endless path, infinite cosmos

chapter 185

Vahn awoke early the next morning and stared at the sleeping faces of the two girls for a few minutes before removing the orb from his inventory and entering into the black and white space. After playing around with Eva for a bit, Vahn noticed that Fafnir's size hadn't changed much and, other than its magical power and spell arsenal expanding, it seemed to have stagnated a bit. Since the ecology of dragons gave them a lifespan measuring hundreds of years, Vahn anticipated that Fafnir wouldn't be able to grow much stronger without hunting and killing monsters in the future.

The two sparred for a bit and Vahn got some practical experience training with Eva for a few hours before he returned to his tireless work at the forge. He had gotten to the point where the majority of the items that he created were near the apex of B-Rank, while a number of them had crested into the A-Rank. Unfortunately, unless he put a lot of effort into a single item, Vahn was still far from the point where he could naturally create an S-Rank item. Other than a bit more experience with Shundo and a few intimate sessions with Eva, Vahn hadn't gained much within the three days he was in the orb.

Awakening in the real world, Vahn waited for around an hour before an alarm clock that had been set by Milan the previous night began to ring. Similar to Tina, she seemed to be really bad with mornings and tried to ignore the alarm for almost ten minutes before finally removing the covers and stretching. Before she turned off the alarm, Milan looked to her left and could see Vahn staring at her face with a gentle smile that caused her to immediately blush as she fixed her night-gown that had opened slightly during the night.

After turning off the alarm, Milan began to get dressed for the day as Vahn helped awaken Tina who seemed to be immune to the ringing sound from earlier. Seeing the sleepy cat girl lazily get out of the bed before Milan helped her change, Vahn couldn't help but laugh out a bit as he also began to change his clothes. Once everyone was ready, Vahn gave Tina her early morning pats before turning toward Milan and attempted to do the same. Unfortunately, Milan caught his hand mid-attempt and gave him a teasing smile before embracing him for a few seconds. It wasn't overly intimate, but it did make Vahn feel a bit of warmth inside.

Vahn then helped the two prepare to open the Inn for the normal business hours before relieving Davi and Sasha from their duties. Tina set about going upstairs to gather the linens from any unoccupied rooms as Milan and Vahn began preparing breakfast for the early-rising patrons. By the time 7 AM rolled around, they had served around twenty customers and Vahn was in high spirits because of all the new things he was experiencing. Since Tina was busy doing laundry, Vahn ended up interacting with the customers a bit more and even recognized some of them from the past who gave him polite comments. There were a number of people who knew him as 'Vulcan' and had congratulated him for his successful recovery.

Before he left the Inn, Vahn gave Tina a big hug and lifted her body off the ground when doing so. She seemed to be very happy by the new experience and even gave Vahn a kiss on the cheek moments before he let her go. Milan stood at the side with a gentle smile, but Vahn had no intention of letting her off as he returned her earlier embrace with one of his own. At this point, he was slightly taller than she was, so it was distinctly different than their past interactions. Vahn noticed the characteristic twitch of her tail which showed she was happy, even though she watched him leave the Inn with an 'angry' look on her face.

Since Vahn had promised to meet up with Tiona and Ais for a date, he made his way to pick them up at the Twilight Manor. Though they could have met at a rendezvous point, Loki had asked him to pick them up personally since she wanted the rest of her Familia to get used to Vahn's presence. There were still a number of disgruntled people that harbored some ill-will toward him, and Loki wanted to nip the problem in the bud by allowing Vahn unrestricted access into the Twilight Manor. This showed that he wasn't simply, 'the guy that stole two girls', but an important person that represented the Alliance between the Hephaestus and Loki Familia. There were few people that had been in the Familia for a long time that would dare try to approach him and find trouble since it would draw the ire of not only their Familia-mates but Loki herself.