Ava's arrival

Seth brought his hand over Maya’s silky hair, rubbing her head like one with a child’s while looking at Iris’s exaggerated expression.

“Don’t mind Maya’s words. You know how she is. What I - “

“Why not?” interrupted Maya with a pout, releasing Iris and removing Seth’s hand from her hair while turning towards him. “It will allow you to link to her the way you did with us, and she could see and feel it for herself.”

Seth grabbed the hand she used to remove his, holding it softly, and shook his head. “Even if that worked, and that’s a big if considering the will of my lust source is dormant again, you can’t blurt something like that out and expect Iris to agree to it.”

Bringing Maya into his arms, Seth sighed and said to Iris: “Think about everything we told you carefully. After you started fusing your soul and source, stopping it is no longer an option.”

“I could give you the complete knowledge that will allow you to break through faster, but that will only make things worse, so I suggest you delay the process instead. If being around here makes you uncomfortable, you can have a creation ascended make you a house at the city’s periphery where you can consider everything in peace, but I can’t allow you to leave too far. Sorry, Iris.”

Iris nodded absentmindedly before giving Maya one more look and flying away from the garden.

“It looks like she might take my offer.” Muttered Seth, rubbing Maya’s back.

“But why didn’t you agree to my proposal? Everything will be better with a link formed between you two.”

Seth looked down again and sighed while shaking his head. “That’s not how it works, Maya. She’s an over 200 years old virgin. Do you think she will sleep with me like that? There’s also the fact that I have no idea if a mark would even appear. It reacts to my feelings about the person I’m doing it with, and I’m not that excited about having a soul link with her.”

“But - “before Maya could finish her sentence, Seth placed a finger at her lips, shaking his head. “Let’s do as I say. I know you think that once she’s marked, she will have no choice but to stay with us, but that’s also not right, at least not to her or even me. Let nature take its course.”

“If she listens to our words, we’ll try to help her and see how it goes, but if she doesn’t… sigh.”

Maya was about to complain again, but after seeing the conviction in Seth’s eyes, she decided against it and simply nodded. “Alright. I’ll listen to you. Now I have to go and take care of things at the palace. Want to come?”

Seth shook his head and said with a sigh: “Not right now. I need to check some things out, and, at this point, you’re more of Endora’s leader than I am. Sorry for always dumping my responsibilities on you.”

Maya sighed as well and nodded. “It’s fine. I’m sure you’ll make it up to me. Can you teleport me there?”

Seth nodded and created a portal next to them. After kissing his lips briefly, Maya walked inside the portal and it closed behind her, leaving Seth alone in the garden.

‘How are things with Sun?’

<He and Pearl are on the move by ship. It will take them about two months to reach the Dream Kingdom.>

After a quick nod, Seth teleported away, arriving in Caitlin’s room. Seeing that Tiana was not there anymore, he realized he should have checked with the system beforehand and asked Caitlin: “How are things going?”

“Pretty good.” Replied Caitlin, opening her eyes. “I should be able to start in two to three days.”

“Alright. Come to find me, and we’ll head outside the city for your breakthrough. Don’t try to do it alone.”

“Sure. If you’re looking for Tiana, she left right after I healed her, saying something about going to rest.”

“Thanks. I’ll let you continue as well.” Seth nodded, teleporting away again, arriving deep under the city this time, next to the bed Leora was sleeping peacefully in.

Creating a chair next to her bed, Seth sat down and placed a hand on her chest, slowly probing her source with his destruction energy. After making sure everything seemed in order, Seth moved the hair away from her forehead and kissed her.

“Please stay like this a while longer. Sorry for not being able to protect you as I should have and keeping you like this, but don’t worry. I’ll ensure everything will be fine when you finally wake up.”

Seth spent a while longer simply staying with Caitlin before going to check on Katy and her troublesome pregnancy and only left after confirming nothing was wrong with her.

Even if he could have accompanied Maya at the palace or spent time with either of his lovers, Seth decided against it. He went to find himself an empty room, spending the next day simply having the system keep him up to speed with everything going on around the continent.

Now that the link to the past records has been resolved, keeping track of everything was relatively easy.

He checked on his empire’s situation before going over Thanatos’ movement and other things, taking him almost half a day.

After that, Seth divided his time between his lovers, Endora’s affairs, and his parents until the person he was waiting for finally arrived, Ava. Even if they were not lovers, at least officially, Seth still waited for her just outside the capital.

Ava was riding a skinny horse and unmounted as soon as she saw Seth standing by the side of the road ahead of her. Smiling brightly, she released the reigns of her horse and walked up to him.

“It’s been a while.” Said Ava, arriving in front of Seth and spreading her arms to hug him.

Seth reciprocated and pulled her in his arms. “Good to see you too, Ava.”

“So, I see you seem fine. What happened?” asked Ava, slowly moving away from Seth’s arms.

“Oh, nothing much. I just slept for a few years at the border with Hope.” Said Seth with a chuckle. “Thanks for taking care of Sorrow for me.”

“No problem.” Replied Ava with a nod. “It was mostly Dan doing all the work while I gave orders around and cultivated.”

Looking her up and down before fixing on her clear face, Seth nodded and said: “I’m glad you seem to be looking better.”

Ava nodded: “Not being a slave to Soren is quite good for one’s health.” After looking behind Seth and not seeing anyone, she asked: “What about the others? Didn’t they come?”

“I didn’t tell them you arrived, so they probably don’t even know. I wanted to come and pick you up myself.”

“Then you could have come sooner. Riding a horse was a pain after sitting on my ass for so many years.” Said Ava with a playful pout.

“I can’t leave the city. Complicated stuff.” Said Seth, extending a hand toward her. “Let’s go inside before we attract too much attention.”

Ava looked at the people passing by, giving them all sorts of looks, and nodded as she took his hand.

Seth teleported them both straight to the Imperial Chambers. Ava’s old house was still there, but Seth planned to set her up in the Imperial Chambers for now.

Ava looked around, noticing she seemed to have arrived inside a dormitory before turning towards Seth. “I just arrived here, and you’re already going straight to business?”

Seth chuckled and shook his head. “You should remain in the Imperial Chambers for now. There’s no point in living in that house all by yourself.”

Ava nodded and released Seth’s hand, planting her behind on the soft bed as she asked: “So. Maya said we should return here but didn’t tell us why. What’s up?”

Seth looked hesitant as he said: “I plan on spending a long time in cultivation, and I’m taking everyone with me. Wondering if you would like to join as well.”

Ava’s right eyebrow rose as she asked: “You’re asking me to join your little band of merry lovers?”

Seth’s eyes darted toward her waist, and he didn’t say anything, his meaning clear. Ava also seemed to get his thoughts and started massaging the mark on her belly with her head lowered.

“I don’t know about being with you like the others, but I don’t mind the occasional fun, so I’ll come. How long will this cultivation session last?”

“50 years? Maybe more, maybe less. I don’t know exactly.” Said Seth. “There are many things that might happen, and I need to work around every one of them carefully, but the idea is to remain there until I reach peak sixth shell.”

Ava sent a probe of energy inside Seth’s body, and she asked in surprise: “You want to reach peak sixth from early fourth in 50 years? Can you even do that?”

“I can try.” Said Seth with a wry face.

Ava gave him a suspicious look before asking: “Alright. So, what now? Are we waiting for anyone else?”

“No. You were the last one. After speaking with Maya and the rest, I’ll have just a few more things to take care of, and we can start our seclusion.

Ava nodded, and they also let the others know about Ava’s arrival.

With everyone in Endora, Seth and Maya began drafting up a series of orders for the empire for their seclusion time.

This part alone took quite some time, having to select temporary leaders for all kingdoms.

The Oath Kingdom had Cain and Molly to keep watch over; Sorrow had Dan controlling it from the shadows; Noth had General Torious; Curse had its new queen, put on the throne by Leora; Loss had Elise and Theodor, while Wrath had Sal, Pearl’s father, take care of everything.

What was left was Endora itself, but with Hollie’s and Maya’s inputs, Seth decided just to let Asteria manage Endora while they were in seclusion.

Now all that was left was to wait for Caitlin’s breakthrough and to make another announcement before they could finally begin.

It didn’t take long after they were finished drafting the orders and Maya went to deliver them, before Caitlin came to seek Seth out, ready to finally breakthrough into the seventh shell.

That was quite the achievement, with Caitlin being the first human to reach the late shells in the entire continent. Still, her progress was only possible with the sacrifice of billions of people, so she was not feeling all that proud.

Leaving everything left to Maya and Hollie to take care of inside the city, Seth and Caitlin teleported for an entire day straight south of the city,  finally reaching an area with barely any humans for over 100 miles in any direction.

After sitting down on the ground and facing each other, Seth nodded with a serious expression toward Caitlin.

“You can begin.”