Chapter 114 - Emerging A.d.u.l.thood

[ Cooldown until 'Isaac's Past - Episode 6' can be experienced has finished.

You can now experience 'Isaac's Past - Episode 6'. ]

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When Ais returned to observing Isaac's past, the circ.u.mstances that she was confronted with didn't differ at all from the ones that he had been in when the last episode had ended. After all, not even a second had passed in between back then and the beginning of this memory. It would have been rather strange if any huge changes had already taken place.

For more than a year, past Isaac's life proceeded exceedingly uneventfully. Each day, the majority of his time was spent on perfecting the method with which he aimed to transcend existence itself. While he didn't make much progress, Ais could at least recognize that he slowly but surely took steady steps forward. Attachments which he had held for some of the more inconsequential parts of his reality were cut off one by one. Sometimes, it took him months to get rid of a single one, other times, he managed to eliminate more than one in a single week - it heavily fluctuated. Yet even after a year, his ultimate goal was still impossibly far away.

The other activity that took up a significant amount of time was reading inordinate amounts of stories and newly published papers - pretty much every single time something new was posted, he was one of the first people to lay his eyes upon it. His mind-boggling reading speed enabled him to devour treasure troves of knowledge at a speed unlike anything humans had ever seen before.

During this year, Ais patiently anticipated the day when the story that featured someone quite like her, the one that had made him take an interest in her, would appear. And finally, a little less than two months after past Isaac had turned 19 years old, all of her waiting was rewarded.

It was the 15th of January and he held a new novel in his hands. Even in this day and age, he still occasionally bought the physical releases of some books. As they usually cost a little bit more than the digital ones, he was able to support authors a slightly better this way, so he primarily bought the physical copies of works that had been penned by new authors, ones that didn't have a huge following yet. The extra income would enable them to more quickly and stably focus on continuing to write their stories, which was preferable. More reading material was always welcome. Of course, for those that excelled in their field, he frequently sent them sizable donations, to enable them to focus on writing full-time. There were far too many people that only silently consumed the works of others, without ever thinking about the welfare of those that supplied them with their enjoyment, so countless authors would never get a fair shot at doing what they excelled at and loved.

At first, the story that he was reading didn't stick out in any way, and past Isaac wasn't too intrigued by it. While it wasn't a bad one, or even a sloppily written one, as a person who had consumed humanity's entire available acc.u.mulation of stories and knowledge up to this point in time, it really just didn't qualify to stand out. But still, he read the whole first volume. Even if it had been garbage, he would have still finished it.

Compared to him, Ais was the one who felt way more passionately about this work: DanMachi, the story that an 'Ais Wallenstein' was a part of. From the descriptions of the character, and the drawings included within the light novel, she quickly determined that this character really was extremely similar to her. She also noticed that the story took place a little later in time - about one year after Isaac had arrived in the world that she came from, if she had to guess.

What somewhat annoyed her a little was that past Isaac wasn't too partial to the fictional Ais in the book, and only had a few passing thoughts along the lines of 'Oh, she's cute.' and 'Her personality is a bit interesting, I wonder what caused her to develop into such a person.'. It wasn't like she couldn't understand why this was all that he felt, but in a corner of her heart, she had hoped for more - like a 'love at first sight' kind of scenario.

If there was one other thing that left her puzzled, it was the fictional Ais' interest in the main character of the story, Bell Cranel. She wasn't a fool and quickly realized that there had to be something special about him, but she simply couldn't figure it out - there was too little information, mainly because the author chose to not disclose it to the readers at this point. As she had never met anyone like this white rabbit in her actual life, she had no clue what about him could have fascinated her fictional self so much.

During the year that followed, a total of four volumes of the story were released, all of which past Isaac dutifully read on the day of their publication. All this while, he didn't develop any special feelings for the fictional Ais whatsoever, only considering her a 'mildly intriguing character', just like countless others. That was until the 15th of January, exactly one year after the first volume had been released. On that day, the first volume of a spin off series of DanMachi, Sword Oratoria, was made available to the public. It focused mainly on the fictional Ais and the Loki Familia that she was a part of, and finally gave the readers deeper insights into these mostly mysterious characters.

Past Isaac's interest in the fictional Ais was finally piqued, because he could vaguely guess at her backstory even from the very small amount of information that he had available at the time. All of this only intensified when the next few volumes were released. More and more realizations flashed past his mind, nearly fully laying the story of the fictional Ais' life bare to him. Admittedly, most of this was purely conjecture, but it wasn't actually hard to piece together the bread crumbs that the author had left.

When past Isaac deduced that the fictional Ais had been subjected to nearly a millennium of absolute solitude, his tranquil heart beat a little faster for the first time in a long while. Partially, this was because of empathy, and partially, it was because he felt like this fictional girl would probably understand his plight to a certain degree. At the same time, he was aware that he could only form this imaginary bond with her… because she 'didn't exist'. This didn't discourage him, however, as he had long since accepted that he would only be capable of feeling close to people like that. It would seem utterly pathetic to the rest of his species, but that really didn't matter to him.

For the first time in his life, past Isaac decided to use a certain term that he had picked up on the internet to describe someone - 'waifu'. The fictional Ais Wallenstein had qualified for it.

This moniker had nearly as many definitions as there were people, and it was used even in completely contradictory ways by some. Isaac's definition of the term fell in line with a sizable group of others - 'the ideal wife'. It described a fictional character that one was convinced would be the ideal wife for oneself - but of course, only in one's imagination and dreams, as fictional characters 'didn't exist'.

The observing Ais felt flattered and embarrassed when she experienced all of past Isaac's detailed thoughts on the matter. Many emotions that he had never showcased before now occasionally appeared in between his usual thoughts. She almost felt a little guilty for getting to look at all of them, and some of the more indecent ones left her transparent self blushing deeply. Still, she didn't avert her eyes, no matter what she saw.

In any case, she also finally realized something else - exactly why her fictional self had gotten interested in the white rabbit. It was a conclusion that wasn't hard to come to, as it was obvious. Even without relying on past Isaac's observations, she had made the same deductions as he did. Bell Cranel… was a little bit similar to her father. Admittedly, the resemblance wasn't too deep, but her fictional self had been reminded of the man that some called 'the greatest hero'. It wasn't because of the boy's qualities or personality, or even his looks - they were all quite different from her father's. Rather, it was just a feeling that he gave off.

'Could it be that he really is the reincarnation of my/her father?'

This was the conclusion that both she and past Isaac had come to. Of course, neither of them could be certain, but the observing Ais at least was tempted to find out more. As for the topic of reincarnation, it was heavily hinted at countless times during even these early stages of the story of DanMachi - one had to be blind and deaf to miss it. The author had sprinkled so many bread crumbs everywhere that the only thing that they hadn't done yet was to literally spell everything out in a clear and concise manner. With just a tiny bit of independent thought, any reader would notice the clues.

A little after the sixth volume of the main series of DanMachi had been released, the fourth volume of the Sword Oratoria spin off was scheduled to be published. But at that point, something unexpected happened. A week before the day in question, the publisher of the series announced shocking news to the dedicated readership.

"We regret to inform you that the release of the fourth volume of 'Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? On the Side: Sword Oratoria', which was supposed to get released on the 15th of December, will be cancelled. Due to private circ.u.mstances regarding the author, both the main series, 'Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?', as well as the spin off series, Sword Oratoria, cannot see another release from this point forward."

The announcement continued after that, but it was mainly just full of apologies to the faithful readers and fans of the series - no other important information got conveyed.

Past Isaac was taken aback by this piece of news, as at this point, he had become invested in the fate of the fictional character, Ais Wallenstein, so he spent a negligible amount of effort to look into the situation - something which he would have otherwise never bothered with.

It didn't take him long to find out what had really happened, and what he now knew left him in anything but a great mood.

The author of DanMachi had died prematurely. One day, during a shopping trip to a nearby convenience store, they had been unlucky and gotten involved in a robbery. One of the other customers in the store was feeling brave and attempted to disarm the robber, but during the scuffle, the gun was fired… and the author who had patiently been observing the situation from afar, unsure of what to do or how to leave the store, had gotten shot and killed. They had died of the spot, and by the time that the situation was resolved, there really was absolutely no way whatsoever to help them. Reviving the dead wasn't something that could be done in this world, after all.

Due to this freak accident, the story that past Isaac and the observing Ais had been looking forward to reading for years to come was left without an ending. Heck, it hadn't even really started yet!

With a displeased snort, past Isaac took a few seconds out of his day to arrange the death of the robber of the convenience store, who had been successfully apprehended by the police back then. It truly didn't require any relevant amount of effort at all. He didn't even need to think about it, and felt fully justified - for the crime of depriving him from this story that he had taken a fancy to, death was a suitable punishment. Considering that he had even planned to eradicate humanity before, ending the life of a sole human being didn't amount to anything in his eyes, even more so now that he was in the process of cutting off all of his emotional attachments to this world.

It didn't take him long to accept what had happened. In his heart, he enshrined this first 'waifu' of his, even though her story was never going to be completed. He was grateful for having had the opportunity to experience even this beginning part of her journey, and didn't spend any more time on mourning what would never come to pass. It wasn't difficult for him to make some assumptions based on what he already knew, and a considerable time ago, the fictional Ais had already grown into an existence that was special to him in his heart.

Once again, past Isaac's life returned to its previous monotony, although it wasn't as dreary anymore now that the fictional Ais occasionally distracted his thoughts.

Nearly half a year after his 21st birthday, something else of note finally occurred. A mobile game by the name of 'Fate/Grand Order' was launched. As it also had a story, he of course began to play it to experience it. The observing Ais wasn't aware of the significance of this event yet, but as always, she paid close attention to all details of his life. Because of that, him adding this game to his routine wasn't missed by her.

The game itself wasn't anything special, and its story was barely better than mediocre, especially during the beginning stages. It was a part of a bigger franchise, which - as a whole - actually managed to stand out slightly from the vast ocean of stories, so past Isaac was hopeful that the game would improve over time.

His hopes weren't misplaced, and over the next one and a half years, the quality of the story consistently improved. It never reached any kind of greatness, but it at least was now far better than average. Still, when compared to the many other stories that he had read, it didn't manage to truly stick out yet.

That all changed on the 7th of December, relatively shortly after he had turned 23 years old. The seventh Singularity, Babylonia, was released. At first, it didn't seem all too impressive, but it was still better than all those chapters that had come before it, yet again improving the quality of the story. During the course of this Singularity, a character named 'Ereshkigal', based on the Mesopotamian goddess of Kur - the underworld - appeared for the first time and played a significant role in the story.

Most people who played the game grew to appreciate her, although the majority of them were solely attracted to her due to her having her personality meshed with one of the oldest characters of the franchise that Fate/Grand Order was set in, Rin Tohsaka. She was popular all around the world, and now that her personality and being had been combined with the queen of Kur, it created a new facet of her character that countless people grew fond of. In the story, Ereshkigal even fell in love with the main characters, the player! While she wasn't the first to do so in the game, it was still a rare occurrence.

Contrary to nearly everyone else, what attracted Isaac's attention wasn't the adorableness of the fictional Ereshkigal, nor her feelings for the player character. No, yet again, he was captivated by her backstory.

Right after she had been born, the goddess had been cast into the underworld, never to see the light of day or walk amongst the people. While she did occasionally get some temporary company down there, she still spent at least tens of thousands of years in solitude, yearning for the surface. It wasn't like she was entirely unable to leave, but she was so devoted to her duty and determined to do her job well, to try her hardest, that she almost never acted irresponsibly, contrary to nearly every single other deity that was a part of Mesopotamian mythology.

She sacrificed her own dreams, her own aspirations, and so much of her time, to do her best and to care for the departed. At her core, she was a devoted and caring being, who wanted to provide those that had died with a safe, secure and comfortable shelter. Still, the price that she paid for it was unfathomable for most. She had been locked away like a bird in a cage for all of her life. Never, not even once, did she have the opportunity to follow her dreams, to do what she truly wanted. Her duties were what shackled her.

During the events of the game, the hybrid of the goddess Ereshkigal and the girl Rin Tohsaka finally managed to make her first human friend, the player character, and maybe because of the countless years of solitude and longing weighing down upon her, because the player character was a simple but good person, her feelings spiralled way past simple affection in no time.

As the spectating Ais had experienced all of past Isaac's feelings, she quickly realized where this was going and heaved a resigned but amused sigh. It was just like what had happened back when her fictional self had appeared. Due to the backstory of this fictional Ereshkigal, past Isaac happened to empathize with her and slowly but surely made a sport for her in the tranquil lake that was his heart. The second 'waifu' was born.

Both the fictional Ais and the fictional Ereshkigal were quite different in personality, but they shared a most important similarity - the loneliness that they had experienced. Well, their hair colour was also nearly identical, as both of them sported shades of long and golden hair. This wasn't actually a factor that had influenced the past Isaac, however, but he certainly grew to appreciate it. In this case, the question of whether the chicken or the egg came first could be conclusively answered. He developed a liking for blonde hair due to the two of them.

Why had only these two managed to worm their way into his heart? There were many other characters that had experienced similar amounts of loneliness, or that had suffered through far worse circ.u.mstances - admittedly, though, the latter group was extremely small in size. Still, why hadn't they managed to sway his feelings? To be honest… there was no specific reason.

Sometimes, people felt attracted to others for no discernible reason. Some described what had convinced them as a 'special something', while others insisted that it was just based upon the compatibility of the hormones of the two people in question. The truth, as almost always, was found somewhere in the middle, or rather, on both sides. There were cases where people simply weren't aware of factors that had caused them to become attracted to others, which mistakenly made them assume that it had to be due to a 'special something'. But on the flip side, some people truly had no reasons to become attached to specific others, and just did. It was often argued that this was surely because of some scientific phenomena that hadn't been discovered or explained yet, but what if that wasn't the case in a miniscule amount of cases? It certainly wasn't impossible.

Now that past Isaac's thoughts were occasionally interrupted by ones that were about a fictional character that wasn't similar to herself, Ais grew even more embarrassed upon bearing witness to them all. She really wasn't spared any details, as Isaac hadn't tried to cover up any part of his past, no matter how shameful or humiliating it would be to let others witness it. Yes, this naturally included 'private moments' that no self-respecting person would ever want others to witness, full of momentary thoughts way too raunchy to openly vocalize.

Only about a year later, when past Isaac had turned 24 years old, did another significant change occur. With a small smile, he opened his eyes and absentmindedly stared at his ceiling for a few moments. It seemed like he was amused by himself.

He had yet again realized something important and had come to a decision - getting distracted by these affections wasn't beneficial to his goal. Yes, this wasn't exactly something difficult to understand, but even if one did, it was excruciatingly difficult to truly leave these things behind. One could swear the most solemn oaths to oneself and claim to forsake any kind of romantic thoughts, but to actually do so was nearly impossible for most. At least subconsciously, a part of these kinds of thoughts would still remain.

Past Isaac was aware of this, and he knew that just because he wanted to follow the path that he had chosen, because of the two diversions that he had run into, it would become a little bit harder than he had expected. If he had been a regular human being, he would have gotten angry at himself, or at least wanted to chide himself for slipping up, but he chose to keep entirely tranquil. The occasional ripples that disturbed his heart became increasingly less frequent over time, and the observing Ais never again was 'forced' to bear witness to any shameful acts. Which, admittedly, was the opposite of what she wanted, which caused her to become quite ashamed of her own vulgar thoughts.

She had seen countless acts of s.e.x.u.a.l nature or knowledge related to it while she was in Isaac's memories - but none of them had been related to himself. He had only come across the knowledge and studied it, just like he did with everything else. She had been somewhat bashful the first few times that these things had happened, but as even the - at the time - very, very young Isaac hadn't been impacted by it, it had been easier for Ais to stay rational herself. But when her fictional self and the fictional Ereshkigal had entered the scene, for the first time, even past Isaac's thoughts had veered from the entirely scientific approach. She couldn't help but fantasize about certain acts herself…

Thankfully, his return to normalcy and to fully devoting himself to his goal allowed her to banish these thoughts to a remote corner of her mind. She wouldn't want to show Isaac an embarrassing side of herself after returning, after all.

Not long after, this part of the memory came to an end.

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Because she had mentally prepared herself in time, it only took her a few moments to shake off most of the aftereffects of returning to her original world and time. For her, about five years had passed, but here, it was as if time had stood still. Even though she had become a goddess, her mentality was still extremely far from that of her senior deities, who had mostly roamed this world for countless years, so she behaved just like a regular mortal would.

As always, the dear feeling of being held in Isaac's arms, as well as his familiar scent, supported her recovery immensely. At the same time, however, she inadvertently recalled some of her dirty thoughts from before, causing her to flinch slightly and hide her red face in her hands quickly, not wanting him to notice. Even though she had wanted to avoid this, she had failed almost immediately…

Hiding was a futile endeavour, and she knew it. The very moment that her cheeks had started to flush, he had already taken note of it and become a bit fl.u.s.tered himself. Thankfully, he was tactful enough to not embarrass her any further and just continued to provide a safe haven for her to slowly but surely gather herself again.

Admittedly, this was far from the first time that Ais had thought about certain intimate acts when with him, and she had even asked him to bathe with her before. Sometimes, she also snuggled her body extremely close to his. Still, as she had never before felt him truly having any of these intentions towards her clearly, it had never felt 'real'. This time, even though such thoughts had only been very occasionally and mildly directed at her fictional self, it was different.

Shyly, she finally raised her head to look into his eyes, only to see a somewhat perturbed but reliable expression.

She had been with him for a very long time now, mostly thanks to experiencing 24 years of his past, so it didn't take her long to understand vaguely what was going through his head. He had some apprehensions regarding the amorous deeds that had occupied her mind. It wasn't like he was disinterested - after all, she knew what pervy and scandalous scenarios he had thought about before - it was just that he felt a little guilty, and simply not ready yet.

But why would he feel guilty? Well, there were multiple reasons. First of all, his past thoughts had been solely about her fictional self, and not her real self - in essence, they were two different people, although they were very similar. Not only had he had these thoughts without her consent - which really wasn't a problem - they had technically been about a 'different woman'. Still, that had been in the past. Aside from that, he had also shown her all of these thoughts and experiences, which made him feel like he was manipulating her somewhat by exposing her to them. That certainly was true, but it had been her own choice to take a look at his past. Lastly, there was the most major of reasons - the fictional Ereshkigal. Now that he had well and truly fallen in love with the Ais that he had come to know ever since arriving in this world, he felt a bit ashamed of his past thoughts not only about the fictional Ais - who could still barely pass as the actual one - but also about the fictional Ereshkigal. Not to mention, even both of them. Yes, all of that had happened in the past, but it was human nature to blame oneself for their past actions and thoughts, and to look negatively upon what one had done years ago. One's younger self was always an embarrassment.

As for why he didn't feel ready yet, that was a way more difficult question to answer, part of which was that he hadn't fully worked through his own emotions at this point. It was his first time to fall in love with someone for real, and while Ais had had many, many years to think about the two of them while experiencing his past, he had only been with her for a month and a week at this point.

Maybe there was more to it than this, but that was all that Ais could gleam from their silent but bashful exchange of gazes - and it was enough to make her understand at least one thing. Isaac needed time more than anything, time to think about them, and to ready his heart completely.

With a glance at the system, she saw that there was only one single episode of Isaac's past remaining - episode seven. She had already resolved herself to show him her own life after that, and although she wasn't certain how she would be able to accomplish this, she was convinced that the system would show her the way. After all, it was called the 'Wish Fulfillment System'. If it couldn't even help with making such a simple desire come true, wouldn't it be a total failure?

Suddenly, a mischievous smile stole itself on her lips, and she approached him for a kiss, like usual. Even though Isaac sensed that something was up, he didn't resist at all, instead becoming intrigued by her uncharacteristic behaviour.

'This much should be fine, right?'

As their lips touched, he twitched a little in surprise when he sensed her lips parting. Soon after, the two were engrossed in their very first deep kiss. The sensations that assaulted them were far more intense than before, and both of them felt their cheeks and bodies heating up rapidly. Only after a minute or so did they finally part, their eyes a little hazy and their breathing heavier than normal.

If Isaac had been like most people, a being principally controlled by its primal urges, then he would have undoubtedly thrown his worries and thoughts aside at this very moment and not been able to hold himself back. Still, he wanted to approach this relationship properly and not rush anything. Better late than never - and now, it was certainly far too early.

Ais was inwardly celebrating her success and relishing in the aftertaste, when she saw an amused grin appear on her beloved's face. Before she could react, he had already pecked her lips once more, then he proceeded to hug her a little more closely.

'How petty.'

She couldn't help but smirk as she was nestled against him. His quick kiss had just been an attempt to have the last laugh, but even though he had won this battle, she considered herself to have won the war. After all, hadn't she advanced their relationship by about half a step?