Chapter 161: Chapter 160: Family Affairs And A Friendly Warning

After the emotional episode, they all needed to decompress before rejoining the others, repositioning so that Carl and Klaire could cuddle into Kyubi while she cradled them both in her tails.

“Carl, you better make sure you come home tomorrow. If things get messy, I don’t want you thinking “well at least Klaire still has a love and Kyubi still has an immortal family and a safe place to live with them”, understand?”

“Yes, I won’t throw away my life, not when I have all the tools I need to get away. I’ll be maintaining a brief glimpse into the future. The other me will be ready to blind at the tip of a hat and I’ll have Tiamutael ready to get us out.”

“Speaking of, I love you both, but I love our babies as well and they are probably waiting for dinner…” Kyubi summarised the situation almost perfectly, but for the one one slightly more likely estimation that Klaire followed with.

“That, or Omedra couldn’t wait and is having her little sister cook for everyone.”

“Yeah I stand corrected, for a family as weird as ours, it’s amazing how normal they all act when the mood finds them.”

With a group sigh, they stood and made their way downstairs, finding the exact scene Klaire described playing out.

“Ki-ko, sit down, big sis is learning to cook.” Klaire said, eyes finding a nervous looking Omedra half-asleep on the couch.”

“But-” Kitsunoko tried to argue, but was quickly interrupted

“You can teach her to cook while we’re away Sweetie.” Kyubi continued as she moved to drago the lazy dragon onto her feet.

“But-” Raziel tried to make some sort of case, until she too was interrupted except by Carl.

“We’re sorry guys we should have called for Aegis.”

“Dad, we’re more worried about quality, Omedra offered but we didn’t want to risk it.”

The three parents stopped what they were doing and regrouped before giving a slight bow and apologising.

“Ugh, I get it, I’m not exactly the homely one. I only know a couple of recipes Sis taught me and I know I’m not really good.”

“No Sweetie, that’s great, why didn’t you ask us to teach you some?”

“Pride, I guess… It’s kind of a problem with us dragons, I wanted to get some distance to learn to be self-sufficient. I’m not a kid, but as a creation, I have very little in the way of practiced life skills and it’s a little embarrassing.”

The three of them moved in to hug her. “You know that things like that are exactly what we meant when we said you can talk to us?”

“Sorry we didn’t notice, we should have made sure you knew things like that.”

“…And we shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions either. Ki-ko, did you want to help your big sis cook dinner and we’ll sit back and only help if you two ask.”

“Thanks Dad! Now Omedra, I don’t know if you can cook this, but we’re soul searing by gently cooking the meat with my soul-fire…”

As they all listened to what she described, they looked between themselves, before laughing when Klaire’s soul form partially detached and made her dribble.

Kyubi stifled her laugh quickly. “I don’t know where she learnt it, but your soul-form seems to think it sounds delicious.”

“It really does, I haven’t felt her act independently since Faylorna forced me to accept we’re two individuals living a single life. I hope you’re ready Me, it sounds like our little girl is making this meal specially for you.”

Her soul-form quickly parted and made its desire to hold the small girl known, receiving a sharp reply from the already disturbed kitsune. “Mum, I’ll hug you when I’m done, I’ll ruin it if I get distracted so please wait.”

The soul-form looked back at Klaire and the others, expressing her disappointment with a series of frustrated gestures and was about to return when Raziel and Tiamutael stood and requested hugs.

The soul-form made a strange noise, not a howl, but a lullaby that followed a tune similar to one Danielle used to hum to her as a child, then Kyubi felt a little left. “Come on everyone, we want cuddles too.”

The soul-form looked a little disappointed, but then Kyubi stood and joined the cuddle, easing its concern that they saw it as a different entity.

When Carl too, stood and joined the hug, the soul-form looked back to Klaire as though it couldn’t entirely believe they were accepting her as a part of their family.

“Don’t look at me, I told you Carl loved me, it was you that saw yourself as separate.”

[ GROUP MESSAGE SENT FROM CARL : HEY, JUST TO LET YOU KNOW, WE’VE FINISHED. DID ANYTHING HAPPEN AFTER? ]

[ GROUP MESSAGE RECEIVED FROM BAHAMUT : THE ELVES ARE INTERESTED TO KNOW HOW IT WENT WITH KYUBI AND KLAIRE. ]

[ GROUP MESSAGE SENT FROM CARL : THOUGHT THEY MIGHT BE, I FIGURED IT OUT, BUT IT IS TRICKY. WHY NOT BRING THEM BACK? ]

“The elves are heading back, they wanted to know how it went. I’m not sure how this is going to go.”

“Yeah, it’s a bit of a slap to the face, “it will be fine as long as you’re really motivated, but if you’re not, then who knows but it’s your fault”. I don’t know how I’d have reacted if losing my people was preceded by that choice.”

“What’s worse, is that if it was just Eldorlora, I think It would be fine. Illum loves his wife so much, his fear for her might make her falter.”

It wasn’t long after that Kitsunoko served dinner, staring intently at Klaire until she took her first bite. The taste was the single most delicious thing she’d ever tasted, a meal that both beings wished to saviour.

“Ki-ko, it’s delicious, but it’s very rude to stare at someone whilst they eat.”

“Sorry Mum.” Ki-ko said as she skipped proudly round to Omedra. “…What about you?…”

“It’s nice, why are you looking at me like that?”

“Well, because now you enjoyed something you cooked, you’ll be motivated to learn more.”

“Wow! You can be a mean little sister. Did I not seem motivated before?”

“Omy, you just watched me while you tried to sleep on the counter while everyone else got cuddles…”

Carl, Klaire and Kyubi turned to look at her, but she just adjust her hair over her eyes and continued eating.

“….Mum, can you show her how to make a desert, she might pay more attention to sweets.”

Kyubi nodded, then told the judgmental little fox to eat her own dinner.

They had just finished when there was a knock at the door and Carl welcomed Bahamut and the elves, explaining the process whilst the others washed up after dinner.

“…So it comes down to whether or not our own motivation can overcome the nature of our species?”

“Unfortunately, yes… When we went through it, we had to first face every flaw, it isn’t a painless experience.” Carl explained.

“I’m probably the most similar to what you would need to face. I needed to admit that my nature made me unhappy, that it made me do things that were manipulative and selfish. You don’t need to answer but, how many apologies do elves need make in regards to curing their fertility issue?”

The elves looked at each other, for a brief moment Carl and Klaire weren’t sure what Kyubi meant.

“When you two came to my realm, you were concerned about the frivolous nature of elves… We didn’t earn that reputation ironically. Many elves resorted to hedonist lives in order to boost the population, necessary or not, we turned our backs on our principles…”

“…We have many, many apologies to make. We will leave, return when we feel properly motivated and have a clear image of how the elven species will be in the future.”

“Of course, no rush. That was the situation already, so it seems we are truly done for today at least, I should probably start preparing for tomorrow.”

“May I ask why you are going? It would not be uncommon to simply send word, in fact it is common practice given the typically poor reception of such news.”

“Well, two reasons. The first is simply that making an attempt on my life would be self-destructive at best. The second, is because I see a chance at redemption for some of them, it may be a longshot, but Jupitteran at least tried to save the fox-spirits.”

“He also tried to kill Faylorna…” Klaire said from behind him.

“Yeah but so did you, so I can’t really hold that against him without being a hypocrite.” Carl laughed.

“Yeah, I suppose that tracks.” Klaire shrugged. “It’s not she seemed to consider it a sincere attempt on her life.”

“You said some, who were the others.”

“Venusiah, she seemed to see the light after meeting my little boy Tiamutael, guessing the “Dragon-god hatchling” tag was a wake-up call.”

“Hmm, keep that one on a short-leash, she is an entitled brat at best and yet not one that should be underestimated. Do you know Solaquin?”

“Solaquin? No, I haven’t heard of that one.”

“He is the strongest offensively, matching most chief deities, he is particularly unpredictable. I suggest having someway to detect heat fluctuations, it would be a good early warning for him attacking, you surely wouldn’t have time to react.”

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