Hatching (2)
I'm not a greedy person. My obsession with sex ran a little strong, sure, but for a healthy guy in his twenties that was only natural. Beyond that, I didn't really care about much of anything.
Games were the exception. At first I played because watching people lose their minds after I beat them was entertaining. Once I realized that climbing the rankings meant people in the community would start defending me, I started grinding for high ranks in earnest.
I barely had any friends in real life anyway. Living as a hardcore gaming shut-in, my rankings climbed on their own, and I even hit number one in a few titles. That first taste of being on top felt incredible — pro gamer offers and collab requests from streamers started rolling in.
After a few more times, I lost some of that initial fire, but the greed never went away. In the War of the Gods, though, pulling off the kind of degenerate grinding a true gaming shut-in would do was nearly impossible.
"Yohan, you're trying to battle again? No! You've already battled three times!"
"On the first and second day I did five each, didn't I?"
"That was because the opponents only had one minion each. The gods we've been matching against lately all bring three or more. Aren't you tired?"
Sophia was right. Lately every god we matched against brought at least three minions. Just now we'd faced a guy with five.
His win rate wasn't better than ours, but he'd spammed matches into oblivion to climb the rankings. Since you couldn't refuse a ranked match once your entry was full, he was exploiting the system.
I'd handled the first two gods' minions myself, so Cheonsol stepped up for the rest — but after taking down two, she lost.
I hadn't realized it from only a few consecutive fights, but until you defeated the last minion, wounds and spent internal energy from battle didn't recover. My Self-Healing didn't recharge either.
Even if your equipment's durability hit zero, it wouldn't auto-repair until the battle fully ended.
That was why Cheonsol lost. The third opponent happened to be a race specialized in weapon breaking. She fought hard with her Vampir abilities, but she'd burned through too much internal energy earlier and lost by a hair.
If her three swords hadn't broken, she would have won. The system just wouldn't restore them — you could still hand them to a waiting blacksmith for repair or switch to other gear.
The problem was we only had two minions, so there was no time to repair. Even one more entry slot and we could have rotated while fixing equipment.
Anyway, thanks to Cheonsol taking down two and nearly finishing a third, we'd effectively only faced nine minions.
"I'm fine."
Ranked matches were best-of-five, first to three. Think of it as matching against three opponents roughly my level. Back when I was hardcore gaming I'd pull all-nighters — nine consecutive fights was nothing.
But Sophia saw it differently. She started lecturing.
"No! If you only battle, you'll ruin yourself!"
"Dohoyo's team hit fifty matches after adding one minion. That Absolu bastard already passed forty. If we push a little, we could hit forty today too."
We'd done thirty-five so far, so just five more. I couldn't match the ranking number one's hundred-match degenerate grind, but I at least had to beat Absolu.
If he'd lost a few more, the gap would have closed, but he barely ever lost, so we were six wins behind. I tried to argue my case, but Cheonsol took Sophia's side.
"Why are you so obsessed with battling? Even martial arts, if learned in haste, lead to qi deviation later. This is a long war — do not rush. Fortify your foundation."
"Cheonsol said it perfectly! This is free season for newbies to adapt anyway — the regular season starts in a month! Raising your rank in free season is fine, but regular league rankers earn way more divinity! And we're still undefeated! Our rank is only eighty-sixth, but we get as much divinity as the top rankers. If we lose, the disappointed gods will lose interest, so let's take it slow."
In the end, I caved to both of them. So this was why they said men ruled the world, and women ruled men.
"Alright, let's rest a bit."
"Good thinking! What do you want to do while resting?"
"What about training? This lady and you are of different races, so you could not learn martial arts from me — but would there not be insight to be gained from crossing swords together?"
"I banned battles and now you two want to fight each other? No!"
I'd been planning to show Cheonsol the fierce power of Impregnating. Shame.
Ah — Impregnating had a critical drawback too.
A woman who has been impregnated once becomes infertile for the duration of that species' pregnancy period.
Buffs still applied and sex was still possible — just no pregnancy. A reasonable limitation, I figured.
If unlimited pregnancy were possible, it'd be EX-class, not S-class. One skill that infinitely supplied talented minions?
The only thing you could enjoy infinitely was galbi. For reference, S-class was the highest rank in this game, so no infinite human-birthing ballads were coming out of this skill.
"So what should we do? Honestly, martial arts are tempting. How much did you say human-learnable martial arts cost?"
"The most famous Three Calamities Sword Art is a million divinity. But even if Yohan learned it, it'd be useless."
"Right. Since I don't have magic power, I'd need an internal energy cultivation method. Or fantasy-world aura or mana cultivation would work. Magic's fine too. Psychic powers are a bit meh, but not bad."
I mainly played martial characters, but I was also ridiculously good with mage and psychic characters. Just saying.
"But you said swords are what you're best at."
"That's true."
"We need a human-only internal energy method... even third-rate methods start at five million minimum..."
For reference, our Lady Sophia's entire fortune was 930,000 divinity. She earned 30,000 per battle, plus about 200,000 from becoming famous as an undefeated ranker.
"I still have to pay off debt... sorry. I'm such a poor master..."
Poverty Goddess Sophia looked dejected. While she was down, I quickly checked her chest.
After nearly a week living together, I'd figured out Sophia only owned one bra. Wear one day, wash one day — so every other day was braless.
Today was a no-bra day! Seeing the clearly outlined areola prints put me in a good mood.
"Then we've got our rest activity. Let's make some items and sell them? The win-streak reward boxes only dropped our own gear, so we haven't made any money."
So far we'd opened three bronze boxes and two enhanced bronze boxes. True to the "first luck is dog luck" principle, we got four common items and one rare.
One of the commons was even women's underwear with a cleaning function. Cheonsol took that — she'd only had one pair of panties.
The rare was a consumable that helped with internal energy circulation, currently stored in the workshop. Since I hadn't awakened mana yet, I offered it to Cheonsol, but she said it was useless at level 1 and she wouldn't need similar consumables until level 2.
"Great idea! What do you want to make first? I'll cover all the materials you need!"
"We've still got plenty of materials from the crafting starter set, so I'm good. I'll use what we have first and let you know if we run short."
"Okay!"
She looked happier than when I said I'd make items. Was I imagining it? No way our goddess was happy about saving on material costs... right?
"So what are you making?"
"Looking at the workshop, there's quite a bit of cloth and leather. What about underwear?"
"That's a no."
I declared it like I'd swallowed a hundred hard pumpkins. If I made Sophia a bra, the no-bra days would decrease. I couldn't let my life's simple pleasures be stolen.
But then again, it'd give me a legitimate excuse to touch Sophia's chest... I considered it briefly, but no.
Touching her chest once versus staring at protruding nipples. The latter won hands down. I'd already touched her chest once, so I could do it again.
"We're already short on materials. Making underwear that barely sells would be a waste."
"True enough."
"Yeah, yeah. Underwear can just be bought from the market. Cheap ones cost only a few tens of thousands of divinity."
What did I just hear? Heaven and earth splitting open, the world collapsing?
"Lady Sophia. I do not think of you as someone who can't even cover food and material costs."
"Huh? Y-yeah. Right. Exactly. Just trust me, Yohan!"
Sophia putting on airs while looking ready to cry any second. I felt a little bad, but it couldn't be helped. Later — much later — I'd make her some see-through lingerie.
"Accessories seem popular. I'm wearing a growth set, and Cheonsol has common-grade accessories, so we don't need any right now. I'll make rings."
"Why rings?"
"They use the least materials."
Plus there was a pamphlet, so they were easy to make. Still not recovered from the earlier shock, Sophia looked dejected again and stroked the ring I'd given her.
"Mmm... if Yohan's making rings... then okay..."
No idea why she was acting like that. Were other accessories more expensive than rings?
"But I've already made rings, so how about switching to necklaces?"
"That's a really great idea, Yohan!"
Alright. Necklaces it is.
"I'm starting work now — come watch if you're bored."
"Okay!"
"This is the first time since you made the bed. I shall observe carefully."
We entered the workshop together.
"There, there. Lan-lan-i. Rest in your cozy nest."
I thought Lan-lan-i twitched a little when Cheonsol set her in the nest. Must have been my imagination.