lived and the life I lived now.

This reality had changed from the one I had known. I’d seen it with Thorin, and then with the Heros Clan, and their Tartarus Branch. Now yet another with the vault came. I could only wonder what all these ripples would amount to when it came to the war to come, but I would learn soon enough when the Rapture happened.

Perhaps I wouldn’t be able to lean on my past experience too much.

Buttoning the fancy suit I was putting on, I looked up in the mirror. Simone stepped up behind me, smoothing out my shoulders before quickly returning to her phone and continuing to place her online orders. 

Nyx finally hung up the phone with a huff, and Gloria spun around, dressed for dinner.

I looked them over, smiling to myself. Whatever challenges might come, we were together until the end.

AN - I've got a 'next time on RD' and a Story Thus Far for DD 204 queued up for tomorrow as well as a Patreon Update. DD 204 will start on the 24th.