Pre-Season Ends (3)

I only stewed in that bitter aftertaste for a moment before using the skill upgrade ticket and the talent enhancement ticket one after another.

The enhancement tickets I had received as rewards were clearly marked [Exclusive to Human Yohan], but Sophia's had no restrictions, so she said she would give hers to Cheonsol.

"Master. Thank you so very much. I shall continue to devote myself to battle."

"Just keep doing what you're doing. You and Yohan alone already racked up an undefeated streak!"

"Indeed."

Cheonsol chuckled softly as she used the enhancement ticket. The paper transformed into red flames and was absorbed into her body.

Cheonsol's enhancement effect looked a little different. Mine had been pure white.

"How is it? Anything change?"

"I will need to circulate my energy to know for certain. Why not ask the Mad Demon?"

"Right. Yohan, how did your skill and talent change?"

"One moment."

I shared my status window so everyone could see.

I had upgraded Iron Man and Self-Healing. I felt no particular need to enhance Impregnating or the Fire Truck Game.

Handicraft was a bit of a shame to leave behind, but Evni already possessed Handicraft of her own.

She was a kid who loved working alongside her dad, so matching talents with her only made sense. If I suddenly pulled too far ahead, she might go Dad... is amazing... while secretly feeling a little disappointed inside.

I really am too considerate a father. If there were an award for Father of the Era, it would be mine without question.

"Diamond Body... a talent that truly gives the Mad Demon wings. Even Iron Man alone was formidable, yet now it has become Diamond Body. I cannot even begin to imagine how much sturdier he has become."

"You're from a martial arts world, Cheonsol. You must know Diamond Body well, right?"

"Truthfully, I do not know it well at all. Diamond Body is a realm that exists only in legend. This is the first time I have ever seen it with my own eyes."

"Self-Healing got even better!"

Sophia's face flushed red as she read the description for Self-Healing.

"Uh... when did our bond reach Rank B?"

"It means the connection between you and me has grown that deep, Sophia. It used to be eight uses, but after the upgrade it went up to ten."

Krista, who had been watching quietly, gave a full-body shudder.

—How horrifying. A minion ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠with a Diamond Body who also has a healing skill? What league did you say Master Sophia belongs to again?

"Frontier A-League."

—The gods in A-League are going to start wailing about why they don't have a broken minion of their own.

Lan-lan-i and Evni both lifted their chins at the same time and struck proud little poses.

"Mad Demon's the best in the whole universe!"

"Dad... best..."

"Aww, look at my pretty daughters. Daddy's really that amazing?"

I pulled them into a hug and rubbed my face all over theirs. Evni nuzzled back happily, and Lan-lan-i didn't push me away either.

My girl might be hitting her rebellious phase, but her love for her dad was still the same. This father was deeply moved.

"Cheonsol. Time to tell us about your talent too."

"Understood."

Cheonsol sliced her wrist and scattered blood. Where the blood soaked into the ground, blood flowers bloomed.

"The Vampir authority to dominate blood has grown even stronger. Even without my conscious will, the blood now blossoms into flowers. They look lovely, yet they are monsters that tear the flesh of anything that touches them and drink its blood."

"Whoa!"

Lan-lan-i excitedly plucked one of the blood flowers.

"Can I eat this?"

"To a Vampir, it would be a flower akin to a tonic. You may eat it. Just take care not to cut your mouth."

"Hehe!"

Lan-lan-i munched on the blood flower with little chomping sounds. She looked as cute as a rabbit nibbling grass.

"It's delicious! Tastes just like Mom's milk!"

"You drank the Mad Demon's blood only yesterday. Of course it would."

—She drank blood...?

Lirota shot me the kind of look one gives a fellow sufferer—an extremely filthy look.

A slave daring to act like an equal with their master. I jabbed a finger straight into those dirty eyes, and tears immediately started streaming down.

"Cheonsol's grown too! I'm so proud of you! The regular season should be no problem at all!"

Sophia bounced with joy, her massive breasts swaying heavily. Watching those violently undulating mama dispensers made me happy too.

"Your joy is my joy, Goddess."

"You gonna keep staring like that?"

I had never taught Sophia any curse words, so when exactly had she learned to talk so roughly? As her minion, I found it deeply saddening.

"Anyway, we've claimed all the rewards. What now?"

"Hmm... we unlocked new regions, right? Want to take a walk and look around?"

"Obviously!"

The magic words that set a gamer's heart racing: new classes, new features, new regions!

As a hardcore gamer, I was powerless against that temptation.

"Let's go right now!"

"You're way too excited. Fine, stop whining like a kid. Three regions unlocked, so where should we start..."

Sophia sank into deep, repeated deliberation.

"What are the options?"

"The planet I rule, a forest where you can capture wild minions, and a resort for vacationing. The planet I rule is basically a vacation spot too, so that makes two leisure regions."

"Mad Demon. Which do you prefer?"

When asked which I preferred, the only proper response was to answer.

"Obviously the Forest of Wild Minions."

Just the name reeked of adventure. The scent of healthy wild beauties ripe for the plucking.

"Huh? Really? That place is for gods so poor they can't even afford minions. Even if you search with your eyes on fire, minions with actual talent are rare."

"Meaning we have no need for it, then."

"Exactly. I've already got Yohan and Cheonsol, and now Lan-lan-i and Evni too, right?"

Rumble-rumble!!

Lulu rolled over and over until she bumped against Sophia's foot. Looking a little sheepish, Sophia picked her up.

"Of course our Lulu is here too! Still just an egg and already so adorable."

Nod-nod.

Lulu, is it really okay to let one compliment fix your mood that easily? The kid inside must be a boy who likes Sophia.

If it turned out to be a girl... I would have to educate her carefully so she wouldn't become too easy.

"So the Wild Forest is a no-go, then?"

"Pretty much, but since this is just for a stroll... should we go?"

"Dad..."

Suddenly Evni tugged on my pants. For a girl who rarely asserted herself, this was extremely unexpected.

"Dad's house..."

"You want to see Dad's house?"

"Mm..."

"Lan-lan-i too! Lan-lan-i wants to see Dad's hometown!"

If my cute daughters wanted it, then Earth it was. Cheonsol nodded as well.

"I am curious about the Mad Demon's homeland. Not every human can be like the Mad Demon, after all."

"I'm a model twenty-second-century Korean."

"A truly horrifying statement. All the more reason I must see it with my own eyes."

"Then it's decided—a little outing to Earth. Location can just be the house Yohan used to live in, right?"

"That works."

My room was nothing to be ashamed of showing off.

"Ah, right. There's something you need to watch out for when we go to a planet. Earth has zero mana development, okay? It's fine if our existence gets noticed, but it could cause chaos, so we should stay hidden as much as possible."

"We're just going to stay in the room anyway. And even if we go out, who would think we're actual other races? They'll just assume it's cosplay."

"That so? Then it should be fine!"

Sophia accepted it so readily. Her chest was enormous—those breasts made it impossible to focus on her beautiful face.

"Then ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠let's head out!"

After a long time, I returned to my room. Thanks to twenty-second-century welfare policy, it was a house I owned outright, so there had been no change of tenants or anything of the sort.

"This room is truly fascinating. What are these devices? You crafted tools from minerals of a quality that would produce a legendary blade if forged into a sword."

"Ah, that one's a faucet. Turn the handle and water comes out."

"And this is... ugh! The smell is awful!"

Lan-lan-i opened the refrigerator and pinched her nose shut. Everything inside had gone bad.

"Sophia, how long has it been since I became a minion?"

"In Earth time, about three months?"

"That long already?"

"Time flows differently between the cosmos and a planet. You'll have to get used to it. After a few regular seasons, decades will have passed."

"I see."

While I talked with Sophia, Lan-lan-i and Evni launched into a grand expedition. They climbed onto the bed, rummaged through drawers, crawled under the desk, and emerged covered in dust.

"Fun..."

"There, there."

I wiped the dust from Evni's face. Lulu, equally coated in dust, gave a little shake, so I cleaned her off carefully with a towel as well.

Lan-lan-i, maybe because she was already grown, wiped herself off just fine on her own. A little disappointing, honestly.

—So this is Earth? Hard to move around.

—My strength... is draining...

The high-ranking spirits Lirota and Krista had shrunk into two-head-tall miniatures.

—Ugh. Even after shrinking my body to the absolute minimum, it's still rough. How did a minion as strong as the Mad Demon even get born on a planet like this?

"I've been waiting for that question!"

It was time to introduce the game I had been grinding so hard before becoming a minion. My first chance to actually use that external video output function I had always thought was useless.

"First, there's something I need to check."

I had to see how well the gallery users had been behaving while I was gone. I operated my smartwatch and connected to the gallery.

It was similar enough to browsing communities in the Divine Realm that Cheonsol and the kids accepted it without any sense of dissonance.

"These little shits..."

I leave for a measly three months and they start trash-talking me? No. Discipline needed to be restored with extreme prejudice.

"Don't try to stop me."

"So 'that bastard' was a term referring to the Mad Demon. How truly fortunate. The Mad Demon was much the same in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠this world as well, yet the other humans are normal. I fretted greatly that this might be a world of madmen."

I said don't stop me, so why are you landing critical hits instead? Fine. I would take out every last bit of frustration I had just received from my children's mother on the game.

The game I logged into after so long had only a few minor patches. Otherwise it was exactly the same as before.

Which meant I completely demolished every single user I got matched with. Educating two of the nicknames that had been trash-talking me in the community made me feel even more satisfied.

"No wonder the Mad Demon's senses were so extraordinary. So this is the device through which he accumulated experience. A truly marvelous apparatus."

Cheonsol, watching a game for the first time in her life, marveled. The kids clustered around the console in a little huddle and cheered.

"Mad Demon is so cool!"

"Ama...zing..."

"Daddy was that cool?"

"Yeah yeah! Mad Demon's the best!"

Riding the mood, I pulled Lan-lan-i into a hug. Mm, ah... she really had grown ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠well. She really had grown so well.