Wish upon the Stars chapter 1189 (Patreon)

I dragged myself into my room with the kind of bone deep weariness that you only ever felt when someone robs you of every ounce of sleep you’d normally have gotten. “I’m back,” I groaned as I hefted the tray I was carrying onto the table. “And can we please, for the love of the gods, move to a room with an en suite kitchen. We OWN this base. We own all the bases. We can pick whatever room we like.” It had been four months since our return, and while this suite had worked fine when we'd arrived, things had obviously changed more than a bit since then.

“I like THIS room,” my pregnant wife said placidly. “I’m comfortable here. We’ll stay.”

“Yes dear,” I said tiredly. “Anyway, I brought what you asked for. Prime rib, caviar, blueberry crepes, red velvet cake, gumbo, cold beet stew, and about a dozen other completely random things. You ARE aware that pregnancy cravings don’t start immediately after you get pregnant and that I know you were using them as an excuse to get me to cook for you?”

She nodded diplomatically as she picked up a tiny cornichon pickle, dipped it in a bowl of raspberry pudding, and popped into her mouth. “And YOU are aware that I’m now four months pregnant and that pickles and pudding is not a food I traditionally enjoy, so we have far surpassed the point where deception became reality?” She arched an eyebrow at me as she chewed.

“Yeah, I know,” I grumbled. “I just wanted to point out the obvious. Can I please go to sleep now?”

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, suck it up. Your effective vitality is in the eight or nine digits. You can survive being a little tired. I am. Or have you forgotten that I haven’t slept more than an hour in three weeks because your baby is tap dancing on my bladder.”

“Why is she always my baby when you can’t sleep, but your baby when we’re picking out baby names?”

“Because I said so,” she said archly. “None of this would be happening if you hadn’t gone behind my back to my mother to convince her to make me stay home. I could be out there with you pushing back the Void god forces instead of in here going stir crazy.”

I sighed, flopping into a chair. “I know, Cal. But we agreed it was too dangerous for the baby. You’re really showing now, and you’re a target even more than I am. You’re still getting the renown though, we have your sister dressed up as you making herself known on the front lines, and you have access to all the wishes you could ever want. The fact that carrying my kid can be repeatedly used as payment is kind of astonishing, to be honest.”

“It’s the bare minimum,” she growled, biting viciously into a hunk of meat.

“Look, I AM sorry,” I told her softly. “I know how much this sucks for you. The staying at home part,” I clarified quickly as her eyes narrowed. “I have no idea how shitty pregnancy is and won’t pretend to. But I promise, I’ll make it up to you. You know I don’t coddle you from doing something stupid when you want to, normally. I’m usually right there doing something even stupider. I promise we’ll go do something absolutely crazy after the baby is born. It’s five months, not five years. In the meantime, I’m here for anything you need.”

She stared at me hard and then groaned. “Ugh, you can’t just let me be mad at you? Fine. You know, there will come a point in my pregnancy when your sentimental speeches stop placating me. I’m not sure when, but it’s bound to happen.”

“Sadly, your ability to wrap me around your finger isn’t going anywhere,” I grinned at her, gesturing down to the tray.

Giving a smug harumph, she returned to her snacking. “Anyway, how was today’s raid? I’m still surprised they let you out there. Wasn’t Aiden stuck inside doing nonsense bureaucracy all the time when he was in charge?”

“That’s because Aiden is a paranoid lunatic, remember?” I pointed out as I sneakily grabbed a stick of fried thousand layer potato. Callie’s hand clamped down on my wrist with a warning glare and I dropped the fry with a sigh as I withdrew it. “If he’d formed a cabinet he’d have been much more free to join some battles. Also we weren’t actively at war during his tenure, so he had less of an excuse.”

“Point,” she said through a mouth full of crepes. “How is that going, by the way? Hatescream’s forces have been a bigger problem than we expected.”

I grimaced. “Yeah, his ability to corrupt Void Spawn has been a pain. I’ve been in contact with the Rainbow Pope about it, and we might have a workaround. That’s part of what took me so long, actually. I was wondering if you might be interested in going on a little trip? I’ve been stuck at fourth rank in my Nine Phoenix Art for months now, and this proposed solution involves a stop at the promethean library. A lot of the carriers for the flames are artifacts, and I thought you might-”

“YES!” she all but screamed as she stood up, chair falling over backwards. “Lets go now, can we go now? Where are my shoes?”

“We can’t go now,” I corrected with a laugh, catching her wrist. “We don’t have any way to get there. I contacted grandma, and she’s bringing the Acheron over to escort us. But it’ll take a few days to arrive. We’re saving time in the long run, though, especially since the library is situated inside the Holy Dominion, and the Acheron has all the permissions needed to access it. Apparently it was built in the middle of a sun in permanent supernova. Somehow. So we need to be careful going in.”

She rolled her eyes as she sat back down, taking another bite of meat. “Sometimes I feel like S-rankers have a pathological need to show off by their very nature.”

“I think that’s more correlation than causation,” I pointed out. “Only the dramatic ones survive.”

Her snort was as conciliatory (I liked to think), as she swallowed her food. “So, tell me about this potential solution to the Void Spawn?”

“We’re looking at ways to weaponize the Peace Flame on a large scale,” I admitted. “It’s incredibly effective, but I’m the only one with access. We had some preliminary success with infusing it into items, but I still need to be there to do the infusing, and it gets consumed fast. We need something long term.”

It was jarring to return home to find the battles ongoing, especially after my experience at the academy. It was familiar, sure, but it also felt…different. Less urgent. Like I had been in a hot shower for too long and then stepped out into a slightly warm night. Compared to the heat of my former situation, this was just a balmy evening.

Of course, being in charge of the WCP was anything but relaxing. I relief on my cabinet a bit too much, honestly, but I was surprised to see that no one on the elder’s council seemed to mind. I’d expected guilt trips or lectures, but my dad had corrected me on my misunderstanding.

I couldn’t help but think back to the conversation we’d had on the subject, and how much it had put in perspective.

“What you need to remember,” he’d said bluntly. “Is that half the reason for the office of Wishmaster is growth potential. The sitting WIshmaster’s job is to become stronger, and the faster they do that the better. You grow at an almost inconceivable rate, and because of that, you’re seen as successful.”

We’d been seated in the throne room at my frontline base, though it had been later at night and it had been empty. “I was actually wondering about that. How am I growing so much faster than other Wishmasters? Aiden should have made it through B-rank as fast as I have, at least.”

He shook his head. “You’re forgetting the most important factor of renown. It’s weighted. You’re in regular contact with multiple gods, and are of interest to several others. They hear about what you do, and that renown weights your actions. Your great grandmother, great grandfather, our ancestor, the Lady, Atlas, even our enemies in the Void. They’re following your deeds out of necessity. Aiden barely had the attention of ONE god, much less seven or eight of them.”

I considered how much I’d grown at the academy, with the renown I’d gained interacting with the teachers and Deans. Thinking about it that way, it did make sense. But then, did that mean I’d had divine attention for longer than I realized?

When I pointed that out, my dad shrugged. “Maybe, but it’s also a fact that wish users grow more quickly in the early ranks. I’m sure you’ve been told as much before, and you must have noticed it? The mismatch between the income from wishes and the sheer number of points you need?”

“I did,” I admitted. “My body tempering art is helping, but even with that, A-rank isn’t going to be quick or easy. I always wondered why we only have thirteen S-rankers in the family, but I’m starting to get it.”

Without the enhanced point cap from my body tempering, I’d have been bringing in maybe a thousand points per wish at the outside. Even getting through B-rank required a hundred million, and A-rank was ten times that. If I didn’t have the excess or all my outside income from the crazy things I got embroiled in, it would have taken me years to cross B-rank, even with the Wishmaster title, nevermind get through A to S.

“Hey, Shane, where’d you go?” a familiar voice perforated my reminiscence. I blinked, returning to the present to find my wife smiling at me ruefully. “It’s rude to daydream mid conversation, you know.”

“Sorry,” I said with a laugh. “I was just thinking about our growth trajectory. I’m kind of glad im pulling ahead, since it means I can smooth things out for you with scrolls.”

She grimaced, but nodded. “Honestly I kind of see your point there. I’ve been thinking a lot about just how far we have to go. We wouldn’t have made it this far without a lot of natural advantages, luck, and the choices we’ve made. We need to keep snowballing those advantages as best we can if we want to reach godhood anytime soon.”

“In the meantime, I’d like to try to get you to A-rank before the baby is born,” I said bluntly. “My parents were A-rank when they had me, and I got a few advantages from it. Not to mention our bloodlines and traits and the overgod sanctifications.”

Smiling, she lowered a hand to her stomach. “Yeah, I want to give her the best chance she has.”

Callie insisted that the baby was going to be a girl, and I knew better than to argue. Besides, I didn’t care one way or the other. I was just excited to be a dad. I was going to be terrified for my baby in this crazy world either way, but I would always do my best to protect her, and so would all her aunts and uncles among my friends, as well as her various grandparents, great grandparents, and great great grandparents.

Laughing, Callie shuffled over to the seat beside me and rested her head on my shoulder. “I recognize that look. Our poor girl. You’re going to be the biggest helicopter dad.” She didn’t sound unhappy about that though, and we shared a smile at the thought.

We’d talked a lot about our fathers, and their various mistakes throughout our relationship. I knew Callie trusted me to be a better dad than either of ours. I wouldn’t let her down either. Her or our baby. My eyes became serious as I stared off into the distance. And that started with this visit to the library. I needed to find a way to cleanse the Void invasion and make a safer world for our daughter. By the time she was born, we wouldn’t be at war anymore. I’d make sure of it.