NOVEL NEXT Chapter 246: So Long as They Both Shall Live
Mila
When Mila woke up, the first thing she noticed was that she wasn’t in the main room of the abandoned villa, instead exposed to the elements up on a mountain lying on a large flat rock. Then a quick look through her sensory domain showed it was Mount Ossa in Tasmania, and she was lying right in the same spot she’d left Aalam when they’d first arrived back on Earth. Only Aalam hadn’t been nice enough to put a tent around her, having moved a rock to the same position instead.
The second thing she noticed was all the people. Aalam was down on one knee in front of her, his expression nervous, and surrounding them were Sally and Francis Davies, their daughter Silvia, both of Mila’s grandparents, Nitya and her husband, Javier Garcia and Reginald Vin, Brom and his assistant, and several other people Mila or Aalam were particularly close to, Isaiah especially noticeable as he was for some reason off to the side holding up a large 5 meter diameter spherical artifact above his head.
The emotions present in everyone’s aura showed a mix of nervousness, excitement, and warmth.
Finally, third, Mila noticed all the little details.
She noticed she wasn’t wearing what she had been when she’d fallen asleep, instead in an absolutely gorgeous yellow gown, an artifact she quickly realized could transform into any type of clothing she desired. She noticed that Aalam was wearing a well tailored suit while everyone else was in equivalent formalwear from their own countries or planets of origin. And she noticed the ring Aalam was holding in his right hand, perfectly sized for her left ring finger and looking plain and old but, to her sensory domain, obviously constructed primarily from violet titanium quintessence, the best A rank material the United Federation of Planets had access to.
Before she could say anything, however, or even fully get up off the rock, Isaiah tossed the large spherical artifact into the air and everything changed. No longer were they up on Mount Ossa in Tasmania, but in the center courtyard of a giant castle of epic proportions, all glitz and glam and ostentation, perfect in every little detail to her description of the ‘most awe inspiring building in the world’, a centerpiece in one of the Dungeons and Dragons campaigns she’d run back when she and Aalam had been dating. The area smelled strongly of fresh bread, with a hint of burnt resin and ethanol, the smell of Aalam’s lab in their apartment, where he’d worked on his inventions and for some reason had a bread maker. And, finally, subtle music emanated from everywhere, a slowed down orchestral arrangement of Rage Against the Machine’s Wake Up, the song which had been playing from Aalam’s TV when the movie they were watching ended and she finally gave up on him making the first move to start a relationship.
With the power of her third eye, she could tell it was all an illusion, but even her sensory domain was fooled.
“Mila, I know I messed up before. And I’m sorry about that.” Aalam started speaking, slightly stumbling over his words. “I did that thing I do where I blindly trusted your words without thinking through whether they were true or not. And then I didn’t ask whether they were still true, even after multiple decades, which was really, really stupid.”
He paused for a second. “I’m so not good at this type of thing.” Then he looked over at Sally, who nodded at him encouragingly, before turning back to Mila and taking a deep breath. “So, I’ll just say how I feel.
“I think you are the most amazing person I’ve ever met. The way you can always predict what other people will do, the way you can take control of even a spiraling situation with seemingly no effort, the way you can somehow fade into the background even though you’re always the most beautiful person in the room. You’re so good at all the things I’m terrible at it sometimes makes me jealous.
“Still, I know how much work goes into what sometimes seems effortless, and I know I often make your job even harder. So, I’m going to work twice as hard to alleviate as much of your emotional burden as I can.
“But I don’t think I can go through with a wedding, at least not right now.
“I want to be married to you. I want to live with you and make you happy. But, for an event like a wedding, I think it would be hollow without Diana there to celebrate with us. And I think I would regret it.
“So, I would like to postpone the wedding part of us getting married. But, after Diana is revived, I’ll give you any type of ceremony you desire. And this ring symbolizes that pledge.”
He held out the ring he was holding, and Mila, feeling emotionally overwhelmed with mostly happiness, but a bit of sadness as well, unconsciously held out her hand.
“Mila,” Aalam asked as he slid the perfectly sized ring onto her finger, his hands slightly trembling, “will you marry me even without a wedding? I know I don’t deserve you, but—”
“Aalam, stop talking.”
A look of fear suddenly appeared on Aalam’s face and Mila felt herself start to cry, mostly from happiness, but Diana not being with them for this type of moment, and the realization of how unconfident Aalam still was, made her sad as well.
“You’re underestimating yourself.” Mila grabbed both of Aalam’s hands in hers and moved to kneel down in front of him. “Of course I’ll marry you. And your reason for not having a wedding is flawless. I would be sad without Diana there as well.”
Mila let go of one of Aalam’s hands so she could wipe the tears from her eyes. “Also, I need to tie you down fast before you realize how utterly imbalanced this relationship truly is.”
She chuckled slightly. “You feel like you are bad at reading people, but that’s mainly because you take others at their word while most of the rest of us lie all the time, something you never do. You were talking about wanting to help lessen my emotional burden, but you have no idea how much being with someone who is always honest, even when it’s something I don’t want to hear, already does so.
“And my talent makes you jealous?” Mila chuckled slightly as she regrabbed Aalam’s hand. “Aalam, I’ve been unconscious for a couple of days at most, yet in that time you made an artifact capable of creating an illusion which expresses our memories together and shows a scenery I could only imagine in my head that even I, an expert at illusions, can’t see through.” She then nodded at her new ring. “Not to mention how this ring is obviously ridiculous.”
Aalam Alvaro’s Pledge (D-Mythic) [Growth]
An artifact designed by the Heavenly Spark Soul King for his wife, symbolizing his desire to care for her so long as they both shall live. Forged from A rank materials and a split piece of the Heavenly Spark Soul King’s own soulbound artifact, the Left Hand of the Runescribe, this artifact is connected to the Left Hand of the Runescribe’s minor pocket dimension, enabling its user to access anything inside when within the range of the Heavenly Spark Soul King’s energy, and, when fed with the triforce of the Heavenly Spark Soul King's wife, it can appear or disappear from her flesh at will.
Effects: Connected Minor Dimension, Flesh Merge
Requirements: Shadow of Hira
Mila put her energy into the ring and it quickly merged with the flesh of her left hand’s ring finger, disappearing completely from even her own senses.
“Aalam, everyone here has to work our absolute hardest every day, not to keep up with you, but just so you don’t leave us behind.
“And I am the luckiest woman in the universe to have you want me as your wife.”
Aalam started to tear up, as did about half of their audience, but then something happened which, in typical Aalam fashion, kind of ruined the moment. Aalam’s body fell forward onto Mila, his eyes closing, and Mila could immediately tell he’d fallen asleep.
“Is he okay?” Isaiah was the first to rush forward, but Mila just raised a hand and he stopped about a meter away.
“He’s fine. He just needs to rest.” Mila moved to a sitting position and gently put Aalam’s head on her lap, having belatedly realized what had been off ever since she’d agreed to marry him.
Soul Lord Battle Armor, even with its limitation of only being able to increase base stats by 300%, was an incredibly powerful racial ability, creating a reinforcement effect on the surface of a soul lord’s soul which increased base stats in a way which completely bypassed how most stats could only be so much greater than other stats without negative repercussions, and Mila had been too focused on it when looking at Aalam’s status, to the point she’d missed something incredibly important. Without taking the racial ability into account, Aalam’s effective Soul stat had surpassed his effective Spirit stat, even with Id active, and, even if he maximized his stats as a D rank, his Soul stat would always be higher.
It seemed Aalam’s Id uniqueness had finally advanced, putting him in a new type of berserker state which, in addition to raising his Spirit, raised his Endurance stat far too high for his Vitality to make up for, completely exhausting his body.
