My Grandfather Is Rick - 16 - 20 (Patreon)

Chapter 016: Deeply Shaken

The ocean, a teenager, a colossal beast, a book, and a perpetually gray sky.

It looked like a famous postmodern painting from the Cthulhu Dimension.

After reading for three or four minutes, Morty set the book beside him and rubbed his aching eyes. The dim light was starting to strain them.

He gave Rick, who was drinking beside him while holding the lantern, an exasperated look. Then he turned toward Cthylla in the ocean.

Cthylla was one of Cthulhu’s daughters and also a daughter of Idh-yaa.

That made her genuine royalty.

Cthulhu was the most iconic creature in the Cthulhu Mythos, while Idh-yaa was the Queen of Xoth and one of the Great Old Ones.

Her noble blood was one thing, but what truly made her special was something recorded in the book.

Cthulhu had foreseen that he would be destroyed at some point in the future.

Cthylla was the key to his rebirth.

That meant the beautiful Cthylla...

Ugh.

Morty couldn’t force those words out, even if he lied through his teeth.

She looked like a gigantic octopus, had three pairs of eye stalks, barbed tentacles, and expandable hairless wings growing from her back.

Rick, how the hell did you bring yourself to do it?

“You mind your own business,” Rick said. “I’ve screwed a planet before! Ever seen planetary Pornhub? That’s Pornhub on a multiversal scale!”

Then again, if Cthylla carried the secret to Cthulhu’s rebirth, Cthulhu Rick getting her pregnant seemed to explain everything.

That child could not be allowed to live.

Morty suggested aborting it, but Cthulhu immediately shook his head.

That child was the key to his rebirth.

Besides, did Morty seriously think creatures from the Cthulhu Dimension possessed that kind of medical technology?

Getting rid of the child required having an actual way to do it.

Morty had to admit Cthulhu had a point.

But Rick definitely knew how to get inside that hole!

This sort of thing was practically routine for him.

All Rick had to do was crawl inside, and then...

“Fuck off, you little bastard!” Rick snapped. “Don’t think I don’t know what you’re imagining! Absolutely not! This is your creepy little adventure, not my personal torture show!”

Fine.

Cthulhu refused, and so did Rick.

For the moment, the child inside Cthylla had escaped disaster.

But even if they couldn’t abort it, they still had to examine it.

What if there was a three-hundred-meter-tall Cthulhu-octopus Rick baby growing inside her?

If it inherited even ten percent of Rick’s intelligence, then every Cthulhu creature present would probably be dead sometime in the future.

When Morty explained it that way, Cthulhu’s resolve began to waver.

He hadn’t learned about his daughter’s importance from the book in Morty’s hands.

Instead, he had once dreamed that he might be destroyed in the future.

Could that destruction be connected to Cthulhu Rick?

Cthulhu had only slept for a few decades, yet a monster like that had already emerged in his domain?

He glanced at Rick, whose lifespan was not even a fraction of his own, yet whose combat strength exceeded his several times over.

Cthulhu agreed.

They had to find a way to see exactly what kind of child it was.

Morty and the two Cthulhu beings turned toward Rick.

Rick appeared completely uninterested in the adventure. He shouted toward the distant wooden cabin, “Hey, octopus face! I know you’ve already started incubating! Tell me what gadget you’ve got that can look inside Cthylla’s stomach. I’m too lazy to build one myself!”

AI Cthulhu Rick was inside the cabin over nine hundred meters away, yet he not only heard Rick but answered loudly enough for everyone to hear.

“You just tried to kill me! Go fuck yourself!”

“You sure you want Cthulhu himself to come deal with this, you rebellious magical AI?”

“It’s on the left side of the second shelf on the base’s right wall!”

The fact that AI Cthulhu Rick immediately gave in seemed to satisfy Rick.

He looked at Morty, who was still standing there. “Well? You going or not? Are you waiting for him to deliver it, or are you planning to place an errand order?”

“When you led the adventures, I did all your running around,” Morty said. “Now that I’m leading, you’re just going to play dead?”

“What else would I do?”

Rick refused to move.

Morty cursed him repeatedly in his head, then ran back to retrieve the device himself.

As Morty returned to the cabin, he remembered that he had just tried to get Rick to blow AI Cthulhu Rick to pieces.

There was no way he wasn’t nervous.

But what choice did he have?

Morty forced himself down the stairs, grabbed the device, and immediately climbed back up.

Only after he reached the surface did AI Cthulhu Rick speak leisurely from inside the Incubation Cocoon.

“Kid, the next time you decide to kill someone, make damn sure you can actually finish the job before you try. Got it?”

“I know. I only asked Rick to fire that missile because I was pissed about you threatening me with the black mist earlier.”

Morty carried the device back to the shore.

He used the nineteenth-century-style scanner to examine Cthylla’s stomach.

An image appeared in the mirror...

“Fuck! Jesus! What the fuck is that?! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”

The nauseating, sanity-breaking sight in the mirror made Morty’s stomach churn.

His entire understanding of the world took a vicious beating.

He threw the device aside, crouched beside a rock, and vomited violently.

“You’ve been adventuring with me this long, and that’s all you can handle?” Rick sneered.

“Let me see what’s so... Jesus! My eyes!”

“Ugh! I’m going to kill that Rick! That sick bastard! I’m going to fucking kill him!”

Rick had looked at Morty with contempt, but the instant he picked up the scanner and saw the image, his worldview suffered the same brutal blow.

He dropped beside Morty and started vomiting against the rocks.

The three-hundred-meter-tall Cthulhu watched them with curiosity and disdain written across his enormous octopus face.

He leaned closer and looked into the mirror.

Then his colossal body began convulsing uncontrollably, as though he were having a seizure.

If he had possessed a stomach...

In any case, the three males had fallen one after another.

Their reactions made Cthylla, still floating in the water, curious about what could possibly have disgusted them so badly.

She was just about to look at what was growing inside her.

The still-convulsing Cthulhu smashed the scanner with one of his facial tentacles.

Then he plunged beneath the ocean, sending wave after wave rolling toward the shore.

After vomiting up everything he had eaten that day, Morty dropped onto the ground. His face was deathly pale.

“Rick, I don’t want to stay here anymore...” he said, his voice trembling with tears. “Let this world be destroyed. I don’t give a shit about the adventure anymore...”

“Let’s just get the hell out of here!”

Rick had wanted to leave earlier.

But after hearing the tears in his grandson’s voice, he refused.

“No. We have to deal with this.”

“Once Cthulhu Rick completes his plan, it’ll be too late!”

“This wall is the only thing keeping him contained!”

...

Chapter 017: No Big Deal, No Big Deal

Whatever Cthylla was carrying inside her terrified Rick, Morty, and even Cthulhu.

Morty had never seen anything so vicious in his life, and he wanted to back out. Rick, however, refused. He looked determined to sabotage Cthulhu-Rick’s plan in this world.

For a moment, it seemed Rick had taken charge again.

But despite all his shouting about fighting and killing just moments ago, Rick immediately handed control right back to Morty.

“This is your adventure, so you make the call. Since you’re so desperate to be independent, handling this shouldn’t be a problem for you, right?”

Morty’s face went pale as he stared hard at Rick.

What the fuck! This had already reached the point where Rick needed to step in, and now he was dumping it back on him?

You controlling old maniac!

Just a minute ago, Rick had been yelling in his ear that if they didn’t deal with this properly, it would turn into one gigantic, universe-sized disaster.

But just because Morty had shown that he wanted to escape Rick’s clutches, Rick had dumped a massive problem that could affect countless universes directly into his lap.

Was this supposed to make Morty realize he wasn’t capable of taking on greater responsibility?

Bullshit! Rick had disappeared for twenty years. What the hell did he know about responsibility?

[Fuck! That spiky-haired old fart!]

Morty almost asked Rick to take the lead, but the words reached his lips and he swallowed them right back down.

Screw that. Morty refused to believe he couldn’t handle this himself.

He buried the horrifying images he had just seen deep in his memory, forced himself to calm down, and frowned as he began to think.

His adventure had gone wildly off course.

No big deal.

Cthulhu-Rick’s plan.

Very big deal!

If the child inside Cthylla was born, it would undoubtedly become something even more terrifying than Azathoth.

A true and singular god that stood above the entire Cthulhu Dimension.

That meant the child had to be eliminated.

But Morty was also worried. How could Cthulhu-Rick have no backup plan for a child this important?

Was he really that confident Cthylla wouldn’t run into any trouble during this period?

Shit.

Whether they should make a move against Cthylla had suddenly become a difficult question.

Still, they didn’t need to deal with that immediately. It could wait.

Finding Cthulhu-Rick, on the other hand, was something they could start doing right away.

Knowing that Cthulhu had plenty of minions under his command, Morty asked him to send out the Deep Ones and the Star-Spawn of Cthulhu to search both the ocean and the land.

Morty returned to the log cabin to have another talk with the AI.

When Morty came back, AI Cthulhu-Rick, still inside the Incubation Cocoon, spoke in an unhurried voice.

“I’m guessing Rick doesn’t actually want to get involved with any of this. Ricks aren’t exactly known for their sense of responsibility. But you’re different, Morty.”

“The courage and composure you showed when we first met proved that you’re an outlier among Mortys.”

“Sure, you had that Rick try to blow me up with a missile, but I appreciate what makes you special. Ever thought about switching sides and joining me?”

Before Morty could respond, Rick, who had come with him but stayed outside, immediately took offense.

Trying to poach my Morty right in front of me?

Wasn’t this AI getting a little too full of itself?

“Hey! Stupid AI, are you sure you want to piss me off, you little shit?”

AI Cthulhu-Rick couldn’t have cared less about Rick’s threat. He kept his attention fixed on Morty.

This time, however, he dropped the recruitment pitch.

Instead, he went straight to the child inside Cthylla and explained where the former owner of the cabin had gone.

“You took the scanner earlier, so you must have seen the child inside Cthylla. I’m guessing you’ve already figured out part of the truth.”

“That’s right. What you saw is part of Rick’s grand plan.”

“With Cthylla carrying the child and Rick’s genetic lineage mixed in, there’s an extremely high chance it will be born as a world-ending monster.”

“But his goal isn’t to destroy the world. He plans to take the maddening voices of the Cthulhu Dimension, modify them through a series of sonic alterations, and broadcast them across countless universes.”

“Ultimately, he intends to control the entire Multiverse.”

Morty found the grand ambition of conquering the Multiverse both unfamiliar and strangely familiar.

On one hand, the idea of something like this happening in Rick and Morty felt completely ridiculous.

Everyone knew Rick was famous for being carefree and doing whatever the hell he wanted.

He would build a robot just to spread butter on his toast.

Conquer the Multiverse?

Were they sure somebody hadn’t handed him the wrong script?

On the other hand, countless universes meant countless different Ricks, and that reminded Morty of something.

If there could be a Rick who was the biggest idiot in existence, why couldn’t there also be one who wanted to conquer the Multiverse?

There was only one thing Morty couldn’t understand.

AI Cthulhu-Rick was casually spilling every detail of Cthulhu-Rick’s plan.

What the hell was he after?

Morty got his answer almost immediately.

“Ask the guy outside. If something he created to make his own life easier tried to break free from his control and gain its freedom, do you think he’d destroy it?”

Morty said, “Uh...”

Cold sweat instantly broke out across the back of his neck.

He had been thinking about running away.

Considering how Rick had trained him over the past six months, Morty realized that when the time finally came for him to leave, it probably wouldn’t be as simple as writing a note and disappearing.

He would have to use every trick he had to hide somewhere Rick would never think to look.

“That’s why I’m telling you everything about Cthulhu-Rick without hiding a thing. The reason is that simple.”

“The moment he realizes I’m no longer under his control, he’ll destroy me. I know far too much about him.”

The pointed remark temporarily drove Morty’s escape plans from his mind. He turned his attention back to Cthulhu-Rick and asked how they could find him.

“It’s no big deal. That book you’re holding contains plenty of clues he left behind.”

“Besides, even after the child is born, it will still need time to grow. If it leaves the Cthulhu Dimension and can no longer absorb energy from this world, it will be like a growing child deprived of proper nourishment.”

“That means Rick is still somewhere in this universe.”

“He won’t allow anything to slip beyond his control before the child is born.”

“Especially after what the two of you did last time. You made a move against Cthylla before he could act. Afterward, he stood right in front of me and cursed both of you out. He spent a full half hour on the guy outside.”

After the long explanation, Morty confirmed a few more details and finally left the log cabin.

Outside, he opened the Book of Eibon and began searching its pages for clues.

Beside him, a mysterious smile flickered across Rick’s face. He shot several knowing looks toward the cabin, then immediately returned to his usual indifferent expression.

Inside the cabin, AI Cthulhu-Rick sighed helplessly to himself.

[You’re trying to keep up with one of the most notorious schemers among all Ricks. I wonder how long you’ll last...]

...

Chapter 018: Tsathoggua, the Toad God

“Tsathoggua, the so-called Great Toad God! I’m not one of your followers, and I have no intention of ever worshipping you! So save your bullshit. It won’t work on me!”

“But right now, the Cthulhu Dimension is facing an unprecedented crisis!”

“I need your power to find Cthulhu-Rick and help your world survive this disaster!”

Morty stood on the rocky shore, holding the Book of Eibon in both hands. He delivered the incantation casually, without a trace of religious fervor.

As Rick listened to Morty use the Book of Eibon’s incantation to “borrow power” from the big shot behind it, he silently looked up at the sky with an expression that said he had no idea who this moron was.

Cthulhu, the leader of a major faction and the official face of the Cthulhu Mythos, had submerged his entire body in the ocean. Only his three pairs of eye stalks remained, hovering about a meter beneath the surface.

Morty’s bullshit alone would have been enough for Cthulhu, as a fellow Great Old One, to erase him on behalf of his good buddy.

But the situation was complicated.

The Deep Ones and the Star-Spawn of Cthulhu he had dispatched had already left R'lyeh and spread out in every direction to search for Cthulhu-Rick.

So as for that incantation, which was not only lacking in reverence but practically insulting...

I, Old Cthulhu, didn’t hear a damn thing!

The seawater blocks sound way too well!

Got a problem with that? Then come take a dip in the ocean yourself, you giant freshwater toad!

Morty repeated the incantation several times.

At last, he managed to summon the giant toad.

Tsathoggua, the Toad God.

The gods of the Cthulhu Dimension were not exactly on-call delivery guys who appeared whenever someone summoned them.

Still, Morty’s distinctive, or rather openly provocative, incantation and the energy carried in his voice had caught the attention of this “Sleeper.”

Especially since Old Cthulhu’s entire family was lurking beneath the water right beside him...

That made the message pretty damn clear. You people need me for something big!

So he came.

A gigantic creature bearing the features of both a bat and a toad materialized out of thin air before Morty. The sight of that enormous, bloated toad body made Morty think that although Cthulhu also loved sleeping, at least the guy had slept his way into a body packed with muscle.

Now look at this loser. He had slept his way into nothing but fat!

Apparently, sleeping at the bottom of the ocean really did help a Sleeper stay in shape. All that pressure beneath the surface must have done wonders for the body.

That was Old Cthulhu for you!

Being the glorious face of the Cthulhu Dimension was a heavy responsibility.

He had an image to maintain, after all.

Cthulhu: “...”

The Great Toad: “...”

Rick: “...”

The Great Toad had arrived before them through some kind of portal. He looked incredibly sluggish, like the exact opposite of a lively young man.

In a slow, reserved voice, he asked, “Human who can resist the Voice of Madness, why have you summoned me?”

“This world is about to be destroyed.”

The Great Toad: “...”

Asshole! I just got here! Don’t scare me like that!

Don’t think you can intimidate me by opening with a couple of dramatic lines!

When is this world not on the verge of destruction?

The Great Toad’s eyes suddenly widened. When Morty realized they could grow to twice their normal size, he sighed in disappointment.

Those beady little eyes had almost made him crack a joke about needing a magnifying glass. 

Without wasting any more time, Morty told the Great Toad the entire story about the child in Cthylla’s womb.

After hearing it, the Great Toad scratched his head. This whole mess was beyond ridiculous.

Your daughter got knocked up by some old bastard.

Once the child in her womb is born, it will possess at least the same combat power as the Supreme God Azathoth. Then it will be used to control countless universes?

Was this shit really that brutal?

The Great Old Ones had already been beaten into the ground by the Elder Gods.

Now they had to face another monster on Azathoth’s level?

How the hell were they supposed to fight that?

Screw it! I’m done! I choose to give up!

“So what I need to know is this. What exactly did Cthulhu-Rick use your book to do?”

The Great Toad turned his gaze toward the book in Morty’s hands.

After hesitating for a few seconds, he said, “This book... I’ve heard of it. The author kept claiming it had something to do with me, but take an actual look at the spells inside. It’s nothing more than a collection of incantations. You can summon just about anyone with it. Whether they answer is up to them.”

Cthulhu’s expression immediately darkened.

Noticing that the universe’s officially designated spokesperson was getting annoyed, the Great Toad hurriedly explained that the white-haired old man had, in fact, summoned him before.

The old man’s evil aura had left a deep impression on him.

The problem was that the guy was a little unhinged.

The moment they met, he insisted on discussing that ridiculous Theory of the Four Elements.

“The Theory of the Four Elements? The thing that nearly ruined the Cthulhu Dimension’s entire mystique?”

From the Cthulhu Mythos, Morty had learned that the whole Four Elements concept had apparently been something a later writer insisted on adding.

Even that person eventually thought it felt out of place and abandoned the idea.

Morty had never expected Rick from this world to waste time researching it.

“So, can you find him?”

“Yes! I planted a mark on him. I don’t know whether he noticed it, though. He struck me as very intelligent.”

“Then try connecting to it.”

With a thought, a faint, invisible current of energy flowed out of the Great Toad’s body and went straight into Cthylla’s stomach...

The instant it happened, the Great Toad’s face turned deathly pale. Even his dark skin could not hide it.

Why... Why did my mark lead directly into Cthylla’s stomach?

It didn’t take a genius to figure out that little bastard was responsible!

Sensing what had frightened the Great Toad, Cthulhu released his own energy as well. He soon discovered that he, too, shared some kind of psychic connection with Cthylla’s womb.

After examining it more closely, they realized that the mark was not a mark at all.

It was a soul chain!

“I’m going to kill that piece of shit!”

Cthulhu and the Great Toad immediately flew into a rage.

Most monsters in the Cthulhu Dimension had no fixed form. They only adopted relatively stable appearances when they needed to communicate with certain creatures, or when they wanted their minions to build statues of them.

In that sense, they were essentially beings composed of spirit.

The existence of a soul chain therefore revealed an extremely serious problem.

Their souls had already been bound to the child in Cthylla’s womb.

The one behind all of this was naturally Cthulhu-Rick. By collecting all kinds of magical tomes, incantations, and prayers, he had bound the souls of one deity after another to the child.

With things set up this way, who could possibly harm it?

Wouldn’t killing the child mean killing every last one of them?

...

Chapter 019: R'lyeh, the City Beneath the Sea

Inside the main hall of R'lyeh, the underwater city deep beneath the ocean...

Morty was still growing and already shorter than his older sister, never mind Rick, who was even taller than she was.

But Rick was not the one making him feel short right now.

It was the freak show filling the entire hall.

There were giant octopuses, the Great Toad, enormous bats, and even creatures that looked like random animals stitched together.

Not one of them looked alike, and the shortest still stood dozens of meters tall. There were so many that Morty could have opened a Cthulhu Mythos monster zoo and charged admission.

As a member of the Great Old Ones faction, Cthulhu had called in quite a few of his buddies from the same camp for a group discussion.

The topic was how to sever their connection to the child inside Cthylla’s womb.

Morty figured they were probably screwed.

After all, Rick from this world was the one behind it.

Morty had already learned from the Rick standing beside him what it meant to face someone who simply could not be beaten.

So these monsters were destined to waste their time.

Rick clearly thought the same thing.

After the trip from the surface down to the ocean floor, he had grown so bored that he finally could not take it anymore.

“Morty, I know this is your adventure, but how about we do something big?”

Whenever Rick suggested doing “something big,” it usually involved blinding light pollution and toxic fumes from burning chemicals.

But Morty was tempted.

He felt like he was wasting his time too.

Instead of sitting around watching these Cthulhu Mythos creatures, whose lives consisted of sleeping and pulling the whole “when I wake, the world trembles” routine, rack their brains over something impossible, he might as well take action himself.

It was better to stir up the snake than crouch in the grass waiting for it to show itself.

Besides, this was not some impulsive decision.

By now, the whole situation was perfectly clear.

Cthulhu-Rick had some grand plan. He was trying to breed an utterly disgusting monster inside Cthylla’s womb while using soul chains to tie all the Great Old Ones to the same fate.

And judging by Rick’s attitude, even if every Cthulhu Mythos creature on the battlefield died, it would still be worth it as long as they dealt with the child in Cthylla’s womb.

“So what do we do?”

Morty had followed Rick into a corner of the main hall. He rubbed his hands together excitedly, clearly expecting Rick to tear the place apart.

Then Rick pulled the same stunt as before.

Morty nearly coughed up blood from sheer frustration.

“This is your adventure. Shouldn’t you use your own damn brain?”

“When I took you on adventures, did I ever make you build me a pair of Grappling Shoes on the spot, or fight a hundred thousand Gromflomites by yourself?”

“Unless I offer to help, the next time you ask me for help, our adventure agreement is over!”

Morty snapped, “Fuck you, you miserable old bastard!”

After getting that out of his system, Morty suppressed his anger and fell into thought.

When he finally finished thinking, he raised the Book of Eibon in his right hand.

The reason this grimoire was considered one of the divine artifacts of the Cthulhu Dimension was naturally because it was packed with spells and incantations.

Beyond that, the book itself had been made from extremely unusual materials.

Otherwise, given the Cthulhu Dimension’s history, where even the comparatively recent era stretched back hundreds of millions of years, there was no way the book could have survived intact for so long.

So...

Take pictures of every page with his phone.

Then set the book on fire!

Seeing his idiot grandson preparing to burn the book and provoke Cthulhu-Rick, who might be hiding somewhere and watching everything, Rick seemed almost embarrassed.

“Morty, you...”

Before he could finish, the entire underwater city suddenly shook.

A deep rumble rolled through the city, as though some ancient creature buried underground was trying to wake from its endless slumber.

The Great Old Ones, who had been arguing heatedly moments before, all fell silent. Their bizarre eyes turned toward the entrance of the hall.

But almost immediately, as though sensing something, every one of them shifted their attention to Morty.

Morty was hiding behind a stone pillar in the main hall. At that moment, the seawater behind him seemed to freeze solid.

His heart tightened. With his neck stiff from tension, he slowly turned around.

The Great Old Ones wore expressions of overwhelming “kindness.” They left Cthulhu to say what they were all thinking.

Pushed to the front, Cthulhu tried to keep his voice calm.

“Morty, in our world, certain objects can form connections with certain individuals.”

“Burning that book won’t harm us.”

“But because we’re all gathered here, the energy released when the book burns will be enough to destroy this entire city.”

“So...”

As Morty listened to Cthulhu’s explanation, the doubts in his mind kept growing.

He could not remember exactly when he had first become suspicious.

But between Rick egging him on earlier and Cthulhu’s explanation now, Morty had officially begun to question this entire adventure.

Because it was way too weird.

Everyone knew Rick’s personality. He did not give a damn about anything. Sure, he eventually started caring about a few things, but the Rick standing here right now did not care about shit.

So why had his attitude changed so completely?

Cthulhu’s behavior was even stranger.

He was supposed to be the face of the entire Cthulhu Mythos, yet he did not have even a shred of aloof dignity. Whenever Morty asked him a question, he patiently explained everything in careful detail.

He was basically an NPC.

Then there was the time Morty’s IQ had been reduced by seventy percent because of the Mega Fruit.

Over those three days, Morty had probably said Cthulhu’s name hundreds of times. Yet the guy who had supposedly crossed into another universe to kill him and Rick had never once appeared.

[This has to be some kind of setup...]

Now fully convinced that he had walked into a trap, Morty stared suspiciously at the Cthulhu Mythos creatures before him.

These were supposed to be mighty Great Old Ones, yet the moment Morty fell silent, every one of them stopped talking. None of them even made the slightest movement.

When my sister talks to me, she starts yelling if I take one second too long to answer.

Are you Cthulhu freaks really this patient?

Morty looked over at Rick again.

Rick stood with his arms crossed. He had not taken a drink in at least half an hour, and he looked unusually alert.

Morty asked in a low voice, “Rick, tell me the truth. This whole so-called adventure was a setup you planned from the beginning, wasn’t it?”

“How else could all four members of Cthulhu’s family cross the universe to find us, but somehow fail to find our house?”

“And what about that cabin? I did one tiny favor for an AI Cthulhu-Rick, and he handed me two divine artifacts.”

“Then every time I asked you for a little help, you immediately reminded me that this was my adventure and told me to handle it myself.”

“But whenever things hit a dead end, you stepped in from the sidelines to keep everything moving.”

“So you planned this entire thing from the very beginning, didn’t you?”

As Morty slowly laid out his reasoning, the permanent scowl on Rick’s face gradually gave way to surprise.

“That’s Jerry’s son for you!”

“You little rascal!”

“I always knew you were a smart kid!”

...

Chapter 020: AI

“The reason they had to cross the universe and track us down on that planet is because I installed a jammer at home a long time ago!”

“Unless those big dumb bastards suddenly learn how to build advanced technology, they’ll never find us there!”

“And as for them being polite, do you think everyone acts like your parents and sister, ready to start a fight the second they see someone?”

“In every Cthulhu Mythos story you’ve read, these creatures treat the outside world the way higher-dimensional beings look down on lower-dimensional ones.”

“Would you, Morty, seriously threaten an ant?”

“If you had to kill every ant you spoke to just because it might crawl up your nose someday and kill you, wouldn’t that get exhausting?”

“You could never wipe out every ant in the world!”

“And finally, all that crap about me pushing things along and setting up obstacles is ridiculous. If I really wanted to do something, would I sit around watching you waste my time over and over?”

“Morty! What’s my usual style? Do I really need to spell it out for you again?”

Rick’s barrage of sarcasm and mockery made Morty’s face turn bright red.

While Morty was busy thinking he had read too much into things, Rick wiped a thin layer of cold sweat from his forehead.

That was close... Way too close...

If he had not kept a straight face, Morty might have caught him slipping and dragged the truth right out of him.

Still, this was exactly why Rick had searched through the brainwaves of countless Mortys across the multiverse and selected this one in particular.

That level of vigilance made all the time he had spent developing Morty worthwhile.

Before, Rick had only thought the kid was somewhat clever. But judging by what had just happened, he might have hit the damn jackpot.

Completely unaware that the devious old bastard was getting excited and had already begun revising his plans, Morty took a moment to calm down.

Then, wearing a slightly embarrassed expression, he shamelessly apologized to all the Great Old Ones present.

How could he have dared to question their dignity?

He had actually assumed they had submitted to Rick’s tyranny and allowed themselves to be worked like livestock.

What a terrible mistake. Truly unforgivable.

Now that he thought about it, these beings possessed overwhelming power, yet still treated a tiny “ant” like him with such courtesy. Morty was incredibly fortunate!

Thank you, everyone!

Thank you for showing me this much respect!

And if any of you big shots ever visit my universe...

Actually, please don’t. Every single one of you is an unstoppable natural disaster.

As Cthulhu and the others listened to Morty’s overly formal apology, they glanced at Rick standing behind him.

They had thought they could finally drop the act, but Rick’s eyes were still signaling for them to keep going.

Cthulhu and the others felt so miserable they wanted to wrap their arms around their own three-hundred-meter-tall bodies and give themselves a comforting hug.

Cthulhu in particular felt like he had gotten completely screwed.

Not only had one of his tentacles been sliced off, but Rick had also tampered with the key to his resurrection. Back at the beach, the two of them had spoken for less than a minute before Cthulhu started hinting that Rick should kill Azathoth and let him become the Supreme God. 

But now, no matter how he looked at it, the whole thing was starting to seem unreliable.

The three sides each harbored their own private thoughts.

Once Morty finished apologizing, everyone let out a stiff, forced laugh.

The laughter sounded so painfully hollow that even the Deep Ones waiting outside the main hall could sense how helpless everyone inside felt.

It sounded like Cthulhu had just watched his partner run off with the Great Toad right in front of him.

After the awkward laughter finally died down, things appeared to return to normal.

To help with Morty’s plan to flush out the enemy, the group gathered around him and began offering all kinds of “excellent” advice.

Mostly useless crap about exploiting the object’s importance, seizing control of key points, securing the conditions for victory, and creating an advantage for the final battle...

While everyone crowded around Morty, Cthulhu quietly led Rick outside the hall.

He felt the situation was already dangerously close to spiraling completely out of control.

Did they really have to keep this up?

“Of course. Why wouldn’t we?”

“You know Azathoth absolutely cannot be allowed to wake up. The moment it does, this world is finished.”

“So you help me, and I help you.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

Rick’s confident argument left Cthulhu silent.

Honestly, ever since he had seen the universe beyond this place, he had completely lost interest in staying in this godforsaken world.

If he had a chance to leave, why would he remain here?

But would Rick actually let him?

As though he had read Cthulhu’s mind, Rick gave him a cold grin.

“You want out of this world? Then it depends on how useful you make yourself from here on out!”

...

Meanwhile, inside the log cabin Rick, Morty, and the Cthulhu family had previously visited, a flash of green light appeared.

An R-style portal opened inside the cabin.

The five members of the Cthulhu family stepped through it, chatting and laughing.

The moment they arrived, however, they were stunned by the sight before them.

This... This...

“My beautiful deerskin velvet rug!”

“My portrait!”

“And why the hell is the entire floor rotten?!”

After mourning the damage to their home, Cthulhu Jerry and the others immediately turned toward Cthulhu-Rick.

The trip to another world had been entirely his idea!

They had only been gone for roughly one day by the Cthulhu Dimension’s standards, yet someone had already trashed their home.

They had to find whoever did this!

“Calm down, calm down. The AI was here guarding the place the entire time. Even if the intruder destroyed it, I installed a security camera... Where the hell is it?!”

Cthulhu-Rick had been perfectly calm until he realized that not only had the AI failed to respond, but the all-angle security camera he had installed separately had also been destroyed.

He walked outside the cabin.

The traces left behind by an explosion of compressed gunpowder suggested that the attacker was not from this world.

[Could it have been a Rick from another world?]

Cthulhu-Rick immediately headed for his warehouse.

It had originally been used to store carriages and miscellaneous junk, but he had long since converted it into an alchemy workshop.

Now, however, the only things left inside were a pile of disgusting Incubation Cocoons.

The longer Cthulhu-Rick stared at the mess, the angrier he became.

He pulled open the door leading down to the underground base.

What he saw made his expression change instantly.

A Cthulhu-Rick who had just emerged from an Incubation Cocoon stood there, staring at him with a vicious grin.

“Hello, Creator! Bet you never expected me to get a physical body, did you?”

“You’re... Fuck! Die!”

Without another word, the two lunged at each other.

Within the cramped cabin, eight hundred and sixty-nine varieties of flashing lights and explosive effects erupted one after another.

On the rocks along the distant shoreline, the Deep One left behind to monitor the cabin saw that a fight had broken out.

It immediately dove beneath the surface.

But it was not heading toward R'lyeh...

It was swimming toward a modern submarine eight hundred meters below the horizon.