(At 12 years and 2 months old)
(3rd person PoV)
Nephelont woke up for the first time in two months since he fell unconscious.
It started small. His fingers twitched for the first time since then. His lips parted for the first time since then. His body finally triumphed and showed signs of his Ancient Dragon form for the first time since then, settling for the human form a moment after. His eyelids finally fluttered open, his golden eye returning.
He was greeted by his entire family either slumped on a wall across the room or slumped over the edges of his bed... their bed, Eucleia still somehow managed to sleep in the same bed as him.
Nephelont tried to get up, suffering from fatigue. Powering through it, he succeeded. The rustling and vibration from that woke everyone up.
"Son" Bell entered the room with enough plates for everyone to eat, including Nephelont. There was always some preserved for him in case he woke up. "You woke up" Bell was overwhelmed. He sat the plates aside hurriedly and made his way through the bodies strewn across the floor, picking themselves from it so sluggishly. They did not get any wink of good sleep for the entire two months. That was evident when Nephelont noticed the heavy eyebags under their eyes.
Bell held his son by the shoulders to hug him, at which point Ais had slithered her way between them and through Bell's arms to envelop Nephelont in a tight hug. Bell held back a laugh at Ais's actions as he hugged them both.
Eucleia, who remained silent and hesitant until now, decided to move closer. "I really missed you, Nephelont" She hugged him, the relief nearly making her too relaxed she could have fallen asleep again.
They were joined by the Williams's triplets a few moments later. The others were satisfied by knowing that he woke up and remained a few steps away not to burden him. Albert, Aria, Aeolus, Meteria and Alfia were already there without anyone noticing them going in for the hug.
"Hey! Am I left out?" Lionheart put his hands on his sides briefly before joining what now became a massive group hug, followed by Meteria and Alfia.
When everyone finally pulled away, they were shocked by Nephelont's lack of reaction. Loki, standing to the side, was reminded of a younger Ais, when she suffered from a difficulty in expressing her emotions.
'I hope that's not the case. This bright child shouldn't suffer like that' Loki frowned.
"Riveria" Loki's complete lack of pretense in her tone of voice made Riveria stand at attention. Loki never used this for a single trivial or unimportant thing. "Doesn't he remind you of Ais when we first met her?"
"Unfortunately, he does" Riveria was displeased. Nephelont was a grandson to her, and she never wanted him to lose a part of himself like this.
(Time skip)
As the months went by, everyone returned to their usual schedule, mostly. There were some difficulties when it came to Nephelont, who now changed how he acted entirely on the outside. When asked, he confirmed that he still felt the same way about pretty much everything. His emotions were the same but were hard to express.
During the year, Ais and Bell felt like they could try for another child and were pleased to know they were expecting. Tiona also came open about the relationship she had with Bell, encouraged by Ais. Ais did not want to see her friend wasting away, abstaining from a love she feared pursuing. Ais knew that Tiona feared ruining Ais's marriage, later telling her that she did not mind sharing Bell with her if he himself agreed.
(AN: Mind you, Orario's people don't have much against polygamy, as far as I know. They have a different culture concerning marriage compared to us)
They sat Bell down and talked to him about it. Bell initially felt hesitant about having a relationship with a woman besides Ais but eventually allowed himself to do it seeing as Ais herself suggested it. Tiona confessed her love to Bell before Ais and he were in a relationship, and that made Bell give this a chance. He told them that they should keep it a secret until they were sure so that it does not affect Nephelont. Shortly after making sure that they were going to marry, they told the rest of their familias. Soon after, Tiona was also expecting a child. Ais, having seen a sister in her friend for a long while now, was immensely happy and congratulated her on her pregnancy. Ais's second child was a boy named Ludwig while Tiona's daughter was named Rhea.
At some point during the year, Nephelont felt that Henryk's children were growing faster than normal people and that they were also stronger than adventurers of the same level. Henryk then told him that when his children were born, he sacrificed something very important to him to make them capable of breaking any and all limits until EX1999, for all levels at that, and getting stronger at many times the rate as normal people.
(At 14 and 6 moths old)
Hephaestus was sitting across from A blushing, squirming Eucleia and a nonchalant Nephelont, at least outwardly. Internally, a mini-Nephelont was discovering new ways to panic.
"Mom!" Eucleia called her mother, almost shouting. "We are the closest of friends! But not like that!" Eucleia stormed out while dragging Nephelont by the hand, who by turn was gliding through the air behind her with an almost blank expression. If one looked closely, they would notice a freaked-out expression hidden under Nephelont's face.
"See?" Welf said. "I told you they will both be too flustered to hold the conversation" He was amused by the sight of his daughter yanking Nephelont out of the room.
"And here I was hoping my daughter would have him as her husband" Hephaestus was cupping her cheeks with her hands, wistfully thinking of the possibility of her daughter having a husband who cares for her as much as himself, one who makes her happy. Nephelont was the perfect candidate, but it seemed like both were not thinking of each other in that way at all.
"If they weren't raised together, they may not have been this close, but that defeats the purpose since Nephelont wouldn't have cared as much as he does now" Welf said as he sat beside her. "We should talk to them about it as many times as it takes. They are almost adults now" Welf's expression hardened. "If they don't marry each other, they would need to separate their sleeping quarters soon"
(A month later)
"Hah! Caught ya!" Welf said as he hoisted Eucleia up into the air to prevent her from escaping. He was cheating. He laid in wait and ambushed her when she least expected it.
For the last month, Eucleia and Nephelont were avoiding Welf, Hephaestus and Bell. Nephelont could not bring himself to avoid Ais, making her decide to just fawn over him until one of the other three showed up, prompting the little dragon bunnies to make an escape.
That ends today, or so Welf thought. Eucleia grew to be monstrously stronger than Bell at the same age; he was a mere high level 4 then. That freakish level of strength allowed her to break free and escape.
'Having to raise a level 8 daughter is taxing' Welf thought. Even while thinking that, he would never trade her for anything in the world.
Eucleia and Nephelont ranked-up to level 8 by one-shotting Udaeus on two separate occasions. Eucleia had to push herself a little, assisted by her skill, but she caught up to Nephelont and surpassed him again.
Well, it was not long before Bell came back with both children held under his arms like sacks of potatoes. Eucleia had a very upset and teary expression, one very well complemented with a pout, when Bell overpowered her. No one told her that Bell was strong enough to overpower a level 8 who broke her limits on every level.
"We need to face this subject sooner or later, kids" Bell said, feeling scummy inside for forcing the children to face the subject so soon. They still have around 5 more months before coming of age.
While thinking of that, he remembered his feelings for Ais blossoming while he was younger than Nephelont by half a year. It gave him pause. 'Is he being held back by the stunting of his emotional expressions?' Bell did not like that.
"Dad, put us down" Nephelont said while pulling Bell's sleeve gently. Bell's heart faltered. It was Ais's beautiful face in all its stoic splendor asking him to put them down, sparkles surrounding Nephelont's face as he said it. Bell shook his head. 'This isn't Ais, this is Nephelont' He looked away from his son's striking resemblance to his wife.
Nephelont managed to dematerialize, successfully escaping from his father and completely avoiding the argument for some time. Eucleia, who did not accustom herself to the ability to dematerialize, barely managed to do it and followed Nephelont out of the manor.
"We raised little escapees, it seems, brother" Bell said, looking in the direction of the pair's escape route. Welf was standing beside him, arms crossed, smiling softly.
"If they didn't want marriage and wanted to stay together at the same time, we cannot stop them, little brother" Welf said.
(At 14 years and 10 months old)
"We talked about it" Nephelont said stoically. "While we won't marry each other, we wish to continue as we are"
Eucleia was leaning on him, her head on his shoulder. She was wrapping her arms around his as well.
'They are the perfect image of a young couple, yet they see each other as nothing but siblings' Hephaestus thought wistfully. 'Nevertheless, this is what they wish for between them. It's high time I gave up my dream of having a reliable son-in-law like him. Being her brother figure is good enough' She smiled at them.
"Do as you wish, our children" As she stood up, she patted their heads with a fond smile before stepping out of the room. "Welf, come with me. I have a new idea" Welf shuddered.
While Welf was happy in his marriage with the goddess, there existed moments when he was dragged into the forge with her for very extended periods of time. It was not the cover for something, either. She genuinely gets ideas that take her long to make sometimes.
"I'll see you later, kids" Welf went along. No matter what, Hephaestus's ideas were always interesting to witness. As a blacksmith, he could not bring himself to miss them.
(End of Chapter. After this point is the status updates that could not be brought up in the chapter, and could not be put into the author notes because they were too long for it)
Name: Nephelont Cranel
Familia: Hestia Familia
Level: 8
STR: SSS1684
END: SSS1601
DEX: SSS1627
AGI: EX1782
MAG: SSS1683
Hunter E
Eidolon E
Abnormal Resistance D (AN: Two words: Syr's Cooking. To elaborate, the cooking skills of Freya, who was once Syr when disguised, levelled up in a way, making her dishes more poisonous. Only if she was an adventurer instead of a goddess, she would have more than likely developed the Mixing development ability instead of Cooking. Her cooking is horrid; so beyond redemption that the falna would have made it worse by default)
Mage E
Spearman F
Swordsman F (Yes, he willingly goes through rigorous training nearly daily to reach this level of skill in his development abilities)
Spirit Healing Based on Level
Healing Power Based on Level
Magic:
Dragon Heart Magic
Ariel
Skills:
Drakókardi
Drakónteia Thysía
Evlogía tou Aiólos
(They finally saw the full description of the first skill, {Drakókardi}, but the second skill is still corrupted text all over)
(Line Break)
Name: Ais Waldstein
(Skip most of the status, including all but one skill)
Mother Power:
Grants offspring the development abilities of Spirit Healing and Healing Power, with a rank dependent on the child's level. (Ais only gained this recently, after wishing for Nephelont's quick recovery for so long)
(Line Break)
Name: Eucleia Crozzo
Familia: Hestia Familia
Level: 8
STR: EX1999
END: EX1999
DEX: EX1999
AGI: EX1999
MAG: EX1999
Slinger E
Abnormal Resistance G
Sniper F (This is not due to guns, but rather due to sling needing ever growing accuracy as the distance between the slinger and their target increases)
Mage G
Healing Power H
Blacksmith (Rankless) (She picked this up for fun, turned out she had a knack for blacksmithing. Who could have guessed)
Magic:
Sklírynsi Flóges
Skills:
Crozzo Blood
Arete Agon
Euplokia
Cheir Hephaistou (Greek for hand of Hephaestus):
A divine inheritance granted to the child of the Forge God.
A blessing of supreme craftsmanship.
Grants instinctive mastery over metalwork and forging techniques.
Greatly enhances precision, heat control, and shaping ability when working with metal.
The user may perform smithing feats beyond mortal capability, guided by the memory of divine hands.