Jake was definitely nervous as he finally found himself alone facing Artemis. It wasn’t nerves born of fear, but a mix of anticipation and hope that everything would go as he’d wished.
So far, Jake still didn’t have full knowledge of how Artemis felt about everything. At most, he could make educated guesses based on how she and everyone else acted. If Nature’s Attendant and Yggdrasil believed she had any desire to end his existence, he really hoped they wouldn’t have assigned her to escort him.
On the other hand, it was also possible that they did this so the two of them could squash any positive relationship between them. While it was true that relationships between S-grades and gods were considered pretty normal in the multiverse, even A-grades and gods getting together was insanely rare. B-grades? Jake had never even heard of it happening outside of some of the times gods decided to impersonate mortals.
All of this is to say that Jake had no idea if a god would even consider a C-grade. They were, objectively speaking, superior beings to mortals. Jake knew that Villy didn’t even consider the average mortal a person. Their lives were too fleeting, too meaningless, for him to give even an iota of thought or care towards them. In his eyes, if they died due to getting killed by something or of natural causes, it didn’t matter, as their lives were so short anyway.
Jake even knew that Villy didn’t have the most extreme opinion. Some creatures born naturally at high grades didn’t view anything below what their young were born at as creatures worth considering. They were nothing more than insects to the average human pre-system. This opinion some gods held of mortals... that mortals were all merely insects.
Naturally, Jake didn’t expect this of Artemis, but if she had even the slightest thought that Jake was fundamentally an inferior being, that would be the biggest turn-off in the world for both sides and effectively the end of anything positively developing between them.
Finally, as a god, there was a big difference in power that none of them could deny. A far larger one than with anyone else Jake had ever been with. Sure, Carmen was strong, but she wasn’t “I could kill you with a thought”-strong.
In summary, Jake had many reasons to be nervous, and he didn’t speak up right away because he couldn’t help but wonder what Artemis was thinking about all this. He wondered if she thought Jake’s relative weakness wasn’t an absolute turn-off because if she did... yeah, that would suck.
--
Artemis had experienced more emotions of nervousness in the last few years than she had in an entire era before that. Usually, when planning to fight something powerful, all she felt was excitement, yet the mortal in front of her was more nerve-wracking than even Godking monsters she’d hunted down.She couldn’t help but wonder what he was thinking. Artemis was used to interacting with mortals, and they all had the same thing in common: innate fear and respect. It was something they couldn’t help themselves with. It was a natural response, no different than someone being forced to close their eyes when faced with a powerful light. Even if they tried to resist with every fiber of their being, they didn’t stand a chance.
The particular mortal in front of her was said to be immune to this sort of thing, yet a small sliver of doubt still wormed its way into Artemis’ mind. She knew her image in Nevermore had a very positive relationship with him, but that had happened under very specific circumstances. One where they were of equal standing and power, both lowly mortals, at least in body.
Things were vastly different now. She recognized the gap and power, and while she would be lying if she said she didn’t personally view it as an issue, in her mind, it was a temporary one. Artemis had lived for a long time, so for her to wait a thousand or even a million years for something wasn’t really a problem. It was one intense meditation session at most, and she’d spent longer working on upgrading skills in the past.
As a mortal, Jake’s perception of time was vastly different. Based on what she understood, he’d been alive a couple of hundred years at most, and that was factoring in time spent training with time dilation.
Concepts such as age difference weren’t really a thing that gods even thought out normally. An S-grade had already lived for a very long time, to the point where neither party cared. Between gods, the level of care was even less. In the grand scheme of things, the difference between a million and a billion years of life was just meaningless when it came to considering maturity.
Artemis couldn’t help but consider it in this instance, though. Compared to him, she was positively ancient, and even if he could ignore her presence, he had to know that. He was also young enough for it to potentially even be an issue in his mind.
The more Artemis thought about things, the more reasons she found not to pursue anything... and the more she felt nervous that Jake had similar thoughts and concerns.
Because despite everything, when Artemis looked into Jake’s eyes, and when she remembered him in Nevermore as he’d stood before Valdemar, she couldn’t help but feel a shiver run down her back... and if that wasn’t a green flag and a massive turn-on, she didn’t know what was.
Jake decided to just bite the bullet and take the initiative as he cleared his throat. “So... it’s been a while. Well, probably not to you, but from my perspective, it has been a little bit.”
Alright, he definitely screwed that one up. As a god, the time Jake spent doing the Prima Event and all that shit had to have felt like the blink of an eye. Luckily, she responded in a somewhat neutral fashion.
“It has, and I’ve heard you’ve been quite busy during this time,” Artemis spoke, and from Jake’s perspective, clearly wasn’t nervous at all. “You killed the Usurper of Yip of Yore and, after that, got into conflict with the Holy Church. Hopefully, that situation won’t escalate more than it needs to.”
Jake couldn’t help but be at least a little happy knowing that Artemis had kept up with what Jake had been doing since Nevermore. Even happier as he detected a hint of concern when she spoke about his conflict with the Holy Church. Sure, it was possible her concern was with the many weak mortals who could be caught in the crossfire should things escalate, but Jake chose to interpret it as her being nervous about him.
“Yeah, things have been hectic,” Jake agreed. “Regarding the Holy Church, matters are kind of complicated. It’s only a schism of the Holy Church that acted against me, with the Holy Mother herself seemingly not that involved. I’m not exactly sure which part of the Holy Church wanted the Truesoul, but I do know the Lodestar Matron was one of their leaders, if not the main one behind the scheme.”
“Oh?” Artemis responded with some genuine interest. “What’s this about a Truesoul and the Lodestar Matron? I have a hard time imagining someone of her status wanting a Truesoul... unless...”
“Ell’Hakan,” Jake commented, Artemis frowning.
“Did the Holy Church attempt to steal your rightful bounty after you defeated the Usurper? That’s rather audacious,” Artemis said, clearly offended by the concept itself. “Even if you didn’t have any uses for the Truesoul, it wasn’t theirs to take.”
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“Of that, we’re in complete agreement, and it did eventually end with me getting the Truesoul back and forcefully dispersing it, fully completing the hunt,” Jake nodded. “As for how I know the Lodestar Matron was behind it, well, I had a small meeting with her regarding the matter. It didn’t end that well.”
“You spoke directly with the Lodestar Matron?” Artemis asked with surprise.
Jake nodded, not really seeing it as a big deal. “I do know she’s kind of a big deal, and I get the feeling I spoke to her directly, likely in an attempt to intimidate me on their part. Needless to say, that didn’t work out well for the Holy Church. Either way, I don’t know if there will be future trouble with them, but I would be surprised if there wasn’t.”
“You don’t seem very disturbed at the notion?”
“Why would I be?” Jake smiled. “I’m already not a fan of the faction and how they operate, so if they want to offer me enemies for target practice, I’ll welcome it. Not to say I would be that disappointed if they just let sleeping dogs lie and moved on from their loss in my galaxy.”
Artemis nodded, looking to be in thought for a moment. Jake wasn’t gonna lie; he had mainly just been saying all that to feel as if he had something to talk about. Seeing as Artemis kept asking questions, he reckoned the topic did interest her at least somewhat. Gossip involving other top gods of the multiverse had to be intriguing for most gods, right?
“Let’s hope they don’t go overboard in their response,” Artemis said in agreement after a few seconds. “Now, let’s get to your assigned residence. From what I’ve seen, it’s pretty nice with a good alchemy lab attached and some high-level study material you shouldn’t be able to find in the Order.”
“Sounds like a nice place,” Jake nodded. “How will we get there? Just a teleport, or?”
“How would you like to go there?” Artemis asked. “We could just teleport, or we could fly there, and I can get you more acquainted with the city surrounding the trunk and roots of the Mother Tree.”
“Flying sounds good,” Jake instantly agreed, gladly taking the chance to spend some more time with her. “Also, I do find it a bit entertaining you call it a city, considering just how utterly humongous it is. I thought the city at the Order of the Malefic Viper was large, but this place is just... silly big.”
“I guess by your standards, it is huge,” Artemis commented. “However, compared to some of the cities in the Altmar Empire or Holy Church, it’s not that impressive, at least not from a pure size and population point of view.”
“Well, I can’t exactly comment as I’ve never been in Altmar Empire or Holy Church territory, but I still think this is plenty huge,” Jake shrugged. “Any idea how many people live here?”
“No idea,” Artemis shrugged as she motioned for him to follow. “I don’t think anyone knows. Too many to count is the right answer.”
“Makes sense,” Jake muttered as he went after Artemis, who walked toward a flat part of the wall in the wooden chamber. When she touched it, it looked as if the wood opened up, revealing the outside world... but seeing as Jake could clearly feel that they were inside the trunk with wood on all sides further than his Pulse could detect, some magic was definitely going on to make that portal.
Once outside, Artemis took out what looked like a whistle and put it in her mouth. To Jake’s senses, no sound was produced even when Artemis blew, yet at the very next second, a giant creature filled his vision as it appeared.
With a huge beast in front of him and a trunk that formed what looked like an entirely flat wall endlessly behind him, Jake truly felt the scope of things. Looking up at the beast, Jake saw a giant bird-like creature without any wings and an extremely elongated body with a beak nearly the same length as the rest of its body. It looked like a massive lance from Jake’s point of view. It honestly looked a bit like a feathered missile or blowdart projectile, just one without the fletched endings.
Size-wise, the beast had to be at least a few kilometers long, but after using Identify, he felt pretty damn certain it could decide its own size at any point.
[Divine Voidpiercer Empress – lvl ?]
As he looked at the divine beast, the divine beast also observed him back. It didn’t speak to him. Instead, Artemis introduced them.
“Vitesse, this is the Chosen of the Malefic Viper I mentioned to you before,” Artemis said to the beast before turning to Jake. “And this here is Vitesse. She is a natural-born divine beast right here from this Great Planet.”
“Pleased to meet you,” Jake nodded in greeting. In response, the big creature just let out a loud humming noise before going quiet.
“Vitesse can’t speak, and while she does know telepathy, she rarely ever uses it,” Artemis explained. “Now come, the building is on her back.”
Jake followed Artemis as she flew up toward the top of the god-tier beast. Up there, Jake saw that in between the feathers, what looked like a small dome was embedded into the beast’s body. It was only about twenty centimeters across, and Jake questioned what it was until Artemis raised a hand. “Don’t resist.”
Doing as told, Jake allowed himself to be teleported, and a moment later, he found himself within a large dome of glass. At least it looked that way, but as he looked outside, he realized they were within that small dome on the beast’s back.
“Vitesse and I are old friends. I defeated her during a hunt a few eras ago as she was causing ravage, but I chose to spare her after she offered to instead serve the Pantheon of Life,” Artemis explained. “It was only meant to be temporary, but she stayed around after that and insisted on being my mount, and seeing as it’s rather convenient, I didn’t reject her.”
“Nice ride, indeed,” Jake commented. “As she’s called a Voidpiercer, does that mean she can actually pierce the void?”
“When I hunted her down, we did so across twenty-two different universes and even more minor worlds spread throughout the void,” Artemis said with a smile as if recalling a pleasant memory. “Took me over a year before I finally caught her for good.”
“Damn,” Jake muttered. “Sounds like you have a lot of great stories to tell.”
“Such things come with a long life,” Artemis nodded. “Oh, and in case you’re wondering, no one can listen in or observe us while within this place. Not even Vitesse.”
“I know,” Jake said, already able to tell that no one else was observing them. Jake couldn’t tell if Villy would also have been cut off as the god had stopped observing him when he got really close to Yggdrasil, making Jake assume he either couldn’t with another Primordial so close, or he’d stopped out of respect as she could likely detect him doing so.
As for why he told Artemis, he knew no one was observing him... well, he didn’t really feel like keeping any secrets from her, at least not ones like that. If they were to spend time together, he at least wanted her to know a bit about himself and his abilities. He was still going to keep some secrets, but he felt more prone to sharing when it came to her.
“I want to ask how you know, but I guess that can wait for later,” Artemis said as she turned more serious. “Seeing as we’re away from the prying eyes of everyone else, I believe it’s time we had a proper discussion.”
Finally, the moment had come. Jake had kind of hoped they could have continued to just speak casually while ignoring the elephant in the room, but he knew it had to happen. He just hoped that she wasn’t going to outright tell him to forget everything that happened in Nevermore and-
“Allow me to start. I have no regrets about anything that happened in Nevermore, and going on the advice of my other self and my unquestionable attraction toward you, I'm open to exploring the matter further,” Artemis said in a very matter-of-fact kind of way.
Jake just stared at her for a moment, taking a bit to process what she’d said. More than a full second ticked by with Jake not saying anything, and he was only shaken back to reality when he saw something he hadn’t expected from the god... nervousness. She had been hiding it well, but his silence had allowed it to surface, and he couldn’t help but smile at the notion of a god being nervous after saying something like that.
“Likewise,” Jake simply answered with a smile. “Especially the attraction part.”
Artemis looked surprised at his answer for a moment before letting out a sigh of relief. “Goodness... now I feel bad for all the people I rejected in the past because I would have felt horrible if you’d outright rejected me, much less made a scornful face while letting out a disgusted voice.”
“Ouch, yeah, that would be a bad way to let someone down,” Jake said, unable to hold back a chuckle.
Artemis looked at him and returned his smile. “I do want to make one thing clear, though. In Nevermore, I – that is to say, my image – was heavily limited in time, which undoubtedly influenced my approach there significantly. Out here in the real multiverse, there are no such time constraints.”
“I get it,” Jake nodded. “We’re not in a rush.”
“Good that we’re in agreement,” Artemis said, once more looking relieved. “Also, while I did use the city tour as an excuse to get you in here and alone, I do reckon I owe you one, assuming you’re still interested.”
“Sure, I reckon I’ll spend some time here, so a city tour would be awesome,” Jake said, genuinely interested in knowing more about what he could only assume was effectively the capital of the Pantheon of Life.
Artemis nodded, and a moment later, the world began to move outside of the glass bubble as the Voidpiercer began to fly. There was still some awkwardness left between the two people in the room, but the nervousness that both had felt only a short while ago quickly disappeared as they now knew how the other party felt.