Chapter 988 – Fishing with the potential father-in-law

Chapter 988 – Fishing with the potential father-in-law

John only possessed a fishing rod to have something to store in one of the many side-rooms of his Palace. After throwing it into his inventory, he and the girls soon made their way up. Scarlett wasn’t amused about her usage time being cut short, but she accepted it given the situation at large. They all met with Magoi, Mabirl and Lee on top of the Palace’s fort foundation, at the agreed time.

The initial meeting was cordial and cold at the same time. Lee kept her distance, likely due to the overbearing presence of her mother, standing between her and John with her arms crossed, while Magoi had a soft smile on his face and a patient glint in his eye. The unusual thing about all of this was that neither of the two Magus parents wore their mask.

The meeting was torture, because absolutely nothing unusual happened. Magoi simply opened up the barrier, created the houses and the gates of light that let John create his Instant Dungeon attached to the Intermediary Barrier, and then told him to get a good night’s rest. Mabirl stomped off wordlessly, Lee gave him a little wave, and Magoi just walked away, tapping his cane.

On his own, John would have failed to sleep that night. Surrounded by his loves, however, the Gamer’s mind was at ease. Whatever happened with this, he would still have all of them. There was great solace in that fact, found in the arms that embraced him as he slumbered.

The next morning, after breakfast, there was a knock on his door.

Dressed and already awaiting something like this, John opened the door for the three waiting outside. “Good morning, John,” Magoi greeted, carrying a fishing rod in his left and a crate of beer together with his wife. Mabirl, for her part, seemed less disgruntled today than she had the day before. Lee, however, seemed annoyed at something. Perhaps at all of this taking so long. “Care to join me on a fishing trip?”

“I mean, sure?” John knew that this was where things were going, but was no less confused about why this was the route being taken. Going with the flow, he offered, “Want me to take that?” He was referring to the crate.

“If you would be so kind.” Magoi let out a relieved sound when the physically superior, younger man took the beer from him.

“Thank you.” Mabirl sounded a bit choppy when she said that, but it was honest gratitude.

“Can we hurry this along already?” Lee wanted to know.

“You be quiet, young lady!” her mother snapped back immediately. “We’ll take this at the proper pace.”

“Proper, sure,” Lee rolled her eyes. “Whatever pace you find proper.”

Clicking her tongue, Mabirl tilted her upper body to look past John and into the room. “Would it affront the other ladies if we were to come inside for a cup of tea?”

“Nah, is all good,” Rave shouted back. “Right, Aclysia?”

“I would be delighted to serve the finest tea I can offer,” the weaponized maid confirmed.

John stepped out of the house, letting the two women join his harem for their talks. “Good luck,” he couldn’t help but say to Lee.

“You’ll have the easier job,” she whined and glanced over to Magoi. “I like him in one piece, Dad.”

“I’ll leave him in one, then,” Magoi responded.

John could have pointed out that there was no way for the High Fateweaver to harm him anyway. It wasn’t good manners, however, to put down a father before their daughter, especially not a friend. He swallowed his cheeky pride. The door to his house closed behind Lee. He turned to Magoi.

“Let’s go fishing then,” the High Fateweaver said and nodded towards one of the many gates of light.

“I never knew my father,” the High Fateweaver continued. “Even if I had, he would have likely died young, like my mother, long before he could have ever seen his grandchildren. Partly owed to how late in life I had them. After Magnus, I knew I wanted another kid fairly quickly. After Stefanie, we continued to try for a third. We weren’t blessed with Lee for a dozen years. Now we’re both too old to hope for a fourth one.”

Magoi reached for his beer and raised it in John’s direction. The two clinked their bottles, likely sending every fish that was getting interested in their bait swimming away at the unknown noise. They drank. Sat there. John waited for the High Fateweaver to continue.

“My little Lee,” Magoi sighed. “She was always an odd one. She always loved her computer more than people and I was afraid that she would grow up to be a complete loner. The problem was that she was never bratty. She never demanded anything or even asked for much. It would have been easier for me to raise her if she had been flawed, I must say. The only way I could have forced her away from her electronic wonder-box would have been to be a tyrant. I love my children too much to be a tyrant. Magnus was odd himself, starting as a horribly loud kid but eventually turning around to be the disciplined man you know today. Stef... well, she liked her freedoms a bit too much. Because she overstepped boundaries so often, I had ample justification to punish her. Lee, Lee just sat around alone. When Mabirl tried to shove her out the door, we would find her sitting on a park bank, reading something or playing on her mobile console.”

“I’ve honestly been pretty similar,” John dared to chime into the monologue.

“I can imagine, Gamer,” Magoi chuckled back, exchanging his empty beer for a new one. “What I’m trying to tell you is that I care a lot about my children. They are my world. I am invested in Fusion not out of an obligation for you or for my own welfare, but to give them a space to flourish in. To make sure that my grandkids have a stable foundation from which to start their life from. Do you understand that?”

John nodded. Him not having children yet was due to similar reasons. While he was still conquering and expanding his realm, that foundation didn’t strike him as firm enough to start a family on. Especially since, once he had the first kid, he expected at least a small cascade to follow. It wouldn’t stay the one and it wouldn’t take long, between over a dozen women, for the second one.

“My objections to your lifestyle, when it comes to how many women you love, they come from two places. One is the logical one. A society cannot function if polygamy is the norm.”

“Frustrated young men burn down a society that doesn’t serve them,” John nodded, “I know. It’s hypocritical of me, but I’m going to continue advertising monogamy for the masses. It’s going to help them, ultimately. I don’t think that the average man can handle more than one woman.”

“Most of us don’t deserve more than one,” Magoi put it another way. “To grant you that much, limited polygyny can work and I don’t think your harem is a soulless breeding institution.” He opened his new beer. “My second reason to object to your lifestyle is emotional. My father had many women, so my mother told me, and I never got to know him. I don’t want my son to turn into an absent father or my daughters into abandoned mothers. Least of all, I want to leave another child born into this world with the uncertainty that comes with never knowing one’s own parents. Without any help or wise words from imperfect men.”

Magoi turned the beer in his hand. “Do you trust me to be there for her?” John asked.

“Otherwise, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” the High Fateweaver said. “Lee would already be sitting in a plane back to the Himalayas and I would be in a hurry to set up a marriage for her. I know a few people who have raised good lads. Maybe it wouldn’t be love, but at least she wouldn’t die alone, with a son too unruly to appreciate what she has done for him.”

The Gamer had nothing to retort to that. It would be a horrible situation and Lee would probably despise her father for it for years to come, but he fully understood where he came from. Leaving her in the Hudson Barrier, around John, would inevitably lead to an outcome he wouldn’t approve of, in the scenario they were currently contemplating.

“My wife shows it more openly, but she actually feels less intensely about this than I do,” Magoi confessed. “They’re probably having a splendid time over there. Mabirl wants to know who she is leaving our little girl with... Meanwhile, I am tormented. I like you, John. I like you a lot and I think you’re a decent person. The boyfriend of my daughter, though? I have a difficult time digesting that.”

“I understand,” was all John could say.

Magoi took a slow breath. In and then out. “It’s not like I’m so naïve I didn’t think this could happen,” he mumbled. “That she showed interest in you from the word go was surprising though. I guessed you would be unable to keep it to yourself all the time. A couple charming words at a party or perhaps connecting over your videogames, that’s how I thought this would go. Warhammer, maybe, since that’s about the only hobby of her old man that she was ever interested in. Instead, she went right to you.” He kicked a pebble into the water. “As her father, I have every right to stop her.”

“...Do you?” John couldn’t help but ask.

Magoi gave him an amused and berating stare. “You will understand, whenever you have children, that they’re incredibly stupid and that they stay stupid until they’re in their thirties. Young people don’t make good decisions. Which is fine, mistakes are how you learn. The greatest challenge of being a parent is to let those you love the most stumble, fall and to only help them up when they need you to.” He sighed again. “Which is why, after all, I will let you two try. I trust you enough to not leave her on her own, if you do work out. You will love her, because my little girl is a lovable one. Even if she is a bit of a tomboy.” Sipping from his beer, he gave the Gamer a long stare. “If you don’t work out, she will be wiser for it. If you hurt her...”

“I’ll deserve everything that’s coming for me,” John finished for the Fateweaver.

“You will indeed.” Magoi put his beer down. “And you better treat her with some romance!” he declared, reclaiming his joviality. “If I hear you just went straight back home and tainted her right then and there, I will do something bad!”



“I promise to give her only my best,” the Gamer solemnly swore.