I stepped out of the portal from Kami’s world and into the castle gardens in my own world after my little adventure in Kami’s world. Immediately upon stepping back into my own world, I got hit by something which made a nice ‘pata’ sound upon hitting my head.

“OW!” I screamed. I looked down at the object that had bounced off my head. “A drum…. Kami, you weren’t wrong about your token. All I know now, though, is that I hate it.” With that, I picked up the drum and dropped it into my magic satchel. “Oi, now what was I doing before I got pulled away?”

I rubbed my chin a few times before my memory came back to me. I was helping out Aule with the Dwarves and Low Elves! I was supposed to be helping reunite all the clans… somehow…

Ya know, now that I’m thinking about things, I think I’m missing something… or someone.

“Cherry!” I called out. “Cherry, where are you?!” I could hear the little popping noises and little splats on the ground as Cherry came running up to me from the direction of the garden’s fountain and pounced me. She made happy popping noises as she clung to my chest. “Where have you been, you silly chu?” Cherry just snuggled my chest and made some noises that sounded kinda like purring. “Cherry? Cherry. Come on, I have things to do. Wanna come along? We’re gonna go running around to some new places.” Cherry piped up a little, then jumped off of me and slid into her bottle which was still connected to my waist. “Great, now, I need to find the girls and tell them what I’m doing, then we can go. Oh, and I should probably go ask Aule where I need to go.”

“The savior has returned!” Suddenly, I found myself surrounded by several Dwarves and Low Elves, all of them prostrating to me. “Savior! Please save us from our wrathful and cruel god!”

“Say what now?” The fuck? Aule seemed cool, even if he’s a fucking troll. Why would he be wrathful and cruel?

“He is angry with us for neglecting our traditions, and is forcing us to carve statues!” Okay, that is a bit mean, seriously, what’s the point of that? “He is especially insistent on ones of our kings of yore.” Ah, he’s trying to get them to preserve history, that isn’t cruel or wrathful. “Please savior! Molding stone with our bare hands is exhausting!” …. Never mind, that is pretty damn mean, even if they can do it.

“Alright, alright. I’ll go have a talk with Aule.” I said casually, which kinda surprised the Dwarves and Low Elves. “So, where is he?”

“No! His nose wasn’t THAT bulbous! Shrink it down!” I sighed as I rubbed my temples. That came from the direction of the former statue garden that Tia said she was planning to get rid of and double-check for anyone cursed by a cockatrice or something. Seems Aule decided to take over the garden while I was off in Kami’s weird Patapon Equestria.

“Hey!” I called out as I rounded a large shrubbery, entering the hedge maze that held the statues. “Aule! What the hell is….” My mind just stopped upon seeing a MASSIVE amount of statues. The entire path that I was on was just lined with statues of Dwarven and Low Elf leaders of all sorts. It was like that one area in Dragon’s Age where the most influential Dwarves had their statues, only these were in detail and there were way, way more. “Holy crap…”

“Ah, Dox. It is good to see you again!” From around a bend down the long stretch of hedge came the automaton body of Aule, steam and electricity-focused magic occasionally coming from him as he approached. “I’ve had my children at work restoring their lost history. Sure, demanding they do it by hand may seem harsh, but it’s the most effective method for accuracy.”

“Dude. You’re kind of abusing your power.” I said. Aule seemed to just ignore me. “Plus, wouldn’t this all be easier with the rest of the Dwarves and Low Elves?” Come on, reverse psychology, get him to help me out!

“Those fools won’t even respond with letter, let alone summons! It’s as if they’ve completely forgotten their heritage. If that is so; I want them to remember, just how storied and great a people they all were, and can be again. Now if you’ll excuse me, I want to see how Egregore and Silas are doing on the statue of Haemar the Seventeenth.”

“But didn’t you want me to go find the other clans?!” I called at him as he started to leave. “Come on! I don’t know where they are! Plus, I was kinda hoping for a casual adventure!”

“I’m the God of the Craft, not of quests. Ask your father, he’ll put you on the right path. Stop forgetting about him, he’s a terribly whiny god when he’s neglected.” Aule grumbled and went around another bend, making me sigh.

“Damn it, so; he’s doing this because he feels they don’t care when they should, but I’m sure there’s reasons they haven’t responded, if they somehow already know where the other clans are anyway. DM, sorry for kinda ignoring you, but can you give me a clue as to my next quest?”

Oh, so he finally asks the Dungeon Master for his next quest. Typical. How about I make it a radiant fetch quest out of spite, hm?

“Hey, hey.” I said. “There’s no need for that, and you know it. Ain’t nobody got time for that. Now, where are they?”

Hm… Fine. So, the first place you need to head to is the Frozen North or near it. You’ll find a clan led by Balgruuf the Greater directly East of the Crystal Empire, near the Neighagra Falls.

“Thats… Pretty freaking far man.” I said. “How far is it, again? And is it possible for me to take a train?”

You can fly. Why would you need a train?

“Because I heard that the trains are badass and I haven’t tried them, yet!” I said.

Yes. You can take a train, even if they aren’t the legendary Dwarven trains. The farthest it’ll go, however, is Neighagra Falls. You’ll have to head west into the foothills to find the entrance then, if you see the Crystal Empire you’ve gone too far.

“Woot woot!” I yelled. “Adventure Time is a go! But first, gotta go find the girls and tell them where I’m going.” I took off the ground, launching myself with gravity like a catapult up to the balcony leading to Lulu’s room, and stopped just barely before I crashed into the castle wall. Practice makes perfect after all, and I’m still way out of practice. “Hey, Lulu I know it’s daytime, but can I-oh, right; she switched sleep schedules to run the country alongside Tia during the day.”

Feeling absolutely no boundaries, I opened the balcony door and looked into the room, seeing it empty. There was a large crib in the room, but little Nyx and Nymus weren’t in here, so they were likely in the nursery with the other foals, cubs, nymphs and whatever else can be applied to them. “Not here….” I looked up at the sky outside, sun was a little to the west, so afternoon; court was going to adjourn soon or might’ve even already ended. I could watch and wait, or maybe tell the others instead.

Deciding to go the sensible route, I left Luna’s room, getting no guff from the guards, and began asking for my mate’s locations. Oddly enough, I found the staff still quite uneasy around me, until I got bored of looking UP at everypony and relaxed into my secondary base form. Then all the mares were all-too-happy to answer my questions, even shamelessly roving their eyes over me. Just let me say something about it; fucking, ego-boosting as hell. No wonder Avarice loves being eyed up so much.

With my new apparently natural charm, I was able to gather that Athena was currently in the nursery, so I made my way there. I wasn’t at all baffled or otherwise shocked to find her nursing two of her cubs at once with a content expression, even though one of them appeared to be on fire and the other one seemed to be frozen solid. I could see her third cub in a corner playing with Loki, crawling around and wrestling each other with adorable giggling. That one seemed to be statically discharging off on EVERYTHING, which just made Loki laugh harder. Kinda funny to watch, honestly.

“Hey big sis.” I joked, getting her to look up and a grin to split her beak.

“Dox, good to see you, it’s been a few days. Where were you off to now?” She asked beatifically, not seeming to actually care and more interested in her cubs and that I was here now rather than when I was gone. Such a sweet girl.

Wait a sec. A few days?! Jeeze! The time difference between here and Kami’s is tremendous! Which would also explain how the Dwarves and Low Elves managed to do that much work on statues, now that I think of it….

“Yeah, sorry about that.” I said. “I got summoned away and didn’t expect to be gone for so long. How are you? In fact, how is everyone else?”

“Oh? It sucks that not everyone’s world can be as convenient as Avarice’s I guess. Well, as you can see:” Athena pointed her beak into the nursery, pointing out all the little ankle-biters playing, napping and otherwise just living little baby lives like they should. These little brats were all mine too...that thought made me so content. Always did like babies. “The foals, cubs, and nymphs are all doing wonderfully. I myself have developed somewhat of an odd ability of late, possibly a delayed reaction to the Gamma Pool. I blame the fact I jumped your bones in it.”

“Something besides AI and Android? What is it?” I got my answer as she grinned even wider and her lower legs seemed to literally melt into a goo the same color as her, and I blinked. “Slime? Huh. Sexy.”

“Yes, happened shortly after I gave birth to these little elemental hellions. I wasn’t comfortable with it at the time and kept it to myself and the doctor. But I can add mass to myself by consuming large quantities of fluids and also lose mass by giving fluids away.” Athena hinted, and I finally noticed something, especially when she stood up and was SHORTER than me! Sure I was about 9 feet tall in this form, but Athena was originally around 11 feet.

“Just how much have you been feeding them?!” I demanded, and she smiled sheepishly, the little flaming and freezing cubs at her nipples hadn’t stopped once since I came in, and she visibly was getting shorter. “Honey, give them here.”

“But I love it….” She whined, clutching her cubs to her shrinking bosom in protest, but I leered at her and she sighed. “Okay. Don’t want them to drink all of me after all, huh?”

“Exactly, now let them be and go soak in a pool or something to get some mass back.” I nearly demanded, I wasn’t going to let anyone hurt themselves like this if I could help it. However, rather than hand them to me, Athena made a point to take them to the others and set them down, where they still made a fuss over their banquet being over, but quickly got over it and started playing with the others, their fire and ice not seeming to harm anything.

“Okay Dox, I’ll go soak in the swimming pool Twilight had installed. So; where are you off to now?” She questioned idly as she took a tube-top that was several sizes too big and tied it around her smaller breasts as she walked out of the nursery, me following and noticing how baggy her short shorts were, only being held up by her tail.

“What makes you think I’m leaving again already?” I asked slyly, and she huffed and rolled her eyes as I easily took stride next to her.

“You only come to us with important things or for love. You’re predictable Dox. Not to mention getting to be your arm for so long let me have an insight into you the others don’t have.” Athena teased, getting me to roll my own eyes back at her. Huh...used to be I was much easier to fluster. That kind of statement just a year ago would’ve made me all nerves.

“Neighagra Falls. The Dwarves and Low Elves are upset over Aule abusing their talents to make statues of their leaders from history, and DM says there’s a clan up around there. I’m hoping to get them to come down to help start things along proper so Aule can stop overcompensating with an arduous and tedious task like that until it’s actually the right time for it.” I explained, and Athena shrugged a bit. Shit, I am so not used to her being so short, well, as short as seven feet can be, but I tower head and shoulders and a bit of chest over her at 9 feet, so it was too weird. “Can you get even...bigger than you originally were?” I asked with a grin and light blush, and she smiled cheekily at me.

“What? Not enough lioness for you?” She joked, flicking my muzzle with the tuft of her long tail, and I chuckled as we neared the pool; a new addition added by my loaders on order of Twilight. It was an Olympic pool at that, so yeah; pool!

“To be honest? No right now. I just can’t feel comfortable being over you like this, and it isn’t the same when I’m normal, like this.” I shifted back to my primary base, and she was only a head taller than me, rather than me looking almost under her massive rack, which was also normal sized now. “It’s still uncanny.”

“Aw, and I was liking being shorter than you for once. Oh well, I’ll griffon up then and just see how big I can get to satisfy my mate’s macro fetish.” I snorted and chuckled as she turned into the pool area. “Later Dox, I’ll let the others know where you’re going later if you plan to leave right now.”

“Thanks Athena!” I called as I continued walking down the hall, changing back to my King form since for some reason everyone was more comfortable with it. I’d rather them all cool down a bit, they don’t seem to like me now that I suddenly have so many kids with their leaders.

“Oh, if it isn’t the Usurper.” Speak of the fucking devil…. I wasn’t going to stop and respond to the barb a noble said to his friend as we passed in the hall, and sighed quietly out my nose. Why can’t they just see it’s love? Why should politics get in the way of something so sacred and beautiful?

“Hun.” Hearing my pet name, I turned to look down a branching hall, and saw Bluebelle standing there in an absolutely beautiful white dress, her new wings flared a bit and ruffled in anger as she looked down the hall as she entered this one, pure rage smoldering in her gaze after the nobles. “Want me to flay them?”

“No. Not this Bluebelle, we talked about this while on Maui.” I said. “No flaying, mutilating, or any other type of harming to the neigh-sayers.” Well, that wasn’t the full conversation. The rest of it involved what would happen later. Like they find themselves under sudden inspection for corruption. That would be so wonderful to see.

“If I wasn’t involved with you; I’d have torn into them without question. But, since I am with you, for better or worse; I’m biased and cannot act without making things worse for you.” Bluebelle stated, feeling angry and impotent despite her new status. The wings automatically qualified her for a position of power, but she was already the duke/duchess of the Court as it was, so her current position wasn’t something to sneeze at without expecting a flogging afterwards. She wouldn’t be an actual princess until the wedding/coronation come next month. THEN she could punish them all she liked with impunity. Gotta love the power of this sort of system sometimes.

“Thanks for holding back for my sake, Blue.” I said. “So, where’s the others?”

“Auntie Tia is currently performing Public Relations tasks by publicly speaking more on the situation as well as on how things should be come next month. Auntie Luna is currently enjoying a peaceful tea and crumpet with her friend Derpy Hooves from Ponyville. She met her some time ago during her original visit and really came to like the mare.”

“Sounds like fun.” I said. “Also sounds like she might be trying to add more to the herd. But maybe not. Either way, I have to go find them and say hi, explain where I’ve been, where I’m about to go, you know how it is. Oh, any word on Emerald or Sapphire?”

“Oh, certainly. You never stayed in one place for long the whole time I’ve known you.” Blue giggled, before sighing and putting an elegant finger to her equally elegant chin. “I believe the Changeling Sisters are actually out of the city right now on their own bit of adventure. They’re looking to see about meeting this world’s changelings, if we have them.”

“Sounds like something that I would do.” I said. “Well, I know what I’m gonna go do after I’m done with my current quest. Hopefully I can get this job done and find them before something bad happens.”

“Oh, I’d worry more about what tries to hurt them than the other way around Dox. Those two and Athena spent most of our vacation working themselves contently into a routine with Hyperion. They worked, they got paid, they spent their money on guns. A LOT, of guns. Purple rarity guns.” Blue said in all seriousness, and I blinked in surprise.

“Well shit.” I said. “I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if one of them bought a rocket launcher, or worse, a laser.”

“Athena has three rocket launchers. Didn’t you notice the explosions? Oh, wait you might’ve been on another island at the time. Anyway, Athena has three launchers, a couple shotguns, and assault rifles, while the sisters got themselves at least one laser weapon each, a few pistols, and several smgs.” Bluebelle reported, shivering a bit. “Those three are deadly now if they weren’t before. Guns are such dangerous things. How you can associate with something so cruel with your kind nature baffles me.”

“Oh trust me, ‘my kind’ is worse than you think.” I said. “Hyperion just so happens to make guns that are even more deadly. Hell, I wouldn’t put it past them for one of them to have found an orange rarity gun.”

“They did.” Bluebelle said simply. “A creature attacked while you were gone. Athena called it a Tork, I think. Anyways, the creature attacked, Emerald shot it a bunch, and it dropped some strange shotgun that has almost zero accuracy. Blows up everything in front of it, though. Sapphire happens to love the gun to death, everyone else hates it.”

“Ugh...that would be a Flakker. I hate it too. I like my weapons to hit where I’m aiming. Well, my worries are nonetheless eased, let Tia and Lulu know I’m going to Neighagra Falls to find a Dwarf clan to help with the local situation...Lulu’s behind me, isn’t she?” I asked blandly, and felt her chest pillows press into my back through my hoodie.

“Yes Dox. It would seem this form is more aware of surroundings than your original one. Mind if I come along? These boorish nobles have already gotten on my last nerve even though we’ve only been back a few days.”

“Well, it might be a little dangerous.” I said. “I know you’re not pregnant any more, but I’d still rather not risk your-”

“Oh, be quiet!” Bluebelle screamed. “You and I both know that I am more than capable to handle myself if a situation should arise here, especially since Auntie Tia is still here. Plus, you’d be amazed at what I swindled off of Homage.” At that, she reached for an Echo storage that I hadn’t noticed was on her hip since I’d gotten so used to seeing them on Maui, and pulled out an Infinity pistol. THE FUCK?! I hope that didn’t come out of my pay, or worse, Jack’s vault of Legendaries. “He gave me this note, though. Said to give it to you, but hey, I forgot to. Here you go.”

I took the note from Bluebelle and started to read it, only to be mortified by what was on it. It read:

“Dear Dox,

I am letting your very well endowed mate purchase a very valuable gun with your accumulated credits, and let it be known that your current ‘balance’ is very low now, but considering how quickly you acquire them, I’m sure it isn’t an issue. Although, I would avoid making purchases through Jack for a while, because unless you find a new Infinity, he is now lacking a corrosive one from his collection of them, and should be EXTREMELY ticked off. Especially since the corrosive Infinity is considered the most worthwhile.

Here’s hoping you put it to good use, and also find a new one to replace the one that I ‘borrowed’ from The Vault, and soon, in which case if you do, your credits will be fully reimbursed.
Homage”

….. Son of a bitch. Now I can’t call Jack! If I do, he’s gonna mutilate me!

Wait a sec, I can dupe things. Why am I freaking out?

“Blue, hand me your gun.” I said.

“But it’s my shiny!” Bluebelle whined.

“And I’ll give you a new one, just give me that for a second.” I demanded.

“Fine.” Blue sighed and reluctantly handed over the gun.

“Thank you.” I said. “DM! Can I have some help, please?”

What do you want? Quest I gave you not hard enough? Want to change it to a fetch quest?

“Oh hell no!” I yelled. “I’m doing a ‘side quest’ right now. I just need to duplicate this gun. Can you help me out with-”

You have a book that has pretty much every spell known to this universe, which is a lot. Just look up the spell.

“Oh yeah.” I said. “Thanks.” I pulled out the D&D tome and searched through it. I found the duplication spell near the back of the book, believe it or not. It was a pretty advanced spell. At least, it seemed like it. Extreme focus and items of great power were needed. I had both, kinda. I mean, I had the dice, or the Dice Roller Core, so that was half of it. The focus…. Well, with Blue in the area and Lulu pressing her breasts into my back….. not so much. Might as well give it a shot, though.

But then there was a simple and ludicrously easy method that just seemed nonsense. According to the book, I just needed some scrolls of the exact same spell, attune to them, and instantly drop whatever I wished to duplicate, and said number of scrolls would be how many of said items were dropped upon landing on the ground. There was some kind of warning to it, though. Something about if done wrong that it would duplicate a corrupted version of the item forever until the original item was destroyed. Well, not doing that. Don’t want to risk destroying one of Jack’s items. Or screwing myself over with a ton of corrupted ones. Hard way it is.

Alright, let’s get started. I tapped the Dice Roller Core, and a bunch of holographic die appeared just above the Core. I started to focus on them, then on the Infinity. The die floated from their position and then to orbit the Infinity in my hand. I let go of the gun, and it started floating in front of me. Alright, so far so good. Now, the instructions said to focus on making it from one into two. One into two…. Alright, focus. I got this.

The dice started orbit the gun at a faster speed, and kept speeding up. Eventually, they were nothing but blurs. At some point, they started glowing brightly. From there on, the faster they orbited the gun, the brighter they got. It was all going very smoothly. Eventually, I was barely able to look at the gun and orbiting dice. The dice stopped speeding up, and only got brighter and brighter. According to the book, this was the end zone. Now was the time when it should duplicate. Hell, it probably would have worked perfectly…. If not for Bluebelle grabbing my attention.

“Dox! I like the light show and all, but I want my shiny!” Bluebelle complained. “If you give me my shiny back, you’ll get some well deserved attention~!” She puffed out her chest and otherwise accented the rest of her features, fully diverting my attention.

That’s when the spell ‘failed’. There was a flash of light and a small explosion that threw me and Bluebelle back. I was the first to get up after everything settled. What I saw surprised me a bit. The original gun was fine, it just sat there like nothing had happened, glowing a faint green like it normally did. That wasn’t what surprised me, though. No, what DID surprise me was that there was another infinity next to it, but with slightly different attachments and such. This one had a stock, augmented iron sights instead of a scope, and a laser pointer attachment. It also glowed a faint orange, instead of green. Looking at the stats of it on my echo, I found something even more surprising. It wasn’t corrosive like it’s original. No, this one, for some reason, was explosive. It was like a glitch in the programming. Hell, it even looked like one of the glitch weapons from Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel. Had the pattern and everything. And oh shit, there’s the glitch stats: O2L4M3A5. Nice. Thank you Echo UI for being so informative.

“Um, Blue, here have the shiny back. I’ll take the one that’s not fully in the physical realm.” I said, picking up the guns and handing the corrosive Infinity back to Blue. Great, now the only question on my mind was: Do I give this to Jack, or do I keep it for myself? I mean, seriously, with my luck, I’d probably find another corrosive Infinity somewhere else, and what was that flash of light? “Blue?”

“I HAVE TWO SHINIES!” Blue screamed happily.

You’re welcome. Can’t believe you screwed it up so badly. Turned out well, though.

“Yeah, you’re telling me.” I said. “Blue, give me the original Infinity. I have to give it back to Jack before he kills me.”

“But it’s my shiny!” Bluebelle whined. “Come on, Dox. You don’t want to do that to me, do you~?”

GAH! MY ONE WEAKNESS! I quickly shifted back to my original base form, and Bluebelle sighed with contempt.

“Fine. But you owe it back to me.” Bluebelle said.

“Fine. Let me just return this, we’ll do the quest, THEN I’ll pay you back. Okay?” I said.

“That works.” Bluebelle said.

“Well, that is certainly a neat trick.” Oh, right, Lulu was here too. I turned to her, and froze with my jaw dropped, getting a smirk out of her. “Oh? Dox, you look like you’ve never even seen me before.”

“Why are you shiny?” Was my intelligent response. My reason for my fluster? Tia used the zebra tanning lotion and accidentally turned herself permanently golden. However, in just a few days, it seemed Lulu had the same idea, only her fur was now a gleaming silver. The way she just glowed yet had her dark ether backdrop of her mane and tail made her look like her very heavenly embodiment made flesh. She was the moon, and she couldn’t have been more radiant and beautiful. Whatever that cheesy movie was, with the line about lassoing the moon and pulling it down for someone, well; she just did for me.

“Whoa~! Dox!” Luna cooed as I had changed into my King form again, grabbed her and Blue’s hands, and started marching hastily towards the nearest empty rooms.

Author's Notes:

Hey guys! It's been a while. Been working on stuff.
You may have seen a new story of mine on the featured page at some point. Ya know, DEMOCRACY OR DIE, The Displacement of Prime!
Well, anyways, I got that up, then needed help with it, so I enlisted GameJunkie to help.
Speaking of GameJunkie, he helped a bit with this chapter, so a big thanks to him.

Anyways, this is Music Mod, signing off. Have a good night!