Tensei Skill Shop Chapter 20

Tensei Skill Shop

Disclaimer: I own nothing

Chapter 20:

Sano finished his examination of the skills collected between Uzume and I.

“Overall, very simplistic, but the powered up versions are giving me good ideas for growth-type skills.”

“Oh, nice.” And here I thought we wouldn’t be getting that much DP for these.

The various fights we instigated, participated in, or observed, all of them had led to us gaining a bunch of Sekirei-specific skills. There were a few elemental-based ones, but most of them were physical-type skills of varying degrees. Some were stronger than Musubi, but only because they had more time and training. If there was one common trait between all the Sekireis, it was their potential to grow, based on their emotional connection.

Social Link power, huh… The random thought came to mind, before I focused back on my current situation.

Not all the fights involved the use of a Norito, but the few that did demonstrated the power that lay buried within each Sekirei. Considering that some of them were getting by on pure physical ability was a little irritating, especially when compared to skilled powerhouses like Miya.

So I was of the assumption that the skills we gained wouldn’t be worth that much. I was glad to be proven wrong.

I looked over at Matsu. “Which ones do you want to keep?”

“Hmm… I don’t think we need the elemental ones, and for the weapon ones…” She trailed off.

I noticed she seemed a little distracted. “Matsu?”

“Huh? Oh, sorry.”

“Thinking about the data we managed to grab?” Uzume inquired with a grin.

The redhead just laughed sheepishly.

We ended up retaining the skills that would produce multiple versions of the weapon in question, due to the matter generation property that they had, along with two of the normal weapon types. I had to admit, I was looking forward to seeing what Matsu might come up with from experimenting with them. 

The rest went to Sano, and he paid out with a good amount of DP. I had a feeling he was giving us more than he normally would so we wouldn’t take up any more of his precious time working on skills.

“I’ll see you all next week. And have a good new year.” Sano nodded to me. “I’ll give you half day off on the first day.”

“Thanks.” The contract did mention that there was no public holiday day off, so that’s pretty generous of him. “See you next week.”

The three of us trooped out, and headed back to our living space, where a Pokemon was waiting to welcome us back.

“Vee! Eeveevee! Ee!” Eevee nuzzled each of us in turn, before sitting back on her haunches.

A nice and chill reaction to our return. 

“We’re back, Eevee!” Uzume picked her up for a cuddle. “Ah… I really missed you.”

“Vee?”

“It’s been longer for us than it was for you,” I explained as I rubbed her head.

She just tilted her head quizzically, before looking towards Matsu, who wore a thoughtful expression.

“Matsu, maybe you can leave it for tomorrow?” I suggested, going over to cup her face. “No need to stress yourself out now.”

She blinked, then nodded, leaning her face into my hand. “Alright. Since my Ashikabi says so…”

“Ee!”

“Oh, it’s already this time?” Matsu glanced at the clock, then exchanged looks with Uzume. “Rick-tan, why don’t you take a shower first? You did do quite a lot.”

I had to admit, I was feeling rather icky from all the sweat I worked up, so I accepted that suggestion and headed off to the washroom. After I finished washing up and changing, I returned to the living room, where I found my two Sekireis and Eevee waiting for me with a cake.

“Happy birthday!!” They chorused.

I knew it. 

It was a simple butter cake with some cream and fruits on top, but I enjoyed the taste nonetheless. Matsu and Uzume took turns feeding me, and I even returned the favor. For the first birthday I spent overseas away from my family, it was a pretty awesome one.

We didn’t do anything special later in the bedroom, but that was fine. I was satisfied with what we had together.

Besides, I could tell that they were making preparations for that special moment.

The next day, it was back to work as usual. Serving gods and recommending skills for their transmigrators’ needs… up till something different happened.

“Welcome to Sano’s Skill Services!” I recited for the tenth time that day, “How may I serve you today?”

“Oh, this is new,” The latest customer remarked as she took in the shop’s interior.

That makes two of us, I thought as I gazed upon the richly dressed woman.

It wasn’t the first time I had a human visit the store, but those times were always because they were accompanying the god who was actually a customer. However, this customer was clearly a human by her lonesome. It was possible that she could be a deity hiding her divinity, but so far I’ve never seen a reason for them to do so.

Her gaze sharpened as she looked at me.

[Appraisal detected!]

“Another puppet dancing on strings?” She made a gesture, and I felt something I had never felt before.

The job persona unwrapping itself from me. 

“You’re free now. Care to explain what is going on in this place?”

The phone began ringing, and I raised a finger. “Um, do you mind holding on a moment?” 

The woman frowned. “I believe I might have been a bit too hasty… but sure, I”ll wait.”

I picked up the phone. “Hey, Sano.”

The unusual greeting I gave made the person on the other end pause for a moment.

“...I thought I was mistaken when I received the alert, but it’s an actual situation, isn’t it?”

“Yes, I think so, but this customer didn’t do anything else yet.”

I could almost hear him thinking. “Alright. She hasn’t actually tried to test my other protections yet, so you’re free to treat her like any other customer.”

“What sort of payment should I accept if she wants to buy some stuff then?”

Another pause as he considered it. “Artifacts, if she has any.”

“Understood. I’ll call if anything else needs your attention.”

Hanging up the phone, I studied the woman once more. She had a regal appearance that looked slightly artificial, possibly altered by magic, with shoulder-length golden hair and features that hinted at past beauty that had only faded slightly. As for her clothing, she wore an ornate white robe that covered most of her body, yet didn’t look like it impeded her motions in any way. She was also carrying a small staff that had a bit of divinity leaking out from it.

“So, are you some kind of apostle then? What sort of shop is this?”

“It’s a shop that sells skills. Up till now, all the customers I’ve seen have been gods.”

“Explain more elaborately, please,” She requested.

“Right… give me a moment to think of a good explanation.” 

It was tough to suddenly lose the help of the job persona, but luckily I had gotten used to having to adapt quickly from the trips to other worlds.

Once I managed to explain my circumstances within this shop to her, she introduced herself to me.

She was a human for sure, but one from a setting with an insanely high power cap. Her age could be counted in millenia, and she had many names over the course of her life, so now most people from her world knew her as the Great Sage, with countless deeds attributed to her. For that reason, she asked me to address her as Sage.

As for how we arrived at our current situation, it was because she had been experimenting with various traveling methods, visiting many places and discovering all sorts of new places and locations. It was only recently that Sage decided to go further afield from the various worlds and planes she had experience with, which was how she ended up happening across Sano’s shop.

Apparently, she had some bad experiences with gods who would impose their divine power upon a human, effectively enslaving them and making them serve in their temple or as an apostle of their divine will. Considering what some of the controlled humans did at the will of the god controlling them, seeing someone in that position made her react automatically by casting a spell to remove said control.

“It’s the first time I’ve seen a human accept that control just to perform a normal job task,” She chuckled.

“Hey, I consider it a reasonable exchange for the pay and benefits I get,” I defended.

“I’ve had some experience with transmigrators, and a few of them had powers they logically shouldn’t have. So they come from shops like this then?”

I shrugged. “Can’t say they all do. Sometimes the gods can make the skills themselves, but they’re unable or unwilling to. Those are the types of gods I usually meet during my job here.”

“Interesting! Very interesting! Could you explain more to me about how that works?”

“Sure, first I usually get the gods to touch this pad…”

It was a bit intimidating to see her reaction to information regarding the functioning of skills and world systems, because from the way she described it, such limitations were practically non-existent for people in the setting she knew.

When Sage finally got around to touching the pad and letting it scan her, I had to support myself on the counter because of the response I got.

A human, being this strong? What the fuck? What the fuuuuuucccck? I was wishing for the job persona to come back and take over because at least it would help me cope better. 

In an isekai setting, Sage would have been something like a High Human in terms of race, though given how far she surpassed some of the gods I’ve met in sheer power and skill levels, I thought Pinnacle Human would have been a more appropriate term.

The phone rang again, and I answered it without thinking. “Yes?”

Sage smiled politely at me and waved her hand to show that she didn’t mind.

“See if she’s willing to trade any of her skills over to me,” Sano instructed.

“Right.”

I barely put the phone down before it started ringing again, so I picked it back up.

“Rick-tan! What the heck is with this customer!?” Matsu practically shrieked in my ear.

“Hell if I know. Also, I’m in the middle of dealing with her, you know.”

“...sorry. I’ll hang up now.”

I looked at Sage, who had an amused expression. “Sorry about that.”

“You’re not the only one working in this shop then?”

“Yeah, she handles backend duties. Anyway, moving on…” I conveyed Sano’s instructions to Sage. “Though if you want to trade some equipment too, that works as well.”

“I do have a rather sizable collection built up from everything I’ve done and experienced, so let’s negotiate, shall we?”

Turns out, the stuff she was willing to let go off were things she hadn’t used for some time, and  those were usually skills too destructive for normal use. The artifacts she unloaded were more interesting, because they only fell out of use because her current equipment was better. 

By my estimates, the value of what she traded was worth more than what I got from all my trips out of the store combined. 

That was a bit discouraging. Not to mention what she did after examining a few of the sample goods I presented; she easily whipped up a skill of her own based off Sano’s creation, displaying a level of talent and creativity that was honestly impressive.

Damn, I bet Sano would hire her on in a heartbeat, if she didn’t already make it clear that she had no interest in such a thing.

I think Sano probably blocked any other customers from coming, because we weren’t interrupted throughout the entire process.

As for what she purchased, she grabbed a large variety of them, with no apparent pattern. Clearly she was just taking anything that caught her eye, just to research them later. I noticed that she seemed the most interested in the ones that would link to a world’s system for mutual development.

“Well, that was quite interesting, but I’m looking forward to seeing what else this world has to offer.” Sage slowly turned towards the door.

“One moment please.” I held out a business card when she looked back at me. “This is a business card, in case you feel like continuing our business relationship.”

She gestured, and the card flew out of my hand and into her sleeve. “I will keep your offer in mind. Enjoy your life, Mr Steel. Perhaps we shall meet again.”

I didn’t know if she would be going to my world instead of another one, but I was sure I would encounter her again somewhere.

Fortunately, the job persona function resumed with no issue, so when Sano called after Sage left, I was responding as I usually did. The call was to let me know that he would come by in two days to pick up the skills she left, instead of the usual weekend visit. Apparently the skills were just that enticing.

Matsu was pressing me for details after my shift ended, and Uzume had a few questions of her own. 

Any idea how she broke the job persona control? None at all, because I wasn’t that familiar with the magic system she used. The closest comparison I could make was Ezel’s Anti-Law cards, but what Sage did was on an entirely different level.

What sort of stuff was involved in the transactions with Sage? All sorts, but hers were usually heavy firepower stuff. It made me wonder just what sort of crazy death world she came from that necessitated such destructive attacks.

Was Sage stronger than Arceus? I couldn’t say for sure since I’ve never scanned Arceus with the shop’s pad, but I believed she could tank several Hyper Beams simultaneously, and put out enough power to surpass that. 

Finally, I changed the subject. “Alright, enough about her. What did you manage to find out from the data, Matsu?” 

She perked up at that question. “Quite a lot, actually!”

The Wisdom Sekirei launched into an increasingly complicated explanation about how the scientists had collected data regarding both live Sekireis and terminated ones, the methods used in the process of their tuning, and the responses to the experiences of daily life outside a lab. 

That last one included the Sekireis’ development to finding and being winged by their Ashikabis. The MBI credit card that was issued to each Sekirei was another way of tracking them, allowing the company to keep a comprehensive record of all the stuff they did. Whether it was just platonic kissing, abusive behavior like with that hammer-using Sekirei, forced winging and emotional abandonment, or even straight up sex, they were all in MBI’s recorded data.

Not all Sekireis had stable powers too. Homura aside, there was Kuno with her voice-based power, causing her own Norito to harm herself. 

There were even some of Asama Takehito’s notes about Homura’s strange body reactions, but all they could confirm was that there were some mysteries about Sekireis and their souls that even MBI’s geniuses couldn’t figure out.

Thankfully, our main objective wasn’t anything so difficult to parse through. 

“Yume was right. It’s all about love for us Sekireis,” Matsu concluded.

“Wait, really?”

“The emotional connection will cause our maturity to progress further.” Matsu noticed my gaze drop slightly, and obligingly lifted up her breasts. “Imagining these growing bigger? That’s possible.”

Uzume poked her. “Don’t get sidetracked. What sort of progress are you talking about?”

“Our ability’s power and control can increase as the strength of our bond depends, and how that bond develops depends on what we do.” She adjusted her glasses as a lewd smirk appeared on her face. “That includes S-E-X. Fufufufu~”

“So no problems with doing it bareback then?”

“None, but obviously we’ll have to take precautions if we don’t want babies like Seo gets with his Thunder Twins.”

I didn’t say anything as I considered what she said.

“Um, do you not want children?” Uzume asked me, a little timidly.

“Mmm… Honestly, I’m not sure… I think I might want that someday,” I admitted, “Just not now…”

My brother already had two children, so I wasn’t unfamiliar with what it took to raise a new addition to the family. It was definitely something I could handle, but the fact is that I wasn’t ready to settle down just yet. I wanted to enjoy life more, with these two Sekireis by my side.

“Alright, we’ll deal with it when the time comes,” Matsu decided. “I think part of it is due to the Jinki’s influence too, but I lack the data to confirm it.”

“Wait, when you said our Sekirei power can grow through love, what about the other skills that we’ve been collecting?” Uzume suddenly asked.

“I think the effect carries over, actually.”

“Really? That’s interesting.”

“There’s a way we can find out for ourselves,” Matsu said slyly.

Uzume and I didn’t even need to guess to know what she was implying.

After dinner, the two of them went to the bedroom first to prepare, while I passed the time by playing with Eevee.

“Not too bored being cooped up here, are you?” I asked her as she struggled around on her back with my hand tickling her belly.

“Vee! Veeveevee~” She squirmed out from under my hold, and gave me a light headbutt to the cheek. 

“Glad to see you’re enjoying yourself so much.”

Eevee crawled onto my lap and curled up against my belly, her tail flicking with contentment. “Ee~”

“Still not considering evolution yet?”

The Pokemon kicked her hind legs out, but not to push off me, instead staying in place. 

“Oh, so you’re thinking about it, but still haven’t chosen one.”

“Vee.”

“Smart girl.” I petted her hair, stroking those fluffy ears. “I’m sure you’ll let us know once you’ve decided.”

The mental link came online. <Rick-tan, we’re ready~>

“Vee?” Eevee queried when I lifted her off my lap.

“We’re going to be busy tonight, so bear with sleeping out here for a bit, okay?” I pointed at the pet bed we left in the corner.

“Ee…” She didn’t particularly like it, but she accepted it.

When I entered the bedroom, it took a moment for my eyes to get used to the dimmer lighting, but I could see that Uzume and Matsu were both waiting for me on the bed.

“Come and unwrap your present, Rick-tan,” Matsu invited.

She was sitting behind Uzume, who was squatting on the bed waiting for me.

The brunette had ribbons tied around her body, done in a way to emphasize her sexy features, with her breasts squished together, and a bowtie over her crotch. Her hands were similarly bound to the sides of her chest, and I could tell how aroused she was.

“Rick-kun, I want you…” She begged.

I approached, shedding my clothes and climbing onto the bed with her. Her eyes drifted between my face and my erection, though as our lips drew towards each other, her gaze remained locked on my face.

The small kisses were soon replaced by deeper ones, even as my hands roamed over her body, enjoying the softness that was available to me.

Uzume gasped when my fingers tweaked her stiff nipples, and channeled that arousal into the next kiss, with her tongue fervently exploring my mouth.

Her breasts felt like firm pudding, with the ribbons holding them mostly still, and I could feel the warmth between them when my fingers slipped into her cleavage. It was also strangely wet and slippery.

“Don’t you want to try it?” Matsu whispered over Uzume’s shoulder. 

There was no way I could resist, so even though I was loath to stop the kissing, I got to my feet, bringing my crotch in line with Uzume’s chest.

With Matsu providing guidance, I slid my length between those two globes, feeling the wet heat engulf it. I wasn’t the only one who was getting pleasure from the act, as Uzume mewed from the stimulation.

“Rick-kun…” Uzume gasped, “Does it feel good?”

“It’s amazing…”

“That’s it,” Matsu encouraged, “Fuck these tits, and mark them with your seed…”

She continued to play with Uzume’s breasts, pressing them together and moving them around to stimulate my shaft. On my end, I just continued to move my hips, supporting myself with my hands on Uzume’s shoulders.

That wasn’t all the redhead did. 

“M-Matsu, that’s my…!”

“I’m getting Uzume-tan ready for Rick-tan…”

Oh fuck, that’s getting me even more turned on. “I’m gonna…!”

“Do it, Rick-tan, cum!”

I thrust forward one last time, and felt my cock slide upwards to poke out between Uzume’s breasts, before the climax hit.

“Kyah!” Uzume squeaked as spurts of cum shot out, splashing over her chin.

“So much force…” 

I pulled back out, looking down at the white mess I left on Uzume’s chest. Matsu was already moving to partake of it.

She scooped it up with her finger, and stuck it into her mouth. “Rick-tan’s salty taste…” 

“Ah…” Uzume sounded disappointed.

The redhead giggled, and collected another scoop for the bound girl. “Here you go, Uzume-tan… Say aaah…”

“Aaah…” Her lips closed over the digit, and she began sucking with her eyes closed in a blissful expression.

I was getting hard again watching them. Matsu waited until it was mostly clean, before pulling Uzume down onto her back.

“Time for the main course, Rick-tan…” 

She pulled the ribbon, undoing the bow tie and revealing Uzume’s wet pink slit.

I moved in between her legs, placing my hands on her hips and spreading her open. The pink flower looked so enticing, and I couldn’t help but want to see how it tasted.

Her nectar spilled out when I licked it, and there was a melodious cry of ecstasy to go along with it. 

“Rick-kun… I want it in me…”

“Alright…”

The tip of my cock pressed against her tight opening, and slowly but smoothly slid right in. Once more, I began thrusting my hips, this time eliciting a stronger reaction from Uzume.

I blinked when another body moved in front of me, cutting off my view of Uzume’s face with two hands spreading open a pair of pussy lips.

“Rick-tan… would you like to taste me too?”

I wasn’t going to say no, and Matsu’s moans joined with Uzume’s.

One of my hands was on Uzume’s hips, while the other was on Matsu’s butt. Their soft flesh felt amazing to my sense of touch. Not as soft as their breasts, but the firmness was a different quality to be appreciated.

My LP was going up so much just from this.

I was still sensitive from my earlier climax, so it didn’t take long for me to reach my limit once more. 

“Cumming!” 

Uzume’s fleshy hole tightened up on me as I released my second load inside of her, triggering her own orgasm with a guttural moan. Some juices splashed against my face, as Matsu’s body trembled as well.

<Mental link abuse?> I asked the Wisdom Sekirei.

<Absolutely!> 

Matsu shifted back, then turned around and lowered herself on top of Uzume. She looked back at me over her shoulder. 

“My turn now, Rick-tan!”

“Give me a while…” I really should have gotten the [Sex Maniac] class from Harem Labyrinth….

…

“Rick-tan! Rick-tan! Rick-taaaaaan!” 

A pair of legs wrapped themselves around my waist, preventing me from pulling out. I unleashed yet another load inside of my current partner.

“M-my turn next, please! Rick-kun!” 

The next one was already waiting eagerly for my attention.

…

Two tongues licked their way up and down my length, their owners’ brown eyes watching my face for any reaction.

“So this is how we both taste on you… how lewd… Don’t you agree, Uzume-tan?”

“Yeah… lewd…”

“He’s getting hard again…”

Uzume bit her lower lip softly, climbing on top of me and lowering her hips on top of mine.

“Give me more of your love, Rick-kun…”

Her hands cupped my face as she leaned in for a kiss, her hips already rocking back and forth.

…

“Ahn~! You’re sucking so hard!” 

The arms around my head tightened as I licked and sucked on the nub in my mouth, even as I held onto the raised thigh and pounded away at the hot meat hole before me.

“Don’t, don’t stop…!” My current partner squealed as I smacked her pert butt, “H-harder!”

“Touch me here too, Rick-kun…”

Two hands guided one of mine down between the legs of their owner, and I began fingering her dripping slit, pleasuring her as well.

…

We finally collapsed on top of the bed, the two of them wrapping their arms around me in a shared hug.

“That was incredible…”

“It really was…”

“You two… really wore me out…” I admitted.

Matsu giggled. “Hope you enjoyed your late birthday present…” 

“We aren’t pregnant after that, right?”

“Probably not…” 

“Oh, okay…”

“Hope you enjoyed your late birthday present, Rick-tan/Rick-kun…”

I drifted off to sleep after that, surrounded by two beautiful ladies who were in love with me. It was a great night.

Being forced by my job persona to wake up to attend my work shift the next day wasn’t so nice.

But overall, I had no regrets.

…

“Thank you for your business,” I recited to the deity, “Hope you patronize this shop again.”

The god nodded politely and left, but before I could relax, the door opened once more to admit the owner.

“Greetings, sir. You’re earlier than I expected.”

“Huh? Ah, yeah,” He replied distractedly.

“Is something the matter, sir?”

“I think the sage person you met might have caused some issues.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s nothing that you have to worry about, but some of the typical transmigration methods have been disrupted,” He explained. “Also, you can close early.”

The shop automatically shifted itself into its closed setting, and I felt the job persona release me.

“Thanks,” I said, more casually than I did earlier. “So what does that mean for the shop? Less customers?”

Sano shook his head. “It’s the opposite.”

“Huh? How?”

He explained as he made his way to his office. It was the reverse of the isekai trope, where the transmigrator returned to their original world after finishing their business in the new world. Whether it was because they succeeded or failed, that was another matter entirely. 

The fact is that their return almost always saw them return with the skills that they had accumulated over the time they spent in that world. 

Ah, so something like Isekai Ojisan, I realized.

In some cases, this caused a bit of system damage or power loss that the deity in charge had to repair or replace. Another possible reason was that the transmigrators’ demonstration of those skills built confidence in Sano’s products, and they wanted to stock up more for any future transmigrators to use when the same threat reappeared.

“So I can expect to be busier then. But what sort of issue is it for the gods?”

“Some of those returns occur at the same moment they left, which causes a bit of a mess for the gods who manage the timeflow.”

“Oooh… that’s bad.”

“Indeed. Especially when they come to bother me for help.”

I paused as a thought came to me. “So what does that mean for the weekly travels to other worlds?”

“That’s what I’m here to settle, aside from collecting that woman’s skills.”

It also represented a delay in seeing what new skills he could develop from the ones I collected, but that was fine with me for the time being.

Sano’s solution for maintaining the ‘business trips’ was to convert a portion of [World Travel] into a physical installation within the shop. I hadn’t seen the skill since the time he granted me its access to make a delivery, and I tried my best to memorize what components went into the reworked version as I observed him working with it.

By my assumptions, it was combined with the scanning pad’s function, which kept some record of the worlds I had been to before, so I could visit them any time I wanted as long as I was free. The same applied to the Sekireis, that meant that they couldn’t go to Skyrim without Sano facilitating it, as only I had been there before.

So in the end, I was still reliant on him to open access to new worlds to mine for skills. That was a reasonable requirement, since he certainly knew more about preventing any disaster spawning from inter-world interactions than we did.

As for the time dilation matter, that function was included as well. Not too excessive, but enough to give us weeks for a weekday night, or months for a full weekend. It also came with an auto-recall function if the trip looked like it was going to exceed that time limit.

“I’m going to be relatively busy for the time being after this,” Sano explained without looking up from his work, “So I recommend that the three of you discuss which new worlds you plan on visiting and let me know once you’ve decided.”

I recognized the dismissal for what it was. “Alright, I’ll go talk to them now.”

As I left the office, I received an alert on my phone, and looked to see what it was.

‘Happy New Year. Hope you had a good new year’s eve.’ The message from my father read.

I consider what to write for a moment, before going for a generic ‘Happy new year to you too’.

A whole new year, and with it, all sorts of new experiences lay waiting. It was just about how I should tackle each of them when they came.

“Huh? Rick-kun, you’re early,” Uzume greeted me when I entered our living area, “Oh, is Sano here already?”

“Yes, he is. He told me something that we all need to discuss together.”

Once Matsu joined us, I filled them in on the new situation Sano was in, and what it meant for us. Eevee was napping in our bedroom, so we saw no point in disturbing her.

“Did you also ask what if we find a person we wish to recruit?”

“Uh, no… That slipped my mind. Sorry.”

Matsu shook her head. “It’s okay. I’ll ask him later when we go see him.”

She brought out her laptop, with the list of prospective worlds we were interested in visiting displayed on screen. All of them had interesting skills that Sano was likely to be interested in, but some of them might not be so easy to link to, if they were anything like the case with Konosuba. 

But the main draw was that they were quite expansive, and we could spend quite a while experiencing what each world had to offer.

There weren’t any amendments to be made, so after one final confirmation, the three of us headed over to meet Sano. The god was leaning on his desk, looking a little exhausted.

“Good timing. I just finished.” He indicated a strange looking door leaning against the wall. “I just need to install it, and one last test to confirm that it works.”

With a wave of his hand, the door straightened up on its own and slid into the wall, looking like it had been installed there all along. 

“Go on, give it a try,” Sano told me. “We need to know whether the timeflow control and the recall are working properly as well.”

Approaching the new installation, I reached out and placed my hand on the pad in the center. It glowed slightly on contact, and I could see a mental list of all the worlds I had been to before. 

Since he wanted me to spend some time over there before returning, I might as well pick a world where I had something to see to. Making my selection, the control panel indicated a certain period of time compared to my last visit; I could alter the date of my entry, so I picked a year. 

Once I finished confirming it, I saw the door dissolve into a glowing portal.

“Is it safe?” Uzume asked concernedly.

“As safe as I can make it. Go on then. Try stepping through.” The god nodded when I looked back at him. 

“Alright, I’ll go take a look.”

Stepping through, I appeared outside the usual cave entrance. The weather here was comfortably cool with only a few clouds in the sunny sky, but my objective lay within the cave, so I went inside, using the password to enter the hidden dungeon inside.

I could hear the music playing as I got closer to the room where Olivia was, and she noticed my approach as well.

<Yo yo yo! Wassu~p! If it ain’t my boy Rick!>

Should have known she’d get influenced by some of those song genres. “That sort of greeting doesn’t really suit you.” I told her.

<Tsk. You’re no fun. Anyway, welcome back. Care to tell me what you’ve been up to outside of this world?>

“Sure. Hope you don’t mind listening while I inspect the music player.”

The player’s battery level had dropped considerably, showing just how long it had been since I last visited. [Appraisal] indicated that the device would continue to work without any issue for much longer than that, so I began using some of my magic to recharge its power.

As I did so, I told her about the sort of things I did, not just in the shop, but in other worlds. I ended up revealing that I had banged my Sekireis, and shared some of the details when she pressed me for it.

<Oh wow, that was quite the story! Now you’ve got me all hot and bothered too!> The blue-haired woman ‘said’, despite her body not showing any change. <Won’t you help relieve this urge in me?>

“...you’re worse than Matsu.”

<Thanks for the compliment! ⭐>

“Anyway, how has the music player been?”

<It really helped a lot! I never knew that there were so many different types of music and themes!> Olivia replied.

“Heh. Good to hear that. Hopefully, the next time I come, I’ll bring some of the other entertainment media as well.”

<Try not to take too long, please.> Her hopeful tone was so obvious.

“I will,” I promised her.

After I left the cave, I went to check out the city, and see how the main character was doing. Noir Stardia had grown the last time I saw him, and it was only a year or so before he would join the workforce… or try to, at least.

I activated the recall, and instead of reappearing in the shop, I saw a glowing portal appear in front of me. This time, I didn’t hesitate to step through.

“Welcome back, Rick-tan. You were gone for two seconds.”

“Okay, so the time dilation really does work.”

After a bit more testing, Sano deemed the traveling door a working success, and settled back in his chair. 

“So, Rick’s probably told you already that I’m going to be busy for the unforeseeable future, right?” Seeing us nod, he continued, “Have you thought about which worlds you’re planning to visit next?”

Matsu stepped forward with her laptop. An action that briefly reminded me of how I did the same with handwritten notes.

She began explaining each of the options on the list she made, and Sano listened attentively. She also made sure to ask about the hypothetical situation of meeting a potential hire.

“I see… this is interesting indeed. Give me a moment to check.” He closed his eyes and placed a finger on his temple.

We waited patiently, and I felt the two girls hold my hands for reassurance. 

Sano finally opened his eyes. “The second one on that list will take some time to negotiate with the other gods, but there shouldn’t be any issues giving you all access to the rest.”

“That’s great to hear!”

As for the hiring matter, Sano gave Matsu the freedom and responsibility to bring on two potential hires at most for two weeks, before he would make the final decision as to whether to retain them or not. It was like the probation period I had when I first joined this shop.

Of course, it would take until the weekend to make sure that everything else worked without any issues, but that was something we had no issue with. 

Our journeys to other worlds were going to continue!

Afterword: Tried my hand at writing another lewd scene, and it appeared to get my creative juices flowing, because I managed to get this chapter written in two days. Hmmm… food for thought. Anyway, this makes another advance chapter for the Patreons. 

Feel free to guess which world they’re going to visit next!