Chapter 17
The rays of the morning sun peeked through the gap between our bedroom curtains, with a snap of my fingers the super high-performance magic clock [Tell] spell flickered into existence, indicating the local time and other time-space related measurements.
I could have checked the time by focusing on my Time laws or summoning my smartphone, but I was feeling way too comfortable to put in any further effort. More specifically, any kind of effort that would require me to take any attention away from my current position.
Having my lovely wife sleeping right by my side with her arms splayed over my chest was a sight that I could never get tired of indulging in. Gently brushing her long blue hair with the arm wrapped around her while staring at her cute sleeping face was undoubtedly a husband/lover privilege that was worth going to war over!
Memories of last night's celebratory sex and the exchange of our vital yang/yin energies taken up to a whole new level filled me with a deep sense of satisfaction.
It was the first time sex had ever exhausted me in this second life.
Normally, my stamina would be nigh inexhaustible, but that was only the case with 'normal' sex. Sex with 'dual-cultivation' elements involved was a different matter altogether, especially with a partner that was within the same Cultivation stage as me.
Artemis had broken through into her 'nascent soul' equivalent stage ('Divinity Soul' would be more accurate) a few days after my return from the other universe and after successfully facing the tribulation lightning from the space between dimensions.
While the quality of her cultivated internal energies and law comprehension was far below my own and much more focused, it can't be denied that she was now comparable to me in raw power (excluding my more sizable reserves of magic power). If it were only up to our Cultivation realms then she would be at about 20% of my power, and could probably fight Lostbelt Zeus at 30% of his true power for awhile.
It was a satisfying thought, to know that my wife stood far above all the other beings of my home universe, and would be able to squash any that dared to raise their hand against her. The image of her showing any arrogant male pigs their proper place beneath her feet (and by extension, my feet) was a vision I was looking forward to turning into reality, if only so that I could brag about my darling wife stomping on any man (except her husband) that tried to take her away from me.
Damsels in distress moments are fine as a first encounter and love epiphany... but having wives/lovers that must be defended from one's enemies gets old real quick and makes unnecessary NTR bait in the long run.
But loyal wives that can obliterate any of my enemies, on the other hand, is something that should be celebrated and encouraged!
That brought to mind the question of how exactly was I supposed to 'encourage' her as we progress in our Cultivation. Unlike the bullshit afforded to me by consuming the Essence of the Cultivator and the Blank, Artemis would still be limited to her own willpower, comprehensive abilities, and talents when it comes to success.
The recent tribulation was smooth thanks to her solid 'foundation' and 'perfect method' derived from my own Cultivation path, but until she reaches the point where both of us can become our own Dao/Path and transcend even the Greater Laws our Cultivations would only continue to diverge and the help I could provide her would become increasingly limited.
Compared to Airi, Alfia, and the others, Artemis was by nature, an immortal being that most Daoist Immortals would envy because of how unkillable Danmachi Gods were. While she was already an immortal being, the progression of her early Cultivation stages was similar enough to my own that we shared many benefits and troubles, with her current Nascent/Divine Soul Cultivation stage providing her an immense strengthening of her soul and overall existence. The two of us would eventually ascend into beings that could touch a higher dimension, I would be doing so as an 'immortal' while there was no way of knowing what Artemis would become.
That uncertainty of Artemis' Dao/Path bothers me, it really does bother me, but in the end… I suppose there is nothing I can do other than to support her the best I can.
No matter how I look at it, raising her innate talent would be the first step in ensuring that she lives through her tribulations and keep up with me as we break through to the higher realms.
Comprehension, Willpower, and Luck (common Cultivator stats) require fortuitous encounters and momentous decisions to be made in order to rise to a higher level. Or at the very least, temporarily enhanced by the use of powerful heavenly treasures.
Innate Talent, however, can always be raised with more drugs, uh, the miraculous power of Alchemy!
Therefore, I needed to find rare materials or refine the corpses of powerful enemies into some Talent boosting elixirs!
Speaking of talent, Airi really should be on the Talent boosting waitlist. I felt a bit guilty about how I had subconsciously written her off on ever standing by my side in terms of power, but now that my Talent boosting project is about to be kicked off, I realized that Airi would actually benefit the most out of having her Talent boosted!
Her Talent may be below average by all measures, but her comprehension ability isn't too shabby, while her willpower and luck respectively are equal to and greater than both Alfia and Artemis!
I know that objectively since I scanned them all using an artifact that measures those Cultivator stats on a scale of 1 to 10, where every single-digit difference is like that of heaven and earth (incidentally my own numbers kept on rising until it reached 100 causing the artifact to self-destruct because it couldn't calculate any further).
On the note of objective measurements of 'luck' or how reality favors someone, Airi having a 9 in Luck, giving her the second-highest value in this universe compared to her father's max 10, makes a lot of sense given that she had gotten me as her husband.
As the main character in my own right and having trained the househusband arts for years, it is only natural that a girl born with such a high luck value would meet the best possible partner for her!
Aside from taking pride in how capable my wives can be, I also take pride in how awesome I am as a husband to many women!
Hmm, oh, Artemis is starting to wake up. Sensing how contented she felt made it all the more apparent that we were both feeling 'lazy' after how intense our night went.
The mutual exchange of vital energies was now within similar quantities, leaving both Artemis and I with tremendous amounts of unrefined vital yin/yang energies while leaving a smaller proportion of our recovered reserves intact. This has resulted in a form of exhaustion that wouldn't go away until we refined those energies to improve our Cultivation base and foundation.
But it was all worth it. After all, with her recent breakthrough, the 'resonance' between our Yin and Yang had never been stronger. As sexual partners, this meant that dual-cultivation between the two of us had become far more pleasurable and exhausting than having sex with anyone else.
The pleasure was worth every bit of tiredness in my soul.
"Mnn, morning, darling~" She whispered after pulling herself closer to me.
"Good morning to you too, my love." I kissed Artemis and then embraced her, enjoying the sensation of her breasts pressing against my body.
"I don't want to get out of bed. Can't we just sleep in?" Artemis complained while resting her head on my chest, looking up at me with a cute pout.
"Hahaha, I wish, I wish. Unfortunately, I have quite a busy day ahead. How about we just start this off the fun way?" I say as I brushed my hand through her hair and down past her waistline, then started fondling her ass, making her shudder in excitement.
"Oh, very well. If we must." The grin on her face and her grip on my hardened dick told me all that I needed to know about how she really felt. "Just stay like that, for now."
Artemis sat and lifted herself up, giving me a full view of her nakedness, much to my delight.
While her 'twin peaks' weren't very big, especially in a universe obsessed with breast sizes, they were beautifully shaped and felt just right in the palms of my hands. Looking at how happy she was as I groped her breasts made me feel warm inside, and encouraged me to double my efforts in controlling my vital energies to 'resonate' with her properly.
By this point in our relationship, 'dual-cultivation' was more important as a technique to enhance our mutual pleasure, rather than anything else.
Artemis slowly raised and lowered her hips, her pussy wrapped tightly around my cock as if swallowing it whole. After enjoying the feeling of my hard rod poking her insides for a bit, she started to thrust her hips harder and faster, but the pace of it was going a little too slow for me.
"Hey, stop lazing around, I might just fall asleep at this rate."
"Hmm, so does that mean sleeping in is still on the table?"
This… cheeky little goddess!
I grabbed her waist and thrust deep and hard into her!
"Mnghh!? Ahh, ungh! Y-you're being really rough, nghhhh!"
The suddenness of it bewildered her for a split second before her shock gave way to pleasure, as I made sure to hit all her sensitive spots and allowed our energies to intermingle with precise timing to maximize our mutual pleasure.
"Aaah, ah! Ungh! Mngh! Oooh! That's the spot! Ha...your thick cock is fucking me so hard, ah!"
"Haa…! Ah, hearing such vulgar noises from a former virginal goddess… is the best!" By this point, Artemis was matching my own efforts by moving her hips to my pace, "The fact that you've put in the effort to get better at stroking my cock with your pussy makes me really happy."
"I'm happy to hear that- Ahh! Ahn, aahn! It feels so good, I can't stop my hips!" The slutty expression on her face was threatening to make me lose control, "Ahh! I can really feel it now! It's making my womb tremble!"
Artemis took my cock deep into her as she continued to grind her hips against mine. Every time she thrust down into me, she would pull out just far enough that the tip of my cock would still be inside.
Her eyes gleamed with pleasure as she repeated this movement when she saw how much I enjoyed it. Seeing her drowning in love and pleasure like this causes me to lose my last remaining semblance of control.
"Uunghh! Alright, I'm gonna cum!"
"Yes, please cum! Ahh, I'm going to cum too! My womb is being fucked so hard! I'm gonna come- Ooooohhh!"
I pumped her womb full of my seed, then got up to hug her tightly while thrusting my still-hard rod that remained inside her, eliciting a loud moan of pleasure.
We went for a couple more rounds until we could finally bathe and recover properly.
As per our new routine, I took Artemis with me to a time-dilated secret realm where we could Cultivate our accumulated vital energies together, then departed to the kitchen so that we could prepare breakfast for everyone.
Artemis and I were getting more used to doing practically everything together since Airi started staying with her family, and with Fiore and Radia finishing up in the secret realm, and would still be spending a couple of days working on their Sacred Gears.
With the old rotation schedule broken up, everyone was doing their own thing, except for Artemis and I. The two of us made the decision to do as much as we can together until we needed a break from one another.
This was, in part, because I needed a lot of intimacy after being away for a year in another world. The other part was that Artemis was determined to follow along with me, regardless of my activities, be it personal training, my crafting and alchemy sessions, or any sort of work that she couldn't understand.
"Are you sure you want to hang around while I mass-produce blades that could drive universe-destroying entities insane with depression to the point of committing suicide? Most of this stuff is pretty beyond you…"
"Then explain it to me. I don't care if I don't understand anything, if you're fine with having me then I would just be happy to spend time with you."
I didn't quite know how to handle Artemis when she wasn't dissuaded at all by how incomprehensible my work can be to those that lacked understanding.
Back then when I was courting Airi and just after marrying her, I would spend most of my waking moments with her so long as she wasn't occupied with some matter, then sneak off to do my personal training, crafting, alchemy, etc…
The routine hadn't changed much when Artemis came into the mix, things still stayed the same when Alfia, Fiore and the Pentel sisters came into my life as well.
In the end, the only thing I could do was gratefully accepted her presence and accommodate her into my usual creation, improvement, and preparation work. My productivity suffered as a result, yet I found myself enjoying every moment of it.
All my life I could only ever share a small part of my working process (as a lesson for others) and the end results of my work with everyone around me. Artemis was the first person to have patiently stuck around and happily watched me do my own thing, without me explicitly making it a purposeful lesson or demonstration of my capabilities.
I could feel that we had gotten immeasurably closer to each other ever since.
"It's about time for the usual appointment. Can you help me set up the bed?"
"Of course. Do you mind if I set up a second one?"
"Certainly not. I do owe you a few massages, after all."
Gabriel rang the doorbell a few seconds after our talk, I greeted her happily and invited the enthusiastic angel inside while making some conversation with her.
"-Dulio is still trying to cook that 'sky serpent' meat you gave him to 'perfection'. He's recruited my brother's brave saints to act as testers, along with Griselda and Mirana, and now he's challenged everyone else to a 'Cook-off' to get some inspiration."
"Oh wow, I'm sorry if I caused any trouble with that."
"Hehe, no worries~ I love it when Heaven is lively! Normally it might have been a problem but with the upgraded system, everyone's burdens have lessened quite considerably! It's good that everyone can have the time to share their joys and laughter with one another."
"That's wonderful. I'm glad that everything is working out so far."
"Me too! Ah, but there are some concerns from the other factions like the Norse and Grecian ones now that the news has gotten out."
"Sounds like it's time to throw in more chaos into the mix to distract them. Maybe I should just revive everyone that was killed by Trihexa all those decades ago?"
"That would be a very nice thing to do… e-eh, a-are you serious?"
"I can do that easily enough, though I have to exclude the humans since their souls can be contacted by mediums and other entities in an afterlife which could cause a paradox if I retrieved them from the past. There are no complications with the likes of devils, angels, and other beings that just have their souls drifting in some other realm."
Learning how to bend the rules of reality over and fucked it in the ass with every loophole imaginable was one of the biggest lessons I learned from Anos Voldigoad.
"U-um, it's a wonderful idea, but could I please discuss that with my brothers first?"
While Gabriel's distressed expression was really cute, it was not one that I liked to see on her outside of the times when I teased her, so I quickly reassured her that I wouldn't do it without consulting her.
"Of course, please do. Though you can add that I'm also offering to revive every angel that has been killed in the past as well if you want them back and think you can transition them into this new era peacefully enough."
"Oh, thank you. I'm sure they will love your idea! You're so kind and generous to us… are you sure this is alright?"
I felt the familiar yet immensely pleasing sensation of getting hugged by one of the most beautiful women I had the pleasure of knowing. Also, one of the best pairs of breasts pressing against me will never be a bad thing.
"It's fine, everyone has, overall, been benefiting from Heaven's systems for a long time." More specifically, the Sacred Gear system, "So I don't see any reason not to help Heaven out a bit."
I have essentially taken up some limited role as a 'volunteer god' within the Heaven hierarchy with how things have been going with them. This suits me just fine since it fits into my plans to seduce Gabriel from the position of a 'senior at work'.
Many men have tried to gain Gabriel's favor across the centuries to no avail as a result of her deep sense of duty and lack of desire to pursue love, among many other reasons. While brazenly offering to marry her could work out, I find it more satisfying to appeal to her from a position no one else could fulfill.
As the second replacement for Heaven's leadership and management of God's system, there was effective, no one else that Gabriel could truly speak to about the sorts of problems she faces when managing the system or various intricacies of the system that she would like changed. The only one she could have done that with would be either Michael or her Father, both of which are unavailable.
I, on the other hand, can empathize with her troubles and help her in managing the system. I can also speak to her about possible improvements and whether or not such changes to the systems should be implemented.
Simply put, I'm her 'reliable senpai' to her 'adorable kohai'.
"By the way, any new changes to your abilities after the previous massage?"
"Yes! There was a 7% increase in light energy intensity in my spears and-"
Gabriel quickly gave me the usual statistics that I requested of her to measure the success of my massages.
"That's good. If we combine that with the other treatment I had planned out, I should also be able to solve the issue of pure angels being unable to gain more power and new pairs of wings."
"Truly?! As expected of you, Dio, you really do work miracles…!"
I had been keeping my massages completely chaste as starting off with the lewd massage would give the game away, unlike a certain silver-haired knight that gets drugged with an aphrodisiac and falls for a revenge-obsessed MC, Gabriel acutely understands the difference between lust and feelings of love.
This is as a result of being long-lived, a target of other people's lust and affections, and also a strong understanding of sin and desire from the perspective of an angel. Even if I conditioned her body to desire me, she wouldn't misunderstand that as feelings of love and would likely repress her desires, and maybe even restrain herself from seeing me, if she felt it necessary.
"Oh, what's this second bed doing here?"
"That would be for me. Dio will be doing working on me after he's done with you."
"Ah, Artemis, hello again!"
That being said, there was nothing wrong with teaching Gabriel the joys of a wholesome 'pleasure' focused massage given from a husband to his wedded wife.
She will be mine, in time. There is no need to foolishly rush matters.
The plan is elegant in its simplicity, just repeat what worked for Airi and raise my standing among Gabriel's 'family' to the point where they wouldn't think bad of me or outright start encouraging her to marry me! If the idiots she surrounds herself by could convince her to pose in a swimsuit just so that Heaven's representatives could win a fight against Issei in an overly dragged out tournament arc, then creating the ideal scenario where they'll convince Gabriel to marry me might actually be easier than any other complicated plan.
