A/N: Minor update, no I'm not dead. I was on a business trip to DC for a bit and then got sick while there. A 4+ Hour flight while dealing with the worst part of a cold is the worst. I'm still technically sick, but I'm at the tail end of it I think, which is why I'm able to write this now.
.~.~.~.
12 Years.
Milim was turning 12 now and was looking a lot more like her canonical appearance as the cheerful loli that she was. She and Yumina were going out more and more on adventures with their friend and technically Aunt Velgaia.
Yeah, Velda granted the little Dragon her name at some point before leaving and the newest Earth Emperor True Dragon was already growing steadily. She was already four meters long and Yumina and Milim loved to ride on her back as she flew through the air, often accompanied by Obera whenever I was too busy or when my wife Velzard was sleeping.
As the years drew on and Milim and Yumina grew more and more independent, Velzard has taken a more and more hands-off approach to parenting, trying not to stifle their freedoms too much unless they do something terrible, like accidentally blow up a mountain or something. I noticed that Milim's strength continued to rise as the years went on with her becoming more and more powerful with each passing day. As she was now, at 12, she had about half of my EV at 20 Million, which was crazy considering that that was literally almost ten times the average awakened Demon Lord would have, and she was still growing.
Yumina also increased in strength at a phenomenal rate as well, but not even close to Milim's, with Yumina's only being 10 Million, only 2 Million more than when she was born. Velgaia was the same, slightly exceeding Yumina at 12 Million, but he was a True Dragon, so it was to be expected.
I thought crossed my mind at that time about how my view on 'strong' was probably going to be skewed from now on, considering that all the people I regularly interact with, outside of my Adventurer Guild Master Hobby, were to just Million Class, but Multi-Million Class or Tens of Million Class, but I ignored that thought for now and decided to just keep watching the growth and development of my daughters.
Yes, I consider Milim to be one of my daughters. I've been raising her since she was an infant! I taught her how to fight, wield a sword, use magic, and even attempt to cook.
'Attempt' being the operative word. Turns out Milim's tantrums weren't a result of her Ultimate Skill or being a Demon Lord. She was just a naturally impatient person, the complete opposite of Yumina who was usually calm, cool, and composed. If I had to break it down into the stereotypical anime archetypes then, Milim would be the Genki Girl whose sisters with the Kuudere. Of course, they were a lot more nuanced than this in reality.
Milim often acted violently against people who looked down on her, like the time she destroyed an entire bandit camp with a dragon Buster because one of the lookouts asked what a 'kid' was doing in the forest. On the flip side though, Milim was also very considerate to the people around her, often suppressing her own Aura even when she really didn't have to, in order to not poison the humans and other weak species we regularly interacted with.
Yumina, while acting pretty cool most of the time, could be exasperated by Milim's antics and was just as likely to freeze over an entire village if they insulted the people she cares for, as is what happened when she overheard some nobody adventurer from the boonies calling me a 'coward' for not defeating Demon Lord Guy Crimson, and that he could take me on, and blah blah blah.
Thankfully there were no witnesses left, so I didn't have to publically do something about Yumina's behavior, though I discovered another cute side to my daughter, in that, she becomes shy and bashful when embarrassed by her own behavior, which is the cutest thing on the planet, so I let her off with only a light slap on the wrist.
Velgaia, on the other hand, was extremely laid back, or at least, that's the vibe I got from her. She still wasn't old enough to take human form, but from her interactions with Yumina and Milim, I could clearly see she just enjoyed hanging around them to see what kind of hijinks they'd get into, finding it interesting. I could see her turning into the type who'd go 'Ara-Ara' when she sees Yumina and Milim play fighting.
I was really sad and worried at first about how Milim's life would be when she was younger, but now she seemed to be genuinely enjoying her life despite not having her biological parents around.
In other news, the aftermath of the Great Tenma War was troublesome. Most nations around the world did not survive, and the ones that did were threatening to collapse due to the huge number of refugees from the countries that DID collapse during the attack. Ironically enough, it was only due to the assistance of the Adventurer's Guild under my watch that stemmed the tide threatening to knock us back from this world's equivalent to the Age of Enlightenment back to the Dark Ages with a complete collapse of society.
Adventurers guarded trade routes and cleared the increasing number of bandit groups that popped up. They were able to use magic in combination with the Fairies in their parties to create shelter for the refugees, maintain cleanliness, help boost crop yields, as well as offer a diverse career path for those who needed work. This did result in bloating the lower ranks of the Guild with F and E Ranked adventurers for a while, but after things settled down after a few years, many of them quit while the Guild expanded its services to accommodate the larger number of members.
Another boon to my organization was that due to the mixed-racial nature of the Adventurer's Guild, and the fact that so many people were forced to work with different races or were saved by members of different races, was that prejudice against people just because they were an elf or beastman decreased and those that still espoused it were deemed bigots and socially isolated.
So long as I limit the humano-supremacism of the Luminist Doctrines in the Future, then I think I can create a world where Elves, Dwarves, Beastmen, and Humans can all get along in a much more generic isekai fantasy sort of way. I might even get someone like Carrion in the future to be a Hero rather than a Demon Lord.
Speaking of which, Demon Lords have become a thing nowadays. There are currently only the 'Four Cardinal Demon Lords' right now, including Guy, Dagruel, Dino, and surprisingly Lilith.
I could understand Guy, he literally went around destroying countries for, from the human perspective, no reason in the past, and Dagruel was labeled one by default due to his previous reputation from before he met Veldanava and the fact that he was king of the Giants. Dino surprised me, but I think it was because he was an Angel. People must have seen him ordering around Pico and Gracia at some point and assumed that he was responsible for the death and destruction of the Great Tenma War and the reason why the previously thought of as 'Holy' Angels, attacked humanity out of the blue. It also didn't help he didn't bother hiding the fact he was living with dagruel, which made people believe they were secretly in cahoots.
There was even a conspiracy theory that the two were evil gay lovers.
Velzard and I had a good long laugh at his expense with Obera giving some amused chuckles in the background. Ramiris was the most blatant about it though, directly calling him up to laugh at his face due to his misfortune.
Lilith was also labeled as a demon Lord, though this mostly came from the fact that, post-Demon Lord Evolution, she straight up looked like one. She looked a lot like Lucifer from Helltaker now and the reputation she had for going around and 'seducing women into having demon spawn' i.e. trying to repopulate her race via the surrogate method didn't exactly help matters. Especially when Scar was often the 'father'.
When I met up with her a few years after she received the title of demon Lord, she told me why she allowed that to happen. Basically, Scar, being a Demon Peer after being the ONLY recipient of Lilith's Harvest Festival and being named by her, had very good genes. The bloodline of a Demon Peer added to the tiefling race would give them an extraordinary affinity and talent for magic, higher than the elves and rivaling the vampires, however, on the flip side, the demonic mana in their blood monsterized the entire race, turning them into straight up Succubi/Incubi.
I didn't really realize when it happened but in the hectic days after the Tenma War and raising my children, I never realized how fast time was flying by. It felt like I was blinking and another year was gone, just like that, s in order to take some time to stop, breathe, and actually enjoy my life outside fo work for a change, I decided to take a break from everything for a while and spend some quality time with the wifey.
Velzard and I went on a trip to a deserted volcanic island thousands of kilometers away from the main Magic Continent and have a faction there. Getting to snuggle up to my dragon waifu while laying naked on the beach was fantastic. Literally, nothing in the universe could beat it... other than the barbeque we had that night followed by a week-and-a-half-straight marathon session we had afterward.
Little known fact, but when Velzard cums, she tends to bury everything in a 10 kilometers radius of her in permafrost from her explosive frost aura. According to her, I glow golden like the sun when I do too, which is probably a remnant of the Aura I have from my [Metatron] skill turned [Shiva]. Also, [Solomon]'s analysis ability is a total cheat during 'reproductive activities' as [Analysis] doesn't just help find weaknesses in defenses for the purposes of combat, but also in the bedroom.
"Hahaha! Kneel before me mortals, for your new sex god is here!" I declared while standing triumphantly over my conquest.
"Just get back in bed with me you dork!" Velzard scowled as I was pulled back under the covers for another round.
Best Anniversary Vacation Ever.