Amazon Apocalypse 7: Chapter 1

Ours was a worldly family, so we went on a tour of all the worlds we did business with. Truthfully, only part of it was to see to our businesses. Mostly, it was because Bridget was hunting down the rarest and most valuable nutritional supplements in the entire multiverse for Adrian, and taking him to visit the best magical doctors she could find.

Sakura and I would handle the business stuff while Myrina and Bridget kept Adrian company. We planned to be away from Crownhill for no more than a week, but Mucaria especially was under quite a bit of time dilation, which would stretch out our family vacation.

During that time, Bridget and Adrian were both seen to by some of the best specialists money could buy, all of whom gushed at what a healthy baby Adrian had turned out to be. Each world's medical professionals had different recommendations for us, but Bridget pieced together a nutritional plan that they could all get behind. The real difficulty was the soul issues.

Well, that, and the price. For the first time since I started minting my own money, I was beginning to feel a pinch in my wallet. Being a father certainly wasn't cheap.

"You know, I bought a whole space ship for the price of what's in that tiny pouch of vitamin supplements," I said as Bridget held a bottle to Adrian's mouth and rocked him.

"You can't put a price on good health," Bridget said. Normally, she was quite thrifty with our family assets, but Adrian was a soft spot for whom she'd spare no expense. I didn't mind though, since he was a soft spot for me too. Besides, I had plenty of stuff to sell if we ever really needed money.

Most of our tours happened while going through the various pocket realm spaces meant for families and young children. The System strongly encouraged families to keep their kids in these safe spaces where monsters didn't spawn and danger was heavily restricted.

It seemed to frown on things that cut back on the next generation of powerful heroes, and monsters attacking groups of low-leveled kids certainly qualified. Violent people qualified too. In Themyscira's pocket world, I saw a few older teens get into a fight, only to see the eldest of them get ejected from the pocket realm entirely before things could get too rough. I wasn't sure if that was an upgrade or already a feature of the pocket realm we had back in Crownhill from a previous System reward.

While Bridget talked with specialists and went shopping with Myrina and Adrian, Sakura and I tended the family business. Our most important shop was Doomblade's Armory in the Mucaria pocket realm.

The Mark Two power armor I'd listed for sale was something rarely seen on any market throughout the Arcadia Multiverse. It was what I'd consider true magitech, and it combined the best of both worlds to make a suit of armor that could turn a scrawny spellcaster like me into a brawny warrior just by putting it on. Anytime we got another shipment in from our workshops, they sold out right away.

Everything on the shelves was Mark Two or Mark Three power armor. On the whole, the redesigns were generally a bit weaker than my Mark One armor, and especially weaker than my initial prototypes for myself and my companions.

They made up for these failings with a lower price and the ease of manufacturing. Both upgrades had been focused on making every component modular, so all the components could be made and assembled by someone who didn't understand anything beyond their area of expertise.

The whole idea was based off the way complex products were built on Earth, and it had provided remarkable results on the multiversal market. In the Arcadia Multiverse, most products were one-off designs created by singular skilled artisans. Turning raw materials into simple modular parts for extremely complex creations was very alien to the people here. Truthfully, it wouldn't have been possible at all if not for my Kindling Architect class allowing me to distribute blueprints that less skilled technicians could understand and copy from.

"We're constantly out of stock on our in-house specialty goods," Sakura said.

Sure enough, the shelves were empty save for what Sakura acquired secondhand to fill the shelves. These were more generic shields, staffs, robes and other common items that sold well in Mucaria, and sold better when we slapped our label on them.

My mind had long since moved on to Mark Four power armor. These would be a step back in the original direction, with an eye toward power instead of ease of manufacturing. I'd have to do more of the work myself, but that was alright. The magical alloys on their own in the frames of the suits would make these far tougher to their predecessors.

I also had visions of something far bigger and grander. Doomblade was by far my largest set of power armor, but something the size of a car just wouldn't do it for me anymore. Not when I'd been fighting planet-sized void monstrosities lately. While restocking inventory, I let my mind wander as I worked on that particular design.

Eventually we reconvened with Bridget and Myrina back in one of the pocket realms on Glacia. Myrina wanted to show Adrian off to her family, even though he was Bridget's kid.

The girls had left me with the kid for a few minutes to pick up some woman things in the nearby shops, so me and Adrian were in what looked like a park in one of the pocket realms.

Adrian was staring intently at a group of kids. At first, I thought he was interested in playing with the big kids, but then I realized his gaze was fixed on the popsicles the kids were buying from a local stand. He was staring at the bottle he was holding with increasing dissatisfaction.

"Oh no, your mother has you on some special diet of leafy green mush. She'd be furious if I gave you a popsicle," I said.

Adrian held his bottle out to me, and I got a whiff of it. Sure enough, there was something in there that smelled more like spinach and kale than milk.

"Alright, one popsicle it is."

So I snuck him one of the local treats the nearby kids were enjoying.

Getting rid of the evidence when the girls came back required a bit of spatial manipulation and high-speed cheek wiping, but we got away with it in the end.

We visited Grandma Luthrin and the Samhain family branch on Glacia, who loaded us up with yet more baby supplies. Myrina was happy, though Bridget didn't like how many of the things we were leaving with were baby-sized swords. Adrian seemed very pleased with the gifts, though.

The bulk of our time however was spent in Mucaria to take advantage of the threefold time dilation there and the health specialists. We wanted to be extremely certain that Adrian was healthy.

"I haven't been able to find any specialists who focus on kids with his condition," Bridget said as she rocked Adrian in her arms.

"By his condition, you mean having the grafted parts of a broken soul from some dead A-Grade?" I asked.

"Yes, that condition." Bridget winced. She hadn't been happy when I told her about that.

I shrugged. "He's fine, isn't he? Besides, I told you I restricted any flow of soulstuff into our son. As long as nothing disrupts my seal, it'll be fine. All that knowledge, abilities, and power are waiting for him to take them when he's good and ready."

"I know, it's just that I'd like the assurance of a second opinion. It's not that I don't trust your work, it's just... well... I've seen how often things in the barn explode." Bridget looked at Adrian as though worried he might explode.

"Our son isn't going to explode." I glanced at Adrian, who was waving the only one of the Samhain Clan toy swords his mother would let him play with. It was made out of some sort of cork-like wood and soft enough it was next to impossible to hurt himself with it.

"You're certain?" Bridget asked.

I hesitated. You could never be entirely certain of anything when working with magic. Especially with magic as touchy as those from the Kindling Dimension. The seal I'd crafted for the dead A-Grade whose soul Adrian was inheriting would only hold so long as my willpower kept it in place. Sufficient willpower applied in the other direction would break it.

"Well..." I trailed off.

Bridget sighed. "This is the reason why I wanted to see an expert."

"Alright, I see your point. Maybe I can invite Jade or Ted over. Either of them would know what to look for better than any C-Grade healer. We're talking about extradimensional power mortals were not meant to wield."

I was scratching my head trying to figure out how I'd talk an A-Grade ruler of a planet, or the equivalent in cultivator society, to come and look at my kid to convince his mother that he was going to be alright.

Ted had an entire planet to look after. He couldn't go around making house calls. And Jade would be instantly attacked if she came to System space, which meant we'd have to go to her.

There had to be another option, but who?

I snapped my fingers in sudden thought when I realized there was another A-Grade I knew. One who was far more accessible, though I'd never seen him as an A-Grade.

***

Later that day, we found ourselves at Galbatorix's shop. He presented himself as a humble C-Grade wizard here, but I knew the truth. This body was just one of many.

Galbatorix was actually a high-ranking member of the Dragon Lodge, one even older than Ted. During the battle on Ladwick where Prince Herius and I fought for our lives against two Chaos Gods, Ted had showed up to fend off one of them while Galbatorix moved the entire planet to safety. If that wasn't proof of A-Grade power, I wasn't sure what was.

But you'd never guess it from looking at him. The old wizard stroked his beard, plucked a monocle from his desk, and stared hard at Adrian.

"Yep, that's a baby. I'm at least ninety percent sure," Galbatorix said.

"I'm mostly concerned about the thing attached to the baby," I explained.

Galbatorix rummaged around for a second monocle, which he placed over the top of the first. When it was secure, he looked at Adrian again and let out a low whistle.

"Okay, that's mostly a baby. It's also an ancient soul from the dawn of the System. That ten percent room for error is important at times like this," Galbatorix said.

"I've tried to seal the ancient soul. Adrian can have it, but not before he's ready." I nodded to Adrian lying on the table. Galbatorix had given him a shiny gold arm bangle to keep him busy. He'd finished looking at it and was now busy trying to figure out what it tasted like.

"Hmm... yes, I see your seal. It's a bit crude by A-Grade standards, but you're not exactly an A-Grade. So it's impressive that you can even do it at all," Galbatorix said.

"Do you think you can touch it up? Make sure it's safe?" I asked.

"Nope! I'm just a humble C-Grade. I don't dare touch this kind of power. Also, things like these are best made with a single vision in mind. Since you'll be near at hand to fix things if they fall apart, it's better if your seal remains in place." Galbatorix shrugged, then bent low to rummage around the underside of his desk.

"But it's safe? He looks healthy?" Bridget asked.

"Seems so. But just in case..." Galbatorix heaved a dusty old tome over the desk and plopped it down on the table next to Adrian.

"And this is?" I asked, flipping to the cover only to find the text written entirely in Architect script.

"A book on raising reincarnated babies. Seems like you're the couple who needs it most. This thing's been clogging up my shop for a thousand years. It can be yours for only twenty gold." Galbatorix waggled his eyebrows, looking like he was prepared to haggle with us over the book.

Twenty gold was practically pocket change, and was less than the least of the experts Bridget had been seeing had charged. I happily paid the full price, and soon we were all walking away. I would study the book myself, but flipping through it now things were largely as Jade had explained to me.

The real value of the book was all the diagrams. I could use it to compare Adrian's soul to the illustrations and make sure everything was proceeding as it was supposed to. Or not progressing, if I was worried about my seal leaking. It would be a lot better than doing things blindly.

"He never said for sure that Adrian wouldn't explode," Bridget grumbled.

I kissed her on the forehead. "He's a tough kid. Maybe exploding once or twice will be good for him. He'll get better after."

Naturally, Bridget didn't appreciate that, though Adrian giggled when he saw her worried face.

***

The rest of our time in Mucaria was more of a family vacation than work. By the end of it, Adrian was still happy and healthy and could already manage some unstable steps. He seemed to have lost some of the uncanny intensity he'd had back when he was connected to the A-Grade soul, but that didn't mean he hadn't kept what he'd already gained from it.

Every parent likes to think their kid is a genius, but I was pretty sure I had a real case for it. I went shopping for more advanced magic puzzles along the streets of Mucaria, and Adrian was solving problems well beyond his age bracket. I had to purchase things intended for new apprentices to give him any challenge at all.

He was walking more often than crawling, was making increasingly coherent vocalizations, and had finally grown enough hair that it didn't look ridiculous when Bridget combed it for him. Bridget was still paying for that apartment she rented when we were staying here while setting up Doomblade's Armory, so that was what we lived out of.

I used the time to buy a few more lessons and play the role of a dragon lodge student again. The number of people who could teach me things of value had dropped significantly since my last time here, but there was always more to learn.

I bought another lesson from Dane Delverson and became fully versed in his technique of turning elementals into golem maids. I mastered casting the Dragon Lodge's signature Dragon Bolt spell, despite not having the ability in one of my skill slots. I took several classes on magical metallurgy, and even competed in a small martial arts tournament. Hand to hand combat wasn't really my thing, but I still managed to claim first prize.

But best of all was coming home to my family each day. I was starting to enjoy spending some time with Adrian while Bridget was out. He liked to sit on my lap while I drew out plans for future projects. I couldn't work on real projects while holding him, but there were always other things to work with.

"See this? This is a giant robot! Really big, like skyscraper-sized. It's going to have a giant sword like this, and it's going to fight these giant bug monsters." I pointed to the drawings I'd just made, which were admittedly less than completely technical. It looked more like a comic book action scene, but that was what Adrian liked.

He stared at the big robot for a while, but his expression while looking at the depiction of the Void Planet Eater I'd drawn was especially intense.

"Is that Voltron? From that TV show we used to watch when we were kids?" Myrina said, leaning over my shoulder.

"No! This is a completely original idea... as far as Adrian knows." I hastily crossed out the idea of five miniature robots that could combine and transform into the giant one.

<Note>

We've got a few family life chapters I want to do. I may add some more stuff to this if it ends up becoming a chapter 1, but for now I think this is good. I can probably keep writing as long as I still have stuff outlined, but I'm probably going to run out of outline in another 20 chapters or so and will need to take a break to outline again, just so you guys know.

But right now I'm just going to write a bit further and see if an ending better than the one I have materializes. I won't force things if it doesn't though.

Anyway, I do hope that Carter can deploy at least one Gundam this book. You can't have power armor without eventually building giant robot battlesuits. Especially not when there are giant planet-sized bug monsters to fight.