RD 3 Ch 48 (Patreon)

Chapter 48

"It kind of looks like a microwave," Nyx said, as my enchantment, which was totally not a microwave, continued to make the icy dish rotate. 

"It really does," Gloria said, reading my expression. "Don't even try to deny it."

"I don't think it looks like a microwave, but you're welcome to your own opinions," I replied hastily. 

What lay before us was a giant ice plate, spinning slowly. It had a larger enchantment that I had built around it funneled energy into the middle, purifying some of the demonic nature placed upon the fruits. It wasn't uncommon for certain demons to taint equipment or objects and leave them for people to find, only to use that demonic energy to harm them. It seemed the process was similar for whatever they had done to these fruits.

The fruits had demonic energy that would harm human souls. I just had to work patiently to remove it without damaging the fruits.

Whether they improved or not would all depend on if there was a bonus to spirit that was being covered up by the demonic energy, or if there would be no bonus at all. 

I rocked patiently on my feet as the inscription continued to work.

Merlin was waving her fingers in a lazy circle, making the ice plate rotate slowly. The only sound was a steady hum from the enchantment as it poured energy onto the fruits. 

"You don't cook with a microwave, do you?" Circe glanced at me. 

"Do I cook with a microwave? No. I spent 500 years cooking with bonfires." I answered.

Simone clenched her teeth and pressed her lips together, clearly fighting off some joke.

"Out with it," I encouraged Simone.

She sat, holding back her laughter, hunched over. “I Bran. Big beefy man. I cook with fire.” She did her best caveman impression. The women around me cracked up.

"You have to admit, that was a wonderful Bran impression," Gloria laid it on thick. "It's also so like Bran to cook with with a bonfire.”

“Please tell me you used seasoning." Circe added, staring at me. 

I stared back at her. "It's hard to find seasoning when the world has ended. Only after you experience it do you understand why spices were once worth their weight in gold." 

Circe gasped. "It's a shame. It really is. I guess you're right. I've somewhat forgotten what it was like to be less civilized." She shuddered. "I don't know what I would do if you forced me not to have seasoning on any of my food anymore. Maybe I need to go make a stockpile." 

Merlin glanced at her. "Murder people for seasoning?" 

Circe shrugged. "Probably." The ancient woman grinned. "After all, we can probably get whatever we want if we try hard enough. Especially after we get all of these tasty fruits." 

Circe stepped up to the frozen bowl, looking at them with undisguised gluttony.

”It's not done yet. Bran is still cooking. He only knows how to cook with fire, so hold your horses." Simone slapped Circe on the arm before she broke out in another bout of laughter. 

Nyx slid next to me. "If it helps, I thought your cooking in the instance wasn't half bad.”

“It wasn't bad at all," I agreed with her. "It takes some extra skill to make food tasty when you don't have modern conveniences." Though I did have a huge store of spices in my spatial ring. 

Nyx bobbed her head. Meanwhile, the serpents tried to sneakily wrap themselves over my shoulders, laying on me, while Nyx herself kept a polite distance, blushing slightly as she noticed the actions of her serpents. 

I reached over and grabbed her by the hip, pressing her to me. "Nyx, you don't have to be shy." I teased her.

"I'm not shy," she said. "I'm just... I don't know, Bran. We did the instance. And then we did things. And now... Now... We're living life at full speed, and I don't know what exactly we are." 

"Don't put a label on it. Not yet," I said. "But I'm happy to have you at my side as often as that’s possible. I'm sorry that I wasn't by your side during the vault. I thought we'd split up some, but it was far more than I expected. In particular, I feel like I failed you, Nyx." 

"Oh, no. Don't." she said, turning to me and looking into my eyes. "I went in there searching for as much reward as I could get. And by being on my own, I was able to get a lot. Plus, you prepared me. There is no way I would have survived what I went through if I had not met you." She smiled up at me.

"Yeah, but then there was the whole demon trying to possess you problem." I said, trying to hide my anger at the thought.

Circe raised an eyebrow. "You didn't teach them soul absorption art beforehand?"

I deadpanned. "Do you have a bunch of souls floating around that I could use? Or perhaps you have a den of demons that we can go into and capture them alive to use them for soul absorption arts." I flashed her another sardonic smile. 

Circe rolled her ruby red eyes. "Sorry, I suggested it." 

I shrugged. "In a perfect world, I'd be prepared for everything, but clearly, more than one aspect of this vault caught me off guard. The group all had talismans to protect their souls, I just assumed that I would be in a situation where I could go and aid them, rather than being stuck in some sort of horrible stasis." 

Merlin glanced at me. "Were you aware during the stasis?" 

"Yup," I said. "Able to see, but not able to move my eyes or breathe. I wasn't even able to activate my abilities. I was pretty much completely in stasis, save for a small part of my mind." 

"Then how did you enter into all of their souls?" Merlin asked, having gotten the cliff notes version of what had happened from Simone.

Circe also raised an eyebrow, curious for my answer. 

"Apparently, all the Mul Branova are now connected to my soul," I told them with a flat smile, unsure of what that would mean for me in the future. "One of their abilities allows them to make an avatar of me, and I was able to take control of the avatar and save each of them."

Circe pursed her lips. “That class they all have is quite strong.”

“Agreed.” Merlin nodded. “Though it isn’t very directional.”

“That only makes it better.” Circe shook her head. “Bran can get a large number of people to join without worrying about their particular desires when it comes to combat. Unlike the rest of us, they essentially get a choice.”

My large inscription dinged as it finished.

They all turned to me and Simone spoke. “Not a microwave, huh?”

“It needs some way to tell you that it’s finished!” I threw my hands up in the air. It wasn’t a microwave.

A moment later, everyone rushed forward to look at the fruits, but I stayed back holding onto Nyx.

“Not afraid someone is going to steal your pies?” I asked Nyx who seemed unconcerned about the mad rush.

“They are your pies now as far as I’m concerned.” Nyx shrugged while her serpents pecked me with kisses. “We should probably make sure you are sturdy enough for whatever comes next. I just care about the bananas.”

I inspected the fruits from where we stood. They had lost their debuff and damage to spirit. However, only a few gained small bonuses to spirit. Still, that was something. Not to mention these would no longer permanently damage our souls.

The fruits were made from souls, so it was only natural for them to affect spirit.

“How do we split these?” Jenny asked, standing in front of the Mul Branova.

“Did you get a full count?” I turned to Gloria. She was the one who had a mind for this and it would help to give her some authority in front of the Mul Branova.

“From everyone’s own counting we have twenty one members of the Mul Branova, your three servants, the four of us, Circe, Merlin. Then there’s Antonio and his eight. That’s forty mouths.” Gloria stated. “As for the fruits, we have roughly an even distribution of Strength and Intelligence fruits totaling roughly thirteen thousand stats each. Agility is a little higher, mostly due to Nyx. And then we have over forty-five thousand stats in Vitality. There are no fruits for spirit.”

Circe let out a whistle. “Shit.” She glanced at me curiously.

“Don’t look at me like that.” I shook my head. “I’m not going to eat them all.”

“Tempting isn’t it?” She teased.

“Being a one man army was how I lived my past life and sadly it didn’t work out as well as I hoped. This time, I’m going to raise a group able to stomp out demons en masse.” I told her before doing the calculations in my head. “Sounds like we can afford to do two thousand stats for each person.” I let out a heavy sigh, knowing no matter what I did this would be a little chaotic.

“Let’s organize so everyone can get a thousand stats in Agility, Strength or Intelligence. Nyx, go ahead and take an extra five hundred. You’ve contributed greatly to to what we have in front of us. Then everyone can take a thousand vitality.”

 I turned to Merlin. “Please take at least an extra five hundred vitality. You could have gotten more on your own.” It was what needed to be done.

Merlin waved her hand. “You and your team provided plenty of assistance. My own collections were a team effort. At least I did something rather than extort you.” She glanced at Circe.

The blue-haired woman rolled her eyes. “He owes me. It isn’t extortion. Bran, you might want to save two offerings to Zeus and Hercules?”

“I’ll give each of them a thousand vitality. Everyone, after you take fruit for the area you want, feel free to trade with others around you.” I focused back on Merlin. “Take the extra you helped considerably.”

She hesitated before nodding and moving to collect her spoils.

Letting everyone else pick over the fruits, I only grabbed Hercules and Zeus’ shares into my spatial ring before watching everyone else eagerly pick.

There was a smile on my face as I watched them consider their choice and count through their fruits several times. These people would work together well; it was obvious that they were all being careful not to take too much advantage.

The spirit stat was a wild card and while some of them quickly secured fruits with the extra stats, they stopped and switched to those that didn’t contain spirit stat shortly after. No one was trying to get more than their share.

To my surprise, several of the Mul Branova started moving their high spirit fruits over to Simone.

“What?” she batted her lashes at me. “My spells use spirit more than most. They are just being kind.”

“Just enjoying watching everyone shower you with love.” I said, realizing how central Simone was to all of our efforts. It went against human nature to give away benefits, yet Simone was favored by nearly everyone.

Circe turned to me, juice running down her face as she devoured a melon the size of her head. “What are we going to do with the extra bits?”

“They are Lord Bran’s.” Jenny declared between bites of what looked like a golden pear. Her words sparked the rest of the Mul Branova to agree with her, the sudden outpour of support for me was hard to speak out against.

“We agree as well.” Antonio bowed in my direction. “Lord Bran would be best served to get them.”

Merlin held up her hand. “Bran put this group together and his inscriptions were vital to multiple parts of our survival. I think it is fair if Bran takes the extra bits.”

“Bran should eat all of the Vitality fruits to make that Blood Avatar tankier to protect the Mul Branova.” Simone grinned around her own fruits.

I sighed. I had planned to award some of the extra bits to those that did well, but it seemed everyone was convinced that I would be the best person for them. “Let's all eat and then get back to clearing this place.”

Counting out my own fruits, I ended up with: 685 Strength, 320 Agility, 285 Intelligence and 2565 Vitality.

It was a huge boost and salved some of my disappointment for not being able to grow during the year that I lost in this vault. I bit into one of the fruits, realizing that I needed to start working faster. Time was not on my side anymore. We needed to push forward.

AN - This chapter is dedicated to those who check my math. I think I got it all right and those numbers have been added to the tracker for Bran's stats.