Jun was having too much fun watching his family’s reactions to what he was capable of in this place.


    With a casual wave of a hand, the mountains receded into vast grasslands and with another wave, the sea of greens changed to a real ocean with waves that lapped at their feet standing on a sandy beach.


    “EEEK!”


    Jun glanced at Lily, thinking the small girlish scream was from her, to see a devilish grin beaming at a blushing Davie.


    A final snap of his fingers and a beautiful open-air pavilion with comfortable chairs and low tables filled with odd looking delicacies popped up behind the group that was still processing the ocean.


    It was Davie’s squeals that won as the funniest reaction while Lily’s little squeaks of surprise won Most Cute.


    Juan stood frozen stiff, eyes bugged, while Mary was too busy loving her new giggling Granddaughter, repressing her shock for later. There was a lot saved up already. It was concerning.


    Jun felt wonderful as he saw the looks of silly incomprehension on their faces. It made him feel better about his own shameful reactions.


    ‘Good, good, good. Everyone must suffer together. Kekeke.’


    Jun had no association with that voice in his mind. He was just trying to uplift the mood.


    He’d just spoken about how he’d found the child he’d adopted, minus the live burials, and enough about her past as a lab experiment to get the point across without revealing too much, at least while in front of the kids.


    Mary and Lily wept. Davie looked sick, while Juan looked contemplative.


    By that point, the child that was now in Jun’s embrace began to stir, he was sure, except she’d been swiped without his notice by Mary.


    Jun turned to speak but faltered when he saw the most beautiful smile on the sleepy girl’s face as Mary did what Aunt Mary did and became the child’s new best friend.


    A single giggle uplifted the mood, as if the previous gloom were a lie. Jun’s smile turned devious as he saw his opportunity for a little prank. To uplift the mood.


    —


    “EEEEEEEEKKKK!!” Everyone roared with laughter at Lily’s perfect imitation of the embarrassed giant.


    Davie took it stoically with red-faced grace, secretly plotting his revenge. The corner of his eye glanced at the only one who laughed louder than Ella, a child he’d forgive, which was Juan, a parent he would not.


    They sat and relaxed, sipping and snacking on the alien treats, as they each introduced themselves and got to know their newest family member. Ella giggled and bounced from her new second favorite lap, Mary, who was fondly making sure the little thing didn’t fall over in her excitement. No one asked about the papers clutched in her right hand.


    “So you’re saying all this isn’t real?” Uncle Juan asked, struggling with Jun’s explanation. His hands were filled with the conjured sands, the coolness and texture against his fingers. This wasn’t real?


    “Well, it both is and isn’t real.” Jun said, struggling to explain what he intuitively knew about the space through his connection.


    “It’s like this,” Jun tried again. “My personal domain is like my rented room in the Nexus building. One of the built-in features allows me control of what form it takes and within the room it’s all like a super virtual reality. Take it out, and it turns back into energy. That’s the reason, at least for now, you can’t eat or drink anything made by the space.”


    “For now?” Lily asked.


    “Yes, one day, when certain conditions are met, it’ll be different.” He said confidently, not mentioning the consequences of failing to reach that reality.


    Not wanting to dwell on this topic, Jun briefly explained how he’d become an Elder of the Nexus, the existence of the World Tree and the scales of power that existed in the multiverse and where he stood in it. An ant amongst cosmic giants. A highly respected ant. So the Ant King. Yay!


    Ella laughed.


    Knowing that they could spend days on any of those topics, Jun promised more later, and asked how everyone had been. The answers were not convincing.


    Mary merely said that she’d been productive, to which Juan looked up, very interested in the sky.


    Lily spoke cheerfully about their exciting first week of school, but her complete lack of mention of anyone else besides lil Davie, and the look on Davie’s face, had Jun suspicious. Before addressing that, there was something else he wanted to confirm.


    “Lily, about the Garden and what it can do for those who experience it,” he began asking. Jun had run through most of the details, so it was only now that he was mentioning it again that Mary and Juan were reminded of something important. Lily and Davie, knowing what was coming next, just smiled.


    “Good.” Jun breathed a sigh of relief. When he finally understood the actual effects of his creation, how the process of awakening faded core memories engraved on the soul also reinvigorated and promoted healing, he thought of his little sister and her constant suffering.


    The injury to her soul had been a heavy weight on everyone’s hearts, trapped in their helplessness to do anything to ease her pains. Jun had been so enraged that his precious little sister, the one who rescued him from the darkness, had been harmed by such a filthy existence, that he secretly went on a rampage throughout the sewers of the city, eliminating all the dirty manifestations that needed to be purified. Since then, it has become a habit to make secret patrols whenever he was stressed.


    This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    When she stepped into his domain, he was already mostly sure. Now, seeing Lily and Davie’s reactions, he knew that his sister had escaped her ill-begotten fate.


    Mary embraced her daughter and cried happy tears, Ella stuck and laughing in the middle.


    “Why didn’t you tell us?” Juan asked his chuckling youngest that didn’t know the fatherly beating he was about to get if he said something stupid.


    “I asked him to keep it a secret, Uncle Juan.” Lily squeaked through the death hug that was suffocating her.


    “We wanted to make sure it wasn’t a temporary thing.” Davie owned up. He didn’t know what he avoided.


    But there were some things that couldn’t be avoided.


    “So how was school?” The voice came soft but terrifying. Davie looked at Jun, who was channeling a bit of that hollowness that freaked him out so much and knew he couldn’t lie.


    “It was as fun as rolling through a field of demon shit.” Davie spoke softly, out of earshot of Ella, unable to contain the mountains of unshed frustration.


    Juan also listened closely, unaware of the extent of things himself. Mary and Lily were busy sharing a moment to notice them.


    Davie held nothing back, about how the entire student body, even the old friends that entered together with them, had alienated them from their social circles, actively pretending they didn’t exist because of their sibling relationships with the most hated couple from the University. Davie wished he didn’t have to bring them up, but as the source of the trouble, it was impossible not to. He worried how his brother would feel.


    “Why are they the most hated couple?” Jun asked, confused.


    “The ‘hated couple’ thing is something Nicole and Tiana came up with to distract the students from things they shouldn’t be thinking about, like your Awakening.” Davie explained helplessly. “They worked really hard to hunt down every recording of the event and alter the entire narrative. You’re the tragic hero and They the traitorous villains that went as far as stealing your work, and that’s the entire story. The light show was just another visual gimmick and a small cliff note that’s not worth mentioning.”


    “And that worked?” Had he fled for no reason? Wait. Stole his work?


    “Well, for everyone that wasn’t there. Actual eye witnesses that were a little too insistent about otherwise each got a visit from Tiana.” Davie shivered, having remembered something he shouldn’t. “But it’s not like she could do that with everyone. Professors, for instance. Student’s with connections to the Guilds and the Families have most likely reported everything too, but Nicole said that without proof that the whole thing wasn’t a visual trick, along with you having disappeared… well they’d have no reason to move immediately.”


    “There were a lot of people recording the event, though, right? Most of them disappeared from the boards after a day but I can’t imagine your friends can track all the copies.” His father asked.


    “What can I say? They worked really hard and apparently got most of it. Enough to contain the news from spreading out of the city, anyway.” Davie just shrugged and looked at Jun seriously. “They wanted to give you as much of a head start as they could. You really freaked them out when you suggested their families were too weak to help you. Us too, but we’ve gotten a chance to feel relieved. You should hit them up and let them know you’re alright.”


    “That’s right!” Lily shouted her support from where she’d been captured on her mother’s lap, Ella having found her new third favorite lap on top of her. “Jun! Nicole and Tiana are so worried about you, too! You have to let them know how awesome you are now!”


    Jun was touched by the dedication his friends had shown, but he still had a question.


    “Did they not do anything to help you with your situation?”


    “Ah, they totally wanted to. Honestly, the two of them are the reason we could make it through the week.” Lily began explaining, while Davie was nodding agreement in the background. “But we told them to leave it alone.” Lily shrugged and Davie looked exasperated, while the parents looked as confused as Jun felt. Ella was smiling.


    Seeing everyone’s expressions, she continued, “Well, you’ll have to ask Nicole, but it seems some people had been looking into us and our relationship with you.”


    “What?!” It was Mary’s turn to scream this time as she stared down at the daughter, who hadn’t once said a word about any of this with her mother. The daughter that was still in her loving embrace.


    “Ah ah ah! It was nothing serious! She just said that the higher ups were poking their noses around and that it might be better to not fight against the rumors until things blew over~!!” Lily squealed as gentle arms turned into a death trap. Ella was giggling.


    Although Jun was troubled, he’d expected something like that. He knew he was leaving his family to be under the scrutiny of higher powers. Even if leaving was in order to lessen the danger, it didn’t change the fact that the potential for harm wasn’t zero.


    Well, that was before.


    After spending a week being introduced to all the different aspects of the Nexus and his place in it and gaining bits of advice from the different Elders that he’d interacted with, he was confident that even if the world were to fall, he could save his family.


    So he laughed.


    “Don’t worry.” He said. “I’ve basically won the cosmic lottery. We are covered for a lot of things. I’ll get to that later, but you should be excited.” Jun grinned at everyone’s shock. They didn’t know. They couldn’t imagine the immense scale of the mountain Jun was currently standing on.


    “It must have been tough.” Jun saw the frustration Davie couldn’t suppress and made another guess. “Something happened with the Freshman Mech King Crown?”


    Davie’s eyes widened in shock. How did he know he was crowned? They hadn’t even told their folks about it, wanting to surprise them when it was rightfully his. Which it no longer was.


    “It’s cause you’re so much more talented than your brother,” Jun said with pride, having seen the unasked question. “He didn’t have his first cleansing till right after school started and people went freaking crazy. They said it was a pity he hadn’t broken through just a bit sooner or he would have qualified for the Freshman Hunter King. You, you little freak of nature, beat him by full year. There was no way you wouldn’t be crowned.”


    In truth, Jun had always intended to be there when his little brother met this hurdle and had even laid out some groundwork in advance, already having anticipated the bestowal and the harsh fights he’d have to keep it, so he never mentioned any of his concerns in advance to prepare him. With so many life altering events avalanching him at once, he had only recalled his failings as a protector when it was too late.


    Davie was shocked. He’d kept his first cleansing a secret to surprise everyone. Then he remembered that his brother wasn’t the weakling he’d convinced the world he was.


    Juan and Mary beamed with equal pride, remembering the surprise they’d gotten back then, but couldn’t help wondering about the full story. How had he lost it? How had their children been suffering without their knowledge?


    Seeing lil Davie squirm in discomfort and a little shame, Jun comforted his little brother. “Don’t worry about not being able to keep it. The politics and the alliances make it impossible if you’re not connected. It’s the fact that you were crowned that’s important. They can’t take away your talent.” Seeing him look a little better, he grinned and dropped the bomb.


    “Besides, it’s good that you didn’t have to take care of the glorified training dummy they dump on you for Freshman Mecha King. This big bro’s got nicer toys for you to choose from that even the real Mecha King would beg at my feet just to see. Heeheehee~.”


    Not acknowledging the devastation those pleading eyes reflected, Jun looked at his adoptive parents and smiled even more sinisterly. He had been deducing many things since their reunion and was loving every conclusion he’d drawn. The opportunities were immeasurable.


    An icy shiver ran down two sets of backs as they gazed warily back. They didn’t like that look. Bad things always followed that look.